Fellow Immigrants

Ever since Franklin Roosevelt addressed them as "fellow immigrants," 'the Daughters of the American Revolution have been running, stumbling and crawling to recapture lost dignity. Their goal; pure "Americanism." In this field they have no peers, with the possible exception of the Colonial Dames who came off the boat a few years before the Revolution. But the DAR is heavily populated, 174,000 this year, and makes up in intensity what it lacks in tradition.

Probably the key nightmare the ancestor-worshipes struggle with is the problem if immigrants. The Daughters were quite put by the displaced persons problem following the war. The vision of an open door brought warnings that the United States couldn't risk "being overrun by European refugees who should stay at home."

But Congress did not help them, so the Daughters had to look for their own brand of protection. In 1950, the Daughters passed a resolution urging "the observance of national holidays as an antidote to the influx of aliens." But they also noted that holidays were slipping and hastened to support them. Their special nostrum, the Fourth of July, needed some pep, so they advocated "a return to the former ringing of bells, pageants and parades."

Another sag in "Americanism" that brought DAR action was the "unamerican" flying of another flag on an equal level with that of the United States. A DAR agent found the Un guilty of this and the outraged Daughters hastened to have the equal arrangement changed. When the Norfolk Navy Yard repeated the insult, they passed a resolution demanding a Congressional investigation.

"Turning from defense of Old Glory to defense of Jim Crow, the Daughters discovered their lease to a Washington auditorium, Constitution Hall. DAR rule has taught many Negroes that the Hall is an exclusive place. Two time loser Hazel Scott, colored wife of Representative Powell, found that the Daughters didn't like her kind of singing. While few negroes have similarly tried twice, the Hall has been forbidden ground to over fifteen colored entertainers in the last five years, and just to prove that they do not discriminate only against the entertainment industry, the Daughters ejected an Ethiopian Minister in the middle of a scientific convention. Marian Anderson, the first celebrity to meet Constitution Hall's closed doors, was also the first to find them wide open. In 1951, twelve years after her initial ban, the DAR admitted her right to sing. An apologetic spokesman said that the Daughters had been trying to stop the bannings for years, but could never quite manage it.

Another hedging issue of the Daughters is the United Nations. In 1948, they sprawled across a widening chasm, expressing indefatigable opposition to world government and unfailing support for the UN. But the passing years solidified their view point, and 1953 brought a demand that the United Nations should "be taken out of the jurisdiction of the Department of State and made responsible to the Congress of the United States."

This proposal may seem difficult to execute, but the atmosphere of a DAR continental convention would make it entirely plausible. Last month, for instance, the Daughters tackled and demolished everything from dope smuggling to the gold standard. A resolution for return to the latter brought protest from an amateur economist: "It would be chaotic to put the United States alone on the gold standard." She was silenced by "It is only foreigners who can't redeem in gold," and the resolution passed.

But again, the United Nations received the full blast of DAR rhetoric. The leader of the Glens Falls chapter took the floor. Starting meekly, she pronounced her scorn for would government, then worked up to, "Let us turn the strength massed within this great, influential and highly esteemed organization to a constructive force for the United Nations." The retort was brief but effective. The only thing we have to fear is such a statement as has just been made."

And last week, the SAR, Sons of the American Revolution, proved themselves worthy of their sisters. Their chief speaker, in labelling the UN a "houses of saboteurs and spies," showed the world that time Americans stick together. JOHNS S. WRITNERS