The Indianapolis times., 1933-12-14

intruStlng his conscience 10 Cne
legendary Tugwell or to the legend
ary Douglas.
For revolutions are not made by
opinions nor prevented by them. 1
do not think it is possible to find
an instance where social order
has been altered radically because
some one thought some other kind
of order would be better.
There has to be complete break
down of the old order, a total pa
ralysis and an extinction of all hope
that it can revive, before genu-
inc social revolution occurs. When
these conditions do not exist, you
may get change Of government
in moments of excitement even
violent change-you may get an
eighteenth amendment or a grandi-
oSe law, but when the smoke clears
away, you are pretty sure to find
the essential instructions and habits
of the nation the same.
That, for example, is why Marx
ism has worked out exactly con-
trary to the MarXist theory. As
cording to that theory, the first
Communist state should have been
the most advanced capitalist state.
INSTEAD, Communism is. trium-
4 phant in the least capitalistic
nation among all the great powers.
Why? Because in Russia and no.
where else there was, as a result Of
the war, a complete breakdown of
the social mechanism and COL
lapse of all authority and enter
prise.
Had there been no Communist
dictatorship, there inevitably would
have had to have been military
dictatorship, and that dictatorship
would have had the task of Great
ing an economic system on the
ruins of the old system.
That the dictators happened to
be Communists rather than czariSt
generals and grand dukes was, it
seems to me, due to the fact that
the generals and the dukes were
defeated and demoralized and dis
credited men, whereas the Commu
nistS we're fresh and were organized
and ready to take power.
I believe this because the Com
munists got nowhere at all in any
country where the old order mad
any life left in it or any leaders
capable of defending and operating
it.
The moral, it seems to me, is that
a social system is not overthro@n
by conspiracies, nor by propaganda,
but only by its own weakness. The
only way to defend a social system
is to make it work. The only time
to have fears for it is wnen it does
not work. AS long as it works, pro-
viding the bulk of the people with
the satisfactions they normally eX-
pect from it, it is not susceptible to
revolution.
The body polite, if it is reason
ably healthy, throws off infection;
it is only when it is sick that it
loses its immunity. A social order
which is a going concern can be
reformed at this point or that, but
to any realistic revolutionist it is
q poor prospect.
A LII Of this will, of course, not be
L n ineligible to those who are in
the habit of describing everything
they do not agree with as revolu
tionary. There are men, for exam
pie, who think that collective bar
gaining is revolutionary, or revalu-
ing the currency, or a steep income
tax, though measures Of this sort
are accepted as a matter of course
by a conservative country like Eng
land.
These measures may be good or
bad, wise or foolish, but they have
nothing to do with revolution or the
perpetuation of American institu-
tions.
If we are looking for really radi-
cal tendencies in Washington we
must not look to Mr.. Tugwell's opin-
ions, whatever they may be, but to
those conditions where the old order
Of things shows serious evidences of
paralysis. There are not many, I