Evening star., 1948-02-14
Mr.. Dewey on Foreign Policy

It Governor THOMAS r. dewey OF NeW
York is to be the next Republican presi-
dental nominee, as many believe, then his
Lincoln Day address In Boston becomes
the more significant and the more
heartening.
It was a good speech For an avowed
presidential candidate, ID was not overly
laden with politics. 1t contained no vote
seeking appeal to those prejudices and
fears among our people which are our
greatest internal source of danger. In
stead, the New York Governor faced up
to the grim alternatives which confront us.
He turned definitely away from the iso-
lationists and the policy they advocate
eve have followed that course before" he
said, "and it led to war. 1t always will"
He identified himself with those who take
the long view of our problem, advocating
that we agree to carry through our Euro
pean program, whether it takes three or
four years, and that we resolve to put into
it enough money to do the job. Il would
rather provide to such an organization the
full sum which has been requested" he
said, "than to limit it with an amount
which might fail to do the job"
Governor Dewey advanced two specific
proposals which are outside the program
contemplated by the Marshall Plan. One
calls for internationalization of the Ruhr,
something he has advocated for long
time. It is a proposal which is not with
out merit, the main question being whether
1t is not now too late for it.
The other proposal calls for new Euro
pean unity, new economic, political and
military unity. The argument which Gov
ernor Dewey makes for this and which
others have made, is highly persuasive.
And, indeed, much is being done in that
direction. In our turn, we, certainly,
should do everything that we can to foster
and promote it, provided only that what
we do in this connection must not serve
to defeat our primary aim of curbing Com
munist expansion.
Governor Dewey's language on this spe-
cific point is a little vague. He would write
the objective of European unity into the
aid legislation, and he urges that "the
amount of aid we give should then be spe-
cifically related to the progress made to-
ward the goal of unity for free Europe"
If this means that there should be no
aid until there is unity it probably would
be a self-defeating proposition. If it
means, however, that we should endeavor
in every feasible way to direct our assist
ance toward the fostering of unity, the
proposal has great deal to commend it.
There has been some misinterpretation
of one aspect of the speech. After re-
viewing the series of futile conferences
with Russia and the concessions made to
Russia to keep her in the war, Governor
Dewey said: "The policies of the pres
ent national administration which have
overheard lock, stock and barrel" There
is politics in this, and it lends itself to
the Interpretation that Governor Dewey
was repudiating the administrations pres
ent policies. But that is not the case, for
as Governor Dewey knows, and as his
whole speech reveals, the policies which
he was criticizing have long since been
thrown overheard.
This administration is no longer trying
to appease Russia, no longer trying to buy
Russian cooperation with ll-advised con-
cessions. The error of that has been seen,
and the effort now is to resist and contain
Soviet aggression. 1t will be long, hard,
dangerous pull, and it is a good thing to
have the New York Governor take his
stand with other enlightened Republican
leaders behind what must be a national,
not partisan, undertaking.