Adlai Stevenson Interview
1968 · Spoken Word SW-9406 · USA
- Artist
- Adlai Stevenson
- Title
- Adlai Stevenson Interview
- Release
- The Foreign Policy of the United States
- Year
- 1968
- Label
- Spoken Word # SW-9406
- Format
- LP · Album
- Language
- English
- Country
- USA
- Genre
- Spoken Word · Speech
- Primary theme
- Peace, Protest & Anti-War
Annotation
Democratic Party presidential candidate in 1952 and 1956 - losing both times to Eisenhower. Later, he represented the US at the UN. This spoken word record featured Stevenson's views on US foreign policy in the early 1960s and the Vietnam War (in conversation with BBC correspondent Thomas Barman on 14 July 1965, the day he died of a sudden heart attack in London). Stevenson publicly backed Johnson's Vietnam War policy of containment, although privately, like many member of the left-wing of the Democratic Party, he believed the US should negotiate with North Vietnam at the UN. His discussion with Barman: "Adlai Stevenson Interview" can be listened to at the UN Audio Library online.1 Sources1unmultimedia.org (archived copy)↩
Annotation by Justin A. Brummer
Lyrics
English: Barman: / "The people in this country are terribly upset about the developments in Vietnam...Now you have been described as a leader of the American liberals, what are your reactions?" / Stevenson: / "My hope in Vietnam, is that resistance there, may establish the fact that changes in Asia are not to be precipitated by outside force. This was the point of the Korean war, this is the point of the conflict of Vietnam. I believe that Asia will be more stable in the future if the outcome is the same in both. That is to say a negotiated line...and a negotiated peace" / Barman: / "Is there a solution to this through the United Nations?" / Stevenson: / "We would all like to see the United Nation play a bigger part in Vietnam...the Security Council called upon the North Vietnamese to come to the table to make known their position but they refused to come. China is doing all that it can to discredit the United Nations...they refuse to receive the Secretary General". / Barman: / "Have there ever been any opportunities in the last two to three years for some contact?" / Stevenson: / "Lately...they have rejected every overture, and we have made some 14. The United States, together with the United Kingdom, together with other government in the search for peace with North Vietnan, and China, in an effort to bring about peace talks, one after another they have been rejected". / Barman: / "This military operation will have to go on to persuade them to negotiate?" / Stevenson: /…
About the artist
Interview with BBC journalist Thomas Barman