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The Senate in Foreign Policy

By Hubert H. Humphrey
July 1959
Article Summary and Author Biography

HUBERT H. HUMPHREY, United States Senator from Minnesota since 1948; member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations

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WHAT is the role of a Senator in the formulation of United States foreign policy? The answer to this question depends upon the character of the times, the issues at hand, and the Senator himself. This essay is concerned with the continuing international crisis of our times, a period for which the term "total diplomacy" was appropriately invented. The issues at stake in the present crisis are almost beyond human calculation. Will a tension-ridden coexistence be catastrophically resolved in a nuclear war? Will Western culture and values be swept under by the rising tide of Communist imperialism?

The United States Senate today is a heterogeneous body reflecting the richness and diversity of the American people. It takes all types--conservatives, liberals, dreamers and practical men--to make a functioning Senate. There is no simple formula for taking its pulse or resolving its will. Its decisions emerge from a continuous process of criticism and analysis on the one hand and the necessity for action on the other. A great nation, like a man of action, cannot tarry for perfect answers. It always has to settle for the best it can get under less than optimum circumstances.

The Founding Fathers regarded the Senate as a council of elders which would deal largely with domestic political concerns. Its unique value, said Madison, is that it proceeds "with more coolness, with more system, and with more wisdom than the popular branch." Federalist Paper No. 64 said "the Constitution provides that our negotiations for treaties shall have every advantage which can be derived from talents, information, integrity, and deliberate investigations, on the one hand, and from secrecy and despatch on the other." Integrity and deliberation were virtues associated with the Senate while dispatch and secrecy were the qualities of the Executive Branch...

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