Before We Burn it Down; E. F. Wells

SOME TIME AGO, Reverend Billy Graham spoke with one of the New Left's leading theorists, a part time university professor. Writing of it in Reader's Digest, (June, 1969) Reverend Graham added that the young man an nounced, "Our intention·· is to tear this country apart." The religious leader asked, "What system would you subsii tute after this one's demolished?" "I don't know," the young man replied, "but anything's better than what we have now." If our young are so woefully misinformed, perhaps they ought to study in China, Cuba, or the Soviet Union, so that they can see and experience the serfdom suf fered by the laborer under state ownership. One year under those tightly Mr. Wells has been an educator and currently is a freelance writer and supervisory training consultant. E. F. WELLS regimented, totalitarian govern ments would undoubtedly leave these students as disillusioned as are the young Africans who have studied in Russia. According to Victor Lasky, author of The Ugly Russian' (1965), Africans quickly learned that socialism was no cure for bigotry. Russian students often surrounded blacks and snickered over racial differences. A boy from Uganda was beaten by a mob of mocking Muscovites. A medical student from Ghana was found dead in the snow, a victim of vio lence. The Patrice Lumumba Uni versity where they study is a seg regated school, dubbed "Apartheid U" by the embittered Africans.

The Sino-Soviet split and the in tense nationalism displayed by most Russians has been enough to con vince many of the brighter black radicals that socialism will not end wars. The tanks rolling into Czech25 26 THE FREEMAN January oslovakia were proof enough for most that socialism is no guaran tee against imperialism. These students have shared the popular Czech joke currently being whis pered among the Soviets. "What is the most neutral country in the world?" one Czech is supposed to have asked another. "Ah, Czecho slovakia, of course," his friend re plied; "she doesn't even interfere in her own affairs." So before we burn it down, per haps we should face up to the alternatives. Pure socialism has never succeeded anywhere. Even though half the working force is assigned to farms, the Soviet Union has never been able to feed its people. According to U.S. News and World Report of May 15, 1972, one American farmer outproduces seven Soviet farm workers, be cause the American benefits per sonally from his increased pro ductivity. The Ukraine, once the breadbasket of Europe, has been unable to feed the people, who have had to rely on wheat sold to them by such capitalistic countries as Canada and the United States.

As Eugene Lyons wrote in Workers' Paradise Lost (1967), Russia is a laboratory test of the effectiveness of private versus so cialized farming. Because of the peasants' resistance and sabotage, Joseph Stalin was forced to grant them the right to own a cow, a few animals, and a small section of land on which they could produce products for the open market at free prices. These private farms make up merely three per cent of the acreage in use, yet they pro duce forty per cent of all Russia's vegetables, sixty per cent of its potato crop, and sixty-eight per cent of all its meat products. Lazo Finds Problems in Cuba Before Fidel· Castro seized the farms, Cubans produced almost 8 million tons of sugar. It was Cu ba's "money crop." Four years after Castro shot his way to pow er, sugar production had plunged to 4.8 million tons. To harvest this vital commodity, Castro forced the militia into the fields at the rate of 7 pesos a month (about $2.00).

Conscripts must spend ten hours a day for a minimum of twenty four months cutting cane or work ing the fields, policed by armed guards. When the rebellious deride ma terialism, they should remember that the abundance of food in the United States is due both to our incentive system and our indus trial adva,nces. Machinery, im proved fertilizers, electrical and mechanized power are contribu tions made by many of the giant companies that are now being har assed by those wishing to destroy our republic.

1973 BEFORE WE BURN IT DOWN! 27 Cuba can scarcely feed its own. Toward the end of 1967, butter was no 'longer available. Chicken could not be bought, nor could fish. Except for infants and the aged, milk could be purchased only with a doctor's prescription. Dr. Mario Lazo, a noted Cuban attorney and author of Dagger in the Heart (1968), stated that meat was doled out at a quarter of a pound a week - "what Americans consume in a single hamburger." Even the con temptible malanga, humble cousin to the potato, which used to be given away free, was being ra tioned. Despite huge shipments of wheat from Canada, bread, too, was a scarcity. In fact, Castro's regime has been kept from bank ruptcy, not only by aid from Rus sia, but by credit or aid from Canada, England, France, and even Spain. Communes Fail, Incentives Restored in China As for China, according to Mor ris R. Wills, one of the twenty-one GI's who defected and later re turned, Chinese officials attempted to combine the agricultural coop eratives into communes back in 1958. In these communistic units, the diligent worker, the skilled, and the lazy were all paid, not ac cording to' their ability or output, but according to their needs, a basic tenet of Marxism. It resulted in complete, if grim, equality for the serfs, while the influential Party members or highly skilled citizens lived in comfort or even wealth. It also resulted a year later in nationwide starvation. The com munes had failed!

"It was a common thing in the countryside," Wills told J. Robert Moskin in an interview for the book Turncoat (1966), "to find a baby lying at the side of the road - thrown away." It had died, and, helplessly, the parents had left it there, but make no mistake, they were not indifferent; they were bitter. The desperate situation forced the Chinese officials to reintroduce the ,inc'entive system, an important aspect of capitalism. Workers were to be rewarded for special effort by monthly bonuses - extra food, extra clothing, extra allowances. In a bakery Wills visited in 1965, he learned the women wrapping candy were being paid a.ccording to piece 'work! How Karl Marx would have raged over' such bour geois retrogression! But, unhap pily for the Chinese, Marx's theory ignored human nature. It is hu man to resent inj ustice. Paying the competent the same as the in competent infuriates the able and causes them to despair. Seeing no future in their efforts, most cease striving. Any political theorist, of whatever leanings, had best take 28 THE FREEMAN January into consideration this inescapable fact.

Housing Shortages in Russia Despite Russia's fifty years of highly touted progress, it cannot adequate'ly house its people. Al most half of Moscow's citizens still share kitchen and bath facilities with other families. In this so called "laborer's paradise," the workers' requests for apartments get less consideration than do the requests of privileged Communist Party members. Russia's astounding scientific and technical advances have been equaled or surpassed by other na tions, nations that have not had to resort to political genocide and mass enslavement. Furthermore, the New Left ought to make a careful note that when President Richard M. Nixon made his fa mous visit to Russia as Vice Pres ident he found roughly half the machines in Novosibirsk's largest machine-tool plant were American made. Many of the rest bore Ger man markings, proof that much of the Soviet's technical progress has been made through the efforts of the free enterprise system.

According to Time magazine's annual review in 1929, the Interna tional General Electric Company signed a twenty-five million dollar contract to electrify the Soviet Un ion. Other U. S. corporations agreed to build a 100-million dol lar hydro-electric plant in the Ukraine, steel mills, coal mines, and tractor factories at Stalin grad. Ford sold the Russian gov ernment a complete automotive factory, installed and equipped. These are crucial facts, because current leftists too often dismiss the failure of socialism in China, Cuba, and Russia by saying these countries were not sufficiently in dustrialized for the changeover. They overlook or ignore Russia's utilization of the technical ad vances created by capitalism. Much of Russia's difficulty came from the resistance of the people. They grew less grain because of heavy taxes and the scarcity of goods. They slaughtered their cattle and uprooted their fruit trees rather than turn them over to the state.

They burned their houses, think ing that soon they would get a brand new one from the govern ment. During 1928, nine thousand homes were destroyed by fire in the Russian province of Samarra. Of these, one third, three thou sand, were gutted because of arson. Red Tape and Waste Theoretically, socialism is sup posed to be more efficient than capitalism due to state control and centralized planning. In practice, it isn't. It suffers from the same ills 1973 BEFORE WE BURN 1'£ DOWN! 29 that plague our own huge, cum bersome, Federal bureaucracy. It is strangled by red tape. It suffers from wasteful duplication. Typical is the factory that received sev enty different commands from fif teen overlapping, government bureaus. Since it isn't necessary to show a profit for a plant or factory to survive, gross ineffi ciency· continues year after costly year. Unlike our own economy, however, there is no free enter prise system to support bureau cratic mismanagement.

The humor of the people is per haps more revealing than are the periodic progress reports. One story tells of a leading Communist who died and was sent to hell. At the entrance, Satan offered him the choi ceo f two ga t es, 0 n e marked "Capitalists," the other "Communists." "I'll take the Communist hell, naturally," the Russian replied. "Oh?" said Satan. The Communist nodded cynical ly, then added, "Yes. There's bound to be a fuel shortage there." As Nation's Business pointed out, if we wanted to match Rus sia's economy, we would have to: "tear down sixty per cent of our homes, demolish sixty percent of our steel mills, rip up two thirds of our railroad tracks, destroy nine out of every ten telephones, and reduce our standard of living a full sixty per cent." Of course, in comparison to China and Cuba, Russia has indeed made giant strides. Mao and Castro have re duced the worker's lot to grim sur vival.

Government Doesn/t Wither Furthermore, the government that Karl Marx said would de crease in importance and disap pear, remains as strong as ever. It ha's become entrenched by sup pressing all dissent. Recently, sev en Russians were imprisoned for merely complaining about the plight of the worker (Facts on File, November 26, 1969). In Cuba, according to Dr. Lazo, a .person cannot change his resi qence or transport so much as a chair or lamp to a new apartment without the knowledge and consent of the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution. China, like Cuba and Russia, has found the most insidious in strument of tyranny is the in former. For awhile, Wills played poker with an American couple also working with the Chinese Communists until their children walked in to demand the gambling be stopped or the children them selves would report it. Borrowing a device from Czar Nicholas I, the Soviet leaders have had many critics .declared "de mented" and placed in insane asyl30 THE FREEMAN January urns. So, before we tear down our republic, perhaps we should de cide: Do we want a system where the sane are caged and the Inad allowed to rule?

Paper Promises So long as socialism remained an untried theory, it was under standable that idealistic young Inen and WOInen should be drawn to it. It promised Inuch: more efficiency in the productive capac ity of a country, equality for all, an end to depressions (such as the famines both the Soviets and the Chinese COInmunists have suf fered), a fairer i distribution of the goods, and - once the state had been abolished - a true de mocracy of the people. The promises were paper prom ises. They have all failed to ma terialize. Today, the only explana tion for the continuing dream of a Utopian Socialistic Society is lack of knowledge or a belief that by destroying the free world, there need be no atomic war. In view of the possible consequences, to re main ignorant is criminal negli gence. As for the fear of a worldwide holoca ust, there is no guarantee that the internal destruction of AInerica would end this awesome threat. Such a belief is naive and illogical, for if a socialistic China can split with a socialistic Russia, there is no reason to believe a so cialistic America would fare any more harmoniously.

At a prominent Eastern univer sity, the majority of young men who were polled agreed with the slogan, "Better Red than dead." But how many of these knew they were voting for slavery? Surely, if the real test comes, the majority of Americans will choose the words of Franklin Delano Roose velt, as expressed in his third In augural, (January 20, 1941) : "We, and all others who believe as deeply as we do, would rather die on our feet than live on our knees." ~ IDEAS ON LIBERTY The Youth Movement IN THE DECADE preceding the First World War Germany, the country most advanced on the path toward bureaucratic regimen tation, witnessed the appearance of a phenomenon hitherto un heard of: the youth movement. Turbulent gangs of untidy boys and girls roamed the country, making much noise and shirking their school lessons. In bombastic words they announced the gos pel of a golden age. LUDWIG VON MISES, Bureaucracy CLARENCE B. CARSON THE FOUNDING OF THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 18 The Bill of Rights THE THRUST for a list of rights to be added to the Constitution gained momentum during the de bates over ratification which took place in the states. No distinct statement of rights had been made a part of the Constitution, nor did it contain any systematic protec tion of those rights traditionally thought to be in especial need of defenses. To some few within the convention, and to a much larger number of those who were not there, the omission was a defi ciency that must be corrected or the Constitution rejected. In retros spect, it appears strange that the men who sat in the convention should have neglected to supply something that was so universally considered essential by Americans and the absence of which so many would judge to be a fatal defect of their work. Among the reasons they did not were these: the leaders were focusing their efforts on getting a stronger general government, not upon restraining it; declarations of rights had not proved to be sub stantial deterrents to governments within the states; and, as some would argue, it was unnecessary to have such restrictions for a gov ernment possessing only enumer ated powers. However good their Dr. Carson, noted lecturer and author, is Chair man of the Department of History at Hillsdale College in Michigan. The articles of this series will be published as a book by Arlington House.