Park Bench Radicalism

THE IMAGE that Peter Seeger conveys, in everything he does, is that of a "decent" man. His behavior in front of the House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1955 was a model of bravery and pride. When asked about his affiliations with the Communist Party, USA, Seeger refused to answer, saying that it was none of the committee's business, and that he resented the insinuation that he was somehow unpatriotic because he had aligned himself with the poor and the oppressed in their struggle against injustice. "I have sung in hobo jungles, I have sung for the Rockefellers," Seeger told the committee, "and I am proud that I have never refused to sing for anybody."

He comes across as an extraordinarily genuine personality. Unlike the barrage of middle class suburban kids who took up guitar in the early '60s and then wrote sentimental lyrics about people they had never seen. Pete Seeger was really there. In the '30s and '40s he had travelled all across the country with Woody Guthrie. Huddie "Leadbelly" Ledbetter, Cisco Houston and Ramblin' Jack Elliot, from the cottonfields of California to the West Virginian mining towns. "...I am proud of the fact that my songs seem to cut across and find perhaps a unifying thing, basic humanity..." Seeger said in response to the inquisition of HUAC prosecutor Frank S. Tavenner. "I know many beautiful songs from your home county. Carbon, and Monroe, and I hitchhiked through there and stayed in the homes of miners."

Seeger's entourage entered into a symbiotic relationship with the people they met, drawing from their traditional folk heritage and in return writing new songs which described their circumstances and problems. All of which man help to explain Seeger's hurt at being accused of anti Americanism.

For Seeger's and his friends commitment to the country ran far deep than that of the distinguished members of HUAC. These folksingers truly loved the people they had met, owed a lot to them, a debt which would not be repayed by vague promises not to subvert the government of the United States.

Seeger's performances still reflect this basic decency and idealism. He sings about children, migrant workers, peace and martyrs for freedom with the same fervor that has sustained him for 35 years.

He survived the McCarthy era much more intact than our generation has survived the disappointments of the civil-rights movement and the antiwar movement. Seeger was also able to resist the trend towards conservatism that claimed many of his contemporaries. Old leftists are usually today's liberals. As Phil Ochs sang in "Love Me, I'm a Liberal":

Sure once I was young and impulsive

I wore every conceivable pin

Even went to socialist meetings

Learned all the old union hymns

Ah, but I've grown older and wiser

And that's why I'm turning you in... Seeger continues to be at the forefront of radical involvement, be the issue political repression in Chile or the struggle of the UFW in California.

And yet one cannot help but feel a certain emptiness when listening to him now. Perhaps it's because his idealism has sustained itself so much better than ours has. One finds oneself restraining a cynical snicker at Seeger's message, which, in jaded moments, seems to be saying no more than. "We are all very nice people, and we all love each other, and, yes, there are some bad people, but if we join hands and sing real loud, we can defeat them and create a utopia where we will play with our children and dance with each other."

"We have three generations of Guthries and Seegers on stage tonight." Seeger says in the introduction to one of the songs on this album, "and I bet there are lots of three generations of you out there." Silence Pause "Aren't there?" Applause A belated recognition. Seeger was summoning up the virtue of Family.

Seeger remained so clean and pure in his commitment to radicalism that he seems oblivious to the very bitter and real struggles that split the left in the '60s along the lines of attitudes, strategies and age. Everything's okay, he whispers; sure we had some disagreements a while ago, but that's all over, we all want the same things, so let's bury bad memories and do some old fashioned singin'. But it won't wash.

The album contains a lot of great songs. There aren't too many surprises here--Seeger and Arlo run through all the old standards, from "Joe Hill" to "deportees" and "Guantanamera," all done competently. The newer songs are less impressive; Arlo's "Presidential Rag," a Watergate song, has a point of view on the subject which is slightly less interesting than that of the House Judiciary Committee. Nevertheless, if you're looking for a good collection of songs of the traditional American left, this album will serve.

Maybe Seeger's sort of appeal can still work. After all, you do hear a lot of people clapping and singing along on the album, albeit a bit slow to respond to Seeger's signals and a little self-consciously. But the whole affair brings to mind that heart-rending scene in Fitzgerald's Gatsby, when Nick ventures that perhaps he shouldn't get his hopes up, that it's been years since Daisy loved him. "Can't recapture the past?" Gatsby responds. "Why, of course you can!"