Draft Chapter I -- Overall Report

October 29, 1957

# CHAPTER I

## AMERICAN HORIZONS TODAY

### I

Throughout history, nations have had difficulty in understanding the transformations through which they were living. For history appears as a series of continuous occurrences, and the perspective which will give it a pattern and a meaning is lacking to contemporaries. Each generation must strive amidst the confusion of its present to establish a continuity with the past and a sense of direction into the future. It must seek to distinguish the momentous from that which is merely of the moment; to single out that which is critical from the multiplicity of events by which it is assailed.

Nothing is more difficult than to exercise this sense of historical discrimination. The past often gives the impression of an inevitable progression because each accomplished action sets in motion a train of events which soon obscures the alternative courses of any moment. The present, on the other hand, is desperately aware of the complexity of its alternatives and often at a loss for the sense of direction which alone can resolve them. History records only the final choice, not the anguish which preceded it. It is only when a society contemplates its own future that it comes to realize that there was nothing foreordained about its past. Its achievement reflected the strength of its purpose. Its ability to master its challenge derived from the strength of its convictions.

reflected the strength of its purpose. Its ability to master its challenge
rose that there was nothing to be gained about its best. Its achievement
it is only when a society contemplates its own future that it comes to re-
History records only the final choice, not the action which preceded it.
and often at a loss for the sense of direction which alone can resolve them.
on the other hand, is deliberately aware of the complexity of its alternatives
which soon obscures the alternative courses of any moment. The present
diffusion because each accomplished action sets in motion a train of events
discrimination. The best often gives the impression of an inevitable pro-
 nothing is more difficult than to exercise this sense of historical
which is critical from the multiplicity of events by which it is assessed.
the momentous from that which is merely of the moment to single out that
best and a sense of direction into the future. It must seek to distinguish
arise amid the confusion of its present to establish a community with the
pattern and a meaning is looking to contemporaries. Each generation must
series of continuous occurrences, and the heretofore which will give it a
transformation through which they were living. For history abounds in a
Throughout history, nations have had difficulty in understanding the

I.

AMERICAN HORNS OF TODAY

CHARTER

October 29, 1957
Drew Cheseley L - General Secretary

October 29, 1957

- 2 -

As the twentieth century nears the end of its sixth decade, America confronts a world in swift and often turbulent change. Both within our borders and beyond, enormous transformations -- in human aspirations, in the structure of society, in economic development, in scientific knowledge -- are reshaping the pattern of existence at a speed without parallel in history. And these upheavals occur not only in the form of big, dramatic events, but also and perhaps predominantly as a series of almost imperceptible changes -- as a slow social drift, the final impact of which may nevertheless affect our destiny and that of the rest of the world as profoundly as the moments of terrible crisis.

It is as much in dealing with the challenge of these unclear and ambiguous trends of evolution as in coping with the explosions of revolution that we will be tested in the future. Indeed in terms of understanding and so mastering the flux of events, the challenge of the seemingly small may pose more of a problem to our sense of historic identity and purpose than that of the big. For fate has not prepared us for the subtle nature of much of the contemporary challenge. Inhabiting a vast continent immensely endowed with natural wealth, we have concentrated our domestic efforts on a prodigious struggle to tame our environment. Protected until yesterday by the great oceans, our international security has been satisfied by a temporary mustering of interest to meet recurrent but passing overt threats. And having subdued our environment and bested the international threats,

October 29, 1957.

we are tempted to believe that any crisis can be resolved by sheer force of
effort.

The task before us is to understand that even though national power
will never be more important, the challenges henceforth may defy the simple
exercise of effort and power. Indeed the recognition of a challenge may be
as important as and even more difficult than the solution of it. For the
problems ahead do not involve material considerations alone. They are,
instead, preeminently problems whose complexities lie in their non-material
aspects. At home, the task of the future no longer lies so much in conquering
the physical environment as in giving meaning to this conquest. Abroad, the
challenge is not merely that of war, trade, or even international prosperity,
but that of a world seeking new values, new purposes and new institutions.

Thus the overriding problem of the future will be our ability to select
the proper challenges and to meet them with determination, dignity and purpose.
For the characteristic feature of a revolutionary period such as the present is
the disintegration of many traditional ways and beliefs of life. The recurrent
shock of our age is the realization that concepts and patterns of action of a
more secure past no longer have their accustomed dependability or even
relevance. We live in an age in which choices are not only crucially important
but agonizingly uncertain. But choice without purpose leads to paralysis or to
fitful or erratic behavior. And power without a sense of direction may drain
our life of its meaning if it does not destroy humanity altogether. Our problems

October 29, 1957.

- 4 -

therefore require for their solution not only great effort and skill, but even
more importantly great conviction. And our opportunities -- which are the
other side of our problems -- depend not only on a state of fact, but also
on a state of mind.

It may seem a strange proposition that America can master its future
only by searching its soul. To many peoples in other lands America appears
to stand on a pinnacle of wealth and power, and to be occupied only with the
material problems of each. Even to many Americans, the great issues of
the future seem essentially those of practical management rather than of
philosophic or spiritual inquiry. But we would be wise to regard our material
achievement with humility and to consider that it defines a duty, rather than
offering a respite. No society can rest on its accomplishments. History
bears witness to the decay of many great nations who sought their future in
their past or their present in the material triumphs. It is the tragedy of
history and its glory that no exertion can ever be final, that no society can
ever be spared the task of learning anew the meaning of its existence.

II

What then are some of the prospects before us?

Let us look first at our domestic situation. As we examine the broad
outlines of the American domestic future of the next two to three decades

October 29, 1957

- 5 -

a paradox strikes us: where most of the world remains still oppressed by
the gulf between its aspirations and reality, the U.S. faces the problem that
in many areas of national life reality has caught up with its aspirations.
Today the overwhelming majority of Americans are, or soon can be, com-
fortably fed, clothed and housed. The steady increase in American produc-
tivity has not only eliminated much of the physical misery with which our
forefeathers had to cope, but has endowed us with a hitherto unimaginable
amount of leisure and opportunity for education and creative effort.

And the achievements of the past point the way to still greater
accomplishments to come. For our economy has been growing at an explo-
sive rate. Since 1950, American business enterprise has been adding to its
productive equipment at the rate of approximately $25 billion a year, a feat
equivalent to reproducing annually all the assets of General Motors, Stand-
ard Oil (N.J.), Ford, U.S. Steel and General Electric. If the American
business community continues to grow at this rate for another two decades
it will add over half a trillion dollars to its plant and equipment -- a figure
which rivals the estimated value of our present entire stock of national
wealth -- the land, machines, houses, cars and grain which comprise our
economic riches.

The effect of this huge addition to our physical capital will be to
exert an enormous leverage on our production. Looking backwards at the
leverage of past capital growth, we find that while our total labor force is

October 29, 1957

- 6 -

is now eight times greater than it was a century ago, the national income
is 25 times greater. In the past half-century, the average output per man
hour has tripled each decade. By 1975, the effect of our present rate of
accumulation can be to boost our gross national product from $390 billions
in 1955 to $814 billions.

This forecast, it must be clearly stated, is not a prediction of what
will be, but of what can be. It outlines the opportunity that lies well within
our capabilities; it provides the blueprint for an economy for which we have
all the necessary material, energy and skills. Our task is to convert this
possibility into an actuality.

But what does this opportunity mean to the individual citizen? By
1975 our population is likely to have reached a level of 220 millions. Despite
this tremendous increase in the number of people who must share in our out-
put, if our present rate of growth continues, the average income per family
or household will be approximately $7,500 in terms of today's dollar evalu-
ation. This figure must be regarded not merely as a crude increase over our
corresponding average income of about $5,500 today; it must also be con-
sidered in the light of other expected characteristics of the 1975 economy.
There is no doubt, for example, that it will be earned in a work week of 35
hours or less, for the trend of worktime has shown a steady decline in the
past six or seven decades. It may further be assumed that it will be under-
pinned by a greater amount of welfare services, and that it will be more

October 29, 1957

-7-

dependable than present incomes by virtue of more effective public control
over economic fluctuations.

But what is significant here is not just the quantitative aspect of
these figures. It is the qualitative value of the level of life which such fig-
ures make possible. For this potential income for the typical American family
must be viewed against the background of the fact that in 1954, the average
income for all _professional_ and _semiprofessional_ families in the U.S. was
just slightly more than $7,300, and that of so-called _managerial_ families was
slightly less than $7,500. Thus the promise of 1975 is the elevation of the
American people to an economic level where the average family will enjoy
an income comparable to that of the upper middle class today. It is the first
approach to a society in which the average person may enjoy not merely the
perquisites of civilized existence but a modest share of its luxuries as well.
Such a social environment has never before existed save for a limited sector
of any community. Its realization will add a new dimension to social experi-
ence.

This extraordinary possibility, we must again point out, is our tar-
get, not our assured terminus. For reasons with which other chapters of this
report will concern themselves, it may not be reached. Yet however great
the difficulties of attainment, it remains the true measure of the _opportunity_
before us. It is not, let us hasten to say, a vision of Utopia which we pro-
ject. Even if our goals are reached, 1975 will be far from a perfect society.

October 29, 1957

- 8 -

Laggard sections of the community will undoubtedly remain. Great and necessary works will still need to be performed. Troublesome, perhaps even grave problems of economic policy will assuredly assert themselves. Nevertheless these hard realities at best obscure the underlying achievement. If the American economy performs according to its capacities, we shall have created a society different in kind, as well as degree, from any heretofore.

Yet, it may well be that the gravest problem of all lies not in a failure to achieve our objective but in the problems inherent in success itself. There is a danger in the natural feelings of national pride and self-satisfaction which the vision of a society of near-universal well-being inspires. This is the peril of failing to understand that in a world of poverty our wealth can be justified only by the moral concern with which we employ it. It is the danger that we may confuse _more_ with _better_, and assume that because we have brought about an environment of relative plenty, that this is an end in itself.

It will not be. Indeed, if the prospect of a society of well-being "solves" some age-old questions of economics it opens new questions of a still deeper nature. There is not, in a society of abundance, the same easy rationale for the single-minded pursuit of private gain, or for the high estimation of economic activity itself, which prevails in a society still coping with the exigencies of want and need. In the past, America has not had to ask itself the purpose for which it worked so hard, saved so much, built so

October 29, 1957

-9-

furiously: the answer was apparent in the needs of the people themselves.
But when those needs have been met and more than met, when additional
economic effort no longer administers to the satisfaction of basic wants,
but caters increasingly to trivial ones, the question of the purpose of eco-
nomic activity itself cannot so easily be evaded.

For the real justification of our domestic achievement is not the mere
creation of wealth for wealth's sake, but the bringing into being of a society
in which each individual may realize to the full whatever capacities for self-
expression he may possess. The material mechanism of American society
must be made the servant of life and not its master; it cannot be the goal
of our striving, but the tool which gives this effort meaning both here and
abroad. Otherwise, we will inevitably succumb to the nemesis of too much
leisure, too much prosperity, too few challenges. Our transcendent domes-
tic challenge, therefore, is to our imagination and vision. Henceforth the
question of *quality* will assume a higher degree of importance than quantity;
the meaningfulness of work will be worth more than its monetary tag. With
the solution of many of the problems of want, we will have the means and
the motive to turn our attention away from an absorption in wealth. America's
internal need at mid-century is to define a new concept of frontier, to find
new scope for the national genius heretofore directed to the economic conquest
of its environment.

October 29, 1957

- 10 -

III

And yet our domestic problems and opportunities are dwarfed by
the challenges of the world beyond our shores. Our domestic environ-
ment is fast changing, but the continuities of the past give it stability.
Abroad even more rapid changes are taking place in a fearful absence of
continuity. In some nations standards and institutions which have re-
mained unchanged for centuries are now disintegrating. In others, mil-
lions whose lives have hitherto been zeros are now restively clamoring
for a new and meaningful existence. Thus Western Europe, the fountain-
head of our civilization and for centuries the arena of world affairs, has
lost its position of pre-eminence and is painfully readjusting to its new
circumstance of diminished influence. Across the great land mass of
Eurasia and on the continent of Africa, new nations are rising in the place
of colonial empires.

These transformations raise issues of philosophical even more
than of political import: every such great change requires an adjustment
of the theoretical framework of ideas. For Europe the philosophic task is
to find a new dignity and historic purpose in a world where it can no longer
entirely command its own destiny, much less that of its past empires. For
the newer nations, the philosophic task is to replace the exhilaration of
the struggle for independence with less dramatic but more permanent

October 29, 1957.

- 11 -

motivations capable of perpetuating the freedoms so hardly won. In any age such transformations of national attitude would be difficult and the inevitable tensions which must accompany them would be dangerous. But in our times the difficulties and dangers are compounded by a truly formidable set of new conditions.

First and most apparent of these is that the world's quest for values and purposes is taking place on a stage over-hung by the shadow of two dark realities: the existence of the powerful and hostile Soviet bloc, which is eager to exploit all dissatisfactions for its own ends; and the deadly peril presented by the new weapons technology, which is literally capable of obliterating all civilization.

A second and no less complicating factor is that the problems of the current international transformations have gained urgency as distances have shrunk and states have grown increasingly interdependent. For the first time in history, international relations are truly global. Until relatively recent times, for example, the hemispheres were sharply divided. The ancient civilizations of India and the Far East developed independently of western culture; they were virtually unknown to the classical Greeks and Romans, and in the Middle Ages impinged only slightly on the occidental consciousness. Indeed, it was not until the outbreak of World War II that "history" ceased to be made almost exclusively by the major European and American powers. Today the hemispheres are inseparable and isolated states no longer exist

October 29, 1957

- 12 -

anywhere on earth. The crucial fact is that every country on earth is a part of something bigger than itself. When ideas can circle the globe in a matter of minutes, when missiles are being designed to carry destruction to distant targets thousands of miles away, when self-sufficient economies are extinct, it is evident that no national state can stand alone -- not even the United States of America. Henceforth the foreign policy of every state must begin with the premise that its degree of international involvement and vulnerability is total.

Yet another factor which has altered the character of international relations throughout the world is that the conduct of diplomacy is no longer exercised as the privileged activity of an elite social or professional group. Foreign policy has become democratic; its implications reach into every aspect of national existence; the nature of its objectives and the effectiveness with which they are pursued are determined by the strength and dynamism of the popular support behind them. In its deepest sense the foreign policy of any great nation stands as a symbol of that nation's total purpose and character. Even when its avowed objectives are limited, its unavowed objectives are the hearts and minds of mankind.

For our American nation the effect of this far more dangerous, more interdependent, more democratically responsive climate of international life is to heighten the importance of something which is anterior even to our international policy. This is our international philosophy. Before we can

October 29, 1957

- 13 -

hope to assist in the transformations now gripping the world we must under-
stand the basic issues which those processes of change involve.

Thus we must recognize, for example, that the "revolution of rising expectations" which is sweeping vast areas of the globe is far more than an economic phenomenon. It is the quest of man for independence, the demand for participation in decisions that affect his own destiny, the stirring of political, economic and social aspirations within hitherto dependent and underdeveloped lands. In such countries the collapse of colonialism and the swift transition from an agricultural or a tribal society has been a disrupting process. Like all successful revolutionaries the leaders of the newly independent states find that the overthrow of the previous system is not the end of their task but the beginning, and that the effort to build a new state requires purposes and skills different from those which achieved independence. A revolution breeds habits of opposition which can sometimes be channeled only with difficulty into tasks of construction. It creates the illusion that all problems can be dealt with by the same impatient methods which proved so useful in overcoming the early obstacles to independence. This impatience may create a psychological climate in which the promise of immediate solutions may seem more important than the safeguarding of freedom. Unless the newly independent peoples recognize the relevance of democratic principles to their lives, it may require the harsh reality of communist enslavement

October 29, 1957.

to bring home the fact that material progress soon becomes hollow and meaningless unless coupled with respect for the dignity of the individual. By then of course it will be too late, either for the victims or the rest of the world.

What we must also recognize, in the delicate and sometimes disheartening task of assisting the transformation of the formerly colonial states, is that their revolution is the outgrowth of our own traditional concepts regarding freedom and the dignity of man. Most of the leaders of these states were educated in the West and drew their inspiration from the tenets of the British, French and American revolutionaries who preached the doctrine of the inalienable "right" of self-government. Thus the upheavals in the newly independent states and in those still under colonial rule represent one of the greatest conversions in history. As the political principles of the colonizers regarding the nature of human liberty became diffused, the basis was laid for the destruction of colonialism itself. The challenge now presented by the newly independent countries to the West is for the West to live up to its own values. They are playing a role drawn from a Western script.

We must understand that the communist challenge is not merely a military threat but an attack on the very basis of these values. The danger of Communism is not that of an alternative economic system; this is a matter about which intelligent men can agree to disagree. Rather, the menace of Communism concerns the values of Western liberalism and libertarianism. For Communism

November 6, 1957

- 15 - (Revised)

uses the traditional terms of freedom and human dignity as the rhetorical tools of slavery. What is worse, communism is itself a slave to a dogma which recognizes no lasting peace between differing economic and social systems. Its intervals of peaceful coexistence have always been conceived as tactical pauses wherein to disarm resistance and to prepare positions for the inevitable showdown. While the revolution of the colonial states represents an effort to enter the international system in full recognition of the variety of wants and needs and preferences of different peoples, the communist revolution is an attempt to subvert this system and to impose a single stamp of ideas and institutions on every people. Thus with respect to the newly independent states we can hope to build a community based on shared aspirations and on mutual toleration of differences. With respect to the communist challenge our security resides in our strength and in our ability to help bring about conditions in the free world which minimize the appeal of communist dogma.

Yet however much the reality of communism comes as a direct threat to our national security, and to whatever degree we may find its institutions and its way of thinking abhorrent to our own, it would be a grave error to ascribe the power and sweep of the communist movement solely to the machinations of one government or to the lust for power of a few men.

Communism today presents itself as an evil, but its historic origin and its human appeal cannot be blamed on sheer malignity. We can only understand

November 6, 1957

- 15 a - (Revised)

the communist revolution throughout the world if we view it in terms of a protest of humanity against the intolerable conditions of its past and present life -- conditions of which we Americans are only faintly aware and whose reality we are often reluctant fully to admit. The squalor and hopelessness of the great populations of Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and of much of Latin America; the inability of many Western nations to use their wealth and intelligence to give dignity and purpose to the lives of their own peoples; the indifference with which the lot of humankind has been viewed by its past rulers -- these are the root sources of a movement which, however much it may trick or deceive men or utilize them for ignoble ends, nonetheless derives its motive power from their anguish and aspiration.

It is part of the tragedy of history that much of the suffering of humanity cannot be traced to conscious wrongdoing; that the greater part of it defies easy improvement; that communism itself will alleviate some of the injustices of society only to impose others perhaps more crushing. It is also the irony of history that our Western civilization which first introduced the idea of self-improvement to the majority of mankind must now bear the animus of aroused peoples who see only the gross disparity between their condition and ours and who have neither the time nor the training nor the inclination for a sober inquiry into causes.

In this terrible retribution of history the just suffer with the unjust, the righteous with the unrighteous. The only counsel which history offers

November 6, 1957

- 15 b - (Revised)

is that of patience, forbearance, and a compassionate sympathy with the
essential justice of the world's revolt. Communism is not just nor should
we compromise our values to come to terms with it: it is a military, an
intellectual, and a moral enemy of ours. But the anguish and the aspiration
which, however mistakenly, have entered into the world's receptivity to
communism are something else again. To view communism otherwise than
as a vehicle for these feelings is to confuse its strength as a movement
with its weaknesses as a form of government, and to overrate the *permanent*
evil which it may cause. It is an indispensable part of the Western faith in
man to believe that when the fury and wrath of the present age have died
down, the moral values in which we believe and trust will again assert
themselves.

IV

It is a terrible characteristic of our age that the world is rent by
conflict at a time when peace was never more necessary. It is fragmented
at the critical moment when all the pressures of history and technology urge
integration into ever larger units. Through the tens of thousands of years
that man has been dominant on earth the structures of society have grown
ever larger -- from family to clan, to tribe, to feudal aggregates, to nations,
to coalitions of nations. At the present time man's loyalties are governed
by entities called nations. He has not yet reached the point where his
perspective can encompass the larger community of mankind.

October 29, 1957

- 16 -

Yet in spite of the existence of hostile ideologies and the effort
by one group of states to achieve world domination, the forces of tech-
nology as well as the demands of the human spirit insist that man must
arrive at this perspective, and this realization as well must enter our na-
tional consciousness. For many of our most urgent problems can be solved
only on a far greater, if not yet a truly global, scale. As the population of
our planet increases, it is likely that existing arable lands, even when
supplemented by those which may yet be developed by irrigation and ferti-
lization, will prove inadequate to supply man with food. We will then have
to exploit the richness of the oceans -- to cultivate or even domesticate
the flora and fauna that live within the great watery mantle that covers most
of our planet. But in so doing we will be faced with the choice between
strife and cooperation. Who will define the limits of territorial waters?
Who will own the great untouched pastures of the seas? What access to
whose sea will the landlocked nations seek?

Other problems will present themselves as the nuclear age unfolds.
Vexing international issues have already arisen in connection with the
fallout of radioactive particles from the testing of hydrogen bombs. It is
less generally recognized that the peaceful use of atomic energy will pre-
sent as many international difficulties as its military employment. For ex-
ample, there is the question of the disposal of radioactive wastes in the

October 29, 1957

- 17 -

ocean. No less serious is the crisis that may arise as the result of an
accident in a nuclear reactor -- or in the dismantling of a nuclear reactor
-- which could spread lethal radioactivity in the midst of populated civil-
ized areas. Since the winds of earth recognize no man-made frontiers, it
is inevitable that the development of atomic energy for peace, as well as
for war, will make standards of safety a matter for regional and perhaps
global concern. We have today examples of international cooperations
imposed by technology: i.e., the assignment of wave lengths for broad-
casting or the agreements governing international aviation. An ever larger
array of such agreements will become necessary as science evolves.

With the launching of earth satellites, the control of outer space
has already become of momentous international import. Our developing
knowledge of meteorology may make this issue even more critical. Long-
range weather forecasts now require the assembling of data from observa-
tion posts around the entire planet. In the future it is likely that we will
be able not only to predict but to control -- or at least influence -- the
weather. Such developments are less implausible today than the unleash-
ing of nuclear energy appeared two decades ago. If man should succeed
in extending his control of the weather beyond his local environs to the
higher reaches of the atmosphere -- if he should for example, find ways
to direct and canalize the flow of currents from the permanent air mass

October 29, 1957.

- 18 -

above the North Pole, the whole pattern of life of huge areas of the earth
may be transformed. To permit any one nation to control the climatic en-
vironment of others would be unthinkable.

A view of world problems in this largest focus is not merely an inter-
esting exercise of the imagination. It is the necessary precondition to
understanding what our own contribution can be. It makes crystal clear the
limited -- albeit essential -- assistance which dollars or machines can
give to a crisis whose characteristic is a groping for new orientations. It is
not wealth but values which will win the adherence of the old world and the
new; not military or economic command but moral and intellectual leadership
which will inspire their trust.

Thus internationally as well as domestically our problems -- and as
before, our opportunities -- are not such as to be mastered by strength of
effort alone. They too call for imagination and vision. The impatient as-
pirations of the newly independent states demands the guiding example of
our own democratic self-discipline quite as much as our material assistance.
The temper of our European friends must be turned away from fruitless bitter-
ness, and toward a new renaissance of effort by the stimulus of sympathetic
ideals as well as by concrete help. The explosive rate of technological
change must be guided by a morality as tough and durable as science itself.
And finally, the communist threat must come to us not merely as a test of
power but as a challenge to make us more deeply aware of the principles by
which we should live.

November 6, 1957

- 19 - (Revised)

V

These are some of the vistas of America at mid-century. They are very great, even to a people used to bigness. The scale of experience which has shaped our traditional notions of policy is rendered obsolete by the enormous contingencies of the unfolding future. The radical nature of the changes before us, and the incredible rapidity with which we have been catapulted into the center of world affairs present our nation with a situation unique in our history; we find ourselves today in a new world, wherein concepts formed in the more tranquil past are proving inadequate guides. There is a discontinuity in our historical experience which makes it imperative to look closely at our national values and national purposes and ask how they can be given a new and cogent affirmation.

For a value system is crucial to the survival of any society or nation. Society cannot carry its tolerance of other value systems to the point of acquiescing in its own destruction. It cannot treat its survival as negotiable. Its values will determine the sacrifices it is prepared to make to insure its survival. In any conflict, spiritual or physical, the side with the stronger faith has a decided advantage. It is willing to make greater sacrifices because its purposes will be stronger.

Beyond the elementary needs for survival lie the positive goals of a society, both domestic and international. The distinction between societies is to be found in the positive part of their actions, in their view

October 29, 1957

- 20 -

of the nature of man and his place in the universe. If we did not have
such values we would not greatly care what happened as long as our im-
mediate security were assured.

The actions of a society can thus be placed into two categories. Certain measures are dictated by the requirements of survival; others are produced by the desire to create a world harmonious with a society's aspirations and values. The first category of actions is imposed by the environment; it is defensive. The second class of actions is an attempt to shape the environment; it is constructive. Without a well-defined value system, or even if the existing one is not clearly understood, any nation is liable to drift aimlessly in the stream of history. Its actions will prove haphazard. Its policies will evolve from impromptu reactions to crisis situations. It will become, inevitably, a prisoner of events.

Unfortunately this has been America's approach to its problems
for most of this century. Time and again the U.S. has mustered its im-
mense, latent energies only at the eleventh hour, when confronted with
an obvious, immediate, deadly danger. We entered World War I only
after German submarines had sunk American ships, invaded American
waters and threatened to dominate the Atlantic Ocean. We entered World
War II only after Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor and threatened to dominate
the Pacific Ocean. The new economic and social concepts that emerged

October 29, 1957

- 21 -

in the 1930s were the products of an economic crisis that threatened the foundations of American society -- and that no one had believed could occur. In each such emergency, the U.S. only belatedly mobilized its resources, creative skills and innate idealism to combat concrete and inescapable dangers. In none of these emergencies did the nation perceive its peril in advance or act soon enough to forestall the ultimate violent storm.

The explanation for our behavior lies deep in the American heritage. For the U.S. has been, at least since the passing of the philosopher-statesmen who directed its first formative decades, a nation inclined to operational rather than abstract or conceptual thinking, to action rather than reflection, to facts rather than theory. By and large Americans today like to regard themselves as a practical people. We feign to be scornful of prophets, idealists and philosophers. We are more interested in the result than in the theory which produced it. We tend to forget that great results are unattainable without great concepts. This nation was populated and established by men of ideas -- by apostles of political and religious freedom like Roger Williams, by many-sided statesmen like Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Most of our great charitable and public welfare institutions, the churches, the endowed foundations, the universities and medical schools, the hospitals and the whole complex of public education, are

October 29, 1957

- 22 -

the creations of men in whom vision was the essential prerequisite of
action. No social problem has ever been solved, no social advance has
ever been achieved, except through the force of concepts formulated by
men of vision, dedication and reason. One need only contemplate the in-
fluence of John Dewey on American education, the influence of Albert
Einstein on science, technology and modern warfare and the influence of
Sigmund Freud on the field of social morals and mental health, to discern
the incalculable effect which conceptual thinking exerts -- though often
belatedly -- on the behavior of mankind.

More than a century ago, the French observer, de Tocqueville,
discerned the pragmatic predilection of our society. Commenting on the
American approach to the unfolding vistas of science, he wrote: "In
America the purely practical art of science is admirably understood . . .
On this head the Americans always display a clear, free, original and
inventive power of mind. But hardly anyone in the United States devotes
himself to the essentially theoretical and abstract portion of human know-
ledge." It was not only with regard to science that de Tocqueville was
prescient. This same impatience with concepts and theory, with underlying
rationales and ultimate questions, has also marked the conduct of our do-
mestic and external affairs. America has met each recurring crisis on the
basis of a last-minute decision shaped more by immediate circumstances
than by a lasting standard of values.

October 29, 1957

- 23 -

Over and above our antipathy to abstract thinking, we have also
cultivated an historical image of ourselves which has served to impede
the formulation of any basic definition of the abiding national interest. The
image has been shaped in part by our Puritan inheritance -- by the ethical
conviction that power is essentially evil, inevitably corrupts and may be
mobilized only temporarily for transient crises. Another distortion in our
perspective has been created by our view of geography which asserts that
the oceans are barriers rather than highways, that economic areas are
necessarily defined by national boundaries, and that we can exist safely
in isolation on our continental island without concern for contingencies
beyond our shores. A third factor has been our recurring peacetime re-
jection of our military tradition. Though victorious in every war we have
fought, each has been regarded as an unhappy, temporary episode induced
by unfortunate circumstances unlikely to arise again. We have approached
our great wars of the twentieth century somewhat in the light of technologi-
cal exercises in production or logistics, quite divorced from the continuum
of international politics or the problems of diplomacy which can be met by
other methods in times of peace.

In essence, we have adhered tenaciously to concepts of history en-
gendered in the more stable past and attempted to solve twentieth century
problems with a kit of tools manufactured in the nineteenth century. Today,
the nature of our situation is such that the U.S. can no longer afford to

October 29, 1957

- 24 -

conduct its affairs on the basis of nineteenth century images. Power is
inescapably ours; and the only meaningful debate is how to use it, not
how to abdicate from the responsibilities it imposes. The world is very
small, and there are no longer any Chinese walls behind which we may
seek security. War -- or the threat of war -- is endemic to our times;
and we only magnify its chances of outbreak by pretending that this is
not so. We cannot afford in a world in transition, wracked by revolutionary
upheavals in social and political thought and overhung by the brooding
menace of nuclear destruction, to continue to meet one crisis after the
other by reliance on industrial strength, wealth, technology and inspired
improvisation.

Action alone is not enough to meet the challenges to America to-
day. To act with assurance in the face of vast changes, both domestic
and international, to meet the ideological competition that divides men,
we require above all a sense of values. And it is here that our generation
will be put to the test. Although we have at our disposal an immense ca-
pacity for gathering facts we have sometimes seemed bewildered by the
very mass of available data. Although we have great energy and strength
we have moved from crisis to crisis without a clearly discernible sense
of direction. Without such direction all our tremendous economic and
technical power may prove self-destructive.

October 29, 1957.

- 25 -

This is not to say that we are bankrupt of values. On the contrary,
the values which are unconsciously ours, which are unnoticeably but tightly
woven into the very fabric of our national existence, are our greatest strength.
The need of the moment is not to devise new values, or to invent new stand-
ards. It is to become more aware, more self-conscious, of existing values
-- not necessarily to approve what they are, but to know who we are.

For it is possible -- at least we would like to think it possible --
that the American tradition may contribute direction and hope to the aspira-
tions of a diversified world. We ourselves are diversified. Indeed a unique
characteristic of American society is its pluralism and diversity. The genius
of America is essentially its ability to synthesize the objectives of a multi-
farious people and to reconcile and combine into a community of outlook,
principles and ideals, a diversity of individual beliefs.

The world has become an international community of which we are in-
extricably an important part. Our task, like that of each nation which remains
free to shape its destiny, must be to find the strength and purpose to contri-
bute to the unfinished moral business of our time: the bringing of peace to a
divided and belligerent family of nations, justice to a world of injustice and
inequality, security to a world threatened by communist enslavement, freedom
to a world of multiple oppression, welfare to a world of misery. It is by the
compassion
carnestness,
the intelligence, and the integrity which we bring to this task
that history will judge the kind of people we are.