Evening star., 1952-06-14
Hope for the EnsIoved

Given the present state of the world the
chances are that the Williamsburg Declaration
OF 1852" will not be translated into an operating
reality for long time to come. Nevertheless,
because men everywhere and at all times in
stinctively yearn for freedom, there is good
reason to hope that the children of the signers
of this declaration-if not the signers them
selves-win one day see its principles actively
applied in the lands now enslaved and terrorized
behind the Iron Curtain.
Proclaimed in WilliamSburg'S restored House
of BurgesseS, where 176 years ago the historic
Virginia Convention adopted the substance of
our constitutional Bill of Rights, these principles
constitute the great bulwark of our own Ameri-
can democracy. They are principles, of course,
that are absolutely indispensable to any system
of ordered liberty anywhere the face of the
globe. Where they exist and are honored and
enforced, tyranny cannot establish itself or
take root and flourish. That is why the Krem-
lin has eradicated them, even in their most
embryonic forms, in every once-independent
country that has been subverted by the Red
totalitarians and forced into Soviet slavery.
The new Williamsburg declaration has been
solemnly drafted and signed by distinguished
men who represent the exile forces of ten such
lands-Estonia Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ro-
mania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, AL
bania and YugoSlavia. OF these ten only the
latter has succeeded in lberating itself from the
Kremlin, but it is still-in its own fashion-a
country governed by Communist dictatorship.
Accordingly. although it is in a special status
calling for sympathetic help from the free West
plus an effort to persuade Marshal Tito to
develop a rule of non-totaltarian law-the
Yugoslav nation must be numbered among
those that the declaration rightly describes as
being oppressed by regimes which deny to
indo
of the blessings of their homes, their liberties,
their national traditions and their democratic
institutions
What the declaration pledges is that these
lands, w1ten they are liberated, will enjoy new
birth of freedom. They will have governments
Of, for and by the people-governments based
strictly on the principles of genuine democracy.
That is to say, they will be rid of such evils
as the secret police, concentration camps, forced
labor, trial by torture and intimidation the de-
struction of basic property rights, suppression of
liberty Of speech, religious persecution, and in
general the tyranny of any minority clique
over the majority, or tyranny of the majority
over the minorities.' In addition once they
are their own masters again, these nations will
join with their neighbors in the great task Of
organizing United States of Europe.
But all this can happen only when they
are liberated" That is the essential precondi-
tion Unless and until the captive countries are
freddy either internal or external pressure
the williamsburg Declaration of 1852" will stand
simply as the expression of hope and promise.
Yet both the hope and the promise, appealing
as they do to the hearts desire of most men,
are powerfully inspirational, and in time-even
If the time is long-they must surely be full
filled. To think otherwise is to doubt that
freedom is stronger than tyranny or that the
truth will not triumph ultimately over the
monStrouS totalitarian lie.