World Trade Organization (last updated: July 14, 2001) To some, it is an international organization that promotes free trade and settles disputes between nations. To others, it is the most visible component of a conspiracy to undermine United States sovereignty, environmental protections, and/or development in the Third World. The conflict between these different views came to a head in Seattle in December 1999, when the member countries of the World Trade Organization met in an attempt to lay the groundwork for a new round of trade negotiations dealing especially with the politically difficult issue of agriculture. Protesters with different agendas but one common enemy took over the city, leading Seattle's mayor to declare a state of civil emergency, and the WTO talks ultimately collapsed without agreement on major issues. Founded on January 1, 1995, the World Trade Organization is the outgrowth of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), an international agreement that reduced participating countries' tariffs and set rules for trade. The original GATT was negotiated by 23 countries in 1946 and took effect in 1948. Countries then took part in seven more rounds of multilateral negotiations, using the multilateral setting to achieve and package tariff reductions that might have been impossible otherwise. These rounds grew in size, scope and length; the last round, the Uruguay Round, involved 123 countries, covered trade from toothpaste and genetic structures to telecommunications, and lasted seven and a half years from 1986 to 1994. Even broader in scope and has more formal mechanisms to create rules and resolve disputes, the WTO is an official organization that implements and enforces the GATT and other agreements. Whereas the GATT dealt mostly with goods, the WTO also covers services and traded intellectual property consisting of inventions, creations and designs. Under WTO agreements, countries cannot normally discriminate against trading partners. Countries must treat all partners as "most favored" trading partners, meaning that if a country offers a trade benefit to one trading partner it must offer it to all other "most favored" partners. Perhaps the most controversial aspect of the WTO, at least from some critics' perspective, is its dispute-settling mechanism. As members of the WTO, countries agree to settle trade disputes through the WTO's court-like resolution process instead of taking action unilaterally. Effectively, countries accuse another for having protective or discriminatory policies, and if successful in their complaint, the other country must change its policy accordingly. This becomes controversial because countries have different environmental and labor standards, and laws or rules promulgated for reasons not necessarily related to trade can be struck down in the name of free trade. Two cases in particular have caught attention in the United States. In both cases, pro-environment laws or rules were struck down as anti-trade by the WTO. In 1991, the WTO struck down a provision of the US Marine Mammal Protection Act that was designed to protect dolphins from tuna-fishing operations (dolphins are trapped in nets designed to catch yellowfish tuna unless the nets are specially designed to be "dolphin-safe"). Under the act, if a country exporting tuna to the United States could not prove that it met the US's dolphin-protection standards, then the US government would embargo all imports of fish from that country. The WTO ruled that the US could not ban imports simply because an exporting country had different policies; holding otherwise would allow countries to impose trade restrictions unilaterally. A few years later, Venezuela (and later Brazil) complained that the United States was applying rules that discriminated against gasoline imports. The US's Environmental Protection Agency had implemented a rule in 1993 that requires gasoline refineries to make cleaner gas; refineries were judged based on past performance and when past performance could not be determined, they were judged on 1990 data for all oil refineries. In May 1996, the WTO ruled that the US rule was discriminatory and did not fall within certain exceptions for environmental reasons. The United States adopted a new rule in 1997. These and other rulings do not necessarily mean that the WTO is anti-environment or anti-labor, but it does mean that pro-environment policies in the United States have to be designed in ways that do not overly discriminate against other countries. In the dolphin case, for example, the WTO upheld other provisions that required tuna products to meet certain standards before being labeled "dolphin-safe," thus allowing for a consumer-based approach that could accomplish the same goals more indirectly. Beyond dispute-settling, WTO decisions are made by the membership as a whole through ministers or officials. The WTO does not delegate power to a board of directors and reaches decisions generally through consensus and also by a majority vote based on a "one country, one vote" principle that gives the United States, France, and Zimbabwe equal voting rights. Within the WTO, some countries have formed formal alliances to have a more consistent and powerful position. Most prominent are the European Union (also known as the European Communities) and the Association of South East Asian Nations; some countries have also formed the Cairns Group to promote greater liberalization of agriculture policy. The WTO currently has more than 130 members. In order to join, countries have to make commitments to open their markets and abide by the WTO's rules and must negotiate with certain member countries such as the United States. That more than 30 other countries (including China, Saudi Arabia, and Ethiopia) are currently negotiating for membership says something about the benefits of WTO membership. WTO proponents say that developing countries benefit by having rights and obligations due to their participation; the alternative would be trying to form relations individually with much more powerful countries. Also, WTO proponents say that developing countries can take advantage of the obligations by using them as cover for imposing changes that may be unpopular and politically risky in the short-term. Sources: The World Trade Organization is on-line here. Paul R. Krugman and Maurice Obstfeld, International Economics: Theory and Policy (Fifth Edition) (Addison-Wesley, 2000). Stephen Dunphy, WTO talks collapse; no accord reached, Seattle Times, December 4, 1999. The Seattle Times' coverage of the December 1999 WTO protests is available on-line here; The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's is available here.
Presidential pardons (last updated June 24, 2001) Under Article 2 of the US Constitution, the President has the constitutional power to "grant reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States." Pardons are considered an official statement of forgiveness for the commission of a federal crime and restore basic civil rights, and do not officially connote innocence. Commutations of sentence are the reduction of a sentence. Most Presidents give hundreds of pardons or commutations of sentences while in office. According to a study conducted by Professor P.S. Ruckman (available here), Bill Clinton did 456 clemency actions, George Bush did 77 actions, and Ronald Reagan did 406. FDR did the most of any president, with 3,687 clemency actions, and Bush did the least with his 77. Most pardon applications are filed with the Office of the Pardon Attorney in the Department of Justice. The Pardon Attorney, currently Roger Adams, begins its review by contacting the United States Probation Office for the petitioner's compliance with court supervision. The FBI provides factual information about the petitioner, and the Pardon Attorney contacts the United States Attorney for the district where the petitioner was convicted or the Department of Justice for more information. The Pardon Attorney's Office makes a report and recommendation, which is then reviewed by the Deputy Attorney General before going to the President for a final decision. Just before leaving office, Clinton sparked widespread controversy by pardoning two fugitives wanted on charges of insider trading, Marc Rich and Pincus Green. These pardons were sent directly to Clinton and were not reviewed by the Pardon Attorney's Office until Clinton's second-to-last day in office. Many grants of pardon have been controversial. On Christmas Eve 1992, just weeks before leaving office, George Bush pardoned former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and six other former Reagan administration officials for their involvement with the Iran-contra scandal mere days before Weinberger was to stand trial on perjury charges. In 1974, Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon who had resigned from the Presidency due to the Watergate scandal. In 1977, Jimmy Carter proclaimed amnesty for those who had evaded the draft during the Vietnam War, extending a more limited amnesty offered by Ford. In September 1979, Carter also commuted the sentences of Oscar Collazo, a Puerto Rican nationalist who had tried to kill Truman in 1950, and others who had fired on the House of Representatives in 1954, apparently to get Cuba to release U.S. nationals held prisoner at the time. Sources: Statement of Pardon Attorney Roger Adams before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, February 14, 2001, available here. The Jurist's section on presidential pardons and Professor Pittman's list, available here.
Alger Hiss (last updated June 24, 2001) Donna's friend's story is clearly based on that of Alger Hiss, the government lawyer and diplomat who was accused of being a Communist spy while working in the State Department in the 1930s, was convicted of perjury in 1950, and (unlike Donna's friend's grandfather) spent the rest of his life trying to clear his name . The case against Hiss would lay the groundwork for McCarthyism and jumpstart the political career of then-Congressman Richard Nixon. Hiss's guilt or innocence is still debated today, especially with periodic revelations from declassified government files. Alger Hiss was a Harvard-trained lawyer and former Supreme Court clerk who joined FDR's administration in 1933. A rising star in the New Deal, he joined the State Department in 1936 and became director of the Office of Special Political Affairs. He accompanied FDR to the Yalta Conference in 1945, where Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin set the stage for the Cold War. Hiss then helped found the United Nations through his work as an organizer and chief adviser to the U.S. delegation. He left government service in 1946 to become the president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Then, in 1948, Hiss was publicly accused of espionage and delivering government documents to the Soviet Union while working for the government in the 1930s. His accuser was Whittaker Chambers, who had joined the Community Party and had been involved with espionage for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Chambers severed ties with the party in 1938 and had become a senior editor at Time magazine by 1948, when his accusations before the House Un-American Activities Committee became public. (Chambers had what appears to have been an unhappy life and some issues were brought out in court, such as his brother's suicide and his grandmother's insanity. One aspect, however, was not raised at trial. Hiss argued in later years that Chambers's homosexuality was relevant "not on the issue of homosexuality per se, but on the self-torture and admitted mental instability which his sexual feelings caused him.") Under oath, Hiss denied being a Communist or knowing anyone named Whittaker Chambers. It turned out that Hiss had indeed known Chambers under the alias of George Crosley and that Hiss had sublet an apartment out to "Crosley" in the 1930s. Chambers continued his accusations against Hiss, and Hiss sued Chambers for libel. Eventually, Chambers led federal agents to his Maryland farm, where they found the so-called pumpkin papers, two strips of developed film and three rolls of undeveloped film containing government documents, hidden inside a hollowed-out pumpkin. This film was allegedly given by Hiss to Chambers for eventual delivery to Soviet spies. The three-year statute of limitations for espionage had run out by this time, but the grand jury still was able to indict Hiss for perjury for lying about his dealings with Chambers. Hiss was put on trial twice. The first trial in early 1949 ended with a hung jury, split eight to four for conviction. The second trial took place in November 1949 and included a new witness who admitted being a Soviet agent and knowing Hiss to be a Communist in 1935. Hiss was convicted on January 21, 1950, and sentenced to five years in prison. He served 44 months and was released on November 27, 1954. Hiss spent the rest of his life trying to clear his name. He was reinstated to the Massachusetts Bar in 1975 and then filed a coram bonis petition to overturn the verdict (it was denied in 1982 by Judge Richard Owen, and the decision was upheld by higher courts). Hiss died in November 15, 1996 at the age of 92. His accuser, Whittaker Chambers, had died decades earlier in 1961. The end of the Cold War has brought to light documents that may or may not shed further light on Hiss's innocence or guilt. In 1992, General Dimitri Volkogonov, head of the Russian military intelligence archives, said that "Not a single document substantiates the allegation that Mr. Hiss collaborated with the intelligence services of the Soviet Union;" he later admitted that his review had been incomplete and that many documents had been destroyed. In 1993, a Hungarian historian, Maria Schmidt, released documents showing that another American believed to be a Communist spy, Noel Field, had admitted during an arrest that Hiss had tried to recruit him in the 1930s; however, Field recanted after being released. In 1996, the National Security Agency released a document considered by some to be the strongest new evidence against Hiss. The March 30, 1945 document was one of thousands of pages of decoded cables exchanged between the Soviet Union and its American agents from 1939 to 1957, the results of a US-British intelligence project named "Venona." It refers to an agent code-named "Ales," a State Department official who had flown from the Yalta conference to Moscow. A footnote says that Ales was "probably Alger Hiss." Hiss had indeed been one of only four men who met the description, but he said that he went to Moscow only to see the subway system; others have criticized the identification as flawed on other grounds. See the document here. More government documents are slowly being released. In 1999, Federal District Judge Peter K. Leisure ordered the release of thousands of pages of grand jury testimony from the Hiss case. Still, many records from the House Un-American Activities Committee are not scheduled to be made public until 2026. Sources: Perjury, by Allen Weinstein. Footnote on an Historic Case, In Re Alger Hiss, No. 78 Civ. 3433, by William A. Reuben. Venona and Alger Hiss, by John Lowenthal, Intelligence and National Security, Vol. 15, No. 3 (Autumn 2000), available here. A comprehensive website is The Alger Hiss Story, available here.
Mercator v Peters Maps (last updated June 24, 2001) Actually, the debate is already over, and both lost. The Mercator map was published in 1569 as a navigational tool; a straight line drawn across the map will have a constant compass bearing. This is done, however, by spacing the lines of latitude farther apart as one gets further away from the Equator. And because the mapmaker, Gerardus Mercator, was German, he put his homeland at the center of the map, with the Equator down 2/3 of the map rather than halfway down the world as it is by definition. (Mercator, by the way, was the first mapmaker to have his works published, posthumously, as an "atlas," after the Greek legend who bore the world on his back). The Peters map, by contrast, is an equal-area map that distorts the actual shape of land masses in order to represent their areas equally proportional. Dr. Arno Peters, also a German mapmaker, devised the map in the 1960s and then announced it in 1973 in order to display third-world countries in a way that recognized their value in world politics. This kind of map, however, was not exactly new to the professional cartography world; Englishman James first released this kind of equal-area map in 1885, though Peters has denied knowing of Gall's work beforehand. The problem is that all rectangular and all two-dimensional maps are inherently flawed in taking the surface of the world, with its curves and three-dimensional nature, and reducing it to a flat sheet of paper. The larger an area you're trying to depict, the greater the distortion. This is why even wide-area aerial photos cannot be used as maps without modification, as the aerial photos reflect the curvature of the globe. Accordingly, seven North American professional organizations adopted a resolution in 1989 calling for a stop on the use of all rectangular world maps, whether Mercator, Peters or whatever. "Such maps promote serious, erroneous conceptions by severely distorting large sections of the world, by showing the round Earth as having straight edges and sharp corners, by representing most distances and direct routes incorrectly, and by portraying the circular coordinate system as a squared grid. The most widely displayed rectangular world map is the Mercator (in fact a navigational diagram devised for nautical charts), but other rectangular world maps proposed as replacements for the Mercator also display a greatly distorted image of the spherical Earth." The National Geographic Society, perhaps the most popular cartographic organization, lives by its example. It began moving away from rectangular maps for depicting the world as early as 1922, when it adopted the circular Van der Grinten map. The society then moved to pseudocylindrical projections, adopting the Robinson map in 1988 and then the Winkel Tripel formulation in 1998. This is the map that it has given out to schools in recent years. Sources: Maps and Civilizations, by Norman Thrower. Flattening the Earth, by John P. Snyder (University of Chicago Press, 1993). National Geographic Society's website, available here (including examples of the Van der Grinten, Robinson and Winkel Tripel maps).