Evening star., 1934-10-14
VIEWS AND REVIEWS.

NEW FRONTIERS. By Henry A.
Wallace. New York: ReynaI &
Hitchcock.
~ 9TH idealistic and practical,
- convinced and open-minded. is
this book by one Of the fore
IL most of the New Dealers, the
Secretary of Agriculture. En-
tirely serious and aware of the serious
ness of the problem he discusses, Sec
retary Wallace Is never dogmatic. He
does not for moment lose sight Of
the fact that on the attitude of the
American people, largely a spiritual
attitude he believes. depends the sue
cess of the New Deal, or any other
program Of government to meet the
needs of changing society. Mr.. Wal
lace's two previous books, recently
published, America Must Choose"
and Craftsmanship and Religion"
have shown that his philosophy of
life, and Of economics, is not a mate
rialistic one. New Frontiers" adds
to the proof.
The early pioneers Of our country
rapidly subjugated a continent by
hard work and self-sacrifice, and
cured depression by "the pioneer vir-
tue of optimistic grab and toll" But
we no longer live in that early pioneer
age. THE tragic joke on the United
States is that we went to bed as a
pioneer debtor nation in 1914 and
woke up after a nightmare of world
madness as a presumably mature
creditor nation in 1920" We have
not been able to meet the situation
with the old pioneer philosophy. Mr..
Wallace makes an earnest and i'm
presSive appeal for some means of
conveyance to this new world" I'm
patient youth, misguided" must not
be allowed in the United States, as 1t
has been in many European countries,
to take us much faster to the left
or right than we middle-aged, middle
course people want to CO." There is
a need for new pioneers to conquer
the new frontiers"
Mr.. Wallace's philosophic first sec
ton, Between Two Worlds" is SO
conducive to reflection that it is diff
cult to leave it for the later, more
concrete, sections on Changing the
Rules" and "The Agrarian Drive to
Change the Rules" Naturally, the
section on agricultural policy under
the New Deal is the heart of the book.
In it is to be found clear exposition
of the growing disabilities of the
farmer, who has slowly learned that
"the fundamental object of the tariff
was to help manufacturers, not farm
ers"; the various attempts unsuccess-
fully made to carry the farmer into
the new world, including the McNary-
Haugen craft of strange appearance,
which was sunk in 1923 under the
plea that it was q pirate ship" and
finally the relief, both accomplished
and proposed, under the agricultural
adjustment act. Here Mr.. Wallace
does not dogmatize or make extrava-
CANT claims, but he expresses the be-
lief that, if the act does not prove
sufficiently powerful and flexible,
Congress and the President will i'm
prove it. His explanation of the
cotton, wheat, corn and hog reduction
programs and the processing tax is
both the simplest and cleareSt this
reviewer has seen. The processing tax,
he says, is the farmers tariff, and
the farmer would be foolish to give
1t up, at least without an acceptable
substitute.
X \ X X
I WORKED FOR THE SOVIET. BY
Countess Alexandra TolStoy. Trans
lated by the author in collaboration
with Roberta Yerkes. New Haven:
Yale University Press
COUNTIES ALEXANDRA Toll
~ STOY was the one of Tolstoy's
children who most sympathized with
his social and religious ideas and was
his closest companion. She was with
him at the time Of his death in the
station masters apartment at Asta-
povo, not long after his tragic flight
from home. She has told the story Of
Tolstoyis domestic Life and its con-