One Worlders

When the American Legion this week condemned UNESCO for propagating "adherence to a nebulous world government," the Legion was falling into an error common to many critics of the United Nations and its agencies. As a league of sovereign nations, the U.N. is hardly a world government. True world government--as its proponents readily admit--is a long way off, almost as far away now as it was in the late 1930's when the movement began in this country.

The first book in world government's Bible is Union Now, by Clarence K. Streit. Writing in 1938, Streit proposed a federal union of the democracies of the North Atlantic. He urged a common citizenship, defense force, money, postal and communications system, and a custom-free economy. By 1940, Streit's book had gone through 17 editions, for with World War II fast approaching, people were seeking a slogan, a goal--in short, a blueprint for a new post-war world.

The war itself aided the world government movement. G.I.'s found themselves in the midst of an air age which brought the farthest part of the globe within 36 hours flying time. Wendell Willkie circled the earth and reported that there was "one world." And some people began to think that nations cooperating in war would cooperate in peace. From such hopes sprang organizations like Federal Union and Student Federalists--neither of them large, but both extremely vocal. A split soon developed within the movement, however, between those favoring a Union Now of the democracies and those advocating a universal world federation. This split eventually forced the virtual disbanding of Federal Union in 1945.

It is no accident that Federal Union began to disappear just as the United Nations entered the scene. For if Streit's Union New was the Genesis of the world government movement, the United Nations and the Cold War caused the writing of a whole New Testament. Or rather, a number of diverse testaments, each of which answered differently the critical questions facing supporters of world government: Should they work through the U.N.? Skirt it? Or should they perhaps forget about blueprinting an organization which the Cold War may have made impracticable?

United World Federalists is the best example of an organization trying to work through the U.N. to a limited world government strong enough to prevent war. At its seventh annual convention in 1953, U.W.F. called for the amendment of the U.N. charter "to achieve universal disarmament enforced under adequate safeguards." Grenville Clark '03, former member of the Corporation, sums up this argument when he writes in A Plan for Peace: "No stable peace without disarmament; no disarmament without limited world government."

Not all groups believe in centering their efforts on the United Nations. Atlantic Union, for example, was basically an extension of Streit's proposal for a union of the Atlantic democracies, with a boost from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Far removed from the Atlantic Union Committee is another group which concentrated on work outside the U.N. Charter--the "People's World Convention." Meeting in Geneva in 1951, the embryonic convention wanted to bring together a giant world assembly composed of one unofficial delegate elected by every 1,000,000 inhabitants. The state of Tennessee actually sent two delegates, but attendance was so poor that this movement to ignore national governments was itself largely ignored.

Another blueprint for a world government is the "Preliminary Draft of a World Constitution," prepared by eleven prominent men, including Robert M. Hutchins and G. A. Borgese of the University of Chicago. Published in 1948 complete with President, Federal Convention, Supreme Court, and a Chamber of guardians, this so-called "Chicago Draft" was intended only as a seed that might "take a thousand years to grow."

One of the signers of the "Chicago Draft" was Stringfellow Barr, former president of St. John's College at Annapolis, who represents a distinct segment of the world government movement. For Barr forgets about a political federation, at least for the time present, and instead faces the economic problems of the world's underdeveloped peoples. In Let's Join the Human Race he outlines a plan for a giant International development Authority, similar to this country's T.V.A. Clearly, the Cold War had driven Barr and others to Asia, where the need for food and medicine overshadowed vague plans of politized federation.

No one can tell what world government groups will do if the Cold War really thaws. One thing is certain, however, the road to world government remains long and slippery.