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Truman Speech
lietter Arileril (dive
UST HOW GULLIBLE are people ex-
pected to be?
Yesterday, President Truman informed
Congress that we had supported freedom
and the UN in every instance since the
end of the war, but the gravity of the world
situation requires immediate House passage
of ERP, and swift action by both chambers
on UMT and temporary revival of selective
service.
It is only too evident that we have never
been willing to entrust the UN with enough
power to accomplish anything, and that
we have supported fascist governments to
stall off the Communists.
It was American objections to national-
ization experiments in Europe that killed
UNRRA, policies of expediency that allowed
Peron and Franco to perpetuate their openly
Fascist regimes and direct aid that bolstered
the corrupt regimes of Tsaldaris and Chiang
Kai-Shek. The vacillating legalistic stand on
Palestine jibes no better with the President's
statements. It will be remembered that the
assembly resolution passed in November
defined efforts to oppose partition by force
as a breach of the peace. For some reason
our delegate has never acknowledged this.
Is this the freedom we are to protect by
instituting a draft of debatable value in
democratic country in time of peace? If so
the game is scarcely worth the candle.
But even the President wants peace, and
suggests that his way is the way to peace.
It is inconceivable, however,,that beating.
the war drums will bring us peace or ac-
complish anything but an atomic weapons
race. Admittedly the world is in a serious
state of danger, but power politics will bring
only disaster.
If we are really interested in freedom,
there is no reason not to adopt a "get
tough" policy with the fascists and nurture
incipient democratic movements uninflu-
enced by either Communists or fascists. At
the same time if Truman were to propose
a meeting with Stalin, neither would lose
anything but face and some agreement
might be reached. Even if nothing more
concrete than a rewritten UN charter re-
sulted, it would be a substantial step for-
ward.'
Faced with the war as the alternative,
Truman should find writing a satisfactory
charter for a limited world government with
sovereign powers, more appealing than an
armaments race.
Certainly such a course is preferable to
committment to inevitable war.
--Jake Hurwitz.
Editorials published in The Michigan Daily
are written by members of The Daily staff
and represent the views of the writers only.
NIGHT EDITOR: HAROLD JACKSON
COd Their Bluff
WE ARE NOW officially living in a crisis.
President Truman yesterday publicly
recognized ; a situation that has been grow-
ing for the last two years. The world is again
in danger of war.
There is no use putting on rose-colored
glasses to keep from seeing the red glow
rising over Europe. There is no use pre-
tending we haven't seen the same thing be-
fore-Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia,
one country after another falling before a
Communist fifth column just as surely as
they fell before the Nazi juggernaut, with
the same results in loss of peace and civil
liberties.
It is senseless to try to absolve this coun-
try from all blame for the situation. We
gave the Balkans away at Yalta as though
they belonged to us; we waved the threat of
the atomic bomb before the world until it
feared us as a possible aggressor. When Eu-
rope asked for economic aid, we gave prom-
ises-promises which Congress has yet to
keep.
But let those who denounce the United
States for working outside the UN remember
who it was that stopped all attempts at
cooperation through the UN. Let them re-
member 21 Russian vetoes in two years. Let
them remember four councils of foreign
ministers that ended in gloom and failure
when the Russian delegation took a "take
it or leave it" stand against all offers of
friendship and compromise.
Let those who would merely wait for
Russia to condescend to cooperate, remem-
ber that Russia is not waiting. While we
haggle over the Marshall Plan, she is work-
ing fanatically to undermine democracy
in Europe. While we argue over UMT, Russia
is going full speed ahead in armament, and
training her young people in militarism
as thorough as Hitler's.
Some people say, let Russia take Europe,
and that will be the end of it. But the Com-
munists are bent on world domination. For
many years they have been increasingly
active and vocal in South America. They
honeycombed Canada, as revealed in the
Canadian spy trials of a year and a half
ago. Their program is set forth as clearly
by Marx as Hitler's was in Mein Kampf.
Their methods are the same, only more
cleverly managed.
This is no time for hysteria or yellow
journalism. In a crisis, men need to stay
calm. War is not inevitable-but only if
we call Russia's bluff, and show that we
are not such weak fools, after all. The
only language that a gangster government
understands is the language of power.
Must we learn the same lesson twice in
one decade?
-Andee Seeger.
I'D RATHER BE RIGHT:
Vision Clouded
By SAMUEL GRAFTON
IF YOUHAD to settle for one word to des-
cribe the "situation,' domestic and for-
eign, I guess disorder would be it. In the
large, or philosophical sense, this is one of
the most disorderly moments the American
people have ever had to face. And the dis-
order is like an enveloping fog, distorting
every vista. One looks about and sees grain
prices heading south, and the Russians
heading west. The former movement threat-
ens a recession, the latter something worse.
And as the American people try to focus,
cockeyedly, on both events, they are uneasily
aware that they must soon elect a President
from a swarming field, and that in all likeli-
hood he will be a minority one.
When, at such a time, Jan Masaryk goes
out of a window to his death in Prague, the
event takes on a kind of extended meaning,
as an expression of the frank incredibility
of our times. Who would have thought, at
the end of the war, that within three years
the postwar world would be one in which the
gay and democratic Jan Masaryk would not
want to live? His death is symbolic of
the world's unbelievable present hour, its
strangeness, its upsidedownness.
But though there is a sense that the dis-
order of our time is general, there is almost
no effort to meet it in a general way, with
a general program, one large enough to pre-
vent recession at home, and to reestablish
peace and order in the world. Instead our
statesmen try to break it up into bits, and
each is content to worry his pet fragment,
A number of Congressmen bellow suddenly
for military aid to China. A number of
others hiss at "grain speculators.' Still
others think the answer will be found in
probing Hollywood, and yet another group
wants to cut taxes, as an uncomplicated,
almost magical way out. Such scuttling, such
running to and fro!
And each man takes hold of only as much
of the general problem as he can carry in
his two hands; each seeks a kind of manage-
able segment, which is made to look like
the whole thing. Each works, opinion-
proud, in miniature, in a climate of steadily-
declining stability in the world as a whole.
What we need is a renewed humility, a
realization that none of these jabs is very
likely to work. We need to face the fact
that our problems are big, and general,
that the "trouble" which has come to every
other country following the war had put
in a sort of American visit, too. We need
a program big enough to tame the huge
disorder.
Part of it, certainly, would have to be a
plan to curb recession, and to mitigate its
effects. The Marshall Plan clearly fits in,
too; to abandon or weaken it now would
transform mere disorder into chaos. We
need, also, a new approach to peace, a re
newed drive to negotiation, before we reach
the stake at which the very desire for peace
will come to seem a weakness; and we are
at the border of that stage now. But the
odd fact is that only through humility will
we be able to approach and shape the big
program; for the prouder and more arrogant
our attitudes become, the smaller will our
thinking be.
Can we do it? But here we run up
against our own prideful hate of planning,
a prohibition erected by ourselves to stop
ourselves. I can easily imagine that the
Kremlin probably relies on this, that it is
even gladder we have given up planning
than we are; that it feels we will shout,
and scurry around, and pitch a number of
wild balls, but that we won't plan. And
part of the current disorder is due, not
to our problems, but to the uncoordinated
atomic dance of our methods for solving
them, to our scuttling and our thin squeals,
our attempted broken-field runs and our
hunch plays.
(Copyright, 1948, New York Post Corporation)
BRILL MAULDIN
" ;
Cnpr. 44 y n~e FAt,
"I use him for low gear on hills."
Letters to the Editor .
Same Motives
THE TIME: May 2, 1941-The Place: Iraq.
The incident: Iraqi troops of the new
Premier Rashid Ali Beg Gailani attacked
the British airport at Habbania near the
Mosul oil fields. From Berlin, Haj Amin
el Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem broad-
cast an appeal to the Arabs to begin a Holy
War. (The British are now on both speak-
ing and business terms with the Mufti.)
German and Italian troops and aircraft
landed in Iraq and Syria to aid the Nazi-
inspired Iraqi revolt. Fawzi el Kawukji Bey,
the Arab chieftain penetrated 170 miles into
Trans-Jordan.
But on June 1, 1941, the insurrection was
over; Emir Abdul Illah had returned to Iraq
and rebel Premier Gailani had fled to Iran.
The question: Why was the British army
able to put down the rebellion?
The answer: The British army was de-
termined to end this threat to its valuable
oil reserves in the Mosul province and
with only twenty thousand men was able
to stop the trouble in exactly one month's
time. A noteworth*y example, indeed, of
Britain's might.
The scene changes. The time: November
29, 1947. The place: Lake Success, New
York.
The incident: The UN here today an-
nounces its plan for the partition of Pales-
tine into an Arab and a Jewish state. Great
LookingBack
From the pages of The Daily:
50 YEARS AGO TODAY:
The first in a series of lectures to raise
funds for the Barbour Gymnasium was pre-
sented by Frank Roberson before a large
audience in University Hall. The lecture was
illustrated with fine stere-opticon views
"which made the lecture doubly interest-
ing."
25 YEARS AGO TODAY:
A survey of the leading American uni-
versities showed that Michigan ranked
fourth in enrollment with 8,703 full-time
students. Ahead of Michigan were the Uni-
versities of California, with 14,061, Colum-
bia with 10,308, and Illinois with 9,285.
A Daily poll failed to unearth a single
Britain is to maintain order until its man-
date ends and the UN formally takes over
management.
And in Palestine all hell breaks loose.
Under the order of the Mufti of Jeru-
salem (the same Haj Amim el Husseini)
the Arabs begin attacking all Jews in sight.
Imported Arabs from Lebanon and Syria
(under the leadership of Fawzi el Kawukji
Bey and his "people's army") battle the
Jewish Defense Army, the Haganah.
Attack:, reprisal, counterattack . . .
civil war rages throughout Palestine. The
British seem to be unable to stop the
bloodshed.
The Arabs are using British arms to mur-
der both Jews and Englishmen (Britain
readily admits selling arms to the Arabs).
The Jews, however, are cut off from their
main sources of supply by the American
arms embargo.
The British, with 70,000 troops, nearly
three times the number they had in Iraq,
are completely unable to maintain order.
The question: Does Britain really want
to stop the bloodshed in Palestine, or is
she again merely trying to look out for her
oil interests?
-Allan Clamage.
Change Attitudes
THE PREVAILING ATTITUDE on campus
and in the entire country is that war with
Russia is inevitable. The feeling is that
the sooner we fight Russia, the better our
chances of victory.
What the individual does not understand
is that in the event of war he has little to
look forward to before a violent death. The
freshman engineer or law student at Michi-
gan has little or no chance of graduating
and practicing his professon if war does
come. There will be no need of creative
construction or law in an atomic war. The
next war may be the last. It certainly will
be the last for many people who are now
reading this paper, including those who
have this attitude of inevitability.
If the war is inevitable, it will be so des-
tructive that it may destroy the world and
everyone in it. Accordng to the pessimists,
then, we have little time left to live. There-
fore, we should spend every precious minute
EDITOR'S NOTE: Because The Daily
prints every letter to the editor re-
ceived (which is signed, 300 words
or less in length, and in good taste)
we remind our readers that the views
expressed in letters are those of the
writers only. Letters of more than
300 words are shortened, printed or
omitted at the discretion of the edi-
torial director.
* * *
Music Dispute
To the Editor:
A RECENT LETTER to Ralph
Raimi's made the telling
point that art could be socio-po-
litical; that if the Politbureau
wanted Soviet music they could
and would get it. Mr. Raimi had
been referring to the latest out-
cry of anti-totalitarians against
the chastisement of Prokofief,
Shostakovitch, and others, by
whatever Soviet agency is delegat-
ed to do so, for the crime of com-
posing "bourgeois decadent" mu-
sic.
Mr. Raimi fails to evidence
awareness of: that which gives
art life is its quality of emotional
expression through its expert fu-
sion of content and form. In judg-
ment of a work or art these twin
components can no more be sep-
arated than one intent and prac-
tical results in ethical examina-
tion of any form of behavior, by
the individual or by the state.
The artist may be quite willing
to direct his work to conform to
the demands of the Inquisition,
Stalin, or the Thomas committee.
(This is evidenced by the volun-
tary recantations in each case.)
However, he, the artist is thereby
forced into an unfamiliar genre
or one he dislikes thus making
him incapable or unwilling to
achieve the spontaneity or bal-
ance or x-factor that is the hall-
mark of a good work of art.
The impotence of one of our ex-
perimental art forms, the movies,
is in direct proportion to the
amount of knuckling under by
Hollywood producers to the pres-
sures of the Johnston office, the
League for Catholic Decency, the
Thomas Committee and the polit-
ical touchiness of foreign coun-
tries and internal minority groups
etc. All this, mind you, in a state
where there is relatively little
censoring of art forms.
It is rather difficult, I imagine
to ride Pegasus with one's hands
and feet tied. The pressures put
upon American movies, and Amer-
ican publishers will indeed pro-
duce American movies and Amer-
ican books (J. Parnell Thomas
American, that is) just as the
pressures on Soviet composers will
produce Soviet music. The usual
philistinish question becomes rele-
vant here: "But, is it art?"
-Edward Tumin
Czech Protest
To the Editor:
1HE STUDENTS in Czechoslo-
vakia are being faced today
with the grim spectre of restric-
tion and repression. It has become
part of a pattern of violation of
academic freedom and civil lib-
erties throughout the world.
We in Michigan know in a
small way what abrogation of
academic freedom means. It has
become increasingly clear that the
cases that at first cropped up
sporadically, have turned into a
deadly series of repetitions both
here and abroad.
Czechoslovakia has always had
close ties with the U.S. We had
aided in its formation after World
War I, and the common bond of
democratic institutions has al-
ways been very strong. The tradi-
tion of Czech freedom goes much
further back than 30 years though.
It has been a heritage won by
many years of fighting for lib-
erty.
Reports from the nation's press
and radio, representing almost
every shade of opinion, have
shown conclusively that the pres-
ent Czech government's actions in
violation of civil and academic
rights have al but abrogated the
work "democracy" in that un-
happy nation.
The march of reaction must be
stemmed wherever and whenever
it shows itself-whether in Czech-
oslovakia, Greece, China, Spain,
Russia - or the U.S.
I therefore urge every member
of this university to join in a
meeting to learn what the situa-
tion in Czechoslovakia means to
us. It is part of an education in
history that extends further than
in classroom into the lives of every
one of us.
-Alfred Shapiro,
Chairman, SLID.
Real Face ,
To the Editor:
r"HE BI-PARTISAN Administra-
tion in Washington has at
last begun to show its real face
to the people. It no longer dis-
guises the purposes of the Mar-
shall Plan and the Truman Doc-
trine. Either the Italian people,
in the April 18 elections are to
vote the way Wall Street dictates,
against nationalization against a
combined Communist - Socialist
slate, or no dollars are forthcom-
ing from the United States. This
admonition to the Italian people
and the people of Europe at large
is coupled with a threat of armed
intervention, if necessary, to re-
tain these markets for Wall Street.
President Truman's speech re-
flected the hysteria of a fright-
ened and doomed Wall Street.
The Morgans, Rockefellers, Du-
ponts and their spokesmen, as
Forrestal, are at a loss because
the common people of Europe
have refu sed-by their expres-
sions at the polls-to accept the
domination of American trusts.
They have rejected all attempts to
mortgage their industry and land
to American capital.
Further, Truman reflected the
hysteria of the two major war
parties because the common peo-
ple in the U.S. have rejected the
path tohwar and have beguntto
rally around the banner of Henry
Wallace. A recent Roper poll esti-
mated close to fifteen million sup-
porters for Wallace.
The conflict is not the way Tru-
man and our kept press would
have us believe-a struggle of
western democracy against the
Soviet Union. (Mr. Truman im-
plies that democracy and capital-
ism are synonymous.) In China,
Indonesia, India, the Philippines,
Palestine, Greece, Italy, Latin
America, as well as the rest of
Europe and the U.S., the rule of
the big capitalists is being chal-
lenged. The conflict is rather be-
tween the democratic minded peo-
ples of the world and a handful
of would-be dictators from Wall
Street, attempting to salvage the
remnants of a decaying capital-
ismn
-Ernest Ellis,
Student Director,
(P of Michigan.
War( Now
To the Editor:
THE TIMES we live in are cru-
cal and cruel. This is a cru-
cial period because war may come
at any moment; this is a cruel pe-
riod because people are confused
and terrified and bitter. Because
they fear and detest the war that
draws nearer, they conclude that
war is not inevitable and can be
prevented honorably.
The people of whom I write can
be divided mainly into two groups,
pure pacifists and those who ad-
mired all things Russian during
the last war; the events of each
day batter their faith, but they
can't bring themselves to let go;
they hang on desperately. Al
Blumrosen, author of It's Not In-
evitable, I think, is of this latter
group.
In 1945, there existed in this
country a tremendous amount of
good will toward Russia. Then was
the time to cement friendly rela-
tions; and had this been done, the
result would probably have been
generations of peace on earth, a
Golden Era of advances in the
social and physical sciences, with
no preparations for or fear of war.
But the job was bungled, and I
believe war is now inevitable. This
is a terrible thing, of course, but
it is too late now.
Look at the record. In the UN,
in Germany, in Eastern Europe,
the Russians have blocked ac-
complishment.
Itais argued that all this is be-
cause Russia distrusts us, fears
American aggression. Ridiculous!
Is America an aggressive nation?
A further look at the record indi-
cates that it is not.
A quotation from a recent col-
umn of Eleanor Roosevelt:
"The USSR is not content-
along her borders, at least-with
just a friendly attitude.
"They want the whole cheese
of complete control, and they seem
to know how to get it.
"Masaryk was probably a
saddened and disillusioned man.
How many others will there be in
the years to come?"
An ultimatum now! The result:
a quick, decisive war, or Russian
retreat.
-Myron H. Marks.
No Food 1laint
To the Editor:
AS A NEW RESIDENT of a Uni-
versity Residence Hall and
one who is quite satisfied with
the food situation, I would like
to commend and support Craig
H. Wilson's views expressed in his
recent editorial in The Daily on
"Food Gripers."
Having lived in a private resi-
dence this past semester, I have
experienced both dormitory food
and the run-of-the-mill food
served in the various eating places
here in Ann Arbor. I am sure that
one will find that the vast ma-
jority of the dormitory gripers
have entered the University Resi-
dence Halls as freshmen or trans-
ferees, never having experienced
the other side of the food prob-
lem here in their fair college
town. How many of them have
wasted an hour or so every eve-
ning lining up at the League
along with the hordes of other
hungry students and in the end
reluctantly shelling out for one
meal almost what a dormitory
resident pays for a day's board
(three meals)? Or how many of
these gripers actually can say that
the Union offers better food than
that which can be obtained in the
ResidenceHalls? Sure theUnion
offers roast beef and sliced ham
at every meal, but the finest cafe-
teria in Detroit can match their
prices for these "delicacies."
Compare the foregoing criticism
with the food situation in a Resi-
dence Hall. The meals are care-
fully selected and supervised by a
dietician and are quite varied. The
state of confusion is not prevalent
during lunch and supper hours,
and one has a decidedly improved
atmosphere for his culinary satis-
faction. For $10.50 per week, the
student is provided with 21 ample
meals. Gone is the necessity of
walking several blocks, waiting in
lines to be served, and leaving the
establishment just as hungry as
when you came in.
No,' I am not under the influ-
ence of opium, I enjoy the food
in my Residence Hall.
-Lincoln J. Racey.
* * *
What To Do
To the Editor:
AS I SAID in my last letter, 1948
politics spell DISASTER for
F OR THE FIRST TIME in more
than 400 years, the 60,000
Greeks of the Dodecanese had
something to cheer about. They
packed the festive, narrow streets
of their medieval capital city of
Rhodes as a Greek destroyer, es-
corted by U.S. and British de-
stroyers, nosed into the mountain-
rimmed harbor. In 1522, when
Suleiman the Magnificent stormed
the battlemented castle of the
Knights of St. John, the islanders
had become Turks; since 1912,
when imperial-minded Italy won
its Turkins War, they had been
Italians. This week, by the terms
of the Paris peace treaty with
Italy, they became again what
they had always remained in
speech and culture-citizens of
Greece.
-Time.
l ty igh Y
Fifty-Eighth Year
U
the United States-the question,
then, is: What can be done?
A year from now a Republican ,
will be sitting in the White House.
That means four calamitous years. 4
And unhappily, those years are
crucial ones for the world.
What are we going to do in
the course of the "four years"?
I suggest three things: first, we
must lay such groundwork as will
prevent a Republican victory from
demoralizing our ranks and will
provide a program for the 'four
years" Second, I suggest that
we throw our suipport to, the Dem-
ocratic candidate, trying to win a
as many votes as possible from
the Left and from the Right-
chancing on a miracle victory.
Third, we must at all costs elect
a liberal congress. We can thus
diminish the bleak effect of the
"four years" and perhaps prevent.
a deterioration of our interna-
tional position.
We know a liberal victory re-
quires the collaboration of the lib-
erals in the three parties, and I
believe that such collaboration is
possible.
Mr. Wallace is committed to the
defeat of the Democratic candi-
date for the Presidency, but such
a committal need not be directed,
also, towards the defeat of his
liberal congressional colleagues.
On the contrary Mr. Baldwin, a
a Wallace campaign manager,
contends, with some truth, that
Wallace's running will pull out
the section of the liberal vote that
otherwise would have stayed at
home. This vote can be utilized,
but certainly not if liberals are
running aaginst each other.
The Wallace men and liberal
Democrats must agree on state
and district levels who of their
two parties is to run and get the
combined vote of the two. Like-
wise, if the Wallace office would
abstain from putting a candidate
in thedfield where such action
would defeat a liberal Republican
running against a rightist Dem-
ocrat, much would be contributed.
Such action will not appeal to
prima donnas and self-seeking
men, but it will help our.country
at a time of desperate need.
-Roger Shaw.
v
Local Controls
-
Edited and managed 1iy students of
the University of Michigan under the
authority of the Board in Control of
Student Publications.
Editorial Staff
John Campbell .......Managing Edlte=
Dick Maloy .............. City Editor
Harriett Friedman .. Editorial Director
Lida Dailes...........Associate Editor
Joan Katz........... Associate Editor
Fred Schott.........Associate Editor
Dick Kraus ..............Sports Editor
Bob Lent ......Associate Sports Editor
Joyce Johnson.......Women's Editor
Jean Whitney Associate Women's Editor
Bess Hayes ................. Librarian
Business Staff
Nancy Helmick .......General Mana e
Jeanne Swendeman.....Ad. Manager
Edwin Schneider .. Finance Manager
Dick Halt......Circulation Manager
Telephone 23-24-1
CONGRESS IS NOW considering a bill to
modify rent controls and extend them
until March 31, 1949. What form the mod-
ification will take is difficult to predict,
because the Senate and House are at odds
over whether rent control authority should
be left in Federal hands or put on a local
basis.
The case for the House view is strong.
It represents the adaptation of a war-time
measure to a peace-time purpose. During
the war, it was necessary to restrict all
domestic housing because there was a na-
tionwide housing shortage and rents could
have shot right to the ceiling. Now, houses
are being built and the old shortage has
disappeared in many areas of the nation.
The problem of rent control is now one of
local application of rent ceilings where the
shortage still exists. Only the officers of
local boards are able to determine whether
their district needs rent control.
However, under the old law, Federal au-
thorities make the decisions on all cases and
the local board acts only in an advisory ca-
pacity. This dissassociation of authority and
on-the-scene information resulted in ,poor
Member of The Associated Press
ThedAssociated Press is exclusively
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of all news dispatched credited to it or
otherwise credited in this newspaper.
All rights of re-publication of all other
matters herein are also reserved.
Entered at the Post Office at Ann
Arbor, Michigan, as second-class mail
matter.
Subscription during the regular
school year by carrier, $5.00, by mail,
$6.00.
Member
Associated Collegiate Press
1947.48
-L,
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BARNABY,..
L f Peewill help increase .the benefiil 1i~
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