# Palais des Nations *Geneva venue of Walter Mondale's July 21, 1979 address to the UN Conference on Indochinese Refugees.* The Palais des Nations in Geneva was the venue of the UN Conference on Indochinese Refugees. On July 21, 1979, [[Walter Mondale]] addressed that conference there.[^1] The full text of the address is held by the [[Minnesota Historical Society]], which makes it a primary source on record in [[Minnesota]].[^1] In this record, the Geneva address is Mondale's documented instrument on refugee policy. The [[Refugee Act of 1980]] is a separate instrument with different authors. It is Public Law 96-212, 94 Stat. 102.[^2] The Act originated as Senator Edward Kennedy's bill, S. 643, which was introduced on March 13, 1979, and President Carter signed it into law on March 17, 1980.[^3][^2] The project's at-issue record corrects its own earlier files, which had credited Mondale with the 1980 Act. The documents cited for the correction are the statute and Carter's signing statement for S. 643.[^2][^3] The project's dossier records that Mondale is not named in the Act's legislative history or in the signing statement.[^3] ## When - **July 21, 1979.** Mondale addresses the UN Conference on Indochinese Refugees at the Palais des Nations.[^1] - **March 13, 1979.** Senator Kennedy introduces S. 643, four months before the Geneva conference.[^3] - **March 17, 1980.** President Carter signs S. 643, which becomes the Refugee Act of 1980, Public Law 96-212, 94 Stat. 102.[^2][^3] - **January 2025.** The White House issues the presidential action *Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program*.[^4] ## Where The address was delivered at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, at the UN Conference on Indochinese Refugees.[^1] In the address, Mondale recalled that "Thirty-two 'nations of asylum' convened at Evian to save the doomed Jews of Nazi Germany and Austria." He told the conference that those nations "failed the test of civilization."[^1] He then asked the delegates: "Let us not re-enact their error. Let us not be the heirs to their shame."[^1] The address also set a test for the conference itself: "Unless this conference gives birth to new commitments, and not simply new metaphors, we will inherit the scorn of Evian."[^1] It closed the point with: "History will not forgive us if we fail. History will not forget us if we succeed."[^1] The standard the address stated was new commitments rather than new metaphors. That standard can be set beside the documented instruments that followed: - the enacted Act, signed eight months after Geneva;[^2][^3] - the 2025 presidential action realigning the refugee admissions program.[^4] The record in this pack does not establish any link between the Geneva address and the content of the Act. It shows only the sequence of dates and the separate authorship of each instrument.[^1][^3] ## In the at-issue record - **Item AI-Humphrey-021** (*The Waverly Promise & the Boundary County Edition*), dated July 21, 1979. The item states that the Refugee Act of 1980 is Kennedy's bill. It states that Mondale did not write it, did not sponsor it, and does not appear in its legislative history. It identifies his Geneva address at the Palais des Nations as his documented instrument.[^2][^3][^1] - The item's anchor is the White House presidential action *Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program*. The item cites it because, in its words, the program being realigned is the one the 1980 Act created.[^4] ## In the Minnesota record ### Where The text of the July 21, 1979 Geneva address is held by the Minnesota Historical Society.[^1] ## Notes [^1]: Walter F. Mondale (full text held by the Minnesota Historical Society), *Address to the UN Conference on Indochinese Refugees, Palais des Nations, Geneva* (July 21, 1979) — venue, date and text of the address, including the quoted passages. https://www2.mnhs.org/library/findaids/00697/pdf/UNSpeech19790721.pdf [^2]: United States Statutes at Large, *Refugee Act of 1980, Public Law 96-212, 94 Stat. 102* (March 17, 1980) — enacted text of the Act. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-94/pdf/STATUTE-94-Pg102.pdf [^3]: President Jimmy Carter, via The American Presidency Project, *Refugee Act of 1980 Statement on Signing S. 643 Into Law* (March 1980) — the signing of S. 643, Senator Kennedy's bill, into law. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/refugee-act-1980-statement-signing-s-643-into-law [^4]: The White House, *Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program* (presidential action, January 2025) — the 2025 action on the refugee admissions program; anchor of at-issue item AI-Humphrey-021. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/realigning-the-united-states-refugee-admissions-program/