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modern art and Communist art are opposite things. The only painting and sculpture permitted in Soviet Russia is thoroughly realistic in style, and is concerned solely with nationalistic propaganda. In fact, with the substitution of the single word "rightists" for "leftists," the following statement by Representative Dondero might have been issued from the Kremlin: "Leftists in art have succeeded in lowering, and are attempting to break down the standards to which artists of the past adhered - to be worthy of the calling of art."

In this same issue of the Congressional Record, Representative Dondero warmed up to an accusation which he expanded on May 17. The art critics in America, he implied, are predominantly Marxist, and have consistently praised and promoted artists of extreme left-wing political inclination. "It is not my purpose," he added, "to suggest that newspapers should clap censorship on their art critics, but I do say that, if this condition of over-emphasis and an attempt to glorify the vulgar, the distorted, and the perverted has come about due to neglect and lack of proper supervision, then it is high time that some of our newspapers start cleaning house in the smaller compartments of their organizations." And at this point let me quote from an excellent editorial by Peyton Boswell, editor of the Art Digest, which appeared in the June issue of that magazine. "Like hell Dondero doesn't want censorship! What else does he mean by 'proper supervision'? In other words, do as Hitler once did with 'degenerate' modern art and burned books, and as Stalin is now doing with the shipment of Zionist Jews to Siberia. You either write what the State demands under proper supervision or the State takes away from you, as a writer, your means of living by your profession."

Alfred Frankfurter, editor of Art News, has also protested editorially against Representative Dondero's crude and untenable attacks on modern artists. Indeed, almost the only encouraging factor in the current witch hunt is that it has united American art circles in protest as I have never seen them united before. Those of us who believe that freedom of expression is not a helpful condition but an absolute requirement of art must stand together against reactionary irresponsibility. "And let it be," according to the second book of Samuel, "when thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees, that then thou shalt bestir thyself: for then shall the Lord go out before thee, to smite the host of the Philistines." -JAMES THRALL SOBY.