Fascism

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John T. Flynn on American Fascism

July 20, 2010 in Fascism by Greg | 3 comments

The growth of fascism in America was noted by Robert Higgs in the post Participatory Fascism. Prior to this, American journalist John T. Flynn – like Friedrich A. von Hayek – warned near the conclusion of WWII how this state of events might transpire:

Fascism will come at the hands of perfectly authentic Americans, as violently against Hitler and Mussolini as the next one, but who are convinced that the present economic system is washed up and that the present political system in America has outlived its usefulness and who wish to commit this country to the rule of the bureaucratic state; interfering in the affairs of the states and cities; taking part in the management of industry and finance and agriculture; assuming the role of great national banker and investor, borrowing billions every year and spending them on all sorts of projects through which such a government can paralyze opposition and command public support; marshaling great armies and navies at crushing costs to support the industry of war and preparation for war which will become our greatest industry; and adding to all this the most romantic adventures in global planning, regeneration, and domination all to be done under the authority of a powerfully centralized government in which the executive will hold in effect all the powers with Congress reduced to the role of a debating society. There is your fascist. And the sooner America realizes this dreadful fact the sooner it will arm itself to make an end of American fascism masquerading under the guise of the champion of democracy.¹

Flynn predicted the ominous effect of unlimited government spending over time:

Continuing this policy will no longer run with the great current of desire in America. Regulating business, cutting in as the partner of industry, repressing the labor unions that were encouraged to action, satisfying the aged who were lured on to dream of abundance—all this will present a problem that will call for such drastic impositions upon every section of the population that nothing short of a totalitarian government supported by the weapons of ruthless coercion and the will to use them will bring compliance from the people. We shall presently be presented with the final crisis—the necessity of taking the last few steps of the last mile to fascism in some generated crisis, of ending the prologue and running up the curtain on the swelling theme—or of calling off the whole wretched business in some costly, yet inescapable, convulsion.²

What were Flynn’s intentions? According to Ronald Radosh,

John T. Flynn on American Fascism »»

As We Go Marching. New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1942. 252-253.↩
Ibid. 257.↩

First Presidency Letter to U.S. Treasury in 1941

November 20, 2009 in Socialism by Greg | 13 comments

Tonight I came across Connor Boyack’s post that contains the full text of a First Presidency letter to the United States Treasury in 1941. This is one of those rare posts which deserve to be read top to bottom, given its length. Here is how it begins:

For several years I have been citing a quote in various posts, emails, discussions, and other settings, allegedly from the First Presidency in 1941. This quote is both potent and largely unprecedented, and its implications are especially interesting.

The quote is as follows:

The Church as a Church does not believe in war and yet since its organization whenever war has come we have done our part … we do thoroughly believe in building up our home defenses to the maximum extent necessary, but we do not believe that aggression should be carried on in the name and under the false cloak of defense. We therefore look with sorrowing eyes at the present use to which a great part of the funds being raised by taxes and by borrowing is being put … We believe that our real threat comes from within and not from without, and it comes from the underlying spirit common to Naziism, Fascism, and Communism, namely, the spirit which would array class against class, which would set up a socialistic state of some sort, which would rob the people of the liberties which we possess under the Constitution, and would set up such a reign of terror as exists now in many parts of Europe. . . .¹

A must read if you have the time.

Sources:

“A Letter to the Treasury from the LDS First Presidency in 1941”. 16 Nov 2009. Connor’s Conundrums. 19 Nov 2009.↩

Collectivism

August 7, 2009 in Fascism by Greg | 2 comments

A comment to the post Health Care Collectivists reminded me that the rhetoric of collectivism permeates today’s political discourse and that as long as a collectivist solution isn’t too “extreme”, some believe that individual rights can be maintained. While this certainly seems like a reasonable approach, there are a number of problems with this philosophy besides the ever present danger of a populace giving heed to the seductive call of social “gradualists.”¹

History of Collectivism

The Encyclopedia Britannica traces the modern history of collectivist ideas to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Du contrat social – or “social contract” – of 1762.² In theory, this was an actual or hypothetical compact, or agreement, between those who were ruled and their rulers, defining the rights and duties of each.

In the 19th century, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a prominent advocate of these ideals and believed that the state “has supreme right against the individual, whose supreme duty is to be a member of the State.”³ In fact, as a statist Hegel believed that submission to the state is the “highest embodiment of social morality.”

Drawing upon Rousseau and Hegel’s work, Karl Marx advocated a collectivist approach to organizing society. Moyra Grant wrote:

Collectivism is sometimes contrasted with both individualism and with statism to mean the advocacy of voluntary, cooperative and non-coercive groups and associations pursuing a common purpose; but is more commonly understood to include statist theories and systems such as fascism and Stalinism. . . .⁴

More broadly, however, collectivism embraces any philosophy which perceives any group, society or state as more important than the individual.⁵

Collectivism »»

See Proposition 8, Mormons, and the New Statesman.↩
“Collectivism”. Encyclopedia Britannica. 6 August 2009.↩
See Hegelian Dialectic.↩
This post uses this more common definition of collectivism and presupposes familiarity with political collectivism.↩
Grant, Moyra. Key Ideas in Politics. Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, United Kingdom: Nelson Thornes, 2003. 19-20. Google Book Search. Retrieved 6 August 2009.↩

Cause of Economic Crisis

June 23, 2009 in Economics by Greg | No comments

Anatomy of a Train Wreck: Causes of the Mortgage Meltdown is a research report written by a University of Texas at Dallas economics professor about the cause of the current economic crisis. If you’ve read Pharaoh’s Dream – A Modern Interpretation by J. Reuben Clark, Jr., then you’ll be especially interested in this excerpt from the executive summary of the report:

Why did the mortgage market melt down so badly? Why were there so many defaults when the economy was not particularly weak? Why were the securities based upon these mortgages not considered anywhere as risky as they actually turned out to be? This report concludes that, in an attempt to increase home ownership, particularly by minorities and the less affluent, virtually every branch of the government undertook an attack on underwriting standards starting in the early 1990s. Regulators, academic specialists, GSEs, and housing activists universally praised the decline in mortgage-underwriting standards as an “innovation” in mortgage lending. This weakening of underwriting standards succeeded in increasing home ownership and also the price of housing, helping to lead to a housing price bubble. The price bubble, along with relaxed lending standards, allowed speculators to purchase homes without putting their own money at risk.¹

As Robert Higgs noted in Participatory Fascism:

In all cases a coalition of big business and the government has emerged, as “fascism’s abrogation of the market in favor of political control over the economy inherently favors big business at the expense of the small entrepreneur.” Characteristically there has been an “extensive interchange of positions between ranking civil servants and high corporate executives”.

If you have time, you might enjoy this video that explores the cause of the crisis from the PBS show McCuistion.

Sources:

Leibowitz, Stan J. “Anatomy of a Train Wreck: Causes of the Mortgage Meltdown”. 3 October 2008. The Independent Institute. 21 June 2009.↩

Flirting with Fascism

May 4, 2009 in Fascism by Greg | 1 comment

A month or so ago, Sheldon Richman was on the Glenn Beck show discussing how the United States continues to flirt with fascism. (Note: For those who unaware, Sheldon Richman is the editor of The Freeman, serves as senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation and is a regular at the Foundation for Economic Education blog.¹ This last organization may be of interest to students of J. Reuben Clark, Jr. and Ezra Taft Benson since both had association with this group.)² Below is an excerpt of this exchange that may provide context to the fact that U.S. government leaders continue to move the country more and more to what may be termed Participatory Fascism. In any case, enjoy the video.

Excerpts from this video that caught my attention:

BECK: Right. OK, could you zoom in on this? Here it is — Harry, bring it forward a little bit. Zoom in right here.

This is — this is the Mercury Dime. On the back of the mercury dime — and Harry saw this earlier today. He works the gib camera that’s zooming in right now. They look familiar? This is the symbol of fascism.

Who brought this dime in? It happened in 1916, Woodrow Wilson was the president. I didn’t even put this together. We’ve have been on the road to fascism for a while.

So, let’s do something here. I looked up the definition of fascism yesterday, and I want to — I want to break it down. The first part is — where socialism sought totalitarian control of a society’s economic process through direct state operations of the means of production, fascism sought to control indirectly through the domination of nominally private owners.

Would you say that this is what’s happening with G.M. right now? And AIG?

RICHMAN: Something similar is happening with those companies. Again, to keep it in context — and this is in no way defensive that I am against all of that — first of all, it began in — back September. As you pointed out, the Republicans and the left and right had done similar things.

Read the rest of this entry »

“Sheldon Richman”. The Future of Freedom Foundation. 3 May 2009.↩
See for example, Benson, Ezra Taft. “Jesus Christ – Gifts and Expectations“. 10 December 1974. BYU Speeches. 3 May 2009.↩

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