Reiner Schürmann 1941-1993

Author(s): John Stallis

Source: Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, Vol. 67, No. 6
(Jun., 1994), pp. 51-52
Published by: American Philosophical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3130531 .
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 MEMORIAL MINUTES 51

greatest thinkers. Schlipp was founder of the Library and edited or co-edited the
first 19 volumes, beginning in 1939 with The Philosophy of John Dewey, followed by
volumes on such figures as Santayana, Einstein, Russell, Popper and Sartre. In
addition to the Library of Living Philosophers, Professor Schilpp produced an array
of books widely translated into other languages, including his Kant's Pre-Critical
Ethics, The Quest for Religious Realism (the Mendenhall Lectures at DePauw
University), and CommemorativeEssays. But, above all, his primary interest was in
teaching, and he was a superb teacher, who was at his best in lecturing on
contemporary moral, social, political, and religious problems to hundreds of students
at a time.
Professor Schlipp was a former president of the American Philosophical
Association and served as a philosophy consultant for the Encyclopedia Britannica for
25 years. He received several honorary degrees and was awarded the Distinguished
Service Medal of Phi Beta Kappa and the Bertrand Russell Society Award.
Throughout his career, Paul was a leader in numerous social causes-chief of
which were Universal Peace and World Government-and he was a member of the
Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy and the American Civil Liberties Union. He
was a passionate and vociferous advocate of the importance of "thinking for oneself,"
and he believed that reason could overcome prejudice and help us create a world in
which we can all live together. In his own words: "All my life I have believed that
no man is greater than the causes he espouses and to which he is dedicated and no
cause is greater than the improvement of humanity in all areas. Humanity is in
danger of succumbing to thoughtless emotionalism, unwilling to pay the price of
serious thinking. Love, I believe, is more powerful than hate, and ideas are still the
most effective weapons."

Mark L. Johnson
Southern Illinois University at Carbondale

REINER SCHURMANN
1941-1993

Reiner Schirmann died in New York City on August 20, 1993, at the age of 52.
Born in Amsterdam, of German parents, he was educated in Germany and in France,
receiving his doctorate from the Sorbonne in 1971. From 1972 to 1975 he taught at
Duquesne University; from 1975 until his death he was a member of the Graduate
Faculty at the New School for Social Research. Among his many contributions to
the intellectual life of the New School, Professor Schiirmann was the founder and
organizer of the Hannah Arendt Symposia on Political Philosophy. Two of his books
have become classic references in their respective fields: MeisterEckhart, Mystic and
Philosopher, published in French in 1972 and in English in 1978; and Heidegger on
Being and Acting; From Principlesto Anarchy, published in French in 1982, in English
in 1986. He also published an autobiographical novel Les Origines,for which he was
awarded the Broquette-Gonin prize by the Academie Franqaise. Throughout the last
52 PROCEEDINGS AND ADDRESSES OF THE APA, 67:6

decade of his life Professor Schiirmann worked on a massive project that involved
rereading the history of philosophy with respect to the tragic dimension constituted
by the imposition of the universal on the singular. This work Broken Hegemonies was
completed shortly before his death; it is scheduled for publication in 1995.

John Stallis
Vanderbilt University

JOHN SOMERVILLE
1905-1994

John Somerville was born in New York City on March 13, 1905 and died in El
Cajon, California on January 8, 1994. He earned three degrees in philosophy from
Columbia University, receiving his Ph.D. in 1938. In 1935-1937 he and his wife,
Rose Maurer Somerville, a sociologist, worked in the U.S.S.R. and studied Soviet
philosophy, both theory and practice. The project laid down the direction of his life
and career: the analysis and evaluation of philosophical concepts in their application
to the solution of social problems both national and international. The product of
this study was Soviet Philosophy (1946), "the first Western book on Soviet philosophy
from an examination of original sources."
From 1939 to 1967 at Hunter College (the City University of New York), John
Somerville advanced from Instructor to Professor Emeritus. He was founding editor
and Editor in Chief of the translation quarterly, Soviet Studies in Philosophy (now
Russian Studies in Philosophy) from 1962 to 1987. After retirement from CUNY, he
taught at the United States International University (1967-1972).
During the 1950's the Cold War hysteria against communism abroad viciously
turned against liberals and radicals at home, and the federal government under the
Smith Act indicted several communists for teaching the duty of overthrowing the
government by force and violence. In response, Somerville testified at three trials
as an expert non-communist witness on the doctrines of Marxism-Leninism,exposing
the government's distorted interpretations of them. Forbidden at the trials to
introduce any reference to the American Declaration of Independence, he elucidated
the principles of democracy and revolution in his book, The Communist Trials and
the American Tradition (1956).
His growing anxiety over international misunderstanding and the precarious
peace led him in 1962 to join others of the APA in the founding of the Society for
the Philosophical Study of Dialectical Materialism (later, the Society for the
Philosophical Study of Marxism). Then, in spite of the refusal of the Department
of State to grant visas to Soviet philosophers, he succeeded in arranging the first full
dialogue on U.S. soil between American and Soviet philosophers at the APA
convention in Washington, D.C. on December 27, 1963. Through his enterprise, the
first binational conference of American and Soviet philosophers was convened at the
XIIIth World Congress of Philosophy in August 1963 in Mexico City.