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CONTENTS

Canada’s Supreme Court Reproves Quch^a 3

Charge of Seditious Litod

Conviction and Appeals

Decision of Canada’s Supreme Court

Favorable Press Rtueiioii

Burning Halls of Woe in Joliette

Furious Catholic Kidnapers

Juliette’s Police Chief Refuses to Act

Town Council Commends Lawbreaking

Knights of Columbus Resolution

by It Wrong to Preach the Gospel in Quebec if It Disturbs the Catholic Peace f

Life in Trailerland

Huw Du Trailer Dwellers Fare!

Where Trailclists Live

Great Depths of Wonder

Shallow-Waler Life

Creatures of the Dark Depth?

Little Relief for Hay Fever Victims

Gambling Craze Seizes New York’s Mayor

“Thy Word la Truth”

Catholicism a Train to Heaven!

Water Festival in Burma

Watching tho World

AWAKE/

^“Now it is high time to awake.— Romans 13:11

Volume XXX]                         Brooklyn, N. Y„ Aor)i B. 1950                            Number 7

CANADA’S SUPREME COURT REPROVES QUEBEC

By “Awake!” correspondent in Canada

CANADA’S highest court ruled in favor of Jehovah’s witnesses recently and rebuked the judges of Quebec, The judges were condemned because they had unlawfully resurrected aneient trial methods of the infamous Court of Star Chamber. These despised principles were dug out o! the tomb by the Quebec judges and used illegally in malicioud prosecutions falsely charging Jehovah’s witnesses with sedition. The Supreme Court decision has put a high hurdle in the path of the conspiracy of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy and Quebec's Premier Duplessis to stop the preaching of Jehovah’s witnesses in Quebec. Moreover, it was a sweeping victory on behalf of all freedom-lovers in Canada.

What caused this conspiracy! Why was this charge of sedition brought before Canada’s Supreme Court? Why was the charge entertained in the courts of Quebec? The answer goes back at least twenty years. It began with the efforts of Jehovah’s witnesses, such as Aime Boucher, who are humble Christian ministers seeking by lawful and peaceful means to bring the

gospel of God’s kingdom to the inhabitants of the Catholic-controlled province of Quebec.

These sincere ministers suffered from hatred, bitterness, and hundreds and hundreds of arrests on trumped*up charges of peddling, distributing circulars and handing out printed Bible sermons to interested persons. Children were expelled from school or dragged into court as juvenile delinquents because of their faith. Police invaded places of worship and made arrests of Jehovah’s witnesses for celebrating the Lord's Supper. Respectable Christian girls were arrested, stripped and held in filthy jails with prostitutes, thieves and dope fiends. Jehovah’s witnesses in Quebec had done nothing more serious than to walk along the, street oy go out shopping. Mob assaults were made on peaceable gatherings. At the peak of the frenzy of police and priest opposition to Bible teaching and freedom to preach the gospel of God’s kingdom, in the year 1946 cases against Jehovah’s ministers reached the staggering total of over eight hundred charges.

Quebec's Burning Hate

The situation was electric. Misrepresentation by the press, daily attacks by recorders, police and other officials, exorbitant hails and consistent postponement of all proceedings had in the Jehovah's witnesses in a situation of intolerable suffering. Protests to officials had achieved nothing. Action was demanded, but what kindl Jehovah’s witnesses decided that the only thing to do was to appeal to the saner elements of the population by publishing the true facts and pleading for a cessation of this barbarism. Accordingly a pamphlet was published reciting those terrible offenses Harming God, Christianity and decency and pointing out the great burden of responsibility upon those responsible for such outrages; The leaflet was entitled “Quebec's Binding Hate for God and Christ and Freedom Xs the Rhame of All Canada” (reprinted in Awafce/ December S, 1946). One million five hundred and seventy-five thousand copies, printed in .English, French and Ukrainian, were, distributed throughout Canada.

The bitter persecution of Jehovah's witnesses was nothing new to Aime Th niche r, from St. Germaine, Dorchester county, Quebec'. St. Germaine is in the hills south of Quebec City, in a poor and fugged country where horse and buggy is still the normal means of travel for the French "habitants”. Here Mr. Boucher faithfully and courageously preaches the glad tidings of God’s kingdom as the only hope for mankind. To care for wife and family in his humble mountain cahin he also operates a small farm. Members of his own family had been persecuted and their experiences published in the Qtte-beds Burmng Hate leaflet.

He was overjoyed to proceedings a statement of the facts which could be distributed in his community, with the object of dissipating some of all hatred and misunderstanding concerning the work of Jehovah’s witnesses. With his two daughters, Gisele, 18, and Lucille, 11, he began distributing the leaflet, traveling many nriles on foot for this purpose. For doing this the two daughters were arrested and held in jail at St. Joseph de Beauce, a nearby town. The father was also arrested as he handed these leaflets to passers-by on the streets. A charge of publishing a seditious libel by distributing the article Quebec's Burning Hate. was preferred against all three.

Charge of Seditious Libel

In publicizing these disgraceful events Jehovah’s witnesses, including Aime Boueher and his daughters, were doing nothing more than protesting against the lawlessness and mob action which had been allowed to go unchecked. The Quebec officials insisted that Jehovah's witnesses should be ch urged with seditious iibei for publicizing these facts and, in effect, made it illegal to complain about these outrages. The prosecuting authorities, acting for the attorney general of Quebec, would not concede that Aime Boucher or anyone else had a right to protest and to ask that the law be enforced. They contended such a protest might cause “disaffection" or raise "ill-will and hostility", which they said would be a seditions libel contrary to the Canadian Criminal Code, It was so patently ridiculous to charge Lucille, the younger daughter only eleven years of age, with such a crime that she was ordered released by the magistrate after spending two days in jail.

The shocking report of atrocities making up the leaflet Quebec's Burning Hate has now been written into the law of the land. The following resume of the article is taken from the opinion written by one of the judges of the Supreme Court. His comments mark the first time a high judicial authority in Canada has seen and analyzed the persecution of Jehovah's witnesses in Quebec stated in Ilie leaflet.

This appeal arises out of features of what, in substance, is religious controversy, and it is necessary that the facts be clearly appreciated. The appellant, a' farmer, living near the town of St, Joseph de Beauce, Quebec, was convicted of uttering a seditious libel. The libel was contained in a four-page document published apparently at Toronto by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, which I take to be the name of the official publishers of the religious group known as the witnesses of Jehovah. The document was headed “Quebec’s Burning Hate for God and Christ and Freedom Is the Shame of All Canada”; it consisted first of an invocation to calmness and reason in appraising the matters to be dealt with in support of the headings then of general references to vindictive persecution accorded in Quebec to the Witnesses as brethren in Christ; a detailed narrative of specific incidents of persecution; and a concluding appeal to the people of the province, in protest against mob rule and gestapo tactics, that, through the study of God’s Word and obedience to its commands, there might be brought about a "bounteous crop of the good fruits of love for Him and Christ and human freedom”.

The incidents, as described, are of peaceable Canadians who seem not to be lacking in meekness, but who, for distributing, apparently without permits, Bibles and tracts on Christian doctrines; for conducting religious services in private homes or on private lands in Christian fellowship; for holding public lecture meetings to teach religious truth as they believe it of the Christian religion ; who, for this exercise of what has been taken for granted to be the unchallengeable rights of Canadians, have been assaulted and beaten and their Bibles and publications torn up and destroyed, by individuals and by mobs; who have had their homes invaded and their property taken; and in hundreds have been charged with public offences and held to exorbitant bail. The police are declared to have exhibited an attitude of animosity toward them and to have treated them as the criminals in provoking, by their action of Christian profession and teaching, the violence to which they have been subjected; and public officials and members of the Roman Catholic clergy are said not only to have witnessed these outrages but to have been privy

APRIL 3, 1950

to some of the prosecutions. The document charged that the Roman Catholic Church in Quebec was in some objectionable relation to the administration of justice and that the force behind the prosecutions was that of the priests of that Churcb.

Conviction and Appeals

The trial of Aime Boucher was heard at St. Joseph de Beauce before Justice Alfred Savard and a jury of French Catholics, mostly farmers. The trial judge was very unfair. He interfered with counsel’s examination of the jurymen and examination of witnesses, refused to admit evidence to prove the accused innocent, and his address to the jury was so prejudicial that it weighed heavily in the appellate decisions to overrule the conviction. He charged the jury that if the leaflet “might raise up ill-will or hostility between different classes of His Majesty’s subjects’’ then they could convict; it did not matter whether the facts contained in the article were true or false. A conviction was entered and minister Boucher was sentenced to one month in prison. Shortly thereafter his daughter Gisele was also convicted and sentenced to two weeks in prison.

Both convictions were appealed to the Court of King’s Bench, the provincial court of appeals. A majority of three of the five judges sustained the conviction of the father. However, Chief Justice Letourneau deceased) and Justice Galipeault (now the chief justice) dissented and recommended a new trial. The court unanimously ordered a new trial in the case of Gisele, which has never been had.

The two dissenting judgments in the court below made possible an appeal of the case of Aime Boucher to the Supreme Court at Ottawa. The oral argument of the appeal by counsel occupied the Supreme Court for four days, May 31 to June 3, 1949. The last reported English appeal judgment on the law of sedition was in 1820, or 130 years ago.

5

Therefore the lawyers in their argument bad to draw from the most fundamental principles of the unwritten British constitution and apply these basic legal concepts to the problems and practices of the present day. Daring the hard-fought appeal the American decisions, as well as the British and Canndian, on the subject of freedom of speech, press and worship were painstakingly analysed in a written argument more than two hundred popes in length. Also the leaflet was read in its entirety to the Supreme Court and discussed line by line.

Death Knell of the Star Chamber

The view of the law of sedition advanced by prosecuting counsel of Quebec and upheld by the Quebec courts has a long and unenviable history as a weapon of oppression and misrule. Bad governments have for centuries used the charge of sedition to stifle well-merited criticism of their mal-adniinistralion. In this case the prosecution contended that if a writing had a tendency to “cause disaffection" or "to stir up ill-will and hostility between different classes of His Majesty’s subjects” then it was a seditious libel. The reason for the statement was immaterial; the destruction of free speech was also immaterial Only one issue was to be decided: might the writing stir up ill-will If the jury thought such a result “might'' arise from a speech or writing, then they could convict the author or publisher of sedition.

The principles of English law on seditious lihel, whence this definition of the offense sterna, were first enunciated by the infamous Court of Star Chamber, whose injustices are a black page in British legal history. They are a relic of the reigns of the dictatorial Stuart kings, who thought they ruled by divine right and that anyone who criticized or opposed the divine inspiration of their decisions was committing an offense against God as well as against the state. The complete denial of free speech during the Stuart reigns is illustrated by the case of Wraynham, who committed the offense of saying of James I: “He is but a man and so may err.” The unfortunate Wraynham was fined a thousand pounds, made to ride with his head to his horse's tail aad had his ears cut off.

The right of free expression, upon which the operation of a modern democratic constitution depends, would be stifled if these old ideas could be reimposed by Quebec’s attorney general at the present time. If Jehovah's witnesses should conform to the outmoded principles of denial of free speech, freedom of worship and freedom of press, then freedom of expression, not only for Jehovah's witnesses, bnt alwn for the rest of the Canadian people, would be seriously endangered. There waa little authority to support the modern concept that governments are servants of the people entitled to be criticized. It was necessary for the attorneys for Jehovah's witnesses to strike into new fields and to lead the Supreme Court and the law of Canada into the twentieth century.

Decision of Canada’s Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of Canada decided the case during the fall of 1949. Eyecatching headlines broke to the Canadian people the news of this exciting chapter in the saga of Christian integrity and persecution that has captured the imagination of the entire country. It was real news in Canada when the Supreme Court of Ottawa quashed, on behalf of Aime Boucher, French-speaking minister of Jehovah’# witnesses, a conviction for seditious libel aud ordered a new trial. The right of Jehovah's witnesses to protest publicly against the burning, hateful outrages which they had suffered in the province of Quebec has been vindicated by judges of the nation’s highest court. Liberty-loving Canadians rejoice with Jehovah's witnesses in the victory.

The reaction ot' public opinion can be gauged from the following newspaper

comments on the decision. The Saskatoon Star-Phoenix emphasized editorially: “AVe are all safer in the enjoyment of our right to worship as we choose as a result of this week’s decision of the Supreme Court > . . Mr. Boucher was engaged in the defence of his right to worship according to his conscience when he was arrested. . . . Here is a minority right that must be protected at any cost." Another freedoM-lovin^           th*

Regina Leader-Post₇ concurred, rebuking the government of Quebec for its shameful course: “The Supreme Court decision is one which will give satisfaction to those Canadians who viewed the Duplessis government's violations of the rights of freedom of speech and religion, with extreme distaste and misgiving.” Other papers have described it as "one of the most important cases in the Supreme Court’s history”, "what may well become a cornerstone of the structure of Canadian Yfberty/’ and a "bulwark of liberty”

The Supreme Court unanimously ruled, on the argument presented by counsel for Jehovah’s witnesses, that there should at least be a new trial. In the practice of the Supreme Court of Canada, each justice files his own separate judgment containing the reasons for the decision at which he arrived. Chief Justice Rinfret, with Justices Tashereau and Kerwin, ordered the new trial mainly on the growr/l that the trial hwd vtat fairly and properly charged the jury. The other two members of the court, Justices Rand and Estey, went further and said that there should be ordered a complete acquittal because the pamphlet and the actions of minister Boucher could not on any reasonable construction be deemed seditious. The Toronto Star made the remark that: "The three who felt there should be a new trial were Roman Catholics. Those who opposed a new trial were Protestants."

The decision sounds the death knell of the oppressive principles of the law APRIL 8, 1950

handed down by the Star Chamber, which the attorney general of Quebec tried to use even in this twentieth century. If people can be imprisoned on such a flimsy, vaporous offense as "causing ill-will and hostility” or "creating disaffection”, an easy way has been found to abolish liberty of expression. The requirement of the court that there must be incitement to violence or disorder is

with free speech.

The decision of Mr. Justice Rand is most outspoken against the ancient theory that it is a crime to criticize the rulers of a democratic country. As he stated: "But constitutional conceptions of a different order, making rapid progress in the nineteenth century, have necessitated a modification of the legal view of public criticism; and the administrators of what we call democratic government have come to be looked upon as servant^ bound to carry out their dudes accountably to the public/' In the latter part of his judgment, Justice Rand weighed the question of whether there should be a new trial or outright acquittal:

In the circumstances, should the appellant be subjected to a second trial? Could a jury, properly instructed and acting judicially have found, beyond a reasonable doubt, a seditious intention in circulating the document? . . . The writing was undoubtedly made under an aroused sense of wrong to the Witnesses, Yrut it is beyond dispute that its end and object was the removal of what they considered iniquitous treatment. Here are conscientious professing followers of Christ who claim to have been denied the right to worship in their own homes and their own manner and to have been jailed for obeying the injunction to “teach all nations"', . . . The courts below have not. as, with the greatest of respect, I think they should have, viewed the document as primarily a burning protest and as a result have lost sight of the fact that, expressive as it is of a deep indigpatiniL, ba conclusion is an earnest petition to the public opinion of the province to extend to the wit-

nesses of Jehovah, as a minority, the protection of impartial laws. Where a conviction is set aside, this court must dispose of the appeal as the justice of the case requires; and where the evidence offered could not, under a proper instruction, have supported a conviction, the accused must be discharged.

Favorable Press Reaction

A large section of the Canadian press has been glad to recognize the fight of Jehovah's witnesses as a landmark securing and protecting the rights of all Canadian citizens. The case has been hailed as a victory for liberty and one of the most important ever heard by the Canadian Supreme Court, The Edmonton Journal had this to say:

Last week the Supreme Court of Canada handed down judgment on what may prove to be one of the most important cases in its history—one which raised perhaps more sharply than ever before in Canada the closely-related issues of freedom of speech and freedom of religion. . . . Mr. Justice Rand held that it could not be considered seditious because it did not incite to violence, but was essentially, despite extravagance of language, a justified protest against persecution and oppression. He described the treatment of Jehovah’s witnesses with an outspokenness rarely heard in a Canadian court. . . . it is to be hoped that Mr. Justice Rand’s blistering criticism will shame them ("Quebec authorities] into abandoning their policy of persecution. . . . their [Jehovah’s witnesses] treatment in Quebec has been inexcusable. It amounts to nothing less than an organized religious persecution—the first in our national history—and if allowed to continue it would put the rights of all religious minorities in Canada in jeopardy.

The Regina Leader-Post said:

Mr. Justice Estey spoke for all democratic thinking Canadians when he said: “The conduct on the part of any group in Canada which denies to, or even interferes with the right of members of any other religious body to worship, is a matter of public concern” , . . The Supreme Court decision has, in effect, ad-

8

ministered a well-merited reproof of the Quebec government. Is it too much to hope that Mr. Duplessis will heed this reprimand?

I

The Winnipeg Free Press said:

Few provincial authorities can have been subjected to such a blistering indictment of their conduct as the government of Mr. Duplessis, To harry and persecute a group for peaceably propagating the articles of their faith is not only undemocratic, it is also unChristian. Mr. Duplessis might well ponder the judgment of Mr. Justice Rand. He might also consider the extent to which his persecution of a minority has brought the operation of the law in his province into disrepute. Freedom of religion and freedom of speech are both under attack in the province of Quebec with the full backing of Mr. Duplessis’ government, For three years a peaceable group of Quebec citizens has been subjected to the pillory of official persecution in defiance of the traditions of this country. It is serious enough when the persecutions are the work of ignorant and unthinking mobs. It is immeasurably more serious wdien such practices are instituted, and encouraged and plotted by those who are appointed as the temporary guardians of the very freedoms they are injuring.

Opinions are not all favorable, however. One “Father” Foley, Catholic priest of Saskatoon, attacked the city’s leading newspaper, the S tar-Phoenix, for approving the judgment of the Supreme Court. "Father” Foley was “amazed” at the paper’s ignorance in saying freedom of worship had been protected. The StarPhoenix replied:

We are proud of our stand in this matter. The accused was distributing a pamphlet of protest against the iniquities which he felt had been done his group by a majority of his fellow townspeople. It was, we think, his right to protest, ... If the Witnesses can be reduced to silence in Quebec because their views and their tactics ‘insult’ the majority we feel that the freedom of every minority in Canada is impaired including that of the Catholic Church in communities where it is in the mi-

AWAKE!

nority. And this, we think, would be wrong.

The power of Almighty God, Jehovah, has given His people a great victory in Quebec and in Canada. There is now a long, wide and unpatchable rent in the iron curtain Quebec has raised against

Bible teaching. Many Quebec people will be glad to see it. Jehovah’s witnesses have not only succeeded in defending their own rights hut their fight has written into the law freedom for the remainder of the Canadian people also.

BURNING HATE FL ARESxJN, / JOLIETTE

A BLISTERING criticism of the law enforcement of the province of Quebec was recently unleashed by some members of the Supreme Court of Canada in a case involving the famous leaflet entitled '‘Quebec’s Burning Hate for God and Christ and Freedom Is the Shame of All Canada”. That judgment was handed down on December 5, 1949. Would the Quebec authorities accept the law as laid down by the highest court? Would they begin to enforce the law and to protect freedom of speech and worship on the part of minorities such as Jehovah’s witnesses? Many liberty-loving Canadians were asking these questions.

They were not long in getting their answer! Only nine days later, December 14, 1949, contempt for law and order and even for human decency once more burst into flaming violence in Quebec province, this time at Joliette, a city of approximately 18,000 people situated forty-live miles northeast of Montreal. “Quebec Men Mob Witness Girls,” “20 Kidnap Girl Witnesses,” shouted the front headlines from two of the largest newspapers in the country. To Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary and Vancouver the news spread. Two of Jehovah’s witnesses

had been kidnaped and run out of Joliette by a mob of men, marking another outburst of the same burning hate for the Bible and Bible teaching; further self-condemnation by a Quebec city.

Two ministers of Jehovah’s witnesses, Misses Olive Lundell and Winnifred Parsons, had for some months been engaged in Bible educational w^rork in the city of Joliette, Their missionary evangelistic work had been confined to going from house to house seeking those who were interested in the study of the Bible. When such persons were located, return visits were made to, discuss the Scriptures. A considerable number of persons was found to be interested in studying with Jehovah’s witnesses, though the town is 99 percent French Roman Catholic,

street it was joined by others who shared in misusing the two ladies and rashing them along as prisoners of the mob. Arriving at the bus stop these ministers asked that they be allowed to return to their home and gather their clothing and personal effects; but all to no avail, and despite their protests they were forced into h large taxi by the hooting, derisive crowd. Six men climbed into the cab, which was then driven to 11 on treat

Ed route the men chanted Catholic prayers, and at the same time made threats to throw their prisoners in one of the ice-covered lakes. Uproarious, devilish laughter greeted the suggestion by the driver that these two Christian lady evangel Ik to be forcibly violated by the Catholic, prayer-reciting criminals who had abducted them. The automobile was then stopped in the darkness and the prisoners ordered to gel. mil. A hurried conference was held which evidently changed the wicked and warped minds of their captors, and the two missionaries were ordered back into the taxi without being molested.

On arrival in Montreal the kidnapers drove first to Fulton Street women's prison where an unsuccessful effort was made to have the two ladies jailed as “undesirables”. Equally fruitless was a visit to another police station for the same purpose, With threats that other and larger crowds would gal her to put them out of Joliette again should they ever return, Misses Parsons and Lundell were left stranded in Montreal without money, extra clothing, or even a place to stay.

Police Chief Refuses to Act

Jehovah’s witnesses do not believe in mob violence. Nor are they intimidated by it. The very next day, after being cared for by friends, the two missionaries returned to Joliette, accompanied by two representatives of the Watch Tower Society, to conduct an investigation into this unlawful action and to have charges pressed against those responsible. After a lengthy interview with the chief of police of Joliette, Valmore Lapierre, and the questioning of some suspected parties, three of the six men who had kidnaped the two Witnesses in the taxi were identified. Fortunat Masse was the driver; Roch Rouleau was one of the other passengers, and the man who appeared to be the ringleader was identified by Masse as one Dion, brush salesman. Despite this identification, the chief of police refused to lay any chargee, stating it was a matter for the crown attorney and the provincial police. He also said he “feared popular reaction" should charges be laid, and admitted that the action taken had been “well organized” and not merely accidental. Charges could be laid only it ordered by the provincial attorney general, was the answer of the provincial police.

In short everyone passed the responsibility to someone else. They He said: “This is a Catholic town. These ladies should not have been here anyway.” The contention seems to be that where the Catholics are in a majority, the minorities have no rights, It is quite a different story in other parts of Canada where the Catholics are demanding minority rights for themselves.

During a long interview with the chief of police, Lapierre, Mr. Couture, one of the representatives of the Watch Tower Society, was polite enough to answer a groat many questions concerning the beliefs of Jehovah’s witnesses. The chief of police then hypocritically told the press that efforts had been made to convert him. He also made the widely circulated statement in the press that the two ministers received $60 per week each for engaging in their work in Joliette. When asked the basis for this statement he Baid lamely that he could not disclose it. Of course he couldn’t disclose the basis of it. There was no basis. It was absolutely untrue. Evangelists of Jehovah's witnesses get no regular salary whatever

and are largely dependent on voluntary contributions to enable them to carry on their work.

Town Council Commends Lawbreaking

The Monday following the above events, December 19, 1949, was the first meeting of the municipal council of Joliette after the kidnaping. The "well-organized” efforts against Jehovah's witnesses were there resumed. The Toronto Star reporter said of this meeting in the next day's edition: We were told earlier by a citizen that organizations in the town were planning action to rid the town of the two girls, who since last May have been going from door to door in Joliette on Witness missionary work. The Knights of Columbus turned out to be the biggest single organization behind the scenes. ...” The Knights of Columbus, Catholic Action wing of the Church, is here identified as the instigator of the lawlessness.

About 200 persons were in attendance at the council meeting; the chamber was jammed to capacity, many standing. Jean Fontaine, a notary, and representative of the Knights of Columbus, addressed the council as follows, mouthing hatred and malicious misstatements against Jehovah's witnesses:

Can you imagine that these two girls have been here for the past eight months and are turning the city upside down. [Same charge as at Acts 11: 6] It is just like a disease. Already one hundred and fifty of our good French families are visited every week by them. It must be stopped or it will infect the whole town. They go from door to door with the Crampon [French] Bible. They come in the house and sit down on the chairs and start to quote scriptures from the Bible, and all this when the men are at work. [What a terrible crime! Imagine anyone's being so evil as to quote Scripture!] There should be a way to throw these girls out of town.

One of the councilors replied: “I don't think we can do anything about that because each person should be able to shut his own door. There is no law in Quebec stating that we can throw Jehovah's witnesses out of town because they are going from door to door.” Then this fine Knight of Columbus replied: “Let us make a law: write a new article in the city charter to make it illegal to go from door to door.”

The speaker of those words did not know how well he fulfilled the words of the psalmist: Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law? They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.” (Psalm 94:20) The Knights of Columbus, representatives and members of the Roman Catholic Church, were demanding to frame mischief by law; anything, in fact, to stop the spread of the Word of God. Mr. Fontaine's own argument gave him away. Trying to protect the people of Joliette from something they didn't want?—that was only his empty contention- Was it because the people didn’t want Jehovah’s witnesses that the Knights had to organize to run them out? By no means! It was because far too many French families did wanted Jehovah’s witnesses to call at their homes that this organized violence took place. Catholic action was in fact organizing to prevent the people who wanted to hear from being free to do so.

Knights of Columbus Resolution

A resolution which was claimed to have been signed by two hundred people was then presented to the city council by Fontaine on behalf of the Knights. Quotation follows from the Toronto Star December 20,1949:

“The undersigned respectfully submit that they protest the arrival in Joliette of strangers, Jehovah Witnesses, who visit their homes falsely posing as missionaries and profiting from the occasion to sow hatred among groups, contempt of          and encouragement oi

immorality.

“That they are glad to learn that certain citizens

zans have asked these strangers to leave the city and that they congratulate eivic authorities, particularly the chief of police for what they have done to rid the town of these sowers of disorder.

“That they ask city council to declare publicly and officially that they no longer want in Joliette these pretended missionaries and that the authorities take every means within the law to chase them forever from Joliette.”

Presenting it, Mr. Fontaine admitted: “A rceont supreme court judgment has complicated the means of getting rid of them hut we must do something. We know it is difficult to expel them legally, but they were driven out of Chicoutimi and they didn't come back.”

The foregoing quotation gives some sparkling examples of Knights of Columbus “logic”. He accuses Jehovah’s witnesses of teaching contempt for authority, then commends local citizens for having acted in contempt of the authority of the criminal law by illegal kidnaping; next congratulates the chief of police for showing contempt of the law and of his own oath of office in refusing to enforce the law against the thugs responsible for the abduction. Finally, Fontaine himself shows complete contempt for the authority of the Supreme Court of Canada when he says that its judgment complicates the means of getting rid of Jehovah’s witnesses legally, but nonetheless urges expulsion of them.

Strangers

Two of those present at this disgraceful and demonized exhibition of rabble-rousing were not in harmony with it. Two representatives of the Watch Tower Society, Glen How, the Society's attorney, and Paul Couture, French-speaking minister from Montreal, were present to see what was taking place. At the conclusion of Fontaine’s diatribe. there seemed little hope of answering his misstatements, so they turned to leave. They had been recognized by some of the mob-stete. A solid phalanx about four deep formed across the door to prevent their exit The atmosphere was electric with hatred. It seemed charged with TNT, We will let the Toronto Star tell the story:

Mr. How and Mr. Couture entered. They were pushed forward and told in English to say whatever they wanted. Mr. How advanced to the council table and was asked his name. He was barely able to reply “How” before being drowned out by shouts of "Speak in French” and “Got out of our town”. . . . Mr. How managed to aay in French that he was a lawyer representing the Witnesses before shouts and boos made him give up. He and Mr. Couture started to leave the room and had to have a way cleared for them by a policeman. The council chamber was practically empty of spectators as soon as the two men left,

Rabble-Rousing Does Un VFurfc

The Star reporter noted that the chamber emptied with remarkable celerity. What he did not know was i.hat the crowd poured down the stairs like an avalanche in an effort to trap the two representatives of Jehovah’s witnesses who had just left. Only by sprinting up the street and making a quick getaway in the near est taxi did they avoid an attack that would have been much more than verbal.

Balked of their first prey, the mob, by this time numbering approximately five hundred people, next headed in high excitement for the house wherein resided Misses Persons and Lundell, the fra peaceful Christian ladies whose Bible evangelism was the pivot point of the tornado that had been unleashed. The mob began to hoot and demonstrate outside their home.

Police came to the house but made no effort to dispente the not, despite the demands of the Riot Act which require them to act. Two reporters who endeavored to take pictures of the mob were seized and run out of town, not even being allowed to stop at the hotel to take their luggage. Miss Lundell asked one of the officers why he (liihi’t go out to the crowd to get some names and auto license numbers of the lawbreakers. He replied: "I’m neutral.” Ultimately the two ladies managed to get into a taxi which was escorted to the town limits by the Joliette police and followed by a cavalcade of mobsters. At the town limits the provincial police took over and blocked the road so none of the rioters’ cars could follow. The city had absolutely gone stark mad. One of the lady evangelists in the car said to one of the men driving: ■“Don’t you know these riots are illegal?” He replied: “Oh, no. They couldn’t be. If they were the police wouldn’t have helped us.”

The home where the two lady evangelists were living was a huge, Victorian-style home inhabited only by the owner, a sweet old lady of eighty-eight. “Just let them come,” she said of the mobsters. “They think an old lady can’t fight. I’ll show them.” When Misses Parsons and Lundell were leaving under police escort and with the mob howling outside, she said: “Don’t go, girls. Let them yell. I’d freeze them out.”

Public Protest, Witnesses* Determination

This outbreak of violence and burning hate, coming as it did hard on the heels of the blistering indictment of the Quebec administration handed down in the Supreme Court of Canada, aroused a burst of protest among fair-minded Canadians.

The Montreal Committee on Civil Liberties sent a telegram to Premier Duplessis demanding investigation. Edmund Major, vice-president of the committee, is quoted: “This brutality towards the two girls scandalizes all the citizens of the province of Quebec. Not only did these brutes impede the liberty of these two young persons, but denied them also the freedom to think and express the opinion of their choice.”

The Association of Civil Liberties of Toronto also wrote the premier of Quebec *. “Immediate steps should be taken to protect those who are attempting to exercise their lawful rights of freedom of worship, press and assembly. Otherwise it will appear as if the authorities have surrendered to mob rule in Joliette.” (Which, of course, they have.) The Winnipeg Free Press bitterly denounced the failure of law enforcement:

There is no indication as yet that Mr. Duplessis intends to become involved. Whatever he decides, it is too late. There has been mob violence, and the province must suffer the disgrace of it. The situation should never have been allowed to reach a point where there was need for government interference, As a minority group, the Witnesses deserve protection against persecution ; had local legal authorities provided this protection, much of the trouble could have been avoided. Instead their soft acquiescence has helped incite some 500 citizens to such violence that the situation is now intolerable. And the Witnesses will not, in the long run, suffer from this persecution. . . . Their persecution will hurt us, not them.

An editorial in the Toronto Evening Telegram, December 22, said: “No mob has any right to tell anyone to get out of town. A reprehensible angle of the events at Joliette has been the manner in which the police have abdicated their responsibility to maintain ordinary rights of Canadian citizens.”

A detailed report of these outrages has been placed in the hands of the Department of the Attorney General at Quebec. No action has yet been ordered. Jehovah’s witnesses^ however, do not believe in mob violence and will take action themselves should the department refuse to see that the law is enforced. As preachers and ministers of Almighty God, Jehovah’s witnesses have a right and duty to speak to the people. The people have a right to accept or reject on their own volition. It is not the function of the priests or the Knights of Columbus to decide that those who wish to hear these ministers shall not be allowed to do so.

Jehovah’s witnesses are not dismayed at the demonized assaults of these lawbreakers, The words of the apostle Paul

APRIL 8, 1950                                                             13

show to all true Christians what they can that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall expect from this world: "Yea, and all suffer persecution.”—2 Timothy 3:12.

<tr-                           ff*

Is It Wrong to Preach the Gospel in Quebec if It Disturbs the Catholic Peace?

AFTER saying that the magazine . Saturday Night (Toronto) had appealed to him "in the past for its spirit of racial and religious tolerance”, Catholic priest J. S. Lesage continued in his letter to that journal:

From time to time, however, your comments on Canadian events have expressed views on the principle of liberty somewhat unacceptable to a large portion of the Canadian people, I refer in particular to this view of r “the right of individual to write, to print and to circulate his opinions.” (SN Dec. 27) This view ia unacceptable, because unlimited liberty does not exist as a right before God or in reason. Forgers of evil thoughts and of error have no more right to circulate their wares than forgers of bad money have the right to circulate their bogus coins. , , . In a society almost entirely Catholic, when the disturbance of its Catholic principles tends to disturb its Catholic way of life, then, a State professedly Catholic (say Quebec Authority), seeking to prevent such disturbance is only safeguarding the common good. [Saturday Night, February 7, 1950]

Obviously, there ia strange inconsistency when a writer opens by praising a magazine’s religious tolerance and then assails its tolerance. Priest Lesage was writing concerning Jehovah’s witnesses, likening them to forgers of bogus coins, justifying denial of liberty to them on the grounds that they disturbed Catholic peace. He appeals to God and to reason as authorities; there could be no better.

Certainly man should not have unlimited liberty, nor does he. God's Word prohibits and commands many things; laws of the land do likewise. Just as earthly governments that make laws set up the courts to judge violators of those laws, so God in heaven has made His laws and He and Christ judge the violators thereof. No men or organizations of men have authority to judge God’s servants. "Who art thou to judge another’s servant? To his own lord he stands or falls; but he will stand, for God is able to make him stand.” (Romans 14:4, Catholic Conf rat. Trans.) Moreover, even the democracies do not allow the unlimited freedom of speech and press and worship that Lesage claims they do. In the name of these freedoms men cannot commit unlawful disturbance of peace or obscenities; there are laws concerning slander and libel that curb abusive use of freedom. There are lawful means of halting abuses of freedom; mob action is not necessary, or lawful.

"Forgers of evil thoughts and of error have no more right to circulate their wares than forgers of bad money have the right to circulate their bogus coins/’ says Lesage. If he is going to argue by this parallel, let it he done well. Do men sentence a forger of bogus coins before they prove him circulating such? Do they not test the coins, to see whether they ring true? If the accused is innocent, does he fear the testing of his coins? Is it not the counterfeiter that trembles at the exposure the test will make? Moreover, would it be wrong to expose the counterfeiters on the grounds that their peace would be disturbed? or on the grounds that the peace of their victims would be disturbed when they learned that they had been cheated? Is not the principle of right and wrong here involved greater and more important than personal feelings?

Carrying this line of reasoning over to the forgers of evil thoughts and errors, the thoughts circulated must first be proved evil and erroneous. Catholic priests have not done this with the teachings of Jehovah's witnesses. Both Catholics and Jehovah’s witnesses recognize the Bible as the foundation for Christian doctrine. Why not bring these thoughtcoins against the Bible, and see whether they ring true or false? Jehovah's witnesses are not forgers, not fearful of the test, but apply it daily in Quebec and throughout the world. It is the Catholic Church that fears the test, whose peace is disturbed by it. Error cannot stand the test; truth is vindicated by it. Read what the Catholic Douay Bible says:

To the law rather, and to the testimony. And if they speak not according to this word, they shall not have the morning light. The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream: and he that hath my word. let him speak my word with truth: what hath the chaff to do with the wheat, saith the Lord? Are not my words as a fire, saith the Lord: and as a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces? And this is the judgment: because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil. For every one that doth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, that his works may not be reproved. But he that doth truth, cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, because they are done in God.—Isaias 8:20; Jeremias 23:28,29; John 3:19-21.

Jehovah’s witnesses gp to the law and testimony of God's Word to prove their teachings true. They do not fear the circulation of Catholic teaching; let it be freely declared, unhindered by mobs. Jehovah’s witnesses speak God’s word of truth, the wheat; not the Catholic chaff based upon human tradition. God’s truth is as a fire that consumes chaff, as a hammer that breaks rock; it need have no fear of Catholic teaching, Jehovah’s witnesses do not need to hide in darkness, fearful of enlightening messages from others that might expose them as false.

It is the Catholic Church that fears the truth declared by Jehovah’s witnesses, that seeks to silence these witnesses by lawless and dark deeds.

Priest Lesage laments the disturbance of Catholic principles. This is a damaging admission. Sound principles cannot be disturbed. Christ Jesus stated His sayings and principles were as a rock foundation, and anything built on them could withstand any storm; but also observed that other principles were as shifting sand easily disturbed. (Matthew 7: 24-27) But aside from this, is the mere fact that a community is disturbed sufficient to condemn the causes behind the disturbance? Would it be wrong to preach Catholicism in Russia because it would disturb that stronghold of atheistic communists ! Do not Catholic missionaries enter various lands and disturb the religious status quo? Jesus disturbed the Pharisees’ peace, and they wailed, ^<fThe whole world is gone after him!” They were also disturbed by Jesus’ followers, and charged that the Christians “set the city in an uproar”, though it was the religious mob that did that.—John 12:19; Acts 17: 5,6; 24: 5, 6, Douay Version.

Actually, it is the priests in Quebec that disturb the peace in that province, by stirring up mobs and officials to wrongfully act against Jehovah’s witnesses. The priests are disturbed because Bible truth is showing them to be “forgers of evil thoughts and of error”, and they fear repercussions when the honest Catholic people learn they have been cheated. Let us ask: Would you awaken a person sleeping in the path of an approaching tornado, though you temporarily disturb his peace by so doing! Then also will Jehovah’s witnesses preach God’s Word and warning, though it cause temporary disturbance of peace. For further proof that it is Catholicism and not Jehovah’s           that circu

lates bogus coins, read the article on pages 25 and 26 of this issue of Awake!

J- -1 sat by your front door and dreamed that wonderful new horizons, from the enchanting sunset of old Mexico to the spine-tin- ^: gling scenery of Alaska, might come bowling right into your view? Incredible, you say? Not at all. There are thousands of people, scattered from end to end of the continent, who think of home as a place with a thousand doorsteps—at one time nestled by the seashore, then perched atop some lofty mountainside, or sequestered in a quiet valley whenever they please.

Preposterous but wonderful, don’t you think, the idea of picking up your home and moving it away from obnoxious neighbors or an undesirable environment at the drop of a trailer hitch? Or let’s say that you had thought of going off in search of more favorable or healthful climates, providing you could take home along. On the other hand, perhaps you are following some profession or trade that requires you to keep "on the go”, and you would like so much to keep the family with you.

In any such case, provided you and your family are the self-serving type, who can enjoy a parklike atmosphere of living and do not mind rubbing elbows with down-to-earth, good-natured, sociable folks and if you can be content in a midget-sized home that is comfortable and cozy and a marvel of compactness and cleanliness, demanding a hare minimum of housework—well, all this added together spells out a fairly sure indication that you are one of those thousands of persons who are in the market for a modern trailer home.

16

, The discovery of so many possibilities in the ‘'home on wheels”, coming with something near the suddenness of a gold rush, has given rise to one of the fastest-rising industries to influence modern community life in the present generation. Old-timers in trailerland have to look back little farther than the twenties, to chuckle over the cracker-box house ear and the collapsible tent-trailer which gave some hardy' souls so much enjoyment when they trekked off into remote areas for a vacation. Such folks had to have the same iron constitutions as the overlanders of pioneer days who traveled in covered wagons.

But how times change! The depression years threw a third of the American people into the throes of a housing shortage. That’s when human ingenuity', in its casting about, got down in dead earnest and began to rig the house trailer into a semblance of a home. Still, in most folks’ eyes, there was precious little atmosphere of permanency hovering within the trailer's walls, and its builders were still scarcely more than novices as late as 1939.    ‘

But in that year, when no more than 11,000 commercial trailer coaches were turned out, total war raged forth and hurled the housing industry' down a deadend street. Was that a windfall for trailer builders! During the next eight years trailer homes multiplied fifteen times. In

AWAKE!

1947 there were 70,000 units built; in 1948 there were 80,000, and this number was scheduled to be duplicated in 1949* Today there are one and a quarter million people living in 400,000 trailers.

You saw them, whole communities of trailer homes moored around war plants and heavy industries. Since the war tens of thousands of GI students and their families have settled in trailer- and quonset-towns around university centers. World War II veterans have bought seven out of every ten trailers sold during the past three years. The housing shortage, the financial strain, and maybe the wanderlust have forced nearly half a million families into trailer homes, booming the trailer business ahove the billiondollar mark.

Will it go on booming? The Trailer Coach Manufacturers Association (TCMA), whose 53 members produce 60 percent of the trailer output, is not making any rash predictions, and is still content to wave the slogan, "The trailer coach is the steppingstone to a permanent home/' While three out of four say they prefer trailer-coach living to apartment life, and half of them owned a home before buying a trailer, most of the current trailer dwellers are going to buy a fixed home as soon as they can. There would be a lot of trailer ghost towns tomorrow \if their occupants could find the houses they want.

How Do Trailer Dwellers Fare?

To hold fast the first love of present owners and woo as many future owners as possible, the trailer industry has spared no amount of engineering genius in developing trailer home-building into a fine art. The combined talents and skills of engineering specialists, designers, decorators and artists have been pooled to build veritable palaces on white walls that fairly take your breath for smartness and comfort. Want to see for yourself? Then come take a peck inside a modern highway Pullman.

The trailer home we are inspecting sits in a trailer park out in the suburbs, in a quiet shady atmosphere (quiet, yes, now that the youngsters are off to school). Its aluminum-alloy skin sparkles in the sun, there on its own private lot, and we walk up a prim little walkway lined with white lattice fencing surrounding a miniature green lawn. Under a striped awning porch, across a seven-foot flagstone patio and through the front door. Now don't say you're not struck by your first glance at the rich woodwork finishings. Look at that luxurious furniture. And did you ever see such a clever arrangement that has converted a minimum of “cubic living space” into a miracle of coziness and elegance? The living room's eight-foot width seems much more spacious. The divan that unfolds into a fine box-spring bed, the deep comfortable chair beside the dropleaf table, the cabinets and shelves, the rugs and drapes and all the linishings and lines blend into an elegance hardly surpassed by the most lavish drawing room. Why, the living room is a completely livable unit. It may be closed off from the kitchen by sliding French doors.

The kitchen, likewise, is a completely furnished unit. What does it lack in modern conveniences? Look at the doublesized sink, providing as much dishwashing room as any big kitchen. The electrical refrigerator, the apartment-size gas stove, the storage closets for pots and pans and food, and the china cabinets, everything arranged by a master hand into the inosf accessible and cornpact unit imaginable.

Down the kitchen galley into the bedroom, and treat your eyes to that fallsized Hollywood bed, the vanity, the clothes closets. That door there, between the kitchen and bedroom, hides the daintiest miniature bathroom, with shower, vou’ve ever seen. *

About every conceivable convenience has been packed into this eight-by-thirty-three-foot space. Yet it does not seem

stuffy. There are plenty of windows, actually four in the bedroom- Its ventilation system, employing ceiling vents and exhaust fans to draw off every kitchen odor, is on a par with the best air conditioning. Thermo statically controlled heat from the oil-burning stove here in the living room is distributed by air ducts with a blower running back into the bedroom. In summer it circulates ouL side air through the trailer as an air conditioner. The whole interior is well lighted, electrically, of course.

Then what's lacking in this three-thousand-dollar home? It can't be smartness, comfort, coziness, convenience and privacy—this is equal to a high-class throe room apartment. If our hostess feels this is not tasteful enough yet, then there are trailer homes on the market ranging up to $40,000. There are land yachts sporting expandable upper-story sleeping porches. There is one designer's dream that expands into a two-story house with three upstairs bedrooms and a portable porch, all of which subsides into a one-story trailer when it's time to cruise away to new horizons.

IF Acre TrailerUte Live

For every two business and pleasure trailers you sec rolling down the highway or parked in a vacationland camp, you can find eight parked on some private lot or in a licensed trailer camp for permanent residence. Trailer parka, you might as well know, have always been looked upon askance by the founding fathers oi respectable fixed communities. Imagine the consternation of the housing industry and civic leagues when, hardly a decade ago, a seared economist prophesied that by now half the Amer* iesm population would be living on wheels 1

Having sprung into existence in so short a time, and without much of a precedent to follow, the trailer park has had hi meet all the requirements of fixed housing settlements—sanitation, health, electricity, water and fuel supply, adequate entrances and outlets and so on, plus special problems peculiar to the folks or trailerland. In meeting them the park industry has so far progressed along three fairly specialized lines. These are

• (1) The overnight trailer park; Should you become a trailefite for vacation or business purposes, the overnight trailer park will be your hotel. On the well-traveled vaeationland highways, especially ULtho seven most southern and western states, you will find the overnight trailer parks. Up north and east they are not as plentiful.

• (2) The vacation camp ground park: If you feel the yen to stop over for a few weeks or months in a vaeationland spot, or in case you are working on a temporary assignment in the locality, your domicile is the vacation camp ground park. Whether your new lawn is the seashore, the mountain vista, or the valley and the winding river, you can appreciate that the solution to your housing needs is hardly less involved and expensive than caring for a school or other public institution. To put it less candidly, all the problems of the vacation camp ground park have not yet been solved to everybody's perfect satisfaction. Possibly you can help. How would you design a practical park lay-out that gives every individual trailer adequate storage facilities, toilet and hath where required, individual electric meters, park water lines connecting with each trailer, as well as sewer lines connecting with each trailer's kitchen sink and bathroom where included, not to mention vear-round driveways and numbered lots laid out and named and maintained after the fashion of a regular community? Two of the thorniest problems are satisfactory foundation supports for parking and adequate storage space for excess equipage.

• (3) Permanent trailer residences: This is a more-or-less well-arranged

community of trailers, with more-or-less handsome trailers parked in what might be called an orderly manner on the lots, and the familiar backyard clothesline hung out, and, depending on the circumstances, the tidy front lawn with flowers and shrubs and lawn furniture. If you don’t find things quite so nice as this in every trailer park, it is not the TCMA’s fault. It is currently spending a quarter million dollars a year to encourage better permanent trailer parks. As of May 1,1949, its Park Division had inspected 4,500 licensed trailer parks and accredited 2,500 of them with the TCMA’s Certificate of Approval, giving each camp a rating of “excellent” or "good” or "fair” according to what degree it met a minimum of requirements based on facilities (sanitary, ^electrical, water, laundry, etc.) as well as park appearance, cleanliness, recreational privileges, size and degree of oecupancy. The TCMA, as well as the three national trailer magazines, publishes guides to the better trailer parks everywhere.

Commendable spadework in developing trailer parks and vacation, trailer camps has been done by state and federal agencies. Some state park commissions, notably Michigan's, have developed numerous camps and parks in which the trailer owner may find accommodations, usually on the basis of no charge for a two-week stay except for electricity supplied at a nominal daily rate. The largest development so far by the federal government is the national park network, furnishing vacation trailer camps throughout the west.

Social Life Among Trailerites

Oh, yes, we were about to forget. What about the morale of the trailer home community? Those who attended the annual meeting of the TCMA in Chicago on April 25, 1949, heard Dr. Preston Bradley cite some statistics that ought to mean something to the founding fathers of Snobbery Heights, Dr. Bradley APRIL 8, 1950

said that of the 40,000 population served by 15,000 trailers in Maricopa county, Arizona, in 1948 there was only one case of juvenile delinquency. At Miami University in Ohio, where 1,000 families were living in trailers, there was only one divorce. But for a perfect record, Dr, Bradley turned to the 600 families living in trailers in Erie county, Pennsylvania, who reported not a single divorce nor a single case of juvenile delinquency.

Reports litre that do not just turn up by chance. As Dr. Bradley pointed out, the trailer home served to keep the families of transient workers and students together during the morally strained war and postwar years. As for the youngsters, the open, outdoor life, with opportunities for better, cleaner fun and play activities, tended to keep them healthier and happier and out of mischief. Author Ray F. Kuns adds that health statistics have proved many good things in favor of the trailerists. “Families much given to colds in conventional dwellings have found themselves free of this trouble in trailer life.”

By the way, if at this point you feel that you want to join the ranks of the trailerists, it might be well to peruse Mr. Kuns’ famous handbook called Trailer Coaches. When the author was asked what he thought the average person like you and me ought to be told about life in trailerland in a magazine article like this, he replied, on the basis of thirty years’ experience:

I would somehow try to point out to the readers of your story the fact that one can only appreciate whether he likes or dislikes a pudding after he has sampled it. Trailers are not for the bonafide social climber. There is not enough personal service, Trailerists, like the early Conestoga • Wagon travelers, do things for themselves. No Redcaps and butlers here. In many cases where circumstances beyond control have forced apartment folks into trailers it takes something like dynamite to get them out of the trailers. Some should and some shouldn’t,

VW

By "Awake !** corrMpoudairt In Puerto men

HOW often have you scooped up the sands upon the seashore and attempted to hold on to the fine particles aa they rapidly slipped through your fingers! Have yon ever stopped to examine these tiny granules and marvel at their variety in color and smoothness to the touch! Perhaps they may not be alike in shape and size, which is true of all things of natural creation, but each grain is somewhat rounded, with no roughness detectable. This mere handful is but a miniature sample of millions upon millions of like granules spread upon the seashores throughout the entire earth. Surely this is the labor of a tireless worker exceeding the capability’ of mere man! It in, and the responsible laborer lies but a few feet away—the sea.

These little specks of sand have come, not just by chance, but by many hundreds of years of constant, regular action on the part of the sea. Each granule had at one time been attached to some rock or stone and had its comers and angles. But through the course of time and by the helping hand of the tossing waves each grain of sand has been rubbed against companion grains with steady friction, until all have been rounded, smoothed and polished, with no angles remaining. While altering the shore line in this rnauneriu some parts of the world, the waves assist in building it up elsewhere through continuous deposits which harden and act as foundations for further deposits left by the incoming waves.

Watching the seas

shoreward with seeming regularity and Srevision, one's appreciation of this won-er continues to increase when it is realized that each movement is due'to a long series of past movements, and each helps to bring about a long series of future movements. Thus there is never complete calm in the sea. Constant currents, drifts, gentle breezes, high winds, storms and hurricanes disturb the placidity that might otherwise exist. These constant movements may cause a single drop of water which today floats in southern seas to find its way by numerous currents to Hii ire fine in the far north many mouths hence. And again, a bit of ice from the polar regions may in the future be part of many drops of water- lapping a sand-covered beach in the tropics.

This wave motion, however, does not venture far below the surface. No matter how terrible a storm may be, five or six miles below the surface not even a ripple is caused. Strange hs it may seem, the fury of a storm causes a commotion only in the upper layers, no more. If wave crests are three feet apart, then it is believed that the disturbance has reached a similar depth. Or, if the crests are several hundred feet apart, then the disturbance below is equal to the same in depth. Currents, however, do exist far below the surface, but they are slow and placid with

Here in the depths of this level calm exists, also an unchangeable climate. Tills great extent of ocean or sea is cold, and only in certain sections is there a thin warm layer. And since cold water is heavier than warm, the cold sinks to lower depths, leaving warmer water to float on top. Heavier water is less translucent, and hence the greater the depth the less sunlight that penetrates. These depths are what intrigue the exploring minds, for here, indeed, is a world strange and fascinating. Still practically unknown to man, it is one of the marvels of Jehovah: “The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land/'—Psalm 95:5.

Shallow-Water Life

Scientists have divided the sea into zones, each zone having its own particular type of plants and animals. The first zone is the shore line bounded by the ebb tide and includes a variety of seaweed as intricate and delicately patterned in its structure as any plant or blossom on visible land. The range is great, not only as to type, but also as to size, from the invisible diatoms to huge plants with solid trunks and fronds like those of a tropical palm. Great growths have been seen between three and four hundred feet in length. Forests of health-giving kelp and floating fucus-istands with fronds seven or eight feet from base to tip serve as living quarters for a variety of tiny sea animals. Some plants are attached to stones or sea bottoms, while others, having been torn from their moorings by the waves, aimlessly float through the sea like lonely wanderers.

In this same zone exist mussels, barnacles, colorful coral polyps, small sand hoppers, sand worms and insects which live in and out of water. Many shellfish inhabit this region, and upon dying their shells are cast upon shore by the ever-tossing waves, to furnish joy and delight to the appreciative eye by their color and markings. Here, ' too, live the hermit crabs that choose thievery as the easiest manner in which to obtain their homes, for they live in the empty shells of snails; sometimes eating the occupant first and moving in afterwards. Thus hoard and room is furnished at the same time. When they grow too large for one shell, they move to another.

However, one particular species of sea anemone seems to balance the score somevrhat. A single anemone attaches itself while quite young to the shell of a certain type of crab and remains there until full grown. When the crah moves,* the anemone moves; when the crab rests, the anemone does likewise. This little flowerlike creature with its bright, glistening tentacles, which look like soft petals, has a mouth and stomach which are elastic, making it capable of swallowing other creatures nearly as large as itself. Sometimes it swallows a crab or bivalve in its entirety, digesting the softer parts and regurgitating the indigestible material.

As the ocean floor varies, so do living creatures existing in these different areas or zones. Slopes gradually descend from the shore and get deeper. There are plains and tablelands that run for many miles at the same depth; and then there are precipices with sheer drops into chasms over six miles deep. Hundreds of species of fish inhabit these deeper parts, in the second zone especially, in water ten to twenty feet deep. Here sunlight still penetrates and many currents mix the water and distribute small floating organisms. There seems to be more

₄ Marine life in this zone than in any other part of the sea.

Creature of the Dark Depths

Strange creatures inhabit the even lower depths or third zone, where there is no light They cannot come to the earface alive, because their bodies are adapted to resist a pressure which amounts to as much as five tons to the square inch, and they cannot live where pressure is less. The weight that man can endure cannot be compared with the pressure on these fragile creatures. Beyond a depth of about two hundred feet or more, the pressure becomes too great for any human, and yet animals are found at depths of three or more miles. Their flesh is extremely soft and bones exceptionally weak, containing less lime than the bones of other animals. Their bodies are usually long and slim; their mouths and teeth, large and foreboding. Some are capable of devouring other t5eh nearly as large as themselves. Many possess organs along the sides of their hodies that give phosphorescent light, which as sints fiome to see in the darkness and for others is a means of attracting prey or a mate.

The ever-existing darkness here appears to increase with the soft, oozy mud which covers the ocean floor. But through scientific observations even the mud has coloring. There are blue and green, red and yellow muds; the red and yellow containing oxygen which changes the coloring. All of the muds have skeletons of tiny sea animals and plants, which make us realize that there is a regular blanket of these tiny living creatures in the ocean waters. In some places they are bo numerous that they form a sea soup upon which larger animals feed, and they, in turn, are prey to larger creatures which roam the surface or deeper parts of the sea. "So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts.'"—Psalm 104:25.

The sea transports not only the creatures and plant life it contains, but it has been the best means of transporting humans and cargo until approximately a half century ago. It has provided food by various fish and body-building plant life. Common salt, Epsom salts, chlorine, bromine, sulphur, potassium, sodium, magnesium and calcium are items used daily. Lime and other building products, chalk, flint, copper, lead, zinc, nickel, cobalt, gypsum and manganese, and even silver and gold, arc among the products removed from its depths. Rain for fields world-wide is provided by sending aloft millions of tons of water through vaporization. Exquisite jewelry comes from the corals. And one of the greatest of pleasures is simple beach bathing.

All this shows the necessity and power of the sea. And yet, as great. ns the sea may be, there is One who is greater—its Creator, Jehovah. “The Lord on high is mightier thau the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea?’ —Psalm 93:4.

“Than the mighty waves of the sea" Jnst as these constantly tossing waves have smoothed and polished each grain of sand transferred from various rock formations world-wide, so Jehovah is transferring from the "sea of mankind’ pie disciples of Christ, and such ones He -is polishing and smoothing with Bible truths to become part of His kingdom. They have faith in His promise of long ago, recorded at Genesis 32:12: “I will surely do thee good, and make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which, cannot be numbered for multitude,"

Little Retief for Hay Fever Victims

Don’t be deceived. The idea that science hag licked the disease of hay fever, that it is about to become a thing of the past, is either irresponsible newspaper and magazine talk or a false hope springing from unscrupulous commercial advertising. As in former years, this dreaded perennial disease soon will again be laying its heavy hand of misery upon the lives of many millions of unwilling victims.

<L When on the rampage, hay fever’s heat waves pass over the body, weakening one’s vitality and resistance. Streaming for hours at a time from the victim’s eyes is a hot fluid that leaves eyes red and sore with inflammation. From the swollen and inflamed nose pours forth a continual flow, punctuated with spasmodic sneezing, and handkerchief after handerchief is used to soak np the flood. The disease may reach down into the bronchial tuhes, causing asthma or congestion at night and robbing the sufferer of proper sleep. In oil ways, physical and mental, the victims have to endure a great deal during the hay fever season.

<L For years hay fever has heen one of the most baffling problems for modern medicine. It may he brought on by the pollen from trees, grasses or weeds anytime from April to September. All people in a community inhale this pollen, yet only a minority are adversely affected by it. Why this is, is unknown. Chiropractors say bone displacement and muscular congestion in neck and spinal column causes a “nerve interference” that brings on hay fever. However that may be, everyone haa in his blood a colorless crystalline substance called “histamine”, which is passed into the tissues of the one smitten with hay fever. It is believed that this discharged histamine causes swelling and irritation of the mucus membranes of throat, nose and sinuses in persons who are sensitive (allergic) to histamine. Some medical men believe that there are also other substances responsible for the irritation. There is, however, no satisfactory explanation as to why these chemicals are discharged in the first place, nor is there positive proof that it is one’s sensitivity to them that causes the suffering.

<L Working on the theory that histamine, if not the basic cause of hay fever, is nevertheless the immediate cause of the suffering, research has concentrated its efforts on finding and producing a number of anti-histamine drugs. Helpful in some cases of hay fever, in other cases these drugs are ineffective. In fact, some individuals get what are called “side effects” which are more disagreeable and sometimes more dangerous than the allergy itself.

<L Some of the ill-effects from anti-histamine drugs include dizziness, nervousness, palpitation of the heart, and even gastric irritation and diarrhea. In milder cases, they cause listlessness, loss of ability to perform a given job, sleepiness, and temporary fogginess of mind, Anti-histamin.es, therefore, should be taken with caution, especially if one is operating machinery or driving an automobile. The Civil Aeronautics Administration has warned pilots to stay clear of such drugs when flying. Medical authorities have also warned, that even at the best do one should regard these remedies as cures for hay fever, for they do not remove the basic cause of the disease. They may be helpful in some cases to control the symptomsin other cases they harm rather than help. In some instances, it has been found that older compounds are more effective,

<L Attacking the disease from another quarter, civil authorities in some of the larger communities have attempted to destroy the pollen-bearing plants. Such undertakings have brought little relief to the great majority of hay fever sufferers. Besides, beekeepers have warned that if such ideas are carried out on a full scale it will mean the end of the hees too.

C, So while the search goes on for the reason why pollen causes hay fever, and while science and medicine endeavor to compound a satisfactory remedy, victims of hay fever will have to continue to get through the summers the best they can. At least one such sufferer takes the philosophical viewpoint that the disease is a blessing in disguise. It provides him with a perfect excuse for taking an extended vacation at his favorite seashore resort or summer home in the tu nun tain a

Gambling Craze Seizes New Yorks Mayor

THE world's greatest center of commerce, people, money and power, New York city, can also boast of having

C Wnh shallow rpa*nning the mayor compared the present ontigambbng law* to prohibition, mt-iug that prohibition failed because the people ware against it, and, hence, laws against gambling fail because of "the public's desire Lo bet”. In other words, he assumed that antigambling laws are wrong because prohibition was wrong. Another conclusion, just as erroneous, m that millions of dollars now spent to “enforce” the gambling lawu could be saved, simply by legalizing betting on all sports events, both amateur and professional games. And, as if to clinch the argument, O’Dwyer said that he had discussed the question with many ‘‘well-tnfunued citizens who are not in public office” und that they agreed with bis idea of turning New York state into a den for gamblers, fit However, judging from the response stirred up by this fantastic suggestion, it is obvious that the number of better informed citizens far outnumbered the mayor’s “well-informed” croniea. Governor Dewpy of New York state regarded the idea “as such a shocking, unmoral and indecent proposal” that he scot the state legislature a special message denouncing the idea on the following nine counts:

4 (1) It is fundamentally immoral to encourage families lu look tu gambling os a source of income.

(2) It is an indecent thing for government to encourage the weaknesses of the people io order to finance itself from such weaknesses. (3) If the state approves betting on spurts then eventually it must endorse lotteries, dice games, slot machines and all their evils. (4) Legal betting rooms would give husbands and wives a continuous invitation to gamble away the family’s income, (5) The proposal would greatly demoralize sports. (6) All nations that have legalized gambling, such as Ireland, Italy and other Catholic countries, are financially bad off and.their people arc poverty-stricken, (7) In early days gambling caused such great eomiption and poverty the people revolted and banned it. Let not history repeat itself, (8) In states where gambling is winked at the underworld is powerful, and gang wars, murders, corruption and poverty are common things. To legalise gambling is not merely to wink, it amounts to closing both eyes to these cpmea. (9} Illegal gambling cannot exist where there are honest adminiutrstors to enforce the laws.

4 Bumming up, Dewey declared: “The entire history of legalized gambling in this country and abroad shows that it has brought nothing but poverty, crime and corruption, demoralization of industrial and ethical standards, and ultimately a lower living standard and misery for all the people." C A bust of Ii igh-caliber in di vi duals—legislators, prominent religions leaders (non-Cfitholics), etc.

joined the governor iu denouncing the viuioua gambling proposal, A. state assembly man said■ **The mayor is trying to cover up the wide-open arrangement that Bow protects the gamblers. He's digging out the old pat proposition to legalize what he can’t correct.” Another asked: “Whut makes Mr. O’Dwyer think you could do away with illegal gambling merely by licensing the gamblers f” ObitTved souther: “Yuu can't make gambling honest any mor? than yon can make a whistle out of a pig’s tail.” More to the point, another assemblyman declared: “First we ought to legalize O'Dwycr.¹'

This latter Suggestion is not a bad one. The people re-elected O’Dwyer to a job paying $25,000 a year, but on January 1 he assumed the rule u£ a “big shot” and boosted his own salnTy to $75,000, and oinc days later came up with this proposition to make New \ ork a paradise for gamblers. The fabulous wealth derived therefrom would primarily benefit the politicians and underworld; not the man in the street. So of what benefit are this vacationing and honeymooning mayor's services to the majority of citizens? In times past the city of New York got better mayors for half the price,

Catholicism a Train to Heaven?

L”NDER the heading “Catholic Infor-J mation” the following was published by different United States newspapers:

How SiMprjc—to Travel to Heaven!

How simple it is to travel to any town across the land! Simply make sure that you are on the right train and that you stay on it. Obey the simple rules of the road. That’s all. You’re sure to get there.

How simple it is to travel to our Heavenly Father’s land. Just make sure that you are on the right road and that you stay on it. Obey the simple rules. That’s all. You’re sure to get there.

Engineers and train crews must know the intricacies of railroading. Passengers can learu them for their own- benefit. But as trains are for everybody, he who knows but little will get there just as surely and as comfortably if he stays on the train and adheres to its rules.

Theologians and teachers must know the fine points of the God-builded road to Heaven. Laymen arc encouraged to study these also. But as God’s train must be for every men so he who knows but little must get there just as surely and comfortably if he stays on the train and obeys its rules.

With simplicity of reasoning the Catholic is convinced that God founded one true church, which because it is God’s “train”, must be perfect in itself and in its operation. To insure this, the Catholic believes that God made His engineer, the Pope, infallible in the running of the locomotive—that He divinely empowered the priests, His traincrew, to direct, serve, and feed the passengers—and that therefore, for the masses of Catholics, simple faith and simple obedience form the full-paid ticket from here to the heavenly depot.

There is such an appealing simplicity about this little homespun illustration that the first impulse of many is to swallow it immediately. It implies that there is no need to study for yourself, that all will arrive in heaven anyway; but since it does toss in the statement that laymen should study these things, honest Catholics should feel no hesitation in doing so. Crucial questions are: Is the Catholic Church the right train? Is its destination heaven ? Is the pope God’s infallible engineer? Are the priests Ged’s train crew? Do they know and teach the “fine points of the God-builded road to Heaven”? Consider the following (all scriptures quoted from the Catholic Douay Bible).

“Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church.” (Matthew 16:18) From this text Catholicism argues that Peter is the rock on which the church is built. However, “Peter” and “rock” are translated from different Greek original words, and mean different things. First Corinthians 10:4 states: “The rock was Christ.” He is the Rock, the Cornerstone over which many stumble, and Peter identified Him as the Rock, but added that others are as living stones built upon Him to form the spiritual temple or church, (1 Peter 2:1-9) Apocalypse 21:14 speaks of twelve foundation stones, which are the twelve apostles. Peter was only one of these twelve, all of which are on an equal footing.

What about the “keys of the kingdom of heaven” given to Peter? Jesus spoke of the “key of knowledge”, aud such were the keys committed to Peter. He used one of them when unlocking the door to

knowledge concerning the mystery of the Kingdom at the tune of Pentecost, and the other he used when revealing this same mystery to Gentiles, to Cornelius in particular. These doors to knowledge once opened to Jew and Gentile, never again were they locked) and hence there was no further need to use these keys. Peter completed the work Jesus gave him, and needed no successor to finish his job. As for the ^/fkeys of death and of helP. Peter never did have them, but ChriBt Jesus only.—Matthew 16:19; Luke 11:52; Acts 2:14-36; 10:148; Apocalypse 1:18,

Peter was not infallible. On one occasion Jesus said to him: “Go behind me, Satan, thou art a scandal unto me" Peter denied Christ at a showdown test. Peter gave way to the pressure of fear of men at one time and did wrong, and the apostle Paul corrected him to his face, before the entire congregation. Peter considered some of Pauls instruction as “strong moat”, “hard to be understood.” Certainly Peter was not the sole channel of in struct ton or revelation. Moreover, it seems that the disciple James presided over the church governing body at Jerusalem.—Matthew 16:23; 26: 34, 35,69-75; Galatians 2:1114; 2 Peter 3:16; Acte 15:13 20.

Peter did not act like the Catholic popes who claim to succeed him. The Catholic Church reaps money rewards from those it promotes, and sells supposed divine favors when collecting money for masses to lift suffering souls from a mythic*al purgatory to heaven. But when Peter was offered money for divine favors he said to the buyer: “Keep thy money to thyself, to perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money.” (Acts 8:20) The popes receive much adulation and honor to themselves, and accept the bows and worshipful attitudes of others, even allowing men to kiss their hands and feet. But not so Peter. “And it came to pass, that when Peter was come in, Cornelius came to meet him, and falling at his feet adored. But Peter lifted him up, saying: Arise, I myself also am a man.” (Acta 10:25,26) Popea and priests crave and demand flattering titles, and fume if they arc not called “Father⁷’; but Jesus said, “Call none your father upon earth; for one is ydur father, who is in heaven.”—Matthew 23:9.

Do Catholic clergymen teach the “fino points of the God-builded road to Heaven”, which road Jesus said was narrow and confined and found by but few! (Matthew7:14) Catholicism teaches that man has an immortal soul, and that sin’s punishment is purgatorial torments. The Bible says, “The soul that einnothj the same shall die”; “The wages of sin is death.” (Ezechiel 18:4; Romans 6:23) Catholicism says God and Christ are equal. The Bible records Jesus^J statement, “The Father is greater than I." (John 14:28) Catholicism teaches that the literal earth will bo destroyed by fire. The Bible says, “The earth standeth for ever.” (Ecclesiastes 1:4) Catholicism uses images in worship. But the Second of the Ten Commandments says: “Thou shalt not make to thyself a graven thing, nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, nor of those things that are in the waters under the earth. Thou shalt not adore them, nor serve them.”—Exodus 20:4,5.

The listing of conflict between Catholicism and the Bible could be continued to embrace many more examples, but let the following information show how little the Catholic Church respects the Bible. A Catechism of Christian Doctrine, revised edition of the Baltimore Catechism, nos. 1 and 2, copyrighted 1941, completely omit a the above-quoted Second Commandment! Why! To avoid exposure of their unscriptural use of images. To cover over their gross sin of deleting this commandment they take the Tenth Commandment and split it into two, ho as to have a total of ten. Jehovah God con-

demns those who add to or take away from His Word the Bible. Not only does Catholicism take away from the Bible, but many centuries after the Bible was completed it added apocryphal books,— Deuteronomy 4:2; Apocalypse 22:18,19.

In the opening quotation the Catholic writers argued by resemblance that the Catholic Church is the “train to Heaven”., Rather, resemblance labels it otherwise. The conduct of Catholic clergy does not follow the Bible pathway, but resembles more the road of the Pharisees. Catholic doctrine does not tread the road of Bible teaching, but resembles pagan dogma of ancient times. Catholicism operates a train crowded by hundreds of millions of riders, and rather than resembling the close, narrow path of heaven-bound Christians that Jesus said few found it appears like the roomy road to destruction crowded by multitudes. Catholicism’s train is on the wrong road for Christian travel.

Water Festival in Burma

By "Awake!" correspondent in Burma

^r I 'HE most jubilant time of the year in J. Burma. Kiddies get their squirt guns ready, adults repair hose pipes, trucks are in first-class condition; all is made ready for the big affair. The Burmese Thingyan Festival begins soon. Everyone is liable to be doused and free to douse in return. Race, religion, color, age, sex are no barriers; there is no protection from water-throwers.

Groups of people hire a truck, load it with several drums of water, and drive through the streets dousing everyone within range. A person walking, or riding a bicycle down the street suddenly finds himself soaked from head to foot, while the truck goes on, everyone shouting “Ye da paw" (“we just laugh”).

At many tire hydrants gangs of kids work in relays, some filling their pumps and pans, while the others busy themselves seeing that not a single passer-by goes away dry.

From various neighborhoods, girls and boys with similar colored clothing and rubber bathing caps, their faces daubed with glycerine, powder and lipstick, add color to ,the occasion and join in the fun.

In some towns in Burma, decorated cars, busses, carts and what-nots assemble at the pagoda and come in procession to town, people singing and dancing as they come, while refreshments are served freely along the route, AH this is accompanied with water-throwing, so that even before the town is reached everyone is soaking wet.

At some spots barriers are placed in the middle of the streets and all cars are stopped, private or public, and hooligans proceed mercilessly to attack their defenseless victims with an outsize hose pipe. At times, people are taken from their cars and drenched from head to foot! Closed cars and those who object to being ducked often attract greater attention; and if people do not want to be forced into the fun of the occasion, they must keep away from the streets for the four-day festival.

One driver that refused to stop at the signal from the crowd got into a predicament. A drum was rolled in front of the car and finally jammed underneath the car, almost capsizing it. The occupants jumped out and received the full punishment for not stopping in the first place. Their raincoats were opened and buckets full of water were poured down inside their clothes. The car being slightly damaged, the occupants were obliged to walk their way home, being drenched every few yards.

After pleasure comes pain, and the first few days following the water festival find one with an aching back and sore arms, or a cough and cold.

Here are a few casualties of the April 13, 1949, festival. A bus was passing a group of water-throwers, the driver got water and sand into his eyes, lost control and overturned the bus. Nine passengers, seriously injured, were admitted into the hospital.

At the bus stand near the bazaar four men were throwing water when they were accused by a stranger of throwing a bladder filled with water on him. They tried to assure him the culprit had left in a bus, but the accuser got angrier, snatched a knife and stabbed two of the four. They went to the hospital with serious injuries.

The Thingyan casualty list in the capital alone included one dead and seventyseven others injured, most of whom have been admitted into the hospital.

But you in ay wonder why all the waterthrowing. What does it represent? To begin with, it is the Burmese new year. Many years ago the relatives used to visit one another with a small bowl of perfumed water. Some of the water was taken on the fingers and sprinkled lightly on their friends and relatives. This, was supposed to erase all traces and memories of evil from the person, making him clear in order to start the new year.

It was about 1928 that water-throwing first commenced in Burma. There used to be no real organized water-throwing before that, just sporadic water-drenching by young children. Then people started going about in motor vehicles as an invitation for all and sundry to throw water on them. *

Hooliganism has developed to such an extent that appeals have been made to the government to step in and make wholesale arrests. Actually, last year the hooligans were not as bad as other years, and, due to the present general unrest in the country, the water festival was not wholeheartedly supported.

What a marvelous occasion when Jehovah will forever wash awav all sin k-¹

once and for all time. No memories of sin and evil to be washed away year by year. Indeed that will be a new world cleansed by the power of the Most High!

Wellsprings of Truth

Truth, like a spring of cool, pure water, constantly flows from the pages of the Bible to those who seek it. This vital fact has escaped the attention of many; so today, even though over two billion copies of the Bible have been distributed, there is a virtual famine for the hearing of the Word of God. (Amos 8:11) For thirst to be quenched one must partake of the truth. He must look into the pages of the Bible, making its truths his own. Read the Bible. The Watchtower edition of the King James Version is available for only $1.00.

WATCHTOWKB               117 Adama St.               Brooklyn 1, N.Y,

Please send me a copy of the King James Version Bible. I am enclosing $1.00.

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End of the World by Bomb ?

<§> The hydrogen hnnib with Its super-destructive powers was very much nn the minds of the world’s leaders, and also very much in the news, in late February. Fnur top scientists expressed the possibility of its destroy io g all life on earth by radioactive dusts, and so ending the world. Winston Churchill of Britain continued to urge talks between the U. S., Russia and Britain to seek security against atomic war. Prime minister Attlee, however, declared that the United Nations was the proper forum for such a discussion. President Truman continued to bor talks with Russia alone on the bomh, saying the doors of U. S. embassies everywhere were opeo to overtures on the part of Russia, and that the U. S. will coniine negotiations on the matter to the U. N. Senator Tydings said the president’s policy was one of “sitting still and waiting for disaster”. Senator Connally was hopeful that the Soviet would clear the way for discussions. Harold E. Stassen proposed a “mid-century conference” of U. S. and Soviet leaders so as to avert a third world war. The secretary general of the U. N. suid he was in favor of negotiations “all the time and on all levels-the top level, the middle level, and the lower level—inside the U. N. and outside the U. N.” Truman stood pat. A member of the Senate-Honse Atomic Committee proposed a second capital for the

U. S., to function In case of Wa shl ngton’s destruction. Defense against atomic bombs wos seen to involve prodiginus expense. At the month’s end the U. S., Britain and Canada prepared to review atomic security arrangements.

Slave Labor Study Urged

<•> Five Russian exiles asked the IL N. (2/1G), on behalf of the League for a Free Russia, to make an investigation into alleged sieve labor practices on a “mass scale” In the Soviet Union and its *

satellites. The petition was signed by 4,000 exiled Russians. General Trygve Lie bad Bent queries to all members of the U. N. and several nonmember states asking for cooperation in making a study of this matter, but many had given ambiguous replies. Loter in the month (2/27) the U. N- heard evidence accusing the Soviet Union of basing its whole economy on chained manpower, millions of workers providing cheap lahor in construction, mining, uranium extraction and other basic industries, but not willingly. The charges were brought before the Economic and Sociol Council by Miss Toni Sender of the American Federation of Lahor, who presented photostntic copies of documents showing that slave labor projects played a major part in Soviet economic planning.

U. N. Slavery Report

<$> Secretary General Trygve Lie of the U. N. on February 20 submitted a memorandum to the Special Committee on Slavery that elavery in the “full sense of the term” was no longer practiced In the world’s nonself-goveming territories and trust areas. He said that there were, however, some regions where certain practices or customs approximated slavery. China’s custom of selling girls still continues. Some of these, sold in Singapore, bring up to $2,000. Slavery or similar practices were found only in Nigeria, Malaya, Hong Kong, Singapore and French Equatorial Africa-

United Nations, N. Y.

<$► The address of the United Nations will omit the name of the city in which it is located and will be simply “United Nations, N. Y.” So said Secretary General Trygve Lio. All news reports and announcements from the international enclave will carry that dateline,

U. S. Third Party Program

Henry A. Wallace, former vice-president of the U. S., speaking at the second national convention of the Progressive party (2/24), scraped off the Communist label which enemies gratuitously have applied to the new party. He asserted that those who had called him and his supporters “apologists for Russia and for communism” were enemies nf progress. He referred to both Russia and the U. S. as “the big brutes of the world”. His ten-point program calls for (1) the promotion of peacetime jobs, (2) adequate income for ivagc-eamers and farmers, (3) equal opportunity for all without discrimination, (4) conservation of soil, water, mines and forests, (5) prevention of depression by a peace program rather than an arms program, (6) opposition to fascism, racism, intolerance and war, (7) protection of small businesses, (8) development of atomic energy for peace, not war, (9) support of world government with an effective police force and based on a revised system of voting, and (10) full support of plans through the U. N. to increase the produc-

productivity of the undeveloped areas of the world. Including Runla and China.

Voluntary F.LF.C.

The civil rights program of President Truman. submitted to Congress two years ago in February. embraced four major measures. They were bills to mate lynching a federal crime, tn bar the poll tar, to end racial segregation In interstate travel, and to establish it Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEIO). The last item was the most controversial of the four, and would Authorize the proposed commission to investigate racial and re-11 gi on s discrimination tn hiring, with power to order employers to cease such discrimination. Violators would be subject to fine and Imprisonment. In late February the House of Representatives passed and sent tn (he Senate a considerflhly mollified FLFC hill, after much heated dehate. The adopted measure hud ♦’no teeth", being ('idled a "voluntary” FEPC. It is without enforcement powers, and can only investigate job dis crimination timf recommend ways to end It.

U. S. Needs More Liner*

At s meeting of the National Security ('ommlffllon of the American Legion (2/IT), President Truman's stuirmeiil that the U. S. could rely on the merchant fleets of nations in the North Atlantic Pact to carry American troops and supplies In time of war was denounced a* a masterpiece of folly. The speaker, president of the American Merchant Marine Institute, I tic., said the U. 8. needs fifty new passenger liners for minimum security.

Pay Increases Rejected

There is honesty In New Jersey, Three top Union County officials turned down proposed salary increase of $1,000 a year. In a Joint statement 12/2,1) they opposed the Senate bin that would increase their salaries from $10;-000 to $11,000, contending that lower paid public workers were entitled to flrst consideration.

Steeling Wein for New York?

To ease Mew York’s water shortage the water supply commissioner, S. J. Orr, was authorised by the mayor (2/17) to go abroad with rain-making testa, under the direction of an outstanding meteoroiogtsL The mayor of Albany guaranteed he would flglil any attempt to "steal" rain by artificially-induced storms. -

Rio de Janeiro Repents

Some people, in bidding goodbye to sin. do so with regret, not for the sins but for having to give them up, even temporarily. This fttritndo 1« hark of the feasting and merriment that precedes the fasting of the Lenten season in Catholic practice, In the City of Rio de Janeiro, Ash Wednesday, marking the end of the last fling, it was found that the pre-l-enten carnival had oner the City $1,100,000 damage. including 28 dead.

British Electteas

# Much atteullou in all parts of the world was focused on the British elections in late February. The results were almost a stalemate, as the two major parties, the Labourites and the Conservatives. eft rue out nearly a tie. The Liberals also rolled up a considerable vote. The slim majority gained by Labor was slight consolation for them, as It was too small to enable them to do much of anything without support from either of the other parties. This setback for the Labor party means that In the Rohm of Com-mtns they (flipped from a 73-vote majority in IfHQ Lu a mere fl-vote lead in 1950. The political picture reflects the uncertainty and dlf-Acuity of the nation, in these days of “distress and perplexity".

Franco Arrests Monarchists

In late February Franco began an intensive drive to crush Monarchist ini errata. He Jailed an undisclosed number of Monarchist leaders, among them the duchess of Valencia, a spirited' young lady who never did get along with Franco, The move to restore iton Juan, son of Alfonso-

00 XIII, to the throne la the reason tar Franco's taking action against the Monarchists, whom he considers more dangerous to his regime than the leftist elements. Meanwhile the pope waits.

France Deals with Sabotage

♦ In the French government campaign against the landing of arms from the IL S., French regulations provide for the seizure of Communist newspapers and tracts containing false news or Instigating violence, and for the protection of those who desire to work in defiance of the Communist orders but find themselves threatened by strikers Local officials will arrest the instigators of all acts of sabotage and violence and bring them before the courts. Sentences may range from Ten years* hard labor lo the death penalty.

No Cokua for the French T

The French National Assembly passed a bill (2/28) to bar CocaCola from France, on grounds of health, Launched by the French wine interests, the anti-Coca-Cola campaign was quickly backed by the (JamniiinlRt preas, donnuncing the Coca-colonization of the country. The French were out Lu be made “Coca-col ique’L However, the name of the beverage Is omitted from the b 11) as unnecessary; it is well understood to be the driok particularly Involved.

France u n Great Fawor

Premier Georges Hldault of France, in a speech at at. Etienne (2/19). said that the French ta-temal struggles and the scandals in French politics were affecting the standing of the country and Incurred the danger of Its losing the role of a great power. He mentioned Churchill's move tar three-power talks as a clear notice cd France that unless stability was maintained that standing would be lost-

Boriln Cardinal Ban Red Ties

The Roman Catholic bishop of Berlin, Konrad Cardinal von Preysing, pat the Socialist Unity (Cnmrnunlflt) party and "Nation-

al Front’* under episcopal ban (2/16). He barred priests in Western Berlin or the Soviet zone from assisting Commnnlet aims in any way. It was the third time the cardinal had taken such action In a matter nf weeks. Communist pressure is making itself felt in bis diocese.

Soviet Ministry of the N&vy

<$> Russia, in late February, announced the setting up of a separate Ministry of the Navy in a drive to build up sea power to match her land forces. The new ministry is headed by Admiral Ivan S. Yumashev, former deputy minister of the armed forces and commander in chief of the Soviet fleet. An earlier report from another aonrce stated that the Soviet Union is building up Its naval strength by construction of at least three ultramodern battleships and up to a thousand sub marines.

Rearming East Germany

^Western Allied intelligence officers were alarmed in late February to note the rearmament of Eastern Germany, which has progressed to a point where 45,000 officers and men form the army of the German Democratic Republic in the Communist zooe nf occupation,

U. S* Breaks with Bulgaria

<^> Bulgaria’s charge that the American minister, Douglas B. Heath, had been receiving information from the former Communist leader, Traicho Kostov (hanged for treason), led to a complete diplomatic break with the U. S. in late February. The forty-three members of the U. S. legation at Sofia departed on February 24, while the Bulgarian chargd d’affaires and his stuff left Washington the next day.

Hungary Sentences Vogeler

<$> In Communist Hungary the spy trial of an American businessman, R. A. Vogeler, begun 2/16 and culminated the following Tuesday. He “confessed” to having been a spy for the U. S. and asked for a light sentence. He was given fifteen years In prison* The U. S. considered a diplomatic break, but felt it best to keep a representative on the scene to facilitate the release of Vogeler.

Vatican Resents Taylor’s Act

The Vatican has hinted around in various ways that it is affronted by Taylor’s resignation, and made it known that Taylor had said nothing about it to the pope. Also, tt is indicated that another personal representative of the U. S. president is not wanted, but a regular ambassador, as heflts an earthly king, such as the pope claims to he. President Truman said he was thinking about it. Since, as has been made public, the president raised Geo. A* Garrett, minister to Ireland, to the rank of ambassador to please a lady friend, he may also do what he can to please the pope.

Religion in Israel

<$> After stayiog away from cabinet meetings for two weeks the three ministers of the Religious Bloc In the laraeli government ended their boycott (2/22). Premier David Ben-Gurion had warned them that continued absence on their part would be viewed as a resignation. The dispute responsible for their boycott was the religious education of the immigrant children from the Near Eastern countries. A truce was reached when parents were given the choice of one nf four systems of instruction, two of which were religions.

It Is Not [to Be] Written

David Bcn-Gnrion of Israel came out (2/20) in opposition to drafting a constitution for the state of Israel. In a two-hour speech in the Knesset the prime minister criticized the U. 9. constitutional setup, declaring that it enabled unscrupulous lawyers to set hack progressive legislation. Debate on the constitution was in Its fourth week, and Ben-Gurlon was the first speaker, aside from two rabbis, to oppose a written constitution categorically. The rabbis said the Torah (ancient low) was the Jewish constitution.

Azerbaijan Oorrnptlon

<$> The Iranian minister of state said (2/27) that he had turned sixty Azerbaijan officials out of nfflee on charges of corruption and cruelty. The minister had just returned from nn inspection of the province, which borders on the Soviet Union. He said that the dishonesty of these corrupt officials had caused 120,000 peasants to flee from the province.

Moslem-Hindu Controversy

Prime Minister Jawaharlal accused Pakistan (2/23) of having carried on “anti-India and anti-Hindn” agitation for a period of months, inciting Moslem masses against Hindus in East Bengal, and bringing on communal rlnts. Between February 12 and 21, he told Parliament, 20,000 Hindus from East Bengal crossed into West Bengal and 5,000 Moslems from Calcutta migrated to East Pakistan. He said the 10,000,000 Hindus in East Pakistan have lost all eenae of security.

Malayans Fight Guerrillas

Men and women of many races and from all walks of life, 350,000 strong, took up their positions behind the lines of uniformed troops and police as these moved forward to clear the Malayan jungles of communist guerrillas (2/26). These guerrillas have terrorized Malaya ever since the end of the war, destroying, killing and wounding.

West Java Rebellion

<$> When Dutch forces, at the demand of Indonesian leaders, withdrew from Taslkmalaja, West Java, invaders of DarnI Islam began an attack that resulted In the death of 1,240 Indonesian soldiers. The Moslem movement is seeking to set np an Islamic State of Indonesia in West Java, which is Indonesia’s No. 1 trouble spot. “Turk” Westerling, leader of the rebel forces, was in Singapore to seek supplies of arms. He was arrested (2/26) as having entered the colony without proper papers. The Indonesiou authorities demanded his extradition*

Walk in the Advancing Light

The light of understanding of God^Js Word does not stand still. God is continually causing the prophecies to come to pass, and then He reveals the meaning to His servants. Today this light is increasing at unprecedented speed. The invitation, “Gr.nie ye, and let us wad; in the light df Jehovah/’ Las therefore never presented a stronger appeal at any previous time.

—isaiah 2: 5, Am. Star.. Vcc

To whom is this invitation to walk in the light extended? "Light is sown for the righteous, and ghidness for the upright in heart." (Psalm 97:11) Surely you are among those whose hearts seek after righteousness and who want thr? gladness that comes only with knowing the truth. Being ore cf These you should read

The W a Ichi over is a semimonthly magazine devoted exclusively tc the consideration of God’s Word. It is the <4:ann?l used to convey to Truth-hungry people the comparisons between the events of car day and what the prophecies fore toll would occur. Its pages reflect the advancing light, making it readily accessible, A year's subscription to The Walch lower is only $L If yoj mail your subs"ription before May 1, 1950, S Scriptural booklets will be sent free.

WATCHTOWER

FnctiaMi is $1 for a 1 year subscript iar. for 7 he Watchtower. F ;im iraiijng this bcifure Myy 1. 1050, with with the understanding that 1 lun to receive H Scripciral tcokkts free.

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AWAKE!