Open forum, vol. 2, no. 8 (February, 1925)
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`THE OPEN FORUM
A Pacific World Around The Pacific Sea
Vola tr LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, FEBRUARY 21, 1925
No. 8
The Boys of the World
The article which follows was written by Tracy
Strong, son of Dr. Sydney Strong and brother of
Anna Louise Strong, for the World's Work Number
of the Scottish Red Triangle News-Kdinburgh.
* % *
A year ago I stood before 200 young people at camp
near Moscow, Russia. This month I am in camp
with Swiss youth near Lake Neuchatel, Switzerland.
-The time between these two events has been spent
in continuous travel. I have been tossed for five
days on the waves of the Black Sea and landed in
Bulgaria; Sweltered in January under the dazzling
sun in 0x00A7 pore; stood entranced before the world's
most beautiful building, the Taj Mahal in India;
been frozen in the blizzards of Mukden, Northern
China; been feted by friends in Japan, China and
Korea; said farewell for a time to my boy and young
men friends at home in Seattle, U.S.A.; caught the
spirit of the hills of Galilee, camped on the Mount of
Olives, rode camel back around the Pyramids of
Egypt, and am now living surrounded by the Swiss
Alps in Geneva, Switzerland.
What has been the reason for these wanderings?
Pleasure? I have enjoyed them, but not sufficiently
to make pleasure the purpose. Sight-seeing? It's
the most tiresome of all sports. Wanderlust? I
prefer the quiet of the mountains. No, none of these
alone. The main answer can be found in what
happened last summer at Portschach, Austria, at
the second World's Conference of Workers with
Youth of the Young Men's Christian Association.
A group of 900, representing fifty different nations,
at Portschach, caught a vision of the youth of the
world, 160,000,000 of them. They recognized "that
the national and racial antagonisms in the world
today form an overwhelming menace to the future
welfare of Humanity and are a flagrant denial of
the will of God for the world; and that a supreme
need of the world is the cultivation, among all youth,
of the mind and spirit of world brotherhood." They
not only resolved, but established at Geneva, Switz-
erland, in connection with the World's Committee of
the Y.M.C.A., a group of men who are facing this
world problem.
It has been my privilege to represent this group,
and in my wanderings I have eagerly sought an
answer to this question. `"What's in the mind of
Youth?" "Are they preparing themselves to be world
citizens?" "What are some of the signs among
youth which indicate a desire for world brother-
hood?"
These questions have brought many answers.
In a short article like this, however, I can only
touch on three general impressions.
My first impression is this:
How terribly ignorant I am! Ignorant of the
life, the needs, the desires, the hopes, the ideals
which surge in the hearts of youth in the different
countries of the world.
af r * . 0x00B0
Yes! How terribly ignorant the boys of Asia
are! I talked to a sroup of 100 Chinese boys, twelve
to Seventeen years of age, about my homeland. I
asked them this question: "How many here have
ever heard of the United States of America?" Not
a boy held up his hand. `How many have ever
parse of Hurope?" Still no response. We can laugh
i nn ignorance, but the fact remains, over half
Ree as young men of the world know practi-
ee ; 8 of the United States or Europe. The
an ee when any one place can be called
ntre of the world.
Yes!
a How terribly ignorant the boys of America
ae heen I've lived with them for fifteen
aasnens ee e. AS hey have taught me some of life's
needa, Gnd oo ; hee auve made me sensitive to the
conndane ` mERICR: Of youth. They have given me
anne oo . youths ideals and longings, have in-
in me for World brotherhood and peace;
.
have helped me to know my Christ and have faith
in the ultimate triumph of His cause.
Yes! How ignorant you are! Do you know some-
thing of the young men in Szechuan? the Senandan
in Japan? the Konsomol in Russia? the ideals of the
Swiss boys? the sacrifice of the Sikhs in the Pun-
jab? the feelings of the young Hgyptians who have
gained a form of self-government for the first time
in 5000 years? the Fascisti in Italy? These are but
a few of the world's movements which are making
history and preparing the youth of different parts
of the world for life. You will meet these youths.
Are you seeking to understand them?
My second impression concerns youth itself:
The youth of the world is alive. Not all youth.
In all countries there are the loafers, the ``sports,"
the blustering, sensuous, quarrelling, bullying, bluff-
ing youth. They count in the population, but not as
the real nation builders. It's the youth who thinks
and acts, longs for a better world and tries to real-
ize it, that is worth while. This youth is not dead.
Its ideals are noble. Its purposes are heroic in the
highest sense of the word. It is studious, industri-
ous; it leaves bluff, intrigue, propaganda to the in-
capable and mediocre. These are the youth which
count. Let me tell you of some of these youth.
I walked through the ruins of Yokohama. It was
a junk pile. Houses flat, buildings changed to brick
piles, streets filled with holes, petrol tins flattened
and used for "shacks." Everything in ruins. Ma-
terially Yokohama was dead. The whole scene called
for one answer: Discouragement. The spirit of
the people and the youth told another story. There
was little comment about the earthquake, seldom
a complaint about their losses, but ceaseless activity
in reconstruction. Among the first stores rebuilt
were book-stalls. The latest books of all countries
filled the shelves. Youth hungry for knowledge
crowded these shacks. When they had no money to
buy books they stood in those temporary book stores
and read by the hour. The earthquake was an in-
convenience, but could not crush the desire for
knowledge of Japanese youth.
I chatted one evening with a group of Burmese
and Karren students. They had just beaten me at
tennis, and I had a wholesome respect for them.
They were Buddhists, Christians, and Hindus in the
group. As we talked together that evening they
asked the following questions: "The Buddhist
movement has been in Burmah for 1000 years. Dur-
ing that time no separate denomination or move-
ments like the Reformation have developed. Is that
due to the strength of Buddhism or the sluggishness
of the Burmese?" "Do you consider fasting a neces-
sary supplement to prayer in Christianity?" `What
is the difference between a Christian and a non-
Christian in the leading of an upright life?" "When
I feel lazy and sluggish about Christian things what
must I do to liven up?" I realized again how pro-
vincial we become if we live unto ourselves alone.
A few weeks later I visited the school of Rabin-
dranath Tagore in India. A young Indian of eighteen
was a visitor with me. Much of his life had been
spent in Afghanistan. He spoke reverently of two
men, Tagore and Gandhi. One represented to him
the spiritual, poetic longings of the race; the other
the political, idealistic aspirations. As I -watched
him worship Tagore from afar, I caught a glimnse of
the secret of the life of the Indian youth. I realized
why many religions had been started in India. There
was a reverence for a leader the like of which I
had never seen. This youth of eighteen years was
but one of millions of Indians who seem to welcome
imprisonment, torture, and death for the sake of an
ideal. He had little interest in machinery, speed,
organization, efficiency, and the system we often
worship. His life consisted in the beauty of thought,
spiritual ideals, longings for brotherhood, and those
ee ae oe % LR
Scott Nearing--Ahoy!
Every forward minded man and woman in South-
ern California, and as far as possible all up and down
the Pacific Coast owes it to himself or herself to hear
Scott Nearing on his present tour of the Pacific
Coast. He is to be in Seattle February 23, 24, 25;
in San Francisco and vicinity February 27, 28 and
March 1; in Los Angeles March 2, 3, 4. You can
hear him three evenings running in Los Angeles
and get a three months' trial subscription to The
Open Forum for yourself or some friend for the sum
of One Dollar.
You spend three times a day for your stomach.
Don't be chary about spending for an hour of such
opportunity for your head. Get your tickets in
advance. For sale here, at the Church of the New
Social Order, at the Sunday night Open Forum in
Music-Art Hall, and elswhere. Ask for them, or send
money here, 506 Tajo Building, Los Angeles.
oe SEE oe SR We SERS:
inner forces which we have turned too often into
steel, inventions and business. As I left him, and
as I left India, an unanswered question was in my
mind. `Who knows, in the long stretches of time,
which has found the true way of life?' Of one
thing I was certain. We need much that India
has to give, just as she needs much of what we can
offer.
Let me raise the curtain for an instant on Russia.
Never before has the world staged such a drama.
With its arts, its music, its dances, its scenes of
revolution, blood, famine, and rebuilding, Russia to-
day presents a story little understood, but a story
in which youth is having a tremendous part.
I visited one of their camps for boys and girls. A
few facts: No leaders over twenty years of age;
forty leaders sixteen to twenty years; 200 boys and
girls twelve to sixteen years of age from the homes
of workers; camp supported by trade unions and
factories; games, studies, pets, hikes, drawing, oc-
cupied the time. It was a good camp. Leaders were
keen, enthusiastic, determined; children were neat,
happy and healthy. My main criticism was their
training in anti-religion and a certain attitude on
the part of the leaders that they had discovered the
whole truth of life. I realized as I left Russia that
if the youth of the various nations who believed in
religion were to show the youth of Russia the false-
ness of their position of anti-religion, it was to be
done not by force, hate, aloofness, but by a spirit
of goodwill and enthusiasm and lives which demon-
strated their faith in the God of Jesus.
One other experiment from life. Down on the
shores of the Black Sea near Constantinople there
is a camp. Boys of many races have camped to-
gether. Fathers had killed one another; sons lived
together in peace, and after the experience sent this
testimony to the world.
"At a time when the whole world needs peace and
prosperity based upon international friendship and
goodwill, we, the campers of the Constantinople
Y.M.C.A. `Camp Perry' at Kilios-on-the-Black-Sea,
representing twelve different nationalities, desire to
join hands with young people everywhere in promot-
ing the growing -movement for peace among all
nations.
Let me close with an appeal from a youth of
seventeen to `the boys of the world."
"It is a trite remark to make when we Say that
the future of the world is in our hands, but never-
theless it is perfectly true. We have three alterna-
tive ways of spending our lives. In the order of
difficulty they are:-
(a) An attempt to gain money and a `position
in the world'-a life lived purely for ourselves.
(b) A comparative withdrawal from both the
pleasures and the responsibilities of the world
-a life spent in an attempt to do no wrong.
(c) A consecraticn of ourselves to the needs of
others-a life where we not only strive to
do no wrong, but equally to do all good, not
for ourselves, but for others.
"When we look at the present state of the world,
none of us can feel very Satisfied with it. But still,
most of us have received something good from the
world, and so we have a double motive for trying
to give something in return. In the first place, there
is the desire to make it a better place for those whe
come after us, and in the second, we have a debt
to repay."
Youth makes the challenge. Youth must make
the choice.
PORT Sa hen SALTED ROSES REAR EE OT
Re See eee ous SANE. CRO TLE CENA TURP CO ONL
Man and His World
By Robert Whitaker
VI
HISTORY AND US
There is a SHTTING of history. There is a
PROCHSS of history. There are more or less
clearly marked EPOCHS, or stages of history. There
is a MOVEMENT of history. Briefly and broadly
the meaning of these aspects of history has been
set forth. But what have they to do with us, in
our daily lives today? And what have we to do
with the story of the past so far as present uses
and future determinations are concerned? That
is what we have in mind in speaking of HISTORY
AND US.
"Posterity! Posterity! What has posterity ever
done for me?" asked a foolish member of the
English House of Commons when appeal was made
to the interests of posterity on behalf of a certain
bill. There are some who would paraphrase it and
say, "History! History! What has history ever done
for me?"
Well, it has done a good deal to you, whether it
has done anything for you or not. Actual history is
but another name for social experience. Now every
man of sense will admit that he is very much the
sum of his own experiences. If he has more sense
he will admit even more readily that he is the sum
of social experience far beyond his own. The
WORLD SETTING, the WORLD PROCESS, the
WORLD EPOCHS, the WORLD MOVEMENT, have
all had a tremendous say as to where we are, as to
who we are, and to what effect we are. Our in-
dividual experience is to the total experience as
the drop of water to the sea.
But history, as it is told, and not only as it hap-
pened, is of utmost consequence to us all, because
we are affected not only by what has been, but
by what we believe has been. When Henry Ford
called history "bunk," he spoke superficially, even
though he meant nothing more than that learning
a lot of dates and names has very little value for
the practical man. Learning that sort of thing may
not be of much meaning to you, but that your teach-
ers spend their time in teaching that sort of thing
ought to mean something to you. Do you know why
there is so much "sawdust" in history teaching?
Because the "sawdust" keeps those who are sup-
posed to be scholars from looking into real things,
and telling the truth about them so that plain folks
can understand it. It is part of the propaganda of
suppression, even where it is not consciously direct-
ed as such. Schools must deal with husks, lest
the scholars get at the corn.
But the matter goes farther than this. The teach-
ing of history is, and always has been a form of prop-
erty. It is very valuable property just now. "Let
me write the songs of a people and I care not who
makes their laws," is an old saying. Not less force-
ful is the paraphrase of it, "Let me write the his-
tories of a people and I care not who you elect as
their rulers." The rulers will do what the drive of
popular tradition compels them to do. The early
Greek stories were propaganda stories, to stir up the
hearts of the young Greeks to belfeve in themselves
and their rulers and their institutions, to the end
that the vested interests might be continued in pow-
er. That is what history telling is yet. "All art is
propaganda," says Upton Sinclair. Certainly the
art of story telling is, either the propaganda of
diverted interest or of interest in supporting things
as they are.
The telling of history was never such a power-
fully organized, adroitly directed, and valuable men-
opoly as it is today. American history,. as it is told,
not as it happened, is more valuable to the American
plunderbund at this hour than was ever the Chinese
opium traffic to the British government. And the
traffic in historical "bunk" is more mischievous than
the traffic in drugs. There is no single item of world
`menace more ominous for world welfare today than
is the substitution of patriotic piffle and claptrap
for American history. Study that item honestly and
intelligently, and you will get an inkling as to what
history writing and history teaching has to do with
world affairs, and with your own affairs.
But what have you to do with the ownership
and control of this telling of history?
Well, you have first of all to recognize the fact.
It is something to be on your guard against national-
istic slush and braggadocio. National pride is built
mainly on lies, or an unreal handling of the truth.
War preparedness calls for a campaign of falsehood
as distinctly and emphatically as it calls for ships
and guns. No war can be put over unless the soil
has been mucked heavily in advance with "rot."
Hvery man who has intelligence and diligence and
courage enough to seek reality about world history
is weakening the insanity of local and national
egotisms on which war is built. "If the real story
of any man's life was written out on his forehead
he would pull his cap down over his eyes." `So
would any and every patriot, if his country's actual
story was told. Get the facts if you want to cure
conceit.
But do not imagine from this that scandal is
history. Making devils of great historic characters
is even more vain than making heroes of them.
It is studying them as men, and even more it is
studying them as items in the social mechanism that
is of real consequence. To prove Washington a hyp-
ocrite or Lincoln a fool would get us nowhere if any
such case could be made out against them. The
real issue is not concerned with either white-washing
them or black-washing them, but with understanding
them and their relation to the vast social forces
which worked in and through them. And that calls
for neither praise nor dispraise, but for something
much more difficult than either.
More difficult yet is it to deal intelligently with
the story of nations, especially when those nations
are still very much alive. Yet worse than deifying
or devilizing a Washington or a Lincoln is it to
deify or devilize a whole people. National prejudice
is a reverse expression of self-conceit, and _ self-
conceit of a very ignorant and indolent sort. It is
easier to hold prejudices than it is to study causes
and get at facts in their world relations. But Eng-
land as she has been, and is, can only be under-
stood as the story of England is studied in relation
to the setting of physical circumstance in which she
is, and as a part of the world process, especially that
process as it has worked out during the last one
hundred and fifty years. Quite as true is this of
the United States of America. The difference be-
tween Americans now and Americans a hundred
years ago is not that we are merely ten times as
numerous. Neither is it a difference in thinking
power, or moral achievement. It is a difference in
our relations to the world setting, in the development
of the world process, in the stage of world history
to which we have come, in the momentum of world
affairs. And what is true concerning the British
Empire and the United States of America is true
of every people under the sun.
Bible faddisms and fanaticisms grow out of ignor-
ance of the historical approach to the Bible. Na-
tionalistic faddisms and fanaticisms , grow out of
ignorance of the historical approach to the world
story. But in neither case can history be separated
from the understanding of the industrial process, if
it is to be real history and not just academic stuff.
The geographical factors in history are being recog-
nized, and some American writers, as Ellen C. Sem-
ple, of Louisville, Kentucky, have done noble service
on this line. `The Frontier in American History,"
by Prof. Frederick C. Turner, of Harvard is another
piece of more than ordinary historical work. But
even these advanced interpreters of world experience
lack "the one thing needful" to the illumination of
our human story, and most emphatically to that
human story as it is working out today.
They lack that identification of themselves with
the new industrial order which is rising, and which
is sooner or later to capture the whole earth, by
which alone can the story of the past and the situa-
tions of the present be understood. It is next to im-
possible that we can have a real writing of world
history with any considerable success `until `we
have the new order here in sufficient strength to
have developed its own scholarship on a world scale.
I have but given some hints here of the lines which
such histories will follow. They will not be written
by the upper classes, nor read in any great measure
until upper classes have ceased to be. Neither will
our middle class of today produce them. `World re-
latious in their actualities can only be seen by those
to whom the vision of class relations has been
opened. All history has been an economic story.
All history has turned on the measure in which man
has produced a surplus above that which he con-
sumed, and upon what became of that surplus. All
history has been in fact the class struggle, the domi-
nance of the few over the many, whatever disguises
that dominance has assumed and does today assume,
and the play of life toward making such dominance
more difficult and impossible and more inevitable
that slowly rising solidarity of the workers of the
world through which alone can our social salvation
come.
BRISBUNK
There are few men who know the ministers an 0x00B0
better
than does John Haynes Holmes, who edits UNITY,
formerly published by Jenkin Lloyd Jones. This, as
too many people need to be told, is not the Ney -
Thought publication of the same name, sent forth
from Kansas City, but is an older and a bolder
publication, with a much wider range of thought,
Every now and then we are quoting from UNIRY
and we want it to be understood what paper it is,
the churches, and `nice people" generally,
and wish that more of our readers would take
occasion to get acquainted with it. We will send a
sample copy to any address for ten cents, or you can
get one from the office of publication at 700 Oak.
wood Blvd., Chicago, Ill. Francis Neilson is eo-editor
with Holmes, and the staff of contributing editorg is
large and very able.
The following quotation is from a recent issue of
UNITY, and if not chosen by Dr. Holmes `himself,
aS we think it was, voices we are sure his own
healthy reaction to the sort of peace talk that ig
running through the churches just now. The writer
from whom UNITY quotes is Havelock Hillis, one
of the foremost thinkers of the world today, and a
man who also knows those whom he dubs here as'
the "superior people" as well as does any man of.
our time. Whether he is as pronounced a pacifist
as Holmes I cannot say, but he is a careful, coura-
geous, and consistent opponent of war. This paper,
THE OPEN FORUM, is emphatically for peace and
against the whole military mood and machine. But
we are putting this quotation under the head of
BRISBUNK because we are most thoroughly con-
vinced that there is no more dangerous piece of
shamming in the world today than most of the peace
talk that the pious and the proper people are getting
off just now. Those who mean business in getting
rid of war will do well to take Havelock Ellis' words
to heart, and be on their guard against the "guff"
the mere peace-chatterers are giving us.
* * *
"When, as go often nowadays, I come upon the
lofty contemptuous horror of war professed by Su-
perior People. I fear I am overcome by nausea,
For where were these Superior People in 1914? They |
write in the very organs of public opinion which a
few years ago were the resonant mouthpieces of
War and Patriotism, the glorification of ourselves
and the vilification of our enemies, and the tone of
the voice, the turns of the phrasing,
of superiority, are all the same.
neither better nor worse than
the complacency
War today is
it has ever been,
merely a little more intensive because of our in-
creased skill and a little more extensive because of
the increased swarming of our much multiplied race.
Long before thig last war there were those who
knew and struggled with the problems of this evil
thing and used their little strength to try to mould
the world betimes that it might be eliminated. No
man marked. And now this empty chaff of Superior
People, that was blown along so gaily and irrespon-
sibly when the wind of war raged, is blown along
just as gaily and irresponsibly now when the wind is
changed, with never a glimmering sense of its own
imbecility. .. One cannot help feeling that it might be
better... it the Superior People . . .were HONEST
Fools. `We shout for peace today,' they might then
tell us, `we are all Pacifists just now. But wait a while.
The day will come. Once more we shall shout for
War as in 1914. Once more we shall joyfully send
our Heroes to glory and erect hideous memorials
to them afterwards. Once more we shall raise the
banner of the War-to-end-War. Once more we shall
cast the Poison-Gas of our hatred over the world.
That would be folly, but it would be honest folly.
It would be the true prophecy of men who knew
themselves."
-Havelock Ellis, in "Impressions and Comments.'
Quoted in UNITY, Chicago, III.
---__ ht
"To exalt patriotism without exalting war at the
Same time is like going out to swim without going
near the water."
2
Fanny Bixby Spencer.
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FROM
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The Spirit of
Patriotism
Fanny Bixby Spencer's strong protest against the
foolishness and viciousness of "The Star Spangled
Banner" as a song for school-children has of course
prought forth a chorus of condemnation from the
politicians and patro-maniacs. Most of the stuff is
only fit for a literary museum and as such is being
- preserved by Mrs. Spencer herself. But the follow-
ing letter, and Mrs. Spencer's fine reply is too good
to have unpublished, so we gladly pass it on.-Ed.
* * *
January 31st, 1925.
Miss Fanny Bixby Spencer:
_ After partly recovering from the shock following
the reading of that terrible insult you offer to our
country and to our flag, my first idea was to read
it again, to be convinced that my eyes had not de-
ceived me. They had not. Hvery word I read still
popped out before me in all its atrocious nakedness,
and the more I read the more I "blushed for shame"
but not for the song that was-and is-a tribute to
our flag. a
Tam still blushing, if the redness representing the
fire that has been raging within me for the last two
days, could be called blushing, I could "blush for
shame" to think-first-a woman, second-a Cali-
fornian (be it hyphenated or native born)-and third
-that anyone bearing the name of Spencer should
be so devoid of the feeling of love and reverence we
hold for that song to our flag.
Every child in his or her school will swell anew
with pride unknown before when he or she sings
that song and remembers that you tried to throw
an insult at it. I am a native born Californian and
again could "blush for shame" to think that this
grand State-of all the Union-could harbor, protect
and nourish a creature that would defile it in such
a vile manner.
CSigNCd) ees eos ce Spencer.
(First Name Withheld)
* * *
February 9, 1925.
My Dear Miss Spencer:
I thank you for your letter of January 31st which
seems quite earnest though somewhat hysterical.
Some people hold one thing sacred and some an-
other. To you the flag is sacred; to me it is not.
To me all human life is sacred; to you, evidently,
it is not. I had three forefathers in the American
Revolution. One of my grandfathers was in the War
of 1812, and the other in the Civil War. In spite of
this heritage (or because of it) I have repudiated
all war and have renounced nationality. "The world
is my country; to do good is my religion." The
people of all the world are my compatriots, regard-
less of nationality, race, creed or color.
Like you, I am a native Californian. My father
came to the gold mines in 1852. Later he was in
the sheep raising business near San Juan, and final-
ly settled in Los Angeles County on a twenty-seven
thousand acre sheep ranch, in pioneer days. I was
five years ago. So you see I am a part of California
born in an old Spanish adobe ranch house forty-
and California is a part of me.
In spite of my innate Californianism, I feel no
enmity toward Arizona, Kansas, or New York. In
the same way I am locally an Amercan, but I love
the English, the Germans and the Japanese equally
with the Americans. They are all my fellow country-
men in the great commonwealth of humanity. I
cannot uphold a song that expresses hatred for my
brothers anq exults over the shedding of their blood.
When you think these things over a little your
anger may cool down. I am sending you, under
Separate cover, a copy of my pamphlet "The Repudi-
ation of War." I hope that you will read it with an
Open mind. I am also enclosing some verses which
I wrote on "My Native Land is all the World."
Yours very sincerely,
Fanny Bixby Spencer
P.S.-You n
me. 4 1 need not
that [
: worry about being related to
bencer is my married name; Bixby the name
was born with.
VARIED
*
FORUM PUZZLES
No. 1
Why are our banks all housed in plain, modest
little shacks while the working class in the United
States all live in fine, splendidly furnished mansions?
Why, indeed? Read this item for the reply.
* % * *
The net profit made by 25 national banks in New
York City from September 14, 1923, to October 10,
1924, according to the "Financial Age" in its issue
of last November 1, is equal to 33 per cent of the
capital stock. It amounted to $53,924,500, of which
$42,083,500 was paid in dividends to shareholders
and $11,841,000 added to surplus and undivided
profits.
No. 2
The big group of business men which is trying to
raise a million-dollar fund to counteract the propa-
ganda in the Hast that is reducing the flow of tour-
ists and dollars to Southern California to a notice-
able degree will receive neither dollars nor sympa-
thy from me. W already have many more people
here now than we can employ at proper wages, or
decently house at reasonable rents, and the question
of a reliable and plentiful water supply is becoming
a serious question. Among the leaders of this move-
ment is Ballard of the Edison Company, which is
doing more to prevent the obtaining of water and
power from the Coolrado River, our only remaining
source of supply, than any other of the enemies of
public ownership now holding up favorable action by
Congress. Why the merchants, bankers, and others
of the Big Business element who realize that Los
Angeles now is standing still and cannot progress
without the fruition of the Colorado River project
do not read the riot act to Ballard, Chandler, Fred-
ericks, and men of that type is past understanding.
P. D. Noel, in Labor Press.
* * *
We will give a psychic picture of General Otis
shaking hands with Saint Peter to anyone who can
furnish a real reply to this query and get it pub-
lished in The Los Angeles Times.
ir ---_-_-_-
Hear Scott Nearing, March 2, 3, 4 at Knights of
Columbus Hall, Los Angeles. Season ticket, with
three months' subscription to Open Forum, One Dol-
lar.
The Bissest
Cross-word Puzzle
Are you crazy over cross-word puzzles? Lots of
folks are nowadays. Untold hours are being devoted
to this new form of indoor sport. And upon the
whole I judge the diversion is a rather wholesome
one-certainly much. more worth while than end-
less gadding to parties, movies, and numerous other
places where the crowds surge to while away the
time that hangs so heavily upon their hands. To
become familiar with a good number of English
synonyms enlarges one's vocabularly and may per-
haps help to open new windows into the brain. So
I am rather pleased to note that the newest fad
has taken a semi-intellectual turn, and promises to
bestir the sluggish gray matter in many atrophied
craniums.
But has it not occurred to you that the devotees
of this popular pastime are passing up the biggest
cross word puzzle of them all? What do I mean?
This: that the cross-word puzzle as we meet it daily
in the press is simply a skilfully woven together
fabric of interlocking words, while all about us the
great cross-word puzzle of the world itself lies
spread before our vision, unstudied except by a few
and misunderstood by the great mass of our fel-
lows.
If only we could get folks to looking into the ele-
ments that go to make up the life of the world of
which we are a part-I. mean to really penetrate be
neath the surface of things and seek to understand
the mighty currents of history-what a fascinating
VIEWPOINTS
*K
Red Wit
THE INTELLIGENT AMERICAN
While engaged in a free speech argument the
other day I quoted Amendment 14 of the U. 8S. Con-
stitution, which reads: "No State shall make or en-
force any law which shall abridge the privileges or
immunities of citizens of the United States."
"But," said my opponent, ``that doesn't say any-
thing about cities-certainly cities have more power
than States have."-L.O'D.
A REGULAR OPTIMIST
"Ts your husband an optimist?"
"Well, he's an optimist in hoping for the best,
but he's a pessimist in working for it."
SPEEDING UP
A Washington road sign painter suggests the fol-
lowing signs for railroad crossings:
"Come ahead. You're unimportant."
"Try our engines. They satisfy."
"Don't stop. Nobody will miss you."
THE ATTRACTIVE COLOR
A wealthy girl from America was attending a
social function at a country house in England.
"You American girls have not such healthy com-
plexions as we have," said an English duchess to
the girl. "I always wonder why our noblemen take
such a fancy to your white faces."
"It isn't our white faces that attract them," re-
sponded the American girl; "it's our greenbacks."
HE KNEW HIS FLOCK
Pastor (addressing church fair): "My dear friends,
I will not call you `ladies and gentlemen,' since I
know you too well."
PRAYING WITH OPEN EYES
A visitor at the capitol was accompanied by his
small son. The little boy watched from the gallery
when the house came to order.
"Why did the minister pray for all those men,
papa?" he questioned,
"He didn't. He looked 'em over and prayed for
the country," was the answer.
BE GLAD THAT YOU LIVE IN LOUISIANA
San Francisco, Calif..-Two boys were drowned,
several persons were injured and citrus crop dam-
age estimated at $100,000 was reported from Southern
California today as the result of cold weather which
forced the thermometer below zero at points in Cali-
fornia, Oregon, Washington and Nevada.
-Llano Colonist
A DAY LATE
Two Scotsmen decided to become teetotallers, but
McGregor thought it would be best if they had one
bottle of whisky to put in the cupboard in case of
illness.
After three days Sandy could bear it no longer,
and he said, `McGregor I am ill."
"Too late," said McGregor, "I was
yesterday!"'
ill all day
at
Hear Scott Nearing, March 2, 3, 4 at Knights of
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and useful pastime it would prove to be. We
might discover by such a process the underlying
reasons for'racial antipathy, the cause of poverty
in a world that is fabulously rich in all material
things, the fundamental forces that have operated
to produce wars, and many other obscure phenom-
ena that are baffling us at the present time.
Social understanding is the crying need of our
time. To be able intelligently to trace the forces
that have shaped the history of the human race and
have brought us to the present conditions is more
desirable than to possess lore of any other kind.
This is the true education that must be stressed
more and more if we are to be saved from the
abyss. Man must first understand his world before
he can properly align himself with the constructive
forces that are operating in it. Let us then give
ourselves to this task-to the solving of the mighty
cross-word puzzle of the world itself.
Creda
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Feb. 23-`"`Gleanings from the Fields of Boaz."
by Fred Rivers.
None of us know about Mr. Boaz nor where his
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O `al
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MAMMONART
By Upton Sinclair. Cloth $2.00; Paper $1.00.
Mr. Sinclair's latest book. No more important
book is before the public this year, as it deals
in a quite unique way with that which as
yet has been hardly dealt with by authors
| at all, the subjection of art of every kind to
the dominant economic power. A most reveal-
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THE NEXT STEP
By Scott Nearing. Cloth $.50; Paper $.25.
This book, by one who is perhaps the fore-
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THE NEW EVANGELISM
By Robert Whitaker. Twenty-five Cents. Pub-
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MAN AND HiS WORLD
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THE FIRST TIME IN HISTORY
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AN OUTLINE OF THE BRITISH LABOR
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subjects. If you want to understand the British
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THE PARLOR PROVOCATEUR
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The letters of Kate Crane Gartz, with an intro-
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SONNETS
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These sonnets, recently reviewed in THE
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February 22-`CAN WE CHANGE HUMAN Na.
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subject and a much-debated one, but Prof. Briggs
who has read widely and thought profoundly on it,
will doubtless have some new light concerning it,
The music for the evening will be furnished by MR 0x00B0
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postpone his trip to the Southland until later. We
hope to have him in March or April.)
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Feb. 22. WAS THE SPIRIT OF JESUS MILD OR
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subject will be, "AMERICAN IGNORANCE OF
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