Imperial Valley press., 1943-06-22
ONE WORLD
AND WIllKlE

HNO WtLLNlL
More than a million copies of Wendell
Wilkes book "One World" are reported
to have been sold, and the demand reput-
edly continues.
This means that if an average of four
persons have read each copy, and if
leadership i'm libraries maintains its regu-
lar percentages with respect to best sell
ers, than anywhere between five and ten
million pople ana maybe more will have
been affected, before the year is up, in
greater or lesser degree by this one en-
trancing volume.
Such attention is fully deserved. With
out doubt, it will accomplish one of the
greatest feats of public education on rec
ord because in the last analysis it is an
effort to 'sell' to the American people
a fact which no one has been able to
get across to the masses, and which
century might have been needed to make
part of national consciousness.
That fact is that in peacetime as well
as in wartime any Semblance of iSola-
tiOniSm is unthinkable.
Mr. Willkie,, by narrative more than
by treatise and argument, shows the
American reader who may never have
been more than so miles from home IN
his life, that American business and agri-
culture and policy no longer can be gov
erned by the old rules but are just as
much a part of the world of tomorrow
as a farmers life is a part Of his own
school district.
He shows how easily all parts of the
world are reachable by plane. Travelling
with him, the reader finds peoples of
the world thinking in terms of the .peo-
pie of all other countries, and especially
the United States, and understands why
the postwar economy of all nations Is
being interviewer into one economy OF
one world.
At one blow, Willkie gives the Ameri-
can people a consciousness of lnterna-
tional relations which was never achiev-
ed by the efforts of all leaders of this
century. Roosevelt with his good neigh
Dor policy couldn't and didn't accomplish
it. Most people just went along with
Roosevelt, believing he was on the right
track in general sort of way. But Mr..
Wilkie makes us feel as if we are long
time cosmopolites acquainted with each
and all countries, their rulers, their peO-
pies and their thinking.
The reader cannot but be aghast at the
artfulness of this man Willkie. No one
suspected him of being such capable,
clearcut. expert writer. He made no pre-
tense of being trained observer of world
affairs or experienced commentator on
international relations.
But he proved to be just those things.
This man who lifted himself by his
bootstraps, was tossed into presidential
race without claim to political training,
suddenly decided to study this thing
called "The World of Today and Tomor-
royr'' op6 went after tho task with fpar-
less, notwithstanding, mental thirsti-
ness.
If he entered as novice he certainly
emerged as an authority. That this was
not without effort is evident throughout
the book. That he has superior mental
ity able to perceive hidden meanings,
quick to catch crafty implications, able
to talk with crowds and keep his virtue
and walk with kings and not lose the
common touch =. all this is also evident.
Anyone who reads Zone World" can
not avoid certain personal conclusions
about its author.
Willkie is a more capable man than
many suspected Wilikie, if ne ever gets
to be president, will be prepared; Willkie
has certainly increased public respect
of him: and no matter what the future
holds, he will have performed a greater
service for the people of this country
than many who are recognized through
history as national and heroic figures.