To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

The quandary of the "democratic left" is not as bad as your editorial painted it.

On the national progressive scene there are new two organizations seeking the so-called "grass roots"--the Progressive Citizens of America, sponsored by such liberals as Henry A. Wallace and Fiorello H. LaGuardia; and Americans for Democratic Action, which has in its camp Mrs. Roosevelt's Harold Ickes, Chester Bowles, and Wilson Wyatt.

The PCA is composed of liberals who feel willing to work with Communists (even in the same organization). The Communist is willing to work ten times as much as are we liberals, the PCA liberal might say, and even though we disagree very much on final aims, we do agree on the necessity of working today for such things as full employment, better protection for minority races and religious, etc.--and so why not work with them?

The ADA liberal, on the other hand, would say: (1) to gain the support of the American people, the liberal movement must be "as pure as Caesar's wife: the masses of the American people don't like Communists and it is the pragmatic duty of the liberal to deter to this if he wishes to get anywhere at all: (2) from bitter experience, we (the ADA) can say that the Communist within the liberal organization is dangerous--he forces the liberal to keep one eyes on the "family silverware" even while the great liberal "battle at the gate" is raging.

So now there are two major progressive groups. And I think that from the point of view of the liberals in both camps, that that is the best possible way. It means---

1. Competition. Both groups are now out in search of members. To a large extent they will, in this, be in competition with each other. How can both win? How can either win over the other? The main factor will be accomplishment.

2. For the PCA members, "an out." The presence of a strictly-non-Communist ADA guarantees to individual PCA members that, should be Communists in the PCA camp ever get too tough to handle, there's always the ADA around, "which doesn't have such troubles."

My conclusion to all this? The quandary of the democratic left is not only not as bad as your editorial painted it, but, after looking objectively at the present situation, I can't help feeling that, the quandary is rapidly being solved. Respectively yours, W. M.--(Name withheld by request)