John M. Leddy

In 1961, President of the United States John F. Kennedy named Leddy as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs. On October 2, 1962, President Kennedy appointed Leddy as United States Ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development; Leddy held this post until June 15, 1965. President Lyndon B. Johnson nominated him as Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs in 1965, with Leddy holding this office from June 16, 1965, until February 19, 1969.

After World War II, Leddy worked with the Trade Agreements Committee, an interagency committee that was involved in developing U.S. postwar trade policy, in particular the negotiation of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and the creation of the International Trade Organization in 1947. He worked at the Department of State on trade issues until 1958. He then spent a few years at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.

After college, Leddy took a job with the Trade Agreements Division of the United States Department of State in 1941. His work initially focused on U.S. trade with Peru and Mexico. He then worked with State Department lawyer Marc Catudal, an expert on the most favored nation clause, on the legal framework for trade agreements.

John M. Leddy was born in Chicago and raised in Miami Beach, Florida. After high school, Leddy took a short business course in Miami, Florida, and then, in 1933, moved to Washington, D.C. to live with an aunt. During this time, Leddy worked at the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation and later the Pan American Union during the day and took classes at Georgetown University at night. At the Pan American Union, he worked in the division of financial and economic information, specializing in economic information about Latin America.

John Marshall Leddy (June 29, 1914 – August 31, 1997) was an official in the United States Department of State, who mainly focused on U.S. trade policy.