Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/18pdf/17-1011_mkhn.pdf
Page Number: 29

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 442–513 (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-