THE PEOPLE'S FORUM
. . . THE PEOPLE'S FORUM . . . Victims Of Vengeance? Dear Sirs: In its editorial of Oct. 15th, the New York World- Telegram expresses the general disgust felt by most good Americans over the...
...But we have helped to destroy not only the armed might of our adversaries, but their industries, their means of transportation and their cities as well, under the rubble of which thousands of men, women, and children still lie unbur-ied...
...Roosevelt and Churchill's denouncement of obliteration bombing as immoral in 1939 may become moral by 1945 and vice versa...
...15th, the New York World- Telegram expresses the general disgust felt by most good Americans over the current whispering campaign for the removal of Gen...
...You mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters and sweethearts of these brave boys in the Merchant Marine, don't forget your Congressman this coming election, who has been silent on his vote ignoring the Merchant Marine...
...Cringe before the boss as a yes man...
...Each carries a description of the atomic engines, driving the transports, used by our ex-allies...
...only those in combat service...
...It is no secret that the pickpockets want to stay in business...
...To them will be added another 4,000,000 Germans from various countries...
...The people of the U. S. should be given the true history of our own unconstitutional money system from its very inception by Alexander Hamilton, who was the "stooge" for the international banker group Thomas Jefferson put up a stiff fight against this group...
...It is time that our people recognize the causes that produced our present deplorable mess, both international and domestic...
...Every writer it seems has done his very best, but I wish to especially mention the article by Harry Elmer Barnes, who has given us ,an avalanche of truth...
...Accept the regimentation of "free enterprise" and "every man for himself...
...Byrnes and Bevin each carried an atomic bomb behind his back...
...Two Pay Scales Dear Sirs: It is no wonder that the working men are going on strike—they stand to lose on the average of $500 per year In wages...
...Utilize the available free musical instruction when the paid kind means private lessons with superior training...
...Seven men at Williamsburg applied for transfers to units where they would not be used in competition with paid labor, but Selective Service has refused to honor these transfer requests...
...This charter expired in 1811 and his failure to get it renewed at once was the real cause of the war of 1812...
...It seems inconceivable that the government of a civilized nation could contemplate such horrors, but the facts speak for themselves...
...To further aid without protest to persecute and destroy our own immediate kin is a reflection on the honor, humanity and decency of every American, but particularly on everyone of German blood...
...Urge your friends to vote against them...
...Two men aboard his ship were killed by a Jap suicide plane, and then Congressmen ignore the service of these brave boys who were and who are still serving in the Merchant Marine...
...In '91 Congress granted his privately-owned bank a charter giving him the control of the nation's money system...
...Kansas City, Mo...
...Against Conscription Dear Sirs: In the many fine articles in The Progressive against peacetime conscription, the following statements stand out as the most convincing: 1. That it was Van Seeckt's handful of officers and trained men, well-equipped with machines, that overwhelmed the French conscript army —one of the worst armies in military history...
...Morals, indeed, become mere mores, fleeting customs which come and go...
...The pressure group in the U. S. though will not allow Rep...
...Weren't those, who are most sanguine in their demands for the destruction of our kin, most willing to sacrifice our youth and wealth to protect theirs...
...This was in 1900...
...Above the United States fly 10 Soviet giant transports on a. flight about the world, non-stop...
...Stafford's letter in the Forum of Oct...
...Conceal your religion to get that position...
...Before the first world war nothing clouded the relations between our country and Germany...
...workers, shipbuilders, have been discharged from their jobs in Norfolk, Newport News, and Portsmouth, Va...
...In the first place, if Congress cuts WRA off at the pockets and says that by Dec...
...Helena, Calif...
...that there can be no such thing as a Natural Law and consequently all laws are passive, temporary, and arbitrary...
...The logic of those gentlemen who still deny this basic truth simply drifts into intellectual sloth and ethical anarchy...
...Vacaville, Calif...
...Learn with regret that most opportunity for the exercise of talent and ability is open almost exclusively to men of means and power...
...The Forgotten Service Dear Sirs: I trust you will publish this letter in The Progressive, so your readers may learn-that Congress has made one of our most essential services to our war victory, the Merchant Marine, the "Forgotten Service...
...I hope that the Progressive will continue to expose the evil doers and uncover the facts...
...2. Tip when you dislike to pay "extra taxes...
...Behind Bevin stood Churchill...
...Eisenhower's mind over these machinations to relieve him of his command than there could be "confusion" in Gen...
...We may likewise reason that the atomic bomb was an immoral instrument .before it was discovered, but it suddenly became ethically good once invented and used...
...At the right hand of Mr...
...It is therefore a foregone conclusion that in the next eight months Germany will become a charnel-house, a ghastly cauldron of death of women, of children and the aged...
...At Eastern State Hospital, Williamsburg, Va., over 60 men are being used who are given no pay...
...Let poverty debase and frustrate your ideals and goals...
...Vote out of office every reactionr ary in Congress, regardless of party...
...It is now evident what fate has been decided upon for Germany by those bent on its destruction: The 70,000,000 German people who occupied the German Reich, which was the most densely populated space of Europe, are to be deprived of about one-half of this space and all of them are to be driven into what is left...
...Richard Calvert Jackson Heights, N. Y. * * * Otto On Wolfe Book Dear Sirs: - What Max C. Otto, in his Oct...
...H. C. Esch Cherryvale, Kan...
...It's a rotten mess of pottage that the international schemers have cooked up for our consumption, R. B. Cooke j Berkeley, Calif...
...Nagasaki Atrocity Dear Sirs: I marvel at the extraordinary degree of moral integrity and the exalted mental tranquility of those gentlemen who still insist on approving our use of the atomic bomb in our defeat of Japan, although most military circles now openly admit Japan was utterly crushed and ready to surrender before she knew we had an atomic bomb...
...They took the average wholesale price of 784 prime commodities for the entire year which they called the 1926 price level or constant from which to determine the average price of these commodities...
...In 1927 the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics established such a con-" stant for United States by taking the calendar year 1926 as 100, our constant...
...Minden, Neb...
...There is no question about the truth of that statement...
...7. Bring a gift to the party just because you were invited...
...8 regarding the Nisei and the WRA...
...International Bankers Dear Sirs: You have been a consistent advocate against economic despotism, but at the same time I have never yet read an article or an editorial in your paper denouncing, or even mentioning, the fundamental cause of all depressions and wars^the privately owned and controlled money system of the world headed by the international banker group...
...In spite of these facts the State of Virginia continues to use conscientious objectors in their state hospitals...
...3. That the rapid changes in the methods of modern warfare have outmoded large trained armies, and that future wars will be won by marching science, and not by marching men...
...in the shops, in offices, in the armed forces of our country, we have taken leading parts...
...Become a professional joiner in order not to be a lone scout...
...America does need an awakening to the rights and privileges of all the minority groups in this country who have all borne their share of this late war and who will not be denied their just share of our country's future...
...Pay a woman's way when she can better afford to...
...31 the camps must be closed and the whole organization folded up, what else can they do but try to get the evacuees relocated within the time allowed...
...They are entering above United States from Mexico, having already passed the South Pole and South America...
...Glorify and worship celebrities as idols...
...Measured by this constant these 784 commodities had fallen in price from 100 to 60 in 1933, and today when we measure these same commodities by this constant, prices have again advanced to 105...
...Otto L. Fricke Cleveland, O. * * * Give A Friend The Truth Send Him The Progressive Today International Bluff Dear Sirs: It started in London...
...As civilization advanced and we began to commercialize these resources, out of necessity was created money or a certain article given a fiat value (a value by law) and ordained that it should be representative of a certain unit as a medium of exchange...
...As for Coleman, Chamberlin, Beals, Villard, Norman Thomas and Barnes: their constant anti-Soviet diatribes remind me of second-rate Hitlers who are unable to reconcile themselves to the fact that the appeasers in Europe are no longer in the saddle and in the- not too distant future democracy may once again prevail...
...The very people who were engaged in framing public opinions to get the American people war minded are now engaged to ease us out of the war not by admitting the truth but by concealing the facts and perverting current events...
...6. Buy something to keep up with or show off to the neighbors...
...test the strength of the Soviet Union...
...9. Wear finery on Easter day...
...What justification eould there have been for the dropping of our second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, which these same Army circles now as frankly reveal was a "purely experimental matter," and, indeed, the biggest atrocity perpetrated in the war, even surpassing, if possible, the "death experiments" with prisoners of such Nazi concentration camps as Buchenwald ? We deliberately made guinea pigs of innocent women and children in Nagasaki to prove the superior destructive potency of our second deadly atomic bomb...
...Churchill...
...Loyally and willingly we have assisted to destroy the German military machine...
...Mary Harvey San Bernardino, Calif...
...If an average worker earns $1 per hour on the basis of a 52 hour week, he will be cut 23 per cent in wages when the 40 hour week goes into effect...
...Clare Luce made the astounding remark in the House of Representatives that we were not led into this war, but we were lied into it...
...Marshall as Chief of Staff...
...4. Wear "makeup" even though nature strongly protests...
...Both these brilliant and intrepid military leaders in Europe, who, together with MacArthur in the Paci fic, have brought us victory with a minimum loss of precious American lives in the most bloody and costly war in history, are actually being humiliated and punished for believ ing thajt the late war is really ended and that therefore they have a moral obligation now to work as effectually for peace and the future saving of human lives as they fought a hard and difficult war to achieve that total victory of "unconditional surrender" for which we all clamored...
...Oddest Assortment Dear Sirs: I have enjoyed recent issues of The Progressive, especially Mrs...
...The conscientious objectors have no way of improving the situation within the law...
...Reply To Mrs...
...Storm the department store counter to get that bargain before the other shopper does...
...We therefore have the right to be heard, at least on the treatment of our own families...
...These refugees will arrive in the new German area, in which we have destroyed all major cities and industries and where everything else of value has been carted away into other countries, without any means of subsistence...
...Joseph R. Ledo New York, N. Y. * * * Insult And Blah Dear Sirs: If The Progressive was not paid to print the editorial, "Secrecy in London," in the Oct...
...Yes, Eisenhower is next in the list to satiate the insatiable lust for vengeance of these perennial harbingers of hate...
...Richard V. Taylor Box 426 Williamsburg, Va...
...Let high pressure radio advertising make you eat what is suggested...
...C. J. Hitchcock 214 N. Elmwood Ave...
...Pass The Progressive Along It's American, Alert, Accurate CO's In Virginia Dear Sirs: In the past month many thousands of war...
...Some of these may be our parents, our sisters, our brothers, or other" relatives...
...If the Attlee Government in England is allowed to nationalize the Bank of England, the foundation of all wars will be shattered—that is, the headquarters for the group that plans all wars and depressions...
...And the -German people idolized America and Americans...
...Byrnes stood Foster Dulles and behind Dulles stood Herbert Hoover...
...To me it was thrilling and I shall read it, as I do all of Muir's books, again and again...
...But as all money measures values by and according to its own abundance or commodities, we were never able to establish a true constant that would not fluctuate until Arthur Kitson, an English economist, gave the world the plan In establishing a price level as a constant...
...Some few of us citizens who believe that democracy has to be practiced at home before it can be exported have lent a hand as much as possible to help our neighbors, but the burden has been on the WRA officers...
...The young and the strong are being detained or shipped to the territories of the justice-and peace-loving allies where they are kept as slave labor at starvation levels...
...Seldom in the history of the world has any race been called upon to exact such vengeance on its own blood...
...I dropped in at the Veterans' Administration office the other day to inquire about my boy's educational opportunities after he had received his honorable discharge and was as tounded to learn that to date the Merchant Marine is not included in the GI Bill of Rights...
...Never have enough to sustain a minimum standard of living...
...The story of the second World War would lack one of its finest chapters if one omits the courage and risk of those who man our Merchant Fleet and in many cases go down into the sea in them...
...Julius T. Becker Yreka, Calif...
...2. Training required for a good soldier is incompatible with that required for a good democratic citizen...
...What anguish this caused us can only be appreciated by those who have lived through similar experiences...
...I'm against regimentation...
...I will also suggest the names of three men I know are well informed on this subject: Oscar Brumback pf Luray, Va., S. O. Sanderson of Rochester, Minn., and Scott Nearing of Jamaica, Vt...
...Now, even though our income taxes are cut 20 per cent, an average man will still lose roughly $10 per week or about $500 per year...
...Yet this vital subject is never' allowed to be discussed on the air or in our newspapers...
...Hence some samples of this regimentation are offered as follows: 1. Drink liquor at a party just to be a good sport and please your host...
...John G. Miller, Sr...
...During the war a bonus of $9 was given hospital employees of this category...
...But now Germany has been defeated and that with our help...
...Live in fear of losing your job...
...Why can't the peoples of England and the U. S. A. be represented at international discussions...
...La Follette's column, Jane Stafford's health notes, and the articles by Richard L. Neuberger, but the rest of the contributors give me the Fourth Estate shudders...
...Pat-ton's mind when he was ignomini-ously relieved of the command of his beloved and heroic 3rd Army...
...Still they are taken care of in the GI Bill of Rights...
...5. Purchase shoes that don't fit...
...To what further depths of dismal despair must we steer our youth before these vengeance-inspired gentlemen will be able to realize with that great statesman and true humanitarian, Herbert Hoover, that "vengeance and revenge are not justice" and "there is no such thing as a 'hard peace' or a 'soft peace' but only a 'just peace' if we are to restore justice in the world...
...Agreed that our Japanese-Americans have been badly treated, first by the Army and later by the civilian stay-at-homes, the WRA has done its best to overcome the difficulties and help to make up for the shortcomings of others...
...Read books only that have been acclaimed by certain critics...
...Mas...
...I know there were more than two million trained soldiers who never set foot outside the United States, much less saw actual combat service...
...A. W. Dragsredt Chicago, Ill...
...Well, every 500 miles they are dropping white parachutes...
...C. G. Binderup, Pres...
...There are but few living quarters and but little food and fuel...
...15 issue, it was more of an insult to a person's intelligence than the blaff about the secret bomb...
...It is no secret that Japan prevented the people of Asia from driving French, Dutch, and English pickpockets out of business...
...4. The final uselessness of the Japanese army, the largest and best trained in the world...
...Those driven from their homes must leave behind everything they saved and possessed, something which is unknown in European history...
...Be herded into theaters and subway cars as a free man...
...Stafford Dear Sirs: I would like to offer a comment or two on Mrs...
...Support charities that should be a government function...
...8 review of Son of the Wilderness, says of the care with which Mrs...
...It is important that certain gentlemen in high political circles still able to yield great pressure are made to understand that we did not suffer over one million casualties in order to perpetuate their pet wartime hates and calloused spirit of vindictiveness over an utterly crushed and helpless enemy...
...8, Part 5 of our Constitution that gives "Congress the power to coin money and regulate the value thereof...
...Thus for the first time in the world we have a definite plan whereby to determine the exact amount of money to put into circulation in order to maintain a certain price level that will not rob the creditor by inflation nor the debtor by deflation—a plan whereby we can measure money into circulation as precisely as a doctor measures medicine...
...Actually, there can be no more "confusion" in Gen...
...Do our fellow Americans expect us, now that the war is won, to be less loyal to our kin than they were to theirs...
...Hamilton finally won, after 10 years of scheming and manipulation...
...and does not expect to apply for a discharge until sometime in December...
...They were flying at 110,000 feet...
...My boy was in actual combat service...
...Russia is the one exception to the absolute and complete domination of this entire planet by this small group...
...Stand in line at hospital clinics for railroaded treatment...
...Many of us have known most of what he writes but no one up to date to my knowledge has given to the public those dynamic truths...
...Truth From Barnes Dear Sirs: Please find enclosed $2.00 for some extra copies of the Sept...
...20...
...In the adminstration of Germany it represents all of us too...
...While I am not familiar with the WRA in Washington, I know some of the men in the field and their work, for I've been helping out a bit myself...
...This low pay scale has been maintained in spite of the war by the use in three state hospitals of about 180 conscientious objectors who have been forced to work in these institutions at no pay...
...17 issue of The Progressive...
...They have put in up to 16 hours a day and seven days a week when necessary to do a job...
...8. Attempt to pay for the other fellow's dinner when it is a strain to pay for your own...
...The Soviets have now met the Hoover, Churchill raise at London and raised them ten...
...For a so-called, "progressive" newspaper, you have the oddest assortment of bedfellows I have ever come across...
...A German-American Speaks Dear Sirs: The armies of Germany have been defeated and utterly destroyed...
...The American people can congratulate themselves on having the good judgment to oppose peacetime conscription, and on having forceful, able men to aid them in their Opposition...
...Seely, has great weight, as he served in the last war, and has observed in this one...
...Their singular code of ethics convinces them that there can be no" universal, everlasting, moral law...
...Attendants and ordinary hired hands receive room and board plus $45 a month in payment for services which amount to a minimum of 54 hours a week...
...For not only was the conference not secret, but even if it had been, only a participant would know if there was any secrecy to it or not...
...that it would have been most immoral and diabolical if used by our enemies before us, but it is quite another story if we used it first, and we should graciously thank Almighty God for our sagacity, as did Mr...
...How do we know they are there...
...It began as a bluff to...
...Although the pictures of the explosions of the bomb indicate it is not as fast as lead azide, fulminate of mercury, or nitro glycerine, it is still too fast to get the results that can be had with trinitrotoluene, amatol, and black powder...
...Yes, our citizens of Japanese descent and the alien parents of several thousand of our Nisei fighting men have been given a rather bad time...
...Jerry Voorhis to put over his Constitutional money bill that he has tried for years to get passed in Congress but hasn't even got to first base with...
...Our Government appears to be doing nothing about it, yet in President Truman's message to Congress, he recommends that our U. S. Senators and Congressmen be given an increase in salary from $10,000 a year to $20,000 a year...
...the hour is late, very late...
...What they can do in England, we should be able to do here in America...
...The Telegram comments that it must be "very confusing to a great and plain soldier in the midst of a hard, uncompleted job" to be softly wheedled out of his present command—by, we might add, the old political trick of being "kicked upstairs" to succeed Gen...
...5. Large armies are no longer necessary, and conscription weakens the moral fiber of a democratic nation, and should be abolished forever from the United States...
...For example, Messrs...
...And, last of all, debase, defame, abuse, belittle and curse any man who proposes order, reorganization of society towards nobler ends to eliminate the "regimentation of "chaos" now existing, with the accusation: "But your proposals will regiment us...
...For this and other reasons we wrote the text book for schools called Basic Principles of Constitutional Money...
...Should this kind of ethics persist, our Christian civilization is doomed...
...Yes, I agree with Mr...
...Wolfe has done the work is true, but when he says, "it is unexciting, not to say dull," I am amazed...
...Nobody gave ground...
...Dawes Eliot Cambridge, Mass...
...As for the men in the field for WRA — they have been doing a swell job out here in California...
...This number is wonderful all the way through...
...Nothing shall remain but sheer ni hilism...
...The entirely different interpretation of the Pinchot-Ballinger controversy is historically important...
...Now it is half-past 1946...
...Upon the solution of this extremely vital issue rests the deci sion as to whether the world will be allowed to recover from the in sane orgies of the last 30 years in peace or be totally destroyed by the atomic bomb...
...Waterloo, la...
...Every state legislature should pass laws compelling the teaching of the money question in the regular curriculum of their universities, high schools, and grade schools, and thus let the schools reflect this knowledge in our Congress who today—with a few exceptions—frankly admit they do not understand the money question...
...This last statement, by Lt...
...Milton Mayer is particularly nauseating when he eulogizes Robert E. Lee and at the same time poses as a progressive...
...Practically everybody in the Department of Agriculture "was for" Pinehot, and I didn't know any better...
...Comdr...
...In the first week after Japan gave notice of desire for surrender, requests for unemployment compensation rose by over a thousand in Virginia...
...Dick L. Mitchell, Jr...
...Eisenhower as head of our occupation forces in Germany...
...P. Francis St...
...Misrepresent past experiences and lie to get a job...
...Virginia has notoriously low pay scales for state hospital employees...
...Accept the humiliation of applying for public relief when there is no means of support...
...Believe that the word of your favorite newspaper is unquescion-ingly gospel at all times...
...Only by breaking the law and walking out, going AWOL, can these men do anything to relieve the situation...
...Agnes Chase Washington, D. C. * * * Beals' Fortitude Dear Sirs: I want to take this opportunity to thank Carleton Beals for having the intestinal fortitude to write an honest opinion as to what is going on and you for printing his article, "London: Peace Versus Loot" in the Oct...
...Let us admit, however, that the dropping of our first atomic bomb, which resulted in the ruthless and total destruction of Hiroshima and the death of well over 100,000 of its people, was a military necessity...
...Constitutional Money League of America...
...Use face powder or a certain brand of lipstick because a Hollywood star urges such action...
...That caused many of us to come here...
...To think that any Congressman would allow this injustice and unfairness to these brave boys who risked their lives to make possible the movement of necessary supplies and troops to many foreign ports is unbelievable...
...He was an oiler on the Liberty ship John Calhoun and this ship underwent 170 Jap air raid attacks in two weeks time in Leyte harbor...
...Our government is the creation of all of us...
...Have not enough of the precious, lives of innocent youth been sacrificed on either side of the contest...
...3. Listen to cheap music because it is the thing to do...
...I would suggest that you add to your list of contributors men with a knowledge of this vital subject of money, which is the life blood of all nations, and that you give it full discussion in your paper...
...And again we of German blood have done our duty to America...
...Hoover, that "without justice there can be no peace...
...Sgt.Kearns, Utah A Money Standard Dear Sirs: In that twilight zone when man first began to emerge from the dark ages and governments first began to take shape, one of the first steps was to establish a standard or constant by which to measure and determine, exchange and distribute God's natural resources...
...8 issue...
...My boy has been in the Merchant Marine service for more than two years and is now on his way to India to haul more troops home...
...And is America willing, even after the war is over, to exact a vengeance on women and children, on guilty and innocent alike, such as in our country is not visited upon our most depraved criminals...
...From 1781 to '91 he insisted on following article 1, Sec...
...It does not make sense to me...
...Regimentation Dear Sirs: Few Americans realize how custom, tradition, and fashion regiment their daily activity...
...I was born and raised in the South and I can assure you that while Marse Robert might have been a kindly old man and an able militarist, he was no shakes as a liberal and is largely responsible for the muddled economic system we Southerners enjoy, plus our cheap labor and racial prejudices...
...These brave boys in the Merchant Marine service are entitled to the same educational benefits, future bonus benefits, retirement benefits, hospital benefits or any other benefits now alloted or to be alloted to those in the Army or Navy...
...If there is any shame, any character, any manhood in those of German blood in America, if they wish to modify the fate of their own kin and to help them, then they must act and speak up now...
...Manyof us had parents, brothers, sisters and other relatives in Germany before the war...
...They were denied the privilege of flying over our land but insisted we had no rights above 100,000 feet...
...Under the present conditions, our Congressmen should be satisfied with a $2,500 a year increase, totaling $12,500 for a year salary plus a possible $1,500 a year allowance for his secretarial help...
...This is the greatest forward step in government, the greatest government directive ever invented by man, and yet I am certain there is not one teacher in 1,000 in our public schools who teaches or understands this important cardinal point in government...
...In the names of reason and common humanity, have we not had enough of bloodshed and suffering in this horrible war...
Vol. 9 • November 1945 • No. 44
