THE FOUR MILLION

With the coming of spring there has sprouted a new crop of reactionary organizations, pushing up their heads in a manner anything but shy. The most recent arrival has been the Paul Revere Society, now of Chicago, Illinois, though pledged to propagate to the far corners of the United States.

The president of the intrepid Reveres, Colonel Hadley, has no doubts of the straight of the American Reds. He estimates that there are extant some 6,000,000 agents in the United States--a figure approximately four times as large as the most optimistic Communist would care to quote. Among this number, according to the president, are "at least 700 college professors, high school teachers and members of boards of education who are in sympathy with the Communists and are preaching their doctrines." But Colonel Hadley is not daunted by the size of the opposition. As he says: "In recent months we have had considerable success in ousting Communist agitators from colleges and pulpits ..." This is, of course, only in line with the general policy of the Paul Reveres, which is "to cleanse the American educational and religious establishments of subversive influences," and to live up to the conservative, staid example of their eponyme.

If the program of these horsemen had been dictated more by sense than emotion, such a reactionary attitude would never have been adopted. It should have been obvious even to Colonel Hadley that only "subversive influences" can preserve the class system which he so esteems. Only by taking some of the wind from the Red sails can the present economic structure be patched up sufficiently to weather this storm and the ones to follow. A refusal to listen to "Socialistic Ideas," and an active suppression of Communist agents and sympathizers may rob capitalism of the lingering delight of an old age.