329. Memorandum of a Conversation Between Vice President Goulart and the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Holland), Blair House, Washington, May 2, 19561
SUBJECT
- Brazilian Affairs: Economic Problem, Communism, Labor
After the luncheon given for Goulart by Mr. George Meany,2 I called upon Goulart at the Blair House. He took me aside and made more or less the following statements. He wants us to feel that from this time forward the most enthusiastic Ambassador that the United States will have in Rio will be himself. He wants us to call on him with complete confidence at any time that he can be helpful on any subject. There will be times when he can be peculiarly helpful because the working classes have an inbred distrust of diplomats and diplomatic channels which distrust he can offset.
He felt that his mission as regards the White House was completed when he delivered the letter from President Kubitschek to President Eisenhower.3 He had deliberately refrained from discussing any economic matters with the President because he felt that it was better for these to be handled by officials in whose normal field of activity those matters fell. He said that he felt that it would be best for him not to discuss the economic aid that Brazil was seeking from the United States because he was not prepared in that field.
I told him that undoubtedly the White House would refer the letter to the proper Government officials including the Department of State; that I understood that Mr. Piniera of his party was staying on in Washington to discuss these economic matters; that all agencies of the Government would be glad to discuss them with Mr. Piniera, and that he could count on our sympathetic consideration.
The Vice President expressed considerable relief that the matters could be handled with Piniera. Apparently he did not feel that he was qualified to discuss them himself. He said that his Government was hoping only that within the limits of what was practical the United States would help them as much as possible. He emphasized that he did not expect us to grant just anything that Brazil might [Page 700] request; that he realized that there would be limits on what we could do.
On Communism he reiterated what he had said on other occasions to the effect that Communism was undoubtedly a problem in Brazil; that the communists consider him their enemy; that they do not oppose him openly because it would not serve their purposes to do so; that secretly and within the labor organizations they fight him; that he lost the election in several communist strongholds. He repeated his statements on other occasions to the effect that people who are hungry and poor are receptive to communist propaganda and that the best way to fight communism is to raise living standards.
I replied that this was quite true but that there was another front on which we must be vigilant, that where we combat the clandestine espionage and subversive organization of communism. I pointed out that communist agents are professionally trained and well equipped in every respect; that the only way to combat them successfully is to do so with men equally well prepared. He agreed that it was necessary to resist communism on this front as well and by means of well trained and equipped specialists.
He said that he intended to urge the Brazilian labor movement invite George Meany and several United States labor leaders to visit Brazil. I said that this would be an excellent proposal and that we would encourage Mr. Meany to go.
I told him that our Government proposed to bring approximately one hundred Brazilian labor leaders to the United States in the course of this year. He expressed satisfaction but added that we should be careful to pick labor leaders who actually represent the labor movement and who are not men now isolated from the main body of organized labor. He said that too often the people that we bring to the United States from the labor movement are men who have drawn apart and who are no longer workers themselves. He said that, if we wished, he would be glad to try to assist us in choosing labor leaders of real influence to the United States.
He criticized ORIT saying that in Latin America it was too often represented by men who are no longer closely identified by the labor movement, by older men who have no influence with the rank and file of organized labor. I asked his opinion of Serafino Romualdi.4 He said that he was a good man but that he was identified with people who had no influence in the labor movement.
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 832.00/5–256. Secret. Drafted by Holland on May 3.↩
- President of AFL–CIO.↩
- This letter was delivered during a courtesy call on President Eisenhower by Vice President Goulart earlier that day. A memorandum of their brief conversation, which did not deal with substantive matters, and Kubitschek’s letter, are in Eisenhower Library, Whitman File, International File.↩
- Latin American representative, AFL–CIO.↩