Foreign Efforts to Increase Disunity

• Author: Clyde R. Miller
• Published date: 01 September 1942
• Date: 01 September 1942
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/000271624222300126
• Subject Matter: Articles

Foreign Efforts to Increase Disunity
By CLYDE R. MILLER
WHAT Hitler and other Axis at the old anti-Semitic line, which until
propagandists want
December 7 was
us to believe
coupled with open pro-
and
Nazism. Back numbers of Social Justice
to do to create and increase dis-
were
unity does not matter
peddled (there aren’t any new num-
so much; what
bers
does
now, since the Coughlin publication
matter is what we already believe
folded after being banned from the mails
and do. Note the following items from
as &dquo;clearly seditious&dquo;).
And one speaker
the newspaper PM of June 7, 1942:
told the audience: &dquo;The days are coming
when this country will need a Coughlin,
LETTER TO EDITOR
and need him badly. We must get strong
Jim Crow in Baseball
and keep organized for that day.&dquo;
Dear Editor:
Conflicting aspirations and goals of
Speaking of Jim Crow, isn’t it odd that
various groups make for disunity. Thus
Negroes can sit in the grandstand and
watch
we have conflicts between capitalists
a ball game while they cannot play
and labor
on the field?
If they are to be allowed in
unions; between whites and
the park at all, what is the sense of keeping
Negroes; between whites and other col-
them off the playing field?
ored groups; between various religious
CARL PETERSON
groups.
In any nation there is already, by the
AN EDITORIAL
nature of things, disunity. The smart
Party Paradox
propagandist plays upon this disunity,
The internal workings of the Republican
seeks to increase it. Thus, wartime ef-
Party are too weird for the comprehension
forts by the Axis to increase disunity
of mere outsiders.
among minority groups in the United
Vito Marcantonio is virtually read out of
States and the United Nations conform
the Party because he is accused of playing
to a propaganda pattern which brought
footie with the Communists, our strongest
the Axis into a position of great power
allies in this war.
before World War II began. For its
On the other hand, another section of
success, this pattern has depended
the
upon
Party in Putnam and Orange Counties
gives
group differences and group antagonisms
a thundering vote of approval to Ham
which antedate the Axis.
Fish, whose monkeyshines with the Nazis,
Some of them
are decades
our enemies, are a matter of record.
old; some, centuries old.
Sympathy with an ally gets Marcantonio
Out of these group differences has
a boot in the pants. Ham’s cheek-by-jowl-
arisen mental-emotional conditioning to
ing with Nazi elements doesn’t even bring
affect hundreds of millions of people
him a slap on the wrist.
in America and the world over, to fill
You figure it out.-RICHARD HANSER.
their minds with feelings of fear, hatred,
Christian
anxiety, insecurity.
Fronters Come Out of the Cellars
Most important of these feelings in-
The Christian Front, which went under-
volved in enemy efforts to increase dis-
ground immediately after Pearl Harbor, is
unity has been the fear of social revolu-
out in the open again, PM
reported. After
tion. This is called by various names:
a period of discreet skulking in cellars and
back rooms the followers of Charles E.
socialism, bolshevism, communism, dic-
Coughlin ran another public meeting in a
tatorship, totalitarianism.
Associated
Bronx Hall, with speakers pounding away
with the fear of social revolution has
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174
been a tenacious belief on the part of
in the midst of a revolution. It is as
the groups holding most power in
profound, perhaps, as that which saw
America, in the essential rightness of:
the rise of Protestantism, capitalism,
business as usual, profit system as usual,
and nationalism. Our business-as-usual
imperialism as usual, opposition to trade
is being rapidly superseded in the
unions as usual, belief in superiority of
United Nations and the Axis Powers
the white race as usual, power politics
alike by a collectivism. The basic issue
and balance-of-power policies as usual,
of the second World War was well put
theological dogma or ecclesiastical pres-
by Vice-President Henry Wallace in his
tige as usual, education and training as
speech of May 8, 1942. He saw to-
usual, journalism as usual.
morrow’s world-if we win the war-as
The desire to have life go on as usual,
closely integrated, a world in which all
coupled with the fears and anxieties
people would have work at just pay,
that it would not, increased after the
with enough food and clothing and shel-
first World War. The fact that out of
ter ; with education and medical care;
the ruins of Czarist Russia arose the
he saw an economy of abundance, and
Communist Soviet Union gave ample
an end of exploitation, imperialism, and
grounds for the fear that social revolu-
tyranny.
tion would sweep the world. Particu-
So revolutionary was the speech of
larly poignant was the anxiety of the
Mr. Wallace that only a few news-
propertied classes in western Europe,
papers published it.
Most ignored it
Japan, South America, and the United
or published but inconsequential ex-
States.
This anxiety conditioned the
cerpts. Very different was the attitude
minds not only of leading figures in
of the American press when late in
business, government, education, jour-
March 1942 Representative Martin
nalism, and religion, but also of the
Dies charged that the Board of Eco-
hundreds of millions of ordinary peo-
nomic Warfare, headed by Mr. Wallace,
ple influenced by the continual de-
was employing &dquo;at least 35 high offi-
nunciation by these influential persons
cials&dquo; who had communistic records.
of social revolution (bolshevism, com-
On this occasion the press gave promi-
munism, socialism) and by their praise
nent space to what Mr. Dies said, as
of business, the profit system, imperial-
it has given prominent space to innu-
ism, religion, education, and all the rest
merable statements by Dies and count-
as usual.
less others denouncing &dquo;communism.&dquo;
Thus the minds of scores of millions
The incident is revealing because it
of American citizens, for example, were
is representative of the mental condi-
made ready to approve and accept the
tioning against social revolution which
propaganda which was to make fascism
has characterized the period since the
strong and to eventuate in the final
close of World War I. Probably most
drive of Germany, Italy, and Japan to
adults in the United States are thus
dominate the world. Today, June 1942, . conditioned. To say this is not to
this mental conditioning is the biggest
blame them, but to state the most sig-
single factor making for the success of
nificant factor in the growth of disunity
the Axis Powers in increasing disunity
here and in the United Nations. So
in the United States and the United
pronounced is the mental-emotional con-
Nations.
ditioning of most Americans with re-
spect to the fear of social revolution
REVOLUTION A PRESENT FACT
that the American Government, in its
The simple fact is that the world is
efforts through its Office of Facts and



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