etween authority and the rank-and-file arises, the subject
can't be dropped at that point. What puts most of the grit into the
machinery isn't that privileges exist, but that they are exercised too
often by persons who are not motivated by a passionate sense of duty.
For it is an almost inviolable rule of human behavior that the man who
is concerned most of all with his responsibilities will be fretted
least about the matter of his privileges, and that his exercise of any
rightful privilege will not be resented by his subordinates, because
they are conscious of his merit.

We can take two officers. Lieutenant "A" enters the service with one
main question in mind: "Where does my duty lie?" So long as he remains
on that beam, he will never injure the morale of the service by using
such privileges as are rightfully his as an officer. But in the mind
of Lieutenant "B" the other idea is uppermost: "What kudos do I get
out of my position?" Unless that man changes his ways, he will be a
troublemaker while he remains in the service, a headache to his fellow
officers and a despoiler of those who are under him.

In recent years, we have learned a lot about American manpower. We
have seen enough of the raw material under testing conditions to know
that, with the exception of the occasional malcontent who was
irreparably spoiled before he left home, American young men when
brought into military organization do not resent rank, and are
amenable to authority. Indeed, they expect that higher authority will
have certain advantages not common to the rank-and-file, because that
is normal in our society in all of its workday relationships.

But they do not like to have their noses rubbed in it by officers who,
having no real moral claim on authority, try to exhibit it by pushing
other people around. And when that happens, our men get their backs
up. And they wouldn't be worth a hoot in hades if they didn't.

Even as privilege attends rank and station, it is confirmed by custom,
and modified by time and environment. What was all right yesterday may
be all wrong tomorrow, and what is proper in one set of circumstances
may be wholly wrong in another.

Take one example. In Washington's Continental Army, a first lieutenant
was court-martialed and jailed because he demeaned himself by doing
manual labor with a working detail of his men. Yet in that same
season, Major General von Steuben, then trainer and inspector of all
the forces, create