I APPRECIATE very much your being here today.

I particularly want to thank Mr. Hoover, and the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of Commerce, and each one of you individually, for coming here today to help on this program.

No change except by agreement, shall be made by the Texas & New Orleans Railroad Company, or their employees in the condition out of which the said disputes arose.

The statement which is now submitted to you is an outgrowth of these activities of the Council and represents our present views.

I urge you, my fellow Americans, to support this noble cause to the utmost of your ability.

I wish to pay a personal tribute to the three million patriotic men and women who form this year's army of Red Cross fund campaign solicitors.

We are in a very serious condition, so far as world food consumption is concerned.

At an early date the Council undertook to consider proposals and applications for foreign loans, and to study the problems and broad implications of foreign lending.

As you can see from the attached memorandum, the United States Government is now extending financial assistance to foreign governments through a large number of Programs, administered by different departments and agencies, and with…

I sincerely believe that with your advice and your help we will be able to work this program out, so that the people who are now on the verge of starvation may live through the next year.

Furthermore, I wish to emphasize that in my judgment the successful execution of this policy, including the implementation of the financial Agreement with the United Kingdom, which I transmitted to the Congress on January 30, 1946, is of…

In order for the Council to carry out the functions assigned to it, it seems to me necessary that the Council should have a picture of the over-all program of financial transactions which it is proposed to carry out in the next period.

It is the most important meeting I think we have held in the White House since I have been the President.

I fully endorse the recommendations of the National Advisory Council.

Red Cross service to our war veterans is one of the organization's greatest contributions of today.

The American Red Cross is so close to the hearts of us all that I need not even repeat it.

The international economic cooperation which is the keynote of our economic foreign policy must accompany international political cooperation, and we must achieve both if world peace is to be enduring.

No, the war is not over for the Red Cross--nor is it over for our men who lie sick and wounded in Army and Navy hospitals here at home.