The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1954-04-30
An Open Letter To Our
Congressional Delegation
Gentlemen

Gentlemen:
This letter is being written for the
purpose of determining your point of
view, and what you intend to do about
the present administrators policy
toward sending American boys to be
slaughtered on oriental battlefields.
There are many issues involved in
the coming election that are going to
be kicked around, harped on, and made
much of. We all expect to hear the
same old reverberations of hot air
and hokum; the same old allega tions,
accusations. and innuendoes that we
have repeatedly heard in the past.
This we accept in the spirit of politi-
cal tradition; this we look forward
to as spectators ready and willing to
enjoy the biennial monkey business
of political campaigning. Right now,
however, there are few people in a
laughing mood.
In the past most of us measured
the value of our vote by what it would
not do to our pocketbook. But of late
things have happened in the United
States that have implicated much
more than the pocketbooks of the
people The lives of thirty thousand
American young men have been sacri-
ficed in Korea in a struggle that was
supposed to make the Koreans free
and the United States more secure.
The United States is not any more
secure, and the Korean people have
been, and are at this time, subjected
to a sovereignty as brutal and tyran-
meal as any in the history of modern
times.
INSULT TO OUR INTELLIGENCE
To call the South Koreans under
Singham Rhee, or the Nationalist
Chinese under Chang kaiShek, or the
Indo- Chinese under the French, a free
people is a mockery that transcends
all mockery. 1t is a braZen insult to
the intelligence of the American peo-
pie.
The American people haven't exerted
too much opposition to many things
that they perhaps should have. For
the most part they have not objected
to heavy taxation, believing it a neces-
sary function for their military Sc
curity. They have paid little heed to
the legions of legalized larceny who
are pilfering their inherent rights in
power, oil, and other natural resources.
These things they have tolerated, con-
sciously or unconsciously.
But there is one issue that nearly
all the people concur in: They defin-
itely condemn the further sacrifice of
the lives of their sons, brothers, and
husbands in the syphilitic and leprous
ratholes of oriental conflict. To this
frightful alternative they say NO al
most unanimously.
They say NO, but have no oppor-
tunity to make their sentiments known
except by demanding emphatic and
clear declarations of policy about
those issues from their bonafide con-
gressional representa- tiVeS. To this end,
and for this purpose, the following
questions are respectfully submitted
to the Montana Congressional Delega-
ton:
DO you. or do you not, favor the
of American boys in
il orea, or any other part of Asia where
the actual security of the United
States is not involved!
Will you, or will You not, oppose
the participation of American boys in
oriental wars, including IndO-China,
Korea. or any other part of Asia where
the actual security of the United States
is not invOIveds
These are unequiVocal questions that |
deserve unequivocal answers. They are |
not framed in the tricky phraseology |
Of legerdemain, but in the plain, ord1-
nary down-to- earth language of the |
common man. They should be answered |
as plainly and concisely as they have
been offered.
The American people, and more par
.icularly the people of Montana, have
the right to know what their repre-
,entatives think about these things.
they have a right to know WHAT
THEY INTEND TO DO, AND WHAT
THEY DON'T INTEND TO DO. They
must have answers that are under
,tandable and to the point; answers
hat leave no room for speculation,
loubt or onfusion.-JOHN D. LUCK
GY, Billings.