Letter to Senator Bennett on the Need for Legislation Authorizing the President To Make Adjustments in Sugar Quotas.
[ Released June 2, 1960. Dated June 1, 1960 ]
Dear Wallace:
Thank you for your May twenty-fifth letter with your observations on the allocation of possible 1960 domestic area sugar quota deficits. I also noted in the May twenty-seventh Congressional Record your comments made on the Senate Floor on the same subject.
Whether or not it would be determined to reallocate such deficits in a manner different from that now provided by law, I nevertheless attach particular importance to the recommendation that the President be given appropriate authority to adjust certain foreign quotas when he finds such action is called for--either in the national interest or to insure adequate domestic supplies of sugar. I hope most earnestly that Congress will act promptly on the sugar legislation recommended last March by this Administration, and I very much appreciate your own efforts, as well as the efforts of your colleagues joined with you, to see that the necessary legislative action on this subject is taken quickly.
With warm regard,
Sincerely,
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
Note: In his letter of May 25, 1960, released with the President's reply, Senator Bennett noted that whenever any domestic sugar-producing area was unable to fill its quota, the Secretary of Agriculture, under existing law, was required to determine the size of such deficit and to allocate a substantial part of it to Cuba. He further noted that estimated deficits in Puerto Rico and Hawaii would amount to 500,000 tons, and that Cuba's share of these deficits would be 160,000 tons unless the law was changed in time to permit adjustments. Senator Bennett further stated "there is every indication that the same situation will occur again next year, so a law extending the Act without change will not only confirm this year's windfall, but guarantee a similar one in 1961."
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Letter to Senator Bennett on the Need for Legislation Authorizing the President To Make Adjustments in Sugar Quotas. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/234563