b30
PARTISAN REVIEW
of our present period to the temper of 1943-an effort which could
only result in making Dr. Oppenheimer look like a liar.
It
should
have rested on an unequivocal reconstruction of the situation, both
objective and subjective, as it obtained in 1943. It should have com–
prehended and admitted the degree of sympathy with the radical
movement, however ambiguous and however unconscious, Dr. Op–
penheimer must inevitably have retained even after he supposed he
was entirely through with Communism and even coincident with his
great patriotic service to his nation. This would in no way have
reflected on his present loyalty. On the contrary, it could only have
affirmed both his loyalty and his honesty.
We recognize that the point at issue in all six character charges
against Dr. Oppenheimer is his probity and we know the extent to
which probity is a matter of cumulative effect.
If
we think we have
caught a man in one lie, our trust is by that much diminished; if
we suppose we have caught him in two or three lies, it is indeed
the generous person who will thereafter give him the benefit of the
doubt. In Dr. Oppenheimer's instance we peculiarly have a case
where the cumulative effect of one seeming untruth after another
goes all against our giving the defendant the benefit of the doubt.
But suppose that in the Chevalier-Eltenton matter, the suspicion that
Dr. Oppenheimer is presently lying had been eradicated by the de–
fense supplying a coherent framework for his admission that he had
lied in the past. Not only would this most telling of the charges
against him have lost most of its impact but at least one other
of the charges-the charge in the Lomanitz matter-would have
wholly vanished and an atmosphere of candor would have been
created which must surely have worked to Dr. Oppenheimer's ad–
vantage in the consideration of other discrepancies in his testimony.
In Dr. Oppenheimer's response to questions about his relations with
Lomanitz, we have again a situation in which, instead of trying to
persuade himself and the Board that in 1943 he would not have
tolerated a Communist in atomic work, Dr. Oppenheimer should
have understood and frankly admitted that at that period he saw no
reason for alarm in employing a Communist, and that this was a
point of view which was shared by any number of persons just as
importantly engaged as he in the nation's business. He would then
