Evening star., 1926-05-09
BY FRANK III. SIMONDS.

Illuminating Of recent weeks in the his
tory of Fascismo. The fourth ami
verSary of the march on Rome had
just been celebrated with all possible
pomp and enthusiasm and from the
Austrian frontier to the capital all the
dead walls were resplendent with
proclamations and with the legends
of ''W il Duce." But while l was I'm
Rome and on the eve of MusSolinis
departure for Tripon on the great ad
venture which was to stir Italian
hearts with the promise of italian eX
pansion, a demented British woman
fired shot which slightly wounded
the Italian dictator.
The result of this utterly mad deed
almost def1es description. AS one of
MussOlini'S lieutenantS described it to
| me afterward, 1t was as If some one
had kicked a beehive. Within two
! hours Rome was full of soldiers, of
marching citizens, Of Fascist black
| shirts riding in motor lorrieS. waving
| Italian flags, waving the broken fur
\ niture of the opposition newspaper,
| which had been wrecked: roaring out
| the Fascist songs. 1t was one of the
maddeSt, widest explosions Of passion
| which / have ever witnessed, a COM
bination Of deep and moving rejoicing
| over the escape Of MusSolini, of vio-
lent and angry feelings toward all
| the opposition at home and abroad
and 1t was something more difficult to
| explain, yet expressive of the fever
which at the present hour marches
! in Italy.
More Than Passing Phase.
| You felt. one had to feel. for the
| first time, that Fascismo was more
! than passing phase and Mussolini
, more than a temporary dictator. 1t
| was. in the old phrase, more than
| riot, it was a revolution. 1t was
i something which in war and peace in
! Europe in the past Is years / have
| not seen, it was a disclosure of eX-
| plosive nationalisn, the meaning of
which for Europe, in the years which
are upon us. can hardly be interpreted
| or exaggerated. 1t was something
which went down into the roots of
race and seemed to be the moving of
a passion. Of a fever, of a wild and
uncomfortable determination to go
! fiercely and violently in some direc-
| ton not yet disclosed, but already
! felt. There was in it youth. en-
| thusiasm; there was also an element
| of terror. 1t was the ultimate eX-
! preston of violence. but of violence
! in some manner harnessed to a ma
tional purpose.
And with this very summary intro
| duction, / shall now try to indicate
| briefly the facts of Fascismo as they
have been set forth to me by Fascist
leaders or disclosed by the events
which I saw unrolling before my eyes
in my days in Rome. At the outset
| too, it seems essential to say that
\ l1;v Io
to regard the movement itself as com
| pretended in Mussolini. An explosive
! moment in national history has found
! "A truly great leader. This is apparent.
. Mussolin is certainly as significant
and important in Fascismo as was
Isenin in the bolshevist revolution in
| Russia. The man and the movement
| have become in a sense inseparable
and the man has stamped it with
characteristics which were his own
personal contribution. But even today
the movement has gone beyond the
limits Of one man, and, had the bullet
| of the demented woman reached its
| target, Fascismo had already gone too
| far, In my Judgment, to be inter
rupted.
FascismO Not Accident.
l. What, then, is this Fascismo. which
| has for four years with increa sing
| disturbance filled the press of the
! world and with the decline of boil
shevism. become the outstanding cir
! cumstance in Europe? AS l have said
| before, it is first of all revolution. 1t
| has moved with violence and with a
very great element Of terrorism to the
destruction of a social and political
| system which existed before its ad-
vent And 1t is by no means a move
| ment which can be limited to national
| frontiers. Like every other revolu-
| tion since the French, it already
dreams Of overpasSing national from
| tiers and convinces itself to be the
new idea which is to save Europe, and
reorganize world political machinery.
Fascismo Is then a system. 1t is
not an accident. and it is in the main
a deliberate, not fortuitous expert
ment. It starts with the assumption
| that the system Of government and of
society which existed before the war.
broke down then, and that in a real
sense the parliamentary order of gov
ernment which existed in all Western
nations before and during the war
has lived it's life and served its pur-
pose, and must be eliminated now to
make way for a new order founded
upon the conditions Of present-day
| life.
| So far. In a sense, Fascismo
marches with bolshevisn, as one must
realize it does in many Of its methods.
Like bolshevism, 1t would sweep
away the last vestige Of democratic
| government as we in America, France
and Britain know 1t. In place it would
substitute brand-new system. and
system constructed from the collar
| up. not in any sense constructed by
making use of existing material.
| Old Order Denounced.
| Now as to this new system, what do
| the Fascist leaders say? Something
| like this: "Let us start with the clear
work. 1t was a criminal failure in
| italy. You can see that France is
| fioundering toward the Italian realiza-
ton; you will see that the parliamen-
tary order is already working very
badly in Britain, and even in the
United States the ever-recurring spec
tacle of your Senate blocking the
orderly procedure of business with its
absurd interferences shows that you
| in time must come to our point of
view.
! "Fascismo naturally has its origin in
| two oforces-socialism and nationalism;
it is the fusion of the best in both.
Socialism in it's original form was
very noble ideal. 1t aimed at the
ameliorating of the condition of the
masses of people. 1t had, however.
three fatal weaknesses, three inherent
blunders, which doomed it. In the
first place it was based upon the idea
of class warfare, which obviously
meant the paralysis of the state and
the injury of all. In the second place
| it was international-that is, it was
anti-patriotic, which is counter to the
deepest instinct in the human mind.
Finally it denied the right of property,