whom—Lord Baltimore—was the first Governor of Maryland. Almost
the first law proclaimed by colonial Maryland's rulers after the early
settlers arrived was the Act of Toleration, making freedom of religion
a cornerstone of the government of the new colony. This Act was one
of the first pronouncements of religious freedom ever heard in the
New World, and Marylanders have long taken extreme pride in this
Act and in the great Catholic family which inspired it. In fact, so
much importance is attached to this declaration that to this day
Maryland is know by all as "The Free State. " This heritage of freedom,
not only of religion but of all kinds, which we in Maryland value so
strongly, is, in my mind, one of the strongest ties that links our State
and our country to the great country of Brazil.

Your strong tradition of peaceful governmental evolution as your
country has grown and developed has left its mark upon your lives
and your institutions as it has on ours. It is this basic underlying
respect for individual rights and the dignity of man which makes it
so natural and easy for the citizens of our two great countries to
understand one another so readily and to embark without a moment's
hesitation upon such enterprising and cooperative endeavors as are
represented by the Alliance for Progress and the Partners of the
Alliance.

Those of us who come from the United States are accustomed to live
in a world of superlatives. We are constantly being told that our
nation has the biggest this and the most of that. It is indeed a chasten-
ing and valuable experience for us to come to Brazil, which is a bigger
country than our own and has now taken its place as one of the truly
great nations of the world. As the fourth largest nation on earth,
exceeded only by the Soviet Union, Canada and China, Brazil's destiny
will inevitably have a profound effect upon the destiny of all mankind.

Occupying almost 50 per cent of the continent of South America and
possessing a common border with all but two of the nations of this
continent, Brazil has long been a vital factor in all Latin American
affairs. Even one who has been in Brazil only a short time, as I have,
is immediately conscious of that vitality. It is not surprising, therefore,
that this vitality is now also being felt in our country and across the
Atlantic in Europe and in Africa. A restless vitality and an unshakable
heritage of freedom and respect for the dignity of the individual—
these two attributes, in my own opinion, are the real ties which bind
Brazil and the United States to one another.

Yet we have another common heritage, which I believe is almost as

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