The Washington times., 1924-03-01
HUGHES POLICY
ON RUSSIA IS
| R|D|CULED
Falacy Exposed by Writer in
Hearst's international
Magazine.

Magazine.
The failure Of Secretary Hughes
to recognize Russia Is ridiculed in
March Hearst's International Maya
zine by Benjamin Stolberg in an
article ''The Mouse That F,rightens
Hughes"
"Mr. Hughes Russian scare is,
perhaps the most harmfully absurd
thing in American politics." says
the author. To-day Russia is recog-
nized by Poland, Germany, Turkey,
Sweden and other states, AS this
magazine goes to press, the British
Labor Party is preparing to bring
about full de jure recognition.
Treaties are being worked out with
France and Italy that apparently
| will lead to recognition soon. Rus
| sia's present rulers have been in
power longer than any other exist.
ing administration m any white ma,
ton in the world. Yet we alone
Of all the great powers look upon
ourselves as too virtuous to have
any dealing with that government"
Denies Red Danger Here.
Stolberg denies that there Is a
real red danger in this country. He
says:
The people who talk about the
| unlimited amount of Soviet gold are
not bothered by the fact that the
American Communists tried to raise
100000 in order to start the Daily
Worker last November on the sixth
anniversary of the Soviet Republic,
and were unable to get the money
| until the beginning Of this year,
| when they merged their weekly
paper. The Worker, into the daily
1--WE do have in the United States
a communist movement, ardently
patterned after the Russian model
and semi-officially connected with
the Third International. The Amer
lean communists form an open po-
litical party, whose philosophy, rec
ord and tactics are accessible to any
one who cares to study them.
Decry Violence.
Presumably we mean by reds
those people who prefer civil war
to the present social order. Accord
ing to this definition the commun-
lists and /. w. W.. who between
themselves exhaust the organized
revolutionary movement in this
country are the only reds. Theo-
retically they believe in the class
struggle. But the communists are
astute enough to realize that the
Last Judgment Day of the American
middle-class is still but a Messianic
hope. Accordingly, they decry VIC.
| lence as part of their immediate pro-
gram, and they cOnfine themselves
strictly to politics and propaganda
among the workers.
! "They are not interested in cap
turing or converting ANYBODY but the
wage earners. They have no mis-
sionaries among the Rotariane, in
the American Legion or Bar Asso-
citation, among the Boy Scouts or
the Camp Fire Girls, in church
synods or college faculties Even
the Daughters of the American Rev
olution do not tempt them. The
III. w. w. on the other hand have
no significance today.
Nominal Membership.
"They have a nominal member
ship of about $4,000 itinerant home
less men, from whom it is extreme
! " difficult to collect dues. Most
Of their members-even in the lum-
Der and the Western mining camps
| are more or less intelligent
Migrants, who are given to utoplan
discussions. The more active mem
bers are everywhere busily engaged
in testing their right Of free speech.
This lands them in Jail so often
that the national organization is
now practically nothing but a legal
defense society. The Russian revo-
luton split the American Socialists
into two unequal camps. The Boil
shevik section bolted with most Of
the membership. thereby reducing
the old Socialist party to a Eres-
bytery Of old time officials, who kept
the treasury, the Rand School of
Social Science-which is a sort Of
Socialist seminary-an excellent
bookshop, and a dwindling news
paper.
But the notorious red raids by
Attorney General Palmer in 1918
drove the American Bolsheviks
underground, where they naturally
attracted within the next few years
an adventurous and unstable men,
bership. leading the unwholesome
life Of all secret societies"