Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1945-05-09
We Day Emotion
Questioned by Writer
Camoufaeine of Truth to Bring
on Other Wars, Says Lawrence
By Dapid Laurence


By Dapid Laurence
SAN FRANCISCO, May 9.-This is a
strange place to be writing about We
day, but perhaps, after all, It is the
most significant location in the whole
world from which to express ones dis
sent from the prevailing concept Of
We day.
AS encourage ment for the future as
satisfaction over what has already been
achieved, as an opportunity for prayer
and thanksgiving that big milestone
has been reached--as President Truman
has SO eloquently proclaimed-there is
reason for applause But what real
reason is there for rejoicing, for shout
ing, for carousing. for stopping work?
Will rejoicing bring back the hum
dreds of thousands who have been
killed? Will it restore the limbs Of the
manned, or heal the wounds of the
sick? Will it stop the fighting against
Japan? Will it help to prevent the
next world war?
These are the questions that one asks
today as the celebrations all around us
seem SO drab and artificial But it Is
precisely because we camouf1age truth
on We days" that we have such
things as wars. We like to sweep along
with so-called popular tides and let
emotion appear as the substitute for
reason. And that's why we keep on
ignoring the facts that lead to wars.
Out There in the Pacific.
Today, as I write this in a high
building which overlooks for~ miles
around the entire bay of San Francisco,
I see SO many ships moving slowly out
to sea, so many kinds of ships, so many
loaded down and so many coming back
to be reloaded, that I can think only
OF the war out there in the Pacific-ten
thousand miles away from our shores
We have won a war $500 miles away
IN Europe, but to win war nearly three
times as far away in the Pacific means
an unsung, yet unprecedented, opera
ton of supply and transportation so
colossal that it is really Undesirable.
Here in San Francisco, too, the United
Nations Conference is going on. Mil
lions of words are being written about
its phrases and its mar1euverings. Again,
emotion prevails-and a limitation on
truth-telling 1t is popular, of course,
to speak of the conference here as one
that is to make lasting peace" It is
considered desirable to emphasize such
progress as is being made and to avoid
telling the people the unpleasant truth,
which is that the charter being written
here is weaker by far and endeavors,
at least on paper, to do much less to
restrain the evil passions of would-be
aggressors and selfish powers than the
document drawn up 26 years ago in
Paris.
To those who make such observations
about the charter is flung back the
misleading retort that they are per
fectionists' They are told that the
old league tried to do too much" and
hence failed. Excuses and more ex-
cuses, alibis and more alibis, and still
not the whole truth.
What is the truth? 1t is that men
with pride and devilish passion, with
selflshness and greed, with an exag-
gerated sense of what military might
can do to make peace and scorn for
the power of moral force and spiritual
understanding, still rule this world and
run its conferences. Timidity such as
men on the battlefield never show,
hesitancy and even fear are the char
'acteristics in and about the United
Nations Conference.
Old Doctrines Stated.
One. had hoped that here at San
Francisco after ali the sacrifices of
heroic men, there would be new spirit,
that the swashbuckling attitudes of
power would be abandoned and that
governments would sit down together in
all humbleness and examine their own
consciences before they asked for po-
litical or economic terms of special
advantage to themselves. But they
boldly proclaim here that might makes
right, that the weak have less voice
because their armament is less, and that
the strong must be trusted to be be-
nevolent, even when actuated by self
interest.
Here they proclaim that human rights
are to be granted on paper but to be
brushed aside if they conflict with the
internal policies of any nation. Here
they state the same old doctrine that
internal affairs are sacrosanct, which
means that another Hitler and another
Nazi party can arise, suppress freedom
Of speech and freedom of worship and
mislead millions of people into war
Must the charter of conference of
nations ignore all this as purely an
internal" and hence a forbidden ques-
ton for worldwide inquiry and con-
demnation?
Some day the truth may force its
way through. 1t must first make a
shambles of this edifice of pretense
called diplomacy and this mechanism
of camouflage called expediency which
permits bubble and equivocation. Then
1t will be revealed clearly that because
powerful nations, like individuals,
often wish to become law unto them
selves, there has been no universal
peace.
We shall have peace only when peo-
ples-the ones who shed their blood
are permitted to have complete access
to each other through freedom of the
press and speech, and when the right
to insist on the truth is not impaired
by the coercive hand of totalitarian
governments or relationships anywhere
in the world.
Peoples can make peace and keep the
peace If they will make governments