Evening star., 1936-07-22
This Patrick Henry-Carter Glass

episode has several important aspects.
One Is the earnestness of Senator
Glass convictions and his exactneSs
OF mind and his scholarship. Another
Is the incongruity of Senator Glass
as a Democrat being bound to the
New Deal-against his convictions,
and only by duress Of party solidarity.
Another is the possibility that the
New Dealers, either by their party
discipline or by their inanities. may
push Senator Glass a little too far;
if they do, he may repudiate ethem
and blow them out of the water in
a way that might have tangible effect
on the election in Virginia and other
Southern and border States.
How long can the South fail to see
what the duress upon Senator Glass
does not succeed in concealing? How
long can Southern editors and othsr
leaders of thought fail to tell their
people what Senator Glass knows,
namely, that the New Deal has taken
away from the Democratic party pre-
cisely those principles and traditions
which for 10 years caused the South
to cling to that party?
But to see this Patrick Henry epi-
sode as merely an incident in q politi-
cal campaign would be trivial. The
issue which Is before America today
is, with extraordinary exactness. the
identical issue in which Patrick Henry
became an American hero.
Centuries Of Struggle.
Henry was the last American leader
in a controversy that begun with
Magma Charta in the thirteenth GEN.
tury. The issue was the right of the
individual to be secure against oppres-
sion by government. 1t was a six-cen-
turies-long struggle to get more and
more liberty for the individual to take
more and more power away from the
king, away from the state, away from
government. 1t was a struggle to es-
tablish the principle that the individ-
ual has certain rights which are in
alienable, which not even government
can take from him.
That Is the whole history of the de-
velopment of constitutional govern
ment in Great Britain and America.
AS Woodrow Wilson phrased it, The
history of liberty is history Of the
limitation of government" AS Mr..
Bernard Shaw put it, Almost all Brit
ish constitutional safeguards are safe
guards against being governed" SHAW.
being Socialist, says that as an accu-
stion. I being not Socialist, quote it
as tribute)
Struggle Revived.
have said that in this struggle
Patrick Henry was the last American
leader. He was the last because until
now We supposed that he and his asso-
ciates had won the fight and won 1t
for all time. But today, after CEN
tury and a half of serene confidence,
we are to assent to a conception Of
government which takes much liberty
away from the individual and confers
great powers upon the Government to
compel the individual. After we had
come to think of the individuals rights
as comfortable heritage. coming to
us by virtue of birth in America, as
much to be taken for granted as the
air We breathe-We now find that this
freedom is a thing we must again
struggle for.
This is the real rendezvous with
destiny which this generation Of
Americans has. II quote the phrase
from Mr.. Roosevelts acceptance
speech, but it doesn't mean what he
implied it doesD To surrender liberty,
or to resume the struggle for it-that
is the choice which fate lays before
this generation of Americans.
use the word Liberty" as Patrick
Henry used it. Every American knows
what it means. Liberty means immu-
nifty from compulsion by government.
What Patrick Henry said was Give
me liberty, or give me death" He did
not say Give me economic security or
give me death" He did not say Give
me IL cents a pound for cotton or give
me DEATH He did not say Dictate
to me how much potatoes 1 can plant
or give me death" He did not say
Fix the price can charge for press
ing a suit or give me death"
Copyright. 1860