Memorandum for legislation
Please discuss the following issue:
You have been assigned the responsibility of developing a memo to the White House articulating your Department’s position on a piece of legislation that is currently being considered by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has requested the Administration’s views of the legislation before it sends the legislation to the floor for a vote. The White House has also asked for the views of the Departments impacted by the issue. Choose one of these roles – State, Defense, Commerce, Homeland Security, Labor, Health and Human Services – and provide your memo to the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Your memorandum should at least 350 words but no more than 500 words in length. You should address all the issues below.
The proposed legislation would do three things. First it would establish tariffs against imports from China and other low-wage countries in Asia and Africa (allies like Japan, South Korea, the Philippines and Taiwan would be exempted). Supporters of this legislation claim that the flood of such imports has eroded America’s domestic manufacturing to the point where action needs to be taken in order to shrink the unemployment rate in this country. In so doing, government tax revenues would increase and spending on programs like unemployment insurance and Social Security would shrink.
Second, the legislation would require the White House to designate high tech and defense industries in which foreign investment by countries that are not members of NATO would be limited. Supporters of the legislation argue that foreign investors should not be able to gain control over companies essential to national defense or to America’s technological leadership in the key industries of tomorrow.
Third, the legislation would prohibit the importation of any goods from a foreign corporation that has been found by either the Secretaries of the Commerce or Health and Human Services Departments to have violated American consumer safety rules. The legislation would require annual reports by the White House listing those foreign corporations.
Your memorandum should evaluate the short and long term effects that this legislation is likely to have. Specifically, the memorandum should address:
1.)How might this legislation contradict previous US policy commitments under the World Trade Organization?
(see http://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/tif_e/agrm1_e.htm)
2.)How might this legislation affect US-Chinese foreign policy relations – especially with respect to efforts to get China to work with us in de-nuclearizing North Korea and to reaching a peaceful resolution of the Taiwan issue?
The initial required post (at least 350 words) should be supported by course readings using parenthetical references. More than two follow-ups should be at least 150 words. Click here for a copy of the discussion rubric. Follow the Turabian Quick Guide style for author/date. Click on the tab in the middle of the page.
