Evening star., 1942-03-22

William Beverage Is acVocatlng Tor
Great Britain.
Nor, it may be surmiSed, do the Ameri-
can people as whole want either the
weakening of present trade-union struc-
ture which proposed amendment of the
wage hour law would unquestionably
involve, or the imposition of the rigid
maximum on profits which is suggested
as an Offset. So 1t Is not admiration OF
totahtarian doctrine but primarily the
inexorable pressure of war needs which
is forcing America toward road par
allel to those travelled earlier by Ger
many and Russia.
Varying Attitudes.
Some manufacturers might welcome
the elimination of free trade uniOniSm,
but not if it were coupled with further
sharp encroachment on the profit sys-
tenn. Some labor leaders might well
come per cent ceiling on all COM
pany profits. but not if pay envelopes
simultaneously become SO thin that there
is no surplus therein for union dues.
If they thought their authority would
in consequence become permanent some
politicians might approve the further
step, advocated by Sir William Bev-
eridge, of eliminating all politics in war
time. But neither party would favor
cancellation of the November elections
if such a move threatened the continu-
alton of parliamentary government,
which 1t would.
It is because Americans detect the
steady trend toward regimentation. and
do not like it, that for the present we
shall try to finesse the 40-hour issue by
such compromise endeavors as the great
production drive now sponsored by Don
aid Nelson That wholly voluntary ef-
fort is undoubtedly the American way.
Every one hopes it will achieve the re-
suits which are so clearly essential.
But if it fails to do So in all prob
ability other measures will be applied.
The Decline of the West" is not less
a remarkable book because its author
was a disagreeable German, named
Oswald Spengler. who at the close of
the last war predicted with astonishing
accuracy the outline of the events which
have characterized world history since
then. Nor can Spengler, whose writ
ings were banned by the Nazis, justly be
called Nazi sympathizer because he
predicted the advent in Germany of
somebody like Hitler long before Hitler
himself had ever gained a newspaper
headline.
Estates" or Vested Interest. =
In his chapters on the development
of modern nations Spengler points out
that estates" originally characterized
by the priesthood and the nobility, were
established long before the rise Of the
state as a political organization. A de-
cisive turn in history, says Spengler,
came when mercantile groups, not con-
nected with the old estates, set up the
state in place of the feudal system.
But the idea of the estate has fingered
within the modern state and has even
gained ground so that in a democracy
well-organized groups, such as manufac-
turers, labor unions, farmers, even asso-
Citations of war veterans, compete with
each other for special privileges regard
less of the well-being of the people as
a whole.
So, says Spengler, the state does not
reach its pure form" until the concept
of the nation rises above that of class,
creed or special interest and until gov
ernment becomes absolute, not in the in
terest of any individual or group but in
that of the whole community.
Spenglers argument springs to mind
on reading the assertion of Sir William
Beveridge that in England it is now time
"for the state to take direct RESPONSE
bility for the control OF vital industries
and for the distribution of income" It
springs to mind as one follows our heated
domestic debate over the justification Of
parity prices" and the 40-hour basic
week during time of national peril.
While we do not can them estates"
that is how Spengler would define our
farm, our labor and our manufacturing
interests, at least when organized each
in its own behalf. And in the tendency
to demand that all be ruthlessly subordi-
mated to single national will, this Ger
man philosopher would see what he else
where calls inevitable and irrevocable
evolution"
At the moment it Is Donald Nelson's
heroic task to prove that Spengler's
gloomy prophecies, valid though they
may have been in Germany, do not hold
for the United States.