SEPTE1UBER 1954 50¢

As Britain Sees UsColm Brogan

Bulls in China's ShopJohn C. Caldwell

The Case for Tax ReliefRobert B. Dresser

Chrysler Corporation does it again

Scoops industry with GelS 1url)Jne development

Chrysler Corporation unveils America's first successful gas turbine passenger car engine!

Chrysler Corporation's leadership has re­cently been dramatically reaffirmed by itsdevelopment and announcement of thefirst gas turbine powered passenger carever built and tested in the United States.

The practical thinking behind thisrevolutionary engine is evidenced by its in­stallation in a production-model PlymouthSport Coupe. The car was thoroughlytested on Chrysler's vast proving groundsand proved as practical and roadable asany standard automobile.

Industry-wide amazement has beenexpressed at the advanced stage of develop­ment achieved by the Chrysler turbineengine. Previous gas turbine ventures hadshown enormous fuel consumption. An-

Simplicity has been achieved in the Chryslergas turbine engine. It is 200 lbs. lighter, hasone-fifth as many moving parts as the pistonengine it replaces. It is air cooled, eliminatingall radiator and liquid cooling components.

other major problem had been posed bythe force and extreme high temperatures ofexhaust fumes that threatened to ~~fry"

anything in their path.The significRl1ce of the Chrysler de­

velopment is shown by the fact that both ofthese major problems have been solved! Fueleconomy is in the range of conventionalautomobiles, and exhaust temperature iscooler than that of an average car!

This radical new power plant is notready for general use. Manufacturing andmetallurgical problems must be solvedbefore it can be made available to thepublic. Still Chrysler engineering has sogreatly advanced the gas turbine engine

Exceptional Power for its size is developedby the gas turbine engine. Rated at 120 hp,it is equivalent to 160 hp in a conventionalengine. Engine exhaust, above, is cooler thanthat of a standard auto.

that its eventual use on the road can nowbe considered seriously.

Why tell you of these future thingswe cannot sell you today? The samesound thinking that went into bringingthis engine into being is behind the carswe make today.

We invite you to discover for your­self the excitement and money's worth thatyou can have right now in the 1954Plymouth, Dodge, De Soto, Chrysler andImperial cars at your dealer's. Pay him avisit and try the many dozens of drivingadvances that put you ahead on the road.You'll find these cars have already wrappedup much of the future of motordom andare placing it right in your hands-today!

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Books

The Return of 1940? 81

Railroading Communism 82

HShall I 'Get Out?" 82

The HExtreme Right" 83

About a Word 83

Why They WriteConsider this fact-that i every contributor tothe FREEMAN could, if he were skilled at thetrade, earn more money at laying bricks in thesame ,time that it took him to write thearticle. In fact, no self-respecting bricklayerwould put in anything like the effort at mixingmortar that ,the FREEMAN' author does in theselection of his words.

The bricklayer is a professional, selling hisservice,s at the highest rate, while the FREEMANauthor's concern with his purpose takes pre­cedence over the p'altry check he will receive.He is an amateur, in the. best sense of theword. That dedication often makes for frictionwith the editor who, also jealous of his amateurstanding, feels impelled to make liberal useof his blue pencil prerogative. He, too, is underobligation to "save the world."

Nevertheless, an issue must be producedevery month, and somehow authors and editorget together to meet the deadline. The fol­lowing' "names" are herewith introduced:

C()LM.BROGANWaS for some years editor oflndividualisrn, organ. of the British Societyfor Individual Freedom. He is the author of:Our New Masters, .astudy of the first Britisl1."~;'socialist government of 1945, 'and other books~"'~L:,

ROBERT B. DRESSER is a prominent Providert~~~,'jt'Rhode Island, lawyer whose current mission iill;;,:;life is promoting the Reed-Dirksen Amend..ment; reputedly puts more effort into thisproject than into his large law practice.

JOHN C. CALDWELL was born in China andhas lived in the Far East most of his life. Hewas in the government serv,ice in tha,t p'art ofthe world for seven years, ending up as DeputyDirector, USIS, in Korea. 'His book, KoreaStory, is a telling account of official bungling.

CLARENCE MANION-as every conscious Amer­ican knows-was fired as chairman of the Gom­mliss!ion on Inter-Government Relations by theEisenhower Administration, because of hisstaunch advocacy of the Bricker Amendment.His latest book is The Key to Freedom.

ROBERT LE FEVRE wrote an essay-"Even theGirl Scouts"-for our contemporary, HumanEvents, that had a profound effect upon theleaders of that organization. Formerly a newscommentator for a Miami radio-television sta­tion, now writing for' the N.E.C.

FELIX WITTMER is the author of The YaltaBetrayal, rev,iewed in thi,s iStsue, and has justfinished a book on collectivism in our col­leges which is scheduled for publication inthe spring. His articles have appeared in theFREEMAN arid Human Events.

FRANK s. MEYER came out of Princeton,Oxford, the London School of Economics andthe University of Chicago-a Com,munist. Heleft the p'arty in 1945 and has s,ince put ina lick or two at exposing the communis,t threat.His articles have appeared in the FREEMAN,the American Mercury, the Saturday Reviewand once in the New York Times.

78

8EPT'EMBER 1954

For

Libertarians

4. Monthly

FRANK CHODOROVJAMES M. ROGERS

VOL. 5, NO.3

EditorBusiness Manager

THE

reeman

From Our Readers

Articles

As Britain Sees Us COLM BROGAN 84

The Case for Tax Relief ROBERT B. DRESSER 86

Bulls in China's Shop .. '0' ••••••• JOHN C. CALDWELL 89

Presbyterians and A Letter EDMUND A. OPITZ 91

As Woodrow Wilson Said FELIX WITT'MER 94

A Six-Billion-Dollar 'Trifle F. A. HARPER 96

That Man Gaskins ROBERT LE FEVRE 97

Mor~ Valuable than Property CLARENCE MANION 99

Th~ 'Rotten A'pple in Our Schools FRANK S. MEYER 100

A Reviewer's Notebook JOHN CHAMBERLAIN 102

Orwell's Socialism E. ME'RRILL ROOT 104

Shameful Document W. JEFFERSON DAVIS 104

Shaping the Individual MIRIAM CRENSHAW 105

A ,Guaranteed Wage PAUL L. POIROT 105

THE FREEMAN is published monthly. Publication Office, Orange, Conn. Editorial andGeneral Offices, Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y. Copyrighted in the United States, 1954,by The Irving,ton Press: Inc. Leonard E. Read, President; Fred Rogers Fairchild, VicePresident; Claude Robmson, Secretary; Lawrence Fertig, Treasurer; Henry Hazlittand Leo Wolman.Entered as second class matter at the Post Office at Orange, Conn. Rates: Fifty centsthe copy; five dollars a year in the United States; nine dollars for two years; sixdollars a year elsewhere.The editors cannot be responsible for unsolicited manuscripts unless return postage orbetter, a stamped, self-addressed envelope is enclosed. Manuscripts must be typeddouble-spaced.ArHc1es signed with a name, pseudonym or initials do not necessarily represent theopinion of the editors.

Editorials

C,ontents

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[Rest easy, friend. We lifted the linesfrom our own book. Modesty restrainedus from mentioning it. THE EDITOR1

In "My Friend's Education" (August)you emphasized that some people areuneducable.... Have you forgottenhow inexhaustably curious a littlechild is?

MILDRED LOOMISBrookville, Ohio

Beliefs ConfirnlcdI agree with Mr. Read (p. 52) thatpeople I know ought to read theFREEMAN, but I also bellieve with AlbertJay Nock that people are not edu­cable . . . and that ignorance is aconstant. These beliefs are confirmedby M:rs. Heath's artide, "The 'Liberals'of Smith," as well as by the rest ofyour excellent August issue.

My conclusion is the same as Mr.Chodorov's : "What can a fellow getout of life more valuable than fun?"and what fun it is to have theFREEMAN to look forward to.Stonington, Conn. J. WINTHROP DAVIS

Mr. Thomas ObjectsA friend has sent me a clipping fro111)TOUT issue of July 1954, containing theeditorial, "Subversives Needed." Iquote two sentences: "Norman Thomas,the perennial Socialist candidate, hasunderscored the entrenchment of

'socialism by advocating the dissolu­tion of the Socialist Party as a use­less organization. We have socialism."

At no time did I advocate the dis­solution of the Socialist Party as a"useless organization." I have arguedthat the present situation forces dif­ferent tactics upon it and I have in-,sisted that what we have to work'for is a mass party, democratic social­ist in outlook, if not in name. We donot, in my opinion, "have socialism,"although American capitalism hassaved itself by adopting a great manyideas once regarded as socialist.New York C'ity NORMAN THOMAS

Re Copy,catsWhat gives? On page 44 of the Augustissue, you or one of your hired mencall Brazil a "copycat." And yet exactlyfive paragraphs earlier on the samepage, without benefit of quotes andw,i,thout batting an eye, you ... run aparagraph lifted, body, soul and boots,out of a book you may have read, TheInc01ne Tax: Root of All Evil.

It's a durn good paragraph in bothinstances, and I'm for the sentimentsit expresses till the last horn blows.But ain't they somethin' in the Con­stitution of the U.S. about doublejeopardy?Lynchburg, Va. J. CAMERON

Clarity NeededThis lead issue of the "new" FREEMAN

was indeed a fine one. I was partic­ularly impressed by its readability-theuse of plaiin straightforward English.It had been my feeling that duringthe last year or so the language ofthe FREEMAN had become luuch tooerudite---,.a trend which can, in amagazine of opinion, eas,ily obscurethe ideas needing express,ion. And itwould certainly seem that the taskfor the libertarian . . . is to makeknown far and w,ide' the basic tenetsof individualism and free enterprisewith the greatest de,gree of clarity.I t is a sad footnote to this agethat our socialistic and communistic"friends" have been able to achievea great measure of success by be­clouding their insidious campaignagainst our free society in the mostpopularly appealing words. . . .

Montclair, N.J. ROBERT W. PFEIFER

II FROM OUR READERS II

Competitive SchoolsAs I am a public school teacher,"A Really Free School System" (July)attracted my a ttention. . . . Those ofus who look with favor on a com­pe:titive school system are not very wellreceived. The fact remains, however,that we are having troubles in educa­tion.... We know what is wrong;let's work on Mr. Chodorov's sugges­tion of relnission of school taxes toparents who want to send their child­c::>.n to private schools.New York City WILLIAM E. IRWIN

As a student in a well-known prepara­tory school, I would, Eke to thank youfor the excellent article, "A ReallyFree School System." It smacks of adeeper understandling of the real prob­lem at hand than I have read in along time.

CLARENCE D. FLEMING, JR.

Branf01"d, Conn.

Cheers for Col. ArmasThe invincible Communists beforewhom the whole world trembles likea great, cosmic bowI of gelatin wereon .the run in Guatemala after onlya ten-day assault.... Colonel Armasdidn't make beautiful speeches about"peaceful co-existence"; he didn't gowhining to the United Nations whereRussia would have bound him handand foot; he didn't rU'n all over theworld begging alid from unwHlingallies. . . . The whole quaking worldowes him a great debt of gratitude forshow1ing it the victorious way of cour­age, of love of liberty....

ELIZABETH LIPPITT

San Francisco, Cal.

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For twenty years the recently deposed federaladministration pooh-poohed this principle. Ourcitizens suffered,-became more and more theeconomic slaves of government. The value oftheir earnings and savings shrank-up to 60%.

Fortunately, technological advancements, suchas Kennametal, increased industrial productivityduring this period-and helped partially to off­set the evil effects of irredeemable currency,

The President, important Cabinet members,Senators, and Congressmen are aware of theinherent relationship between the Gold CoinStandard and individual freedom. Why, then,should legislative action on it be delayed?

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t'The surest way to overturn an existing socialorder is to debauch the currency." These por­tentous words, credited to Lenin, point the wayto defeat Communism, at home and abroad.Make monetary strength the weapon-and soundmoney the ammunition.

The only sound money system that has everbeen successful is the Gold Coin Standard.* Itstabilizes the value of money-prevents issu­ance of fiat currency· ... gives the individualclose control over government policy since hecan redeem his currency for gold coin wheneversuch policy is inimical to preservation of indi­vidual rights and liberty.

This sovereignty of the citizen over govern­ment is the great difference between dictator-

Excerpt from Republican"Monetary POlicyll Plank

:* The right to redeem currency forgold will help keep "Americafree ••• ask your Senatorsand Congressman to work andvote to restore the Gold CoinStandard. Write to The GoldStandard League, Latrobe,Po., for further information.The League is an associationof patriotic citizens ioined inthe common cause of restoringo $ound monetary system.

The Return of 1940 ?Two years before Pearl Harbor the libertariansof the time began taking sides on this question:shall we postpone our fight for freedom untilafter the menace of Hitlerism is disposed of?'The debate was for some time conducted alongrational lines, but eventually the issue becamebeclouded by bitterness and name-calling; one sidewas dubbed interventionist, the other isolationist.I was among the latter, and in a publication-oddlyenough called the FREEMAN-pressed my positionhard. My erstwhile friends soon disowned me, andsome of these advocates of freedom called uponthe minions of the law to look into my case.

My well-trained nostrils detect the aroma of asimilar stew now in the making. The ingredientsare strongly re.miniscent of 1940. Already thelibertarians are debating among themselves onthe need of putting off the struggle for freedomuntil after the threat of communism, Moscow style,shall have been removed, even by war. The cogentargument is being advanced, as it was in 1940,that the conquest of America by a foreign foew'ill wipe out every vestige of freedom, will imposeon us a dictatorship that will ruthlessly obliterateeven the concept of freedom. First things first,it is being said; the Soviets must be destroyed.

,In view of the similarity of the currently de­veloping debate, still quite rational and withoutrancor, with that of pre-World War Two days, itmight be well to review the old "isolationist" side,to see whether subse,quent history supported itspredictions. If its anti-war argument was vali­dated by results, it comes into the present case'with strong support. I do not refer to the human­itarian or pacifist argument against war, but ratherto the position held by the torchbearers of free­dom, that their cause would be set back by war,regardless of the military outcome. Was it?

As a consequence of the war, the country carriesa debt-burden from which there is no prospect ofrelief except by outright repudiation or repudia­tion by inflation. How free are a people who mustface that prospect?

As a consequence of the war, the taxes we arecompelled to pay come to a third of all we pro­duce. Nazism, the virus which we went to war toexterminate, did little worse. While we resentthe suggestion that perhaps we are tending towardthe slavery of the Germans under Hitler, in pointof taxes we are little better off than they were.A people who are not permitted to retain theirearnings are hardly free.

As a consequence of the war, conscription hasbecome a permanent fixture in the American way oflife, even as it was under Hitler. To be sure, wecall it a "democratic" army, having become inured

to it, but in point of fact, conscription is involun­tary servitude. Only words can equate conscriptionwith freedom.

As a consequence of the war, we are saddled witha bureaucracy that compares favorably in size withthat of the Nazi regime. We still think of ourgovernment as representative in character, asresponsive to the will ot the electorate, but thatis only because our tradition cannot face up tothe reality: we are governed by a s'elf-sufficientand self-centered army of 2,500,000 time-servers.It is they who draft our laws, administer themand interpret them to further the interests ofthe bureaucracy. It is they also who carryon aninterminable propaganda intended to condition ourthinking to an acceptance of theIr purposes.

As a consequence of the war, we have as apeople lost our sense of personal independence,and have adjusted our concept of freedom toaccord with government intervention. Most of ussee no contradiction of freedom in social security,no mitigation of freedom in subventions, no in­vasion of freedom in regulation and controls. Ourschools and textbooks, since the war, have madefreedom synonomous with collectivism and paternal­ism.

All this, though not in detail, the "isolationists"of 1940 foresaw. Not because they were endowedwith any gift of prevision, but because they knewhistory and would not deny its lesson: that duringwar the State acquires power at the expense offreedom, and that because of its insatiable lustfor power the State is incapable of giving up anyof it. The State never abdicates.

If, therefore, another Pearl Harbor is arrangedfor us, and we are rushed into World War Three,what can we-those of us who put freedom at thepinnacle of human values-expect? Some kind ofimperatorship, as a matter of course. No war canbe conducted these days under less stringent rule.Not only will our inalienable rights be strangulated,but thought and expression, the essential weaponsof freedom, will be impounded, so as to immobilizeany 'effort to restore some freedom after war isdone. This is admitted by those who fear theSoviets at least as much as they love freedom,but, as did the "interventionists" in 1940, theystress the immediate rather than the ultimatedanger, and are willing to gamble with freedom.I am not.

IThere is a plausibility being advanced by someof the modern crop of "interventionists" that isworth mentioning. It could not have been thoughtof in pre-atom bomb days. Suppose, they say, thatthe war should result in the destruction of ourcivilization, the chief characteristic of which is

SEPTEMBER 1954 81

materialism. What could we lose? The destructionmight be so thorough that the debris would coverlJP 'even the memory of machines, and 'men wouldlive happily on potatoes and poetry. Quite a pros­pect fora Chaucerian.

Railroading CommunismCommunism will not come to America by way ofMoscow. It will sprout in our own backyard. Andits taproot will not be the teachings of Karl Marx,but rather the shortsightedness and cupidity ofBig Business. Yes, if communism comes to A.merica,it will have been brought in by its intended victims,the capitalists.

Which brings us to a ferment in the railroadworld. Last July 12, President Eisenhower set upa Cabinet Committee on Transport Policy andOrganization, to submit to him a "comprehensive,up-to-date r'eview of over-all transportation policiesand problems." Why ? Well, for one thing, therailroads are in a bad way; taken as a whole,they are not ,earning anything like what theircapital investment would yield in other lines ofbusiness; competition from other means of trans­portation has made things difficult for this erst­while "natural monopoly." What to do? Followingmodern practice, these captains of industry appealto governm'ent to show them a way out.

The "way out" that has long been advocated-notonly by anxious politicians but also by hard-pressedrailroad men---.;is "uniification." That means theconsolidation of the nation's transportation servicesinto a single unit, to be regulated and controlled,if not owned and managed, by an agency of govern­ment; perhaps headed by a Secretary .of Trans­portation. This is not a new idea. As far backas June 7, 1935-six years before war dropped abonanza into the laps of the railroad companies­President Roosevelt wrote Congress, "It is hightime to deal with the nation's transportation asa single, unified problem." And in August 1949,Presjdent Truman said, "I have for some timebeen concerned about the needfof the greatercoordination of federal policies and programs re­lated to transportation."

Now, unification means monopolization. Whetherthe government actually owns an industry, or con­fines its'elf to regulation and control, it cannotand will not permit entrepreneurs to enter thefield at will. 'Therefore, the proponents of anAmerican Ministry of Transport are actuallyplugging for the abolition of competition in thefield of transportation. Under communism thereis no competition.

IThe motives of both the politicians and therailroad men urging this monopoly scheme arequite human. In the case of the former, anyacquisi­tion of power is to their liking; a department

82 THE FREEMAN

of transportation would make for many politicaljops, for more ,e.moluments, in ostentation as wellas in pay, for officeholders. As for the railroadmen, the prime attraction of unification is thepromise of security that it holds forth; the govern­ment.might guarantee them against loss of capital,or assure them, at the expense· of taxpayers, ofa fixed income on their investment. Little is' be1ingsaid about the likelihood of government purchaseof their equities, which would be the logical con­sequence of unification; but if it comes, even ifit smacks of socialism or communism, what ofit? One has the government's bonds in one's pocket,and the next generation will get used to the kindof transportation service that the bureaucratsprovide.

Thus is the seed of communism being plantedin American soil. Notby the agent,s of Moscow,nor even by the professors in our colleges, but bythe capitalists who, for an immediate profit, arewilling to sell out their children's birthr.ight ofprivate property.

''Shall I Get Out?'~

Last month, a city desk ran a headline that ithad been mulling over for months: "Stock Mar­ket Hlts the 1929 High." Now, a headline is notsupposed to convey -information, but to arouseemotion. In this case, the emotion it was in­tended to evoke was fear-fear that a crash simi­lar to that which the stock market experiencedin 1929 is imminent. Since I own ten shares ofstock, I called tpe matter to the attention of aneconomist and asked the question which other"economic royalists" are no doubt asking thesedays: "Shall I get out?" He took the matter un­der advisement, meaning that he pulled down fromhis library a couple of tomes and started digging.He came up with the following information:

In September 1929, just before the crash, theDow-Jones Industrial Average was 381. On July28 this year, the corresponding figure was 345.This indicates that the headline was a bit pre­mature-unless the city desk had some other "aver­age" in mind. However, that is unimportant.

What is important is that the Consumers' PriceIndex-sometimes called the cost of living-hasin the meantime risen to where a dollar now buysonly 64 per cent as much as it did formerly.. Themeticulous economist worked out this statisticfor me with a set of equations, and came to aconclusion thait my wife came to withoutequa­tions: namely, that your share of common stock,at today's "average," will fetch less "bread andshoes" than a similar share of stock did in 1929.How much less ?Forty-two cents on the dollarless.

From this one must conclude that the "high" of

today is comparable with that of 1929 in dollarsonly-not in real value. The upward trend ofmarket prices is not a reflection of a burgeoningnational prosperity, in terms of goods, but of adepreciation in the value of money. The stocks,like "bread and shoes," have risen in price be­cause of inflation. There is more money aroundbidding for things, and that is what makes every­thing "high."

Of course, the plenitude of money is traceableto the speed at which the government printingand lithographing machines have been runningthis past quarter of a century. We must keep inmind that the manufacture of money is a govern­ment monopoly; a private citizen engaging inthat business courts incarceration.

So the 'question that the bulls and bears of WallStreet are confronted with, in trying to guess thefuture trend of stock prices, is this: will thegovernment continue on the inflationary courseit has followed in the past, and for how long? Ifit keeps on manufacturing more money, and per­mits us to have some of the increase, it is a cer­tainty that a considerable part of these depreciateddollars will ,come into the market to bid for stock.In that case, the pre-crash 1929 "high" is not aguidepost to go by. It might be lower than youthink.

I am not advising.

The ''Extreme Right"In reporting the FREEMAN'S change of managementTime takes occasion to describe us as a "publi­cation of the extreme right." The weekly, whfchaffects objective reporting, obviously refers toour editorial policy. But the cryptic phrase hasus puzzled; just exactly what is meant by "extremeright"? Inquiry reveals that it is an amorphousconcoction of connotations, and that its meaningvaries with the predilections of the user. Some­times it is used derogatorily, even to describea person of levi! intent; always it is applied toa point of view quite the opposite to that of the"extreme left"- whatever that is. In short, itis a subjective phrase, and one cannot be surewhat it means, in any particular case, unless theuser rev'eals his predilections. Time does not helpus out in this respect; in fact, the publicationconfuses us all the more by its pretensions toobjectivity.

This probllem in labeling, however, can be readilysolved. That is because the basic editorial policyof the FREEMAN is a fixed quantity, one that canbe put down categorically. There is nothingequi­vocal about it. We need only stat'e this policy--the purpose to which the publication is dedicated-and if that is the information which Time in-tended to convey, we proudly accept the appellation.

The FREEMAN is dedicated to the propositionthat the society of humans flourishes best undera condition of fre'edom. We are for freedom, onehundred per cent, no discount. What we mean byfreedom is quite simple: it is the right of the in­dividual to work out his destiny, with whatevercapacities he possesses, without interference fromgovernment beyond that neeessary to prevent himfrom interfering with the freedom of others. Weare convinced that freedom is inherent in theindividual, the gift of 'God, and that the functionof government, the only function for which ithas any competence, is to protect the individualin the enjoyment of that endowment. If it goesbeyond that field, if it invades any area of humanactivity, it necess,arily transgresses the freedomof some or all of the peopl1e. 'Therefore, freedomis best served when government is small, actingunder clearly delimited powers, and is subject toconstant surveillance.

Is that what is meant by "extreme right"? Ifso, then the phrase implies that thos'e who areto the "left" are opposed to freedom, in varyingdegrees. Those who are thrHe-quarters to the"right" ,advocate the curtailment of freedom, orgovernment intervention, in approximately one­quarter of the area of human activity; the "center,"by definition, propose that the government take ahand in about fifty per cent of our private affairs;while the "extreme left" must be for the abolitionof all freedom and a condition of slavery undergovernment.

It would be quite to the point, therefore, forthe FREEMAN-"a publication of the extreme right"-to inquire of those who do not go along withits policy: "How much freedom are you against?"Or, "what particular freedom would you compel anindividual to give up?" These questions, however,are not directed to Time, which is, by its ownadmission, an objective publication.

About a WordLibertarians are individualists, and individualistsare rightly jealous of their philosophy. So muchso that they are prone to argue among themselvesover the correct expression of every concept, and areparticularly resentful of the introduction of anew word. Like all perfectionists, they suffer fromdejinitionism, which is a dread disease.

For instance, a number of readers have objectedto our use of the word "libertarian," maintainingthat it is a concession to modernism and amisnomer. So we took to our dictionary for themeaning of the word and found, in Webster'sUnabridged, that a libertarian is "... one whoupholds the principles of liberty, ,esp. individualliberty of thought and action."

What's wrong with that?

SEPTEMBER 1954 83

As Britain Sees Us

By ~COLM BRO'GANThe average Briton's attitude toward Americais compounded of ignorance, misinformation anda natural resentment at playing second fiddle.

Today there is more anti-American feeling inBritain than at any other time within livingmemory. 'The causes are complex and some of themobscure, though others are patent 'enough. First,there is the understandable primitive feeling ofenvy. Many Britons have a resentful feeling thatthere is something unfair about American pros­perity. 'The war, they will tell you, m,adeAmericarich. In the next breath they will tell you thatthe war made Britain poor. How the same warcould have opposite ,effects on two countries fight­ing on the same side is a problem never considered.

Res'entment at American prosperity sometim'esleads to an illogical attempt to belittle it. Thereare people who will tell you that high Americanwages are an illusion, for they are all swallowedup by the enormous cost of living, and life formost Americans is a perpetual losing struggleagainst installment debt. Convineed Socialists areparticularly keen on this line of ,argument, for itdoes not pay them to admit that capitalism canproduce the goods. Ever sinc,e the ,end of the warthey have been watching and waiting for thegreat American slump, as if they were waitingfor ,a ,man to fall over and brieak his leg.

TheS'e Socialists, however, constitute a smalland dwindling minority. The ordinary Britishworker favors nationalization only if and when itpromises to give him great'er security and aneasier time. But his attitude on the productiveprocess is greatly and incr,easingly different fromthe American attitude. To the average Britishworker a job is simply a privilege to collect wages.The number of hours worked, the rat,e of pro­duction and the social value of the work arematters of minor importance, if they are con­sidered ,at all.

ISome time ago British Railways had a hardfight on their hands to get rid of ,five hundred"knockers-up." 'These were men who went aroundthe streets of railway towns, knocking on windowsto waken railway,men. 'They have been a totalanachronism sinee the invention of the alarmclock, but their abolition was opposed becaus,e itmeant the end of five hundred jobs. Making twojobs out of one is held to, be a social advance.

'There is an awareness that American workershave a quite different point of view, and thatknowledge engenders a certain amount of hostility.For a variety of causes, high taxation being one,

84 THE FREEMAN

most people in Britain pr,efer leisure to money.The pace of British industry is therefore slowand in some trades, building among them, it isscandalously slow. There is talk of the wondersthat could be worked by the application of Amer­ican industrial know-how, but the talk misses thepoint. The decisive obstacle to higher productivityin Britain is the attitude of the men. The Fordand Briggs plants in Britain are machined justlike the American plants. The British executiveand technical staffs are every hit as good as theirAmerican colleagues, but they cannot get the sameresults. The attitude of the man at the bench de­feats them.

People seldom think kindly of those who have adi:ffierent view of life. There are many Britishworkers who think and openly say that the furiousindustry of the German worker is degrading,almost immoral, and constitutes unfair competition.They also regard the fast pace of the Americanworker with suspicion and dislike, partly becausethe contrast implies some criticism of themselves.'They may talk loftily of ,American materialism,but they also want cars and ,expensive gadgetsfor the homre. However, they do not want thembadl'y ;enough to work hard for them. In a minordegree, they resemble the colonial peoples whoangrily demand the mat'erial comforts of the in­dustrial West but are not willing to adjust theirlives to the demands of an industrial society.

A Gulf of Misunderstanding

The worker who votes for the Socialist Party inBritain is committed to the furtherance of a typeof society whose philosophy is flatly contradictoryto the American philosophy. This clash has noimmediate relevance to international policies, butit creates a stat'e of mind inclined to assume thatAmericans are wrong on all major issues. Apartfrom the Communists and their associates, thereare few who suspect ·Americans of belligerent in­tentions, but most Britons suspect the UnitedStates of pursuing policies which might well leadto war. Socialists believe that it was Mr. Attlee'who dissuaded President Truman from permittingthe bombing of Manchuria. Both Conservativesand Socialists believe that it is only the maturewisdom of Anthony Eden that has frequentlysaved Secretary Dulles from disaster which might

have 'engul\fed the world. Many Britons believethat Dulles is a well-intentioned but rash andinexperienced young politician. I pointed out toone man that Dulles was at the Conference ofAlgeciras when Eden was running about in shorttrousers. He was surprised and asked me if Iwas not thinking of Dulles' father.

The incident was trifling, but it illustratesthe gulf of ignorance as well as of 'misunder­standing. The ignorance should not he surprising,for British newspapers are wretchedly small, andin the popular press the meager ration of Amer­ican news is mostly composed of sensational trivial­ities.There is also a danger in selectivity ofpresentation. The British people were told that theChurchill-,Eden visit to Washington had been agreat and unqualified success, with the Britishstatesmen winning their American counterpartsto a saner and more constructive policy. The back­wash of American criticism and opposition tooksome Britons painfully by surprise: the othersnever heard of it.

British int'erest in for,eign affairs was neverso low. The fear of a third war is so deep thatit inhibits thought and interest. The British, forthe most part, cling to the hope that so longas their representatives keep talking to the enemysomewhere about anything at all, the worst willnot happen. Given the choice between a policywhich would involve some risk of war now andanother which would keep the peace for the'moment but would involv'e a much greater riskin a few years, they would choose the first, notby logical and conscious decision but by a simpleshrinking from the thought of war. It must beemphasized that it is not simple physical fearwhich induces this hypnotic state of mind, but aprofound moral disgust at the thought of r,enewedslaughter. Both parties, and especially the Social­ists, would follow Eden in any parley which mightpostpone a sharp decision. Opposition to Germanrearmament is widespread. After two wars withGermany, this reaction is understandable enough ;but behind it is also the fear that German re­armament would be a challenge to Russia, andBritain is in no mood to challenge anybody.

Britain is fundamentally isolationist. Ever sincethe end of the war we have been absorbed indisputes over social policy at home. An argumentabout subsidized rents or cfreemedical care willrouse interest and even passion, but it is hardlypossible to start an argument about foreign affairs.The official socialist paper, the Daily Herald,wanted to get rid of all its foreign correspondentsbecause of the lack of interest shown by theirtwo million readers, and agreed to keep one cor­respondent only for the sake of appearances.Among the vast majority of Socialists, apathyabout foreign affairs could not be more intense.Among Conservatives, the situation is not muchbetter. There would be widespread relief if Russia

and China consented to call off the 'cold war atthe price of securing a guarantee of all theirconquests. The word "appeasement" is unpopular,but the spirit of appeasem,ent is rife. That iswhy Eden's proposal for a Far Eastern Locarnowas welcomed in Britain.

Another cause for resentment is Britain's re­duced strength. The British have not yet aceeptedthe obvious proposition that the major pow,er inan alliance simply must have the major sharein policy-shaping, because the major power can­not indefinitely commit its strength to policiesit believes to be to its disadvantag,e. In Europeandefense this fact is signified by the superiorpositions given to American military, naval andair commanders. The more far-sighted Britonswelcomed these appointments becaus'e they com­mitted America to the defense of Europe, butthe man in the stre,et was far from pleased.

The Legend of McCarthyism

A natural resentment at falling into a secondaryposition after a long spell of world leadership isjoined by a lack of faith in Aim·erican judgment.This lack of faith has been gravely emphasizedby the monstrous growth of the legend ofMcCarthyism. It is difficult to indicate the extentof the grotesque misrepresentation of the Mc­Carthy controversy in Britain. A majority of theBritish believe that Senator McCarthy conductsa reign of intellectual terror in America and thatno man who incurs his displeasure can make aliving or find any prote,ction under the law. Ther,eare Socialist leaders who talk openly of the rivaltyrannies of the East and the W,est and of theBritish duty to offer asylum to American refugees.It goes without saying that the Communists makethe most of the gross misunderstanding, but incircles far removed from communism it is re­garded as somewhat disreputable to suggest thatSenator McCarthy might possibly have somethingto say for himself. 'The reports of the Army­McCarthy hearings in the British press furnishedanother example of misleading selectivity. Onlya small minority in Britain suspects that the Armymight be s'orry the affair ever took place.

I t cannot be said that the misleading reportingis deliberately meant to m.jslead. It happens be­cause British journalists in the United Statessee what they want to see, while those who prunethe news in Britain print what fits into theirpreconeeived picture. But the results are gravelydamaging. Educated Englishmen will tell youcomplacently that Britain was never so popularand admired in the Unit'ed States as she is today.They will also tell you that every American livesin terror of the Committee on Un-American Activ­ities. The word "McCarthyism" has become analmost meaningless incantation of abuse.

For that reason, the Oppenheimer case got a

SEPTEMBER 1954 85

thoroughly bad press in Britain and the case ofDr. J. H. Cort was invested with every absurdity.Dr. Cort, an American citizen living in Britain,refused repeatedly to pres,ent hims,elf for medicalexamination for the U. S. Army. When his permitto stay in Britain was withdrawn by the HomeSecretary, a large-scale agitation was at oneeorganized, demanding that he should be accordedpolitical asylum. The agitation was based on theassumption that he could not possibly expectjustice if he returned to the United States, andthat his calling-up was merely a device to bringhim home and persecute him. It is difficult toimagine a more insulting assumption concerninga friendly country, but Mr. Attlee hims'elf rais,edthe matter in the Commons. That fact may givesome measure of the stupefying effect of theMcCarthy myth. (Significantly, Dr. Cort has nowbeen given "asylum" in communist Poland.)

There are other reasons for anti-Americanism.Britons who find it hard to get any kind of ac-.commodation near an A.meriean base in Englandare apt to be·· annoyed, but seldom stop to thinkthat the Americans may also have a grievance inthe rack rents they must pay to British house­owners. Sensational and trashy publications forchildren and morons are always known as "Amer­ican comics" even though most of them are printedhere, and are taken as evidence of the deplorablestandards of American taste. On a slightly more

serious level, the socially slanted Am,erican crimestories have helped to spread the idea of de·epcorruption and brutality in American public lifeand extreme immorality in private life.

Nevertheless, these factors are of minor im­portance. Personal animosity toward Americansis not the explanation of anti-:Americanism. Itspririgs from fear of American power and itspossible misuse. If the pres'ence of Am·ericantroops in Britain creates some friction, it is muchless and not more than may be expected in suchcircumstances. If at times there is a readinessto condemn the mote in the American eye whilecondoning the beam in the Communist eye, thatbias is, in a way, a compliment. Americans areexpected to be better and to know better thanRussians or Chinese.

It is profoundly difficult for the British peopleto aceept the fact that Americans are foreigners.They nearly all have relatives in the United Statesand do not easily remember that few Americanshave relatives in Britain. This illusion of closekinship encourages the sharply critical mood whichpeople feel for those of their own family group.But the fundamental reason for anti-Americanismis a consciousness that the American attitude tolife is radically different, and that that differenceboth in economic competition and internationalpolicy constitutes a great threat to the Britishpeace of mind.

The Case for Tax ReliefBy ROBERT B. D'RESSER

By reducing excessive and discriminatory taxes, theReed-Dirksen Amendment will benefit all the people.

The legitimate function of taxation is to raiserevenue, not to change or destroy a system ofsociety.

·One hundred years ago Karl Marx, who verydefinitely proposed to destroy the cap.italistic orprivate property system, substituting for it a com­munistic regime, recognized the destructive poten­tial of taxation, and advocated, therefore, in hisCommunist Manifesto, the following measures:

1. "A heavy progress.ive or graduated incometax."

2. "Abolition of all right of inheritance."Our federal government has for some time been

following the course prescrihed by Marx, withparticular urgency during the last twenty years.It now imposes a "heavy progres,sive income tax,"running from a beg.inning rate of 20 per cent onincomes of $2,000 and under to 91 per cent onincomes of more than $200,000. Also, while not

86 THE FREEMAN

abolishing the right of inheritance, the federalgovernment has been increasing the rates of theestate or death tax until the top rate is now 77per cent.

'As yet, the Marxian Utopia has not been achieved.But since the ultimate result of confiscatory tax­ation must be the impairment of capital ac­cumulation, or savings, the result which Marxanticipated is only a matter of time. The onlysure and effective way of preventing it is to amendthe federal Constitution so as to limit the powerof Congress to tax incomes, inheritances and gifts.

.snch an amendment is now pending in Congress.!(nown a,s the Reed--Dirksen Amendment (H. J.Res. 103; S. J.R'es. 23), it was introduced inJanuary 1953 by Congressman Chauncey W. Reedand Senator Everett Dirksen, both of Illinois. Itlimits income taxes· to a maximum rate of 25 percent, but permits' .Congress, by a vote of three

Prior to 1942, which was' a war year, the largestexpenditure of the federal government in any yearwas $18.4 billion in 1918, which was also a waryear.

By way of illustration, at the present level ofnational ,income, a rate of 7 per cent on net tax­able income up to $10,000, with a rate of 25 percent on, the 'excess, could be established and the

fourths of the members of each House, to exceedthat rate at any time. When the top rate exceeds25 per cent, however, it can be no more than 15percentage 'points above the bottom rate. Forexample, if the bottom rate were 15 per cent,the top rate could not exceed 30 per cent. If thebottom rate were 20 per cent, the top rate couldnot exceed 35 per cent. If the top rate does notex:ceed 25 percent, however, there is no restr,ictionat all on the bottom rate. It could be one percent, or one half of one per cent.

This would make it in the interest of every tax­payer (1) to keep the top rate down to 25 per cent(as compared with the present rate of 91 per cent),and (2) to keep the bottom rate no higher than 10per cent (as compared with the present rate of20 per cent).

The Small T'axpayer Would Benefit

The proposed amendment is just as important forthe small taxpayer as for the large. 'This unitedself-interest of all taxpayers is relied on as aforce that would keep the tax rates within reason­able bounds. There are 66,000,000 individual in­come-tax payers in the United States. Most of themvote.

It should be noted that the proposed amendmentmerely limits the degree of tax-rate progression.It does not prescribe the, top rate that Congressmay impose. Hence, it cannot he argued that theamendment impair,s the government's power toraise needed revenue dur,ing either war or peace.

IThe ultimate objective of the amendment is atop individual income-tax rate of 25 per cent anda beginning rate of less than 10 per cent. Thisis not an unreasonable expectation. The budgetfor the current fiscal year is $65 billion. TheCommittee on Federal Tax Policy headed by Ros­well Magill, Under Secretary of the Treasury in1938, in a private study recently releas'ed, statedthat government spending in the current fiscal yearcould be reduced by $5 billion below the Adminis­tration',s estimate of $65 billion.

Government expenditures for the comparativelyrecent years 1948 to 1951 were as follows:

1951 (which included a full yearof the Korean war)

195019.491948

Expendituresin Billions

$44.05839.60639.50733.068

budget balanced if the government's expendituresw'ere reduced to the $44 billion of fiscal 1951,which, as noted above, included a full y,ear of -theKorean war.

The Reed-Dirksen Amendment also deprivesCongres's of the power to impos'e death and gifttaxes and leaves these ,means of raising revenueexclusively to the states, where they belong, andwhere competition among the states would tend tokeep the rates within reasonable bounds. Underexisting laws the tax on the estates of decedentsruns to a high of 77 per cent, and the tax ongifts to 57.75 per cent. Thes,e rates are manifestlyconfiscatory, and they have very harmful economiceffects. They not only seriously impair the incentiveto work, save and invest in productive enterprise,but they are extremely destructive of capital and,in the long run, will destroy the accumulations ofcapital that are so necessary for industrial activityand expansion, with the resulting beneficial eff,ectson our economy.

Moreover, the heavy taxation of large estatescompels the rich to seek comparatively safe liquidinvestments in order to provide for the heavytaxes that will be impos'ed upon their estates atdeath, thus further reducing the capital availablefor risky business ventures.

The harm done to the economy by the presenthigh rates of death and gift taxes is out of allproportion to the revenue produced, and cannotbe justified by any argument based on fiscal needs.Even with the very high rates now in force, therevenue from these taxes is comparatively trivial.:In 1953, it was $891 million from the two sources.'I'his was a Iittle over one per cent of the totalbudget of $74 binion-enough to pay the gov­ernment's expenses for about four days. The gifttax is merely auxiliary to the estate tax, and bothshould be dealt with alike.

A ",Millionaire's Amendment"?

Incidentally, the Reed-Dirksen Amendment shouldnot be confused with other similar amendments,from which it differs in important respects.

Certain critics of the proposed amendment referto it as a "millionaire's amendment," and assert thatit. will shift the burden of taxation from the richto the poor, and make the rich richer and the poorpoorer. Their criticism implies that the two classesare static-that the, r.ich are always rich, and thepoor are always poor. Of course, this is not thefact. The poor of today are often the rich oftomorrow, and vice versa.

The proposed amendment will reduce the burdenof taxation on those with the smaller incomes.A fact not generally realized is that the greatbulk. of the revenue from the individual incometax comes not from the taxpayers with large in­comes,but from those with smalL incomes. Thatis so simply because the small incomes, in the

SEPTEMBE;R 1954 87

aggregate, ,constitute the bulk of the natIonal In­come. For example, only 3 per cent (about $2billion) of the total estimated fed-eral revenue of$62.642 billion for the fiscal year 'ending June 30,1955, is produced by the individual income-taxrates above 34 per cent, which is 14 percentagepoints above the present beginning rate of 20 percent.

Contrast these figures with the effect of anincrease of only $100 in the present $600 personalexemption and credit for dependents. Such an in­crease would result in a reduction of 7,000,000in the number of income-tax payers and a revenueloss of $2.5 billion. This is one-half billion dollars'more than the total revenue received from theindividual income-tax rates above 34 per cent.

Accordingly, if we are to have enormous ex­penditures and correspondingly large rev-enue, thegreat bulk of the revenue must come from personsof small and moderate m'eans.

The only possible way to giv-e relief to the smalltaxpayers 1s either (1) by reducing the need forrevenue through cutting expenditures, or (2) byincreasing revenue through a drastic reduction ofthe present confiscatory higher bracket rates soas to increase incentiv-e and investment in produc­tive enterpris-e. This would increase the nationalincome, which constitutes the tax base, and there­by increase the revenue.

Any immediate loss in revenue through theelimination of the higher individual rates wouldundoubtedly be only temporary. Eventually, thelower rates would produc-e greater rev-enue thanthe higher rates now in force.

Reducing the high surtax rates is not a discrim­ination in favor of the rich, as some assert. It israther the partial removal of an existing dis­crimination against the r.ich of a most extremecharacter. This will benefit not only those in thehigher brackets, but the people as a whole, as Ihave pointed out.

Opponents of the Reed-Dirksen Amendment as­sert that it violates the principle of "taxationaccording to ability to pay." That so-called prin­ciple is not an economic concept having any definedlimits or scientific basis. It is more in the natureof a political slogan. With a flat rate of taxation,a man with a $20,000 income pays twice as muchas a man with a $10,000 income. This certainlygives recognition to the ahility of a man witha larger income to pay a greater amount oftaxes. When, however, you accept the principlethat a man with a $20,000 income shall pay ahigher rate of tax than a moan with a $10,000 in­come, where is the stopping point? Oarried· to itslogical conclusion, the principle of progressivetaxation would m,ean the reduction of all incomesafter taxes to the same level, which happens to bea socialistic goal.

That the present confiscatory rates of the in­dividual income tax are not approved by a large

88 THE FREEMAN

majority of the American people is shown by'Gallup polls. The vote of those having an opinionwas two to one in favor of a 25 per cent top limitin the September 1951 poll, and three to one inthe July 1952 poll.

Attempts are frequently made to justify thevery high tax rates on individual incomes on theground that they effect a redistribution of wealth,to the great benefit of the less fortunate. Thestatistics on this subject are enlightening. Bas'edupon figures taken from a report of former Secre­tary of the Treasury Snyder to the Ways andMeans Committee on February 5, 1951, the resultsof such a redistribution would be as follows:

'If the total taxable income, before taxes, in theincome-tax brackets over $6,000 were dividedequally among the 155,000,000 people in the coun..try at that time, each person would receive $80.

If the total taxable income, before taxes, in thebrackets over $10,000 were so distributed, e.achperson would receive $50.

If the total taxable income, before taxes, in thebrackets over $20,000 were so distributed, eachperson would receive $25.

'The lesson to be le-arned from this is that whatis needed to improve the lot of the les,s fortunateis not a redistribution of existing wealth, butthe production of more wealth. -This can be ac­complished only by providing a proper incentive forpeople to work, s,ave and invest in productive en­terprise. The removal, or partial removal, of thisincentive by excessive taxes leads to the produc­tion of less wealth and defeats the objective ofimproving the lot of the less fortunate.

If the heavy progression in individual income­tax rates is destructive of the private enterprisesystem, and if the high rates produce relativelylittle rev'enue now and will ultimately produceless revenue than lower rates, what excuse ils therefor continuing them? Not a single valid reasonfor so doing can be given. They are manifestly apenalty imposed upon success. Dr. Willford 1. Kinghas very aptly asked the question, "Is successcriminal?" It is so treated by our present tax laws.

For a government to profess to favor a systemof private enterprise and then to confiscate byexcessively high tax ratels the incomes and estatesof the successful differs from what we call "rob­bery" only in form.

•As we go to press, the author points out .thatthe Reed-Dirks-en Amendment has gained wideapproval and has already been endorsed by anumber of the country's leading organizations,including _the American Bar Association, the N a­tional Association of Manufacturers, the AmericanLegion, the Committee for Constitutional Govern­ment, the Life Insurance Policy Holders Protec­tive Association, the Western Tax Council, and theNational Small Business Men's Association.

Bulls •In China~s Shop

By JOHN C. CALDWELL

The same kind of naive, biased and inaccuratejournalism that helped the Reds to gain controlof China continues, as American correspondentsreport the Natiof!,alist activities on Formosa.

Once again, with the aid of Americans, communismhas been pres'ented with opportunity for a victoryin China.

United Press reports, appearing in our news­papers a few 'weeks ago, called attention to thepossibility of a major Chinese Communist attackagainst the Nationalist-held 'Tachen Islands, offthe coast south of ;Shanghai. In May and June,UP reported the situation so serious that allcivilians were being evacuated to Formosa. Andaccording to one UP story, these islands form "theclassic invasion route to Formosa."

The statement that this barren, rocky chain ofislands is "the classic invasion route to Formosa"is so impossibly false that it is difficult to avoidthe conclusion that the ",error" was premeditated.The islands have never been an invasion route toany place, either in ancient or modern times. Thetotal land area of all thirty islands in the Tachengroup is 30.7 square kilomete'rs. The total pop­ulation of all the islands is 18,576. 'Only a halfdoz'en islands are inhabited by 'more than a hundredpeople. The 'chain possesses no major harbor, theislands are so small or so precipitous that it isnot possible even to land a light plane on any ofthem. Half the islands 'are so small or so closeto the Communist-held mainland that only tokengarrisoning is possible. As of three months ago,total Nationalist strength in the Tachen groupconsisted of 6,000 guerrillas who had not yetreceived advanced training, and less than onedivision of regulars.

!As far as any old China hand knows the onlyinvaders ever to approach the inhospitable isles arethe fishermen who settled them during the Mindynasty. Yet this is UP's classic invasion routeto Formosa.

'The implication of the false report is clear:that loss of the Tachen Islands will be a majorblow to N'ationalist China and Formosa will bethreatened. The anti-Chiang lobbyists will be ableto crow with glee, for the simple truth is thatthe islands can be taken. Having built up the im­portance of these least strategic Nationalist hold­ings, the UP has almost made it .mandatory thatthe Reds take over. And in doing so they willachieve a United Press..,created military victory ofgreat importance.

'~g;ee," the anti-Chiang lobbyists will say, "Chiang

can't even hold the most important islands alongthe China coast. He can't even protect Formosa!"

If the .Tachen Islands are lost, what should havebeen described and ,evaluated asa skirmish amongthe never-ending skirmishes along the China coast,will become magnified into a rfirst-class communistvictory.

Chiang's "Uncooperative" Officials

Yes, once again, with an able assist from Amer­icans, communism is on the march in China. Forten years the pattern of biased, inaccurate andhalf-baked reporting has continued. At times thebuns that have wandered through China's shophave been simply naive, sometimes they have beenvicious, sometimes merely stupid.

Last fall two bright young Americans, a world­famous movie and 'TV camera team, arrived inFormosa. The Korean truce had been signed;'Operation Big Switch was over; the young mensought new worlds to conquer. Their request ofChinese Nationalist authorities was simple: theywanted to be dropped, with equipment and in­terpreter, three hundred miles in the interior ofcommunist China. 'Then they would go about photo­graphing and recording life under Mao, turningover their data to the Chinese N'avy at a pre­arranged place.

'The request was politely refused. CourteousChinese officials tried to explain the facts of lifeto the young Americans. Thereupon cables beganto fly, thick and fast, to the ,New York networkoffices. The uncooperative Chinese authorities weredenounced. When the American Ambassador andthe Commanding General of the U. 8. MilitaryAssistance Advisory group refused to intercede,they too were denounced. The net results of theactivities of this duo of bulls was that feelingswere unnecessarily ruffled; all the guerrilla islandsfor a time put out of bounds to ,all Americancorrespondents; the already difficult task of re­porting on this important sector on the cold warfront was made more difficult.

!The Nationalist government is well aware of theimportance of good public relations. It maintainsa Government Spokesman's Office in Taipei withspecific responsibility to help all visiting cor­respondents. The help is given generously. Inter-

SEPTEMBER 1954 89

preters are provided for those who do not speakChinese, transportation is set up, appointmentsmade :quickly with top-echelon officials.

But the poor Chinese are damned if they· do,damned if they don't. It is commonly reported byAmerican correspondents in the Far East that theChinese use these services, not to help, but as amethod of 'controlling what the visiting writersees. It is, of course, well-known that all Taipeihotel rooms are wired for sound, that every visit­ing American is tailed wherever he' goes, thatbaggage and rooms are searched, that all mail iscensored. Or at least that is the story that everynew correspondent receives from the advance anti­Chiang press forces he meets in Tokyo.

'Has anyone ever had actual evidence of tamper­ing with his mail, or actually seen the re'cordingdevices, or actually ,caught a Nationalist secretag,ent in the ,act of searching his hotel room? No,it's always third- and fourth-hand information, re­ceived ,from so-and-so 'who is now in the Balkans ordead.· Yet the stories go on, filling every incomingAmerican writer with prejudice.

She Eluded the "Secret 'Police~~

A few months ago in Taipei I ran into a. charm­ing young American woman reporter whom I hadknown in Korea. She was happy to see me, for shewanted my help. Could I somehow arrange for herto visit beautiful Sun-Moon Lake over the 'weekend so that "they" would not know it? ,PatientlyI explained that it was only necessary to buy atrain ticket, make reservations at a hotel, go to8un-iMoon Lake and enjoy the scenery. No amountof explanation .on my part could convince theyoung lady that she was not being tailed, wouldnot be tailed wherever she went. When last seen,she was slipping off to the railroad station, elud­ing the nonexistent secret police of a governmentwhich had not ,the slightest interest in her plans.

During the past year I have visited Formosatwice, have traveled all over the island, havetoured the guerrilla bases along the China coast,have gone on raids. On an extensive trip intocentral Formosa it would have been impossible forthe Chinese government to tail me. I made my ownarrangements, planned my own stops, talked topeople in Chinese without an interpreter withinearshot. I mailed all of my stories to the UnitedStates; none were tampered with, none delayedin any way. I wandered at will even on the guer­rilla island bases, talked to whomever .J wished.Obviously, certain areas are off bounds for anyreporter. It is not possible for, any Americansto go into the mainland on a raid. Special passesare necessary (and should not be) to visit aboriginecountry in the interior of Formosa. Otherwise theA'merican correspondent who comes to Formosa isfree to see what he wishes and to report what hesees in Chiang's China.

90 THE FREEMAN

But the truth is that American correspondentsdo not want to report the truth. Last January Imet an old friend from China days, in Formosato write a story for the Reporter. His was to bea report on economic progress. How long was heplanning to stay in making his research? Seventy-two hours.

Experts in Two D'ays

The average stay of the American corre'spondentis 48 hours. During that time he lives in theswank Friends of China 'Club (wired for sound,of course! ). He sees nothing of Chinese officialactivities outside Taipei. He then reports learn­edly upon conditions in Free China.

The most celebrated recent bulls are columnistJoseph Alsop and novelist Verne Sneider. Mr.Sneider spent three weeks in Taipei, gatheringmaterial for his book, A Pail of Oysters. He camearmed with letters of introduction from Chinesediplomatic officials in the United States. He wasgiven every cooperation possible by the Chinesegovernment. If he got outside Taipei during histhree 'weeks, it was not far distant. He, too,stayed at the Friends of China Club. Free Chinawas set literally on its ear when Sneider's bookappeared last fall, for it is the nastiest bit ofuntruth that has appeared about China in a decade.In passing, it nlight be interesting to note that thebook got rave reviews. The Saturday Review con­cluded its accolade with the statement that thebook cast a bright light on the infected peri­toneum of Formosa. "It is a true light," opinedthe review,er.

Joseph Alsop is, of course, an ,Old China reporter,intimate of Vinegar Joe Stilwell when the latterwas fighting Chiang and trying to arm the Chi.neseReds. Mr. Alsop visited Formosa for almost 72hours last fall. He found the N'ationalist govern­ment somewhat improved, .but decided that therewere no guerrillas to worry the Communists. Hismajor piece, in the Saturday Evening Post, wasdevoted to the invincibility of the Chinese Com­munist army.

Having spent almost three weeks with Mr.Alsop's nonexistent guerrillas, having talked tothem, lived with them, I am interested in his find­ings. Mr. Alsop should have informed the ChineseCommunists that there are no guerrillas. OnFebruary 25, 1954, the Communist press reporteda force of. 140,000 to 150,000 well-trained, welI­organized guerrillas in one part of one province.And the Provincial Administrative Council ofYunnan Province reports that 200,000 guerrillas"vere killed during recent months in SouthwestChina.

P.erhaps it's all a matter of terminology. TheCommunist press doesn't actually call them guer­rillas. They are "reactionary armed forces" or"dissident peasants."

Presbyterians and A Letter

By EDMUND A. OPITZBehind the e,ndorsement of the controversial MackayLetter by the Presbyterian General Assembly was"machine control," say ministers who were present.

"Can't you churchmen ever get together withoutmaking cockeyed pronouncements about communismand capitalism?"

This questionwa,s' put to me by one of a groupof men 'who wer,e discussing the Church's stand onpolitical questions. Talk had drifted around tothe recent Letter to Presbyterians, popularlyknown as the Mackay. Letter from its principaldrafter, the R'ev. Dr. John A. Mackay, Presidentof Princeton Theological Seminary. This Letterwas released to the news services last fall andwas greeted with loud acclaim and equally loudprotest. There was opposition to the Letter in localPresbyteries throughout the country; but when thechurch commissioners gathered for the 166th Gen­eral Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A.,in June, the Letter was endorsed by a vote of880 to 1.

My questioner continued: "My own pastor isa swell guy and he doesn't go along with a lotof this stuff. That's true of most of you fellowsI meet at luncheon clubs or elsewhere. You'reall right until you get to some conf.erence andthen you sound off on politics and economics.I wouldn't mind so much if you were merelysounding off for yourselves, but you make likeyou were speaking for the whole Church-whichyou are not.

'~My 'minister was at this G,eneral Assemblywhich endorsed the Mackay Letter. I asked himwhy he didn't vote against it, and he said, 'Well,it was a pretty good statement even if I didn'tagree with it, and I didn't want to get into a bighassel, so I voted for it.' And what is the result?According to an editorial in the Christian Century,the action of the General Assembly means thatthe Letter to Presbyterians is 'an authentic ex­pression of the mind and conscience of the Reformedtradition in this period in America.' It is nothingof the sort; it is merely an 'expression of themind and conscience of the man who wrote it and,to some extent, of those who are willing to em­brace it as their very own. It certainly doesn'texpress my mind or conscience."

Someone raised a question at this point aboutthe character of the General Assembly which en­dors,ed the Letter. Did it speak the mind of localchurches around the country, or was this Assemblypretty' much of a packed affair?

I managed to get in a little lecture on Church

conferences, and it boiled down to this: theyappear to be loaded, just like a lot of other officialmeetings in which people get embroiled. But per­haps Church conferences tend to be worse in thisrespect than those of other organizations becauseecclesiastical organizations include a high per­centage of professional funcHonaries. These men,by virtue of their numerical strength and the lackof any real organized opposition, have far morepower in practice than they are allowed in theory.

"Rigged Beforehand~~

:Some ministers have ventured the opinion thatin choosing commissioners for the recent Gen­eral Assembly which ,endorsed the Letter, care wastaken to select delegates who would be inclinedto support the hierarchy on the Letter. Let merelate the experience of a prominent Presbyterianminister by quoting from his letter:

"I have talked with four different men whowere at the Assembly. Their stories are identical.They were all disgusted with the complete machinecontrol of the Assembly. It was not a deliberativebody in any sense of the word, as it should havebeen. Those who object,ed to what was being donehad no opportunity to voice their objections. Itis true, of course, that the machine cut out many

, by the election of delegates in the Preshyteries.For example, I was in line to be :elected by thisPresbytery for this General Ass,embly. My standbeing known, I did not have a ghost of a chanceto be sent-even though it was my turn. All thisemphasizes the fact that the machine is in com­plet.e control and the Church is drifting furtherand further away from the truly representativebody which the Presbyterian denomination used tobe. I am opposed to any hierarchy and, there­for,e, to any change in policy, but what is happen­ing in the State is happening in the Church--adrive toward centralized control.

"In view of the attitude of the ecclesiasticalhierarchy, many younger men are afraid to opentheir mouths. They see, for example, how I ambeing treated and they don't want to pay sucha price for independent thought and action."

Another Presbyterian minister who attendedthe meetings writes: "The whole performance ofjustification of the' Letter was meticulously riggedbeforehand and carried out at the General

SEPTEMBER 1954 91

Assembly-a fascinating study in ecclesiasticalpolitics."

At this point the group was willing to agreethat maybe a good deal of church politickingsurrounded the official endors,ement of the Letter,and that returned the discussion to the documentib~elf. What is it? What does it say?

,The Letter is a message sent to the memberchurches-and the news services-by the Presby­terian General Council, the governing body of thatChurch. The General Council is instructed by theconstitution of the Church "to correspond withand advise the General Councils of Presbyteries."In its message, the General Council was "guidedby the historic witness of our Church and the de­liverances of successive General AssembUes." Itintroduced the Letter by quoting with approval apronouncement of the 165th General Assembly onChristians' "responsibility as citizens of theirnation, to seek as far as their influence may ex­tend, to bring national life and all the institu­tions of society into conformity with the moralgovernment of God, and into harmony with thespirit of Jesus Christ." And then it continued,"In full accordance with this deliverance, the Gen­eral Council would share with our Church con­stituency the following thoughts . . ."

It would be difficult for Christians to disagreewith this opening st,atement, and one can alsoendorse the approach which conceives of the Letteras a sharing of thoughts. This mild and humblebeginning would indicate that the General Councilinitially ventured to set forth its fairly common­place thoughts for the churches to mull over, andthen to accept, amend, or reject. Probably theCouncil was taken by surprise by the extravagantreception accorded its Letter, by the warm ac­ceptance and the heated rejection. On the one hand,a prominent theologian hailed it as a shiningexample of "corporate prophetic teaching," whileon the other hand, the Letter was attacked asa device to give aid and comfort to the enemy-theenemy in this case being communism.

The General Council came back swinging. Nowthe issue was larger than the content of the Letter,or its lack of content; the Faith was at stake andneeded defenders. All who wanted to defend theFaith must fight to keep the Letter from fallinginto the hands of the infidel. The proponents ofthe Letter chose to accord their attackers the majorportion of their energies, and they met attack withcounterattack, and ignored those who merely"vanted to discuss the Letter on its own merits.This became an exciting crusade for those engagedin doing ,battle, but there was a major casualty:yV'hat began as an effort to share thoughts becamea determination to lay down the law.

The Assembly vote of 880 to 1 in favor of theLetter, the whole Letter, and nothing but theLetter, is evidenee of the bandwagon psychologywhich the whole episode has generated. Following

92 THE FREEMAN

the adoption vote some one proposed a vote ofconfidence in Dr. Mackay, the author, and thegathering leaped to its feet and applauded longand loud. In such an atmosphere there can be nodetached discussion of issues, and there was none.

On Congressional Investigations

'The Letter to Presbyterians, like almost everyother pronunciamento, issuing of late from "pro­gressive" circles, starts off by giving us the low­down on congressional committees. The Letterapproves the committee system, and says thatinvestigations have helped "to forestall the in­sidious intervention of a foreign power in theinternal affairs of our country." It goes on tosay, "Congressional committees, which are an im­portant expression of democracy in action, haverendered some valuable g.ervices to the nation."But-"Some congressional inquiries have revealeda distinct tendency to become inquisitions."

IGuess which inquiries are here referred to.If you guessed the Nye, La Follette, Truman, orBuchanan committees, you are wrong! These com­mittees never, never practiced the rough tacticsthat present-day committees are accused of, or ifthey did, look at the kind of people these committeesinvestigated-people who deserved all they got!

Not until congressional committees went to workon security and loyalty risks in government wasthere a threat to basic human rights, or such isthe inference we are led to draw. The Letterreads, "Favored by an atmosphere of intense dis­quiet and suspicion, a subtle but potent assaultupon basic human rights is now in progress." Nota few years ago, but now! This sentiment has beenr,epeated ad nauseum by the "liberal" intelligentsia,who not only did not raise their voices againstthe tactics of earlier congressional investigations,but applauded the tactics, and in some case'S helpedengineer the investigations.

Fifteen years ago, many of our "liberal" intel­ligentsia, including the most prominent of ourtheologians, were finding a great new faith intheir war of words against fascis'm abroad andwhat they called "isolationism" at home. Whenthe New Deal sought war ,abroad as a means ofrecouping its lost prestig,e at home, the lay andclerical supporters of our local utopia followedthe piper with even more enthusiasm than theyhad displayed for domestic reforms. In additionto their old targets, the "economic royalists" andthe "reactionaries" who opposed the New Deal,they were given a whole set of new targets onwhom to heap abuse-thos'e who advocated UnitedStates neutrality, and on this account w,ere por­trayed as friendly to fascism.

Tolerance is not likely to thrive during a war,against enemies pictured as satanic, and the"liberal" intelligentsia were intolerant toward anywho questioned the idealism of the crusade. This

intolerance persisted after the war. When ardoris dampened by seeing one proclaimed aim ofthe war after another go sour, there is a naturaltendency to want to poke beneath the surfaceof events in the interests of an honest historicalrecord. The official propaganda of World WarOne was replaced by revisionist history whenscholars began to sift the ev;idence. But the"liberal" intelligentsia have pretty well stoppedthe writing of revisionist history by contemporaryscholars, and where a book has actually appearedin print, they have attempted to bury it and itsauthor under an avalanche of smears. N'ot evenworld eminence in his field exempted the lateCharles A. Beard from getting the treatment by"liberal" writers and book reviewers.

And these are the "liberal" inteUig,entsia whoare putting up a deafening clamor that they arebeing silenced by democratic efforts to weed outloyalty and security risks in government!

The Letter to Presbyterians falls into step withthese p.eople and takes up their hue and cry. Thisis indeed a witnes:s of a sort, but it is not thekind of prophetic witness one has a right to antic­ipate from an institution which is expected to livecloser to its conscience than to current opinion polls.

The Anti-Anti-Communist Line

The Letter is seriously concerned because manypeople approach "the grave problem of communismin a purely negative way. Communism, whieh isat bottom a secular religious faith of great vitality,is thus being dealt with as an exclusively policeproblem." Communism. was a philosophy longbefore it became the secular faith it now is formany people. Assorted tenets of its philosophyare widely held by people who ar;e not devoteesof the communist faith. They may, indeed, believ,ethemselves to be strongly anti...Communist. Thus,while guarding aga-inst conspiracy, it is importantto meet the philosophy of communism on thephilosophical level. The Letter's disparaging refer­ence to the methods of the policeman does notautomatically lead to an adoption of the methodsof the philosopher. There is nothing in the Letterwhich indicates the slightest interest in opposingthe philosophy of communism on that level. It viewswith alarm our "fanatical negativism" toward com­munism, which may lead to a spiritual ,emptinessin our national house that could "he occupied withease by a fascist tyranny" in "the case of anational crisis." It says that "attacks are beingmade upon citizens of integrity and social passion";that "truth is being subtly and silently dethroned" ;that "the demagogue, who lives by propaganda, iscoming into his own on a national scale," and morein the same old vein.

Nothing in the Letter even hints at the linesalong which a philosophical critique of communismwould proceed. All it says is that communism goes

against the grain of human nature, and that it"has an approaching rendezvous with God and themoral order." That much, at least, is obvious;"for things," as Emerson observed, "won't be mis­managed long." Things may ,even themselves out ina thousand years!

Verbally, the Letter is aware of the menace ofcommunism and of our need to defend ourselvesagainst it, but at the same time it seeks to weakenone important line of defense by slandering theeX-ICommunist. One of the important ways ofprotecting ours'elv:es against the conspiratorialactivities of communism is to find out how theapparatus works from those who have been closeto, or part of it. Many ex-Communists are eagerto make amends .for the damage they may have doneour society during their party days, by testifyingto what they know. Yet these men, as a class, arethe victims of a scurrilous attack in the Letterto Presbyterians. The imputation is that most ofthem are liars. The Letter purports to be shocked"that men ,and women should be publicly condemnedupon the uncorroborated word of former Com­munists. . . .'The ex-Communists to whose wordcongressional committees apparently give unqual­ified credence are in very many instances peoplewhose basic philosophy authorizes them now, asin the past, to believe that a lie in a good causeis thoroughly justified."

The Letter then performs the incredible feat ofstooping even lower than this level of abuse toattack one of the great Churches of Christendomwhich some former Communists have joined. Itsays, "Many of these witnesses have done no more,as we know, than transfer their allegiance fromone authoritarian system to another," and theirnew religious faith, the Letter informs us, author­izes them to lie in a good cause!

"That's ,enough for me," broke in my originalinterrogator, "I've had it! If that is the Church'switness, I don't want any part of it."

"Just a minute," said a young minister. "Earlierthis evening you objected to a few churchmenin a conference claiming to speak for the wholeChurch. Now you cannot turn right around and,condemn the whole Church because you dislikewhat a few men say in her name. If you don'tlike the witness of the Letter to Presbyterians,then you'd better start witnessing yourself, inyour own way, in your local church. Jesus wasa layman and He preached a lay religion; and oneof the most hopeful signs in religion today is therevival of serious interest in religion on thepart of laymen. Not only is their weight beingfelt in local churches, but the appearance ofsuch organizations as the Yokefellowship, theChristophers, and now the Orpheus Fellowship, ishighly significant."

Our group broke up. We passed no· resolutionsnor did we issue a statement to the press. Buteach man was busy with his own thoughts.

SEPTEMBER 1954 93

As Woodrow Wilson Said

By FELIX WITTMER

During the Army-<MoCarthy hearings PresidentEisenhower publicly approved the Army directiveswhich lenjoined Army personnel' from honoringcongr,essional subpoenas. He went further; he or­dered Army Counsellor John G. Adams, then awitness before a congressional committee, to refrainfrom giving any answers that might throw light onthe subjeot under investigation. He did not specifythe kind of questions that ought not to be answered-such, for instance, as might lead to disclosureof information regarding our defensre program; heforbade the Army counsellor to tlell Congr'ess any­thing whatsoever regarding a meet,ing at which theArmy charges against-- a 8enator were drawn up.

Them'eeting over which the President threw ablanket of secrecy was attended ,entirely byPresidential appointees. Thus the President us'edhis power to protect from scrutiny the activities

, of a group inside the Executive branch of thegovernmlent. He virtually informed Congress thatthe doings of the Executive branch w,ere none oftheir business. Thus once again the issue of su­premacy between the two ,branche'S of our govern­ment was joined.

The Senator from Wisconsin lost no tim'e in defy­ing the Presidential order and inviting officials ofthe Executive branch to supply his investigativecommittee with information which might lead tothe det'e,ction of subversive or otherwise criminalactivities. In theeJ'1es of many he thus invitedfederal officials and 'employees to insubordination.

'The "liberal" press, lespecially those metropolitanpapers which are known for their opposition to;congressional investigations of alleged Communists,unqualifi,edly supported the President's position.The Attorney General, in a speech before the Na­tional Editorial Association in Baltimore, evencharged that the Senator "'would substitute govern­Inent by an individual for governm'ent by law." Butdoes not a Presidential directive come under thehead of "government by an individual"?

H'ere is evidently an issue on which there doesnot yet exist enough clarity. Consequently, dis­agreem,ent is likely to flare up in the future unlessthe limitations of 'Executive and congressionalprerogatives can be determined, and enforced bylaw.

The issue currently is complicated by the semi­warlike atmospher!e in which we live. Public,ity thatmay affect the national security is admittedly un-

94 THE FREEM~N

Today it is considered "liberal" to applaudevery Executive defiance oj Congress. Butliberals oj yesterday had a differeint view.

desirable'. Employees in certain defense plants andscientists who do research in the development ofnew weapons, for ,example, must be sworn to s'e­crecy. But .it is this very seer,ecy that may coverup the danger it attempts to forestall.

Information '~eak8"

Let us assume that one who works in a nuclearlaboratory runs into 'evidence of subversive activity.Dutifully he reports the case to the FBI. The latterappraises the data and notifi,es the D'epartmtent ofJustice. Months pass by, yet nothing seems to hap­pen. What is the original informer going to do?FB'I agents may be covering 'ev,ery movement ofthe reported suspect, but in order to obtain tangibleproof of tre'ason and also to discover confederates,do not hav'e him discharged. The FBI doe'S not takethe original informer into its confidence.

After some time, the laboratory worker becomesuneasy. He, recalls instanees (now a mattler ofpublic record) in which the FBI was properlyalerted, and, as far as is known, nothing of im­portance was done by the Executive branch. Heknows that Hiss and Remington would not havebeen convicted had it not been for congressionalcommitt'ees of investigation.

Will this remploy1ee of the Executive branch, inobedience to the Presidential order, maintainsilence, or will he leak his· information to a con­gressional committee? Will the security of his jobtake precedence over conscitence and patriotism?

In another case, though, a suspected Communistcould in fact be an agent of the Central Intellig,enceAgency. Common sense re,quires the CIA even tomislead public opinion regarding such an allegedCommunist. Misinformed aetion by a congressionalcommittee against this individual could damagethe proJect of the CIA. N'ot all Congressmen orSenators, it is feared, know how t'o keep secrets.Can we blame the CIA for at least being hesitantabout taking them into its confidenee?

Yet is the GI'A above suspicion? Walter B,edell8mith, when head of the CTA, declared publiclythat· in his opinion there were Communists in hisorganization but that he was not able to spot them.Such inability may well stem from the lethargywhich is inherent in bureaucracies.

There ar'e also those who· demand what is canedopen diplomacy; but open diplomacy frequently

would not he any diplomacy at all. We know thatEis,enhower and Churchill recently discussed what(if any) unit'ed stand their countries might take inface of communist expansion in Southeast Asia.Newspaper reporters complained about the secre­tiv:eness of the two government heads. Yet if thePresident and the Prime Minis,ter had informedtheir respective nationals of their decisions, theywould at the sam'e time have given Chou En-Iai andMalenkov the cue for future action.

George Washington, in 1789, rej1ected a Houseresolution requesting a copy of his insitrucHons tothe U. S. Minister who negotiated a treaty withBritain. President Hoover, in 1930, held that the8enate's prerogative in the trea'ty-making proc'essdid not entitle it to see the confidential messagesthat led to the conclusion of the London treaty. Itwould seem that Presidents in such circumstanc1esmust use their discretion as to what actions of theExecutive branch may be disclos'ed.

Yet in the American political system nobody, not,even the President, is immune from the system ofchecks and balances. On the contrary, in deferenceto human weakness, we have traditionally insistedon keeping the Executivle branch under surveillance.

The Duty of Congress

In the concept of our Constitution, the Executiveand Legislative branches are not suppos,ed to beof lequal weight. Congre'Ss 'makes the laws; theAdministration executes the laws. If Congress feelsthat the Administration does not act in accordancewith the laws, its duty is to delimit in detail whatthe Administration mayor may not do.

Until recently our Prlesidents knew quite wellthat ours is a government of limited powers, andthat therefore they owed profound respect to ther·epres1entatives of the people. Even Andrew Jack­son, who let unlimited democracy loose on us, wasmost restrained in his languag'e when, in 1835, hedeclined to supply the Senate with copies of thecharg'es which led to the removal of Gideon Fitzas surveyor general. At any rate, he dealt with acas,e of minor scope, which was his proper domain,and not with such a major issue as the communistthreat to our form of government.

Peremptory orders not to honor subpoenas orsystematically to re'fus'e to ans'wer any questionsa congressional committele may ask amount to con­tempt of Congress. Coming from the top layer ofthe Executiv,e branch, such orders smack of author­itarianism. Exac'tly becaus'e we do not want to sub­stitut'e government by individuals for gov,ernmentby law is there need for congressional surveillanceof the administration of law.

Such surveillance is more needed now than everbefore in the history of our country. In the nine­teen twenties there were but 300,000 people em­ployed by the federal government; today thisbureaucracy has clos'e to 2,500,000 on the payroll.

If it were not for the investigative committeesof our elected representatives, we would not haveany chance at all to check upon the activiHesof this vast and expensive body. Once the in­vestigative powers of Congress are curtailedby Executive truculence,what can prevent thisbureaucracy from -transgressing the limits putupon it by the law? If the administrator of the lawis ,immune from investigation, what can preventhim from perverting it? In short, the curtailmentof congressional investiga1tion is a step towardauthoritarianism.

Era of Secrecy

In a speech prepared by the research staff ofthe Arbtorney General, President Eisenhower cited26 instances in which previous Presidents had with­held desired information from Congress. It is sig­nificant, though, that only eleven of these 2,6 casestook plac1e in the first 144 years of our history,while the other fifteen occurr,ed during the twentyyears of the. New-Fair Deal Administrations. If,to use the figures of the Eisenhower speech, ourPresidents of the pre-Roosevelt era had defiedCongress as oft'en as RooseVielt and Truman did,they would have done so 108, not eleven, times. Itwas during the era in which Mr. Roosevelt threat­'ened to pack the Supreme Court and Mr. Trumanseized the steel plants that Presidents r1efused withincreasing frequency the demands of Congr,ess tosupply it with information. Hecrecy kept pae,e withthe acquisition of power.

There is something else which disturbs discern­ing citizens. 'The torte of Presidential defiance haschanged. On the four occasions on which, accordingto Mr. Eis,enhower, Presidents Washington, Jack­son, or Cleveland felt obliged not to comply withthe wishes of Congress, they explained that veryparticular .factors, in these instances, compelledthem to withhold the desired documents; there wasnone of the curtness or arroganc'e that typified Mr.Truman's gag order.

This chang,e in Presidential manners significantlycoincides with a change of the "liberal" attitudetoward the ascendancy of the EX!ecutive over theLegislativ,e branch. A generation ago those whoclaimed that tiUe strongly supported congfiessionalinvestigations of the Executive branch, whHe thepresent crop applauds every Presidential defiance ofCongress. When Senators Walsh and Wheeler con­ducted probes in the Teapot Dome 'and Elk Hillscas'es, the then liberal Harvard professor FelIxFrankfurter chided those who "seek to divertattention and shackle the future by suggestingrestrictions in the proc,edure of future congres­sional investigations."

In an article tInder the tiUe of "Hands Off theInvestigations," in the New Republic of May 21,1925, the profe'Ssorconceded that (regarding in­quiries into the activities of an official in the

SEPTEMBER 1954 95

Department of the InteTior) "much of this washearsay and gossip"; but, he continued, "If thesearen't leads properly to be pursued, then we hadbetter admit tha't the power of congr,essional in­vestigation is a sham, and n.ot an effective instru­ment for ventilating issues for the information ofCongress and the public."

Nowadays the "liberals" wail and lam1ent thatcongressional investigators use' "uncouth" methodsin ferreting out the Communist traitors. But F'elixFrankfurter, anno 1924, had this to say: "'Thequestion is not whether peopl1e's feelings here and

there may be hurt, or 'names dragged through th~

mud,' as it is called. The retal issue is whether thedanger of abus'es and the actual harm done are soclear and substantial that the grav,e risks of fetter­ing fvee congressional inquiry are to be incurred byartificial and technical limitations upon inquiry/"

The professor from Harvard, it then seemed tomany, carried the torch of liberty. But who spea'ksfor liberty now? What has happened to the liberalsof ~esteryear, who held with Woodrow Wilson that"The history of liberty is the history of m'en'sefforts to restrain government"?

A Six-Billion-Dollar TrifleBy F. A. HARPER

As this is written, the Senate has just voted a $6billion increase in the federal debt limit. Let's behopeful and assume the final figure will be no largerthan this, after it goes back to the House, whichhad previously approved a $15 billion increase.

Few of us have been interested in that particularlittle sideshow of the Washington circus. We havebeen in the main tent, watching them play withour tax rates ,and the lotteries for our specialprivileges, happy to leave the matter of debt limitto those technically minded in fiscal affairs.

Yet the increase in the debt limit, while ourattention is diverted, picks our pockets as effectivelyas a direct tax would have done. It permits thegovernment to live beyond its tax income, to con­tinue being profligate. And this deifieit is as mucha form of tax on you as is your annual income­tax bill. It is' an inflation tax, though you may notrealize its tax aspect at the tim'e. Your moneyis really taken from you when your pocket ispicked, not when you discover it is gone.

"But it's such a small amount, as though yourwife were to propose increasing your thousand­dollar mortgage to $1021.82, because she 'needs'a new hat that is on sale for $21.82. Let her haveit! Not worth a family row." 'This is the argument.

Or is it? Let's see.In addition to the fact that the $6 billion may

be used to buy something you don't want, it isauthorization for many times that amount of in­flation. If persons would buy all these bonds withmoney in their pockets, it, would he more like adirect personal tax of $6 billion. But if, on theother hand, the government -is forced to find itsmarket in the banks, the inflation becomes prolificand reproduces itself several times. That is whythis sideshow is so important. And this is theway it works.

Let us say the government spends one dollar it

96 THE FREEMAN

does not have from other taxes. It writes on apiece of paper, in effect, "I owe me one dollar."But that doesn't give it the dollar. So it takesthis bond or note toa bank, and gets the dollarwhich it can then spend-not a dollar bill, actually,but a deposit in the bank and subject to paymentby check. This is called "monetization of the debt";the government debt goes into the bank, and comesout as money.

Then another thing happens. The governmentmay not spend the dollar at onee; or if it does, theone who receives it may not do so. Somebody isgoing to leave the dollar in his bank account.Banks know this, and bet on it. They can loanthat idle dollar, left there on deposit, to someoneelse. He will probably leave it idle, too. So theycan loan it again. And again.

Why is there any limit? Because the bank mustprotect itself against the chance of withdrawals.And anyhow, as a member of the Federal ReserveSystem it is required to keep on deposit with theFRS a specified percentage of these deposits,asprotection. This is about 15 per eent, on theaverage, for all banks in the, System and outside.

So, of the one dollar monetized from the govern­m'ent bond and left' on deposit, 15 cents has to besalted away as a reserve and 85 cents c.an be loaned.When the 85 cents is loaned, 13 cents (15 per cent),must be salted away and 72 cents can he loaned.This goes on and on. If we add up the amountsloaned (85 plus 72 plus...) for all the banks andpersons who become involved, we find that theoriginal dollar becomes six or seven dollars ofnew money-inflation money.

The rise in the debt limit is not just a fiscaltechnicality. It affects all of us, first as aninflation tax and then as fuel for further inflationtoa possible increase of more nearly $40 billion.Your wife's new hat becom'es pretty expensive.

That Man Gaskins

By ROBERT LE FEVREThe story of a self-reliant Floridian who builta unique industry through pioneering and hardwork, without benefit of government handouts.

Drive to Florida this year and have your cypressknee LQ. checked. The man to do it for you isTom Gaskins of Palmdale.

Take Highway 27 south from Tallahassee,through the forests of turpentine pines, over thehills and valleys of the beautiful lake country, andon down into palm·tree territory where the Ever­glades begin. You will know you are getting closewhen you are startled by signs made of cut-outletters artistically placed on dead tree-limbs. Youget another jolt when you read, "Tom GaskinsCypress Knee Museum-an individual thing-noneof this group stuff." Many of these sjgns are fes­tooned with dangling beer bottles.

Look for Fisheating Creek, and nearby you'll seea building with a large cypre'Ss tree growing outof the middle of it. There you'll find 'Tom.

In front of the building is a larg.e sign. It says,"The cyp~ess knee industry was started by and thismus,eum was built by a selfish reactionary. Withoutany help ever, from any city, county, state or fed­eral government. No RFC, HOLC, FHA, WPA,WBSOC. No price top, no price bottom, no subsidy,no labor union protection. What you see here cannev,er be duplicated. Souvenirs of a time beforecivilization covered the United States." In caseWBSOC is unfamiliar to you, you'll hav1e to askTom.

Cypress knees might best be described as some­thing you never saw before. In short, they are anatural growth up from the roots of the cypresstree, and they take indescribable forms. But moreabout them later.

'Gaskins is a type. It could almost be said, avanishing type. He's a s'elf-r'eliant American whohates all government. agencies, particularly thos,ewhich are clothed with good intentions. AndGaskins got that way by living his own life andthinking his own thoughts.

Tom is a native of Florida. He was born inTampa in 1909 and got himself a raggle-taggleeducation, according to accepted standards. Hefigured out at an early age that it wasn't what theteachers knew that counted-it was what he wasable to learn for hims'elf, whether from selectedteachers, books, nature, or just that old school ofexperience.

He married Virginia "Bible in Arcadia, Floridain 1934, and decided to set up headquarters onFisheating Creek and to make a million dollars.

And being soundly American and self-reliant to thecore, he planned his first million on the basis ofproducti\Tte energy, although he didn't call it that.He allowed he'd have to trade something he couldfind, grow, or make-for that million. It was thissearch for something for trade which caused him totrip over his first cypress knee.

But l,et Tom tell it. "Shortly after I was married,my mother-in-law asked me to get her a cypressknee. She wanted to use it for a flower vase. Shethought knees were hollow. All dictionaries priorto 1953 say the cypress knee is hollow, but normallythey are solid. I turned to my wife then and said,'That's something that will slell.'" Thus began anindustry that has spread into sev1enteen southernstates.

His 'Own Handiwork

In 1937, not far from the banks of FisheatingCreek Tom began to build his home, and a cypressknee factory. He built two buildings and s'everalsheds and l'ean-tos with an ,expenditure of littleover $300 cash. That's all the money he had. Heran out of funds before his house was finished.The house at first was 12 x 36 feet, and he coveredit with cypress shingle'S which he had made him­self. The shingles were split with a frow, a toolev'ery hous'ehold in America once knew all about.Today, along with the virtue of building one's ownhouse, the frow is practically extinct. What didTom do when he ran out of money? "Instead ofhaving real windows like rich people hav,e, I tookpi'eees of flooring, nailed them groove side up inthe window openings and slid pieces of glass in thegrooves. The glass didn't cost me anything~ Insteadof building regulation partitions inside for therooms, I divided the house up with sheets of cor­rugated cardboard. I picked that up back of thestores in Arcadia." Even the bathroom, which eamein 1946, is waned with corrugated cartons.

In the midst of this poverty, Tom Gaskins andhis wife w'ere happy and content,ed. They hadplenty of hard work to keep them busy. Theyhelped out on the food bill by ewting wild game,fish from the creek, and pl,enty of swamp cabbagewhich was to be had for a prodigious amount of'effort-but is worth it, if you've ever eaten it.Hand-me-down clothes from friends and relativeswer,e always welcomed. Gaskins never complained

SEPTEMBER 1954 97

about his living conditions or }ack of finances. H'efigured he was lucky to be an American-and tohave the opportunity to toil each day for his keep.But his mind was bothered.

There were two migratory labor camps the otherside of Lak!e Okeechobee, one at Belle' Glade, theother at Pahokee. They had electric lights and run­ningwater, hot and cold. They had washingmaehines, ironers, sewing machines-plenty ofmodern convenirenees and all for just a dollar aweek. Also, the people who lived there could buyreal groeeries at a real store for wholesal,e prices.Now, Tom and his wife spent eight years on Fish­eat,ing Cre·ek without electric lights. And their onlyrunning water was the bucketful they ran with.

\Tom didn't mind the luxury of the migratory1workers. But it bothered him to think that they'l were considered "underprivileg'ed." Because', despit'eihis poverty, he was helping to pay for the things'it those migratory workers got, through the taxes that., we're collected from him ,every time he spent one

of his few dollars. Somehow this didn't seem quitefair. Further, it didn't seem quite American.

What a Pioneer Thinks of Socialism

Despite the unfairness, the Gaskinses w'e'nt towork cutting and curing cypr1ess knees. Whenstrangers would stop by, Tom would explain thewonders of nature and the beauty of the cypresskne,es. Some would buy a knee. Others couldn'tfigure out what it was all about. But gradually ademand was built up for this strangely beautiful,exotic 'growth. At first, 'Tom sold to big stores andshop.s all over the country. But as the Q.emand grew,he stopp.ed this practice. H,e explains:

"I've got a stack of orders in from the big storesbut I've written them I won't fill their orders. Yousee, with the wage and hour laws, 'Social security,unemployment insurance, and :all the red tape, inorder to fill itheir orders I'd have to bea big busi­nessman. 'Then I'd get involved with all the taxes,and I'd worry and fret and be unhappy,and prob­ably wouldn't end up with much, anyway. So I'vewritten and told thousands of dealers all ov'er thecountry that I am going to keep my business sm,allbecause of the socialistic situation. I sell only toindividuals who 'writ'e in or visit my shop. I chargea dollar to see the mus'eum. Many thousands haveseen it. Millions will want to see it. It looks like Iwill ,either have to 'close the doors or hav,e a largebusiness foreed on me."

'Tom's museum is decor,ated with signs that ex­pr,ess his opinions on social security, wage and hourlaws and such things. The Labor Department be­came eurious. ;They wanted to know how manypeople he' 'employed, ·for how long and for howmuch, etc. 'Tom wrote the D,epartment: "I thinkyou are alIa bunch of leeches and you should quityour jobs and do something worth-while." He ex­panded in letters to the editor. Tom (like the Mar-

98 THE F'REEMAN

shall housewives; Mary Cain of Summit, Missis­sippi; ,RoyPurs'ell of Plymouth, Miehigan; PhilO'Connell of South Weymouth, Miassachusetts andothers) has refused to pay soeial security taxeson one of his employees who doesn't want govern­ment insurance, and on himself. Twic'e the govern­ment has attached his bank account. He counterswith mor'e letters to the editor.

Perhaps the thinking of this rugg,ed swamp-mancan best be illustrated by repeating here a letterhe sent to the Tampa Tribune. It doesn't happen tobe about social security. It contains a theme whichin this day of sereking after g,ecurity is almost asrare as the creak of the wheels of acover,ed wagon,the cry of the muleteers, the snap of the bullwhipand the scraping of shov1elsas :men bent their backswith a will to :build the Am'erica we us,ed to haVie.It runs as follow'S:

A SHOVELFUL OF INDEPENDENCEPalmdale recently lost its most respected citizen, Mr.John Hess. Not many people knew Mr. Hess, as hedid not make much noise.

He lived five miles out in the woods, by himself.He owed no man,ever. On being forced to retirefrom the A.C.L. Railroad at age 65, he refused apension, stating that he had heen paid for his workand the railroad owed him nothing. At ,the continuedinsistence of his friends, heag,reed to accept thepension on the condition that he could work ,twodays 'a week for it. But there are rules and lawsagainst such work.

As he was not allowed to work during daylighthours, ,twice weekly, at night, he walked five milesto Palmdale to shovel cinders off the roadbed. Hewas often seen walking home from work at thecrack of day. This continued for some time, and therailroad people found out about it and hid theshovels. Mr. Hess then bought his own and con­tinued working two nights every week. He wore outone shovel and ordered another.

Finally, diesel engines replaced coal burners andthere were no more cinders to shovel. Mr. Hess thenpulled grass from the railroad bed, keeping it niceand neat, until a few days before he became sick anddied. The above continued over a seven-year period.

Whether you know ,anything about 'cypress kneesor not, it's worth a stop at the museum to shakehands with 'Tom Gaskins, an American.

Oh, y,es, the dangling beer bottles on his signsare for target practice.

Names Wanted

Because you read the FREEMAN, you know

people who ought to read it. Please send in the

names of these kindred spirits, so that we can

introduce them to the publication by way of

sample copies. Your help is appreciated.

The FREEMAN, Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y.

More Valuable than Property

By CLARENCE MANIONUnless we leave one priceless inheritance to ourchildren and grandchildren, we leave them nothing.

Here is a personal experience· that has changedthe whole course of my lif,e. It has to do with a,form'er client of mine. My task was to try toinsulate him against the post-mortem impact~ ofthe federal tax collector.

There was a stack of documents on the deskin front of the client: a trust agreement,- a will,insurance polici'es of various sorts-deeds of landand transfers of personal property. With a bigsmile on his face my client signed thes'e docu­ments. He was chuckling with happiness-evenwhen he signed my check. At that point I in­terrupted him.

I said: "John, you s'eem to get a kick out ofthis." H·e laid down his pen, removed his pipefrom his mouth, blew out a big billow of smoke,and said: "Yes, I certainly do get a kick out ofthis. I'm an old man. I've got much more propertythan lever thought I would· have. I had somebad luck, too. Lost my good wif'e a few years ago;lost my son in World War Two; but I've stillgot a daughter and a lot of fine grandchildren.I wanted them to have this property but I neve'reven had a will. I knew that unless I did some­thing like this, the government would g'et most ofit and the rest of it might go to the four winds.We've done a good job here. And, I'm really goingto sleep tonight. You bet I get a kick out ofthis."

So he put his pipe back into his mouth andstarted to sign again. I 'interrupted him a sec­ond time. I said: "John, now that you've takencare of their property, what are you going to doabout the liberty of these children?"

He didn't stop signing; he just laughed outloud. "Oh, I don't know· anything about liberty,"he said. "I'm just a merchant, and I've made somemoney, but I'm going to have to leave that libertybusiness to the professors and politicians." Hekept on laughing and kept on signing.

'Then I told him something that I'm going to tellyou-something I want you to remember. I said:"Tear up that will, throwaway the insurancepolicies, forget the trust agreement, forget all thethings we have done here this afternoon, becauseunless you leave your children liberty, you leavethem nothing at all."

Ask the wealthy Jews in Germany what theirproperty did for them, if you pleas!e, when theywere fac~ng up against the concentrated, unlimitedpower of government.

Ask the kulaks, ask the ghosts of ten millionkulaks murdered by agents of governm1ent. Say:"Fellows, you had a lot of land, a lot of prop­erty over there in Russia. Didn't that propertyand that land help you when you were faced upagainst this concentrat'ed, unlimited power of gov­ernm1ent ?"

Ask the imprisoned .or expelled or dead Chineselandlords and merchants what good their propertydid them when their government decided "to ownand operate the me'ans of production for the goodof all people." Is that the future you want towill to your children?

A One-Way Ticket

Wherever you look, at whatev'er page or periodof history you ask that question, the answer comesback always the same: In time of tyranny, intime of concentrated, unlimited governmentalpower, your money is going to buy your childrenjust one thing-a ticket to the concentration camp,a one-way ticket to the point of no return.

Will you think of that the next time you paythat life insurance premium? The next time youput a codicil on your will for the next grand­child, or stash away a few dollars for ,a rainy day,or set up a trust fund, stop and think a moment.'Vhen the power of government is unlimit'ed andcentraliz'ed, the inevitable result is a one-wayticket to the point of no return. _

Think of it, pleas'e, when you gather thoseyoungsters around you. What is your personalcontribution to the fate of the next generation?When you gather those children, as I have gatheredmine, look into their faces and ask yourself thisquestion: How much unlimited, centraliz'ed poweris my government going to have when these chil­dren are. as old as I am?

That will do it! Thereafter, you'll do your ownindividual bit to preserve human liberty-whichis to be found only in a limited constitutionalgovernment with strict divisions of power andunbreakable checks and balances. Then and ther.eyou'll make a solemn resolution that your legacy,not of property, but of liberty to these children,is going to compare favorably to the big fortuneof freedom which the Founding Fathers devised atmuch sacrifice and willed to you as a trust foryour children and their children. I pray that wevvill deserve the help of God in keeping it.

SEPTEMBER 1954 99

The Rotten Apple •In Our Schools

By FRANK S. MEYER

The tragedy 01 the new education for "adjustmen~

to society" is that the philosophy 0 I Deweyismsubstitutes lor our grea't cultural heritage thefallacies of today's fashionable collectivism.

The symptoms of deterioration in our educationalsystem-long apparent to serious observers-havebecome so obvious that the fact of deteriorationis now a matter of public concern. Everyone exceptthe educational bureaucrats, whose vested interestis under fire, and the "liberals," to whom anyattack on any state institution is impermissible,agrees that something has gone wrong. But what?Why is it that the school graduate accumu1latesso little learning from the years invested in themodern school? And why is he so devoid of anysense of values?

Starkly, in the corruption of our children, westand face to face with the truth that "ideashave consequences," that philosophical thought isnot a dreamer's luxury but the ,most powerful offorces. The pre'Sent state of American educationis the direct consequence of the pragmatic-instru­mentalist phi'losophy of John Dewey. Applied tothe educational process and transmitted to theAmerican educational system through a networkof associations, training schools and publications,these theories have, in little more than a gen­eration, annihilated the education whi.ch for athousand years formed the men who made Western!civilization. This education, inherited from cla'S­sical Greece and transmuted by Christianity, moldedthe framers of our Constitution and the leadersof the Republic in its early years.

It was based on the assumption that the functionof the school is to train the mind and transmit tothe young the culture and tradition of the civi:l­ization-leaving everything els'e necessary to theraising of the new generation to the fa;mily, thechurch, and other social institutions. This assump­tion, of course, implied the acceptance of certainother assumptions of a philosophical kind: thatthere is such a thing ,as truth; that the traditionof Western civilization embodies the conclusions ofcountless generations in the search for truth;that va'lue resides innately in the individual, sothat the claims of society and the State are sec­ondary to and derived from him. It implied definitesocial and political beliefs: that, although all m'enare created with certain inalienable rights, in­dividuals vary in capacity and ability ; that, there­fore, in the name of equality, to deprive the ab'J<eof the opportunity to realize their ability is asgreat an oppression as to enslave the ,many for the

100 THE FREEMAN

bene1fit of the few. And it i.mplied an importantpsychological presupposition: that, like everythingelse worth having, ,education can be acquired onlyat the cost of work and pain.

'Today, one can examine volume after volumeof the proliferating official literature which pre­scribes the practice of our educational system andfind scarcely a tra.ce of the great concepts ofWestern education. It i.s not that the trainingof the mind and the transmission of the truthsasserted by our civilization have been forgotten;they have been deliberately and consciously elim­inated. Those who have done the eliminatinghave made no secret of their intentions. Fromthe writings of John Dewey hiimself down throughall the literature of the "philosophy of experience,"as Dewey liked to call hi.s instrumentalist prag­matism, these concepts are branded as reactionaryobstacles to the development of the New Education.

F'or the instrumentalist there can be nocultural heritage worth trans,mitting; values area superstition left over from the Middle Ages;what is right and good is what serves as aninstrument to achieve adjustment to the societyimmediately around. 'Therefore, the aim of educa­tion ,must be "life adjustment" and the method,"life experience." Above all, the teacher must"impose" nothing. His role is not to teach thewisdom that a great civilization and a great nationhave created, but to "cooperate" with the childin gaining "aequaintance with a .changing world,"where ",experience" and "free activity" will ·some­how magically 'educate hi.m. Thus he wHl growup free of the "stifling authoritarianism" of theold education, and become independent of mindand will.

Collectivism Fills the Gap

Now, as a matter of fact, it is nonsense toassume that because the child is not taught valuesand drilled into habi,ts of thought he will spon­taneously develop an educated independence ofthought. What wiH happen instead is what ishappening. The teacher, freed from the respon­sibility of teaching "ahstract values" in a dis­ciplined m'anner,must fill the gap with something.Being under pressure to bring about "adjustment"to the environment, he fills it with the current

prejudices of hisenvironm'ent, and the prejudicesof a contemporary educationist or a teacher trainedby educationists are eertain to refl'ect the fashion­able collectivism of the day.

'This nihilistic m'ethod not only ends thus incollectivism; it destroys the very ability to thinkclearly about anything. To learn to think re­quires effort and pain. There being no pressureto exert effort or to undergo pain, the mentalhabits of run-of-the-,mill students are simplyslovenly, while the bright ones develop into brashyoungsters in whom flashes of brilliance onilyemphasiz,e lack of intellectual development. Thatthere are still a few hard-thinking young peopleabout can only be put down to the~ remainingvestiges of hom'e influence and the providentialsurvival of a few good teachers in the interstice'sof our educational institutions.

A Dearth of Leaders

'Thi.s is a tragedy, first of all because~ it dwarfsthe true potentialities of man. It makes scarcerand scarcer, year in and year out, the develop­ment of individuaJs strongly rooted in the wisdomof the past and calpable of standing on theirown against error, whim and fashion. But it isalso a social tragedy. Such individuals are theonly kind of men who can give society the leader­ship it must have if it is to solve its problem'sin the spirit of right and justice, to reject facileand erroneous solutions, and to survive as a freeassociation of individuals.

The primacy of society and the state over theindividual, which is the essence of collectivism,can never :be enforced s'o long as such men existin reasonable quantities. The New Education, bydestroying the possibility of rearing such men,by inculcating "adjust.ment to society"- 'whichcan only mean subservience to society-has beenperhaps the most important factor in making pos­sible that widespread acquiescence in collectivismwith which the body politic is today so deeplyinfected. It has left its students bereft of anydefense against the fallacies of collectivism, un­able to think their way through political problems,and with a vague uneasy feeling that anyone whoputs the individual above the group or the Stateis somehow evil. Its effect has been catastrophic,and that catastrophe is the direct outcome ofthe philosophy of John Dewey and his followers.

But the question still remains: what were thepolitical and socia'l conditions which made itpossible for this philosophy to prevail? In myopinion, the conditions for the triumph of Dewey­ism in our schools and the consequent decay ofeducation were created by a process which s-et ina hundred years ago or more. The invasion ofthe field of education by public tax-supportedauthority was the first great breach in the conceptof a government limited in its powers to the

maint,enance of internal and external order, theconcept upon which our Republic was founded.

'The movement for universal free compulsorystate education begins simultaneously with theemergence in American history, in the person ofAndrew Jackson, of the type which Franklin Roose­velt brought to perfection, the demagogic "leaderof the masses." By the turn of the century themovement was largely successful. The decay ofthe quality of American education had alreadybeen signalized by many eminent observers, andthe foundation had been laid for the debacle ofthe past thirty years.

IIf all must be educated equally and in the sameway, and if education must be "produced" withoutcompetition under the monopolistic control of abureaucracy, then the very idea of quality ineducation will go by the board. What is wantedis not the development of the spirit of man butits acclimatization to the mediocrity of the mass.To such a system of "education" De'wey's theorieswere w,ell adapted; when quality and differentiationwere rejected, his ideas were bound to win out.

Triumph of the Mediocre

Education in the true sense, the opportunity forevery individual to develop hi.mself to the limitsof his ability, is the m'ost valuable thing a fathercan provide for his children. Had the spirit of theAmerican Republic bee'll fulfilled in this field, isthere any reason to doubt that, with the increaseof wealth in the last 150 years, there would havebeen as multifarious, diverse and briHiant a growthof educational opportunities under the enterpriseof private individuals and independent groups, ashas taken place in other fields? Under suchcircumstances, if the false theory of Deweyismhad gained influence in some institutions in acompetitive educational network, its obvious in­feriority would soon have put them out of business.Or, at the least, it would have restricted theirpatronage to those who could not recognize asuperior product. Nor can it be alleged that thiswould have restricted good education to thewealthy. Competition would hav,e made educationalopportunities as common a'S it has ,made the auto­mobile.

The entrance of the State into education, how­ever, moving inevitably through quasi-monopolytoward monopoly, crushes all diff'erentiations. Itsleveling effort to assure ,that no unworthy son of awealthy father shall receive an education he doesnot deserve, has made it c'ertain that no one, richor poor, shall receive an education pitched abovethe dead level of the mediocre.

For the achievement of the mediocre, for thede'struction of individualism, for the transforma­tion of a Republic into a mass State, the philos'ophyof Deweyis1m has created the ideal educationalsystem.

SEPTEMBER 1954 101

A Reviewer's NotebookBy JOHN CHAMBERLAIN I

Igor. Gouzenko is the code clerk whostartled the world back in 1945 bydes-erting the Soviet Embassy inOttawa, Canada, .carrying with him109 secret documents bearing ir­refutable proof of a superbly organ­ized Communist spy ring in Canada,the United States and Great Britain.Since the time of his melodramaticdefection, Gouzenko, with his wifeand two children, has been livingunder the protection of the RoyalCanadian Mounted Police. A manwho knew his secrets about cipherswould have need of shelter in any~ase, but Gouzenko, as it turns out,has an extra rea/son for wantingprotection that is totally unconnectedwHh his 1945 break.

The truly astounding thing aboutthis man is that, in addition to beingan expert on codes, he happens tobe Russia's greatest living fictionwriter. And the book he has writtenwhile living under the protectionof the "IMounties," a long, rich 629­page novel caned The Fall of a Titan(New York: W. W. Norton, $4.50),discloses hundreds of things aboutcontemporary Russia that are farmore damaging to the Soviet gov­ernm'ent than anything that couldbe told about the oper1ations of spiesor informers.

The story is obviously based onthe career of Maxim Gorki, authorof The Lower Dep,ths and many othercontributions to the literature ofrevolt that helped pave the way forthe Bolshevik Revolution. As every­one know,s, Gorki returned fromEurope to his, native land afterLenin and his gangsters had seizedthe political power in Russia. Hisonce keen eyes blinded by his hatredfor the Tsar, Gorki was willing tobelieve in the "proletarian" future.Idolized by the Russian masses, andneeded by the Bolsheviks as a "re­spectable" front for their cruelties,Gorki accepted all sorts of honors

102 THE FREEMAN

from the party. His native Nishni:Novgorod on the Volga, city ofaworld-famous Fair, was renamedGorki; and palatial living quarterswere put at the dispos'al of, the one­time tramp author. The spectacleof such a great "free spirit" asMaxim Gorki living in presumedamity with the Bolsheviks w,as swal­lowed by the eggheads of the West­ern nations without so much as asingle grain of salt. But during theperiod of the Great Purge, MaximGorki died. In death he was officiallypraised by Stalin, but there is con­siderable evidence that he waspoisoned at party orders. The partycould put Gorki's reputation to gooduse, but it couldn't trust any intel­lectual with memories of Westernliberties to keep quiet forever aboutthe terrible things that were beingdone to individuals in the name ofcollectivization and the Five-Year

,Plan.

Gouzenko has taken Gorki as theironic "hero" of his story, renaminghim Mikhail Gorin for purposes offiction. And around this Gorin, withhis titanic airs, he has written atruly terrifying parable. Returningto Rostov, at the mouth of the Don,in the early years of Stalin's rule,Gorin is granted the use of a magni­ficent country house and park. Fromhis long 'exile in Capri Gorin hasbrought with him his wife, ,a formerRussian countess, his beautiful andtalented daughter Nina, and hisstrange, super-sensitive son Pavel.During his first months in RussiaGorin sings paeans to the Bolshe­viks. Naive and s'elf-deluded desp.itehis genius for writing ,about trampsand waifs" Gorin overlooks suchitems as concentration camps, firingsquads, slave labor and forced "con­fessions."

'The day comes, however, whenGorin falls silent. And this, of

course, is a greater sin in Stalin'seyes than outright denunciation ofSoviet barbarities. Accor9.ingly, a"secret agent" is called in to "per­suade" Gorin to continue his literaryj ustirfication of the Bolshevik terror.The secret agent, Feodor Novikov,is a professor of history in his day­light hours. But his academic status,though real enough in his own eyes,is, to the party, a mere cover for1:'Jovikov's NKVD work as a spy andan agent provocateur.

Introduced into 'Gor.in's house,Novikov undertakes the job of stim­ulating his vietim to write a playabout no less a person than Ivan theTerrible. By providing Gorin withsome artfully :edited "research,"Novikov builds up ,a picture in thegenius's mind of an iron-willedemperor who wades through bloodin the name of "historical necessity."Gorin swallows the claptrap: he iswilling to condone Ivan's atrocitiessimply because they led to a unifiedand centralized Muscovite State.Stalin is infinitely pleased whenthe Pravda critics draw the obviouscontemporary Bolshevik inferencesfrom Ivan the Terrible when it isperformed in Moscow.

The special quality of Gouzenko'sstory of Gorin's "fall" is its refusalto deal in simple blacks and whites.For Gorin, as it turns out, is justas much the villain of the piece asNovikov himself. Gouzenko does notjustify Novikov's career, but he ex­plains it as the "normal" consequenceof a decision to remain alive. Novi­kov had seen his father, a bourgeoisbuilder of railroads, witlessly shotby a white guard officer in 1917;he had seen his mother die of grief.These experiences hardened him,and he swore to himself that hewould do anything at all to getalong in the jungle society estab­lished in the name of "security" bythe Bolsheviks. In the course of

pursuIng his single-minded objec­tive, Novikov falsifies history as aprofessor, and even kills people with­out more than a momentary qualm.He falls in love with Gorin's daugh­ter Nina, but jilts her as a matterof course on party orders. Later,a3 a measure of pure careerism, hemarries the kindly Lida Sidirov,daughter of a tank plant manager.When the tank plant manager ishimself liquidated for "nonfulfill­ment" of his factory quotas, Novi­kov tosses Lida and his own unbornson aside without thinking twiceabout it.

Such a career in practically un­adulterated Machiavellianism is re­voltingly unappetizing, to say theleast. But Novikov has one virtue:he does not lie to himself. He knowsthat he is evil, and he is even capableof doing good in secret. Gorin, onthe other hand, is a living lie. Andit is in contemplation 0'£ this livinglie that Gouzenko rams' home hismoral: it is the Gorins of the world,the supposedly "honorable" intel­lectuals, who prepare the way for thetriumph of the gangsters.

In three or four particularlypowerful pages Gouzenko constructshis rationale of what "three gen­er·ations" of hate h~ve done to hisnative Russia. In Dostoevski's timeAlyosha Karamazov preached lovewhere his brother Ivan Karamazovpreached hate. Mistaking the importof Dostoevski's prophetic novel, theintellectuals of Russia chose IvanKaramazov as their spir.itual leader.The "second generation" of Ivans­Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin" and the rest-thought they could hack their waythrough to "Utopia" by killing every­body who was their "class enemy."Their "morality" was simple: any­thing was justified in the name ofpower for the, Bolsheviks. ,But the"third generation" of Ivans-M·al­enkoy and his bureaucratic hench­men-was formed by the consistentpractice of terror. To this genera­tion "Utopia" is here already: itconsists of murder and slavery asa way of' life.

What Gouzenko eannot forgive inhis figure of Gorki-Gorin is theinability to see that the attempt tocontrol society in -the name of a

planner~s blueprint must alwayseventuate in a sea of blood unless"rea::tion" comes along in time toput a stop to it. Gorki-Gorin is thesymbolic proj ection on the modernRussian scene of all the F,abians,all the eggheads, all the believersthat a little more sociaIis'm can beaccepted each year without :anydanger to the human liberties thathave been established by centuriesof struggle against the overridingpresumptions of the State. And justto make it doubly plain that he doesnot regard Gorin as a purely Rus­sian phenomenon, Gouzenko con­trives to have a Western intellectual,Romain Rouen (modelled apparentlyon the figure of the great Frenchnovelist, Romain Rolland), visitGorin in Rostov. Rouen's point ofview is identical with Gorin's: asGouzenko puts it, the French novelistsuffers from "a disease very commonamong so-called broad-minded intel­lectuals-the disease of suhconsciousegois'm." Together, Gorin and Rouenprove that "intellectual" is by nomeans synonymous with "intel­ligent." Clemenceau once said thatwar is too important to leave to thegenerals. Just so is thinking in thismid-century period of the cold wartoo important to leave to those whocall themselves intellectuals.

It is easy to describe the skeletonof The Fall of a Titan, but virtuallyimpossible to convey any sense ofthe richness of its portraiture with­in the compass of a short review.All sorts of rascals abound in thenovel's pages: the bureaucracycreated by Stalin spawns cheats,murderers, sadists, men who know nomoral limits, as a warm sea spawnsfish. Veria, the party chief of theNorth Caucasus region; Drozd, theNKV,D man; Durov, another NKVDfunctionary; Oleg, the son of Durov-these and many others like themcarry' out their cynically depravedoperations on page after page. Thevillains of The Fall of a Titan areso set in their vicious ways that theysuggest the "flat" characterizationof a Charles Dickens rather thanthe subtly' mo~ulated and roundedcharacterization practiced by aITolstoy. But within their staticlimits Gouzenko's villains have animmense and appalling vitality.

Taken together, Gouzenko's vastaggregation of monsters superblyillustrates Hayek's conclusion, asset forth in The Road to Serfdom:that in any society which is planned,ordered and controlled from a centralpoint by "social engineers," theworst elements inevitably gravitateto the top. The re,ason for this up­ward gravitation of evil is obvious:it takes, men without hearts topractice the arts of a Procrustes.If men are to be fitted into a cen­trally ordered and enforced scheme,they must be knocked in the headif they prove recalcitrant. And onlygangsters can be trusted to knoe,kpeople in the head as a means ofobtaining professional advancemsn t.

What is really astounding ill

Gouzenko's book is that goodnesssurvives in the hearts and minds ofsome men and women who havenever had contact with the liber­tarian currents of the past. LidaSidirov, the daughter of a plantmanager, was born too late to knuwfrom personal experience that, touse Max Nomad's famous descrIp­tion, "the Kaiser and Ts,ar wereliberals." (And liberal they WCl'3

indeed when compared to the tralyreact'ionary bureaucrats who rulethe roost in today's totalitariansocieties.) But even though Lidahas never known the con1parativelyfree air of Russ'ia under the Ro­manovs, she has a vision of freedomand Christian morality in her heart.So, too, has Nikolai, the thorough1vdecent brother of the "new Sovietman," Feodor Novikov. It is Nikolaiwho marries Lida when she is castoff by the monster Feodor.

The Book of the Month Club hassent Gouzenko's appallingly vividnovel to its readers, and it has beenreceived with praise by a wholechorus of reviewers who were busyextolling the virtues of the SovietState from 1941 to 1946. What theseby now semi-repentant reviewersstill do not see is that, in their w,ill­ingness to tolerate "soft socialism,"they are acting as the Gorins oftheir day in America. They do notcomprehend the double aim of Gou­zenko, which is to castigate allkinds of socialism, the soft as wellas the hard.

SEPTElYIBER 1954 103

Orwell's SocialismA Collection of Essays, by George

Orwell. 320 pp. N'ew York:Doubleday Anchor Book. $.95

The genius' of George Orwell is themost encouraging of our time, be­aause-himself a Socialist-he sawand said that socialism leads at lastto absurdity and horror.

Orwell was the genius of schiz­ophrenia. Intellectually he remaineda resolute collectivist, whose con­scious ideology narrowed him intosocialism; yet his free transcendentimagination saw the horror at theother side of all socialism and liftedit into 1984. After reading hisAnimal Farrr/; and 1984, what manof reason can ever accept collectivismas anything but the' road to night­'mare? Orwell debunked the Russian"Revolution" into the triumph ofthe swine; he rej ected the aber­rations of "liberal" and Fabian withthe quiet wisdom: "The basic free­dom is to say that two pIus twoequals four. If that be granted, allelse follows."

In these essays the lesser, doctrin­aire Orwell dilutes somewhat thegreat imaginative seer. He says sillythings (then sooner or later refutesthem) . He defines a "conserva­tive" as one who upholds the "rulingpower"-nonsense of the first ,vater.Is a "conservative" on the side ofthe "ruling power" in Hitler'sReich or Malenkov's barbed-wireparadis'e? A conservative is a manwho believes in the timeless valuesthat transcend time and power. AndOrwell speaks of the "class war"as if it were a contemporary real­ity-then later admits that it isnot. He believes that only "socialist"nations can truly have "patriotism";he speaks of the predatory habitsof modern American "millionaires"-as if we were still living in thegay nineties. Thus his "ideas" aresometimes pterodactyls posing asinhabitants of modern Pic.adilly.

As a literary critic he is alwaysinteresting but not quite great. Hesees finely the limitations of Hous-

Any book reviewed 'in this Book Section(or any other current book) supplied byreturn mail. You pay only the bookstore.price. We pay the postage, anywhere inthe world. Catalogue on request.THE BOOKMAILER, Box 101, New York 16

104 THE FREEMAN

man, but is blind to those of Eliotand J oyee. He is just to the superior­ity of Dickens," but only half-justto the greatness of Kipling-whodoes not appeal to the "civilized"(high unconscious praise!) and isat best "a good bad poet." He' doesKipling more justice than most con­temporaries, however, as Orwell'shear~ was too strong to be fullydeceIved by his head.

The major lack in OrweH's writ­ing is that he saw life with a nobleunflinching realism, but could nottranscend its aspects to enter itsmeaning with poet or mystic. Hewas blind to colors that lie belowred and beyond violet. Yet-thoughhe ran avvay from it immediately­he was capable of saying: "Themajor problem of our time is thedecay in the belief in personal im­mortality."

The total ,effect of the essays iswisdom and health. Orwell, impatientof all sham and nonsense, could notlong endure the Left: he was tooconcrete a lover of Unamuno's "manof flesh and bone." Therefore, hiskeen fingers skin the political andcultural Left with the finesse of anApache flaying a rancher alive. Hewrote: "'The Communism of theEnglish intellectual is somethingexplicable enough. It is the patriot­ism of the deracinated." "Much ofleft-wing thought is a kind of play­ing with fire by people who don'teven know that fire is hot." "Mostrevolutionari'es are potential Toriesbecause they imagine that every~thing can be put to rights by alter­ing the shape of society." And hewrote nobly: "He [Dickens] is onthe side of the underdog, alwaysand ,everywhere. To carry this toits logical conclusion one has gotto change sides when the underdogbecomes an upperdog. . . .The com­mon man is still living in the mentalworld of Dickens, but nearly everymodern intellectual has gone overto some form of totalitarianism."Orw'ell knew well that the ideal ofcollectivism is the boot forevercrushing the human faee, becausethe rootless intellectuals are men inwhom the lust for power has des­troyed the power of love.

Orwell's greatness is that he wasso passionately on the side of man­concrete man, "the man of fleshand bone"-that his heart alwayscorrected his head. He tried hardto be a Socialist, but sanity was

always breaking in. So, in spite ofideology, he finally and forever tookthe side of Huckleberry Finn againstold Miss Watson, of the privatehuman heart against the proudCommissars. E. MERRILL ROOT

Shameful DocumentThe Yalta Betrayal, by Felix Witt­

mer. 136 pp. Caldwell, Idaho:The Caxton Printers. $1.25

The Yalta Betrayal should be re­quired reading for students ofworld affairs, in order properly toevaluate the twenty-year periodwhich brought devastating com­munistic inroads upon our securityand our form of constitutionalgovernment. The book is a factualanalysis of what were unquestion­ably "betrayals on a tragically dis­honorable plane." It is the resultin concise form of the reading anddigesting of ten million \vords ofofficial records by Dr. Wittmer.

What happened at Yalta is but onein the long series of betrayals,V'hich began with President Roose­velt's arbitrary and illogical recog­nition of the U. S. S. R. At Yaltaan ill and faltering man, the ex­ponent of Wes;tern civilization,surrendered to Stalin. Just beforehis death Roosevelt admitted toAmbassador Hurley that "on thelast days of the conference, in astate of utter exhaustion, he hadsigned the shameful document."

The reader very properly asks thequestion: Was Roosevelt the dupeof pro-Soviet schemers such asLauchlin Currie and others in theWhite House entourage, and trai­tors such as Alger Hiss and HarryDexter White? On the basis ofDr. Wittmer's factual analysis, theanswer is obvious.

With the signing of the YaltaAgreement on February 11, 1945,the principles of the Atlantic Char­ter, the lives of millions of free men,and the honor of America vanished.Even .the New Republic admittedthat "on the whole, the results atYalta represent a substantial victoryfor Stalin." Bulganin told his Polishstoog,es less than a week after thedocument was signed, "The YaltaDeclaration is a scrap of paper."

Dr. Wittmer's book should beread and reread by every patrioticAmerican. W. JEFFERSON DAVIS

SOCONY-VACUUMOIL COMPANY

INCORPORATED

The Board of Directors todaydeclared a quarterly dividend of50¢ per share on the outstand~ing capital stock of this Com~

pany, payable September 10,1954, to stockholders of recordat the close of business August6, 195'4.

W. D. BICKHAM, Secretary

sation is the ,employer's respon­sibility, regardless of how an em­ployee injures himself. Soon theemployer will be responsible, evenif the man doesn't work there!

To this reviewer's taste, the secondlong chapter could have beenomitted to good advantage. It ex­plains that the effect of a guar­anteed annual wage linked to the un­employment compensation programwould be to deplete the fund builtup in the name of the latter pro­gram. The greater the temptationto idleness, the more of it thereis likely to be. Apparently, theChamber believes there should besome temptation to idleness, but notenough to expose the fallacy ofthe whole idea. Someone in thefield of economic research sometime should explain that the un­employment compensation fund,just like the social security fund,contains absolutely nothing butthe promise to payout if and whenthe government can get it fromtaxpayers.

The most constructive parts of thebook are two chapters in the mid­section, showing how the guar­anteed wage scheme would resultin the subsidy of inefficient busi­ness operators at the expense ofthe efficient ones, and how theworker's quest for security alongthese lines is bound eventually tofreeze him at a job, with the gov­ernment telling him precisely howto live.

'Those two chapters ought to bewell worth the price of the book toanyone who thinks he is interestedin the guaranteed wage issue. Butif not, there is a good bibliography:pick your own. PAUL L. POIROT

July27, 1954

DividendNo. 174

A Guaranteed WageJobs? Or Jobless Pay? 90 pp.

Washington 6, D. C.: Chamberof Commerce of the UnitedSta,tes. $2.00

A businessman expects somethingin return for the pay checks of­fered to employees. lOr at least that'sthe way it 8'eemsto the Chamberof Commerce of the United States.In ninety pages of well-chosenwords and not-so-very-helpful ear­toons, the real issue behind thenew proposal for a guaranteedannual wage is shown to be a ques­tion of jobs, or pay for the jobless.

Leaning over backward to be fairis an exceedingly difficult positionfrom which to scrutinize the de­tails of an idea, but the Chamber'sEconomic-s Research Departmentgave it a good try. The layout art­ists for the booklet obliginglyadopted that same awkward stance,presenting the right-hand ,side ofeach page so that he "who runsmay read, while the ,diminutivetype on the other-hand page, wouldtempt any self-respecting readerto run. It only arouses suspicionto find such a vast difference be­tween the categories "F,ACTS" and"supporting evidence."

'The book merits the foregoingcriticism only because it other­wise analyzes sowell an exceeding­ly vital issue. After the evidenceor facts of the first ten pages, onecan readily believe that much ofthe clamor for guaranteed annualwages comes from persons whoseem to think they merit a regu­lar pay check whether or not theywork. That's right in line withthe idea that workman~s compen-

cation such as he enVISIons wouldnot be possible in tax-supportedschools. And he will disturb some ofhis readers by branding knowledge,courage, honesty, fair play and re­spect for law as middle-class values.What becomes of the search fortruth that is the essence of bothphilosophy and education if knowl­edge and honesty are only middle­class values?

In format and primary purposethe book is a college text, but it con­tains much rewarding reading forthe layman who is concerned abouteducation. MIRIAM CRENSHAW

Shaping the IndividualBuilding a Philosophy of Education,

by Harry S. Broudy. 480 pp. NewYork: Prentice-Hall. $5~QO

What shall we teach, how shall weteach it, and how can we justify ourchoice? At last, in this book, wehave a straightforward answer.

Education, according to ProfessorBroudy, is the process throughwhich the individual achieves self­determination, self-realization andself-integration, thus perfectinghImself to the point where he cancreate and enjoy the good life. Morespecifically, the task of the schools isto develop as fully as possible eachindividual pupil's capacity for ac­quiring, using and enjoying knowl­edge.

'The field of knowledge is dividedinto Natural Science, Social Scienceand Se1:f-lScience, the last group in­cluding philosophy, religion andpsychology, as well as literature andthe fine arts. The pupil is to masterunits of progressive difficulty ineach field, working always at thelevel of his own capacity in eachsubject rather than having all sub­jects with the same group of chil­dren. In the secondary school he willmaster units of work arranged onsix levels in each of the three fieldsof knowledge; each unit will beginwith a subj ect-matter course inwhich the emphasis is on acquiringknowledge, and will finish with aproblems course emphasizing useand enjoyment of knowledge. Be­yond the secondary school, he willprepare for a career.

W'e are warned against the temp­tation to take the ,easier but lessrewarding course of sacrificing thegood life for the pretty good life.Education thus dedicated to the per­fecting of each individual is toachieve the "aristocratization of themasses." It is to abolish the Com­mon Man, subst'ituting uncommonlyenlightened men, able to envisionand create the Common Good. Suchmen must be free not only to actbut to know, and to determine actionin the light of knowledge. "Everyman is a potential manufacturer ofpossibility; to restrict· him is tolimit possibility . . ."

Professor Broudy seems to taketax-supported education for granted;he does not deal with the strongconviction some of us hold that edu-

SEPTEMBER 1954 105

K"eeping America on the GO... with ITIMKEN®I Tapered Roller Bearings

How to make a freight train act like this Panama Limited

No freight can match thePanama Limited's cuisine

and luxury, taken straight fromthe French Quarter of NewOrleans. Or would want to.

But there's one freight thatcan match its record of beingright on time-time after time.It's ~~Roller Freight".

Streamliners like this PanamaLimited have Timken® taperedroller bearings that virtuallyeliminate friction. Most freightsdo not. As a result, freights oftenpull up ~~lame"with a hot box

-the number one cause offreight delays.

But the railroads are solvingthe problem. More and moreare going ~~Roller Freight"­putting freight cars on Timkentapered roller bearings.

With Timken bearings there'sno chance for metal-to-metalsliding friction. They roll theload. They end the problem ofhot box delays.

Timken bearings cut frictionto a minimum because we de­sign them to roll true. They live

up to their design because wemake them to almost micro­scopic tolerances. And to furtherinsure quality in every bearing,we make our own steel. Noother U. S. bearing maker does.

In terms of performance,Timken bearings are lowest incost. That's why the railroads,like all industry, use Timkentapered roller bearings to helpkeep America on the go. TheTimken Roller Bearing Com­pany, Canton 6, Ohio. Cable:~~TIMROSCO" •

OnlyITIMKEN®\ bearings roll so true, have such quality thru-&-thru

Progress

Charles F. Kettering, a director and research consultant of General Motors, hasplayed an important role in America's automotive progress for over 40 years. Theinventor of the self-starter, he is also identified with such important automotivedevelopments as tetra-ethyl lead, four wheel brakes and safety glass.

of Automotive

they are~ready with th~, proper fuelto power this engine efficiently andeconomically.

TQ me, this proves once again thewonders that COlne from keen con1­petition in our free enterprise ByS­tern. Yq.u see, thetincrease in gasolinequali,y:is a dir~et/Tesult of the in­tensive competition for your busi-

. nesS among America's oil companies.":Every SQmpany~nows, that the only'way to' win or keep business is tocontinually offer you new, improvedproducts at the lowest possible price.

As long as this competition con­tinues, there is no way to predictwhat tomorrow's gasoline will belike-except that it's sure to be evenbetter. Just as automobile compa­nies are experin1enting with drean1cars of tomorrow, oilmen are spend­ing millions to develop radically im­proved fuels to power them. So thenext time you get a thrill out of thepower of a '54 car, give some credit,too, to the gasoline-the unsung heroof your driving pleasure. And remem­ber - tomorrow it will most likely beeven better!

stantly increasing gasoline qualityhas been all-important, because ithas allowed us to build more power­ful and more efficient engines just asfast as we were able. The oilmenhave never failed us-when we comeup with an advanced engine design,

byCHARLES F. KETTERING

The Unsung Hero

In this nation on wheels, I think ev­eryone is well aware of the amazingprogress made by the automobileindustry in the last quarter-century.You only have to get behind thewheel of one of today's powerfuland efficient cars to see how farwe've come.

But there is an important fact youmay not realize-but one which wein the automobile industry neverforget: In all of these years of greatprogress we've had a vital workingpartner. I'm talking about the con­stantly improved gasolines devel­oped by America's oil companies.

To the eye, today's gasoline looksmuch like the gasoline of the 1920's.But inside - chemically - there hasbeen a world of change, all of it forthe better! For the truth is that to­day's gasoline, by every measure ofperformance and economy, is 50%better than the gasoline of the twen­ties. Think what this means to you.Yes, 2 gallons of today's gasoline ac­tually do the work 3 did then.

And equally important in thesedays of high prices, the price of thissuperior gasoline is just about thesame as it was in 1925-only thetaxes are higher.

To the automotive industry, con-

This is one of a series of reports by outstanding Americans who were invited to examine the fob being done by the U. S. oil industry.This page is presented for your information by Sun Oil Company, Philadelphia 3, Pennsylvania.

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