World Unity/Volume 14/Issue 1/Text

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WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

Volume XIV, April, 1934

The Principles of Universal Peace . . Horace Holley Keynotes of the Conference on

the Cause and Cure of War... . Evelyn Newman World Advance . « « ws we eawe se Oscar Newfang Christian Social Policy and

the New Economics ........ Gorham Munson World Citizenship, VII ....... Carl A. Ross Book Notes

Notes on the Current Issue

1- 16 17- 23 24- 30 31- 46 47- 56 57- 63 64 �[Page 0]

ig i ti ded eels ic ticles tgs over mere rationalizations of former customs; to quicken the vital powers of faith and to give substance to confident hope—this is

the effost of World an effort dependent spon tion because they also have been touched by the spirit of the age.

World Unity Maganae is by World Unity Publishing mg msongrcin ss gry &, Mew York (ity. Single issues, 25 apy, postpaid. Annual Actiaad wibactiction, £2.50; for Libeasia, 82.00.

Contents Copyrighed 1933 *e World Unity Publishing Corporation �[Page 1]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE by

Horace HOLiey

N ali human affairs the element of duality is constant and un- escapable, adding such confusion to the difficulty inherent in every important problem that the final outcome of major social questions remains uncertain to the end.

So marked is this duality that popular psychology takes it for granted in assuming a fundamental division of people into “‘lib- eral” and “conservative” groups whose interests are inherently op- posed. Further analysis frequently seeks to identify the particular quality of each group in terms of some definite relationship to the material environment. For example, conservatives are regarded as property or office holders, liberals as those not so we.l endowed by the past and hence seeking some change which will give them greater economic or political advantage.

This simple analysis does indeed partly explain a number oi social struggles which have taken place throughout the period of known history, but at the same time leaves unexplained a far greater number of decisive political and economic contests by which landmarks of social progress were established. Particularly is this true in all cases where the issue involves ethical and religious values, and can not be defined merely as a struggle to retain or take over definite forms of wealth and power. In reality the interpreta- tion of this eternal duality in terms of property or privilege is su- perficial and incomplete. When the issue becomes that of world peace, the criterion of property holder and dispossessed loses real meaning.

The element of duality, however, becomes tragic and sinister precisely to the degree that the social issue holds the balance be- tween life and death. The universality of the peace problem makes

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it the supreme social issue, a matter as fundamental as the survival of civilization and humanity itself. Yet despite the clarity of the alternatives and the overwhelming result of the question in terms of human existence as well as in terms of property and all other essential factors, the age is divided on the issue of peace no less blindly and no less grimly than previous ages have divided on questions of local interest and temporary importance.

Whence does this eternal duality arise? Without insight into this mysterious condition, this unescapable fatality, no substantial basis can exist for any peace movement more influential on the one hand than pious exhortation, more significant on the other hand than a mete successive counting of ballots none of which is cast for or against the main issue confronting mankind.

For the source of duality we need look no farther than man himself. It is the duality in all men—in the liberal and conserva- tive alike—whose shadow is cast upon the material environment, giving rise to the superficial notion that the duality begins outside man and is reflected within.

The duality mingled in all human affairs and conditions is the duality of body and soul. Man lives simultaneously in two different worlds, though far more conscious of the world of the body than of the world of the soul. This dual nature projects itself outward whenever important social problems stir individuals to the depths. It projects a spiritual content into questions which seem entirely and exclusively material; it projects a material content into ques- tions which seem entirely and exclusively spiritual. For there is duality throughout the history of churches as of governments. The spiritual and the material elements are ever intermingled, never isolated one from the other, never purely spiritual and never purely material or physical. This intermingling is the mystery of human life on earth.

Thus, in considering the duality surrounding the supreme so- cial issue of peace, the inevitable division obviously lies not be- tween property’ and lack of property but between that interest which is local and that which is universal or human.

What the problem of world peace essentially means is that �[Page 3]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE 3

humanity has developed to the point where it becomes immediately imperative to decide an issue which in itself gathers up and focal- izes the entire burden of the contest between spiritual and material elements—the historic contest, fought out incessantly in local is- sues, never decisively, but now come to the final culmination. By peace in the true sense is meant the victory of humanity over na- tions, of man in his integrity over men of divided selves. What peace means as a political arrangement or a social order is second- aty in order of importance as in order of time.

When the peace problem is interpreted as the final struggle between local interests and the interests of mankind, the term “local” requires careful explanation.

Many matters involved in the problem of peace are strictly local in the obvious geographical sense, as for example that un- sound and false patriotism which asserts a national sovereignty ever to be exercised for the immediate advantage of the nation, and never to assume responsibility for extra-national situations. Less obviously local is that loyalty to race or class which maintains itself for that race or class wherever represented, and exétts conscious antagonism against what is felt to be the enemy of that race or class anywhere and everywhere the enemy exists. Least obviously local, but no less local in relation to universal humanity, is that attach- ment to creed and sect which emanates from the view that one ex- pression of religious truth is final and complete.

Whatever their outward claims on behalf of peace, all these local interests are combined in essential theory and action against its actual realization. It is this combination of various groups, some holding great political power, others possessing great financial power, others representing the power and weight of vast numbers, still others enjoying high religious authority and influence, that makes peace so intricate a uestion, a universal social issue and not a matter under the entire control of governments and states. Moreover, since most individuals have not one simple social status but a variety of uncoordinated social relationships, the problem of peace is further confused by the fact that a large number of in- dividuals may sincerely favor peace as a political issue, but in their �[Page 4]4 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

religious loyalty work to make peace impossible in the moral and ethical realm. Others may sincerely promote peace as ‘a moral prin- ciple, but in a moment of crisis repudiate peace when it assumes a political or financial aspect. It is only by holding true to the con- ception of peace as the unity and order of mankind, a unity which must obtain simultaneously and equally in the political, financial, moral and social realms, that we can rise above the existing con- fusion and make effective effort to serve the universal ideal.

From this larger vision it can be seen clearly that the question of peace is not a mere social question but a crisis. It cannot be determined by any form of popular referendum nor by any appli- cation of authoritative civil action. Peace is in reality the capacity of mankind to continue existence under the terms and conditions which destiny has laid down in this age.

The question of peace accordingly resolves itself into the ques- tion, What are those terms and conditions? Why may the race not continue indefinitely its occasional wars?

The view of life which has been termed “local” in distinction to the view termed “universal” is inability to perceive and under- stand the area of operation of the law of cause and effect. People limited to localism in any form attempt arbitrarily to exclude the operation of cause and effect from any and all social areas outside that area of which they consciously form a part. Outside their gov- ernment there can be no political reality; outside their class no economic principle; outside their creed no almighty God. Their consciousness dwells on an island, la-ge or small, and admits no dependence upon the rest of the world.

This localism in the past rested upon a substantial basis of fact. But what the localist fails to perceive today is that all social islands have been submerged. Cause and effect operates, whether we will or no, throughout the whole continental area of human society. The terms and conditions for human existence have been revolutionized.

Whether we term this revolution the destruction of isolation or the establishment of inter-dependence, the result is the same. What has happened to the world in the present age is the anni- �[Page 5]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAl PEACE 5

hilation of materialism—that is, the overthrow of the physical or territorial factor as the basis of human relations—and the triumph of the spiritual, evidenced in the universality of the operation of social cause and effect.

The essence of this matter is that man no longer depends upon nature for his life and sustenance but upon his fellowmen. The human environment has been raised from nature to society, and the minds and hearts of people, wise and ignorant, compassionate and cruel, govern and control the very foundation of our existence from day to day. Therefore, while we cling to materialism, we are surrounded by spiritual values in their positive and negative manifestations.

Today, therefore, local causes, or influences emanating from the localist view, produce actions directly contrary to the actions produced in the past. Instead of confirming the strength of isola- tion and increasing the power of separation, they operate for its destruction. The vital fact that war no longer produces victory but inflicts general defeat is the assertion of destiny and the proof that human existence has become subject to new terms and conditions beyond any human power to annul or defy. For war is the true symbol of the localist view of life, and in the annihilation of mil- itary victory every form and degree of localism—economic and religious as well as political—is brought to an end.

It must of couse be granted that further vigorous assertions of localism can and no doubt will be made. But the power of spiritual truth has become so clear that the man of peace can confidently predict the outcome in frustration and ruin even before the gage of battle is thrown down. Not by nationalism in economics nor by military nationalism will humanity emerge from its existing troubles. It will emerge only by understanding the nature of spiritual law as determining the movements of human society, and by obedience to the conditions of peace which a divine destiny has ordained.

Peace, then, is capacity to be educated and trained in the principles of that reality which applies to man as mind or soul rather than as physical body. Peace is a collective life, a mutual �[Page 6]6 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

response to laws and principles which God has given to men as He has given other and lesser laws to animals. The “struggle for existence” is the law of the animal, and for the animal serves the aims of life. Man has passed from the domain of this law in an age which reveals ever more clearly the law of unity and inter- dependence.

In ‘Abdu’l-Baha the modern world has its perfect symbol and embodiment of utter, complete response to the terms and condi- tions upon which humanity has come to depend for survival and for further evolution as a race. In him the spirit of the new age found a clear mirror prepared to understand its implications and able to interpret its significance in simple, direct human terms com- prehensible to all mankind. Now that his life has been lived, his work accomplished, it is possible to realize it as a mission, no less a mission than the promulgation of universal peace.

‘Abdu’l-Baha was born in Persia on May 23, 1844 and returned to the spiritual world at Haifa, Palestine on November 28, 1921. More than fifty of this span of seventy-seven years were spent in exile and imprisonment, victim of one of the most implacable pe- riods of persecution recorded in human history. While in the West human personality was being expressed and fulfilled in scientific thought and social action, in the East that emphasis was laid upon spiritual qualities which ever accompanies the rebirth of faith in God and the renewal of religion.

Released as result of revolution in Turkey during 1908, ‘Ab- du’l-Baha as soon as possible prepared to carry out the long cher- ished task of promoting universal peace in the western world. Between 1911 and 1913, on the very eve of the European war, he traveled throughout Europe and America and before innumerable public audiences as in personal conversation with leaders of public life expounded the principles which to him represented the foun- dation of human existence. It is of historic interest to note in pass- ing that previous to this journey ‘Abdu’l-Baha had been visited at Haifa by the late William Jennings Bryan who afterward, as Sec- retary of State under President Wilson, attempted to put into effect some of the peace principles he had learned from ‘Abdu’l-Baha. �[Page 7]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE 7

One of the first statements on peace found in ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s writings is the following passage from a book written more than forty years ago in order to educate the Persian people for true civilization.

“True civilization will unfurl its banner in the midmost heart of the world whenever a certain number of distinguished sover- eigns of lofty aim—the shining exemplars of devotion and deter- mination—shall, for the good and happiness of all mankind, arise with a firm resolve and clear vision to establish the cause of Uni- versal Peace. They must make the causc of Peace the object of universal consultation, and seek by every means in their power to convene a conference of the governments of the world. They must conclude a firm treaty, and establish a covenant the provisions of which shall be sound, clear and definite. They must promulgate it to the world, and cause it to be ratified by the unanimous decision of the whole human race.

“This great and noble undertaking—the real source of the tranquility of all the world—should be regarded as sacred by all who dwell on earth. All peoples and nations should bend their efforts to insure the stability and permanence of this supreme Cov- enant. In this universal treaty the limits and frontiers of all nations should be definitely fixed, the principles underlying the relations of governments expressly stated, and all inter-governmental agree- ments, relationships and obligations ascertained and clearly set forth.

“In like manner, the size of the armaments of every govern- ment should be strictly limited, for if the preparation for war and the fighting forces of any government advance and increase, the suspicions of other governments will be aroused. The fundamental principle underlying this sclemn Agreement should be so fixed that if one of the government. of the world should later violate any one of its provisions, all the governments on earth would arise to reduce it to utter submission, nay the human race as a whole should resolve with every power at its disposal to destroy that gov- ernment. Should this greatest of all remedies be applied to the sick body of the world, humanity will assuredly recover from its �[Page 8]8 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

ills and will remain safe and secure for all time. ..

“A few, unaware how much man can do:if:he will but regard this matter as really impracticable, and even beyond the range of human ability. Such is not the case; however. On the contrary, thanks to the unfailing grace of the Lord, to the loving- kindness of the favored of God, to the extraordinary endeavors of wise and capable souls, and to the thoughts and ideas of the peer- less leaders of the times, nothing whatsoever can:be regarded as unattainable. Nothing short of the highest endeavor and the firmest determination can possibly achieve this end. Many a cause, which past ages have regarded as a mere dream and fiction of the fancy, has proved in these days to be practicable and easy of achievement. | How then can this most great and lofty cause—the day-star in the firmament of true civilization and the cause of the glory, the ad- vancement, the well being and the success of all humanity—be regarded as an impossibility? Of a surety, the day will come when its beauteous light shall illumine the assemblage of man.”

In that statement ‘Abdu’l-Baha gave the measure of possibility inherent in the race at this time.

In the following excerpt from a letter written to England a few years before 1914, the theme is further developed.

“In cycles gone by, though harmony was established, yet, owing to the absence of means, the unity of all mankind could not have been achieved. Continents remained widely divided, nay even among the peoples of one and the same continent association and intercourse of thought were well nigh impossible. Conse- quently intercourse, understanding and unity amongst all the peo- ples and kindreds of the earth were unattainable. In this day, how- ever, means of communication have multiplied, and the five con- tinents of the earth have virtually merged into one. . . In like man- ner all the members of the human family, whether peoples or gov- ernments, cities or villages, have become increasingly interdepend- ent. For none is self-sufficiency any longer possible, inasmuch as political ties unite all peoples and nations, and the bonds of trade and industry, of agriculture and education, are being strengthened every day. Hence the unity of all mankind can in this day be �[Page 9]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE 9

achieved. Verily this is none other but one of the wonders of this wondrous age, this glorious century. Of this past ages have been deprived, for this century—the century of light—has been en- dowed with unique and unprecedented glory, power and illumina- tion. Hence the miraculous unfolding of a fresh marvel every day. Eventually it will be seen how bright its candles will burn in the assemblage of man.

“Behold how its light is now dawning upon the world’s dark- ened horizon. The first candle is unity in the political realm, the early glimmerings of which can now be discerned. The second candle is unity of thought in world undertakings, the consumma- tion of which will ere long be witnessed. The third candle is unity in freedom which will surely come to pass. The fourth candle is unity in religion which is the cornerstone of the foundation itself, and which, by the grace of God, will be revealed in all its splendor. The fifth candle is the unity of nations—a unity which in this cen- tury will be securely established, causing all the peoples of the world to regard themselves as citizens of one common fatherland. The sixth candle is unity of races, making of all that dwell on earth peoples and kindreds of one race. The seventh candle is unity of language, i.e., the choice of a universal tongue in which all peoples will be instructed and converse. Each and every one of these will inevitably come to pass, inasmuch as the power of the Kingdom of God will aid and assist in their realization.”

Before the excerpts next quoted were written the Euro war and its subsequent social revolutions and upheavals had inter- vened, and the League of Nations had been founded. These ex- cerpts are from the famous Letter addressed to the Central Organi- zation for a Durable Peace, The Hague, on December 17, 1919, in which ‘Abdu’l-Bahé summarized his message to the modern world.

“There is not one soul whose conscience does not testify that in this day there is no more important matter in the world than that of Universal Peace. Every just one bears witness to this and adores that esteemed d Assembly because its aim is that this darkness may be turned into light, this bloodthirstiness into kindness, this torment into bliss, this hardship into ease and this enmity and �[Page 10]IO WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

hatred into fellowship and love. Therefore the effort of those es- teemed souls is worthy of praise and commendation.

“But the wise souls who are awate of the essential relation- ships emanating from the realities of things consider that one single matter cannot, by itself, influence the human reality as it ought and should, for until the minds of men become united, no important matter can be accomplished. At present Universal Peace is a matter of great importance, but unity of conscience is essential, so that the foundation of this matter may become secure, its estab- lishment firm and its edifice strong.

“Therefore His Holiness Baha'u'llah fifty years ago, expound- ed this question of Universal Peace at a time when he was con- fined in the fortress of Akka and was wronged and imprisoned. He wrote about this matter of Universal Peace to all the great sov- ereigns of the world, and established it among his friends in the Orient. The horizon of the East was in utter darkness, nations dis- played the utmost hatred and enmity towards each other, religions thirsted for each other’s blood, and it was darkness upon darkness. At such a time His Holiness Baha'u'llah shone forth like the sun from the horizon of the East and illumined Persia with the light of these teachings.

“Among His teachings was the declaration of Universal Peace. People of different nations, religions and sects, who fol- lowed him, came together to such an extent that remarkable gath- erings were instituted, consisting of the various nations and re- ligions of the East. Every soul who entered those gatherings saw

but one nation. nathway, one teaching, one order; for the teachings of ss Baha'u'llah were not limited to the es- tablish~ sal Peace. They embraced many *:achings

which . , »....eited and supported that of Universal Peace. “Among these teachings is the independent investigation of reality, so that the world of humanity might be saved from the darkness of imitation and attain to the truth; might tear off and cast away this ragged and outworn garment of one thousand years ago and put on the robe woven in the utmost purity and holiness in the loom of reality. As reality is one and cannot admit of mul- �[Page 11]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE II

tiplicity, therefore different opinions must ultimately become fused into one. |

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah is the oneness of the world of humanity; that all human beings are the sheep of God and He is the kind Shepherd. This Shepherd is kind to all the sheep, because He created them all, trained them, pro- vided for them and protected them. There is ro doubt that the Shepherd is kind to all the sheep; and should there be among these sheep ignorant ones, they must be educated; if there be children, they must be trained until they reach maturity; if there be sick ones, they must be healed. There must be no hatred and enmity, for as by a kind physician these ignorant, sick ones should be treated.

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah is that religion must be the cause of fellowship and love. If it becomes the cause of estrangement, then it is not needed, for religion is like a remedy: if it aggravates the disease, then it becomes unnecessary.

“And among the teachings of Baha'u'llah is that religious, racial, political, economic and patriotic prejudices destroy the edi- fice of humanity. As long as these prejudices prevail, the world of humanity will have no rest. For a period of six thousand years history informs us about the world of humanity. During these six thousand years the world of humanity has not been free from war, strife, murder and bloodthirstiness. In every period war has been waged in one country or another, and that war was due to either religious prejudice, racial prejudice, political prejudice or patriotic prejudice. It has, therefore, been ascertained and proved that all prejudices are destructive of the human edifice. As long as these prejudices persist, the struggle for existence must remain domi- nant, and bloodthirstiness and rapacity continue. Therefore, even as was the case in the past, the world of humanity cannot be saved from the darkness of nature, and cannot attain illumination, except through the abandonment of prejudices and the acquisition of the morals of the Kingdom... .

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u'llah is the origination of one language that may be spread universally among the people. This teaching was revealed from the pen of Baha’u’llah �[Page 12]12 es

in order that this universal language may eliminate misunderstand- ings from among mankind.

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha'u'llah is the equality of women and men. The world of humanity has two wings—one is woman and the other man. Not until both wings are equally developed can the bird fly. Should one wing remain weak, flight is impossible. Not until the world of woman becomes equal to the world of man in the acquisition of virtues and perfections, can success and prosperity be attained as they ought to be.

“And among the teachings of Baha’u’llah is voluntary sharing of one’s property with others among mankind. This voluntary shar- ing is greater than equality, and consists in this: that man should not prefer himself to others, but rather should sacrifice his life and property for others. But this should not be introduced by coercion so that it becomes a law and man is compelled to follow it. Nay, rather should man voluntarily and of his own choice sacrifice his property and life for others, and spend willingly for the poor, just as is done in Persia among the Baha'is.

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u'’llah is man’s freedom: that through the Ideal Power he should be eman- cipated and free from the captivity of the world of nature; for as long as man is captive to nature he is a ferocious animal, as the struggle for existence is one of the exigencies of the world of nature. This matter of the struggle for existence is the fountain- head of all calamities, and is the supreme affliction.

“And among the teachings of Baha'u'llah is that religion is a mighty bulwark. If the edifice of religion shakes and totters, com- motion and chaos will ensue and the order of things will be utterly upset, for in the world of mankind there are two safeguards that protec. man from wrongdoing. One is the law which punishes the criminal; but the law prevents only the manifest crime and not the concealed sin; whereas the ideal safeguard, namely, the religion of God, prevents both the manifest and the concealed crime, trains man, educates morals, compels the adoption of virtues and is the all-inclusive power which guarantees the felicity of the world of mankind. But by religion is meant that which is ascertained by �[Page 13]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE 13

investigation and not that which is based on mere imitation, the foundation of divine religions and not human imitations.

“And among the teachings of Baha’u’llah is that although ma- terial civilization is one of the means for the progress of the world of mankind, yet until it becomes combined with divine civilization the desired result, which is the felicity of mankind, will not be attained. Consider! These battleships that reduce a city to ruins within the space of an hour are the result of material civilization; likewise the Krupp guns, the Mauser rifles, dynamite, submarines, torpedo boats, armed aircraft and bombing aeroplanes—all these weapons of war are malignant fruits of material civilization. Had material civilization been combined with divine civilization, these fiery weapons would never have been invented. Nay, rather hu- man energy would have been wholly devoted to useful inventions and concentrated on praiseworthy discoveries. Material civilization is like a globe of glass. Divine civilization is the light iself, and the glass without the light is dark. Material civilization is like the body. No matter how infinitely graceful, elegant and beautiful it may be, it is dead. Divine civilization is like the spirit, and the body gets its life from the spirit, otherwise it becomes a corpse. It has thus been made evident that the world of mankind is in need of the breaths of the Holy Spirit. Without the spirit the world of mankind is lifeless, and without this light the world of mankind is in utter darkness. For the world of nature is an animal world. Until man is born again from the world of nature—that is to say, becomes detached from the world of nature, he is essentially an animal, and it is the teachings of God which convert this animal into a human soul.

“And among the teachings of Baha’u’llah is the promotion of education. Every child must be instructed in sciences as much as is necessary. If the parents are able to provide the expenses of this education, it is all right; otherwise the community must provide the — for the teaching of that child.

“And among the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’ll4h are justice and right. Until these are realized on the plane of existence, all things will be in disorder and remain imperfect. The world �[Page 14]14 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

of mankind is a world of oppression and cruelty, and a realm of aggression and error.

“In fine, such teachings are numerous. These manifold prin- ciples, which constitute the greatest basis for the felicity of man- kind and are of the bounties of the Merciful, must be added to the matter of Universal Peace and combined with it, so that results may accrue. Otherwise the realization of Universal Peace in the world of mankind is difficult. As the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’ll4h are combined with Universal Peace, they are like a table provided with every kind of fresh and delicious food. Every soul can find at that table of infinite bounty that which he desires. If the question is restricted to Universal Peace alone, the remark- able results which are expected and desired will not be attained. The scope of Universal Peace must be such that all the communities and religions may find their highest wish realized in it. At present the teachings of His Holiness Baha'u'llah are such that all the com- munities of the world, whether religious, pelitical or ethical, ancient or modern, find in the teachings of Baha’u’llah the expres- sion of their highest wish.

“For example, the people of religions find, in the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah, the establishment of Universal Re- ligion—a religion that perfectly conforms with present conditions, which in reality effects the immediate cure of the incurable disease, which relieves every pain and bestows the infallible antidote for every deadly poison. For if we wish to 2 “ange and organize the world of mankind in accordance with th present religious imita- tions and thereby to establish the felicity of mankind, it is im- possible and impracticable: for example, the enforcement of the laws of the Old Testament and also of the other religions in ac- cordance with present imitations. But the essential basis of all the divine religions which pertains to the virtues of the world of man- kind and is the foundation of the welfare of the world of man, is found in the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah in the mot. ~ perfect presentation.

“Similarly, with ccgard to the people who clamor for freedom: the moderate freedom which guarantees the welfare of the world �[Page 15]THE PRINCIPLES OF UNIVERSAL PEACE 15

of man, is found in the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah.

“So with regard to political parties: that which is the greatest policy directing the world of mankind, nay, rather the divine policy, is found in the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah.

“Likewise with regard to the party of “equality” which seeks the solution of the economic problems: until now all proposed so- lutions have proved impracticable except the economic proposals in the teachings of His Holiness Baha’u’llah, which are practicable and cause no distress to society.

“So with the other parties: when ye look deeply into this mat- ter, ye will discover that the highest aims of those parties are found in the teachings of Baha’u’llah. These teachings constitute the all- inclusive power among all men, and are practicable... .

“For example, the question of Universal Peace, about which His Holiness Baha’u’llah says that the Supreme Tribunal must be established; although the League of Nations has been brought into existence, yet it is incapable of establishing Universal Peace. But the Supreme Tribunal which His Holiness Baha’u’llah has de- scribed will fulfill this sacred task with the utmost might and power. And his plan is this: that the national assemblies of each country and nation—that is to say, their parliaments—should elect two or three persons who are the choicest men of that nation, and are well informed concerning international laws and the relations between governments and aware of the essential needs of the world of humanity in this day. The number of these representa- tives should be in proportion to tue number of inhabitants of that country. The election of these souls who are chosen by the national assembly—that is, the parliament—must be confirmed by the upper house, the congress and the cabinet and also by the president or monarch so that these persons may be the elected ones of all the nation and the government. From among these people the mem- bers of the Supreme Tribunal will be elected, and all mankind will thus have a share therein, for every one of these delegates is fully representative of his nation. When the Supreme Tribunal gives a ruling on any international question, either unanimously or by majority rule, there will no longer be any pretext for the plaintiff �[Page 16]16 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

or ground of objection for the defendant. In case any of the gov- ernments or natio.is, in the execution of the irrefutable decision of the Supreme Tribunal, be negligent or dilatory, the rest of the na- tions will rise up against it, because all the governments and nations of the world are the supporters of this Supreme Tribunal. Consider what a firm foundation this is! But by a limited and restricted League the purpose will not be realized as it ought and should. This is the truth about the situation which has been stated. . ..

“Today nothing but the power of the Word of God which encompasses the realities of things can bring the thoughis, minds, hea.ts and spirits under the shade of one Tree. He is the potent in all things, the vivifier of souls, the preserver and the controller of the world of mankind. Praise be to God, in this day the light of the Word of God has shone forth upon all regions; and from all sects, communities, nations, tribes, peoples, religions and denom- inations, souls have gathered together under the shadow of the Word of Oneness, and have in the utmost fellowship united and harmonized!”

This presentation, it is submitted to people of conscience and goodwill, firmly gathers together into one united doctrine the re- alities of this question of peace which have become hopelessly di- vided and confused. It restores a valid power, raised above the ebb and flow of public events or the increase and decrease of personal enthusiasm, to the central ideal and need of mankind today. In its reconciliation of the spiritual and material factors entering into world peace it will assuredly receive more and more attention as the sectarian creeds continue to wither away and the capacity, of limited organizations to guide and control humanity out of the wilderness is proven vain. Universal Peace has by ‘Abdu’l-Baha been identified with the rebirth of conscious faith, the union of mind and soul in response to a higher order and a higher will. If we do not tread this path, the goal will eventually be achieved only after the agony of another and final war. �[Page 17]KEYNOTES OF THE CONFERENCE ON THE CAUSE AND CURE OF WAR by

EVELYN NEWMAN Rollins College

women have always hated war and its sacrifice of human life.

Back in Greek literature, two of the greatest plays containing

women’s lament and rebellion against war are the Euripidean tragedy The Trojan Women, in which the wail of Hecuba and her daughters rings down the ages, and Lysistrata, that fascinating comedy by Aristophanes which was adapted by Gilbert Seldes and played to crowded houses several years ago. Then we recall the famous phrase of Vergil, “War, hateful to all mothers.” And so, from 400 B.C. and 19 B.C. to the Boer War and that Anglo-Dutch woman, Olive Schreiner, with her book, Woman and Labor, which came out of the travail of those war years, on to 1933 and Vera Britain’s autobiography, A Testament of Youth, we have repeated again and again what the Trojan women said, what Lysistrata said, what Vergil said, concerning women and war.

Also we must mention Bertha Von Suttner and her propa- ganda novel Lay Down Your Arms, for which she received the Nobel prize in the early nineteen hundreds. Now we have reached the present and two most representative women in war’s attack— Jane Addams and Carrie Chapman Catt. Always in their struggle for civic rights for women, down to the organization of the “Inter- national Congress of Women” in the spring of 1915, they have been fighting against war. When woman suffrage was granted in this country, Carrie Chapman Catt organized ‘‘The National League of Women Voters.” When that organization was full grown, she originated the “Cause and Cure of War Conference Group” now in its ninth year. Its membership is made up of repre-

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I: seems that in the mind of men, and some women, as well, �[Page 18]18 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

sentatives from eleven of the leading women’s organizations in the country: American Association of University Women, Council of Women for Home Missions, Federation of Woman’s Boards of Foreign Missions of North America, General Federation of Wo- men’s Clubs, National Board of the Young Women’s Christian Associations, National Council of Jewish Women, National Fed- eration of Business and Professional Women’s Clubs, National League of Women Voters, National Woman’s Christian Temper- ance Union, National Women’s Conference of American Ethical Union, National Women’s Trade Union League.

Delegates from these organizations meet each year in Wash- ington, D.C., in January, for the purpose of translating peace ideals and peace education into action against war, war propa- ganda, and all the economic causes of war. The last such confer- ence was held at the Hotel Washington, Washington, D. C., Jan- uary 16 to 19, 1934. “Oh, another women’s emotional jamboree!” some cynics may cry. Let me assure them that every speech and every discussion was on the intellectual, the hard-headed level, with a planned program and a discussion of the pros and cons of the fundamental questions concerning three big causes of war: Nationalism in its various phases, economic and psychological; armed preparedness and the menace of international munition and armament manufacturers; and the problem of the Far East, one of the most complex situations of modern times—two cultures and two civilizations, the East and the West, facing each other. Added to these momentous questions was the ever present one of the status of our Peace machinery: the League of Nations, the World Court, the Kellogg Peace Pact, etc. What can be done to strengthen their power. The atmosphere of the meetings held both the despair and the hope of the past year 1933.

Walter Van Kirk, Secretary of the Commission on Internation- al Justice and Good Will, Federal Council of Churches, opened the conference, speaking to more than five hundred sixty delegates from the eleven member organizations in the country. As he stood up in that crowded room called the “Hali of Nations,” and talked to us about the shadows of 1933, one felt his own hope and his �[Page 19]CAUSE AND CURE OF WAR CONFERENCE 19

own despair interwoven in what he said. The despair was found in the withdrawal of Japan and Germany from the League of Na- tions, and the breaking up of the Economic Conference in London last spring. It is the accusation of many of the European peoples against us here in America that we refused to think of the good of the whole world as put over against the good of American trade in connection with inflation of the currency. He went on to say that the Economic Conference in London was wrecked because of the uncertainty of the position of the United States concerning its money stabilization. He then turned to the happier side of the year’s picture, to the immense advance toward world understand- ing President Roosevelt had made by his Latin American policies. Though he had blocked the work of the Economic Conference, he had effectively aided Secretary Hull at the Pan American meeting at Montevideo. Now for the first time in many years, South Amer- ican countries turn to us almost as though we were a friend. The promise of lower tariffs and reciprocity treaties, the promise that no armed troops from the United States should cross over the borders of the Latin countries for the purpose of intervention, the non-intervention policy concerning Cuba, and the changed view- point concerning the Platt Amendment; all these things have drawn the two Americas into almost cordial relationships. The recognition of Russia and the possibility of some planned recipro- cal form of international trade between her and our country is another bright light among the shadows of 1933.

Carlton Hayes, one of the great authorities on nationalism (see his book Essays on Nationalism) , compared twentieth century nationalism with that of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The eighteenth century nationalism had the humanitarian spirit, springing as it did out of the throes of the American and French revolutions, with their background of the teachings of Voltaire and Rousseau. It included rebellion against tradition, and prided itself upon promoting world democracy in which all men would be humanitarians working toward a new social order. But the cut- throat competition that so-called international trade had become by the end of the nineteenth century and the early years of the �[Page 20]20 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

twentieth, had brought tremendous conflict in trade between Ger- many and the British Empire and had helped to make the World War. The post-war world had become divided in the worship of various phases of nationalism as fanatical as any so-called Christian sect has ever been. Since the World War, the small nations have developed more “infant industries.” The protection of these has brought up tariff walls. Nationalism grows rampant in one coun- try after another. It is a serious question as to whether or not there are informed minds enough in the world today to combat it. In closing, Professor Hayes suggested possibilities in a planned gov- ernmental effort of the present moment toward something that would lead to a new kind of nationalism, that might possibly, through its planning, lead to a new kind of internationalism.

Mr. J. B. Mathews, secretary of the Fellowship >f Reconcilia- tion, said that planned self-sufficiency in a country was an impossi- ble thing. The very root causes of all wars are economic troubles, trade rivalries concerned over raw materials. He cited the immense struggle right now between Japan and England for markets for their goods, how Japan is driving out English-made goods by her cheaper, lower-level-of-life-made goods.

Mr. Lawrence Dennis, writer and former member of the State Department, combatted Mr. Mathews’ arguments against eco- nomic nationalism. Mr. Dennis believes that planned self-suffi- ciency is the only way our government can possibly win the game. Often, to me, his thought seemed to run parallel to that of Musso- lini and his Fascistic theories.

And scarcely had Mr. Dennis taken his seat when up leaped Professor Gideouse, of the University of Chicago, to show how impossible it was to stand upon the basis of self-sufficiency, how impossible to obtain enough raw materials in this economic na- tional unit. He said, “What can you do when another country has the largest supply of rubber; what can you do when one country has the greatest power supply; what can you do when another country has almost all the nickle in the world? It is useless to talk about the self-sufficiency of any country. What we have got to do is to think in terms of internationalism, of internatic ' trade, but

~-—_—_— �[Page 21]CAUSE AND CURE OF WAR CONFERENCE 21

not of the old cut-throat, pre-war international trade. There must be a new kind of planning in this world, international as well as national.” _

In one of the evening conference meetings, Mr. Stanley K. Hornbeck, of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs in the Govern- ment State Department, gave a paper on the United States’ foreign policy, with especial reference to the Far East. Mr. Grover Clark, former editor of the Peking Leader, now a lecturer at Columbia, disagreed with much that was said by Mr. Hornbeck concerning our foreign policy and the affairs of China and Japan. The prob- lems of Japan at the present moment are population and trade problems. If Japan could have taken them to a competent world council to be worked out, the situation might have been very dif- ferent by now. What is Japan to do for territory? What is she to do for trade? Where can she find her markets? It is that immense problem that is right now causing the competition between Eng- land and Japan. Japan is driving out English-made goods. Asked Mr. Grover Clark, “What are you going to do about China? The Extraterritorial Treaty with China is up in 1935.” He advised us to withdraw our marines and to stop protecting by force our Na-

ionals money and investments in the..Far.Hast. The American obacco Company, with its huge investments in China, had yet never demanded marine and army protection. He believes that the only effective policy for the United States to pursue in the future in China is to declare that its citizens may invest abroad only at their own risk. The United States should never again allow the ' slogans “Capital gives control” and ‘The Flag follows the dollar” to be used in connection with private investments abroad. He warned the audience that if China is allowed to realize that armed strength is the only strength and, therefore, starts in the perilous armament race, the result will be a mighty conflict between the West and the East that may destroy Civilization as we know it. Dr. Mary E. Woolley presided at the session upon traffic in arms and munitions. She urged us to use courage and informed energy in facing this most difficult problem of the world. She then introduced Dr. Esther Brunauer, ihe Research Associate in Inter-

i �[Page 22]23. WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

national Relations, American Association of University Women. She had just returned from six months of investigation in Ger- many, working on the problem of woman’s condition under the Hitler government, the armament situation, and the menace of militarism. Her carefully worded address was not an optimistic one. She made a statement, confirmed again and again by every speaker of the conference, concerning the grave mistake made by all the Allied groups in allowing the war guilt clause concerning Germany to remain all these years in the Versailles Treaty. Be- cause of our delay and hesitation to do anything for the Germany of Stresemann and Curtius who were making a liberal government in a new Germany, because we allowed that Germany to go down in hopeless defeat, Hitler rose to power and leadership. Now the absurdity of the situation is that we would be ready to give to the liberal Germany what it wanted for so many years. Our education comes too slowly for accomplishment. We get the idea to let lib- eral Germany have some rights, just at the time that liberal Ger- many gives up hope and is caught up by Hitler in a new kind of absolutely fanatical nationalism. Though the Germans do not ad- mit that they are training their young men for war and urging their young women to be mothers of cannon fodder, they do have in their textbooks that the only way the “suppressed countries” of Germany can be won back is not through the processes of peace, but “through the might of the uplifted sword.” Boys’ camps and educational centers everywhere, while not ostensibly for military training, are wonderful centers for propaganda of the Hitler group.

Next, Mr. H. C. Engelbrecht, the Associate Editor of The World Tomorrow (his book, Merchants in Murder, is one of the most thorough exposés of armament graft and the international armament menace that we have had in recent time), discussed ar- ryaments and armament graft. He told of the immense power of the armament traffic all over the world, and said that we in America cannot obtain as much real information concerning our armament manufactures as can the French and the British concerning theirs. He believes the French_press to be practically owned by the arma- ment interests. French war propaganda, which they call patriotic, �[Page 23]CAUSE AND CURE OF WAR CONFERENCE 23

is very often backed by the armament industry. Bridgeport, Con- necticut, is the “Essen” of America. In this country, the largest percentage of the taxes goes into the cost of war—past, present, or future. The whole question of armament traffic and munition makers, said Mr. Engelbrecht, must be handled in some way before there can be any kind of practical hope for the doing away of war.

At the end of those two speeches, there rose a young man, just out of Yale, by the name of F. Vinton Lindley, who informed us that he was the first man in his family who had not attended West Point (Do you understand a little of the significance of that family story?). He went on to tell about the hope of doing away with war. Said this young man, we must have courses in every school in every land, showing the causes of war, the futility of war, and the way to op war. We must start a youth society, the main purpose of which 18 to combat war and military training, and we must cultivate a will toward peace and find adventurous ways of pursuing peace.

So the conference proceeded, day after day and night after night, till four of each had passed. I must not fail to mention that “regiment of women,” the quiet actors back of the scenes who kept this immense organization running smoothly. Few of them had a place on the program, but they were here, there, and everywhere, slipping in and out with their great sheaves of papers, ready to be of service, to supply the information needed, and to keep the wheels running.

The forty-first modern movement presented by World Unity in its department “The World We Live In.” �[Page 24]WORLD ADVANCE

A Monthly International Review by Oscar NEWFANG

Author of “The Road to World Peace,”’ etc.

THE COMING ATTACK ON TRADE BARRIERS

HE grandfather of high tariffs has had a change of heart.

The United States government, after a century-old policy of

ever-increasing tariffs, in recent years amounting practically

to embargoes, has finally come to see that it is a poor rule that will not work both ways; that, if we shut out the goods in which foreign countries have so great a natural or acquired advan- tage over us that they can pay the transport: charges and still sell us the goods more cheaply than we can manufacture them, it is to be expected that the countries whose trade is thus prohibited will take similar measures against our exports of goods in which we have so great an advantage that we can more than compete in their markets. The result of this economic warfare, as far as the the United States is concerned, is that our agriculture has lost a large and necessary part of its market; and with the diminishing pur- chasing power of the farmers urban industry has lost a large and necessary part of its market in turn, and has created a vast amount of unemployment, whose vanished purchasing power has still fur- ther depressed both industry and agriculture alike.

The Wallace Plan for International Trade

One of the principal members of President Roosevelt’s cab- inet, doubtless with the approval of the President, has recently issued a carefully written pamphlet under the title, “America must choose,” in which he sets forth that the American nation has be- fore it three trade policies from which it must choose its course.

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He says that America may adopt a policy of no foreign trade, of self-containment or autarchy; we may adopt a policy of free and unhampered exchange of commodities with the whole world by removing our tariff barriers and establishing free trade; or we may adopt a policy halfway between these extremes, by considering carefully what commodities can be advantageously produced here and what can be advantageously purchased abroad, and with this study as a basis making reciprocal trade agreements with foreign countries under which we will agree to buy a certain volume of their advantageously produced commodities upon their agreement to buy an equivalent amount of our advantageously produced goods. Mr. Henry A. Wallace, Secretary of Agriculture, in this pam- phlet emphasizes the consequences that must be faced in the adop- tion of each one of these three policies. If we adopt the policy of exclusive nationalism and of complete self-containment, we must not only be prepared to do without certain tropical commodities, such as coffee, and to pay an enormously larger amount for certain other commodities, such as sugar and rubber; but we must also be prepared to withdraw from forty to one hundred million acres (depending on fertility) of agricultural land permanently from cultivation, and we must be prepared to pay the price of the neces- sary redistribution of the country’s population and of the grave dislocation of the country’s whole industrial and economic struc- ture which would follow; and, finally, we must regiment all agri- cultural production and license every plowed field.

If we adopt the second course of unhampered exchange of commodities, we must be prepared to receive at least one billion dollars of additional imports annually, we must be prepared to face the destruction of uneconomic industries that have had a hot- house existence behind the protection of tariff walls, and we must be prepared to face the extensive dislocation of established indus- try and employment that would follow.

Mr. Wallace favors the adoption for the present of the third policy of establishing through reciprocal trade agreements wich other countries a controlled and planned exchange of commodities �[Page 26]26 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

which would permit every country to specialize on the goods in whose production it possessed a marked advantage, and make mu- tually profitable exchanges with other countries. The adoption of this policy by the United States, he says, would mean that the coun- try must be prepared to admit a half-billion of additional imports and to withdraw from cultivation some twenty-five million acres of fairly good agricultural land. He advocates a study of the indus- tries in this country which are uneconomic from a world stand- point and a study of agricultural lands for the purpose of with- drawing from exportable crops marginal and sub-marginal lands to the necessary extent. This policy Mr. Wallace thinks would to a reasonable extent restore the prosperity of the American farmers, whose increased purchasing power would in like manner largely restore the market for industrial products, thus causing the re- employment of a large part of the idle workers, whose additional purchasing power would further restore the country to prosperity.

America Moves Toward a Policy of Reciprocal Trade Agreements

This educational pamphlet is not to be regarded as merely academic. President Roosevelt has already begun to put the policy of reciprs "se has gequested from Congress authority to extend that sialic to all foreign countries. In the case of Cuba the United States has made a sugar allotment of 1,900,000 tons for the imports from that island. This restoration to Cuba of the market for her principal crop, in which she has a great natural advantage over the United States, will enable that island in large measure to resume her former volume of purchases of American manufactures, which in times past amounted to about $500,000,000 annually. The prohibitive tariff which previous administrations placed upon sugar not only ruined Cuba’s economic life and was the cause of recent political revolutions, but it cut off almost en- tirely this large and much needed market for our manufactured goods. This is a practical illustration of what the policy of reci- procity is and what mutual economic benefits it confers upon coun- �[Page 27]WORLD ADVANCR 27

tries that adopt it; not to merition the gain in that intangible but most important of ali benefits, mutual good-will as the basis of an assured peace.

It is generally expected that President Roosevelt will shortly obtain authority to apply the same policy in our relations with all the other countries with which we formerly exchanged large amounts of commodities. Should America adopt the policy of reciprocal trade agreements to encourage international trade in place of our present policy of excessive tariffs to destroy it, the good effect of this change of policy throughout the commercial countries of the world will be profound. America’s principal for- eign customers are ready and willing to meet this country in mak- ing reciprocally advantageous trade arrangements. France has long practiced the policy of bargaining tariffs, and President Dou- mergue has just obtained complete authority to make such arrange- ments without the delay of lengthy parliamentary discussion. In Ger- many Chancellor Hitler has authority to enter upon reciprocal trade arrangements, in order to encourage German foreign trade. France, Germany and England have long been America’s chief foreign customers. As to England, it is needless to say that she will give most favorable consideration to any policy that makes for a freer and more unrestricted exchange of commodities be- tween nations. For almost a century England held fast to the policy of free trade in spite of the multiplying discriminations against her own exports by one nation after another, in which discrimination America has for many decades been the chief factor; and she aban- doned the free trade policy with great reluctance only after the world-wide post-war trend toward nationalism, trade restrictions and embargoes. Russia, of course, has of necessity adopted the policy of reciprocal trade arrangements by the very fact that all foreign trade is handled entirely by the government.

The Offer of Reciprocal Trade Arrangements at the

Pan-American Conference at Montevideo

Regarding the countries of the American continents, Secretary Hull at the Montevideo Pan-American Conference made the sug- �[Page 28]28 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

gestion that this policy of reciprocity wouid be beneficial to all the countries of the two continents in the encouragement of mutually ad- vantageous exchanges of goods, and he intimated that these coun- tries might expect the early adoption of the policy by the American administration. The Secretary’s pronouncement aroused the liveliest interest among all the delegations, and the practice of establishing reciprocal trade agreements with the Latin-American countries would doubtless largely increase the good-will recently awakened in these countries toward the United States by our liberal accept- ance of political equality and independence among the states of the Western Hemisphere. The trade possibilities with South Amer- ican countries are capable of great development as these countries grow wealthier, more stable and more populous.

Since the repeal of prohibition the United States has also be- gun to apply the principle of reciprocal trade arrangements with certain European countries in the matter of importing wines from these countries, in consideration of and in proportion to their re- moval of restrictions against our exports. Such negotiations have recently been begun with France and Greece.

While the attempt made at the London Economic Conference to halt the insane multiplication of tariffs, preferences, license re- strictions and embargoes, and to establish a tariff truce preparatory to a reversal of the trend proved abortive, on account of the cur- rency war which was then threatening between the two great En- glish-speaking nations; now that the monetary issue has been large- ly solved and the battle of the depreciated currencies ended, the time seems ripe for a recognition of the fact that the strangling of world trade has been an important contributing cause of the unprecedented depression in all countries, and for an attempt to take down, piece by piece, the tariff walls that have thwarted the economic welfare of mankind. With the United States leading the way with its new policy of reciprocal trade agreements, the rest of the commercial countries will be very likely to adopt similar more liberal policies for the encouragement of trade and the gen- eral restoration of world prosperity. �[Page 29]WORLD ADVANCE 29

The New Policy a Roundabout Method of Reaching Freedom of Trade

Definite authority to make these reciprocal trade agreements without parliamentary delays now rests in the hands of the chief executives of France, Germany, Italy and Russia, and may reason- ably be expected in due time to be granted to the British Premier and the American President. The great bulk of world trade has always been among these great nations. While the method of regu- lating international trade on a planned basis, through a study in each country of the commodities which can be exported and im- ported to the advantage of the nation, is an artificial method of determining the flow of trade; still, if the studies of relative ad- vantages are carefully conducted and the resulting decisions are not influenced by political, financial or industrial pressure, this policy will in the end lead to the natural movement of goods that would have resulted from the unhampered operation of economic laws. It is merely a clumsy and roundabout method of moving toward freedom of trade. As Secretary Wallace said in his pres- entation of the plan, it will involve a firm resolution to pursue the course which is most beneficial to the country as a whole, notwith- standing the fact that the uneconomic industries that must be sacri- ficed in the process will “put up a continuous howl.”

The great obstacle which this plan of reciprocal trade agree- ments will meet sooner or later is the political demand for an “economic defense” policy; that is, the demand in each country that goods vitally necessary in war must be produced domestically, whether this can be done economically or not. At the present time the entire populations of France and Germany are paying from twice to three times as much for their wheat as they would need to pay, if the supply were imported. The political leaders in these countries insist that these vitally necessary war commodities be produced at home regardless of economic considerations. The same thing holds good with the chemical industries, the steel industry and other “key industries” necessary for the national defense. �[Page 30]30 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

Freedom of Trade Depends on Political Security and World Peace

The principal nations will not consent to drop their policy of economic defense, and until such progress has been made in world organization as will give them full assurance of national security and freedom from attack, the solution of the economic problem of the free and mutually profitable exchange of commodities in world trade must await the prior solution of the political problem of assured world peace.

The United States will find it impossible to make any sub- stantial headway with the economic problem, if it will not consent to consider and to aid in the solution of the political problem. The world has become far too closely united by the vast improvements in transportation and communication to permit statesmen in the twentieth century to adhere to Washington’s advice in the eigh- teenth century, that in our trade with foreign nations we should have with them as little political connection as possible. Unless this country is prepared to take its place in a general federation of the nations for the purpose of maintaining justice and establishing permanent world peace, its attack on trade barriers is very likely to have only a meagre and unsatisfactory degree of success. �[Page 31]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY AND THE NEW ECONOMICS

by GORHAM MUNSON

coloration whatever. Economics is merely the housekeeping

of society: it is the science of the production and distribution

of goods and services. Yet economics is seldom understood in this practical way, and as a matter of fact, and deplorable fact it is, economic theories are infused with moral considerations, and these moral considerations are of a very crude kind. They are moral considerations derived from our mores and may be summed up as a vague but tenaciously held theory of rewards and punish- ments. To think clearly about economics we must first divorce the science of the production and distribution of goods and services from any idea that this science should embody a disciplinary sys- tem for mankind; we must rid ourselves of the notion that the way in which we exploit our planet and distribute its fruits is in- evitably associated with rewards (or riches) and punishment (or poverty).

But to strip moral considerations from economic thought is not to say that economics should not serve a moral end, and here I use the word moral in its universal and permanent sense, in the sense in which Henry David Thoreau, that “heathen without re- proach,” employed it when he remarked that “moral reform is the effort to throw off sleep.” It is curious, and characteristic of our period, an age which as Chesterton tells us knows the last word about everything and the first word about nothing, that where we should find morality related to economics, we do not find it, and where we should find pure economics, we come upon pseudo- morality or mores. I mean that economic systems, both those in practice and those untried, ignore the question of what compre-

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hensive moral aim they should serve, while all the time they are shot through with moral assumptions that will hardly bear in- spection.

There is one exception, and in its home, England, it is known as the New Economics. In the first chapter of his first book, Eco- nomic Democracy, the founder of the New Economics, Major C. H. Douglas, met the issue squarely with the declaration, ‘‘Sys- tems were made for men, and not men for systems, and the interest of man, which is self-development, is above all systems, whether theological, political or economic.”

The interest of man is self-development, a statement in accord with religious teachings at their source where the stress is laid upon striving for a life more abundant; self-development in con- trast with a term like self-expression calls up the Scriptural injunc- tion, “Be ye perfect even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.” Major Douglas has in fact in the restrained language characteristic of him put religious aim foremost in devising his system of eco- nomics; he has said that all is subordinate to the true aim of man which is the development into actual functioning of those latencies of character that constitute the soul. As much cannot be said of our present groaning economic system which uitimately serves the will-to-govern of high finance, nor can it be claimed that Marxism with its cult of equality relates itself satisfactorily to the idea of spiritual development.

I wish to outline how Major Doug.:s after this initial subor- dination of economics to a grandly moral design, or perhaps I would do better to say, to a religious purpose, proceeds to eliminate sentimental and pseudo-moral ideas from the details of his system, but I am halted by the fact that the Douglas Credit Proposals are not well known in America, and therefore some account of Douglas himself is desirable. To discuss economics without mentioning Douglas, as we do in America, is to discuss modern physics with Einstein left out. So far are we from being in the van of Western thought!

I Major Douglas’ wide culture is self-evident in his writings, �[Page 33]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 33

and his standing as an economist is sufficiently attested by his being summoned as a witness by Lord Macmillan’s Committee in their inquiry into finance. What I wish to stress is Douglas’ long experience in practical undertakings.

About 1908, following his profession of civil engineer, Doug- las was in India in charge of the Westinghouse interests in the East. During his sojourn there two things were pigeonholed in his mind. First. at the instance of the Indian Government he surveyed a large district containing a great deal of water power. He returi +d to Calcutta and Simla and asked what was to be done about it. The reply was, ‘““We have not got any money.” At the time manufac- turers in Great Britain were hard put to it for orders, and prices for machinery were very low. Douglas Lowever accepted the reply, merely retaining it as an isolated fact in his mind. Second, he often dined with the gentleman who was then controller-general of India, and this gentleman harped on the subject of credit. He would tell Douglas of his experiences in India and Great Britain with Treasury officials who persisted in melting down and re- coining rupees, in accordance with the “quantity theory of money.” His burden was, ‘Silver and gold have nothing to do with the situation; the situation depends almost entirely upon credit.”

Just before the war of 1914-1918 Douglas was employed by the British Governfnent in connection with a railway for the Post Office to run from Paddington to Whitechapel. The enterprise presented no physical difficulties, but Douglas found that he would get orders to push on with the job and then orders to slow up with the job and pay off the men. The war broke, and this rail- way line has, as a matter of fact never been completed. Then Douglas noticed a curious thing to be related to his formerly collected odd facts: during the war money was obtainable for al- most any purpose.

The war was in fact exceedingly instructive to Douglas. He was called to Farnborough to serve as assistant director of the Rov | Aircraft Works and there he was immersed in industrial disputes. He soon found that the easiest solution of these dis- putes over more wages was to give higher wages. He was also �[Page 34]34 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

obliged to study very carefully the costing, and one day it struck him that the wages and salaries of the plant did not represent at each weekend the value or price of the goods produced during the week. It followed then that if this disparity was true of the Royal Aircraft Works, it was true also of every factory in every week. Therefore, it was true that the total amount of purchasing power (wages and salaries, etc.) distributed during the week were insufficient to buy the total product at the price prevalent in that week. This is one of the basic discoveries of what has since be- come the New Economics.

Later Major Douglas went to Richborough, one of the con- crete cities built during the war. He was immensely impressed by the fact that despite the withdrawal of approximately seven millions of the best producers and despite the appalling destruc- tion of materials by war, England had been able to erect such wonderful concrete cities. And he noted too that people were living at least at as high a standard as before the war.

Next Major Douglas’ attention was attracted by the huge propaganda asserting that England must produce more. He began to think what would happen when the whole of this intensive war-time production was diverted to the conditions of peace. Then the super-production propaganda was supplemented by a new cry saying that England was a poor nation and only hard work would save it from destruction. Major Douglas sat down then to write his first article; it was on the delusion of super-production. Finally, his mind returned to the dinner conversation of his old friend in India, the controller-general, and he thought to himself: ‘That man was correct. The key to the problem is credit.”

At the end of the war Douglas knew (a) that the modern pro- ductive system is equal to any reasonable demand we can make of it, (b) that nevertheless mankind as a whole was not getting its needs and desires satisfied, and (c) that something stood between the wants of men and the productive mechanism which was abun- dantly able to satisfy them, and this something was the financial system. He went to work on the solution which proved to be a highly technical affair, and which is reserved for treatment in a �[Page 35]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 35

later section.

Meanwhile, let us note that the most brilliant weekly in Eng- land, the famous New Age which had been advocating National Guilds, took up Douglas’ proposals and has since faithfully ex- pounded the New Economics. Douglas’ books, beginning with Economic Democracy in 1920 and culminating with the Monopoly of Credit and Warning Democracy in 1931, attracted students, and a strong movement has resulted, not only in England but even more spectacularly in Australia.

The remarkable thing about the New Economics movement is the variety of parties and beliefs who make it up. There is an Anglo-Catholic wing, for example, including such a brilliant propa- gandist for Social Credit as Fr. Demant; there are Protestant Followships which endorse Major Douglas’ ideas; there are paci- fist groups which see in the adoption of the Douglas scheme the removal of the curse of war. It is significant that at the Industrial Christian Fellowship’s conference in January of 1932 the great topic of discourse turned out to be the Douglas’ proposals, as the chairman, the Bishop of Lichfield, remarked in closing the session. Then there are supporters of the New Economics recruited from various left wing groups, and there are likewise adherents from the right, like W. Allen Young who pleads for the Conservatives to rally for Douglas. Furthermore, the Legion of Unemployed in England backs Douglas. A roll call of the New Economics writers would include the editor, Arthur Brenton, the Scottish poet, C. M. Grieve, the dramatic critic, Paul Banks, and the artist, Will Dyson.

Surveying this variegated following, two exciting questions must occur to upholders of a Christian social policy. Can it be that the New Economics of Major Douglas is actuated by a sense of equity toward all elements of the community? Is it possible that here at last is an economic theory which intelligent men of all parties can agree upon as the remedy for the dire workings of our present system ?

Il One way of approaching Major Douglas’ central ideas is by comparing his teaching with Karl Marx’s in certain respects. We �[Page 36]36 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

have seen that the antecedent morality for Douglas is self-develop- ment. He says plainly, “We must build up from the individual, not down from the State.”” He stresses the second necessity of men’s lives, the first being the necessity for bed, board, clothes, etc.; the second necessity he calls ‘‘the satisfaction of the artistic instinct, which can be further analyzed and def.ned as the incorporation in material forms of ideals conceived in the mind.” He appears to me, then, to be conformable to Christian social policy which while it seeks to improve the environment of man and inter-human re- lationships can never depart from a basic emphasis on personal salvation and personal active spiritual living. Now Marx, as is well known, was definitely anti-religious. Douglas is a libertarian, a foe of interference with the individual; he is no mere anti- religious than he is anti-atheistic in his conception of a sound eco- nomic society. But Marx in his antecedent morality presents many stumbling blocks to the Christian desirious of working for economic reform.

Marxism minimizes the individual and is addicted to State- worship (in the form of the proletarian dictatorship). Its idol is the collectivity. Its aim is presumably the increase of human hap- piness to be brought about however by violence and persecution, reminding us unhappily of the phrase, “a war to end war.” By increasing the sum of hatred in the world through the setting of class against class, it hopes in the end to produce a classless society which, it predicts, will raise the sum of happiness. It proposes to eliminate mysticism and religion from the world as bourgeois paraphernalia. About its cult of disciplined equality there is some- thing fearsome, reminding men of the ant-hill and its regiments who are at once so marvellous in their organization and at the same time so dreadful in the feeling they give of being a symbol of failed humanity.

Thus the clash between Marx and Douglas is quite clear at the very outset of their respective social theories.

But the two are united in their certainty that a social change is coming. Marx declared that capitalism carried within itself the seeds of itsown overthrow. Douglas is no less emphatic in asserting �[Page 37]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 37

that there are such radical defects in the present system that it must inevitably change. There is no question of a coming change, he says, but will that change be for the worse, that is, to the Servile State and eventual world-enslavement, or will it be a change for the better, that is, a change to a society wherein initiative is de- centralized and men cooperate in administrative enterprise?

As Douglas sees human history, there was first the long Age of Scarcity which began to be terminated in 1774 when Watt’s steam engine came into the world. ‘When men maintained them- selves by manual labor,” he writes, “this process was very nearly a closed cycle, that is to say, it took a very large proportion of the en- ergy which mankind acquired through food, to maintain life. . . . From the moment that the first crude steam engine pumped the first gallon of water, if not before, the metabolic cycle contained a factor, a new method of entrance for solar energy; which was bound to result in a much steeper spiral of ascent.” How steep it has been we may gauge by noting that the nineteenth century received from its predecessor the horse, the goose-quill, the scythe, the hand loom, the tallow dip, flint, steel and tinder, the signal beacon, the sailing vessel, and leather fire-buckets. In their place it pased on to our century the bicycle, the steam engine, and the motorcar, the fountain pen and typewriter, the harvester and binder, the factory, electric light, matches, the telephone and the wireless, the steamship, the modern fire engine, not to mention lithography, the camera, anaesthetics, X-rays, and the dynamo. A tremendous advance, which is stili accelerating. No wonder Major Douglas concludes that the productive problem of society is solved. Yet we are obliged to call our age not an age of plenty, but an age of artificial scarcity, for the obvious fact is that the immense quantities of goods we can make cannot under present conditions be distributed.

Now whatever we may say about the cruelties practised dur- ing the rise of capitalism, we must, according to Douglas, admit to its credit this triumph: it has devised a mechanism able to flood us with goods in excess, very likely, of our desires. ‘The primary fact on which to be clear is that we can produce at this moment �[Page 38]38 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

goods and services at a rate very considerably greater than the possible rate of consumption of the world, and this production and delivery of goods and services can, under favorable circumstances, be achieved by the employment of certainly not more than 25 per cent of the available labor, working let us say seven hours a day. It is also a fact that the introduction of a horse-power-hour of energy into the productive process could, under favorable circum- stances, displace at least 10 man-hours. It is a fact that the amount of mechanical energy available for production purposes is only a small fraction of what it could be. ... But it is also a fact that, for a given program, increased production per man-hour means de- creased employment.”

That is, applied science has, as we all know, displaced pro- gressively men from industry and created what we call the distress- ing problem of unemployment. Unless a man can get a job, in almost every case he will lead a miserable existence, and there are bound to be fewer and fewer jobs with the growth of technology. It is at this point that Major Douglas removes “morals” from economics. Economics he declares roundly should not be a system of punishment for those who are jobless and reward for those who can squeeze into the productive mechanism. And indeed it is diffi- cult for us to succeed, as he has done, in ostracizing the reward- and -punishment notion from our economic thinking, and it is difficult because we all accept unwittingly the following proposi- tions and a corollary.

We accept:

(1) That work is a necessity against a constant menace of scarcity. (But progress in industry has destroyed that menace; we ate, as we say, threatened nowadays with overproduction!)

(2) That work, the production of utilities, is per se dis-

agreeable, and unless peopl¢ are made to work, they won't. (But what is disagreeable is not work—consider how enjoyably the golfer works at his game—but the fact that often work is too prolonged and insufficiently remunerated. The most disagree- able feature, however, is the compulsion to work.)

(3) That work being disagreeable and only tolerable if �[Page 39]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 39

everyone works, it must be induced by a system of rewards and punishments, that is, by riches and poverty. (But let it be ob- jected that the inducement to work need not be bestial and based on greed and fear. Man can, in fact, be appealed to on a ground of pride and shame.)

And now for the corollary we unconsciously accept:

(a) All leisure is at the expense of the state or community unless paid for by riches or else employed for education (fitting for work) or else for recreation (getting ready to work again). (But leisure should not be attached to production, past or future. Leisure is a by-product of a progressive society. )

Major Douglas, the reader will perceive, virtually calls for a psychological revolution to accompany the Industrial Revolution. He wishes us to reform our ideas of work and leisure, and in effect stigmatizes the “morality” imbedded in the present operative sys- tem of economics as obsolete, a holdover from the days of actual scarcity. These are the alternatives we now face, as he phrases them.

(1). “We can say, as we are saying up to the present time, that the wages, salaries and dividends system, with its corollaries of the employment system, as at present understood, and the moral discipline which is interwoven with all those things, is our prime objective. Having decided that, we have decided that the indus- trial system with its banks, factories, and transportation systems, exists for a moral end, and does not exist for the reason which in- duces individuals to cooperate in it, z.e., their need for goods; and that moral end can only be achieved through the agency of the system and its prime constituent—cinployment. And the practical policy to be pursued is one which has been frequently pointed out from very diverse sources, and which was the basis, or alleged basis, of the Russian Revolution. It is to make the man-hours necessary for a given program of production equal to the man- hours of the whole population of the world, so that every one capable of any sort of work should, by some powerful organiza- tion, be set working for eight or any other suitable number of hours a day. To achieve this end, the use of labor-saving machinery �[Page 40]40 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

should be discouraged, all scientific effort should be removed from industry (as was done in Russia), and, in particular, modern tools, processes, and the application to industry of solar energy in its various forms should be vigorously suppressed. Failing an alter- native, one should dig holes and fill them up again. All this is the logical outcome of the attitude, not merely of the orthodox em- ployer (although he may not realize it), but of the orthodox so- cialist, and it ought to be clearly recognized.”

(2) The New Economics “surveys the facts, finds an inherent incompatibility between the substitution of solar energy for human energy, and the retention of a financial and industrial system based on the assumption that work is the only claim to goods, making the objective always subordinate to human individuality.”

These are the alternatives. The first can be epitomized in a joke. Two workmen unemployed and therefore not possessed of a claim on goods were watching malevolently a steam navvy at work in the streets of Shefheld. Observing this symbol of progress in industry, Joe was moved to remark to Tom, “If that theeer ma- chine wern’t thear we’d ‘ev 500 men on wi’ shovels.’’ ‘“Tha’rt reight, Joa,” replied Tom, carrying out the logic of equating the man-hours necessary for a given program with the man-hours of the total working population, ‘‘and if there wern’t noa shovels they’d ’ev 50,000 on ’em wi’ salt-spooins.”’

The other alternative asks, is work the only claim to goods? Douglas’ answer is surprising. The three basic factors in wealth production, according to classical economics, are Land, Labor and Capital. And socialist thought deals only with these three, con- tending that of these Labor is the true productive factor and the Capitalist is only the owner of the tools. But Major Douglas main- tains that ‘there is now a fourth factor in wealth production, the multiplying power of which far exceeds that of the other three, and which may be expressed in the words of Thorstein Veblen as the ‘progress in the industrial arts.’ Quite clearly, no one person can be said to have a monopoly share in this; it is the legacy of countless numbers of men and women, many of whose names are forgotten and the majority of whom are dead. And since it is a �[Page 41]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 41

cultural legacy it seems difficult to deny that the general com- munity, as a whole, and not by any qualification of land, labor, or capital, are the proper legatees. But if the ownership of wealth produced vests in the owners of the factors contributed to its pro- duction, and the owners of the legacy of the industrial arts are the general community, it seems equally difficult to deny that the chief owners, and rightful beneficiaries of the modern productive sys- tem, can be shown to be the individuals composing the community, as such.”

The meaning of this passage is that our Machines are the product of corporate effort. They have come to their present state through development (by many hands) and use (by the public) no less than through invention. And, by the way, who invented radio? Or military tanks? Or consider the railroad locomotive: what a corporate effort it represents, drawing for its perfecting from engineers and stokers, passengers, shareholders, boards of directors, and so on. We can now ascribe our progress in the in- dustrial arts only to Man: it is impossible to single out the numer- ous persons who had added bits to it.

This leads Major Douglas to remark on the fallacy (and here we may again contrast him with Marx) which asserts that “labor, as such, produces all wealth, whereas the simple fact is that pro- duction is 95 per cent a’ matter of tools and process, which tools and process form the cultural inheritance of the community, not as workers, but as a community, and as such the community is most clearly the proper, though far from being the legal administrator of it.”

It will be noted that again and again in the extracts made from Douglas’ writings stress is laid on the community as a whole, and this is a partial answer to the question raised earlier, is the New Economics just toward all elements in the community? It seems to me that it comes as near justice as the circumstances allow. It proposes to expropriate no one, to confiscate nothing. It wishes to disturb current commercial practice as little as possible. It at- tacks present banking policy but it proposes to use banking experts for the administration of a social credit policy. It declares that �[Page 42]42 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

when put into practice the New Economics will raise the purchas- ing power of every grouping in the community. These are claims to be investigated, but they are of the sort to thrill those interested in Christian social policy with the desire to see them substantiated. and if they can be substantiated, then it is very likely that the most humane and intelligent men in all quarters will find a common rallying-ground in the Douglas Credit Proposals.

In the next section I shall present Major Douglas’ leading ideas, namely, the A plus B Theorem, the Just Price, and the Na- tional Dividend. Meanwhile let us draw breath and recapitulate the points so far covered in our preface to the vital ideas of his system.

1. The Douglas Commonwealth hopes to found itself on the profoundly moral stand incorporated in the American Declaration of Independence; it aims to fulfill the inalienable right of every man to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

2. It wishes the economic activities of mankind reduced to their proper place; it foresees the day when the necessary economic work of society becomes a semi-automatic untroublesome process analogous to the body’s functioning and certainly not motivated by rewards and punishments.

3. The problem of production, as Douglas saw clearly dur- ing the War, has been solved.

4. The problem of distribution, the consumer’s problem, as anyone can see, has not been solved.

5. During the War Douglas got hot on the trail of financial economics and scented the source of trouble in the bankers’ mo- nopoly of credit.

6. He realized that the community was not receiving the cultural heritage that properly belongs to it; economists have failed to realize that the abstinence of past generations has built up an enormous reserve for us to enjoy. He would therefore make “pro- gre: in the industrial arts” a pivotal thought for a new economics.

7. In thinking about a Social Credit Commonwealth he has stressed the decentralization of initiative and kept in mind the claims of all fractions of the whole community. �[Page 43]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 43

IV

I will now give in Major Douglas’ words his famous A plus B Theorem (famous at least in England). It is a challenge to all orthodox systems of economics and to Marxians as well. Says Ma- jor Douglas: “In any commercial undertaking payments may be divided into two groups. Group A. All payments made to indi- viduals (wages, salaries, and dividends). Group B. All payments made to other organizations (raw materials, bank charges, and other external costs). Now the rate of flow of purchasing power to individuals is represented by A, but since all payments go into prices, the rate of flow of prices cannot be less than A plus B. Since A will not purchase A plus B, a proportion of the product at least equivalent to B must be distributed by a form of purchasing power which is not comprised in the description grouped under A.”

This formula expresses what is the experience of the vast ma- jority of members of a modern community, the experience of being chronically short of money. Major Douglas says that it simply isn’t true that most people are poor because some people are rich. To him the argument that the working classes are impecunious be- cause the capitalists are hoggish profiteers is crude and unsound. No, he says, the truth is that the community as a totality never has a sufficiency of purchasing power. What is put into the pockets of the community, i.e., wages, salaries, commissions, and profits, can- not meet the total of prices ever.

Here the banks come into the picture of modern production, and they do so by making loans to producers. They control credit, and as they see fit, aid capital expansion, but not the consumer. Now Douglas insists that the credit extended to producers is really the public’s credit and not as it is now considered the bankers’ credit. But it is through the banks’ extension of credit to indus- trialists, that society keeps functioning in a fashion, though a sorry one.

Douglas invites us to watch, as it were, a sleight of hand per- formance. We have to sharpen our eyes to catch the banker creating money (a bank loan is the creation of new money) and then to �[Page 44]44 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

catch him destroying money (the repayment of a loan tears up the money, so to speak). And we shall find that the credit the banker plays with should be Social Credit. If it became Social Credit, then an immense change would take place in our price system. We would have a Just Price.

A Just Price was an old concern of Christians, and it is strange that modern Christians have let the idea fall into disuse. Under the Douglas system the Just Price is arrived at not by price fixing but by price regulation. And the regulation is with reference not to demand but to supply. Says Arthur Brenton in a popular ex- position of the New Economics, the Price Regulation Factor ‘‘is a figure—really a fraction, a proportion, a ratio—which is calculated from statistics taken from industry itself, z.e., figures derived from sources out of the reach of the would-be bureaucrats. .. The figure would be calculated periodically, and it would be determined on each occasion by comparing the amount of production with the amount of consumption which had taken place in the previous period. Thus the Price Regulation Factor would be automatic, almost like a speedometer, and not subject to errors of judgment by the controllers.” The astounding thing is that the Just Price would be a price considerably below the apparent financial cost of goods. For example, all goods might be priced under the Just Price regime at one-quarter of their present prices. How then does industry recover its costs?

The answer is, by the National Dividend. Mr. Maurice Col- bourne in his book, Unemployment or War, crystallizes the Na- tional Dividend proposals as follows:

‘That, the difference between Price and Cost shall be made up to the Producer by an imbursement from the community.

“That, this imbursement shall be made through the Govern- ment Department appointed to administer the community's finan- cial affairs: namely, the Treasury.

“That, this imbursement shall be regarded as a National Divi- dend payable in virtue of the addition to the community’s Real Wealth brought about by not only the production but also the con- sumption of the ultimate goods concerned. �[Page 45]CHRISTIAN SOCIAL POLICY 45

“That, the only cost to the community of this imbursement shall be the cost of making and distributing money tickets: v#z., the cost of ink, pens, paper, and a staff of accountants.”

The essentials of the Douglas Scheme are then (1) a challenge expressed in the A plus B Theorem and (2) a remedy involving the simultaneous creation of more money and price regulation.

Vv

I aim to be suggestive rather than convincing in this article. To be convincing, I would first have to expand the Douglas Credit Proposals, illustrate them and restate them in several ways. Then I would have to prove them, which would be a very technical af- fair. In short, I would require the space of a book. In an article on a subject about which there is in America no knowledge dif- fused, I can only say, ‘“These are the leading features and there is a considerable literature obtainable from England which compe- tently expounds and justifies them.” For example, most people on first hearing the Douglas’ proposal to increase the volume of money remark sagely, “A-ha, another inflationary scheme.” But they overlook the fact that Douglas says you must regulate prices at the same time you increase money. So I shall simply invite the prospective student to follow the trail of Douglas literature, chal- lenging him at the outset with the assertion that Douglas has got to the bottom of economics, and the bottom is credit-control.

Two of the many happy results which it is predicted will flow from the adoption of the Douglas Scheme are an immense lessen- ing of crime and a great minimizing of the chances of war—both results that the Christian yearns to accomplish. Undeniably, eco- nomic conditions can stimulate crime and can make for war. A Christian social policy would seek to remove economic causation as much as possible—but these questions are best deferred for another essay.

What is obvious is that the New Economics proposes to con- struct a society in which the dominant values will be not economic as at present but psychological. It proposes to enable each man to guarantee his existence; he will have the means to live irrespective �[Page 46]46 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

of whether he is employed or not. On the material plane he will be a free man. That being the case, there will probably occur a shift in the center of gravity of man from material values to spirit- ual ones. The prospect is that the race will follow the normal course of Robinson Crusoe who, it will be remembered, occupied his increasing leisure with thoughts of religion and philosophy after he had solved his economic problem.

Is this too rosy a prospect? The New Economics asks us finally, what do we believe about man? Perhaps some will decide that freedom is too good for man. But the Christian view. is a balanced one. It is acutely realistic in its description of man as he is, but it has a bold faith in what man may become. An economic system based on compulsion and fear, backed by machine guns, can never be the instrument of a Christiz 1 social policy. What is wanted is an economic structure permitting scope to the positive aspirations of man. You may say, the New Economics appears too good to be true. But part of the Christian technique is to go behind appear- ances and discover if they correspond to the facts. We must not be deterred from an investigation by a distrust of good news. �[Page 47]WORLD CITIZENSHIP

by Car A. Ross

Lawyer

VII. SOME DIFFICULTIES (Concluded)

E believe we are heading into another irrepressible

conflict over freedom rather than that we are at the WW: of an era and while we admit that the adoption

of World Citizenship would not finally settle this conflict, we believe that it would atleast put off the armed conflict for a generation or two and we p€lieve the interim of peace would be used to better advan an were the years between 1789 and 186r. _—

This introduction indicates the spirit in which we would take up and consider the few serious problems we have outlined; name- ly, taxation, migration and the bill of rights. We do not intend to imply that these are all the serious problems that would be en- countered, but these seem inescapable and highly important. Much could be written about the necessity of broad powers of taxation and we could refer to the elaborate arguments in the Federalist in support of the broad power to tax embodied in our constitution, but is not the situation different? In 1789 the thirteen states were hemmed about by strong European powers, the north and west being in the hands of the French and British while the south was in the hands of the Spanish, to say nothing of the high seas infested with Barbary pirates and competing ships of European countries. With the consummation of Tne World Union embracing a reason- able majority of the sixty nations of the world, there would remain no such threat to its existence, there would be no rival either in the military or economic field. The sole problem would be to ward against internal conflict, against rebellion. With this limited need,

47 �[Page 48]48 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

why should not some taxes like the tonnage tolls on high seas freight be sufficient to carry on? To be sure the constitution might provide that if a national crisis was encountered and duly declared, other forms of taxes could be levied to meet the extraordinary revenue needed to carry over the crisis.

When we consider the question of migration, however, wé open up a live question closely associated, we believe, with the new irrepressible conflict over freedom. In our article appearing in World Unity for August 1933, under the caption World Citizen- ship and Races, we discussed a new doctrine that we feel should be incorporated in the constitution of the World Empire and form one of its controlling coucepts; namely, the doctrine that there is room in the world for our different types of civilization, that the present dominance of the few nations does not mean that the civilization of the weaker though perhaps older nations and civilizations should perish, but that their art and culture should survive through the survival of national control of domestic affairs and through the limitation of the World Union to the govern- mentai function of control over ev erritorial affairs. The United States and Soviet Russia have go © | ong way in the application of this doctrine in the letters ex: hanged recently to effect the re- sumption of diplomatic relations. Maxim Litvinoff, People’s Com- missar, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, President, each wrote the other that it would be the fixed policy of his respective government:

“To respect scrupulously the indisputable right” of the other's government, ‘‘to order its own life within its own jurisdiction in its own way and to refrain from interfering in any manner in the internal affairs of” the other’s government, “its territories or possessions.”

What is this but the application of one phase of this doctrine we have labeled ‘World Citizenship” ? Surely after this the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics should be ready to give careful and favorable consideration to a world constitution so far as it is based on this principle.

This doctrine works out very smoothly till we encounter the desire and need of overpopulated nations to migrate. How is this �[Page 49]WORLD CITIZENSHIP 3- 63970 49

problem of migration to be met? In our first article appearing in World Unity in April ), we hinted at the approach we suggest, to the solution of this difficulty; namely, that no citizen of one nation by migrating to another nation should acquire any right to citizenship in such new nation and the rights incident thereto, unless and until he learned the language and became assimilated to the character and customs of the land where he is an immigrant. We consider this doctrine the mere complement, or as naturally resulting from the basic conception that the world should preserve the older races and cultures, it is the corollary of that doctrine. In practice, it seems that it would work out in the following manner. Those nations now overporulated and having a distinct culture and civilization of a high order, would naturally rigidly exclude immigrants seeking to gain citizenship rights, including, in any capitalistic state, the right to acquire property; and, whenever the activities of a transient guest became obnoxious, deportation would result and there would be no stigma to such action. Nor should there be any stigma to exclusion laws as this principle would work both ways, to the exclusion of Americans from China as well as to the exclusion of Chinese from the United States; deportations would not indicate any superiority complex, it would merely mean that the deportee was still a citizen of his honored native land. There may be other ways of controlling migration, but this doc- trine seems to open the door to one solution, although it may be argued that it would virtually put a stop to all migration and fur- nish no outlet for overpopulated nations. While emigrants from overpopulated countries could not acquire citizenship rights in the country of their first choice, there would likely be several second choices for them. The foreigner could learn the language of the iand where he seeks admission and surely should be permitted to travel and represent the business interests of his native land, so that in practice we doubt if any radical changes in naturalization laws and exclusion laws would result except as they would be modified by this new doctrine. Some undeveloped countries of large extent and of large resources would still encourage immigra- tion and the restraint of the Monroe doctrine would be lessened. �[Page 50]50 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

We have no space here to estimate the effects of World Citizenship on the Monroe doctrine, but we feel that this new doctrine of hands off of the domestic affairs of all nations effectually takes its place. While the ultimate character and social complexion of the local government in such undeveloped lands might be materially altered by migration, yet no monarchical form of government could threaten and no European nation could acquire such lands as a colony. Thus the principal objectives of the Monroe doctrine would have been achieved and an efficient control instituted for the development of local self government in these undeveloped regions.

The time is hardly propitious to consider many other phases of this problem, like uniformity of naturalization laws, extradition laws, laws fixing the citizenship of children born in lands where their parents were sojourning and laws fixing the status of a per- son in the land of his birth after he has gained citizenship in an- other nation, but a careful study of these perplexing problems would doubtless shed much light on the problem of the control of migration under any world government.

This problem of migration appears to us to have its main significance in its relation to the irrepressible conflict over freedom which we have pointed out. In other words, we should take care that migration laws do not take on the significance of fugitive slave laws, we should take care that in the rush to fill up unde veloped countries there should not be a new “‘freedom’”’ conflict. We do not mean to imply that World Citizenship would bring on such a conflict in a more acute form than it exists today, but that we should learn from our experience over the Mason and Dixon line how to avoid such a clash as our Civil War. Without an ex: change of goods between nations and without migration, there would be little reason for thwarting the ambitious aims of nation- alism since the ambition of an Alexander to conquer and subject to tax and rule would hardly be tolerated today. Under World Citizenship organization if we can extract the venom of tariffs and immigration and exclusion laws, we shall have taken a long step in overcoming the evils of nationalism. We contend that the three

�[Page 51]WORLD CITIZENSHIP 51

fiscal reforms we advocate, a world currency, a world reserve bank- ing system, and a refunding by the world government of war debts into one world issue to be liquidated by world taxes of the charac- ter of tonnage tolls on high seas freight, would so terminate inter- national competition in the inflation of national currencies and competition in erecting high tariffs that the fallacious usefulness of tariffs would be apparent, since tariffs would be no more bene- ficial to any nation in protecting national industries than tonnage tolls, as each would be merely another hurdle for trade. Under World Citizenship what sentiment there is for protective tariffs surely should support tonnage tolls on imports as a protective tariff, and all foreign merchandise traversing the high seas con- stitutes imports at destination today, while traffic between member nations of The World Union would be no longer “exports” or “imports” but “internal trade.” Why have we never had tariffs between the States of the United States? Is it merely because our coustitution forbids them? We would say that an equally efficient reason is that our single currency, consistently adhered to, our joint taxes to liquidate all our obligations incurred in matters exterri- torial from the point of view of our forty-eight states, and lastly our several United States banking systems, even though not consistently adhered to, we would say that it is because of these three reforms that we have drawn the venom of tariffs between our states so that today they would be considered merely impediments to that free trade we all recognize as the basis of our material prosperity. In regard to migration between our states since 1789, it has caused trouble only in so far as it has entered into our irrepressible con- flict and the issue of this struggle was not so much the elimination of slavery from the original slave states as the exclusion of slavery from the new states about to be formed. From this analogy we believe that the serious clash to avoid under World Citizenship would appear in the ambition of capitalistic nations to colonize and capture undeveloped nations for the capitalistic system of local affairs, while, on the other hand, each type of social state would offer competition for this prize. It is easy to see that our doctrine of the social solidarity of nations in their domestic affairs goes a �[Page 52]§2 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

long way in solving these difficult problems of migration.

We believe that the approach to one other allied constitu- tional problem would be different than that adopted in our United States constitution. We refer to Section 4 of Article IV guarantee ing our forty-eight states a republican form of government.

“The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened ), against domestic violence.”

Has the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics a republican form of government, has Germany, has Italy? It is not likely that all would agree on this question as to Soviet Russia or Italy, still less as to Germany in spite of Hitler’s forty million vote of approval. The people of 1789 had no vision of social states, while today various social states form an integral part of our world community and exert an important influence on our existing exterritorial af- fairs. We believe we should recognize this fact in drafting a con- stitution for the World Union by making the like provision more specific than liberal. This could be done by a proviso to the effect that the type of republican government in each member nation should be determined by the citizens of that nation and that it mignt be the capitalistic type with a bill of rights, or the social type without a bill of rights, as the people might elect. Certain other inhibitions laid on the legislative powers of our states in our constitution should be revised accordingly, while, on the other hand, it would seem wise to add provisions to the effect that the bil! of rights would be in force in the realm of the High Seas and that the judicial power of the World Union, in construing the laws of national parliaments, should be controlled by the type of gov- ernment enacting the law.

Under our United States constitution there has been built up a mass of decisions of our courts on the ‘“‘conflict of laws,” on “comity” between state laws and decisions, on the question of what is a “ruling” precedent. We have no time to analyze this mass of law in its relation to this suggested new constitutional set-up, but �[Page 53]WORLD CITIZENSHIP 53

we believe it provides the foundation for drafting the changes that would be needed to harmonize capitalism and socialism under a new world order.

Some will immediately claim that this sort of guarantee of local self government does not go far enough, that protection should also be afforded against propaganda by other nationals to overthrow any existing form of domestic government; for instance, that the World Union should protect the capitalistic local govern- ments from the activities of the Third Internationale, or, on the other hand, that it should protect the Soviets against that religious propaganda which they fear will undermine their social form of government. Phases of these problems were covered in the recent negotiations between President Roosevelt and Commissar Litvinoff. Surely this is asking a favor that none can ask today, because there isno world government to ask it of, unless you consider the League such a government. Let us assume, for the sake of argument, that some control over propaganda is desirable, can any more efficient policemen be selected than the World Empire we would set up? With its basic purpose the control of exterritorial activities, such propaganda comes within its scope and the exclusive jurisdiction over the high seas, combined with its direct jurisdiction over the individual, would give it facilities of control superior to those of any single nation.

To our mind the danger spot for propaganda and like per- nicious activities would not be in those nations where local govern- ment is strongly intrenched, but in those undeveloped countries lacking that degree of self government entitling them to charter membership in the Union. Surely some provision should be made so that such a couiitry would not be overrun 1s Kansas was overrun and fought over by settlers from the slave states and another class of settlers from the free states. It would seem that the World Em- pire could easily control the plebiscite in such countries by estab- lishing a strong territorial government and maintaining a registry of all native citizens and by establishing some kind of naturaliza- tion laws for those who shall be qualified to vote on statehood.

To sum up our entire series of articles published in World �[Page 54]54 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

Unity since April 1929, we would say that the statesmen made a mess at Versailles causing political and economic reactions that none foresaw. Two basic errors were committed, both inherent in our world set-up of sixty national governments. The statesmen faced the task of giving Germany, the nation, orders what to do and what not to do, and of ordering how German citizens for generations should vote. Secondly, when these statesmen returned home it was soon apparent that they had gone farther and at- tempted to dictate how their respective countrymen should vote for generations to come. The first returning statesman to be dis- illusioned was our president Wilson. The result was tragic. Ameti- cans were then willing to dictate to Germany that future genera- tions of Germans should vote no armaments and in favor of high reparations, but when President Wilson asked them to bind them- selves for generations to join in economic and military sanctions against Germany they refused to rubber stamp his League. Later the legal wing of the intelligentsia, seeing the weakness of the League, organized the World Court, an institution likewise de- pendent for success on a rubber stamp ballot box. As this was not effective in curbing nationalism, the financiers offered an Inter- national Bank along lines that would leave basic control in their hands if a rubber stamp ballot would approve. Whether the failure of the ballot box to rubber stamp these plans brought on the de- pression or whether the depression zesulted from other causes may be hard to determine. However, public opinion as expressed by the ballot box has so definitely driven parliaments and congresses in virtually all nations to increased armaments, higher tariffs, na- tional currency inflation, repudiation of national debts and other restrictive measures, that world cooperation has finally been dis- carded for more intensive nationalism. The United States is in the van of this movement away from world cooperation and back to economic self-sufficiency. To effect its economic salvation the United States has discarded the statesmen, the lawyers and the bankers and has called on the economists among its intelligentsia. These intellectuals have actually been put in control and are ac- tually organizing a system that requires executives not only altru- �[Page 55]WORLD CITIZENSHIP 55

istic in motive but highly educated in some school of economics and finance; but whether it is the sound money school or the in- fe*ton schos! ** - »ue international school or still some other school of economics and finance, seems at this writing to be un- determined. Furthermore, unless success crowns these efforts with- in an unreasonably short time to make any experiments, it seems likely that the ballot box may again upset orderly progress.

Why does the ballet box always upset our plans? Our criti- cism of all these schemes is that each one has attempted to tie the hands of futuie generations of voters and the voters of today rebel. The voter says I do not want to have the Council or Assembly of the League decide what armament my nation shall have and then ask me to approve the plan and leave me at the mercy of another nation; I do not want the World Court to decide whether my na- tion has violated the rights of China in Manchuria and afterwards expect my sovereign parliament to rubber stamp their decision that might, perchance, favor some other nation; I do not want the League, the World Court or any International Bank or other like body to decide on what basis my country shall stabilize its national currency, or whether international debts shall be paid, and then expect my sovereign Congress to approve it by making me pay the taxes that will be necessary on that basis to balance our national budget; no, I will have no international cooperation of this sort, I will vote that my government decide on its own armament, I will vote that my representative in my national Parliament join with the representatives from the other districts in our country and decide what we need to do in Manchuria to maintain the rights we claim there, I will vote that my own national legislative body de- cide how many dollars shall be paid for one ounce of pure gold and whether we shall pay or be paid our war debts, my parliament has sovereign rights to execute and I will not vote to ask it to rub- ber stamp any action of the League, the World Court or any other foreign body; even though my nation may have sent delegates to the League, the Covenant of the League reserves for us the right to object and we insist that we shall not be bound, rather I shall vote for increased armaments, for higher tariffs, for stabilization �[Page 56]56 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

of our currency at a figure that will give my nation an advantage, in short I will vote for nationalism, or even for my type f social- ism and the abandonment of the bill of rights if neces y to es- cape from the rule of other nations seeking their advantage.

Does it not follow that the problem is to so organize that the citizen voter will be left in control of the initiative? To do this it seems reasonable to segregate our various domestic troubles by leaving them to the people in our exising national groups, to !et social states wrestle with socialism, capitalist states wrestle with capitalism or with national recovery acts, so long as each respective state confines itself to its own domestic problems; and this leads to the functional division of World Citizenship whereby the World Union would disclaim all jurisdiction over such domestic affairs. This dual citizenship concept of World Citizenship now embodied in our diplomatic relations with Soviet Russia leaves all citizens of all nations free to join in the conduct of exterritorial affairs along constitutional principles that have been tested in detail in the United States for nearly a century and a half. We believe this problem is primarily one of constitutional law and that if the legal profession will set out to curb all classes of the intelligentsiz, if they will avoid the fatal error of asking the common people at the ballot box to rubber stamp the schemes whereby the intelligentsia have the initiative, and will earnestly devote themselves to the constructive task of so organizing the world government to func- tion in exterritorial affairs only, that the primary power is in suit- able legislative, executive and judicial officers directly elected by the citizens of the world to govern themselves in this limited field, our constitutional reforms would soon solve our world difficulties for a period of the span of several generations. Surely this brings us back to the constitutional principle we have represented as the most basic of all, the principle enunciated by Hamilton, ‘““we must resolve to incorporate into our plan these ingredients which may be considered as forming the characteristic difference between a league and a government; we must extend the authority of the Union to the persons of the citizens,—the only proper objects of government.” �[Page 57]BOOK NOTES

Ethical Systems and Legal Ideals, by Felix S. Cohen. Falcon. $3.75. Felix Cohen is a challenging figure. Some will remember his valiant struggle to abolish compulsory military training at City College. Others know him as a figure prominent in Socialist intel- lectual circles and, young as he is, already a force for radical analysis and change. (I am using “radical” to refer not so much to a political affiliation as in the pristine sense of going to the roots; and “change” not for the sake of change but specifically toward a wider sharing of social benefits.) Too few are acquainted with his always judicious, stubbornly reflective mind. This book, in its care- ful reasoning anomalous among American publications, introduces us to the fruits of many years of study and thought, earning a Ph.D. at Harvard, an LL.B. at Columbia, as practicing attorney, lecturer at the New School, and chief critic of Morris R. Cohen.

Cohen is an ethical philosopher—not only in the sense that his central preoccupation is ethics, but in an idealistic sense. He would mold society in the direction of the good. Aware of the futility of mere abstract and isolated ethical rumination, and the impotence of much of religious moralizing, Cohen has turned his thought to legal institutions which so markedly influence our con- duct. Here it is evident that ethical insight and judgment are requi- site and have not been abundant. In Ethical Systems and Legal Ideals, Cohen directly attacks the basic problems in the relations of morals and law. Without intending to mitigate the originality and power of his contribution, I find it is illuminating to discuss the book in terms of its sources.

The major thecis of the book is that law should make for the good life, as against all other possible functions like social solid-

57 �[Page 58]58 ; WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

arity and maintenance of the status quo. This position is essentially that taken by Aristotle, who establishes its plausibility by showing the way in which law bears on our education and, if we are moving in the channels of the good life, ought to make its due contribution. This contention would seem to be convincing to all those who have perspective enough to see the place of the law in society as other than that of merely helping settle disputes; and it is no wonder that it is strange to lawyers in a country where the legal profession has been so commercialized. Its wisdom surely cannot be too of:- ten reaffirmed,—thcugh it is a sad commentary on the condition of our society that such labored defense should be required. Cohen’s method of defense is dialectical. He attempts to demolish, by exposing their logical fallacies, the most potent alternative po- sitions. Though the reasoning is admirably close, it reminds one painfully, at times, of a child on the floor with lead soldiers and a toy cannon. It is a pity that many will find the rigour and polemic forbidding, because the implicit plea is so needful of acceptance.

But what is the good life? Cohen bravely shoulders the ob- ligation and, spurning a wide open pluralism, proposes to define the good in terms of pleasure rewards. It is interesting to observe that Plato in the Republic assigns this view to the multitudes as distinguished from the philosopher. Here is where Cohen makes a sharp divergence from the traditional intellectualist philosophy, and draws upon the hedonistic calculus of Jeremy Bentham. The significance of the contention seems to me to be lessened because of the failure to orient it among contemporary currents. In the first place, this endeavor to redefine the good in terms of a norm is in direct defiance of the widely prevailing Deweyan attitude which concentrates on specific direction for solving different per- plexities and disallows the possibility of such an identification as this for a single regulative ideal. Whether one agrees or not, it ought to be recognized that Cohen’s case for hedonism is a gen- uine challenge to instrumental relativism. In the second place, the simplicity of the appeal to all of us is backed from an unexpected quarter, in the clinical support of the Freudian school. I must add that I have long been at a loss to understand how a philosopher �[Page 59]BOOK NOTES 59

like Cohen, who knows that love ana faith are as germane to fine living (and hence to a philosophy) as reason and knowledge, can abide the dichotomy this book reflects. It cannot be regarded as a mere piece of logical analysis; it must at least adumbrate a total view. Yet there is no suggestion in this book of the real range of Cchen’s intellect and sympathies. The derivations of his thought from Marx, for example, are not so much as juxtaposed to his in- debtedness to the middle class reflections of Bentham. The tremen- dous difficulties involved in regulating human relations on a hedon- istic basis, to which Santayana brilliantly points in the following remarks from his new book, are nowhere confronted. “Pleasure... would be no guide to a moralist wishing to control events, and to distribute particular pleasures or series of pleasures as richly as possible in the world. For this purpose he would need to under- stand human nature and its variable functions, in which different persons and peoples may find their sincere pleasures; and this knowledge would first lend to his general love of pleasure any point of application in the governance of life or in benevolent legis- lation. Some concrete image of a happy human world would take the place of the futile truism that pleasure is good and pain evil.” Such an image Cohen has, but the difficulties of reconciliation which he faces in further thought become evident if we were to conceive of his running for judge ona Pleasure platform.

The most novel and seminal part of the book is the section on ethical science in which Cohen indicates that, if psychology and meteorology can claim the status of sciencé, ethics too can hope for such disciplined form. Here the discussion is fraught with posst- bilities, but for one who wishes to promote the effort, too much in terms of science as a structure of propositions and too little in terms of science as a method.

Felix Cohen’s position is enough unlike that of his father, who professes indifference to popular approbation and influence, to make it doubly deprecable that the manner of his reasoning (and not only his literary style to which so many reviewers have referred; witness his superb essay The Blessing of Unemployment in a recent number of The Scholar) may preclude the wide audience his book

�[Page 60]60 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

richly merits, and, on its hidden premises, must possess to avoid self defeat. On the surface merely a logical analysis, it is clearly far more than that. I have emphasized its .noral and social implica- tions in the hope that lawyers and teachers and students, and all those who would think social questions through to the bottom, will endure the rigours of the analysis for the sake of the insight, and may even find the tight argument tonic. BERYL HAROLD LEVY

Handbook of Revolutio.:« by Roger Shaw. Review of Reviews. $1.00. In this volume Shaw’s pen sketches in short, bold strokes the outline of the principal revolutions of history, through which mankind has forged its way up from slavery, up from serfdom, up through industrial wage-slavery toward freedom, equality and a fuller life. This common struggle links revolutions as diverse as the sex revolution of the Amazons, the slave revolt of the Roman Gladiators, the risings of serfs of the Middle Ages, the industrial revolution of the eighteenth century, the political revolutions of the American Colonies, of France, and of the South American countries, the Russian Revolution of communism, the Italian, Span- ish and German revolutions, right down to the Roosevelt New Deal.

In his terse, lucid picture of these various epochs Shaw does not rest content with detailing events, but goes behind the events to the pioneering thought that brought them about; and he shows the electric speed with which the new ideas of liberty and equality leaped across national boundaries and spurred into action whole continents. The style of the book is rapid and direct, with only enough dreary dates to enable the reader to navigate by.

OSCAR NEWFANG

Fiery Stronghold, by Nicholas Roerich. Stratford. $3.00. Ina way the “Fiery Stronghola” may be regarded as the basis on which Roerich’s ideal for the Roerich Pact and Banner of Peace has been founded. If Roerich in his plan for the Roerich Pact and Banner of Peace, set down a definite working formula among the nations for the preservation and protection of artistic, scientific and educa- tional monuments, it is because he perceives how imperative for us �[Page 61]*

BOOK NOTES 61

becomes this united vigilance for these humanitarian pillars of life. In the pages of his book, this philosophy is set out before us with the pallete and style for which Roerich has long been noted. It was Beebe who said that “Roerich’s prose was as great as his painting, and one can give no greater praise.” This new work confirms the mastery of Roerich’s pen. Courageous color, broad stroke, elimination of the needless detail marks the style—a style which may confound the cobwebbed critic, but which offers a vista to the reader who senses the utterances of a spirit of amazing synthesis.

It is the same searching reader who can profoundly agree with Roerich in his designation of tne present day as one which admits of no delays. Against the new entrenchments of intolerance, sus- picions, hatred, Roerich perceives that the one alleviating force is Culture. And only a swift, united action in its behalf can defeat the advances of the “tioglodytes,” and preserve inviolate the ‘Fiery Stronghold.”

Says he, “It is necessary to hasten with all measures to replace the ragged standards with vital and unwithering foundations of creativeness and of high quality. It is sad to see how at times those who might think in accord, often seek to resurrect the memories of dead malicious offenses and contentions. He who in himself finds the spiritual force to forget all pettiness and discomfort for the sake of general construction, shall thereby express the most vital need of the present hour.

‘The necessities of our life, which at times could have been expressed in terms of years, now in their acceleration must be meas- ured by a day or even an hour. In the same swift way must be measured also the striving towards the unification of all those who can think of culture; who dream not of abstractions, but who feel inwardly the potentiality of applying this creative thought in action, without fearing all the bovine derision, the venemous darts and the cudgels of contemporary barbarians.

“Hence, he who within himself fnds the strength of con- struction and of unification, will express the Urge of the Hour.”

To the educator, the artist, the scientist, the humanitarian— upon whom devolves the ministry in this new vigilance—Roerich’s �[Page 62]62 WORLD UNITY MAGAZINE

work will provide new courage, a new sense of comradeship, a new recognition that this battle need not be alone. If there seems to be some new arraying of the hosts of retrogression, Roerich calls us to believe, in “Fiery Stronghold” that in any case there is also a new arraying of the Legion of the spirit and the dark hosts shall not prevail against that Legion’s selfless consecration to the ultimate goal of each successive epoch, ever-advancing—a fraternity and brotherhood among the sons of men. In “Fiery Stronghold,” Nicho- las Roerich once again sounds his call to World Unity through Beauty and Spirit. FRANCES R. GRANT

Modern Germany. A Study in Conflicting Loyalties. By Paul Kosok. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1933. $3.00. The present dictatorship in Germany is the logical outcome of various forces at work during the pre-war and post-war years. Pos- sibly the most important point is that a tremendous emphasis is being placed upon loyalty to the national state, that is, the increased subordination of all other loyalties to this supreme central emotion. For our understanding of this phenomenon, Dr. Kosok’s presenta- tion is most valuable and timely. He spent two and a half years in Germany gathering the material and several years putting it into shape. His book belongs to the excellent series on the systems of civic education, edited by Professor Charles E. Merriam of Chicago, who, as in other volumes, writes an introduction to the present one, pointing out that “the study of Professor Kosok differs from some of the others in this series in the strong emphasis placed on the economic factors in the system of political cohesion, and in the greater attention to the growth of communistic civic education as distinguished from the identical process of cohesion in other groups.” We must also notice a very valuable chapter on “Nation: alistic Symbolism,” written by Isidor Ginsburg for Kosok’s book, and dealing with the struggle of the competing groups for the crea- tion and operation of a dominating symbolism.

Builders of a New World. By Robert Merrill Bartlett. New York: Friendship Press, 1933.

Christian Unity in Practice and Prophecy. By Charles S. Mac-

�[Page 63]BOOK NOTES 63

farland. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1933. $2.75.

Mr. Bartlett, author of several books, has here produced a beautiful work. In it he frankly and courageously propounds the Christian doctrines. He has used his excellent descriptive powers well, as is evident from the following citation: “We live at the end of an epoch. Our efforts towards cooperation are slowly lifting us to the dawn of a new day. The new day will supplant the limi- tation of creeds, nations and races with the friendly hand and the trusting heart. The dawn will not burst upon us until we have lived bravely through the dangers of the night.” (p. 159).

Reverend Macfarland is another author who has a score of successful books to his credit. His purpose is to describe how we are gradually but actually overcoming the evils of Christian disunion or disunity. Furthermore, “the thesis of this volume is that we must start with the unity and union already existing, or, in other words, we must begin by considering the things that we know we have in common and which our experience and practice has proved that we have as mutual possessions, rather than with the discussions of the matters on which we differ.” Needless to say, that the author’s conclusions are hopeful and constructive. It is a volume admirable in pian and clarifying in treatment.

Bankers vs. Consumers. By Guy W. Mallon. New York: The John Day Company, 1933. $1.50. The author, a banker of note, who, in addition to other important positions, is Vice-President of Berea College, has constructed a clear and logical proposal as to how the banks should be stripped of their present power to create and regulate the people’s money. He would replenish the consumer’s pocketbook with money apportioned by the government as a na- tional dividend to every family, and proposes that the government feassert its exclusive power of issuing money and regulating the value thereof. He believes that the materialization of such pro- posals will for all time remove the bar of artificial scarcity of pur- chasing power and provide the medium of exchange sufficient to cause a national flow of goods from producer to consumer. Con- sequently the day of “booms” and ‘‘depressions’’ would pass.

JOSEPH R. ROUCEK �[Page 64]NOTES ON THE CURRENT ISSUE

The series on World Citizenship by Carl A. Ross ends this month, after developing a thesis which World Unity has accepted as the true political goal of the peace movement.

Its publication in book form is now being arranged. We understand that both the author and his publisher desire endorse- ments of this thesis by organizations and also individuals for the more effective presentation of the book to the general public. Their desire is here expressed, that readers who have followed the articles may cooperate in the sucess of an undertaking which represents an important contribution to current social thought.

Comments and endorsements may be sent to Mr. Ross in care of World Unity Magazine.

The late Senator Beverege in his life of John Marshall, points out that the American Constitution was ratified not as the result of overwhelming numbers but solely through the high character of its leading advocates. Courage and conviction are surely as vital now when the question is not of establishing one nation but world order. The persistent challenge upheld by organizations like the “Cause and Cure of War Conference Group,” so vividly reported by Dr. Newman, seems to be the modern equivalent of that power of character wielded a hundred and fifty years ago by the Washingtons, the Madisons, the Hamiltons and the Marshalls of that age.

The ‘‘New Economics” as interpreted by Gorham Munson 1s a weicome departure from the Marxian thesis. Is it merely a ration- alization of the old dream of “cheap money?” Is it, as claimed, the true and sound analysis of the economics of large production in- dustry? The views of readers on this subject will be greatly appreci- ated. If, as is hoped, the publication of this article leads to inter- esting discusion, excerpts from correspondence will be published at an early date.

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