TO ENSURE AXIS DEFEAT

Dominion, Volume 34, Issue 80, 28 December 1940, Page 9

TO ENSURE AXIS DEFEAT

Settled U.S. Policy Sought PRESIDENT’S PLAN Prominent People Show Approval

(By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright.) WASHINGTON, December 26. More than 150 prominent people have jointly telegraphed complete approval of President Roosevelt s plan to lend or lease armaments to Britain and have asked him to inform the nation “clearly and boldly of the possibilities of an English failure and the consequences for us, our children, and our children's children should Britain fail. We ask you to make it the settled policy of the United States to do everything necessary to ensure the defeat of the Axis and thus encourage here and everywhere resistance for the plausible but fatal arguments for appeasement.

"We ask you to tell us what we believe to be the truth that the war materials and military and naval strength we now have and the implements we can produce are enough to make the Axis defeat certain while Britain is on her feet fighting, but that with Britain down they are not enough and may not in the future be increased enough to hold the whole world at bay.” . • The signers comprise editors, lawyers, authors, actors, and educational, religious and Labour leaders. Among them are Mr. Hamilton Fish, the Re publican representative for New York, who was for long a leading isolationist ; Miss Dorothy Thompson, the famous columnist; the president of Columbia University, the former president of Yale University, and Mrs. Dwight Morrow, mother-in-law of Colonel Lindbergh. A general indication of what the President will say when he speaks in a nationwide broadcast on Sunday night was given by his secretary, Mr. Stephen Early, when he told reporters today: “I think the President will be very specific in what he says regarding aid to Britain.” Mr. Early added that Mr. Roosevelt would probably deal comprehensively with the Administration’s effort to speed up the production of war materials in the United States