Henry A. Wallace, My Commitments

Selected Works of Henry A. Wallace

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My Commitments

Betrayal by Old Parties

Henry A. Wallace

Progressive Party Candidate for President of the United States Acceptance Speech, Philadelphia, Pa., July, 24, 1948.
From Vital Speeches of the Day (August 1, 1948), v. 14, n. 20, p. 620.

Four years and four days ago, as Vice President of the United States and head of the Iowa delegation to the Democratic convention, I rose to second the nomination of Franklin Roosevelt, and said: "The future belongs to those who go down the line unswervingly for the liberal principles of both political democracy and economic democracy regardless of race, color or religion. . . . Roosevelt can and will lead the United States, in cooperation with the rest of the world, toward that type of peace which will prevent World War 3."
That was four years ago. Do you remember that summer of casualty lists, and the wreckage still smoldering on the beaches of Normandy? A time of dying and destruction and, yet, something more.
For in that time, you remember, every one of us held a dream. At the lathe, in the fields in early morning, at the kitchen window, sweating out a barrage in the line, everyone of us dreamed of a time when the sound of peace would come back to the land, and there would be no more fear, and men would begin to build again.
VISION OF PEACE
And in that dark time, you remember, Franklin Roosevelt looked beyond the horizon and gave us a vision of peace, an economic bill of rights; the right to work, for every man willing. The right of every family to a decent home. The right to protection from the fears of old age and sickness. The right to a good education. All the rights which spell security for every man, woman and child, from the cradle to the grave.
It was the dream that all of us had, and Roosevelt put it into words, and we loved him for it.
Two years later the war was over, and Franklin Roosevelt was dead.
And what followed was the great betrayal.
Instead of the dream, we have inherited disillusion.
Instead of the promised years of harvest, the years of the locust are upon us.
In Hyde Park they buried our President and in Washington they buried our dreams.
One day after Roosevelt died Harry Truman entered the White House.
And forty-six days later Herbert Hoover was there.
It was a time of comings and goings.
Into the Government came the ghosts of the great depression, the banking house boys and the oil-well diplomats.
In marched the generals—and out went the men who had built the TVA and the Grand Coulee, the men who had planned social security and built Federal housing, the men who had dug the farmer out of the dust bowl and the workman out of the sweatshop.
A time of comings and goings . . . the shadows of the past coming in fast—and the lights going out, slowly—the exodus of the torchbearers of the New Deal.
I was still in the Cabinet—hoping that we might yet return, somehow, to the course Franklin Roosevelt had charted for the nation in peace. And in that great hope, two years ago this month I wrote to the President.
I warned him that we had fallen upon cynical counsel, that the bankers and the brokers and the big brass had launched us upon a dangerous policy—the "get tough policy."
MUTUAL TRUST
I said then that "our post-war actions have not yet been adjusted to the lessons gained from experience of allied co-operation during the war and the facts of the atomic age."
I said that it would be fruitless to seek solutions for specific problems without establishing an atmosphere of mutual trust and confidence—and I warned that our "get tough" policy would only produce a "get tougher" policy. That warning was before the crises in Greece, in Italy, in Palestine, in Czechoslovakia. That warning was two years ago—two years before Berlin.
You have read your papers. In the two years since the people who planned for living were eased out of Washington, and the ghosts who plan for destruction were invited in—in those two short years during which the Department of State has been subtly annexed to the Pentagon, and the hand of military has come to guide the pen of the diplomat—we have ricocheted from crisis to crisis.
The "get tough policy" has spawned its inevitable bread—the "get tougher policy."
WORLD'S EYES ON BERLIN
And what harvest do we have of all our hoping, what fruits of the hard-won victory? Not peace—but the sword; not an economic bill of rights—but a mounting bill of wrongs.
Not life—but tens of thousands of deaths, on unnecessary battlefields in Greece—in Palestine—in China.
One world, yes—frozen in one fear.
The world's eyes today focus upon the burning spot of the cold war—Berlin.
Berlin need not have happened. Berlin did not happen. Berlin was caused.
When we were set on the road of "get tough" policy, I warned that its end was inevitable. Berlin is becoming that end.
There is no reason why the peace of a world should hang on the actions of a handful of military men stationed in Germany!
In all earnestness, I assure you that if I were president, there would be no crisis in Berlin today. I assure you that without sacrificing a single American principle or public interest, we would have found agreement long before now with the Soviet Government, and with our other wartime allies.
Long before now we could have embarked upon a policy for Germany upon which a sound foundation could be built for peace throughout Europe.
GERMANY HEART OF CRISIS
It is not by accident that Germany has become, once, again, the heart of a crisis.
Germany will be the core of every world crisis until we have come to an agreement with the Soviet Union. We have been manoeuvred into a policy whose specific purpose has been this, and only this: to revive the power of the industrialists and cartelists who heiled Hitler and financed his fascism, and who were the wellspring of his war chest.
In the western zone of Germany today, we are told, there is enjoyed "peace with justice."
This so-called just peace is not just. It is a peace which rebuilds the war-making potential of German industry in the western zone.
This justice is being dispensed by local judges, of whom 70 per cent are former Nazi officials. German war industry is on the rise again—and its managers are the same Krupp and I. G. Farben men who made Germany into Hitlerland.
There is no peace, no justice—for either allies or former enemies in our German policy. It is a child born of lust for power and profit.
With a Germany groomed and muscled as the easternmost outpost of another war, we cannot make a peace. Nor can the world which watches helplessly.
I repeat. If I were President, there would be no crisis in Berlin. Do you remember when—only two months ago—our Ambassador to Moscow sent a note to the Kremlin? It was a note which seemed to be an invitation to sit around the table of reason—an invitation to talk over the problems which have created this continued state of crisis? Do you remember how the Russians responded with what seemed like real eagerness? You remember that day.
It was as if somebody had suddenly declared peace. Sit down and talk it over, we said—that's the way. But what happened?
Within twenty-four hours, our Administration, having consulted its carbon-copy opposite party, slammed the door it had itself swung open.
On that day, I addressed an open letter to Premier Stalin. I detailed a program which would have safeguarded the interests of both nations and preserved the peace. Ten days later, when Stalin responded to that open letter, the "get tough" boys slammed the door again. Since that time there have been no more approaches—except toward conflict. There are two sides to every curtain.
And so, Germany still festers at the heart of all peace-making—yet, by closing the door to peace talks with Russian leaders, nothing remains but the fruitless discussions of minor officials in Berlin.
NO NEED FOR CRISIS
I say the peace of the world is far too fragile to be shuttled back and forth through a narrow air corridor in freighter planes.
I say the lives of our children, and our children's parents, are far too precious to be left to the tempers of second lieutenants at road harriers where zone meets zone—or to the generals who are quoted calmly as favoring a "show of strength."
I say that if reasonable men, men without special interests, peace-loving men—if Franklin Roosevelt were in Washington today—there would be no crisis in Berlin. Long before this the leaders of both nations would have rooted out the causes for conflict.
We hear it said that we should have a showdown at Berlin. But what is the showdown about? What is the American public interest which will be served by a showdown? There may be some private interests . . . some interests of Dillon, Read and international bankers. But there is no public interest. Dillon, Reads distinguished alumni, Secretary Forrestal and General Draper and Dewey's Wall Street lawyer, John F. Dulles, are major advisers on this issue, but I have yet to meet the American in shop or field or college or independent business who wants to give up his life to defend Dillon, Read.
I think we should look coldly at same of the facts which confront us if the cold war developed into a hot war:
There is not a single nation on the European Continent prepared to put an army into the field to defend Anglo-Saxon, that is, British and American policies.
GAVE UP BERLIN POLITICALLY
We can buy generals with dollars, but we can't buy wartime armies. These generals won't die in battle. Soldiers would. We can support—and we are supporting—armies during this time of cold war, but we can't purchase suicide. We can buy governments, but we can't buy people.
It is said that we must have a showdown or lose prestige. Truman may lose prestige. Dulles may lose prestige. But the American people won't lose prestige by demanding fundamental discussions looking to peace. Our prestige in Germany went sinking when we divided Germany and established the western sector as an American and British Puerto Rico—as a colony. When we did that we gave up Berlin politically and we can't lose anything by giving it up militarily in a search for peace.
We who are met here tonight—who are met here at a time of crisis—are talking to the people of the United States and the world on behalf of the everlasting principles of the founding fathers of our country.
We who are gathered here tonight recall the crisis of 150 years ago, when Thomas Jefferson was attacked here in the city of Philadelphia—attacked because he spoke courageously for the peaceful settlement of alleged differences between the United States and France.
SLANDER OF JEFFERSON
It was a time of terror unsurpassed till now.
Thomas Jefferson was slandered as the tool of French revolutionaries bought with French gold.
One hundred and fifty years ago Thomas Jefferson took leadership in forming a new party—a successful new party, which overcame the odds of a hostile press, of wealth and vested interests arrayed against it, and of a Government which sought to undermine the new movement by jailing its leaders.
The party Jefferson founded 150 years ago was buried here in Philadelphia last week. It could not survive the Pauleys, the Hagues, the Crumps, the racists and bigots, the generals, the admirals, the Wall Street alumni. A party founded by a Jefferson died in the arms of a Truman.
But the spirit which animated that party in the days of Jefferson has been captured anew. It has been captured by those who have met here this week-end with a firm resolve to keep our tradition of freedom that we may fulfill the promises of an abundant, peaceful life for all men.
LINCOLN'S PARTY REDUCED
Four score and seven years ago, the successful candidate of another new party took office in Washington.
Lincoln, with the Emancipation Proclamation fulfilled the promise of the new party which he led to victory. He headed a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. In the generations which followed his party became a party of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations. The party of a Lincoln has been reduced to the party of a Dewey.
But we here tonight—we of the Progressive party—we here dedicate ourselves to the complete fulfillment of Lincoln's promise; we consecrate ourselves to a second emancipation; an emancipation that will achieve for the Negro and all Americans of every race, creed, and national origin a full, free, and complete citizenship everywhere in these United States.
We ally ourselves against those who turn to nightmares the peoples' dreams of peace and equality.
We ally ourselves to stand against the kings of privilege who own the old parties—the corrupted parties, the parties whose founders rebelled in times past, even as we do today, against those whose private greed jeopardizes the general welfare.
We stand against their cold war and their red smear, under cover of which they steal our resources, strike terror into our hearts, and attempt to control our thoughts and dominate the life of man everywhere in the world.
POLICIES BREED DISASTERS
We stand together to stop the disasters—economic, political, and military, which their policies must breed.
Only those who take the spirit of Jefferson and Lincoln and apply it to the present world situation can bring the peace and security which will end fear and unleash creative force beyond the power of man to imagine.
It was in the spirit of Jefferson and Lincoln that Roosevelt challenged the money changers in his first inaugural address fifteen years ago: It was in the spirit of Jefferson and Lincoln that he told the Wall Street crowd in 1940 that they had met their master. In the spirit of Jefferson and Lincoln he outlined the Four Freedoms and the economic bill of rights.
It was in the spirit of Jefferson and Lincoln that he addressed that great Senator, George Norris, and said: "I go along with you because it is my honest belief that you follow in their footsteps—radical like Jefferson, idealist like Lincoln, wild like Theodore Roosevelt, theorist like Wilson—dare to be all of these as you have in bygone years."
Franklin Roosevelt did not fear; he reveled in the names hurled by those who feared the shape of his vision. We of the new party—the Progressive party—shall cherish the adjectives and mound of hate thrown at us. They are a measure of the fear in the temples of the money changers and the clubs of the military. The base metal of vituperation cannot withstand the attack of truth.
FRONTIERSMEN NEEDED
We of the Progressive party must—and will—carry on where Roosevelt and Norris and La Guardia left off. They preserve for us all that was most precious, the old-fashioned Americanism that was built for us by Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.
There are some who say they agree with our objectives, but we are ahead of our times. But we are the land of pioneers and trail blazers. Though we have reached the end of the old trails to the West, a new wilderness rises before us. The wilderness of poverty and sickness and fear.
Once again America has need of frontiersmen. A new frontier awaits us—no longer west of the Pacific—but forward across the wilderness of poverty and sickness, and fear. We move, as the Pilgrim ships moved, as the Conestoga wagons moved, not ahead of our time, but in the very tide. And always before us, the bright star, the dream of the promised land, of what this nation might be.
But the American dream is no Utopian vision. We do not plan rocket ships for week-end trips to Mars. The dream is the hard and simple truth of what can be done. In one fleet of heavy bombers lies wealth and skill that could have saved Vanport from the flood waters, that could have taken a million veterans out of trailer camps and chicken coops.
We can build new schools to rescue our children from the fire-traps where they now crowd two at a desk. We can end the murderous tyranny of sickness, and disease. The dream is nothing but the facts. The facts are that we spend $20,000,000,000 a year for cold war. The facts are that world health authorities, given one-tenth of this sum, could, in one year, with $2,000,000,000, wipe from the face of the earth tuberculosis, typhoid; malaria and cholera!
DEATHS OF MILLIONS
The cold war has already brought death to millions of Americans.
Look at your friends. Read the papers. Here are casualty lists. Millions—sick of cancer, tuberculosis, of pellagra, of heart disease and polio. We can prevent and cure not only these diseases but a vast host of others by devoting our science as enthusiastically to peace as to war.
A nation that is shaped for life, not death, can save these lives—your lives, the lives of your families. Together we must rise up and write an end to the casualty lists of the cold war. This is the American way—to conquer the forces of nature, not our fellow men.
Within the past month other men, candidates of the graveyard parties, have stood in this city, have flexed their muscles, and have declared their intention to continue the cold war whose heaviest tolls have been taken here at home. Both have said that "partisan politics must stop at the water's edge." They have declared their agreement. It is an agreement which would doom the nation and the world.
It is the policies which operate beyond the water's edge; the policies which demand heavy arms, and draft acts, and the waste of resources and skills in producing for disaster—it is those policies which determine the real wages for American workers, prices for American consumers, and the life-span of all the people of the world.
COMMITMENTS
Yes, other candidates have stood before the American people to declare that they have made no commitments to obtain their nominations. But they have committed themselves; they have committed themselves to the policies of the big brass and big gold; to the policies of militarization and imperialism; to the policies which cast a shroud over the life-giving, life-saving course Franklin Roosevelt had charted for this post-war world.
I tell you frankly that in obtaining the nomination of the Progressive party—a nomination I accept with pride—I have made commitments. I have made them in every section of this land. I have made them in great halls and sports arenas, in huge open air meetings and in small gatherings. I have made commitments in the basement of a Negro church and in union halls and on picket lines. I have made commitments. I have made them freely. I shall abide by them. I repeat them with pride:
I am committed to the policy of placing human rights above property rights.
I am committed to using the power of our democracy to control rigorously and, wherever necessary, to remove from private to public hands, the power of huge corporate monopolies and international big business.
I am committed to peaceful negotiations with the Soviet Government. I am committed to do everything I can through the new party to save the lives of those who are now to be drafted through the establishment of peace without sacrificing any American principle or public interest.
TO HELP PEOPLES OF WORLD
I am committed to appointing to positions in the Cabinet and Administration men whose training and private interests cannot conflict with their public responsibilities.
I am committed to building and strengthening the United Nations as an instrument which can peacefully resolve differences between nations.
I am committed to using the power and prestige of the United States to help the peoples of the world, not their exploiters and rulers; to help the suffering, frustrated people in the colonial areas of the world even as we help other civilizations which have felt the full destructive force of war.
I am committed to planning as carefully and thoroughly for production for peace as the militarists and bankers plan and plot for war. For many of today's 60 million jobs are cold war jobs, unstable jobs, suicide jobs. I am committed to making 60 million—and more—jobs of producing for peace—house building jobs, school building jobs, the jobs of building dams and power plants and highways and clinics.
PROGRESSIVE CAPITALISM
I am committed to a program of progressive capitalism—a program which will protect from the tentacles of monopolists the initiative and creative and productive powers of truly independent enterprise.
I am committed to fighting, with everything I have, the ugly practice of stifling with Taft-Hartley injunctions and the power of Government the free trade union organizations of our workers.
I am committed to rooting out the causes of industrial conflict and anti-labor practices; to returning us to the basic principles of the National Labor Relations Act and to strengthening the democratic organizations which give our workers safeguards against economic and political injustice.
I am pledged to fight the murderers who block, impede and stifle legislation and appropriations which would eliminate segregation and provide health and education facilities to bridge the gap of ten years life expectancy between a Negro child and a white child born this day.
I am pledged to licking inflation by stopping the cold war, the ruthless profiteering of monopolies, and the waste of resources which could give us an abundance of the goods of peace.
COMMITTED TO PEACE
I am committed to helping lift the heavy hand of fear from our elder citizens, whose minds and bodies have served to build this America and whose reward must be the economic security which will enable them to spend their days with the peace of mind that comes from work well done and appreciated. And I am committed to those programs—principally the program for peace, which will lift from our young people the dread of war and drafts and unemployment and which will replace these fears with hope born of security and the equal opportunity to develop fully their individual talents and careers.
I am committed—as I have been my whole life through—to advancing those programs for agriculture which will increase the productivity of our land and better the lives of our farmers and their families.
I am committed to stopping the creation of fear; to using all my powers to prevent the fear-makers from clogging the minds of the people with the "red issue." The American people want and deserve fewer red issues and more red meat. Millions know and millions more must see that it is not the Kremlin, not the Communists who have sent milk to 24 cents a quart and meat to $1.30 a pound; that it is the red issue not the reds who did this to us.
Yes. I am committed and I am confident the new party will commit itself to the principle of using our democratic process to the end that all men may enjoy the benefits made possible by modern science.
And I am committed and do renounce the support of those who practice hate and preach prejudice; of those who would limit the civil rights of others; of those who would restrict the use of the ballot; of those who advocate force and violence; and I am. committed to accept and do accept the support of those who favor the program of peace I have outlined here; the support of all those who truly believe in democracy.

Introduction | Essay | Documents | Resources

Selected Works of Henry A. Wallace

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