Evening star., 1946-10-07
Peace and Man

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the other day by Justice Jackson at
the University Of Buffalo should be
required reading not merely for
Senator Taft and others of like mind
on the Nuremberg judgment, but
also for any thinking adult WHO
looks with anxiety on the upended
character of our time.
"When we seek to identify the
sources of catastrophe in modern
life," says Mr.. Jackson, 1--WE find that
the chief source is war. another is
tyranny-the oppression OF individ-
uals and minorities by governments
in power" The two evils. feeding
upon each other, are as ancient as
the human race itself, and there is
no guarantee that they will not
cause another global upheaval.
Seeing things as they are, Mr..
Jackson takes note OF the grim fact
that a large part of the world is
still ruled by relationships. In many
of their aspects, he observes, the
oppressive acts committed by such
governments constitute an internal
affair, but their effect can be so dis
ruptive externally and SO conducive
to war that tyranny on Sizable
scale anywhere is matter Of in
ternational concern" Indeed, for
his own part, he is convinced that
little progress can be made toward
permanent peace without solving
the problem Of protecting the ele-
mentary rights OF minorities."
Mr.. Jackson, however, is not al
together gloomy. He has hopes that
statesmen will pick up where the
lawyers have left off at Nuremberg,
that they will build on the principle
of nonaggression, that they will
adopt "at least a minimum of civil
rights for peoples everywhere" and
that they will make international
law really effective by henceforth
applying to their own countries the
standards and rules of conduct they
have applied to Germany in the
great precedent setting judgment
handed down through the four
power court at Nuremberg.
But the problem of ending war
and tyranny goes even deeper than
this. It involves the mental attitude
of man, his measurement of his own
worth and meaning. his own pur-
pose and ultimate destiny. Since
Darwin's day we have been living
in supermaterialistic age, with the
belief common that our beginning
and our end are here, that we are no
higher than the lower animals, that
We are born-like beast of the field
for nothing more significant than
to exist for a time, and to satisfy our
flesh as much as we can during that
time, and then to die and be merely
empty negation again in an eternity
of empty negation.
In strict logic, it is not many steps
from such belief to the conclusion
that the law of the jungle-the
might-makes-right philosophy, war,
tyranny-is perfectly valid, assum-
ing that there is sindeed nothing
beyond the grave. Many an "edu-
Gated man" in our time has assumed
this. The Goddess educated men"
among the Nazis assumed 1t and
carried it to its logical extremes. It
is why Mr.. Jackson feels impelled to
say that about the only thing mod
ern society needs to fear is the "edu-
Gated man"-the educated man"
whose nihilism, plus his atom bombs,
can be the finish of all Of us.
This is a fact that constitutes a
challenge to all educators: II this
world is to enjoy a lasting peace
there must be more than mere
learning; there must be commen-
surate wisdom as well-a wisdom
under which there will be a greater
spiritual content to existence and a
greater awareness by human beings
of their own peculiar worth and of
the solemn possibility that not
everything ends for them here.