Lynd Denounces Capitalism, Asks Fighting Labor Party

"Only a militant labor party can save the United States from the sickness of capitalism," said Robert S. Lynd, professor of Sociology at Columbia University, last night at the New Lecture Hall in the second of the John Reed Society's series of lectures on Marxism.

Calling himself "skeptical of the Liberal Party, skeptical of the P.C.A., and skeptical of a Wallace Third Party," Lynd doomed all these to failure within the near future because they all "cut too shallow."

Middle Class Impotent

The great middle class, once the leader of progressive movements, now can only aid by providing leadership for the militant masses, according to the author of "Middletown."

Lynd termed the view that the middle class is the faith and hope of America as "just plain applesauce." Once this group was a powerful progressive force, but since the death of frontier democracy, the middle class has been crushed between the power of both "big business" and "big labor."

Big Business is Villain

The worst villain of the piece, according to Lynd, is big business, which has "exploited the symbols of democracy to get the U.S. in line with their private purposes." He also condemned the N.A.M. for furthering the principle of monopoly rights under the guise of "competition."

Forces of business, he claimed, hold practically all the press, radio, schools and other media of communication in an ironclad grip. Through these, business conducts its propaganda behind the front of the "little man."

America Reactionary

Taking a poke at the American character itself, Lynd termed it "ideologically naive and slovenly." The United States, he proclaimed, is no longer a leader in assuming new modes of doing things, but is actually the "arch-example of reaction and conservatism."

Professor Lynd's program of "new options" for the future includes large scale planning, full employment, and avoidance of inflation. All of these are possible if only "we are willing to do what it takes."

This means that a "militant labor party" is essential, for capitalism, he believes, "can do planning only in a fascist way."