Evening star., 1936-04-12


danger-that the familiar American
conception of society and government
shall be superseded by a variation Of
the new conception that has been
spreading in Europe since 1917.
One reason for the public's failure to
grasp the danger lies in overstatement
of the danger itself. If partisan po-
litical orator says that President
Roosevelt is deliberately and con-
sciously trying to impose a new order
upon America, the public thinks it just
can't be so. and the public Is largely
right. President Roosevelt is not
making such an attempt in any for
NAL or continuous sense. The danger,
as respects Mr. Roosevelt, lies largely
in his temperamental zest for the
novel and the dramatic, and in his
preference for advisers who counsel
the novel and the dramatic and the
daring.
Even when the charge is made not
against the President personally. but
against some of his advisersLeven in
that case the charge is sometimes over
stated. Not all the Presidents ad-
visers, not even all the radical ones,
have the conscious purpose Though
some do) Of suppressing the American
tradition about society and govern
ment and setting up in its stead a
variation of the new European con-
ception. Some of the most radical ad-
visers would preserve. or think they
would, some parts of the American
system. And it is fact that the va
ration set up in America, II 1t should
come, would not be identical with
either Nazism, Fascism or Communism.
Just as these three differ from each
other, just as the new conception in
each country where it takes a foot
hold is modified to some extent by the
separate national traditions. so In
America the variation which would
come here would differ from all three
of the experiments in Europe.
Danger to America.
Even if nobody in the administra-
ton whatever had any intention or
wish of bringing to this country a va
ration of the European novelty: even
if the administration were in the
hands of persons thoroughly conserv-
ative, thoroughly devoted to the
| American tradition-even so America
would be in danger, as mere matter
of infection, from the new European
conception. The sheer existence of
the European conception constitutes
danger to America. We do not live
in vacuum: the world is in ferment
and the ferment touches us. The new
conception in Europe exists, and it
spreads. Beginning in Russia in 1917,
it spread to Italy in 1922, to Germany
in 1882 In a world as compact as
modern invention has made it, and
especially at time when the world is
in ferment, ideas are infectious. To
them, the Atlantic Ocean is no bar
rier The desire that America adopt
the European conception, or 6 part of
it, is widespread in many areas of
American life not related to the ad-
miniStration,
II Germany, or italy. or Russia, or
the three combined, we're attempting
by force of arms to impose on Amer
lea a new form of government. we
should all know it and resist. When
the danger comes in the form of in
lection by ideas. coupled with a sus-
ceptibility to the novel on the part of
the President and his advisers, we fail
to take alarm.
The average American is reluctant
to believe. Acceptance of the familiar
faith that what is will always be is
deep-Seated human trait. When dis
astrous imitation was at its peak in
Germany, lunched in Berlin with
German fiscal statesman He told
me he had lost all his money. I
asked him why he. banker all his
life, had not seen what was coming
and protected himself. He replied
that he could not believe such
thing could happen: all his life he
had taken for granted the soundness
of the German mark, he thought of
it as he thought of the sun or the
earth.
1t is in some sllc.l spirit that manv
Americans read Mr.. Sinclair Lewis
1T Can't Happen Here"-without
realizing that what Mr. Lewis really
means is not a negation but an af-
firmation-it can happen here. The
dispatches which today come out of
Berlin and Rome could after a few
years bear the date line of Washing
ton. The reader may think it utterly
preposterous that ir America there
should ever occur the things that m
Germany and Italy are frequent. The
reader thinks President Roosevelt
would never do sIch things, or coun-
tenance them-and President Roose-
welt would not. But some Of the in
novations the New Deal has set up,
and even more some that were at
tempted but were baked, have with
in them the GuaiIty of automatic
self-expansion. Unless they are ar
rested they go on, by forces within
themselves. to what we see in Europe
One device for patient enlightenment
of America should be careful restraint
from statement of the danger. I
may have committed over statement
myself. I have said or implied that
this danger constitutes the true issue
in the coming presidential campaign
Actually the tendency under way in
America could be arrested by any of
at least three developments. The ten
dency could be arrested If President
Roosevelt should dedicate himself to
preserving the American system and
by continuity Of purpose sustain that
dedication. The tendency could be
arrested by another agency; it could
be arrested If the Democratic party in
Congress should dedicate itself whole
heartedly to maintaining its own ira
ditions and rejecting the threatened
invasion from Europe-if the Demo-
Gratis should become wholly Democrats,
repudiating the New Deal. The ten
dency would be arrested, without
doubt. by triumph of the Republican
party and the conservative section of
thought in the November election.
XkI III u