LETTERS
LETTERS First Amendment At first I was very confused over the reports in the media that The Progressive would publish a "how to" article on the H-bomb. But your May 1979 issue shows it was another...
...Iran I look to The Progressive for clarification, and what do I get...
...The American Civil Liberties Union entered the case early in April as counsel for Erwin Knoll, the editor of The Progressive, and Samuel H. Day Jr., the managing editor...
...The Government's case is not only flimsy and capricious, but also signals a most dangerous precedent which should not be allowed to proceed without a vigorous challenge...
...I fail to see where the article on how to make an H-bomb is of any value, and could, in fact, be the missing ingredient to some lunatic scheme...
...Those who take coal-fired plants for granted seldom add up all the cost in lives and injuries and occupational diseases from coal mining and transportation, all the ecological damage from mines and waste dumps, all the respiratory diseases and deaths from air pollution...
...When I hear of Madison university students holding toga parties and discoing like mad people, I am reassured that this decade, unlike that decade, is a more normal, safer, saner time — and I am happy for anyone who is eighteen and does not really know what Vietnam meant to me and my friends...
...It does, however, contrast with the human rights reports just issued by the U.S...
...It is too bad that he thinks only of himself and not of the dead, disabled and displaced for whom the war still goes on every day...
...The major source of radioactive garbage is not the electric power utilities but the military establishment...
...Pat Moyer Chemainus, British Columbia Palestine Editor Erwin Knoll's "Oh Promised Land" in the April issue was both interesting and disappointing...
...It is sixty years since the communists have been trying to make socialists and fellow communists, let alone anarchists, knuckle under, "or else...
...I think Bessman falls into that category...
...But wouldn't it be better all around if critics of America's performance in Micronesia devoted more time to developing alternatives for Micronesia and less time to stating the obvious...
...Gerald Morris Santa Monica, California Nuclear power The zeal and vigor with which you oppose nuclear power plants is admirable, but you may find the fruits of victory disappointing...
...Interesting, because it so accurately stated the premise on which American policy seems to be based...
...The tragedy of Vietnam may never be over, although each day it becomes more of a history lesson...
...Steve Hardesty Washington, D.C...
...Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago is expected early this summer...
...Come, come, Mr...
...To champion Hitler's Arab supporters horrifies me...
...F.S...
...William Palmer Taylor Hamilton, Ohio Inspired A year of reading your fine magazine has now gone by and you good people ought to know that yours is the best damn magazine that we have yet seen Thank you for your inspiration and information...
...Cameron Munter Marburg, Germany Socialism Your useful pages of Reflections dealing with Sidney Lens's views of "The Contradictions of Socialism" are more than useful, they are enlightening...
...I hope you love your country enough to cut the article from your magazine — it would not be censorship, but self-defense...
...Sadat's stubborn insistence upon linkage, having the full endorsement of Carter, implies that those two leaders are still thinking in terms of a future elimination of Israel as a national entity...
...So long as we grab blindly onto the coat-tails of individuals and groups simply because they define themselves in ways that appeal to us, rather than supporting those whose behavior and actions fit comfortably with our ideology, we shall be disappointed and our ranks thrown into disarray as each straw man falls...
...Marian W. Stram Paoli, Pennsylvania Abortion The Progressive did its readers a great disservice in publishing Judy Barton's article, "Abortion Clinics under Siege," in its March issue...
...William J. Elperin Saint Louis, Missouri If you print the article on the hydrogen bomb secret, I, along with millions of other Americans, will consider you a traitor to our country...
...If anyone, it is the Germans and not the Palestinians who should bear the weight of providing a homeland...
...I never want to see anything like that again...
...I fear we use a double standard when comparing nuclear energy with the alternatives...
...Orlan Love Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights Milwaukee, Wisconsin After Vietnam I am not usually offended by any articles written in The Progressive but I found the article by James Bessman entitled "The War is Over," in the April issue, personally offensive...
...While they signal a major improvement from last year, they nevertheless have some damaging deficiencies...
...Your knowledgeable readers should be able to distinguish between totalitarian communists and social democrats...
...Use your so-called "privilege" to resist conscription — perhaps you are in a better position to do so than others...
...Stone (April issue, Page 28) tells us that "one of the world's best-equipped armies capitulated to a few thousand determined street fighters...
...And there is not the slightest hope that our military establishment — or that of any other country — will change its ways...
...Glenn D. Fabbrini Silver Spring, Maryland On behalf of the American literary community, PEN American Center wishes to express its full support for The Progressive in its battle against prior restraint and Government censorship...
...There is, in fact, some reason to fear that we would be worse off...
...Sidney Lens talks of "socialism" but his examples of the failures and contradictions deal with problems of communist, not socialist countries...
...It is not at all certain that if every nuclear electric plant now operating or being built were replaced by a coal-fired unit, we would have a better environment, or appreciably less exposure to radiation, or much less risk of "nuclear blackmail" from terrorists, psychopaths, extortionists, or agents of hostile governments...
...Thank you for your efforts to awaken us to the nuclear threat...
...Mayer indicates that citizens of the Federal Republic of Germany have neither interest nor a stake in coming to grips with the atrocities of the Nazi era...
...Since the information presented in the article is available from sources already in the public domain, the court's ruling forbidding publication of the article "in the interests of national security" is nothing but a sham...
...John K. Warsaw Queens Village, New York Your barely concealed anti-Semitism continues to astonish me...
...Barton maintains that since "the Catholic Church is the biggest force" behind it, "the thrust of the anti-abortion movement is to impose a single, religious moral conception on all of society, eroding the separation of church and state which is a cornerstone of democratic liberties...
...Joseph T. Eldridge Washington, D.C...
...Leonard Cizewski Chicago, Illinois The great majority of all Americans, I am sure, now feel that our involvement in Vietnam was an outrageous and inexcusable blunder...
...C'mon, de-confuse me...
...Felix Lopez Bridgeport, Connecticut Dachau Although Milton Mayer was able to convey the sense of contradiction and confusion that any visitor to a concentration camp must feel, his article ("A Suburb of Munich," February 1979 issue) failed to come up with anything more than a superficial analysis of the problems present-day Germans have in dealing with the past...
...Frances Zang Wayne, Mew Jersey I'm sure your readers must be a discriminating group, but who knows where a copy of your publication may find itself...
...The draft I would like to share a few thoughts with Davis Oldham, the seventeen-year-old, who raised his concerns about the return of the draft in the Letters column in the April 1979 issue...
...Yet the political and social culture of Germany today is fundamentally affected by the Nazi era, and a visit to Dachau is not enough to bring this across...
...I know you call yourself "objective," and feel that your criticism stems from some high-minded even-handedness...
...We should not permit the communists (of whatever sort) to take over so easily the use of that honored term...
...Frank X. Gebert Vestal, New York I am a regular reader of The Progressive, but I am appalled that you are considering printing construction design for a thermonuclear device...
...Although you pounce on every alleged economic and social injustice perpetrated in Israel, you are strangely silent in regard to the much more blatant and disgusting injustices committed in Arab lands: sexual segregation, extreme economic differentiation, the absence of human rights and liberties, totalitarian governments, whether monarchical or dictatorial, political and religious intolerance, occupation by Syrian "peace-keeping" forces of Lebanon, the practice of black slavery in Algeria and Saudi Arabia, and, finally, the fact that it is not the Israelis, but, rather, the neighboring Arab countries that have been and are the principal oppressors of the Palestinian Arabs, whether by confining them to refugee camps or by butchering them in the civil wars of Jordan (1971) and Lebanon (1976...
...But why did you duck the issue of systematic torture of Palestinians by Israeli soldiers on the occupied territories...
...I.F...
...With substantiation of widespread torture coming from the U.N...
...Bill and Deena Monsees North Little Rock, Arkansas...
...To be philosophically disheveled by the fact that the New Age has not dawned in Vietnam is to admit that one listened uncritically when the PRV told us it was socialist, of the people, and the force for goodness and light in the area, and that one has ignored the momentum of 2,000 years of political, economic, and social history...
...At issue here is not just the vindication of The Progressive's constitutional rights but the vindication of every American's constitutional rights...
...It is also an outrageous attack on The Progressive magazine's First Amendment rights...
...Nothing...
...The sad truth is that the Marshallese need the Kwajalein missile base...
...But, what is missing...
...Abraham Kaufman Port Charlotte, Florida The developing "new schism" of the left (Vietnam's "incursion" and Reflections, March 1979) spotlights the continuing triumph of "wordthink" over "ideathink," of lazy, label-oriented advocacy over the hard work of analysis against a set of moral values...
...Do not print that information: such an act is highly irresponsible...
...The tragedy of the Mideast is a burden to every decent individual but to show bias of such proportions to Israel, as presented in your article, exposes prejudice rather than a rational account of facts...
...Expressions of support for The Progressive and the First Amendment have been received from hundreds of subscribers, newspapers and other publications, and organizations in this country and abroad...
...A hearing before the U.S...
...State Department...
...Does the role of the Jewish community in advocating (and securing) American support for Israel violate that vaunted separation...
...he concludes the Germans don't care...
...I'm with you in your fight against censorship and "prior restraint" If I fill in the "deleted" words in Dr...
...Brian Field Vancouver, British Columbia During the recent negotiations for peace in the Middle East, neither Anwar Sadat nor Jimmy Carter was ever able to advance any logical reason for connecting the Egypt-Israel accord with the so-called Palestinian issue, involving the Gaza Strip and the West Bank...
...The "whys" of that premise are not so simple...
...H. Mark Samuel Philadelphia, Pennsylvania If the sacrifice of the First Amendment to nuclear technology would reverse the nuclear policies of the world's nations, then the barter of free expression for genuine peace and security might merit consideration...
...From his standpoint, the contradictions are obvious: the Germans he sees are in a "garden restaurant" with their cars, "many of them Mercedes and BMWs, parked in the lot behind...
...The powers in Washington are once again demanding restoration of the draft...
...We are alarmed by the fact that pluto-nium may become more available if spent fuel is reprocessed: should we not remember that the Hanford reactors were originally used solely to produce plutonium, and have, for thirty-five years, been producing a grade far more suitable for making bombs than anything that can be leached out of fuel from power plants...
...Could it be that for many of the youth of the late 1960s anti-war demonstrating was as much a fad as are the toga parties of today...
...As during the last war, it will be your efforts — resistance if you choose, or draft and GI counseling, or political action — that will lift the burden of any future conscription from all who are oppressed by it...
...But this they won't learn from a piece like Sidney Lens's on "contradictions...
...They don't mention, however, that because of unhealthy military conditions a large percentage of those who did enlist failed to serve out even their first term...
...An independent Palestinian state, literally straddling the heart of Israel, offers the sole hope for a future successful assault against Israel...
...Being hung on a meat-hook and beaten to a bloody pulp seems to transcend a little "harassment...
...He fails to tell us why a European social and political structure should be transplanted to the Middle East, where it was rammed down the throats of the local inhabitants...
...Churches and religious people have always been and will continue to be vital in the shaping of American public policy...
...Please feel free to use our support in any way you can and call upon us if we can be of additional help...
...Whom would you rather face: a maniac with or without a gun or, for that matter, an angry, jealous spouse with or without a gun...
...To imply, as Barton does, that churches should not be permitted to speak out on political issues with a religious or moral dimension is to betray a gross insensitivity to civil liberties...
...But your May 1979 issue shows it was another Government "snow" job...
...They were absolutely helpless...
...How about an examination by The Progressive of just what is socialism...
...It was the Germans, not the Palestinians, who were responsible for wartime atrocities against the Jews...
...Charles C. Lockwood Bradenton, Florida Gun laws Neal Knox of the National Rifle Association writes in the April issue accusing The Progressive of inconsistency because you are against laws requiring registration of workers in Louisiana while being for registration of persons owning guns...
...Betty Lu Williams Dallas, Texas I consider it important that in the context of The Progressive's legal actions against the court order banning the article on the H-bomb, the wholesale disclosure of nuclear know-how by European industry, notably the government-sponsored joint development effort between Brazil and West Germany, should be exposed as much as possible...
...Sylvia Day Woodstock, New York Erwin Knoll's April article, "O Promised Land," calling for a just and equitable peace in the Middle East, while admirable in its ultimate vision, is, in fact, based on misperceptions, assumptions that are either simply not true or have been taken completely out of perspective, and a totally unbalanced assessment of the sources of oppression in the region...
...I'm glad I don't have my subscription with you any more...
...State Department, one would certainly think it high time to face up to the issue squarely...
...Dorothy deRoo Kalamazoo, Michigan I cannot see that it is "progressive" at all for you or anyone else to publish an article describing how to make "the bomb...
...Did the Palestinians get a free election...
...that the Arab nations refused to permit the victims of the early wars to be dispersed among them...
...Rather than something to fear, this is welcome as a healthy manifestation of a pluralist society...
...Sidney Lens, on the other hand, declares (Page 30) that "millions of Iranians were in the streets, willing to die for their cause...
...I am glad you have taken this stand and will support you in any way I can...
...Those who oppose nuclear plants point not only to the hazards of operation but also to those involved in mining and processing uranium, and disposing of the wastes...
...The premise is simple: "It was necessary for the world, in the wake of the Holocaust, to provide a homeland for Jews...
...Maybe the world ought to get together and "provide" the Jews with Germany...
...He fails to tell us why the Palestinians, a people he surely cannot blame for the "Holocaust," should be forced at gunpoint to give up their homes, villages, shops, schools, and places of worship...
...Indeed, witness what a conscripted military did to your brothers and sisters in Vietnam...
...But it happened and for one main reason — our boys could be drafted and forced to risk their lives...
...The problems of the use and control of guns are interwoven with the problems of violence in our society, and firearm registration is only one small step to begin handling them...
...Michael S. McDonough Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin Micronesia Your recent articles on the Marshall Islands were disappointing...
...Once one exclusion is made from the protection of the First Amendment, others can easily follow, as Elijah Lovejoy, the American free press martyr who thought as highly of free expression as of his own life, put it: "The truth is, my fellow citizens, that if you give ground a single inch, there is no stopping place...
...For every German, of any age, the Nazi era is a question and a problem — a personal question and a personal problem, involving family, friends, and identity — and one needs only to discuss their past with Germans in order to feel its weight on their shoulders...
...Disappointing, because it failed to question that premise...
...Richard Howard President PEN American Center Dore Ash ton Chair Freedom to Write Committee Kirk Sale Freedom to Write Committee New York, New York You people are dopes and creeps to publish the H-bomb article...
...Donn Berkeley, California I was very pleased with your basically even-handed approach to the unjust situation in Palestine...
...These are totally disparate issues, anti the only possible reason for linking them is Sadat's never-dying devotion to jihad, the holy war...
...You call it "harassment," but this is the understatement of the year...
...Your intentions in such an act make no difference: those data do not belong in the hands of the public...
...It is to have expected that for the first time a hawk would lay a dove's egg...
...I was a foot soldier in Vietnam and in the peace war and I remember 1965-75 as the worst time of my life...
...I really do not believe that there is any violation of freedom of the press...
...De Witt's affidavits, will my issue be classified and I subject to the Atomic Energy Act...
...Kidder's and Dr...
...It happens to be the only meal ticket in town...
...The contradictions have been raised, ever since 1919 by social democrats (for whom he apparently has little use...
...Jane Hulling Ames, Iowa Latin America Gary MacEoin's article in the March issue assessing contemporary Latin America is devastating in its clarity of projection...
...Yes, Ebeye is a horror...
...A team of seven ACLU attorneys, headed by ACLU Legal Director Bruce J. Ennis, is working with The Progressive's legal counsel, LaFollette, Sinykin, Anderson, and Munson, and Morland's attorney, Thomas P. Fox...
...We must protect our basic rights — individually — and as members of society...
...But in the present case the American people lose a liberty without gaining security...
...They claim that although more than six hundred million dollars was spent in 1978 on a recruitment campaign, not enough boys enlisted...
...No American boy should ever, ever again be forced to undergo what our boys were subjected to in the outrageous, insane, and deadly Vietnam bloodletting...
...The screening of Holocaust on German television hit a nerve in East and West Germany that is indicative of how seriously the problems of the past are taken...
...I know, guns don't kill people, people kill people — but without guns how much harder it is...
...In announcing its participation, the ACLU called The Progressive's First Amendment fight "one of the most significant free-speech cases of the decade...
...Of course not...
...You, Davis, are not conscripting anyone, nor ought you blame yourself for the burdens imposed on people by the state...
...Eliminating all nuclear generating plants will leave our major problems unsolved...
...Knox — reasoning by analogy has always been as full of holes as a sieve...
...thus he concludes that they ignore the Nazi era, and busy themselves with their beer...
...while extremist groups do exist in the Federal Republic today, there is an awareness of the dangers of extremism in Germany that is unmatched in western Europe...
...Knoll fails to tell us why the Jews should be given Palestine, a land already occupied by the Palestinians...
...Patricia Rowe Arlington, Virginia I want you to know that I support your right to print the article written by Howard Morland...
...Then we could criticize Europe for not taking in the German refugees, just as we now criticize the Arab nations for not taking in the Palestinian refugees...
...What has worker registration to do with gun registration...
...It is too bad that "old" Bessman, at twenty-six, has let a fad of toga parties, drink, and pot blind him to the realities of what Vietnam was and what it means today...
...Jim McClellan Arlington, Virginia Memo The Progressive has filed formal notice of appeal against the preliminary injunction handed down March 26 barring publication of Howard Morland's article, "The H-bomb Secret...
...He asks if he, as a "privileged citizen," escapes the draft, does he shift the burden onto his poor and oppressed brothers and sisters...
...Commission on Human Rights, the International Red Cross, the Swiss Freedom League, The Times (of London) and The Washington Post, Amnesty International, and even the U.S...
...As an affiliate of international PEN we affirm our support for "the unhampered transmission of thought within each nation and between all nations" and our opposition to any form of suppression of free expression...
...Dissemination of nuclear engineering know-how through reams of blueprints exported by West Germany to Brazil, for instance, tar exceeds the alleged disclosure of secrets by The Progressive...
...LETTERS First Amendment I strongly endorse The Progressive's fight to print Howard Morland's article on the H-bomb...
...Some are published in this issue...
...It is midleading to call his examples contradictions of socialism...
...Born Secret," last month's special First Amendment issue of The Progressive, which contains detailed accounts of this magazine's confrontation with the Government, is available in quantity at reduced rates — $ 1 per copy for bulk orders of up to 100 copies, and seventy-five cents for more than 100...
...And, yes, we have made a lot of mistakes in Micronesia...
...Paul L. Dernier Jamestown, New York How odd that James Bessman (in "The War is Over") should seem to think the anti-war movement period the best time of his life...
...he notes that only foreigners were on his bus to Dachau...
...One wonders: Did the role of New England churches in inspiring the abolitionist movement violate the separation of church and state...
...Surely your knowledge of history cannot be so blunted that you fail to remember that the Palestinians as a terrorist organization were a product of Nasser's hatred of Israel...
...Among those who have announced that they intend to file amicus curiae briefs in support of The Progressive's position are The New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, Scientific American, The Nation, The New York Review of Books, the Committee for Public Justice, and the PEN American Center, a writers' group...
Vol. 43 • June 1979 • No. 6
