May 1st, 1993 marks the 60th anniversary of the publication of A Humanist Manifesto, which was published in the May-June, 1933 issue of The New Humanist, Edwin Wilson, editor.

Among the books in the collection which Ed Wilson gave to the Chapter was the May-June, 1953 issue of The Humanist, successor to The New Humanist. Edwin Wilson, who was editor of both magazines and at that time the executive-director of the American Humanist Association, published in that 1953 issue a Symposium titled "The Humanist Manifesto, Twenty Years Later." In his preface to that article, he states:

"This present re-appraisal is a continuation of the constant effort to keep Humanism a dynamic movement. Humanists do not look back to a faith delivered once and for all time at a particular moment or during a particular period in history. They rather look forward to a constantly growing synthesis produced by the interaction of many minds relating the increasing discoveries of science to human fulfillment."

Following this introduction, the Manifesto was reprinted, followed by observations from a number of the then living signers. I thought it would be interesting to include some of those comments in this issue of The Utah Humanist, also begun by Ed Wilson.

I include the historical notes of Raymond Bragg, one of the original four editors, which tell of the history of the composition of the Manifesto and the responses to the original circulation which led to its first publication. Most of the names cited are not recognized today, and were probably Unitarian Ministers. (Where possible, I have included their identity.) In reading the notes of Raymond Bragg and the l953 responses of the original signers, I was struck by a similarity between what they wrote in 1933, as reported by Bragg, and what they said in 1953. In the main, their comments concerned words and phrases which they thought should be different, and criticisms of content which reflected more a change in perspective than outright disagreement in philosophy. It was refreshing to read the 1953 comments of Robert Morss Lovett of Chicago, who wrote: "I think the Manifesto is fine. I would change nothing." Therefore, I include the statements which make the most positive contribution to the understanding of this remarkable document.

I also include the substantive notes from John Herman Randall, Jr., because of his status as Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University and author of "THE MAKING OF THE MODERN MIND, A Survey of the Intellectual Background of the Present Age", (Columbia University Press, 1926, 1940). This text has been used by many Universities, and was part of my course of study at George Washington University in 1953. The last quote is from the lead article of the Symposium written by Roy Wood Sellars, who composed the first draft of the Manifesto.

AN HISTORICAL NOTE, by Raymond B. Bragg, Kansas City, Missouri

"For a year or more prior to the publication of the Humanist Manifesto in May, 1933, there was occasional talk of its preparation. In January of that year the talk reached the project stage. The Chicago group, once it had agreed on publication, realized the difficulties of composition by committee. Unanimously it was agreed to ask Roy Wood Sellars (Professor of Philosophy, University of Michigan) to prepare a draft that the undertaking might by launched.

"The frame of the Manifesto as finally published is essentially what it was when received in the first draft. The correspondence, however, makes clear the extent of revision in terminology and order of the theses.

"The committee--Reese, Wilson, Haydon, Bragg--spent unnumbered hours in successive sessions culling, refining, reordering the statement. Then it was returned to Sellars whose rejoinder was in effect: 'You fellows have done a good job.'

"The first circulation to potential signers was then prepared. The resulting correspondence was torrential. Some of the commentators viewed with alarm a statement so haphazard, while others found in it only the clearest of phrase and thought. Several wrote detailed comment; a few revised the statement (and its meaning) point by point. A half dozen lost their copies and made their replies out of faulty memory; the cautious asked for an additional copy.

"The editorial task at this time emerged as a full time undertaking. While no thought was given to abandonment of the project, despite discouragement by a few honored skeptics, it was necessary to deal fairly with every thoughtful suggestion. There was consideration given to postponement until approval was close to unanimous. The prospect was suggested that in a document involving the thought of thirty or forty or fifty minds we could expect no final, detailed formulation satisfactory to all. We could hope only for approximations, not ultimates.

"How many editorial sessions were held in drawing up the final draft, I do not recall. They were not few and they were lengthy. In the latter part of March the draft was mailed to about fifty individuals and each was requested to authorize the use of his signature. April 10 was the deadline.

"There was another flood of mail in response to this 'final' request. A few sought postponement; and a few abandonment. The first response, I recall, was from John Dewey who ignored the form provided for signature authorization and signed his name to the mimeographed copy of the Manifesto. Robert Morss Lovett(Teacher, Editor) wrote, 'I am proud to be able to sign the Humanist Manifesto, so sound in thought and admirable in expression.' One dissenter, on the other hand, wondered at the lack of form and still further at the complete ignoring of literary values. His substitute manifesto is available in the file of The New Humanist (now The Humanist).

"Such is the trial of preparing a statement meant to express a consensus of many minds. There were light responses, and some made no response at all. F.C.S. Schiller(Philosopher) noted that 'your Manifesto has 15 articles, 50% more that the Ten Commandments, and one more even than President Wilson's Fourteen Points,' Harlow Shapley(Astronomer) stated that excursions of other scientists out of the realm of science had embarrassed him---he would forego participation in religion.

"There were a few men who refused to sign and stated their reasons. Some of these reasons were published in the May (1933) issue of The New Humanist, the issue in which the Manifesto first appeared, Harold Buschman found in the document the exclusiveness of a creed rather than a new inclusiveness. John Haynes Holmes objected to the spirit of the Sixth Thesis for, 'You are arbitrarily ruling out from our thought something about which you know absolutely nothing at all.' Max C. Otto(Professor of Philosophy, University of Wisconsin) expressed his fear for the Manifesto as 'one of those theoretical gestures which leave with some persons a feeling that something has been done when all that has been done is that something has been said.' James H. Hart was reluctant to go on record about 'continuous processes.' Arthur E. Morgan wrote that his hesitance to sign grew 'out of the questions of emphasis rather than of explicit disagreement...Humanists are not, he said, 'characteristically strong in faith, hope and love.'

"The Manifesto had a wide press coverage. Time, The Literary Digest, The Christian Century, the Associated Press, religious journals representing a variety of denominations sent it into every corner of the country. The late Clarence Skinner thought it might some day rank with Luther's more extensive theses. Catholic journals presented it as the logical outcome of the centuries of Protestant thought.

"The immediate aims were achieved: to stir up discussion, to prompt debate. The editorial note accompanying the publication was explicit on that score. And, for the greater part, that spirit was carried in the reporting of the document.

"To revise the Manifesto, in my estimation, would be misfortune. If Humanists in 1953 or 1954 want to restate the position, let it be done in today's terms. Twenty years ago the editors were careful in their designation. The document of 1933 was called A Humanist Manifesto. Each living signer has pondered many meanings since that time. Nonetheless, in 1933 he stood by what he signed, whatever qualifications he may have made in his own mind or for the informal record.

"A new formulation may be in order. May the vigorous undertake it!"

Comment by J. H. Randall, Jr., New York City

"I originally signed the Manifesto in a spirit of general agreement, without quibbling over details. My own philosophical views I have long preferred to call naturalistic rather than humanistic, and while for the purposes of stating a religious position the differences are minor, they are there. Thus in Point Five, while there certainly has been discovered no 'cosmic guarantee of human values' I have always wished that there were some emphasis on the fact that such values are and must be rooted in the natural conditions of human life. Religion has always seemed to me truncated when focused too narrowly upon man alone, without a sense of the encompassing presence of the nature that has generated man and his concerns.

"On two points on which the Manifesto failed to satisfy me I have come to feel more strongly. First, there is lacking any expression of a tragic sense of life. 'Joy in living' (Point 12) is not the only attitude religion must foster. There is also such a thing as humility. The inevitabilities of frustration and the evil that men necessarily do must be seen in proper perspective, but they must be seen. There is no reason why supernaturalism should be allowed a monopoly on the religious expression of this tragic sense. Humanism can do it more effectively because more sanely. Thus, in the last paragraph, 'man has within himself the power for the achievement of the world of his dreams,' has always sounded insensitive and brash. Man has the power to work toward it, and there is no other power. But...

"Secondly, there is insufficient recognition of the need of imagination in religion, and of the role of religious symbols. The traditional Christian symbols are no longer adequate---though they seem much more relevant to present-day experience than to that of a generation ago. But no religion that tries to get along without any imaginative embodiment of its basic attitudes and values is likely to attract many. Humanism should face seriously the very difficult problem of creating more adequate imaginative symbols. It should at least recognize the need even if it cannot yet satisfy it.

"Both these points demand much further elaboration, especially the second, to which I have given a great deal of attention and thought. But I think the problems suggested will be sufficiently indicated to any one who has lived through the last twenty years with some sensitive attention to the direction of religious feeling and thought."

NATURALISTIC HUMANISM: A Framework for Belief and Values,

by Roy Wood Sellars (Professor of Philosophy, University of Michigan).

"It goes without saying in detail that I have read and thought much about religion in the abstract and in the concrete since those already far-off days when I first sought to make explicit to myself and others the perspective called religious Humanism...

"Much has happened since the formulation and the publication of the Humanist Manifesto. Under able and vigorous leadership in this and other countries, Humanism has become an international stream of thought and commitment aiming at a basic revision of the human outlook and a revaluation of values. I still think the adjective, naturalistic, best symbolizes the perspective of religious Humanism since it calls attention to its rejection of supernaturalism. Modern naturalism is, inevitably, evolutionary in its premises. And I can quite understand why the distinguished English biologist, Julian Huxley, selects this latter term and speaks of evolutionary Humanism. As I see it, it is all a matter of accent. The essential thing is to have a common framework.

"Is Humanism a religion, perhaps, the next great religion? Yes, it must be so characterized, for the word, religion, has become a symbol for answers to that basic interrogation of human life, the human situation, and the nature of things---which every human being, in some degree and in some fashion, makes. What can I expect from life? What kind of universe is it? Is there, as some say, a friendly Providence in control of it? And, if not, what then? The universe of discourse of religion consists of such questions, and the answers relevant to them. Christian theism and Vedantic mysticism are but historic frameworks in relation to which answers have in the past been given to these poignant and persistent queries. But there is nothing sacrosanct and self-certifying about these frameworks. What Humanism represents is the awareness of another framework, more consonant with wider and deeper knowledge about man and his world. The Humanist movement is engaged in formulating answers, with what wisdom it can achieve, to these basic questions.

"It would be absurd to expect complete novelty in either framework or answers. Many people throughout the ages have had a shrewd suspicion that established beliefs were insecurely based. Humanism at its best represents a growth and a maturing of its perspective...I fear that the orthodox idea of religion is something static and given---once for all. The Humanist thinks of his answers as responsible ones, that is, responsible to the best thought and knowledge on the subjects involved. He [they are] is always ready for honest debate...

"...I want to contrast the perspective of Humanism with that of traditional rationalism...There is no Humanist who does not appreciate with respect and admiration the moving story of the Gospels. Seen as one of the culminations of Judaism in the setting of the Roman Empire, it speaks to us of nobility of soul, human love, pity, and comradeship; and this among everyday people fired by moral and religious leadership of high quality. The heroic and the earthly touch meet, and mingle; and so it has been ever since.

"What have the intervening centuries made possible? The gradual disentangling of ethical principle and example from both the early framework of belief and the later ecclesiastical development of power and dogma which supervened. But the notes of love and self-sacrifice remain as perennial chords. This also, is greatly human.

"The older rationalism was on the defensive. And so it expressed itself too often in negative terms: not this; not that; not God; not revelation; not personal immortality. What Humanism signified was a shift from negation to construction. There came a time when naturalism no longer felt on the defensive. Rather, supernaturalism began, it its eyes, to grow dim and fade out despite all the blustering and rationalizations of its advocates.

"Now this was a change in dominance, long prepared in both philosophy and science, and beginning to manifest itself in everyday life. To use a homely expression, the shoe was on the other foot. Instead of feeling that he had to disprove the existence of a God, special revelation and the general mystique of a supernatural realm, the naturalist simply began with good reason to feel that the job of proving these pivotal assumptions rested with the supernaturalist. And he knew that both theologians and philosophers in the past had never been able to develop satisfactory proofs. In short, the strategic situation had changed.

"As I conceived it, then, the Humanist Manifesto expressed this change of dominance as a sort of declaration of independence. And I imagine that Wilson and the others who supplied the comments and suggestions which went into its making had something similar in mind. Naturalism was maturing into a humanistic phase. The old supernaturalistic framework no longer possessed its former intrinsic prestige. There were now two competing frames of reference for both belief and values. The time had come for a reassessment all along the line. If possible, a friendly debate was indicated. Let the premises or theses be stated and the arguments, pro and con, be entered. To the best of our knowledge, what kind of a universe are we in? What can man [humankind] expect? Is man [humankind] now his [its] own worst enemy? What are the complexities of human nature? In what fashion are these tied in with cultural arrangements? What can be done about it?

"I have recently read over the fifteen theses. On the whole, I think they sketch the essentials of a framework which is both naturalistic and humanistic. There is, of course, nothing sacrosanct about any of the formulations. New conditions will bring new emphases...Every framework needs clarifications and a rational grounding if it is to function satisfactorily. And this process is, as we all know, well under way both here and abroad. It will continue. The annihilation of civilization alone could stop it as well as all progress."

--Bob Green

(Note: A second Humanist Manifesto was published in 1973, but that is another story.)