Cea

Page 12 — PA. Features, February 10

Foibles, Facts and Fancies

Brother Rats

There are some American journals which should be better known on this side of
a radical socialist journal, opposed to Amer-
boosting

the line . . . the new monthly ‘‘Politics” . _ .

ican participation in the present war. (From CCF “Canadian Forum”

quisling friends in the USA.)
6. ® @

The Master Race-rs

The German home guard is reported to have received a
heels surrounded by a cloud of dust. (Editorial Note in “The Ne

e@: 6 eo

Wall-eyed Prejudices

It is strange and nauseating, but nevertheless it is a fact, that the Willson Wood-
sides on our own CBC and the Hearst crew in the United States are so
wall-eyed prejudices that they cannot see the woods for the treeS—cannot understand,
or shrink from understanding, that this mighty drive on Berlin from the East, and the
d which encompasses a whole
(As they were once sneered at for
being the first to use another, but then a hateful word, “‘Munich.”’)— (Leslie Morris

awaited offensive from the West, is Teheran—that Wor
epoch that the Communists are sneered at for using.

in the Canadian. Tribune.) é
e e @

Why Nazis Shake

©

We will get to Berlin. We say that not boastingly, not cheerfully, but with clenched
teeth, with pain in our hearts, with the determination of the
(Ilya Ehrenburg.)

“With tears of blood.” We will get there.
€ e e

Looking Ahead

It is an utterly false assumption that there is a fixed amount of trade to be done
and that if somebody else does it, we won't. The truth is that there lies before all nations
the possibility of a tremendous expansion in world trade, as in industry at home. (Her-

its

new insignia—a pair of

w World,’’ Seattle, USAC) =

blinded by their

Red Army man who wrote,

bert Morrison, British Home Secretary and Labor Party leader, quoted in Amerasia. )

4 Why The People Love Him

In my travels about the world, if I have been impressed with one thing; it has been
that most peoples are alike, not different. When I sang my Negro folk songs in places
as different as Scotland, Norway, Wales, Czecho Slovakia, Hungary, Russia, Egypt—
everywhere I could find that there were some songs of these peoples very much like
In Norway I had to sing “Sometimes I Feel Like a Mother-
less Child,” so much like the sombre quality of the Nerwegian folk songs. In Scotland,
In Wales today, the Negro spirituals are sung by the Welsh choirs.
And so I began to feel that really the
differences were not there as much as the likenesses, and with the winning of this con-
flict—-with the forces that are there before us, it seems to me that we could be quite,
quite certain that the peoples of the world, given an opportunity,
guide them to live in a common brotherhood, could easily do so.

_-my own Negro folk songs.

other songs. Sp
Russia, Hungary, the rythms were so similar.

casting over CBC on January 14.)

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THE SOVIET SPIRIT. The story of the incentives behind the -
~ tories of the peoples of the Soviet Union. By Harry Fo We
Professor Hmeritus of Christian Hthies, Union Theolos
Seminary. The International Publishers, New York, 160- |
paper cover, 50c. apres . A

By LOUIS F. BUDENZ

(os dark-gray columns which have liberated Warsaw |
past week, stormed Lodz and pulverized Radom have dr:
deserved superlatives in the world’s press. These Red Army gig”
marching on Berlin are warriors of the land which has been by”
and bled by the Nazi hordes. And yet, out of long-siesed Te;
grad, embattled Moscow and! shattered Stalingrad have risen th
dauntless millions to pound on in Poland with a power which ¢
tounds the world. : :
America, ever admiring courage and moral Strength, wants!
know “the why” of the Soviet Union’s historical miracle, 7:
tremendous ability to fight. That “why” is supplied in the pa™
of the new book by Dr. Harry F-. Ward, aptly titled The Soz!
Spirit. tf
2 A volume of this character will be particularly valued by th’
hundreds of thousands of us who. appreciate that but for the sti |
of the Soviet armies and production machine our New York 4)
other cities would be in ruins from the Luftwaffe The book |
comes an added MUST in view of the studied failure of the ee |
mercial press to tell “the why” of Soviet intrepidity which is ess.
tial for America to understand. 2
Dr. Ward gives us these reasons with a lucid and beautiful sj
plicity. The socialist system, in the Soviet Union has rid ~
peoples of that vast land of any fear for the future. “The gene
social security,” as Dr. Ward so well Says, “which is being” pol
cally fought for in Great Britain as though it were a social revo
tion, and in our country only tentatively discussed, has been
accomplished fact in the Soviet Union for a working generatio
‘Then the continues: “And the record shows that people ¥
grow up without the tormenting fear of economic insecurity wi
with a freedom, a joy and a power that cannot exist when the n
ural desire of man to create is limited by fear and want.”
YOUTHFUL SPIRIT
That is a mighty cause for the spirit which has stood out ame
the Soviet peoples. To this fearlessness is added. the knowlec
that the land and all it possesses is the people’s own in a real w
and in a genuine degree. It is “the builders who fight” as 1|
Ward so well puts it. Stalingrad was a city built by the Soy
youth, and to them it was dear because they had created it throu +
a huge effort, through a mighty working together. It was “ou:
ia the jspecial way that made them determined to die for it,
Stand with their backs to the Volga holding back the Nazis Ww
a human wall that became more adamant than granite. i
Because they were the owners of their country in this r
sense, the Soviet people had learned “how to conduct everybod
business” through the Five-Year Plans. Under the leadership |
Marshal Stalin, they had erected those giants of Masnitogo:
and Kuznetsk, pouring out steel by the thousands of tons whi
before there was the silence of the sterile desert. The Sov
peoples had learned how to plan ahead for gigantic achieyemen
to measure their strength to the last bit of energy, to know abc
all how to work together in a unity which has been their foun #
tion stone. When war came, they and their people’s fovernmé
knew ‘how to wage it. i
To learn this whole stirring story, you will have to go to / }
Ward’s pages. In the manner in which he presents tne thrilli
facts, there is a special appeal to the American mind and spi
Many men, of course, by now have expressed their admirati.§
of what the Soviet peoples and government have done in this w
There have been correspondents like Quentin Reynolds, recogniz:
the epochal character of Soviet fighting. There have been int |
lectuals sprung from the old regime like Alexander Werth
have paid their homage to the courageous men and women filli
the Soviet land, such as the old man who persisted in staying
the Leningrad library no matter what the perils. There are stat
men of the type of Wendell Willkie who have written Sympathet
ally of Soviet life. : |
ROLE OF UNIONS
What will especially enthrall our workers is the account of t
functioning of the Soviet trade unions, with their remarka) ¥
contributions to the building of the country and the Waging ||
the war. “The Soviet trade unions,” says the author of T
Soviet Spirit, “offer the worker more opportunities for gene; ¥
development of his initiative than those of the capitalist wor }
They give their members more activities than ordinary tra ¥
unions, and their membership includes more than 28 million wor }
ers.” The extensive responsibilities of the trade unions—in mana \h
ing the social insurance system, in their widespread education i
activities, and in stimulating the mastery of technique—are thin 4
the American worker will read about with gripping interest. The #
achievements will make the Atmerican trade unionist proud
being associated in the anti-fascist struggle with such staune ff
liberty-loving and intelligent union allies. E
Running through this whole story of the Soviet Union is ti i
incentive of social approval. Three decades ago and before—whe
no socialist state existed anywhere—it was a favorite gag
those opposed to socialism to ask “how it will work without
profit motive.” Then there was no concrete answer; now there i)
Of course, in the Soviet ®nion there are rewards for worker
initiative—and Dr .Ward discusses these rewards at considerab @
length. But, as he points out decisively the basie shift in ir}
centives is important—“the transfer of the tremendous power ¢ iP
common judgment and public opinion from money making 7
socially useful labor.” It is this, more than anything: else, whic §#
goes to make the Soviet Republics “a new world.”
As we Americans battle shoulder to shoulder with these allicas
in the anti-Nazi.war, Americans will have to consider the relatior
we shall have ;with such a powerful land in the days of peace,
Our great United States and this mighty Soviet nation ean, if the G
work together, establish a lasting peace and the basis for a4
enduring. prosperity throughout the world. ;
In order to worl: with the Soviet peoples, we must understan
them. Dr. Ward’s book is a bie help in that direction. It is in the
sense a highly patriotic work. The farther this yolume’s inf
ence reaches, the better prepared will America be to work permat 4p
ently with the Soviet nation and its fovernment. It becomes not #
ing short of a solemn duty, then, for everyone who wants to Sef,
Such a desirable thing consummated to mount up the numbery
who read this book everywhere throughout America. ee