DEMOCRACY IS FUNCTIONING...

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21212, 7 September 1940, Page 11

DEMOCRACY IS FUNCTIONING...

AMERICAN CALL TO PAY DUES

Unity and Strength to Meet Test of Times

(J. Roscoe Drummond in Christian Science Monitor.) 'JHE TIME HAS COME when Americans are being called upon to pay their back dues to democracy. The time has come when the first thought of every American must be not of the rights which he receives from his country but of the duties which he owes to his country. The time has come when there must be such a degree of national unity, national discipline, national self-sacrifice that the United States can command whatever strength it needs to guarantee its safety. The response is already evident. It is evident in the capital. It is evident in the country. It is thrillingly apparent that the American people, quickly sensing the crisis, quickly perceiving the demands of the crisis, are Ready to Perform the Tasks which are necessary in order that a free people may be united and a united people may be strong. Democracy is functioning. Adolph A. Berle, Jnr., Assistant Secretary of State, one of the finest thinkers in the Government, said recently: “ Even in the tragedy of these times, I welcome the test to which this country is being put. Too many people have said that a free people cannot succeed in swift and unified action. It is time to give the lie to that sort of talk.”

Representative Hatton W. Sumners, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, one of the deeper students of affairs in Congress, said: “ This is a day of preparation in America not only preparation to defend ourselves against attack, but preparation to live. This is one of the times when nations and civilisations stand at the bar of judgment and must answer for their right to live.” Mr Berle and Judge Sumners see beneath the surface and what they see is true. While spending much time in Washington, I have during the sequence of what President Roosevelt describes as the “ almost incredible events ” of recent weeks, also travelled through many States and conversed with many people. It is a heartening and humbling experience to feel the reserve of selfless discipline and devotion and poise which is available to wise national leadership at this hour. It can be fairly stated that those qualities in the American people are ready to respond to those qualities wherever they are manifest in their Government. Democracy is functioning.

The most exciting and significant fact in public affairs today is that American opinion, responding with a readiness and a determination which Belies the Detractors of democracy, is waiting for political leadership to catch up with it, not forcing opinion to rally behind it.

After the deep and dire meaning of the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands and Belgium began to be apparent, the American people were ready for the President’s second defence message to Congress by the time he had delivered his first. When Mr Roosevelt sought an emergency appropriation of 1,200,000,000 dollars, the Nation wondered why he did not ask more. Two weeks later he did.

And now that the Administration is preparing to spend 4,400,000,000 dollars for defence and to raise only 656,000,000 dollars in taxes to start paying for that defence, there is every evidence that it will find American opinion more desirous of shouldering more of its burdens now than passing them on to their children. When the Government asks labour and management to adjourn their conflicts and make a common contribution to the national welfare, it has only to indicate the opportunity. Coercion is Not Needed. Co-operation is to be had for the asking. The appointment of such distinguished industrialists as William S. Knudsen, Edward R. Stettinius, Jnr., and others to gear the Nation’s enormous peacetime productive forces to the needs of its new defence machinery is either a welcome response to public pressure or a timely decision by the Government in the direction of public desire. Democracy is functioning.

It is being increasingly realised today that to achieve military security the United States must regain economic strength. It is being recognised that the building of the machinery of defence is not a military problem; it is an industrial problem, it is

a financial problem, it is a management problem, it is a labour problem. This fact means that the urgency of defence is not going to rob the Presidential campaign and the fall elections of their importance and their meaning. It means that the American people are to be called upon to choose new leadership or retain present leadership at a time when real and vital issues are at stake. Defence is not at issue. But the means of achieving defence centres in itself every domestic issue with which the American people are concerned. The needs of defence require a national administration qualified to deal not only with foreign policy but with the industrial, the financial, the management and the labour problems which must now be solved, more urgently than ever before. That is the electoral decision of 1940. To make such a decision is the function of party government. The need is not to adjourn party government but to demonstrate the Highest Possible Level of party government. There is every i cason to believe that the American people are ready to make this decision and to back it up with such a degree of national unity that the United States can command whatever strength it needs to guarantee its safety. The need is to make the United States united. Having seen and sensed much of America in recent weeks, I believe this to be a reportable fact: Freely have the American people received the blessings of their democracy, freely will they give. Who dares to say that democracy is NOT functioning!