The Relevance of the Pumpkin Patch: Whittaker Chambers’ Enduring Legacy
Anna Leutheuser /
Today we celebrate Whittaker Chambers’ birthday. This quiet, unassuming man has become a giant in the conservative movement for his condemning testimony against Communism, and his autobiography, Witness, remains one of the masterpieces of American writing. Even the pumpkin patch on the Chambers’ farm, where he famously gathered evidence of Communist spies in the United States government, has become a pilgrimage point.
His significant role in exposing Communism, then, is undisputed. But what is his relevance to the American situation today?
As Richard Reinsch illustrates in the latest First Principles essay, Chambers recognized that Communism was not an isolated philosophy. Chambers explained in Witness:
[W]hen I took up my little sling and aimed at Communism, I also hit something else. What I hit was the forces of that great socialist revolution, which, in the name of liberalism, spasmodically, incompletely, somewhat formlessly, but always in the same direction, has been inching its ice cap over the nation for two decades. (more…)