young men with courage and character;
for today democracies are on trial. Our
form of government is challenged through-
out a large part of the earth by other es-
sentially different and to us basically hate-
ful systems, based upon the nefarious
assumption of power to strangle the per-
sonal initiative, rights, and freedom of the
people in the priceless pursuit of the
democratic way of life.
There is only one way in which democ-
racy can answer dictatorship; that is by
the proof that it is a more livable, a more
intelligently human, and a more humane
form of government. To do this, it must
be of the form which was given into the
keeping of America by our forefathers; an
athletic type of democracy, if I may so
describe it, alert to every possible danger,
vet never aggressive; quick in defense of
our rights, yet never the bully or the
braggart. This was the human, humble,
virile, yet militantly protective democracy
which grew and flourished so effectively
until nearly a generation ago.
®
Then, did we grow too rich? Did we
grow too tired? Did we become too lazy?
Did we become dissatisfied with too much
of plenty? Or did we forget those God-
given qualities of sureness, of strength, of
courage, and of vigilance which had made
the eagle a symbol of this nation, and its
sharpness of eye and smoothness of speed
symbolical of the swiftness and unity with
which we met and defeated an alien effort
against our heritages?
Whatever it was, the change which came
over us was fundamentally dangerous. At
heart a law-abiding people, we became so
lethargic, so apathetic to the encroach-
ments of the underworld, that we per-
FEBRUARY,
1942
mitted to grow within our boundaries a
veritable army of criminally inclined men
and women. Shocking as it may seem,
there 1s a murder in our United States
every forty-four minutes, a major felony
every twenty-one seconds. Of our entire
population one out of every twenty-six
persons has been arrested for some offense
more serious than a minor violation of law.
Was this the kind of nation for which
Washington fought at Valley Forge? Was
this the type of apathetic indifference to
civic standards for which the soldiers of
our Revolution gave of their life’s blood
that they might build for us the world’s
first real democracy?
With our minds engrossed in materi-
alistic and selfish pursuits, we have allowed
thousands of espousers of alien hate and
foreign isms to enter our communities, our
neighborhoods, our factories, our stores,
our homes, and even our governmental
agencies. I wonder what the heroes of
1776 would have thought could they have
looked ahead to a day when disciples of
destruction would be allowed to freely de-
bate on how best to plunder our nation;
or parade our streets by the thousands,
jeering at our system of government.
Could our forefathers have fought so
fiercely at Bunker Hill if they had known
we would allow this nation to be under-
mined by human termites, to be weakened
by disrespect for our laws and customs,
stolen from us by the very persons to whom
we had given a haven of refuge from the
tyrannies and godless philosophies which
they would now impose upon us? There is
something seriously wrong with the blood
stream of America. When the paid van-
dals of a dictator power, dedicated to
atheism, and destructionism, can be al-
lowed to masquerade in this country as a
political party, under the guise of civil
liberties, then indeed there is something
desperately wrong.
By whom have these persons been set
upon us?’—By persons whom we have
trusted the most—Dby certain teachers in
our public schools and institutions of higher
learning, by certain writers, fattening upon
the royalties paid by the American people
while fostering class hatred and discontent,
by some prattle-minded politicians, grab-
bing for votes with one hand while waving
the flag of pseudo-liberalism with the
other, and worst of all by some ministers
of the gospel who have loudly proclaimed
the right of so-called liberalists to destroy
America and its God-fearing way of life.
®
That word “liberalism” is something
we should weigh carefully during these
dark days that confront our nation. There
1s nothing more cowardly than a criminal;
he works in the dark, he sneaks upon you
in the shadows; he hides his gun under his
coat until the moment when he would ter-
rorize you. And he lives under an alias,
pretending respectability while practicing
the vilest of crimes. Is there not a strange
connection between such persons and cer-
tain apostles of degenerate dictatorships,
who advance upon us in sham cloaks of
liberalism, pretending to be seeking social
reforms and equality for all, while in
reality plotting to trample beneath their
blood-stained boots the very document
which has been their greatest protection,
our sacred Constitution of the United
States!
In the vaunted peacefulness of our home-
land, espousers of foreign hates have
stalked at will. These sinister enemies of
America seek to destroy the faith of our
youth in democracy. They use easy prom-
1ses to lure them into blind acceptance of
the venal doctrines of gangster govern-
ments. “This is the new order,” they
counsel. I challenge that contention. It
1s neither new nor does it bear any sem-
blance to order. Right-thinking people
recognize 1t as a barbaric throwback to the
jungle laws of kill and plunder, and might
makes right.
Only the subtlety of his argument cloaks
the activities of this most treacherous of
all enemy agents. He uses no secret codes.
He does not carry a bomb with a sputter-
ing fuse. His plots do not depend upon the
cover of darkness. He expounds his harem-
scarem panaceas from many forums—in
the drawing rooms—on a soap box before
the idle curious in our parks—on the lec-
ture platforms in some of our schools—in
groups of workers wearing the badge of
duty in our great industrial centers.
(Continued on page 16)
53 «e
¥ A British lookout in an cxposed posilion
above the bridge of a destroyer in the North Sea.
This picture is suggested by Mr. Hoover's
statement, “The obstacles and trials in the paths
of each are many and grave; heroic and forth-
right qualities of the soul are required to con-
quer them.”
Page FIVE