9th May 1950
THE SCHUMAN DECLARATION
Jean Monnet & Robert Schuman
9th May 2003
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I.
THE SCHUMAN DECLARATION:
A POLITICAL INITIATIVE WITH A SPIRITUAL VALUE
Europe at the service of peace and democracy
On 9 May 1950, Robert Schuman made history by putting to the Federal Republic
of Germany, and to the other European countries who so wished, the idea of
creating a Community of pacific interests. In so doing he extended a hand to
yesterday's enemies and erased the bitterness of war and the burden of the past. In
addition, he set in train a completely new process in international relations by
proposing to old nations to together recover, by exercising jointly their sovereignty,
the influence which each of them was incapable of exercising alone.
The construction of Europe has since then moved forward every day. It represents
the most significant undertaking of the 20th century and a new hope at the dawn of
the new century. It derives its momentum from the far-sighted and ambitious
project of the founding fathers who emerged from the second world war driven by
the resolve to establish between the peoples of Europe the conditions for a lasting
peace. This momentum is regenerated unceasingly, spurred on by the challenges
which our countries have to face up to in a world of deep-seated and relentless
change.
Could anyone have foreseen this immense desire for democracy and peace which
ultimately brought down the Berlin Wall, put the responsibility for their destinies
back into the hands of the people of central and eastern Europe and today, with the
prospect before long of further enlargement to seal the unity of the continent, gives
a new dimension to the ideal of European construction?
A historic success
As we approach the dawn of the third millennium, a look back over the 50 years of
progress towards European integration shows that the European Union is a historic
success. Countries which were hitherto enemies, and in most cases, ravaged by the
most horrific atrocities this continent has ever known, today share a common
currency, the euro, and manage their economic and commercial interests within
the framework of joint institutions.
Europeans now settle their differences through peaceful means, applying the rule
of law and seeking conciliation. The spirit of superiority and discrimination has
been banished from relationships between the Member States, which have
entrusted to the four Community institutions, the Council, the Parliament,
Commission and the Court of Justice, the responsibility for mediating their
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conflicts, for defining the general interest of Europeans and for pursuing common
policies.
People's standard of living has improved considerably, much more than would have
been possible if each national economy had not been able to benefit from the
economies of scale and the gains of growth stemming from the common market
and intensification of trade.
People are free to move and students to work within a frontier-free internal area.
The foundations of common foreign and defence policies have been laid, and moves
are already afoot to take common policies of solidarity further in the social,
regional and environmental fields, as well as in the fields of research and transport.
The European Community derives its strength from common values of democracy
and human rights, which rally its peoples, and it has preserved the diversity of
cultures and languages and the traditions which make it what it is.
The European Community stands as a beacon for the expectations of countries near
and far which watch the Union's progress with interest as they seek to consolidate
their re-emerging democracies or rebuild a ruined economy.
From I May 2004, the Union will have 25 Member. Other countries of former
Yugoslavia, or which belong to the European sphere, are in turn asking to join. For
the first time in its long history, the continent is preparing to become reunified in
peace and freedom.
Such developments are momentous in terms of world balance and will have a huge
impact on Europe's relations with the United States, Russia, Asia and Latin
America. Even now Europe is no longer merely a power which has retained its
place in the world. It is a reference point and a hope for peoples attached to peace
and the respect of human rights.
What explains such a great success? Is it lastingly etched in the continent's history,
sufficiently rooted in the collective memory and resolve for the seeds of any intraEuropean war to have been eradicated?
The tragic events of the past and the conflicts which still today undermine the
planet should prompt Europeans not to sit back and take lasting peace for granted.
The challenges of the future
After a half century of Community history, Europeans still have a lot of soulsearching to do: what are the elementary values to which they are attached, and
what are the best ways of safeguarding them? How far could and should union be
taken in order to maximise the strength which derives from unity, without at the
same time eroding identity and destroying the individual ethos which makes the
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richness of our nations, regions and cultures? Can we move forward in step, thanks
to the natural harmony which favours consensus between 25 countries, or should
we recognise divergences of approach and differentiate our pace of integration?
What are the limits of Community Europe, at a time when so many nations are
asking to join the process of unification in progress? How can we get everyone
involved in the Community undertaking and give them the feeling of a European
identity which complements and goes beyond fundamental solidarity? How can we
get every European citizen closer to the institutions of the Union, and give everyone
a chance to embrace the project of a unified Europe which was long the preserve of
the deliberations of diplomats and the expertise of civil servants?
The topicality of the Community method
Since 2002, the Convention on the Future of Europe has been drafting a
Constitution for the Union. Hopes are running at the same level as the ambitions
and challenges involved, but the risks of failure are still very much there.
Europe merely as a free trade area or Europe as a world-level player? A
technocratic Europe or a democratic Europe? An 'every man for himself' Europe or
a caring Europe?
Faced with so many critical choices, so many uncertainties, the Community method
which stems from the dialogue established between the Member States and the
common institutions exercising together delegated sovereignty is as topical as ever.
This is what made it possible, 50 years ago, to set up the European Community.
The founding principles of the European edifice are not simply a matter of
institutional mechanics. The Community spirit was invented and carried forward
by statesmen who wanted first and foremost to construct a Europe at the service of
people and makes the European idea a project for civilisation. The Schuman
declaration remains very much 'a new idea for Europe'.
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II.
THE SCHUMAN DECLARATION:
THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
The respite which should have followed the cessation of hostilities did not
materialise for the people of Europe. No sooner had the Second World War ended
than the threat of a third between East and West loomed up very quickly. The
breakdown on 24 April 1947 of the Moscow conference on the German issue
convinced the West that the Soviet Union, an ally in the fight against the Nazis, was
about to become the source of an immediate threat to western democracies. The
creation in October 1947 of the Kominform establishing a coalition of the world's
communist parties, the 'Prague coup' of 25 February 1948 guaranteeing
domination for the communists in Czechoslovakia, then the Berlin blockade in
June 1948 which heralded the division of Germany into two countries, further
heightened tension. By signing the Atlantic Pact with the United States on 4 April
1949, western Europe laid the basis of its collective security. However, the
explosion of the first Soviet atomic bomb in September 1949 and the proliferation
of threats from the Kremlin leaders contributed to spreading this climate of fear
which came to be known as the cold war.
The status of the Federal Republic of Germany, which itself directed its own
internal policy since the promulgation of the fundamental law of 23 May 1949, then
became a focal point of East-West rivalry. The United States wanted to step up the
economic recovery of a country at the heart of the division of the continent and
already in Washington there was a call in some quarters for the defeated power to
be re-armed. French diplomacy was torn by a dilemma. Either it yielded to
American pressure and, in the face of public opinion, agreed to the reconstitution
of the German power on the Ruhr and the Saar; or else it stood firm against its
main ally and took its relationship with Bonn into an impasse.
In spring 1950 came the hour of truth. Robert Schuman, French Foreign Affairs
Minister, had been entrusted by his American and British counterparts with a vital
mission, namely to make a proposal to bring Federal Germany back into the
western fold. A meeting between the three governments was scheduled for 10 May
1950 and France could not evade its responsibilities.
On top of the political deadlock came economic problems. Steelmaking capacity in
the various European countries seemed set to create a crisis of overproduction.
Demand was dwindling, prices were falling and the signs were that producers,
faithful to the traditions of the forgemasters of the inter-war period, would
reconstitute a cartel in order to restrict competition. In the midst of the
reconstruction phase, the European economies could not stand by and leave their
basic industries to speculation or organised shortages.
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Jean Monnet's ideas
In order to unravel this web of difficulties where traditional diplomacy was proving
powerless, Robert Schuman called upon the inventive genious of a man as yet
unknown to the general public but who had acquired exceptional experience during
a very long and eventful international career. Jean Monnet, at the time responsible
for the French modernisation plan and appointed by Charles de Gaulle in 1945 to
put the country back on its economic feet, was one of the most influential
Europeans in the western world.
Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman
During the First World War, he had organised the joint supply structures for the
Allied Forces. Deputy Secretary-General of the League of Nations, banker in the
United States, western Europe and China, he was one of President Roosevelt's close
advisers and the architect of the Victory programme which ensured America's
military superiority over the Axis forces. Unfettered by any political mandate, he
advised governments and had acquired the reputation of being a pragmatist whose
prime concern was effectiveness.
The French Minister had approached Jean Monnet with his concerns. The question
'What to do about Germany?' was an obsession for Robert Schuman, a native of
Lorraine and a Christian moved by the resolve to do something so that any
possibility of further war between the two countries could be averted once and for
all.
At the head of a small team in rue de Martignac, headquarters of the Commissariat
au plan, Jean Monnet was himself committed to this quest for a solution. His main
concern was international politics. He felt that the cold war was the consequence of
competition between the two big powers in Europe and a divided Europe was a
source of major concern. Fostering unity in Europe would reduce tension. He
pondered the merits of an international-level initiative mainly designed to
decompress the situation and establish world peace through a real role played by a
reborn, reconciled Europe.
Jean Monnet had watched the various unsuccessful attempts to move towards
integration which had followed in the wake of the solemn plea, launched at the
congress organised by the European movement in The Hague in 1948, for the
union of the continent.
The European Organisation for Economic Cooperation, set up in 1948, had a purely
coordinative mission and had been powerless to prevent the economic recovery of
European countries coming about in a strictly national framework. The creation of
the Council of Europe on 5 May 1949 showed that governments were not prepared
to surrender their prerogatives. The advisory body had only deliberative powers
and each of its resolutions, which had to be approved by a two-thirds majority,
could be vetoed by the ministerial committee.
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Jean Monnet had understood that any attempt to introduce a comprehensive
institutional structure in one go would bring a huge outcry from the different
countries and was doomed to failure. It was too early yet to envisage wholesale
transfers of sovereignty. The war was too recent an experience in people's minds
and national feelings were still running very high.
Success depended on limiting objectives to specific areas, with a major
psychological impact, and introducing a joint decision-making mechanism which
would gradually be given additional responsibilities.
The declaration of 9 May 1950
Jean Monnet and his co-workers during the close of April 1950 drafted a note of a
few pages setting out both the rationale behind, and the steps envisaged in, a
proposal which was going to radically shake up traditional diplomacy. As he set
about his task, instead of the customary consultations of the responsible ministerial
departments, Jean Monnet on the contrary maintained the utmost discretion in
order to avoid the inevitable objections or counterproposals which would have
detracted from the revolutionary nature of the project and removed the advantage
of surprise. When he handed over his document to Bernard Clappier, director of
Robert Schuman's private office, Jean Monnet knew that the minister's decision
could alter the course of events. So when, upon his return from a weekend in his
native Lorraine, Robert Schuman told his colleagues: 'I've read this proposal. I'll
use it', the initiative had entered the political arena. At the same time as the French
Minister was defending his proposal on the morning of 9 May, in front of his
government colleagues, a messenger from his private office delivered it personally
to Chancellor Adenauer in Bonn. The latter's reaction was immediate and
enthusiastic. He immediately replied that he was wholeheartedly behind the
proposal.
So, backed by the agreement of both the French and the German Governments,
Robert Schuman made his declaration public at a press conference held at 4 p.m. in
the salon de l'Horloge at the Quai d'Orsay. He preceded his declaration with a few
introductory sentences: 'It is no longer a time for vain words, but for a bold,
constructive act. France has acted, and the consequences of her action may be
immense. We hope they will. She has acted essentially in the cause of peace. For
peace to have a chance, there must first be a Europe. Nearly five years to the day
after the unconditional surrender of Germany, France is now taking the first
decisive step towards the construction of Europe and is associating Germany in
this venture. It is something which must completely change things in Europe and
permit other joint actions which were hitherto impossible. Out of all this will come
forth Europe, a solid and united Europe. A Europe in which the standard of living
will rise thanks to the grouping of production and the expansion of markets,
which will bring down prices ...'
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The scene was thus set. This was no new technical arrangement subject to fierce
bargaining. France extended a hand to Germany, proposing that it take part on an
equal footing in a new entity, first to manage jointly coal and steel in the two
countries, but also on a broader level to lay the first stone of the European
federation.
The declaration puts forward a number of principles:
- Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan. It will be built
through practical achievements which will first create real solidarity;
- the age-old enmity between France and Germany must be eliminated; any action
taken must in the first place concern these two countries, but it is open to any other
European nations which share the aims;
- action must be taken immediately on one limited but decisive point: FrancoGerman production of coal and steel must be placed under a common High
Authority;
- the fusion of these economic interests will help to raise the standard of living and
establish a European Community;
- the decisions of the High Authority will be binding on the member countries. The
High Authority itself will be composed of independent persons and have equal
representation. The authority's decisions will be enforceable.
The preparation of the ECSC Treaty
Swift action was needed for the French initiative, which quickly became a FrancoGerman initiative, to retain its chances of becoming reality. On 20 June 1950,
France convened an intergovernmental conference in Paris, chaired by Jean
Monnet. The three Benelux countries and Italy answered the call and were at the
negotiating table. Jean Monnet circumscribed the spirit of the discussions which
were about to open: 'We are here to undertake a common task - not to negotiate
for our own national advantage, but to seek it to the advantage of all. Only if we
eliminate from our debates any particularist feelings shall we reach a solution. In
so far as we, gathered here, can change our methods, the attitude of all
Europeans will likewise gradually change' 1.
The discussions were an opportunity to clarify the type of international edifice
envisaged. The independence and the powers of the High Authority were never
questioned, for they constituted the central point of the proposal. At the request of
the Netherlands, the Council of Ministers, representing the Member States and
which was to give its assent in certain cases, was set up. A Parliamentary Assembly
1
Jean Monnet, Memoirs, (trad. R. Mayne): London, etc., William Collins and Son Ltd, 1976, p. 323.
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and a Court of Justice were to round off the structure which underpins the
institutional system of the current Communities.
The negotiators never lost sight of the fact that they had the political mandate to
construct an organisation which was totally new with regard to its objectives and
methods. It was essential for the emerging institution to avoid all the shortcomings
peculiar to the traditional intergovernmental organisations: the requirement of
unanimity for national financial contributions, and subordination of the executive
to the representatives of the national States.
On 18 April 1951, the Treaty establishing the Coal and Steel Community was signed
for a period of 50 years. It was ratified by the six signatory countries and on 10
August 1952 the High Authority, chaired by Jean Monnet, took up its seat in
Luxembourg.
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III. THE SCHUMAN PLAN:
THE BIRTH OF COMMUNITY EUROPE
'The Schuman proposals are revolutionary or they are nothing. The indispensable
first principle of these proposals is the abnegation of sovereignty in a limited but
decisive field. A plan which is not based on this principle can make no useful
contribution to the solution of the major problems which undermine our existence.
Cooperation between nations, while essential, cannot alone meet our problem.
What must be sought is a fusion of the interests of the European peoples and not
merely another effort to maintain the equilibrium of those interests ...'
Jean Monnet
The innovatory principles of the first European Community
The reason it took nearly a year to conclude the negotiations of the Treaty of Paris
was that these negotiations gave rise to a series of fundamental questions to which
Jean Monnet wished to provide the most appropriate answers. As we have seen,
this was no traditional diplomatic negotiation. The persons designated by the six
governments had come together to invent a totally new - and lasting - legal and
political system.
The preamble to the ECSC Treaty, comprising five short paragraphs, contains the
whole philosophy which was to be the leitmotif of the promoters of European
construction:
- 'Considering that world peace can be safeguarded only by creative efforts
commensurate with the dangers that threaten it;
- convinced that the contribution which an organised and vital Europe can make to
civilisation is indispensable to the maintenance of peaceful relations;
- recognising that Europe can be built only through practical achievements which
will first of all create real solidarity, and through the establishment of common
bases for economic development;
- anxious to help, by expanding their basic production, to raise the standard of
living and further the works of peace;
- resolved to substitute for age-old rivalries the merging of their essential interests;
to create, by establishing an economic community, the basis for a broader and
deeper community among peoples long divided by bloody conflicts; and to lay the
foundations for institutions which will give direction to a destiny henceforward
shared'.
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'World peace', 'practical achievements', 'real solidarity', 'merging of essential
interests', 'community', 'destiny henceforward shared': these are all key words
which are the embryonic form of both the spirit and the Community method and
still today retain their rallying potential.
While the prime objective of the ECSC Treaty, i.e. the management of the coal and
steel market, today no longer has the same importance as before, for the European
economy of the 1950s, the institutional principles which it laid down are still very
much topical. They started a momentum of which we are still reaping the benefits
and which fuels a political vision which we must be careful not to depart from if we
are not to call into question our precious 'acquis communautaire'.
Stemming from the Schuman plan, four Community principles can be identified as
forming the basis of the current Community edifice.
The overarching role of the institutions
The application to international relations of the principles of equality, arbitration
and conciliation which are in force within democracies is progress for civilisation.
The founding fathers had experienced the chaos, violence and the arbitrary which
are the companions of war. Their entire endeavour was geared at creating a
community in which right prevailed over might. Jean Monnet often quoted the
Swiss philosopher Amiel: 'Every man's experience is a new start. Only institutions
become wiser: they amass the collective experience and thanks to this experience
and this wisdom, the nature of men subordinated to the same rules will not
change, but their behaviour gradually will.'
To place relations between countries on a pacific and democratic footing, casting
out the spirit of domination and nationalism, these were the deep-seated
motivations which gave the first Community its political content and placed it
amongst the major historic achievements.
The independence of the Community bodies
If institutions are to fulfil their functions they must have their own authority.
Today's Community institutions still benefit from the three guarantees which were
given to the ECSC High Authority:
 the appointment of members, today commissioners, by joint agreement between
the governments2. These are not national delegates, but personalities exercising
their power collegially and who may not receive instructions from the Member
States. The European civil service is subordinated to this same and unique
Community allegiance;
The European Commission is also subordinated to the vote of investiture by the European
Parliament.
2
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 financial independence through the levying of own resources and not, as is the
case of international organisations, by the payment of national contributions which
means they can be called into question;
 the responsibility of the High Authority, and today that of the Commission,
exclusively to the Assembly (today the European Parliament), which can cast, by a
qualified majority vote, a vote of censure.
Cooperation between the institutions
For Jean Monnet, the independence of the High Authority was the cornerstone of
the new system. However, as the negotiations continued, he acknowledged the
need to give the Member States the opportunity to assert their national interests.
This was the safest way of preventing the emerging community from being limited
to excessively technical objectives, for it needed to be also able to intervene in
sectors in which macroeconomic decisions would be taken and these were a matter
for the governments. Hence the creation, alongside the High Authority, of our
Council of Ministers the role of which was strictly limited in that it was not called
upon to decide unanimously but by majority. Its assent was required only in
limited cases. The High Authority retained the monopoly of legislative initiative, a
prerogative which, extended to the competences of the present Commission, is
essential in that it is the guarantee that all Community interests will be defended in
a proposal from the college. From 1951 on, dialogue was organised between the
four institutions on a basis not of subordination but of cooperation, each institution
exercising its own functions within a comprehensive decision-making system of a
pre-federal type.
Equality between Member States
As the principle of representation of States within the Council had been selected,
there remained the delicate matter of their respective weighting. The Benelux
countries and Italy, fearing that they would be placed in a minority situation on
account of the proportion of their production of coal and steel in relation to total
production, argued in favour of the rule of unanimity. Germany, on the other hand,
advocated a system of representation proportional to production, a proposal which
of course could hardly allay partners' misgivings, quite the opposite.
Jean Monnet was convinced that only the principle of equality between countries
could produce a new mentality. However, he was aware of how difficult it was to get
six countries of unequal dimensions to forego the option of a veto. For the big
countries in their relations with one another and for the smaller countries in their
relations with the bigger countries '... Their innermost security lay in their power to
say No, which is the privilege of national sovereignty' 3. The chairman of the
3
Jean Monnet, op. cit., pp. 330 et seq.
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conference accordingly met Chancellor Adenauer in Bonn on 4 April 1951 to
convince him of the virtues of the principle of equality:
'I have been authorised to propose to you that relations between France and
Germany in the European Community be based on the principle of equality in the
Council, the Assembly and all future or existing institutions ... Let me add that this
is how I have always envisaged the offer of union which was the starting point of
the present Treaty; and I think I am right in saying this is how you envisaged it
from the moment we first met. The spirit of discrimination has been the cause of
the world's greatest ills, and the Community is an attempt to overcome it'.
The Chancellor replied immediately:
'You know how much I am attached to equality of rights for my country in the
future, and how much I deplore the attempts at domination in which it has been
involved in the past. I am happy to pledge my full support for your proposal. I
cannot conceive of a Community based on anything but complete equality'.
Thus was laid one of the legal and moral foundations which gives the notion of
Community its full meaning.
The ECSC, the first stone in the European edifice
In the absence of a peace treaty between the former warring sides, the first
European Community was both an act of confidence in the resolve of France and
Germany and their partners to sublimate the mistakes of the past and perform an
act of faith in a common future of progress. Despite the ups and downs of history
and of nationalist opposition, the process began in 1950 was never to stop.
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IV. THE IDEAS OF JEAN MONNET AND ROBERT
SCHUMAN
QUOTATIONS: JEAN MONNET
EQUALITY/NON DISCRIMINATION
'The fault layed in the Treay of Versailles: it was based on
discrimination. From the moment I first began to be concerned with
public affairs I have always realized that equality is absolutely
essential in relations between nations, as it is between people. A peace
based on inequality could have no good results.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Dubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 4, p. 97, 2nd
paragraph.
'If the countries of Europe once more protect themselves against
each other, it will once more be necessary to build up vast armies.
Some countries, under the future peace treaty, will be able to do so; to
others it will forbidden. We experienced such discrimination in 1919;
we know the results. Alliances will be concluded between European
countries, we know how much they are worth. [...] Europe will be
reborn yet again under the shadow of fear.
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 9 p. 222, 2nd
paragraph.
'Peace can be founded only on equality. We failed in 1919
because we introduced discrimination and a sense of superiority.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 11 p. 284, 2nd
paragraph. Meeting with R.Schuman.
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'A solution which would put French industry on the same footing
as German industry, while freeing the latter from the discrimination
born of defeat would restore the economic and political preconditions
for the mutual understanding so vital to Europe. It could, in fact,
become the germ of European unity.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12 p. 292293, last paragraph.
'If the problem of sovereignty were approached with no desire to
dominate or to take revenge, if on the contrary the victors and the
vanquished agreed to exercise joint sovereignty over part of their joint
resources, then, a solid link would be forged between them, the way
would be wide open for further collective action, and a great example
would be given to the other nations of Europe.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12 p. 293,
2nd paragraph.
'The spirit of domination has been the cause of the world's
greatest ills, and the Community is an attempt to overcome it.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday&Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 14 p. 354,
3rd paragraph. Meeting with K.Adenauer, April, 4 1951.
'It cannot all be done at once: it is gradually that we shall
achieve this organization. But already it is essential to make a start. It
is not a question of solving political problems which, as in the past,
divide the forces that seek domination or superiority. Its is a question
of inducing civilization to make fresher progress, by beginning to
change the form of the relationship between countries and applying
the principle of equality between peoples and between countries.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 20 p. 487,
3rd paragraph. Notes, August, 22 1966.
‘To start unifying Europe five years after the last war, it was
essential for everyone to understand that there were no longer the
victors and the defeated, but only equal partners under a common
law.’
Source: ‘Europe-America: a necessary partnership for peace’ Speech by Jean Monnet at the award ceremony for the
‘Freedom prize’, New York, 23 January 1963. Centre for European Research, Lausanne, April 1963
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‘The common market was not set up simply to establish a better
system of trade in goods, nor to create a new power. Our main
objective was, and still is, to create a unified Europe and remove the
spirit of domination from relations between countries and their
peoples, which has several times brought the world close to
destruction.’
Source: ‘Europe-America: a necessary partnership for peace’ Speech by Jean Monnet at the award ceremony for the ‘Freedom
prize’, New York, 23 January 1963. Centre for European Research, Lausanne, April 1963
PEACE
'There will be no peace in Europe if States re-establish
themselves on the basis of national sovereignty, with that this implies
by way of prestige policies and economic protectionism.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 9, p. 222,
2nd paragraph. Note written for the Committee of National Liberation in Algiers on August 5, 1943.
'Coal and steel were at once the key to economic power and the
raw materials for forging weapons of war. This double role gave them
immense symbolic significance, now largely forgotten, but
comparable at the time to that of nuclear energy today. To pool them
across frontiers would reduce their malign prestige and turn them
instead into a guarantee of peace.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12 p. 293,
3rd paragraph.
'The best contribution one can make to civilization is to allow
men to develop their potential within communities freely chosen and
built'.
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 14, p. 356,
4th paragraph
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'Like all political systems, the Community cannot prevent
problems arising; but it offers a framework and a means for solving
them peacefully. This is a fundamental change by comparison with
the past - the very recent past.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 390,
1st paragraph.
‘Today, peace is not only a matter of treaties or commitments. It
depends essentially on creating conditions which, though they may
not change human nature, guide people’s behaviour towards each
other in a peaceful direction. This is one of the essential consequences
of the transformation of Europe which is our Community’s aim. By
achieving unity, by restoring vitality to Europe, by creating new
conditions which will last, the Europeans are contributing to peace.’
Source: Jean Monnet, ‘Pointers for a method, thoughts on the construction of Europe’, Fayard 1996, p. 106. Speech,
Washington, 30 April 1952
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‘Making Europe is making peace.’
Source: Jean Monnet, ‘Pointers for a method, thoughts on the construction of Europe’, Fayard 1996, p. 108. Speech, Aix-laChapelle, 17 May 1953
‘The United States of Europe are not only the great hope but also
the urgent need of our era, because they will bring about the full
development of each of our peoples and the consolidation of peace.’
Source: Jean Monnet, ‘Pointers for a method, thoughts on the construction of Europe’, Fayard 1996, p. 108.
WORKING FOR MANKIND
-
'We are not forming coalitions between States, but union among
people.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Introduction.
18
'The countries of Europe are too small to give their peoples the
prosperity that is now attainable and therefore necessary. They need
wider markets... To enjoy the prosperity and social pogress that are
essential, the States of Europe must form a federation or a 'European
entity' which will make them a single economic unit.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 9, p. 222,
2nd paragraph.
'We want to put Franco-German relations on an entirely new
footing. We want to turn what divided France from Germany, that is
the industries of war, into a common asset, which will also be
European. In this way, Europe will rediscover the leading role which
she used to play in the wold and which she lost because she was
divided. Europe's unity will not put an end to her diversity, quite the
reverse. That rich diversity will benefit civilization and influence the
evolution of powers like America itself.
The aim of the French proposal, tehrefore, is essentially political. It
even has an aspect which might be called moral.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12, p. 309310, last paragraph. Meeting with K.Adenauer, 1950.
'Men who are placed in new practical circumstances, or
subjected to a new set of obligations, adapt their behaviour and
become different. If the new context is better, they themselves become
better: that is the whole rationale of the European Community, and
the process of civilization itself.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 389390, last paragraph.
'Major psychological changes, which some seek through violent
revolution, can be achieved very peacefully if men's minds can be
directed towards the point where their interests converge. That point
always exists: but it takes trouble to find it.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 392,
1st paragraph.
19
'Our Community is not a coal and steel poducers' association: it
is the beginning of Europe. The beginning of Europe was a political
conception; but even more, it was a moral idea.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 392,
1st and 2nd paragraphs.
'When I think that Frenchmen, Germans, Belgians, Dutchmen,
Italians, and Luxembourgers are obeying the same rules and, by
doing so, are now seeing their common problems in the same light;
when i reflect that this will fundamentally change their behaviour one
to another - then I tell myself that definitive pogress is being made in
relations among the countries and people of Europe.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 393,
2nd paragraph. Speech at the Assembly of the ECSC, 1954.
'Our countries have become too small for the present-day world,
for the scale of modern technology and of America and Russia today,
or China and India tomorrow. The union of European peoples in the
United States of Europe is the way to raise their standard of living and
preserve peace. It is the great hope and opportunity of our time.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 399400, last paragraph. Meeting with the members of the High Authority of the ECSC on November, 9 1954.
'It must be understood that the Common Market is a process of
change - not only economic change, but psychological change as well.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 18, p. 460,
1st paragraph. Meeting with a newspaperman, July 1963.
'What we had achieved in Europe, against all expectations,
ought equally to be possible wherever men were still thinking in terms
of domination and hoping to settle their dispute by force. I was
convinced that the union of Europe was not only important for the
Europeans themselves: it was valuable as an example for others, and
this was a further reason for bringing it about.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 21, p. 511,
1st paragraph.
20
‘The greatest danger that Europe runs is the impoverishment of
the individual, through being unable to apply to his daily life and his
security the means that progress would allow him to apply. If he
cannot do so, it is because the conditions under which we live, the
conditions in which the countries of Europe live, prevent him.’
Source: Jean Monnet, ‘Pointers for a method, thoughts on the construction of Europe’, Fayard 1996, pp. 82-83
INSTITUTIONS/SUPRANATIONALITY/GENERAL INTEREST
'All too often I have come up against the limits of mere coordination: it makes for discussion, but not decision. In circumstances
where union is necessary, it fails to change relations between men and
between countries. It is the expression of national power, not a means
of transforming it: that way, unity will never be achieved.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 1, p. 35, 1st
paragraph.
'Co-operation between nations will grow from their getting to
know each other better, and from interpenatration between their
constituent elements and those of their neighbours. It is therefore
important to make both Goverments and peoples know each other
better, so that they come to see the poblems that face them not from
the viewpoint of their own interests, but in the light of the general
interest. Without a doubt, the selfishness of men and of nations is most
often caused by inadequate understanding of the problem in hand,
each tending to see only that aspect of it which affects his immediate
interests.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 4, p.83,
3rd paragraph.
'Bringing Governments together, getting national officials to cooperate, is well-intentionned enough; but the method breaks down as
soon as national interests conflict, unless there is an independent
political body that can take a common view of the problem and arrive
at a common decision.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 4, p. 87, 1st
paragraph.
21
'The veto was at once the cause and the symbol of this inability
to go beyond national self-interest. But it was no more than the
expression of much deeper deadlocks, often unacknowledged.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 4, p. 97,
2nd paragraph.
'It would be a mistake to ask more than that of a system which
entailed no delegation of sovereignty. Very soon, OEEC had become
simply technical machinery; but it outlived the Marshall Plan because
it provided a mass of information which everyone found useful. I
realized that neither this organization, with its headquarters at the
Château de la Muette in Paris, nor the parlimentary meetings in
Strasbourg that resulted from the Hague Congress, would ever give
concrete expression to European unity. Amid these vast groupings of
countries, the common interest was too indistinct, and common
disciplines were too lax. A start would have to be made by doing
something both more practical and more ambitious. National
sovereignty would have to be tackled more boldly and on a narrower
front.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 11, p. 273274.
'I had already learned this from my experience at the League of
Nations; but apparently no one remembered the vetos that had
blocked all our efforts to find peaceful solutions to the conflicts set off
by Japan, Italy, and Germany. The United Nations Organization had
the same inbuilt flaw, and so had the Council of Europe. [...] The
international assemblies gave themselves the appearance of
democratic bodies, publicly expressing their people's will: what was
less obvious was that even their unanimous resolutions were nullified,
behind their backs, by a Committee or Council of Government
representatives, any one of whom could prevent all the others from
acting as they wished.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 11, p. 281,
3rd paragraph
'Nothing is possible without men: nothing is lasting without
institutions.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12, p. 304305.
22
'The Schuman proposals are revolutionary or they are nothing.
Co-operation between nations, while essential, cannot alone meet our
problem. What must be sought is a fusion of the interests of the
European peoples and not merely another affort to maintain an
equilibrium of those interests through additional machinery for
negotiation.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 12, p. 316,
1st paragraph.
'Since these institutions were set up, the Europe we want to
bequeath to our children has begun to be a living reality.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 383,
3rd paragraph.
'Europe, that is, would be built by the same process as each of
our national States by establishing among nations a new relationship
comparable to that which exists among the citizens of any democratic
country: equality, oganized by common institutions.' [...]'The union of
Europe cannot be based on goodwill alone. Rules are needed. The
tragic events we have lived through and are still witnessing may have
made us wiser. But men pass away; others will take our place. We
cannot bequeath them our personal experience. That will die with us.
But we can leave them institutions. The life of institutions is longer
than that of men: if they are well built, they can accumulate and hand
on the wisdom of succeeding generations.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 15, p. 383384, last paragraph. Speech at the Assembly of the ESCC, 1952.
'If Europe has been pulled in many different directions by people
with contrasting ideas of her destiny, I regard that as a great waste of
time and effort, but no denial of the need to unite. It was simply that
ideas and methods differed; and as always, reality had the last word.
Today, I believe, reality is having the last word again - and it closely
ressembles the first, written in 1950. What it spells is the delegation of
sovereignty and the joint exercice of the new and larger sovereignty
thus created. I cannot see that in twenty-five years anything else has
been invented as a means of uniting Europe, despite all the
temptations to desert that path.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 17, p. 432,
1st paragraph.
23
'The search for common interest, [...] by no means excludes
taking account of the other's point of view; but it must no turn into
haggling. We held fast to our method, which consists in determining
what is good for all the Community countries as a whole, then taking
the measure of the particular efforts which will have to make - but
without vainly seeking, as in the past, a meticulous balance of
advantage.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 17, p. 435,
2nd paragraph.
'There's a fundamental difference between the Community,
which is a way of uniting peoples, and the Free Trade Area, which is
symply a commercial arrangement. Our institutions take an overall
view and propose common policies; the Free Trade Area poject is an
attempt to solve particular poblems without putting them in the
context of colective action.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 18, p. 449,
2nd paragraph. Meeting with L.Herhard, January 1969.
'To persuade people to talk together is the most one can do to
serve the cause of peace. But for this a number of conditions must be
fulfilled, all equally important. One is that the talks be conducted in a
spirit of equality, and that no one should come to the table with the
desire to score off somebody else. That means abandoning the
supposed privileges of sovereignty and the sharp weapon of veto. The
second condition is that everyone should talk about the same thing;
the third, finally, is that everyone should seek the interest which is
common to them all. This method does not come naturally to people
who meet to deal with poblems that have arisen precisely because of
the conflicting interests of nation-States. They have to be induced to
understand the method and apply it. Experience has taught me that
for this purpose goodwill is not enough, and that a certain moral
power has to be imposed on everyone - the power of rules laid down
by common institutions which are greater than individuals and are
respected by States. Those institutions are designed to promote unity complete unity where there is likness, and harmony where differences
still exist.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part Two, Chapter 19, p. 474475, last paragraph.
24
SOLIDARITY
'Even where solidarity is obviously essential, it still does not
come naturally. It needs organization. That organiszation is never
complete.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 7, p.176,
last paragraph.
MUTUAL CONFIDENCE
[Mutual confidence] 'grows up naturally between men who take
a common view of the problem to be solved. When the problem
becomes the same for everyone, and they all have the same concern to
solve it, then differences and suspicions disappear, and friendship
very often takes their places.'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978. Part One, Chapter 3, p.76,
last paragraph
25
QUOTATIONS: ROBERT SCHUMAN
FRATERNITY
'For many years we have suffered from an ideological
demarcation line which is splitting Europe apart. It was imposed by
violence. Let it be wiped out in freedom!'
[...]
'We consider all those who wish to join us in our re-formed
community to be an integral part of this living entity of Europe. We
pay homage to their courage and loyalty and also to their suffering
and sacrifices. We owe them the example of a united and fraternal
Europe.'
[...]
'The European community must create an atmosphere of mutual
understanding which respects the particular characteristics of each
party; it will form the solid basis of a fruitful and peaceful cooperation. In this way a new, prosperous and independent Europe
will come about. Our duty is to be ready for it.'
Source: Robert Schuman Revue France-Forum No. 52, November 1963.
'It is no longer possible for any thinking European to take a
Machiavellian pleasure in the misfortunes of his neighbour; we are all
united, for better or for worse, in a community of destiny.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 43.
26
SOLIDARITY
'Over and above the institutions, and reflecting a deeply held
aspiration in our peoples, the European idea, the spirit of solidarity
and community, has taken root.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 16-17.
'Our borders in Europe must become much less of a barrier to
the exchange of ideas, persons and goods. A sense of solidarity among
nations will triumph over outmoded forms of nationalism.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe'. [For Europe] Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 23.
'This Europe is not directed against anyone; it has no designs of
aggression, no egotistical or imperialist nature, either internally or
with regard to other countries. It will remain accessible to those
wishing to join.
Its raison d’être is solidarity and international cooperation, a rational
organisation of the world of which it must form an essential part.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 25.
'It is necessary for everyone to share this conviction of needing
one another, regardless of the status and power we possess.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 26-27.
'After two world wars we have come to realise that the best
guarantee for nations no longer lies in our splendid isolation, nor in
our own strength, no matter how powerful we are, but in solidarity
between nations, guided by the same spirit and ready to carry out
common tasks, in the common interest.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 30.
[Borders] 'retain their raison d'être if they are capable of
changing their role to become more of a mental construct. Instead of
27
being barriers which separate they must become contact points where
material and cultural exchanges are organised and developed; they
will define the particular tasks for each country, its particular
responsibilities and initiatives, when faced with all the problems
affecting borders and even continents, so enabling all countries to
show solidarity towards each other.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 34.
'Over and above being a military or economic alliance, Europe
must be a cultural community in the highest sense.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 35.
'We do not, nor shall we ever deny our country or forget the
duties which we owe it. But above each homeland we recognise with
increasing clarity the existence of a common good, superior to the
national interest, a good in which the individual interests of our
countries will meet and merge.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 38.
'The law of solidarity between nations imposes itself on
contemporary consciousness. We feel solidarity towards one a nother
in our keeping of the peace, our defence against aggression, the fight
against poverty, our respect for the treaties and in safeguarding
justice and human dignity.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 38.
'We must bring people to accept European solutions, by fighting
against not only any pretensions to hegemony or belief in superiority
but also against any narrow-mindedness in political nationalism, any
autarchic protectionism or cultural isolationism. All these tendencies
which we have inherited from our past must be replaced by the
concept of solidarity – a conviction that our real interest consists in
each of us recognising and accepting that in practice we are all
interdependent. Egotism will longer reward us.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 47.
28
'The surest way of protecting ourselves from the hazards of war
and servitude is our collective cohesion in all matters economic,
political and military. The close cooperation which will be established
within the European communities which have already been created
will encourage us to consider everything in terms of shared interest
and responsibility. We will become accustomed to taking not only a
strictly national point of view. [...] It will be necessary to begin with
the national line but then place it within a framework in which all the
national view-points will complement and perfect each other.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 149.
'Europeans will be saved to the extent that they are aware of
their solidarity before a mutual threat.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 184.
'A real community assumes, at the least, a number of particular
affinities. Countries do not join together unless they feel they have
something in common and that must be, at the least, mutual trust.
Likewise there must also be shared interests, without which there
would be coexistence but not co-operation. In order to understand
each other and build a close union, it is not necessary to give up our
differences completely, but we must be sure that there are enough
common links and ideas. Serving mankind is a duty demanded of us
equal to that of national loyalty'.
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 196.
'Europe will not happen overnight, or as part of some grand
design; it will come about in practical steps, building on a sense of
common purpose.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. Appendix: The Declaration of 9 May
1950.
29
EQUALITY
'Europe will not be a sphere of influence to be exploited for the
purposes of political, military, economic or any other type of
domination. But in order to exist in reality it must be governed by the
principle of equal rights and duties for all the countries involved.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 24-25.
'The European Community will not be made in the image of an
empire or a holy alliance; it will be based on democratic equality,
transposed to the arena of international relations.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 47.
'We cannot pretend that European integration is not an
immense and arduous task, or that it has ever been attempted b efore.
It requires a complete change in the relationships between European
states, in particular between France and Germany. But this task is
being undertaken together, on an absolutely equal basis, in mutual
respect and trust, after a generation’s experience of intense suffering
and hatred.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 106.
'It was up to her [France] to take the initiative and show a
readiness to trust its neighbour, not by a platonic or conditional
declaration but by the explicit offer of permanent cooperation in an
area of such vital importance. In other words, France was proposing
to deal with Germany on an equal footing.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 106-107.
30
PEACE
'Europe’s strength is its ability to contribute effectively and
without delay, to the needs of mankind, in response to new
aspirations among its nations. It is an enterprise for peace.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 25-26.
'War and its devastation, like the victory which brought
liberation, have been collective enterprises. If we wish peace to be a
lasting victory over war, it must be achieved together by all the
nations, including those which yesterday were fighting each other
and which are again in danger of falling into bloody rivalries.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 43-44.
'Yes, what is needed is something other than texts and words,
something other than the stain of the crime that is war, something
more than reminders of its horror and misery. War must be deprived
of its raison d’être and the temptation to wage it removed. We must
reach the point where no one, not even the least scrupulous of
governments, has an interest in waging it. I will go further: we wish to
remove the means of preparing for war, of taking the risk. The worst
of gamblers will in future be rendered incapable of carrying out an
attack. In place of the nationalism of old and of a defensive and
suspicious independence, we shall join together the interests,
decisions and destinies of this new community of previously rival
states.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 45.
'So long as there is room for revenge, the hazards of war will
reappear. A detailed settlement drawn up in private between
conquerors and conquered may temporarily appease a territorial
claim or conflict of prestige. But in itself it will never be sufficient to
establish lasting peace. In the past there have been many attempts to
stabilise political situations in regions of Europe by multilateral peace
treaties.[…] We have gone from one disappointment to another
because we failed to give these pseudo ententes something more than
a somewhat artificial legal status, i.e. a common task and a new hope,
capable of overcoming the past. This leads us today to look for a
31
common agreement, a form of peace which is not just an
elimination of war but a blueprint for the future.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 108-109.
'But these approaches based on economics have also highlighted
immediate advantages in the political arena. Concluding a lasting,
monitored union in the area of coal and steel in effect prevents any of
the countries involved not only from waging war against the others
but even from preparing to do so, since one cannot go to war without
free use of the energy and metals essential for such an undertaking.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 164.
'The contribution which an organised and living Europe can
bring to civilisation is indispensable to the maintenance of peaceful
relations. […] A united Europe was not achieved and we had war.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. Appendix: The Declaration of 9 May
1950.
'By pooling basic production and by instituting a new High
Authority, whose decisions will bind France, Germany and other
member countries, this proposal will lead to the realisation of the first
concrete foundation of a European federation indispensable to the
preservation of peace.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. Appendix: The Declaration of 9 May
1950.
INSTITUTIONS
'The democratic law of the majority, freely accepted in
accordance with established conditions and procedures, limited to the
essential concerns of common interest, will certainly be less
humiliating than decisions imposed by the strongest.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 25.
32
CHRISTIAN VALUES
'Here we are, then, constrained by experience, after so many
failures of diplomacy or the generosity of certain individuals such as
Aristide Briand, facing the terrible threats to mankind from the
dizzying progress of proud science, here we are returning to the
Christian law of a noble yet humble fraternity. And by a paradox
which would surprise us if we were not Christians – unconsciously
Christian perhaps – we hold out our hand to our enemies of yesterday,
not simply in order to forgive them but to build tomorrow’s Europe
together.’
Source: Robert Schuman ‘Pour l’Europe’ [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 44.
'This new policy is based on solidarity and building trust. It
constitutes an act of faith, not like that of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in
the human kindness so cruelly denied for the last two centuries, but an
act of faith in the good sense of nations at last persuaded that their
salvation lies in entente and cooperation, so solidly cemented together
that none of the governments involved could separate them. Let this
concept of a reconciled, united and strong Europe become the slogan
for the younger generations wishing to serve a mankind at last
delivered from hatred and fear and which, after such long rifts, will
teach us once more the concept of Christian fraternity. '
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 45-46.
'Europe is the implementation of a universal democracy in the
Christian sense.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 53.
'Democracy owes its existence to Christianity. It was born the
day when man was brought to recognise the dignity of the human
being in his temporal life, in individual freedom, in respect for each
other’s rights and by the practice of brotherly love towards all. Never
before Christ had such ideas been expressed. Thus democracy is linked
to Christianity, both in terms of doctrine and ideology. It took shape
with it, gradually, after much trial and error, sometimes falling into
serious mistakes and barbarism along the way.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 56-57.
33
'Christianity teaches the natural equality of all men, who are
children of the same God, redeemed by the same Christ, without
distinction of race, colour, class or profession. It makes us recognise
the dignity of work which it is the obligation of us all to accept. It
recognises the primacy of the inner values which alone lend nobility
to man. The universal law of love and charity makes all people our
neighbours, since when all social relationships in the Christian world
have been based on this law.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 57-58.
'I agree with Bergson that "democracy is essentially evangelical
in that its source is love".'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p.70.
'The implementation of this vast programme for a universal
democracy in the Christian sense finds its fulfilment in the building of
Europe.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 77.
'The Coal and Steel Community, Euratom and the Common
Market, with the free circulation of goods, capital and persons, are
institutions which are already profoundly and definitively changing
relationships between associate states; in a certain sense they are
becoming divisions, provinces of a single unit. And this unit cannot
and must not remain a purely economic and technical enterprise: it
requires a soul, an awareness of its historical affinities and its present
and future responsibilities, a political will to serve the same human
ideal.'
Source: Robert Schuman 'Pour l'Europe' [For Europe]. Editions Nagel, Paris 1963. p. 77-78.
34
'Europe will be in difficulties for a very long time. Besides
it's a fundamental error to think that one can make
progress without difficulties.'
[What has to be done?]
'Continue, continue, continue...'
Source: Jean Monnet 'Mémoirs'. Doubleday & Company, INC. Garden City, New York. 1978.Part Two,
Chapter 21, p.513, 3rd paragraph.
35
In charge of publication : Pascal FONTAINE
Drafted by : Pascal FONTAINE and Leatitia DESCOIN, stagiaire
OR : FR
_____________________________________________
Research, Documentation and Publications service
EPP-DE Group - European Parliament
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36