The news scimitar. (Memphis, Tenn.) 1907-1926, 1919-03-12
AMERICAN BoLsHEvIsM

For some months there has been talk OF Bolshevik activity
IN tins country. very lew took these reports seriously, while
Others thought that the much bespoken and long deferred war
between capital and labor in this country was on the way.
Sohotor-General Lamar at Washington has made a discov-
cry which cannot be passed over lightly. He claims to have
documentary and oral evidence TO prove that the |. W w. is a
revolutionary society that IS carrying on a propaganda, the
object OF which is to overthrow this government and establish
in its stead a Bolshevk republic. Preposterous: Certainly!
But many things are preposterous while they are becoming.
Only when they emerge or enter into being do we recognize
them as the natural results Of provocative causes. What is a
BoIsheyik republic: Briefly, it is a government for all the peo-
pie, in which only one-tfth OF the people shall have a voice.
The philosophy OF the BolsheMki teaches that everyone is
entitled to the essential necessaries Of life, such as food, raj
ment, heat, light, shelter, medicine, etc, and only those engaged
IN the production and distribution OF these essentials shall have
voice or representation in the government. There can be no
rich men. When a person takes more from the common fund
than he needs to supply his wants and boards it up in accumu-
lation he must surrender the surplus and return it to the COM
mon fund, Just as during the war when a person had more
coal or flour than the government thought he needed, he had
to surrender it, so that it might be distributed among those
who had not enough. TO make room and prepare the way for
this new Utopia, short cuts must be taken. Those who have
inherited or accumulated wealth in excess of their share, under
a fair distribution, must be despoled, and as they will not sub
init to spohation they must be gotten rid Of by killing them,
Each trade union is to be a political unit and elect chosen
delegates to a local soviet, and these sovets will elect delegates
to a general soviet or central government, and in this way do
away with all existing forms OF government. The plutocrat'
even on a small scale, should he be shrewd enough to escape
spolaton, cannot enter the soviets. These are exclusively for
the proletarnt.
Innocently many good people have furnished arguments
ior the Bolshevki, How often do we hear complaints against
the government and criticisms of it. These 90 unchallenged
aWd hiHIlNNd NNN pNMS III NDNS vi pClI. VIZ dlC lOu lhl
the unearned increment on land belongs to the community. II
SO it should go to the community and not to individuals, and
it the community cannot come into its own in any other way,
it must do SO by force and violence. To the charge that their
plan is class government, they answer in our own words, that
this country has now class government and always has had
class government. Our legislatures, state and national, are
composed of lawyers, whose mode of life and training instll
into them loyalty to clients, and their clients are the men Of
property, who can pay. We did not have to wait for the
Boshevists to say this. We have been doing it ourselves.
Lawyers are numerous in our public life, but that is because
the study and practice of the law builds up and develops the
mentality, gives amplitude Of vision and trains the mind to grasp
new problems, and the perception to look on all sides and reason
from cause to effect. A lawyer must think and express him
self, and this power Of expression is a great asset. Emerson
tells us that "a man is only half himself. The other half is his
expression"
No matter what the Bolshevik philosophy, or lack of MIL
osophy, they cannot be permitted in this country. In theory
at least, we have no classes in this country. All men are equal
before the law, and if they are not in practice and in fact i l.
our own fault. Foreign agitators must not come in to tear
down. We want builders and preservers, not demolishers and
destroyers. The very element-the native laboring elemcnt-that
these seltexpatrnted trouble-makers are expecting to win over
will be the first to turn down their thumbs and drive them from
the country. A republic is difficult to conduct even where every
citizen is equal to every other citizen. A republic conducted
by one class, and that a hungry, predatory, b~loodthirsty class
would be an anonymous structure which could not last. The
raucous. ~cacophony Of BoShevsm must be silenced, whether in
the senate or out OF IT. Free speech is all right, but foul and
f~ault-fnding speech that breeds and encourages agencies of dis
order should be repressed, True Americans should cease crit
icizng their laws and government. Fault finders and trouble
makers should not be listened to, and their complaints should
be resented and their demands resisted. We should stick 10
for our country and remember the words of Stephen Decatur;
May she ever be in the right; but, right or wrong. our
country"