The Daily Alaska Empire

The doctrine of panhandling has been incorporated into a document entitled, "universal declaration of human rights," prepared by the United Nations under the Aegis of Eleanor Roosevelt. Should this declaration be ratified by the government of the United States, it would be the law of our land.

Also, it would place upon this country obligations and responsibilities beyond our capacity. The financing of some of these obligations would bleed us white and should anyone try to enforce these rules and regulations, we should be in permanent war.

Of course, the United Nations is only declaring. This is a proclamation of intentions; "a common standard of achievement. . ." To be kept "constantly in mind." There is not much harm in keeping this in mind, so long as it does not cost us money and send our sons all over the world enforcing these rights.

Take, for instance, Article 25: "( Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control."

Now that promises a great deal more than all the expenditures since the end of World War II have achieved. The British still have to go easy on eggs, and in this country, as a result of last year's blizzard, lamb chops have become prohibitive. On the basis of this guarantee, every Englishman is entitled to two eggs for breakfast, whether they exist or not, and I want my lamb chops, blizzard or no blizzard. What right has a blizzard to interfere with the intentions of the United Nations?

And look at Paragraph 2 of Article 25 of this declaration of good intentions: "(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection."

Is this an encouragement to all the young ladies of the world to have babies out of wedlock? By "social protection" is meant subsidies, state care, all that sort of thing. The United Nations apparently wants provision made in all countries for comfortable illegitimacy. When Hitler encouraged his storm troopers to increase population by the same method, public opinion was horrified at the reduction of the family to the mechanics of biology.

The defenders of the United Nations and of the progenitor of this declaration, Eleanor Roosevelt, will say that Hitler's proposal was based on bad intentions, but UN's is based on good intentions. That kind of reasoning has led us astray before: It is like making the distinction between good and bad dictators.

Intentions, I can know nothing about: They are in the conscience of those who intend. But encouragement to bastardy is a renunciation of the family as the elemental unit of a social system. It is destructive of the moral restraints which, while often irksome, alone preserve civilization.