The Wilmington morning star., 1941-01-18
Fair Enouuh
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER

ions expressed in this article
are those of the author and
may not always harmonic
with its position.-The Editor,
NEW YORK, Jan. l7.-It must
amuse the Communists and the
Nazis to observe the squirming Of
the American people in a desperate
struggle to escape communism and
nazism, which are pretty much the
same. The more we wiggle and
writhe the tighter our bonds are
drawn like the cords enmeshing
the victim of a ribald prank known
as the sack trick which the boot.
leggers sometimes practiced on
their friends in the days of prohibit.
ton. To free the world of this
dreadful thing and protect Ameri.
can civilization from it we resor..
to the very thing we loalhe and
fear, and it is only a wish and not
a promise to ourselves that when
the war is yer the people of the
United States will again b e
ranks and discipline as in 1918 and
1919. How can we ever know that
we have won the war, presuming
that we will 60 to war and win,
when by that time there will be
only a few minor peculia~ities to
distinguish u brand of govern
ment from that which We are so
determined to put down?
Does anyone believe seriously, l
wonder, that private ownership will
survive this war, when we have
been observing. already. in peace
time, eight years of unrelenting eli.
fort from the top of the govern
ment and all down through the de-
partments of the national admins.
tration to establish some form of
socialism?
Unable to Pay
The British, of course, will never
be able to pay what they owe,
and not only that but they them
selves will have socialism when 1t
is over, and will simply repudiate
the debt and use our own words 10
justify their ccctention that it never
was a debt at all but our W ex-
penditure to save our w Ameri-
can way. The cost of it all in
spending of u w and lending
or, more tr%uthfully, giving to Brit
ain will be such that it will be hope
less to try to carry on in the old
American way-the only way, in
cidentally, under which the Ameri-
can liberties a exist.
I suppose some leaders of labor
unions really do believe in their
dull, dumb way that it is a fine
thing to herd all the workers of a
huge nation together in two great
organization, or, better still, in one
organization. But the Communists
and Nazis must find Kumor in that,
knowing, as they do, what a handy,
compact force this would be with
which TO boss all labor from one
desk in one government office. Al
ready millions of patriotic Ameri-
cans are caught in unions-some
of them willingly and suspecting
no danger, others by force or CO.
ercion-and are now subject to Or
ders from above.
We find Sidney Hillman, a So
cialist of. some kind who has trav-
eled to Moscow, in command Of
labor's effort in the national de-
tense, and nowhere are there any
signs that the government repudi-
ates the Communists and party
liners in the labor board and other
departments. Gathered together in
the unions, labor now can be told,
and will be told, politely at first
and bluntly as time passes, to tor
get any frivolous notions that un-
ions, are free organizations
their w masters.
Must Please Government
The labor leaders, like the in
dustrial leaders in Germany, will
be allowed to keep their nominal
Authority only a long as they please
the government, and when private
ownership of industry has passed
labor, of course, will be employed
by the government and will obey
the boss as a patriotic duty. There
will be laws covering that problem
when the war is over.
In a very short time now opinion
in the press will be curbed in the
interests of the great national Ell
fort to preserve freedom of speech,
thought and writing, for already
the feeling is on the rise that
criticism of the President or re-
sistance to his plans is obstructive
and wrong.
Strange it is that so many OF US
see fascism or nazism in the mlndS
of those who oppose RECOMMENDATION
of men and the confiscation, by IN
direct means, of property, when
the record shows that fasclsm ana
nazism are based on regimenta.
ton and confiscation. And, OF
course, the Communists are delight
ed by every new step in the direc'
ton of fascism or naZism, because
after all, their ism differs only IN
the label.
We can't see it, because we are
so close to ourselves, but the enc
mics, including Russia d the
Communists here, can see that al
ready we have had to adopt their
own ways to deal W\h them on
even terms in QUIZ international re-
~lations. So, just as they took part
in the Spanish war, but only WIN
volunteers" and denied any lot
NAL participation. the United States