Awake!, March 8, 1952

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ISRAEL-"THE FORCE OF A MAGNIFICENT IDEA”? What "ideas” does aid to Israel really support?

Nature’s Thermometers

These earliest forecasters outmode man’s best instruments

India’s Sacred Suicide

’’Sacred” animals rule and starve India’s millions

How Big the Mental Tragedy?

Mental ills heap staggering toll in victims

MARCH 8, 1952 semimonthly

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CONTENTS

Hoover Asks Return of “Old” Virtues

Israel—“The Force of a Magnificent Idea” ? 5 "In a Hostile Environment”

India’s Sacred Suicide

Strange Phenomenon of the Undernourished Bridge

"Accused of Preaching the Gospel!”

Nature’s Thermometers

World War II an Expensive Venture

Republican Campaign Ammunition for 1952

'Bishop for President,

MacArthur for King’

How Big the Mental Tragedy?

Dog Gone—but Where?

The Animals’ Undertaker?

This Business of Being Beautiful

Letter to Churchill on Malayan

Discrimination

“Your Word Is Truth”

Is Israel the Messianic Nation?

-Quick, Watson, the Fingerprints!

Watching the World

Hoover Asks Return of w01d” Virtues

Herbert Hoover is the only living expresident of the United States. According to the New York Times, August 31, 1951f Mr. Hoover, in his speech the day before at Des Moines, Iowa, made some very frank observations regarding honor in public life.

Mr. Hoover told how politicians have overworked the word “new0 in "trying to get out of this age of misery from our thirty-seven years of hot and cold wars, with only intervals of hot and cold peace". The remedy, he averred, is always something ''new”, but too often the “New Testament” is omitted.

Mr. Hoover’s concern was not about these pseudo “new” things. According to him: “Some of these fold’ things are slipping badly in American life. And if they slip too far, the lights will go out of America, even if we win these hot and cold wars. We might explore some of the things that have happened to the 'old' virtues of integrity, and truth, and honor in public life a little further. During the recent past we have had a flood of exposures by Congressional committees, by state legislatures, by grand juries in scores of cities, and in the press.”

He wondered what the fifty-six Founding Fathers of America “would say about the procession of men in responsible positions who have come before [the] Congressional committees in this day. What would they have thought of the 'sacred honor* of the five percenters, the mink coats, the deep freezers, the free hotel bills ? Or favoritism in government loans and government contracts? Or failures to prosecute evildoers for widespread cancerous rackets and gambling rings with their train of bribed officials all through the land?”

“We have a cancerous growth of intellectual dishonesty in public life which is mostly beyond the law,” continued Mr. Hoover. “One of the chief instruments is corrupt propaganda. There has been such propaganda by foreign governments, and even our own government, designed to get us into wars. Then we have propaganda to keep up our pep. Then the habit continues in peacetime. And some pressure groups have learned this trick to get something they ought not to have. The mildest form of corrupt propaganda is a process of persuasive half-truths. At times it even rises to the high moral levels of selling snake oil.

“But the most malignant form of propaganda is the spread of deadly poisons^ Its process is to create suspicion, and hate and fear. Its purpose is less to persuade than to conceal the truth and to crush opposition. The machinery of propaganda is made of certain standardized gadgets by which you can detect it.’*

Among these gadgets he listed the use of slogans and smears*, the pollution of the integrity of the language by insinuating new meanings to old, simple and well-understood expressions, and the cries of “Unity! Unity!” for the purpose of stifling free discussion. And still worse than the use of the gadgets of propaganda, according to Mr. Hoover, is the concealment of the truths relative to commitments, such as were made at Yalta and Teheran, which “sold the freedom of half a billion people down the river”. Then again making a bid for the “old” virtues he said:

“And I would like to explore this ‘old’ virtue of truth, and integrity and honor in public life a little further. The Congress can well widen the laws so as to clutch the ‘new’ kinds of bribes and benefits that they have recently discovered. But Congress cannot reach into intellectual dishonor. Part truth, concealment of public commitments, propaganda and its gadgets, the failure to enforce the law, the failure to keep promises are all but part of them. There are group pressures also ‘to get theirs' which smell from the decay of integrity and the rotting of patriotism. And some persoqs arrive at their morals with a sort of divining rod that measures morals in terms of votes.

“The Congress, from its own inquiries, is confronted with the fact that sacred honor cannot be tested by legality nor can it be enforced by law. In its frustration, the Congress is groping for some sort of a code of ethics, which with the prefix ‘new’ might protect the citizen from his own officials. Might I suggest that we already haMB some old and tested codes of ethics? There are the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, and the rules of the game which we learned at our mother’s knee. Can a nation Eve it these are not the guides of public life? . , ,

“When people are dishonorable in private business, they injure only those with whom they deal or they may injure their own chances in the next world. But when there is a lack of honor in government, the morals of the whole people are poisoned. The drip of such poisons may have nothing to do with dishonor in some college athletics or the occasional policemen on the beat. But the rules of the^game have been loosened somewhere by somebody.

'“Some folks seem to think that these are necessary evils in a free government. Or that it is smart politics. These are deadly sleeping pills. No public man can be just a little crooked. There is no such thing as a no-man’s land between honesty and dishonesty. Our strength is not in politics, in prices, or production, or price controls. Our strength lies in * . . public sensitiveness to evil. Much as the Congress has my good wishes, something stronger than a new code of ethics is needed in American life. The issue today is decency in public life against indecency. Our greatest danger is not from invasion by foreign armies. Our dangers are that we may commit suicide from within by complaisance with evil. Or by public tolerance of scandalous behavior. Or by cynical acceptance of dishonor. These evils have defeated many nations many times in history.”

In thus analyzing the moral plight of America, Mr. Hoover not only corroborates the fulfillment of Bible prophecy concerning the perilous times of these last days, but also gets at the cause, even as the prophet long ago foretold: “The wise shall be abashed, they shall be dumbfounded and taken; for lo, they have spurned the word of the Lord, and what wisdom, then, have they?” Those who are wise will heed Jehovah’s instructions: “Stand ye in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way; and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.” The old paths and the good way are found in God’s Word, the Bible.—Jeremiah 8:9, An Amer, Trans.; Jeremiah 6:16, Am. Stan, Ver.; 2 Timothy 3:1-5.

—-'The Force of a Magnificent Idea"?

IN THE winter of 1950-1951 the Israel

Philharmonic Orchestra made a goodwill tour of the United States. While in Providence, Rhode Island, a reception was given in its honor at which Dr. Henry M. Wriston, president of Brown University, lauded the new state of Israel as "the force of a magnificent idea” and stated that in it “an ideal, frustrated for centuries but tenaciously held, has finally found expression, even in a hostile environment”.

In the spring of 1951 the prime minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, visited the United States- He was feted by Jewish groups, and made a favorable impression in Washington. Officials there spoke of Israel as “our devoted ally”, “a natural ally,” and alluded to the possible role in defense that it could play as an outpost of democracy in the Near East. Late in the year the United States allotted Israel a $64,000,000 grant in aid- The American Christian Palestine committee is giVing help of another kind to Israel By endeavoring to create good will toward it among American Protestants.

What kind of country is Israel? What is taking place there, and why? Does it indeed represent “the force of a magnificent idea”, thus deserving the help it is getting from religious, political and financial circles in America? Or may it be that there is another side to the picture, that of its “hostile environment”, the Arab nations?

The first Jewish agricultural colonies of modem times in Palestine were established in 1840, Some fifty years later the Zionist movement came into being with the goal of a “publicly and legally assured home in

Palestine” for the Jewish people. The establishing <of a British mandate over Palestine at the close of World War I ended four centuries of Turkish domination and restored the immigration of Jews,

For about thirty years England had a real job trying to preserve the Pax Britannica in Palestine between the Jews and the Arabs. Ironically, it had the most difficulty with the ones it had favored most, the Jews. Fanatical Jewish groups murdered hundreds of British officials and soldiers to lend weight to their demand that the British get out. Finally England’s patience gave way and she announced her withdrawal from Palestine.

The date of England’s withdrawal, May 14, 1948, marked the birth of the stafe of Israel. As nations go, it is small indeed, at present consisting of less than 8,000 square miles, or about the size of the state of Jersey. Its 1951 population □f less than one and a half milliop is about half that of Brooklyn, New York. Its chief cities are Jaffa-Tel Aviv, with a population of 400,000; Haifa, with 150,000, and Jerusalem (New), with 110,000. About 12 per cent of all the Jews in the world reside in Israel.

Ideological, Religious, Political Problems

The birth of the state of Israel has crystallized a wide ideological rift in world Jewj-y. On the one hand are the Jews who hold th#t being a Jew is a matter only of religion and not nationality; and on the other hand are those who hold that Israel is the homeland of all Jews. Holding this latter view is Israel’s premier, who told the recent World Zionist Congress at Jerusalem, “The state of Israel differs from all other states in that it is not only the state of its citizens alone but of the entire Jewish people, of every Jew wherever he lives/1 This view is repudiated by many American Zionists, one of whom countered with “American Jews are not candidates for mass immigration”. In fact, years ago American Jews went on record that “America was [their] Palestine, and Washington [their] Jerusalem”. Further bearing this out is a New York Times, November 28,1951, dispatch from Jerusalem, telling that while American tourists flock to Israel “American Jews who come here as immigrants and remain are rare”.

In Israel, religion and politics are joined in a Judaistic democracy. As pointed out by the world chairman of the Jewish Miz-rachi society, those who would divorce these issues “do not face reality”. In order to form a government, the Mapai, leading political party of a socialistic labor nature, had to take into its coalition the religious parties. This meant acceding to their demands which “covered religious education, a Sabbath law, opposition to the importation of nonkosher meat and a ban on compulsory mobilization of women for military service”. Because of the radical nature of this small religious bloc and the controversial questions involved, the government has not gone ahead with its plans for drawing up a permanent constitution. This religious bloc, though small, is powerful; it was able to force the resignation of the previous coalition on a church versus state issue.

This coalition of the liberal and religious parties at present has 65 of the 120 seats of Israel’s assembly or Knesset, Due to the balloting’s being on a national basis instead of according to states or constituencies, a great many small parties have seats in the Knesset. However, only two others are of any importance: the General Zionists, which is in favor of “free enterprise”, and the Mapam, which goes to the other extreme and Is divided on just how far it should be influenced by the Kremlin.

The Economic Problem

Enthusiastic and optimistic Israelis point with pride to the industrial progress their country is making. Since its founding it has almost tripled its textile, building material, food products and metal industries. A large auto assembly plant is in operation, recently a new tire and rubber plant was opened, iron and steel plants are nearing completion and extensions are being made on chemical, fertilizer and other industrial plants; all aiming to make Israel as economically self-sufficient as possible, even though the country has very few natural resources.

However, in spite of all such magnificent progress, the fact remains that Israel has an extremely adverse trade balance; or is it because of such industrialization? Year after year its imports are upward of six times as great as its exports. Israel has made use of every conceivable means to alleviate the strain of such an adverse trade balance on its national economy; in keeping therewith being the floating of a half-billion-dollar loan in the United States.

At the root of Israel’s economic plight is its policy of unrestricted immigration. Aiming to have a nation of 2,500,000 within five years, it has been using mass air transport to achieve its goal. Its “Operation Magic Carpet” brought in fifty thousand Yemenite Jews; it has just about completed bringing in 100,000 Jews from Iraq, and hopes to bring in 70,000 of Iran’s 100,000 Jews in the near future- Concerning this immigration an Israel Newsletter stated: “This is a moral responsibility and one of the main reasons for its existence as an independent state.”

But an Increasing number of Israelis are pressing for immigration restriction.

To make matters worse, many of the immigrants do not like farming and so quit the wilderness settlements for the cities. “The people now coming to Israel . . . have not the background nor the enthusiasm for the tasks they must undertake?’ Why should they do hard manual labor when, as one immigrant of 30 put it, “we can get along very nicely with the black market.” A New York Times dispatch from Tel Aviv, dated November 21, 1951, told of 150 disillusioned Jews from India staging a sit-down strike; because of bad treatment and color discrimination they demanded that they be returned to India.

*'Zn a Hostile Environment”

To understand why this “magnificent idea" of the state of Israel finds itself “in a hostile environment”, it is necessary first of all to appreciate the viewpoint of the Arab nations surrounding Israel. These Arab nations consider Israel a protege of imperialistic England, a recent intruder, a usurper and robber of Palestine territory. What right did Great Britain have to allow the Jews to settle in Palestine? True, the Jews were being persecuted in the rest of the world, but is that any reason why the Arabs should surrender their sovereignty of Palestine to the Jews? Jews could go to the North and South Americas, or to Australia; why must they come to Palestine? The mere fact that 3,000 years ago the Jews held the land is no argument why they should be entitled to claim it today! Have not the Arabs been in possession of the land for many centuries? After all, modem law provides a time limit during which one can press a claim.

Oh yes, the Arab continues, the Jews have sentimental and religious reasons and base their claim on the history of the Bible. But since when are the modem nations basing their power politics on that Book? And while the Jews claim the land as theirs because they are the descendants of Abraham through Isaac, the Arabs counter with the claim that they are Abraham’s descendants through Ishmael. Why were a million Arabs compelled to sit idly by while foreigners gained control of the land, even thotigh they were willing to pay for it?

No question about it, the infant nation of Israel is persona non grata as regards the Arab nations of the Near East. And it is being spoiled by an indulgent United Nations organization. Repeatedly this tiny country of less than one and a half million has defied its parent. It gave a striking example of this in 1949 when the U. N., by a more than two-thirds majority vote, adopted a resolution placing Jerusalem under an international regime. That did not suit Israel and so it did not submit. Instead it moved its capital from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and then rejected the U. N. demand that it move its government out of there.

It is not surprising therefore to repeatedly read of the U. S. and the U. N. rebuking the belligerent little offspring. "U. N. aide holds that Tel Aviv obstructs efforts to settle Huleh marshes dispute.” “U. S. urges Israel to soften stand," dealing with the same subject And again, “U. S. rebukes Israel for bombing Syria in border incident," in which the U. S. observed that the bombing was in no way justified, and reminded Israel that in the long run its position in the Near East depended on the development of friendly relations with the Arab states.

In February 1951 an Israeli army raiding force crossed the border into the state of Jordan, blew up houses and killed a number of Arabs, causing four Hebrew professors at Jerusalem to issue a protest which concluded with the words: “Is this the Jewish tradition on which we believed

the state of Israel was founded? Is this the regard for human life on which the Jewish people stood when they were not yet a political nation? Is this the way of proving to the world that our nation upholds the principles of justice?*'

Under the heading “Israelis Oust 12,000 Arabs from 2 Villages; Occupy Territory Under Armistice Accord*’, a New York Times dispatch told how the Israelis made an armed attack at three o’clock in the morning. “The residents of the two villages . . - said they had farmed the land for generations and had no advance notice of the occupation. They said the Israelis had not exercised their right to move up to the new boundary until the acres of wheat and barley had been ready for harvesting*'* And while taking all it can under the 1949 armistice accord, Israel refers to the 1947 line of demarcation when that suits her best! She deals wTith her neighbors on a “Heads I win, tails you lose*’ policy*

The Refugee Problem

Much justifiable criticism has been directed against Israel’s treatment of the Arab refugees* These, according to Life, November 17, 1951, number 880,000, with 467,000 in Jordan, 199,000 in Egypt, 106,-000 in Lebanon, 84,000 in Syria and a controversial number in Israel. The plight of these refugees is every bit as bad as ever was that of the European Jews. True, these refugees-were caused by the Arab-Israel war, but the fact remains that according to a long-standing U. N. Security Council resolution refugees have the right to return to their own land, a right which Israel refuses to grant them.

These refugees are now the pawns in the Israel-Arab conflict. Israel has offered to take 100,000, if the rest of the Arab states will absorb the rest, but the Arab states insist that the refugees be permitted to choose. Israel does not want all these refugees, for both economic and political reasons; and her fears that they may become a fifth column may not be altogether groundless. (According to a U* N. head, to rehabilitate the refugees in new homelands would cost $1,500 per family*) And while Israel and the Arab States haggle over these wretched refugees and refuse to do anything for them, ‘Truman asks the U. S. Congress for $5 million for Arab relief as interim aid to ease tension in the Near East.* And there is no relief in sight. Because of the “rigid positions1* taken by both the Arabs and the Israelis, the United Nations Conciliation Commission for Palestine announced on November 21, 1951, its decision to end current mediation efforts.

Clearly, from the foregoing it is apparent that much can be said on both sides of the Arab-Israel controversy and that Israel leaves much to be desired as the “force of a magnificent idea”. No wonder many Americans express concern over the U. S. policy of favoring Israel when its case is so weak from both a moral and a practical standpoint* Israel has yet to give proof that she will face her economic problems realistically; and why push the Arab nations into the Kremlin’s orbit for purely sentimental regard for Israel?

Human nature is ever the same. It craves justice and mercy when oppressed, but fails to mete such out when tables are tumed* Labor unions long complained of the tyranny of big business, but now labor union czars are tyrannical with the power they have gained. Negroes complain of discrimination, but they practice color discrimination among themselves. Israel is no exception. Since such is the case, how can anyone claim that it is the Messianic nation? But for a discussion of this phase of the subject we refer the reader to page 25 of this issue.

A NAKED hollow-eyed child stares at you from behind sunken sockets. Her mouth is wide open but too weak to cry. Her arms are bent but no strength is left to chase the flies away that crawl on her ulcerous sores. Her chest is sunken and stomach swollen. Crouched beside her on the hot brick is her mother, with one hand holding the child so it will be able to stand, and with the other hand begging for food and life.

In the streets are plump, vigorous, healthy monkeys, big white cows, fat hissing snakes and strutt ing peacocks. As you stand wondering why people should be starving when there is an overabundance of meat everywhere you turn, the child lets out a pleading cry that sends chills down your spine. Animals and men turn to watch the baby writhe in pain. Its knees buckle, its head slumps forward as the mother catches the limp body in her arms and slowly lays the child beside her. The baby is dead. A truck with a regular corpse removal squad comes along. The men pick up the body and toss it on the truck as if it were a piece of lumber.

Multiply this scene a million times if you wish to capture in your imagination what is happening to India. Why should starvation gnaw at the vitals of a nation that maintains almost a third of the world’s total cattle population? Why should men, women and children die of malnutrition when the nation’s potential milk and meat capacity .could easily exceed the production of the temperate zone ? Why should monkeys live in luxury and people in filth and degrading poverty? Why should sick cows and worthless peacocks rob the starving multitudes of their bread? Why?

Strangely enough, the answer is a religious one. It is one involving man’s exercising proper dominion. In all seriousness, India needs to consider the truthfulness of the Creator’s words in the book of Genesis, that man must exercise “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth”, including cattle. Today in India the animal vyorld dominates man, Until the reverse comes true, her situation will remain critical if not disastrous. India’s greatest single cause for poverty is her sacred monkeys and sacred cows. It is either monkey and cow that must be sacrificed, or the nation. Which will it be?

Until a few years ago the country was self-sufficient, but now it must import hundreds of thousands of tons of food a year. Her soil has been denuded. Open gullies, eroded fields and miles of empty wasteland are everywhere. Food production does not keep pace with a population

which increasesby about four million each year. The masses move about like living skeletons In search of food. Most of them are destined to a cruel life of aemlstarva-tian. The cause? Sacred cows and sacred monkeys, say officials.

Monkey Business

Some estimate that monkeys alone eat or destroy $2,000,000 worth of foodstuffs every day, that they consume about 1,000,-000 tons and destroy another 2,000,000 or more tons of grain each year. India’s monkey business runs high, costing more than $190,000,000 for grain alone. Their nature makes them natural-bom saboteurs. They form a simian fifth column looting homes, tearing up crops, stealing food from restaurants, biting babies and committing murder. One tossed a piece of masonry on a man, killing him; another snatched an infant from his mother’s arms and threw it out of the hospital window, killing it. Others pickpocket, mimic and tease their victims, men, who are powerless to retaliate.

Why are monkeys considered sacred by Hindus? Legend has it that Hanuman, a monkey chief, once led a horde of monkeys to save a beautiful princess named Sita, who was carried off by a demon. With Kis army Hanuman built the bridge of boulders joining India to Ceylon and rescued the queen. In respect to his tribe for this deed, the purple-black-faced monkey with the white ruffs has become a sacred member of the animal kingdom. In every street, in every alley, on country roads, one will encounter graven images of the monkey god Hanuman.

To put an end to this religious monkey hazard, the government in a drive for more food ordered all states to kill them and placed a 5-rupee bounty on every monkey head. No longer does monkey find safety behind the skirts of mythology. A starving Indian is liable to cash legend for loot and earn himself 5 rupees, if monkey is not careful. Over 200,000 have already been turned over to the altar of sacrifice. Many have taken to the jungles for cover, sensing that India wants no more of this monkey business.

Sacred Snakes and Peacocks

Milk and food offered to sacred snakes and grain fed to peacocks could help ease the starvation grip. But the native looks upon the snake as an incarnation of God. Special room is kept in a home for snakes that may wish to dwell there. The cobra is considered the most sacred to Hindu snake worshipers and is often called "the good lord”. Yet snakes are known to cause the death of over 50,000 persons every year. It is sacrilege to even think of killing a snake. When bitten by one natives dread to mention it for fear that they might incur the wrath of the gods. They usually refer to it as a briar scratch or something of the kind. It is from such superstitions that men must free themselves before they can exercise dominion over the animal creation.

Cow or Country

However, to stay famine the slogan might well read, *For cow or country?* Some have gone all out for cow and nothing for country. Rajrishi (King of Saints) Purushottamdas Tandem, white-bearded and frail candidate for the presidency of India’s dominant Congress party, said: “Cow protection is part of Indian culture and as such ,,. the cow should be afforded full protection even if it leads to the collapse of the country’s economy.” In other words, sacrifice the people, but not the cow. Unlimited cow protection became a hot and debated political issue in India.

She maintains some 215,000,000 cattle out of the world’s total cattle population of 690,0(X),000. Facts show many of these sacred cows are sick and aged and are a burden to the country. Other cows mature slowly and are very low in milk production. Improvement by selective breeding could change the picture greatly. But religion says No! As a result, there is a great surplus in cattle, but the food production is very low. The cows compete with the growing population for the produce of the land, with the result that both suffer. To remedy this, the sick, diseased and aged animals ought to be slaughtered for beef and fed to the starving. But beef is repugnant to the Hindu. Killing cows, whether healthy or sick, is looked upon as a great sin. Yet Mahatma Ghandi, who was worshiped by Hindus as being next in greatness to Buddha, set aside this superstition by killing a sick sacred cow to spare it from agony.

According to many Hindus Ghandi was not condemned for what he did. His act showed mercy. He is said to have gone ‘directly to the seventh heaven of his faith and achieved mystic nirvana or oneness with God without further transmigrations'. The people are in agony for want of food, and not pagan mythology. Will India sacrifice her sacred cow to save her people, or sacrifice her people to save her cow? In some states they have*changed the cow to a horse, thus making it possible for the native to kill. How was this possible? Simply by changing two letters the cow became a horse. Nehil Gae, meaning “blue cow”, was changed to Nehil Goa, meaning “blue horse”, which made the difference between life or death for the animal, and food or starvation for the native.

But the answer is still one of proper dominion, God over man and man over animal. Only by acting upon the Creator’s commands at Exodus 20:3-6 (Am. Stan, Ver.) and Genesis 1:28 will India find her answer.

Strange Phenomenon of the Undernourished Bridge

IN THE summer of 1948 Quebec province’s dictator-premier, Maurice Duplessis, opened his proud "Duplessis Bridge", a nine-span structure connecting hfs home town of Three Rivers, Quebec, with Cap de la Madeleine. (See Awake/ issue of September 22, 1951.1 But the bridge was due for an ill-fated history. Throughout most of 1950 it was closed for repairs. Then on January 31, 1951, reported as the coldest day of the year in the vicinity, four of Its spans collapsed and plunged four persons to icy death in the St. Maurice river, ♦ A United Press dispatch reveals that a two-man commission appointed by Premier Duplessis to investigate the calamity has been unable to find a cause after examining forty-three witnesses and sixty-nine exhibits. The commission lays the blame to either sabotage or to a strange phenomenon of which its report says cryptically:

♦ "We may conceive there was a phenomenon, not yet defined, through which the Duplessis Bridge would have carried in itself the cause of the collapse; in other words, a phenomenon which goes beyond the present knowledge of the science of engineering."

4 Investigating commissions should, of course, be interested in all of the facts. Noteworthy is the fact that the bridge’s contract had been let privately to Duplessis' own associates. Furthermore, the commission is said to be satisfied that steel girders in the span were not "up to standard". Indeed It does appear that the bridge “carried in itself the cause of the collapse”. This it apparently carried in place of sufficient-quality steel.

+ With the commission’s findings, many may well "conceive there was a phenomenon . . . which goes beyond the present knowledge of the science of engineering”. However, observers outside the Duplessis-appointed investigation comndssion may conceive that it is a phenomenon well known to the science of political graft.

“Accused of Preaching the Gospel!"

THE men who were instrumental in mak- I ing the United States a free nation felt keenly about establishing freedom of worship.

In American colonies before 1776, ministers of certain religious sects were frequently arrested on the charge of ('disturbing the peace". Among the foremost opposers of such interference in freedom of worship were Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Patrick Henry. In one instance Patrick Henry traveled fifty miles to defend certain Baptist ministers who had been arrested. A historian recorded:

• "He [Mr. Henry] entered the court house while the prosecuting attorney was reading the indictment. He was a stranger to most of the spectators; and being dressed in the country manner, his entrance excited no remark. When the prosecutor had finished his brief opening, the newcomer took the indictment, and glancing at it with an expression of puzzled Incredulity, began to speak in the tone of a man who has just heard something too astounding for belief :

* " ‘May it please your Worships, I think I heard read by the prosecutor, as I entered the house, the paper I now hold in my hand. If I have rightly understood, the king’s attorney has framed an indictment for the purpose of arraigning and punishing by imprisonment these three inoffensive persons before the bar of this court for a crime of great magnitude,—as disturbers of the peace. May it please the court, what did I hear read? Did I hear it distinctly, or was it a mistake of my own? Did I hear an expression as of crime, that these men, whom your Worships are about to try for misdemeanor, are charged with—with—with what?'

* "Having delivered these words in a halting, broken manner, as if his mind was stag-gfering under the weight of a monstrous idea, he lowered his tone to the deepest bass; and assuming the profoundest solemnity of manner, answered his own question: (Preaching the gospel of the Son of Godf1

• "Then he paused. Every eye was riveted upon him, and every mind intent , . . Amid a silence that could be felt, he waved the indictment three times around his head, as though still amazed, still unable to comprehend the charge. Then he raised his hands and eyes to heaven, and in a tone of pathetic energy, | wholly indescribable, exclaimed, 'Great God!’ , , . The orator continued:

• ** 'May it please your Worships, in a day like this, when Truth is about to burst her fetters; ... at such a period, when Liberty, Liberty of Conscience, is about to wake from her slumberin^s, and to inquire into the reason of such charges as I find exhibited here today in this indictment. ... If I am not deceived,—according to the contents of the paper I now hold in my hand,—these men are accused of preaching the gospel of the Son of Godr . . .

• "■May it please your Worships, there are periods in the history of man when corruption and depravity have so long debased the human character, that man sinks under the weight of the oppressor’s hand,—becomes his servile, abject slave . . . But may lb please your Worships, such a day has passed. From that period when our fathers left the land of their nativity for these American wilds,— from the moment they placed their feet upon the American Continent, from that moment despotism was crushed, the fetters of darkness were broken, and Heaven decreed that man should be free,—free to worship God according to the Bible. In vain were all their offerings and bloodshed to subjugate this new world, if we, their offspring, must still be oppressed and persecuted. But, may it please your Worships, permit me to inquire once more, For what are these men about to be tried? This paper says, for preaching the gospel of the Saviour to Adam’s fallen race!7

• "Again he paused. For the third time, he slowly waved the indictment round his head; and then turning to the judges, looking them full in the face, exclaimed with the most Impressive effect,

* "'What laws have they violated?'

• “The whole assembly were now painfully moved and excited. The presiding judge ended the scene by saying, 'Sheriff, discharge these men.'"

• In view of the foregoing we can well appreciate why the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States begins with: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

Nature's

Thermometers

AGES before science designed the telethermoscope or the thermograph, nature's thermometers were registering temperatures with astonishing accuracy and beyond the perceptibility of the most modem scientifically developed instruments.

The Eastern moccasins and copperheads used their built-in thermometers to find their prey. Old Dobbin kept to the road in the blackest night even when blindfolded, detecting the difference in road temperature. The largemouth bass thrives in waters of 80 degrees Fahrenheit, while lake trout prefer a cooler pool of 50 degrees. Worms and caterpillars find their food by skin sense, and specialize in foretelling weather months in advance. Birds and bees will flock together in regions of low humidity and falling temperatures. Crickets wilt chirp so many chirps per minute according to air temperature and begin their song of love each day within five minutes of the original hour selected. Possibly if all nature’s thermometers were known man would have no difficulty in approximating the temperature every hour of the day.

Insect Thermometers

Perhaps the best and most accurate thermometers in nature’s world are those belonging to the insect family. The cricket, the grasshopper and the katydid are among the most accurate and reliable. The bee, the housefly, ichneumons and the sawfly belong to another family (the Hymenop-tera, membrane-winged group). These are mute but show definite reactions to changes in temperature.

The male katydid argues throughout the night that Katy “did!” and whether she “did” or “didn’t” time may never tell. But Katy’s case shows Mr. Katydid to be very sensitive to air temperature. In a single tree can be heard the “did’s” and the “dldn’t’s”. This is because the temperature varies in different locations of a tree. On the warmer side are the “did it’s!” her accusers, and in the cooler sections the “didn’t’s!” her defenders. The little lady is mute and has nothing to say for herself. Some say she can’t hear her admirers, but nature has not denied Katy this pleasure. In the front shin of Katy’s anatomy a minute slit has been found, and in this opening is what we might call an eardrum with which Katy listens to and thrives on th& advances of her many admirers.

As thermometers they are fairly accurate. The careful study by Cleve Hallen-beck, as reported in the Natural History magazine of June 1949, shows the katydid thermometer to read something like this: 77 degrees and on up, he is sure that she “did it!” From 74 to 76, after the third or fourth call, signs of weakness.are detected with a “didn’t!” here and there. From 67 to 69, fatigue sets in. Chirps are slower and less pronounced. Below 66, a chirp once or twice and a pause. At 63, he sounds raspy and worn out. From 58 to 60, a weak “take me back, Katy” is heard as he fades away. Below 57, she evidently takes him back because no more is heard. At 55, case dismissed!

The grasshopper is a daytime thermometer. He loves the blazing sun and the wide

open spaces. A sensitive weather reporter, but difficult to gauge because he is always on the go. A cool 39 degrees will slow him down to the point that he cannot hop. In temperatures from 47 to 60, he will hop but not fly or sing. His “b-z-z’s” and “z-z-z’s” will begin when the air warms up to a good 65 degrees, and they will mount In force until the thermometer reads 85. His wing motion will be rapid and audible, but in temperatures around 65 degrees his wing motions are slow^nough to be counted and too slow to be heard.

Temperature Cricket

Of all nature’s thermometers the cricket responds best to temperature changes. At least one has been accurate enough to be called *‘temperature cricket”. One entomologist reports that at 63 degrees a cricket will chirp 100 times a minute. In warmer weather the “b-z-z’s” are much faster, and, as does his cousin the grasshopper, he increases the tempo with the rising temperature. Dr. Dolbear and Dr. Edes timed crickets against thermometers and found that the dark field cricket responded well. Dr. Dolbear's formula was to count the number of chirps it made in 14 seconds and add 40, which sum would equal the air temperature, Dr. Frank E, Lutz’s formula required counting the chirps in 15 seconds and then adding 40, which sum total would equal the degrees in Farhenheit

Hie catch is to get the dark or black cricket to chirp for 14 seconds. He seldom does. The wisest thing to do is count his chirps in 7 seconds, double the number and add 40, which total would equal the day’s temperature. For a more reliable chirper try the snowy tree cricket, alias temperature cricket. He sings in the same spot and almost every day throughout the summer. When the temperature rises to 55 degrees his day begins and when it drops below 55 degrees his day ends.

These chirpers have been critically checked against the latest scientific temperature recording instruments and have been found as reported in the June, 1949, Natural History: '‘The chirps were counted every 5 minutes, and for greater accuracy were counted for 60 seconds and then multiplied by 14/60 in order to obtain the number for 14 seconds. . . . Thus for the first count, at 7:30 p.m,, there were 132 chirps in one minute, which reduced to 30.8 for 14 seconds. Instead of a thermograph, a telethermoscope was used—a quite accurate instrument which measures temperature In terms of electrical resistance. On only four of the 25 counts were the chirps and the temperature record not in practical agreement.... It is quite possible that the difference, which in no case amounted to more than one-fourth of a degree, was due to a slight lag-error in the instrument and to the fact that the cricket was more quickly responsive to temperature changes than was the thermal coil of the instrument—which is not remarkable when we remember that a cricket isn’t one-twentieth the size of the thermal coil of a telethermoscope.”

Bymenoptera Family insect

Of the Hymenoptera family the bee is the most sensitive to temperature changes. When temperatures drop below 57 degrees, the bees will bunch up and buzz to keep warm. Cold weather makes them very temperamental. A cool 50 degrees makes them fighting mad, while a warm 85 degrees makes them very loving and affectionate. Hie busy bee Is not always busy. He is a loafer when it is 90 or 100 degrees and no shade. Can’t blame him, either.

The beetle, housefly and the firefly all respond to temperature changes. The insects vary their flight speed according to degrees Fahrenheit., They can speed up when excited, nervous or angry. In no case do they fly in temperatures lower than 40 degrees. When the thermometer drops below 65 degrees their voice is faint and at 55 degrees they are mute. In below-freezing temperatures all insects lie dormant but not dead. In extreme heat the Insect will remain voiceless although very active.

Fuzzy Forecaster

A woolly bjear caterpillar, which is now being studied by the American Museum of Natural History in New York, is said to forecast what the ensuing winter will be like. It all depends upon whether the brown strip in the middle of this familiar caterpillar, black at both ends, is wide or narrow. Dr. C. H. Curran, curator of insects and spiders at the museum, is wondering whether these little creatures by their coloring do actually foretell the character of winter. For three years they have been right. This year they would seem to indicate that the winter will be mild. Another admirer of this fuzzy creature asserts that in the years from 1913 to 1939 inclusive, “Fuzzy” was right 26 years out of the 27. That isn’t bad even if “Fuzzy” was guessing.

Sensitive Thermometers

For sense incredibly keen to temperature the sensitive sensory perception of the “pit viper" is considered. The following is enough to shame us humans with all our great gifts of intellectuality and intricate inventions. It is quoted from the August, 1946, Reader’s Digest:

“Scientists at the American Museum of Natural History made tests on snakes of the ‘pit viper’ group, which includes copperheads and rattlers, and which derives Its name from the little indentations or pits in the reptiles’ facial structure. These pits are the organs by which the snakes sense temperature.

“In a series of experiments, using two suspended light bulbs which were identical except that one was slightly warmer than the other—snakes will always strike at the warmer of two available targets—the investigators progressively lessened the de* gree of heat-difference between the two bulbs. Thy found that the snakes would still strike at the warmer of the two swinging bulbs rather than the cooler one when the temperature-difference between them had been narrowed to less than two-tenths of one degree centigrade. Incredulous, the scientists undertook further experiments, using the warm bodies of dead mice. The snakes having been blind-folded and their nostrils plugged, they were tested to see how well they could detect the mousebodies just by their radiation of heat. The snakes not only could unerringly sense the warmth at distances at which no human being could detect it at all but they could sense it even at distances at which delicate scientific thermometers were too gross to record any change."

Truly, nature’s thermometers tell of God’s wisdom and uphold the truthfulness of His Word: “There is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, *Lo, this is new’? It was already in existence in the ages which were before us." —Ecclesiastes 1:9,10, An Amer. Trans. fl. Vorra Fbauds: 258 workers for the Pendergast machine sent to prison lor vote frauds in 1936. President Truman refused to reappoint district attorney who prosecuted frauds, pardoned many Pendergast men sent to Jail. New frauds were charged in 1946, and 71 were indicted. Mr. Truman had paid his dues in the Pendergast organization and wished it success. < Tax Evasion: The late Tom Pendergast was sent to prison in 1939 lor tax evasion. Mr. Truman commuted the sentence of an Indiana gambler who had evaded income taxes. He pardoned a movie magnate who had evaded taxes ^ind made big campaign contributions.

World War ll an Expensive Venture

On August 21, 1951, International News Service reported:

"Washington, Aug. 21—(INS)—Sen. McMahon (D), Conn., said today the Legislative Reference Service of Congress has put the total cost of World War II at four trillion dollars and 40 million lives. He said he asked the Service for the compilation, which he relayed to the Senate Ln reply to economy advocates.”

fl. Influence Peddling: Fortunes were made by five percenters with White House entree. Millions of dollars were made by insiders in deals for war-built ships. Other millions in RFC loans went to men who hired the right political lawyers. Influence wangled jobs, contracts, ships and loans.

fl. Speculation: A White House official and several hundred other Government employes were found speculating in the commodity markets at a time when the President was appealing for price controls.

fl. Tax Scandals: Six of 64 collectors of internal revenue were removed or quit under fire. More than 350 other tax men went out in a shake-up involving tax frauds and irregularities. Some had fixed taxes. Some had collected fees. There were charges of bribery.

fl. Mixed Justice: Highly placed Government prosecutors were charged with going easy on their friends and on those who made the right contacts. A large-scale extortion attempt was charged. Testimony indicated cases could be fixed for men w2» paid the right people, C Get-Rich-Quick; Fortunes were made In ship deals. Other fortunes came from leasing Government-owned warehouses and renting them back to the Government, Arms orders, hotel sales, plant sales, all sorts of things bought from or sold to the Government gave fortunes to the lucky men who had contacts. They bought cheaply from one Government agency and sold at h^h prices to another one, C. Chimb and Pounce: Charles Binagglo, a Democratic leader In Kansas City, paid off his political workers by setting them up in the gambling business. Binaggio died in a blast of gang gunfire, his assassins never were found. C Job Selling: Administration Democrats were found by a Congress committee to have sold post-office jobs in Mississippi.

fl. Gifts: The Comptroller General said it was common practice by many high Government officials to accept gifts from those with whom they dealt. Several generals were removed from procurement offices, many civilian employes were fired, for doing so. There were stories of mink coatsT airplane trips, television sets, free vacations in luxury hotels, liquor, other things.—Reprinted from December 14, 1351, U.S, News World Report, an independent weekly news magazine published at Washington. Copyright 1951 United States News Publishing Corporation.

'Bishop for President, MacAitfiw for King’

Church of God overseer “Bishop” Homer A, Tomlinson has announced his candidacy for president of the nation in the general election of 1952. Declaring that he is seeking election on a “platform of righteousness”, the bishop has been busy getting a head start on all rivals by means of an energetic speaking tour. He quotes the prophecy of Daniel, infers that the kingdoms of this world are to be given to the "saints of the most high God", and contends that “the time Is at hand for this fulfillment”. On last July 4 this same "Bishop” Tomlinson carried his extravaganza to perhaps its dizziest heights bo far In recommending General Douglas MacArthur as future “King of All Nations”. Claiming that he spoke "in dead earnest”, Tomlinson exclaimed that “the world needs a great king over all the nations of men”. He said that the free nations “must needs have one man to symbolize their hope”.

HW

YOUR chance to escape treatment in a mental in-stitution during your life is less than one in fifteen. Facts show more than half of the patients in all U.S. hospitals are mental cases. There is not a medium-sized town or rural county that could not put a mental hygiene clinic to good use. Studies show that at any one time there are at least 1,000,000 persons sufficiently disabled by mental illness to warrant hospitalization, although, because of lack of facilities, only a little more than 600,000 actually obtain it. These are the seriously ill.

It is estimated that 3,000,000 of the 30,000,000 children now in school suffer from serious emotional and behavior prob* lems. The number of children under 15 be* coming mental patients is alarming. Perhaps three children in every average classroom of thirty pupils are destined to spend part of their lives in a mental hospital. One out of every 10 persons in the nation is suffering from mental ailment, and each year more than 150,000 persons are admitted to mental institutions. One per cent of the nation’s\population are mentally ill and only 10 per cent of them are in hospitals.

The tragedy becomes greater when we consider that ope-third of the 350,000 disabling accidents occuring each year are due to mental factors. Mental sickness plays a predominant role in the 1,700,000 crimes committed yearly in the United States, as well as the problems of some 400,000 children under 18 who are sent to juvenile courts each year, the 600,000 cases of chronic alcoholism in this country, and

the one divorce granted for every three marriages performed. Of all illnesses that

afflict the nation, mental disease is the most widespread and the most dangerous. It is the least understood of all diseases and the least suspected and cared for. It is a greater threat than all other diseases combined.

Official statistics show mental disease is on the increase. Mental wards are crammed to the walls. Beds are crowded so close together that patients must crawl over the beds to get out. Some patients sleep two in a bed or on the floor. And there is a waiting list at every institution. Surgeon General Leonard A. Scheele of the Federal Public Health Service reported publicly that state mental hospitals were almost 15 per cent overcrowded in 1948, Dr. Scheele said that if figures for 1949 and 1950 were available they would show added overcrowding corresponding to the increase in population. The estimates on overcrowding were made by officials of twenty-seven states. About 43 per cent of the nation’s mental hospitals reported overcrowding in excess of 20 per cent. Fourteen were 50 per cent or more overcrowded.

The number of admissions to state mental hospitals was 664,000. Of these some 173,000 were said to be hospitalized for dementia praecox (schizophrenia is the general term, including dementia praecox which appears in three forms: the hebephrenic type, characterized by silly behavior; the paranoid type, by delusions; and the catatonic form, by taking rigid and often peculiar positions and postures without moving for hours). Other afflictions of those making up the total of 664,000 are senility, mental infirmity due to old age, over 74,000 were listed; manic-depressive insanity, intense mood swings from elation to depression, listed at 72,000; psychoneurosis, malfunctioning of personality, with conflicts, anxiety, disturbed human relations, over 42,000; over 38,000 with paresis, syphilis of nervous system; involutional psychosis, a deep depression often at menopause, listed at 33,000; alcoholism, excessive drinking as an escape from reality, numbered 28,000; cerebro-sclerosis, 89,000; and others, 115,000,

Officials point out that the majority of the patients remain in hospitals for five years when they could be cured or improved in six weeks to three, months, if proper facilities were available* There is immediate need for 20,000 psychiatrists; only some 4,465 are on hand. Fourteen thousand psychiatric social workers are needed. A mete 1,011 are now in service. Psychologists numbering 15,000 and more could be used at once, but only some 849 are in hospitals. Schools need trained psychiatrists or mental hygienists to help children. Local authorities are demanding psychiatrists to help curb crime and delinquency. Equipment, homes and hospitals are in demand.

In 1946 all 48 states spent less than $190 million to maintain their hospitals. Today the state of New York alone is spending $1,200,000 on special research projects. The 1951-5Y budget is $143,000,000; and the construction fund is $125,000,000. Of all federal medical funds 40 per cent is spent on mental illness, and the U. S. tax* payers are paying $1,500,000,000 for the upkeep of mental institutions.

Conditions in Institutions

With all the money that is poured Into reconstruction and upkeep of mental hospitals the taxpayer should expect at least halfway decent hospitals for the feebleminded. What do the facts show? Crooked legislation and public neglect have allowed its mental institutions to degenerate below the stench of Dachau’s concentration camp. The dilapidated, overcrowded, undermanned hospital is far from a thing of the past. Naked inmates, milling around in their own filth and dung, in rooms completely bare, or bound lying on bare concrete floors with their bodies gaping with sores, still can be seen. The stench of garbage and old cooking odors enough to flip the strongest stomach fill dingy, ill-ventilated rooms. Inadequate plumbing and heating systems, walls without plaster, and conditions more gruesome than the “black hole of Calcutta” are still a part of the mental tragedy.

In a mental institution for Negroes, Reader’s Digest reported, “Little children, adult mental defectives, epileptics, schizophrenics and tuberculars, all mixed in the same wards.” Representative Walter A. Lynch charged that in a New York institution some 575 children were sleeping on mattresses on the floors or in dayrooms. He blamed political bungling as being responsible for the condition. “The^sorry fact is, that other plans for helping our mentally ill have been abandoned left and right. .And on top of that the existing institutions from one end of the state [New York] to the other are badly understaffed and overcrowded. It is a sorry deplorable condition.”

In view of the appalling increase at the present and the tremendous cost for the maintenance of mental institutions, the question arises as to what relation world conditions have to this mental decline. Proof is abundant that war or tensions of modem life have materially boosted the

insanity rate. War brings Its anxieties, its, fears, its burning hatred, undoubtedly breeding psychosis, as well as psycho-neurosis and .simple neurosis.

Dr. Robert P. Knight, medical director of the Austen Riggs Foundation in Stock-bridge, Massachusetts, said the number of casualties in Korea resulting from psychiatric problems was high. During World War H mental or emotional unfitness caused more than half of all discharges from military service, and disqualified another two million. Half of the beds in Veterans Administration Hospitals are occupied by men and women suffering from mental troubles, men and women who passed the physical examination for military service. Fifty per cent of all pensions paid by the Veterans Administration for disability are necessitated because of psychiatric disabilities.

The great increase of insanity during fairly peaceful periods, however, indicates that war is not the entire cause. “In far more cases than would be supposed, insanity is precipitated by some actual physical condition, injuries to the brain, epilepsy, brain tumors, encephalitis (inflammation of the brain), cerebral palsy, and many others.*’ This bears out the truthfulness of the statement found in the work,, Mental Illness, A Guide for the Family: “The most important thing for your patient’s chances of recovery and for your own peace of mind is to realize that mental illnesses are illnesses like any others.”

The tempo of modern living is too great. Problems seem to multiply faster and reach critical climaxes more sharply. World changes affecting the living of millions are abrupt. Not enough time is allotted the mind to catch up to the reality of the change. Plus overwork, nerve strata, lack of proper food and rest, equals ulcers, jittery stomach, a nervous breakdown or a mental crack-up.

…