LETTERS

...In the same way I think that the students at Columbia University were fighting over far more significant issues when they invaded the buildings there, and while they were not totally nonviolent they were certainly a good deal more nonviolent than the police who were used to take them out of thebuildings...

...In fact I think the real problem confronting the American resister involves not so much a case of illegitimate authority as it does a case of nonexistent authority...

...2) The population of Poland today is virtually 100 per cent Polish...

...The trouble with Marcuse is not, as Graubard thinks, that he is a utopian...

...Wright Mills calledstriving for it, are not dependent on existing con-them "crack-pot realists") of Niebuhr's stripe andditions, nor are they fundamentally subject to pru-the empiricist liberals of Arendt's and Talmon'sdential considerations...

...The nuances of this situation are of course somewhat difficult to express in the title of a manifesto and call to action...

...Radical utopians, on the other hand, hold that there is a third dimension, genuine transcendence, FRANCE—A NEW KIND OF REBELLION which is not limited by the real...

...government meets the minimal standards of democratic legitimacy...

...is or is not the potential of improvement in the STEPHEN S. SCHWAxzscHILD...

...it leads inevitablyto failure and fanaticism...

...Times have changed and I think we must adjust our thinking with that change...

...They programmaticallywanted, and want, to be "realists...

...The Communist leadership of Poland has unleashed the age-old device of anti-Semitism and reaction to shift attention from the true causes and goals of the student protest movement, andto "compromise" it by inventing a Jewish origin...

...mension they derive the values, impetus, and evenNow the establishment will not dictate the directhe tactics of revolutionary change...

...Now I don't have to care cannot accuse me of arrogating to myself divinewhether Marcuse or Graubard is right that therepowers, since I am in fact submitting to them...

...The truth of the matter is that it is Marcuse who is the very opposite of a utopian...

...We strongly reject any effort to denigrate the memory of the martyred millions of Jews and to minimize the historic significance of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising against the mighty and murderous Nazi war-machine...

...The same applied to the early experiments of CORE where their civil disobedience actions were characterized again by the kind of responsible behavior that would meet the definitions laid down by Bob Pickus...

...I think however that there was a sense of the academic about the discussion and a tendency to define civil disobedience in terms that are so pristine as to be removed from the contemporary situation...

...The authors of the call wished to draw attention not only tomoral beliefs and to moral traditions, but also to important recently established legal precedents, in particular to the principles laid down at Nuremberg and the principles embodied in the UnitedNations Charter...

...Those of us who believe these actions to be illegitimate are therefore led to contest the authority of the government to demand that we in any way cooperate with or take part in these actions...

...Even when faced with the fact of the total annihilation of the Jews, those of the underground who were anti-Hitler but also reactionary and anti-Semitic remained unmoved...

...But I also understand how deeply they are involved with the issues they confront and I realize that the choice may be between a somewhat impolite and not totally responsible form of disobedience to law, and violent mob behavior...

...Finally, although the notion of sovereignty is a complex one, it seems to me that there is a certain contradiction involved in Paul Goodman's espousal of a "weak concept of Sovereignty" and his coexisting belief that the war is illegal...

...but instead a call to what I would like to label "civil challenge...

...ScHERER As a political party which played a significant part in Polish affairs through all the changes of the past half-century and more—from Tzarist rule to independence between the two world wars, through the hell of Nazi occupation and into the first few years after World War II, until we were liquidated as a party by the Polish Stalinist regime...

...To represent Jews as organizers of the ferment, for Jewish purposes, contradicts evident facts...

...They are at the same time draft challengers basing their challenge on international law which they believe reflects in a significant way the conscience of mankind...

...WORLD COORDINATING COMMITTEE OF THE JEWISH LABOR `BuND" New York April, 1968 A New Program Editor: Your readers might appreciate some information about an Interne Program in the field of public opinion and international conflict, sponsored by the World Without War Council of the United States, for which applicants are now being sought...

...I supported that teachers' strike, but I am suggesting that if teachers can deliberately violate state laws over what are essentially trivial matters then one must recognize the right of young men in large numbers to refuse service in the draft and even to organize efforts to close down induction centers...

...The distinction is important because while it is true that the rights and claims of individual conscience are precious and worthy of protection, it is also true that any sort of decent world order can arise only on the basis of the demands of some sort of collective conscience...

...Of course, no such court exists...

...It should be recalled: the Jews in the Ghetto, imprisoned by the Nazi invaders behind walls of brick, also suffered the indifference of broad circles of Polish society and, apart from the Polish labor movement and other humanist groups, even of many within the underground organizations...

...Thus also he ends up advocating the Stalinoid view that social freedom must be limited to those who essentially agree with him...

...as a party of the Jewish working class always loyal to socialist internationalism...

...When I was a kid at UCLA in the early 1950's we were living in a period where there was so little resistance of any kind and to anything that to challenge the government by refusing to obey orders (primarily on the matter of miliary service) took a great deal of thought and analysis and was carried through with profound responsibility...

...Thus the principles established at Nuremberg continue toexist in a kind of limbo...

...His envisioned revolution, and that of orthodox Marxists, is a real slave to reality...

...We declare: ' • I (1) The strikes, demonstrations, and other actions by Polish students and intelligentsia are well-founded protests against their dictatorial government...

...See the recent discussion of Limited Tolerance in DISSENT...

...The teachers were relatively well paid, they worked relatively decent hours, nobody was sending them abroad to be killed, nobody was containing them in ghettos with police brutality...

...We must, instead, be satisfied with `small favors...

...Protest has broken through to the surface in the political life of all the countries of Eastern Europe...

...3) A- systematic campaign against Jews is be ing conducted in the Polish Communist press andat various Communist gatherings...

...and as a party which left behind on Polish soil the ashes of millions of our people and by far the majority of our members, spokesmen, and leaders—we feel compelled and particularly entitled to state our position on recent events in Poland...

...That is, I find it somewhat contradictory for an anarchist or semi-anarchist to appeal to legal concepts...

...We welcome the democratic and Socialist strivings of Polish students...

...I will strive for it in any case...

...4) Shameful statements have been published with regard to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and the millions of Jews annihilated by the Nazis...

...Graubard's view of the matter is in fact to fall for Marcuses's as well as his hostile playmates' game: the former will just wave you off as another fink, and his opposite counterparts, the Niebuhrians, Hannah Arendt, Jacob Talmon, etc., will resume their old chant: "Utopianism is an expression ofman's inveterate, sinful hubris...

...I agree with Paul Goodman that "the actions of the Administration...

...When Hegel proclaimed "the death of God" he laid the foundation for Marx's and Engels's attack on "the utopians...

...The title "A Call to Resist Illegitimate Authority" is not quite precise...

...Here I disagree with Paul Goodman...

...The problem is that in a period of profound social change where masses of people are moving, things are not done as we would like them done, quietly and responsibly...

...The issue in that case is life and death, not a matter of salary...

...Anddispensation, change, or at least the demand andnow also the "realists" (C...

...Facts are distorted and lies disseminated to put Jews in an improper light...

...They have lived there for many generations and, like the Poles, they are entitled to live there without any conditions whatsoever...

...And one would like to hopethat such actions will help to strengthen the fragmentary and imperfect body of international law which deals with aggressive wars, war crimes, andcrimes against humanity...

...Certainly those of us who are Socialists did not turn our backs on the trade-union movement in the thirties because of the violence that was so often associated with strikes of that period...

...are not merely immoral or unjust" (though that term "merely" has connotations I would certainly prefer to avoid) while I agree with Michael Walzer that "the U.S...

...To perpetrate such a fraud, especially in the Poland of today where the Jewish population was slashed from 10 per cent to the present ratio of 1 Jew to 1,000 Poles, is a deeply debased manipulation in the internal Communist power struggle...

...But one cannot have a legal right to do what is illegal, that is, illegal according to some sort of "final" analysis...

...It would seem that only a properly constituted international court would be sufficiently free from bias to decide this issue...

...This misrepresentation plays upon anti-Semitic sentiments within a part of Polish society and in the ranks of the ruling Communist party...

...An interne in this program is expected to commit at least one year of full-time work to developing knowledge and experience in three fields: the nature of international conflict...

...Out of this di-existing situation...

...What we are faced within fact is a government which is in an important sense a legitimate government, but which at the same time is engaged in actions that seem quite clearly (to many of us at least) to be illegitimate...

...Theoretically the Supreme Court may have the competence to declare the war unconstitutional (on the grounds that Congress has not declared war, for example), but it is questionable whether even from a theoretical point of view it has the ability to determine the war's status under international law...

...In this campaign Communist propagandists employ the pseudonym "Zionists" to create an impression that they are only anti-Zionists, not anti-Jewish...

...Regardless of any attitude toward Zionism as an ideology and movement, it is clear that the issue of Zionism is being used here as a cover to facilitate an anti-Semitic campaign...

...DAvm McREYNOLns More Problems of "Legitimacy" Editor: In the spirit of Michael Walzer's plea that we not give up analysis for rhetoric, I would like to draw attention to aspects of the problem of "illegitimate authority" which neither he nor Paul Goodman touch upon in their exchange...

...The issues in the strike were not really that important...

...The recent discussion of "Civil Disobedience and Resistance" in DISSENT magazine was provocative and helpful...

...It is rather futile to talk about the illegality of certain actions, unless one is willing to grant authority to some "sovereign" institutions to determine when those actions have been committed and to impose sanctions on their perpetrators...

...One would like to believe, or at least to hope, that those who resist the war in Vietnam even at the cost of disobeying the orders of their own national government are acceding to the demands of a growing collective conscience...

...We emphasize: the Jews are not aliens in Poland...

...Yet I do not agree with Michael Walzer's correction, namely that it is "a call to resist the immoral acts of legitimate authorities...

...So far mankind has feared to grant authority to determine issues of this magnitude to any kind of permanent world court...

...Now their realistic chickens have come home to roost.(Actually, they have been doing so for a long time...

...PENN KEMBLE On Marcuse Editor: Allen Graubard has made a useful beginning in subjecting Herbert Marcuses's seductive views tophilosophical criticism (DISSENT, May—June '68), but I think he has not by far gone far enough, nor quite in the right direction...

...and for all its variety of forms, the movement aims at a common goal—that their entire social and cultural life be liberalized and democratized...

...In this rhetorical game radical humanists are squeezed to death inthe middle...

...The program is conducted by the World Without War Council of the United States, a cooperative effort by organizations and individuals who share the goal of a disarmed world under lawin which free societies can grow and flourish...

...Anyone wishing application forms should write to: Interne Program, World Without War Council of the United States, 218 East 18th Street, New York, New York 10003...

...techniques for influencing American public opinion and foreign policy...

...He completely accepts the Hegelian and later-Marxian view that change and revolution, if they are totake place at all, must be dialectically contained in the reality which is to be overcome...

...I certainly will continue to agitate for polite and responsible be havior on the part of the black community, the student community, and draft-age young men...

...Therefore the call is not a call to civil disobedience (if one accepts Richard Wasserstrom's contention that "if an act is performed under a claim of ultimately legal, that is, constitutional, right, it is simply not an act of civil disobedience...

...Internships are being offered in New England, New York City, the Midwest, the Pacific Northwest, and California...

...to the contrary...

...Thus hewrites a whole book, Reason and Revolution-Hegel and the Rise of Social Theory, which has exerted great and baleful influence, in which he tries to rehabilitate that classic reactionary Hegel who, unlike social democracy, is among the modern god-fathers of the doctrine that "the real is the rational...

...The authors of the call asserted not only that every man has a "moral duty," but also that every man has a "legal right . . . to exert every effort to end this war, to avoid col lusion with it, and to encourage others to do the same...

...What they challenge is the validity of orders which directly or indirectly contravene international laws and treaties alreay explicitly accepted by the United States...

...BEVERLY WOODWARD Bund on Poland Editor: I would be grateful if you publish the following statement on recent Polish events adopted by the World Coordinating Committee of the Jewish Labor Bund (the Jewish Socialist party of Poland, now in exile).—E...

...For Marcuse the revolutionary antithesis contained in the established thesis is "the second dimension," and in its absence he laments the one-dimensionality of contemporary reality, and the impossibility of radical change...

...What I really am urging is that DISSENT readers not draw tidy lines that would cut them off from the student movement but recognize that the points raised in the symposium, while valid, need to be argued within the context of the movement as it occurs around us...

...Among the members and consultants of the Council are: Roger Baldwin, John C. Bennett, Norman Podhoretz, Bayard Rustin, Leon Shull, and Norman Thomas...

...It is, for example, interesting to note that most of those who cautioned against irresponsible civil disobedience were not disturbed by the last teachers' strike in Manhattan when school children were deprivedof an education for the period that the strikelasted and when a state law, clearly supported by the majority of New Yorkers, was deliberately violated...

...We recognized that the issues were profoundly more important than the occasional violation of the legal forms...

...and professional means for dealing with these problems in the public arena...

...Therefore, the medicine to prescribe for him is not meliorism but rather genuine radicalism...

...The resisters to the draft whom the call pledges to support are not simply draft refusers basing theirrefusal on private claims of conscience...

...Under thistion or conduct of my revolution, but I will...

...Thus, all these protests and demonstrations have also been purely Polish and actually began as a reaction to a specific suppression of Polish national culture...