LAW ENFORCEMENT IN A CRISIS
By J. Ldgar Hoover, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation
war A410 SUPREME importance at the
moment is the necessity of protecting all
phases of American life and traditions.
Every nation’s history is marked by peri-
ods of unusual stress. At this time, when
the ominous clouds of strife hang heavy
over distant lands, the thunder of their
wars awakens us to the possibility of
threats to our own America. There has
never before been the need that now exists
to seek the truth and to recognize the facts
as they are. While other peoples are
regimented and assembled to hear the pro-
nouncements of government, we seek the
truth without the crushing hand of dicta-
torships directing or determining in ad-
vance what shall or shall not be said.
Upon us of this generation has fallen the
responsibility to defend the cherished
principles of Americanism. There are
times, to be sure, when the cost of peace
is too great to endure. No price in peace
or war, however, can be put upon our
American heritage. Its maintenance means
the preservation of life and liberty itself.
Today the internal security of a peaceful
nation is at stake.
As in the days of the early pioneers, the
call goes out to the enlightened and
courageous spirit of American womanhood
to enlist her intelligent aid in the solution
of our present-day problems. The home
still remains supreme as the basis of our
social order. The very forces that attack
the home attack the nation, which is the
aggregate of all our homes.
The American home—presided over by
you women of America— holds the key to
many of our most perplexing problems.
In preserving the security of the home, we
safeguard the security of the nation. The
time has come to erect defensive walls to
protect our homes and our body politic
from the insidious and malignant germs of
foreign isms and the subversive forces of
lawlessness. That is the task of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation and American law
enforcement, aided by every loyal Ameri-
can citizen.
We must unite to resist the insidious
propaganda designed to foment unrest and
bring about the destruction of our national
ideals. There was a time when America
was proudly known as a melting pot, in
which all peoples living within our shores
were fused into truly American citizens,
whose hearts and minds were wholly cen-
tered upon the future of this land. These
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the home attack the mation, which is the ag-
gregate of all our homes.”
Page TEN
citizens in turn were guaranteed all the
benefits, the securities, and the oppor-
tunities for which the Revolutionary pa-
triots fought and died, in winmng our
highly prized independence. In recent
vears, something has happened to that
melting pot. It is unfortunate but true
that there has come into being a sub-
surface element, shifty, malicious, and dis-
honest, which with wanton effrontery seeks
to turn a great melting pot into a catch-all
for the things that could never fuse with
our ideals.
Our generation has had greater ad-
vantages, even in the depths of our de-
pression, than were ever known by those
whose alien ways of living, whose foreign
isms, have slowly but gradually filtered
into our land. Despite the freedom, the
liberties, and the opportunities guaranteed
to all within our midst, there are those who
have betraved America by chiseling at the
foundations of this great edifice of freedom.
The foes within our gates, like termites,
have sought by every scheming means to
inculcate their alien ideas into our social
order, fouling our cradle of liberty.
There is no place in our land for the
regimenter, or the Dblustering type of
martinet, who, steeped in the bloody-
handed egotism of gangster conquest, seeks
to make us all salute before him. This 1s
4 time when we must think straight and
not be misled by the exotic and Utopian
pratings of those whose allegiance 1s
pledged abroad.
A good citizen must be on guard against
subversion in all its forms. Call it what
vou will--it is un-American. Our patriot-
ism can best be judged by our diligence in
protecting American ideals from the rap-
ists of justice and common decency. To
stem the insidious machinations of such
enemies, to thwart their plans, to preserve
our traditions and ideals, is a sacred and
supreme task. Here is a battle between
priceless God-fearing principles on the one
The WATCHMAN MAGAZINE