Washington Post, March 23, 1939
3kuIaX-And T6moirraj^
By Walter Lippmann
An Estimate Of American Public
Opinion About Foreign Affairs
NOWADAYS anyone who
wishes to make an estimate of
public opinion must begin by
v.asking how much he may rely
upon the returns from the Gallup
and the Fortune polls, for
whether or not they are In fact
correct, the leaders of opinion and
the people at large, follow these
polls with close attention. The
people are eager 'to know what
the people are thinking, and there
are no measures of popular
opinion that have a comparable
authority. .•
The authority of these polls has
two main supports. The first is
that, when they were tested by
the election returns of 1936 and
1938, they showed not a perfect
but a high degree of accuracy.
Actual election returns are the
only absolutely conclusive test of
the reliability of these polls.
While we know that these polls
can go. wholly wrong, as witness
the Literary Digest poll in 1936
after its many previous successes,'
the Gallup and Fortune polls
have thus far proved themselves
in general substantially right by
the test of the election returns.
This may be due in part to good
luck. It may be-due wholly to the
fact that the directors of these
two polls have, as they believe,
discovered and eliminated the
cause of the error in the Literary
Digest poll.
2 Polls Believed
Soundly Based
THE MOST careful students of
this new branch of. political sci-
ence are, I think, on the whole
convinced that Dr. Gallup's in-
stitute and Fortune magazine are
proceeding on .sound scientific
principles. There is to begin with
no doubt whatever of their en-
tire good faith. They have invited
investigation and, since their re- J
suits have so often run counter to
the wishes and the interests of
politicians and editors all over
th-t country, it is safe to con-
clude that any bias would have
been detected and exposed.
Moreover, the two polls are a
check the one upon the other,
and since in general they have
thus far tended to agree, the prob-
ability of their being accurate Is
greatly increased. Then, too, the
method they employ is not some
new tricky device but in princi-
ple the same method used by
good reporters. The returns are
derived from interviews with men
and women all over the country
and in various walks of life. The
only difference between the -polls
and the experienced reporter who
goes traveling to estimate opinion
L that the polls interview more
persons than any one reporter;
can interview and are able (to
take greater precautions against
interviewing too many persons
win think alike.
.Nevertheless, in a field' like
that of opinion about foreign af-
fairs there are no election re-
turns with which to test the abso-
lute accuracy of the polls, and the
question is whether there are any
other objective tests that can be
applied. The polls have shown,
for example, that American opin-
ion is not indifferent but strongly
partisan on /the issues raised by
aggression An Europe and Asia.
They have shown an Increasing
concern about the\ou'tcome of the
conflict between the dynamic and
the static powers of Europe. They
have shown a rapidly growing
belief that if war broke out, the
United States would be unable to
remain securely isolated.
Armoment Increase SSB
Widely Favored
IF WE WISH to test these re-
turns by something tangible, what
test can we use? The surest test.
It seems to me, is not what has
been said in Congress but what
has actually been voted in Con-
gress on the proposals to expand
armaments. These votes have been
overwhelming. Moreover, the op-
position to armaments has melted
away spectacularly since the
autumn. Four months ago the best
observers in Washington were
saying that the President would
get his program only after a long
struggle. In January when Con-
gress met, there was distinct evi-
dence that the alignment on de-
fense might fellow the alignment
in regard to the New Deal, with
the Republicans and conservative
Democrats opposing the program.
But there has been no such oppo-
sition.
Having crossed the continent
recently and talked with anti-
New Dealers of all sorts in many
places,' it is evident to me why
there has been no such division
on the armament program./ The
plain fact is that Congress has
been representing the real opinion
of the great mass of the people.
That opinion is that the aggres-
sions abroad do concern the
United States and that increased
armaments are necessary. The
votes in Congress on national de-
fense confirm the returns from the
two polls.
The polls measure opinion as it
is. or more accurately, as it was
within a week or a fortnight of the
publication of the returns. Suc-
cessive polls on the same question
show the trends of opinion as they
have been developing, but, of
course, the most important ques-
tion for statesmen is not what
opinion is today, but what it Is
going to be later on. How is one
to estimate the answer to that
question?
There is no certain way of pre-
dicting the development of
opinion. But we can say that the
opinion will be made by the im-
pact of events .upon the mentality
of the people.
Specific Issues
Arouse Feelings
IT MAY BE SAID, I think, that
the mental attitude of the Amen-,
can people toward foreign affairs
is determined initially by the fact
they make strong moral judg-
ments on any issue in which they
are interested. The American
conscience is historically and
fundamentally a Puritan con-'
science, and, therefore, almost in-
capable of remaining for long-
morally, detached. This is, I be-
lieve, the clew to the difference
between. isolationist sentiment ¦
since the World War and isola-
tionist sentiment before the war.
The'traditional sentiment of iso-
lation had its source in the fact
that the people knew little about
Europe;.and, therefore, cared lit-
tle. That absence of information
rather than morajS' indifference
was its cause is proved, it seems to
me, by the ifaef. that all through
American history the people have
become quickly aroused on spe-
cific Issues abroad such^aS the
treatment of Ireland, or the des-
potism of the Czars, or the mas-
sacre of the Armenians.
Post-war isolationist sentiment,
on the other hand, has been based j
not on absence of information but
on moral disillusionment. The
thing which repelled Americans
from post-war Europe was the
fact that they were morally dis-
gusted with their former allies.
They were driven to the conclu-
sion that all the European powers
were morally alike. Precisely be-
cause they are moralists to the
core of their beings, they became '
disappointed moralists, that is to
say cynics, when they contem-
plated the Treaty of Versailles and
the oppression of the German
republic. This was their mood .
when they approved the neutrali-
ty act. They set up an embargo
on munitions because they felt
that there should be a moral em-
bargo against Europe as a whole.
Public No Longer
Neutral In Thought
IF THIS IS correct interpreta-
tion of isolationist sentiment, that
it operates only when the moral
issue is not clear, then one can
hazard a guess as to*how opinion
has been developing and how it
will develop .in response, to events
abroad. The actions of Hitler, for
example, have already modified
radically the post-war feeling
that there is no moral difference
between the powers of Europe,
The polls confirm what any ob-
server can see for himself, that the
American people have decided
that there is a fundamental differ-
ence between the democracies and
the dictatorships.
There is no real doubt whatever
that the people are not indifferent
and that they are not neutral in
thought But it also is true that
the degree to which they wish to
intervene in Europe is a direct
reflection of their own feeling as
to how clearly the democracies
abroad draw the moral issue. Thus
Munich, for example, caused a re-
version to isolationist feeling, be-
cause once again it seemed to the
people that the British and French
were abandoning the moral is-
sue. On the other hand, the re-
armament of Great Britain and
the recovery in France have
worked in the opposite direc-
tion.
jfl In short, insofar as the alc9
| tators juse violence/ and Insofaf
as I tee"^democracies resist* g it,j
American opinion, which is always
moved by moral-judgments, tends
to leave isolation and become in- ~
terventibnist In so far as tfaer'de-'
mocracies retreat, and surrender
and compromise the moral Issues,
American opinion becomes cyni-
cal and isolationist
Moral Stakes Wake
U^^^r^ntier Spirit
IT MAY BE asked whether this
anatomy of American opinion
does not leave out of- account
'"¦th« Immense hatred for war and
the profound desire for peace. My
own view is that American paci-
fism is not at all. like some paci-
fism abroad, caused by weakness
and fear and decadence. American
pacifism is itself the product of
the Puritan conscience, which
hates tiie waste and destruction
and lawlessness and violence and
unrighteousness of war as such.
Where the issue between nations
' is not a moral issue, the Ameri-
cans are, therefore, very pacifist
But they are not at all pacifist
'when they feel that something
morally vital is at stake in a
specific war.
The frontier spirit remains, and
'Americans are, once they are ex-
asperated, very quick on the trig-*
«er. .
Of all the people in America
who become most impassioned
about a moral issue in foreign
affairs>-'the pacifists, the morally
outraged pacifists, are the most ar-
dent. The pacifists are, so to speak,
the radical wing of American
Puritanism. Mr. Hoover was
profoundly right, therefore, when
he said recently that the massacre
of thousands of civilians, by the
aerial bombardment of London
and Paris would produce an'un-
controllable indignation in this
country. The Americans would
have to be a much older nation,
a much more tired and morally
disillusioned nation than ¦ they
are, in order to sit by and be
willing to do nothing about a cal-
culated horror of that sort
Explosion Imminent
In Public Opinion
IF THIS IS correct then there
are very practical conclusions to
be drawn from it both here and
abroad. The dictators should
realize that as indicated by the
successive polls, by the tendency
of the votes in Congress and by
the drift of sentiment as seen by
observers, American opinion is
now in a state of imminent ex-
plosion. . A spectacular unprovoked
act of violence would almost cer-
tainly touch off that explosion.
The European democracies and
their allies should realize that an-
other Munich win cause another
return to isolationism, that they
may expect assistance only inso-
far as they first show that they
help themselves.
And the American Congress
I should realize that the only sure |
I way to keep the American people |
1 out of war is to do everything
that can now be done to prevent
war. Legislation designed to keep
America out after war breaks out
-will almost certainly be shattered
j /by the moral partisanship of the
people. Therefore, the only legis-
lation which can surely be effec-
tive is legislation which makes
clear before the fatal decision is
taken abroad that war Is too
| dangerous a gamble~to be risked
I by the dictators. * |
Copyright, im. by New York Tribune, ino.