The Wilmington morning star., 1943-10-07
Bv RAYMOND CLAPPER

WASHlNGION.- Wnlte House
announcement says that President
Roosevelt visited the battlefield at
Gettysburg, Pa, Sunday.
Such a day must have given the
President new strength, and per-
haps a new sense of proportion
and a broader view about this war.
Autumn air was crisp, and the
sun was still warming where its
direct rays fell, and one drew new
energy from few hours out in
the day. But there is, of course,
more than scenery that l am talk
ing about.
When Winston Churchill address
ed the joint session of Congress on
May 20, he said he had been driv-
ing a few days before near the
field of Gettysburg which he knew
we'll. Mr.. Churchill said that al
though Gettysburg was the de-
cisive battle of the Civil War, yet
far more blood was shed after the
Union victory there than in all OF
the fighting that went before. He
said to Congress that it behooVed
us all to search our hearts and
brace sinews to contribute the
suffering and sacrifice that must
go into the victory.
Now is when the real II r
strength of Mr.. Roosevelt is need
ed, his vision. and his steadfast-
ness to that vision.
War planning has been largely
completed. Production and training
are well advanced, Just as it is
said that the time has come for
General Marshall to move on from
the work of preparation to the task
of directing the forces in battle,
so the time has come for Mi.
Roosevelt to move more completely
into the leadership in forging the
shape of the victory.
Lincoln held the union together.
That was the first purpose OF the
Civil War-to prevent the balkanl-
cation of America, and to make
this land, not another Europe with
its feuding little states. but one
great nation.
Secondly, Lincoln used the war
as a means of abolishing human
slavery. He did not believe the
union could continue indefinitely
half free, half slave.
This war is fought to insure the
security of America. But it also
is important to use the war as
means of advancing the cause of
human freedom. Free people are
less likely to make war of agrees
sion against us. A free world is
a safer world for all of us than
one in which Nazi and Fascist con-
quest and oppression Of individual
freedom is practiced.
You can ask Carl Sandburg and
lie will tell you how some sneered
at Lincoln because he wished not
only to save the Union but to make
the Union a nation of free people.
Today human beings are not sold
on the market block like cattle
nowhere in the civilized world-as
they were in downtown Washing
ton once. The Union was saved
and the sacrifice of that bloody
war was also used to break the
heaviest of human chains.
Out of this war can come Sc
curity, and enlarged freedom for
human beings. Out of it can come
a union of nations, and an end of
such regimes of terror and bru-
tality and such violations of hui
man dignity as have been charac-
teristic of the Nazi and Fascist
regimes.
Mr. Roosevelt, more than any,
one else, can bring that about. 1t
is only half victory if we learn
that the Oklahoma and Colorado
boys who died on the beach at
Salerno, and those who are buried
on the Southwest Pacific Jungle
islands, fought so that somebody
could hold what he had, or some
body else could get those coveted
little states back.
We want security. We want the
security and also the
deeper security that comes from
the banding together of free peo-
pies. We have millions of allies
in every land, countless millions