THE ATLANTIC CHARTER
AUGUST 14.1941
The President of the United States of America and the Prime Minister,
Mr. Churchill, representing His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom,
being met together, deem it right to make known certain common principles
in the national policies of their respective countries on which they base
their hopes for a better future for the world.
First, their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial or other;
Second, they desire to see no territorial changes that do not accord
with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned;
Third, they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of gov-
ernment under which they will live; and they wish to see sovereign rights
and self government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of
them;
Fourth, they will endeavor, with due respect for their existing obli-
gations, to further the enjoyment by all States, great or small, victor or
vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw mater-
ials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity;
Fifth, they desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all
nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all, impro-
ved labor standards, economic advancement and social security;
Sixth, after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to
see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwel-
ling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance
that all the men in all lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear
and want;
Seventh, such a peace should enable all men to traverse the high seas
and oceans without hindrance;
Eighth, they believe that all of the nations of the world, for real-
istic as well as spiritual reasons must come to the abandonment of the use
of force. Since no future peace can be maintained if land, sea or air arm-
aments continue to be employed by nations which threaten, or may threaten,
aggression outside of their frontiers, they believe, pending the establish-
ment of a wider and permanent system of general security, that the disarma-
ment of such nations is essential. They will likewise aid and encourage all
other practicable measure which will lighten for peace-loving peoples the
crushing burden of armaments.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Winston S. Churchill
|
