A Socialist Looks at Democracy
Solomon, Charles
By Charles Solomon A Socialist Looks at Democracy Candidate for U.S. Senate in New York, Analyzing Soeial Background of Democracy in Debate With Professor Barnes, Shows How Workers of Hand and...
...Must Usher In Classless Society History is repeating Itself...
...No one appreciates more than I that political democracy Is not enough...
...Points the Way to Real—to Industrial— Democracy i»§ly that ( omraie Solomon won tki debate SO far In this debate there haa been no definition of democracy...
...Political democracy suited for requirements of the bourgeoisie...
...Political parties represent essentially special economic and social interests...
...I am sure Dr...
...Civilization dates back thousands of years...
...Such p/rties exist In all the important capitalist nations of the world...
...They will be ended when the people become the masters of their own live* through the social ownership and democratic control of those things without which thry cannot live...
...Democracy in this •Wse really first arose In the 19th century...
...Let me present one by Professor Charles A. Beard, the distinguished student of history and politics...
...with the right of free migration on which peasants and factory owners insist...
...Was Inevitable Product It should be clear, then, that democracy is not an invention, not an ingenious device, not a social medicine prescribed in one form or another for the ills of society...
...The bourgeoisie used democracy to sweep away the feudal impedimenta in the way of its expansion, to protect its special interests...
...No one has better stated this fact than such American statesman as Madison, Webster and Calhoun...
...Corruption, inefficiency, war— these have prevailed as long as exploitation and Ignorance, growing out of the existence.of ruling and ruled classes, have existed...
...To identify democracy with the simple agrarian society and stable civilization of the remote past is again historically Inaccurate...
...with business enterprise which cannot flourish under autocratic and irresponsible government, dependent upon the vagaries of personal rulers...
...In the first place, modern democracy is young, so young...
...It ia not perfect...
...It is impossible scientifically and intelligently to discuss democracy without contemplating it historically...
...To say that democracy is a dogma Is Utopian...
...Barnes himself, in an article published last Tuesday, assails this point of view In the following language: "There Is a eugenic fallacy which needs to be silenced forever, namely, the arrogant assumption that our present hierarchy of social classes rests upon a valid blo-(logical basis, with the ablest at 'the top and the Inferiors at the bottom of the pyramid...
...So have the masters, the rulers, throughout all history, and today, except that their mistakes have been worse...
...4$k» Hoover and Roosevelt For Declaration on Negro Asserting that heretofore the demands of the Negro had been "evaded In an American political discussion, when they have not been relegated to the hate-inspiring diatribes of demagogues," the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has submitted to President Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt a questionnaire calling for "plain apd unequivocal declaration on the subject of race relations...
...It is the noblest political ideal men have yet formed, although, like many another human ideal, it haa suffered from extravagant hopes arising out of Ignorance and mis understanding...
...Comrade Solomon took the negative The raitt audience vat '4 mer- '¦ -------—--------¦— People Have Failed to Use Democracy as They Should Have to Eliminate Waste, Want and War, but Are Waking to Possibilities of This Method...
...with telegraphs, cables, telephones and radios...
...Deepening and broadening all of the time...
...But these are not peculiar to democracy...
...No questionnaire is being sent the Socialist or Communist party candidates, inasmuch as these parties have adequately declared themselves on the issues involved...
...Barnes and myself to participate in this very discussion and your right to listen in...
...with automobiles and flying machines which make the whole world akin...
...and this involve understanding of that momentous social phenomenon — the rise of the bourgeoisie and the breakdown of monarchy and aristocracy...
...Democrats may be dogmatic, but democracy is no dogma...
...with cities, and their fermenting intellectual life...
...No other method available in our western world offers the people, the mosses, the workers, the same opportunity of relatively peaceful social progress on the way to the establishment of the first industrial democracy in history...
...The association states that It la asking the questions to provide Negroea with a "competent and authoritative basis in determining their choice of candidates In the coming election...
...No social institution is...
...It is a living, growing, changing, expanding medium...
...Bui It seems clear to me that this position is utterly In conflict with much that he has said and Implied here tonight...
...We had' war long before democracy was ever dreamed of...
...I need only remind Dr...
...That is a party of these masses, these workers...
...and it cannot be understood apart from its social background, from the historic soil in which it is rooted...
...The nature and distribution of property throughout history have lain at the bottom of class divisions and determined the character and purpose of government...
...The world cannot go on without theni, and they are not going on without the iv struments and practices that, constitute what we know as democracy, temporary interruptions in relatively backward parts of the world notwithstanding...
...They are primarily class organizations...
...With democracy we have had war, corruption and inefficiency...
...Let us see it we cannot very briefly, since our time is so limited, get at the essence of this business of politic* and parties...
...Senate in New York, Analyzing Soeial Background of Democracy in Debate With Professor Barnes, Shows How Workers of Hand and Brain Must Use It to Achieve . Emancipation of Mankind The New leader is glad to present herewith Charles Salomon's presentation in his debate over station H OR wpth Professor Harry I-Inter Bsrnes on "Is Democracy a lailure...
...are here...
...There is no necessary and Inevitable relationship between democracy and these evils...
...The failure of the people, thus far, adequately to employ this method is no valid indictment of the method Itself...
...the masses, the workers by band and hraia, roust and will have Industrial democracy...
...This working.class now demands political power in conformity with its social Importance...
...However, this victory will usher in the classless society, since it will consist In the transfer of the basic means of life from the hands of the capitalist owners, who exploit the many, to society generally, to be used for the service, security and happiness of all, instead of for the profits of the few, be the social consequences what they may...
...There Is no necessary relationship between democracy and the dogma that all people are equal...
...However, that very social development which brought into existence the capitalist class, and ranged It as a revolutionary force against the feudal order, has evolved the modern working class, which grows in numbers and social Importance while the capitalist class becomes smaller in numbers and increasingly socially superfluous and parasitic...
...The people have made mistakes ? Of course...
...Democracy does not rest or depend upon any such hypothesis...
...They are rooted in social conditions These conditions can and will be radically changed and the people provided, for the first time in history, with an adequate opportunity for the full unfoldment of their capacities...
...Bourgeois Raised Bat Me-Cry It was this bourgeoisie, notably h the French Revolution, which raised the great democratic war «ry of "Liberty, Fraternity and Equality...
...They are: 1. Industrial or social democracy, as it is sometimes called, is Impossible without the social ownership and democratic control of the basic means of life— that Is, natural resources, public utilities, machinery of production and distribution generally...
...The masses of the people, the workers, have distinct economic and social Interests which require special political expression and representation...
...Barnes is a member of the League for Independent Political Action, which seks to organize a similar party in the United States...
...Barnes how democracy, embodied In the political and economic organizations of the British working class in 1920, prevented Britain from going to war against Russia...
...He says further: "All we know of as civilization has I.- -ri achieved by this same race of men Inferior, according to eugenic standards...
...We have advanced from the cave to the Empire State Building with all our defects...
...Barnes would not seriously dispute this...
...Democracy is in the process of development even as is society itself...
...This is the essence of the scientific method in the study of history and politics, and it Is precisely at this point that we encounter the essential weakness in the conception of Dr...
...ut homed Potentialities No, democracy is not a failure...
...with mass production...
...The great masses, the workers of hand and brain, must use political power, democracy, to accomplish their class victory...
...Observe how he stresses the social character of the institution: "It (democracy) is an intricate collection of realities, slowly evolved with the development of freehold agriculture, commerce, machinery and science facilitated, no doubt, by the agitation of idealists, yet moving relentlessly forward as modern economy triumphs over feudalism...
...Barnes seems not to appreciate...
...It has hardly been used...
...with schools, which are Indispensable to the factory system, if nothing else...
...Property Baals of Politic* There has been talk here of politics and political parties as Incidents of democracy...
...It is the right of Dr...
...Nevertheless, let us beware of that supercilious attitude of disdain for the people and the things of which they are capable...
...Democracy and War Democracy is not the cause of war...
...The Industrial revolution precipitated the ascendancy of the capitalist class — factory owners, financiers, tradesmen and their retainer Intellectuals...
...It cannot be understood in any other way...
...It demanded and gtalned a political position collate with Its economic and so-^ Importance...
...It is no mystic savior...
...We cannot understand them apart from an understanding of property, its distribution, and the social relationships thereby created...
...with trade unions which assert the rights and power of industrial labor...
...The bourgeoisie was the social carrier of democracy...
...There is biological tMxs'm for cUii uistiifCtlous...
...The masse...
...But I know also three things which Dr...
...This matter of education now has a very vital bearing on the effective use by the people of the processes of democracy...
...From this definition, It is clear that the democracy we are concerned with In this debate is distinctly a modern Institution...
...By Charles Solomon A Socialist Looks at Democracy Candidate for U.S...
...and 3. In the struggle to bring about this result, these masses, these workers, have an invaluable asset In those weapons that are to b> found in the arsenal of democracy...
...In the typically capitalist nations of the world those that are predominantly or substantially industrial — the masses are giving striking proof of their ability to use democracy In their own Itnerests and for the general good...
...What we need right now is sane education, not eugenics...
...To speak of it as having failed in the sense that it is something that may be deliberately tried and experimented with, regardless of time, place and circumstance, is historically Inaccurate...
...The 18th was still the •rand age of monarchs...
...Regarded in this sense, democracy and its Ideology could no more be prevented than the coming of the machine and the civilization predicated upon it...
...While this "ass was economically the important class, It was excluded from Mttlclpation in political power and **lal privileges...
...If I mistake not, Dr...
...Wars are and have been rooted In economic rivalries among the ruling ojasses of the different countries...
...Has I...
...Industrial Democracy Next The next logical step in its development is industrial democracy, and political democracy is the best menus available to us for the realization of this great objective...
...It Is historically the product of the bourgeois revolution, of the economic and social ascendancy of the capitalist class...
...revolutionary because it challenged the political and social predominance of a socially •arasltlc class...
...To be evaluated it must be understood...
...There is no acceptable substitute for It, especially for us here In the United States, conceding Its Imperfections...
...In the French Revolution, the achievement of (bis end was marked with dramatic violence...
...It has un-fathomed potentialities...
...Scarcely one hundred years old even in its classic home-England...
...It is different today than it was yesterday and will be still more different tomorrow...
...Hence, to claim that we could not, if we had sound ideas, create a rational social system and intelligently exploit our great scientific knowledge, is shear nonsense...
...It is affiliated with the printing press and the newspaper which spread ideas in spite of all censors...
...and 2. It is Utopian to expect this result to be accomplished except by the great masses of the people, the workers by hand and brain...
...It is freedom of speech, press and assemblage: the right of workers to organize labor unions, to strike and picket...
...This is the heart of the world revolutionary struggle of our time...
...In England, the rise of the capitalists to political power was comparatively unspectacular...
...There lies the future course and not in the advocacy of the abandonment of democracy assuming it can be deliberately and voluntarily done...
...The pyrotechnics of the French Revolution should not be mistaken for the revolution itself, which was essen-HqMu the successful effort of the capitalist class to achieve political power...
...The bourgeoisie used political power to entrench Itself socially...
...It is the inevitable product of a definite stage in the development of society, the corollary of the rise to power of a particular class...
...with railways and travel which break down the rigidity and ignorance of village life...
...They have built up powerful labor unions, mighty political parties, inspiring cultural organizations, gigantic cooperatives, all of which could not have been created without democracy...
...I agree with Dr...
...that there can be no adequate democracy unless and until there is industrial democracy...
...There can be no doubt that democracy affords the masses a much better opportunity to oppose and prevent war than did the absolutisms and aristocracies of yesterday or than do the transient dictatorships of today...
...Barnes Is commenting on the recent congress of eugenists...
...All these things are indifferent, indeed hostile, to fixed status-the foundation of monarchies and aristocracies...
...Democracy Is not something static, final...
...Democracy is more than merely casting votes...
...Sane Education Needed Dr...
...Democracy is a social method...
Vol. 14 • September 1932 • No. 13
