Century of the Common Man

Henry Wallace
May 8, 1942

In response to the article published in Life magazine by Life publisher Henry Luce pushing a plan by the Council on Foreign Relations for a post-war American Empire, Vice President Henry Wallace issued a rejoinder to Luce with a speech entitled “The Century of the Common Man.”

“No nation will have the God-given right to exploit other nations. Older nations will have the privilege to help younger nations get started on the path to industrialization, but there must be neither military nor economic imperialism. The methods of the nineteenth century will not work in the people's century which is now about to begin. India, China, and Latin America have a tremendous stake in the people's century. […] There can be no privileged peoples. We ourselves in the United States are no more a master race than the Nazis. And we cannot perpetuate economic warfare without planting the seeds of military warfare. We must use our power at the peace table to build an economic peace that is just, charitable and enduring.”