THE AMERICAN PEOPLE THE PRINCIPLE PROBLEM?
Senator Fulbright takes a dim view of the American people. He indicates
that the curbing of the people, or the manipulation of the masses, may
be the primary problem of the President. The masses are all potential
McCarthyites who are easily infected with the virus of extremely
radical rightwingism. “In the long run, it is quite possible that the
principal problem of leadership will be, if it is not already, to
restrain the desire of the people to hit the Communists with everything
we’ve got, particularly if there are more Cubas and Laos. Pride in
victory, and frustration in restraint, during the Korean war, led to
MacArthur’s revolt and McCarthyism.”[119] This is the most charitable
interpretation of McCarthyism which the Senator has ever made. For
in effect he is saying that McCarthyism is the result of the desire
for victory over Communism, and the frustration which comes when the
leaders try to restrain people from winning this victory.
We think that the principal problem is Communism and not the American
people.
The memorandum went on to say that the people cannot be trusted on
foreign policy. They tend to “obey the impulse of passion” and “to
abandon a mature design for the gratification of a momentary caprice.”
Thus the Senator thought that if foreign aid was “laid before the
people in a referendum, it would be defeated.” The Senator obviously
does not want what _he thinks_ is the people’s will to be carried out.
The people want simple solutions, they want to scourge devils or lash
out at the enemy.[120]
The Senator, it is plain to see, does not have a very high opinion of
the American people and their ability to govern themselves. Is not
this a lack of confidence in our republican form of government?
_How Much Is the Senator For Civilian Control?_
Senator Fulbright says that he has a “strong belief in the principle
of military subordination to civilian control.”[121] So does this
reviewer. Furthermore, civilian control ultimately means the
_sovereignty of the people_. Thus it ultimately means the civilian
control of the President and of all other politicians and statesmen.
Does the Senator believe as strongly in the civilian control of
politicians as well as of the military? It does not seem that the
Senator is too well pleased with this bedrock principle of our
constitutional system. In a TV interview July 30, 1961, he said,
concerning the question of Red China and the U. N. and the recognition
of Communist Outer Mongolia, that: “The sentiments of this country have
been developed to such a pitch our President has no freedom of action
in this field.”[122] Again: “... we will not recognize Red China,
because of the price of dissension within our own ranks at home; it is
too great to pay ... I think we have no freedom of action in this field
because of domestic politics.”[123]
If he thought that he could get by with it would the Senator thwart the
will of the people concerning Red China and Outer Mongolia? Would he
like to have the freedom to act in these matters contrary to what he
knows to be the will of the people?
As a matter of fact, the Senator wants us to recognize Outer Mongolia.
He thinks that it might help us learn more about the relationship
between the U.S.S.R. and Red China. Obviously he would urge the
President to recognize Outer Mongolia if he thought that the people
would stand for it.
The American people, in my judgment, have good reason to be against the
recognition of Outer Mongolia. _First_, around five thousand of her
troops fought Americans and the U.N. forces in Korea.[124] _Second_,
it is one of the oldest of the satellites of the U.S.S.R. _Third_,
it is recognized as a loyal Communist country by Red China. For
example, a Communist paper recently carried an article entitled: “China
Salutes Fraternal Mongolia.”[125] In trade talks around the first of
March, 1961, it was emphasized by Peking that the cooperation between
Mongolia and China was “on the basis of the principles of proletarian
Internationalism.” Marshall Malinevsky, who is chief of the Russian
Army, “described the bond between Mongolian, Chinese and Russian Armies
as ‘cemented in blood’.” _Fourth_, the Premier of Outer Mongolia in
a broadcast on April 24, 1961, emphasized their loyalty to Lenin.
Furthermore, he said: “In their struggle for building a new life,
our people always leaned and continue to lean upon the disinterested
all-around aid of the Soviet Union, the first country of triumphant
Socialism.” _Fifth_, if we recognize Outer Mongolia, Japan will likely
do likewise. This will help increase the sentiment of neutralism in
Japan.[126] _Sixth_, it would have a bad psychological effect in Asia.
The Foreign Secretary of the Philippines, Felix Berto Serrano, said
that it would be “an example of the softening of the U.S. attitude
toward Communism in this part of the world.” The Foreign Minister of
Thailand, Phanat Khoman, said that it would have an adverse affect on
free world morale.[127]
The Senator thinks that if the people were given a choice in the
matter, they would defeat foreign aid. He may or may not be right. But
is he not saying that what he thinks is the will of the people should
not rule in this matter?
_Attitude Towards America_
The Senator attacks those individuals who, he says, run down America.
“Implicit in much of the propaganda of the radical right is the
assumption that our free society is permeated with corruption and
decay.”[128]
There is much that is right in America. We believe that it is the
greatest country in the world. The principles on which it is founded
are the principles which when followed produce progress and prosperity.
On the other hand, there is enough crime, corruption and decay to cause
all thoughtful Americans real concern. For example, J. Edgar Hoover has
called our attention to these matters countless times.
We shall not enter into a discussion of this except to point out that
the Senator himself has some hard things to say about America.
In the speech at Stanford University he said: “In the last few years
American statesmen and scholars have been turning their thoughts
toward an effort to re-define the national ‘purpose,’ to interpret our
national life and politics in terms of goals. The genesis of this quest
for a clear national objective was a feeling that somehow the American
people had strayed from their historic course into a blind alley of
aimlessness and frustration. In an era of unexampled affluence, the
American people, by and large, are not happy. In the years since World
War II, we have attained our private purposes almost too well at home,
but beyond our personal material needs we have not yet recognized an
objective or purpose which inspires our real interest. At home we
have become immersed in the crass delight of extravagant consumption,
puerile faddism, and callow amusements.”
“The quest for a definition of the national purpose has been generated
by this sense of malaise. If our people were engaged in vigorous
and meaningful activity, it is quite possible that we would not now
be troubling ourselves with a quest for abstract definition and
articulation.”[129]
Rightwing extremism, he says, has great appeal to the American public,
and in times of crisis it has “great mass appeal”. The people are the
ones who need to be restrained in our conflict with communism. The
people do not have enough understanding to back an adequate foreign
policy.[130] The people are misled by simple solutions and need some
devils to scourge. “The radicalism of the right can be expected to
have great mass appeal during such periods. It offers the simple
solution, easily understood: Scourging of the devils within the body
politic, or, in the extreme, lashing out at the enemy.”[131]
On September 1, 1960, Senator Fulbright said: “I believe that such
a study would conclude that America’s trouble is basically one of
aimlessness at home and frustration abroad.”[132]
In the light of these contentions of the Senator, he is hardly the one
to defend America against the charge, which he says is made by the
“radical right,” that our “free society is permeated with corruption
and decay.” Has the “radical right” said anything harder about America
than has the Senator? If not, why should they be classified as radical,
and the Senator not also be grouped with them in this matter.
_The Manipulated Masses?_
Not only does the Senator think that the problem is to restrain
the people, but that the people should be “directed” into backing
whatever the President’s program happens to be. He does not trust
the people; his statements make this clear. They must be “directed”.
“Fundamentally, it is believed that the American people have little,
if any, need to be alerted to the menace of the cold war. Rather,
the need is for understanding of the true nature of that menace, and
the direction of the public’s present and foreseeable awareness of
the fact of the menace toward support of the President’s own total
program for survival in a nuclear age. There are no reasons to believe
that military personnel generally can contribute to this need, beyond
their specific, technical competence to explain their own role. On the
contrary, there are many reasons, and some evidence, for believing
that an effort by the military, beyond this limitation, involves
considerable danger.”[133]
Frankly at times we are not sure what is the President’s own total
program. It has vacillated, for example, concerning Laos and Cuba. Are
we to be “directed” into it, as the President unfolds it, or shapes it,
from time to time?
Senator Fulbright has attacked the competency of the people. He laid
down in his secret memorandum, in our judgement, the ideological basis
for a program of Pavlovian conditioning of the American people to
accept whatever is decided on in the White House, the State Department
and by a small group of advisors.[134]
The Senator thinks that the people are susceptible to radicalism. He
says that extremely radical rightwingism “already has great appeal to
the public. In the future it may well have much greater appeal.”[135]
So the problem is to “direct” them into the President’s own total
program. This program, the Senator implies, _is quite different_ from
the general program for victory and survival which is discussed in the
memorandum and repudiated as being rightwing. For he thinks that the
rightwingers are raising an obstacle to the “public acceptance of the
President’s program.”[136]
Carried out to its logical conclusion, we believe that the memorandum,
and the way in which it was formed and implemented, introduces a
new concept into our government, a concept which would replace the
Constitution and the sovereignty of the people. The President, the
State Department and a few advisors are the ones who through their own
will and wisdom formulate the policies which shall be followed. This
they are to do independently of the people, for the people are too
deficient in understanding; they are so immature that they follow the
momentary caprice; they tend to obey the impulse of passion and thus
the “Radicalism of the right can be expected to have great mass appeal
during such periods” as the “long twilight struggle”. Furthermore,
our age is complex, therefore, the public must either be ignored or
conditioned so that they will follow the leader. In directing the
people into the President’s program, the military should engage in the
cold war only to the extent that it can help do this in explaining
their own strictly military role. After speaking of the need for the
direction of the people’s awareness, that there is a danger, into
support for the President’s program, he said: “There are no reasons
to believe that military personnel generally can contribute to this
need, beyond their specific technical competence to explain their own
role. On the contrary, there are many reasons and some evidence, for
believing that an effort by the military, beyond this limitation,
involves considerable danger.”[137] Does this mean that when the
military cannot be used as a rubber stamp it must not be used in waging
the cold war?
It should be remembered that this basically anti-constitutional
concept—against the Constitution in that it distrusts and wants
to “direct” the people, rather than accept the sovereignty of the
people—was set forth in a secret memorandum. The other members of the
Foreign Relations Committee did not see it. It was sent directly to the
President and the Secretary of Defense, and has had an influence on a
very important policy.
Walter Lippmann, who is highly regarded by Senator Fulbright, said that
there was a tendency of Government “insiders” to view the criticism
of the “outsiders” as that of ignoramuses who were not enlightened
by secret files and conferences. He said: “I tell the critic, you be
careful. You will be denouncing the principle of democracy itself,
which asserts that the outsiders shall be sovereign over the insiders.
For you will be showing that the people themselves, since they are
ignoramuses because they are outsiders, are therefore incapable of
governing themselves.
“Furthermore, Lippmann declared that as far as the affairs of the world
are concerned, those who regard themselves as insiders are actually
outsiders since none of them read all of the U.S. papers and they
have no access to the records of foreign governments that are equally
important and if one is to have the total wisdom the insiders indicate
they have.”[138]
_An Out-Moded Constitutional System?_
Senator Fulbright seems to want to change our system of government
so that it will be run by one man, the President. He has unlimited
confidence in the President as a man who is above partisan politics
and who is of high moral calibre _by virtue of the fact_ that he is
President. He views our constitutional system as out of date. Thus in
his Stanford speech, July 28, 1961, he said:
“The President is hobbled in his task of leading the American people
to consensus and concerted action by the restrictions of power imposed
on him by a constitutional system designed for an eighteenth century
agrarian society far removed from the centers of world power. It is
imperative that we break out of the intelligent confines of cherished
and traditional beliefs and open our minds to the possibility that
basic changes in our system may be essential to meet the requirements
of the twentieth century.
“The ability of this nation to preserve the value system which
constitutes the core of our national interest has come to depend
principally on our ability to cope with world wide revolutionary
forces. If we are to deal with these forces successfully, we must be
able to act quickly and decisively on the one hand and persistently and
patiently on the other. ‘Our American task,’ wrote Walter Lippmann in
a recent article, ‘is to generate superior national strength. For this
we must have a powerful and purposeful National Government.... There is
no getting away from the fact that, as Lord Acton said, power corrupts.
But also, there is no getting away from the fact that powerlessness
invites confusion, demoralization, and defeat.’
“The fact that is needed is Presidential power. He alone, among elected
officials, can rise above parochialism and private pressures. He
alone, in his role as teacher and moral leader, can hope to overcome
the excesses and inadequacies of a public opinion that is all too
often ignorant of the needs, the dangers, and the opportunities in our
foreign relations.
“Public Opinion, wrote Lippmann in _The Public Philosophy_,
consistently lags a generation behind in its attitudes and assessments
of international relations. The tyranny of public opinion, he says,
imposes upon our policy-makers a ‘compulsion to make mistakes.’
The poet Yeats was not wholly wrong when he laid down this harsh
pronouncement on public opinion: ‘The best lack all conviction—the
worst are filled with passionate intensity.’
“These views may be extreme but they are not wholly without merit,
and I point to them in order to stress the point that public opinion
must be educated and led if it is to bolster wise and effective
national policies. Only the President can provide the guidance that is
necessary, while legislators display a distressing tendency to adhere
slavishly to the dictates of public opinion, or at least to its vocal
and highly organized minority segments.”[139]
Lippmann’s statement concerning the “insiders” and “outsiders” ought to
be recalled in this connection. We should also remember his criticism
that President Eisenhower was a defeatist who lacked faith in our
people and in our system.[140] Why, then, should he contend that what
is needed is more Presidential power? Why should Senator Fulbright
maintain the same thing?
In a news conference in Washington, President Eisenhower said on May
10, 1962, that: “I believe that the problem of the Presidency is
rarely an inadequacy of power. Ordinarily, the problem is to use the
already enormous power of the Presidency judiciously, temperately and
wisely.”[141]
With all due respect to the President of the United States, whoever he
may be at any given time in our history, we do not believe that any
President is wise enough, knows enough or is good enough to occupy the
position to which Senator Fulbright would elevate him. Of course, with
the attitude which Fulbright has toward the masses, it is logical that
he should accept the Fuhrer (Fuhrer means “leader”) principle. The
masses must look to _the leader_. He must be their teacher and their
moral leader.
“We got rid of kings back there in 1776, Senator.”[142] The Senator
talks like a reactionary who wants to go back to kings and their
“divine right” to rule.
Senator Fulbright thinks that legislators are slaves of public opinion,
but the President is exempt from such. We ask: In our Republic
shouldn’t the legislators and the President be subject to public
opinion under law? If they are not to be responsive to the will of the
people within the framework of our constitutional government, to whom
and to what are they to be responsive?
Has the Senator from Arkansas forgotten that less than two years
ago President Kennedy was a Senator, and thus a legislator; and
legislators, according to Fulbright, display a “distressing tendency
to adhere slavishly to the dictates of public opinion, or at least to
its vocal and highly organized minority segments.” Just because this
particular Senator was elected President did he therefore become so
transformed that he rose above “parochialism and private pressures”?
Did he become overnight the “teacher and moral leader”, the “only” one
who can “provide the guidance that is necessary”? Does the Senator
think, if Nixon had been elected President, that automatically on
his shoulders would have descended the wisdom, the knowledge and the
unlimited goodness which would be necessary in one who is to be our
Leader in morality, our Teacher and our Guide? As a matter of fact,
we know that the Senator does not believe that Mr. Nixon, if he had
been elected, would have metamorphized into the Leader which Senator
Fulbright claims that the President by the very nature of the case
becomes. On February 1, 1960, Senator Fulbright reprinted in the
_Congressional Record_ an article by James Reston which was critical
of Mr. Nixon. Senator Fulbright said of the article that “it is seldom
in this stolid and humorless era that an observer of our political
scene sees through the absurd double talk of so much of the political
speeches with which we are entertained.” Reston, however, had done so
concerning Mr. Nixon.[143] And yet, Senator Fulbright’s concept of the
Presidency is such that he must believe, if he follows his position to
its logical conclusion, that Mr. Nixon would have ceased all double
talk, and have become the teacher and the moral leader of the nation if
he had been elected!
Did Senator Fulbright think that President Truman was the moral and
educational leader of the people just because he was President? Of
Truman he said in 1951: “For a long time we have been walking on
opposite sides of the street, neither of us nodding to the other. He
has often thought me wrong and unspeakable, while I have sometimes
thought him wrong and incomprehensible.”
“I have spoken with him on official business only once in several
years.”[144]
Senator Fulbright did not think that because President Eisenhower
was in the office of President that he was therefore qualified as
the leader and teacher of the people. He thought that Eisenhower was
confused and engaged in the lucrative business of making and selling
tranquilizer pills.[145] He spoke of the absence of leadership on the
part of the President.[146] A veto message was described as “unworthy
of his great office and beneath the dignity of the Congress to which
it was sent. It is not factual. It is intemperate. It was obviously
designed to catch newspaper headlines and radio and television news
blurbs.”[147] The President himself; the Senator said, was unaware of
the vastness of the Soviet challenge. “In defense, in our domestic
economy, and in our foreign relations, the administration seems to
be unaware of the depth and scope of the Soviet challenge. There is
no evidence that the administration is now or ever will be willing
to urge the American people to take in one notch on our belt to deal
with a Soviet challenge which confronts us in missiles, arms, and just
downright capacity to produce.”[148] “I believe that the people of
America will rise to the needs of our situation if they are clearly
told what is at stake. They certainly would be willing to be taxed
if it is necessary to survival. But I am not sure the administration
agrees with even that simple proposition.”[149]
With high commendation, Senator Fulbright inserted an article by Joseph
Alsop into the _Congressional Record_ which indicated that he thought
that President Eisenhower did not have, to say the least, the balanced
judgment necessary for guiding aright the ship of state. Of a reason
advanced by the President concerning test bans, Alsop said: “Surely
this singular choice of reasons for a high policy decision of truly
immeasurable import, reveals a mind gripped by one idea to the point
of total obsession. Surely it shows a man driven by a single purpose
almost to the point of mania.”[150]
Senator Fulbright further charged that President Eisenhower did not
have the proper attitude toward Congress and that he did not take
them into his confidence. Perhaps the Senator thought that there were
too many secret memorandums floating around! At any rate he said: “I
believe that a great deal of this stems from the President’s attitude
toward Congress, particularly toward the Democratic Members of
Congress. He has shown very little disposition to take them into his
confidence, now or at any other time.
“I believe that legitimately leaves many people with the feeling that
we do not know all that we ought to know. I asked Mr. Kohler about the
letter which Khrushchev had written, and Mr. Kohler said flatly that
he could not discuss it. I said that it had appeared at least in part
in the Herald Tribune, and that it was strange indeed that it could
be revealed to Miss Higgins of the New York Herald Tribune, but not
to a committee of the Senate. He said that he could not discuss it.
Apparently he was under orders not to discuss it in any respect with
the committee. That did not leave a very good taste in my mouth. It is
a mystery to me why a letter, unless it was specifically agreed that
Mr. Khrushchev considered it a personal and confidential letter, should
not be released. Having been released, or leaked, as the new term is,
to the Herald Tribune, I do not know of any reason why it should not be
made available to the committee, and to the public, for that matter, in
a more official manner than the way in which it was.
“With reference to the statement of the Senator regarding what Mr.
Tsarapkin said, I have only seen a summary of it which Mr. Farley
brought to me and said:
“‘This is all that can be released now.’
“I do not quite understand why that should be true. Maybe the Senator’s
explanation would be a violation of an understanding. That is possible.
However, I must agree with the Senator that a little more frank
discussion, and taking the public into their confidence, certainly the
Senate of the United States, particularly the Committee on Foreign
Relations, would be a very healthy step.”[151]
Senator Fulbright also thought that President Eisenhower was forcing
uniformity of viewpoint in his administration. Men under him were
either muzzled or suffered the consequences. Or at least the Senator
indicated this in an insertion, with high praise, of an article by
Joseph Alsop which said: “In this administration, uniformity of
viewpoint is virtually enforced. Independent-minded persons who do
not take their viewpoint, readymade, from the White House have always
been condemned as non-team players. Soon or late, they have always
met the fate of General Gavin, General Ridgway, and Gen. Maxwell D.
Taylor.”[152]
As late as March 22, 1960, Senator Fulbright, in a speech before the
Annual Dinner of the Harvard Club of Washington, D. C., commended
a high military official for disagreeing with the President. And,
furthermore, Senator Fulbright seems to cast scorn on the idea that
it was not for Generals to reason why! As the Senator put it: “Gen.
Bernard Schriever has also said that there is ‘very much evidence’
that Russia has greatly strengthened its bomber defenses. But the
aircraft that might not be able to get through may not even be able to
demonstrate their impotence. ‘For,’ states Gen. Thomas Power, Chief of
the Strategic Air Command, ‘our bomber bases are vulnerable to surprise
attack.’
“Generals are not to reason why. Their Commander in Chief complains
that, ‘too many generals have all sorts of ideas.’
“Yet mankind moves on ideas. Men with ideas are the makers and shakers
of the world. The larger their number serving the country the more
fruitful and vigorous the country. But few men of ideas come to
Washington. They are not likely to seek service in a government which
is scornful of their kind.”[153]
The Senator seemed to agree with the idea that “President Eisenhower
leads a dangerously sheltered life as Chief Executive of the
Nation.”[154]
Lyndon B. Johnson also commended, on February 16, 1960, the idea that
public debate by military officials was good. He reprinted a letter
from a Harvard professor, Henry A. Kissinger, that: “The President
says he deplores public argument by military experts regarding our
defense policy. Prior to this, he had called his critics parochial and
had invoked his superior expertise in the subject. It is impossible,
of course, for laymen to pass judgment on a debate of such technical
complexity. They have a right to insist, however, that the categories
of the debate be properly put.”[155]
In the light of these considerations, it is a serious question as to
what has happened to Senator Fulbright within the last year or so that
has led him to think now that President Kennedy is in office, that
the office of the Presidency has automatically raised the President
above the temptations and mistakes that not only beset legislators—and
Kennedy was a Senator less than two years ago—but also above those
which beset Eisenhower. What makes the Senator, in the light of his
previous criticisms of Eisenhower, think what is needed in this country
is more power for the President? After all, the Senator might reflect,
President Kennedy will not be President forever, and what if after we
have conferred far greater powers on the President, while Kennedy was
in office, someone like Eisenhower or Truman, of whom the Senator was
so critical, became President!!
In denouncing those whom he labeled as “fanatics” and “extremists” of
the right, in a speech in Los Angeles on November 18, President Kennedy
said: “They call for a ‘man on horseback’ because they do not trust
the people.”[156] And yet, Senator Fulbright calls for more power for
the President, because the people are so ignorant that they need the
Leader. Wouldn’t this position make the Senator, in this matter, akin
to the rightwing “fanatics”? As Joseph Alsop said, in regards to a
position President Eisenhower had taken, “perhaps it would have been
better to assert, at the outset, that it is always wrong for any nation
to trust any leader, instead of trusting the hard facts.”[157]
Former President Herbert Hoover has indicated that more than one loss
to communism has taken place because the man in the position of the
Presidency, along with his selected advisors, entered into agreements
without an opportunity being given to the Congress or to the people to
know of, to discuss or to pass on these matters. “Executive agreements,
Mr. Hoover said, had spread communism over the earth, turned over the
Baltic States to Soviet Russia, partitioned Poland at the Teheran
Conference, surrendered 10 nations to slavery at Yalta and set in
motion the communization of Mongolia, North Korea, and all China. One
result of these ‘unrestrained Presidential actions’ is a worldwide
shrinking of human freedoms. Another has been a steady encroachment on
powers of the legislative branch by the executive.”[158]
Senator Fulbright would lead us away from our constitutional system
to a system wherein the power would be concentrated in the hands of
the President. “The power that is needed is Presidential power.” “Only
the President can provide the guidance that is necessary....” But
this is not to lead us to a newer and higher form of government, than
that of our so-called out-moded “eighteenth century agrarian society”
constitutional system. It is to lead us back to the concept of
dictatorship, of the Fuhrer.
The leader, of course, would have his small, select group of advisors.
In such a set-up, government by secret memorandums would likely be the
order of the day.
We trust that Senator Fulbright, who is influential in the present
administration, will not influence President Kennedy to accept this
concept of our constitutional system, nor this idea of the role of the
President.
The Senator knows that power tends to corrupt and that absolute power
corrupts absolutely, for he himself once said: “Wherever there is power
there is the possibility that it will be used and the danger that it
will be misused. This assumption, expressed in Lord Acton’s maxim that
‘power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely,’ is common
to all effective democracies. This principle is one of instinctive
distrust of power itself wherever it exists. It has nothing to do with
the motives of any group or individual who may wield it. It has been
directed against big business, big labor, and big government, and now,
inevitably, it is directed against our big Military Establishment.”[159]
Why, then, does the Senator want to give to the President far more
power than the Constitution now allows and the President now has? For
what does the President need more power?
_Backing the President_
The Senator said that the need is for the public to be directed into
the support of the President’s own total program.[160] Does this apply
to the Senator?
As a candidate, President Kennedy said he would do something about
Cuba. He was going to do something, i.e. back an invasion. But Senator
Fulbright’s opposition to our backing an invasion had an influence,
according to some, on the President which helped induce him to modify
his plans. Thus the invasion was doomed to failure.
President Kennedy emphasized that we would stand firm in Berlin.[161]
On a TV program on July 30, 1961, the following exchange took place:
“Mr. Scali. In any negotiations over Berlin, Senator, would you be
willing to accept any concessions on the part of the West which closed
West Berlin as an escape hatch for refugees in any way?
“Senator Fulbright. Well, I think that that might certainly be a
negotiable point. The truth of the matter is I think the Russians have
the power to close it in any case. I mean we are not giving up very
much because I believe next week if they chose to close their borders,
they could, without violating any treaty right I know of. We have no
right to insist that they be allowed to come out. As I said I don’t
understand why the East Germans don’t close the border because I think
they have a right to close it. So why is this a great concession? You
don’t have that right now.”[162]
The question dealt specifically with the West making some concessions
which would close the escape hatch. The Senator thought “that might
certainly be a negotiable point.” He made it clear that we could not
negotiate with them as to whether they had the power to close it, so he
was not implying we should negotiate concerning their power; nor, as
he also put it, their right to close the escape hatch. The only thing
left to negotiate was, as the question specifically said, whether the
West should make any concessions “which closed West Berlin as an escape
hatch for refugees in any way.” In other words, the Senator indicates
that we should negotiate as to whether or not the West should help—by
making concessions on our part, since obviously we could not make
concessions for the Russians—close the escape hatch and thus in effect
whether the West should help the Communists guard the prison house in
which the Communists have their slaves.
The East German Communists made use of the Senator’s statements, and
commended him. On August 3, 1961, in East Berlin _Neues Deutschland_
had the following heading for an article: “U. S. Senator Against Trade
in Human Beings.” He was quoted as saying that: “the East Germans have
the right to close their borders.” The paper stressed that the Bonn
government was very much upset with Senator Fulbright’s proposal, as
they put it, to hold “serious negotiations on Berlin with the USSR.”
On August 4 the same paper said: “But the man seems to be a realistic
politician.” “Apparently Fulbright is aware of the fact that the
man-trap of West Berlin is an untenable situation, that it must and
will be closed.”
We wonder whether the President felt that the Senator’s speech upheld
the President’s position on Berlin.
The Senator later explained that this was not what he meant. It was,
however, what he said. We quote the entire explanation which was made
in the Senate on August 4, 1961.
“Last Sunday, I appeared on the ABC network television and radio
program, ‘Issues and Answers.’ In the course of that program one of
the exchanges led to an unfortunate and erroneous impression of my
views. When asked if I thought the West should make any concessions
on the question of the flight of East German refugees to West Berlin,
I responded that this, too, is something that could be discussed,
because—and this is the point—the East Germans have the ability to
control travel _within_ East Germany.
“The imposition of tighter travel restrictions by the East Germans
on travel of East German citizens within East Germany could restrict
access of East German citizens to all of Berlin, thus depriving a large
number of potential refugees from East Germany (as distinguished from
East Berlin) of this convenient means of escape.
“As I pointed out in the TV and radio interview, I know of no
agreements to which the Western Powers are party which prohibit the
East Germans from restricting the travel of East German citizens within
East Germany (outside of Berlin). It is to that point of reference that
my response was intended in the interview.
“I certainly did not intend to imply that the West should execute any
agreement whereby the West would assist in enforcing any restriction
imposed by East Germany on travel within East Germany nor that the West
should consider changing existing agreements and consent to closing
West Berlin to refugees wishing to enter.
“The right of persons to move freely within all sectors of Berlin is
entirely another matter and is guaranteed by post-war agreements signed
by the United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union. I do not
consider such right to be negotiable.”[163]
According to Constantine Brown, Germans and other Europeans have raised
the question: “How can we reconcile what your President tells us with
what his own important party leaders and especially the chairman of
the most important Foreign Relations Committee, Mr. Fulbright, says
in public, on the floor of the Senate and in radio and television
interviews?”
“The suspicions of what may be termed a schizophrenic foreign policy
started some time ago when Senator Mansfield, the majority leader, and
later Senator Fulbright urged negotiations on Berlin after Mr. Kennedy
had taken a formally strong stand on that very matter.”[164]
We wonder if the Senator has set the public a good example of clearly
and wholeheartedly backing the President’s program in such matters as
we have mentioned?
In a review of some of our history Senator Fulbright took the position
that it was important for the people themselves to bring to bear
pressure on the President, instead of always following the leader.
“Moreover, throughout the whole of this process, while much was done
by the action of individual Presidents, a great deal was done as a
direct result of congressional action or by the direct play of public
pressures, rising from a people whose life was being progressively
democratized.
“The key point is that the conduct of foreign affairs did not appear
to be an elite function, limited to specialists in and around the
Executive. Neither the electorate nor the Congress was ever overawed
by the Executive claim to exclusive knowledge, or its claim that it
would be against the national interest to disclose the facts relevant
to a foreign policy decision. Foreign policy was debated in remote
frontier outposts as well as in seaboard cities, with a shrewdness and
a knowledge of great power rivalries that astonishes any modern reader
who browses through the records of these debates preserved in our
National Archives.”[165]
Now that the Senator’s secret memorandum has been made public,
the people can study it, debate it and continue to exercise their
sovereignty. It is through knowledge and action based thereon that
the civilian control can be maintained over the government and thus
over the military. Those who do not believe that our constitutional
system is out of date will surely want to examine closely the Senator’s
position.[166] In fact, the Senator himself once emphasized the
necessity of debating issues. “Too many people are given a practical
veto over policy. There is an inhibition of the kind of free debate out
of which a fundamental national agreement emerges.” “Nonpartisanship
does not mean the absence of debate on foreign policy.” “I do not think
it is possible for a democratic country to have a viable, effective
policy unless it is founded on the widest possible public discussion.
Debate is a necessary ingredient of policymaking.”[167]
FOOTNOTES:
[119] _Congressional Record_, August 2, 1961, p. 13437, col. 2,t.
[120] _Ibid._, p. 13437.
[121] _Congressional Record_, August 2, 1961, p. 13436, col. 2,b.
[122] _Ibid._, August 1, 1961, p. 13219, col. 2,t.
[123] _Ibid._, p. 13219, col. 2,m.
[124] _Commercial Appeal_, August 1, 1961. Report of speech of
Congressman Frank J. Becker. This same news item said that Senator
Fulbright was for the recognition of Outer Mongolia.
[125] _Peking Review_, July 14, 1961, p. 7.
[126] See the American-Asian Educational Exchange’s recent report on
Communist China and Asia, July, 1961. See also _The Worker_, October 1,
1961, p. 6. _World Marxist Review_, July 1961, p. 3.
[127] _Chinese News Service_, August 1, 1961, pp. 3-4. For some
additional comments see Thomas J. Dodd’s speech in the _Congressional
Record_, August 2, 1961.
[128] _Congressional Record_, August 21, 1961, p. 15357, col. 3,m.
[129] Speech of Senator Fulbright before the 1961 Summer Cubberly
Conference of Stanford University, Stanford, California, July 28, 1961.
Mimeographed copy, pp. 1-2.
[130] _Congressional Record_, August 2, 1961, p. 13437, col. 2,m.
[131] _Ibid._, p. 13437, col. 2,m.
[132] _Ibid._, September 2, 1960, p. A6708, col. 2,b.
[133] _Ibid._, August 2, 1961, p. 13437, col. 2,b. Dr. Robert T.
Oliver, of Pennsylvania State University, expressed his opinion on
October 24, 1961, that: “Democratic and totalitarian governments are
becoming more and more alike in their methods of governing—through the
manipulation of public opinion by control of secrecy and publicity.”
(_Congressional Record_, Jan. 15, 1962, p. A141, col. 2,t.)
[134] See Edward Hunter, speech on the Manion Forum. 1961. Reprinted in
the _Congressional Record_, Feb. 6, 1962, pp. A906-907.
[135] _Congressional Record_, August 2, 1961, p. 13437, col. 1,b.-2,t.
[136] _Ibid._, p. 13437, col. 1,b. See also p. 13436, col. 3,b.
[137] _Ibid._, p. 13437, col. 3,t.
[138] _Ibid._, January 18, 1960, p. 578, col. 3,m. Dr. Robert T.
Oliver, who served over twelve years in the inner councils of the
government of Korea, dealing with matters of foreign policy, said: “On
the whole, however, the significant facts concerning all the major
international issues are completely available to anyone who takes the
trouble to keep up with the news.” (_Ibid._, Jan. 5, 1962, p. A140,
col. 3,b.)
[139] Speech of Senator Fulbright before the 1961 Summer Cubberly
Conference at Stanford University, Stanford, California, July 28,
1961, pp. 7-8. When he was a Senator, Kennedy made it clear that
the Presidency conferred no wisdom in his criticism of Eisenhower.
(_Congressional Record_, June 14, 1960, p. 11630, col. 3,t.) The
question is raised in my mind as to whether or not Senator Kennedy,
who spoke of the “missile gap” and other “gaps” in our defenses during
the campaign for President, was really that ignorant of our defense
posture? Yet, within a few months after he became president—and
certainly before anything that his administration did could have
changed the picture basically—we “learned” that there was no “missile
gap” and that our defense posture was strong. (See the article by David
Lawrence in the _Congressional Record_, Jan. 16, 1962, p. A241, cols. 2
and 3.)
Senator Fulbright himself said “In a democratic system, such as ours,
the people do have much to say about policy, and they decide who shall
govern them. How, may I ask, can our people be expected to discharge
their duty as citizens of a self-governing republic, if they are not
told the truth about their affairs? It would be easier, more pleasant,
and I am sure more popular, to join those who pretend that all is
well, that the summit meeting was a triumph for the West and that the
Japanese fiasco only demonstrates once again the viciousness of the
Communists.” (_Ibid._, June 28, 1960, p. 13672, col. 2,m.)
[140] Column of February 11, 1960. _Congressional Record_, February 19,
1960, p. 2761, col. 3,t.
[141] _U.S. News and World Report_, May 21, 1962, p. 15.
[142] _Evening Tribune_, San Diego, California, Editorial, August 14,
1961.
[143] _Congressional Record_, February 1, 1960, p. 1519, col. 2,m,
Senator Fulbright once accused Nixon of “deceiving the American
people”. Quoted in _The Arkansas Historical Quarterly_, Winter, 1961,
p. 328.
[144] _Congressional Record_, April 26, 1951, p. 4409, col. 3,m.
[145] _Ibid_, September 9, 1959, p. 17250, col. 3,m.
[146] _Ibid._, April 24, 1959, p. 5932, col. 3,b.
[147] _Ibid._, August 12, 1959, p. 14272, col. 1,m.
[148] _Ibid._, March 18, 1959, p. 3948, col. 1,m.
[149] _Ibid._, p. 3948, col 1,b.
[150] _Ibid._, February 8, 1960, p. 1978, col 3,m.
[151] _Ibid._, March 28, 1960, p. 6207, col. 2,m.
[152] _Ibid._, February 8, 1960, p. 1978, col. 3,b.-p. 1979, col. 1,t.
[153] _Ibid._, March 28, 1960, p. A2708, col. 2,m.
[154] _Ibid._, March 28, 1960, p. A2708, col. 2,b.
[155] _Ibid._, February 16, 1960, pp. A1250, col. 3,b. A1251, col. 1,t.
[156] As quoted in the _U.S. News and World Report_, December 4, 1961,
p. 4, col. 1,b.
[157] _Congressional Record_, February 19, 1961, p. 2769.
[158] _Congressional Record_, August 16, 1954, p. A6075, col. 3,m.
See the entire speech in Herbert Hoover, _Addresses Upon the American
Road_, August 10, 1954, pp. 74-84.
[159] _Ibid._, August 21, 1961, p. 15357, col. 1,t. Speech before the
National War College, August 21, 1961.
[160] _Ibid._, August 2, 1961, p. 13437, col. 3,t.
[161] Compare Constantine Brown, _Congressional Record_, September 5,
1961, p. A6963.
[162] _Ibid._, August 1, 1961, p. 13218, col. 2,t.
[163] Statement by Senator Fulbright before the United States Senate,
August 4, 1961. It is regrettable that the right to move freely within
all sectors of Berlin has been abrogated by the Communists without any
negotiations. J.D.B.
[164] _Congressional Record_, September 5, 1961, p. A6963, col. 2,m.
[165] Speech by Senator Fulbright at the 10th anniversary banquet of
the _Reporter_ magazine. April 16, 1959. _Congressional Record_, April
17, 1959, p. 5543, col. 2,m.
[166] Compare Constantine Brown, “Remaking the Constitution?” _Ibid._,
September 12, 1961, p. A7150, col. 2.
[167] Senator Fulbright, _Congressional Record_, April 17, 1959, p.
5542, col. 3.