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Andrew HeiskellAndrew Heiskell
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Session:         Page of 824

bigoted religion--

Heiskell:

Is that the Ridgefield Memorandum?

Q:

Yes. O.K. The Ridgefield Paper.

As the attack on Dulles has been rising all over the world, it has more and more been centering on his politics of moral right and wrong. The French papers have been trying to get their sights on this issue, and only a couple of weeks ago, a leading German paper--yes, in Adenauer's Germany--had a long attack on Dulles as a Puritan, with much reiteration that deplored the Puritan streak in America.

He then goes on to say--this is all I'll read you:

The struggle between Freedom and Communism is, at bottom, a moral issue. And any serious moral issue is, at bottom, a religious issue. This, I think, has been our feeling. This surely is the message of Whitaker Chambers. The uniqueness of Abraham Lincoln lies in the fact that he made the moral issue clear: man is an ambiguous proposition. He is never wholly right. He has never any occasion whatever for self-righteousness. Now therefore, to put God on your banner without self-righteousness? We must surely support Dulles as vigorously as we can in this effort to establish a moral basis for our world politics. His handling of this supremely difficult issue in his United Nations speech--[i.e. Dulles's United Nations speech]--was, it seemed to me, excellent. In effect, he said that the moral imperative of freedom was inherent in the consciousness of the American, not something he was inventing or enforcing. He eschewed coercion of others but equally refused to deny the moral imperatives in the American approach.

I guess I want you to make any comment you want to on that but really, the general--

Heiskell:

It sounds--I don't remember the memo, but it sounds like Luce--

Q:

My question is how did this influence the magazines--Luce's views as a Cold Warrior.





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