AN OPEN LETTER TO SECRETARY ACHESON
An Open Letter to Secretary Acheson Mr. Dean Acheson Secretary of State Washington, D. C. Dear Mr. Secretary: Countless Americans whose integrity and patriotism are more firmly established than...
...The Communists are awakening the masses, and make no mistake about it, the masses are listening...
...II One may haggle over details in Sen...
...Shortly the Atlantic Treaty had to be plugged up with the measure to rearm Western Europe...
...These Senators sense, as do countless citizens out in the country, that you and your Department have fastened stubbornly onto an approach to world problems which is cold, negative, intransigent, and totally lacking in moral appeal to the peoples of the world...
...That left such a gap that Czechoslovakia and Hungary were lost to the Kremlin...
...Kefauver to recognize the sincerity and concern of his complaint that "the State Department's apparent lack of vision at this time is shocking and alarming to many of us...
...Secretary, not from characters like Sen...
...I think that State Department officials," said Sen...
...One needn't accept in its entirety, or at all, the concept of Atlantic Union supported by Sen...
...Kefauver, "have dealt with the problem so long that they think they are the only persons who have any particular opinion or insight as to what the Congress and the American people are ready or prepared for...
...Secretary: Countless Americans whose integrity and patriotism are more firmly established than Sen...
...This is the approach the world is waiting for, Mr...
...Time is precious, for as Churchill said so well, "it would be a grave mistake, perhaps a fatal mistake, to suppose that our breathing spell will last forever, or for more than a few years...
...McCarthy and his politically-motivated attack on the State Department, we are anxious to call your attention to the fact that there is another kind of criticism of you and your associates, and one which comes from Senators and citizens of totally different character and motives from McCarthy's...
...We in Wisconsin are not greatly surprised by McCarthy's performance...
...We cite these facts because they help to explain the background and character of the man whose hunger for headlines has led him to vilify the State Department and blacken the reputation of its staff at a time when its energies and resources are more critically needed than ever before to develop and proclaim to the world a truly democratic foreign policy...
...This, in turn, had to be propped up with the Marshall Plan...
...His candidacy for the U. S. Senate, while he continued to sit on the state bench, was denounced by the Wisconsin Supreme Court as "a violation of the constitution and the laws of Wisconsin and a violation of his oath as a circuit judge and as an attorney-at-law...
...The very loudness of McCarthy's brawling show has drowned out the voices of constructive critics of State Department policy...
...His record in this state was, and is, most unsavory...
...Secretary, that his basic indictment is sound...
...It will be recalled what the United Nations and the International Bank and Fund were supposed to do...
...Wouldn't it be a master stroke of statesmanship to take up with them a more affirma-ative approach to world problems, one in which we and they would grasp the initiative for what Winston Churchill—again no appeaser— called a supreme effort, at "the highest level," for honorable agreement with the Russians...
...Purely economic and military measures tend to breed a corroding skepticism and even cynicism which can be overcome only by an appeal to the higher moral values that sway mankind...
...Positive proposals which would enable America to assume moral leadership in dramatic moves for world peace, like those proposed by Sens...
...These Senators, and the others who participated in like vein in the discussion, are not members of the McCarthy-Wherry-Bridges cabal, but are old supporters of State Department policy...
...Now, as this letter is being written, he is desperately trying to save his skin by reducing his broadside smear against hundreds of employes of the State Department to an attack on a single individual, who is not even an employe of your Department...
...As Sen...
...Kefauver was referring to the fact that 40 Senators have sponsored or joined in sponsoring a variety of affirmative suggestions for developing a more constructive American foreign policy, but every one has been opposed or ignored by the State Department...
...Secretary] being mainly economic and military, are enough unless they are backed by an over-all peace program able to inspire the free world...
...This leads us to one of our real reasons for writing you, Mr...
...McCarthy...
...13, which contains the verbatim report of a lengthy discussion on foreign policy by a group of distinguished Senators...
...As for the Senators we were mentioning, we wonder if you read the Congressional Record for Mar...
...Sen...
...Douglas of Illinois who rose to inquire if the State Department were not assuming the position of Glendower in Shakespeare's Henry IV: "I am a blessed Glendower...
...The Wisconsin Supreme Court, denouncing his conduct as "highly improper," concluded that "the destruction of evidence under these circumstances could only be open to the inference that the evidence destroyed contained statements of fact contrary to the position taken by the person destroying the evidence...
...It is mine to speak and yours to hear...
...There's a lot more like it around the country—more than you may suspect...
...For, aside from wanting to make it clear how at least some of us feel about Sen...
...Kefauver's summary, but the distasteful fact remains, Mr...
...We hope you have had the time to read the Congressional Record enough to know that some of the best of our Senators are deeply worried about the way you are conducting foreign policy...
...It has become increasingly clear to even the most casual reader of the papers that "Jumping Joe" has changed his story and shuffled his charges every time he was caught in a downright lie or shifty distortion...
...The Department brought us measures which soon turned out to be only stopgaps, and which required a greater stopgap to prop them up...
...You seem to ignore the overriding fact that the conflict in the world today is one of ideas, that the revolutionary ferment of peoples everywhere will not be satisfied with your doctrine of peace through strength...
...Even total diplomacy is likely to fall short of expectations without that strengthening element" This criticism comes straight from your own circle, Mr...
...McMahon and Tydings, have been ignored or dismissed as Utopian by your Department, when, in fact, they came closer to expressing the hopes and wishes of the people of America and the world than the sterile doctrine of "total diplomacy...
...McMahon had this paragraph entered in the Congressional Record—that: "It may be questioned whether these proposals [your proposals for "total diplomacy," Mr...
...It's an eye-opener, Mr...
...At one time he destroyed evidence in a case in which he sat as judge...
...McCarthy's are revolted by his crude and irresponsible attack on the State Department...
...To stop that gap we were offered the Atlantic Pact...
...This proclivity for burning evidence which might weaken his position is especially noteworthy in the light of the role he has now assumed for himself, but it isn't the Whole story, by any means, While a Marine during the war he cleaned up $42,000 in a stock-market gamble, but he failed to report the gain in his income tax, and was subsequently forced by tax authorities to make good on this attempted tax evasion...
...Tydings' for universal disarmament, the McMahon Plan, or Sen...
...Kefauver expressed it: "Many of us have continued through the years to vote for the State Department's policies, although we did it with grave doubt and concern...
...Most of your speeches are pretty much the old power stuff...
...It was no appeaser but Gen...
...We're thinking now of Senators like Estes Kefauver of Tennessee, Paul Douglas of Illinois, Ralph Flanders of Vermont, Brien McMahon of Connecticut, and Millard Tydings of Maryland, all of whom, you know, have been staunch supporters of most Administration measures like the Marshall Plan...
...Even so usually firm a suuporse of your position as the New York Times is wondering outloud if you haven't lowered your sights too far, The Times said in an editorial—and it's significant that Sen...
...In a remarkable address to the House of Commons—characterized by the Manchester Guardian as his greatest since the war—Churchill brought cheers from all parties in the tense House when he asserted that "it is our Christian duty to do our best" to seek such agreement...
...Time and patience are not necessarily on our side...
...It was Sen...
...But soon we were called to up these State Department plans with the British loan, until suddenly it broke down, and had to be followed up by a guaranty to Greece and Turkey...
...You're heading for London to confer with the leaders of the Western democracies...
...Humphrey's for a top-level conference to clear the way for detailed negotiations for peace...
...Sincerely, The Editors of The Progressive...
...It would be a serious mistake if you felt that the discrediting of the Wisconsin Senator meant the country was united behind your present program of "total diplomacy"—a program which rejects peace overtures to the Soviet Union through such proposals as Sen...
...We have stumbled from expedient to expedient, most of them purely negative...
...George C. Marshall, your predecessor, who pointed out recently that the Soviets are "riding in on the crest of a wave"—the wave being "the revolution of the little people all over the world*" It was no radical or pacifist, but your former associate in the State Department, Will Clayton, an ultra-conservative business man, who said: "Stalin is winning the cold war...
...Press and radio have concentrated their reporting resources on McCarthy's cheap sensationalism while ignoring the constructive criticism in the Senate of your Department's policies...
Vol. 14 • May 1950 • No. 5
