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Show UTAH LABOR NEWS, SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH, MARCH Page 8 ' EdlatoiTEall n2 IPage Tlhe Otelh 1 7, 1939 News ILrialboir UTAH PEOPLE WAKE UP! THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY WILL BE EITHER A LIBERAL PARTY OR A MINORITY PARTY (Continued from Page 1) political power and unwilling to be ignored. And the Democrat should take to heart no less the plain lesson that when the people are in the mood for reactionary government they never stop with "conservative" Democrats. They turn clear over to the Republican party. Its record, its leadership, and its financial backing give a guaranty that it will deliver reactionary government. The Democratic party cannot succeed as a reactionary party. History teaches us that fact. Remember the reactionary platforms and campaigns of Democratic candidates for President Alton JB. Parker, James M. Cox, or John W., Davis. No set of figures has yet proved that the Democrats can win by stealing the Republican position and trying to the Republicans. The plain lesson of political history is that when the counreaction it will take it from Republicans who are exwants try perts in reactionarism, and when it wants liberalism, and only then, will it turn to Democrats. The Democratic party will be either a liberal party or a minority party. If Democrats join Republicans in helping turn the people against the New Deal, they will find that they have also turned them against the Democratic party and are authors of a ruin in which they will have to share. Those of us who are liberals know that there is no cohesive, intelligent, or harmonious policy from the Republican party. It talks of balanced budget but flirts with the most radical old-ag- e pension plans. Its leaders agree upon nothing except PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT opposition to the Democrats. It has no recognized leadership and none can tell who would be most influential in its counsels. Deal Democrats Its most recent President, Herbert Hoover, assails every policy If the Fortune survey is right, the anti-Nesuch as Senator Byrd down through such with the undiscriminating rancor of a man who bungled his own from "moderates" as John N. Gamer either dont know what a maopportunity. Being in power centers public attention on Democratic jority of the voters really think or are ignoring it. As Mr. Garner, so far as I know, has never pretended to be more than party differences. Nothing but their being out of power conceals even deeper a good practical politician, I assume that he would not knowand more bitter division among the Republicans. ingly defy the settled opinions of the electorate. But these are times when the whole structure and philIncorrect Readings of Public Mind If the Fortune survey is even approximately correct, a osophy of democratic government is under question, when free government is undermined by Communists on the left and over- great many Democrats in Congress have let themselves be whelmed by Fascists on the right. If in the presence of this the stampeded into the camp by trepidations based Democratic party fails, there is no ground for believing the Re- on incorrect readings of the public mind. The questions asked in this survey were general in character, of course. Most peopublicans can succeed. And if both are failing, what then? The responsibilities upon men in public life today are not ple who approve on the whole of Mr. Roosevelt and his poliOur comforts, prides, and ambitions cies disagree with him in various particulars. An overwhelmordinary responsibilities. must yield to the overwhelming necessity that public confidence ing vote for him is not a demand that Congress act as his "rubin democratic government be maintained and that our unsolved ber stamp. Neither is it a demand that Congress lend itself It is a warning to the uses of a "rubber-stamp- " problems do not vanquish us. opposition. We cannot become conservatives and strive for mainte- to the members of Congress, and especially to the Democrats, nance of status quo. That philosophy had some basis when that they should think twice or three or four times before status quo itself was reasonably .satisfactory. Status quo cant they, flout him. The Fortune survey also shows that among the voters who stay with us now. To stop swimming is to sink. A nation-wid- e rank and file has chosen the leadership of now approve of Roosevelt, approximately 58 per cent would the President, He could not, if he would, abdicate it to a few vote for him again in 1940, while about 21 per cent say they or to many, none of whom have a nation-wid- e constituency. would not, and about 2 per cent are doubtful. He has led in the best tradition of the Democratic party. If the The first figure is roughly 37 per cent of the whole elecDemocrats win in 1940, it will be upon the record and under torate and the others are about 3 per cent each. These rethe momentum of the leadership President Roosevelt has given turns can be used to show, negatively, that Franklin D. Rooseto the people of this nation. velt could not win as a third-tercandidate unless he received Of all Democrats of this time President Roosevelt is safe- the votes of all those who say now that they do not know whether or not they would vote for him in 1940. But the rely anchored in history, where party strife and personal can do him no harm. It is rather for the people and rank and turns indicate, also, that the tradition reprefile of the Democratic party voters and those who will come af- sents no deep conviction, on the part of a great majority of the ' ' ter them that loyal and liberal Democrats should renew their American people. , t faith m liberal democratic government and go forward to a new Only 13 Per Cent Disfavor the Third Term the is no way of knowing, from this survey, how the There lessons learned at the feet of the most inday, guided by people who are already against Roosevelt feel about the third-terspiring and courageous leader given to any people in our day Franklin D. Roosevelt. tradition in the abstract. What it has shown is that only 3 per cent of the voters feel strongly enough about the tradition to indicate that they. would not vote against Mr. Roosevelt because of it in 1940, and only 13 per cent for various Survey-N- ew reasons are doubtful. Many hearty Roosevelt supporters of my acquaintance are strongly against a third term some of them on general prinwant to take the progressive Demociples, some because Herewith is an editorial from the Washington Post, writ- cratic movement out they from under the shadow of a single perten by Ernest K. Lindley, a well known political commentator. sonality, some because they believe that a leader of different It contains more truth than poetry. It reads: talents and personality would be better fitted for the task of If you believe what you hear around Washington, Presi- carrying forward the work Mr. Roosevelt has begun. dent Roosevelt and his policies have lost the confidence of the Retains Confidence of Great Majority country and the New Deal is all "washed up." The Republicans Yet I have heard many of those same individuals say, and conservative Democrats have built up such a bear market when pinned down, that if they had to choose between a third on Roosevelt that even some of the New Dealers are selling term and the election of a conservative Democrat or the loss of him short. the election to a conservative Republican, they would vote for Now, however, Fortune magazine appears with a survey Mr, Roosevelt again. Probably many of the Roosevelt supshowing that the President and his policies are approved by porters who say now that they would not vote for him in 940 63.5 per cent of the voters who have an opinion on the sub- would change their minds if the alternatives were less acceptaject. As less than 6 per cent of all those polled lacked a defi- ble than those they supposed when they gave their answers to nite opinion one way or the other, this is an impressive ver-di- Fortune. for Mr Roosevelt The answer shows also that the Mr. Roosevelt does not want a third term; of that all of last two months the popularity of Mr. Roosevelt andduring the New his close askiciates whom I know are convinced. But he reDeal has increased. tains the confidence of a great majority of the electorate. Even Obviously, somebody is out of touch with the real senti- with the handicap of the third-tertradition he- remains the ments of the American people. This column offers no opinion candidate now in sight on the Democratic side. - By as to the accuracy of the Fortune survey, except to recall that strongest the spring of 1940 the movement to draft him may be too in 1936 it forecast Mr. Roosevelts majority within I per cent. powerful to be resisted. an w right-winge- rs anti-Roosev- elt 1 1 m ill-wi- ll "no-third-ter- m ' m " 1 Fortune Deal Approved 1 et m - (Continued from page 7) satisfied in 1929, that year of great years of production, with one-ha- lf a new suit of clothing each, and h of a new overcoat, and since then the budget has been drastically cut. And what of the housing condi' tions? Two-thirof the 30 million American families live in shacks and slums. Half a million of these unfit for human habitation. One million, seven hundred thousand city dwelling units are in need of one-sixt- ds structural Tepair; four million city homes lack indoor toilets; five mil- lion lack baths. In six million urban homes, cooking is done without gas or electricity. farm homes are not Most with any modem appliequipped ances whatever. Politics Block Progress It is high time that we, the people, realize that politics stand in the road, blocking the pathway to our future. The country hast the men, machines, and materials to provide every American with the highest standard of living in the world from the cradle to the grave It is high time that we enlist to banish poverty from our land, and make America safe, sane and sen- sible for Americans. You have heard of wars and rumors of wars. We have only one war it is the war of plenty versus leisure versus toil of poverty abundance versus scarcity. The year 1940 will be the critical point in America. Will the people of Utah do their part in saving of America and our own state from the grasp of selfish Tory politicians, who are blocking the progress ? ( THIS IS REAL FREEDOM do you think would to anyone who held a meethappen Berlin at which he dein ing nounced the Nazi government and its officials, referred contemptuously to the Chancellor as Adolph Hitlervitch, and advocated a virtual revolution? The participants in the meeting would find themselves swiftly incarcerated in a concentration camp if they were fortunate enough to escape the headman's axe.German-American Yet in New York, the Bund recently held a meeting in Madison Square Gar- den, which was decorated for the occasion with swastika flags and guarded by men wearing Nazi storm-troopuniforms, at which the speakers sneered at the President of the United States and called him Franklin Rosenfeld, denounced high government officials, including a distinguished Justice of the Supreme Court, called for the extermination of the Jews, and pledged themselves to establish a virtual Nazi dictatorship in this country. And what happened? Were the Bund members arrested as enemies of the government? No instead, one of the largest concentrations of police in New Yorks history surrounded the meeting place, and protected them while they aired their views, which would destroy the freedom and protection they were enjoying. There isnt another country in the world where that could happen. For there isnt another country in the world where the cardinal tenet of democracy, free speech, is so zealously protected. And free speech means the right to speak bjr those with whom you most violently disagree, as well as those with whom you agree. It means the right to call for a change in government. It means giving the people every chance to hear all sides of a controversy, and to weigh fact against fact and theory against theory before reaching a decision When you hear someone denouncing America and its instituThink of tions, remember this. what happens to those bold enough to speak, even in moderate terms, against the regimes in power in Germany, Russia, Italy and a host of smaller countries. Ours is a freedom possessed by no other people. Why try to destroy it? Just what er , t |