Evening star., 1942-02-23
Calls on America
To Rise for Victory
Writer Urges Realization
Of FutiIity Of Profits
From Present Crisis
By w. H. HOrd.

By w. II. Hord.
Wake up America! We are not fight
ing! We are not alarmed for the safety
of democracy! We do not sense the
weakening grasp with which we hold
our liberties! We do not feel the tidal
waves undermining the very foundations
of our institutions! We do not sense the
awful blackout Of hope in the depths Of
the chasm just ahead!
We have not begun to fight because
we have not SenSed our danger. We
have not located our enemy. We have
not come to the hour of decision. We
do not fight to keep the sun rising, the
seasons changing, the rain falling, the
wind blowing and we have not distin-
guished these from democracy, freedom
of worship, freedom of person, free en-
terprise and all the other freedoms and
liberties that make this America!
But this type of mental blackout be-
lies centuries of history and throws the
infant of democracy helplessly and un-
defended into the struggle with the
demons Of oppression and human slavery
which have survived through all the
millenniums of time. My grandfather
was born only 40 years after the death
Of George Washington. He talked with
many people who had seen and known
the Father of Our Country-the father
of democracy! I was a grown man be-
fore my grandfather died and I am still
young mani But the institutions of
slavery and human oppression are as
old as time itself. 1t was only 166 years
ago-less time than may be Spanned by
two human lives-that our Declaration
of Independence was signed and it was
13 more years before basis for our pres
ent democracy was finally established.
Twenty three years later our democracy
had to be desperately defended once
more against attack from without. Less
than so years after this it barely escaped
destruction from within. Only 25 years
ago our will to defend free institutions
was again put to the test. And today
our democracy and the freedom upon
which it stands is more seriously threat
ened than ever before. Democracy does
not perpetuate men; men perpetuate
democracy Democracy does not live
where men do not defend it, nurture it,
cultivate it, groom it. 1t lives only in
the hearts of menl 1t dies when cast
aside!
America wake up! Our dreams are not
true! Our complacence is cowardly! Our
sense of security is hypocritical! Our
Inst QnH Oraad coIfchnoce
sanity! We are still recovering from a
depression when we ought to be fighting
for our very lives! We are still straining
for our per cent, 10 per cent, 20 per
cent profit-yea, as much profit as we
can get-of the shells, the planes, the
tanks, the guns, the ships, the uniforms,
the food and all the other necessities
with which the very life blood of de-
mocracy is being defended. We are
gambling human lives for profts-profits
that have no substance in reality! We
cry for higher wages which burden the
cost of defending America! We hike
rents which handicap the defense CEN
ters throughout the land! We storm the
halls of Congress for an extension of
social security while our national exist
ence is being threatened menacingly!
We bubble over our hours Of work as If
1t were pleasant vacation for the flower
OF American young manhood to face
death on the battlefield! We are working
| for profit when we ought to be fighting
for life, for freedom, for our homes, and
for a future that inspires hope and
vision and courage!
Wake up America! We have not begun
to fight! We are still trying to get rich!
! But what delusion! If we were base
enough to want profits from this mur-
derous war We should be sane enough to
recognize the impossibility. How can
in which the annual cost of producing
the implements of war, not to mention
the destruction which these implements
will inf1ict, is more than one-half our
| greatest nnualnational income? Howcan
profits be obtained from a struggle whose
| requirements at the outset are straining
our national resources to the breaking
point? How can profits be realized from
an increasing avalanche Of paper dollars
that buy less and less as there becomes
less and less to buy? There can be no
profits from this war! There can be only
losses! Our problem is not how to make
profits, but how to distribute the costs
Of war. Our present obsession for max
ing profits can only pyramid a fictitious
mountain of dollar marks which will
perpetuate for generations the problem
which ultimately must be met-that of
distributing the war losses. 1t is fool
hardy to be deluded by the fantasy of
war profits. This kind of thinking can
only create circumstances to follow hard
in the wake of the war which will be
more devastating to our economic and
social fabric than the war itself. Every
dollar borrowed and thereby pyramided
in the price structure is but an accumu-
lation and postponement of the ultimate
determination of the distribution of the
costs of this most destructive of all the
wars recorded in history.
Let's be honest and believe and act
what we know in our hearts to be true
War profits are but a mirage which will
fade and disappear before our very eyes
There can be no profit out of organized
universal mass destruction. Every day
we are being denied the very substance
of which profits are made. First it was
aluminium, then tires, then cars, then
radios, then refrigerators, and sugar, and
so ON until, If the war continues for q
long period we, as is already true of