William Penn Lecture
1948
"In Apprehension How Like a God!"
Delivered at
Arch Street Meeting House
Philadelphia
by
Bayard Rustin
What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and
moving how express and admirable! in action how like
an angel! in apprehension how like a god!
-HAMLET, Act II, Sc. 2.
"In Apprehension How Like A God!"
On August 6, 1945, a bomb fell on Hiroshima. At
that same moment a bomb fell upon America, and its
impact was felt around the world. Since that time, there has
been considerable discussion of the atomic bomb and its
effect upon man, and much of this discussion speaks of the
bomb as a new factor in the stream of history. In the
physical sense this is no doubt true. However, in a spiritual
sense the atomic bomb is not new, but is merely another
listing in the encyclopedia of force which began with the club
and the slingshot and which now includes biological agents
and chemical warfare. The atomic bomb has forced us to
raise a question: Will not those who rely on violence end not
only in utilizing any degree of violence, but in justifying it?
If the answer to this question is Yes, then the use of
violent force becomes the greatest problem of our time. In his
book, Thieves in the Night, Arthur Koestler recognizes this
fact when he says. "We are entering a political ice-age in
which violence is the universal language and in which
the machine gun is the esperanto to be understood from
Madrid to Shanghai."
The world over, suspicion is so intense, apathy so
wide-spread and reliance on old methods so established,
that man has become cynical and frustrated. Yet, when we
look upon our scientific progress, we can, without worry,
repeat the words of Hamlet, "What a piece of work is a man!
how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty!" But, can we
add, "in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like
a god!"? Many formerly trusting men, observing
the manifestations of depravity today, have begun to
question whether that spark of God in each of us is not all
but completely smothered.
The spark, the potential, is indeed still within us,
but in our reliance on violence we have misused our
energies and sapped the strength from our moral muscles. At
this moment each man in the world possesses a limited
energy for social action. Let us consider this quantity similar
to the contents of a drinking cup. If we use a portion of
this energy in fear, another portion in frustration, and
still another in preparation for violent aggression, soon we
shall discover that our power is greatly diminished. But, if
we can discipline ourselves and that is a matter requiring
a practical, willing, and thorough-going devotion we
can remove fear, hatred, bitterness and frustration. Then
the cup will overflow with energy, a great deal of which can
be used in finding a creative solution to our problems.
On the other hand, placing our faith in weapons,
no matter how reluctantly we do so, and no matter
how compassionately we rationalize, means that we are
using our energies in the hope that the Devil can cast
himself out. Reliance on violence by inexorable logic leads to
three conditions that are contrary to that community of spirit
on which law and order are based. Violence leads to fear,
to moral suicide and to nation-worship
May we begin with an examination of fear and
certain of its effects upon human behavior? When we are
frightened our behavior often becomes erratic and unaccountable.
We may be petrified, or we may run about wildly, as men
have done in a burning building. It might be a simple matter
to walk directly to an exit. But frightened men behave as
if the truth were not true.
So great has America's fear of the Soviet
Union become that many people do not recognize the law of
cause and effect still to be in operation. The argument runs
that getting tough with the Russians will bring them to
their senses and inspire in them a more reasonable attitude
toward us; when, actually, a rather substantial case can
be made that our present discord with the Soviet Union
may be in large part the result of our own past policies
and unfriendly acts. We are, in reality, in the present
crisis precisely because the law of cause and effect has been
and still is in operation unfriendliness
begetting unfriendliness, trust-inspiring trust.
Many people today believe that the way to peace is
to play upon the horror of modern weapons and the
devastation of any future war. In an article, "Do People Like
War?", published in Look on September 30, 1947, A. M.
Meerloo, the Dutch psychologist, comments on the current
notion that people will actually be forced by fear to build
a constructive plan for peace: "Psychology tells us that
this way of thinking is dangerous. We know that fear
never evokes peaceful reactions in men. On the contrary,
people react to fear by readying themselves for defense and
attack. ... But we are not only children and fighting primitives.
We still possess positive drives for peace. But they are
based on love and social adaptation, not on fear of attack....
The answer to how to build a positive peace cannot be found
in military strategy and atomic science. The militant way
of life always fails. It always turns into a vicious circle
of defense, aggression, and renewed attack. `To resist
force inspires force.' Mobilization of armies in this country
means counter-mobilization of armies elsewhere. This is
an eternal law. But making peace without fear and
suspicion encourages peace. That is the other aspect of the
same eternal law." This is the kind of statement one had
learned to expect only from the pulpit. Today men in all walks of
life are deeply concerned.
At a meeting of the Emergency Committee of
Atomic Scientists at Princeton on November 17, 1946, Dr.
Albert Einstein addressed himself to the question of fear, and
concluded that making peace is basically a
psychological problem. He stated that today we have the profound
dilemma of wanting to make peace at the same time we prepare
for war. In conclusion, he said, "You cannot serve two
masters. You cannot prepare for peace and for war at the same
time. It's psychologically impossible." An indication of this lies
in the fact that while the great majority of people in
America cry "peace, peace" and truly desire peace, and while
the Government claims that its first job is to insure peace,
we go on spending 79 cents of every dollar paid into the
treasury for war, present, past and future, while we spend a
mere pittance in developing the functional agencies of the
United Nations which might lead to world government. We hope
in one direction but follow the road that is diametrically opposed.
It was in fear that Congress, on August 2, 1947,
placed its stamp of approval for the first time in American
history, upon the creation of a secret police: the Central
Intelligence Agency, with orders to operate throughout America and
the entire world. This agency must now spend as much
time watching our "trusted and essential" scientists as
in observing individuals who may be engaged in sabotage.
For in times when war is total, who, indeed, is to be trusted?
It is fear which prompts us to permit the military to
shackle research in physical sciences in our universities.
Our fears demand total preparedness, and
such preparedness demands totalitarianism for
American citizens. Cord Meyer, Jr., is a marine veteran who
was wounded in the fighting in the Pacific, and who returned
to serve as an aide to Commander Harold Stassen at the
San Francisco Conference. The editor of Harper's
Magazine describes him as adding up realistically, what it will
cost America to disperse our industries, to move
cities underground, and to build up stockpiles for
atomic bombardment. In the June 1947 issue of Harper's
Meyer wrote:
... Total preparedness means totalitarianism for American citizens. There is hardly an
aspect of human life that will not have to be corrupted
to the organized pursuit of force. Together with
their loss of the democratic right to determine
public policy, the large majority of American
citizens stand to lose also their right to choose their
work and to live where they please. It is unlikely
that the freedoms of speech and assembly can be allowed to survive. Conscripted to serve in
the defense forces or to labor in the subterranean factories, regulated by police restrictions in
their attempts to travel, subjected to arbitrary
search and arrest, forced to work longer hours at less
pay, they will become mere instruments of the
state. If there is complaint against these
staggering sacrifices, the answer will always be that
they are necessary in order to preserve the
sovereign independence of the United States. This is
the monumental irony inherent in the whole policy of modern preparedness....
In fear most Americans give passive support
to totalitarian governments abroad at the very moment
we protest totalitarianism. Fear of Russia dictates that
we defend a government in Greece which follows the
secret police techniques practiced for years in Nazi
Germany. Fascist Italy and Spain, Japan, and the Soviet Union.
On April 1, 1947, Arthur Krock, observer for the
conservative New York Times, telegraphed his paper that
between midnight and 5:00 A. M. on March 29, 1947, hundreds
of innocent citizens had been arrested by the
Greek Government. He then added:
In one three-day period, after the United States said it would assume
political
responsibility, the Greek Government arrested about 600 persons in Athens, mostly
professionals doctors, lawyers, etc. and sent them
away, frankly declaring there was no longer any
need to exercise restraint. There is no doubt that
the loudest shouters in support of the United
States are Athens' three thousand wealthiest
citizens whom the government continues to protect against any direct taxation and who, with
their gold pounds, hardly realize there is any
inflation. And the Rightists, and extremists, encouraged
by the President's speech, now trumpet that the Center is almost as traitorous as the Left
because it doesn't make humble obeisance to the government.
That one finally becomes the thing he violently
fights is a fact that Hitler understood, in 1933, when he said,
"The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces
those who fear it to imitate it." It would be a tragic thing indeed
if we Americans were stripped of our freedom by a
foreign and aggressive power; it is all the more tragic that
we gradually and somewhat unknowingly give up our
freedoms, one after another, in the pursuit of that force which
we claim will guard our liberty.
If it is true that violence destroys our liberty, it is
also possible to offer some evidence that violence
causes inconsistencies that are tantamount to moral suicide.
The moral man is he who is opposed to injustice
per se, opposed to injustice wherever he finds it; the moral man looks
for injustice first of all in himself. But in the process of
creating and utilizing modern weapons, one cannot really
be concerned with injustice wherever it appears.
Certainly, many who use violence wish to be so concerned, and
begin with a broad sense of community; but they end in opposing
injustice when it touches them, having become capable
of rationalizing when they use it against others. An
indication of this lies in some editorials which appeared in the
New York Times in the year 1904, when the Japanese
had "without warning" attacked Russia, as the United
States was attacked at Pearl Harbor. In the editorial of February
9, 1904, the Times stated:
Our Manchurian trade has, under Russian occupation, sunk from a very promising
beginning to a condition which has brought American
mills to bankruptcy. ... Japan stands for freedom, cultural enlightenment.
In the editorial of February 10, 1904, it continued:
The blow came unexpectedly.... As a matter of naval strategy and tactics, this
prompt, enterprising and gallant act of Japanese arms
will be memorable.
And on February 11, 1904, the editor concluded:
It hardly becomes the dignity of a great nation to complain that it has been struck before
it was quite ready. If Russia is caught
unprepared, the fault is surely her own. To impute
treachery to the Japanese because they took the promptest possible advantage, was a
gloss reserved for the publicists at St. Petersburg.
Thus we observe that we are not opposed to
sneak attacks; we are opposed to sneak attacks upon us, or
when they are not to our advantage. We may justify a sneak
attack according to its affect upon our "Manchurian trade."
Or, let us consider the efforts of a large segment of
our leadership and citizenry to pass the Universal
Military Training bill. In the thirties, we argued that conscription
in peacetime was wrong in principle, that Italy
and Germany, by conscription, were depriving young men of
a most sacred freedom freedom from military
domination. Arguments which appeared in American newspapers
and journals condemned totalitarian leadership which
then conscripted youth. Yet today, many responsible men
would conscript our young men in peacetime, and would
be embarrassed to reread the things they once wrote.
Military preparedness has led to its logical conclusion, as it did
in Germany and Italy. We are opposed to conscription
when others prepare to fight us, but can justify it when we
are preparing to fight them.
When Vittorio, son of Benito Mussolini, returned
from Addis Ababa and described to newspaper correspondents
the effects of Italian flame-throwers, the American public
was justly incensed that such a weapon had been used
upon barefooted and ill-equipped Ethiopians. The
American papers used such words as "cruel," "barbaric,"
and "uncivilized," in describing Italy's use of the
flame-thrower against defenseless women and children. Yet scarcely
ten years had passed before we destroyed hundreds of
thousands of defenseless women and children by dropping bombs
into Japan and Germany. Now it would he an easy mistake
to call men in responsible positions evil because such
bombs were dropped, but it is a more complicated problem
than that. Such acts lie in and are the direct result
of, dependence upon violence.
On November 4, 1947, the United Press reported
from Tokyo that the United States Government had placed
on trial several Japanese generals who had participated
in the bombing of Chinese cities in 1937. In presenting
its case, the American Government took the "view that
any general bombing of extensive areas wherein resides a
large population engaged in peaceful pursuits, is
unwarranted and contrary to the principles of law and humanity." Since
then, several of these Japanese generals have been
hanged. One may ask why have we not hanged Eisenhower and
the other American generals who engaged in the
"general bombing of extensive areas wherein resides a
large population engaged in peaceful pursuits"? We have not
done so because we are not opposed to indiscriminate
bombing. In addition, we have reached that stage in history
where the choice must he between total war and total peace,
since it may now he argued that all pursuits in wartime in
some way, directly or indirectly, are connected with the war
effort. Where does this process lead?
There is some indication that even military men
are concerned to answer this question. On September 21,
1946, an Associated Press dispatch reported in the
Herald Tribune for September 22, quoted Admiral Halsey as having
said that the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima was a
"mistake" and an "unnecessary experiment" because the
Japanese had already put out peace feelers. Halsey also
indicated that he was sorry the bomb had been invented and
used, and he deplored "exaggerated statements that the
atomic bomb was responsible for the collapse of Japan." Even
those who put pressure upon Admiral Halsey to change
his statement could not, on the other hand, suppress
"The United States Strategic Bombing Survey,"
an official Government document published July 1, 1946, under the editorship
of Commander Walter Wilds, United States Naval
Reserve, which, in discussing the atomic bomb, concluded:
Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of
the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to
31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to
1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been
dropped,
even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.
We thus observe the eternal truth proclaimed
by Laotse, Buddha, Jesus, St. Francis, George Fox and
Gandhi: the use of violence will destroy moral integrity the
very fundamental of community on which peace rests. We
cannot remain honest unless we are opposed to injustice
wherever it occurs, first of all in ourselves.
Further, there is real evidence in history that
those nations which have defended themselves by physical
force have produced citizens whose final allegiance is to
the political state rather than to principle, to truth, or to God.
On May 28, 1946, the Emergency Committee of
Atomic Scientists set out to raise $200,000 for a Campaign
of Education on the Atomic Bomb. The Committee stated
in its press release that the time had come to "let people
know that a new type of thinking is essential in this atomic
age" if mankind is to survive and move toward higher levels.
On the day following this urgent appeal the Federation
of American Scientists said, "Scientists seek by education
to teach men that they must abandon atomic weapons
to preserve civilization." But there is some reason to
question whether scientists who are building stockpiles of
atom bombs can "teach men that they must abandon
atomic weapons to preserve civilization." How can scientists
expect the man on the street to follow their leadership? Would
not ordinary human beings conclude that the matter is not
so serious after all, and that the thousands of dollars
which the scientists are attempting to raise will have little
effect? It would seem that the only logical conclusion many
could reach in observing the scientists continue to make
what they describe as "utterly dangerous and destructive"
would be that these scientists are "afflicted with insanity."
The campaign of education on the atom bomb
was addressed to those "possessing the power to make decisions
for good and evil." It announced that "our modes of
thinking must be changed," and yet the atomic scientists
themselves are still addicted to outmoded thinking, and the
Federation of Atomic Scientists expressed it most frankly in
their statement made on May 26, 1947, to which we have
referred, by admitting that in these matters "we must submit to
the guidance and orders of the military."
The behavior of these scientists is symbolic of many Americans' basic
allegiance. Although these scientists claim that the atom bomb
will destroy civilization, and although they sincerely appeal
for funds in order that this calamity shall be avoided, they
end in foregoing the dictates of their conscience, and, in
the interests of national defense, "submit to the orders of
the military." A few days after the Emergency Committee
of Atomic Scientists issued their appeal for funds, A. J.
Muste of the Fellowship of Reconciliation wrote Dr. Einstein
and said, in part:
You and your colleagues seek to draw a line between yourselves and the military. You
speak of them as "fantastic and shortsighted" in
the estimation of "reasonable men." Some of you
have said even harsher things than this of General Groves and other military men. But plainly
you are subservient to the military, as you were during those years when, without the
knowledge of your fellow citizens, you made the first
atomic bomb. The military say they must have
atomic bombs, which will wreck civilization, and
you make them! You are cogs in the same machine as they are. If you think there are not some
of them who also work with heavy hearts and
without enthusiasm, you are surely mistaken and
lacking in the grace of humility. They have not
changed their mode of thinking the habit of
command.
You have not changed your mode of thinking the habit of subservience to the military and
to the State when it comes to a showdown. In the final analysis, they practice the Fuehrer
principle, and you submit to it.
Mr. Muste ended his statement by urging the
scientists to forsake being merely scientists, and to become
prophets, persons, whole human beings, and not technicians or
slaves of a war-making state. He urged them to
become conscientious objectors, and to refuse to make weapons
of destruction.
On June 10, 1946, Dr. Harold C. Urey, who had
received a copy of the Einstein letter, wrote Muste from
the University of Chicago Institute of Nuclear Studies. He
began by saying, "In the first place, neither Dr. Einstein nor
I myself nor anyone else has the power to prevent
some scientists from working on military weapons if they
wish to. We have only control over our own actions and no
others." He then said, "I personally believe in obeying the laws
of this country, and in aiding its efforts in whatever
direction my own government and the responsible officials
believe that we should go."
Thus, men who cry out that atomic weapons will
destroy civilization continue to make them, because
national allegiances demand it. They announce that they work
with "heavy hearts and without enthusiasm" but they do
not answer the heart. They answer the demands of the
state. It may be true, of course, that men continue to depend
upon guns because they see no other way. Faced with
tyranny within and without, we have begun to question man's
ability to reach peaceful solutions. One of the chief causes
of dictatorship and war may be the readiness of the
average citizen to go into uniform. How difficult it must be for
leaders in government to make a sacrificial effort to avoid
hostilities, when men and women doubt the efficacy
of demanding that their leaders find a real way to peace.
The hearts of thousands of men cried out against
participation in the last wear, yet they who protested against the
useless order of a life at variance with the centers of their
beings, had been so conditioned by nationalism that they could
not use the unique and powerful weapon within their own
hands civil disobedience. We find many reasons for our
failure to use this weapon. As Tolstoi pointed out in his
book Christianity and Patriotism:
One man does not assert the truth which he knows, because he feels himself bound to
the people with whom he is engaged; another, because the truth might deprive him of
the profitable position by which he maintains his family; a third, because he desires to
attain reputation and authority, and then use them
in the service of mankind; a fourth, because he
does not wish to destroy old sacred traditions; a
fifth, because he has no desire to offend people; a
sixth, because the expression of the truth would
arouse persecution, and disturb the excellent
social activity to which he has devoted himself.
For these and other reasons, we have failed, in
the past, to identify ourselves with all men. Now we have
no choice but to do so if we are to survive. We have
reached that stage where only a miracle can save us the
miracle of individual responsibility. Individual responsibility is
the alternative to violence; individual responsibility is
capable of overcoming fear; it is capable of converting
nation-worship back to the Judaeo-Christian tradition and
ethic; it is capable of re-establishing moral integrity. How can
we begin? We can begin by opposing injustice wherever it
appears in our daily lives. As free men we can refuse
to follow or to submit to unjust laws which separate us
from other men no matter where they live, nor under
what government they exist. As the now-famous editorial in
Life Magazine pointed out, in our time it is "the
individual conscience against the atomic bomb." In the parochial
states of the world today, it is the responsible man, the
man against all injustice, who can save us, and this in a
very real sense means man against the state.
Justice Jackson of the United States Supreme
Court, in his opening statement at the Nuremberg
trials, addressed to the people of the civilized world,
castigated the German people for refusing to recognize this
principle. Mr. Jackson said over and again that German citizens
had been irresponsible in following the cruel and
antisocial directives of the Hitler government. He reiterated
that responsible people would have resolved to end the
Nazi regime and its wide-spread injustice, even though
they were aware that to have done so would have meant
severe punishment or even death for many of them and
their families. There is some question in my mind that
Mr. Jackson understood the total implication of his words,
since he had issued no such statement in defense of
the conscientious objectors in this country, who refused
to register under what they considered the antisocial
Selective Service and Training Act. I agree with him, however,
that the failure of the German citizens to resist unjust
laws from the beginning of Hitler's regime logically ended in
their placing Jews in gas furnaces and lye pits, although
many who did these things, no doubt, worked with "heavy
hearts and without enthusiasm."
It would, however, he a mistake to make simple
the matter of resistance to the state. Several of the
greatest teachers of the past, and such practicers of civil
disobedience as Mahatma Gandhi, have never taken
lightly their inability to follow the directives of
governmental officials, and have with intense study and grave
concern for all persons involved, weighed many aspects of
the question under consideration before appearing to
set themselves off from the will of an organized social
group. Although there has not been complete agreement
among those who have practiced civil disobedience, most
leaders have generally adhered to certain very basic principles.
Tile chief of these is that no individual has the right to
rebel against the state. One has not the right to resist the
social group of which he is a part. This is particularly true
where decisions made have been reached after
extensive democratic discussion. One has, on the other hand, a
duty to resist, and one resists because the state is
poorly organized and one's everlasting aim is to improve the
nature of the state, to disobey in the interest of a higher law.
Hence, one has the duty but not the right to rebel. But
before rebelling, one must clearly examine the questions
outlined by the British scholar, T. H. Green, in his
Lectures on the Principles of Political Obligation:
I must ask:
(a) Have I exhausted all possible
constitutional methods of bringing desired change?
(b) Are the people I ask to rebel
keenly conscious of a flagrant wrong to them? Or do
I excite their passions?
(c) What is likely to be the effect of
the resistance? Will the new state be worse than
the first?
(d) What of my own motives? Have I
removed all EGO?
To these one must add another: Can I
accept punishment, prison, or even death, in that spirit which is
without contention? It is most important to examine
one's own motives, for even if a given resistance fails, this
does not disprove its validity; repeated attempts and
repeated failures may be necessary to success. But, since it is
not possible to see completely what the results of any
given resistance will be, one must therefore be careful that
one's character and motives are clear. Henry Thoreau, sitting
in prison, was visited by Ralph Waldo Emerson, who urged
him to forego his useless efforts to stop slavery and an
unjust war. But Thoreau, whose aim was clear, held to his
belief and action. Little did Emerson realize that Thoreau's
action was to be one of the chief factors in the development of
the life and spirit of Mahatma Gandhi, and that
Thoreau's resistance was to move through history and help
bring freedom to four hundred million people, far exceeding
the number Thoreau attempted to free in the middle of the
19th century.
There have been many great men in history who
have been civil resisters. All who have resisted have seen
clearly that social progress is made through simultaneous
change in men and in the environment in which men
find themselves. Thus, these men have not only sought
to behave with integrity, but they have resisted secure in
the faith that their opposition ultimately would influence
society in the direction of those conditions which make it
possible for other men to see issues clearly enough to press for
a more abundant economic, social, and political life.
These men recognized that there is "individual responsibility
for collective guilt." Among these have been Socrates,
Henry Thoreau, and more recently, Norbert Wiener, the
American scientist.
Plato describes in the
Apology a scene in which Socrates is on trial for the practice of philosophy. In
that great work Socrates, having heard an indictment
against himself by Anytus, turns to the Athenian court, and says:
If you say to me, Socrates, this time we will not mind Anytus and you shall be let off, but
upon one condition, that you are not to inquire
and speculate in this way any more, and if you are caught doing so again, you shall die if this
was the condition on which you let me go, I should reply: Men of Athens, I honor and love you; but
I shall obey God, rather than you, and while I
have life and strength I shall never cease from
the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet and saying to him after
my manner.
I tell you that virtue is not given by money but
that from virtue comes money and every other good of
man, public as well as private, this is my teaching: this is
the doctrine which you say corrupts the youth For I do
nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike,
not to take thought of your persons, or your properties, but
first and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of
the soul I shall never alter my ways, not even if I have to
die many times. For I will obey God rather than you . . . and
so I bid you farewell I to die, you to live; which is better,
God only knows.
Centuries later, the United States government,
which at the time condoned slavery, called upon Henry
Thoreau to contribute his share into the tax-box to support the
war with Mexico. Thoreau, as you know, refused to pay
such taxes, and in his Essay on Civil Disobedience,
which Mahatma Gandhi lists as one of the four great influences in his
life, raised the question which will be raised again and again
if there are to be free men, "How does it become a man
to behave toward this ... government today?" And he went
on to comment, "I answer that he cannot without disgrace
be associated with it. I cannot for an instant recognize that
political organization as my government which is a
slave's government also." The American people "must cease to
hold slaves and to make war on Mexico though it costs
them their existence as a people.... There are thousands
who are in opinion opposed to slavery and to war, yet who
in effect do nothing to put an end to them; who,
esteeming themselves children of Washington and Franklin, sit
down with their hands in their pockets and say they know
not what to do, and do nothing; who even postpone the
question of freedom to the question of free trade.... I think that it
is not too soon for honest men to rebel and to revolutionize."
In 1944 G. B. Shaw published his book,
Everybody's Political What's What. In discussing the question of
general strike versus conscientious objection as a means
of bringing government officials to the point of seeking
peace or stopping war, Shaw observed that:
... The social organization of such conscientious objection is the only method
now available for preventing a war....
... The conscientious objector does not
starve himself; he asserts himself in the practical
form of a flat refusal to fight. And if he is
numerous enough, there will be no war....
... A majority of objectors is not necessary:
an organized minority could stop war as it stopped Prohibition in the United States....
One may question that a minority could stop war,
but certainly one cannot question that disobedience both
to military service and to payment of taxes for war would
reveal to the state that a segment of the population cares
enough to pay a price for peace. Wide-spread resistance to
war preparations and the willingness of resisters to
face imprisonment would have to be taken seriously by the state
and ultimately would have a profound effect on
American foreign policy.
The action of Norbert Wiener a year ago is worthy
of observation, for this one scientist has had a profound
effect upon the thinking and action of many men in the
States and abroad. Norbert Wiener, one of the
outstanding mathematical analysts of our time, a professor
at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, published in
The Atlantic Monthly, January 1947, a letter which earlier
he had addressed to the president of a great aircraft
corporation who had requested of him the technical account of a
certain research Wiener had conducted during the war.
Professor Wiener's indignation at being asked to participate
in rearmament less than two years after the war's end
is typical of a growing sensitivity among many
American scientists today. His conclusion is revolutionary and
makes Norbert Wiener more than a scientist and more than
an ordinary man: he has become a prophet. After stating
that in the past scholars had made it the custom to
furnish scientific information to any seeking it, Norbert
Wiener pointed out that the bombing of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki had made it clear to him that "to provide
scientific information is not necessarily an innocent act, and
may entail the gravest consequences." He therefore felt
it necessary to reconsider the established custom of
scientists to give information to any person who might inquire of
him. He stated it had become perfectly clear to him that
to disseminate information about weapons in the
present state of our civilization is to make it practically
certain that the weapons will be used, and in that respect
the controlled missile, concerning which he was requested
to give data, represented the still imperfect supplement to
the atomic bomb and bacteriological warfare. He said that
their possession can do nothing but endanger us by encouraging
what he describes as the "tragic insolence of the
military mind." Wiener's conclusion was this: "If, therefore, I do
not desire to participate in the bombing or poisoning
of defenseless peoples and I most certainly do not I
must take a serious responsibility as to those to whom I
disclose my scientific ideas.... I do not expect to publish any
future work of mine which may do damage in the hands
of irresponsible militarists...."
Civil disobedience is not advocated as a cure-all,
nor is it urged as an alternative to world government. It is
not itself equal to the adjustment of social, political
and economic displacements which have produced
first depression and then dictatorship and war.
Such adjustments are in reality the means of peace. But in
our fear, when we behave as if the truth were not true, the
real problem, the struggle to provide men with bread,
beauty and brotherhood, has been relegated to a second place.
Our fears have brought about an armaments race and until
we have broken the vicious circle of this race with the
Soviet Union, there cannot be attention, energy and money
given to the basic causes of war and injustice. It is important
to realize that such competition can be ended when
the United States is willing to disarm completely. We
have within us as individuals the responsibility and power
to help achieve this task. We have the responsibility and
the duty to make an effort to save the world from the curse
of atomic war. We have the power to disarm the United
States by one gun if we refuse to carry one; we have the power
to take a gun from another if we refuse to pay for it by
refusing to pay that part of taxes used for war.
There are those who will say that this is a
futile, unrealistic and impractical course, but as we look
through history we find that it is dependence on arms which
is unrealistic. Every nation that has put its faith in violent
force has sooner or later been overcome. Today we
must face not merely the question, What will happen if we
give up our arms? but we must face two other question:
first, What will happen if we do not give up our arms? Then
we must ask ourselves, Can we expect that others will be
willing to give up their arms unless we do so first?
Edmund Taylor, formerly director of the Office
of Strategic Services in India, and author of Strategy of
Terror, has since published his book Richer by
Asia, in which he describes his living in India and his contact with
Gandhi and Asia. In discussing disarmament he points out
that pending the establishment of one world it is our duty to
try to persuade other nations to join us in
extensive disarmament, but he is quick to point out we must
not expect to be trusted or followed immediately, for too
much suspicion has been sown for too many years. He is
convinced that we must resign ourselves to seeing other nations
insist on retaining some war-making potentialities, and
he pleased if they accept any limitations at all. He
then concludes:
That leaves us the alternatives of retaining our own arms, or disarming unilaterally
and announcing to the world that we will never
under any circumstances resist aggression by force.
The time may be near if it has not arrived already
when we must seriously consider whether that is not the best thing to do, whether the evils
which armed resistance, even successful, would
bring on us would not be worse than any possible consequences of surrender.
In a very real way the American people sense
that Edmund Taylor's question is a profound one. Men argue
that violent force is the great protection of our democratic
institutions, that in arms alone lies security. On
this premise we pile higher and higher armaments and
bases which are to provide us this much sought
security. Consequently we have the world's largest air force,
the greatest industrial output, fantastic weapons; we have
naval bases circling the globe; we urge our scientists to find
even more devastating weapons. Yet how do you account for
the fact that the higher and higher this mountain of force
rises, the deeper and deeper the fears of the American
people become?
We have become so involved that Dr. Harold C.
Urey, outstanding liberal scientist, in a quarterly publication,
Air Affairs, recently came out with an article which
conclusively proves what a frightened man he is. Failure to
safeguard development and use of atomic energy, he believes,
will inevitably lead to civilization-destroying war, and to head
it off he concludes that the United States may have to
declare war itself "with the frank purpose of conquering the
world and ruling it as we desire and preventing any other
nation from developing more weapons of war." He reveals
the extremity of the proposition by adding, "This is a
possible course of action; it's one that I can't contemplate with
any pleasure but one which may be a strict necessity."
Indeed, only a miracle can save us, and that is
the miracle of opposing injustice everywhere, first of all
in ourselves; it is the miracle of depending upon the power
of good to overcome the power of evil; it is the
miracle performed when we no longer believe that Satan can
cast out Satan. In the book, What Can We Believe?
an exchange of letters between Dick Sheppard and Laurence
Housman, English poet-dramatist, there appear the
following statements:
I don't believe the rise and fall of empires, however good and great, is decisive for the
coming
of God's Kingdom on earth. The Fall of the Roman Empire must have seemed at the time the
biggest possible disaster for the advance of civilization
in the then-known world. But was it?
Most nations die, I suppose, because of
their sins; but if one nation died because of its righteousness, as the Christ of history died
on the cross, what a wonderful New Incarnation
that would be to prove, and what a wonderful new
faith for the troubled nations it might give rise to,
it might convert nation-worship back to
Christianity, again.
We cannot convert nation-worship back to
Christianity again unless we care enough, unless we can believe
that man is in apprehension like a god, unless we are able so
to revolutionize and to discipline ourselves that those
who behold us exclaim of us, "In action how like an
angel!", unless like Jesus and Gandhi we attain that spirit
which makes it possible for us to stand with arms
outstretched, even unto death, saying, "You can strike me, you
may destroy my home, you may destroy me, but I will not
submit to what I consider wrong; neither will I strike back."
Many will question the practicality of such a course, but has
not the life, the work, the death of Gandhi demonstrated in
our time that one man holding fast to truth and to
non-violence is more powerful than ten thousand men armed?
Yet even though failure should seem certain, the
faith we profess demands allegiance. But how are we
different from the heathen if we strike back or submit to
unjust demands and laws; or what have we left to protect if in
the process of defending our freedom we give up both
democracy and principle? How can we love God, whom we have
not seen, if we cannot, in time of crisis, find the way to love
our brothers whom we have seen?