Three professors diagnosed this sick world and as often happens passed three divergent opinions.
At a luncheon meeting Saturday of the Middle States Association of History Teachers at the Chamber of Commerce Building Professor James T. Shotwell of Columbia University tapped several sore spots. He found that-
“The Nazi movement is knocking at our doors.
“The youth in the colleges of America today are arguing that they will not go to the next war. Their spirit is blindly seeking a way out and obstacles will only give them greater energy.
“Intolerance may be an outcome.
“I have seen a similar youth movement in Germany. These boys are now marching with the Nazis.
“So long as war is a characteristic of the European system so long will we revert to the type of leadership characteristic of the Middle Ages.
“If the war system lasts Hitler will last, for his type of political machinery is suited to the present crisis.
“Our only alternative is to revise the League of Nations so as to face realities, not philosophical theories.
“International affairs must be an outgrowth of national interests and their realizations.
“We must try to give more intelligent direction to our thinking and to a program of safety.
“Our solution is international membership in the League of Nations with a revision of its cov###ant so that our country would not have to become an accomplice of ###er nations who violate the ###aty.”
The second professor, Edward P. ###eney of the University of Pennsylvania, said in a short interview at a meeting of the teachers in the Museum of the city of New York:-
“Mussolini compares his character and methods to those of the bold Emperor Napoleon, but not even Hitler can find a prototype of himself in the annals of history.
“Nothing like him, fortunately, ever existed before. He has risen like some malignant growth from the miserable economic mess of post-war Germany.
“It is hard to reconcile the decadent Germany of the present with the country I once loved, lived and studied in years ago.”
And Professor Nelson P. Mead of City College pronounced hopelessly:-
“What’s the good of teaching history when people make the same mistakes in government over and over again?
“The world is now retrogressing-going back to dictatorships, like those of Hitler and Mussolini.
“The democratic form of government for which so many fought is fast disappearing.
“Our country is in danger of a sharp swing either to the right or left unless we steer out of the present depression.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
