Fascism in Practice

...John A. Ryan of the Catholic University of America, the first appearing in the issue of November 17.—The Editors...

...The majority of the apologists lay great stress upon the un-contested reforms which Mussolini has brought about in public administration, particularly in the protection of property and the enforcement of public order...

...Collective agreements made between recognized organizations of employers and employees'are legally binding, not only upon the contracting parties, but upon all the employers and workers of the class and district involved...

...Following are some of the enactments which have greatly curtailed important liberties of the individual in Italy: "Whoever offends the premier by word or act is punished with imprisonment for a term of from six to thirty months and a fine of from 500 to 3,000 lire...

...This represents the first formidable stroke in the campaign of severity against the opponents of Fascism...

...While Italian wage-earners may continue to maintain their own kind of unions, they may not use them for industrial purposes...

...There is no natural right either to vote or to hold office...

...It is well known that this measure was directed at the order of Freemasons, which through secret methods, had frequently been guilty of illegal and revolutionary political activities...

...Again, I ask, where is the warrant for this in human history or psychology...

...About a year ago, legislation was passed greatly extending the power of the prime minister...

...This pious aspiration seems to be utterly devoid of rational or experimental foundation...

...Every newspaper and periodical must appoint a director who becomes responsible for the contents, and who must be registered as a professional journalist...

...Its enormity can be easily grasped if we assume that a similar prohibition "protected" the President of the United States...

...He is also required to obtain the sanction of the state's attorney of the Court of Appeals in whose jurisdiction the paper is published...

...Modern times have not produced a more effective instrument of industrial and political enslavement...

...Accordingly, the election laws have been changed in the interest of a compact Fascist minority...

...and it is astonishing that men who in other respects are very intelligent, should cherish them...

...What principle of psychology and what historical instance can be adduced to give this assumption the color of probability...

...By the provisions of a law enacted in December, 1925, only legally recognized associations may enter agreements with employers concerning wages or any other term or condition of employment...

...If the Italian people are satisfied with this kind of political constitution, no rational objection can be raised by those who are not Italians...

...To these recognized organizations all employees and employers, respectively, must contribute the regular dues, whether or not they are enrolled as members...

...Such a condition could be prevented only through the combination of all the non-Fascist political elements in a single party...

...The reinvigoration of the communal governmental organism, therefore, can only be accomplished by the work 74 THE COMMONWEAL November 24, 1926 of the state...

...However, it is not the diminution of political liberty which gives most concern to friends of Italy and believers in human rights...

...In as much as this authorization can, apparently, be given or withheld at will by the state's attorney, this provision is by itself an effective bar to real freedom of the press...

...In view of these achievements, they maintain that the curtailment of political liberty, of representative government, deserves very little emphasis—or perhaps should find a place on the credit side of the Fascist ledger...

...At the present time, they may be less ready for efficient self-government...

...If they are called upon either to defend or to condemn the laws in restraint of individual rights, they evade the issue by expressing the hope that this legislation is only temporary and will be repealed as soon as the Italian people have learned how to refrain from abusing civil liberties...

...Organizations become eligible for recognition as soon as they include, respectively, 10 percent of the workers in a given category and district and the employers of 10 percent of the employees in a given class and jurisdiction...

...When the Italians have unlearned, in turmoil and tears, the compulsory lessons received during the Fascist regime, they will have to begin anew the slow process of education in self-government...

...To liberate Italy and to make her more powerful he would use any means, for to his mind the holiness of the end justified the means...

...If this statement is correct, the downfall of the Fascist government is nearer than most outside observers have considered probable...

...It enforces consistently and completely the theory, as set forth by Signor Rocco: "Fascists make of the individual an economic instrument for the advancement of society, an instrument which they use so long as it functions and which they subordinate when no longer serviceable...

...He can continue in office despite the opposition of the Parliament...

...In the workers' organizations, all dues are collected by the simple device of deducting them from wages...

...We cannot rely entirely upon the favorable reports made by returning American tourists who casually observed conditions in a few Italian cities but who failed to note the coercive powers of the Fascist militia in the background, the suppression of free speech and a free press...

...All the indications point to the conclusion that the charge of political incapacity against the Italians is nothing short of a cruel libel upon a nation which is the equal in native intelligence of any other people in the world...

...The foregoing assaults upon civil liberty are either curiously overlooked or deliberately ignored by the American apologists for the Fascist regime...

...Indeed, such has been the facile excuse offered by tyrants, autocrats and Tories in every age for denying self-government to any people...

...This wholesale abolition of local self-government is defended by the Mussolini reeime on the ground that the former system was incompetent...

...The reaction is likely to be worse than the evils that Fascism found when it began its violent and tyrannical course...

...According to another section of the law, the prefects, who are appointees of the central government, "are empowered to seize editions of newspapers which attack the government in its foreign policy, or which injure national credit at home or abroad, or which alarm the people without justification...

...The precision and thoroughness which distinguish the opera76 THE COMMONWEAL November 24, 1926 tion of the press censorship in Italy are neatly illustrated in the following Associated Press despatch, dated Rome, November 2, 1926: "Twelve opposition newspapers and two magazines were suspended from publication today, and the licenses of three others were revoked by prefectural decree...

...It aims at making impossible even intelligent and constructive criticism of the prime minister's official acts...

...Strikes and lockouts are forbidden, and compulsory arbitration of all collective disputes is enforced through special labor magistrates appointed by the government...

...He nominates the other cabinet ministers, determines their number and their several functions, and decides matters upon which they disagree...

...In this democratic age, it is very doubtful that a permanent or safe political regime can be maintained on the basis of this extraordinary assumption...

...Any other theory assumes that they are mere children...

...Freedom of the press is narrowly and definitely restricted by the law promulgated on December 31, 1925...

...It is also exceptionally great in the province of legislation...

...If it does, this law would seem to be unique in modern times...

...Several laws have been enacted which exactly illustrate the Fascist theory, as stated by Signor Rocco, that liberty is a concession of the state, that individuals are means to the interests of the state, and that there should be no such civic institution as a bill of rights...

...Fascist leaders have proved themselves apt pupils of this cynical master...

...According to an editorial in a recent issue of an exceptionally well-informed Catholic weekly, "the great majority of the Italian peasants and workers are opposed to the Fascist regime...

...Nevertheless, the law just mentioned seems to be unnecessarily drastic and to constitute an unjustifiable interference with freedom of association...

...This is a euphemism for adhesion to the political party of Fascism...

...Apparently, it would apply to the Knights of Columbus November 24,1926 THE COMMONWEAL 75 and other fraternal organizations quite as injuriously as it does to the Freemasons...

...The constitution of these pseudo-labor unions is in sharp contrast with what Pope Leo XIII says about the "natural right of man to enter a private society," about the duty of the state "not to violate the rights of individuals and not to impose unreasonable regulations under the pretense of public benefit," and about the "general and lasting law, that workingmen's associations should be so organized and governed that each individual member may better his condition to the utmost in body, mind, and property...

...Very apposite here are some words uttered at the end of March, 1925, by the brilliant priest and social reformer, Don Luigi Sturzo, who was the leader of the Italian Popular party until he found it no longer safe to remain in his native country: "Of such illusions the political history of nations is full...

...A few of the Mussolini apologists reluctantly admit that some diminution of civil liberty, some injury to individual rights, has occurred under the regime of Fascism...

...For centuries, a similar assertion was made by the apologists for British rule in Ireland...

...According to the first, men who have a fairly long and constant tradition of liberty will, during the few years allotted to a dictatorship in the modern era, docilely learn through deprivation of liberty not to misuse liberty when it again comes into their possession...

...Nor is there anything in the nature of human beings or in the nature of the existing Fascist constitution which prevents the proper ends of government from being attained...

...The greatest offenses committed against liberty by the Fascist government have taken place in the civic sphere...

...No person can become a member unless he can show "satisfactory political affiliation from a national point of view...

...Freedom of organization and of economic action has, therefore, been so restricted and mutilated that Italian wage-earners must support unions which are completely controlled by the government, must deal with their employers through these unions alone, must never quit work by concerted action, and must abide by the decisions of a political tribunal which is provided with no industrial code or more definite standard than a vague and elastic "equity...

...It is that politicians who have ruled despotically, as Mussolini and his associates have ruled, and who have deliberately adopted the autocratic doctrine set forth by Signor Rocco, will soon willingly restore to the people the liberties that they have taken away...

...The second assumption seems to be even more improbable than the first...

...Political communities do not learn the art of government by short cuts or by forcibly imposed instruction...

...IN THE field of methods, Fascism seems to have exemplified the teaching of Machiavelli, from whom, according to Signor Rocco, it has "learned, not only its doctrines, but its actions as well...

...But they seem not to have taken the trouble to explore its extent...

...He is now responsible only to the king...

...Does "offends by word" mean merely verbal criticism...

...All the precedents and all the probabilities seem to warn us that after Fascism will come the deluge...

...In place of proportional representation, which is the fairest method yet devised of giving to all classes and interests a legislative representation in proportion to their numbers, the Fascist government has substituted an arrangement whereby the party receiving a mere plurality in a parliamentary election becomes thereby entitled to two-thirds of the members of the Chamber of Deputies...

...The arbitration body is required to "weigh the interests of the employers against those of the workers, and in each case to take into account the higher interests of production...

...A further extension of the prime minister's executive power is seen in the laws enacted at the beginning of the year 1926, and recently made more inclusive, which abolish mayors and councils in practically every commune throughout Italy, and substitute instead an executive, called a podesta, appointed by the central government...

...In view of the numerous situations in which it has been proved false, it ought never to be accepted without careful examination and specific evidence...

...but the remedy is time and education and opportunity to make and profit by their own mistakes...

...Whatever may be the truth about the present attitude of the Italian people, there is one apology for the Fascist political constitution which is devoid of solid foundation...

...In other words, efficiency is to be attained through despotic and benevolent compulsion rather than through the civic education of the local communities...

...His power to legislate by decree has been clearly defined and greatly expanded...

...As to freedom of speech, it is well known that, whether by official or unofficial means, with or without the forms of legality, the opportunity to give public expression to political opinions is strictly limited...

...In case of absence or prevention from fulfilling his duties, the prime minister designates the cabinet member who is to act as his substitute...

...Furthermore, the government may actively supervise the organizations, depose their officers, and revoke their legal recognition...

...In each kind of establishment or industry, only one employee-organization and only one employer-organization may receive the required legal recognition...

...Obviously, a government is justified in opposing and punishing such conduct and even in dissolving organizations which are persistently guilty of it, if they refuse to reform themselves...

...The restrictions upon political liberty and self-government enacted by the Mussolini regime exemplify that element in Fascist theory which "rejects the dogma of popular sovereignty and substitutes for it that of state sovereignty, . . . and entrusts the normal control of the commonwealth to a selected elite...

...Is it likely that a political party noted for its systematic violation of civil and political liberty . . . will terminate, spontaneously, by a logical and historical process, by internal necessity, in a regime of legality, morality, and liberty...

...He has the power to ask that any bill rejected by one of the legislative houses be voted upon again after a period of three months or that it be transferred to the other house, examined, and voted upon...

...in other words, by means of the "check-off...

...Through these extraordinary powers the will of the prime minister is virtually absolute in the field of administration...

...Rome and Naples are exempted from the podesta system, but apparently are at present ruled by appointees of the central government...

...Something over a year ago, a law was enacted providing that "all associations, organizations, and institutions . . . must communicate to the police their charters, statutes, and internal regulations, the list of their activities and of their members, and all other information pertaining to their organization and activities whenever, in the interest of order and security, it is required by the authorities...

...It is in industrial relations, however, that the right of association has suffered the greatest restrictions and injuries...

...While the officers are elected by the members, their designation does not become effective until it is approved by the national government...

...but they are held down by Fascist bayonets and able to make their voices heard only with the greatest difficulty...

...Owing to events and vicissitudes in their history, which need not here be recounted, the Italian people may be less advanced than some others in political training and education...

...Are the Italian people satisfied...

...It would not be easy to conceive a legal enactment calculated more effectively to destroy utterly the liberty of printed expression in political matters...

...Perhaps they are, but we have no certainty that this is the fact...

...i.e., fidelity to the political administration...

...It is that this is the kind of government that best suits the Italian people, since they are not capable of maintaining genuine democratic and representative political institutions...

...Under the authority of this election law, it will be possible for the Fascist organization to control the Italian legislature and government long after it has ceased to include a majority of the voters...

...Any form of government which promotes the common good and the welfare of individuals may be legitimate, at least so long as it enjoys some kind of consent of the governed...

...Neither the Chamber of Deputies nor the Senate can consider any matter without his consent...

...If the apologists were at once honest and cognizant of the facts, they would realize that no evaluation of the present regime in Italy is adequate which does not give due consideration to its destruction of such fundamental civil liberties as freedom of association, of speech, and of the press...

...The officers of the organizations must be distinguished for their "ability, morality, and national loyalty...

...Its only basis is two extraordinary assumptions...

...Much as we may dislike these restrictions upon political liberty, we cannot say that they are contrary to the moral law or constitute a violation of individual rights...