Awake!, July 22, 1951

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JULY 22, 1951 SEMIMONTHLY

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CONTENTS

Hero Worship Spins a Modern Web

Two Worlds Shape Up

The Moral Tone of Politics

A Terrifying Picture

Corruption, Why Permitted

Plant Life Wages Chemical Warfare

Science High Lights

The Aged’s Pitiful Parade to Oblivion

The Coconut Palm—Trade-Mark of

Pleasure and Prosperity

A Fisherman Chooses Life

Making Friends, Choosing Life

Vicar Praises God, Passes Tobacco

Peace Plan—“Out of the Mouth of Babes” 24

Communism’s Messiah

"Your Word Is Truth”

Do You Love Life?

"Letters from the People”

"Blue Babies”

Watching the World

Z1W.AKE:/

“Now it is high time to awake.”— Romans 13:11 &

Volume XXXII•Brooklyn, N. Y., July 22, 1^91 “ " ' N urn bar 14

HERO WORSHIP SPINS A MODERN WEB

THE age of atoms, like the age of chivalry, produces its heroes. Is it better fitted, though, to view them with greater reason and less emotion? This April’s press coverage of the return home of General of the Army Douglas MacArthur gives answer. The controversial political issues involved with the general’s removal from command have received abundant coverage. The concern here is rather with the pomp and adoration that swept the country. Did the nation weigh the matter with intellectual reserve? No, but emotion ruled as never before, and modem accessories such as television only contributed their bit to the mad whirl.

San Francisco, Washington, New York and Chicago quickly set smashing records in welcoming the hero of the Pacific. New York alone poured out seven and a half million people and 3,249 tons of confetti. But the decor of the people more than the size of the crowds provokes mention of the "hero-worship” issue. Like a web it grew in a wave of emotion that followed MacArthur’s plane from Tokyo to Wall Street With each stop the sentiment mounted.

Religions of East and West drew to common ground in the general’s reflected glory. 100,000 of Japan’s Shinto-dominated people cried “Banzai! [May you live a thousand years]” as he left Tokyo. On New York’s Fifth Avenue, Cardinal Spellman welcomed him back to the great American metropolis. Protestant protests, however, forced a change in the later Loyalty Day Parade in which the cardinal was to have ridden in MacArthur’s car.

The whole matter is the more vital since America is the most powerful champion for the Western world in the field with global communism. Thus her actions paralleled with her professions of Christianity receive constant observation. In answer to a query in San Francisco, General MacArthur said: “The only politics I have is contained in a simple phrase known by all of you—God bless America” Both the nation and the general, then, claim God’s side and petition his help. It would seem proper, therefore, to measure their actions with God’s Word. As a powerful reminder, that Word says: “For all the gods of the peoples are idols; but Jehovah made the heavens.” (Psalm 96:5t AS) All claiming to serve the true God are bound to recognize this truth. Whether out of alarm for this principle or for other reasons, one foreign observer, Grattan O’Leary, associate editor of the Ottawa Journal (Canada), said, in his column of April 20:

“What went on in Washington when MacArthur came had to be seen to be believed: For seeing it, an all but frightening manifestation of the fuehrer complex, it was almost impossible to think that such idolatrous hero-worship could take place on this continent in our day. This was not ths mere acclaim deserved by a great soldier: its frenzied emotionalism was more like tribal worship of some god.”

“Tribal worship of some gad.r> The International News Service correspondent reporting the San Francisco welcome as quoted in the Los Angeles Examiner thoughtfully inserted a qualifying term in describing the bay city’s “almost idolatrous host of people” that turned out for the long-absent general. If MacArthur objected to any of the customs bordering on “tribal worship” or the like, the press failed to record his feelings. To the contrary, speaking of General MacArthur’s ego, the New York Times said, on April 23:

“This ego and this power are perhaps best illustrated by a remark a worried president made shortly after he had decided to relieve MacArthur: ‘Well, I guess I have to relieve God!7 The president was in no sense blasphemous, he was merely repeating an appellation used to describe MacArthur many times—by some in sarcasm, by a few in almost complete sincerity.”

Louis B. Mayer, vice-president in charge of production for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, put himself in the latter class when, on April 18, he said, “I have known General MacArthur for 30 years and I have respected him during all of those years. Now I have reverence for him.”

Apparently Mr. Mayer is but one of many. However, their numbers do not make the hero devotees right. In the Bible’s only use of the word “reverend” it is applied exclusively to Almighty God. Psalm 111:9 states: “He sent redemption unto his people: he hath commanded his covenant for ever: holy and reverend is his name.”

Are we to believe the modem hero worshipers would match their candidates in competition with the Most High God, **whose name alone is Jehovah”? (Psalm

83:18) The Baal priests of old tried that and spent the day crying in vain to a deaf god while the prophet Elijah taunted them: “Shout, . . . for he is a god! He is musing, or away on business, or perhaps he is asleep and must be wakened!” (1 Kings 18:24-40, Moff.) Well to remember that human heroes while alive are limited by the same frailties of the flesh as others, and when dead are just as deaf and asleep as any. Even the artificial glory of their triumphant moments fades soon after the shouts of the crowd have died away.

Facing the problem realistically, the New York Times, of April 23, analytically saw in the general’s unprecedented ovation a strong trend toward greater military influence in politics. Public criticism of his president by a military man speaking from Capitol Hill would have been unthinkable in decades past, the paper declared. The Times likewise called attention to MacArthur’s oratorical powers and “flair for the dramatic”, both appealing to public sentiment, and offered these as added reasons for his magic spell effect. Who will deny that both qualities took telling effect during the general's address to Congress when he described himself as an ‘old soldier fading away’? But both can also be dangerous traits. Prompting mob hysteria, they dull common sense and defeat logic and reason when unbridled.

The wise will consult history for some justification of hero worship before becoming its latest victims. They will note that for the glory-seeking conquerors, the Nebuchadnezzars, Alexanders, Caesars, Napoleons, Hitlers, etc., the old rule applied : "Whatever goes up must come down. But obviously the old world has not learned the lesson. Jesus Christ predicted for this day the multiplying of global armies and that this would avail nothing despite the heroes that militarism brings forth. (Matthew 24:7) If the web is spreading even now and the MacArthur case does indeed indicate a trend to all-out militarism,* those who forget the Creator would do well to note the shortcomings of creature man. He has no life in himself; how much less his own creations of bayonets and bombers. Yet to men and their works goes the praise of this “brain age”.

“Although asserting they were wise, they became foolish and turned the glory of the incorruptible God into something like the .image of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed creatures and creeping things . . , even those who exchanged the truth of God for the lie and venerated and rendered sacred service to the creation rather than the One who created, who is blessed forever.”—Romans 1:22,23,25, New World Trans,

TW° WORLDS

were trying to piece together a statement of words that would bolster the morale of the people and give them courage to fight on. What they composed that day of August 14, 1941, there on the deck of the American cruiser “Augusta”, became known as the Atlantic Charter.

TWO men sat on the deck. One held his cigarette lighter between his fingers when he talked. The other man talked with a fat cigar clamped down in the corner of his mouth. The ship’s crew was holding a death watch on the North Atlantic. German planes and submarines hovered on every horizon. Convoys nosing east, loaded with guns, planes and bombs, were being sent to the bottom by torpedoes.

The cigar smoker had come from a London whpse skies knew nothing but the dreary regularity of bombs, tragedy and death. His companion had just left a Washington where gloomy political prophets were wondering if August 1941 were about the limit of Russia’s endurance against Nazi Germany and if now was the time for America to plunge to the rescue of the world.

In this atmosphere the men talking on the deck, Mr. Roosevelt and Mr. Churchill,

Among the Charter’s eight points, the signal aspiration, the Sixth Point, declared their two countries “hope to see established a peace which will afford all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries”.

Nothing short of an international organization exercising authority world-wide could bring the envisioned peace and security, they felt certain. The language of the Atlantic Charter implied that, when the Nazi tyranny should be crushed, some great world alliance would be inevitable.

Five months later, on New Year’s Day of January 1942, four men sat down in a conference room in the White House and penned their names to a short document typed out on four sheets of gilt-edged stationery. The signers were Roosevelt of the United States, Churchill of Great Britain, Litvinov of Soviet Russia, and Soong of

Nationalist China. Next day, while Mao Arthur evacuated Manila and the Japs marched In, representatives from twenty-two other nations trooped into the State Department office to add their signatures to the paper.

That document marked a high point in world history, jn more than one way. It marked a departure of the United States from an isolationist policy that dated back to President Washington. Now the United States was committed by alliance with other world powers. And, too, the document marked the birth of the United Nations-

The signatory nations joined therewith to “a common program of purposes and principles'* embodied in the Atlantic Charter, and pledged themselves never to falter in their efforts to fight to victory or commit themselves to any separate treaties, but to strive unitedly to the end for "a peace which will afford all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries''. Within four years and two months 21 other nations subscribed, making a total of 43.

In a final build-up Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin met at Yalta, and on February 11,1945, published the declaration that "we are resolved upon the earliest possible establishment with our allies of a general international organization to maintain peace and security”. Further: “Only with the continuing and growing co-operation and understanding among our three countries and among all peace-loving nations can the highest aspiration of humanity be realized—a secure and lasting peace. . .

And so, after so much fanfare five thousand people began to gather at San Francisco in April 1945. There, in the mightiest parliament of man, after almost three months of discussions, the Charter of the United Nations was laboriously wrought out upon the political anvils of 53 nations of the world.

At this point in history the rosy prognosticators from the religious, political and economic realms painted rich pictures of an evergreen new world of peace and tranquillity. It would be one world. Most assuredly. Were not the inspired words of Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin still echoing glowingly in the ether: “Only with the continuing and growing cooperation and understanding among our three countries and among all peace-loving nations can the highest aspiration of humanity be realized—a secure and lasting peace"?

Yet while the ink was still wet on the U. N. Charter world division was already being stirred, and that by the very Big Three who welded the nations together under their solemn Charter. Selfish ambitions and acts of aggi^ssion were not curbed. Jealousy, fear, frustration and anger have driven the nations asunder, made them trucebreakers, despisers of peace, and they have plunged into one set of entangling alliances after another.

No More the Misty Eyes

At the start of World War n the Soviet Union claimed 170,467,000 population and about one-sixth of the earth’s area, 8,173,* 550 square miles. By January 1950 Communist control had spread over a popula* tion of 830,428,000 and an area of 10,005,* 763 square miles. The farther the spread, the wider the schism between East and West. Back in 1945, when America, Britain and Russia were conquering allies, it was no uncommon thing to read headlines that stated sympathetically, “Russians Seen Simply Out to Keep War Off Their Own Soil Forever/’ That heading actually appeared in the Baltimore Sun on Saturday, June 23, 1945, over a story that reviewed how Russia had clawed away the provinces and countries of Petsamo, parts of Finland, the Baltic States, East Prussia, Poland, Ruthenia, Bukovina and Be&sara-

bia from the eastern face of Europe all the while she clamored for the Dardanelles and the Hongo Peninsula guarding the Gulf of Finland—all this smelled to the reporter like no imperialistic putsch but merely “a determination that never again will Russia have to fight on her own soil”. But by February 1948, after Communists had tuMen control of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Rumania,Hungary, Albania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia,East Germany and

North Korea, the misty eyes had cleared. The Western world was feeling that Russia was never going to feel “secure” until the last particle of dry land was “absorbed”.

Not that the Western world had been -neglecting Its own interests all this time. It was Russia’s feeling, or so she said, that Uncle Sam, with his Marshall Plan and his Middle East designs, not to mention his embryonic empire over Japan’s way, was flyout to mold the world’s economy in his own Image. The Communists’ viewpoint iwas put in a nutshell back in October 6, 1947. That was when Communist leaders from 9 European countries met in Poland to organize the Cominform (Communist information Bureau), and published a joint Statement declaring:

“Thus- two camps came into being, the imperialistic anti-democratic camp with the “nasic alm of establishing world domination □f American imperialism and routing democracy, and the anti-imperialistic demo? Cratic camp with the basic aim of disrupting imperialism, strengthening democracy *nd eliminating the remnants of fascism?’

And so it seems that every nation under the sun is stirred into a dither and is rushing Into as many alliances and defense pacts as it can sign its name to. By February 1950 observers viewed the world’s populations as being divided about as follows: Western bloc, 1,361,159,000; Communist bloc, 830,428,000; ah others, such as Yugoslavia's independent communism and Franco’s fascism, 159,269,000. This means that all but about 7 per cent of the world's populations are claimed by one or the other of the two big blocs, and some of that 7 per cent is throwing itself at one side or the other.

Thus all earthly power, with Its potential for peace and security, prosperity and happiness, is diverted to support at least 20 leagues and alliances over and above the United Nations. The world’s resources are divided, mobilized, groomed and harnessed Into war machines, poised for what some view as a “globicidal” war. And who divided the world thus? The nations, the Big Three principally, whose leading spokesmen declared only six years ago: “Only with the continuing and growing cooperation and understanding among our three countries and among all peace-loving nations can the highest aspiration of humanity be realized—a secure and lasting peace.”

But how solid and firm are all the component parts of the two sides? How strong is the Communist empire, claiming 830 million people but boasting of not ( more than 25 million communists? On the other hand, how strong are the Western powers? Is it not true that the Soviet bloc feels that in only a matter of time the Western bloc, founded on “rotten imperialism”, will collapse of its own weight? Is it not true that the Western bloc feels,that in only a matter of time the Soviet bloc will fall of “Titoism” and internal strife? And is It not true that there is something- to both viewpoints?

Quite true, both sides are in for some kind of a fall. If for no other cause they will suffer a fall at the hands of a Power from out of this divided old world, the power of Jehovah God reigning over the earth and poised ready to smash out of the way all selfish opposition to a real world of peace and security.—Contributed.

been plagued by racketeers or that our municipal governments have been infested by leeches who take in more in a month by protecting criminals than they can earn in a year’s protection of the law-abiding.”

A Terrifying Picture

Kef auven presented to the American ' people a terrifying picture of a powerful under*

Politicians Dance on Strings Pulled by Gangland Hoodlums

resident Truman likes to talk about moral laws and about the United States’ leadership of the free nations, yet corruption is evident on every hand, and unfortunately in many instances political morals have dropped so low as to be repulsive to honest persons.

Most people take it for granted that politics and politicians are at least a little crooked, and many regard them with complete disgust. Recent federal investigations have added to this feeling by revealing a corrupt ring of influence in the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, the evil plotting of the “5 per centers” in Washington; the sale of federal appointments to those who will pay cash for them, the scandalous waste resulting from a swollen federal pay roll, gyps in government purchases and sales, and the tie-up between politics and crime.

The investigation of the RFC, conducted by Senator Fulbright’s committee, shocked millions of Americans when it unearthed case after case in which political influence, pull in high places, and powerful pressure groups determined policies followed by the largestof the government lending agencies.

One national magazine recently said, “No one above the level of a high-grade moron has doubted that our cities have

world government that operates in the United States. Its sinister power is made possible through a corrupt alliance with politics, and its corrupting influence has been found on all government levels. Apparently arch criminals are immune to law. Kefauver’s committee proved that the staggering amount of illegal gambling that has been going on would have been impossible without police protection and without the connivance of local officials. Concern-* ing the connection of politics and crime Senator Kefauver said that the organized racketeers have a stronger hold on the country today than in the days of prohibit tion, and “they want to belong to the clubs and play a part in politics”.—U. 8, News

Worid Report, April 20.

How criminals have corrupted politic^ was also shown by Frank Costello, whom many call America’s rackets overlord when he said, “There is no such thing a? a nice politician,” (INS, April 2) Perhaps that statement is harsh or even unjust but through long experience Costello should be an authority on crooked politicians.

Influence peddling on an eye-popping scale goes all the way up to top govern* ment officials. Despite Truman’s claim that his house is clean and his frequent reference to the need of ’honor, ethics and up* rightness*, there has been much criticism of his own staff. U. S. News & World Report said on March 16, “The president has resisted the idea that he should fire one of his stenographers because her husband engaged in the ‘influence* business. If he fired the stenographer, Mr, Truman then might be under pressure to fire two top aides who have been linked with ‘influence’?’

Truman retorted to charges of moral deterioration made by Senator Fulbright by saying there had been no illegal action in his department, but Fulbright reminded that his charge was improper action, and morals are not based merely on legality. It was well stated by the poet who said, “The meanest man I ever saw alius kep’ inside o’the law?’ .

Cotiier’a magazine for April 21, 1951, commented editorially on the general moral level in Washington and said that the Missouri gang’s “brazen influence-peddling, now being gradually exposed, is causing a public reaction of cynicism and loss of confidence at a time when faith and unity are vital. . . . Mr, Truman cannot divorce himself completely from his background. He was educated in the Pendergast school of political morality. This teaches that a political office is secondarily a public trust, and primarily a chance to wield power and bestow favors. The motto seems to be: Anything goes so long as it isn’t downright illegal”.

This rotten string pulling and influence buying becomes the worst when it is done by downright out-and-out criminals. When the underworld controls the government, the situation becomes intolerable. In some cases exactly that has happened!

A Sordid Story

Collier’s magazine (September 30,1950) told of this in an article entitled “The Capone Gang Muscles into Big-Time Politics”, when it said, “The mob . . . made friendships reaching high into local politics, into the state capital—and even into Washington. Who was on hand last May to greet the President, the Vice-President and the Cabinet when they visited Chicago? Friends of the mob. ... The mob’s friends are in upper-world places of great political influence. . . . We found a Capone mob so potent it could demoralize Chicago's police department and defy a reform mayor’s efforts to reform Chicago.”

Senator Kefauver, in the first of a series of articles in The Saturday Evening Post (April 7), said, “I have listened with mounting revulsion to the sordid story of the filth on America’s doorstep, . , . What I have learned scares me. . . . Some of these self-serving politicians ... are full-fledged members of the crime syndicate. , , . I look about the world and see once-strong, once-proud nations of Europe and elsewhere where the infection of criminal and political corruption set in and progressed to the point where democracy and national strength were utterly lost. I ask myself—and it is a good question for every citizen to ask—did the citizens and legislative bodies of those ruined countries realize what was happening? Couldn’t they sense that the mess of politico-criminal corruption would so weaken both the moral and economic fibers of their countries that their homelands inevitably must degenerate into ruined, impotent, third-class powers?”

In the second article (April 14), he said concerning the Miami investigation, “The area surrounding the fabulous winter playground was infected with everything: Grafting sheriffs, deputies and police officers. Hundred-dollar bribes for lowly constables and $100,000 contributions to gubernatorial campaigns. . . . All of us suspected graft existed in the unholy relationships between criminals and the law. Nevertheless, we came away from the Miami area shocked and disgusted—a dis-iliusionment that was to be repeated many more times before we completed our hearings throughout the United States—with the flagrant, cynical nature of this sort of corruption/’

Corrupt Cops

Concerning the connection between crime and politics in New York, he said, in the April 28 article, that the position of former Mayor William O'Dwyer is “lamentable—a melancholy essay on political morality”. Regarding the wide-open, officially condoned gambling at Saratoga, New York, he said, “There was an incredible police chief named ‘Paddy* Rox who knew nothing about either the plush casinos for the ‘swells’ or, as one witness put it, the ‘sawdust joints* for the common people. . . . His chief detective Walter Ahearn, took ten dollars a night from one gambling casino to haul the receipts back and forth to the bank, using a city police car. ... If the law is not to be laughed at in New York State, the open and flagrant violations in Saratoga certainly could not be ignored.’*

After New Orleans* Sheriff Frank Clancy admitted to the Kefauver committee that he had been on the end of the gamblers’ string pulling and had licensed gambling, Senator Tobey said in exasperation, “It is a revealing and disgusting thing . . . that a man like you can continue in office. , . . If you had a governor down there that had some guts, he would kick you out!”

Reporting on the Kefauver investigation Malcolm Johnson said, in a March 29 INS article, “Far from enforcing the laws they are sworn to uphold, these corrupt officials . . . are actually conniving to facilitate and promote organized crime/’ Further explaining this degraded tone of political morals and summarizing the political string pulling he reported: “In Missouri, says the committee, the state narrowly escaped being taken over in the 1948 election by underworld forces led by Charles Binaggio, slain Kansas City political boss and crime syndicate representative. ... In Florida, the committee notes, gamblers contributed to the campaign of Gov, Fuller Warren, In California, it was testified, a state-wide system of protection for slot machines was plotted by representatives of the Attorney-General's office. ... In Chicago Capone gang representatives attempted to influence legislation and are believed to control certain Illinois legislators. In New York, the nation’s largest city, the committee established once and for all that politics is dominated by Frank Costello and his underworld associates. One wltnesfc.Sdid ft taaf necessary to get the support of Costello and Joe Adonis in order to elect a mayor/

Hoodlums Pull Strings

This Joe Adonis was a leader of “Mur* der Incorporated”. Its affiliates are known to have executed sixty-three men in and around New York between 1931 and 1940, and probably’ a similar number in other parts of the country. Its victims were punctured to death with ice picks, buried alive, burned alive, hacked with cleavers, drowned with weights. For violating New Jersey’s gambling laws he was finally sen-tpnrod to jail, for the first time, on May 28, 1951.

The moral depravity of politics and the connections that keep big-time racketeers out of jail were shown in the report of California’s Special Study Commission on Organized Crime, which said, “Comparatively few professional criminals enter our jails or prisons. It is rare indeed that a professional criminal who has attained any real measure of financial success pays any serious penalty, even when caught. . . . Huge sums of money . . . are readily converted into political power, and invariably tend to distort and pervert our governmental and political institutions,”—San Francisco Chronicle, November 15, 1950.

The Kefauver Committee’s report (released May 1) declared that "despite known arrest records and well-documented criminal reputations, the leading hoodlums in the country remain, for the most part, immune from prosecution and punishment, although underlings of their gangs may, oh occasion, be prosecuted and punished”. The report further said the gangsters got this "immunity” through various connections, including bribery of public officials, and acquisition of political power by contributions to political parties. Many persons have asked, “If all these hoodlums could be hauled into the full view of millions by Kefauver, why coulckVt prosecutors have sent them off to jail where so many of them obviously belong?” Look at their approximately ^20~billion annual income and answer that question yourself. On March 26 Judge Samuel S. Leibowitz of the Kings County Court (New York) testified that New York gamblers alone pay between $20 million and $25 million a year to the police for protection.

Chicanery and Graft

Here are a few other examples of moral delinquency in politics selected from just one four-week period. On March 27 it was announced that a U. S. vice-consul had been dismissed in Hong Kong for having accepted up to $10,000 in bribes. On April 2 a Senate subcommittee was assigned to make recommendations to Congress concerning the establishment of a commission on ethics for the federal government. On April S it was announced that the "Dollar-a-Year” men faced an inquiry to determine whether they are actually unselfish patriots willing to contribute their skills to their country in an emergency, or whether they are agents of big busi

ness pressing their own and their company’s interest. On April 10 M. E. Thompson, former governor of Georgia, resigned as a consultant to the Office of Price Stabilization saying that for twelve weeks he had been on a $53.48 per day salary, plus expenses, but had not been consulted nor assigned any work. Although formerly a Truman supporter he declared he definitely would not support the “Kansas City crowd” in 1952. Meanwhile a Senate subcommittee was uncovering a story of widespread party patronage mixed with private business when federal jobs in Mississippi were “bought” by persons who made political “contributions” of from $250 to $2,000. Then on April 16 Representative . Brehm of Ohio went on trial and was soon found guilty of forcing salary “kick-backs” from his staff in violation of the corrupt ^practices act.

Other graft and political chicanery have been frequently exposed. The New York Times said, last November 1, “The political campaign of 1950, in city and state and apparently elsewhere too, is certainly one of the dirtiest in recent years,” Senator Taft said, in a Reader's Digest article entitled “The Dangerous Decline of Political Morality” (November 1950), that the decline of integrity in public life has brought us into the “twilight of honor”.

And what effect will this have on youth, regarding whose morals so much concern is expressed? Youth follows the example it sees, and the National Education Association’s publication “Moral and Spiritual Values in the Public Schools” says that “if observant young people see that the realities of political and community life differ sharply from the ideals which are presented to them by their teachers, they are bound to conclude that their teachers are either ignorant or untruthful”. And on April 30 James A. Farley said that coming generations should be taught good

citizenship, that "our leaders, must, by their own public acts, set a good example. Unfortunately a segment of our leadership has failed to do so”.

Senator Fulbright called attention to the extreme seriousness of the immoral tone of politics today when he said in his notable Senate speech on March 27, “Democracy is, I believe, more likely to oe destroyed by the perversion of, or abandonment of, its true moral principles than by armed attack from Russia. . . . When our government was small, when it took only 10 per cent of our earnings in taxes, we could afford a certain amount of official boodling. Today it has become important. We simply can no longer afford moral obtuseness in our public officials. . . . Too many people in our nation do not believe anything with conviction. They question the precepts of God or of man, indiscriminately. The values of life which were clear to the Pilgrims and the Founding Fathers have become dim and fuzzy in outline/’

Corruption, Why Permitted

Many citizens have been incensed at the reports of politicians dancing on the end of strings pulled by big commercial leaders and by big-time criminals. Yet corruption continues. It exists because the people permit it. U, S, biews <£ World Report said on April 6 that “the president refused to believe that the voting public takes seriously the signs of scandal in the peddling of influence in Washington”, and in this he is probably right. If the people were actually as honest as they claim, they would go in and clean up the dishonest political conditions. The guilt lies with the community itself. The people as a whole have not risen up in righteous indignation at the flagrant immorality of many officeholders who are sworn to uphold the law and protect the taxpayers. They gleefully read the scandals, but in much the same way that they devour the details of a movie stair's divorce. They have some "juicy” gossip, but the corruption continues. True, in some localities action has been taken against corruption, and some results have been achieved, but those who say that corrupt conditions will cease delude themselves by saying only what they and their listeners want to hear, not what the facts indicate. Has not past experience shown that the wave of enthusiasm will be short-lived, will pass on, and that an indifferent public will let the moral tone of politics continue to deteriorate?

The Bible, a Sure Guide

If the people believed God's Word, the Bible, they would have nothing to do with these corrupt conditions. If you sincerely want righteous conditions, then you must first get a knowledge of the Bible, the book that has been rejected by this immoral world. The rotten system of things today has become so corrupt through casting aside righteous principles that some persons have suggested that the whole present civilization may collapse, as former civilK zations have in the past. They are much closer to the solution than they think.

By studying the Bible you will learn that the whole present “civilization*’ is going to go down, to be replaced by something far superior; not directed by corrupt and greedy politicians, but directed from heaven by Jehovah God through his Son Christ Jesus. The Bible shows that the people in general would not believe this warning, that they would prefer their corruption, greed, wickedness, and that for such they would receive God’s condemnation to ever} lasting destruction. (2 Timothy 3:1-7; Psalm 145:20) So take courage. Study your Bible and learn of God’s kingdom that will soon replace this corrupt system of things with conditions of righteousness and peace.

all its rea

el! Every year hundreds sa of people are numbered among the casualties. Their misery and suffering are great and many die from the plant-inflicted wounds. Livestock by the thousands are also killed. Loss in damage runs into the millions of dollars, and, besides, men and governments bear a heavy burden of counterattacking. It is not a pretty picture; not many wars are. HoweVer, a dawn is breaking over the horizon that will shortly dispel these clouds of war, and once again plant life will be at peace with men and animals. What a happy prospect!

Vegetation is noted for the way it valiantly fights for self-preservation. Not only is it able to tenaciously hold on to what it has, it is capable of pushing ahead and conquering new, eroded or burned-off ground. Plant life is noted for its fortitude against sick soils, its ability to adapt itself to habitat and environment, its stamina against foul weather conditions, against excessive heat and cold and drought, against plagues of insects and blightful diseases. The many mechanical means employed by militant members of plantdom’s society in defending their domains are also generally known. There are bristling briars and thorns and thistles of desert-land and forest, and there are entangling barriers of underbrush that fortify the jungle. Trees are armor-plated with bark.

Nuts and seeds are protected by shells and hulls. And delicate flowers pull off super-colossal publicity stunts splashing color d perfume around, in order that an army of insects be lured into the pollination job for the perpetuation of the species. Such things are common knowledge.

But what most people are not aware of is the tremendous chemical warfare waged by powerful unseen forces in the vegetable kingdom. Within the plant organisms are giant chemical factories which take in great quantities of water, air, sunshine and minerals, transforming these raw materials into thousands of compounds, some so complicated that learned chemists among men cannot duplicate them. Now it is in these same chemical laboratories where plants secretly turn out chemical weapons which they use in warring against their enemies. "Plants of all kinds and sizes, from bacteria to trees, use chemical weapons in their struggle for living space in a crowded world.” (Science Digest, Dec., 1948, p. 5) This is one, but not the only reason why plants engage in chemical warfare.

Poison ivy, poison oak and poison sumac compose an ornery trio that every year makes life pretty miserable for some 250,000 men, women and children in North America. After brushing up against one of these rogues out in the woods, or after petting a dog or handling some object that has come in contact with one of these poisonous plants, the victim breaks

out in a mean, irritating rash, often accompanied by fever. The leaves, stems, berries and even the root systems have on their surfaces a complex phenolic substance called unjshiol, the molecule of which is made up of 21 atoms of carbon, 32 atoms of hydrogen and 2 atoms of oxygen. Only one person out of three is resistant to this poison, and none are totally immune.

Common nettles also cause a painful rash on the skin, and in some cases their venom has caused the death of dogs. Altogether, there are nearly 100 species of plants that are capable of afflicting man with dermatitis. After years of research and expense man tries to retaliate in this chemical war by spraying pathways of park and woodland with powerful synthetic chemicals. But alas! the best preventive is personally to avoid these hostile individuals.

Deadly Plants Send Out Warning

Besides the rather irritable personalities just mentioned, there are some 400 species of vascular plants in the United States, belonging to 68 families, and many others throughout the earth, that are definitely killers of all who will freely eat of them. The majority of these, however, constantly radiate fetid, disagreeable odors as a smoke-signal warning, so to speak, to all livestock. Animals usually take the smelly hint and let them alone, except when pressed by the pangs of hunger.

To name a few examples: poppies, common elder and dwarf elder, henbane, foxglove (which is hicknamed dead men's bells), lous^wort, dog's mercury and annual mercury, garden nightshade, bittersweet, tansy, fool’s-parsley, and toadflax —all bitter in taste and acrid in odor, all to be avoided by man and beast alike. The conifers, to which the yew belongs, are in the same class. Also the deadly nightshade. that plant long known as the source for toxic belladonna. Monk’s hood of the buttercup fahiily if eaten causes irritation of the mucous membranes and inflammation of the intestinal tract, and the chemical found in the leaves of traveler’s joy causes bad swelling of the mouth, vomiting and violent dysentery.

Some plants have a special way of protecting themselves when sick and bruised. From even the smallest wound the caper spurge exudes a poisonous milky sap which causes violent irritation on sensitive skin. Greater celandine exhales a foul, unpleasant odor when bruised. Cherry laurel does the same, and it should, for its leaves produce prussic or hydrocyanic acid, one drop of which will cause instant death. Poison hemlock, also a notorious killer, gives off a disagreeable, mousy smell, especially when bruised.

Another group of plants, including great mullein and mayweeds, have just as loud a bark but lack the lethal bite. Their chemical apparatus generates just as obnoxious an odor and flavor, but they do not as a rule kill. The oil in the foliage of Canadian erigeron contains a terpene that causes smarting of the eyes, soreness of throat and colic, and is therefore avoided by stock even if it lacks the potent power to inflict the death sentence.

It must be concluded from these facts that plants in their chemical warfare are not ruthless and sadistic, bent on killing off all animal life just for the sake of dominating the world. Rather, their plan seems to be that of self-preservation, one way or another, and many of them successfully employ powerful chemicals to accomplish this purpose. In this regard, Harold C. Long makes an interesting observation in his book Plants Poisonous to Live Stock, page 2:

“It may be assumed that many plants are to a considerable extent protected from

animals by the fact that they have an unpleasant odor, are acrid or bitter to the taste, or are actually toxic in character, just as others assume such protective devices as spines. In a state of nature animals appear to avoid instinctively such plants as are toxic or *unwholesome/ and to be less readily poisoned than are domesticated animals living under artificial conditions. Indeed, it has been remarked that farm stock reared in a locality where certain poisonous plants abound are much less likely to be injured by these plants than animals imported from a district where they do not occur,"

Other Phases and Formulas in This War

Some of the strangest plants are those that war on animal life for the purpose of catching and consuming fresh meat* To accomplish this they employ the most ingenious traps and lairs, as well as a number of Chemicals especially designed for the job. Certain pitcherplants dope the nectars around the edges of their traps with anesthetic compounds containing ammonium salts which stupify and paralyze the innocent bugs until they finally topple into the receptacle below and are consumed. Other carnivorous plants, like the sundew, manufacture sticky mucilages which gum up the insects that stop by for a visit until time comes for them to move on, and they are unable to budge. Then the happy sundew uncorks powerful digestive acids and enzymes, and these literally dissolve the nitrogenous parts of the unfortunate insects for the satisfaction of the plant's peculiar appetite, Venus's-flytraps, the butterworts, and the. flycatchers also war on the insect world with a line of digestive chemicals similar to those manufactured by the sundew.

More than seventy years ago it was observed that beneath black walnut trees nothing much seemed to grow, not even seedlings from the tree itself. Poisoned soil was the reason. Poison manufactured and distributed by the roots of the tree itself! Here was a startling case of where plants seemed to turn their chemical warfare on members of their own realm. Research discloses that a similar practice is more or less widespread among plants.

The absinthium or wormwood plant that is native to Europe, the guayule rubber plant of the desert, certain woodland asters of Wisconsin, the Indian tobacco plant, and the most common, the prolific sunflower—all of these imitate the black walnut. Particular study of the sunflower shows that in the spring of the year the decaying roots from the former season saturate the soil with a poisonous chemical that inhibits other plants as well as sunflower seeds from developing properly* The poison is not lasting in the soil, however, and the following year sunflowers will flourish again in full strength.

Here, then, is another wonderful 'and wise use of chemicals by lowly plants. Certain individuals, like the black walnut, require plenty of standing room, and since there is an abundance of space available there seems to be little reason why they should not have what they need. The sunflower's noble example illustrates conservation of soil through rotation of crops, and that by the plants themselves.

When viewing this warlike drama on the lower levels of creation it is well to call to mind that it is taking place in an earth not yet brought to a paradise state, an earth that produces thorns and thistles and briars and brambles when it runs wild. But it will not always be so. Jehovah God has promised that a restored paradise garden will envelop the globe. With Armageddon completed in the near future all creation will henceforth dwell together in eternal peace and unity.—Isaiah 11:9; 55:13; Micah 4:3,

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Science tiifih Lights

c/4 tom-Smasher Smashes Theories

<L Long fawned upon by scientists as a cherished aid in analyzing the universe, the highly touted atom-smashing machines, besides splitting the atom, have cut down, the former favored theory of the universe’s make-up. Thus physicists, despite numerous modern experiments, are still trying to answer the age-old scientific problem: “What holds the universe together?”

C It is known, of course, that all the universe consists of atoms, each of which possesses an atomic nucleus embracing 99.9 per cent of the matter and energy of the atoms. The nucleus consists of positive electrical charges called protons and of electrically neutral particles called neutrons. Since like charges repel each other, a force of great power must control the atomic nucleus to prevent the protons therein from parting company. It must be a force millions of times greater than the electrical charges tending to repel them. Were it not for this force, everything would, according to scientific logic, dissolve In a cloud of hydrogen gas with its nucleus of one proton and nothing to resist it.

C Yet, what is this great cosmic binding force? Several years ago the Japanese physicist Hideki Yukawa thought he had the answer, and advanced the “meson theory”, in which he suggested that each atomic nucleus contained particles with masses 200 times the mass of the electron. This he offered as the “cosmic cement” capable of holding the protons stable 'against the electrical repelling forces. For this Professor Yukawa was awarded the Nobel Prize, even while a tide of doubt was beginning to besiege his theory. Now, atom-smashers have produced artificially created “mesons”, and with them a flood of contradictory ideas. Latest experiments seem to have completely finished off Yukawa’s theory, leaving leading nuclear physicists admittedly in “jungles” of uncertainty.

L

Answering Phone When No One Home

C Science has made possible a reasonable if somewhat astounding answer to this problem. The “Telemagnet”, recipient of the merit award of 1950 from the American Society of Industrial Engineers, makes possible a person’s answering his telephone with his own voice even when away from home. It all starts with the ring of the telephone which sets off an electrical cycle. The receiver is lifted sufficiently for the caller to hear a recorded message in the other party's voice say that he is away, and directing the caller to leave a message that he might hear it on his return.

^Amputee Frog Grows New Leg

C On December 29, 1950, Dr. Marcus Singer of Harvard Medical School reported to the American Association for the Advancement of Science that he had witnessed the growth of a new leg by an amputee frog. Dr. Singer had amputated a front leg of a frog, then cut and freed the, main nerve and its branches supplying the rear leg on the same side. These nerves he diverted to the surface of the foreleg stump. This extra nerve supply is believed to have supplied the necessary push to spur the growth of a new limb. The new leg was observed to possess muscle, tendon and connective tissues.

Superb Safety Record in the Air

C The president of the Ain Transport Association, Admiral EiTiery S. Land, has announced a phenomenal record of safe flights by scheduled domestic airlines during the year 1950. In spite of a new record of passenger-miles flown, with resulting greater exposure to accident, these lines have compiled a 1950 record of but 1.2 passenger fatalities per 100,000,000 passenger-miles flown. This excels even the splendid 1949 record of 13. Dividing the past twenty years into four flye-year groups, the following are found to be the successive average passenger fatalities per 100,000,000 passenger-miles: 15, 6.1, 2.4 and 18. During take-offs and landings over the year, which came at the rate of one every eight seconds or a total of about 5,000,000, there were but five accidents.

Breaking the record down another way, the scheduled domestic airlines suffered one fatal accident for each 73,400,000 plane-miles covered This would be nearly equal to 3£000 safe trips between Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles. The fine record was attributed to the co-ordinated efforts of engineering and research by builders and operators.

homes, and steps are being taken to correct these deplorable conditions they have found lurking there. Until recently, 282 of the 754 private homes In the State of New York were classed better than “fair”, in a survey by the Welfare Department. Less than half of them were required to have any local licensing or inspection, and about one-fifth of them were not required to meet any standards at all. However, as this is being written, the governor of the state has signed a bill placing the private nursing homes for the aged and convalescent under the supervision of the State Board of Social Welfare.

However, notwithstanding the outrageous conditions, or the improved conditions existing, the ever-swelling tide of commitments to such institutions is not being checked, but is overflowing into the psychopathic wards of state and mental hospitals. Here the same overcrowded conditions exist as are prevalent in the private and county homes; and the same impassive and depressed countenances can be seen on the faces of these pathetic individuals who are the victims of merciless and unjust railroading. According to a condensed article appearing in the New York Times, of December 28, 1949, entitled “‘Committed”, and therein quoting a clinical director of a large New England hospital, it was pointed out: “Many of these old folks die within a few days or weeks after they arrive here. They don't die of any mental or physical disease. They die of a broken heart. They feel themselves betrayed. They no longer want to live. They commit psychic suicide.”

**No Loving* Kindness,

Having No Natural Affection”

Who are the ones responsible for this shameful and outrageous pawning of these helpless aged parents into the psychopathic wards and dismal institutions where no love exists? For the answer, ponder a few of the facts that should stand as a grim reminder that the words of the apostle Paul, when writing to Timothy, are being fulfilled before your very eyes: “But know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here. For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, self-assuming, haughty, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, without gratitude, with no loving-kindness, having no natural affection, . . . having a form of godly devotion but proving false to its power; and from these turn away.”—2 Timothy 3:1-5, New World Trans.

In the spring of each year the nation has set aside two Sundays to be celebrated as Mother’s Day and Father's Day, During these special events, many are those who proudly display their little red carnation in the buttonhole of their lapel. Many of such ones must stand accused of snatching their own mother or father from a home which such parents made possible, and in turn railroading them off to institutions, depriving the parents of the love and gentle care which were so painstakingly bestowed upon them through life by these parents; and, because of this railroading, hastening the day of their death. To such ones let it be said: What deceiving hypocrisy is that little red carnation!

The pattern is one that repeats itself time and again; and, although a very small per cent of these inhuman dramas find their report in the local newspapers, yet many oi such actions are regularly published. In a large eastern city, an aged couple was found destitute, hungry, and with no place to call home. The man was 83 years old and stricken with paralysis. His wife was 77 and very feeble. This couple had been making their home with their daughter, until she grew tired of keeping them, abandoning them in the opposite part of town. City police found them cold and bewildered, and provided sandwiches and hot coffee, and a nights lodging by placing twin beds in a police celt Appar* ently this unloving daughter had considered that they had lived much too long in this modem world with room only for the modem youth.

Many of these elderly people who will spend the rest of their lives in homes for the needy and the aged, or mental wards of hospitals, are there simply because they are considered “in the way” by the children, and too much of a burden; or, as in many cases, the daughter-in-law “finds it impossible” to cope with his or her eccentricities. Through greatly exaggerating these to the family physician or local psychiatrist, a permit is written out for a commitment of them to the nearest asylum for the insane.

Says Albert Deutsch, writing for Companion magazine of January, 1950: “I have visited more than forty public mental hospitals in recent years. I have seen rows on rows of old people waiting in numb despair for death to end their miserable existence. Few mental hospital superintendents will deny that many should not have been there. Most superintendents are eager to have the public know the appalling facts.” Quoting Dr. George S. Stevenson, director of the National Committee for Mental Hygiene: “It is intolerable for a civilized society to permit the continuance of this situation, especially when solutions are at hand.”

Farcical Devotions

From Atlanta, Georgia, comes the report from the state welfare director, which merely discloses further how the modem generation pawns the aged off on the state for support, and which smells of the prelude to railroading. The report shows that parents of wealthy children were allowed to receive small welfare checks, and out of these were charged by their wealthy children for all the essentials of life. In another case^ the report discloses that a man, his wife and one child lived in an expensive home and insisted that the servants entrance be used by welfare workers who came to check on the mother’s old-age benefit needs. Still another was that of a couple who lived in a wealthy home and owned two expensive automobiles, and who were allowing the dependent mother to live in a small shack in the rear of their home, and willing to provide her with only lights and water. One judge, whose salary is between $10,000 and $15,000 a year, refuses his mother assistance because “he contributed to the Community Chest and paid taxes”. What farce such devotions!

Although many of the aged are covered by old-age pensions, yet the rising cost of living is making the “ends” that should meet become shorter and shorter for them. And the “ends” have become so short for some that their measly monthly checks are now being used to pay the monthly fees to live in the homes for the aged. Taking up such residence is only the last resort. Even the feeble and handicapped apply for employment to keep the “big bad wolf” of institutions out of their lives. But in this- ultramodern generation the accent is on youth, and the aged find employment extremely scarce. So the marchers in the pitiful parade to oblivion increase, and seemingly there is no hope.

Let all those who are responsible for such unloving actions toward the aged be reminded that today their destinies are being decided and sealed by their unjust course of action. The hope for complete freedom for the aged in a world where love will fill the whole earth and never die, and where even the most ancient will return to the days of their youth, will be fulfilled in that new world of righteousness which is soon to blossom into full reality inac-complishment of God’s purpose.

By

THE COCONUT PALM

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Trade-Mark of Pleasure and Prosperity

'‘Awakil" correspondent fn Puerto ftico

Are you hungry, thirsty, In need of

■J .A.J '■ clothing or a place of shelter? Inis , •■■;J credible as it may seem all these ’Tr’£S*^T necessities of life, and then some, may be obtained from the munificent coconut palm s—truly outstanding individuals among members of Jehovah God’s creation. Tall and stately in appearance, their graceful trunks, devoid of branches, reach heavenward to a height of 60 to 100 feet, where leaves, ten or twenty feet in length, arch outward to give each a glorious crown peculiar to the palm-tree dynasty. These majestic trees are very sociable and thrive best in groves. Seldom found far inland, unless planted so by man, they hug the shores of tropic isles seeking the sandy soils that border the seas.

•v Besides their beauty and grace coconut palms have a most charitable disposition, as unselfish as True Love herself. It is rare to find a tree that bestows upon mankind so many bountiful gifts of practical value and yet, in exchange, requires oh so very little care and attention. What is it you desire? Is it a new house? Well, the leaf stems are so strong they furnish the rafters of native huts. Is it something to drink? Then how about some agua de coco, the so-called coconut milk? What an excellent thirst-quencher! Or is it a stimulant you need? By fermenting and distilling the sweet juice of the unopened spikes or spathes an alcoholic liquor is obtained. Maybe you are hungry, If so, a delicious dish of ‘‘palm cabbage” can be made from the heart of blossom buds before they open. And this is not all.

…