While denying support for UN We Believe, however, Mr. Augustus C. Long, Chairman of the Board of Texaco (and a member of the Business Advisory Council) gave unqualified endorsement of the Council on Foreign Relations. In a letter dated August 17, 1961, Mr. Long said:
"The Council on Foreign Relations is one of the most effective organizations in this country devoted to spreading information on international problems. The officers and directors of the Council are men of reputation and stature. We believe that the Council through its study groups makes an outstanding contribution to public information concerning foreign policy issues."
One day in the spring of 1961, a New York lawyer received a long distance telephone call. Concerning this call, the _New York Times_ reported:
"'This is President Kennedy,' the telephone voice said.
"'The hell you say,' retorted the lawyer. 'I guess that makes me the Prime Minister of England, but what can I do for you?'
"'Nobody's pulling your leg,' the telephone voice said. 'This is President Kennedy all right. I want to talk to you about coming down here to Washington to help me with this long-term foreign aid legislation.'"
One week later, the New York lawyer took an apartment in Washington and, as a member of President Kennedy's "Task Force" on foreign aid, started writing the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. The lawyer is Theodore Tannenwald, Jr., a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, who wrote many of the foreign aid bills which President Harry Truman presented to Congress and who, during the first Eisenhower term, was assistant director of the Mutual Security Program.
After Mr. Tannenwald and his task force had finished writing the 1961 foreign aid bill, President Kennedy appointed Tannenwald coordinator in charge of "presenting" the bill to committees of the House and Senate. Three cabinet officers and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff took their orders from Mr. Tannenwald, who was, according to the _New York Times_, "the Administration's composer, orchestrator and conductor of the most important legislative symphony of the Congressional session."
"Mr. Tannenwald has been a kind of special White House ambassador to Capitol Hill. While the legislative committees struggled with the controversial proposal to by-pass the appropriating process and give the President authority to borrow $8,800,000,000 (8 billion, 800 million) for development lending in the next five years, he was the man in the ante-room empowered to answer questions in the name of the President."