For Us, the Living

by Robert A. Heinlein

  That night at dinner at the New Mayflower, Cathcart asked him what impressed him most about the Capitol. Perry replied that it was the Congressmen, and explained that they appeared to be a much more able body of men than was commonly reputed to be the case in 1939. Cathcart nodded.

  “That was probably the case,” he said. “If you got good elective officials in your day, it was a happy accident, better than you deserved.”

  “To what do you attribute the change?” asked Perry.

  “To a number of things. To my mind there is no single answer. The problem involved is the very heart of the political problem and has been plaguing philosophers for thousands of years. Plato and Confucius each took a crack at it and each missed it by a mile. Aesop stated it sardonically in the fable of the convention of the mice, when he inquired gently, ‘Who is to bell the cat?’. The present improvement over your period can, I think, be attributed to correcting a number of things which were obviously wrong without worrying too much about theory. In the first place all of our elective officials are well paid nowadays and most of them have full retirement. In the second place, every official makes a full statement of his personal finances on taking office, annually, and again on leaving office. In the third place, public service has gradually been built up as a career of honor, like the military and naval services in your day. A scholarship to the School of Social Science is as sought after as an appointment to West Point was in 1939. Most of our undersecretaries and executives of every sort are graduates. They are recruited for they have the same reputation for efficiency and incorruptability that your West Pointers and Annapolis men have always had.

  “Of course you can’t teach creative policy making in a school. The top men still come from everywhere. Our complete system of social security makes it possible for any man with a taste for it to enter politics, and several arbitrary changes in the code of customs have encouraged them to do so. Campaign funds and permissible types of campaigning are now restricted enormously, a degree of change comparable to the difference between your day and the elections at the beginning of the nineteenth century when a man announced his vote to a teller at the polls whereupon the favored candidate shook hands with him and gave him a drink of whiskey. Nowadays our object is to ensure that each voter has a chance to know the record, appearance and proposals of each candidate. They must use the franking privilege jointly. They must go on the air together, they must refrain from certain forms of emotional campaigning. The people are better able to judge than they were in 1939 because of the improvement in our educational methods. They are not as subject to word magic, not so easily spellbound.

  “Possibly the most important change that has improved the chances of obtaining honesty and efficiency in government was the extension of civil rights after the defeat of the Neo-Puritans. You will recall the new constitutional principle that forbade the state to pass laws forbidding citizens to commit acts which did not in fact damage other citizens. Well, that meant the end of the blue laws, and a grisly unconscious symbiosis between the underworld and the organized churches—for the greatest bulwark of the underworld were always the moral creeds of the churches. You still think that unlikely? Consider this: The churches had great political power. It was almost impossible to be elected to office if the churches disapproved. It is a matter of fact, easily checked, that every public leader of every corrupt political machine was invariably a prominent member of a large, powerful sect. He always contributed heavily to the church, especially to its charities. On the other hand every church stood publicly for honesty in government. At the same time they demanded of the government that there be suppressed all manner of acts, harmless in themselves, but offensive to the creeds of the churches. Churches and the clergy were usually willing to accept the word for the deed. Protestations of integrity, combined with tithing and psalm singing, plus a willingness to enact into law the prejudices of the churches, were usually all that the churches required of a candidate. On the other hand the gang leaders were hardened realists. They cared nothing about a candidate’s appearance of pious virtue if he could be depended on to protect from prosecution the gang that supported him. Furthermore they were anxious to have blue laws on the books as long as they were not enforced. Illicitness was the thing that made most of their stock in trade valuable, and they knew it. Where in your 1930’s was there a gang leader who urged repeal of the eighteenth amendment? The very blue laws they broke gave them a weapon to destroy competition, for the same machine which gave them protection could be used to destroy an enemy who did not own a piece of the local government. And so it went for years, in every large American city, the gangsters and the preachers, each for his own purpose, supported and elected the same candidates. It was inevitable, because the churches demanded of government things that government cannot or should not perform—things that come under the head of making a man be ‘good’ for the good of his soul, instead of interfering only to prevent him damaging another. The churches had a thousand rationalizations to prove that their nosey-parker interference was necessary for the welfare of all.

  “For example, Brown must be stopped from peddling pornography, because, if he does, he will harm the purchaser, Smith. But note that Smith is to be Saved from harm for the good of Smith’s soul, as defined by the churches. Sometimes the concatenation is very involved, but in every case you will find at the end the churches attempting to use the state to coerce the citizen into complying with a creed which the churches have been unsuccessful in persuading the citizen to accept without coercion. Wherever that occurs you have a condition which inevitably results in the breeding of a powerful underworld which will seize the local government, and frequently, through control of local political machines, seize state and national governments as well.

  “One is always asked, ‘What about the sweet innocent children? Are they to have no protection?’ Certainly not, but many of the things which were believed to be bad for children were bad only in the unventilated minds of the religious moralists. For example, we now realize that it is not bad for children to be used to naked human bodies—on the contrary it is very unhealthy for them not to be. We know that knowledge of the objective fact of bisexual procreation is not harmful to children—on the contrary if we satisfy their natural curiosity by telling them lies, we are building trouble for the future. But we do know that nicotine and alcohol do more physical harm to children than to adults and we punish the adult who provides them with such. By the same token we look with disfavor on a church which fills children’s minds with sadistic tales of a cruel vengeful tribe of barbarians under the guise of teaching them the revealed word of God. We disapprove of exhibiting pictures and statues of a man spiked to a wooden frame. I say we disapprove—but we do not forbid, for the damage, though probably greater than habit-forming drugs, is hard to prove, but we do insist on some years of instruction through the public development centers to clean their minds of the sadism, phobias, simple misstatements of fact, faulty identifications, and confusion of abstractions that their preachers and priests have labored to instill.”

  “Is the state actively fighting religion?”

  “Of course not. To educate in opposition to particular dogmas of particular sects is not to fight religion. But if a church persists in teaching anti-social doctrine, the state reserves the right to combat those doctrines with argument in rebuttal. It is necessary to remember that head-hunting is a religious rite. Shall we tolerate it? The most popular sects of your day practiced a form of symbolic cannibalism. Is the state obligated to stand in awe of that rather nauseating myth? Our answer is simple. Any religion is free to preach and practice but the state and all individuals have an equal right to combat their doctrines by any peaceful means.”

  “Haven’t some sects attempted to prevent any non-conformist instruction of their children?”

  “Yes, some extreme cases have preferred to go to Coventry, whole sects. They seceded from us, so instead of fighting, we seceded from them. But we were talking abo
ut politics and here we are on religion. What was I saying? Oh yes, why we get better men into office than we used to. I think I’ve covered most of the reasons. The destruction of the political power of finance capitalism was a big factor, naturally. Required voting helps—only those can draw the dividend who vote, and the franchise calls for a rather stiff course in the details of the mechanics of government.”

  “Suppose one doesn’t pass the examination, does he lose his vote?”

  “There is no examination. If there were, the party in power might use it to disenfranchise the opposition, just as such laws were used to disenfranchise the negroes in the South in your day. We just make sure that the citizen has been thoroughly instructed in the machinery of government. All these things help to make a more intelligent electorate and bring out better candidates. In spite of everything we get a certain percentage of stupid, or unqualified, or small-souled men in office. This isn’t Utopia, you know. This is just the United States of America in 2086.

  XIII

  Back in California, Diana paid a call on Master Hedrick. He received her at once and ushered her into his study, his face wreathed in a smile of welcome that managed to make him more birdlike than ever.

  “Come in, come in, my dear. May I do you a service? I’ve missed you lately. But I did see some of your Chicago appearances by telecast. You were magnificent. Lovely! Lovely! Sit you down here by the fire. Something to eat? No? A cigarette? A little glass of wine? Ah, good. I saw your parents when I was up north this past week. Both well and hearty and full of the joy of living.”

  Diana shifted uneasily in her chair. “Master Hedrick, I’m troubled and need advice.”

  His face sobered. “I hope that I can help you. Tell me about it.”

  She drew circles with her toe on the floor, and considered her words. “I hardly know how to begin. You already know a lot about it. You know how Perry got into difficulties and why he was sent here. Well, I am very deeply attached to Perry. I thought and still hope and believe that our association will last throughout our lives and grow and deepen. But the trouble with my dancing partner, Bernard, got us off to a poor start. It worries me that it might happen again and I care so deeply that I find myself willing to do anything to avoid the possibility of anything like it happening again.”

  “How do you plan to avoid the possibility?”

  “I don’t know exactly. I could quit dancing with Bernard when this contract expires, and not see him anymore. But this last series we did together went so well that we have been offered a new contract at a considerably higher salary. I know that Bernard expects me to take it. He has even planned what he will do with his additional credit.”

  “You believe that you might be happier with Perry if you refused to work with Bernard?”

  “Well—that is what I’ve been thinking about. In any case, although Bernard hasn’t said anything and apparently the public hasn’t noticed it, I know that my work with Bernard isn’t as good as it used to be. I am distracted from it by the fear of Perry’s opinion. Whenever a dance calls for a love scene, I can’t get my mind off Perry. I wonder if he is tuned in, and if he thinks my acting too realistic.”

  “Do you intend to quit dancing with partners entirely?”

  “I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I don’t know.”

  “Mightn’t you have the same fear about any other partner?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Do you see that to spend your life guiding your actions by the possible opinions of a person suffering from delusions will become very complicated?”

  “Yes, I see you’re right. But I’d be willing to try it if I could keep Perry happy and loving me by doing it.”

  “That does your heart credit, but not your good sense. You are a normal healthy girl and your standards and desires are as sane as can be. But I think that I see the consequences of such a course more clearly than you do. In the first place you won’t be helping Perry to get well. You’ll make a permanent invalid out of him emotionally. Your whole life will become forced and unnatural. After re-molding yourself to suit his spurious standards, you will then undertake to change the world around you to prevent it from conflicting with his carefully nurtured delusions. Gradually your friends will drop away as they will be made restless by the restraints you will have imposed on their conduct and conversation. Eventually the day will arrive when you will be one of our patients. Tell me, how do you like our friend Olga?”

  “Olga? Why, Olga is grand.”

  “Ever felt any uneasiness about Perry and her?”

  “No, not really. Perhaps I have in a way. It sometimes seemed a little unfair to me that he should enjoy her company so much in my absence, when I’ve been so miserable with Bernard.”

  “Suppose that you gave up Bernard and all close association with other men on Perry’s account and that the two of you were living together. Suppose Perry decides to pay Olga a visit of a few days and you can’t go along. Aren’t you likely to find yourself fiercely resenting Olga?”

  “Maybe I would. It’s hard to imagine myself resenting anyone as nice as Olga.”

  “I see that Perry is becoming very interested in rocketing. Olga tells me that both of you wish he wouldn’t because of the physical hazards of the work. Are you going to demand that he give it up?”

  Diana looked surprised. “How can I? He must decide for himself and find his self fulfillment in his own way. I must not interfere.”

  “Yet you plan to give up or greatly modify your own career to fit his delusions. Aren’t you likely to tell him someday that, since you have sacrificed the best years of your life for him that the least he can do is to stay out of danger?”

  “I’d never say that. It wouldn’t be right. Oh dear, perhaps I would. I don’t know. It’s very difficult.”

  Hedrick smiled and patted her hand. “Let not your heart be troubled, my daughter. The situation isn’t at all serious. I’ve just been showing you some of the possibilities in order that you might understand the implications of your decisions. In the first place your young man will have a complete cure. He is doing very well, very well indeed. You can revise your plans accordingly. You are suffering from a slight touch of atavism, a regressive false identification, which you contracted from him. The layman doesn’t realize that these non-lesional mental disorders can be as contagious as diphtheria or whooping cough. More so, in fact. In the old days one man sometimes infected a whole nation, particularly after the advent of radio. You have a slight touch. Physically you are well and strong, a beautiful example of a civilized girl, but mentally you have slipped back in part to the stone age woman, squatting on your haunches before the fire and cowering in fear of the unpredictable displeasure of your semi-bestial mate. Now that you know what the trouble is, correct it. Perry will be all right, so you need no longer concern yourself about him. Go ahead. Live your own life. Make your own decisions in your own way. Associate with men and women as freely as you did before you knew Perry, and don’t worry.”

  Diana stood up, smiling, and put out her hand. “Thanks a lot, Master. I’ll try it. Anyhow I’ve decided to take that contract.”

  “That’s fine. If you become worried again, come back and we’ll talk it over.”

  “Thanks again. I can go home and sleep now.”

  XIV

  Perry was very poor company for the next couple of weeks. He threw himself into the study of the arts of rocketry and astronautics, determined to make up quickly his century-and-a-half handicap in technical knowledge. He could easily be persuaded to quit his studies and enter a sky car, but he always insisted on setting the controls for the Moon Rocket Station. This suited neither Diana nor Olga. In time they became reconciled to his single-minded enthusiasm and compromised by insisting that he take regular exercise and eat his meals on time.

  Perry found that catching up was not so much of a job as he had feared. In engineering matters he had the simple empirical point of view and consequently was not disturbed by changes in
theory. The mathematics of ballistics and astronautics were simpler, rather than more complicated, than the ballistic formulae that he had once used in predicting fall of shot. In particular the Siacci-Vernet method of variable exponents was a much simpler description of the action of a moving body in a gaseous medium than the cumbersome empirical formulae used by Siacci himself. Metallurgic chemistry and explosive chemistry naturally were enormously advanced over his day, but with the advance of knowledge, theory was, as usual, simpler, and he soon found himself able to understand and appreciate the technical publications of the day. He looked for and failed to find any description of the use in rockets of the high explosives of his own day. He made a mental note of this for it seemed possible that he might have some things to teach these latter day engineers.

  Late in April Perry received a call from Cathcart. To Perry’s surprise, he had a business proposition. Cathcart related that he’d been hired to give technical advice in the recording of an historical adventure drama laid in the United States during Perry’s period. Several scenes called for airfighting of the contemporary type and neither Cathcart nor the producer were satisfied with the laboratory process shots. So Cathcart was calling from Hollywood to see if Perry thought he could fly a museum piece airplane. Perry considered, then asked what sort of a plane it was. Cathcart didn’t know, but switched to the hangar circuit and let Perry see for himself. It was a Douglas light bomber with a Pratt-Whitney engine, probably 750 horsepower. Perry estimated a top speed of around 250 miles per hour. She’d land pretty hot. He looked the plane over and nodded.