Memorandum to the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Commerce, and the Secretary of Labor:
In view of the International Textile Agreement reached ad referendum at Geneva on July 21, 1961, which I signed September 7, 1961:
A.
I am asking the Secretary of Commerce, as Chairman of the President's Cabinet Textile Advisory Committee, to convene that Committee for the purpose of creating an Interagency Textile Administrative Committee to carry out the rights and obligations of the United States under the "Short-Term Arrangement" provided for in the International Textile Agreement of July 21, 1961, at Geneva. The Interagency Textile Administrative Committee is to be established under the Chairmanship of a designee of the Secretary of Commerce; will be located, for administrative purposes, in the Department of Commerce; and will be composed of the Chairman and one representative each, from the Departments of State, Treasury, Agriculture, and Labor. The President's Cabinet Textile Advisory Committee will, at the request of any member of the interagency Textile Administrative Committee, consider any question of policy relating to the administration of the "Short-Term Arrangement."
B.
I am asking the Secretary of State to undertake, in accordance with policies established by the President's Textile Advisory Committee, the negotiations contemplated by the International Textile Agreement of July 21, 1961, including bilateral textile agreements. The Secretary of State will request the Secretaries of Commerce and Labor to appoint representatives of these Departments to the delegation on the Provisional Cotton Textile Committee of GATT, contemplated under the International Textile Agreement of July 21, 1961, toward the end that the United States representation on this GATT Committee shall include designees of the Secretaries of State, Commerce, and Labor, with the Chairman being the designee of the Secretary of State.
C.
I am asking the President's Cabinet Textile Advisory Committee to form a Management-Labor Textile Advisory Committee to provide continuing advice on Textile problems to it, the Interagency Textile Administrative Committee, the United States representation on the GATT Committee, and the United States negotiators on bilateral agreements.
JOHN F. KENNEDY
Note: A White House release of September 7, 1961, announced that the President had accepted, on behalf of the United States, the international cotton textile agreement reached at a July 17-21 meeting in Geneva of the major textile importing and exporting countries.
The meeting, the release further stated, was called by the Executive Secretary of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade at the request of the United States, a request based on point 6 of President Kennedy's 7-point program of assistance to the textile industry, announced on May 2 (item 161, above).
The text of the Agreement is published in the Department of State Bulletin (vol. 45, P. 337).
John F. Kennedy, Memorandum Implementing the International Textile Agreement. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/235818