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    "localId": "269701852",
    "label": "Correspondence Between President Harry S. Truman and Christian Ravndal, with Attachment and Related Note",
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    "id": "269701852",
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    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Correspondence Between President Harry S. Truman and Christian Ravndal, with Attachment and Related Note",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/269701852",
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        "President's Secretary's Files (Truman Administration)",
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    "naId": 269701852,
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    "productionDates": [
        {
            "logicalDate": "1952-07-01",
            "month": 7,
            "year": 1952
        }
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    "ocrText": "THE FOREIGN SERVICE\nOF THE\nUNITED STATES OF AMERICA\nAmerican Legation,\nBudapest, July 10, 1952.\nDear Mr. President:\nYou asked me last December to write you personally what\nI found to be the peasants' attitude towards the Stalinist\nregime in Hungary. It is opposition, unorganized but\nstubborn, sullen and potentially powerful.\nFor centuries the lot of the many landless peasants in\nHungary was virtual serfdom. Then in 1945 came land distri-\nbution. The erstwhile landless enjoyed ownership of land;\nand their reaction was one of buoyant hope.\nA scant three years later, however, Stalin's puppets\ngot complete control of the Hungarian Government. Indivi-\nduality and private ownership of property became anathema.\nCollectivization, crop surrender at fixed prices, working\nnorms and penalties were taught as the only road to well\nbeing. By that time, however, gratification of a centuries\nold longing had indelibly carved its impression on Hungary's\npeasants. Resistance came naturally.\nSterner measures followed: for most kulaks*, public\ndenunciation, fines, imprisonment, confiscation of property,\ndeportation, separation of families, forced labor; for\npotential givers-in, confiscatory taxation, discriminatory\ncrop surrender obligations, unceasing brain washing, the\nlot of the convenient scapegoat. Serfdom was back again\nunder a different name; this time intended to engulf all\npeasants.\n*Note: Formerly a kulak was a peasant who had 25 yokes of\nland (35.5 acres) or more, (though possessing less land, had\nsome farm machinery or cattle. Today any peasant of whatever\nproperty is a kulak and class enemy if he refuses to join a\ncooperative.\nThe President,\nThe White House."
}