LB2016.15.957

LB2016.15.957

Locals lining the street in Rockland, Maine to greet President Roosevelt riding in an open touring car in 1941. The photograph of the open touring car, with President Roosevelt with the straw hat, was taken in Rockland after the meeting with Winston Churchill*, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt went to take the train to Washington. Everyone went to see the President, and only knew he had met with Churchill in the North Atlantic. He gave a speech one year later to tell about the meeting. * President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, representing H.M. Government of the United Kingdom, met at sea accompanied by high ranking officers of their military, naval and air services. They agreed upon the following declaration: The President of the United States and the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, being met together, deem it right to make known certain common principles in the national policies of their countries which their hopes for a better future of the world. There were eight paragraphs describing it. That became known as the Atlantic Charter. Churchill and Roosevelt met on August 9 and 10, 1941 aboard the U.S.S. AUGUSTA in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, to discuss their respective war aims for the Second World War and to outline a postwar international system. The Charter they drafted included eight “common principles” that the United States and Great Britain would be committed to supporting in the postwar world. Both countries agreed not to seek territorial expansion; to seek the liberalization of international trade; to establish freedom of the seas, and international labor, economic, and welfare standards. Most importantly, both the United States and Great Britain were committed to supporting the restoration of self-governments for all countries that had been occupied during the war and allowing all peoples to choose their own form of government. While the meeting was successful in drafting these aims, it failed to produce the desired results for either leader. President Roosevelt had hoped that the Charter might encourage the American people to back U.S. intervention in World War II on behalf of the Allies; however, public opinion remained adamantly opposed to such a policy until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Churchill’s primary goal in attending the Atlantic Conference was “to get the Americans into the war.” Barring that, he hoped that the United States would increase its amount of military aid to Great Britain and warn Japan against taking any aggressive actions in the Pacific. While the Atlantic Charter of August 1941 was not a binding treaty, it was, nonetheless, significant for several reasons. First, it publicly affirmed the sense of solidarity between the U.S. and Great Britain against Axis aggression. Second, it laid out President Roosevelt’s Wilsonian-vision for the postwar world; one that would be characterized by freer exchanges of trade, self-determination, disarmament, and collective security. Finally, the Charter ultimately did serve as an inspiration for colonial subjects throughout the Third World, from Algeria to Vietnam, as they fought for independence. https://history.state.gov/milestones/1937-1945/atlantic-conf The president and the prime minister also agreed to compose and make public a document in which the United States and Britain declared their intention “to ensure life, liberty, independence, and religious freedom, and to preserve the rights of man and justice.” They also promised to strive for a postwar world free of “aggrandizement, territorial or other,” addressing those nations currently under German, Italian, or Japanese rule, offering hope that the integrity of their sovereign borders would be restored to them. This document would be called the Atlantic Charter and, when finally ratified by 26 nations in January 1942, would comprise the founding principles of the United Nations. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/roosevelt-and-churchill-confer-map-out-short-and-long-term-goals "270"