A Clear Line

For the first time since the days of the senior LaFollette, American progressives have succeeded in setting themselves up in opposition to the Communist Party. Drawing a clear line between the Progressives and the Communists is not as easy as it sounds and it is interesting to note that the job fell to a Dartmouth man, Dr. James Loeb Jr. '29.

In January, Dr. Loeb engineered the formation of a new organization called Americans for Democratic Action, which seems likely to become the rallying point for the country's non-communist left. The reason why Dr. Loeb's task was difficult lies in the often neglected truth that American Communists strongly support a good deal of progressive legislation and most of the liberal ideas. For years American liberals have been asking themselves whether this was enough.

Sometime ago Dr. Loeb decided that it was not enough. In 1941, he became one of the leaders of the Union for Democratic Action, one of the very few progressive organizations which has successfully barred Communists from membership. It is from this group that the new movement has sprung.

What made this break in the American left wing necessary was the fact that though the American Communists have supported the progressive program, they have done so only when the program did not conflict with Russian foreign policy. Nowhere has this paradox been more pointed than in the history of the Communist attitude towards Franklin D. Roosevelt, who ranks as the hero of many American progressives. In 1933, Roosevelt was a "social fascist," which in the hyphenated parlance meant that he was a cut more dangerous than Hitler because he was a secret rather than an avowed Nazi. By 1935, the change in Soviet foreign policy made Roosevelt the leader in "the democratic front." After the pact with Hitler in 1939, he was discovered "selling out to Wall Street," but in June of 1941 he again became the American prototype of Joseph Stalin. This is the sort of logic which has caused American progressives to set up shop for themselves.

It is fair to ask what all this means to liberal education. It means that the danger to our freedoms which Communism implies may possibly be made a little less. In this country the choice between those who work for freedom and security and those who think security is enough has been made a little clearer. Fai more importantly, it holds out the promise that American liberals may now turn the attention of the country to the real Communist menace, the starvation and poverty all over the world which are creating Communists faster than Russian foreign policy can use them.