The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1934-11-10
DUCEF|NDS OWN
POWERS MAY
ENGULF HIM

EuJLOT NOLS. FOT E,UUV yCWSI
Italy has been obliged to choose
merely betUeen good dictator.
ships and bad ones. H. r. Knick.
erbocker, noted foreign CORE
sondent OF International NeUS
Service, DriteS in the eighteenth
article OF his series: democracy
pS. Dictatorship"
BY H. r. KNICKERBOCKER
International News Service
Correspondent
Copyright, 1884, by international News
Service. Reproduction in whole or
part strictly forbidden.
ROME, Nov. 10 U.N.So.-Lib-
erty is like olives. One must cul'
tivate a taste for it. Italians have
had enough to like it.
Americans fought for liberty
152 years ago and since that time
there has never been any ques-
ton Of choosing between liberty
and dictatorship in America. To-
day Americans observing Fascist
Italy are compelled to accept the
verdict of most Italians, that the
dictatorship of MuSSolini is, for
Italy, good dictatorship.
Business Manager
Mussolini rules like a business
manager. His essential purpose
is the same as that Of Stain and
Hitler: To change the old, Free
liberal society into a collective
society. They all want to drill
humanity into ant,heaps or bee
hives where instead Of each indi'
vidual working for his own good,
each works for the common good.
Communists declare the conflict
Is irreconcilable as long as private
ownership Of the means OF pro
duction persists.
Mussolini first, and Hitler after
him, proceeded from the assump-
ton that men won't work except
for profit. Both believed private
initiative based on private profit
was necessary.
Both therefore decreed that
there was no inherently inSupera.
bic conflict between capital and
labor. The conflicts between pro-
Queer and consumer, between fac
tory worker and farmer, are just
as real and just as little insupera.
BILE as the conflict between capital
n,@j 1o1anY than argued
Planned Economy
The Mussolini plan is that en-
ployers will be organized on the
one hand and employees on the
other, and both will be headed
by a state boss, both will be or
dered to cooperate, never to
quarrel, and II they fail to CO.
operate they will go to jail.
There are now being formed
20 category corporations" COM
prising every human being at
work in Italy from actors to
farmers, bank directors to needle
workers, factory owners to res
taurant walters. Head Of each
of these syndicates will be Mus
Solini.
twelve years of government
control of Italian economy and
seven years of depression have
led already to the point where
private initiative has a smaller
share in business than the gov"
eminent has.
All the Government
Nobody buys shares any more
in italy. everybody buys govern
ment bonds. All credit to Italian
business flows through govern
ment agencies. Profits already
have become a secondary matter.
Mussolini is gradually being
driven by the mechanism Of his
own contriving to complete
system of planned national
economy, and from this prospect
Mussolini has always recoiled.
But the crisis upset his plans.
AS profits dwindled and wages
dropped, capital and labor turned
to the state for help, and aband-
oned to Mussolini their private
initiative"
Mussolini has declared there
will be no second duce," and
meant he would train Italians
to govern themselves and give
them system to do it with.
But the longer he lives the more
they depend on him. He has
taught them to follow, and to
like it, but what will they do
when their leader is gone?
Mr.. Knickerbocker is now en-
route to Russia to gather ma
terial for the balance of his
articles on Democracy versus
Dictatorship" The Russian ar.
ticles will be carried as soon as
they are received.