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Show A SONG FOR THE NATIONS Are those who seek to draft a constitution for an international inter-national order beginning at the wrong end? Did the man who said, "Give me the making- of the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws", have a sounder approach? Should we look for a song rather than a law to unite the nations na-tions ? Doubtless there are many candidates already for the role of world anthem. The best advertised "Internationale" is that of the Communists, who have ruined the- tune, indeed even the name, by using it as an instrument of Russian nationalism na-tionalism and class hatred. "Deutschland Uber Alles" discloses dis-closes in its title the defects which make the Nazis' "new order" unacceptable. . Possibly no song tied closely to any nationality will serve the new internationalism. The words at least will need to be new or as non-political as "Home, Sweet Home". But for music, something already familiar to many peoples peo-ples might help those who felt a bit lost in their new super-national super-national state. Musically-minded readers may have just the tune to suggest. One which certainly is worthy of consideration consider-ation in that jointly used by Britain and the United States for "God Save the King" and "America", respectively. This air is by no means an Anglo-American possession. A dispatch dis-patch from Vichy the other day put in a claim for the French composer, Lulli. Now in a letter to the New York Times, S. H. P. Pell says the tune's origin is lost in antiquity. anti-quity. He writes: The truth is Lulli snatched it from the Germans in 1680. However, a song to the same air was shouted in defiance over the walls of Geneva in 1602 during the famous attack by Catholic invaders from Savoy. That was thirty years before be-fore the birth of Lulli. The Dutch, however, claim that the Germans snatched the tune from them. Dutch, German, Swiss, French, British, and American there is a good start toward internationalism. And the tune, good in itself, has noble associations of freedom and progress. pro-gress. Who has a better candidate? ivr |