THE DISCONTENTED CLASSES
63
the Revolution. Indeed, the New Dealers were almost too ready to
dismiss both the Stalinists and their left-wing sectarian critics; preoc–
cupied with domestic reforms and anti-fascism, they formed no clear–
cut image of Communism. They did not sympathize with it, let alone
accept it, but they did not see it as a major enemy.
Understandably, they could not be as ebullient in carrying on
a policy in which Communism was the major enemy as they could
be in attacking depression and the interests. True, they did what was
necessary: Truman's Point IV program and the Marshall Plan were
the major postwar achievements of the American political imagina–
tion. However, these brilliant anti-Communist measures have not
succeeded in saving the New Dealers from the taint of fellow-travel –
ing. Moreover, these measures were not able to arouse among intel–
lectuals, and sensitive young people, very much enthusiasm, even in
the hearts of those active in administration of the aid programs. For
one thing, with the whole planet sending in distress signals, Point IV
seems a drop of milk in a rusty Malthusian bucket- to be defended
more for what it symbolizes at home than for its often ambiguous
blessings (lowered death rates and uncontrollable population growth)
abroad. For another thing, all these measures of international hope
and help have been launched and caught up in the spirit of cold-war
public relations.
No one knows any longer whether he supports a program because
it is worthwhile and an expression of humaneness or because it is ne–
cessary to harry Soviet satellites or win over neutralists in Europe
and Asia. To appear tough-minded vis-a-vis congressmen and Philis–
tines generally, a military "angle" has been discovered in, for instance,
the work of anthropologists seeking to mediate the coming of industry
to Indonesia. While such practical compromises and dual motives
are always involved in reform, in this case they have often served to
confuse the reformers, who deny, even to themselves, that they are
motivated by anything visionary; hence the intellectual climate be–
comes less and less open to political imagination.
5
5 Commenting on an earlier draft of this paper-and we are indebted to
such comments for many important revisions-Arthur Schlesinger,
Jr.,
reminds
us of utopian thinkers still alive and ki cking, such as Stringfellow Barr, Clarence
Streit, and the United World Federali sts. VVe feel that the spectrum here is
not wide or the proposals terribly imaginative; moreover, many of the proposals
are counsels of despair, to avoid world catastrophe, rather than of hope, to
improve American or planetary life.
