Elmer Barnes from the Scripps-Howard chain. Oswald Garrison Villard, former
owner and editor of the Nation was obliged to withdraw his contributed page,
and John T. Flynn, brilliant economist and author, similarly found his position
on the New Republic impossible. Lawrence Dennis in his Weekly Foreign
Letter, Jan., 1941, explains the situation on the latter in the New Republic.
And so the dissident voices are gradually stilled. Unity, Jan. 6, 1941, remarks, "Our newspapers and magazines are competing with our colleges and universities for leadership in the campaign for war." H. L. Mencken's Sunday editorials disappear from the Baltimore Sun after February, 1941.
(7)
Commonwealth College at Mena, Arkansas, for 17 years sought to bring
education to the ignorant share croppers of the neighborhood and aroused the
enmity of the landowners and employers. Charged with Communism, anarchy,
it was frequently attacked, raided. August 30, 1940, the college closed and
transferred its assets to the New Theatre League. In September the director of
the college was arrested, charged with "anarchism", the property confiscated and
sold at auction. "They drove off our dairy herd (24 head), two teams of mules,
and hauled away our office fixtures, our dishes and cooking utensils, and other
goods. Yesterday afternoon, during a downpour of rain, they snatched books
by the thousand from the library, threw them into an open-top truck, the floor
of which was covered with what would have been coaldust if the rain had not
made lava of it . . ."
Highlander Folk School at Monteagle, Tenn. is another school that according to the New Republic "prepares efficient spokesmen for labor" which are not desired by "the vigilante leaders" of Tennessee. It, too, is under fire though one of the sponsors is Eleanor Roosevelt.
(8)
Bulletin #36, February 9, 1940, gave a list of the Bulletins issued to that
date and immediately projected, adding "No charge is made for these Bulletins.
Originally sent to personal friends and educators, as the list lengthens it becomes
necessary to cut off those who have not responded or cooperated. We are in the
war now. Last year we gave billions for European armaments, including Russian,
chiefly through gold buying. To 'defense', which helps the Allies, we gave more
billions. We are getting in deeper. These Bulletins are not to express opinions
or to present all sides, but to reveal what is generally unknown or unrecognized.
By uncovering untruths, it is hoped to slow down the growing hysteria and to do
something to save America first."
INTERNATIONAL INANITIES
A Washington internationalist writes appreciatively of "your gay attacks on current idiocies". The show goes on,--a continuous performance.(1)
Just as the 'red drive' is gaining momentum, Sen. Lodge is unkind enough to charge the Administration with aiding and arming the Soviets against the Finns by exports of copper, rubber, tin, and oil, increased from 3 millions in July to 10 millions in December. The
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