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NOTE The Fascists and Fabians

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The Fascists and the Fabians

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Two of the most interesting socialist groups presently active in the United States would be the Fascists and the Fabians.

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They are quite different, but their influence is very profound.

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The fascist movement is a very interesting variation from the central theme of socialism.

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The first thing that you have to realize about all socialism is that it is fundamentally disturbed with a completely free market in which private property is a total concept.

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Every socialist is interested in intervening here to some degree.

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That is, they don't want any private property to exist, or they want certain types of property to be owned by certain groups, or whatever it may be, they cannot permit a total free economy, a laissez-faire market, and total private ownership of property.

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So there are as many different kinds of socialists as there are different theories as to how you can intervene in the property relationships of other persons.

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The fascists are a particularly interesting group because here we have people who do not

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propose to destroy private ownership of property.

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They simply wish to have a national socialist goal, and the property would continue to be

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privately owned, but it would be managed centrally.

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Now that's an interesting variation, and we have quite a bit of it in this country,

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and it exists in many other countries as well. We often think of the fascists as being the

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Germans or the Italians during World War II. As we know, Mussolini called his followers

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fascists and we know that Hitler referred to his party as the Nazi party or the party

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of National Socialism, and fascism takes this characteristic. Private ownership of property

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would be maintained, but the management of property is passed over to the state or to

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an agency of the state, which will proceed to make the decisions in respect to the property.

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Actually, so far as I am aware in this country, we do not have any intellectual fascist or

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and of course once the government gets in and begins acting for them it isn't long usually before the government is making recommendations as to how the business is to be run and presently before you know it the businessman is engaged in listening to what the government has to say and doing pretty much what the government suggests to him to do if he wants to stay out of trouble and since the government represents the

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The legal use of force, the businessman virtually is at the disposal of the politicians who will tell him how to price his goods and what formula he can use and how he is to sell and what products he is to make and so on.

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And that is all that the fascist movement ever attempted to do anyway.

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It was to create a kind of socialism in which private ownership was retained, but the management

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would be shifted to the government. A very good example of fascism in practice occurred

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in this country during World War I when the federal government seized the railroads. Now

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by no means did they take the railroads away from the owners, that is to say the stockholders

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who held the stock in the railroads didn't have their stock taken away from them. They continued

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to be the owners. But the managers selected by the owners were put aside and the government imposed

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its own management. Then when the railroads were all run down and losing money, then they turned

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them back to the private managers again. I'm not certain that the railroads have ever recovered from

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from that particular shock, but that is an instance of fascism. Another one in this country

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that would be typical would be the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank as such. Now,

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that is a case of pure fascism or national socialism. As you perhaps know, the Federal

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Reserve Act, which was passed in 1913, is the enabling act that set up the Federal Reserve

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Reserve Bank, but all of the capital of the Federal Reserve Bank was privately subscribed.

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That is, it operated on private capital, but the management of the bank was never permitted

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to go into the hands of the people who owned the stock.

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As a matter of fact, the people who own the stock in the Federal Reserve Bank are limited

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to a total of $25,000 worth of stock.

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That's all anyone can have, and they are paid a stipulated return on that $25,000, and they

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have nothing to say about the management of the banks.

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The Federal Reserve banks are managed directly by a board which is created by the government,

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and the entire banking system is operated according to federal policy.

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So here you have a pure case of fascism.

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You have private ownership of the banks, but governmental management.

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And that's pure fascism. We don't have a great deal of pure fascism in the country.

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We do have other instances of a drift in that direction. Whenever the government becomes

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involved in any particular industry and begins to establish prices, set up quality controls,

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marketing procedures, and regulations of all types, you have decisions being made by the

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The Government over the management of property that is privately owned.

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A very good case in point would be the Agricultural Administration.

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We hear very little, if at all, of private farmers having their farms taken away from

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them by the government.

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Here and there, of course, a farmer who fails to pay his taxes would face that contingency.

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But normally the farmers own their own farms, and they can buy and sell other farms.

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That's up to them.

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But it would be a rare farmer who manages his own farm as he pleases. Usually he operates

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under the regulation of the Agricultural Administration and he plants pretty much what he's told,

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when he's told and how much of what he's told and he sells it at a price that is determined

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by the government and he sells when the government tells him he can sell. So here again you see

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the move in that direction. It's not totally fascist because if a farmer really wanted

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to dig in and would refuse to accept the government benefits to him that are offered if he cooperates.

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Well, at least in theory, he could operate in a free market. Whether he could do so successfully

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is a moot point. But in any case, you don't find a farmer going to jail if he decided

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not to follow the quota system. He just wouldn't get the benefits. And the consequence would

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be that since he wants the benefits, he follows the quota system and is in essence operating

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within a fascist framework, that is the framework of national socialism. This is happening in

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other industries too. I don't have to tabulate them. You can yourself look about you and

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see many instances where national socialism is a characteristic. It is unfortunate that

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Many people who are communists or who are other types of socialists will tend to look at all

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businessmen as if they are fascists. In fact, frequently it happens that some socialists will

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use this term. They will call capitalists and businessmen—they'll just plain call them

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fascists, and it simply isn't true. There are a great many businessmen who do not want the

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government to intervene in their businesses and don't even want the benefits that they might get

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from the government they would like very much to operate in a free market but they don't have that

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choice and but this does not mean that they are willing fascists they are not they much prefer

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a laissez-faire market and they say so as best they can so just to call every capitalist

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The term properly would belong to those persons who favor fascism, which would be the retention

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of private ownership, but the management of productive property by the state. I might

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point out that that is precisely the type of socialism that exists in Sweden, where

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property is still privately owned and privately bought and sold. But the management of the

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The property is in the hands of an RTEL, that is, there are representatives of labor, business

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and government in a kind of a committee that organizes and has an overall national plan

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in which every industry plays a part and national quotas are established and everyone does what

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he's told to do in terms of the national policy, but all of these are privately owned

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property or most of them are.

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So that is the characteristic of fascism. Now the Fabians have a very interesting history

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and we ought to really concentrate on them for a bit. The Fabian movement as such, the

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Fabian society, was organized in England in 1883 by three men whose names appear on the

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In corporation papers, their names are Pease, spelled P-E-A-S-E, Wallace, spelled W-A-L-L-A-S,

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and Shaw, spelled George Bernard. These three men put together the Fabian Society, and they

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dedicated it to the accomplishment of socialist objectives. They stated candidly that they

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They Were Socialists, and that their means would be fulfilled by adopting peaceful gradualism.

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And this is characteristic of the entire Fabian movement. Now, the thing to be noted here

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with the Fabians is that they took socialist thought one step beyond where Marx had taken

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it. Go back for a moment and review. The anarchists launched the modern socialist movement by

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by in essence declaring war against private ownership of property by viewing private owners

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as being essentially politicians and then by demanding that the government be removed

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in order to eliminate private ownership of property. Marx broke with that tradition,

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seeing that what you ought to do was to have the government taken over by a new party,

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The Party of the Workers, the Proletariat, and then, instead of abolishing the government,

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Marx wanted to use the government to take by force properties belonging to private persons

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and centralize the property through this manner in the hands of the state, that is to say,

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the new state in the hands of the proletariat.

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But the Fabians went a step further. Although they wanted the same ultimate objective, they

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They recognized that the anarchists and Marx were both in error insofar as the method was concerned.

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They too believed in a centralized control, at least of what Marx was to call bourgeois property,

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that is, the tools of production and distribution.

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But they pointed out an extremely interesting fact.

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And that is, that governments by their nature, whether they are democracies, republics, monarchies, oligarchies, whatever they may be,

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that governments by their nature are established for the social whole, and consequently, all governments by their nature are socialistic.

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Therefore, you don't have to overthrow the government, and you don't have to even have a revolution and take over the government.

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you just take any existing government, it doesn't make any difference what it is, and you cooperate

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with it, because the natural tendency of every government will be to move in the direction of

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more and more socialism if it's just given the time. That is the reason they adopted the idea of

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peaceful gradualism. You don't have to have a war, you don't have to have a revolution, and you don't

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Don't have to kill anybody. None of these extreme measures, advocated both by anarchists

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and communists, are necessary if you're going to advance the socialist economic goals.

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The Fabians saw that the communists and the anarchists, however exciting they might be

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as political figures or as way-out radicals—and they are exciting—that when it comes to

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to establishing socialist economics fall flat on their faces. They just never get anywhere.

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And they never will. The Fabians are correct. What they saw is that you don't have to have

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any of these violent methods. You go in on a peaceful basis. You don't have to take

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over the government. In fact, you don't even have to provide the leading figure of the

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government, work at the middle management level, get yourself appointed to a bureau

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or a department or an agency get inside and help to draft the measures which gradually

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will move the controls of property and the actual ownership of property into the hands of the state.

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Now, in order to make their program acceptable, it was the Fabians who first introduced the idea

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of a War on Poverty. This happened way back in 1883, as sometimes we think that it was a recent

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development in this country, but it happened a very long time ago, nearly 100 years ago in England.

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And what they saw, and this was the way they looked at it, was that private capitalism had

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done a great job in production. Even Marx acknowledged that in some of his writings.

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As a productive method, you can't beat capitalism. Lenin acknowledged it. Many of the socialists

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and communists acknowledged the efficacy of capitalism when it comes to producing goods

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and services. There's no question about it. Capitalism has won that argument.

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But when it comes to distributing the goods, the Fabians came up with what they thought was a

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very good idea. Now it happens that factually a free market does the best job of distributing too,

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but they didn't see that. What they saw instead was a chance to make real propaganda hay out of

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this idea that it is the poor people who actually need the goods and services that the people with

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with the tools create.

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But those are the very people that can't afford to buy it.

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So that capitalism, according to the Fabians,

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has a fatal flaw to it.

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While it's very good in producing,

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it's very bad in distributing

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because it only gives the goods and services

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to those who can afford them.

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And it is those who can't afford them that need them.

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And therefore, according to the Fabians,

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You have to have some agency outside the market that will intervene and help with the distribution.

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Now because they were interested in peaceful gradualism, they took it upon themselves to

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try to find sensitive points that could be converted into major political issues.

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And then, and you can see how brilliant they were in their theorizing, they realized that

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if you could get people arguing about how much of their program to accept, rather than

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whether or not you would want their program, they could really carry the day, so they introduced

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what could only be called modern political methodology.

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And that's what the Fabians have done.

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Let me give you an example of what I mean.

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If the Fabians decided, as indeed at one time they did, that the use of private real estate,

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land holdings and things of this sort should be intruded in by the government, that is,

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we should have government housing and government management of land and government management

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of these resources, they didn't come out with a program in which they simply favored

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the government stepping into this area. Instead, they operated on this basis. First of all,

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they conducted a survey to establish that there are a number of substandard dwellings,

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and there certainly are. No question about it. So they did a survey and came up with

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the statistics to prove that there were a number of houses owned by private people whom

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which they classified as absentee landlords or as slum landlords or any other derogatory

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term that they could think of to show that these were very, very bad people who had no

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social conscience and then pointing out that these substandard dwellings existed, then

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they had someone launch a movement to get a law passed that would create a government

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Housing Agency to alleviate the worst aspects of this bad housing.

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But after they had launched this, they launched a secondary program with a modified position

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for the same thing.

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In other words, they launched a major program for public housing that was to cost at the

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time this was launched.

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This was some years ago, but as memory serves, it ran around $800 million, which was a great

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Deal of Money at that time. But then there was a more modest proposal, which the Fabians also authored,

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where you would get the basic job done for around $450 million, as opposed to $800 million.

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And the argument then developed between those who favored the $800 million program

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and those who favored the $450 million program. And that's where the debate centered.

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It didn't center on whether you should have public housing or not. It centered on how much public

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housing should you have. And, of course, the Fabians very skillfully introduced both sides

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of the argument. So—and here was the way it went, as I know from first-hand experience, having

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watched this very closely on this particular issue—if a person came forward and said that

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that he didn't favor public housing, he was at once reprimanded whether he was a liberal

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or a conservative, because if he was a liberal and he said that he was opposed to public

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housing, he was at once said that it would be very important for him to favor the $800

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million program, because otherwise the conservatives would carry the day and they'd only get a

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and the $450 million program, and that would be inadequate and wouldn't do the job.

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And so the liberal was held up to believe that if he didn't go whole hog, why, the

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whole program would fail.

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On the other hand, if he was a conservative, then he was reprimanded if he said he didn't

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favor public housing at all, then he was told, look, you've got to support the $450 million

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Program, because if you don't, the $800 million program will carry the day. And that's too costly.

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We can't afford it. Therefore, you've got to favor the $450 million program so as to prevent the

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other from happening. And so you find both parties and all of the people in between getting caught

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up in an issue where they debate each other as to the size of the program, not as to the efficacy

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of the program itself. It is simply accepted and taken for granted that you're going to have the

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program. And that is precisely the same technique that the Fabians have used from that day to this.

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In fact, they themselves invented certain slogans, which are now on everybody's lips,

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vote for the lesser of two evils. Of course, because whichever you think is evil,

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well, then you vote for less evil than the other one. And naturally, it depends on your

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or Value Judgment as to what you think is evil. So you'll naturally vote for the lesser of the

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two evils. And by this process, it really doesn't matter to the Fabians which way you vote,

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because you're voting for one of their programs since they've introduced both sides of the same

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program. They also came up with the slogan, we don't care how you vote, but vote.

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Obviously, they wouldn't care how you vote since they have both sides. Naturally,

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The faster you go, the better they like it. But if you go slow, that's what they planned on in the

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first place. So that is their technique. It has been a beautifully successful technique. As a matter

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of fact, the Fabian Society, as such, was never very large. At its heyday, it had perhaps 4,000

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members, most of them in London, and there was a chapter in New York City. I don't know of any other

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Chapter of the society itself in this country, but they didn't have to have many chapters

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or a large membership.

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I might point out that the Fabians were very choosy about whom they took in as members.

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The only people who were welcome were people who were in the communication areas.

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They didn't want just a large membership, it would become cumbersome, and it would bring

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down the quality of the people that they had.

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So they wanted people who were in public offices.

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They wanted people who were in the pulpit or newspaper or radio or later on television

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or teachers, people of this sort who communicate either in writing or vocally.

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They wanted all of the communicator people in their bailiwick.

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In fact, they set such a very high standard in London that for a while there was a little

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phrase going around in London that if a man is a gentleman, he must be a Fabian.

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Now that's prestige.

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And the Fabians got an enormous amount of prestige by virtue of their selectivity when

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it came to their membership.

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And then they put out a whole series of tracks which argued various points very well, very

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cogently, and they sold these ideas one after another.

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The principal buyers of the Fabian ideas have always been politicians.

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Politicians are always casting about trying to find something to do, to make their jobs

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worthwhile, and here the Fabians came up with an entire wagonload of ideas and programs

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that made it possible for the government to become an ever more important factor in our

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daily living.

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So under Fabian influence, the government expanded step by step, the politicians accepted

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the Fabian arguments, without notable exception, and the entire Fabian movement simply took

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hold in the United States without, well, I suspect that many of the politicians who simply

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followed what they were told by the Fabian logic never even heard of the Fabian movement,

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and much less paid dues to it or belonged to any organization. They simply bought it

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because it was practical politics, and the Fabians were very skillful in suggesting this

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and in doing it, and the consequence is they have become a very dynamic force in modern

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political operations. In addition to the fascist movement and the Fabian movement, there are

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any number of other socialist groups. It wouldn't be possible even to tabulate their number.

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There are as many, almost, as there are different theorists in the socialist area. But I would

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like to just quickly summarize the major ones and once again stress the evolution of socialist

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thought here. Beginning in very ancient times, the idea emerged that the community is more

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are more important than the individual, and the individual can be sacrificed for the good

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of the community.

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Now, that's the essential core.

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This takes on particular meaning in the economic theater, where we have the means of production

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and distribution being considered in various ways.

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Now, the first of the modern socialists were anarchists who argued that private ownership

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Private ownership of property is evil and wicked and must be abolished, but that private

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ownership of property is only possible when the government protects the owners, and therefore

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it is an instrument that is private property is an instrument of privilege.

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This idea was modified by Marx, who saw as a socialist that private property ought to

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to be abolished, but he recognized that the government was the agency that could do the

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demolishing, and that if you wiped the government out, you wouldn't obtain your objective.

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So Marx favored a revolution in which the proletariat took over the government by a

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violent revolution if necessary, and then with the government as their tool, they extract

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the property from the owners, and then once it's all centralized in the hands of the

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is redistributed on the basis of need. Then came the Fabians with the idea that you don't have to

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do any of these extreme things, that government per se is a socialist instrument, it is designed

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as such, and all you have to do is cooperate with it, and you will move gradually and inexorably

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into a total condition of socialism. Thank you.