THE PEOPLE'S FORUM
Thunder on the Left Dear Sirs: I applaud much that the Kennedy Administration is attempting to achieve, but I am gravely concerned that American liberals have relaxed too completely under the...
...Admiral Burke on the other, I'm afraid the blame is on those poor bemused men who wrote our Constitution...
...We need more of this critical type of vigilance represented by The Progressive and Mr...
...Hatred begets hatred...
...It is with this in mind that I want to congratulate The Progressive for publishing William V. Shannon's "The Neglected Frontier" in the April issue...
...Or is this the fallacious opinion of Mr...
...This is not to encourage complacency, but only to assure all who have worked so hard that their efforts are being rewarded in the far corners of our country...
...Ticktin and Rockwell Dear Sirs: Esther Ticktin (The People's Forum, April) seems to miss the point...
...Of course, this elementary kind of loyalty is no different from that required also of a civilian official...
...It is a fundamental military principle, however, that once a decision is made it must be supported loyally, not just by those who favored it but by those who opposed it initially too...
...I urge Progressive readers to order and distribute these petitions, not only for themselves but as a means of informing the uninformed public...
...Before that, you know there were lynchings, . . ." Is Mr...
...Stoutness and decency of character are admirable qualities, but the critical questions that are the responsibility of our United States Senate require knowledge and understanding of history and of current domestic and world problems, a deep appreciation of our American traditions, and a commitment to reason...
...Thank you for being our gadfly, and for pointing out that which is truly significant in America today...
...John G. C. Sohn Indianapolis, Indiana...
...As a private citizen it is then his constitutional right to speak out as his conscience dictates...
...The Constitution states that "The President shall be Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy...
...Let's stop kidding ourselves...
...Why don't you forget about me...
...Indeed, where is Mr...
...Members of the Committee on Non-Violent Action's transcontinental walk for peace arrived on schedule, and sparked the expression of an intense desire for disarmament and the lessening of world tensions...
...I live in the same suburban community as the Ashkena-zys and have often been impressed and humbled by their inherent goodness...
...The mainstreams of both liberal and conservative thought are receiving vital new currents from the American campus and it is exciting to witness and be part of this development...
...Full page articles in the local press gave adequate coverage, and stimulating ideas were discussed in the public meeting until the audience had to be reminded it was necessary to close because of the late hour...
...If (in peacetime) a general finds himself so out of sympathy with a major policy of his Commander-in-Chief that his very patriotism compels him to denounce it publicly, he has no alternative but to resign...
...An example of the confusion that the reader feels is Eichmann's retaliatory statement ". . . when our enemies gave us the green light by bombing and burning our cities in 1942...
...Fixation upon military defense as a means of survival and promoting our way of life has so blunted our critical senses that we leap from one heinous absurdity to another...
...War begets war...
...Surely Mr...
...Mayer on this point...
...The challenges, though, do exist and issues such as segregation, disarmament, and civil liberties are stirring our students to action...
...This retreat from the position of vigilance we maintained under the Eisenhower-Nixon Administration may prove costly and destructive in the long run...
...I hope The Progressive continue* to observe and report this significant trend...
...will not have to be made...
...A few years ago, some sophisticated reactionaries adopted the term "conservative...
...A character who's gotta register with the police wherever he goes...
...I do not know the author of the article, Paul Jacobs, have never spoken to him and have never been interviewed by him...
...But isn't it too much to expect of Everyman to be a Nazi and a liberal at the same time...
...Write to VIGIL, 324 West Patrick Street, Frederick, Maryland...
...It was bad enough when they sold this interpretation to the reactionary magazines and newspapers, but it is even more unfortunate that this interpretation is agreed to by liberals...
...Edward B. Duehr Bloomington, Illinois Blatant Inconsistencies Dear Sirs: The confusion of facts is still smoke-screening the issue in articles concerning the House Un-American Activities Committee film...
...John K. Osborn Chevy Chase, Maryland Goldwater's Ignorance Dear Sirs: In the April issue of The Progressive, Karl Meyer displayed great tolerance of Senator Barry Goldwater, while describing at the same time Coldwater's ignorance as a Senator: "[His] intellectual limitations are painfully evident...
...James E. Kline Evanston, Illinois Stop Germ Warfare Dear Sirs: Nothing proves more conclusively that preparation for mass killing is preparation for mass suicide than does our chemical, biological, and radiological program...
...You will become Nazis unless you forget the Nazis...
...Edith Ganz San Francisco, California Significant Gadfly Dear Sirs: If I were sentenced to be sent to the proverbial island and could take but one publication, it would be The Progressive...
...During the debate and discussion period that followed, not one voice from the audience was raised in behalf of the film, while penetrating analytical questions tore the honesty and constitutionality of the House Un-American Activities Committee to shreds...
...Why the blatant inconsistencies in the reporting, and whose side is Carberry on...
...Paul, Minnesota Mysterious Mayer Dear Sirs: Milton Mayer's views remain something of a mystery to me after reading his "dialogue" in the April issue of The Progressive...
...This article made me proud, if only momentarily, to be a member of the same human race...
...Otherwise you will go on hating, and hatred makes people resemble the thing they hate...
...In the past three years I have traveled to 250 American campuses, representing first the National Student Association, and now World University Service...
...M. Stanton Evans, however, in the February 18, 1961, issue of the National Review Bulletin states: "Matthew Carberry, sheriff of San Francisco County, told me: "The people stirring the students up, and bringing them to an emotional pitch, were well-known Communists in the San Francisco area.'" In the same article Evans quotes Carberry in reference to the "no act of physical aggression" statement which was first reported by Paul Jacobs in The Reporter magazine...
...We— and the world—are entitled to know what established Administration policy is...
...With all due respect, I think Mrs...
...Perhaps essay form is best after all for expository writing, and bravest...
...Then I turned a few more pages and read the article by Irvin Ashkenazy...
...You Jews, above all...
...Kennedy's liberalism so he will feel impelled to press on to "The New Frontier," whose shores we have seen only dimly up to now...
...More step-by-step evidence of the dishonesty of the Un-American Activities Committee is needed...
...Elementary human respect for the memory of Eichmann's victims should have prevented you from printing such filth...
...Of course the challenges we face are in many ways more abstract than those offered by a totalitarian regime or a miserably low standard of living...
...Operation Abolition...
...The vicious circle gets tighter and tighter...
...Time, April 7) L. C. Haas San Francisco, California Goldwater's 'Weaseling' Dear Sirs: In retaliation for my giving him a subscription to The Progressive, a conservative friend gave me a subscription to Buckley's National Review...
...They must forget the Nazis...
...Those brave souls who have been standing these many months at the entrance of Fort Detrick, protesting silently to this outrage, now offer us the opportunity of joining them in a petition to President Kennedy asking that preparation for germ warfare cease, and that the laboratories of Fort Detrick be transformed into a World Health Center for research in the prevention and control of diseases and epidemics...
...I do not agree that Goldwater's views are "most explicit and clearly formulated . . ." Instead, in the debate with Senator Eugene McCarthy, Goldwater displayed the knack of either dropping a point when cornered and jumping to another, or becoming "deaf" to his opponent's remarks and repeating the same moth-eaten economic cliches over and over again...
...Mayer himself...
...Ticktin is letting her thoroughly justified indignation toward Mr...
...Ashkenazy's fine article, "The Prison Visitors," in the April issue should help greatly to show people that we all have needs and that "just visiting" helps tremendously to keep a guy's head up...
...The growing controversy over the House Un-American Activities Committee is but one facet...
...Mayer put such unbelievable speeches in the mouth of Eichmann...
...A little later on, in the First Amendment, it also makes pretty clear that even an obnoxious bigot must be allowed to express his opinions...
...It is hard to believe that a single article could contain so much vicious nonsense, so much nauseating distortion...
...The youth and energy of the new Administration are doubtless responsible in part for much of the activity we are now witnessing on campuses from Berkeley to Cambridge...
...John H. Abbott Los Angeles, California Elixir Dear Sirs: The Progressive is a sort of an elixir to me, and I am grateful for your fine reporting on national and international developments...
...It is what I've been thinking, but scarcely had the nerve to mention out loud...
...According to Milton Mayer in the March issue of The Progressive: " "There was no act of physical aggression on the part of the students," said Sheriff Matthew Carberry of the City and County of San Francisco on a TV Interview two months later...
...Rockwell muddy her logic...
...The article by Milton Mayer is perfect...
...the phenomenal student response to the Peace Corps, another...
...When, after reading this, I read Karl E. Meyer's characterization of Goldwater as a "decent, upright, and thoroughly attractive politician," I felt that there is too often such a thing as leaning over backward to be fair to an opponent...
...Irvinc J. Stolberc Regional Executive World University Service Chicago, Illinois America Stirring Dear Sin: America is stirring from its lethargy and is rising in indignation at the abuses heaped upon its constitution if the reactions of the populace of this small, conservative, mid-western town are an indication...
...Shannon...
...A military leader has not only the right but the duty to press his views vigorously when policy is being formulated...
...the City of Los Angeles, the Supreme Court of California decided that registration for ex-cons was not legal in the state of California—and so statements like that on Page 41, ("Do you know what I'll be the rest of my life...
...After just so many steps we shall find ourselves stepping right along into a rational world...
...Last year, in an ACLU-supported case, Abbott vs...
...If only people could realize the truth of this observation...
...It merely confirms the bias of any whom one might wish to persuade...
...Aaron Aronin Chicago, Illinois Goldwater on Birch Dear Sirs: It is too bad Karl E. Meyer's April article describing Barry Goldwater as a nice guy came out before the Senator expressed his opinion of the Birch Society: "A lot of people in my home town have been attracted to the society, and I am impressed by the type of people in it...
...Webster Peterson St...
...what does not come through as clearly is the stoutness and general decency of his character...
...Ruth H. Pool Seattle, Washington New Life on Campus Dear Sirs: Congratulations to The Progressive and to Milton Mayer for his perceptive article, "The Found Generation...
...This one is rambling, full of mere name-calling or insinuation (smear-style), bitter, titillating those already on his side...
...There is no such classification as a contented liberal...
...Perhaps it was a desire to make Eichmann a literary symbol of Everyman that had Mr...
...From this experience I would heartily concur with Mayer's thesis of the "found generation...
...Our students are becoming aware of their social and political potential, as their counterparts have throughout the world...
...I had planned to give copies to nearby high school superintendents, but I fear this would defeat his and my purposes...
...Mayer and himself in "Eichmann in Israel...
...Our military leaders have not lost their freedom of speech merely because they may no longer publicly disagree with their civilian superiors...
...The "finding" process is still far from concluded, but if one looks closely it is possible to discern the American student's increased concern with the challenges facing his society...
...Carberry is reported by Evans to have said: "I did not make that statement...
...Robert L. Hamilton Golden, Colorado Mayer Disappointing Dear Sirs: I confess I am sharply disappointed with Milton Mayer's article about Operation Abolition, as compared with many brilliant, well-constructed, delectably tangy, unpredictable turns in his other articles over the years...
...They are the kind we need in politics...
...An ex-con...
...Mayer trying to say that the bombing of German cities was interpreted by the Germans as a punitive measure to their action against Jews and that this triggered wholesale exterminations...
...The first issue I received contained an article by Senator Barry Gold-water on foreign policy, which makes very interesting reading by comparison with the rather flattering article on Goldwater by Karl E. Meyer in your April issue...
...Goldwater's two main points are the desirability of ignoring world opinion and the necessity of subordinating peace, freedom, and prosperity (so specifically named by him) to the necessity of achieving a military conquest of "world Communism...
...We need more thunder on the left—the democratic left, that is—to fortify Mr...
...Operation Abolition was shown this month at a university to a completely hostile audience...
...If there is any inconsistency in the "liberal" position concerning George Rockwell on the one hand, and, let's say...
...We can not afford to accept that the United States Senate should be a social club where "personal courtesy," "a sense of humor," and charm are the chief qualifications for membership and status and influence...
...If Goldwater's weaseling about the John Birch Society is "upright," and if his going even beyond the John Birch Society in some respects is "thoroughly attractive," and if Karl Meyer and The Progressivt would (as intimated) rather see Goldwater in control of the Republican Party than Nixon or Rockefeller, then for similar reasons The National Review is to be admired by comparison with The Progressive...
...Once upon a time there were three terms which had some meaning: liberal, conservative, and reactionary...
...Mayer could have chosen a more suitable and believable spokesman to express his views...
...Marye Myers Los Angeles, California Mayer's Nonsense Dear Sirs: You have sullied your widely respected magazine by printing Milton Mayer's piece, "Eichmann in Israel," in the April issue...
...John H. E. Fried Special Legal Consultant to the United States War Crimes Tribunals Nurnberg, 1947-1949 New York City Mrs...
...One truly decisive step in the right direction can make all the following steps possible and easier...
...Shannon has done us all a great service in emphasizing how little, if anything, the President and his brother, the Attorney General, have done or plan to do in the vital field of civil liberties, especially in moving toward dismantling the oppressive "security" program...
...The interest has always existed in an academic sense, but it is today rinding channels of expression...
...the sit-ins are another...
...It seems that Eichmann represents Mr...
...I can't remember when I've been so excited over anything as I have over the April issue...
...it is difficult to see how that policy can be made effective if each general and admiral is free to support, attack, or ignore it as he chooses...
...Now, to confuse understanding further, a reactionary, whose "beliefs date back only to the Nineteenth Century, who ran for Senator in Arizona against Walter Reuther, is termed a "radical of the Right...
...T. D. Eliot Fontana, Wisconsin Praise for Ashkenazy Dear Sirs: Although I never had the experience of having a visitor such as Irvin Ashkenazy, I am an ex-con, having served time in three Federal pens during World War II as a walkout from C.P.S...
...Thunder on the Left Dear Sirs: I applaud much that the Kennedy Administration is attempting to achieve, but I am gravely concerned that American liberals have relaxed too completely under the euphoric slogan, "Let Jack do it...
Vol. 25 • May 1961 • No. 5
