Extracts from a letter from Joseph D. Brennan
to Conor Cruise O'Brien (Dublin)

In a note I sent you the other day¹ I may have appeared not too optimistic about the immediate future of the Resolution passed by the Foreign Affairs Committee. I would like now to supplement that note as a result of conversations which I have had with a number of our friends in the Capitol. There is no reason for pessimism. In fact, there is every reason for what I might call a guarded optimism. Indeed I am now inclined to believe that before the year is out Congress will have expressed itself in terms of the Resolution which has been voted by the Foreign Affairs Committee.

[matter omitted]

As to the method of getting the Resolution through. That is immaterial at the moment, the results are the things that matter. We now have the Foreign Affairs Committee on record as being in favour of the abolition of partition. All my contacts tell me that the prospects of getting the Resolution through the Rules Committee are good. Congressman Adolph Sabath,² Chairman of the Rules Committee, was one of the members of the Foreign Affairs Committee in 1919 which voted out the resolution in favour of the Independence of Ireland. He, I understand, knows Mr. de Valera from that period. He has always been an ardent advocate of the rights of small nations and is a powerful figure in the House of Representatives. John Fogarty has already been in touch with him and John is quite optimistic as to the future of the Resolution in the Rules Committee. He thinks that there is no doubt that when the House reconvenes in session in September or October that the Committee will vote that the Resolution be brought to the floor. Congressman John McCormack³ has sounded a warning note. He thinks it might be well not to hurry it too much so as to be sure that all our supporters will be available on the floor to push it through. There may be something in all that. The Resolution will command support not only from the Democratic side but from many on the Republican side, and I really believe that we might be guardedly optimistic.

This is a rather discursive report but I wish to give you all the details. Do you think you could arrange with some of the A[ssociated] P[ress] boys in Dublin for an interview with Dev on this? It would make a good story on this side.