Minneapolis spokesman., 1962-10-05
The Anti-Intellectuals
Intelli igentsia?

Editors Note: This editorial was printed here
last week but garbled in the makeup of the
page. part of 1t appeared in one column and the
other paragraphs were found at the bottom Of the
next column. We had a number of complaints
about our poor proof reading and decided to
reprint this editorial In proper fOrm-we hope.
1t is nothing in this country that civil
rights should be under attack The classical Jeffer
sonian ideals upholding the human mind and spirit
have never been fully accepted and in many parts
of our country have never been accepted at all (Not
to dwell the point, but consider how the Negro
can testify to thsD
What is, or seems to be, new is the DEVELOPMENT
of body Of intellectual" opinion supporting the
positions formerly taken by the Know-Nothings, the
Ku Klux Klan, and the late Senator Joe Mccarthy
Recently referred to a remarkable commentary
in a magazine called the National Review, which
incongruously combines pretenses to intellectuasm
with worship Of the aforementioned Mccarthy The
National Review commentary denounced a very
large damage award to radio personality who had
been deprived of his livelihood by a campaign of
slander against him. 1t enormously asked If this
meant that you couldn't do this to people anymore
more recent and more remarkable assault
upon the basic civil rights assumptioned occurred
in column in the Minneapolis Tribune by Russell
Kirk the all-outest Of that curious stable of about
crept into the Tribune columns led by all-outist
Richard Wilson, chief Of the Cowles papers Wash
ington bureau.
Kirk reviews book about famed civil rights
case the Sacco and Vanzeth trial in which two pro.
fessed anarchists were executed in Massachusetts,
in the 1905 for a murder no informed person be.
neves they committed The book in question offerx
evidence (not proof that of the victims, Sacco
might have had guilty knowledge of the murder
There has never been credible evidence against
Vanzeth Of guilty knowledge of the murder
for which he executed.
On the basis of this new and circumstantial
evidence involving one of those who were put to
death, the Tribune columnist Russell Kirk chortles
that the liberals lie. defenders Of civil rights)
stumbled into trap of their own creation: that
they were too ready to defend a man who held un-
popular and extreme political opinions. The i'm
pcation is clear that Kirk believes that such people
are not entitled to the protection of the Bill of
Rights, that by embracing unpopular opinions they
sacrifice this right!
Such a position is indefensible. 1t is denial of
the basic assumptions upon which humanity depends
everywhere in the world-for that freedom Of the
person, the mind and the spirit which essential
to the full development Of the human personality.
1t has sometimes been remarked that certain
groups in America and especially Negroes, Jews
and recent immigrants, especially aggressive in
the defense Of their civil rights This is true and
the is that they have to be- 1t is for these
that the civil rights principles have been evolved
Unless they assert their rights, the rights dead
letters. In the South, the advocates Of civil rights
up against various degrees Of official and non
official violence, today In the north at least
no authority, reputable otherwise, would again
put his name to the papers and processes that sent
Sacco and Vanzeth to their deaths-unless, Of
course, the views of the Tribune columnist Russell
Kirk should begin to prevail in the north.