[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 31 (Thursday, March 19, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2281-S2284]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
HIS EMINENCE BERNARD CARDINAL LAW, ARCHBISHOP OF BOSTON, REFLECTING ON
CUBA
Mr. DODD. Mr. President, earlier last week I had the privilege of
having a brief conversation with His Eminence Bernard Cardinal Law, the
Archbishop of Boston. In fact, it is a nice coincidence that my
colleague from Missouri is here on the floor as I say these remarks,
because I shared with him a message that Cardinal Law had sent to our
colleague from Missouri, Senator Ashcroft, who had the privilege of
knowing Cardinal Law when he was presiding as a bishop in Missouri back
before assuming his present post. And he extended his best wishes to
our colleague from Missouri. So I appreciate his presence here on the
floor as I share these remarks.
In the course of our conversation, Cardinal Law mentioned to me he
was going to be speaking at a conference
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sponsored by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at Harvard
University. The topic of the conference was to be on Cuba, Mr.
President.
The cardinal was very kind enough to send a copy of his remarks to
me. And after reading them, I have no doubt that all of my colleagues
should have that opportunity as well. They are excellent, excellent
remarks and ones that I think will be worthwhile.
I know Members are going through their own private discussions of
what should be our policy with regard to Cuba. There have been some
changes here. How do you respond to them? Cardinal Law has laid out, I
think, some very, very creative, clear, and interesting ideas on how we
ought to move forward here. So I urge my colleagues to read these
remarks.
Cardinal Law is extremely well informed on this subject. He has
visited Cuba over the years. He has kept in very close contact with the
clergy in Cuba. I was particularly struck, Mr. President, by what he
believes we should have learned from Pope John Paul II's January visit
to Havana; namely--and I quote him --
The Holy Father has amply demonstrated that a policy of
positive engagement can achieve far more change within Cuba
than can the [U.S.] embargo.
Cardinal Law starkly and very vividly highlights what he thinks is
the failure of our current policy with regard to Cuba by contrasting it
with our policies towards the People's Republic of China and even
Vietnam--two nations that have had deplorable human rights records and
where religious freedom is severely restrained, even as we speak here
today.
He then pointedly asked--and I quote him--
If openness is thought to be further freedom in those
nations where change is not so evident, how it is that a
different standard is applied to Cuba where there is evident
change?
Mr. President, I do not believe that there is a credible answer to
that question. And that alone should tell us why the current U.S.
policy with respect to Cuba is so flawed. Cardinal Law's remarks, which
touched on such issues as the state of affairs in the Cuban and United
States-Cuban relations are very insightful, and I urge my colleagues to
read the full text of his remarks, which I now ask, Mr. President,
unanimous consent to have printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
Address by Bernard Cardinal Law Before the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences
In preparing these remarks, I reviewed my correspondence
file from persons who accompanied me to Cuba for the Pope's
visit. Our direct flight from Boston to Havana might have
established a record in itself! Every letter expressed
appreciation for the opportunity to participate in a historic
and profoundly moving event. Almost to a person there was the
expressed desire to be of assistance to the Church in Cuba
and to the Cuban people.
These pilgrims to Cuba included bishops, priests and
sisters, and Catholic laity as well as Protestants and Jews.
There were business leaders, bankers, doctors and a Health
Care System President. There were heads of social service
agencies and representatives of foundations, there were
lawyers and judges, Congressmen, presidents of colleges, a
law school dean and a university professor, and the editor of
a national magazine. We were a wondrously diverse group, but
we found unity in our conviction that the time is now for a
change in U.S. policy towards Cuba.
Since returning from the Papal Visit, I have often been
asked if I thought that change might now come to Cuba. The
question misses the point that change has already come. An
earlier barometer of change focused on the departure of Fidel
Castro as the threshold for any substantive change. The
events of the past year clearly demonstrate that that
barometer simply does not work. The toothpaste is out of the
tube, and Fidel Castro squeezed the tube.
Any blueprint for a change in policy which demands a change
in leadership in another country is too rigid a starting
point and depending on the means willing to be used to
achieve that departure, could lack a moral claim. This is not
to condone a dismal record on human rights. Religious freedom
is certainly not yet fully developed in Cuba. The fact
remains, however, that dramatic change has occurred within
the past twelve months in the area of religious liberty.
These changes could not have occurred without the active
approval of President Castro. He has been a promoter, not an
obstacle to what is now happening in Cuba.
It is not the visit alone, stunning though it was, which
chronicles change. Events leading up to the visit must also
be acknowledged. Some in Cuba with whom I have spoken place
great emphasis on the private audience accorded Fidel Castro
by Pope John Paul II. One must also note the mixed commission
of government and Church to plan for the Papal visit which
marks a sea change in that relationship. The Church was able
to engage in a door to door nationwide mission in preparation
for the Pope's visit. Religious processions were allowed, as
were some outside religious celebrations. The exclusion of
the Church from the use of public media was, at least in a
modest way, but nonetheless establishing a precedent, lifted
with the pre-visit nationally televised address by the
Archbishop of Havana, Jaime Cardinal Ortega.
Quite before the time of planning for the visit, the Church
was allowed a new expression of social services through
Caritas Cuba. While its work is still narrowly circumscribed,
a principle of public, organized social service by the
Catholic Church has been recognized. The backlog of visa
requests by foreign clergy, religious and other Church
workers has been broken as the number of visas has
dramatically increased.
Change cannot be rooted in a precise paradigm for the
future. If we are to measure change realistically, it must be
measured against the past. The past that I know in terms of
the Church in Cuba begins in 1984. Before then, there were
confiscations of Church property, the closing of Catholic
schools and other institutional works, the departure, and
some would argue the forced exile, of hundreds of Church
personnel. There were the labor camps which number among
their alumni the present Cardinal Archbishop of Havana.
Pervading and justifying all this was an official version of
history, employing a method with which we have become all too
sadly accustomed in some current trends in the U.S. academy.
It is the application of deconstruction to the study of the
past in a way which serves an ideological end.
In an earlier visit to Cuba, I objected to President Castro
concerning the severe intimidation of the omnipresent
Committees of the Revolution. These watchdogs of Marxist
orthodoxy saw as dangerously subversive the baptism of a
child or the visit of a priest or the regular attendance at
Mass. Castro's response, replete with Church history
according to Marx, made the claim that the state did allow
for religious freedom. The State was powerless, in his
explanation, to counter the strong anti-Church sentiment of
the people borne of what he described as the Church's
oppressive and sinful past.
For the past fourteen years, I have been in continual
contact with the Church in Cuba. I was present in the
Nunciature in Havana the first time Castro met with Cuban
bishops. There were no more than three substantive encounters
of this kind before the Pope's visit. During the past
fourteen years there have been sporadic efforts on the part
of the Cuban government to marginalize the Church by
suggesting that the bishops were ``counter revolutionary'',
which in our terms would mean unpatriotic and subversive.
Against that all too schematic background, focus on Havana,
Sunday, January 25, 1998. The Plaza of the Revolution has a
new face: a heroic-sized painting on the facade of the
national library portrays Jesus in the familiar style of the
Sacred Heart. One million Cubans, with a sprinkling of
foreign pilgrims, are ranged in front of the altar. Fidel
Castro, in a business suit, is in the front row.
For me, one among the many moving moments stands out in a
particularly vivid way. During the Havana Mass, the Holy
Father commissioned representatives from various dioceses to
go forth and present the message of the Church. He presented
each with a Bible. The last person to approach the Pope was a
older woman, quite frail, who was helped up the stairs by two
young men. When she approached the Holy Father, she threw her
arms around him. There they were, aging and frail, this
elderly woman and the Pope, with their common witness to
fidelity in the face of Communist oppression. As she was
helped down the stairs, she was accompanied by the thunderous
applause of thousands of Cubans.
I wondered what she thought. Must I not have been for her
the unfolding of a miracle? What had it been for her these
past years in a land governed by Marxism? What must have been
her joy in this sea of Cubans, so many young and ecstatic in
their celebration of faith? I could only think of Anna in the
incident recorded by St. Luke. Anna was an old woman, a
widow, who spent her days in prayer and fasting in the
Temple. When Mary and Joseph brought the infant Jesus to
present him to God in the Temple, Anna came to the scene at
that moment. St. Luke says ``she gave thanks to God and
talked about the child to all who looked forward to the
deliverance of Jerusalem.''
It must be said that the Cuban government could not have
been more obliging and welcoming. The Masses of the Holy
Father were televised live nationally.
As the Holy Father left Jose Marti Airport on January 25th,
he said that in our day ``no nation can live in isolation.
The Cuban people therefore cannot be denied the contacts with
other peoples necessary for economic, social and cultural
development, especially when the imposed isolation strikes
the population indiscriminately, making it ever more
difficult for the weakest to enjoy the bare essentials of
decent living, things such as food, health and education. All
can and should take practical steps to bring about changes in
this regard.''
These are important words of the Pope which have meaning
not only for the Catholic faithful but for all women and men
of
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good will, including those who exercise leadership in
government. Current U.S. policy towards Cuba was set during
the missile crisis. A few things have happened since then,
however, including the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and
the unraveling of Communist hegemony in Eastern Europe. The
visit of the Holy Father to Cuba in January of this year is
one of those defining events. A policy driven by events of an
earlier time does not meet the challenge of new possibilities
which the Holy Father's visit opens up.
One of the strongest impediments to new policy initiatives
is the pressure of partisan politics. Is it but the musings
of an unrealistic cleric to suggest that an earlier pattern
of a bipartisan foreign policy could serve us well again? To
that end, I propose the establishment of a bipartisan
National Commission on U.S./Cuban relations. Such a
Commission, perhaps Presidential or conceivably organized by
a non-governmental body, would have as its charge the
development of policy initiatives which could build on the
changes already perceived in Cuba since the Pope's visit. The
work of this Commission should be completed within three to
six months. It should not take longer than this because the
Commission's work would be essentially a simple and
straightforward task.
The Commission might be co-chaired by President Carter and
President Bush or President Ford. It ought to include Senator
Lugar, Representative Hamilton, a U.S. Bishop, Elizabeth
Dole, head of the American Red Cross, two corporate CEO's,
two prominent Cuban-Americans, someone from the field of
medicine and someone representing the concerns of the media.
Since the Holy Father's visit, there has been the release
of more than 400 prisoners. While one political prisoner is
one too many, this direct response to the Holy Father's visit
cannot be dismissed. So very much more needs to be done to
broaden the scope of human rights in Cuba. However, I am
convinced that the best way to do this is to move the
starting point of U.S. Policy from the missile crisis to the
Papal visit. The Holy Father has amply demonstrated that a
policy of positive engagement can achieve far more change
within Cuba than can the embargo.
Cardinal Ortega has commented on the so-called Helms-Burton
Act that ``any economic measure that aims to isolate a
country and thus eliminates the possibility of development,
thus threatening the survival of people is unacceptable.''
It is impossible to reasonably support the embargo against
Cuba while at the same time granting most favored Nation
status to the People's Republic of China, and while moving
into closer relations with Vietnam. Both of these nations
have a deplorable record on human rights in general and on
religious liberty specifically. If openness is thought to
further freedom in those nations where change is not so
evident, how is that a different standard is applied to Cuba
where there is evident change?
We should not wait for the report of a bipartisan
commission to introduce some measures which would ameliorate
human suffering in Cuba, which would foster cultural,
religious and other interchanges, and which would therefore,
encourage the new attitude of openness and change within
Cuba. It is time for the U.S. To respond positively to the
change that is occurring in Cuba.
There is no moral justification for the current embargo. In
terms of effectiveness as an agent of change it has proven to
be complete failure. The most egregious aspects of the
embargo, namely the prohibition of sale of food and medicine,
must be lifted immediately. The two bills currently in
Congress which would do this should be immediately passed.
What is needed in Cuba is the ability to purchase food and
medicine in the U.S. A singular focus on facilitating
charitable donations of food and medicine is patently
inadequate.
There are certain things that can be done tomorrow by the
President of the United States.
The President should agree to license direct, humanitarian
flights to Cuba.
The President could take immediate action to ease
remittance restrictions, increase visiting privileges, and
expand opportunities for U.S. citizens particularly Cuban
Americans, to visit Cuba by restoring direct flights. The
right to travel is a Constitutional right. It should not be
violated for outdated political reasons.
The President could restate that he will continue
suspending the international trade bans of Helms-Burton
indefinitely. This would help the people of Cuba and it would
ease the concerns of our closest allies and trading partners.
The President should give serious critical attention to the
legal opinion that concludes that the Executive Branch has
the legal and constitutional right to grant a general license
for medicines and for food. Such an action on the part of the
President would, of course, effectively end the food and
medicine embargo immediately.
The foreign policy initiatives of a President can be
decisive. President Nixon went to China. President Carter
brought Begin and Sadat to Camp David. President Reagan met
Gorbachev in Iceland to ease nuclear tensions and President
Bush followed up by reducing our nuclear weapons. President
Clinton has the possibility of charting a new relationship
between the United States and Cuba.
Let me end by recounting an incident during the Pope's
visit. One of the pilgrims traveling with us took a walk
along the waterfront. He was alone, it was raining, and the
pavement was slippery. He stumbled and fell, with a resultant
large cut in the head. Some passersby stopped their car and
took him to the emergency room of the nearest hospital. The
care he received was both professionally competent and
compassionate. However, he was struck by the fact that the
only medicine he could observe on the shelf in the treatment
room was some alcohol. When the doctor arrived to stitch his
wound, he first reached into a pocket of his white coat,
removed a light bulb, and screwed it into the empty socket so
that he could see more easily. It is not just a bulb that is
missing. There is often a lack of power with devastating
consequences, especially in surgery. The lack of medicines
more quickly and cheaply attainable from the U.S. severely
restricts the treatment that can be provided. Even more
basically, the effects of the lack of sufficient food
threaten the most vulnerable members of the population, the
old and the young.
I would submit that the people of Cuba deserve better than
that from us. I would submit that it adds no honor to our
country to deprive a people of those necessities which should
never be used as bargaining chips.
Change is occurring in Cuba. The question is, do we have
the political will and moral courage to change?
Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I would also like to call to the attention
of my colleagues some very specific recommendations Cardinal Law has
made to President Clinton and the administration, recommendations which
the President has the authority, without any acts of Congress, to
undertake. And I recite them very briefly to you here: Restore direct
flights to Cuba; ease restrictions on remittances and travel; suspend
implementation of title III indefinitely; and utilize current executive
authority to grant general licenses to permit the sale of food and
medicines. I say ``title III.'' That is of the Helms-Burton
legislation.
Mr. President, I strongly support these recommendations and hope that
the President will immediately act on them.
Let me summarize briefly some of the other major points made in the
course of Cardinal Law's presentation.
On the positive side, the Cardinal noted that ``change has already
come'' to Cuba in many ways; ``dramatic change has occurred within the
last twelve months in the area of religious freedom''--I am quoting him
from his remarks--``a principle of public, organized social service by
the Catholic Church has been reorganized'' by Cuban authorities; ``the
backlog of visa requests by foreign clergy, religious and other Church
workers has been broken as the number of visas has dramatically
increased;'' and, ``there has been the release [in the last few weeks]
of more than 400 [political] prisoners [in Cuba].''
The cardinal also readily acknowledges that Cuba's human rights
record--and I agree with him--has been dismal. No one is suggesting, I
hope--not by my remarks--that there has been a total transformation in
Cuba. There has not been a total transformation, but there has been
change, and it is significant, and we ought to respond to those changes
that have occurred.
He reminded--Cardinal Law did--listeners of Pope John Paul's party
comments as he left Havana to return to the Vatican. I quote him. He
said:
The Cuban people cannot be denied the contacts with other
peoples necessary for economic, social, and cultural
development, especially when the imposed isolation strikes
the population indiscriminately.
Mr. President, I think it is fair to say Cardinal Law was extremely
critical of current U.S. policy. He noted that the ``[c]urrent U.S.
policy towards Cuba was set during the missile crisis'' and that ``[a]
policy driven by events of an earlier time does not meet the challenge
of new possibilities which the Holy Father's visit opens up.''
Finally, Cardinal Law made a number of very important recommendations
concerning how we might begin to fashion some new and constructive
policy initiatives. He recommended, for example, that steps be taken to
isolate U.S.-Cuba policy from partisan politics by establishing a
bipartisan national commission on U.S.-Cuban relations. I think this is
an intriguing idea and one that I intend to discuss personally with the
President and the Secretary of State.
Mr. President, I believe that the cardinal's remarks are timely, they
are important, and they are worthy of our
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serious consideration. I urge my colleagues to review them personally
in these coming days as they formulate their own views on how we ought
to proceed with regard to U.S.-Cuban relations.
Mr. KENNEDY. Would the Senator yield?
Mr. DODD. I will be happy to.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I just want to, first of all, commend my
friend, the Senator from Connecticut, for his understanding of Cardinal
Law's statement and for the constructive nature in which the Senator
has referred to it.
I do think that it is an enormously serious document. I agree with
the Senator that it deserves a great deal of study. I had had the
opportunity to talk to him prior to the time of delivery. He is
motivated by a very deep and continuing humanitarian concern from his
frequent visits there and from the study of the people on the island.
I just want to commend the Senator, who is a real leader in the
issues of the hemisphere, and to thank him for an excellent statement,
and to say that I think it has been an enormously constructive and
positive statement and I hope our colleagues will pay attention to it.
I thank the Senator.
Mr. DODD. I thank my colleague from Massachusetts.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
Mr. ASHCROFT addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. ASHCROFT. Thank you, Mr. President.
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