Where the News Ends
Chomberlin, William Henry
By William Henry Chomberlin Where the News Ends Tactics and Diplomacy TWO recent developments, the recognition of Admiral Darlan as the supreme administrative authority in French North Africa,...
...After all the objective in war is to have the smallest, not the grist on number of enemies...
...But only this week has a competent authority been established to assure ordered use of the brains and muscles of our people...
...Of course," he says "the conditions for competition between the two kinds of enterprise will have to be conducted fairly so that the more efficient enterprise will win...
...If I had a really divergent point of view I should be glad to write a comment...
...My great admiration of the paper grows as time passes...
...Every time the idea of social planning, general planning, government planning was mentioned it was with disfavor...
...The ideal is to have every man and women fighting or working where the effort will count most...
...as long as it can impress legislators and hoodwink the general public...
...the political structure of business, are all swept aside in an absorption with the free operation of a pluralistic market...
...As far as one can gather, he is the typical midwest politician...
...The leaders of industry have made up their minds that nothing is to be changed...
...He takes care to mention the war, and he might have also helped clarify the issues by mentioning super-profits, a non-competing government investing program, and a war economy which magnifies the monopolistic position of our industrial giants...
...It is to be desired that every trade union member, every liberal, every intelligent citizen will give heed to the temper and pronouncements of this convention...
...ORLAND S. LOOMIS T*HE sudden death of the Progressive gover-* -nor-elect of Wisconsin is a real tragedy for the-progressive forces of this country...
...There should be no premature mortgaging of people's destinies to groups who may happen to have our ear, but who may not pass the decisive test of popular approval at home...
...We can also feel fairly...
...The direction of the flow of labor presents problems far more complex than those connected with channeling steel or oil...
...Darlan is emphatically not a man whose record would inspire either admiration or confidence...
...I'd like to see our machine tool industry, which has expanded so much since Pearl Harbor, continue to operate at the same pace after the war until every tool of production more than five years old is replaced in our factories, until India, China and South America are completely industrialized...
...It is a problem for the accountant-economist...
...The war and peace resolution adopted last April under WeadeH Willkie's influence was reaffirmed...
...For the instruments of power in Europe are not in the hands of idealistic democrats...
...Indeed the injection of this issue is probably the surest means of thwarting the economic co-operation perhaps on a federative basis that should help to speed the transition from elementary relief to economic reconstruction in the countries of eastern and southeastern Europe...
...But William Green and Philip Murray took active part in the tug of war which went on in Washington prior to the appointment of the new director, and there is an 'impression that they offered no opposition to it...
...f*HE National Association of Manufacturers has become the chief American exponent of social and political theory...
...Harrison E. Spangler, the man who was voted into the leadership, is a lawyer from Cedar Rapids, Iowa...
...Schenectady...
...EDITORIAL COMMENT THE NATION'S GREATEST RESOURCE IhlATIONS rise or fall in accordance with their use of what we have now come to call the manpower pool...
...Men and women— whether soldiers or workers—have wills, minds, feelings...
...Here were a hundred or more men and women with their minds centered, on winning the next election...
...certain that Ford, General Motors, and Chryslers will not tolerate a government operation of competing plants...
...If we get regimes, ¦> Europe which rest on a reasonably broad has* of popular acceptance and which eo-stdWff loyally in measures designed to promote #*"f and all-around economic recovery, we shell M*^ done amazingly well, considering the terruV problems of hate, of almost all European people...
...Time was when managers of industry met in annual convention and discussed practical matters connected with money-making...
...It is doubtful whether any general, necessarily animated by military considerations, would have acted differently from General Eisenhower in the matter of accepting such a valuable auxiliary...
...seems calculated to produce nothing but headaches for American diplomacy...
...It is the French people at home, not any comparatively small group of Frenchmen abroad wbt must decide what is to be the future type of the French state and who are to be its leaders whoa the German occupation has become only a hateful memory...
...They do not use Dr...
...The recent developments of the trade associations, brilliantly analyzed by Robert Brady, with their political implications renders idle the speculations of the "theorists...
...Workers will approve...
...McNutt revealed himself as a man determined to rely as much as possible on voluntary cooperation and as little as possible on coercion...
...For twenty wears he has plugged away electing governors and assemblymen...
...But his collaboration was desirable in the interest of a larger aim: the success of the United Nations cause...
...Indeed, in this matter of permanent commitments the entire logic of the situation should induce us to walk very warily...
...McNutt revealed the temper of his approach in a remark with regard to this matter of the regulation of hiring: "Although I am determined to exercise this authority, where necessary, to prevent labor hoarding and allocate essential workers to war plants, action will be taken only in those areas and with respect to those occupations where it is essential to meeting labor requirements...
...THE "GRASS ROOTS" REPUBLICAN AT the meeting of the Republican National *T Committee in St Louis we saw our party system reduced to its elementary mechanism...
...Whatever temporary engagements oar military leaders may make, our policy should never deviate from the broad principle of recognizing the right of every people to choose to own form of government, subject only to the general limitation that no type of regime that organizes its people for war and aggression is defiance of international treaties can he mirratoi in the future world order...
...Another important dividing line is that between agriculture and industry...
...In the dicta tonally governed countries no one can know what are the strongest forces fermenting beneath the surface of outwardly enforced conformity...
...He confessed frankly that he has nothing to do with political principles...
...Of course, I haven't the complete report at hand and must be satisfied with the synopsis which appeared in the New York Times...
...Lerner asks us to accept this qualification, and of course the many others so vital to his economic theorizing...
...The greatest cleavage is along the line which divides the fighting forces and the working forces...
...The history of capitalism has been one of marked revulsion towards free arjd open competition...
...Teaneck, New Jersey...
...The policy of dealing with Vichy, for which there is no longer any need, has been vindicated by the relatively small cost of opening American military operations on the other side of the Atlantic...
...It was officially revealed in the War Program...
...This is the first distasteful compromise...
...The Chicago Tribune may think itself the world's greatest newspaper, but, in the opinion of the smart ladies and gentlemen of the committee, close association with it is no political asset...
...How, let me ask, can freedom from want in the whole world be Implemented otherwise...
...against the Germans, of many of the foW countries against each other, of widespread hunger, of destruction of productive roSSOSSSi which must somehow he solved...
...This will take planetary economic planning...
...The naivite of the approach is safe within the confines of the university where impressionable youth does not understand it.* The infiltration of this outlook on our problems, is disastrous to political movement...
...The War Production Board long ago set up subsidiaries to control the flow of raw materials...
...Suppose men and women die who might have overcome chronic disease, thanks to the progress of gerontology—the right to exploit medicine in order to give disproportionate incomes to "horse-and-boggy" doctors will be maintained by the A.M.A...
...In an election in which the tide seemed to be against men of his principles,-he polled 381,000 votes against 280,000 for HeiL . Though Mr...
...They have marshaled enormous forces and unlimbered nationwide mechanisms of propaganda to accomplish their ends...
...danger to the United Nations canoe which would emerge from any permanent commitments to adventurers or dictators of a fascist or semi-fascist type...
...The key to the mood of the assembly was revealed when Herbert Hoover was received as a hero when he rose to explain that the other war was much better managed by him and a couple of other fellows than this one is being managed by President Roosevelt, his cabinet and the Army and Navy...
...FOR THE REST NEWS From RUSSELL R. IX To the Editor: For the beet of foreign and domestic news and honesty in newspapers — read The New Leader...
...Coal, oil, steel and aluminum are important...
...The men who now meet each year just before the igfiristmas season, calling their assembly—significantly enough—Congress of American Industry, seldom descend below the level of advocating a system, a way of life, an ideological outline of the national existence...
...The very complexity and obscurity of the situation in Europe should be a warning npnntt snap judgments...
...It is well for Americans to be reminded of the fact that there is such a thing as Russian democracy...
...His institution of the Management-Labor Policy Committee indicates that he conceives of his job as one of working with the leaders of industry, - labor) and agriculture rather than dictating to them...
...Otto, on the other hand, represents nothing in the way of real strength that could be thrown into the balance of the war and the singling out for special favor of this amiable young pretender to the ancient throne of the Hapsburg...
...For that matter, it wouM be unwise to extend recognition as a government to General de Gaulle and his associates, staunch fighters for freedom though they have been...
...A lot of things may happen between now and November, 1944, but from here it looks as if the next national campaign would be fought along the line of domestic New Deal issues...
...It has been a part of the policy of the Courier from the start to give full support to the American war effort and, especially, to American aid to the Russian fighting forces...
...For this French political Admiral held some trump cards...
...It is not an edifying sight, but it is not intended to be...
...And among the peoples who self determined themselves out of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918, among the Czechs, the Poles, the Jugoslavs and Croats, restoration of this Empire would be anything but a desirable war aim...
...4Te poMh* inatter in Want and unphilosophi-cal terms, the sessions of the Congress held here hi Haw York last week ware devoted to the proposition that the war must be won but that we must so manage tilings that nothing important will be changed by the war or the victory...
...The next is to set up methods of procedure to reduce the hoarding and pirating of workers in various industrial areas...
...It remains to be 'seen whether Mr...
...Up to now the armed forces, industry and agriculture have been bidding for men and women in helter-skelter competition...
...Louis are not without their pleasant aspects...
...The committee members did not dare to elect isolationist Schroeder to the chairmanship...
...Loo mis could not, with the opposition of a Republican legislature, count en carrying through a complete Propressive program, liberal and labor forces all over the country expected him to make such an impression during his administration as to swing the state back completely into the Progressive column...
...Nothing could more honestly picture the Republican attitude toward our national life than the choice of this sort of man...
...In the past the representatives of labor have been suspicious of Paul V. McNutt on account of certain incidents connected with his record as Governor of Indiana...
...These countries have not mixed economies, in fact the developments bode a far more difficult transition to the model which is later developed...
...We shall soon see whether his desire to be President of the United States is a handicap to his job as administrator of the key post in the mobilization of our fighting and working forces...
...His prestige among the handpicked Vichy naval and military officers and colonial administrators-in North and West Africa was high...
...Dark and difficult as the outlook is in sMgf ways, there is the reassuring thought ****** mere prestige of an anti-fascist, demoereW vie-to ry will unloose in Europe such vigoeoos d—h|' cratic forces that the Fiances and Dsrlans will be eliminated...
...But the efficiency we must have...
...The crucial issues are ruled out in this construction of a model mixed economy retaining democracy...
...THE IDEOLOGY OF THE N.A.M...
...Cochran-Agrees With Lerner Article From THOMAS C.COCHRAN Co-author, The Age of Enterprise To the Editor: Thank you for sending me The New Leader with the interesting article by Professor Lerner...
...LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Political Pressures Will Topple Mixed Economy, Says Reply to A. P. Lerner The New Leader ha* received many Utter* commenting on A. P. Lerner'*, "Collectivism and Freedom...
...One vote for collectivism...
...To return to the Beveridge Plan, more social medicine is its most admirable feature...
...The only answer is a Progressive victory for the whole ticket at the next election...
...Pottstown, Pa...
...For twenty years they have carried on—first in Berlin, then in Paris, now in New York...
...The first requirement is to establish clear rules with regard to military exemption on the basis of industrial necessity...
...The fate of labor and liberal policies should not be allowed to hang on the slender thread of one man's life...
...The first of the post-war goals enumerated is: "Preservation of the Constitution of the United States and the rights, freedoms and opportunities which it guarantees...
...It is Utopian to visualize a "reformed entrepre-nurial spirit," which will forget all his instruments of.power accumulation which he developed in the era of monopoly capitalism...
...The danger of such acquiescenet would be much enhanced if the State Department had followed the prodding of some —'1 nuiahn amateurs who have been clamoring for a htsnp of relations with Franco...
...The nation has its eye on him...
...Along the lines laid down here will be waged the greatest fight in American history...
...UR power will be very great in the starving, desolated Europe that will emerge from to* present war...
...The New Leader wishes them success as they enter upon their third year of American publication...
...All that we learn from planning war production must be unlearned the minute the bells ring out the victory...
...I JNTIL North Africa is thoroughly cleaned up ^ it will be a distasteful military necessity not to rub Franco the wrong way...
...Lerner can only postulate fair, gentlemanly competition by a desperate capitalist class, who are being told about their coming liquidation...
...By William Henry Chomberlin Where the News Ends Tactics and Diplomacy TWO recent developments, the recognition of Admiral Darlan as the supreme administrative authority in French North Africa, and the encouraging letter which Secretary of War Stim-son addressed to Otto of Hapsburg in connection with the ratter's proposal to raise a "free Austrian" battailen, indicate the thorny problems which will arise as more territory is liberated from Axis control and more claimants for recognition appear on the scene...
...It is upon these grounds and not with the use of simplifying assumptions that our answer will be based...
...Madison, Wisconsin...
...The mixed economy can operate in a few isolated markets, but a determined government policy to enter all markets is a revolutionary proposal, and only those prepared to cope with such, should make this proposal...
...We should not expect doctrinaire uniformity in the political institutions of post-war BoXMja Our own system of government is by no mass a replica of the British...
...Management was given a pat on the back, Labor and Government had their duties sternly pointed out, but the main stress was laid on the return to normalcy after the war...
...I assume that old people, for example, will receive benefit as a matter of course, not after making themselves out paupers as is the case in our own country at present...
...I think there was a far stronger case for dealing with Darlan than for showing any special favor to Otto...
...N. Y...
...Under the able editorship of Raphael Ab-ramovitch, the journal carries on the best traditions of Russian democracy...
...If one thinks of this Republican conclave from this > point of view, the doings in St...
...the great majority of the workers would almost certainly be opposed to such an idea...
...For the Spanish dictator enjoys a position of considerable strategic importance so long as a belt of Axis-held territory lies between the armies of Montgomery and Eisenhower...
...Which adds up to the fact that the Republicans dare not fight the President on the issues of the war and foreign policy...
...A swift German move through Spain and across the Strait of Gibraltar would raise much graver problems than our armies are compelled to face to-day...
...Had the demands of our democratic purists to have nothing to do with Vichy been followed collaboration of that regime with Germany would almost certainly have been intensified and we should probably have encountered in the first stages of the operation the stubborn resistance which the Axis has been displaying in Tunisia...
...Sees Beveridge Report as Only First Step From HERBERT M. MERRILL To the Editor: I suppose one should not complain about .the insufficiency of the Beveridge Plan as long as Harold J. Laski gives it his approval...
...To recognize the immediate overriding military necessity of dealing with Darlan or parleying with a Franco is not to overlook the grave mora...
...As a Socialist I must say that the Beveridge report does not implement any "economy of abundance" or threaten the status quo to any great extent British conservatives, or most of them, will doubtless approve the efforts of Sir William, albeit a few, as well as Americans who call Roosevelt a "Communist," may denounce it as another Concession to Bolshevism...
...and there are M« greater differences, of course, in the case of 4§ Soviet Union and China...
...What we should do is not to impose any ready-made regimes or personalities upon the European peoples, but to pave the way fay large-scale relief, by policing where acute racial and civil strifs prevails, for an ultimate orderly decision by thaw peoples themserves...
...From beginning to end the theory was advanced that the American way is to let the directors of big business have their way and depend on them to produce prosperity for all...
...The conflicts of the classes, the character of the bureaucratic implementation...
...To an American the benefits paid seem very small, but of course Beveridge has made it cover practically Briton's entire population...
...We want the greatest efficiency, but we want it coupled with the least possible dictatorship...
...With the aid of the slide-rule, a working knowledge of solid geometry and calculus, our democratic citizenry will be fully equipped to solve the problems of efficiency, full employment, and the many freedoms...
...The meaning of this becomes clearer later on with mention of the "right to receive wages, salaries and profits commensurate with . . . performance and usefulness...
...No matter what decision is reached by the courts as to filling of the gubernatorial chair, the hope of a progressive administration has, for the present, disappeared...
...It is one thing to recognise Darlan as the de-facto civilian administrator of a region which, after all, is predominantly colonial, with a small French population...
...Our food reserves alone will represent a weapon of almost unimaginable potonea Our sense of responsibility must he correspond ingly keen...
...and Franco's acquiescence would facilitate such a counterrtroke on Hitler's part...
...The order is to be, "As yon were...
...So far as "freedom from want" is concerned, the United States can well afford to put a bottom on wages and salaries and assure a minimum income of at least $2,500 to every family, an income which can be increased just as fast as the equipment of industry is brought op to date...
...A democratic collectivist economy cannot tolerate these elements...
...The solution in his formulation becomes fairly simple...
...RUSSIAN DEMOCRATS JJEW journals have had more varied and ex-citing histories than the Russian Social Courier, the bi-weekly which on Friday evening, December 11, will celebrate its second anniversary in this country...
...For nly own part, I only respect those who are wise enough to see where technological progress is leading, those who are ready to have the most up-to-date inventions and techniques made immediate use of...
...Prof...
...And Chairman Spangler thought it politically safe to venture the remark that "we can't say that the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans are moats around the country any more...
...We must win a war but mast sidestep the results of the victory...
...If the labor and liberal elements, the intelligent and patriotic citizens of this country are to counter this offensive with any hope of success, they must take the field with full consciousness of their task, with trained forces and with adequate equipment for large scale political warfare...
...The last Chandun of Deputies in France was elected in 10M and under circuav stances so different from those of the present time that it could scarcely be considered representative now...
...In his former, comparatively powerless position, Mr...
...His adhesion considerably facilitated an operation that is of the greatest importance to the United Nations cause, the final success of which is still in the balance...
...Gallup's scientific methods of assaying public opinion, but they have traditional methods of their own which serve as a rather rough but thoroughly adequate substitute...
...As reported by Miles McMillan in The New Leader of November 14, the 49-year-old Orlando S. Loorrris won his election over the arch-reactionary Julius P. Heil by conducting a straight and energetic campaign on vital issues...
...These people are experts in their way...
...His business—as he frankly sees it—is to see that candidates are elected...
...But against Russian dictatorship and against the various lines of the American Communist Party the Courier writers have waged relentless war...
...Lerner cites the full employment existent in the comparable countries of Germany, England, . and the United States, to show that a mixed economy can achieve this desired end...
...Less important divisions appear between the various lines of production...
...It was important, as this paper has frequently pointed out, that the Director of Manpower be the right sort of man and that his organization be set up in such a way as to inspire confidence and cooperation...
...Won't our insurance companion and the A.M.A...
...An appraisal of the workability of these two economic forms, must include an evaluation of class forces, a political philosophy, and a theory of human nature...
...But men and women are more important...
...Known by his own preference as a smalltown lawyer, he knew his way about politically and had every prospect of a long and fruitful career...
...Their opinions and temperaments, their moods and reactions are closely tied in with their potential productive capacity...
...The New Leader has again and again argued for an all-inclusive manpower authority...
...We know that a socialist economy can work...
...raise "particular hell," however, if Congress undertakes to extend social insurance to biological engineering and nutritional regimentation for citizens...
...They are citizens, voters, trade union members...
...It is their business to estimate how the cat of public opinion is setting itself to jump and then set the screws of their party machine so it hops in the same general direction...
...it probably will not be the last...
...Such an authority was set up by the President last Sunday...
...It would be objectionable, it would be unthinkable to recognise a nana of Dorian's type as bead of a .government claiming to speak for France...
...Abba P. Lerner has inserted the academic sterility with his "modern economic approach...
...Admiration for The New Leader From WILLIAM ROWAN To the Editor: I have been getting The New Leader regularly for the past thirteen years...
...McNutt can be clear enough, quick enough, tough enough to give it to us...
...There is no evidence that a strong monarchist restorationist movement exists in Austria itself...
...I am nearly enough in agreement with the views he expresses in the article to feel that I could not add anything very striking...
...He suffers under the handicap of a reputation for political ambition...
...The men and women who speak through this paper are Russian Social Democrats who fought against dictatorship inside Russia and have carried on the fight for democracy since...
...Other* tcill be printed next week, along < with a di*cu*sion article On the tvbject by C. Wright MUls.] from JULIUS MARGOLIS To th* Editor: The Dreher-Chamberlain debate, confused as it was with the smoke of a battle, was at least fought along crucial lines...
Vol. 25 • December 1942 • No. 50
