MY WAR WITH THE UN
Davis, Garry
My War with the UN By GARRY DAVIS AS A stateless citizen in Paris, in the early fall of 1948, I was trapped in a no-man's land between the sovereign nation of France and the international...
...The force of unity was lying there waiting to be awakened...
...Why on earth were these great names supporting me...
...At the first, at the Salle Pleyel, we asked the United Nations whether they considered they had a plan for peace, and, if not, if they would heed the declaration I had made from the balcony Nov...
...It was impossible for me to sea just how well I, a world citizen without papers, had made the point of the UN's impotence...
...I began to change my viewpoint concerning our general need shortly after our UN appeal...
...We can be served by nothing less...
...During the past year, in the period of diffusing our idea, I made a speaking tour of France, visited major towns and spoke to many types of Frenchmen, gave interviews and talked on radio broadcasts...
...In a personal letter to me...
...It may be difficult for people in the United States to understand how Communist, Socialist, conservative, Catholic, Protestant, Gandhi-ist, scientific, artistic, and labor representatives could, in spite of their individual diversity, meet in an atmosphere of complete unity and form a council to protect the future actions of one barely-conscious, overwhelmingly confused, redheaded ex-American who hardly knew more than how to do a buck-and-wing and a double-take...
...leading...
...This idea had brought them together, simply as human beings...
...I had written and re-written the speech until that last morning...
...Should I set up a stand outside the UN grounds and get people to sign petitions, as I had when I worked with the United World Federalists in New York...
...But that awareness came, as I said, later...
...This means simply that each of us has a responsibility to the world community, and we should therefore endeavor to find our own way to express it...
...After all, wasn't I where I was simply because back in the States I had discovered a great mental and moral cavity in my life which I wanted to fill...
...II Up to this time, I had been concerned chiefly with political solutions to our general world problem, mostly because of my indoctrination in United World Federalists' propaganda while home, and partly because of the influence of the Sarrazac group, which was concerned with institutional approaches such as world government and people's assemblies...
...Our gesture had aroused world-wide attention, and the letters came to me in torrents...
...I had not reached the awareness that it was in reality not me that they were supporting...
...Madame Guieyesse, the leader of Friends of Gandhi...
...I know that the responsibility of a world citizen is to bear living witness to the creation and development of a true world civilization in which all men can live to harmony and creative peace...
...I call upon you to deceive us no longer by this illusion of political authority...
...Pasteur Roser, French representative of the Fellowship of Reconciliation...
...I have since felt that because of the rigid social system under which these people live—and under which we all do in varying degree—they could not approach their neighbors with genuine feelings of brotherhood and kindness...
...that for me to engage in public activity before indications of our world civilization emerged from the community itself would be only to seek personal prestige at the expense of my position in the community...
...Always move a step further...
...Let us respect each other...
...Our problem is not to create more division through arms and hate...
...5, someone asked how we were going to inform the public of the UN's answer, if an answer came...
...My voyage to this part of the world community is most of all a private visit to my family and friends, during which I hope to be able to evaluate my recent world citizenship experiences against the background of America today...
...This group later became the Conseil de Solidarite de Garry Davis...
...The United Nations, meeting at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, didn't quite know what to do with me when I settled with my sleeping sack on its "international" territory there...
...The first job was to get through the door, to declare oneself a part of the whole, instead of a part of a part, to cry to the world, "I am a World Citizen...
...I call upon you to convene forthwith a World Constituent Assembly to raise the standard around which all men can gather, the standard of true peace, of one government for one world...
...I remember remarking in a press statement at the time that if the UN couldn't solve the case of one little guy who had done nothing but obey national regulations until he finally landed in UN's collective lap, it didn't seem probable that UN could solve the problems of the millions of people they presumed to represent...
...He knew many of the...
...Support came from England too...
...Continue...
...In the Salle Pleyel again...
...Germany has almost 250,000 world citizens registered, France about 100,000...
...It is now our problem to create with our basic understanding of these facts a world society in which we can live in sanity and happiness...
...George Altman, editor of Franc-Tireur...
...It seems I wasn't wanted by either and was a nuisance to both, as I pointed out in the first installment of these reflections last month...
...We only know now that our world is one, and that despite all our apparent diversity, we are one people, and inhabit one world...
...They responded with religious fervor...
...Ill Many have no doubt regarded my renunciation of U. S. citizenship as illogical, impractical, foolish, or neurotic...
...Faced with this gnawing problem of what next, I don't think I ever felt lonelier in my life than in September, 1948...
...For the French the UN was another council in a council-ridden country...
...That wouldn't do...
...we had four days to organize a meeting...
...Girard, head of the Biological Institute of Paris...
...I received only one answer—and that from South Africa...
...That is what I read in my letters...
...For me this unity in diversity has tremendous significance...
...They said in brief, "We're with you...
...I became more and more inarticulate as a result of this external pressure of being a symbol of unity...
...This idea of world citizenship had seemed to spring up almost in spite of my mistakes...
...GARRY DAVIS, "World Citizen No...
...It became apparent that there were no second-class world citizens...
...Sarrazac handled the organizational details...
...He was detained on Ellis Island or four days as a result of his status as immigrant...
...I sent a letter to each delegate, asking to be reinstated at the Palais as an insignificant reminder that humanity was still to be served by the UN...
...But around me a community of world-thinking, or human-thinking people have come into being...
...last month as a "stateless person" under the French immigration ?[UOta...
...Evatt, the president, and Mr...
...IV My conclusions to all my activity are brief and quite simple...
...I was told later that it was the most extraordinarily assorted mixture of spirits ever assembled in one group in the history of France...
...Help me by helping yourself...
...Hope and faith ran through these countless letters...
...It does neither of us any good to regard me as a leader or an idol...
...Sarrazac had been a lieutenant-colonel in the French Maquis and was the French representative for the People's World Assembly Steering Committee...
...Hence, after I tried to visit my many friends in Germany (an at tempt frustrated again by officialdom), I decided to return to my homeland of the United States for a visit, and that is where I am as I complete this series of two articles for The Progressive...
...Granted, these are vague concepts, but they are real ones...
...Prof...
...If I were an American citizen now, I would not consider it necessary to renounce that citizenship to be a good world citizen...
...Their ideals had been destroyed too often for them to have faith and hope in much outside their own little communities...
...I figured that none of us would have much time to talk, so I tried to keep it under one minute...
...No one had thought of this...
...literary lights of France and organized a press conference (Oct...
...A way had been found to express one's feelings of humanity...
...Or brotherhood, or friendship...
...Then how in the world did I get myself into such a position that people were looking toward me for help...
...many members of Parliament signed a petition endorsing my declaration of the UN...
...My mail piled high...
...Why don't you go home and forget it...
...The very nature of their daily lives prohibits it...
...I could feel it in the letters—thousands of them—which poured in from every corner of the world...
...We're with you," came in, I became more and more unsure that I was the man for the job...
...But fuse, it did...
...I felt instinctively that somehow something big had been released by my presence at the UN in Paris...
...But continue what...
...The second meeting came about this way...
...I seemed to become a symbol for so many depressed and disillusioned Europeans of all races, faiths, and political views...
...The only difference was that this one was bigger, and more people talked...
...He was head of the one-world organization known as Front Humaine and one of the founders of the now famous Centre de Recherche et d'Expres-sion Mondialiste near Paris...
...Let us recognize our differences of culture, language, habits, but, above these, let us seek to understand each other...
...Man stripped of all limitations, fearless, kind, and strong...
...What actually have you done other than get a lot of publicity...
...Had I been a man of religon I should have said that these people were looking for the love of God...
...The sovereign states you represent divide us and lead us to the abyss of total war...
...Complete Man in all his glory...
...At a session of the Conseil Dec...
...only Thorez and de Gaulle could fill the Vel D'Hiv...
...But the feeling was definitely not poli-tical...
...This didn't seem to make much sense to the audience, most of whom were already too familiar with diplomatic jargon...
...The day after this meeting (Dec...
...Richard Wright, author of Native Son...
...I might be tempted to answer, "Personally, very little, except perhaps to understand the problem a little more...
...22, 1948) where they declared their solidarity with our action...
...Should I organize the people who were writing letters into some sort of international party of which I would be Number One...
...And if you fail us in this . . . stand aside, for a People's World Assembly will arise from our own ranks to create such a government...
...Frankly, I found little to recommend me...
...Mankind is ready for world civilization...
...Besides, there are police all around the joint...
...I wanted to work with my hands, too...
...that the words of praise were not meant for me personally...
...With the UN's fumblings adding new gloom to an already depressing situation, our balcony appeal to reason and humanism on Nov...
...On it were such people as Albert Camus...
...Evatt...
...Here my theatrical training came through...
...As it was, after I found myself standing on the little side railing looking down on the assembled UN delegates of our most powerful sovereign nations, with Dr...
...I became more and more sure that I was completely unprepared for the role in which I had been cast...
...It was this center which was instrumental in "mondializing" the entire province of Lot, in which Ca-hors and Figeac, two middle-France towns, declared themselves World Territory...
...Of course not...
...But numbers of this kind have little significance, in my opinion, if they are not accompanied by examples of concrete changes in the actual living conditions of men...
...It seemed clear that if the UN delegates wouldn't listen to my unspoken petition-by-presence, I would have to write to them individually...
...To give impetus to the interest we had created by the UN action, the Conseil de Solidarite, and other support, we held two meetings in Paris...
...Is this new...
...The weeks that followed were full of frantic preparation...
...This is hardly possible in our stage of evolution...
...It was Bob Wilson of the Associated Press talking to me outside the enclosure of the Palais de Chaillot...
...You've just been released by the police...
...But that was secondary for the moment...
...To my mind, this is the greatest challenge we have ever faced...
...World citizenship...
...3, 1948), Pat Armstrong of the British Crusade for World Government, Maurice Cosyn, president of the Union Federale of Belgium, Sar-razac, and I trudged to the UN to present the petitions to Dr...
...This didn't matter too much, since we had planned that others would take up the speech after I had been hauled away by the security police...
...1 was a role thrust upon me more by circumstances...
...After that experience, I called Robert Sarrazac, whom I had met briefly on the steps of the UN restaurant...
...The people who wrote seemed motivated more by a sort of religious fervor than by the logic of our words...
...No one disagreed with world citizenship...
...Classes, religions, races, nationalities, cultures—all were forgotten, or at least subordinated to the general realization of One Human Family...
...My War with the UN By GARRY DAVIS AS A stateless citizen in Paris, in the early fall of 1948, I was trapped in a no-man's land between the sovereign nation of France and the international organization of the United Nations...
...in short, to live in harmony with ourselves and our fellowman...
...Andre Breton...
...And so if one asked me, "But what have you proved...
...No one man could hold it down or greatly augment it...
...We, the people, want the peace which only a world government can give...
...But I am getting ahead of events...
...But they aren't going to let you back after throwing you out...
...If so, what would be our program of principles...
...But, surprisingly enough, all seemed to have a common objective in protecting this naive boy who presumed to call himself a World Citizen...
...Chairman and Delegates: "I interrupt in the name of the people of the world not represented here...
...It is necessary, however, to be good neighbors in our community, to try and reach the next fellow with understanding and recognize that he is like 'the next fellow' all around the world, to share, not only the small things with which we part with little concern, but our very lives...
...The strain of the constant Put ity, the crowds, the feeling of re-sponsibility, and the necessity to act like a world citizen even when because of my own fatigue, I didn't feel especially friendly toward ray fellow men—all this brought me to the realization that I must return to the source of my energy...
...I am obliged to say that most of my public utterances at this time (and, in fact, later) were slighty less than coherent...
...Perhaps this is a good point to report that Europeans, from my personal observation, regarded the United Nations with general apathy and disillusionment...
...Vercours, the Communist writer...
...The disagreement came on the practical means to achieve it...
...I felt the driving need for much study and spiritual meditation...
...They may be right...
...1," has just returned to the U.S...
...Sarrazac and I, as fellow World Citizens, talked about presenting a petition to the UN directly from the balcony of the beautiful theater in the Palais where the UN plenary sessions were being held...
...Later, I realized that I simply happened to be in the right spot at the right time—at the precise moment an idea was waiting to be expressed...
...I do not dispute these two, but after all are these not only shells which will permit us, as human beings, to live together in harmony and peace...
...I began to notice something...
...this does not mean that sometime in the future I might not see that necessity...
...they work too long for too little...
...Slowly, the idea of world citizenship has spread...
...At the time, I searched myself for justification of the position in which I found myself...
...We meant to be organized...
...We couldn't risk failure at this stage of the game...
...Though my words may go unheeded, our common need for world law and order can no longer be disregarded...
...The letters underlined a desperate yearning to believe in something affirmative, something responsive to basic human needs and desires...
...I also found it in myself...
...But the pressure of playing the role made me realize that the basis of security is understanding...
...This was my speech to the UN delegates: "Mr...
...Andre Gide, and others...
...All right," he continued, "so it is the only place you can live...
...I called it world government and a people's world assembly...
...whether we survive and grow into manhood will depend on how many of us enter morally, mentally, and instructively the world community and act as world citizens in pur daily life...
...I suspect now that that situation was a tremendously delicate one...
...Registries have been established in many countries...
...Evatt said that the UN was not established to make peace, but to maintain it once made...
...No, I reminded them, never repeat...
...that the letters expressing hope and faith did not actually mean that Garry Davis, the man, was the personification of their ideal...
...A meeting was indicated, but where...
...That was secondary...
...This doctrine of understanding and harmony...
...nor was it economic...
...Our problem is one of reconciliation, of understanding, of giving...
...But do not think that it is necessary for each of us to grasp the entire world or all people in our understanding or our heart...
...Claude Bourdet, editor of Combat, the French resistance paper...
...19 went straight to the hearts of hundreds of thousands of Europeans...
...As each letter saying, "Continue...
...My inner conflict was great...
...Lie, the secretary-general, looking up politely to hear what I had to say, the words froze in my mouth...
...But few today seem to believe in its power...
...The Centre also has initiated the idea of a World Road, which it is hoped would some day traverse the globe and on which men, ideas, and produce would travel freely...
...Before our UN appeal, Sarrazac suggested that it might be advisable to seek the support of men of renown who could explain publicly the true significance of our forthcoming action...
...The French had turned down my appeal to remain within their borders...
...On the World Citizen's card is this simple pledge: "I am registered as a World Citizen...
...My part has been almost passive till now...
...But Garry, what are you trying to prove...
...We felt it had been sufficiently demonstrated that the UN as an organization for peace was virtually paralyzed by sovereign-statehood...
...Here was an idea which touched the hearts of all men...
...I was still without papers, although the French Ministry of Interior had tried to foist on me an illegal (par bonte) extension of the original tourist visa stamped on my U. S. passport, which was now filed under "Voluntary Stateless," at the U. S. Embassy...
...Emanuel Moun-ier, editor of Esprit...
...That's the way Europeans seemed to feel...
...Men are ready to be men, to show, friendship and love, to create, to live in harmony...
...I too am searching...
...The narrowness of division, of pettiness and greed, the gnawing of fear and hate—all were forgotten for a world citizen...
...I must, "re-charge...
...The only hall bigger than the Salle Pleyel which was available was the Vel D'Hiv, the Madison Square Garden of Paris...
...Europe had seen the old League come and go, helpless to prevent war...
...I was in charge of writing the speech...
...It was brotherhood I was looking for, understanding, communication with my fellowmen...
...It did not matter what kind of structure was established to allow this world brotherhood to express itself fully...
...And yet they knew they were a part of world society which was not allowed to function freely and efficiently, which was frustrated by strangling frontiers, mountainous state bureaucracy, and, worst of all, a crushing armament race spreading fear and hate...
...Evatt's answer opened the door for us to turn directly to the people for support...
...They came from 76 countries...
...to rest, study, think, and plan, after two eventful years in Paris, where he won world attention and more than a half-million followers for his organization of World Citizens...
...At this time I see no necessity for regaining my U. S. citizenship...
...World citizen No...
...Let us recognize that each of us has something to give the other, and that this can only be done if we find within ourselves what the other needs...
...In the first week of January (1949), 30,000 letters poured into the Hotel des Etats-Unis, where I was living...
...I wanted to cry out in anguish, "No, don't look to me for the answers...
...The UN was pulling out in the next week...
...I happened to pull out the plug which held back a flood of human sentiments damned up by a divisive social order...
...When we, by our action before UN, seemed to pierce through the tough shell of sovereign states, people seemed to see an open door with the great light of world brotherhood beyond...
...Martin-Chauffier, a well-known Socialist writer...
...But four days later the Vel D'Hiv was filled with 20,000 people...
...The 28-year-old former Air Forces bombardier had renounced his American citizenship in France and was admitted to the U.S...
...I myself have just recently become aware of it...
...As such I will endeavor to recognize my responsibilities as a member of the world community...
...You've made your point...
...This evaluation will allow me to face the problem of my contribution as a member of the world community with more assurance and understanding...
Vol. 14 • May 1950 • No. 5
