Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1944-11-24
Letters to The Star
Pleads for Effective Union Now
For World Democracy
To the Editor OF The Star:

working for peace are not supporting
the one practical plan so far advanced
for that purpose.
That plan is Clarence Streit's proposal
for a federal union now of all demo-
| cratic nations. Those withholding their
support present the following objections
to the STREET plan:
l. The proposed federal union would
include only democratic nations. This
will offend certain states, who will
regard it as combination against
themselves.
2. Any organization which Is not
worldwide will divide nations into power
blocks instead of uniting them for
peace.
But are these objections valid? If
we examine them closely, we find they
show greater concern for peace" than
for that which we democratic peoples
prize much more highly than peace
namely, self government.
Now the obvious way to weaken any
cause is to keep its adherents divided.
Let the democracies remain separate,
and they are weakened thereby and
their influence in world affairs reduced
to minimum.
If the 48 States of the American
Republic were each separate and sover-
eign as were Norway, Denmark, Holland
and Belgium, they would have suffered
the same fate years ago. "In union there
is strength is the lesson of 1914 as
we'll as of 1887.
The pattern of growth for all con-
cepts in religion and government is the
formation of a few groups in scattered
areas to~promote them. These groups
then consolidate, forming center
around which others of like mind can
rally. If this consolidation fails to take
place, disintegration is apt to follow,
for the power of an ideal is never static.
1t is either waxing or waning,
Democracy obviously stands at this
turning point today For it is an I'M
deniable fact that, in 1919, the demo-
cratic nations, Britain, France and the
United States, stood unopposed In
Europe. Democracy itself was a high
the entire world. What brought the
democracies from this pinnacle down
to Munich, Dunkerque and Pearl Har-
Dor?
Lack of Unity a Weakness.
The reasons, of course, are many and
varied, but they all point to the same
answer-disunity. Those states which
stood for basic human rights and free
government We'd with one another for
power. Had they presented a united
front, Hitler never would have dared
challenge their combined strength.
The past four years have borne ter
rible witness to the folly of that dis
union. And If democracy today stands
on a lesser pinnacle than when Wood
row Wilson fired the hopes of all man.
kind with his plan for universal justice
in world safe for democracy" what
shall we see in the years to come?
That phrase, make the world safe
for democracy" recognized one in
escapable truth: Democracy will not
survive in world always at war, on
the verge of war or Keeling from the
effects of war. For democracy and war
are as oil and water. We have one
or the other, but We cannot. for any
great length of time, have both.
The mistake of 1919 was the failure
to recognize in democracy the only per-
manent cure for war.
To refrain from any course which
|. bought with blood, that now exist in
the scattered democracies, because we
fear to offend states dedicated to some
other ideal is to place the good will
of those nations above the principles
we hold dearer than life itself
This is the 1914 approach to the old
road marked Peace at any price
To refrain from a democratic union
because we cannot at once include all
nations is to forever preclude the pos
sibility of universal democracy-the
brotherhood of man. For nothing in
all history ever sprang like Athene
from the brain of Zeus, full panoplied
and complete. The child must precede
the man, as the union of present-day
democraeies must precede any universal
federal union.
Such a union would exclude no ma
tons as such. It's foundation would
rest on principles, not on nations. 1t
would guarantee its citizens the basic
rights without which elf-government is
impossible. There would be no attempt
to force democracy on those who prefer
other types of government, but the
union would be open to all peoples
willing to recognize and apply its funda-
mental principles.
And this great union" of democracies
would cooperate in every way as a
member of the United Nations, as the
48 United States cooperate today
through their Federal Government.
Peace on earth would be an accom-
plished fact, when, through their volun-
tary entrance, the great union" in
Guided all, or even majority, of the
nations of the earth. Tt would then be
government "of the people, by the
people, for the people" the world over
I+ JANICE HOLLAND.
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