their lives, a middle ground betweennindividual rights and material interestnon the one side, and religious andnsocial obligations on the other. Americansnhave chosen heroes who seem, innsome way, to have risen above thencontradiction between material rightnand moral duty.nSignificantiy, Diggins’ saintly Lincolnnillustrates his view of Americannheroes as bridges between self-interestnand duty. His Lincoln has nothing inncommon with the political realists whonplaced American Union above thenemancipation of Negro slaves, who inn1863 backed Tsarist Russia in crushingnan uprising of its Polish subjects, whonsuspended the right of due process innjailing opponents of the war, and whonauthorized the devastation of the insurgentnSouth. Although Lincoln’snsingle-minded, relentless pursuit ofnwartime objectives may have beennnecessary to preserve the Union at anynprice, I for one am tired of attempts tonturn America’s Bismarck into a VictoriannChrist. Lincoln’s religious rhetoricnmay help to explain the image of himnleft to posterity. Calvinist ideas of guiltnand redemption were present in Lincoln’snpolitical statements, even whennhe spoke of the secular, individualnrights which the Declaration supposedlynguaranteed to whites and Blacksnalike. Diggins correctiy notes that Lincoln’snappeal to biblical themesnallowed him to give the Declaration anbroadness of meaning that would havenshocked its author, Thomas Jefferson.nDiggins looks for points of intersectionnbetween Calvinist religious valuesnand the pursuit of wealth in Americannculture. He insists (at least in somenplaces) that the recourse to moral argumentsnon the part of practitioners ofnthe work ethic has not been a merenrationalization for the pursuit ofnwealth. Americans have felt a genuine,npersistent need to harmonize thenProtestant biblical heritage with theirnbelief in material things. Diggins doesnnot claim that the American preoccupationnwith accumulating wealth resultednfrom Protestant moral concepts.nRather, he stresses the American people’snattempt to justify living in twoncultures: one teaching original sin andnthe need for redemption; and the othernglorifying material advancement in anland of opportunity.nDiggins sees “the dignity of work” asna concept by which Americans haventried to harmonize the two cultures.nNineteenth-century Americans couldnonly justify the accumulation ofnwealth as the fruit of diligent toil freelyngiven. The redemptive value of freenlabor is a theme sympathetically treatednin 19th-century American lettersnand religious homilies. Those whonexpounded and absorbed this beliefnwere usually critical of two other socialnideals: a plantation system built onnservile labor; and the collectivizedneconomy that the socialists preached.nj Announcing . . .n1 A Major Work onn: Genocide & Terrorism inn Ukraine:nDiggins is most informative in tracingnthe emergence of an Americanncivil religion, based on the work ethicnand wedding Calvinism to a culture ofnaffluence. Unfortunately, he is notnconsistent. His own anticapitalist biasnprevents him from believing that thenAmerican middle class took its worknethic seriously. Although Diggins isnwilling to ascribe sincerity to politicalnand artistic exponents of the dignity ofnfree labor, he resorts to Marxist methodsnin explaining why nonintellectualsnexpressed the same idea. Outside ofnHUMANnLIFE INnRUSSIAnDr Ewiild Ammonden• Ewald Ammende’s Human Life in Russia is the long unavailable history :n• of the “Hidden Holocaust” and the cover-up which prevented news of the In’. starvation of nearly 7,000,000 Ukrainians from being reported in the West •n• during 1931-1934. Ammende, a professional humanitarian whose career is ;n: markedly similar to that of Raoul Wallenberg a decade later, gathered eye- In: witness testimony on the Famine as a means of exposing the awful truth of •n• the genocide and terrorism then occurring in Ukraine. ;n• As such, his work is one of the earliest histories of the Gulag, wherein the |nI Archipelago consisted of an entire nation to be punished for its opposition •nI to totalitarianism. Human Life in Russia has long been unobtainable; we ;n• make it available with the hope that the lesson of the Ukrainian Famine will Jn: not be lost on our times. The book, 330 pages in a cloth binding and striking |n• jacket, is well illustrated and documented; it belongs in every collection of :nI books on the U.S.S.R. and Ukraine. |n; CLIP AND MAIL TO: In• John T. Zubal, Inc. — Publishers •nI 2969 West 25th Street – Cleveland, OH 44113 !nI Phone: 216-241-7640 Telex: 298256 ZUBAL UR In• Please send copv/copies of •n• Human Life in Russia to: •n! NAME: !nI .STREET AnnRFSS:nCITY/STATE/ZIP:n• Mv check in ihe amotmr of fSn.95 per cnpv^n• plus $1.85 postage per copy is enclosed.nI NOTE: Ohio residents must add .91 sales tax per copy.nI ORDERS SHIPPED THROUGHOUT THE U.S. BY U.P.S.n• SAME DAY PAYMENT IS RECEIVEDn; ORDERS TO OTHER COUNTRIES SENT BY POSTnnnAPRIL 1986/31n