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Principled Wartime Conformity

Will Wilkinson seems amazed that the leaders of “organized Protestantism” in 1942 espoused very internationalist and collectivist political views. First, I’m not sure why this is so remarkable. As Wilkinson partly acknowledges, this is not that radically different when compared to the politics of most mainline Protestant denominations and most member churches of the WCC […]

Will Wilkinson seems amazed that the leaders of “organized Protestantism” in 1942 espoused very internationalist and collectivist political views. First, I’m not sure why this is so remarkable. As Wilkinson partly acknowledges, this is not that radically different when compared to the politics of most mainline Protestant denominations and most member churches of the WCC today. For another thing, the positions reported in the Time article conformed to all of the views that good liberal Christians were supposed to have after U.S. entry into the war. It’s all there: the wartime vilification of nationalist causes, confidence in economic regimentation and collective organization, and support for strong international institutions in keeping with the conventional internationalist piety that the U.S. had contributed to the breakdown in global order because of our alleged “isolationism.” In other words, the leaders of “organized Protestantism” expressed their enthusiasm for what happened to be the prevailing ideology of the day and succumbed with amazing speed to the official propaganda campaign of the moment. Normally, this is the sort of thing that would get Wilkinson very agitated, but apparently not when it involves “principled, cosmopolitan globalism.”

It’s a generous assumption that the cosmopolitan globalism in question was, in fact, “principled” and not an embarrassing expression of wartime conformism. What’s even more strange is that Wilkinson regrets that this 1942 vision of regimentation, collectivism and global government did not come to pass. Had the conference attendees had their way, the U.N. would have had “the power of final judgment in controversies between nations . . the regulation of international trade and population movements among nations,” and the world government they imagined would be run by “an international legislative body, an international court with adequate jurisdiction, international-administrative bodies with necessary powers, and adequate international police forces and provision for enforcing its worldwide economic authority.” Whatever else one wants to say about that, it would have involved an overall reduction in economic liberty and self-government.

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