Emily Greene Balch Quotes

I have spoken against fear as a basis for peace. What we ought to fear, especially we Americans, is not that someone may drop atomic bombs on us but that we may allow a world situation to develop in which ordinarily reasonable and humane men, acting as our representatives, may use such weapons in our name. We ought to be resolved beforehand that no provocation, no temptation shall induce us to resort to the last dreadful alternative of war.

We are not asked to subscribe to any Utopia or to believe in a perfect world just around the corner. We are asked to be patient with necessarily slow and groping advance on the road forward, and to be ready for each step ahead as it becomes practicable. We are asked to equip ourselves with courage, hope, readiness for hard work, and to cherish large and generous ideals.

As the world community develops in peace, it will open up great untapped reservoirs in human nature. Like a spring released from pressure would be the response of a generation of young men and women growing up in an atmosphere of friendliness and security, in a world demanding their service, offering them comradeship, calling to all adventurous and forward-reaching natures.

A dark and terrible side of this sense of community of interests is the fear of a horrible common destiny which in these days of atomic weapons darkens men's minds all around the globe. Men have a sense of being subject to the same fate, of being all in the same boat. But fear is a poor motive to which to appeal and I am sure that "peace people" are on a wrong path when they expatiate on the horrors of a new world war.

Fear weakens the nerves and distorts the judgment. It is not by fear that mankind must exorcise the demon of destruction and cruelty, but by motives more reasonable, more humane and more heroic.

If the disinterested neutrals, who alone are free to act for peace, wait for a moment when neither side has any advantage they will wait long indeed.

As we know only too well, the League of Nations, lacking Russia and the United States, was not sufficiently inclusive. Also when the pinch came, different governments proved unready to make the sacrifices or face the risks involved in effective opposition to imperialism in Japan, reaction in Spain, fascism in Italy or nazism in Germany.

The question of peace is a question of terms. Every country desires peace at the earliest possible moment at which it can be had on terms satisfactory to itself. Peace is possible the moment that each side would accept what the other would grant, but from the international or human point of view a satisfactory peace is possible only when these claims and concessions are such as to forward and not to hinder human progress.

In one sense the present war is a conflict between the two great sets of belligerent powers, but in a different and very real sense it is a conflict between two conceptions of national policy. The catch words "democracy" and "imperialism" may be used briefly to indicate the opposing ideas. In every country both are represented, though in varying proportions, and in every country there is strife between them. In each belligerent nation there are those that want to continue the fight till military supremacy is achieved, in each there are powerful forces that seek a settlement of a wiser type which, instead of containing such threats to stability as are involved in annexation, humiliation of the enemy, and in competition in armaments, shall secure rational independence all round, protect the rights of minorities and foster international cooperation.

May no young man ever again be faced with the choice between violating his conscience by co-operating in competitive mass-slaughter or separating himself from those who, endeavouring to serve liberty, democracy, humanity can find no better way than to conscript young men to kill.

The form of work for peace which has most obviously made history is the long continued effort to create some form of world organization which should both prevent wars and foster international cooperation.

A peace involving annexation of unwilling peoples could never be a lasting one.

I feel it rather surprising that refusal of war has never taken the form, on any large scale, of refusal to pay taxes for military use, a refusal which would have involved not only young men but (and mainly) older men and women holders, of property.

Another thing-men are everywhere becoming less "private-minded." There is a growing community sense. It is as though the urge which found expression in monasteries and nunneries in the middle ages were finding new expression. In the political field this consciousness of the common interest and of the rich possibilities of common action has embodied itself in part in the great movements toward economic democracy, cooperation, democratic socialism and communism. I am sure we make a great mistake if we underrate the element of unselfish idealism in these historic movements which are today writing history at such a rate.

There has been personal refusal of war service on grounds of conscience on a large scale and at great personal cost by thousands of young men called up for military service. While many people fail to understand and certainly do not approve their position, I believe that it has been an invaluable witness to the supremacy of conscience over all other considerations and a very great service to a public too much affected by the conception that might makes right.