FASCISM IN ACTION

A DOCUMENTED STUDY AND ANALYSIS
OF FASCISM IN EUROPE

PREPARED AT THE INSTANCE AND UNDER THE DIRECTION OF

REPRESENTATIVE WRIGHT PATMAN OF TEXAS

BY

LEGISLATIVE REFERENCE SERVICE

OF THE

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

UNDER THE DIRECTION OF

ERNEST S. GRIFFITH

published in 1947

FOREWARD

by Representative Wright Patman, of Texas

The world today is faced with a dangerous manifestation of recent history known as fascism. Opinions vary as to whether this movement is economic, social, political, or philosophical, but there is marked agreement as to its objective characteristics. Briefly, fascism means the seizure and control of the economic, social, political, and cultural life of the state by a small group. Free speech, free press, free worship, and public meetings are ruthlessly suppressed. Blind obedience to the "leader" is demanded of the people and the slightest wavering means death or imprisonment to any person. Restrictive policies may be carried on against his entire family. A fascist regime is necessarily militaristic and nationalistic.

It is not my purpose to attempt a technical definition of fascism, which is given in the preface, but rather to point to some of the tendencies prevalent in society today which might lead to a resurgence of this hated movement.

To most Americans the threat of fascism vanished with the defeat of Germany and Japan in the greatest war that history has known. There is, however, a real question as to whether we defeated the evil itself in destroying its two principal exponents. Public opinion appears in general to hold that fascism is a wholly European, or at least a wholly foreign movement. Yet there are many strong symptoms of fascism in our own democratic society. True, this movement in the United States masquerades under other names than the discredited one of fascism, but whatever it may be called, it's peculiar characteristics are alarmingly evident.

If we are to combat successfully such an insidious movement, many Americans must understand clearly what fascism is and what it means to the individual to live in a fascist state. At my request, the Legislative Reference Service of the Library of Congress has prepared a study of Fascism in Action as an aid to the American citizen in protecting himself and his children against this most dangerous movement of modern times.

A careful reading of this study will show what fascism in actual operation means in direct personal terms. Every person must think and act at the command of a higher authority. Every school, church, home, and business is carefully controlled by the dominant party. The concentration camp or death await the citizen who offers opposition to the regime.

To many, fascism, particularly as it operated in Germany, seemed a model of order and efficiency. It had apparently solved many of the most crucial problems of modern times. Fascist countries radically reduced or abolished unemployment, seemingly eliminated many social differences, and contrived many new devices which assisted or amused their people. But the cost to the individual was heavy. The price was abolition of representative government, of individual liberty, of the rights of free speech, free assembly, free religion, a free press, and the principle of equality before the law.

Fascist Germany and Japan used the boasted efficiency of fascism to build mighty war machines to crush the "inefficient" democracies, but an important fact had been left out of their leaders' calculations. Democracy and efficiency, even military efficiency, are not incompatible, and the democracies decisively defeated the fascist powers and coincidentally answered one of the principal arguments in defense of fascism.

I believe we are forced to admit that fascism is today an ever-present danger to our democracy. We must consider not only how to recognize its manifestations but also what we can do to combat it. Many means can be used but no one method seems to be the real solution. Some of the most effective are described briefly below.

Perhaps the best means of fighting fascism is to recognize it, no matter under what title it masquerades. Not all hate organizations are necessarily fascist, but they have certain definite trends towards such a policy. If members of groups of this type can be made to realize the dangers inherent in such beliefs, a long step toward overcoming fascism will have been taken. ---

One of the most powerful means of preventing the establishment of a fascist government in a democratic country is to make certain that the existing government operates honestly and efficiently No really strong democracy has fallen before fascism. Democracy is not to be had for the wishing, and the best efforts of every American citizen should be devoted to its perpetuation and successful operation. Democracy and efficiency are compatible, but insinuations that we must choose between democratic participation in government and efficient government often emanate from fascist sources.

---------------------

PREFACE

This study of Fascism in Action was undertaken at the request of Representative Wright Patman, of Texas, who also indicated that its scope and method were to conform in general to the earlier study, Communism in Action --- prepared at the instance of Representative Everett Dirksen, of Illinois.

This study is appropriate because of the many similarities between fascism and communism, some of which Representative Fred E. Busbey, of Illinois has recently listed as follows:

1. The wiping out of all independent trade-Unionism with the result that those trade-unions which are permitted, exist only under the tolerance of the totalitarian state, to serve as its servile adjuncts.

2. The elimination of political parties except the ruling Nazi, Fascist, or Communist Party.

3. The subordination of all economic and social life to the strict control of the ruling, single-party bureaucracy.

4. The suppression of individual initiative, and the liquidation of the system of free enterprise, and a tendency toward government control of supercartels.

5. The abolition of the right to freedom of speech, assembly, and religious worship.

6. The reduction of wages and, in the case of communism, living standards.

7. The use of slave labor on a vast scale and the establishment of concentration camps.

8. The abolition of the right to trial by jury, habeas corpus, the right to independent defense counsel, and the innocence of the defendant until proven guilty.

9. The glorification of a single Leader, Fuehrer, or Duce, who is all-powerful and subject neither to criticism nor removal through the ballot.

10. The utilization of a special form of social demagogy - for example, incitement of race against race and class against class - the elimination of all opposition, and the concentration of power into the hands of the ruling dictatorship.

11. The subordination of all economic and social life and the everyday needs of the population to the requirements of an expanding military machine seeking world conquest.

12. The establishment of a system of nation-wide espionage to which the entire population is subject.

13. The severance of social, cultural, and economic contact between the people of the totalitarian state and those of other countries, through a rigorous press and radio censorship, travel restrictions, etc.

14. The open disregard for the rights of other nations and the sanctity of treaties.

15. The maintenance and encouragement of fifth columns abroad.

16. The reduction of parliamentary bodies to a rubber-stamp status automatically approving all decisions of the one-party dictatorship and the omnipotent Leader.

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COMMENTS:

Am I the only one who sees far too many similarities between the path we are currently on and the one which is referenced above?

Note the highlighted words.

They are highlighted because you can read about them almost any day in our newspapers and magazines, or watch them on your television sets, or websites, as exponents of these patently neo-fascist policies can be heard to shout out as they stand in front of numerous flags and tell you how they are "christians" or "jews" (or "scientists" i.e. technocrats, by which they mean atheists pretending to be unbiased persons, above it all).

Whatever it is which they truly are, NEO-FASCIST cannot help to come to my mind, especially after reading the prescient warnings from the year 1947, two years after the end of WWII.

Wake up, already !!

And prepare yourselves for more to come.

This probably will not be a pretty sight to behold.

Just go ask Bradley Manning, or Edward Snowden, or the persons being held indefinitely, without legal rights, at Guantanamo, and Abu Ghraib, and Bagram Air Base, or those persons whom our great Leader determines should be assassinated without right to due process, or right to counsel and trial by jury.

This is a most definite and very ominous pattern.

These sound far more like the acts of enemies of our Constitution  (which they have sworn to uphold, as the "law of the land"), than they do pro-Americans, like Representative Wright Patman.

Oh, and don't forget the supercartels = banksters = too big to fail? or too big to survive without massive government assistance, which you and I are paying for with our very life blood, no less.

I sure do wish you all would come out of your stupor before the final pieces of the "hangman's gallows" have been fully put in place, as is happening while we watch.

I especially like the language about a national surveillance system ("nation-wide espionage to which the entire population is subject"),
in light of the recent NSA/Yahoo/Microsoft/Google/Facebook/PRISM revelations.

Are there "snakes in the grass"?

Just how much evidence do you need, anyway?

This seems a pretty compelling case to me.

And I say that as one who has defended numerous criminal cases during nearly twenty-three years of trial practice.

Meaning, thereby, that I do know, all too well, whereof I am speaking, having long been in the practice of determining whether or not a constitutional issue will stand up to legal and factual scrutiny in a court of law.


w/ love to all


vw

6:44 a.m.
7-13-13
Saturday
Ventura, California, USA


p.s.  here is a link to Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Fascism+in+Action+Patman+Griffith