THE PEOPLE'S FORUM
THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Nixon Can't Be Trusted Dear Sirs: Usually I find the thinking in The Progressive much to my taste, but I cannot digest your suggestion, in the February issue, that Vice...
...This problem can be readily solved by persuading Israel to permit all refugees to enter Israel together with all of the former areas of Palestine that these refugees now occupy...
...George P. Hayes Decatur, Ga...
...W. C. Meyer Clayton, Mo...
...He had no personal ambition or property, his life was dedicated to the principle of non-violence and freedom...
...aid to India has been always a blessing to her 370 million people...
...None of the governments is Communist, although in Syria and Egypt there is a strong tendency to regard Russia as the big brother...
...The only conclusion that can be drawn from these actions and inactions of Governor Collins is that he is firmly opposed to any moderation of traditional racism...
...Rene Lewis Princeton, N.J...
...Assuming the truth of that cynical cliche about "strange bed-fellows" in politics, I am shocked to think that you do not realize that this is a matter that has nothing to do with party politics...
...Can any informed person really believe that this totally competitive program, as advanced by Mr...
...However, I do not want to cut out any portion of any of my Progressives...
...All her efforts are directed towards maintenance of peace...
...Timely Aid to India Dear Sirs: I would like to thank all "my brothers and sisters" of America for the aid to my country—India...
...would have a moral obligation in view of our general support of Israel to supplement what Israel would pay in this process of indemnification...
...There are still millions of people in the larger cities of India living shelterless in the streets and railway stations...
...My fears were more than confirmed...
...Again, Governor Collins refused to intervene against the demands of racists...
...As far as I am concerned, the answer will be peace...
...Jean Steelink Tucson, Ariz...
...Having thus charmed the audience by his apparent moderation and high purpose— only small wars versus high hopes for peace —he calmly presents this proposal: total and unlimited competition, both military and economic...
...Was not this type of competition one of the major causes of World War I where the two blocs were led by Germany and England respectively...
...For instance, U.N...
...Caution in accepting these offers at face value is justified, but nothing can justify our government's failure to make positive proposals along this line...
...How does he act...
...guarantees that no borders will be changed except by negotiation, not by force, this guarantee to be underwritten by the Western powers and the U.S.S.R., which nations should also agree absolutely to discontinue the arms race in that area...
...Elizabeth Weidman Dearborn,- Mich...
...Bulganin and Khrushchev made rather extraordinary proposals looking to the disengagement of the major powers in the internal affairs of these countries and to the demilitarization of the area...
...As Senator Kennedy has pointed out, the program India has undertaken is not over-ambitious...
...And his humor (which evidently some of your correspondents do not comprehend) is exactly in the tradition of the poet and the man of letters...
...My children will reap far more from your efforts than the meager sums I have contributed...
...no mention is made of race in the new law, but its sole purpose is to continue segregation...
...but if they vote to return their area and their allegiance into Israeli territory, then they could eventually become full citizens of Israel...
...It would be possible to work out their absorption in the Middle East outside the territories of Israel, if there was any good will...
...He also cleverly supplies just the necessary amount of fuel to keep the "cold war" lamps brightly burning by making the usual charges against our "opponents" and paying the usual compliments to ourselves and "allies...
...Dear Sirs: Et tu, Brute...
...He makes me just a little prouder (as sometimes I am not proud at all) of being an American...
...Item: In December 1956 the U.S...
...It has balance in that he pays appropriate respect to both the deterrent power of "superior" military might and man's deep desire for peace...
...Whenever and wherever we can register our protest to these tests we must do so...
...Implicit in economic aid, whether unilateral or bloc, is political pressure against both opponents and neutrals alike...
...Our talk of leadership of the free world arouses some cynical amusement in view of the fact that our friends are people like King Saud and others of the more conservative, reactionary, and rich landowning elements...
...Far from being a moderate, Governor Collins is, even more than his Arkansas colleague (once also hailed as a "moderate"), thoroughly committed to holding the line on segregation...
...That means that General Bradley anticipates a continuation of the arms race until the "whole electronics house of cards" reaches the point of impossible extension, when we will have nothing to do but settle down to an uneasy life "in a thickening shadow of death...
...U.S...
...All this is a phase of our progress toward universal, controlled disarmament...
...Nixon was when he started his upward climb, but not one of them is too young to know and live by the basic decencies...
...Whoever strikes first will achieve the final destruction of the other...
...This is why Nehru, U Nu, and the leaders of the other uncommitted nations have always supported multilateral aid through the United Nations, similar to UNRRA of the pre-cold war period...
...The progress they have made in the last ten years is indeed heartening...
...I went without great hope that any formula could bring about a prompt settlement of the problem of the Arab refugees...
...Both sides, certainly the Arab states, regard the refugees as pawns in a political game rather than as living and breathing human individuals...
...Indeed I doubt whether there can be a settlement of Arab-Israeli relations except in the framework of a general Russo-Amer-ican modus vivendi in the Middle East...
...To an unaccustomed observer the poverty of the people is appalling...
...The article then pointed out that diplomatic missions concerned have sent blunt telegrams to the State Department and the I.C.A...
...Vernon Ward Belhaven, N. C. Mayer the Poet Dear Sirs: I resubscribed primarily because you run the articles of Milton Mayer...
...Last year I was in India and as a technical man visited many industries—three unfinished steel plants, projects with huge dams, reservoirs, and hydro-electric power plants, and many research laboratories...
...The people of India have always been aware of the obligation, and the best way to reward obligation is by gaining success in all spheres and thus demonstrate the success of democratic ways of doing things for which our countries stand...
...It is anything but a happy picture, and that picture cannot be changed for the better by the processes of spending more billions in order to get more weapons of annihilation...
...It would be almost impossible, it seems to this writer, to conceive of a blueprint better designed to destroy the United Nations, to divide the world permanently and to make total war inevitable...
...If there is no alternative to peace, can there be any substitute for international cooperation...
...If the decision is for peace, each side must completely disarm and each side must be given complete freedom to inspect the other on the ground to give absolute assurance that there are no violations...
...This tendency is shared by most of the Arab world even in countries like Iraq or Lebanon whose governments are more or less allied to the West...
...America, being the first and only nation to use the atomic bomb on human beings—not only once but twice—must take courageous leadership and ban atomic tests...
...Let us, the American people, have our government offer to the world, through the United Nations, a carefully composed, comprehensive plan for establishing an international equality of opportunity to use, or to benefit from the use of, the world's natural resources and facilities for living, and for providing for production and exchange of wealth in the mutual interest of all peoples...
...John Boardman Syracuse, N. Y. Weapon Against Communism Dear Sirs: In the article, "A World Safe for Living," in The Progressive for January, the implications in the editors' introduction overshadow the contents of General Bradley's address...
...The 1959 date marks the exact mid-point of the present term...
...But now one basic "scientific" fact emerges: Both "selves" are rigged for rigor mortis unless the wires are ripped up and the bombs dismantled...
...To overcome the fear and hatred of our age a completely non-partisan step towards peace is mandatory...
...We must realize that Soviet propaganda exploits our weaknesses, therefore we must cast out the evils in our own land...
...The last chance for the two sides to perish together in a fair fight is rapidly slipping away...
...Ray Southworth Los Angeles, Calif...
...But we must face another fact which reflects against our people as a whole...
...Will this be an exception...
...Emth Goldfarb Onset, Mass...
...Alas, after polishing the lenses to an unaccustomed brilliance, there it was—stark and (I hope) not altogether unashamed...
...between the "slave" and "free" worlds...
...Prafulla C. Mukerji Brooklyn, N.Y...
...Perhaps that's why so many liked Ike...
...His position as governor and his personal prestige could both have been decisive...
...And is not history replete with similar instances of wars between leading powers...
...This has been aptly demonstrated by her leaders and people whenever occasion has demanded...
...She was promptly fired...
...that we have taught them all the wrong things...
...Robin Prising New York, N. Y. Bomb Test Protest Dear Sirs: In reply to E. Whealdon of Medford, Oregon (The People's Forum, January), I wish to state that I do indeed want to sign the resolution put forward by Senator Wayne Morse, calling for a cessation of nuclear bomb testing...
...No comment from Governor Collins...
...Talking with the Secretary of the India Government Planning Commission, I learned that at the end of the first Five Year Plan, the average per capita annual income was raised to only $57...
...Nixon simply can't be trusted...
...The aid is, of course, not sufficient enough for India to relax...
...In the past years both the United States and Russia have used "peace talks" as weapons in a propaganda war...
...Stevenson, will increase East-West trade in goods, services and ideas, or promote peace...
...Unless we heroically take Gandhi's message to heart we will be part of the ignorant force behind the bullet of his assassin and the world will turn into a monstrous slaughter-house in the most criminal war known to the human race...
...May not both have fallen into the same booby trap with Mr...
...Norman Thomas New York, N.Y...
...Cannot he and other reasonable men realize that unlimited economic competition—another name for economic exclusion, spheres of influence et al— among sovereign states has always played an important, if not dominant, role in warfare...
...The Arabs would not even be satisfied by Israeli withdrawal to the boundaries of the U.N...
...Rtd...
...Our leadership is now clearly seen to be wavering and ineffective...
...As Margaret Halsey so pungently puts it, "this is debasement of our moral currency...
...Item: Governor Collins signed into law a bill providing that any school which is integrated by the federal government must be closed...
...9, 1957, is beautifully written.^as are most of his speeches, and this one is clever too...
...Item: A year ago I was expelled from Florida State University for supporting integration...
...This would of course make Dickie Boy president...
...that they often created resentment toward the United States...
...Under such circumstances, neither side could be trusted not to strike first...
...At that time he can, and likely will, retire as previously hinted in public statements...
...Gandhi was not so afraid of his enemy that he had to have stockpiles of bombs...
...But his statement of faith in the ability of intelligent human beings to get together on some basis of a just accord is discounted by the explanation to the editors that his expression of views on the need for action does not compromise his position that we must gain equality or superiority in scientific performance before an accord can be achieved...
...We have three children, all younger than Mr...
...Is this the truth that shall make us free: "Use the foulest means possible, but get to the top of the heapl Then you are respectable and fit to be President of the United States...
...Dear Sirs: In your recent editorial you advise Ike to resign...
...No comment from Governor Collins...
...In the long run, such offers might somewhat change the situation and permit the settlement without which the future peace of the world is in danger...
...The reason for this is simple: if the present armament race proceeds to its logical conclusion, either side will have absolute power completely to obliterate the other...
...A careful study of all his acts (as opposed to his public utterances) show they have been purely political...
...The refugees involved should have the inalienable right to determine by a plebiscite the state to which they and their respective areas should become annexed...
...THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Nixon Can't Be Trusted Dear Sirs: Usually I find the thinking in The Progressive much to my taste, but I cannot digest your suggestion, in the February issue, that Vice President Nixon should replace President Eisenhower...
...Dear Sirs: What a let-down to find The Progressive handing us the "new Nixon" line too...
...Their children are growing up untrained for jobs...
...His pronouncements on race relations do not seem to inspire trust in Negroes o? my acquaintance, and his close friend and adviser, now Attorney General, created no objections among Southern Senators when he was appointed...
...The New York Times, December 28, 1957: "The moving force behind the decision to reduce the American staff on Technical Assistance projects is Vice President Richard M. Nixon...
...For whatever price each nation pays it will get a proportionate degree of individual and collective freedom...
...Most Americans have apparently come to believe they haven't needed strong leadership except in war...
...Now, puckering his lips in the other direction, Mr...
...He looks different...
...Together they liked "enlightened self-interest...
...The camps are breeding grounds for fascism or communism or a mixture of both...
...He sounds different...
...General Bradley appealed for action to halt the "search for peace through the accumulation of peril...
...As you know, the present constitutional provision states that no President can hold office for a greater period than 10 years...
...Financially, the U.S...
...Rigged for Rigor Mortis Dear Sirs: The excellent letter by Hiram B. Hold-ridge titled "Spurious Leadership" in the January issue leads me to add a thought or two...
...Must we now tell our children that their parents have failed them...
...Israel is regarded as a necessarily expansionist nation by its own philosophy of the ingathering of all exiles and by its role as agent of the West in dividing the Arab world and protecting Western oil concessions...
...Whealdon to cut this letter from his Progressive, and I assume it will have the same meaning...
...If the people of Russia and the satellites should be offered an assurance of partnership in a world-wide project of rehabilitation and equalization of opportunity, it would start a ferment of anticipation that the Communist dictators could not control...
...Our failure to do anything constructive is even more obvious in the Middle East than elsewhere...
...Item: No school, college, or university in Florida, at any academic level, is integrated, despite the governor's claim that "integration is the law of the land...
...This surely is not too much...
...Well, in the words of a great man whose political career was halted by Southern bigotry, "Let's look at the record...
...India is well aware of this fact and she will continue her vigorous activity and prove to the world how to gain success in a democratic way...
...But the chief trouble is not physical but psychological and spiritual...
...Stevenson's Competition Dear Sirs: Governor Stevenson's speech to the New York County Lawyer's Association, New York, Dec...
...Hugh B. Hester Brigadier-General USA...
...Poll for Arab Refugees Dear Sirs: Your article in the November 1957 Progressive, describing the horrible conditions in the Arab refugee camps, should stimulate all who are responsible for their continuance into immediate action...
...Ray O. Caukin Pasadena, Calif...
...Better support for educational projects would somewhat help this situation...
...As one born in India and a citizen of the United States for 40 years, thank you especially for Senator Kennedy's article...
...Only in this manner can any aid possibly become a unifying instead of a divisive force in the struggle against poverty, ignorance, and bigotry...
...Supreme Court declared racial segregation on intrastate buses to be unconstitutional...
...Action for India Dear Sirs: I wish to congratulate you for the valuable articles such as "If India Falls" by Senator John F. Kennedy, "The Right to be Let Alone" by Justice William O. Douglas, and "A World Safe for Living" by General Omar Bradley, in the January issue of The Progressive...
...The aid now amounts to $1,413,000,000 since independence in 1947...
...Governor Collins obligingly suspended city bus service until the city commission could draft a new ordinance requiring bus patrons to take seats assigned to them by the driver...
...Yes, he is ten years older, but still hungry —for the Presidency...
...Eisenhower is a vastly superior man...
...Item: A Negro assistant state's attorney was fired when it was found that he dictated letters to white secretaries...
...This great Indian leader was the most progressive spirit of the age because he proved for all time that non-violent resistance was the practical solution to war...
...Gandhi was a man utterly above politics and avoided the snares of belonging to the right or left...
...The maintenance and success of the free world has become an added responsibility for every free nation on the earth...
...Today, recognition of Gandhi's greatness is mere sentimentality unless we persuade our leaders to study his life and methods profoundly...
...Bad as the picture is, there are some constructive forces and there is some progress, especially along educational lines, in the Arab nations...
...Israel should also press more eagerly for economic union, or federation, at least with Jordan...
...My vote is agaimt dumping Hindenburg for Hitler...
...History will show us that even though he was presented to the public in one concept, the President appeared to be acting in terms of a political strategy board...
...For 26 years we have been raising a family to adulthood...
...It is timely and penetrating...
...Maximization of world trade is certainly one of the major means for dispelling these curses of civilized man...
...War or Peace—Now Dear Sirs: The issue of war and peace must be decided now...
...No single leader can lead us to this unless we proclaim the self the world self...
...Carping at Ike Dear Sirs: We are canceling our subscription because we do not approve of your carping at the President...
...I say this so that you will count me strongly on his side in the continuing controversy over him...
...But can he not understand that NATO and the other alliances, outside the United Nations, will destroy this world organization just as effectively as the cordon sanitaire and similar alliances destroyed the League of Nations earlier...
...Gov...
...An appeal was made to Governor Collins, who claimed that he had no power to intervene...
...I hope Congress will take imaginative and practical action to strengthen India's efforts...
...Wonderful Job Dear Sirs: You are doing a wonderful job on a very small budget...
...Mrs...
...We must prove boldly to all the world that in the question of peace we are utterly above political games and name calling...
...Item: A public health official in a north Florida town ate lunch with a Negro in a local restaurant...
...Tallahassee Negroes promptly abandoned their seven-month boycott and began taking seats without regard to a city ordinance requiring segregation...
...Gordon Kindy San Diego, Calif...
...And no group of nihilist leaders can stop us if we insist upon our most basic freedom—freedom to live...
...That does not mean that I agree with him much over half the time (I am no pacifist), but I believe him to be a great man and a most intelligent commentator on public affairs...
...This is a part of the political move to hold Nixon in power for the succeeding two terras...
...Too democratic...
...Dulles has been able literally to alienate everybody, both Israeli and Arabs...
...Ike may come along with this plan...
...Item: The adjutant general of Florida has declared before a legislative committee that, should a situation similar to that of Little Rock arise in Florida, he would order the state national guard to fire on federal troops...
...Governor Collins gave this move not only passive acceptance, but active cooperation...
...The outstanding and depressing fact is the extent and depth of Arab fear and hatred of Israel as an immigrant nation and as a kind of spearhead of a new Western imperialism...
...A« a matter of fact, the United States has a weapon that can be used with devastating effect on Communist tyranny, without a buildup of military superiority...
...There is no formula, however rational it may seem, which has a chance for immediate settlement...
...Thomas' Fears Confirmed Dear Sirs: After six weeks in the Middle East, I should like briefly to supplement the article I wrote for the November issue of The Progressive on that area...
...Khrushchev, who, also, recommends East-West economic competition...
...By way of illustration, if the area of Gaza votes its destiny into Egypt, they should automatically be citizens of Egypt...
...partition plan, not unless that withdrawal were accompanied by an absolute prohibition of further Jewish immigration and a resettlement of all Arab refugees in Palestine...
...My country will aptly demonstrate her ability to shoulder the responsibility whenever time demands...
...Therefore I will permit Mr...
...I value my civil liberties too highly...
...He returned from his travels convinced that there were too many Americans abroad...
...Such camps are no model villages with possibly one or two exceptions...
...Nixon currently favors the new Development Loan Fund, which actually hopes to substitute private investment abroad, although it is included in the budget under economic aid...
...C. C. Hall Springfield, 111...
...Despite the charm of manner, the facility of style and apparent good will, the Governor's speech, like that of Vice President Nixon a few days earlier (before the Congress of American Industry), fails completely to encompass the main issue...
...The question of war or peace, death by hate or life by love, is here and now and will not wait for an answer...
...This was much in evidence during the 1952 and later in the 1956 campaign...
...They have little to do but think of the past...
...Solomon A. Dann President Arab-Israel League for a Free United States of the Middle East Detroit, Mich...
...I would cancel my subscription if he were dropped...
...Nanoo M. Patel Los Angeles, Calif...
...A thorough exploration of active pacifism and a renunciation of the use of force would be such effective weapons that they would baffle the Russian soldier and cripple Soviet propaganda around the world...
...Eisenhower has been going in the wrong direction since his election in '52—but slowly...
...UNRWA does a good job at extraordinarily low cost in running camps for nearly a million Arab refugees...
...The refugees are largely without jobs...
...This, of course, is well known to the Republican high command and the present build-up of the Vice President is a longrange strategy to convince the public that he is the next wonder-man in the making...
...Build-up of Nixon Dear Sirs: Regarding your February editorial, "The President Should Resign," suppose we assume that the President's health remains as it is until at least January 20, 1959...
...While I do not believe that any proposal that Israel can make would win instant acceptance, I think it of the utmost importance that along with the Russo-American negotiation should go a far more convincing declaration by Ben Gurion of refusal to try to expand by force which would be accompanied by a far more generous offer to repatriate a very considerable number of Arab refugees, if in the event they want it, and to indemnify the others on the basis not only of loss of property but of the years in camp...
...he needed no bombs at all, only courageous men...
...Gandhi would have shunned such tactics and it is up to us to insist that our leaders do so...
...The aim of the second Five Year Plan is to raise it to $65...
...This weapon is the democratic idea, the idea of complete justice and true humaneness in human association...
...Surely educated Americans are smart enough to realize by now that the world can't be "saved for democracy" unless we and the world's other nations are brought to agree to pay a proportionate price toward world responsibility...
...The currently announced aid of $225,000,000 is most timely, because, as it is well known, my country was undergoing an acute foreign exchange crisis...
...It would be tragic if these efforts of India were to fail for want of funds...
...These, too, were outside the international organization and considered necessary for security...
...So each rigged up wiring for nuclear bomb "deterrents" around the world to make the world safe for his kind of "self...
...Mrs...
...It brings some pertinent facts about the situation in India before the American people...
...This, Israel would not, probably could not, accept and live as a nation...
...protesting such action...
...Evidently, a ruthless "arriviste," a calculating opportunist, has only to say, ingenuously, with boyish charm, "I was so young, etc.," and that makes everything right...
...and they've been hungry too...
...Peace through strength is a delusion which has always led to war, and from this moment on, war means annihilation...
...The Russian triumph with Sputnik, the skillful and generous-seeming economic aid now offered by Russia to Syria and Egypt, and Russian lack of commitment to Israel, added to the extraordinary ineptness of Dulles' diplomacy, give Russia an overwhelming diplomatic advantage in the Arab world...
...Washington, D.C...
...Governor Stevenson, of course, does not wish any of these things to happen...
...He made this clear in his campaign for re-election in 1956, and will continue to make this clear whenever the opportunity arises to cater to the White Citizens' Councils of his state...
...Consternation filled my being when another of my favorite publications suggested that Richard Nixon should not be the object of "permanent distrust," but I vowed my bifocals must be sadly awry when i read "The New Nixon" in the editorial of the February Progressive...
...Collins' 'Moderation' Dear Sirs: In your January issue, you give Holiday Greetings to Governor LeRoy Collins of Florida for his "counsel of moderation in the field of civil rights...
...R. L. Heinrich Baytown, Texas Gandhi's Greatness Dear Sirs: January 30, 1958 marked the tenth anniversary of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi...
...If the decision is for war, the war must be fought now...
...And that now appears to be why Ike liked them...
...With all his age and ailments Mr...
...Such noises to the contrary as he makes from time to time are for strictly Northern consumption, and have no relation to the political situation within Florida...
...The direction would be the same under Nixon, but Nixon with his great energy would take us faster...
...Peace can be achieved only through friendship with the enemy...
Vol. 22 • March 1958 • No. 3
