The Advisory Committee on Postwar Foreign Policy was a secretive committee created on February 12, 1942, to prepare recommendations for President

Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...

on post

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

foreign policy Foreign policy, also known as external policy, is the set of strategies and actions a State (polity), state employs in its interactions with other states, unions, and international entities. It encompasses a wide range of objectives, includ ...

. Predecessors included the similar Advisory Committee on Problems of Foreign Relations and the Division of Special Research. It was created by Secretary of State

Cordell Hull Cordell Hull (October 2, 1871July 23, 1955) was an American politician from Tennessee and the longest-serving U.S. Secretary of State, holding the position for 11 years (1933–1944) in the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevel ...

at the suggestion of his assistant Leo Pasvolsky and Norman Davis of the

Council on Foreign Relations The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an American think tank focused on Foreign policy of the United States, U.S. foreign policy and international relations. Founded in 1921, it is an independent and nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit organi ...

. The committee appointed subcommittees on political problems,

economic reconstruction Economic reconstruction is a process for creating a proactive vision of economic change. The most basic idea is that problems in the economy, such as deindustrialization, environmental decay, outsourcing, industrial incompetence, poverty and a ...

, territorial matters, legal questions, and international organization, all under the direction of Pasvolsky. After four sessions, the main committee disbanded, Hull preferring to rely on the smaller subcommittees. Chairman of the committee was Secretary of State

; vice chairman, Under Secretary of State Sumner Welles, Dr. Leo Pasvolsky (director of the Division of Special Research) was appointed Executive Officer. The committee included

Dean Acheson Dean Gooderham Acheson ( ; April 11, 1893October 12, 1971) was an American politician and lawyer. As the 51st United States Secretary of State, U.S. Secretary of State, he set the foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration from 1949 to ...

, Esther C. Brunauer,

Lauchlin Currie Lauchlin Bernard Currie (8 October 1902 – 23 December 1993) was a Canadian economist best known for being President Franklin Roosevelt's chief economic advisor during World War II. After Roosevelt's death, he led the first World Bank survey ...

, Laurence Duggan, Herbert Feis,

Alger Hiss Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official who was accused of espionage in 1948 for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. The statute of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjur ...

, Harry Hawkins, Philip Jessup,

Archibald MacLeish Archibald MacLeish (May 7, 1892 – April 20, 1982) was an American poet and writer, who was associated with the modernist school of poetry. MacLeish studied English at Yale University and law at Harvard University. He enlisted in and saw action ...

, Charles W. Yost, George C. Marshall, Henry Wadleigh, Henry Agard Wallace, and

Harry Dexter White Harry Dexter White (October 29, 1892 – August 16, 1948) was an American government official in the United States Department of the Treasury. Working closely with the secretary of the treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., he helped set American financia ...

. Several experts were brought in from outside the

State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs o ...

, mostly members of the

such as

Hamilton Fish Armstrong Hamilton Fish Armstrong (April 7, 1893 – April 24, 1973) was an American journalist who is known for editing ''Foreign Affairs'' from 1928 to 1972. Early life Armstrong was a member of the Fish Family of American politicians. His father w ...

, Isaiah Bowman, Benjamin V. Cohen, Norman H. Davis, Anne O'Hare McCormick, James T. Shotwell and Myron Taylor.Shoup & Minter, p.152 The international organizations subcommittee, the ''Special Subcommittee on International Organization'', included Welles, Bowman, Pasvolsky, Cohen, Shotwell, Notter, Green Hackworth (the State Department legal adviser) and later Clark Eichelberger of the League of Nations Association, and eventually produced a draft charter of a new international organization. The economic policy subcommittee was led by

, and the economic reconstruction subcommittee by Adolph Berlebr>
From March 1942, the committee was supplied with research secretaries by the Council on Foreign Relations' '' War and Peace Studies'' project, with each subcommittee being served by the secretary of a corresponding Council study group. Meetings were scheduled to allow secretaries to carry out Council work during the first half of each week with the remainder of the week spent at the State Department. In early 1943, as the main committee declined in importance, much of its work was taken over by the Informal Political Agenda Group composed of Hull, Welles, Taylor, Davis, Bowman and Pasvolsky.

Notes

References

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Advisory Committee On Postwar Foreign Policy History of the government of the United States Politics of World War II United States Department of State American advisory organizations Government agencies established in 1942 1942 establishments in the United States