Fraternity-Testvériség, 1956 (34. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1956-12-01 / 12. szám

FRATERNITY

9

IUE SIGN REPROACH TO SOVIETS

Guests leaving the Soviet Embassy’s lavish party held November 7 to celebrate the 39th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution were met with a stark reminder of Russia’s brutal suppression of the Hungarian people’s fighting bid for freedom.

Facing the Soviet Embassy’s departing guests was a gigantic white cross, six stories high, formed by illuminated windows of the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers headquarters building directly across the street from the Embassy.

Beneath the cross was a giant sign reading:

IN REVERENT MEMORY OF THE HUNGARIAN WORKERS WHO DIED FOR FREEDOM

Soviet attaches protested to police, but A1 Hartnett, IUE Secretary- Treasurer, refused to remove the sign.

Earlier, IUE President Carey had sent a scorching letter to the Soviet Ambassador, accusing the Russians of genocide comparable to the hated Nazis.

George E. K. Borshy, President-elect of the Hungarian Reformed Federation of America, sent the following telegram addressed to A1 Hartnett, IUE Secretary-Treasurer:

"In behalf of the Hungarian Reformed Federation of America — a fraternal benefit society working among Hungarian Americans — I congratulate and thank you for the impressive demonstration showing your sympathy toward Hungarian workers who sacrificed their lives for freedom, and reminding the guests of the Soviet Embassy of the most cynical hypocrisy of human history."

IS THERE AN OBLIGATION?*

A reader has written to ask us what our “obligation” to the Hungarians is. “What have they done to obligate us?” he wants to know.

We do not think we can answer him in terms that will satisfy him, because it is a fact that we have no treaty with these people which obliges us to go to their aid. Nor did we ask their men to rise up as one man, with bare hands, against tyranny. We did not suggest that their youth, ignoring their Soviet indoctrination, should engage in individual acts of heart-stopping heroism against their overlords. We did not tell their women to march, bearing flowers, up to Russian guns and taunt their oppressors. We did not direct them to gather up their chil* An Editorial, Evening Star, Dec. 7, 1956