BREYER, J., dissenting
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10 JAM v. INTERNATIONAL FINANCE CORP.
BREYER, J., dissenting
and other relief supplies to children freed from Nazi con-
centration camps and to others in serious need. 3 id., at
429; see generally L. Nicholas, Cruel World: The Children
of Europe in the Nazi Web 442-518 (2005).
These activities involved contracts, often made in the
United States, for transportation and for numerous com-
mercial goods. See B. Shephard, The Long Road Home:
The Aftermath of the Second World War 54, 57-58 (2012).
Indeed, the United States conditioned its participation on
UNRRA’s spending what amounted to 67% of its budget on
purchases of goods and services in the United States. Id.,
at 57-58; see also Sawyer, Achievements of UNRRA as an
International Health Organization, 37 Am. J. Pub. Health
41, 57 (1947) (describing UNRRA training programs for
foreign doctors within the United States, which presuma-
bly required entering into contracts); International Refu-
gee Org. v. Republic S. S. Corp., 189 F. 2d 858, 860 (CA4
1951) (describing successor organization’s transportation
of displaced persons, presumably also under contract).
Would Congress, believing that it had provided the abso-
lute immunity that UNRRA sought and expected, also
have intended that the statute be interpreted “dynamic-
ally,” thereby removing most of the immunity that it had
then provided—not only potentially from UNRRA itself
but also from other future international organizations
with UNRRA-like objectives and tasks?
C
This history makes clear that Congress enacted the
Immunities Act as part of an effort to encourage interna-
tional organizations to locate their headquarters and carry
on their missions in the United States. It also makes clear
that Congress intended to enact “basic legislation” that
would fulfill its broad immunity-based commitments to
the UN, UNRRA, and other nascent organizations.
S. Rep. No. 861, at 2. And those commitments, of neces-
HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_028568
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