interventions may have been excessive, the inroads made on poverty and in- : A Parable of American equality in society have actually been . very minor. We should expect more, not Righteousness less, from public policy to redress social by Marshall Frady ills. As to the international scene, the (Little, Brown; xi 4- 546 pp.; $12.95) new attitudes toward other countries that have resulted from the Indochina debacle, far from being a “failure of Billy Graham: Evangelist to the World nerve,” are, Steinfels believes, to be welcomed as a new sanity in the conduct by John Pollock of American foreign policy. (Harper & Row; x f 324 pp.; SlO.00) What is finally at issue in all of this is more than one’s attitude toward this or that particular domestic or foreign poli- cy. What is rather at issue is one’s over- Tracy Early all perspective on American society and, indeed, on the contemporary world. Frady had better walk cautiously. overwrites with a purplish passion, nev- Negatively, the neoconservative pcr- Though Graham himself prefers to er stopping at one superfluous adjective spective has been shaped by a profound shower critics with buckets of warm when the dictionary will yield four oth- recoil from the realities of contempo- syrup, some fiercer disciples may dis- ers as silvering, shimmerous, scintillant, rary totalitarianism and by the insight cover the love of Christ impelling them and sockdolagizing. He also detours that American power is legitimated by to boil Frady’s head in a washpot. But rather much, delivering the deep things the fact that it is the main bulwark he has written a useful book, the first of Calvinism, his tracings of American against the inhumanities of this totali- attempt by a writer with stature outside culture, and other fancy goods. Though tarianism. Positively, the neoconserva- the religion camp to give Graham the all that may come chockablock with tives do indeed have a more benign view full treatment. import, the redder will skip over patches of American society than Steinfels Also useful, in a quite different way of it. More pertinent are the pages would allow, but this view results pre- of course, is the work of Graham’s offi- showing Graham’s connections with the cisely from looking at the world in cial biographer, John Pollock, a Church American power structure in the cold comparative terms and thereby discov- of England minister. In Billy Graham: war years, and how he won the backing ering the (so to speak) relative frequen- The Authorized Biography he took the of big men who did not necessarily cy of the distribution of the human story up to 1966. and then updated it in share his piety or his views on fornica- decencies. Perhaps central to the diver- 1969. NOW,in Billy Graharn: Evange- tion. gence of perspectives is the issue of the list to the World, he covers the past The lineup of important figures in capitalist’ economy, about which one decade. Pollock provides not only data Graham’s career makes a sobering spec- gathers Steinfels has very serious mis- but also the tint of lens for viewing trum-from conservative to ultracon- givings. None of the neoconservatives, Graham as Graham would wish, espe- servative to wacky. One starts with his as far as I know, has the quasi-theologi- cially in scenes dealing with his relation- forward-walk as a high school junior cal faith in the market that character- ship with Nixon. But for analysis, Fra- under the exhorting of the anti-Semitic izes, for instance, Chicago School econ- dy’s the one. By showing himself great- tub-thumper . Then, via omists. But most of them have come to ly enthused, Frady got several hours Bob Jones, a Florida Bible institute, and the conclusion that in an imperfect with Graham plus interviews with fami- Wheaton. on to anointment by the world, a society with a sizable market ly and associates. They are likely not dying warhorse William Bell Riley. sector in its economy gives a much pleased by his interpretations of Gra- Next to Hearst, whose 1949 order to better chance for democratic gover- ham as one who happily took the king- “puff Graham” put him in orbit-like nance and humane social policies than doms of this world and obligingly Nixon, from Southern California. Lat- any of its empirically available alterna- served the devil. er, he accumulated plutocrats such as tives. This conclusion, and not the de- Himself the son of a Southern Baptist Sid Richardson, politicians such as sire to hobnob with affluent business preacher, Frady feels the awkwardness. Strom Thurmond, and panjandrums types, explains the affinity of neocon- Many will anathematize him, such as Henry Luce. L. Nelson Bell, servatives with the socio-economic 6lite he knows, as a scalawag who smiled his pure Goldwater. became not only Gra- that Steinfels dislikes so strongly. It is way in for dinner and then dirtied on ham’s father-in-law but also an influen- possible, of course, that Steinfels is the rug. So he sprays a magnolia scent tial advisor. right and the neoconservatives wrong in around: “The difficulty is that, when And there are some that Frady skips. their respective assessments of contem- one arrives at the point where one has to He bypasses Graham’s decision to iden- porary world realities. This book is begin the actual writing of it, one neces- tify with the First Baptist Church of unlikely to persuade anyone who was sarily must withdraw ....” And so on, Dallas and its ranting pastor, W.A. not so persuaded before reading it. At which won’t pacify them a whit. Criswell-a notable decision because best, therefore, it makes a very modest The rest of us, however, can feel Graham had no personal or organim- contribution to the urgently needcd dis- grateful for the book, though it turned tional reason for putting his member- cussion of these matters. wl out to be less than it might have. Frady ship in a Texas church except to show where his heart and treasure lay. Nor does Frady mention the late oil baron J. Howard Pew, once introduced by Gra- ham to a Madison Square Garden crowd as “a man I go to for advice as much as any layman in America.’’

Thus oriented, Graham naturally ~ took such stands as knocking the Senate ’ for its censure of McCarthy. But like Nixon, Graham promotes the idea that his stature has increased a cubit or two, that a new Graham comes broadened by experience and chagrined by youthful excess. Frady and Pollock show that this has about as much validity in Graham’s case as in Nixon’s. If some numbers of the McCarthy era dropped from the Graham repertoire, the reason lay more in the shifting tastes of the fans than any change in the stars. So Graham can still perform to the satisfaction of Park in Korea and the generals in Brazil.

Religious News ServiEc The banality of Graham’s intellect can take one’s breath away. Frady got HOW WELL I KNOW HIM his cool analysis of Nixon’s fall: “I think there was definitely demon power in- 1955: “I disagree with those who say Mr. Nixon is not sincere. I believe volved. He took all those sleeping pills him to be most sincere, and like President Eisenhower, he is a splendid that would give, him a low in the morn- church man .” ing and a high in the evening, you know. 1959: “Mr.Nixon is probably the best-trained man for President in Amer- And all through history, drugs and ican history. and he is certainly every inch a Christian gentleman.” demons have gone together ....” 1964: “I know that he is a devout person and a man of high principles, with Maybe a bit gullible at times, Frady a profound philosophy of government.” holds a straight face as Graham reports 1968: “He has a great sense of moral integrity. I have never seen any that he cried on reading Nixon’s profan- indication of, or agreed with, the label that his enemies have given him of ities in the transcripts. If Graham in- ‘Tricky Dick.’ In the years I’ve known him, he’s never given any indication of being tricky.” deed shed tears, they may have been 1969: “I have known him for many years and, after many conversations, I tears of joy for such a godsend. At a am convinced his greatest concern is that America have a moral and spiritual time when he desperately needed to say renewal.” something, the expletives gave him a 1971: “I remember once I made a suggestion to him. He looked me in the heavenly chance to moralize without eye and said, ‘Billy, that wouldn’t be moral.’ At that moment, he was the confronting anything substantive. preacher and I was the sinner.” Sympathizers indulgently suppose 1972: “I know the President as well as anyone outside his immediate that Graham is naive and lets himself be family. I have known him since nineteen-fifty, and I have great confidence in used. Frady shows us how Graham his personal honesty. I voted for him because I know what he’s made of. yearns to be used, and how his deliber- “Kennedy was no intellectual-I mean, he was written up by the Eastern press as an intellectual because he agreed with the Eastern Establishment. ately willed naivete makes him “a para- But Nixon is a true intellectual. and he is a student, particularly a student of ble of American righteousness.” Cold to history. In that respect, he’s a DeGaulle type.” suggestions that he get seminary train- 1973: “I have known him a long time, and he has a very strong sense of ing, Graham learned early and well that integrity.” mass evangelism went faster when he 1974: “What comes through in these tapes is not the man I have known for avoided complex thoughts and just many years.” preached a straight fundamentalist Bi- 1975: “He’s suffered a lot, but religiously he has grown.” ble. He grins and acknowledges that he 1976: “I understand how there’s a piece that’s come out about him at some cannot explain all the contradictions. dinner party not long ago, drinking and using profanity and all those things like that again. I haven’t seen it yet, but-. 1 don’t understand it. The last But what he can do is refuse to think several times I’ve seen him, I thought he-I mean, I really had the feeling about them and assure others that they, he’s gotten over all that. But this thing now that’s just come out, if it’s too, can get the blessing without having true-.” to wrestle. 1977: “I wasn’t really one of his confidants, either to have a game of golf or Similarly with American righteous- to sit down and have a serious discussion. I didn’t really move at the level with ness. Graham cannot explain all the Nixon that the press thought J did.” deeds that make some people question, but he can pass over them so lightly that 57 his followers keep their minds at ease. If The kingdom of Graham’s highest more seriously, Graham’s status means Mylai threatens our complacency, he ambition, Frady shows, is not money or he got his information on King direct quickly trivializes it with the observa- pleasure or power, but popularity. And from J. Edgar Hoover, on Vietnam tion that all have had their Mylais in the this he has gained beyond measure by from General Westmoreland. And he thoughtless word or deed. Graham can his gift for sensing what people want to cannot doubt Authority. preach all night about God’s judgment hear and his eagerness to give them, Using a technique in some disrepute, on America and never speak a line that especially the better sort, what they Frady often lets critics of Graham get might annoy the most super of patriots want. Like other celebrities, Graham their licks in without being identified. or endanger his welcome at the White may find his fame a nuisance at times. But one quote is too good to ignore: House. Thus a minister who even now After a TV appearance, a pack of fans “What I want to know is, how can a remains unable to voice a moral judg- come running up before he can make his man spend thirty years preaching the ment on the Vietnam war or the Nixon escape: “Dr. Graham, do you think this gospel, and with maybe only two or presidency can beacclaimed by John Con- generation will see the Second Com- three exceptions, not have one mayor, nally as “the conscience of America.” ing?” Verily. he has his reward. But one governor, one banker, one chairman He is not a conscience speaking to the nation, but a reflection of the conscience operative in Connally’s America. UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS Graham followers may hear about A Comparative and Joumidof billions of their tax dollars going to the Intemadonid CIA every year, but they certainly don’t the Sodid Sciences, Philosophv and Law want to hear about their use. America’s moral superiority to nations that spy EDITOR IN CHIEF:Richard Pierre Claude and do other nasty things might seem Professor of Government and Politics,University of Maryland weaker if they thought about Ameri- SELECTED ARTICLES SCHEDULED TO APPEAR IN VOLUME 1 cans spying, bribing, overthrowing gov- SYMPOSIUM: Huamn Rightrand US. Foreign Policy ernments, planning assassinations, and Patricie M. Derisn. Assistant Secretars of Statefor Human Rights- and Humanitarian Mairs-Humk Rights and Americ-anPoreign Policy teaching dictators the methodology of Donald M. Fnrcr, Congressman. rnd John P. Salzbcrg, StqBConsullant, House Committee torture. In The Powers That Be David on International Relations-Foreign Policy and Effective Strategies for Human Righls Halberstam reports that in 1965, when Cbrislion Bay. Universiry of Toronto-A Human Rights Approach to Transnational Politics Richard A. MclPnwn, Kenyon College-Human Rights and the American Withdrawal from CBS showed a film of Marines destroy- the ILO ing a Vietnamese village and the villag- SYMPOSIUM: Human Rfghtr and chc Third Wodd ers, it got hit with frenzied phone calls Humt Hannum, Institute of International Law and Economic Development-The Butare Colloquium on Human Rights and Economic Development in Francophone Africa from the enraged saying Americans Marshall Carter rad Otwin Marenla, Ohio University-Human Rights in the Nigerian don’t do such things and how dare CBS Context: A Case Study and Discussion of the Nigerian Police show Americans doing such things. One Robert E. Goodla, University ofEssex-The Development-Rights Trade-Off: Some Unwarranted Economic and Political Assumptions of the calls came from a close friend of Richard Falk, Prinreron Universiry-Comparative Protection of Human Rights in Capitalist and Graham’s, the president of the United Socialist Third World Countries States. As in some other con+-oversies, Adamentie Pollis, New School for Social Research-Cyprus: Nationalism vs. Human Rights ARTICLES there was no danger of leaking LLrets*- to Abdul Ash Said. American Universiry-Precept and Practice of Human Rights in Islam the Vietnamese, who knew quite well Clovis C. Morrisson, Norrh Texas Srure Universiry-The European Human Rights Convention what they were enduring. But Johnson as a Functional Enterprise James F. Rosa, University of Pennsylvania-A Natural Rights Basis for Substantive Due worried that Americans might not ex- Process of Law ploit their power to the fullest unless David Ko~IcwIW,Benedictine College-Human Rights Protests in the USSR: Statistical they remained free of inner reservations Trends Stephen F. Sznbo. Georgetown University-( 1) Social Perspectives and Suppon for Human about their own righteousness, and Rights in West Germany and (2) Contemporary French Orientations Toward Economic and about the interests they were serving. Political Dimensions of Human Rights (PmOne and Two of a four part. four counlry series) David P. Fomythe, University of Nebraska and Laurie S. Wiseberg. Human Rights Internet- Johnson needed an Amaziah to warn, Human Rights and International Organization: The Politics of Protection “Prophesy not again any more at Be- Lamnee Ward Beer, Universiry of Colorado-A Review Essay on Recent Human Rights thel, for it is the king’s chapel.” Meet- .------*------Literature in Japan ing the need, Graham would step for- ORDER ward with a rebuke when Martin Luth- BLANK er King, Jr., spoke against the war. To: Earl M.Coleman Enterprises, Inc. P.O. Box 143, Pine Plains, N.Y. 12567 Please enter my subscription(s) to Universal Human Righfs as follows: Later, as people asked Graham to exert 0 Individual SubSWiptiOns @ $19.50 each Lndividullr mun rend check or money order with heir order his influence with Nixon and counsel (no cash pkrre). lndn’idull rubVriplim will be rcccpced only on ordcn sen1 Io heddnun‘. 0 Institutional Subscriptions @ $39.50 each restraint, he explained that he was a 0 Please bill me (Institutions only) PO No. New Testament evangelist, not an Old Testament prophet. But luckily, where- as New Testament evangelists have of- ten been run out of town, the well-to-do in cities across the nation compete for a chance to finance the Graham “cru- sades.” of the board, one president of a Cham- had we been a nation that rewarded The author’s religious perspective is ber of Commerce, one Defense Depart- different behavior. Amaziah has no informed by Niebuhr. Emphasis on the . ment official, one political party chair- binding ties to any political slant. If the tragic element in human existence, the man-not one!-speak a single ill word king says “war on poverty,” Amaziah partial nature of solutions to problems, against him. You ask me if there’s will say “war on poverty.” If the king and the possibility of living with ambi- anything finally tragic about Graham in says “exit cold war; enter ditente,” guity and unresolved problems are in- all this? Lord knows, it’s tragic.” Amaziah will say “exit cold war; enter sights Niebuhr stressed again and again. d6tente.” Like a mirror, he only shows Thompson speaks clearly as one in- It must be admitted that the nation as us what we are. If America ever devel- formed by Christian faith and back- a whole must share responsibility for ops a better conscience, Graham will be ground as well as by experience in inter- what Graham (and Nixon) became. We the first to pick it up on his radar and national affairs. Absolutists of all varie- would have gotten different behavior proclaim it, without compromise.wi ties will be unhappy with the book. The pacifist, the pragmatist, the cynic, the militarist will all find much to criticize. The position Thompson takes is diffi- cult. He calls for a wrestling with the Ethics, Functionalism, and Power issues, a willingness to leave some prob- lems unresolved, an open mind about in International Politics differing points of view, and above all a humility before life’s perplexities. It is by Kenneth W. Thompson easier to be doctrinaire and bring to (Louisiana State University Press; xi 170 pp.; $10.95) + tough problems some quick solution. But Thompson is concerned about the long view, the “moral” solution. Sidney A. Rand In speaking of the rapid changes in the world, the author writes: “There is The author has long been concerned and school ourselves in the ancient no such thing as one objective response about moral issues related to statecraft tradition of moral reasoning; 2) What- to change, for each of us responds from and diplomacy; this volume builds on ever our satisfaction with general prin- the ground on which we stand.” On the those interests and moves several issues ciples and truths, we should understand inevitability of a concern for values: into sharp focus. At first impression the that values become powerful only in “Man’s problems are too overwhelming, title seems too ambitious. Such large context; and 3) Where higher truths are his perplexities too unsettling, and the and profound issues seem to require involved, it is in their ordering character burden of his choices too oppressive for more than these few pages. One sus- that they serve mankind, in their plac- him not to seek meaning where he can pects Thompson would agree-the ing of the practical and immediate in find it.” And words that echo a lesson preface describes the book as a “first tension with the ideal always lying learned by many recently: “The 1960’s step” in an effort to deal “somewhat beyond human reach.” In the epilogue and 1970’s have taught ...that responsi- more critically [than some other recent Thompson acknowledges the influences bility must be the handmaiden of free- attempts] with the main currents of that mark the work, notably those of dom.” international thought.” In that, the Hans J. Morgenthau and Reinhold Nie- Thompson refers more than once to book succeeds. buhr. his being reared in a parsonage, to the Thompson is Robert Kent Gooch The first chapter is on the subject of pioneers who settled the prairies of the Professor of Government and Foreign values, the second on “ethics in war and Middle West, to his mother who taught Affairs at the University of Virginia and peace,” the third on “functionalism and by her example much of the basic sense director of the White Burkett Miller world order,” and the fourth on “the of values and commitment that Thomp- Center for Public Affairs. Until recent- problems of power, nationalism and the son holds. It is refreshing to observe ly he was vice president of the Rocke- future.” In fairly broad strokes the that a man of Thompson’s scholarly feller Foundation, with responsibilities author spells out his position on each ability and worldly-wise approach still for programs in international coopera- topic. The reader is left to fill in the finds at the core of his being the marks tion in agriculture, education, and details, but the basic assumptions are of a heritage that many would count health. His overriding concern is with clear: the need for consideration of pass&. With perfect openness he owns values where he, along with others, morality and values, the impossibility of his past. More than that, he claims it is senses a crisis. The book abounds in an exclusively “idealist” or “realist” the past that has molded almost all of straightforward, even categorical, state- position on international issues, and the us. and seems to recommend that as a ments about the inevitability of moral root problem of pride on the part of nation and a people we reclaim it and concerns and the possibility of dealing strong nations such as the United live by its precepts. In short, there is with them. “If there is a way out of the States. He emphasizes that pride too piety here. It is a piety that never present impasse-and no one reading easily becomes the stance out of which a becomes maudlin, but communicates history can be sanguine that historical nation’s relationships with other nations strength. This is a book one commends trends are easily reversed-it is visible Row, with the result that a wise or prac- to those most involved in making deci- along the lines marked out by three tical solution to problems becomes im- sions in international affairs. It both propositions: 1) We need to rediscover possible. haunts and inspires.