Evening star., 1944-02-20
Total Peace- n Postwar PLnn
Cubertson Proposes II United Regional Federations
BvChoy Ross


Culbertson's world organization plan as
set forth with wealth of supporting
argument in his Total Peace" Double
day, Doran), suffers from the very fact
OF its beautiful articulatien-that it
needs more play in the joints to be
workable in an imperfect world-and
yet to admire the authors ingenuity, the
assembled on the problems OF world
peace and the vigorous style in which
he expounds his ideas
Total Peace" cannot be brushed aside
as crackpotism. 1t is the work OF an in
teliigent, imaginative mind, and the fact
that the writer has been typed as a
bridge expert-"typed." as he disarm-
should frighten nobody away from the
book. Even if the federation plan itself
be dismissed as a mathematical tour de
force, incapable of being put into prac-
tical operation, there remains much OF
undenlahle value in CulbertSons anal
ysis Of the conflicting forces that have
somehow got to be reconciled if world
peace is to be achieved.
This is not to say that skepticism
about the workability of the plan is uni
versal among those who have studied
it. To the contrary, it has won an i'm
pressive lot of support. Prof. Charles
A. Ellwood of Duke University, formerly
head of the sociology department OF the
University of Missouri, says it is the
nnSt rerfect machinery vot deyiSe6 hv
the mind of man to prevent interna-
tional wars" and Hamilton Holt, former
executive director of the Woodrow Will
son Foundation, calls it "a striking, orig
inal, realistic and statesmanlike at
tempt to forecast and plan for the fu-
ture." Max Eastman says that Culbert-
son "hos boldly met all the seemingly
world federation and offered what seems
to me workable solution Of each.'
Dogged by Bridge Reputation.
Endorsements such as these followed
the first publication of the plan year
ago Total Peace" Celebrates and ex-
pains the plan.
In his 'presumptuous and awesome"
task of making blueprint for new
world order, Culbcrtson has been both
handicapped and helped by his fame
as a bridge expert He had to get over
the hurdle that confronts anybody who
steps out of the role In which he has
made his reputation-a hurdle particu-
larly high in the case of a man whose
fame rested on card-playing system
and who now proposed to create a sys-
tenn for world peace. But the advan-
tages. he says, were far greater than
the drawbacks. Bridge gave him time
and money for research: the promotion
of bridge, moreover, had enabled him to
test and improve his theories of social
psychology and mass propaganda.
Culbertson's father was all American
mining engineer who developed the oil
fields of Grozny in the Caucasus, his
mother the daughter of a Cossack gen.
eral. His early years were spent in Rus
sia. and while still in his teens he was
arrested for revolutionary activity by the
Cars soldiers and thrown into Jail in
Sochi, in the Caucasus
The family fortune having been ex-
propriated by the Soviet government,
he settled down in New York in the 20s.
Penniless, he decided to become "a sci
entiflc gambler in cards. He had
always been fascinated by "the bizarre
world of cards and had learned to play
bridge waile in the University of
Geneva in 1915. Taking up the game
seriously. he worked out his own system
and seldom lost
The plan provlces that the world shall
be divided into IL regional federatlons.
Nine OF these-Pan- American, British,
Latin European, Germanic, Middle Eu-
ropean. Middle Eastern. Russian. Chi
nese and Japanese-shall be sovereign
regional federations, and two-Malay-
sian and Indian-shall be temporarily
under the trusteeship respectively. of
the United States and Great Britain. 1t
is contemplated that these two shall
eventually, upon plebiscites become
sovereign federations. Each region is de-
scribed as "a natural economic, cultural
and psychosocial unit"
Each region consists of one or more
sovereign states, and these states retain
all their rights except one-the right to
wage war Of aggression.
In each region, the most populous
state is known as the initiating state
and this state may join the world fed
Grafton on behalf of it's region. When
two or more initiating states become
members, the world federation comes
into existence. If the most populous
state in any region fails to join the fed
Grafton, then after six months the next
most populous state may join on behalf
of the region.
With the exception Of Germany and