Dissent, Power, and Confrontation [[1st ed.].] 1533305242, 9781533305244

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I

BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY

ary.

[n][a][a]|n]Ia][g][a]

Dissent, Power,

Confrontation Ia][a][3]|ll2ll2ll|]

and

Digitized by the Internet Archive in

2012

http://archive.org/details/dissentpowerconfOOklei

Theatre for Ideas / Discussions No. 1 Shirley Broughton, Director in association with

Elizabeth Hardwick and Robert B. Silvers

sirsFaifnirairirsr^rair^rairsrairai^

Dissent,

Power, and Confrontation EDITED

BY

Alexander Klein srnirirnrrsisiHirarainirsrsrairs^

McGRAW-HILL BOOK COMPANY New York St. Louis San Francisco Dusseldorf

Mexico

Toronto

Copyright

©

1971 by Theatre for Ideas, Inc.

All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. of this publication

may be

No

part

reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,

or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,

photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written per-

mission of the publisher.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 77-178935

FIRST EDITION

07-063901-9 DESIGNED AT THE INKWELL STUDIO

Contents

Elizabeth Hard wick

Preface:

Editor's Note:

1

ix

Alexander Klein

xi

The First Amendment and the Politics of Confrontation

Moderator:

Hannah Arendt Ramsey Clark Ron Young Nat Hentoff

Discussants:

Philip Hirschkop

Panelists:

Seymour Melman Joan Simon

2 Democracy: Does Panelists

:

It

Alexander Klein Stephen Rousseas

Have a Future?

Norman Mailer

Moderator:

Herbert Marcuse Arthur M. Schlesinger, Nat Hentoff

Discussants:

Elizabeth Hardwick

Jr.

Robert Lowell

33

Contents

VI

3 The Tactics of Dissent

57

Panelists :

David Dellinger

Moderator:

Paul Goodman Nat Hentoff

Discussants:

Shirley Broughton Julius Lester

Tom

Nagel

Ira Sandperl

Raymond Rubinow Joan Simon

4 The Legitimacy of Violence Political

Panelists

Steven Halliwell

David McReynolds

as a

96

Act?

Hannah Arendt

Noam Chomsky

Moderator: Discussants:

Robert Lowell Conor Cruise O'Brien Robert B. Silvers Mitchell Goodman Susan

Sonta^

Robert Paul Wolff

5 The Meaning of Chicago Panelists:

Moderator: Discussant:

Afterword:

Tom Hayden Murray Kempton Jeremy Larner Robert Lowell Mary McCarthy Jeremy Larner

The "Hidden" Story of Chicago: Alexander Klein

135

Contents

vii

6 The Impotence of Power

177

Hannah Arendt Hans J. Morgenthau

Panelists:

Ithiel de Sola Pool Moderator: Discussants:

Afterwords

Ronald Steel Nat Hentoff Frank Bassin Tom Farer Robert Jay Lifton William Lineberry Klaus Meschkat Joseph Neyer William PfafT Stephen Rousseas Robert Sussman Stewart Adam Yarmolinsky Donald Zagoria Ithiel de Sola Pool

Ronald Steel Nat Hentoff

7 The Debris of Marxism

235

Joel Carmichael Ekkehart Krippendorff

Panelists:

Moderator: Discussants:

Harold Rosenberg Ugo Stille Eric Bentley Murray Bookchin

Max Geltman

James Johnson Leo Sauvage

Sidney Morgenbesser Sol Yurick Afterwords:

Panelists

Ekkehart Krippendorff Harold Rosenberg

and Moderators

283

Preface [n][a][U[U[a]Gi][a]

The

discussions gathered together in this book took place

on West 21st Street in New a very austere loft, reached by

at Shirley Broughton's studio

York

City.

The

studio

is

a flight of rickety stairs. Inside, crowds, uncomfortable seats, some without backs, demand much of the audience. In the winter you sit on your coat; in the summer and fall you swelter. No smoking, never enough air. The meet-

members and a few was always smaller. were held in more spa-

ings were usually small, restricted to invited guests, but

somehow

the studio

Occasionally benefit discussions cious surroundings, but there were always the faithful

who complained from

that the discussions lost something

away

the ramshackle loft.

Complaints are a part of the Theatre for Ideas atmosphere.

The

rather general lack of readiness to accept any-

thing, whether the space or the ideas, gives the

whole en-

terprise an argumentative, skeptical quality that is

now

almost old-fashioned and brings to mind, for those old enough to remember it, something of New York intellectual life of a few decades past. In addition there is always a good deal of personal tension in the air, always the dignity or the pride call it what you will of the panelists and the unpredictable convictions and predictably lengthy expressiveness of the audience. The encounters were not meant to reach out to the opposite poles of an argument, as in a debating society. Rather, the people came for the speaker's information, beliefs, scholarship, inspiration or, sometimes, temperament. All

—

—

—

IX

x

Preface

of the evenings except one* (and that, strangely, not about

about dramatic theory and were likely to be disorderly, but only in an intellectual way. It was all meant to be free and interesting and the talk could lead where it would, without much politics or social questions but

practice)

parliamentary policing or control.

The ideas for discussion grew out of events, out of what was happening at the moment, what people were talking about. No set of topics was planned in the summer and offered up for the season. I think Theatre for Ideas is a New York City thing, but one of the attractions of the place was the fact that Miss Broughton was so often able to get writers and thinkers to come in from Chicago, Washington, or Boston and even to catch them while they were here from California, or from abroad. It is hard to describe something as fluid and noninstitutional as Theatre for Ideas. The looseness of the organization of the evenings, the give-and-take atmosphere had everything to do with the interest of the whole conception. The existence of something small, without any larger purpose than the airing of ideas and the dramatic interplay of characters and their opinions: this in itself seems unique. For the rest, the discussions stand on their own.

—

Elizabeth Hardwick

*

A

discussion with the directors of

The Living Theatre.

Editors Note HE BEE BE Theatre for Ideas is a group of some one hundred heterogeneous intellectuals writers, artists, scholars who meet in New York City, usually privately, for panel discussions of the arts, culture, and politics, as well as for advance performances of new works in theater, music, dance, and film. Shirley Broughton, its continuing director, founded Theatre for Ideas in 1961, and she has had advice in planning the forums chiefly from Elizabeth Hardwick and Robert Silvers of New York Review. Theatre for Ideas discussions have been frequently reported on and commented about in The New York Times,

—

—

UEuropeo, Harper s, The NaAmerican Scholar, Daedalus, Atlantic Monthly, and other newspapers and periodicals here and abroad, as Village Voice, UExpress,

tion,

well as in various books. This, however, series of

books which will make the

is

the

first

of a

texts of these hitherto

private discussions directly available to the general public.

In most instances

—

—

with a sharp exception or two the and other participants (all unpaid) came to these evenings because they were interested in one another's thought, and also in the chance to talk freely with a small and sophisticated audience. The discussions are extemporaneous and informal. Panelists make initial remarks, then comment on each other's views and amplify their own after which commentators from the floor join in. By and large, the panelists remain at the center of the action throughout; but it frequently happens that those invited panelists

—

—

xii

who make comments

Editor's Note

challenge not only the panelists'

ideas but also their personalities and temperaments.

The texts in this book have been edited to eliminate some of the redundancies and digressions that occurred but the main lines of the discussions have been preserved. Some of the participants have inserted footnotes or added "Afterwords" to supplement or recast some of their points. The reader will find brief biographical items about the panelists and moderators in the back of this volume. Data on the speakers from the floor are in footnotes within the text.

Theatre for Ideas and the editor want to express their thanks to all the panelists, moderators, and commentators who have contributed to this book, to Del MacKenzie of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation who so kindly and efficiently taped the discussions, and to Paula Greenbaum for her valuable assistance. The Theatre and its director, Shirley Broughton, also wish particularly to acknowledge the generous aid and support of Mrs. Joan K. Davidson, Mr. and Mrs. Jacob M. Kaplan, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Rubin, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Stanton, and the late Armand J. Erpf.

Alexander Klein

1

The First Amendment and the Politics of Confrontation

Panelists:

HANNAH ARENDT RAMSEY CLARK RON YOUNG

Moderator:

NAT HENTOFF

Discussants:

Philip Hirschkop

Seymour Melman Joan Simon

Alexander Klein Stephen Rousseas

This TFI discussion took place on March 19, 1970.

[n][a]l2ll2ll2lll]l2lll]

Nat Hentoff / Mr. Ramsey Clark by Hannah Arendt and Ron Young.

will begin, followed

Ramsey Clark / Hamlet was

right. That is the question: be or not to be. George Wald, the Nobel Prizewinning biologist at Harvard, has said that the key reason there's such great unrest among young people is that they doubt their generation has a future. The poet Archibald MacLeish has attributed youth unrest to their doubt that man is in control. And we all know, today, that everything depends on whether our institutions are capable of change, of being responsive to the enormity of change in our lives, and whether human attitudes can change to meet essentially new conditions. For change is the dominant fact of our time more change in half of the last generation perhaps, in the fundamental way people live and the way they spend their moments, than in all history there-

to

—

tofore.

What are the forces for institutional change and att itudinal change? The major force is dissent. If you analyze you find that it contains some twentynine different ideas. They all have to do with human dignity, and they fall into three general categories. The first category relates to the spirit of man; the second, with the fairness of trial when the state challenges the individual; the third, with the integrity of the individual, his physical integrity and his property. The First Amendthe Bill of Rights,

ment embodies the

issues of the spirit of

man:

religion,

4

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

ideas, thoughts, communication, petition to government,

freedom of press. Its re al purpose is to protect dissent Look back through history and I think you'll find that dissent has been the principal catalyst in the alchemy of .

truth.

what

And is.

A

the reasons are fairly clear: dissent questions scientist like

Max

Planck could

tell

you how

goes beyond where generally expressed by powerless

dissent leads to discovery, because

it

you areJ^Now dissent is people. They may not be

utterly powerless, but they're obviously powerless with regard to the matters on which they dissent. Because if they had power, they wouldn't have to dissent; their will would be done. Now how do powerless people influence and affect the exercise of power? Confrontation is one technique. Confrontation is dissent in action, dissent seeking changej The people at the helm of institutions in the very nature of things will tend to be the most satisfied with the way things are now. They grew up to a very considerable degree within those institutions. They tend to like them the way they are. This university that I'm the president of? This corporation that I'm the chairman of the board of? This government agency that I head? Change it? It's me. I should

change myself? That's the hard part. Let me discuss two case histories that I had the opin which portunity to see from a particular perspective the issues of the First Amendment and the politics of confrontation were involved. The most unique to me, the most telling and perhaps the most exciting, was that longtime-ago Poor People's Campaign in the spring of 1968. Dr. Martin Luther King, who started it, never got to participate, but the Poor People's Campaign went forward.

—

And

it

—

frightened a considerable part of the public in the

United States. It frightened many people in positions of great power. There were poor people, and they came to Washington. They came in animal-drawn caravans, and they were not many. Now how could "the Establishment" be frightened by some 1500 people, very poor and powerless people, from Georgia and New York and Chicago? People led by leaders committed to nonviolence?

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

5

—

They were given a permit a rather unusual permit up a camp where a camp had never been set up

to set

before, on the great grassy stretches in front of the Lin-

coln Memorial.

And

they

camped

many

there for

poor people brutalized by poverty, sickened, poverty and hunger. Where is most human centrated in America?

Among

weeks,

literally,

by

illness con-

the poor.

So they went to the Department of Agriculture and they said: We're hungry. In these United States which pays farmers billions of dollars not to grow more food there are millions of people

who

are hungry.

And

large numbers of mentally retarded children

there are

—because

the

mothers were suffering from malnutrition during pregnancy. The incidence of malnutrition and mental retardation among the poor in the urban slums is estimated to be eight times greater than among the well-to-do. So the poor people said: We want food. And the Department of Agriculture said: Well, we have this fine food-stamp program. And the poor people said: But the stamps cost money and we don't have any money; and, anyway, county and state rules and practices, and the limited federal funds allocated, are keeping food stamps from being available to all but a small fraction of the millions who are hungry. Then they went to the Department of State and they said: This war is bearing down hardest on us. And they went to the Department of Justice and they said: There is racial discrimination, very deep and very wide, and you haven't really touched it. And they gave specifics, vivid, pitiful scenes and remorseless statistics. Now the first great lesson we could all learn from the Poor People's Campaign is xhat^merica did not want to hear the poor people's voiceJjThere was great resentment of the very fact that they were permitted to be on Monument grounds where we had to see them right there, at Lincoln's feet. What America wanted was that the poor should remain out of sight and out of mind. The last thing America wanted to hear was the poor people's dissent. As Attorney General, I met with them, for several

—

6

Dissent, Power,

hours.

It

and Confrontation

was quite a traumatic experience. They

told

me

things about our laws, and about the Justice Department

and

and

law enforcement that all the theotell me. The poor people knew, they really knew, they were getting beat over the head with it. If you listened, they had a lot to tell you about the nature of the problems, as well as ideas towards possible answers, approaches toward meaningful action and community participation. Their dissent had a lot of important truth to communicate to us all. Then there was the Vietnam Moratorium March in Washington on November 15, 1969. Out of it emerged four clear lessons. First: Peaceful assembly on the most volatile and emotional issue in these very turbulent times is clearly possible. The largest demonstration on a politiat least 300,cal issue in the history of the United States 000 concerned people, conducting themselves with dignity, as they nonviolently demonstrated their deep dissent. A effective

reticians at

my

fair

disposal couldn't

—

couple of unrelated, unsponsored, peripheral incidents of minimal violence, of insignificant property damage, were used by some to try to smear one of the most dignified, peaceful and potentially effective communications of dissent in our history. Lesson two was that, of course a few troublemakers can cause some trouble, of course a few people who want to provoke can provoke. So what's new? .

.

.

But— Lesson three: professional police, who will not selves be emotionalized

and are

let

them-

sensitive to the rights of

can maintain control effectively and fairly and in accordance with law if only we care, if only we pay to professionalize and train police and imbue them with solid traditions against violating the rights of anyone. Lesson four is that leadership has a very high obligation, in our times, not merely to protect First Amendment rights, but to provide the opportunity for their full and effective communication. It's very, very difficult to communicate dissenting ideas effectively in our age of mass media and mass population. Leadership must not stifle. The people have to be heard ; we have to have a chance to

citizens,

—

First

Amendment and the Politics of Confrontation We've got

test their ideas.

Ce

can judge

was the

—and

to give

them a chance

to

7 speak

learn,

dissent expressed under the protection of the

Amendment which turned

this country around on the Vietnam War issue. £ertainly it was not our leadership that saw the mistakesulndeed, in a sense, it wasn't the leadership that made the mistakes; it was the institutions, institutions that all but define, and channel and limit, leadership, in a very real sense. (Who believes there was anything inherently more bellicose about John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson than there would have been about Richard Nixon or Barry Goldwater, had they been elected in 1960 and 1964?) And our institutions would not have changed their position, would not have reexamined; they would

First

have gone straight on, except for the people who spoke out, questioned, who caused doubts, who raised their voices until the fever broke, until America began to realize that our Vietnam actions were wrong. Similarly, I think there's been more beneficial change effected in the administration of colleges and universities

who

in the last five years

by student

protest than

twenty-five years. I don't

mean

by adminis-

in the preceding

trative leadership in those institutions

that student protests are al-

But neither is the status quo. So we must not be afraid to listen, to open up. This is a continuing search for truth. And it will take liberty and curiosity and doubt to find the truth. And examination of every idea. Repressiveness would be disastrous. Perhaps the most significant idea that John Kennedy expressed in his great inaugural address, for the world at this time, was he said it in a slightly different context but what applies to Latin America applies to North America and to the world that those who

ways

right.

— —

make peaceful

revolution impossible

tion inevitable.

The

First

make violent revoluAmendment can remain the lib-

erator. Its truths will abide.

The question

is,

Nat Hentoff / Before

will

we?

asking Dr. Arendt to comment, I'm curious about one thing: to what degree, Mr. Clark, do you feel the First

Amendment

is

now

in

danger?

8

Dissent, Power,

Ramsey Clark / The

First

It's

tion

what do they mean

is,

And

Amendment

is

a

not self-enforcing, words never are.

words. ple?

and Confrontation

I

bunch of The ques-

to the minds and hearts of peothink the greatest risk to our commitment in

mind and heart is fear. And fear is a fairly prevalent phenomenon today. Change creates uncertainty and leads to fear, and many of those who fear would seek safety through repression. That may have been feasible in an earlier and simpler time, but not today. S o I see man y ways in which we are tending to erode the substance of the First Amendment. I see it in subpoenas of a fishing nature issued to members of the press. That strikes right at the jugular of a free press. The press can't be effective if it can't operate with integrity and in confidence. As to peaceful assembly, how does the powerless person express himself today? How does he try to effect change? He's got ranges of things that affect him so vitally. Bulldozers are leveling the last park that he can sit and think in. Welfare is demeaning his dignity. A war threatens his own character and his son's life. And what can he do? Ho w can he affect all this? He can dissent. But there are many who really don't want to hear that dissent. We have this little question of" "a permit," and we've ha d some recent episod es when permits weren't granted "This city just has two and a half million people, and sorry we can't have but one convention at a time. We just have 12.500 police officers, so we can't give a permit to people to say what they think about the Democratic National Convention or about the War. They can come back next month." So the First Amendment is threatened in a variety of ways. Just at this time when we desperately need to open up dialogue as creatively as we can, we're tending to clamp down. And it's like trying to hold down the lid on a boiling pot. 7

—

!

—

Hannah Arexdt / We all know, of course, the attacks on Amendment by Vice President Agnew, who sin-

the First

gled out the press for attack, who talked about the "rotten apple in the barrel," the parasite theory, the first time in

First

Amendment and the

Politics of Confrontation

9

this country that I have heard this doctrine which reminded one most unpleasantly of other related past doctrines in other countries. And we know that the press has not reacted to it as vigorously as it might, that the press has been rather subdued. Let me turn now to the real political core of the First Amendment, that is the right to assemble Even the freedom of the press, apparently not connecte d with it, depends on this right of Americans to organi ze themselves outside the chann els of what is usually calle d "the democratic process." This right to assemble is guar,

.

anteed in the First Amendment, much more than it's guaranteed in any other constitution I know of. But this right

jeopardy today. Indeed, Mr. Agnew talked about what I deem a strange and ominous fashion as though he wanted to say that perhaps such rights are now obsolete. Which brings me to what Mr. Clark said at the beginning. He asked, will our institutions change? In correspondence and response, I suppose, to changes in reality. This seems, indeed, the foremost question. The question is really "to be or not to be": Will this form of government be able to survive the onslaught of change of the twentieth century? Will freedom prevail in the world for the foreseeable future? We may believe that ultimately freedom will always reassert itself, but for the foreseeable future is

in real

traditional democratic standards in

—

this is really in doubt.

There was one point in Mr. Clark's statement about which I hoped he would say a little more. He talked about those who have power and those who are powerless, and how those who are powerless can gain power and influence power. Now I would say something like the Vietnam Moratorium is a prime example of how power can be generated. That this generated power did not prevail doesn't mean that it was powerless just as the march of the poor people was not powerless. But when we ask ourselves how can powerless people influence power, then we presuppose something, that there are those who are in power. And what you [Mr. Clark]

—

10 said

Dissent, Power,

makes me doubt

—

that.

You

said

and Confrontation

—and

I

think you are

govern our leadership and not the other way round. That is, that we have lost control and those "in power" are no longer powerful in the sense that they can do what they will. Why that is so and how we got into this situation is another question. But this is the real predicament, the predicament of "the impotence of power." That sounds like a witty paradoxTTut the trouble is that this witty paradox has become true. Persons no longer have power, but are primarily representatives of institutions with automatic laws somehow pushing them in one direction or another. This makes every confrontation between the powerless who seek for power and the powerful, who have in reality lost power, on the one hand so futile, and on the other hand so dangerous. For it's precisely because both know that power somehow is evadon both ing them that they are so very much inclined sides of the fence to move toward violence. entirely right

that

it is

institutions that

—

—

Now

was especially interested in the Constitutional you said the First Amendment can Yes indeed. If anything can save us, if anything

I

question. [Mr. Clark,]

save us. can help us to get through this particular period, it will be the Constitution. If we lose that, then truly everything will

be lost. When the Constitution was framed the framers were afraid of the legislature becoming a tyranny. But Jefferson did say that perhaps later it would be executive tyranny we would need to fear. Today we live in that period which Jefferson predicted, while Congress acts really like a lamb. Because Congress could finish this war simply by cutting the budget but somehow nobody really is able to mobilize support for such necessary action. And so everything hangs in the balance and nobody can predict

—

how

it

will go.

Now, in such a situation, if ment people who begin to take

there arise in the governliberties with the Constitu-

then the situation reaches an altogether different depth of seriousness. God knows I was no great friend of President Johnson and his administration. But I am certain

tion,

First

Amendment and the Politics

that every single

member

11

of Confrontation

of that administration

knew

the

importance of the Constitution for this country. And there's no other country in the world for which the Constitution has this same great significance, this same primal importance. But now some members of the Nixon administration act as though they never read the Constitution (which I don't think is impossible) or as if they really think the Constitution is nothing but a piece of paper, one of those obsolete, archaic standards which we must abolish in order to move on to I don't know where, and they don't know either. And this is very serious indeed.

—

Nat Hentoff / Ron Young was

project director of the

November March on Washington. He's National Student Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation.

Ron Young /

Mr. Clark be too general and

First of all, the question that

started with, "to be or not to be,"

may

I think the question many people are asking of themselves is a much more specific and controversial one: that is, to do justice or not to do

too uncontroversial a question.

justice.

Thafs the question. And

that

means a

fight.

A

fight

over what is justice. Second, the matter of dissent as the major force for institutional and attitudinal change. For those of us who are younger and generally I think come from white traditional American families, not families where our parents are radicals, or even very politically conscious people one of the things that we've been discovering, or coming

—

back

to, is that

people are society

—

the basic social and economic discontents of

much more important

forces for change in our

for attitudinal change and institutional change

than is "dissent." And holding up expression of dissent, on its own, opinions without deep roots, so to speak, as having that much influence really, on institutional change, is to give "dissent" too much credit. Third, whereas Mr. Clark said that protection of dissent is the most important job we have, again I would say that

12

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

what people are coming to say rather is that protection and encouragement of life of that which sustains life, that which encourages life is more important than protecting dissent. And that the protection of dissent, finally, must be an outcome of the protection of life itself. That kind of a recognition is implied in how people today view the progress in Cuba, or in North Vietnam. That is, that these are countries and peoples which have taken the protection of life and the encouragement of life seriously enough so that in fact true freedom of individuals, of human beings, can

— —

develop.

Many of us, I would guess, have too high regard or too primary regard for "the protection of the right to dissent," and too little regard for the protection of life, partly because we are fairly secure in our lives, and it's our dissent which sometimes we feel being challenged. I talked with a high-school girl the other day who typified this American attitude.

The

first

comment

she

made when

the subject of

China came up was: "But they're not free to speak out as we are." Well, for growing numbers of us, the protection of Vietnamese lives, the protection of the lives of Americans

who

are being taken to the slaughter, the protection who are being

of the lives of black people in the ghetto killed daily,

And

is

in fact a

primary right and a primary duty.

the protection of dissent will

come

as

we

struggle to

protect literally people's right to life, to the sustenance of

and About

life,

to the

encouragement of

life.

November Washington peace march:

I read a couple of different lessons than Mr. Clark. I would read the lesson that peaceful assembly literally becomes possible, not because the First Amendment "exists," but because the people who wanted peacefully to assemble forced it

the

into existence once again.

They

asserted

its

existence

by

commitments, and their actions. In other words it's not because it exists abstractly as a right that peaceful assembly could happen but because people made it happen. A second lesson I would draw, however, is that Republi-

their intentions, their

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

13

cans and Democrats in Congress for trie most part conspired against that peaceful assembly in November. We met with forty or fifty Congressmen who had supported the October 15th Moratorium Day, and their concern was not primarily with the assertion of the right of peaceful assembly, but with how "clean" politically the mobilization was. "Why do you have to have communists in the Mobilization?

Why

can't

Mobilization?

you

Why

get rid of certain factions in the

do you have

to tie in the issues of

war? We you do those things and if you don't get rid of the communists in the Mobilization." Those were the questions asked us by those liberal Congressmen who supported the Moratorium in October. Their concern was not with the protection of peaceful assembly. Their concern was primarily with how "clean" was the Mobilization. Was it touchable or untouchable? A few poverty, pollution, the draft, with the issue of don't think

we can support you

if

decided in favor of the March, though with a great deal of shaking and nervousness. But for the most part they decided that the Mobilization and the November activity was untouchable. The media, too, for the most part in November conspired against peaceful protest. How many of us remember August 1963, and the kind of coverage that the Washington Civil Rights March received? From beginning to end, there was live network coverage of that event. By contrast, at the end of October 1969, we approached every network including educational television and told them the kind of major, newsworthy program we had lined up for Washington, a great array of both entertainment figures and speakers. We approached every network and even offered to plan o ne hour of the program together with them—the basic-nontemy the sp eakers, the entertainment, for at least one hour of television time during the day. And we were r ejected by every network including educational televi .,

say the media conspired against meaning ful peaceful assembly that could reach the nation. As for the Justice Department, we started negotiations sion.

So

I

14

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

with them way back in the first week of October. We presented a twelve-page memorandum of all our plans, including all the needs in terms of parking and everything. You will recall the hassle and the difficulties about the march route. What you may not know is that we did not get to meet with any responsible official to talk about where people would park until just three days before people were coming to Washington. Thus, the government conspired to harass, impede and to try to prevent peaceful assembly: that is what we need to hear said publicly from men like Mr. Clark. That the government, by its actions, conspired to abrogate the First Amendment.

There appear to be two crucial areas in which the response to confrontation will determine how change is made in this country. One is the courts, the response of the courts to such confrontations as the rebellions in the city. In a time of deep, deep crisis, such as we're going through now, whether or not the courts are able to include in their judgments more elements than they would ordinarily include in noncrisis times will help to determine how change is

—

made. Example: in Newark, when people rioted, the courts ought to have considered how they were provoked to rioting by the conditions of the society. They ought to have considered even into the

Newark

how

advertising, yes, advertising

ghetto, is a

this product, you're not a

goad

man;

if

to riot. If

beamed

you don't have

you don't have

this prod-

you're not one of the "good Americans." If you don't live like this, you're not one of us. The courts should have been capable of considering such matters of substance and social context which might have enabled them to rule that uct,

the rebellion

A

was

justified.

second question for the courts is in regard to Vietnam. Supreme Court Justice Douglas has said that the legality or illegality of the Vietnam War must be taken up by the courts. And so it must, if the courts are going to play a positive role in making it possible for change to take place without chaos and bloodshed. The courts must consider and determine the question: is the Vietnam War legal? Is crop

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

15

destruction in Vietnam legal? Is forcible removal of civil-

ian populations from rural areas to urban areas part of a

policy that violates international agreements and is it not in fact a war crime? Is a man justified in saying "I will not be drafted"?

I

mean

not a

conscientious objector status; this

war

is illegal, I

I

man who has applied for mean one who simply says

will not go.

take up such issues. But

I

The

have very

courts must begin to little

hope

that they

will.

A

second area which

how change

I

think

crucial in determining

is

happen is the schools. Mr. Clark comment some more on the will

the schools. Because, literally, the

I

would

like to

hear

Amendment in institution which now is First

doing the most to make nonviolent revolution impossible the school: the high schools, the junior high schools and the elementary schools. When young people are not alis

lowed

to set

when they're

up

tables

and give out

leaflets in their school,

not allowed to call meetings on school grounds

for political discussion, propaganda, and agitation,

when

students are not allowed to criticize textbooks and teachers is

a kind of

think, wants to

comment.

openly, freely, in their school newspapers, that

going to make change impossible in our society.

violence that

—

is

Nat Hentoff / Hannah Arendt,

I

—nonviolent change

Hannah Arendt / I want to pick out a few things on which I really disagree with Mr. Young. Because they seem to me to reflect illusions among the young and among those who rebel, and rebel with justification, which could make life very difficult and very dangerous, not just for them but for us all. Number one, this business of "life" versus "dissent." You do not protect dissent when you protect life. Life is protected in many countries in which dissent is not protected. And the answer which this American girl gave you, "They cannot speak out freely," is not just an American answer. This is the answer which you will receive in all of

16

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Eastern Europe, and in the Soviet Union, too. We have this fantastic situation of a world-wide rebellion, with students rebelling against every government we happen to have. And in the East they rebel for precisely those freedoms of speech, thought, and assembly which

we

still

enjoy.

And

they are right, because those freedoms are the foundations for all other freedoms. On the other hand, the East Europeans are not entirely right when they think that the young in America and the West, in general, are just talking abstractly

rights

and don't know the

we have

—

that

is,

score.

the First

They

don't see that the

Amendment

rights

—no

longer really open up for us the channels of action, and that the constant frustration, the disappointment is very severe and difficult to bear. But this is a mutual misunderstanding which, in my opinion, should be reconcilable: you should be able to understand the Czechs and the Poles and the Russians and the Hungarians and all those who cry out for free speech, just as they should, with

somewhat more

be able to understand that here all this has become futile even though it is the necessary preliminary difficulty,

condition for freedom for action.

Now

let

me come

to the

You

second point of disagreement

it was not the First Amendment that made the Moratorium Mobilization possible, it was the people who enforced it. You are entirely right. Without the people to enforce it, the whole edifice crum-

with you, Mr. Young.

said

But without the First Amendment in the Constitution, would have found it very easy simply to prohibit the whole business. For those few lines on the books do still stand between us and tyranny. So do not think poorly of the First Amendment. Remember, every power, including the power of the Moratorium, can be destroyed by violence. You know what happened in Chicago in 1968. Now if you throw away that Constitutional guarantee which stands between you and this destruction, you do something extremely dangerous. All in all, it seems to me that you underestimate the seriousness of the situation in a fantastic way. What concerns me are your illusions. bles.

the government

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

17

concerns me is that you really don't know how fast you must hold on to this First Amendment. And show it to the government, and the people, time and again. Can it be that you have cried wolf so many times that you do not see when he really does come around the corner? [laughter and applause]

What

Ron Young /

I

don't think

it's

a lack of appreciation or a

lack of sense of solidarity with Czechoslovakian rebels that

me to say what I say: rather just the opposite. How do we best stand in solidarity with student rebels in the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia? Not primarily by enjoying and displaying our glorious First Amendment. But rather by struggling against the literal death machine that our government represents. And that, in fact, is also the way we best defend the First Amendment, in a struggle, a vigorous and dangerous struggle against the Vietnam War. leads

Hannah Arendt / But your

right to carry out this strugguaranteed precisely through the First Amendment. Without that you would have to rely on the goodwill, the compassion of the government. I wouldn't do that if I were you. I would much rather have a legal leg to stand on.

gle

is

Ron Young /

Yes, but what I would rely on more is the for all kinds of reasons, some of them

growing hatred

—

moral, some of them economic and social can people for the Vietnam War.

Nat Hentoff /

I

think at this point

—

of the Ameri-

we ought

to

expand

the discussion to the audience.

Joan Simon* / I feel that things are much more serious and grave and that erosion of the First Amendment is no longer the major danger. The wolf around the corner that *

Joan Simon has published articles in Life, The Nation, Ramparts, and is writing a book on the Fort Dix stockade uprising.

Commonweal and

18

Dissent, Power,

we are not seeing is Amendments count

and Confrontation

not the government, but the military. for very

when we are

little

in the

hands of the military. And as far as "to be or not to be" is concerned, we have already the instrument for not being, as we all know. Perhaps this is the reason why the First Amendment is not so terribly important to our younger people any more. Because if you can murder, as they did in My Lai, what does free speech mean?

Ramsey Clark /

have

I

to apologize for bringing

"to be or not to be" thing

be Hamlet the to get into the problem.

wanted First

to

Amendment

.

.

.

—time

[laughter]

first

out. I

We

came here

and the

—

I

up

guess

meant

it

to talk

that

I

just

as a

way

about the

politics of confrontation, not

ecology, or the military-industrial complex. Nor can you compare or contrast reverence for life with the First Amendment. Free speech, the First Amendment, is a technique, a principle, and it applies to all of these things. If you think that the military-industrial complex is a critical danger, the First Amendment means that you shall have the chance to

speak about

and is

to

that, to

move them

a technique, a

mobilize people to think about that,

to act against that. TheJFirst

means

tharihe~centraT issue

is

,

it's

not an end in

human

we don't come to revere more and more. But to get

Amendment

itself. I

we're going to destroy

life. If

life,

file

those ideas across, to

effectively for them,

need the freedom

you need the

to

agre e

dignity and reverence for

First

exchange ideas,

to

work Amendment, you communicate,

to

speak.

Seymour Melman* / Mr.

Clark,

the importance of institutions. dissent. Until recently

you were

I

And

share a strong sense of of the importance of

the operating chief of one

of our important institutions. I'd like to *

know why, when

Seymour Melman teaches at Columbia University and is Cochairman most recent book was Pentagon Capitalism (1970).

of sane. His

First

Amendment and the Politics

19

of Confrontation

you were Attorney General, you treated the dissent of William Coffin and Ferber and Spock and most of us in this room by implication as conspiracy, and put that group of

—

—

men on trial. Ramsey Clark / Well, at least I picked on some people who could take care of themselves quite well, [laughter] Let

me

put

it

this

way.

I

think the system must act with

with compassion and wisdom, but it must also do what it claims to stand for. And therefore I think if a prosecutor sees that the law has been violated, then he can't make moral judgments. I think if integrity. It

the

has

man who

to try to act

prosecuted Thoreau had thought "that war's

probably wrong and history will prove Henry right so I don't think I ought to prosecute" then I think he wouldn't have done his duty. And, by the way, Thoreau would have thereby been prevented from making history. Indeed, if the system doesn't do what it claims to stand for, there is no hard place for forces of change to push against. Martin Luther King was once implored to leave the Birmingham jail. The jailer didn't want him in there anymore because there were a whole bunch of people outside and they were causing a lot of trouble. But Dr. King didn't think he ought to leave, because if he did the principle that he felt so deeply about would be compromised. Similarly, Coffin, Spock, and the others showed immense moral courage and rendered a great service to the United States. Now there was no local law that could apply to them. The Selective Service Act is a law of the land whether consti-

—

tutional or unconstitutional

the question

is

for the courts to decide.

was whether the law should be

And

tested

or

whether we should ignore the flouting of that law. I thought I had a choice, either resign or do what my judgment told me must be done.

Nat Hentoff /

Jessica Mitford,

the point that if the cute,

why

did

it

among

government did

others, has raised

feel

it

had

to prose-

choose the conspiracy route, which

made

20 it

Dissent, Power,

very

difficult for the

and Confrontation

defendants to raise the moral and They were not charged

other ethical problems involved?

with aiding and abetting draft resistance. They were charged with conspiracy, which is using a very slippery kind of statute indeed.

Ramsey Clark /

Yes, it is. And I've doubted that the conspiracy statutes, as they have developed in law, have a place in a fair system. Because the rules have developed in ways that cause them to be misused and cause evidence against certain people to be then used against other people in ways that are unmanageable for the rights of a single defendant. But we had some practical problems. One of them was that there were thousands of people involved, thousands of potential defendants. Now, one thing the law

has to do

is

culpability.

ple

make priorities and measure the dimensions of So we devised a formula, choosing those peo-

who had

participated in at least five of eight different

events that all took place leading toward the

March on

the

Pentagon. The evidence consisted in large part of what cameramen and people saw, and cameramen and people happened naturally to see famous people. And Dr. Spock is a big, tall man, and he showed up at five of the places. Remember, conspiracy doesn't mean secret; you can have an open conspiracy under law, people who work together to accomplish an end. And if the end is frustration of a law, the paralysis of the Selective Service Act (which may be morally right or morally wrong, but is the law) then I think the system has to move. But if we hadn't prosecuted for conspiracy then it would have been fairly hard to set up criteria to distinguish among all the thousands of peo,

ple involved.

Seymour Melman / My second question, Mr. Clark. You noted earlier that after all the law exists and it has to be enforced, for if it isn't enforced, then there's no integrity in the system. Fine.

Now

I

believe in integrity in the system.

there's a large

body of law

that

was there for you

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

21

and your subordinates to enforce. It's the body of law which the Constitution calls part of the supreme law of the land, consisting of the treaty clauses.

The

treaty clauses in-

clude the specifications and limitations on laws of war. At a meeting in your department, I offered to your associates a body of evidence on United States violation of the laws of war. It was subsequently published and hence available to them and to you in a volume called In the Name

—

—

of America.

It

presents detailed documentation of events

Song My and hundreds of others. It was part of your sworn duty to enforce the law of the land. Why didn't you enforce that law? Why didn't you press prose-

like those at

cution for violation of those laws

—

against the officials of

and others who collaborated in those conspiracies, public and private? And in ordering the violation of those laws, repeatedly over several years and in full public view? the government

Ramsey Clark / There lished and available to

are a lot of things that are pubthat I never saw. And I think

me

you may credit the office of Attorney General with greater power than it has. It's a long way from there across the Potomac River to the Pentagon, I'll guarantee you. I personally never was apprised of that meeting, nor did I see your documents. But in all honesty, if I had, I'm not sure that would have made any difference. I'm not sure what jurisdiction I would have had in the matter.

Seymour Melman /

All right, Mr. Clark. I'm just acting this government after all some-

on the assumption that in

body's in charge, somebody has jurisdiction.

Philip Hirschkop* / I'd like to go back to the question, be or not to be. Not to belabor it, but from my experience of being tear-gassed and beaten in a lot of cities, and having seen my clients beaten and a lot of them buried. to

* Philip

many

Hirschkop and

civil-rights

is

a Washington-based attorney

protest-activist clients.

who has represented

22

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

I'm more concerned about a later part of Hamlet's speech, up arms against outrageous fortune. When do you reach that point? Isn't the civil rights act of 1964 written in the blood of four young girls in

that is whether to take

Alabama? Aren't many

of the things that happened in the

voting rights act written in the blood of

many

black kids

South? When do we stop just speaking because just saying things wont work? When do you start with civil disobedience? When do you start sitting in at lunch counters and the like? And when does sitting-in stop being useful? When do you start burning draft records? And in the

so forth.

Ron nor I, nor many of the other young people movement, would say for a moment that free speech isn't vit al But i s n't violence sometimes a form of speech of com munication, perhap s the nly effective for m? Wasn't the most eloquent speech we heard in a long while the flames in Washington, D.C.? The tear gas in Washington, D.C.? The flames in Detroit? The sound of guns in a motel in Detroit didn't they say something to us? What do you do about Fred Hampton and Rap Brown? How do they speak? They can't do it in the press. We saw what the press did about Cambridge, Maryland, how they called it a riot. We saw what the government did under Ramsey Neither

in the

,

—

Clark. I realize that he refused to bring an indictment in Chicago, that he agreed to testify for the defense in the trial but was not permitted to testify by Judge Hoffman. But he made mistakes, too. For there was a report in the Attorney General's office maybe he didn't read it personally, but it was on the desk of one of his assistants

—

proof that there was no riot in Cambridge, Maryland. And yet the Justice Department pursued Rap Brown on that charge.

Ramsey Clark / Of course I made mistakes. I don't know them all, but I know a lot and there were some real beauts.

violence

Now I

I

don't want to get into semantics, but by injuring people physically or substantial

mean

destruction of property. In a

mass society you've got

to

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

23

be very careful when you talk about destruction of property because we're destroying property all over the place all the time. But to me violence against persons, as an interpersonal or as an international problem-solver, is intolerable. We simply must find other ways. Because vio-

demeans human dignity and it destroys life. Change was Martin Luther King's purpose: such as trying to get people to be able to sit where they wanted to, on those Montgomery busses. The reasons why he chose

lence

nonviolent confrontation as the technique are perfectly clear. He represented powerless black people in massive

And nonviolent confrontation was an effective source of power didn't solve all their problems, but it solved some, very slowly, and it did make a difference.

numbers.

As

—

man, Dr. King knew all too well what violence didn't want any part of it, for anybody. Now people who are preparing to engage in civil disobedience have to think through carefully what they're doing. They have to realize this is a serious and a risky business. They need to be as sure as a human can that their priorities are wise. But if from deep moral conviction they believe that there is an intolerable injustice and that they have a responsibility to seek change through nonviolent civil disobedience, then I think they have an obligation to act accordingly. Men like Gandhi and Martin Luther King have enhanced justice in our lives because they did that. a black

was.

And he

I'd like to ask

Ron Young

sixty years of

commitment

of the F.O.R.

[Fellowship

think of F.O.R.'s almost to nonviolence, often including

of Reconciliation] a question.

I

disobedience and very forceful direct action, and I think of A. J. Muste, who was so long connected with the F.O.R. My feeling is that there are very few people who would listen to A.J. now. What future, immediate or civil

do you see for what F.O.R.'s past tradihave been? What do you, Ron, feel about violence?

in the long run,

tions

To persons?

Ron Young / Let me Gregory

tells,

start with a little story that Dick about when the Man comes at 5 o'clock in

24

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

morning and knocks on your door and you go to the sort of bleary-eyed. And he says: "I'm sent from the Selective Service System and I'm here to pick up your dog." And you cry out startled, "My dog? You can't have my dog! What do you need my dog for?" And the Man says, "The government needs your dog; there's a war going on in Vietnam, we have to send your dog there." People would get frantically upset, instinctively slam the door in the Man's face, instinctively resist. Whereas, when the

door

it's

a question of fighting against their taking

"my

"my

son"

lover" it becomes a decision of deep conscience and anguish can I possibly resist this?

or

I tell

—

that story just because I think in regard to the

Vietnam War, that if there are any of us this year who can pay our taxes without literally shaking, then there's something deeply wrong with us. As opposed to those of us in about a hundred cities around the country who participated sitting-in at draft board doorways and blocking are now saying, yes of course I'll sit in, hide a deserter. to violence: I believe that the more element of con-

the door;

who

of course

I'll

As

frontation there

is

in

what we do, the more that action

has to try to reach out and communicate what it's about. And the more, therefore, violence against persons has to be absent from it. Partly for reasons of clarity. It was important that people who sat in at lunch counters in the South not hit back at the white owner who hit them. Because that restraint made the situation very clear. One of the reasons it's important when we sit in at a draft board not to call the clerks pigs

is

to

make

the issues clear.

Another reason is that the kind of social movement that needs to happen now is a movement that has to be on the one hand socially constructive and changing, and on the other hand, psychotherapeutic. It's literally the case that the movement has to be psychotherapeutic, it has to deal with the psyches of those who feel more comfortable with the way things are rather than with the way things might be. And that has to do very importantly with the question of violence. I think that's what Erik Erikson is turned on

First

Amendment and the Politics

of Confrontation

25

about in his book on Gandhi: the question of how a social movement can be also a psychotherapeutic movement. How do you reach into the heads of people who are committed to the way things are and get at their minds, get at the way they feel? I don't think you do that by hitting them with a brick.

Hannah Arendt /

1 would like to suggest a distinction disobedience and confrontation. It seems to me rather important that in confrontation, whether violent or nonviolent, you act together with others. And you do something. For instance, Martin Luther King actually confronted the American people with the gap or the contra-

between

civil

diction between the Constitution, the law of the land,

and

the actual ordinances and laws and practices of the South

which were in clear contradiction to the Constitution. That was the real confrontation. And it was effective. Now, civil disobedience I quite agree that it must be

— —

very seriously considered is entirely negative. Civil disobedience means that I refuse to do something which I am supposed to do. And this decision is made by individuals according to their conscience.* Now whenever I act according to my conscience, even though it be in political matters, I am more concerned with myself with whether I could live with myself if I did or failed to do such-andsuch than I am concerned with the order of the world with justice, for instance, with which I am directly concerned in a situation of confrontation.

—

—

room knows that the moment may come to make this individual decision of And we know of people who failed to make

Everyone in

when he

will

conscience.

this decision,

this

have

with disastrous consequences for themselves. this test of conscience with

However, those who did meet

* I no longer believe that civil disobedience is the same as, or relies primarily on, conscientious objection. The civil disobedient, in distinction from the conscientious objector who relies on his individual consciousness alone, is a member of a group and relies also on the opinion which he shares with other members who hold the same conviction. See my article on "Civil Disobedience," The New Yorker, September 12, 1970.— Hannah

Arendt

26

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

disobedience did not thereby change the actual poTo effect such change you would have to have mass civil disobedience. Laws cannot be enforced if a large minority not necessarily a majority decides that what the law forbids is not a crime and they are going to break that law. That is what happened with Prohibition; it simply could not be enforced. Just as, up till now, it seems to have been impossible in this country to enforce the laws against drugs. Because a substantial minority constituting a considerable mass does not consider drug-taking a real crime and disobeys those laws. Now if as many people so regarded the draft law and refused to go, their individual acts of civil disobedience would, cumulatively, make it impossible to enforce the draft law. The prisons, literally, are not big enough to hold them all. civil

litical situation.

—

—

—

—

Stephen Rousseas* / Mr.

Clark, earlier this evening you

and people who lead instituand the possibility that the leaders are the led,

told us about institutions, tions,

that the pressure of institutions in themselves has to be

taken into account. Perhaps things are out of control. Yet you also said that you yourself made the decision that the draft law had been broken, and that, as Attorney General, you had therefore no choice but to prosecute. I find

Because surely the decision to prosehad a political dimension to it. After all, this country can have selective "show trials" just as well as Eastern European countries. So the question I'm raising is, in making your decision, did other institutions within the executive branch of government lean on you, however lightly? [laughter] this a bit disquieting.

cute the

war

resisters

Ramsey Clark / Admittedly one can

feel

institutional

weights that never speak. That's part of the institutional * Stephen Rousseas teaches economics at Vassar. His books include, Death of a Democracy, an account and analysis of how the "colonels" with United States complicity seized power in Greece.

—

—

First

Amendment and the

Politics of Confrontation

27

process. But as far as I know, President Johnson had no knowledge of those particular indictments [of Spock, Coffin and the others]. And my philosophy, right or wrong, while I was at Justice, was that we had to hope and believe that you could take facts and apply them in relation to laws, and arrive at an objective judgment whether to prosecute or not. Of course I'm influenced by the institution that I'm working in. And it has methods of proceeding, and there are long staff memos from investigative and other agencies and so forth. One of the most troublesome things of all to me was that of the many thousands of cases that come through, only one in a great while really comes up to the Attorney General to make the decision. It's very difficult to try to apply equal justice to all the cases that way because you don't really see the others. That's an unfortunate, unfair, and possibly dangerous thing. It would be all the more dangerous to have the President involved in decisions of what prosecutions should be undertaken. No, the decision was mine. You might ask me whether what I thought the White House or other institutions would think about my action played a role. I can only tell you that I tried not to let that influence me. Whether it did or not subconsciously I don't know.

Stephen Rousseas / Mr. Clark, can you tell us form the case came to you and from where?

Ramsey Clark / It came memos from the criminal

in the

in

what

form of a huge stack of from the investigative

division,

agencies and from the several United States attorneys' offices. It was brought to me by a group of lawyers, career men, and non-career men, perhaps half a dozen or so.

And

brought other lawyers in on the decision to try to be sure that my judgment was right. Including one man I regard as one of the greatest Constitutional lawyers of I

our time.

28

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Alexander Klein* / In all fairness to Mr. Clark, I think we should broaden the issue of responsibility to include all of us. We've been hammering away at a single act by Mr. Clark. But Hannah Arendt suggested that mass civil disobedience by a substantial minority could have made

—

the draft law unenforceable

and, I would add, might perhaps literally have stopped the war. If there had been, say, "We Won't Go" clubs with a million members, or more. Yet, that is something which even now, with massive opposition to the war has not been created. So the question I raise is why in our society do two sorts of things not happen. One: Leaders in the government do not take the necessary moral actions of dissent that would endanger their positions. Administration officials do not resign and mobilize opposition to a policy they consider both immoral and disastrous for the national interest. Officials despite the Nuremberg trials precedent have not had the courage and moral imperative, nor, for that matter, the true patriotism, to do this, even in so extreme a case as the Vietnam War, which by its nature involved daily slaughter of civilians and for which they came to foresee no possible victory or national advantage to be gained. Two: The rest of us seem to learn very

—

—

—

—

slowly and fail to mobilize the sort of mass civil disobedience which would actually be relatively "safe," and yet truly effective. The question is how could we learn faster and be impelled to move in such essential directions and to organize accordingly?

Hannah Arendt obedience

So long as the question

question,

a

question

of

is

a civil dis-

conscience,

nobody

thinks about, or only to a very small degree, whether or

going to change anything. The man who burns his I've read the explanations of these people carefully usually talks in terms of conscientious objec-

not

it's

— —

draft card

* Alexander Klein teaches at Fordham University (Lincoln Center) His books include The Counterfeit Traitor, Grand Deception, and Natural Enemies? Youth and the Clash of Generations. .

First

Amendment and the Politics

29

of Confrontation

and conscientious objectors

are, of course, individLater on, learning slowly, some of them talk in terms of setting an example. That is of course much more political. What you demand political action is almost by definition that field in which people learn very slowly. Max Weber once compared politics with drilling very hard wood, where you make very slow, almost imperceptible progress. But, if I may stay with this metaphor, it takes a very long time until the drill sinks in, until suddenly this very hard plank of wood splinters. I am afraid I cannot give you an answer; I don't believe that human nature's going to change, at least as quickly as we always would like it to change. I think we have just got to live with this.

tion,

uals.

—

—

Alexander Klein /That seems mistic.

Perhaps

it's

to

more a matter

organizational channels and

me

needlessly pessi-

of developing

fostering

the

now

the

readiness of

when necessary.* way organization and social attitudes had to be a form of mass "disto make union strikes

citizenry to participate in such action

Just the

created

obedience"

—an

—

available action-option in the economic

sphere.

how such channels for sustained, wide citizen-participacommon purpose" might be created and maintained in the

* I've outlined

tion "politics of

my

—

book, Natural Enemies? (Lippincott, January 1970), and in articles in Current (September 1970) and Congress Bi-Weekly (March 6 and October 23, 1970). Thereafter John Gardner, despite nearly all experts' skepticism, launched the organization "Common Cause" as an ongoing, participatory citizens' lobby on substantive issues, as well as to press for basic governmental and political-party structural reforms. At this writing Common Cause is mounting a major campaign to end the Indochina war. To date, interestingly, although membership has risen rapidly (contrary to most liberals' pessimistic predictions) the majority of members are newcomers to politics, while far too many of the long-term "involved" and "concerned" citizens, including intellectuals, continue to watch and criticize, rather than joining and helping shape the organization's policies and contributing to its effectiveness. As to nonviolent, antiwar "disobedience," except for the dedicated activists, neither public figures nor widely known intellectuals have, as yet, even begun the process of setting examples and trying to lead, persuade, and educate the citizenry toward such action. With the hunger for leadership so acute today, my guess is the extent of positive response such a campaign could evoke would be as surprising to the skeptics as has been the response to Common Cause. Alexander Klein, April 3, 1971

introduction to

30

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

in 1967, Tom Wicker in a column estimated that if students were going to be drafted some 25 percent of them would refuse to go. And that year the Fellowship of Reconciliation started a project jokingly-

Ron Young / Back

referred to as the a

little

"We May Not Go"

movement.

We

card for students and others to sign headed

had

"We

May

Not Go." And it said: The war is unjust and imI do not believe I should be forced to fight in it. Today we have 22,000 of those signed cards. And some 500 college student presidents and student editors have signed ads in The New York Times declaring "We May Not Go." Now, of course, one big factor that made that less significant than it sounded was that at that time no one was asking students to go. In fact, our society was doing all it could to protect them from having to face that moral, and

choice.

Alexander Klein /

Nevertheless, had such a movement been organized on a mass scale not just by the Fellowship but by many peace groups many, many nonstudent youth might have followed suit, via a sort of bandwagon effect. As it was, most young people I've talked with never even knew of the existence of a "We May Not Go" movement.

Ron Young /To Amendment,

We

I

— —

get back to this matter of the First

believe

we have

too

much

faith in dissent.

really believe that expressing our opinion will change

the minds of those in power. That's bull. We praise Dr. King but we forget that one of the things that Dr. King taught us was that black people literally had to die, had to fight, had to be in jail to make it. In Nashville, Tennessee one of the best sit-in campaigns when it was all over, the mayor went on television and said: this could have happened a lot more easily if this trouble hadn't come; we would have desegregated the restaurants much more quickly and with much less ill feeling if only all

—

—

these sit-ins hadn't happened. In fact, the reason they did

First

Amendment and

31

the Politics of Confrontation

desegregate was because the

sit-ins

made

it

more

difficult

for Nashville whites to live, to survive, segregated than

Now we New York Times

unsegregated.

don't have an appreciation of that.

The

in its reporting

can come up with

the facts of what our government's doing in

Vietnam and

what's happening to those unfortunate people.

you turn

to the editorial

timism; at the slightest

And

then

page and you find perpetual opchange in government rhetoric,

The Times anticipates real change. That's characteristic of of us. Then there are those who tend to sit around enjoying their own despair. Both are ways away from

many

the kind of action you're talking about, but both are very

American ways.

2 Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

Panelists:

NORMAN MAILER HERBERT MARCUSE ARTHUR

M. SCHLESINGER, JR.

Moderator:

NAT HENTOFF

Discussants:

Elizabeth Hardwick

This TFI discussion took place on

Robert Lowell

May 3,

1968.

EEEEEEE Nat Hentoff / This

first question has to do with what presumably the reaffirmation of the Democratic processes, the fact that because of Eugene McCarthy and Senator Kennedy various young people have become convinced some say for the last time, if it doesn't work that the political processes are viable, that you can change things that way. Do you three on the panel agree with this as-

is

—

—

is a reason to be reasonably optimistic about the processes of democracy in terms of what's been happening politically? Does it make you hopeful about

sessment: that there

democracy? Norman, do you want

the future of

to start?

Norman Mailer /All

right. If this question had been asked six months ago, the consensus, if I may use that gentleman from Texas's favorite word, would have been altogether more pessimistic. In fact, it's hard almost to conceive of a forum of this sort in New York City with this panel six months ago. It's obvious that there's been an extraordinary shift in the tempo of events. When McCarthy began to run no one believed that he had a chance. We were all drenched with a sense of defeat. People went through the ritual of democratic gestures, democratic moves, democratic stands. They attempted to express dissent in one form or another. It never amounted to anything. Copyright

©

1968 The

New York

Times. Reprinted by permission.

35

36

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Suddenly we've had this incredible phenomenon. McCarthy, while not winning a majority in New Hampshire, nonetheless comes close enough to take the delegates.

Kennedy comes

out. Johnson, if

veals to us that he's a

man

he does nothing

else, re-

of incredible political imagi-

nation.

Even

if

from the Presidency was done

his resignation

for Machiavellian reasons, at least he's a Machiavellian,

which you couldn't say before. And I work on the firm theory that a democracy depends upon having extraordinary people at the helm even if they're villains, because an extraordinary villain can sometimes create an extraordinary hero. Just as a doctor is no better than his patient, so a hero is no better than his opposition. I think the answer to the question, then, has to be in the affirmative. Now, the next point to consider is what is actually going on in American life. I would suggest that Technologyland tends to create a psychic condition which

—

is

the equivalent of plastic.

And

just as plastic objects

work well and show no sign of age until the moment when and then they give no warning; they they cease to work just split so certain things in American society are break-

—

—

—with

ing

no warning

at all.

Nat Hentoff/I wonder

if

Professor Marcuse

is

that

optimistic.

Herbert Marcuse / He is not. He disagrees with Norman Mailer. He is where he was six months ago. He is optimistic

if

the question

means

that the

American demo-

go on. The American democratic process, which I do not consider a democratic process [applause] at least it is not what the great theoreticians of the West understood by democracy. We see shifts. We see even important shifts. But they cratic process will

—

are all shifts within the same mess. We say, in favor of the democratic process, that the people's will makes itself felt. It makes itself felt up to the point where the will

Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

37

of the people would threaten the established institutional

and cultural framework of the society. So changes we have indeed. But they are changes within the established framework. So I would say democracy certainly has a future. But in my view it certainly does not have a present.

Arthur Schlesinger /

1

would

like to distinguish be-

tween what one might call the practical and the pure democratic process. The practical democratic process deals with the possibilities existing within the kind of industrial society which prevails in the developed countries of the West. I would say that the practical democratic process as it has established itself in political procedures implies, for example, the First

Amendment

dom and

discussion,

of the Constitution.

and

it

It

implies free-

implies in particular the

in-

change things in a decisive way unless you have a majority of the people with you. In general, it seems to me the values associated with civil liberties and with the effort to persuade majorities to shift from one position to another are more useful to a ability to

society than the values associated with short-run decisions in the interests of what one group or another believes to be absolutely right. I believe that the views of those who were deeply opposed to the Vietnam policy but were willing to rely on the democratic process to achieve a change in that policy have had a certain vindication. Because what has happened, as Norman Mailer pointed out, is that in January of this year this country appeared to be locked

so far as the Presidential contest in November was concerned, to a choice between the two most disliked and mistrusted politicians of the twentieth century. In the weeks since, the political situation has changed. President in,

Johnson accepted the case of his critics and we now have rather than a choice between the worst among the Presidential possibilities a choice from among the best. [Loud

—

hissing.]

—

38

and Confrontation

Dissent, Power,

Now let me distinguish between the practical model of democracy and the pure model. The pure model, I suppose, is a democratic system which would instantly reach infallible results. This pure model of democracy has never existed anywhere on earth. You have to make a choice. We have, for example, a system which always has a lot of dolts and idiots who have to be brought along. Either you exist in this system and you do your best through every kind of pressure and persuasion to make the maximum gains within that system, or you abandon that system. Herbert Marcuse has written with great eloquence about an alternative system. This would be a system which would abrogate, for example, the Bill of Rights, which would deny freedom of expression to those who took views which Herbert would consider antipublic views.

Herbert

Marcuse / Here,

a

correction.

I

certainly

haven't said there should not be freedom of expression for those opinions with which

I

do not agree or which I I have suggested

consider as damaging to the public cause. there should be discriminating tolerance

—

that is to say,

movements which are obviously and objectively aggressive and destructive, not in my personal view but objectively, should not be tolerated.

I

think that

is

a very different

thing.

Nat Hentoff / The term you used was

"objectively"

determined?

Herbert Marcuse /Yes.

Nat Hentoff / How

does one accomplish this?

Let me give you the example which myself gave long before Hitler came to power. It was

Herbert Marcuse / I

shadow of a doubt that if the movepower there would be a world war, there

clearly beyond the

ment came

to

Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

39

would be the extermination of the Jews. That was not a personal opinion. That was objectively demonstrable. If the Weimar Republic had not tolerated the Hitler movement until it was too strong to be suppressed, we would have been spared the Second World War and the extermination of six million Jews. I think that is one case where you can say the definition of this movement as not deserving democratic tolerance is more than a personal value judgment. Similarly, you can very well decide today in [Vietnam]

who

is

the aggressor

and who

is

not the aggressor. Again,

not in terms of personal preference, but objectively.

Arthur Schlesinger / 1 would not, perhaps, disagree with Herbert Marcuse on his substantive judgments on the war in Vietnam. Where we do disagree is in the way a democratic society should confront a problem of this sort. It is my belief that a democratic society should confront a problem of this sort as we have confronted it, with all the defects and messiness of this confrontation, and that is through some form of public argument and political pressure, and not through some system of exclusion and

control.

Herbert [has written] that in a proper democratic society there should be: "the withdrawal of toleration of speech and assembly from groups and movements which promote aggressive policies, armament, chauvinism, discrimination on the grounds of race and religion or which oppose the extension of public services, social security, medical care, etc." These people would be denied protection under, for example, the First Amendment. Moreover, the "restoration of freedom of thought may necessitate new and rigid restrictions on teachings and practices in the educational institutions." All this seems to me a high price to pay. Let's take, for example, Herbert's proposal that racist arguments and teachings should be automatically suppressed. Now, this contains for anyone, since I assume

40

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

we're all antiracist, a certain flavor of acceptability. But there are two problems with it. First, if you accept this, you have to have a mechanism which is going to effect the suppression, and this implies the concentration in our society of an extraordinary degree of power; and you have no assurance that the power is going to be used disinterestedly, for the suppression of racist teachings rather than

men operating the mechanism. In the second place, the actual judgments: Even if you are persuaded of the disinterestedness of any central authority, what, for example, would happen to Stokely Carmichael or Rap Brown under this proposition? for the benefit of the

Nat Hentoff /

1

would

like to ask

Norman, what

servative, a rather singular conservative, is to

the quotation

from the essay on

as a con-

his reaction

sin.

Norman Mailer /From

it's

too

ar-

Dr. Marcuse? Oh, I think much! [laughter] Let me make my side of the

gument.

Democracy

comes out of what is part of the game and what is not part of the game, you are entering into the most dangerous territory of all. Now, of consists of the resolution that

a play of forces.

The moment you

legislate

course, every society does precisely that. cuts off part of a terrain.

It

It legislates.

says, for example,

It

you cannot

you cannot steal, and so forth. So that there is not a free play, if you will, of every human desire. To that extent, a society is not democratic. If we're going to talk about the nature of democracy and whether democracy has a future, we've got to consider the problem in some depth, rather than should we

kill,

legislate against this or legislate against that, because I

can give one immediate answer to Marcuse, which is that is void of ideas, of human content. Sometimes a profound idea is buried in a particularly ugly not every racist notion.

The moment one

starts

wiping whole ideologies

off the

Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

41

board and giving them no chance to enter into a civilized dialogue, one may be losing untold intellectual fertilities of the future. We just don't know. It's an incredible arrogance to assume that one knows what should belong in the game and what shouldn't. So in that sense, I'm completely against what Marcuse says. On the other hand, I think that Marcuse is absolutely right to this extent: that the sort of things that have been going on in the last six months have been going on in democracies so-called. What's fascinating about the game is not that we have been having true democratic expression these last six months.

What

is

fascinating

is

that the old

used to be used to pen us up and keep us away from any kind of democratic expression at all are not working anymore. In other words, I grant you that the forms that are used now are not democratic. But what's interesting is that the old forms that were able to contain us ever since the Second World War are just not working. There is something loose, and this something can go on to break down those old forms and create new ones. This brings us back to the whole notion of what I talk about when I talk about democracy. You might say the great democrat of them all was DeSade because DeSade said that everybody should have absolute rights over everybody else. Now, what does that mean? That means when a man is walking down the street, he goes up to a girl and he says, "I want to have you." And, according tricks that

—

DeSade

where DeSade is a little bit impure is supposed to say, "All right, you can have me," and DeSade's theory was that the woman might make it sufficiently distasteful so that the man would never approach her again. We Americans prefer a more direct riposte; we prefer the girl to say, "Get lost, mother." Now, the point I'm making is that if you go down the street and you do that to a girl in life, what happens? If she's attractive enough, the odds are she has a boyfriend and he's a real stud. And you're in trouble. In other words, democracy consists of a play of forces and

to

this is

as a democrat

—

—

she

42

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

some of these forces are not altogether divorced from violence.

we're going to start to think about democracy, we about it as a process which consists of much more than people getting together and voting on where they want to go with the next step. Democracy consists of an open play of human forces with the end unknown. Its essential affirmation is that a good rather than an evil society will eventually emerge. For the first time in years I feel there is a hope for this to emerge in If

have

to start to think

America.

Herbert Marcuse / Well, that was very illuminating. This notion of democracy I accept completely that it is an open play of forces. My criticism was precisely that it isn't open. The word that occurred again and again in Norman Mailer's presentation was "game" "playing the game" and precisely here is, in my view, the unbridgeable gap between what I and my friends stand for and what he stands for. We don't want to play the game anymore. We consider it a rigged and a brutal game; I would be

—

—

—

ashamed

to call

it

a game.

Norman Mailer / That's all marvelous, but Marcuse misread me 180 degrees. I said that, to the extent that society is

a game,

it is

forces are cut

not democratic. off.

You

Herbert Marcuse /

1

just

To

that extent, democratic

misread what

I

said.

misheard.

Norman Mailer / Misheard. We're

finally going to get

arbitrary: O.K.

Arthur Schlesinger / May to to

I

say something?

The problems which we confront today are not peculiar the United States. One need only read the newspapers know that every form of frustration for example, of

—

Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

43

student protest, of bitterness about the devaluation of hu-

man

—appears

values

in societies all over the

world

at a

certain stage of industrial development, quite regardless

of whether they're capitalist, communist, socialist, or whatever.

The problem is not something specifically related to the United States, to the military-industrial complex or whatever else one likes to attribute all original sin to, but is a world-wide phenomenon which exists in all highly organized societies.

Man

Audience / What would happen if Columbia I'm sorry to bring up Columbia. It seems to me that here you have clearly a question of people who resorted to force instead of sitting down and talking. You have people who did not have any power, could not control force, setting up a situation where they did finally have some power to confront a people who normally in a in

.

.

[hisses.]

society

do have power. That's why is unrealistic. There

of the forces

this

whole discussion an equality of

isn't

forces.

Nat Hentoff / Would

you, Norman, focus on what's in terms of your idea of

been happening at Columbia the play of forces?

Norman Mailer / All

—

support that strike at Cobecause it was existential, because these kids went out and did something that they had never done before, and they did not know how it was going to turn out. If they end up making an institution of this strike, and disrupting that particular campus year after year, I'll probably end up being against it. But what's interesting about this is it was a new way of forcing the administration to recognize that they had no sense at all of how powerfully the students felt about a

lumbia completely.

great

many

issues.

I

right. I

support

it

These students had gotten

to the point

44

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

where they recognized that any number of polite protests were going to mean nothing with the Columbia administration. They'd obviously been doing this for years. So they broke a whole series of rules, and profoundly shocked the administration, and in return got beaten up by the police. So they then learned something else about themselves.

What

necessary for democracy is that you must learn yourself. Sometimes, in a democracy, one will need peaceful modes, because there's nothing more boring, more debilitating of the real resources of a whole cadre of students than to be on perpetual strikes. Listen to those meaningless speeches for hour after hour, week after week, year after year. That's no way to spend a college is

more about

education when you could be reading a great many things. to do it once to do it that brilliantly, with that much force, that much conviction was marvelous. It's just that, next time, they're going to have to do something else. I think some of them decided that they'd had enough. I think others decided that they were going to go back with more. The fact of the matter is that if this technological society which rules us and brainwashes us is as bad as we all say it is then there's no way to get around it. There's going to be violence before that society is cracked to the point where we can begin to breathe

But

a

—

—

more. That [Columbia]

little

strike was a good one because it had an air of the unexpected. It was bold; it was passionate; and the causes were good. Another strike in another school might just be a disaster a dull disaster, like the one in Harvard, where 700 kids penned one man in a room, a man from Dow Chemical. I mean, that's not the way to show the administration that you're fed up with them.

—

Herbert Marcuse / The thing I was interested ing is that apparently Norman Mailer believes,

in hearat least

in this case, that the democratic process wouldn't work unless from time to time broken by extrademocratic and

nondemocratic action.

Democracy: Does believe that

I

It

Have a Future?

45

you can transform the democratic proc-

we have today only by

this injection of extrademoextraparliamentary actions for the simple reason now I use the word "game" that the game was rigged. The play of force is not the play of equal forces. I can hardly imagine a concentration of power which is more overwhelming than the concentration of power we have right

ess

cratic,

now

—

in this country.

Nat Hentoff /Dr. Schlesinger, the terms now that have been introduced are "extrademocratic," "extraparliamentary." What's your reaction to Columbia in that context? Arthur Schlesinger / There

is

nothing that the students

Columbia did which was not wholly consistent with the American version of democracy. at

Herbert MARCUSE/Then why

the police?

Arthur Schlesinger / This

has nothing to do with the There is nothing and I will repeat it there is nothing in what the Columbia students did which is in the slightest degree extrademocratic. We do not in the United States identify the democratic process with the parliamentary process. Ours is a rich and complex conception of

by

—

—

police.

democracy

in

which the right

—

students, or whatever

is

to strike

—by

labor,

a basic part.

The democratic process in any sense in which a historian has to deal with it includes a wide variety of means of pressure. I don't think any serious student of the American democratic process would say that the sit-down strikes [of the 1930s] were not a contribution to the democratic process.

One of its great qualities is the diverse means by which the democratic process absorbs public protest and conit to a change of policy. I am unwilling to settle for a definition of the democratic process so restrictive that it would exclude what the Columbia students did, or what the sit-down strikers did, or what the abolitionists did. To

verts

46

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

have so impoverished and legalistic a definition of the democratic process is against what the American democratic tradition

is

about.

Herbert Marcuse / May I ask one question (because I am afraid that we may agree here) ? Do you consider the forcible occupation of buildings

and the invasion of

pri-

vate property a part of the democratic process?

Arthur Schlesinger / Yes. Herbert Marcuse / Then

I

agree with you on the defini-

tion of democracy.

Woman

in Audience / 1 am struck with the agreement between Norman Mailer and Arthur Schlesinger. I think that Norman Mailer is amoral. I think that Arthur Schlesinger is immoral. I can give a few examples. Norman Mailer said, about the Columbia thing, he liked it. He constantly referred to its novelty, its newness, its daring. At no point did he talk about the Columbia thing in terms of its issues. If it was

a right-wing thing, students' rights

have enjoyed I

—

it,

if

if it

it was reaction, was just as novel,

too. I think that is

if I

it

was against

think he would

amoral.

think that Arthur Schlesinger has been extremely im-

moral and dishonest. For instance, the way you talk about Herbert Marcuse's discussion of democracy. It's the kind of activity that's to be permitted or not to be permitted that must be discussed, not who has the right.

Norman Mailer /

1

think that charge has a great deal

What characterizes totalitarianisms is that they are no fun. One of the reasons it's very, very hard to get proRussian for more than a few weeks is that we keep coming

to

it.

face to face with the fact that the Soviet Union must prob-

ably be the most boring country in the history of nations.

Democracy: Does

It

47

Have a Future?

But the young lady, like

many mechanical

—

leftists

—I'm

is extraordinarily inaccuusing an old-fashioned phrase rate in her indictment, because I was concerned with these issues. I said several times over that I thought they were excellent issues. If some right-wing kids were going up and saying they didn't want any Negroes allowed in Morningside Park do you really think I would applaud equally?

If you believe that then a become psychotic.

certain portion of the left has

I'm perfectly willing to go down in a leaky rowboat with Arthur Schlesinger so long as we're both for Kennedy, that is but let one thing be understood, which is that Schlesinger and I are not at all in any kind of profound agreement.

—

He

is

—

we much more

talking about the institutions that

he's saying that he thinks there's

you

those institutions than most of

much less than he feels. If we are amoral we

have, and vitality in

believe. I feel there's

are each amoral in our

own

sepa-

rate ways.

Robert Lowell* / I'm going

to

ask a short, concise ques-

tion of Arthur Schlesinger, but I'm going to cheat

make

and

a statement.

The only

democracy that makes any sense power to vote people out of office. That's a very profound rule. But the democratic process is something much deeper, and I want to ask Arthur this: Do you think the police were acting within the democratic process at Columbia, or should they have been put on trial? to

me

is

definition of

that

you have

the

Arthur Schlesinger /

1 fear I must seem to cop out of been out of town, [hisses] O.K. The question is a perfectly legitimate and searching question which, when I have had a chance to get caught up on The

this question. I've

* Poet Robert Lowell's books include

and many

others.

Lord Weary's

Castle, Life Studies,

48

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

New York

Times and Jimmy Wechsler and Nat Hentoff I'm prepared to answer [hisses] but I'm goddamned if I'm going to answer to please an audience on the basis of no knowledge of what the facts are.

and the

facts,

Nat Hentoff / I'm

going to move on to another quesHerbert Marcuse has written that American society is "an explosion of insanity." Norman Mailer writes that he had to come to decide "that the center of America might be insane." Now, is democracy possible in a society of madmen? How serious are you, both of you, in these diagnoses, and how do you apply them to what we're talking about? tion.

Norman Mailer / Insanity

consists of building major upon foundations which do not exist. I think American society has become progressively insane because it has become progressively a technological society. A

structures

technological society assumes that tion to a

problem then

if it

it

keep food

in

decides that the problem, for instance,

such a way that it proceeds to freeze six

months

later

has a logical solu-

that is the entire solution. If is to

may

be eaten six months later, then it and then it points out to you that when you unfreeze that food you can it,

— —

What

although it does not decide scientifically is what pretends that this has been a scientific operation portion of that food has been destroyed, what unknown ailments may possibly be inflicted upon the generations of the future. This is a tiny example of it. But if you start going still

eat

it.

it

through every single manifestation of American society you find that it's just an endless series. There's architecture, there's food, there's the

incredible fact that in a

supposedly rational society we've come to a point where it's almost literally impossible to breathe the air in the city.

That's a sign of a society that's mad. is: How do you take a society

The question

madmen?

Well, you take a society away from

away from

madmen by

Democracy Does :

It

49

Have a Future?

weapons and charging the castle where the madmen have barricaded themselves and are terrifying the countrygetting

side.

The point of the impasse in which we find ourselves is that no one knows where the castle is, no one knows quite who the madmen are, because every time we think we've found a madman, he disclaims himself on television. For instance, we have this enormous hope that maybe Richard Nixon is the madman. But he gets on television: He's as reasonable as you or I. He cannot be the madman. Can it be our own dear Governor Rockefeller, who has never said anything interesting that any of us can remember? It certainly can't be Jack Armstrong, our Mayor. He's not the madman. Or is it General Motors then? Yes, conceivably. Now we're getting a little closer. Where in General Motors?

The point lution which

is

that

what we are getting

into is not a revo-

going to take over the seats of power. We're going to have a revolution which is going to be a reconnaissance to find out where the power is located. is

That's what the sense I

is

Columbia now knows a is

of all these operations. That's

approve of the Columbia lot

why

because everybody at more about where the power strike,

located.

way in which you discover the madyou have a slow, continuing revolution which consists of artful moves that expose the madmen, or expose some of the places where they've buried their power, their So, as

men

is

I

say, the

that

techniques, their secrets, their fears

—because

they're ter-

ribly afraid.

That's the one thing we've won in these six months, Marcuse, that you give no credit to. The people who have the power are terribly afraid. Which one of us thought that Lyndon Johnson would cave in? The fact of the matter is that the man was suffering from that barrage we were giving him. The barrage we were giving him is much more powerful than he, than any of us, believed. That's the incredible fact.

50

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Nat Hentoff / difficult to find

Professor Marcuse, do you think out where the men involved are?

Herbert Marcuse / No. tion to find out

The problem

is

society that

insane.

I

is

I

don't think

where the power not:

"Who

— —

—

a revoluIt is

or, rather, not

uses the available resources

that

country today.

madmen?"

are the

would consider a society sane

—which

we need

lies in the

it's

the

insane

technical, material,

intellectual not for increasing waste and destruction and unnecessary consumption, but for the abolition of poverty, alienation, and misery all over the world. And inasmuch as this society disposes over resources greater than ever before and at the same time distorts and abuses and wastes these resources more than ever before, I call this society insane not the people in it.

—

Elizabeth Hard wick* / As a resident of Manhattan I can't have too much of Norman Mailer and Arthur Schlesinger, but I'm fascinated by our visitor from the West. I don't want to ask a stupid question, so I'm trying to think of one that would be cogent so that he could talk about it. Well, does it bother you, Professor Marcuse, when you talk about the inequalities in our society, that perhaps the

real left as

we

all

think of

it

isn't

a very large thing in

American society? Perhaps it has as much power people want it to have, maybe a little more?

as the

Herbert Marcuse / Well,

I think this is about the most important question you could ask in this context because

involves what is really, in my view, the problem of democracy today: namely, whether we can still say, with good conscience, that the majority is right. I think we cannot say it anymore. Within the established society we no longer have a ma-

it

* Elizabeth Hardwick, Advisory Editor of New York Review, is author Own, among other books. She is a of a collection of essays, A View of member of the Board of Directors of Theatre for Ideas.

My

Democracy: Does

Have a Future?

It

51

on the basis of the completely free development of opinion and consciousness. We do not have a majority constituted on the basis of free and equal access to the facts and all the facts. We do not have a majority constituted on the basis of equal education for all. However, we do have a majority which is standardized and manipulated and even constituted by standardized and administered information, communication, and education.

jority constituted

In other words, this majority

is

not free, but

it

belongs to

democracy that the people who are sovereign are a free people. That was the notion of Rousseau and John Stuart Mill. That was also the way the great fighters for democracy understood it from the begin-

the very essence of

ning

—

not the people as people, but the really free people,

the people

who

are allowed to think for themselves, to feel

for themselves, and to form their

own

to the terrific pressure of lobbies,

whole power structure as

it

exists today.

Arthur Schlesinger / The proposition

is

opinion, not subject

political parties, the

implication

of

Herbert's

was some golden age of democmajority was pure, unfettered, and wise,

that there

racy in which the and that this golden age has

you want me to make it perfectly do admit such a democracy has and does not exist in any society today. But

Herbert Marcuse / clear once and for

never existed I

If

all, I

do believe that we could have

Arthur Schlesinger / All

it.

right.

Herbert has

made

made

it

American democracy in the 1960s is something he would level equally at American democracy at any stage in its history, at the clear that the indictment he has

of

time of Jefferson or whatever.

Herbert Marcuse / No, because we media

at that time.

The technological

of control that never existed before.

didn't have

society has

mass means

52

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Arthur Schlesinger / There

are two mild points I no one minds. One of them is this: Herbert Marcuse has said that the democracy of an immaculate majority has not existed, does not exist, but he hopes it may sometime exist. Is that correct?

would

like to

make

if

1 not only hope it may sometime say today that all the resources are available so can be translated into reality.

Herbert Marcuse / exist. I

that

it

Arthur Schlesinger /

In order to bring about the de-

mocracy of the immaculate majority, I take it that the policy which you would advocate in the transition is the suppression of those views which you think are incompatible.

Herbert Marcuse / No.

Arthur Schlesinger / Well, do Herbert Marcuse / I'm

posed

on

.

to

misread you?

afraid so.

Arthur Schlesinger / 1 tion again, but I gather

I

don't want to read that quota-

you

feel that those

the extension of the social

who

services"

are "op-

and so

.

Herbert Marcuse /Yes,

but what has this to do with is a free majority

the question whether the majority today

or not?

Arthur Schlesinger / My

second point is this, and pera different or a deeper problem: If there is any society which, far from being arrogant and tyrannical, is confused, has a bad conscience, is vulnerable to argument, and, in fact, is condemned by its critics because of its pathetic desire to come to terms with its critics, it is this one. Even Herbert is embarrassed by the fact he's being

haps

it's

Democracy Does It Have a Future?

53

:

celebrated by

Time and The New York Times Magazine. by the society.

Critics resent the fact that they are hailed

Norman Mailer / The ciety

is

that

it

danger of this technological soappropriates everything that's new. It does

not appropriate Marcuse's thought. But

it

of Marcuse's flesh and

into the machine.

introduces

it

it

takes one piece

It appropriates him to the point where people who couldn't begin to understand one of his sentences can use his name

at a cocktail party.

Herbert Marcuse / Your name,

too.

Yes. Now this is a debasement of nadebasement of the Gothic intricacies of Mr. Mar-

Norman Mailer / ture. It's

cuse's style.

Herbert Marcuse / You write much better.

Norman Mailer / Thank you. Herbert Marcuse / But

I

write deeper.

Norman Mailer / Yes, you write deeper The point I might like to get to is this Someone asked whether the left wing we have now is a reflection of what the democratic majority wants I'm talking about the orthodox left wing. But the orthodox left wing really doesn't matter because that's not the left that I think anyone is really talking about now. That's not the left wing that produced this particular, :

—

odd, nascent revolution in American life. This nascent revolution in American life popped out to everyone's amazement. It came out of the youth. It came out of a very basic reaction. Untold millions of this youth began to say, "They are snowing us. They are burying us." And they said, "We cannot put up with it anymore. We're going to

overthrow

it."

Now

there are two perspectives in all this.

54

One

and Confrontation

Dissent, Power, is

a revolution from the top and, in fact,

a revolu-

it's

tion that's impossible, given the present state of

American

life. It's a revolution which would come to pass only if worldwide communism won everywhere and then some of you might inherit the mantle here and be as unhappy as all those guys with names like Norodny or Novotnick or what-

ever his

The

name

is.

American

real revolution that's going on in

revolution that no one in this

say which

way

it

room can

No

predict.

will turn. It's a revolution,

life is

a

one can

submit, that

I

comes out of the very marrow of the human condition which is what is exciting about it. And the reason it cannot be put down is that no one comprehends it. That's its strength.

The horror of the technological society ment it comprehends something it acquires it

understood

how

to freeze

food

it

is it.

moThe moment

that the

acquired that act of

freezing food without knowing the rest of what was going on.

The moment

idea, whether

it

it

knows how

to sell

an idea

it

sells

an

cares about the rest of the idea or the con-

sequences of the idea or not.

One of the ways in which the society would be overthrown is for this revolution to be directed against the mass media. For instance, how about occupying some of the television stations? [applause] How about occupying some of the newspapers? [At this point a young man approached Mailer and offered what appeared to be a marijuana cigarette.] Are you joining me? Thank you, I don't smoke. You've unmasked me. I'll tell you why I didn't take a puff on that stick. I see no reason to arm the police while I'm feeling a state of euphoria. The action of the gentleman coming up to me was marvelous and interesting. He revealed the conservative side of

my

Nat Hentoff / We've been

talking about

new structures, change. What would tions,

as the only that

mean

nature.

way

to

Thank you.

new

institu-

fundamental you, Mr. Marcuse, in to get

terms of the university, in terms of Columbia?

Democracy: Does

It

Have a Future?

55

Herbert Marcuse /

I was afraid of that because I now myself as a fink. have never suggested or advocated or supported de-

finally reveal I

stroying the established universities and building

new

anti-

have always said that no matter how radical the demands of the students and no matter how justified, they should be pressed within the existing universities and attained within the existing universities. I believe and this is where the finkdom comes in that American universities, at least quite a few of them, today are still enclaves of relatively critical thought and relatively free thought. So we do not have to think of replacing them by new institutions. But this is one of the very rare cases in which I think you can achieve what you want to institutions instead. I

—

achieve within the existing institutions.

—

3 The

Tactics of

Dissent

Panelists:

DAVID DELLINGER PAUL GOODMAN

Moderator:

NAT HENTOFF

Discussants:

Shirley Broughton Julius Lester

Tom Nagel Ira Sandperl

Steven Halliwell

David McReynolds

Raymond Rubinow Joan Simon

This TFI discussion took place on November 10, 1967.

[o][a][a][a][a][n][a]

Paul Goodman / To understand the resistance movement, to go back some years to the rising sentiment

you have

against the

bomb

testing

like the formation of

—

all of

which seem

to

see rising all the time. tics

and the bomb

Women's

me

shelters, to things

Strike for Peace, sane, etc.

parts of the

What

it is

really

depends on how we view what

it is

same arc

—and —

really

that

we

correct tacis

a resist-

ance to a usurpation. not a radical or left-radical

It's

tally of the

Marxian type with one

movement fundamen-

class trying to displace

another class. Rather people begin to feel vaguely, dimly then more and more and clearly that their government has been taken out of their hands; and that somehow there has crept up a collection of interlocking corporations, gov-

—

—

ernment agencies, etc., of overpowering force, which is going its own way. Just like a conquering army. In reaction, the developing resistance movement is akin to some of the national liberation movements the kind of national lib-

—

eration

was

—

movement

American Revolution actually civil war of a different kind. The

that the

rather than internal

given this interlocking centralized collecimposed itself and usurped power, there is no check on it anymore. The Congress doesn't work. The laws of the land are repeatedly being violated by the powers that be. There is no longer an American pluralism operating. These people have appropriated all feeling

is that,

tion of forces that has

the avenues of decision making.

Besides, for the most part, their machinations, their

59

60

Dissent, Power,

operations, are hidden.

Take

and Confrontation

the military-industrial com-

By and large we know who they are, but we really don't know how they lobby, how they pull the strings, just how they operate. Then there are things like the CIA and we don't even know who they are nor what strings they're plex:

Suddenly there's a fait accompli overseas and commitments are made and how the commitments are made we don't know. Now, this interlocking monster has been growing quite steadily since at least 1938. Of course during the Second World War, since nearly everybody was in favor, one didn't notice it all so much. But then, during the long years of the Cold War these groups have been subsidized on an enormous scale without any economic or market check, and no political questioning, unanimous votes in Congress, etc. and now we're stuck with them. Suddenly some peo-

pulling.

—

—

—

ple begin to be shocked.

Now

the point to the resistance

awaken more and more people to the fact that this is the case, to get them to realize that the wielders of all this power do not represent the "general will," to use Rousseau's phrase, and then somehow you turn them out. It seems to me there are three main aspects to such reis to

sistance, two of which have been very rapidly and well developed by us in the resistance movement, the third much less so, though I think it's equally important. The first aspect is mass demonstration protest, the appeal to wake the populace. This can be some kind of sit-in of the classi-

cal sort. (It's great

when you

get to talk of classical sit-ins,

never thought we'd see the day; I hope Gandhi is sitting up in his grave and cheering.) I mean, of course, such actions as the one Joan Baez led in Oakland on the 16th. Or the shenanigans that the students have subjected the I

Dow

recruiters or the

navy recruiters

climactically, the kind of great rally

or again

down

Now when

in

to.

And

of course,

we had on April 15

Washington on the 21st of October.

all those

people get together they begin to get

a heady sense that they are the sovereign. You see, when there is a usurping government, the sovereignty reverts to

The Tactics

61

of Dissent

and somehow they, the demonstrators, feel that they are the people. Certainly that feeling was present on the 15th of April and it was present in Washington: the feeling of the great crowd that they know they are right, and that they, in some way, represent the country and the others do not represent the country. One very important

the people

—

characteristic of that feeling,

which Rosa Luxembourg was

is that when this happens, populace group gets to feel it is sovereign, then it quite spontaneously overrides all kinds of rules and regulations and legal permits. I've seen it happen even in little operations of a hundred kids down in Foley Square. Suddenly just because there are a hundred of them and they've gotten enthusiastic, they begin to walk without a parade permit and then they stop the traffic and it doesn't bother them at all. For they are suddenly all convinced

one of the

when

few to analyze well,

this

that they are the people.

conspiratorial way,

And

this doesn't

happen

in

any

it isn't a revolutionary a spontaneous outflow stemming from the copresence of the like-minded, when the like-minded feels that it's against

tactic.

It's

the usurper.

Then again, as in all populist upheavals, you get the peculiar kind of politics that comes from being moral. They are protestants. When critics say they "merely protest," I wonder what they think that phrase means. Luther merely protested too.

To

protest that way, en masse, petitioning,

some way the enemy is the whore of Babylon and, boy, the whore of Babylon doesn't have any rights. So in the end the whore of Babylon can just get wiped off the slate. That kind of protestantism turns right into Cromwell, deeply imbued with a moral feeling. And when the SDS kids put down the moral aspect, they simply don't know any history and they don't have any feeling of the pulse of this kind of crowd at all. They're thinking much

means

that in

much in terms of conspiratorial hard-core "cadres" of seasoned revolutionaries. And this isn't that at all. The second aspect of resistance which has also been beautifully developed is a kind of citizenly legal resist-

too

62

Dissent, Power,

ance, where the group

is

saying not so

and Confrontation

much

that

we are

sovereign, but that as citizens

we

and "they" are

"They" have abrogated "we" welcome a test in

laws;

illegitimate.

"we" stand

feel

"we" are

legitimate

for the laws,

courts, etc. This is clearly the feeling of those kids

the the

who

burned their draft cards, and, especially, of the older peo-

who support them. In fact, a lot of the draft-card burning takes place because of the older people no matter what the kids say because we've not only egged them on but we've put the ideas in their mind. And our feeling is ple

—

—

we are legitimate, and that in the test in the courts, when everything is aired, it will come out that just as the "trespassers" became legal in the civil-rights movement, so

that

—

it will turn out that our acts of resistance against the unlawful draft, against paying taxes for an unlawful, immoral war are legal. For we say that the powers that be have abrogated the law and the system of contract and faith on which the law is built, but we have not abrogated the contracts and are acting in accord with basic law and principle. In other words, we have not only the feeling of sovereignty, but also the feeling of the legitimacy of a sovereign people. Now both of these are necessary because the enthusiasm of the resistance comes from the feeling of legitimacy as a sovereign people; all its enthusiasm, all its real energy comes from that. The demonstrations are essential. But my own feeling is that what is going to do the government in is going to be the failure of their legitimacy. Now there's a third aspect and that's where we've done very badly so far. This is institutional or professional resistance, where each person in his functional role in the fabric of society resists and says that one cannot carry on one's institutional role under these circumstances. In principle, it's been done a little bit by the academics when, for instance, they kicked the draft out of the college because

—

of their faculty vote, or

when they denounce classified reby the academics would come

search. But the real attack if

they were to purge the university of all military-indusmoney. Since the universities are heavily supported

trial

The Tactics of Dissent by

63 money, that will be a

military-industrial

down

the faculties will only do

if

it.

terrific

In the same

show-

way

it's

necessary for every professional in his position to act. For instance, journalists could track down who is responsible for the phony low numbers given in the newspapers with regard to the demonstrations and find out under what kind of government pressure those phony numbers were decided on.

Or an

actor, before going on, comes in front of the curand says: Look, we're going to entertain you, we're going to give you a play. Now that's an art work and we're not going to tamper with it, but remember as you're sitting there watching the play and we're performing, our government is bombing and killing those people and only we, the people, can stop it. It's a poor context for art. Let's discuss it. Now that would be a profoundly artistic thing to do. If an actor did that, he would, of course, risk being fired. Nevertheless, that kind of action needs to be taken. And a host of other actors should support such an actor professionally. That's the sort of thing I mean by professional resistance: really taking your role, wherever it is, and joining it into the resistance. In sum, in discussing the resistance, I've touched on three different aspects the mass popular aspect, the citizenly or legitimacy aspect, and the professional aspect. I think all three are necessary. The first two we've developed beautifully; the third we have to think more about and try

tain

—

.

.

.

—

to

move

into action.

Nat Hentoff / Except that struck

me

for the third undeveloped aspect,

as a remarkably sanguine appraisal of wish I felt as optimistic. Do you think this

where we are. I heady feeling of sovereignty exists between demonstrations? And do you think it is effective?

Paul Goodman / Yes,

I

think you just have to look at the

more frequently. you cannot pick up the

fact that demonstrations are taking place

And between

the demonstrations

64

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

papers without seeing stories of some actions from the campus every day.

Dave Dellinger / I'm very sympathetic

with Paul's last point about the importance of really living up to what we believe in our chosen field, whether we're journalists, in the example he gave, or whatever. In some of the medical

committees to end the

War

in

Vietnam

that the Mobiliza-

how they could live their entire lives as doctors in a more meaning-

tion has been in touch with, they're talking about

—

ful, a more humane way what I would call a more revolutionary way. But, in general, I'm a little disturbed by

to me to be a failure in Paul's remarks to deal with the depths of the problem. I agree that we should all be active in a variety of ways to try to end the War. I agree that not just the Johnson administration but a whole coalition of forces have usurped their positions and are acting in violation of normal law and order and in violation of international law and order, in violation of the ideals and the statements of the Declaration of Independence. But I think that, behind this, one has to recognize that if we manage to return to the good old days of law and order, we would be returning to a law and order which in itself is, if not illegal, certainly inhuman and contrary to the ideals which I think that we all stand for. We have to recognize, for example, that the Declaration of Independence was interpreted in action as a society which excluded black people and annihilated red people. Therefore simply to say that Johnson and Kennedy and the other people and institutions have violated the laws and norms as they were, or rather, as some of us thought they were, twenty years ago or thirty years ago, I don't think is really to come to grips with the problem.

what seems

Now, through the blood and suffering of the Vietnamese people and of our own draftees and sucked-in enlistees, we are having a profound education as to the nature of our society, world-wide and domestic. I wish the war would end and we could go on getting that education in a hu-

The Tactics

65

of Dissent

less costly way, but I think that we owe a lot of thanks to the Vietnamese people for having rejected a lot of the proposals actually put forward by segments of the American peace movement, as well as the kind of proposals which editorials in the New York Post say that we really should be putting forward. Because if the Vietnamese had been willing to negotiate on the kind of terms that this country was prepared to accept I don't mean acceptance just by the people in the White House and the military-industrial complex, and by general public opinion, but even by a great many in the peace movement it would have been a disaster for the Vietnamese people. It would also have been a moral and, ultimately, a political disaster for the American people. For there's a certain sense in which, behind the usurpation which Paul spoke about, there is something very close to the traditional war of one class against another class. I say "very close" because I never accepted too narrow an interpretation of the class war and I don't today. But I think the reality which Marx did an awful lot to illuminate still exists today. I've already mentioned the black people

manly

—

—

and the Indians, but there's also the Mexican War and the Spanish-American War, the interventions in Latin America, etc. So Vietnam, in a sense, is a logical continuation of one stream of our society, one of the things that has always been with us. Only now, for a variety of historical reasons, but on the surface because the Vietnamese people had reached the point where they were unwilling and unable to give in to it, we're beginning to understand more about that aspect of our society. Something happened at the Pentagon confrontation which points up my attitude toward what I call class war, why I don't quite accept it in too narrow a way. For the civil disobedience or direct action part of that weekend's activities we had talked about blocking the Pentagon, disrupting it, stopping the normal flow of activity. Although that was more symbolic than some of the people who were calling for it wanted to recognize because obviously we

—

66

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

—

weren't going to grind the wT ar machine to a halt still I think there was a certain logic to it. We had to show that

American people, the duty of all of and stop that machine that simple dissent isn't enough. It's all very fine to have meetings and rallies and marches, but if the government can just go on because we lack a certain seriousness and a certain implementation, then it really has become a sort of self-indulgence and it is apart from the real dynamics of history. So I think that was a good start at feeling for something more serious, and that elements of this kind of disruption must be maintained and developed, although I don't automatically favor all disruption by any means. At one meeting that some of us were at from about midnight till five a.m. on the 21st, just before the event, we were facing up to the fact that there were estimated to be ten thousand Army troops on hand and perhaps fifty thousand more nearby. How do you act seriously in that situation? We gradually articulated the idea that we had wanted to confront the warmakers and now that the government had brought some of the potential warmakers, the soldiers, right to us, handing them to us on a silver platter, so to speak, our job was not to attack them but to confront them with some kind of broad human appeal. After all, we know that every stratum of our society is honeycombed with dissent, including the Army. So we don't view the fundamental battle in the old crude class conflict sense in which the guy in uniform is your enemy or, for that matter, any human being is your enemy. Instead, you make an appeal to them as human beings, to be more human, to live up to their responsibilities. In effect you appeal to them as friends and potential allies even if, at the moment, they are in the service of other people and other objectives. All we have to do is look around at our friends and neighbors and at people generally and we see a society in motion with people moving from supporting a war last year to being opposed to it this year. I know a case of a soldier, for example, who took part in the torturing of NLF it is

the duty of the

us, to obstruct

—

The Tactics

67

of Dissent

who has now made a statement for a film going to be used at the war crimes tribunal. Now, in advocating human appeals to potential allies, I do not mean that we should give up the blockage, the disruption, prisoners and

which

is

the serious tactics which are increasingly

movement now. But

I

coming

into the

think that some kind of tension or

balance should exist between the serious political disruption, the serious attempt to shut down things, and the intercourse with the human beings involved. Stewart Meacham [of American Friends Service Committee], who came back from South Vietnam recently, told me that on one Saturday afternoon, the NLF went into four crowded movie houses, turned off the projectors, and turned up the lights and they talked to the people. They talked to them in terms of their responsibilities as Vietnamese and as ings.

Now

war and of

the

NLF

human

be-

are engaged in a bloody and violent

yet they have not lost sight of this other dimension

human

persuasion.

Paul Goodman / I am curious to know why you use the word "serious" as if that had some special moral value, because strictly speaking the way to block, say, a draft board, is to blow it up, right? But obviously that is not going to lead anybody to change their mind and oppose the War. Now what you might better do is to tell these people: We won't let you carry on your routine, and how far are you willing to go to be able to carry on your routine? Are you willing to hurt so many of us? Are you willing to gas so many? Are you willing to bring all the cops on the campus? Or are you going to think it over? And if you think it over we're sure you're going to come over to our side. That seems to me serious. It's not the blockage which is serious, but it's the confrontation which is serious. Isn't that true?

David Dellinger / Yes. And yet, when more serious things, more tangible things begin to happen I think it also

68

Dissent, Power,

assaults people

and Confrontation

and really shakes them up

in a

way

that is

necessary.

Paul Goodman / If the aim of an occasional action is, in a sense, to slap somebody that's drunk in the face and say, "Wake up and think," that's okay. It's not nice, but it seems

to

TV

be the only thing that

pays any attention

to.

Man

in Audience / I may be wrong about it, but I detect something which disturbed me, at least in some of the implications I draw from certain of Mr. Dellinger's remarks. It seems to me that anyone who hooks his dissent to the

War

any sacrifice of its efWar, is thereby acting so as to prolong the War which means that the people who are being killed in Vietnam, Vietnamese and American, are then to larger ideological ends, at

fectiveness in ending this

—

made

involuntary soldiers in an ideological effort. agree with a lot of the objectives that Mr. Goodman has stated here and in his books, very much so. But it seems to me that those are two distinct problems.

being

Now

I

my point about the understanding, the human appeal, and my rejection of a narrow concept of the class war. I believe that we should welcome every little act whereby David Dellinger / importance of

I

think you missed

human

anybody becomes a little more human in the ways that Paul was talking about or in dissenting from the War. I think that a characteristic of old left politics, which unfortunately often creeps

think that this

new

up

in

new

thing which

I

left politics also, is to

have

just discovered or

which I'm experimenting with is the only way, and that anybody who doesn't do it my way or doesn't come all the way, right now, at my pace, is somehow an enemy of the movement and should be attacked. What we tried to do on October 21 was somewhat daring. There was a tension in the movement between those who wanted a massive demonstration like the one we had on April 15 and those who wanted to escalate the forms of protest into more serious

The Tactics of Dissent

69

We

looked the things over and the committee combine both elements. Not everybody was happy with that. Some people still thought that only their thing was the real thing. resistance.

as a whole decided to

Nat Hentoff / To

talk meaningfully about the tactics of might be a good idea to put the question in the context of where we are now.

dissent

Man

in

it

Audience /

Practically speaking, only the deci-

War. At this point neither arguments and reason nor demonstrations are likely to sway Johnson only the growing antiwar feeling among the mass of the American people can be effective. And that, too, could help defeat Johnson, and put someone in office who would end the War. So the type of dissent that increases mass antiwar feeling seems to me absolutely central. I can understand that some people may be impelled to take certain acts of moral conscience, of civil disobedience even at personal risk though it may make no practical contribution to ending the war, or may even be counterproductive. But there are also self-indulgent types of dissent such as marching with Viet Cong flags or "Ho Chi Minh Will Win" placards— which are not really acts of conscience, which entail no risk, but are political actions which turn off most people or even incline them to favor the War. sion of the President can end the

;

—

—

—

Certainly the original dissenters to the

War

laid the

groundwork for making dissent "respectable" so that given the stubborn resistance to our forces in Vietnam dissent to the War here could spread. More and more actions, better and better organized, to widen the antiwar feeling are needed. I believe this would fairly soon build to

an antiwar majority.

—

Paul Goodman / But

to face a dreadful possibility suppose in the face of rising antiwar sentiment, the military and the President cast the die and invade North Viet-

70

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

nam. What do we in the resistance movement do then? I think we should have contingency plans for that particular event. The other possibility is that the military and the government play it somewhat shrewder and reason: Look, be a bit sticky, like the depression before Deal, so let's play it cool. We'll write off Vietnam in order to reinforce the corporate structure a little grander in some other way. We'll even give a little more money to the cities, and so forth. And we'll live to fight another day. Now this is the thing which Dave is worried about and, of course, I'm worried about too. I want us to get out of Vietnam but it's very important that the resistance movement continue after that. this is getting to

the

New

Julius Lester* / This to me has been an incredible disit's been unreal. It's been a segregated discussion. Because how can you talk about dissent and not talk about, say, Newark? I mean blacks are once again invisible. The second thing is that the whole tenor of the discussion has been within the framework of this country, within the structure. And I ask: How can you have effective protest against a system if that system is going to set the rules for your protest? To protest you've got to get a permit from the police. The police tell you if and where you're going to demonstrate and to march. So that can be the end of your protest. And each thing in this country in terms of protest until October 21, outside the black movement, has been along those lines. It seems to me that if you've got an enemy and you want to defeat your enemy, then you don't let your enemy set your rules for fighting. People have talked about changing other folks' minds in this country and the way to go about doing that. We know from the experience of black people in this country that the only way white folks' minds have cussion so far,

* Julius Lester, formerly a member of sncc (Students' Non-Violent Coordinating Committee), has taught black history at the New School for Social Research. His books include To Be a Slave, Revolutionary Notes, and

Search for the

New

Land.

The Tactics

71

of Dissent

been changed is when they've been threatened. We can go back to the eighteenth century and you can read appeals to the legislature of Massachusetts for equal facilities for education and you can come all the way forward with the petitions of National Negro Congresses, and with every black man who has written to white people trying to change their minds. Their minds haven't changed. It was only when the sit-in was started that I could eat at Kresge's, and that the Civil Rights Bill, for what it's worth, and the Voting Rights Bill came about because blacks were in the street. Nobody heard of Watts, nobody gave a damn about Watts, until folks started shooting guns out there and throwing bricks and stuff. So we say that the only time you're effective is when you threaten the powers which have control. Now the peace movement has been very good in terms of activating the American people. Still, the war has been escalated all along. So the peace movement has had no effect upon the people who make the decisions about the War. All right. It seems to me then that the next step to take is plain and simple: blowing up draft boards. I know that won't directly stop the war machine, and some of the cats doing the bombing may get caught. But if you keep it up, then it's going to scare the hell out of the folks, maybe add up to something real.

—

Nat Hentoff / you do

Julius,

what about the contention that if and they'll

that kind of thing they have all the guns

simply obliterate dissent? Julius Lester / At the present moment, in this country, we have nothing. We don't even have our own lives. So if we die, we ain't lost nothing, because we ain't got nothing to begin with. And, in a sense, whites are more successfully oppressed in this country than blacks are. Because I know I'm oppressed. But as yet whites don't even know they're oppressed, they don't realize what happens in this country. But the signs are there, the hippie movement, the LSD, and

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Dissent, Power,

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then all that goes on in suburbia, which I don't live in, thank God. But these are all reactions against oppression, though they're very reactionary reactions. Until whites really realize how oppressed they are, they're going to be playing the kind of games that I think Paul Goodman's playing.

David McReynolds* / You know, there's something about America that produces a Julius Lester who demands more out of this country than any other country in the world and I think Dave [Dellinger] does too. Which is a good quality. But Lester is more down on this country than on France and Russia and China and Japan, which have their own out-class. And that's because America is a fairly decent place when you come down to it, for all the crimes committed. I'm glad we have Julius Lester to make I think is a rather inane series of comments because they flow from something profoundly American which you won't find in a lot of other places. (And it has nothing to do with black or white, which is another discussion about the fact that black people are more American than most whites.) Americans want more out of this nation than they want out of any other nation, we have higher standards for us than for anybody else. We run around talking as if we're living in a police state and the FBI, wire-tapping we meet and argue and debate and picket and demonstrate. You have to realize that Washington was very mild in its no one shot to death for violence to the demonstrators example. Try it in Russia, try it in France. I won't guarantee what might happen. it's

what

—

—

—

Voice in Audience / Try

it

in Saigon.

David McReynolds / Try it in Saigon, right. Take another aspect of America. We want results day. There's a mental depression *

not

David McReynolds, peace and socialist activist, is Director of Field for the War Resisters League, and author of We Have Been Invaded

Work By

yester-

now because we have

the Twenty-First Century.

The Tactics

73

of Dissent

ended the War already. And we're pitted against the whole government. This is good about Americans too: we want action yesterday or today at the latest. Paul [Goodman] made a comment a year or two ago that struck me as very sensible because we were then very depressed about the fact that we weren't we had put our ads

getting

any

results.

in the papers

We

had

petitioned,

—everybody here

signed

two ads and the government hadn't fallen yet. And everyone was depressed and saying, What should we do next, violence? which is the idiot romantic retreat from reality. Paul said at that time: What we need is not something else. We need more and bigger "meaningless demonstrations," because they're not meaningless. And April 15 was bigger and better than anything we had before, and it at least

—

had a real impact. That's why McCarthy is thinking of running, it's because of April 15 and all that led up to it. And I wouldn't give up at the point that we're on the verge of a major breakthrough. McCarthy is about to wreck the Democratic party. And McCarthy is not a radical, he's not a hidden agent in the Democratic party. He's a fairly conservative, basically decent Catholic who's in the Democratic party, and he's going to wreck that party. That means movement has occurred Lester says bomb the say to Lester, go bomb them if you want to, but it means that Paul is going to get picked up, I will get picked up. The legitimate peace movement is going to be closed down when the draft boards are bombed. Go ahead and try, if that's your gambit, but don't expect serious people who play serious politics to cut their own throats at the moment when we are having some success. That's playing into the hands of Johnson. You'll blow up a troop train; great idea. Kill some GIs, who are enlisted men, incidentally. You've played into Johnson's

below.

And

at exactly this

draft boards.

I

moment

agree with Paul.

I

hands. At that instant you've betrayed the whole movement, not only because it's violence, but also because it's stupid.

So, instead, I want to extend an invitation to all you people to join us on December 5 at Whitehall Street at

74

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

about 5:30 in the morning. The kids are doing their thing on the fourth. We are nonviolently, in a very old-fashioned way, going to do our thing on the fifth. We're going to sit down at Whitehall Street. I can guarantee arrests, I think, for everybody, possibly five or ten days in jail. And this I think is much more effective than burning draft cards because there are some names in this audience,

names

that count.

Woman

in

Audience /

I

doubt that McCarthy will wreck

the Democratic party; he might even strengthen

—

it,

ulti-

mately. But he might wreck LBJ in view of the increasing antiwar attitude. I also have been told by some

knowledgeable political pros that dissent was having meaningful impact even a year or more ago when many dissenters were feeling very futile. Without dissent the War would have been far larger and more extensive. In that sense dissent has acted to some extent as a restraining factor on our government.

Steven Halliwell* /

I

was with Dave Dellinger

in

Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, meeting with North Vietnam-

NLF

representatives. Dave mentioned one of the came from that: that when you're building an antiwar movement you build a broad social base and everybody does their own thing. Landlords come in to work with the Front (NLF) on their own terms. Each

ese and

lessons that

group participates in that broad coalition according to its own social functions. The other lesson that came through was the role of spontaneity and self-reliance in that society. People rebuild highways after bombings not because they get orders from some bureaucrat, but because they sense that it's something that has to be done, and they've got the resources within themselves to do it every time a road is bombed; they just do it over and over and over again. *

Steven Halliwell was active in the SDS, at Columbia and elsewhere.

The Tactics

Now

I

75

of Dissent

think that's the element that

makes what Paul

Goodman and some

others have said profoundly irrelevant growing movement among young people, and that makes it possible for me to dispute with him and to break that coalition thing on Vietnam. And when I listen to him say that Martin Luther and the ninety-three theses leads to Oliver Cromwell, I see that he's got no understanding of the dynamics of social change today. That dynamic which the young people are beginning to understand is that there are no creative positions open within the middleclass society in which they were born, like myself. You see, that's made a change, that's what that military-industrial complex is all about that we're being asked to bureaucratize ourselves. There's no creativity left in those roles. That's why that whole hippie thing has become so self-destructive. That's why using drugs went from being a liberating thing to a really self-destructive thing. People were trying to find some creative role in a society and couldn't find it and so turned to find themselves. to the

—

Paul Goodman / What makes you agree with any of that

—which

think that I would you learned from

dis-

my

books? [laughter]

Steven Halliwell / The thing is very serious in that who have been sort of deflowered by that corporate-military complex in terms of how they context because people

conceive of themselves

now

—everybody post-World War

II

realizes that the social content of this country is really

perverse. Like, I didn't

know

as a child that a million

people were dying in Algeria because of what France was doing. I didn't know until very recently that three hundred thousand children die every year in Brazil, our "good neighbor" Brazil, of malnutrition. When I realize how manipulative the system is and what it's doing to the Third World, and to black people in this country, then I'm not going to go looking for slick, nonideological ways to coerce this power structure into

76

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

ending just one specific act of brutality. Because if brutality is built into a system that depends on the corporate military-industrial complex then you have to go after the

whole system.

me

When

I realize that,

then

it

doesn't bother

that I can't convince that great respectable

move with me, because just going to

sit

middle

to

they're finally irrelevant. They're

on their

asses.

If

the thing goes too

strongly against the ways in which they have defined them-

have for themselves, they'll But the young people who've been denied that possibility by the social changes that have gone on since World War II are going to stay mad and they're going to fight at whatever level they have to fight. Even if they have to be hunted out on the streets and shot down. They're going to continue to fight until it happens. selves, the social roles they

punk

out.

Woman

in

Audience /

Steven Halliwell /

Until what happens?

Till they're destroyed

by the

soci-

ety or until they build that kind of self-reliant, spontane-

ous revolutionary movement in this country that will knock out that military-industrial complex and change the whole thing.

David Dellinger / Steve, got from my contacts with

I

think a third lesson that

the Vietnamese

is

I

that not all

people do Front and of the Vietnamese resistance are actually middle-class people intellectuals, composers, poets, writers, and all the rest. But, coming back to the kind of thing that Julius Lester was talking about and to the three hundred thousand people dying each year of malnutrition in Brazil and what's happening here and now I can't go with the notion that America is such a decent place and that we are too impatient. Because if you're black or if you're one of those Vietnamese or Brazilians or any of those people who can't meet freely and can't read and speak freely because of the middle classes

come

over.

A

sit

on their

asses, that

lot of the leaders of the

— —

—

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77

of Dissent

if there's

the technical right (which there isn't in most

where the United States dominates in Latin America) you don't have the economic base, the daily livelihood so you can get to be concerned with whether you can write and think and speak. Your concern is survival. Now I agree that April 15 was a very useful thing and accomplished a lot, but I don't know why we should draw the line there and not talk about October 21. Because I think if October 21 had been a mere repetition of April 15 there would not have been, for one thing, the challenge to the middle classes, the challenge to all of us to keep moving forward. Also there would not have been the beginning of the development of new methods. Even if somebody else now replaces Johnson, someone who might end the War in Vietnam, what will be happening in Thailand meanwhile, and in Latin America and all of the other places? I'm afraid that the guy who defeats Johnson to end the War will be to Johnson what Johnson was to Goldwater, which doesn't come to very much. of the countries, for example,

Man

in Audience / But we do have freedoms that the people in Saigon or Bolivia, and a lot of other places, do

not have.

David Dellinger / I agree that there is a facade of democracy here, and a certain reality to that fagade too. Which is why we get caught up in our own illusions. Because it's not that there's some great plot, but this is the way our society operates we have freedom as long as we don't exercise it too much, as long as we don't become a serious threat to the status quo. But in the last couple of years, with the growth of dissent, these dynamics have been loose throughout our whole society and there is so much opposition to the War and so much (at least

—

—

beginning) understanding of the nature of our society that for Johnson or anybody else now to be able to control it they'll probably have to go as it continues to grow

—

—

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Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

which is unknown in this counwhich would destroy the fagade. I think that we're in a profoundly moving historical situation now where the old alternatives that we've lived with and that our country has lived with are no longer the real ones and there's a much greater extreme that we have to face up to. into a kind of repression

try,

Paul Goodman / I just want to make a remark to the SDS young man who spoke before. To my mind, there are two major political facts of the world as a whole. One is the fact that more than a majority of mankind is becoming increasingly poorer. The use of a high technology and the trade methods used by the power structure, largely Europe, the United States, the Soviet Union, and Canada, have caused increasing poverty throughout the rest of the world. The second equally important political fact in the world at present is that, given the present development of technology, we are headed for ecological or bomb disaster in the next ten or fifteen years.

Now none of the ideologies in the field at present, but none, are really coping with those two facts. SDS can talk but I've yet to hear from them a single scheme an African people get out of its poverty without imposing on it a technology which is going to be destructive. Now when they say there is no creative place for the as

it

will,

to help

middle-class kid or the professional kid, this is the creative place to try to find out how to make a decent future world and to engage in such activities now as will lead

—

(bombing a draft board

to that

will certainly not lead to

out of consideration you are not talking serious politics. You're talking counterrevolution and practically every word I've heard out of SDS for a long time now, for the last two or three years, has seemed that).

to

me

Now,

if this is left

counterrevolutionary.

Joan Simon* / When we

talk about the Establishment or

the military-governmental complex, *

I

don't think we're

Joan Simon has contributed to Ramparts, The Nation, and Commonis writing a book on the Fort Dix stockade rebellion.

weal, and

The Tactics

79

of Dissent

remember during March on Washington, my children and I kept seeing facing the whole question. I can these cars with their lights on.

Now

My

feeling

is

ance grow.

I

War, and against our

the majority

movement grows,

is

still

all

the people in those

cars were not the military-industrial complex.

those people were for the

the

on that

But

all

resistance.

side.

As our

so does their resistance to our resist-

think there can be a case

the large middle class

made

that a lot of

on October 21. So disobedience still should be

were turned

off

do you really think that civil escalated, to use that word, if the movement

is to

increase

in effectiveness?

David Dellinger / Yes, I think that civil disobedience has to be both intensified and broadened. I know that the first reaction of all of us to anything that upsets our equanimity or challenges our assumptions is to say, Oh, I wish they wouldn't do that. But in a period when the United States has to go through a whole process of reevaluation, I don't think that we can get people to undergo that process just

by nice and

polite discourse. I believe in

nice and polite discourse, but

I

which shake people up, which

also believe in other things

may

turn them against you

for the time, but at least will challenge them to face to the issue.

When we were

up

talking about plans for Octo-

ber 21 with Martin Luther King and some of his colleagues, certain members of the peace movement raised this very question that if we do these far-out things, won't we antagonize the great middle, and turn people against us. And the King people came back very sharply and said that they had learned in the South that almost anything they do today that is of value is going to be attacked on that very ground, and was in fact going to alienate some people; but that only such actions made it possible for them to grow to the point where they should be tomorrow. Now this whole business of the cars with their lights on and whether a majority is for the War or not that is quite a complicated matter. The majority of people in our

—

—

80

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

society normally aren't really for anything.

And one

They go

along.

of the great virtues of this kind of civil dis-

obedience that we're talking about is not only that it gets a Senator McCarthy to take a step and that's one sign of things moving but also that it does reach many, many other people so that in the middle of a War you have hundreds of thousands marching in the streets against the War. That's pretty unusual especially considering where we started from. There was trickery involved too, with those lights, because people were asked to turn their lights on "to support our boys in Vietnam." So it didn't necessarily mean supporting the War. Our big problem has been majority apathy and ignorance. So to alert the majority, to really shake them up, is a very important step.

—

—

—

Joan Simon / Are people over

thirty going to

to get involved in civil disobedience

their lives? Is this possible,

—

perhaps

be willing

to dislocate

on a large scale?

Ira Sandperl* / This was one of the real dimensions happened in our last civil disobedience in California on October 16. For the first time we got many older people to participate. Our ages ranged from eighteen to sixty-seven and probably most people were between the ages of forty and fifty. We believe this participation of participation in nonolder people will grow and grow

that

—

violent civil disobedience.

Let me add that socially organized violence has always been the middle- and upper-class mode and as soon as you do that you're playing by their rules absolutely. I'd like also to say one thing to Mr. Goodman. I really think it isn't us old ones who set the fire under the young It's they who turned in their draft we really have not turned in our profesas you yourself implied sional cards yet. And I think that's the step we have to go to.

ones, but vice versa.

cards, whereas

* Ira

Sandperl

is

—

Director of the Joan Baez Institute for Non-Violence.

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81

of Dissent

David Dellinger / Another way of

getting older people

into civil disobedience is illustrated by the movement for turning in draft cards. There were twelve hundred draft card turn-ins on the sixteenth and the Grand Jury has be-

gun subpoenaing some of the people. So, the suggestion is that the young people should be just full of news about all of those

Grand Jury

older people lots

and

who seduced them. Give

lots of

that

names of those older people.

list of over five thousand on record, prominent names who've signed the Declaration of Conscience, including Bayard Rustin, thank God. Give them the whole list. Read off that list of the five thousand names on the Declaration of Conscience. Just swamp the government with those names. Will the government prosecute them all? Put them in a concentration camp?

There's a beautiful

Woman

in

have a mass

Audience / The government

is

not going to

hundreds of people, or five thousand. several persons and prosecute them as the leaders, or as examples. trial of

They may pick one or

David Dellinger / All right, at that moment hundreds more of us walk into the court with our lawyers saying that we are really responsible for this young man's action.

Man

in

Audience / Then

the prosecutor says

we

appre-

your statement and we're going to consider your application. Now clear the court and we'll proceed with

ciate

this case.

David Dellinger / All right, so if the government ducks and doesn't prosecute us all, then thousands and thousands more older people, including parents,

that challenge

—

know it's safe publicly to join in that action in urging draft refusal and draft-card burning. So we might be able to spread it into a mass movement of older people

will

and young people in solidarity resisting the draft on an enormous scale. And if they do prosecute selected cases,

82

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

—

why

it'd just be a sort of draft-resistance lottery better than being sent off to kill and be killed in Vietnam. And the whole thing would become "respectable." Conceivably, such mass action could end the War. And those sentenced would later be pardoned and emerge as real patriots who really saved "our boys in Vietnam."

Woman

in

Audience / To look ahead

at the

of dissent generally, a key question really

development

is:

What

will

happen to the people thirty and under now in the movement who, unless I profoundly misread the times, are getting a kind of education and leading a kind of life which

make

very unlikely that they will go back into the numbers that our generation did? So they may bring a whole new force and direction into our society. There may be various shifts taking place, and it's very hard to anticipate just what the effects will

it

established society in the large

will be.

Tom Nagel* / From what

several people have said, we can gather that a protest movement can arouse considerable hostility and yet have a salutary influence even on some of the people who are very derisive about it. If such protest is noisy enough, it forces everyone to think about the matter at hand. And it gives them somebody to be to the right of. I think it's very important for The New York Times, for example, for the Ciceronian balance of its editorials, to have somebody to attack on the left. And I've also seen how protest spreads. I used to teach at Berkeley at the time of the great events out there. At first, just one protest petition appeared in my box, very intransigent, which only a few people signed. Then a whole lot of protest petitions began to appear, along various points of the political spectrum; and in the end nearly everybody began signing one or another.

—

Woman ing the *

Tom

in

Audience / In the case of early dissent regardnow so widespread and respectable there

War

—

—

Nagel teaches philosophy

at Princeton University.

The Tactics of Dissent

83

were of course not only radicals and militants but also some early moderate voices like Fulbright, who certainly influenced other politicians, in turn. And some notable journalists and commentators. As to dissent, in general, to the way our society has been going the sense of powerlessness, meaninglessness, of being processed and manipulated, of the American Dream not being our society's effective animating spirit, much less lived up to this is being felt by the middleclass, too, and by other segments. And the dissent is fermenting and rising and more and more will express itself, and have political impact, too which I don't think

—

— —

we should

—

discount or discourage. In that sense, the system

And the people do have reserand common sense with regard to

does have some openness. voirs of both decency

their true self-interest that, in time, can assert themselves. I think that's the sort of point which David McReynolds was trying to make. And this kind of dissent gets stronger and stronger among people whose class interest, narrowly

interpreted, has certainly not changed. But there's some-

thing

more important than

their class interest that

moves

them.

David Dellinger /

I don't disagree with that. But I think unfortunately very successful at squeezing the humanity out of people, whether it's their sense of

our society

is

solidarity with their fellows, or their ability to think for themselves, or their sense of initiative and self-reliance. And I think that this is one of the roots of the student revolt. But one of the disagreements I had with SDS was that after their April '65 march they thought, Well, we

can deal with these problems of making the university a of participatory democracy and meaningful education without really challenging and tackling the Viet-

real place

nam War. The fact is that these things are all interrelated. And a society which can treat a peasant in Vietnam as if his life really isn't important can treat a student in the

classroom as if his important either.

life

and

his initiative weren't all that

84

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Raymond Rubinow* / Mr. Goodman, you have that there are two world facts

stated

we must

face: (1) that the getting poorer; and (2) that tech-

majority of mankind is nology is heading us all toward the bomb or to ecological disaster. You say further that unless we plan to deal with these basic problems, we're all "whistling in the wind." I would like to ask what, in addition to your theory of dissent, are you pointing your assent toward?

Paul Goodman / Well,

My

first I'd

like to point

my

dissent.

fundamentally is against the interlocking power structure of the whole world. It is not America as such, although America at present is the biggest leader therein. But, in order to play that game, what you always do is keep the other people's technology developing toward and related to your own level, but always well behind yours. That is, you keep the leadership, but you have to do business. So there is a humanly abusive technology run by an interlocking power structure of the world. In the end that has got to go, otherwise we are going to have the starvation of the great majority of mankind and the processing of all the others. This was called 1984. And in Orwell's 1984, as you remember, there were three lovely big powers and we know just who their names are now because we see them on the face of the world, and we're heading very rapidly toward that. And it's very necessary for all of the forces including the humanistic dissent

forces (which, unfortunately or fortunately, include lots

of middle-class professionals and poor peasants

know how

to

till

who

the soil, etc.) to realize that this

really is

the

enemy.

What after

I

book

think that

assent to or toward

is

a decent society. In book its lineaments. I don't

I've tried to utopianize it

will be

communist or

socialist

and

it

cer-

tainly will not be corporate-capitalist. I have a feeling that *

and

some kind of big vague mixed economy varying with Raymond Rubinow

active in civil rights

is

Executive Director of the

and related

fields.

J.

M. Kaplan Fund

The Tactics

85

of Dissent

the different circumstances of each group

is best.

It

will

be a society in which the underdeveloped regions will not be "developed" but which will be given a kind of intermediate technological aid to develop in their own terms. That's what I'm for.

Shirley Broughton* / I think we need to diversify and broaden the issues of our dissent. For instance, we should go out against air pollution. Specialists tell us that those of us in large cities are all living in a semitoxic state.

We're

all potential victims for

lung cancer. There should

and a doingaway-with-the-slums campaign, and a campaign for total also be an anti-water pollution campaign,

employment, etc. Just as Martin Luther King saw that civil rights and black progress were not unrelated to the peace movement, so the peace movement should, perhaps, link up with the sort of other crucial issues I've mentioned. The problems are interconnected and it might also build broader support.

Man

in

Audience /

I

see validity in this view, but I'd

an urgent question on the War. If North Vietnam is invaded by us fairly soon, or if the War takes a dramatic rise in some other way, what really can be done like to ask

to stop it?

David McReynolds /

we can

stop

it.

I

think

don't know that there's any way we have to begin with that, but a

I

great deal of what we're doing has

become

—

existential.

Second, I'm for escalating the disobedience based on my own peculiar viewpoint of America, but it applies to all countries. Cultures are almost always very strong; governments are almost always extremely fragile. We usually confuse the two. I don't think we're going to go fascist. The culture has many many many problems, but I don't think it's a fascist culture. The government is weak, it has * Shirley

Broughton

is

Director of Theatre for Ideas.

86

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

tried to counter and reduce dissent and failed. It brought back Westmoreland from Vietnam; that's the first time a commanding general has ever in our history been brought back from Gaul to address the Roman Senate, by the or-

der of Caesar.

more

And

it

failed completely; actually,

it

drove

would say that the culture is very strong, the government's fragile, and the thing to do is to get 500 intellectuals, writers, artists people whose names cannot be forgotten to sit down at the induction center or go to the UN and ask Goldberg to resign and ask the government to resign. Sure it's irrational, but into the peace

camp. So

I

—

—

it's

time for irrationality.

Man /Is 500 enough? David McReynolds / It would be a good we could grow in numbers and influence. sist

beginning.

And

we but

per-

If

in such nonviolent so-called "irrational" actions, they

could cumulate significantly.

Julius Lester

The

/

I

think a lot of things are being missed.

American culture has always been fascist: for 400 years black people have had to live under fascism. To think that the culture is not fascist is to be under an illusion. Black people had no rights, and at the present time they still have no real rights. The second thing: I think that it's an illusion to think that the government has tried to deal with dissent. The government has toyed with dissent, it has not tried to deal with it. At the present moment, the peace movement and the black power movement are in mortal danger. In Congress you have the McClellan Committee and the House Un-American Activities Committee investigating the peace movement and the black power movement, investigating all dissent. And undercover there's the FBI, the CIA, and Army Intelligence compiling dossiers, infiltrating, wiretapping getting set for domestic Green Beret counterinsurgency, while Congress prepares various bills to hedge first

thing

—

is

that the

The Tactics of Dissent and curb on the whole

in

I

dissent,

87

and put a fagade of law and order

thing.

think that Johnson and his successor are going to try

Everybody talks about law and order and now it's being directed toward the demonstrators at the Pentagon and toward all forms of black resistance. So I feel that every day of the week there should be attempts to disrupt the country, because I think that is the most to eradicate dissent.

way at this point. The situation is critical. I would like the American people to have a semblance of what my experience has been and what the experience of the Vietnamese has been. Just a semblance we can't bomb you all with napalm or anything like that. Yet I effective

—

don't think people really care until they begin to feel

themselves. Just like this summer,

it

when whites were going

bed wondering, "Oh good God, is it going to be my time next?" you know, sleeping with one eye open, that sort of nonsense, looking out for us coming through the window. I think that this has to be escalated in the peace movement so that Vietnam will begin to tear them apart and they will not be able to function inside the society. Then I think those people may feel they have to move to

to

—

force the government to stop the

War.

Man

in Audience / I want to underscore Lester's points. Several speakers have said that in time we will gradually have a change a President who will end the War. Now, no matter what rhetoric they use, no matter whether the President they elect in 1968 is a Democrat or Republican,

—

war President. Maybe in five American blood will finally force the War to end. Maybe, maybe not. At best that means five more years of war, five more years of destruction of Vietnam and of massacre of Vietnamese men, women, and children. Think of that when you say let's walk on our toes with lily-white hands and not inter-

that President will be a

years, in 1972, Vietnamese blood and

fere too strongly, let's

McReynolds

says.

Now

do I

it

gently, gradually,

as Mr.

don't believe in violence, but

88

Dissent, Power,

sometimes violence situation

—

is justified

by

and Confrontation

the very nature of the

as a lesser evil to stop enormity of evil. Let

me

draw you an analogy. Suppose those draft boards weren't draft boards in America but boards with names of Jews selected for concentration death camps in Nazi Germany. Would you be a "good German" then? Or would you feel that violent resistance was justified was your duty as a

—

human being

—

Well, Americans are and, in effect, huge numbers of Vietnamese including women and children are being consigned to death. You could say Vietnam is one giant high-technology death camp operated by your government and mine. Is disruptive, even violent resistance maybe bombing draft boards not called for to stop the slaughter?

being selected and sent to

kill

—

and be killed

—

—

—

—

to stop that?

Man

Audience / But

by the peace movement would only provoke massive, counterviolence by the government, here, supported by the American people. It would, in fact, harden hearts and in

would not stop

this evil;

violence it

lead to the intensification of the War in Vietnam, too. Rather, what is needed is hard, sustained, imaginative efforts to build as quickly as possible massive nonviolent

make this slaughtering abroad repugnant to people and to provide leadership and channels for non-

protest, to

means of protest in which large numbers will participate. At the same time, you also have to work to get political leaders to take bolder, emergency

violent and political

measures. As McReynolds said, get administration bers

who

are opposed to the

War

mem-

to see the full, horrible,

massive, Nazi-like immorality involved, and to resign and soon, not in five help lead the opposition. And in time to stop the wheels of years get Senators to filibuster government dead until the President orders total with-

—

drawal of troops, an end

—

—

to the senseless slaughter.

David Dellinger / The goals of the peace movement certainly encompass building massive nonviolent protest

The Tactics

89

of Dissent

and moving political leaders into action. But I want to refer back to David McReynolds' very valid distinction between the government and the culture, and his point that the government is always more fragile than the culture. This is one of the reasons that I'm worried about political shifting around of the government up on top and not really getting at the culture. Now Shirley Broughton pointed in a useful direction when she said, what about air and water pollution, and the slums and racism and dire poverty? In short, a whole series of things which show that we don't really even value ourselves and our own fellow citizens as humans. I said before that a government which "disvalues" a peasant also "disvalues" the student, that there's an interconnection. But if we don't even value ourselves, then

it's

very

much

easier for us also

not to value the peasant or the student. So

have

to tackle all of those

problems.

think

I

And one

we do

of the very

was Paul Goodman's third category of dissent, you know, the institutional dissent where people within their own vocations, in all the areas where this kind of dehumanized society impinges upon us, have to speak up and act up as full human beings. creative things tonight

As

to Senators, they're fragile; at their best they redeeper currents which are happening in the society. They don't have these initiatives ordinarily on their own. Also, I'm a little nervous when appeals are made to people with important names to do things because they will move people. I think this is one minor gambit, yes, but the real thing that we need is to work along the lines the Vietnamese, the NLF, have done. Yes, they include imporbut basictant names yes, they include the middle class ally they built what they call a people's movement. And I think that that's what we have to do in our society: build a wide-based people's movement which is not dependent upon big names. Now someone referred to blowing up draft boards enough of them, I suppose, to interfere with conscription. Well, the antidraft movement by essentially nonviolent flect

;

—

90

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

and interfering with conscription. It their draft cards that's a symbolic thing-but that many, many more people won't go. That can really be expanded. And to me the exciting thing at the Pentagon was that I think we began to get through in a number of encounters to some of those soldiers who can become like the Fort Hood Three or Ronald Luckman tactics is disrupting isn't just that

—

many burn

or other people who refuse to go. If we're really going to appeal to the people in the society who are asked to carry out the orders that we oppose, then I think that we don't just

go in and

start flailing

around with irresponsible

vio-

lence. I agree with Ira Sandperl that actually violence has

always been the weapon of the oppressing minority

—

yes,

the oppressing minority or oligarchy. Behind the fagade is the police station, and the bank, and which the majority of the people in society are prevented from attaining their just economic and other

of law and order all the

ways

in

deserts.

So earlier, I spoke of appealing to the soldiers, to the people involved, and becoming more humanistic ourselves, because I think that is the essence of nonviolence. If we develop a people's movement which is both as militant and determined as violent revolutionary movements are, and at the same time is humanistic and nonviolent in its treatment of its enemies, then I think we have a chance of carrying through the kind of creative disruption and change which will actually last and be building on a foundation rather than on an illusion. But shifting the government by political manipulations or shifting it by violence, without basically changing the culture, without infusing a new, profound respect for ourselves and for other human beings, will not lead to lasting humanistic changes.

Man

in

Audience / The dissent that worries Johnson is movement as such, but the broader antiwar which is now far too respectable and embraces

not the peace dissent

too

much

class

of the establishment

phenomenon

—

to

move

—

it's

an upper- and middle-

against in repressive fashion.

The Tactics

91

of Dissent

As a matter of fact there's very little activity by trie peace movement in educating working people on the War and on draft resistance and conscientious objection. So the is fought largely by the poor and the ignorant. A movement which grounds itself on populace sentiments and then restricts its activities to an intellectual and moneyed class of Americans is playing, in some sense, a game. It's a valuable game in that it has impact on the rest of the society through the media, though I don't think

War

it's now as important as the fact that there are fifteen or twenty Senators who make constant antiwar speeches and get on the front page of the newspaper. Or that there are a large group of businessmen willing to come out against the War. I think that begins to move people. But it all helps. It's all part of the movement. Only it seems unfair for the peace movement to aid the middle and upper classes in avoiding the draft and thereby thrusting the burden onto the poor.

David Dellinger / Your facts are wrong. Attempts to organize and educate among workers and blacks have been extensive. Students, for example, have offered draft counseling in the ghettos. The trouble is the Negroes, by and large, are not buying it. The reason is, of course, that the Army for most of them is a good deal. And they reenlist. The proportion of black reenlistments is three times as much as white. Ironically, that's a bonus the military are reaping from our society's racism.

Woman

in Audience / It seems to me The New York Times said the other day that the voters against the War in San Francisco came mostly from the working-class

neighborhoods.

David Dellinger / Things are changing. You have to make a distinction between the working class which remembers the Depression and is profoundly grateful for having a refrigerator and a television

set

and a

car,

and

92

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

the younger generation, not just

from middle-class famibut also of working-class parents, who take some of these things for granted and find out how empty they are in a world in which there is not human solidarity and lies

fraternity.

Woman

in

Audience / Would David Dellinger comment

further on the roles of violence and nonviolence in effect-

ing social change and building, hopefully, a new, better society?

David Dellinger / That's a complex, difficult question and I have never been completely satisfied with my own answers or anybody else's. I think there is a fraternity, a solidarity of people who are serious about revolutionary change and serious about other human beings and this transcends differences in tactics and strategy and methodology. As a pacifist and as one who believes profoundly in nonviolent methods, I still feel a great solidarity with someone like Che Guevara and with the NLF. The greatest problem about nonviolence, perhaps, is that most of us nonviolent people have not been as truly serious as violent revolutionaries have been. Now I have never had any trouble, myself, relating to black power people like Stokely Carmichael and Julius Lester and they, I think, have been able to relate to me. Because, although we have a profound difference in our belief as to what tactics are valid, we share basic humanistic attitudes and goals and a serious dedication to effect-

—

ing essential revolutionary change. The accusation that black power advocates are racists in reverse is scandalous and false. What they reject is a kind of hypocritical, white fraternity. Not necessarily intentionally hypocritical, but perhaps without realizing it, we whites are not as serious and determined as they are and we don't stand beside them the way we ought to and this is what they reject. I can recall that when three soldiers refused to go to Vietnam and I called up Stokely Carmichael whom I hardly

—

The Tactics knew

at the

93

of Dissent

time

are they white.

—

He

Stokely did not ask are they black or respected what they were doing and he

where do you want me to be, I'll be there do believe that this is an age of technological development whereby violence is being rendered obsolete and impractical. Now there are moral and humanistic reasons why I reject violence, to begin with. Let me add here that Ho Chi Minh and most of the Vietnamese that I've ever talked to have a profound attitude of compassion toward the GIs. Now for their situation, which I'm not in, I can't presume, as an outsider who isn't suffering what the Vietnamese are, to try to prescribe how they should act. Here at home I'm not very well satisfied with my own position or my ability to implement it. I believe we must take on a greater seriousness in our nonviolent methods, said, yes,

.

.

I

akin to the seriousness of the Viet Cong or of the black people. If we, by nonviolent methods, can bring down the Pentagon, bring down the administration that wages those kinds of wars, then we have something to offer them. That's the seriousness with which we must work. Meantime we should not repudiate people like Stokely who believe that violence is necessary, but should stand beside them and at the same time saying and demonstrating forthrightly to them why we think nonviolence is a better way and a necessary way. Now Martin Luther King, I believe, got somewhat out of touch with reality and got into the illusion of thinking that change and progress was going to come down from the Federal Government. I happen to respect King highly, despite my serious tactical disagreements with him. Unfortunately, King became the symbol of nonviolence in this country, and King basically tried to appease the status quo. But I do believe that nonviolence is the hope and the method which serious people should perfect and develop as a means toward basic, revolutionary change.

—

—

4 EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

The Legitimacy

of

Violence as a Political Act?

Panelists:

HANNAH ARENDT NOAM CHOMSKY ROBERT LOWELL CONOR CRUISE O'BRIEN

Moderator:

ROBERT

Discussants:

Mitchell

B.

SILVERS

Goodman

Susan Sontag Robert Paul Wolff

This TFI discussion took place on December 15, 1967.

lU[n][a][2]E!][2l[2]

Robert Silvers / All the great crises in the last fewyears have involved the question of the legitimacy of violence: violent actions in the Negro slums; attempts at and disrupt the war and efforts to the Third World and

violent resistance in order to protest

effort in this country; violent revolutions

inspire revolution taking place in

likely to continue far into the future.

symposium

We

arranged

this

examine some of the questions that underlie the problem of violence. Under what conditions, if

in order to

any, can violent action be said to be "legitimate"? Le-

gitimate, for example, as a tactic for those

the

War

in this country;

who oppose

legitimate as a form of self-

by those who see themselves as managed by the constituted authorities themselves; and legitimate as a way of bringing about social change in those backward countries where the ruling elite is wholly intransigent and defense, or self-assertion,

victims of a system of oppressive violence,

repulses all attempts at reform.

My own reaction to the question is one of distrust of people who think they have simple solutions to these questions. Camus wrote in UHomme Revoke that a commitment never to resist violence with violence can amount to a life of acquiescence in evil and inhumanity and to what he called bourgeois nihilism. But during the Algerian War, Camus himself stood apart from the militant efforts going on in Paris to organize resistance. Certainly it should be clear to all of us that a passionate conviction that a violent course of action is justified has often enough led to ghastly consequences and to no remedy of injustice. To discuss some of these questions we have Dr. Hannah 97

98

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Arendt who is author of The Origins of Totalitarianism, and On Revolution, among other writings which deal with questions of revolution and resistance. Poet Robert Lowell, whose concern with some of these questions has not only affected his own work but was expressed also in his public acts as a conscientious objector in World War II and as one who's taken part in protests against the Viet-

nam War. Noam Chomsky, MIT, who's

professor of linguistics at

written on the responsibility of resistance in

and who was arrested while participating in the march on the Pentagon. And finally, Dr. Conor Cruise O'Brien who is, among other things, a historian of the Irish revolution, the author of a biography of this present situation,

UN

official in the Congo, now Albert Schweitzer Professor at New York University. He comes here having just gotten up from sickbed after a beating administered to him by the New York police while he was nonviolently taking part in the recent antiwar demonstration at the Whitehall education center. I'll call first on Dr. Arendt.

Parnell, a former

Hannah Arendt / I certainly don't believe in simple solutions. And I shall argue that the whole question hinges on the distinction between, and possibly even the opposipower and violence. Power and violence are not the same. Power is inherent in all politics, and all government rests on power. Violence in constitutional government is a marginal phenomenon incorporated in police and the armed forces. Those instruments of violence are legitimate to the extent that they are used to keep the power structure intact, defend the citizenry against crime, and the country against an aggressor. They stand outside the walls of the city, as it were, in order to stand guard tion of,

—

over them. The danger, of course, is always that they may emancipate themselves from the power that established them, as we see now in Greece, that they may invade the city or begin to interfere in strictly political affairs. They then lose their instrumental character. Under constitutional

The Legitimacy

of Violence as a Political Act?

99

government violence is instrumental to the political community, whereas power is the essence of all political entities. The power of the laws or the Constitution rests on and springs from the consent and support of the people. Wherever this power is intact violence is unnecessary. The criminal who challenges lenges at the same time agreement supports these this challenge is violence.

the authority of the laws chalthe power of all those whose laws; the community answer to Already, in such a case, we have

a certain breakdown of power, the inability of the law to be self-enforcing, that provokes a limited violence which

according to law. Generally speaking, violence always rises out of impotence. It is the hope of those who have no power to find a substitute for it and this hope, I think, is in vain. Violence can destroy power, but it can never replace it. By the same token, it is a dangerous illusion to measure the power of a country by its arsenal of violence. That an abundance of violence is one of the great dangers for the power of commonwealths, especially for republics, is one of the oldest insights of political science. To maintain itself is instituted

—

that this country, for instance, is the

earth because

it

most powerful on

possesses the largest arsenal of destruc-

prey to the common and erroneous equation of power and violence. What we see now in Vietnam (and could have known before if we had paid some attention to guerrilla warfare in the nineteenth century) is the superiority of the power of the guerrillas to an enormous and disastrous display of violence. No doubt American violence could, if fully unleashed, destroy the native power, but it cannot replace it. Nothing will be left after destruction but destruction. The Napoleonic Wars, especially in Spain and Russia, still offer instructive cases to study in order to learn the distinction between power, which is generated if people act together in concert for a definite purpose, and violence. Indeed, the increase in violence which we see everywhere today might well be accompanied by the drying up of the tive instruments is to fall

sources of power and thus, in effect, by an increase of

100

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

impotence in this country. The most common and also the most plausible justification of violence is, of course, that only violence can answer violence. This brings up the old story of the fight against the dragon. If, as it is only too often assumed, you must become a dragon in order to fight the dragon as, for instance, to develop an ideology, anticommunism, to fight communism, with the possible result that this counterideology will outlast its original model then the whole enterprise is of course simply self-defeating. Or to put it differently, and choose our examples from the other side

—

—

if it is true as Fanon in his The Wretched of the Earth maintains, that the native is ready at a moment's notice to exchange the role of the quarry for that of the hunter, that he is an oppressed person whose permanent dream is to become the persecutor, then we are confronted by nothing more than some form of rebellion, not by true revolution. Because revolution wants not to exchange rulers, not to exchange hunters, but to abolish hunters and persecutors and oppression altogether. Now the two best-known theoretical justifications of violence rely on two forceful metaphors. Since Marx, violence has been thought inevitable, revolution being likened to the event of birth which is preceded by labor pains. For Marx, the old society is "pregnant" with the new one. Without this simile, the very continuity of history would, for Marx, be in jeopardy. History in Marx is a natural process, resting on man's biological metabolism and the processes of labor that mediate this metabolism and make it human. The metaphor leads us astray because the rhythm of human affairs between man and man is not part

of the barricades,

—

of nature, not even part of the natural is

not because

life that

we

we belong

human

sphere.

It

to the great cycle of organic

are also political beings. justification is best represented by George

The second Sorel

who

lence

is

Bergson actually believed that vioand that, therefore, a philosthe proper philosophy for producers,

in following

essentially creative

ophy of violence

is

for the working class, as distinguished

from the

rest of

The Legitimacy

101

of Violence as a Political Act?

which he sees as mere consumers. The principle behind the very elaborate philosophy of Sorel, the principle behind this construction, is that there is an element of violence inherent in all fabrication. We kill a tree in order to obtain wood; we destroy the wood qua wood to make a table. To the extent that our creativity apparently is never a creation from nothingness, ex nihilo, we are forced to do violence to something in order to create something else. In the sphere of fabrication, violence is indeed justified and justifiable by the end, the end-product. We know this common view by the saying "you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs." But for an action which is not fabrication, it would be much wiser to say you can break many eggs without ever making an omelet. In the sphere of human affairs violence as an absolute loses its creativity together with its instrumental character because nothing is achieved in the sphere of action that could be likened to an end-product. The only final, definite end we could ever be able to achieve in history would be the end of mankind and this indeed society,

which

is

—

we could

achieve.

another justification for violence has only come up in Sartre's introduction to Fanon's book. Sartre writes about an irresistible violence which is neither sound and fury nor the resurrection of savage instincts nor even the effect of resentment. It is man recreating himself. Now violence as a creator of man that is a remarkable step Still

—

recently

—

beyond Marx, who, as you know, wrote when he was a young man, and believed up to his end, that labor creates man; not God but labor creates man. And now we hear from Sartre that not labor but violence creates man. This gives us an idea of the general climate in which we live. Now none of these justifications, I think, can be understood without taking into account something about which the justifiers usually are silent. Not only does the rage which rises out of impotence relieve feelings and emotions that are well-nigh unbearable, but acting together in vio-

lence

more than any other form

erates a kind of ecstasy. I

of group action also gen-

borrow

this

word

for

it

from

102

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

a book which I hope you all will read, The Warriors, by J. Glenn Gray. This kind of ecstasy is perhaps unique. General Robert E. Lee once remarked that it is well that

war was so terrible, In war there is the

else

we would grow

too fond of

it.

confraternity of danger, the intense

feeling of brotherhood on the battlefield, the feeling that

you are no

longer,

quote, "shut

I

up within the walls of

the self and delivered over to the insufficiencies of the

ego." (This you can find in the French poet Rene Char, the way.) Finally, the immense increase of vitality in the face of death, the intensification of being alive, is a

by

well-known phenomenon. To quote from Fanon: "It is as though the practice of violence binds them together as a whole, each individual a part of the great organism of violence which has surged upward. Violence is the cleansing force, it frees the native from his inferiority complex, and from his despair and inaction. It makes him fearless and restores his self-respect. It is as though he were illuminated by violence." Now, this, to be sure, is much more than the liberation you might feel when you have burned your bridges to respectable society. But this ecstasy, though it is real enough, has no consequences. It blows over like everything that

is

—who

mere emotion. And Fanon himself

is

much

knows what he is talking about tries to extricate himself from the mirages of violence when he warns against an unmixed and total brutality which he calls antirevolutionary, though

less extremist than

he admits that

it is

Sartre,

—

precisely because he

astonishingly like the violence that

typical of revolutions

—how you

is

actually can distinguish

them he never

says. This total violence, he says, if not immediately combatted, invariably leads to the defeat of the movement within a few weeks.

Robert Silvers / Our

next speaker will be Dr. O'Brien.

Conor Cruise O'Brien /

I agree with Miss Arendt in sharing a dislike of a certain romantic mystique of vio-

The Legitimacy

103

of Violence as a Political Act?

lence which has appeared recently, perhaps a

on the

little

sur-

But I would tend to disagree with her when she suggested an opposition between power and violence. I think that Sorel, whom she quoted, is on sounder ground here in making a distinction, rather than an opposition, when he speaks of force, force being violence when used by the state. Nor do I see a legitimizing factor in the fact that violence is used by the state. I would like to begin my own discussion by reminding ourselves prisingly,

left.

of certain specifics, such as

who we

sidering what

and what

is

legitimate

—and where we

violence

are.

—we who

are

is

are con-

not legitimate in

—

we exist whether we're Americans or not, if we're here we exist as beneficiaries of past violence against the original inhabitants (Robert Lowell has reminded us with what the acres are fenced*) and against the English. We are living under political and social conditions made possible by successful violence in Here on

this continent,

—

World War. We're living framework defined and regulated by conventions upheld by the sanction of violence, or if you prefer the Sorelian term, force. Even the composition of the population is ultimately determined by violence whereby we

the recent past, in the Second in a social

keep out the world's poor. This being to dissociate ourselves from this society

so,

unless

we

are

most radical fashion, by refusing to take its money (as I think few of us do), we are hardly in a moral position which entitles us to tell others that violence as a political method is illegitimate. Or even to tell them what kinds of violence are legitimate and what kinds are not. We can, of course, say that we do not choose ourselves to use violence but that is a different and personal matter. We can say that we reject this rather bogus mystique that has been made to surround violence and that is almost an aesthetic matter. Or we can say that, in certain circumstances, violence can achieve no useful result, but that *

The reference

and stones

/

is to

and fenced

is

in the

essentially a tactical decision.

the lines: "Our fathers built this land from sticks their acres with the Red Man's bones."

104

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

In most of the world, political methods involving violence are the only methods which offer a possibility of bringing about those substantial, crucial changes amounting to a social revolution which nearly everyone agrees are necessary in the poor world. The democratic conven-

which make possible certain kinds of nonviolent power have only a very limited extension in the world. In most poor countries, they either never existed or had only a spurious existence or have been abolished. In these countries governments are changed by coup d'etat, palace revolution, or, much more rarely, by mass revolution, and not by any other means. Even in those few poor countries where democratic process exists and nonviolent change is possible, this functions only within definite and predictable limits. If a party in any poor country which looks sufficiently left wing to cause alarm in Washington is on the verge of winning an election, then democracy is likely to be abolished by the army. This has happened in many Latin American countries and recently in Greece. No one who knows, for example, the

tions

transfers of

attitude of the Indian officer class will doubt that in equiv-

democracy in the East on the nondemocratic shelf. Thus, those who, for example, tell the Indian masses to use the democratic process, and it alone, to attain social revolution, are in effect telling these people to try to win a game, the rules of which will be changed if they ever appear to be winning. According to a nineteenth-century Irish agitator, William O'Brien, violence is the best way of insuring a hearing for moderation, [laughter] Obviously, this is not always the case but it sometimes is, as is proved, for example, by the solicitude which the governments of major American cities show for the welfare of the Negro population during alent circumstances the showpiece of

will simply be put

the

summer months.

We

all agree that it would be desirable for race to attain a condition in which conventions for peaceful transitions and adaptations become so solidly established and so respected that violence would be un-

the

probably

human

The Legitimacy

105

of Violence as a Political Act?

necessary [sound of police siren; laughter], and therefore illegitimate. But progress toward such a condition is itself unlikely to be achieved without violence on a considerable scale. The real problem seems to me to concern not the "legitimacy" of such violence which if I may say so, is a somewhat scholastic problem but the possibility of containing it by the tacit recognition of one basic common interest that violence be kept within limits which will not threaten the survival of the human race.

— —

—

Robert Silvers / Thank

you. We'll hear next from Rob-

ert Lowell.

Robert Lowell / The Irish

critic V. S. Pritchett said that the have a sheer, unadulterated joy in destruction,

[laughter]

Conor Cruise O'Brien / You're the Sinn Fein

.

talking about Joyce, not

.

Robert Lowell / When I'm

with other poets,

I

think of myself as a thinker, [laughter] Tonight

sometimes I

think of

myself as a poet. I say this as a part-apology. I didn't prepare any speech, hoping to pick up wisdom from my colleagues and elaborate on it, or make it shrink. This subject is much too serious, I think, for a debate. One can only state one's own opinions and make a kind of personal testament which may wash for someone else or may not. All year, God knows why, at Harvard I've been teaching a course called "Selections from the King James Bible as Writing." And I became very familiar with that text, the text that

was quite

state we're in,

just as

influential in bringing us to the

though now

awful as

life. I

it's

mean

receding.

And

happy

that text is

the history of the Jews,

it's

a

most national histories. The pages of the Bible drip with blood, and it finally ends with the New Testament. This may be controversial with this audience but I do think that gives us a kind of answer. I'm

vile, terrible history like

106

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

one-eighth Jewish and seven-eighths Christian

Lord, what

we

got in the end

—

I

.

.

.

and,

my

think this must be a large

part of the meaning, I don't see how anyone can miss it was a kind of nonviolent activism that had nothing to do with the wars of the Roman legions or Jewish insurrections. It was a message that was immediately buried by the Christian Church and was never put into practice, but I don't see that don't see

why

it's it's

not something one shouldn't attempt. I Utopian; we could hardly do worse than

the various wars and insurrections we've fought.

Hannah Arendt that what we might call domestic violence almost always makes things worse than they were before. And even if it didn't it would be immoral. But I wouldn't make too great a distinction between that kind of violence and the violence of governments; surely something like World War I is more horrible than any number of riots, and more immoral. The trouble is that man always has been faced with such violence^ throughout recorded history and I think almost all these wars have been unjustified and hideous and fought with great brutality. They vary, of course. No two are alike. But, alas, they've almost always been inescapable for the individual. And if we know anything about ourselves, we know that we're very inconsistent, that you might do everything to be a pacifist, then suddenly find you're joining some armed force to defend your community. And we'd hardly be human if we weren't that inconsistent. But we must try to get over that somehow, and to substitute violence with words and with passions. I think the real problem is that we don't have the courage for nonviolent active work; I mean I don't think I do very often. But I don't see how the world's going to go on without a turn to nonviolence. It's getting harder and more dangerous all the time. And anyone who objects to the I'd agree with

private,

—

—

War must object to guerrilla wars as well. Even though one is more sympathetic to the cause or goals, guerrilla wars are equally immoral and violent and dangerous, Vietnam

productive of

evil.

The Legitimacy

of Violence as a Political Act?

107

Robert Silvers / And now Noam Chomsky.

Noam Chomsky / My

general feeling is that this kind of question can't be faced in a meaningful way when it's abstracted from the context of particular historical concrete circumstances. Any rational person would agree that violence is not legitimate unless the consequences of such acstill greater evil. Now there are people of course who go much further and say that one must oppose violence in general, quite apart from any possible consequences. I think that such a person is asserting one of two things. Either he's saying that the resort to violence is illegitimate even if the consequences are to eliminate a greater evil; or else he's saying that under no conceivable circumstances will the consequences ever be such as to eliminate a greater evil. The second of these is a factual assumption and it's almost certainly false. One can easily imagine and find circumstances in which violence does eliminate a greater evil. As to the first, it's a kind of irreducible moral judgment that one should not resort to violence even if it would eliminate a greater evil. And these judgments are very hard to argue. I can only say that to me it seems like an immoral judgment. Now there is a tendency to assume that a stand based on an absolute moral judgment shows high principle in a way that's not shown by a stand taken on what are disparagingly referred to as "tactical grounds." I think this is a pretty dubious assumption. If tactics involves a calculation of the human cost of various actions, then tactical considerations are actually the only considerations that have a moral quality to them. So I can't accept a general and absolute opposition to violence, only that resort to violence is illegitimate unless the consequences are to eliminate a

tion are to eliminate a

greater evil.

With

this formulation,

however, one moves from the ab-

stract discussion to the context of concrete historical cir-

cumstances where there are shades of gray and obscure complex relations between means and ends and uncalcula-

108

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

ble consequences of actions, and so on and so forth. Formulated in these terms, the advocates of a qualified commitment to nonviolence have a pretty strong case. I think they can claim with very much justice that in almost all real

circumstances there

is

a better

way

than resort to

me

mention a couple of concrete instances that may shed some light on this question. I read in the Times this morning an interview with Jeanette Rankin, who was the one member of Congress to vote against the declaration of war on December 8, 1941, to the accompaniment of a chorus of boos and hisses. Looking back, though, we can see that the Japanese had very real grievances, and that the United States had quite a significant share of responsibility in those grievances back in 1941. In fact, Japan had a rather more valid case than it is customary to violence. Let

admit.

On November

1941, just a month before Pearl Harto eliminate the main major factor that really led to the Pacific war, namely the Closed Door Policy in China. But they did so with one reservation: that they would agree to eliminate the closed door in China, which is what we'd been demanding, only if the same principle were applied throughout the world that is, if it were also applied in, say, Latin America, the British dominions, and so forth. Of course, this was considered too absurd even to elicit a response. And Secretary of State Cordell Hull's answer simply requested once again that they open the closed door in China and he didn't even deign to mention this ridiculous qualification that they had added. Now that qualification was of the essence and had been fought about for the preceding ten years. And it was one of the factors that led to Pearl Harbor and the war. Of course it was politically impossible after Pearl Harbor for the United States not to declare war; we know how very difficult it is to refrain from striking back, even when you do know that the guilt is distributed. But we're talking about what is legitimate and what is moral, not what is a natural reflex. And the advocates of nonviolence are really saying bor,

6,

Japan had offered

—

The Legitimacy that

we should

109

of Violence as a Political Act?

try to raise ourselves to such a cultural or

moral level, both as individuals and as a community, that we would be able to control this reflex. Now what were the consequences of striking back and what was our own role in creating the situation in which the violence took place? On December 8, we struck back quite blindly, quite unthinkingly, and I'm not at all sure in retrospect that the world is any the better for it. It's

Tokyo who was permitted to

quite striking to read the dissenting opinion at the

tribunal of the one Indian justice

who dissented from the entire proceedings, concluding himself that the only acts in the Pacific War that in any way corresponded to the Nazi atrocities were the dropping of the two atom bombs on Japanese cities. A. J. Muste in 1941-42 predicted that we would adopt the worst features of our adversaries, of the object of our take part, and

hatred, and that

we would

And

replace Japan as a

still

more

very difficult to deny the justice of that prediction. So even after Pearl Harbor, I would accept advocacy of nonviolence, not as an absolute moral principle, but as conceivably justified in those particular historical circumstances. In short, there may well have been alternatives to the Pacific War. A second case, which I guess is the one everybody's got on their mind, Vietnam, raises interesting and difficult questions in this regard. I'm not going to discuss the situation post-February 1965 but rather the earlier period. ferocious conqueror.

From 1954 by

to

I

think

1957 there was

it's

large-scale terror instituted

and the reason was pretty simple, it wasn't just blind and wild. The reason was this is Buttinger's theory and I think accurate that any democratic institutions that would have been created would have been taken over by the Vietminh and therefore it was impossible for the Saigon regime to allow any sort of democratic expression. It was necessary to resort to violence and the Saigon government,

—

—

terror.

Then, in the period from 1957 to 1965 there were two There was the mass violence

sorts of violence, roughly.

110

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

conducted by Saigon and the United States; Bernard Fall estimates about 160,000 killed during that period. And there was also the selective violence, selective terror carried out by the Viet Cong as part of a political program

which succeeded in gaining the adherence of a good part of the population. During both of these periods, Americans tended to accept and condone the violence that was conducted by the United States and the Saigon government, reserving their indignation for the

Cong

much more

limited Viet

terror.

For my part, of course, there's no question about justifying the American and Saigon government terror. But what about the harder question, that of the terror practiced by the National Liberation Front? Was this a legitimate political act? The easiest reaction is to say that all violence is abhorrent, that both sides are guilty, and to stand apart retaining one's moral purity and condemn them both. This and in this case I think it's also But for reasons that are pretty complex there are real arguments also in favor of the Viet Cong terror, arguments that can't be lightly dismissed, although I don't think they're correct. One argument is that this selective terror killing certain officials and frightening others tended to save the population from a much more extreme government terror, the continuing terror that exists when a corrupt official can do things that are within his power in the province that he controls. Then there's also the second type of argument, the Fanontype argument that Miss Arendt quoted, which I think can't be abandoned very lightly. It's a factual question of whether such an act of violence frees the native from his inferiority complex and permits him to enter into political life. I myself would like to believe that it's not so. Or at is

the easiest response

justified.

—

the least I'd like to believe that nonviolent reaction could

achieve the same result. But it's not very easy to present evidence for this; one can only argue for accepting this

view on grounds of the peasant

from

faith.

And

the necessity of releasing

this role of passivity is

hardly in ques-

The Legitimacy tion.

Ill

of Violence as a Political Act?

We know

perfectly well that, in countries such as

North Korea and South Vietnam and many others,

it

was

necessary to rouse the peasants to recognize that they were capable of taking over the land. It was necessary to break the bonds of passivity that political action. to the point

where

bondage of the I

And it

made them

violence does

sort that exists, say, in the Philippines, then

think there's a pretty strong case for

An

totally incapable of

move

the peasantry can overcome the sort of permanent if

it.

interesting sidelight to this issue in the

situation is a recent that the areas in

Vietnam

Rand Corporation study which claims

which American control

is

most firm are

the areas in which there has been least disruption of the

old feudal social order, where the peasants are docile, where they don't raise political issues, where they don't cause trouble and then begin to act politically which in Vietnam means acting as members of the Viet Cong, ap-

—

parently.

There's also a third argument in favor of violence which on the surface sounds pretty abhorrent, but I'm afraid it has a point, from the point of view of the revolutionary guerrilla groups. That is the idea that violence, say by the Viet Cong, will lead to reprisal, often o^erreprisal, and reprisal will win adherents to the Viet Cong. Of course that's what happens, in fact. The first year of the massive American bombardment of South Vietnam the number of recruits for the Viet Cong increased enormously, tripled at least.

With

arguments in favor of this type of viogood grounds to reject it. It me, from the little we know about such matters,

all these

lence, I still think there are

seems

to

that a

new

form

society rises out of the actions that are taken

And

the institutions and the ideology it develops are not independent of those actions in fact, they're heavily colored by them, they're shaped by them in many ways. And one can expect that actions that are cynical and vicious, whatever their intent, will inevitably condition and to

it.

;

deface the quality of the ends that are achieved. Now,

112

Dissent, Power,

again, in part this

is

just a matter of faith.

some evidence

there's at least

and Confrontation But

I

think

that better results follow

from better means. For example, the detailed studies of Viet Cong success, like those of Douglas Pike, indicate quite clearly that the basis for the success, which was enormous, was not the selective terror, but rather the effective organization which drew people into beneficial organizations, organizations that they entered out of self-interest, that they to a large

extent controlled, that began to interlace and cover the enit was the programs for rural Vietnam that led to the NLF successes, which by 1965 had led in effect to their victory. I think the course of collectivization in China and the Soviet Union can also be instructive. It's clear, I believe, that the emphasis on the use of terror and violence in China was considerably less than in the Soviet Union and that the success was considerably greater in achieving a just society. And I think the most convincing example the one about which not enough is known and to which not enough attention is paid is the anarchist success in Spain in 1936, which was successful at least for a year or two in developing a collective society with mass participation and a very high degree of egalitarianism and even economic success. Its successes, which were great, can be attributed to organization and program, not to such violence

tire countryside.

Other studies also show that

attractiveness of their

—

as occurred,

I

believe.

Such examples seem

to suggest that there is a relation-

ship between absence of terror and the degree of organizameaningful programs and spontaneity, on the one

tion,

hand, and success in achieving a just society on the other. This is a sort of Luxembourgian and anarchist conception, that a just society cannot really be imposed on the masses of people but must arise out of their own spontaneous efforts, guided by their own developing insight. I think that this is a valid conception which has some support from

modern history. war movement

A

final case I'd like to refer to is the anti-

in the United States,

where

I

think the

The Legitimacy

of Violence as a Political Act?

113

—

argument for nonviolence is overwhelming so overwhelming that I don't think I need argue it here. A couple of days ago I was rather despairingly trying to think of something illuminating that I might say about this subject, and I decided to turn back to some of Tolstoy's essays on civil disobedience. I'm not sure I found anything very deep there, but I was surprised to discover a note of optimism that I hadn't expected, and, since that's a kind of a rare treasure these days, I'd like to quote a couple of remarks just to relieve the prevailing gloom. He has an interesting essay that was written in 1897 called "The Beginning of the End" [laughter] in which he points out that until recently men could not imagine a human society without slavery. Similarly, one cannot imagine the

man

without war. "... a hundred years have gone clear expression of the idea that mankind can live without slavery; and there is no longer slavery in Christian nations. And there shall not pass away another hundred years after the clear utterance of the idea that mankind can live without war, before war shall cease to be. Very likely some form of armed violence will remain, just as wage labor remains after the abolition of slavery, but at least wars and armies will be abolished in the outrageous form, so repugnant to reason and moral sense, in which they now exist. "Signs that this time is near are many. These signs are such as the helpless position of governments which more life of

since the

first

and more increase their armaments; the multiplication of taxation and the discontent of the nations, the extreme degree of efficiency with which deadly weapons are constructed, the activities of congresses and societies of peace but above all, the refusals of individuals to take military service. In these refusals is the key to the solution of the question."*

We

which is the most aggressive in the under conditions of almost unparalleled

live in a society

world, and

we

live

* Tolstoy*s Writings on Civil Disobedience

N.Y. 1967),

p. 17.

and Non-Violence (Bergman,

114

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

We therefore have the opportunity to eradicate a good part of the illegitimate violence that plagues our lives and that is destroying the lives of many who are much less fortunate. I think we have no choice whatsoever but to take freedom.

up

the challenge that's implicit in this prediction of Tol-

we do not take up this challenge, we will help to bring about a very different state of affairs which was reportedly predicted by Einstein, who was once asked his opinion about the nature of a third world war and replied that he had nothing to say about that matter, but that he was quite certain that the fourth world war would be fought with clubs and stones. stoy's. If

Robert Silvers /

I

think that

we now

will have discus-

sion by the panelists.

Hannah Arendt / When I made my first remarks, I was very conscious of leaving out all moral considerations partly because this would very much complicate the matter, but partly also because I was so sure that everybody else on this panel would invariably raise the moral question and I must say this has been done even more than I expected. I very much agree with Mr. Chomsky's assertion that the nature of new societies is affected by the nature of the actions that bring them into being. And our experiences with such new societies are, of course, by no means encouraging. It would be really fooling ourselves if we looked upon them with enthusiastic eyes, with which I sympathize but which, I am afraid, simply do not see the truth. As to the Viet Cong terror, we cannot possibly agree with it, just as we couldn't agree with the terror of the National Liberation Army in Algeria. People who did agree with this terror and were only against the French counterterror, of course, were applying a double standard. But perhaps, as Mr. O'Brien said, we are simply in no position to judge. These are far-away countries and situations and I would say that in this sense, morally speaking, what is really so very wrong with what we are doing in

The Legitimacy

115

of Violence as a Political Act?

—

Vietnam quite apart from the horrible excesses which we commit and which go beyond anything which anybody would have thought possible a few years ago what is so very wrong, even if it had been for the best reasons in the world, is that we are interfering in the civil war of

—

another country. But I have the impression that many people today at least a number of people in the so-called New Left who are against our country's intervention in Vietnam (as I am, too) would like us to interfere, only in favor of the other side. And though I do not think that this would be as horrible as what we are doing now, I definitely think that it would be very wrong indeed. Let me turn now to Mr. O'Brien's statement that we are all beneficiaries of past violence in this country. I think

— —

we

all can immediately agree on one point: namely, that a great crime was committed by this country and that we are now and have been paying the price for this crime. And it is interesting to see how very long it takes a coun-

pay back such really fundamental crimes. Many crimes history forgets, but such a fundamental crime

try to little

as chattel slavery has, as lasting consequences.

But

we know now, enormous, to say that we are the

ficiaries of this past violence is I

could challenge on

many

long-

bene-

an interpretation which

grounds. Let's

first

of all dis-

tinguish between the acknowledgment of the enormity of the crime perpetrated in the past and expression of guilt feelings, as though those who acknowledge the crime also had committed it. This confusion sounds very moralistic and is actually hypocritical: No one can feel guilty for something he didn't do. American political attitudes are

known as "moralistic" all over the world; in this country we seem not to be aware of the seriousness of this reproach. Moralistic attitudes in politics tend to provide moral justifications for crimes, quite apart from leading into pseudoidealistic enterprises which are obviously to the detriment of the intended beneficiaries. Machiavelli, as you may recall, said: I love my city and my country more than the salvation of my soul. And

116

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

—

with this since he still believed in heaven and hell with this he, in my opinion, showed quite clearly the distinction between politics and moral questions. In all moral questions we are concerned with ourselves. We ask ourselves whether we are guilty of something, whether we can live with ourselves after having done this or that. These are entirely legitimate and very important questions, but they are not fundamentally political. In politics we are concerned with the world and not with ourselves, and

what

I

to the

object to in the

Old Left

—

New

is this

—

Left as I sometimes objected concern with themselves.

Robert Silvers / I think that several of the things that Dr. Arendt said do raise important questions. I'd like to ask Dr. O'Brien if he would comment on them.

Conor Cruise O'Brien / Thank

you. Dr. Arendt has taken some of the rest of us to task for supposedly placing too much emphasis on moral questions. It doesn't seem to me altogether possible to avoid this. We're asked to consider the legitimacy of violence, essentially, I presume, a moral category. (Is it legitimate, right, just, to use violence?) And that I think does force us to examine the question of what exactly qualifies us to pronounce on legitimacy, what our moral and social credentials are in this matter. That seems to me quite a pertinent question, which we must ask about ourselves as members of this society, before condemning other people for actions which are to be held up as immoral or illegitimate. Connected with that question is the point Dr. Arendt has suggested:

that

we

are not beneficiaries of past violence, rather that weighs heavily upon us. I would like to

this past violence

The

issue which she raised was chattel which I raised, which she did not mention in her reply, was the liquidation of the aboriginal inhabitants of this country, the original owners of the land on which we are sitting discussing legitimacy. It may be that the crime of the liquidation of the American Indian

challenge that. slavery.

The

issue

The Legitimacy

117

of Violence as a Political Act?

weighs heavily on the American conscience and therefore it is a disadvantage, but if so, this must be happening at a very deep unconscious level. As regards the slavery question, I would of course agree with Dr. Arendt. This has left very heavy ominous adverse marks on the whole society and these are felt and experienced. But at the same time the slave trade and slavery did help to lay the foundations of capitalism. I think that is pretty generally accepted now. So that while we do suffer from some of the adverse consequences of slavery, we are also among its beneficiaries by our advanced standard of living. I really don't think we can quite get away

from that. Another point I would like to make relates to the price which has to be paid for violent revolution, for the methods of violence used. These methods do leave their marks on character, the character of the new rulers and the society. Mr. Barrington Moore in his important book, The Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy, asks a pertinent question

For which

is

—one he

says he's almost afraid to answer:

the price heavier, the price for violent revo-

lution, as in China, or the price for peaceful stagnation,

as in India?

And he

leans rather to the view that the

price for peaceful stagnation

may

in fact be higher.

The

question has also been raised here about the terror used

by

the National Liberation Front, and by other revolutionary movements. I think there is a distinction between the use of terror by oppressed peoples against the oppressors and their servants, in comparison with the use of terror

by

their oppressors in the interests of further op-

pression. I think there is a qualitative distinction there

which we have the right

to

make.

Robert Silvers / Do you want

to say something,

Noam,

about this?

Noam Chomsky / Let me make just a couple of quick comments. Dr. Arendt takes rather an absolutist view, that

118 I

Dissent, Power,

don't share, about certain historical

new

and Confrontation

phenomena such

as

have emerged. I don't feel that they deserve a blanket condemnation at all. There are many things to object to in any society. But take China, modern China; one also finds many things that are really quite admirable. Many things, in fact, do meet the

the character of the

societies that

sort of Luxembourgian conditions that apparently Dr. Arendt and I agree about. There are even better examples than China. But I do think that China is an important example of a new society in which very interesting positive things happened at the local level, in which a good deal of the collectivization and communization was really based on mass participation and took place after a level of understanding had been reached in the peasantry that led to this next step.

—

Indeed, a recent article in the China Quarterly which hardly a pro-Red Chinese journal compares Chinese and Russian communization to the very great credit of the Chinese communization, precisely for these reasons, pointing out that its greater success in achieving a rela-

—

is

tively livable

and

to

some

extent just society

lated with the fact that these methods involved

was

corre-

much

less

O'Brien raised. I'm not at all convinced that the alternatives are hard and fast, either-or, violent revolution or peaceful stagnation. What one has to ask about a revolution is whether its success is based on its violence; and if we look at revolutions that have taken place I think it's not at all clear that the success has been based on the violence. In fact to a significant extent it seems to me that the successes have been based on the nonviolence. Now again a blanket statement on this is not possible, but I suggest that there are elements of truth in this characterization. I'm quite convinced, as I indicated, that, to a very considerable extent the revolution that took place in China, after the Nationalists were defeated, was successful because of its rco/iviolence, because the ground had been prepared, because people were moving to the next stage out of a sort of necessity that was widely felt. And

terror. This relates to a point Dr.

The Legitimacy

119

of Violence as a Political Act?

a nearlyclassic example of this sort of thing, where the great success of the revolution was largely due to the very long period of preparation extending over a generation, in during which the groundwork was laid for what fact turned out to be a very sudden, spontaneous, and I think the anarchist revolution in Spain, I think,

is

—

—

highly successful revolutionary action. And, in a way, one of the most striking examples of all is precisely the National Liberation Front. If you examine the careful studies that have been made of NLF success, it turns out that this success was not due to its use of violence. Therefore I think one has to be rather cautious about accepting as absolute the alternatives peaceful stagnation and violent revolution. There's also a possibility of spontaneous revolution that uses both violence and nonviolent tactics, that minimizes the use of terror except as necessary in defense. I certainly don't think that things like the mass slaughter of landlords in China contributed in any significant way to the revolutionary successes, just as I don't think that the slaughter of landlords in North Vietnam contributed in any respect to the successes of the revolution there, such as they were; and in fact the North Vietnamese agree with this judgment. As to the NLF terror, I think Dr. Arendt and I agree in conclusion but probably disagree on the reasons. For me her vision is too absolutistic. I don't accept the view that we can just condemn the NLF terror, period, because it was so horrible. I think we really have to ask questions of comparative costs, ugly as that may sound. And if we are going to take a moral position on this and I think we should we have to ask both what the consequences were of using terror and of not using terror. If it were true that the consequences of not using terror would be that the peasantry in Vietnam would continue to live in the state of the peasantry in the Philippines, then I think the use of terror would be justified. But as I said before I don't think it was the use of terror that led to the successes that were achieved. To turn to another point raised, it's quite true that

—

—

120

Dissent, Power,

American policy

is

and Confrontation

often accused, as Dr. Arendt said, of

being moralistic, that

it tries to give a fagade of legitibe legitimated. The policy of every rising imperialism has been moralistic in exactly that

macy

to acts that can't

sense.

For example, Japanese imperialism

in East

eration ago used the sort of rhetoric that

Asia a gen-

we use and

it

was just about as moralistic as we are. The Japanese argued that clearly they were just building up a sphere in which their technical know-how would be used for the benefit of the oppressed masses of Asia who were being terrorized by fascists and bolsheviks or Western imperialists.

In fact people like Tojo went so far as to argue that

truly no one could accuse the Japanese of being imperialistic

for any crass material gain, because they were pour-

more money

ing out

for the benefit of those backward

peoples than they would ever get back in return. In truth

about every argument that's part of the American was used by the Japanese. Now of course I'm opposed to such speciously rationalized moralistic policy but I'm not in the least opposed

just

repertoire

moral

to truly

son

why moral

final stage is

me

policies.

And

I

don't see the slightest rea-

considerations must be left out until

reached at which destruction

some

imminent.

is

It

which is the beneficiary of both past and present violence, moral quesseems to

that, particularly in a society

tions should be raised at the very first point. Quite apart

from whether the West reached of exploitation of the Third

its

present stage because

World

(so called), the rape

of India, and so on and so forth, quite apart from that issue,

we

should, for example, press for the proper use

of the capacities that exist in this country to alleviate the misery and backwardness of much of the rest of the world.

Toward

that

we would need

to organize

our society prop-

erly and organize our concepts and morals properly. That's

of course, and

don't see the slightest reason

a moral

act,

why we

should refuse to take that moral

I

act.

The Legitimacy

121

of Violence as a Political Act?

Robert Silvers / Perhaps we should

give the audience

a chance. Susan?

Susan Sontag* / Pve been listening to the discussion I came here expecting some sharp differences among members of the panel, but I find them all united in one way that surprises me. They treat this subject as if they were sitting in judgment on history as a sort of theater in continuous performance. The question as they see it is whether violence was unjustifiable or with great interest.

It's personally understand how in December 1967 in New York the discussion has at no point turned actively to the question of whether we, in this room, and the people we know are going to be engaged in violence. Only Mr. Chomsky in one sentence breathtakingly short said: Of course, it goes without saying that we in the peace movement in America should not use violent means. That's the issue I think we ought to be discussing here.

legitimate in this or that past situation.

hard for

me

to

—

—

Noam Chomsky /

I had intended to talk about that and even have some notes about it. I hoped that by that quote from Tolstoy I would at least imply what I felt, namely that the real issue today is the all-importance of the re-

fusal to participate in violence, the refusal to fight. I

War

but a

terribly crucial, central thing for us citizens of the

world

think that's not only crucial for the Vietnam

—

dominant power, the world's major aggressive power that the freedoms that still exist in it to try to build

we use up

resistance to participation in war.

the peace

movement,

As

to the tactics of

think there are very strong reasons in favor of nonviolence. The first reason which Professor I

—

—

Hans Morgenthau described quite eloquently is that the government happens to have a monopoly of terror. Therefore violence

is

simply suicidal. There

is

no way of com-

* Susan Sontag's books include the novels Benefactor and Death Kit, and the collections of essays Styles of Radical Will and Beyond Interpretation.

122

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

batting the terror, the violence that the government can use in response to

any use of violence

that the peace

movement

And the situation is clearly getting worse. As some of you may know, the major universities are participating quite actively now in developing new techniques might adopt.

of control of demonstrations and crowds. The Institute of Defense Analysis which is run by a consortium of ten major Eastern universities Columbia, Princeton, MIT, and so on has been working on crowd control, which means control of blacks, students, peace demonstrators. And the technology for doing this is extremely efficacious and will only improve. So that's one reason for nonviolence. The second reason for nonviolence, I think, is that clearly violence antagonizes the uncommitted. And what we want to do is not antagonize them, but attract them to, involve them in, the resistance to the War. We want to get them to take part in active resistance to this and whatever future war the United States will attempt to conduct. Toward this end, violence carried out by peace demonstrators would be a serious "counterproductive" tactical error. And, as I mentioned before, I think that these tactical considerations are not in the least to be disparaged, but are actually the only considerations that have, ultimately, any moral character to them, because they are the consid-

—

—

erations that involve the

same

is

human

costs.

And

I

think the

true even in the case of the confrontation with

authority. Sitting next to

Mr. O'Brien, who was

just beaten

up by

the police a couple of days ago, I hesitate to say that one

can appeal to the policeman by nonviolence. I, myself, have not been beaten up by the police, but I was kicked around a little bit by them a couple of weeks ago and I certainly didn't feel so optimistic about such appeals at that moment. But despite that I do think there have been

when this was possible, when in fact was defection from the ranks of authority. And we may be not too far from that now. For example, last summer, the paratroopers who were sent into Detroit consisted

historical occasions

there

The Legitimacy of

of Violence as a Political Act?

25 percent Negroes and

I

think

it

123

was extremely stupid

of the government to be willing to take the gamble that they were going to fire their guns in one direction and not in the opposite direction.

One technique

Next summer

making choice of appropriate means, and

other way.

for

it

it may work the happen would be

in this case I think has to be nonviolent tactics. Another very convincing reason for limiting oneself to nonviolent action is that in a way that's pretty hard to

the it

characterize,

immense harm

is

participates in violent action.

comes much the worse for

it.

done to the individual who Almost invariably he be-

On

the other hand, the par-

ticipant in nonviolent action very often does achieve a

kind of transforming effect. And I do believe that we need a moral revolution in certain sectors of American society which can then perhaps extend to other sectors. If these people are contaminated, and if their potential for transforming the society is destroyed, that'll be a terrible tragedy.

On

the other hand, if they can reach the kind of matuand dignity, and depth of understanding, that was in fact reached by many of the Southern Negro participants in the civil rights movement and nobody who's seen any of that or taken part in it can doubt that it was achieved if that kind of moral, human transformation, can be achieved, I think it could be an enormous benefit to the society at large, and might even save the world from destruction which may, otherwise, not be too far off. rity

—

—

—

Hannah Arendt / I'm very

glad that you brought up which of course is in the back of all our minds. Now, Professor Hans Morgenthau is correct when he says that the government has a monopoly of violence. Revolutions usually don't break out unless this monopoly of violence breaks down, and this happens when the soldiers or the police no longer obey orders to use their weapons. This very dramatic moment comes suddenly, but it is preceded by the disintegration of the government, this question,

124

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

which brings about the so-called "revolutionary situation." Disintegration of government means simply that the government loses its authority and is unable to function. Such

may exist today in many counincluding some European countries. But one thing absolutely certain: it does not exist in the United States.

a revolutionary situation tries, is

And

therefore to oppose the United States government with violent means seems to me, just from the point of view of tactics, absolutely wrong. I quite agree with all of Mr. Chomsky's arguments. Also I want to add one thing that is usually overlooked: the enormous power of nonviolence. There's no doubt that nonviolence can be defeated, as every power can be defeated, by violence. But if the republic were to use violence in order to break nonviolent power, it would somehow be breaking the very foundations on which it rests. It would be exactly in the situation in which, for instance, the English were when confronted with nonviolence by Mr. Gandhi an enormously powerful movement, which could, however, have been broken, as one of the impe-

—

did propose, by administrative massacres. would have meant the end of England, as England. And every sane English statesman knew it. So they

rialist officials

But

this

did not apply administrative massacres; not because of moral reasons, but for the sake of the English, themselves. I

believe the

Now

I

same would happen

think that the nonviolent

here.

movement has achieved

an enormous change of climate and mood is not given credit. By contrast, I read something which a student from Harvard, a representain this country

for which

it

usually

SDS, had said. I quote from memory: "The end is revolution. And whatever we do against the War in Vietnam is only a pretext to bring the government down." Now I think that is precisely where we should draw the line. For me, to be against the War in Vietnam is by no means a pretext. I am really concerned with what we are doing in Vietnam on many political levels, perhaps even on a moral level. And I'm really concerned

tive of the

—

The Legitimacy

of Violence as a Political Act?

125

with specific aims of the civil rights movement. When these things are utilized by anyone as pretexts in order to bring the republic down, that is precisely where the line should be drawn, between legitimate and illegitimate tactics.

Conor Cruise O'Brien /

seems fairly clear that it peace movement if it could bring the larger violence to an end, or help significantly toward that. If by throwing stones at the police we could bring an end to the use of napalm in Vietnam I think we should be all out throwing stones at the police. However, I do agree with Mr. Chomsky that it would have a negative effect, through its antagonizing of the noncommitted, the people who need to be reached. I think those who urge the use of violence in the peace

would be legitimate

It

to use small violence in the

movement should take a careful look

at the press cover-

age of nonviolent demonstrations which almost invariably seeks to play up use of violence by demonstrators. If the slightest touch of violence by a demonstrator can be found, this will be played up, just as police violence will be played down. One small personal point: The little episode with the police in which I was involved the other day was referred to earlier as a confrontation with authority. I should say it was the reverse of a confrontation. I was kicked from behind, [laughter]

Robert Lowell /

It

seems

to

me

self-evident not only

movements should be nonviolent, but that such sustained nonviolence under difficult, provocative, dangerous circumstances could be an important

that our various protest

spiritual discipline for all of us. I couldn't agree more with what Chomsky said. One more point and it's a very important one is that there are often things you should do whether they work or not. Maybe you don't know whether they will work and maybe they'll work for a little while and then they won't work. But I don't see how any-

—

—

126

Dissent, Power,

one can

and Confrontation

live without doing that kind of thing do any important action.

line, or

Robert Silvers /

wonder

I

if there's

—

or write a

anyone here who

a strong case to be made for some kind of violent role within the peace movement.

believes there

Man

is

Audience /

agree fully with those who say that usually only successful if you have built very strong political foundations. But it surin

the use of violence first

I

is

me that no one has raised the example of Cuba, where you have the amazingly successful use of violence as a tactic by a small group to create the political foundations. That's quite different from Vietnam, where revolutionaries built the political foundations first and only later prises

violent tactics into their overall work. Cuba, violence, I believe, did set off a chain reaction that caused political circumstances to arise which made it possible for political revolution to be carried

incorporated

Whereas

in

through.

Secondly, I'm surprised that the issue of the ghettos has only been raised tangentially. It seems to me that the violence employed by people in getting mattresses and clothes and a supply of liquor for the winter is a constructive and revealing form of violence. But violence has been posed, here, in terms of cutting someone's throat or throwing stones at a person, when in fact there are many actions involving property destruction that are neither nonviolent nor violent by any narrow definition. A third point that Mr. O'Brien touched on, but which hasn't been really stressed, is that it's not as if people haven't tried the democratic procedures. It's not as if the violence in the slums and the violence in South Vietnam arose in a vacuum. They arise in such contexts as the failure of Vietnamese mandarins to provide for the people of Vietnam, and the failure, over a long intolerable period, of the American majority to do justice with regard to the race question. Also there's the failure of various

The Legitimacy

—

such methods as electoral polito effect change community organization, nonviolent demonstrations,

methods tics,

127

of Violence as a Political Act?

appeals to the government, petitions, rallies, letter-writing campaigns. In most cases when people participate in politically directed violence,

ure.

it is

in the context of that fail-

Not simply out of the kind of psychological factors

that certain of the panelists focused on.

that position is that

somehow

logical expression of self-hatred

circumstances. That

I

The extreme of

the riots are really a psycho-

and hatred of your own

think entirely misses the point and

reduces it all to the psychology of the oppressed and the psychology of rebellion. Rather than talking from the point of view of people who are faced with a real situation of oppression and deprivation, who try a number of methods and out of their own experience rationally considered don't see the methods working, yet feel that their problem is desperate and requires an immediate resolution through some kind of action. It seems to me that until you can begin to show not in language and not in theory, but in action that you can put an end to the war in Vietnam, and an end to American racism, you can't condemn the violence of others who can't wait for you. I'm sure that the violence will subside as soon as you put an end to American imperialism and racism.

—

—

—

—

Noam Chomsky / Of

course, the

alternatives

either violence or democratic procedures.

draft resistance

is

not violence, but

of democratic procedures.

And

it

is

are not

For example,

also not the use

draft resistance,

I

believe,

has had a significant impact on the War in Vietnam, by imposing some kind of a ceiling on troop-sending. Now you talked about the fact that the blacks in the ghettos had been provoked to the use of violence by the failure of democratic procedures and the failure of nonviolent action. I'm sure that's accurate. But I don't think that deals with the question of whether they were correct in having acted upon this provocation. Maybe they were very justified because they were provoked beyond reason,

128

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

doesn't follow that that was the most politically and rational reaction. Frankly, I doubt very much that it was. Somebody may be provoked to a certain action and you can understand his being provoked to it and not make any moral condemnation of it, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you then go out and tell him, Yes, that was the right thing to do. Maybe it wasn't the right

but

it still

effective

thing to do.

For example, I think that large segments of the American people who understood very little about what was going on were provoked to war on December 7, 1941 and from the information available to them, justly so. But, as

I

said previously, I

am

not at all sure

it

was the

right

reaction, to go to war. In general one has to distinguish

from legitimacy. Legitimacy brings into account the consequences of the action for the people themselves and for all concerned. So I see it as a tactical, hence, moral question whether violent reaction is going to be more efficacious in the slums, let's say, than some forms of nonviolent reaction that have so far not been terribly effective or, perhaps, other forms that'll be invented. But the fact that certain things haven't worked so far doesn't

justification

mean

that

some particular other

gitimate politically. likely to

As

work; in

It's

got to be

tactic is necessarily le-

shown

that that's

more

been done. myself wouldn't regard

this case I don't think that's

to the question of looting, I

why it's more violent for a person to go into a store and take what's there than it is for a person who has money that was achieved by violent methods to go into the store and take what's there by handing over the money. I think one can give a good argument that looting isn't violence at all. In a sense, most of us are looters, basically, or at any rate we are benefiting from

that as violence. I don't see

others' looting.

Now

with regard to Cuba,

I

really don't see

much

his-

Debray thesis that the successful revolutionary situation was created by the use of violence. That's based on an assumption, which I think was prob-

torical evidence for the

The Legitimacy

129

of Violence as a Political Act?

ably false, that the peasants were participating actively in Cuba; actually, it appears that it was largely middle-class elements. And whatever support was the revolution in

given by the peasantry has not been shown to have been due to the success of the violence. This thesis was recently tested in Bolivia with utterly disastrous effects. So to sum up: if violence could be shown to lead to the overthrow of lasting suppression of human life that now obtains in vast

would be a justification for viohas not been shown at all, in my view.

parts of the world, that lence.

But

this

Mitchell Goodman* / tries^ other experiences I

think this

is

We

keep shifting

to other coun-

—away from our own

experience.

partly because we're afraid of our

perience and what

we

own

ex-

face now, and partly because so

much

of what is happening now in this country remains hidden or half-hidden. Part of this is due to what is lamely

known

as the generation gap. There's a lot of truth in

this notion of a gap. I

am

provoked frankly by Dr. ArNew Left. Now what the

endt's offhand reference to the hell

is

the

New

Left?

It's

a simple

way of describing, I among young peo-

think, certain stirrings in this country ple.

Thank God

there are stirrings after the torpor we've

lived in for so long.

Now

most of us have never confronted violence in our We're talking very theoretically about it. However, the tone that Dr. O'Brien used tonight must be somewhat conditioned by his recent experience with the police. Although that was a pretty mild occurrence compared to some other things that have happened and are likely to happen very soon. Our experience is so different from the experience of Cuba, India, China, Korea, and Vietnam lives.

* Mitchell Goodman was a codefendant (along with Dr. Benjamin Spock and three others) in the draft resistance "conspiracy" trial in Boston. His latest book is The Movement for a New America. t For a notably different interpretation of the Bolivian situation from Professor Chomsky's, see John Womack, Jr., "Che Guevara in Bolivia," in New York Review, 2/11/71.— Mitchell Goodman, April 1971

130

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

that we really have to assess all this in other terms. Now what makes the situation here peculiarly complicated and difficult to assess is that we have, as we all know, at least two societies a black society and a white society and they live in very different conditions, by and large. Tom Hayden has the enormous advantage of having lived in the black ghetto whereas I have very little sense of what's going on there, so I could hardly prescribe tactics for the

—

blacks.

.

.

—

.

Or take

the confrontation at the Pentagon. Talking to

college students I've discovered that that

was an experi-

ence of enormous importance to them. Over those 34 hours 80 to 90 percent of the people who endured that experience were very young, down to seventeen and sixsome kind of important teen, and fifteen and fourteen impulse was catalyzed that night and it is showing its effects, as in the recent Stop the Draft Week actions.*

—

—

Hannah Arendt /

want to say very briefly that I certainly welcome what you called the stirring among the American younger generation after the so-called Silent Generation we taught during the fifties. But I would de*

I

So many of the older generation see the movement in too narrowly po-

terms. Politics, as the young people of the movement now live it (spontaneously and inventively), has been redefined to include sex, music, theater, learning, etc. Culture and politics are seen as inseparable. The result is an understanding of the need for permanent revolt. The intention is to revolutionalize the concept of revolution. The movement (taken as a whole) has been dynamic and organic, so that every action, every coming together not only such planned demonstrations as those at the Pentagon, Chicago, Kent State, etc., but also the spontaneous black rebellions in Watts, Newark, Detroit has been energizing, has built the sense of community, and has led to further activity of various kinds, based on new insights. (Meantime, blacks and other outcast groups, including "hippies," have been subjected continually to terror and persecution much of it day-to-day and unreported, as well as at such demonstrations as those at the Pentagon and at the Oakland Induction Center, as well as during the People's Park struggle in Berkeley where I was a participant. And the trend in that direction continues.) Nor can violence as a political act be taken out of the total context of the ongoing constructive activity of the movement. They are different expressions of the same force; they are part of the process of interaction and cross-pollination by which the movement lives and grows viz., the recent fruitful interchange between Dan Berrigan and the Weathermen. Mitchell Goodman, April 1971 litical

—

—

—

—

—

The Legitimacy

131

of Violence as a Political Act?

it a little bit differently. I would say that the American youth have awakened and are political animals again. And they know how to make their opinions known by one

scribe

means or another. This is an absolutely new phenomenon, namely, that there are the means and ways to make diswith senting and revolutionary opinions widely known impact to the entire nation, and the whole world, for

—

—

that matter.

There is one other thing with which I heartily agree, namely, that this country doesn't know what real violence is. In this respect Europeans could teach Americans quite a few lessons. Up till now there has been no torture here, nor do concentration camps exist, nor terror. As for riots helping effect social change, riots have, of course, occurred throughout history, and they have never led to anything; nothing blows away so quickly, and leaves so little trace. At any rate things in this country are not yet decided by violence, even though this country has embarked and in this I agree with you on an imperialist course. If it continues on this course, then there will indeed be violence and of a different form and order than what now exists.

—

—

Man

in

Audience /

I'd just like to state

what seems a

plain fact: violence does rule the world, still. When we do not see violence manifest in our very midst, when there

is

seeming peace,

this is the result of a decision

by

the powers that be that the suspension of overt violence

more efficient. The free speech privileges which have been so hard-won in this country could be suspended and will be suspended if they prove real threats to the violence and potential violence which sustains the ruling interests in this country. In turn, the peace movement the resistance movement, I think is a better term for it may very well become violent if such methods should be deemed more effective. Groups act according to their felt interests; when a group feels that violence efficiently

will be

—

—

— —

serves

its

goals,

it

tends to use violence.

132

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Robert Paul Wolff* / Dr. Arendt, argument,

it's

that politics

in effect

is,

if I understand your an Aristotelian one. You're saying

in a sense, the exercise of certain virtues,

that virtues are habits, that ecstatic catharses such as riots

don't ever produce habits, and therefore that they are po-

And as Aristotle himself remarked, you can neither practice virtue nor teach it to someone who isn't well brought up. But what counsel do you give to a nation that isn't well brought up, that isn't fortunate enough to have that great gift of a political habit? litically futile.

Dr. Arendt / I must say I was not thinking of Aristotle, and I'm not even sure that I agree with this part of Aris-

—

teaching so let's leave Aristotle out of it. Now I agree with Mr. O'Brien about the state of India, for instance. To expect that India could become anything resembling a democracy is an absurdity, and I think that large parts of the world are in the same situation. I do believe that freedom is about the most important principle of all political life, but I do not believe that freedom can exist always and everywhere; not all countries can afford it. I do not believe that you can afford freedom so long as you are really miserable, really starving. On the other hand, take Vietnam, which was a poor country, but not abysmally poor. I believe Vietnam would have been capable of achieving something which, according to its own namely, not lights, would have come close to freedom only freedom from France but also freedom from Russia and from China. Now, of course they would also need to achieve freedom from America and this may really be more than they can manage though they may ultimately succeed with that, too. The opposite of freedom is either necessity or oppression. We are confronted with necessity whenever physical survival is at stake. Only when this survival is guaranteed totle's

—

—

Robert Paul Wolff teaches philosophy at the University of MassachuAmherst. His books include The Idea of a University and In Defense of Anarchism. *

setts at

The Legitimacy

men

of Violence as a Political Act?

133

begin to think about fighting oppression. Against physical necessity absolute misery as we know it from the Indian masses there may be remedies, but fighting will not help. So wherever you have starvation, there cannot be any freedom, and no Aristotelian education, whether we believe in it or not, and no Thomas Aquinas can help.

can

— —

Robert Silvers / Thank you very much. I'm have to call it a night. Thank you all.

afraid we'll

5 EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

The Meaning

of

Chicago

Panelists:

TOM HAYDEN MURRAY KEMPTON JEREMY LARNER

Moderator:

ROBERT LOWELL

Discussant:

Mary McCarthy

Afterword:

JEREMY LARNER

The "Hidden" Story of Chicago: Alexander Klein

This TFI discussion took place on September 17, 1968.

E

ESSE HE

Robert Lowell / Jeremy Larner tributor to Dissent.

Carthy.

He was

Murray Kempton

is a novelist and a conspeechwriter for Senator Mcis known for his essays and

He was a McCarthy delegate. Tom Hayden was a founder and ex-president of the SDS. His position and actions at Newark, Columbia, Chicago, and elsewhere are too well known to state. All four of us were in Chicago. Mr. Hayden was arrested twice in Chicago; Mr. Kempton was arrested once; Mr. Larner, like me, not at political columns.

all.

Jeremy Larner / 1 was held

twice

—but

so

what?

Robert Lowell / So we have every gradation on

the

platform. Briefly, my own reflections: In the overworld of the delegates, the opposition and peace parties were

drowned, as we knew they would be. We knew, and yet the foreknowledge has not made the defeat less bitter. Nor did we perhaps imagine how quickly these parties would melt like the snow of winter in the sun. The underworld of the demonstrators was also overwhelmed. This too was expected, though not with the degree of police violence, nor with the overwhelming approval of the police by our country that watched the brutality on television. This is a gloomy moment. There is no chance of stopping one of the three grim and limp registered candidates from being elected. Never in the history of our country has the Right, with a capital R, been so advantageously poised

137

138

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

down the opposition. There may be hope. Never have there been such spritely political arguments, nor such an increase in political consciousness. It might seem that the speakers here are all on one side. We don't spread over much ground. No shrewd and dear old crony of Mayor Daley is here to flatten us. In fact, w e have no representative of the forces and criminals who rule the country or are about to. Still, we will do the best we can. We agree enough to talk, and probably too little to understand. I to pin

T

think

Tom Hayden begins.

Tom Hayden /

There have been, I think, two general misunderstandings of Chicago, one on the part of the open

and the other on the part of The New York Times "liberal" type reactionaries. And in both cases their opinions are framed in terms of the terminology and the imagery of the war in Vietnam. So I would like to examine what they say and then, using the same Vietnam imagery, discuss Chicago in another way. reactionaries,

From

the

more

violent repressive forces,

we hear

the

argument that an innocent group of people and the innocent citizenry of Chicago were led into a trap that was carefully set by a group of terrorists with connections to Havana and Hanoi. The reply we have to make to this is probably unimportant to argue in a group like this, but for the record,

ing

it is

important that

whom, and who

is

we point whom.

out

who

is terroriz-

disrupting

First of all, the question of permits: A considerable period in advance of the convention, the Mobilization asked for permits and the yippies asked for permits for sleeping, for rallying, and for marching and had to take

—

—

the City of Chicago to court before the city attorney finally proposed several inadequate routes approximately two days before the convention was about to begin. Inadequate because they did not allow any demonstrators near the amphitheater although they said it was the greatest fortress ever constructed and it was impenetrable; inadequate because they had no provision for people to sleep in the

—

The Meaning

139

of Chicago

park where people needed to sleep. But beyond that, because lately the city of Chicago has defended itself by saying that our requests were deemed unreasonable by the courts, it has to be pointed out that Judge Lynch, who turned down the request, is a former law partner of Mayor Daley.

The second specific charge from was a build-up of terror

that there

the right against us

cessitated the use of repression. Their "evidence"?

ently that Paul Krassner, while stoned in earlier, said that

cago.

Daley

Compare

—

LSD would

is

into a climate that ne-

Appar-

New York weeks

be put in the water in Chi-

that to the material threats

made by Mayor

the earlier shoot-to-kill order, the threat that a

would be recruited from Cicero, that the underground tunnels of Chicago would be used as prison camps for demonstrators. And the material preparations that were made long in advance of the convention and which were known to the public the calling of Federal and state troops; the total mobilization of the Chicago police force; the experimentation done on a casual basis with Mace during the April 27 peace march (which was a warm-up by the police for August), where the antiwar demonstrators were refused a permit until the last moment and then assaulted in the Loop and Mace'd. All of these actions and threats were aimed not simply at local Chicago, but at people around the country who might be considering coming to Chicago. So on the question of build-up, I think it's clear who was doing the building up and what the build-up was all about. Next, on the question of fighting in the streets, the "evidence" of the police was that we used bags of urine and McCarthy delegate cards, and two poles with sharp points and razor blades attached, and plastic balls with nails in them. I would be glad for that evidence to be laid on the table next to the evidence of the weapons of violence that the other side employed: weapons of massive violence up to and including automatic weapons, weapons which were being used for the same "laboratory" purposes that vigilante posse

:

140 weapons are used

Dissent, Power, in

Vietnam

—

and Confrontation

just as certain kinds of

helicopters, certain kinds of photographic equipment, cer-

and wiring systems have been used in experiments aimed at Columbia students, Berkeley students, as part of an overall domestic counterinsurgency program. There's no doubt as to who initiated the fighting in the streets. To call a man a "pig" is not a provocation of the same scale as the use and display of automatic weapons, the use of military formations to sweep people out of parks after denying them constitutional permits, and so on. As to the question of the injured, those "massive contusions" that we were supposed to have imposed on the police of Chicago: an examination of the 194 reported injuries to policemen indicates that three according to the police's own reports just three were hit by an "unknown chemical substance" in the face. That was all, after the charge that caustics, easy-offs, and other lye formulas were "widely used" and, to quote the Mayor's report, "many Chicago policemen were injured and made casualtain kinds of sound

—

—

The other thing to note in the statistics 194 injured policemen and this is concluded by Mr. Tom Buckley in an otherwise bad New York Times article of this Sunday is that most of the injuries are to the hands and wrists of policemen, injuries undoubtedly self-inflicted as they bashed people in the mouth, and smashed people over the head. These are finger injuries of ties in this action."

—

of the

—

the kind that prize-fighters pick up.

On

our side several hundred people were wounded and by our mobile medical units, which accounts for the fact that Daley can say not so many were handled in hospitals. And one was killed. That should be remembered. A boy was killed on the eve of the convention, for being out after curfew and for having allegedly pulled a gun on a policeman and shot at him from three feet away, missed him, turned around and ran, and got shot in the back. He was an American Indian, which is only fitting and symbolic, for what this country has represented to the Indian since the white man founded it on Indian soil. treated

The Meaning The other I will call

sumes

141

of Chicago s i

interpretation of the events in Chicago,

which

the liberal-counterinsurgency interpretation, as-

that the conflict

was "mismanaged" by the

local

That Mayor Daley is some kind of freak, a kind of Bull Connor of the North who is outside of the velvet-management mainstream of American society. That the granting of permits and a little more relaxed attitude could have changed the situation, and that as [Tom] Buckley writes in The New York Times, the innocent people were caught between the militant agitators and the police. Just as in Vietnam, "needless brutality" is inflicted and "inefficient management" is the rule of the day, so in Chicago the authorities supposedly got uptight and irrational. I would say that this is not an attitude which simply emerged around Chicago but you'll find it in the editorial columns of The New York Times throughout this year and authorities.

last year.

Item one: When Ramparts Magazine disclosed that the National Student Association was a CIA front for fifteen

Times was that this was most uncame at a moment when the influence of the New Left over the young minds on the campuses was beginning to "crumble." Item two: When Senator Mcyears, the reaction of the

fortunate because

it

Carthy announced for the presidency, the Times pointed out that he had no chance to win, but said that his campaign was a very good thing because it would create an alternative for students

who would

fall into the clutches of the

New

otherwise flounder and

Left and other "irregular

movements." Item three: The treatment of the convention on the part of the Times; and this reflects a general attitude which is now pervasive in liberal circles from Columbia across the country that the problem on the left

political

that there is a sophisticated hard-core that has to be separated out from the innocent and idealistic followers. That the movement as a whole had desirable social goals, but is infested with scum who are attempting to annihilate the institutions of American society rather man transform them peacefully and constructively. This position basically misunderstands the militance is

142 that

Dissent, Power, is

latent in all

youth in

and Confrontation

this society.

Secondly,

it

as-

sumes a flexibility and a responsiveness about the system which we are finding out is not there. I believe that there would have been more disruption and paralysis if the convention had been held under liberal John Lindsay in New

York

—

because the social structure of this city is incapable of dealing with the problem of putting the Democratic party and its war criminals into a convention arena here in Manhattan, no matter who was mayor, under whatever administration.

The real parallel with Vietnam comes down to understanding the opposite of what Hubert Humphrey is saying. Hubert Humphrey has been saying that the "Great Society" would be transported to Southeast Asia when, in fact, that view of the world and the policies behind it are guaranteed to bring at least a taste of Vietnam back to the United States. And we have been seeing just that: the rigging of the Chicago convention, the rigging of a two-party system, the establishment of news management backed up by repression at home as well as in Vietnam, and the use of bayonets and gas to "protect" the convention from American citizens. Underlying this is a tendency in the system itself, by whatever name you call it, to become less and less viable, less and less able to create the political, social, and economic answers to political, social, and economic problems at home and abroad and, not being able to erase the problems, turning increasingly to force and the threat of force. ;

We

are running into this situation increasingly. And it's having significant impact on the United States, significant costs are being paid by the government of the United States because of this tendency. One is that the United States is increasingly seen as an outlaw nation, and Chicago imposed a certain degree of international humiliation on the United States which makes its international empire

more

difficult to

manage.

This kind of policy increasingly splits off conscientious people, especially young people and liberal people, from

The Meaning

of Chicago

143

acceptance of the system, and sharpens divisions not only within the Democratic party, but within the establishment itself between the rulers and the people in the press who are supposed to report upon them. This kind of policy or tendency brings to the surface certain actualities of Amerilife and takes the myths away from the system, as we dreamed about it as we grew up. This is especially true for

can

youth who are beginning to realize that the so-called generation gap is more fundamentally a strange and complicated new kind of class conflict between an older generation which wants young people to inherit a certain kind of industrial, financial, military, and political system (which it's necessary to make us inherit or otherwise it will fall apart for lack of technicians and managers) and a growing resistance to that inheritance on the part of people who, having been born with affluence, with money, cannot accept the commercial, competitive, and militaristic values that are required of us to accept as part of the inheritance. So is brought into the home. It's not an accident that while his son was being beaten on the street, the Chairman of the Board of Continental Edison of Illinois was advising Mayor Daley about what to do in the convention. It's not an accident that their sons and daughters are gravitating not David Eisenhower, but most of their sons and daughters are gravitating our way. Now in terms of the development of the movement, Chicago first of all revitalized the antiwar movement as an entire body of energy and feeling, after several months of illusion and confusion stemming from Johnson's trick bombing limitation. I would expect now that escalation will be met with a greater level of resistance. Secondly, the imposition of police state conditions on the students and youth in particular instead of just scaring them away created the mentality and consciousness of warriors and street fighters in people who previously had thought of themselves as working within the system or accepting nonviolence. And they understand very well a slogan which in some quarters was considered to have no political content.

the class struggle at last

—

—

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Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

The slogan "The streets belong to the people" became political when people were pushed out of the Democratic party, pushed out of the Hilton Hotel, pushed out of Lincoln Park, and pushed out of their movement centers into the streets.

The other

result of that

—

besides people realizing that

when you have been kicked out of the institutional structure of the United the streets are the only area left States tion

New

—

the other result of that

now

is a certain cross-fertilizataking place between people who have been apart.

Left, antiwar,

McCarthy people,

—

yippies, hippies

what Mayor Daley called "Hippies" they all figured that if the police made no distinctions perhaps we should begin to modify the distinctions ourselves and look upon ourselves as at least being in a

common

situation, if not in a

common movement. I

also think the relationship to black militant groups in

the country on the part of white radical groups

what enhanced. This

is

a speculation, but

I

was some-

think

we took

care of the charge to some extent that white students are simply in it for kicks and will return anytime they wish to

At the same time we did our best for the black by opening up another front of struggle, so that it will become necessary for the Man if he desires to persecute and make aggression in black communities to also face fire and opposition on other sides and on other fronts, which may tax his resources. Finally, I would say to the McCarthy movement at this stage: the system has been tried and found wanting, the aggression is escalating, you can become junior politicians and look toward 1972, or cynics and return to the 1950s, or you can refuse to be good Germans and take up the right to resist and discover what resistance means in the the suburbs.

liberation struggle

course of attempting it. I believe that resistance is the only alternative; the only question is how to define it and that should be the main subject on the agenda tonight. We're in a situation which, number one, is desperate, absolutely desperate, twenty- four hours a day people being

The Meaning

of Chicago

killed while

we

sit

145

here. Secondly, we're in a situation

where "the decent respect of mankind" has been flaunted, when public opinion on a considerable scale is in the process of being repressed, and when the available channels have been tested and found not to work, at least not in time to save us from the situation that we define as desperate. So really the only question now is how to create more Chicagos in our cities and more Columbias on our campuses and how not to be good Germans, how to discover a correct method of resistance against the Hitlerite policy and administration that presently passes for a democratic administration of the

United States.

Murray Kempton / There were that I

would

a lot of things

Tom

said

like to consider seriously, but at this point I

want to offer one or two reflections of my own. I think Americans have a terrible tendency to use a kind of Faulknerian language to talk about what are Booth Tarkington experiences. I want to talk a little bit about the experience

my arrest at Chicago, because to peculiar point about my class.

of

me

it

made

quite a

When we were

waiting in the detention room, and with to find that most of the people with whom I'd been arrested except the yippies who were unexpectedly charming as they often are when they're great comfort,

I

was surprised

—

—

camera were McCarthy delegates and Kennedy staff I had not intended to get arrested, but I believe that they had. Now, one of the people I was arrested with was a man I was introduced to by Richard Nixon's advance man. Another was the personnel director of the Perth Amboy Hospital. Another was the president of one of our state universities. And there was one man standing in the detention room in whom I immediately recognized a class difference from myself. He had one of those extraordinary chalk-stripe suits the kind that Anthony Eden kept trying to wear and couldn't carry off. He was standing there looking sort of lost and I went up to him and I said, What in the name of heaven got you into this mess? off

people.

—

146

Dissent, Power,

And he

and Confrontation

I was the chairman of Kentucky [laughter] I think these people, particularly those who were McCarthy delegates, really did not want to go out on the floor and play jokes on poor Mr. Humphrey on television on the last night. But they did want to do something. I think, if I could use that dreadful expression, they wanted to make some statement, and they wanted to be about as untheatri-

said, Well,

the Rockefeller

cal about

it

it's

a long story,

Committee

in

as they could. This proves to

.

.

.

me

and when there's nothing else left gesture. But I'm afraid Tom's problem is does

feel,

—

that our class it

will

—and

make

a

I'm not

sure this is generational that our class has a way of choosing a gesture that carries with it some chance of privacy. And even going to jail under some circumstances can be a chance for privacy. Now, I think what's happened to us is that we have been refreshed, revived in many ways in this country by the radicalism of theater. And I think theater is perfectly understandable as a form of action. There is no way in the world, I'm afraid, left in this country to make any impact except by getting on the television camera. This has led Stokely Carmichael to rather mechanical formulations fit for two minutes of television. It leads us all that way, and to a certain extent all our politics now is in terms of playing at dramas of one kind or another. Today, deeply serious people do this. But I'm beginning to wonder really whether or not a watched revolution will ever boil. I sometimes think to myself, suppose Lenin had gotten off at the Finland station and Gabe Pressman said to him, Mr. Lenin, there's some talk that you're not going to support the Constituent Assembly, [laughter] Somehow all thought would

have been dissipated. It's rather remarkable that Tom has managed to go through life with those people putting those things in his face. And to a certain extent it seems to me that this framed theater of television is really the most antiexistenbecause this feeling that the hour tialist of all mediums is yours and there will be no other (which is what I think

—

The Meaning

147

of Chicago

is extremely difficult to compass if it conducted in this vast company of people just sitting and looking at the picture. And I don't see how it's possible really for this to be the only form of revolutionary action in the United States, exciting as it is and profitable to Mr. Sarnoff as it certainly seems to be. I would like to wonder a little about the possibilities of subversion. I will grant you that they don't seem very large, but the gesture of going to jail, if only once and under highly comfortable circumstances, by men who in most cases have been able quite well to make it in society as it is, does seem to be a pretty final judgment on their part on the society. Now we may have more to subvert than we ever had but I would suggest that we may have better people as a result of this experience, in every generation, who are ready to subvert. Now this is not a quarrel, really, between me and Tom Hayden. You know, Tom, we have to be very careful. Because once we go "on stage," so to speak, the attitudes are

of as existentialist) is

struck and then there's this feeling that there are different repertory companies standing on the same stage, each delivering their

Tom,

own

plays.

The

I

want

to

avoid that.

And

really,

New York

Times aren't the attitudes of an awful lot of people who have some feeling about reality. I think you and the Times and I, too, all have the same problem, in a strange sort of way. Some revolutionaries somewhere change the world, but unfortunately nobody seems to be able to describe it very well. the attitudes of

Jeremy Larner / In six months, I got to

traveling around the country the last

know many young people who were

involved in the McCarthy movement. And in Chicago I spent a lot of time in the parks and on the streets and in hotels,

and

I

knew whom

was amazed to come across quite a few kids I had thought were not very interested in poli-

I

tics.

Particularly I remember one of them who was lying stoned in Grant Park on his back about ten feet away from where there was a line of cops in white helmets who looked

148

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

When he saw me, he raised his hand and said: "Hey, Jeremy, I've been talking to delegates." And the funny thing was that he really had been; apparently there were quite a number of delegates in the park from time to time. And he enjoyed talking to delegates, he was very interested in delegates. In fact, this was true I would say of about three-quarters of the kids I talked to in the park. The most popular chants were "Dump the Hump" and "We Want Gene." The most popular song was "We Shall Overcome." And when somebody up on the twenty-third floor of the hotel wanted to drop a heavy lamp out the window on the heads of the cops, a girl grabbed him and said, "Don't do that, then we'd be as bad as they are." And looking around the room, I could see that among the young McCarthy workers and among demonstrators who'd come in from the street via the hospital ward in the hotel there was very strong agreement with that girl. I would say that there was a large difference between the kids in Chicago and the thirty-year-old ideologues who appeared in front of the microphones and TV cameras. I think many of the kids were very interested in this electoral politics game that was played in the United States. They felt there was something important happening, even though they knew the convention was partly rigged. By the way, it partly wasn't rigged, which is something to think about. From what I saw, I would say there's a tremendous emphasis on nonviolence on the part of the kids. Many of them were lying there rather innocently in front of the cops. I saw no weapons, and the only violence I observed was verbal violence some of it very angry and I would gauge pretty provocative to a cop, considering the class differences between the cops and the demonstrators. Of course that was no excuse for the stomach-turning brupretty scary. But he wasn't very scared.

—

tality that followed.

The McCarthy student coordinators estimated that there five thousand young people in Chicago altogether, including at least two thousand McCarthy kids.

were only

The Meaning Since

Mobe

149

of Chicago

leaders and yippies had been calling for 100,-

to come to Chicago, I wonder why so few showed up. I believe they stayed away because what happened in Chicago was no surprise to them. They knew the ugliness, the desperation, the violence that had been aroused in this country in the last few years and they knew what such a confrontation might produce. They were afraid in advance of the Chicago cops. They believed

000 people

Mayor Daley, they took him

at his word. They felt they could be more effective in other places, doing other things. And many of them had done other things and worked very hard during the year. I think there were some very important gains. For example, the kids who went out and rang every doorbell in the state of

Wisconsin apparently had some

voters in that state to repudiate the

effect in getting

War. They were part of

a crew of amateurs who dumped the President of the United States with only a few months of political work. Of course we couldn't go on to elect our own President partly due to the bad luck of one candidate assassinated and the other turning out less committed to our cause than we had thought* partly due to the snobbery and elitism that continue to plague the American left. But it would only be more snobbery and elitism to conclude after all that's happened simply that politics can't work. I think if anything we proved the opposite: it will work if we work if we go on working though we undoubtedly will not get all we want. Maybe we'll just get what we deserve. Consider what we accomplished with the little bit of work we did. The military establishment has lost its sacrosanct position in American society, and for the first time Congressmen can chop away at the Pentagon budget, and Senators can try to restrict the warmaking powers of the President. And even though we ended up with Nixon vs.

—

—

Humphrey, we made

it

clear that the winner of that contest

will not be reelected if he continues to prosecute the *

War

For a discussion of this and other problems of the McCarthy cammy book Nobody Knows (Macmillan, 1970). J.L.

paign, see

—

150

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

1967, just one year ago, the radicals and myself included, assumed in our wisdom that the American people were supporting that war. In 1968, we showed that wasn't true, and we helped in Indochina. In

intellectuals of this country,

to

make

it

untrue.

I'm not saying the present situation is in any way satisfactory, but before we speak of sabotage and civil war that would tear this country apart and give the law-and-order reactionaries a respectability they don't deserve, we ought to at least consider what we might do with more than six months of sustained pressure politics. About the students and professional people active for the first time in 1968: As an organized force they were unique in American politics. They got a taste of power

maybe before

their time.

And many

of

them came

to feel

they wanted to inherit more power, not as managers, Tom, but as people who are going to bring about a qualitatively different kind of society. Now these people are wholeheartedly opposed to the kind of politics that led us into Vietnam, to the kind of foreign policy, to the kind of injustice and inequity and racism, to the kind of electoral rigging

and fraud that's gone on in America for hundreds of years. But they know they are not going to change things through confrontations and theater. They believe our only chance is hard and persistent work, win or lose. One of the other things we've seen emerging is the recognition of what it means to be powerless in this country, not only what it does to individuals but how it undermines our whole society. Now the lack of power is felt not only by black people but by white workers and by the middle classes. The workers find themselves isolated in the cities, sending their children off to die in Vietnam, and unable to move up that American success ladder. The middle-class people find that the money they have saved and the positions they have gained cannot secure them satisfactory lives. They find the cities unlivable and the suburbs hit by urban blight, they find they don't understand their children and can't pass on very much that is useful, they find they

The Meaning

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of Chicago

haven't been able to stop a

war

that in so

many ways makes

our country a worse and worse place to live in. So far nobody, no political candidate or group, has seized upon the political potential that exists in this widespread feeling of powerlessness. Senator McCarthy had the students as nobody has had them, certainly as the left has never had them. Senator McCarthy, I think, no one will deny, had the middle classes of this nation, even many of the Republicans. One of the great failings of the McCarthy campaign was that nothing, in effect, was done to broaden that base, to include the black people and most of all to which were two groups include the white working classes that Robert Kennedy in particular appealed to. Partly by

—

and vision and foresight, partly by accident, and by demagoguery, Bobby Kennedy was attempting to lead the white and the black lower classes together and to join them, he hoped, with the forces that McCarthy already intention,

partly

had.

Now we

have not paid enough attention to some of whom were Chicago policemen. They're the people whom the streets have always belonged to in this country, by the way, and they're part of "the decent opinion of mankind." There's been a tendency on the left to be far too condescending, to write them off, when we badly need them and when, in fact, their on the

left

those white lower classes,

interests in

many

the middle classes

As

to

cases are identical with the interests of

and of the blacks.

whether or not people on the

within the system,

I

think

it's

left

are going to

a false question.

work

Many

dif-

and they're not necessarily mutually exclusive. As long as the War in Vietnam is going on, there's going to be draft resistance and other forms of protest, and there should be. But I think there's also going to be politics, an attempt to build on the base that was begun in 1968, which is far bigger than any of us expected. We have a responsibility to that base, we have a responsibility to the millions of Americans who agree with us that the War in Vietnam is immoral and must be ferent courses can be pursued

152

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

movement doesn't belong to them, too, we simply cannot win. Now I agree with Tom that the situation is desperate, but before you advocate violent revolutionary activity, you have to consider the consequences. I believe the consequences would probably be more repression, so quite aside from other questions about violent revolutions I'm against it because I don't want more repression in this country. The absolute hunger with which many people look forward to the repression of other segments of the population is appalling and frightening. I believe America could become a fascist state, a totalitarian state. Bad as our foreign policy is, with its senseless killing and shameless lying, I think it could be still worse. Bad as the racial situation is, it could be much worse, and if it becomes worse it will end up with a lot of black people getting killed and blacks as a whole in a worse situation than ever. And violent revolutionary activity would very likely rush things in stopped. If our

——

this direction.

So I would think more in terms of fruitful, constructive, nonviolent forms of protest which would not turn off potential converts and allies combined with broadened,

— —

and sustained pressure tactics and electoral pofreed of elitism and snobbery, and pressed with persistent, intelligent effort and dedication. intensified,

litical activity,

seems to me the most important ismight almost be called the only issue between us and Tom Hayden (though the three of us are not the same) would be the question of violence, of force, of provocation, the question of what means we should use on our side. I want to read three statements, one by I. F. Stone, one by Murray Kempton, and one by Tom Hayden, then get some comments from the speakers. Some of these

Robert Lowell /

sue, so important

It

it

are pre-Chicago, but post-Columbia. First, I. F. Stone: "The New Left and even its moderate allies are still operating in a fog of misconceptions. The main one is that the people are against the War. The peo-

The Meaning

153

of Chicago

on the contrary, are confused and divided. To say that Tom Hayden has done, is to overlook those people who feel that the streets belong to them, too, for the ordinary business of their lives. 'Let that party,' [Marcus] Raskin said of the Democrats the pie,

the streets belong to the people, as

other day in calling for a

new

party, 'be the party of the

and the nonpeoStone says: "There are an awful lot of nonpeople. The need is for dialogue, not monologue, to win them over. If law and order really break down as democratic processes are abandoned, it is we of the left, the antiwar forces and intellectuals, who will be the first to suffer. To play with revolutionary talk and tactics as the New Left is doing when there is no revolutionary situation is to act as the provocateurs for an American fascism." Next, Murray Kempton on the Black Panthers in a column last June: "The day's great event is the visit to the brothers in prison. Occasionally some white youth or other will come by to talk enthusiastically about Fidel's achievements or severely about Che's mistakes. The Panthers are polite, not plainly distracted by private sorrows. One of them sits down, opens his copy of Mao Tse-tung, leans his head back, and sleeps. And Bobby Seale, the last of the three who began, cannot sleep, being simply exhausted. What is curious is how drained he is of rhetoric, although he occasionally rests himself in conversation by giving a speech. The surviving chairman of the revolutionary vanguard which is the Black Panthers is a spent young man whose best friend is being tried for murder and whose next best friend is dead." Then Kempton says, "I guess I just don't like the Students for a Democratic Society, an undergraduate manifestation. There is something quite disgusting about white kids moved by the high romance of Negro kids getting themselves killed." Finally, Tom Hayden in Ramparts some time before Chicago: "Columbia opened a new tactical stage in the cops, the military, the big city bosses, ple.'

"

And

resistance movement which began last fall. From the overnight occupation of buildings to permanent occupation;

154

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

from the mill-ins to the creation of revolutionary commitfrom symbolic civil disobedience to barricaded resistance. Not only are these tactics already being duplicated on other campuses, but they are sure to be surpassed by even more militant tactics. In the future it is conceivable tees;

that students will threaten destruction of buildings as a last

deterrent to police attacks.

Many

of the tactics learned can

also be applied in smaller hit-and-run operations between

on the offices of professors doing weapons research could win substantial support among students while making the university more blatantly repressive." Now, I strikes: raids

want to invite comment on these from the speaker and I would suggest we let Mr. Hayden be last and have the full sweep. If you'd start, Jeremy, and then Murray, and then Tom Hayden.

Jeremy Larner / If

you

All those statements beg the question: your revolutionary

call for a revolution, where's

How

going to work and for whose benefit? Anyanswer that? [laughter] It seems to me if you're going to laugh, if I hear smug laughter, the basis for that smugness is that the man who's laughing has the answer. And he should tell me what it is because I don't have it.

plan?

body want

is it

to

Murray Kempton / Tom, why

is

the worse better?

Why

did you have a special feeling against Senator McCarthy? It stands to reason that from the point of view of the people of Vietnam, Senator McCarthy obviously represented a far better alternative. In terms of this whole brutal blathering benevolence of the United States abroad, he was it. His career was aimed at its rereally if these kids who ran out wonder And I and rang doorbells for him were suckers, as I think you imply. Presumably to you McCarthy's election would just have made the United States more hypocritical. Actually, it's quite possible it would have made it a better country

totally skeptical about

pudiation.

to live in.

The Meaning

155

of Chicago c l

Tom Hayden / The

paternalism of the McCarthy movement was shown in its slogans: "Your kids have come home," "the McCarthy kids." Bullshit, they're not kids. And I don't share with some radicals and radical organizations the feeling that what you do with "McCarthy kids" is radicalize them, as if they ripen to a certain point and fall off a tree into an SDS basket. When I think of McCarthy workers, I essentially think of myself in 1960, hoping with a certain detachment, committed with a certain critical stance to John F. Kennedy and the Peace Corps. And looking upon the radicals as people who weren't doing anything and didn't offer me any alternative and spoke in 1930s language. If I were going to be radicalized, I thought, it would never be by those old left organizations because they didn't seem to be where things were at. along I was radicalized I don't even like the term with my particular small generation of people by a particular set of experiences we went through. And to some extent the same process will go on with workers for Senator McCarthy. Some will believe, as Jeremy here does, that they should continue to pay close attention to the electoral system. Others will lapse into disgust and apathy because they don't believe anything can be done outside of the system they worked in and now they don't believe anything can be done inside. But the vast majority will think very hard about their experience, learn from it, create new movements, new forms of protest and resistance and direct action, maybe some independent politics. But they don't go to Chicago, get hit over the head, and picked up by a beautiful young lady who says join SDS. They go through a series of red-hot experiences starting with New Hampshire and ending in Chicago, or maybe a little later, and they come staggering out of that with some fresh evidence about what the system is all about and where we should be at. And they contribute to dialogue with other people in the country about where young people and students and other people in the movement should go.

—

That's point one.

—

156

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Point two: The North Vietnamese made their position on Senator McCarthy very clear. And that position was that fundamentally it did not matter who was President of the United States, though it was important to take an active interest in knowing and influencing the splits between the different competing politicians. Fundamentally it did not matter if McCarthy was President because, in the absence of a strong, broad, and radical left, even a McCarthy would be forced into bombing Vietnam or into future Vietnams, because of the institutional drift of the United States. And even a Nixon could be forced out of Vietnam regardless of his personal politics. It would fundamentally depend on a balance of forces starting in Vietnam with the hopeless situation the United States faces there and ending in America with the frustrated level of public opinion, which would put Nixon in a pot which he could only get out of by getting out of Vietnam. Third, the question of violence, which is supposed to distinguish me from the other panelists: I would say that the distinction is a political distinction and not a matter of style, a distinction between politics which continues to pursue an American dream that never was and politics that attempts to create some kind of dream and realize it for the first time in this country. Violence is a minor feature, a minor question in some ways in that equation. By comparison: The labor movement in Chicago just before the convention took guns and shot down the wires leading to the Nike Missile System, thereby exposing Mayor Daley and the good citizens of Chicago to Russian rockets for a few hours with no air defense system. This made about a sixinch story in the Chicago papers. No one was accused of anarchism, no one was accused of terror, no one was accused of revolution. Now they didn't find any guns on us

and we certainly didn't shoot down any Nike lines. At most we were charged with throwing nails under cars and that sort of thing. And yet we are accused of being anarchists, terrorists,

and so forth. is no substitute for revolutionary

Violence

politics. Vio-

The Meaning lence its

is

not politics.

violence

is

157

of Chicago

When

the labor

movement

not fundamentally disruptive,

its

is violent,

violence

is

fundamentally integrative, part and parcel of what Rap Brown calls the violence which is as American as apple pie. It is because of our politics, not for our rhetoric, not for a rock thrown, not for a building burned down, that we are being condemned in this country. Because our politics are fundamentally impossible to integrate into American political and economic institutions. Under the heading of what is called "violence" also could be the important question of whether you agree with [Supreme Court Justice] Abe Fortas's conception that proper civil disobeyers should be good people who only break laws they consider to be unjust and then go to jail, while people who break other laws like "trespass laws" in order to protest crimes in Vietnam are bad people, because they're disrupting the fabric of

we have

American

society. Clearly

an anti-Fortas position, and take it very strongly and propagandize for it, because we're facing a situation in which all the given rules of the structure are to take

stacked against us.

Bakunin

that

It isn't

out of

we go through

some kind of reading of

the doors of the Mathematics

Building at Columbia; it's because at that point people have no other way of satisfying their needs. And I don't mean that in some vulgar sense. I mean that in a very strict social and psychological and political sense. And to lock up students who are breaking unconstitutionally vague laws, like criminal trespass laws, when they have no other way to confront their own institutions is a problem that we have to face and examine very deeply. Finally there's this question: At the point of repression, at the end of a police club or something similar, do you fight back or not? My personal position is that people should fight back, because I think there is more protection in fighting back.

The

America

accused of being "homosexuals, who are constitutionally unable to fight in Vietnam or anywhere. We have to adopt on our left in

is

professors, Jews, sissies,"

158

Dissent, Power,

insides a certain kind of toughness

we

and Confrontation

and resilience so that

are not seen in those terms and not walked on in the

that we have been walked on. I'm not saying that toughness of spirit can be a substitute for politics and ideology but it's a necessary ingredient which the young people now are building. It's a kind

manner

of fearlessness in the face of violence that

is

a prerequisite

being able to confront the society, because if you're afraid of violence, then you have no way to change this country. Obviously you can't change it from within when they use the stick to keep you from doing it. Now, fearlessness does not mean adventurism or fighting on every occasion to prove your manhood; it means overcoming

to

your

fear.

me

Let

give

you one concrete example,

calling the policemen "pigs."

I

the matter of

don't usually call police-

men

pigs because I have worked out other ways not to be afraid of them. But you can understand very well the psychological need, and ultimately the political need, to over-

come

when he sees a brute armor coming toward him. If you are afraid of that man, you have lost the battle at that moment. It is traditional submissiveness to the authority of armed force that people are trying to overcome when they call this man the fear that paralyzes a person

object in

-pig."

sometime, try calling a policeman "pig," and word will catch in your throat because you know the consequences of letting it come out and then letting the policeman take a good look at your face and

Try

it

you'll find that the

raise his club to reply.

And

very crucial for people to be able to overcome and face down that policeman; and when they are able to do that, then the use of the term "pig" may have a political effect, because at that point the police will begin to crack up. Their families will say, "Get the hell out of the ghettos and the campus, go work for the sheriff's department or the county" just as soldiers' families say now (or at least feel like saying), "Get the hell out of it's

their fear

—

The Meaning

159

of Chicago

why

are you over there doing the politicians' work?" The only way to create these contradictions between the armed forces and their families, between the

Vietnam,

armed

forces and politicians, between politicians about the

use of armed force, is to prove to them that neither the threat of force nor the use of force is going to stop the de-

velopment and growth of the resistance movement in this country. So the question is not whether to use the word "pig" but whether you fight back in such a way that these people begin to behave in the desired manner because they have no other choice.

Man

in

Audience / Tom Hayden,

I

agree that

it is

neces-

sary to resist and that to resist it's necessary to overcome our fear of illegitimate authority. But if it is possible to

overcome this fear as you suggested, without calling the opposition pigs, wouldn't that also be politically more effective, in terms of gaining those allies we need, and not frightening them off? Since the majority of the people in

showed after Chicago, are even more scared of us than they are of the police?

this country, as the polls

Tom Hayden /

I

think an absolute pacifist's position rethe easy slide from concondemning the use of the phrase

sults in a blurring of issues

demning violence

to

"pigs"

—even though

as

were "violent"

if it

it

.

.

.

may violate humanist

to call

someone a

philosophy

pig. It's a standard

confusion to mix these things up. But we have to examine them according to some categories: the question of socalled violence against property, as distinct from violence against persons; the question of defensive violence as disfrom offensive violence; and so on.

tinct

In any event, I would say that there have been very few people in the New Left, or whatever you want to call it, who believe that violence is the primary instrument of change. Everyone would probably acknowledge that our basic strategy has to do with organizing people into organizations in which people censor their own authority; and

160

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

the sense of illegitimacy of the authority above

them

be-

gins to grow.

Also, the

new

direction tends to be not to try to radi-

w ork with liberals on tactical and concrete questions while basically organizing youth which brings up the questions of calize liberals, whatever that slogan meant, but to

T

—

the polls.

who

is

Who

is

polled?

And who

invisible to the poll-takers?

fetish or a

new

momentum

is

Now

growing up? And I'm not making a

proletariat out of youth, but

I

think that the

of youth, especially students, in this country

should not be overlooked and we should realize that when talk about polls, when we talk about elections, we are talking about the people who are least likely to change but most likely to die in the near future of old age. Another thing to point out finally is that the experience of most people starting from 1960 on has been a shocking experience over and over again at the degree of violence that our organizations are met with whether we were in the South, whether we were in Northern ghettos, whether we were on campuses, or whether we were peace marchers from Berkeley into Oakland. There's a good deal of evidence to suggest that the question of fighting back is becoming crucial for whites as well as blacks. The degree to which violence comes down on us is amazing, given the apparent flexibility with which this society might be able to control or deal with us. And I think that it's that original violence of the authorities that will cause people more and more to fight back in various ways.

we

—

Woman in Audience / Tom Hayden, effect of

Chicago was

relative to the left? If

do you think

that the

to increase the strength of the right it

did,

how

is this

going to lead to

the achievement of social justice and peace?

Tom Hayden /

I

was quite certain about the strength of

And I don't think that it fundamentally increased their strength or accelerated their growth any more than ours. The fact that we're now in an the right before Chicago.

The Meaning of Chicago

161

campaign where they are searching around in vain some kind of bullshit issues to run on is, to my view, the reason that we have become a primary campaign issue. And if by right you mean Nixon, I don't think that there's a fundamental distinction between Nixon and Humphrey. election

for

Although

I don't think this way, within orthodox political thought you might say Nixon would be "better," since now the Democratic party will be against the War for the next four years instead of the situation during the last four years, in which both parties were for the War. But whether that's true or not, I just don't think that repression is the immediate issue at this moment. Fear of repression is a much greater issue right now that and the consequent tendency of many people to urge accommodation to the status quo, softening resistance rather than stepping it up.

—

Man

in Audience / Mr. Larner, isn't now the time to stop playing the game of voting for Tweedledee or Tweedledum, or is that time at some future election?

Jeremy Larner / Any time you

think it's Tweedledee or Tweedledum, don't play the game. But maybe you should get started before it comes to that. I just want to mention also that I guess I've had my answer from Tom Hayden for revolutionary plans, and

obviously tain

one

it's

names

psychological warfare, calling people cer-

in order to change them, fighting

back when

being arrested, going into buildings to satisfy needs, and so on and so forth. I think I'm in Alice in Wonderland because I still haven't heard a political program. As far as being afraid of repression, repression is a historical reality. People have been rounded up and put in camps in this country not so long ago, as people on the left are fond of pointing out. People have been put in jail, they've been blackballed from professions, they've been denied their constitutional rights. They've been murdered. Lynching is not unknown in this country. I think all of this could increase and I think the tendency and the talk about is

162

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

have increased dramatically in the last three where you get the Vice Presidential candidate of one of the major parties the probable Vice President talking about actual limitation of certain con-

this thing

weeks

to the point

—

—

stitutional rights.

Man

in

Audience / One man

in this country, Senator

McCarthy, somehow managed to wage a campaign which led to remarkable unexpected successes. And he did it with undersell rather than oversell, without violent confrontation. Rather, his people trimmed their

softly, quietly,

whiskers a bit and politely rang doorbells. Now, since the McCarthy campaign was defeated not by the people but by the bosses and their systems, isn't it the obvious, logical thing now to engage in a sustained campaign of a similar nature to put through legislation in each state that delegates are to be elected only by the people, not chosen by the bosses, and that delegates go to the convention committed to vote as directed by the people? Wouldn't this be a feasible way of restructuring the situation, constructively?

Murray Kempton /

Senator McCarAmerican people bewas an understyle particularly. The point was First, I don't think

thy's style necessarily touched the

cause it that he did nothing in violation of his own nature. If there is a lesson in his performance for our politics, it is that there are a great many different kinds of people in America and they probably don't do too well when they do things in violation of their

own

nature, in terms of their

rhetoric, their language, their posture.

As

for reform of

delegate election, that's a very complicated problem. But

T wouldn't be

surprised

if

we can develop

much

Demoknow how

a better

cratic party than we've ever had. Still, I don't

add up. So I couldn't urge the one course of action as the feasible way. It seems to me there are many different ways of doing things and many different types of things that need doing, on community and better that will

national levels.

And

they're nonexclusive.

The Meaning

163

of Chicago

Tom Hayden /

Look, I don't know if we have a revoluI do know that there is a revolutionary impulse or tendency that has been growing in this country at least over the last ten years, taking different forms even before the Vietnam War, during the Vietnam War expressing itself in a kind of a Bobefore the New Left hemian subculture that became political and that has been pushed into organized action primarily by the black movement. How fast it's growing especially among young people, white and black, is anybody's guess. How the series of assassinations that we've had will speed it up is anyone's guess. I would say we should always act as revolutionaries whatever our diagnosis of the situation is and act in such a way as to make ourselves more revolutionary tionary situation.

—

—

and make the situation more revolutionary. We're in a period now where if I had to give an objective analysis I would say that the country has been pushed into what appears on the right and to certain commentators to be a revolutionary situation, but it is actually something else. It's basically a crisis of legitimacy affecting the political institutions of the country. But at the

same time, certain of the basic

institutions of the society,

only being challenged by young people who clearly are not going to become involved in the corporate way of life and are looking for an alternative, by black people who are increasingly sharpening the issue with the corporations as it's discovered that even with all their wealth they don't seem to be able to solve the emespecially the corporations, are

—by

on the cultural front

ployment problem.

Jeremy Larner / what side

And

still

the yippies,

so on.

Let's talk about who's going to be

on

you're going to have a power struggle. If you're going to change this country, what power do you if

go after and with what troops? And what kind of society do you think your actions would create?

Man

in

parallel

Audience / Tom Hayden,

earlier

you made a

between the United States and pre-Nazi Ger-

164

Dissent, Power,

many. The communists

in

and Confrontation

Germany were

fighting the so-

cial democrats, saying that

between social democrats and Hitler there were no differences. Trotsky supported union between the social democrats and the socialist party saying that there was a difference. Today, here, would not a politics of popular front, including social democrats and liberals, be the best method to prevent such tragedy?

Tom Hayden /

I think that the confrontation that

going through

creating the basis for alliances that would

is

we're

not otherwise exist. I'm not against alliances or coalitions. I think that they are being brought into existence now by the situation that we're in and what

I

asked in

my

opening

who supported McCarthy, which I presume most of you did, what do you do now? You can probably guess what we radicals are going to do. But I think that it's very important now to examine where statement was: Those of you

McCarthy campaign should which way it's going to go. I thought that could be answered by the panel. But there have not been serious answers to that question, perhaps because I didn't put it in the right way.

the energies that existed in the go. I'm not sure

Woman to

in

know

raised

Audience / Tom,

a lot of people here want

the answer to one of the questions Mr. Larner

—namely,

what kind of society do you want

to

build?

Tom Hayden / You ously,

we

if

want a two-minute blueprint? Obvi-

talk about the

—

New

Left, the humanistic basis

was formed the rejection of not simply the unrepresentative and undemocratic structures of the military, the corporation, and the state, but also the rejection of commercial values and consumer values as being primary in this country was simply the starting point. But there was, and still is, a wariness toward blueprints liberal, left, or otherwise and a bias toward creating on which

it

—

—

action, negative action, against the situation in

which we're

The Meaning

165

of Chicago

as a way of producing evidence about whether this system can change or not change, and how it must be changed, and what its limits are. A belief that action creates this kind of evidence of its own. And the feeling that people will not follow a blueprint unless they have had a hand in making it. So the blueprint is being made and it isn't so difficult to sense it. We're not really writers, we don't put out programs, but there are intense discussions going on all the time about what is the correct way, for instance, to restructure a university, with more direct roles in determining curriculum for students, with abolition of the influence of the financial community and of the kind of trustees in,

that

you now have. The way

to

move from

there, for ex-

use the university at least as a staging point for making the kind of changes in society that would secure for us certain changes within the university. And we've discussed similarly other institutions: industry, labor, and

ample,

to

so on. But there has been a clear understanding all along that the "blueprint" for the

society

would come out of

new

university and the

new

specific struggles against the

institutional system that determined whether it would give, and out of issues and struggles which would help shape our own needs and views and purposes. In the case of Columbia, if the strike had gone further, if the strike had built faster, if the strike had created more allies, all of which may have been objectively impossible, you could have brought into existence a situation in which the authority of the administration would have been so badly fractured it would begin to crumble, and you would then have had virtually a "provisional administration" made up out of the people who joined the strike and the people who became its allies. And the strike movement would have had the decisive power in determining when the university doors would open and what would be taught behind those doors and how university resources would be used. Now clearly you cannot liberate, transform, and democratize one university in an undemocratic city in an

166

Dissent, Power,

undemocratic country. But

it's

and Confrontation

out of experiences like the

Columbia strike that the image of the future gets created and our own ability to create that future gets created. That's very important to us and I don't think that's antiprogressive or anti-ideological.

I think it's a politics of experience that's intensely ideological and intensely pro-

grammatic.

Murray Kempton / Tom, I don't think Jeremy's question about revolutionary programs is irrelevant. We live in a country where we have a labor movement which at this point still supports the War almost totally. We have an NAACP which, in the person of Roy Wilkins, hails Mayor Daley. We have a completely fragmented left, and so on. What I want to know is what do you do with the people who have a sense of powerlessness as a result of this? Do you simply take them into the streets? What do you do with all these different kinds of people to give them instruments of defense and power?

Tom Hayden /

No, of course you don't simply go runstreets. You remain in your institution as far as you can go while not becoming loyal to it, not considering yourself its employee. You consider your primary loyalty to be the creation of broad social movement in the country that will take that university and change it around. At some point you may be expelled and become part of the faculty-in-exile, joining in the movement. ning out into the

And

you're in a labor organization, it's not a concept of working inside versus working outside it's a concept of trying to find the correct strategic positions on several levels to transform the institution or if

you're in a church,

if

;

There are some be transformed, like universities, and others that should be abolished, like the profession of social work. And you judge how far "inside" you go into these situations by what your goals are. Just because we emphasize the street and the identity that grows abolish

it

in the quickest possible time.

institutions I think should

The Meaning of Chicago

167

out of the street, people often think that

if

they can't fight

in the streets, there's nothing else that they can do, or

they think that we're some kind of simpleminded romantics who think that the streets are the Sierra Maestra. And they make up all kinds of other explanations so as not

which is how will you struggle change the situation that you're in when you find that the tools of struggle do not exist within the system. Now I'm sorry but I have to leave. to confront the basic issue,

to

Robert Lowell / Do you want Jeremy, before

to

make

a last comment,

Tom leaves?*

Jeremy Larner /

I just wanted to say that when we talk about democratizing institutions I think we have to talk about means as well as ends. Because if we know something about the politics of experience, we know that we become the things we do. In the case, say, of Columbia, I'm not so sure that what people have become in the course of that encounter won't turn out to be just as important as the changes they may have made. We have to think carefully about our own legitimacy when we act in behalf of other people. If we insist that the President can't automatically assume his legitimacy, then neither can we. If we want to democratize this country, that should involve participation by everybody not only the people who agree with us, but ultimately everybody. And if it's really democracy we're after, then our tactics have to be democratic. That's why I am the kind of radical who is always going to work for truly democratic elections, among other things. That to me is an es-

—

sential part of

accountability.

what

it

means

Now some

to try to create equality

and

of our institutions no longer

function democratically: some, like the corporations, are

beyond public control; others, like the Pentagon, are a pure betrayal of democracy. But we have to work against them by means which create more participation, more ac*

ment.

Tom Hayden

exits during the early portion of

Jeremy Larner's com-

168

Dissent, Power,

countability,

these ideals

and Confrontation

and not less. Because when you don't respect you may become part of a process which will

them out completely. In terms of practical politics, it seems to me we have made a beginning toward pulling together certain groups in the United States which could add up to a majority and which could transform the quality of life in this country. snuff

Tom

said that

if

McCarthy were

view of North Vietnam, he their country. I disagree. If

elected President, in the

would have had to bomb McCarthy were elected Presi-

still

dent it would be because he succeeded in persuading a majority of this country that the bombing was wrong and must be stopped. And that is the way you can make changes in this country, by getting an effective majority to have certain kinds of realizations and to come over to your side. Now I wonder, for example, what are the tactics aside from congratulating ourselves on our moral superiority and our fearlessness what are the tactics of revolutionary people or of left people or of liberals? What are our tactics, say, for approaching the white lower class that is now apparently drawn toward Wallace? The militant right is picking up strength much faster than the yippies or the middle-class revolutionaries. Now what are we going to do about that? If we are going to take responsibility for our acts, we have to consider that consequence

—

—

also.

Woman

Audience / Mr. Larner, I have to agree with Tom Hayden told us, believe there would not be much difference between McCarthy and Humphrey or Johnson. Because when Mr. McCarthy was asked what the United States should do in the Middle East to relieve tension between the Arab and Israelis in that afflicted area, Mr. McCarthy responded by saying, in

the North Vietnamese who,

Well the United States has its commitments in the Middle East. And that seems to be a very familiar, ominous phrase in the 1960s. So I would doubt McCarthy's really changing our Vietnam policy.

The Meaning of Chicago

169

Jeremy Larner / You mean because he would support Israel?

Woman

Audience /

is precisely what is Vietnam. This is precisely the terminology of several Presidents who have followed our present Vietnam policy.

in

said about our

Right. This

commitments

in

Jeremy Larner / But

the difference is that Senator McCarthy thinks that there's a legitimate commitment to Israel,

and

that there's not a legitimate

South Vietnam

—whereas

that there's a legitimate

commitment

to

Johnson and Humphrey think

commitment

in both places.

Mary McCarthy* / I don't consider myself a greater authority than Tom Hayden on what the North Vietnamese think. No doubt he knows the North Vietnamese better than

I

when

do. But

I

was

in

North Vietnam,

get the impression that he's given tonight.

I

I

did not

think they did

very clearly distinguish between Senator McCarthy and President Johnson. They were intensely interested in the New Hampshire and Wisconsin primaries, and they viewed them as possible portents of change. I think the candidate they were most interested in was Robert Kennedy. Admittedly, however, they did repeatedly say that, although what was happening to American domestic politics was extremely important, the events on the Vietnamese battlefields were the most important. And they did feel that the War would be won in Vietnam and not in America and that the antiwar stands of Senators McCarthy and Kennedy would not have come into being but for the stubborn and effective Vietnamese resistance to the American military on the battlefield and to the American bombing

—

of their country. *

include The Company She Keeps, The Group, Bathtub, Vietnam, and, most recently, Birds of

Mary McCarthy's books

The Humanist America.

in

the

170

Dissent, Power,

Afterword

and Confrontation

Jeremy Larner

As

I write, in the spring of 1971, the conditions which prompted this discussion have been intensified. President Nixon has managed to expand the War in Indochina, while giving the impression that he wants to end it. Apparently he would end it only on terms that amount to victory for himself for, like Presidents before him, he does not have the strength to give his country the bad news. If we can make this understood and it is certainly within our power President Nixon will not be reelected in 1972. The more important job will be to build the public understanding which will leave the next President no

—

—

—

way

out but to get out. This must be the most critical short-term goal of liberals and radicals, not "how to create more Chicagos in our cities and more Columbias on our campuses." As a result of our experience in the two years since Tom Hayden proclaimed these stirring objectives, activists and students are nearly unanimous in rejecting them. But it would be a mistake to conclude along with Time Magazine that we are in a period of national "cooling." Disruption and violence will not disappear, though the next wave is likely to be more nihilistic than political. It will derive, I think, largely from working-class kids, dropouts, and "street people" who have come to feel that they have no worthwhile roles to play in our social structure. In the collapse of so much that Americans used to take for granted, too many futures have been crushed. The lower classes are socially trapped and economically squeezed, while too many young people are lost at leisure in a world of empty images. The only answer would be a radical restructuring of our institutions but that will happen too slowly and haphazardly to save lost souls and ease the frustration. The development which could give speed and direction to the changes that must come would be the long-term com-

—

The Meaning

171

of Chicago

mitment of a sizable group of people

—

to ordinary politics

not just the politics of presidential candidates but the

politics of pressure groups,

precinct meetings. But I

community organizations, and

am

not optimistic that this will

happen, despite a few positive trends (for example, the engagement of young professionals in advocacy roles). Politics in the long run is dull work, and maybe it just doesn't give the sense of satisfaction and identity that peo-

ple need most these days.

In better times, politics might be the part-time duty of who get their ego satisfactions elsewhere. But if

citizens

we had the cohesion that kind of involvement implies, we wouldn't have gotten in such trouble to begin with. Social disintegration turns out to be a two-edged blade: it cuts at the rebuilders as well as the maintainers. Yet I think the desire for a decent society is strongly and widely felt, and the struggle

to fulfill

it

will continue, despite the in-

evitable excrescence of turmoil

and image-mongering.

The "Hidden" Story of Chicago Alexander Klein

A

month or so after this discussion, while providing campaign counsel to Senator Abraham Ribicoff (who had denounced the Chicago police violence in a convention speech) I came across a still little-known, significant, and instructive facet of the Chicago story: (a) the election

Chicago Civil Liberties Union's imaginative attempt to provide evidence that would alert the nation in advance to

Mayor Daley's and

his police officials' continuing plans

to suppress constitutionally protected dissent

during the

upcoming convention week and to wreak violence on the would-be dissenters; and (b) the national press and broadcasting media's incredible failure to inform the American people about this, thereby nullifying the Civil Liberties Union's efforts, which if widely reported might well have averted the violence with its bitter aftermath and

—

—

172

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

broad repercussions, conceivably preventing Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, John Mitchell, and crew from occupying the White House.

Tom Hayden*

referred, in the discussion, to the Chi-

cago police assault on the peace demonstrators on April 27, 1968, as "a warm-up for August." In May 1968, Jay Miller of the Chicago Civil Liberties Union took the lead in forming a Citizens' Commission to investigate that peace march violence and make recommendations to prevent future violence, particularly during the convention. Shrewdly, the CLU named as Commission chairman university president Edward James Sparling, in whose honor Mayor Daley had a year or so earlier proclaimed a "Sparling Week" in Chicago. Other Commission members were the vice-president of a steel company, the president of an insurance firm, assorted respected clergymen, law professors, et al. Most of them were supporters of Mayor Daley but considered men of such integrity that they would, nevertheless, call the shots as they saw them. In a lengthy investigation they uncovered overwhelming evidence numerous eyewitnesses, photographs, newsreels of wholly unprovoked (not even verbal provocation) wholesale police brutality. They also traced the deliberate orders by Mayor Daley and his police superintendent,

—

—

carried out by the police, to suppress peaceful dissent

both in advance and during the rally and march. With the Democratic convention only a few weeks away and the eyes of the nation already anxiously focused on Chicago, the Sparling Commission published its findings

—which included an express ity

would very

prediction that police brutal-

likely take place during the convention

no

* To make my own views clear, I want to associate myself basically with Jeremy Larner's analysis in this discussion, though not with all of his strictures and by no means with all of the pessimism in his "Afterword." I would commend to his attention the rapid growth of John Gardner's citizens' lobby, "Common Cause" (originally scorned by sophisticated pols and involved intellectuals alike) which moves toward the sort of majority coalition of common purpose and "long-term commitment of a Alexsizable group of people to ordinary politics" for which he hopes. ander Klein

—

The Meaning matter

how

173

of Chicago

peacefully the demonstrators conducted them-

Mayor Daley and changed their unconstitutional policies. The Commission's and CLU's expectation was that national press and radio-TV would give headline coverage to the report, that Commission members would be interviewed on TV, that pictures of the brutality on April 27 would be published and televised across the country so that citizens and free press in concert would arouse public opinion to force the Democratic National Committee and Mayor Daley to cooperate with plans for lawful dissent and avoid the disaster in the making. The Chicago newspapers did summarize key elements of the Sparling Commission report, but hardly as prominently and fully as was clearly warranted. Nationally although the CLU sent news releases and copies of the report to all major media and columnists (2000 in all) only one newspaper gave the story decent coverage. This was the Des Moines Register, which also ran an editorial warning Mayor Daley to mend his ways. All the other major news media overlooked, ignored, or buried the story, while continuing to stress the danger of violence being instigated by the demonstrators. Thus, events and Daley's plans progressed toward the "police riot." Later, during the convention, as the brutality was being televised and reported and denied by Daley again not one network and none of the major newspapers or news magazines told the American people the highly significant fact that respected businessmen and clergy and lawyers, longtime supporters of Daley, had found incontrovertible evidence of calculated, ordered Chicago police brutality against wholly peaceful antiwar demonstrators and had predicted just such brutality would occur again. None of those prominent, eminently interviewable Commission members was put on TV at that point nor were the pictures and films of past Chicago police brutality shown selves, just as

had

it

in April, unless

his police superintendent

—

—

—

so as to put the events into perspective for the majority

millions who,

it

became

clear,

were going

to believe

Daley

174

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

and the police and condemn "the hippies and the yippies" as the nation's press had for weeks been priming the

—

public to do.

Only

in September, after the convention, did one paper,

the St. Louis Post Dispatch, run the story in depth.

months

later

came

Many

the trial of the Chicago Eight "con-

spiracy" and still the media did not inform the American people that Mayor Daley and the police superintendent-

who were accused

testifying in court

and

in the

media against the

—had themselves been condemned, and

their testi-

by a blue-ribbon "jury" (the CLU Commission) weeks before the convention. For the mass public

mony

—

invalidated,

the national jury, so to speak

trial

was not the

— —Daley and

the real issue of the

technicalities of the slippery "conspir-

acy" statute, but who was at fault the police or the demonstration leaders. But once again the media denied the nation vital data that might have affected their judgment. Only through providing campaign advice in the fall of 1968 to Senator RibicofT did I happen to become aware of these facts. RibicofTs opponent was charging that Ribicoff, by virtue of his impassioned comments in his nominating speech for Senator McGovern about "gestapo tactics in the streets of Chicago" had left the mainstream of American politics and joined "the hippies and the yippies." This charge came at a time when the later Walker Report, blaming Mayor Daley, had not yet appeared and polls were showing that the majority blamed the demonstrators. So I checked back issues of Chicago newspapers for some earlier "respectable" condemnations of previous Chicago police assaults, preferably against nonhippies and without provocation. In five minutes I w as startled to come upon summaries of the Sparling Commission Report, published August 1, 1968, just a few weeks before the convention. Senator RibicofT used clippings of these stories in his campaign, including a TV debate with his opponent. (The opponent happened to be an insurance company executive, which made it poetic justice that one of the Commission T

The Meaning critics of

175

of Chicago

Daley and the Chicago police was president of

a large insurance firm.) It

seems particularly important now

to take this

oppor-

tunity to call attention to the signal efforts of the Chicago Civil Liberties

Union and

the Sparling

Commission mem-

bers and to this possibly pivotal press and television oversight, so as to stimulate greatly

increased citizen vigilance

and media responsibility henceforth. With particular regard to the upcoming appeal hearing of the Chicago "conspiracy" defendants the media might at least, belatedly, place the entire matter in full perspective for the American people and the appeal judges by interviewing those "buried" Commission members and, finally, reporting this "hidden" story of Chicago to the nation at large.

—

April 3, 1971

—

l2Jial2JOl2ll2Jl2JI2Jl2iOl2Jl2Jlal2JelaJl2J

The Impotence

of

Power

Panelists:

HANNAH ARENDT HANS J. MORGENTHAU ITHIEL DE SOLA POOL RONALD STEEL

Moderator:

NAT HENTOFF

Discussants:

Frank Bassin Tom Farer Robert Jay Lifton William Lineberry Klaus Meschkat Joseph Neyer William Pfaff Stephen Rousseas Robert Sussman Stewart Adam Yarmolinsky Donald Zagoria

Afterwords:

ITHIEL DE SOLA POOL

RONALD STEEL NAT HENTOFF This TFI discussion took place on

May 22,

1969.

EEBEEEG3 Nat Hentoff /

have introductory remarks by by exchanges among them, and

First we'll

the panelists, followed

then open discussion. We'll begin with

Hannah Arendt.

Hannah Arendt / The title of our discussion, "The Impotence of Power," sounds paradoxical, but unfortunately it's a very apt title. I don't have to go into details of our numerous problems urban decay, rising crime rates, racial conflicts, snarled traffic and communications, including the mails, garbage collection failures, and what

—

have you. You may feel, as I sometimes feel, that the country seems to have fallen under a spell. Nothing works anymore, except of course trips to the moon, about whose necessity one can be of very different opinions. The "greatest power on earth," or so we are constantly told, is obviously helpless in many respects. And if power has anything to do with the "I will and I can" then we certainly are powerless. It is

obvious that the people in America no longer supits foreign policy, spe-

port the government, certainly not cifically the

Vietnam War. And

it

turns out that this form

of government cannot truly govern without the support of the people. Our government is engaged in, or has become entangled in, imperialist policies, and it turns out that this form of government based on the federal princi-

ple seems to be incapable of truly successful imperialist intervention.

This country was founded on the division of powers,

179

180

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

and it was powerful so long as this division worked. If you said a good word for state power a few years ago, your liberal friends were down on you and you were almost ostracized from society. Today, you may again talk about the good side of state power. But you have not only state power versus federal power, we have the whole system of checks and balances between the branches of government. There are many sources of power in this country and each one checks the other, without arresting it, without destroying it. Nevertheless we became persuaded that in order to be more "powerful" we needed centralization, and that became the progressive thing to do. But now

it

turns out that centralization in this country,

work. We are confronted with the rebelwhole generation plus the ethnic rebellion of a part of the population. There have been many minority pressure groups here and these have often exerted considerable power. When we heard of black power, many of us at least, doesn't

lion of a

thought that this would spell the normalization of the Negro people in America, as it had spelled the normalization of the Hebrew people, the normalization of the Irish people, and so on. But none of these minorities has ever believed and proclaimed that they want to "control America," and I'm quoting from the memorandum of James Forman [his so-called "Black Manifesto"]. Forman, of course, sincerely believes that the whites now do control this country. But in truth this country has never been controlled, and right now it's not even governed, I think. Now, whenever the powers that be are assailed, they have the tendency either to "overreact" as we have seen on many occasions, especially during the Chicago convention or to bog down entirely. The loss of nerve in certain respects and the overreaction in other respects are both extremely dangerous. When we are confronted with

—

—

who stage a sit-in, we call for the poare confronted with arson and arms on the campuses, and nonnegotiable claims, we begin to negotiate. At the same time, certain social scientists tell us rebellious students lice;

but

when we

The Impotence of Power

181

that our rebellious generation, far

the future, is

is

an obsolete

from being a herald of what they are doing

class, that

the last gasp of the past, of a rapidly obsolescing hu-

manism. Reading these analyses of certain of our colleagues that this so called youth revolt is actually an antirevolutionary movement, because the trend of the future is in an entirely different direction, I was reminded of a saying by Valery which I will quote in conclusion: "On peut dire que tout ce que nous savons, c'est a dire tout ce que nous pouvons, a fini par s'opposer a ce que nous sommes." "One could say that all we know and that is all we have the power to do has finally turned

—

—

against us."

Nat Hentoff / Dr. de

Sola Pool.

Ithiel de Sola Pool / I suppose that most of you know about the conversation between Lyndon Johnson and a wonder rabbi? As the situation in Vietnam got more and more intolerable, Johnson was very disturbed and one of his advisors suggested he consult a remarkable rabbi who could advise him how to win the War. So, quietly, without any press coverage, one night, President Johnson went to see the rabbi and said to the rabbi: "I just don't understand the situation. I understand power but we have 500,000 men over there, we have helicopters, we have complete control of the air and still we don't seem to be able to win this War. Tell me, rabbi, how can we win the War?" The rabbi replied: "There are two ways. You can win it the normal way or you can win it by a miracle." And Johnson said: "Miracles are for saints, that's not for me, tell me how to win it the normal way." And so the rabbi said: "Ah, that's the miracle." [laughter] I think it's easy enough to prescribe how to win the War in Vietnam, or how to end the turbulence on the campuses; the miracle is to persuade people to do it. The War in Vietnam, for example, could be won if the American public firmly and unitedly believed in the justice of

182

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

the American cause there, and if the American troops in Vietnam understood and were sensitive to cultural differences and made real efforts to relate to the people, and if the people of Vietnam were patriotically supportive of their government and were willing to make personal sacri-

than indulging in corruption for the advantage The problem is that they're not going to do it. In the same way one could say about the crises in American universities today that it's not at all hard to see what the solution is; it's not at all hard to answer the problem of how to maintain these edifices of power. If the faculty had some spine and stood up for their traditional rights, and if a majority of the student body insisted on their views against a more militant minority, there'd be no turbulence. But these miracles don't happen. fices rather

of their families.

world that stands behind the gun is more than what comes out of the mouth of a gun. The power that comes out of the mouth of a gun is very effective as a force for disruption, as a force for chaos. A few fedayeen can create a high level of insecurity in a country that clearly wants to find them and stop them. A larger number but still relatively few Viet Cong can create chaos and disruption in a country where they're not welcome, where they do not represent much of the population, but where, again, people are fearful and have nothing that they want to cling to or protect. A few neofascists of the New Left can create similar chaos in American universities. The phrase "the im-

There

Mao

is

is

power

in the

not entirely wrong. But power

potence of power" is, of course, a clever way of saying something that has been said in many different ways. When military men talk about it, the standard formulation is that the moral is to the material as ten to one. Students of revolution have said for centuries that it's when the Establishment loses its confidence in the rightness of what it's doing that it will decay and fall. What are the implications of this for

Well,

I

ironically

don't it is

American policy?

know how

to

produce the miracle. But

clear that as long as the

American public

The Impotence

of

183

Power

not only opposes military interventions such as Vietnam,

but also opposes the political, ideological, and economic interventions and activities of the United States in the world, that the net result will be more Vietnams. For the alternatives that face a nation with great power are either to effectively use its moral, ideological, economic, and various other kinds of nonmilitary power, or, if it fails to do that, fails to mobilize support for itself, then it will try over and over again desperately and unsuccessfully to achieve the same result purely by military power.

Hans Morgenthau /

I

am

in strong disagreement with

Mr. Pool's analysis of the situation. I think we are faced with two profound and unprecedented paradoxes: on the one hand, the impotence of the majority; on the other hand, the impotence of the government. Today we have an extension of the franchise which has gone as far as it physically can go. We have the principle of one man, one vote. And this situation of majority rule for which men have striven for centuries has produced a situation in which the average citizen feels more helpless, more unable to influence the policies of the government, than he felt, say, fifty or one hundred or even a hundred and fifty years ago. Why is this so? Why in a constitutional democratic context does the majority feel impotent to influence

the decisions of the government? I have no time here to go into details. Let me mention two basic points. First of all, there has occurred a drastic and unprecedented shift of material power from the people to the government. A hundred years ago, still, the people had essentially the same material power at their disposal as the government. They had guns, they had knives, and it was a matter of organization, of numbers, of morale, of leadership, that decided who would win. WTien the Spaniards in 1808 rose against the army of Napoleon, they took their knives from their kitchens and their guns from under their beds or out of their closets and started to kill Frenchmen. And they drove the French

184

Dissent, Power,

out of Spain.

Today

the government

is

and Confrontation in the monopolistic

possession of the most destructive weapons of warfare against which the people at large are powerless. For this reason,

we

are living no longer in an age of popular revo-

lution but in an age of coups d'etat. That

technologically advanced nations

—

it

is

the

is

to say, in

army which

whether it realizes it or not really controls the levers of power. So it is not by accident that the last real popular revolution occurred in 1917 in Russia, and that in the more highly developed countries of the West the so-called fascist revolutions in Italy and Germany were quasiconstitutional successions to democratic rule or they were, at worst coups d'etat. Secondly, the people at large are faced today with a multitude of problems, which to them are neither intelligible nor seem to be manageable. Take the problem of race. A hundred years ago the racial problem was relatively simple. It

was

the legal

problem of slavery; the

choice was between the retention and extension or the abolition of slavery. And every man, without any expert

knowledge, was capable of making up his mind, on the basis of his prejudices or moral convictions, one way or the other.

The

issue before us today, the integration of the

modus vivendi, more complex than

between

races or the creation of a

at least,

the races

the issue of slav-

is infinitely

and nobody has an answer to it which is simple and and appears to be manageable. What compounds this paradox is the other interrelated paradox that this loss of power on the part of the people is not compensated for by an increase in the usable power of the government. In other words, what the people have lost, the government has not necessarily gained. It is of course true that a modern government like ours has in its hands an unprecedented accumulation of material power. No government in times past was able to wipe out humanity within a matter of hours. But it is exactly this plenitude of power which makes the government impotent in using that power for the day-by-day purposes of government. In ery,

clear-cut

The Impotence

of

185

Power

is an existential discrepancy between enormous destructive power which the government holds in its hands, on the one hand, and the tasks for which power is supposed to be used on the other. Vietnam is, indeed, the classic example. There is, of course, no doubt that our material power is infinitely superior to the power of the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong. But even if the American people were not to show the "deficiencies" which Ithiel de Sola Pool detects in them, the United States w ould still be incapable of winning the War with the power at its disposal. What it could do is to wipe Vietnam, North and South, off the face of the earth. That is the w ay the Nazis tried to solve the Jewish problem. If all Jews are killed, you haven't got a Jewish problem anymore. Once you have killed all Vietnamese, you haven't got a Vietnamese problem any more. But this is obviously not a pre-

other words, there the

r

r

scription for a rational policy.

Throughout history nuclear age

—

—

until

1945, the beginning of the

there has always existed a rational relation-

ship between violence as a

means and

the ends of foreign

and actually did ask himself whether he could achieve his ends by the peaceful means of diplomacy, by diplomatic bargaining and pressure, or whether he would have to resort to war. And he could calculate the juxtaposition of interests and power and then decide one way or the other. He might miscalculate or he might become the victim of accident, but he still remained within a rational framework. But a nuclear power trying to deal with a conventional problem is no longer able to bring its power to bear upon that problem, because the discrepancy between the enormity of the power at its disposal and the relatively limited character or scope of the problem it must deal with is so wide that it is incapable of using that power. It is like a man who is attacked by a swarm of bees and has a submachine gun to defend himself with. Certainly, by the law of averages, his bullets will strike a bee from time to time, but the bees are going to hit him much more often than he is able to policy. That

is to

say, a statesman could

186

Dissent, Power,

hit the bees.

So

in spite of his

material power, he

is

and Confrontation

enormous superiority

in

helpless in the face of the bees.

And what is true of foreign policy is also true on the domestic scene. Here is a government, as I have just pointed out, which no longer needs to be afraid of popular revolution, which is perfectly secure in its power, but yet it is incapable of dealing with the unrest on the campuses. For it is dealing here with a problem which transcends the potentialities of material power, even under prenuclear conditions. When such a moral disintegration occurs, the government is powerless. It has been said, a hundred years ago, that you can do everything with bayonets except sit on them. That is to say, you can kill, but you cannot govern with them; and this is true of the enormous power which the government of the United States today holds in its hands. Thus, we are confronted with a profound crisis of society, a moral and social crisis which requires not only for its solution, but simply for the ability to live with it moral and social resources which are really quite separate and different from the enormous material power which the government possesses. I think it is true in a very profound sense that the government is impotent, that the kind of power on which it has been accustomed to rely is impotent because it is incapable of dealing with the moral and social issues which require for their resolution not material

—

power but moral force, social understanding, and the ity of affecting and resolving such social problems.

abil-

Ronald Steel / Power, as Peter Lorre once said about time, is a cheat. Which is to say it's a snare and a deluit breeds an inflation of rhetoric and self-assumed responsibility, such as John F. Kennedy's reference to the United States as a watchman on the walls of world freedom. Or Lyndon Johnson saying: Why are we in Vietnam? Because there's nobody else there to do the job without ever asking whether anybody should do

sion. It's a snare in that

—

that particular job. It's a delusion in the sense that national

The Impotence

of

Power

187

power, however great it may be, is never quite able to keep pace with the pretensions that it engenders. I think the greater the power, the military power, marshaled by any nation, the greater is the gap between the effective use of that power, as Professor Morgenthau was saying, and the grandiose and almost unattainable ends to which that power is applied. So it could be said that whether or not

power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, power certainly does breed a kind of arrogance because it has to justify itself, it has to justify its existence and its implementation. In this country this kind of arrogance of power, to use Senator Fulbright's phrase, takes the form of a messianic idealism, a belief that our power is being used for the betterment of mankind, for beneficial economic development and nation-building, for progress and "democracy," and that we're bringing about necessary improvements in all these countries in which we intervene whether militarily or economically and politically. This belief that the American contribution is a positive and a necessary one is absolutely essential to the use of American power. That is why Fulbright's phrase has irritated so many people, why it struck so deeply when it was first used because the idea that this nation could use its power arrogantly, or that it might not necessarily be directed toward the noble ends that we like to think it is, is anathema to many Americans. I think we find it very hard to reconcile ourselves to the use of raw power, crude power, to achieve national ends which might be divorced from the noble rhetoric in which it's often phrased. Also the mere existence of superior power provides an overwhelming temptation to use it: for example, Woodrow Wilson sending Marines to Mexico and to Haiti, and Lyndon Johnson dispatching troops to the Dominican Republic. In each case there was no real opposition. One could make a good argument for the proposition that we never would have dared intervene in Vietnam in the military fashion that we did if Vietnam had been a stronger country and if China had already developed an effective nuclear

—

188

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

arsenal. Certainly we wouldn't have done that in a country bordering the Soviet Union because the Soviet Union represents a very formidable countervailing force. This whole messianically inspired interventionist thrust of American foreign policy is a continuing pattern that is partly rooted in ideology, partly in economics, and also in the mere existence of our power. The counterideology of anticommunism has been certainly the motivating force of American foreign policy ever since the Second World War. But it could also be looked on as a kind of lubricant for a policy of expansionism and political control. And the fear of losing control, losing dominance, is one key spur to use power, even when the immediate stakes themselves are not greatly important. I think this is what's troubling our ad-

ministration re Peru today, not the special issue of the oil wells, but the chain reaction that their expropriation

might

evoke. If this spread to other countries, the United States would be losing its grip, Latin America would no longer

be the private preserve that

it's

been ever since the Monroe

Doctrine.

There has certainly been a staggering divorce of power and politics in this country, which is simply to say that there's been this temptation to use our enormous military power to achieve political ends which would otherwise be recognized as unattainable and often as undesirable. This temptation to use power was held in check for a long time by the strategic balance with the Soviet Union. That balance went out of kilter around the time of the Cuban missile crisis. That confrontation is looked upon as one of the high points of the Kennedy administration, one of its greatest victories, a turning point in the Cold War, but I think, in retrospect, that it was a rather disastrous episode for this country. It led to an intoxication with power, and to the belief that the latitude of the United States was far greater than had heretofore been generally believed. I think the Vietnam War is in a sense a result of this false lesson learned from the Cuban missile crisis. I don't mean to say even though we've reached a stalemate, a defeat,

—

The Impotence

of

Power

189

—

Vietnam War that American power is not But the impotence of power, I think, is that gap and it's a growing gap between the effective power which any nation marshals and this almost irresistiin effect, in the

real ;

it's

very

—

real.

—

ble temptation of control, the desire to control that this

power engenders, but cannot achieve.

Nat Hentoff / So far, power has been talked of here in terms of government, and impotence of power has been talked of in terms of government, and, as Professor Morgenthau added, in terms of the impotence of the majority. But Hannah Arendt's bringing up of James Forman's belief that whites control this country reminded me that there are other loci of power. We've seen, in New York City, an ad hoc coalition of power: the United Federation of Teachers, largely white; the Council of Supervisory Associations, entirely white conservative legislators scared liberal democrats; and a few Negroes involved for various tradeoff reasons. These elements coalesced to destroy the Ocean Hill-Brownsville and 201 school districts. On the other hand we've seen in Denver this week a group of black people still pursuing the grail of integration defeated because power, so far as it is politicized in Denver, was two to one against their attempts at integration. So I would ask, Was James Forman that incorrect? Dr. Arendt, you said that this country has never been controlled, but aren't specific areas of the country under control by whites, as seen from a black viewpoint? Was Eldridge Cleaver so far wrong? Isn't white power very real? ;

;

Hannah Arendt /

It seems to me that what you have here power against power, and this has always been the case in this country. For example, there was the growing power of the working class pitted against the power of the managerial class until these powers, finally, and after quite a number of violent interludes, almost equaled each other, that is, checked each other. As far as the Negro population is

is

concerned,

I

can very well see that hitherto they have

190

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

come into this interplay of power. But there was never anything like control from one point or by one group. And this holds true throughout the whole history of the American republic since the revolution. Now, that the one group which for many reasons did not attain sufficient power not

—

power interplay which normally went on in group becomes, so to speak, paranoid, seeing all other groups as one coalescing power bloc, is understandable. It's a very well-known and old story in history. But that doesn't make it any more correct. In the beginning, I was very much in favor of this slogan "black power." I do not believe that power inevitably corrupts. Power is engendered by any group of people that organizes itself and acts in concert. Of course, the amount of power they acquire may be less than that of other groups, and they may have to struggle to increase their to enter the

America

—

that such a

power; they may have to forge alliances, develop trade-offs with other groups, and so forth, in order to make their power effective to gain some of their ends. At any rate, I thought the growth of black power could help lead to the normal integration of blacks into the American grouppower interplay process. But the terrible thing is that the race problem here is bound up with a whole host of social problems, and with poverty and slums, with the deterioration and disintegration of the cities, with crime in the streets and with much,

— — —

much more. And both

whites and blacks out of deep antagonisms, fears, frustrations, misunderstandings, and both real and imagined conflicts of interest have contributed to distortions of this concept of black

dering

its

power, further hin-

useful growth and development.

Now the

civil rights movement was a marvelous example power really is nonviolent, and yet generating an enormous amount of power that achieved considerable results in a comparatively short time. The next such example came with the student rebellion against Vietnam which

of what

—

—

changed the climate of the country again results achieved by sheer power and without any violence. But sheer human

The Impotence power

is

distinct

191

Power

of

when

helpless

from legal and

it

comes

to today's

political, questions

new and

social, as to the dis-

integration of the big cities. And I don't believe with Mr. de Sola Pool that it will be at all easy to solve our problems. Moreover, when he says that it is easy to say "how" and the difficulty is only to persuade people, then I would say that's precisely what I meant when I talked about the loss of power, namely, the inability to persuade people. In this sense the American government has suffered an enormous power loss since, roughly speaking, 1963. Let me add that to call the unpersuadable, rebelling students neofascists has become, I am afraid, a commonplace, and it couldn't be more wrong. First of all, the stu-

dent rebellion occurrence. So,

is

if

a global phenomenon, not an American you want really to explain it, you must

it's global. Also it is a generation against the world as it is, it has been left to them by us who course in every country this takes on

not forget that

rebellion of a whole

against the world as

are their elders.

Of

a local coloring, But

the rebellious feelings of this generation are utterly differ-

ent

from those of

either the fascist or the

forty or fifty years ago.

None

communist rebels

of the latter would have said

what students have said to me time and again when I asked them what they wanted the world to look like in fifty years. They said "provided that there still is a world." And when I asked what they would want their life to look like five or ten years from today, they prefaced their reply with "provided that

I

am

still

alive."

Now

I

belong to the generation

which in the twenties and thirties was pretty rebellious, and I can assure you none of us thought in such terms. But the generation which has grown up under the shadow of the atomic

bomb

is

not so sure

it

has a future, as Professor

George Wald pointed out. As to Mr. Morgenthau's point about the majority feeling impotent vis-a-vis our government in a country which is solidly based on the old Roman proposition potestas in populo, "all power comes from the people." What stands between the people and power are the party machines. The

192

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

parties were originally devised as a means to represent the people and an instrument for electing representatives. Today they represent nobody, not even party members, but only the party bureaucracy. In other words, the people have been left without appropriate institutions for their

representation.

There is another point in Mr. Morgenthau's remarks which I'd like to stress. He is quite right: What makes us impotent is that we have too much power. His analogy of machine guns against bees characterizes our helplessness. There is a further aspect to this. We have dropped as many bombs on little Vietnam as we did on Germany, yet Vietnam has been able to survive better than Germany could partly because industrially developed nations depend on maintaining their "living standard" not just for ease and comfort, but for sheer survival. Disrupt the interconnected productive machinery and various services and utilities, and that survival is threatened. This is not true of underdeveloped countries. In this sense, as far as survival is concerned, the underdeveloped countries are in a much better position than the big powers. So in regard to Senator Fulbright's phrase "arrogance of power," which Mr. Steel

mentioned, I begin to ask myself if we are not living under a delusion of power, and if our arrogance does not reflect the uneasy feeling that something is utterly wrong with our power, that our power is not at all as potent as we think it is.

European governments and France suffer from the same sort of power loss we do, and that, very characteristically for our time, it is the small countries that are more stable, that can still rely, by and large, on the support of their citizens which is what gives power, internally, to a government and that can still solve their problems, because these problems are still on a manageable scale. I

believe that the larger Western

—Germany,

Italy,

—

— —

Ithiel de Sola Pool: I think there is a great deal more agreement here than my fellow panelists want to admit, but

The Impotence

of

193

Power

must accuse them of not appreciating satire. Clearly I was trying to say that it would be a miracle and by that I

mean "impossible"

—

—

kind of consensus on national goals and on a set of values that would enable a great society like our own to operate in the way you suggest some small countries still do or as you indicate may have been possible for us at an earlier stage. But I question the accuracy of the historical comparison. People are not less powerful today than they were in the past. There are factors making them less powerful, and there are other factors making them more powerful, such as the development of instant communications, speedy transportation, the increase in general educational levels. Now we on this panel do all agree that there is an increased sense of powerlessness. But I would say that this sense does not correspond to the reality. We on the panel also seem to agree that there is a temptation for the United States as a "great power" to use mammoth force, mammoth violence. There may be a difference within the panel on whether this is an inevitable, irremediable temptation that is bound to destroy our society or whether it can be controlled or at least moderated. I got from Dr. Morgenthau's remarks no sense that he feels our society has the ability to produce the kind of moral conviction and moral consensus that he believed was essential. Certainly I got no I

to achieve the

sense from Mr. Steel's remarks that there was any possibility of anything else except the yielding to that temptation in the presence of nuclear

power.

And when

I

weapons and mammoth I was jokingly

talked about a miracle,

How can a society like ours control temptation? Since no suggestions have yet come up, let me throw out some ideas on this point. I think the crucial factor that we haven't talked about so raising the question,

this

far

is

mean the sort of leader who own moral posture provides the the leader who by his own restraint

political leadership. I

in his actions

and

in his

model for the society, on violence, simultaneously with

a genuine political attempt to achieve goals, gives people a sense that there is

194

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

something they can believe in. I think we had a President in Kennedy who was capable of giving American society some of that feeling. We have lacked it since. Now it's a very unsatisfactory and dangerous and tenuous situation if the functioning of a society like ours depends upon the chance factor of the character of the political leadership at

that

it

does.

It is

any given period. And yet

I

feel

essential that our political leaders learn

(and we scholars can by writing about it perhaps teach them) the futility of attempting to use naked force as a substitute for political means, whether it's in Chicago or whether it's in Vietnam. I would disagree profoundly with Mr. Steel's attack on American "messianic idealism." From the beginning this nation has thought of itself as the proponent of certain "self-evident" truths and higher values. And a good thing that has been. The American ameliorative ideal of bringing a better democratic set of values to the world is the essential condition for the responsible use of the great power that we now have. These values communicated by a national leader who illustrates them in his own behavior are the essential condition for America to refrain from using the violence it has in its power.

Ronald Steel / It seems to me that if our national behavior is going to have to be determined by a leader who's going to give people some transcendental feeling that what is good and important, I think we're in for very bad times. And if John F. Kennedy is the example, I think we're in for even worse times than I feared. Because, when one removes the style from the substance, the Kennedy period was one in which the American people were terribly manipulated manipulated in the Berlin crisis, manipulated re Cuba, and manipulated in regard to Vietnam. And this was a very deliberate and cynical policy of that administration. (And, looked at in retrospect, I think it was a period of terrible impotence all-around; unlike the Johnson administration there was not even any countervailing force in the country against it that amounted to much. There seemed to be nothing to react against, because

they're doing

—

The Impotence

of

195

Power

was so inspiring that people were taken in by I would hate to have to think that a democratic government is dependent upon public relations imagery of the kind that the Kennedy administration depended upon.

the rhetoric it,

for the while.)

How is

power, to be sure,

to control the temptation to use

means

a great problem. But Professor Pool's

ling

it

by bringing

the

American way

for control-

to less fortunate

people throughout the world is precisely the way to bring about more Vietnams, and not the contrary. I think that this is what I meant by the arrogance of power, the notion that the mission of the United States in the world is to bring its own form of government to other people, and to bring them "modernization." What has "modernization" meant in most of the countries which we've tried to modernize? Like Vietnam? What has nation-building meant? I think it's meant really the worst aspects of our civilization, at best; and, at worst, it's meant massive destruction. I'd hate to think that these are goals that we're trying to pursue when we're talking about the limitation of power.

Hans Morgenthau /

I

want

to stress

one point, namely,

the unprecedented character of the immensity of

power

which is in the hands of modern governments. It is this fact which has paralyzed a modern government such as ours in

its

attempts to deal effectively with certain tradi-

tional external problems.

From

the beginning of history to

1945 an increase in the power of a nation, in its material power, meant an increase in its usable power it became actually more powerful. But here is the United States capable of destroying every man, woman, and child living on this earth today a couple of times over, and it is incapable of winning the War in Vietnam. Ask yourself, too, what Great Britain or France can do today in the field of for-

—

eign or domestic policy because they have nuclear weapons, which they could not do without them. Absolutely nothing. You can even go farther and say again if Great Britain and France had no nuclear weapons, if they did not feel

compelled

to divert scarce

human and

material re-

196

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

sources for the purpose of developing nuclear weapons, they would be much better off in terms of power because they could use those resources for the solution of manageable problems. So this

new

is

a paradox which seems entirely

in history.

Nat Hentoff / Now

we'll let the

audience join the

discussion.

Joseph Neyer* / I'd like to pick up a point that Professor Morgenthau developed and Miss Arendt touched on, namely, that the loss of power by the people is partly connected with technological changes. I wonder if one of the important factors in that is the economic interdependence of most people in a sense in which this did not exist 200 years ago. In the eighteenth century if somebody wanted to take an unpopular stand and then he had to suffer for it, well, he could retreat to the ancestral shack in the country

—

live on potatoes and salt pork. Now and I think this connected with the loss of freedom today now if anybody does something unpopular, he's liable to lose his next year's salary, which he's already spent. And if you really organize to confront the Establishment, and you act on it seriously, you may find yourself bringing certain essential services to a halt; and the follow-

and is

ing morning the babies in

Harlem

will get

—

no milk, and

for that matter neither will the babies on Park Avenue. I wonder whether this isn't an important factor in the loss of

power on the part of the majority.

Hans Morgenthau /

I

think

you are

entirely correct.

We

have today a centralization of power, of control over the most vital necessities of the individual, which, of course, makes him utterly dependent upon the holders of that centralized power. I still remember in my own early youth in Germany, when I visited my grandparents in a little town and we went to the well every morning and got the water. *

Joseph Neyer teaches philosophy at Rutgers University.

The Impotence of Power

197

We

were on our own, we were not dependent upon anyif the workers in the water-works strike, you haven't got any water and you are completely incapable of doing anything about it. So the very necessities of life are no longer controlled by ourselves but by others. And those others have a sort of stranglehold upon us. body. Today

Tom Farer* / Mr.

Morgenthau, don't you think that you have underestimated the tactical power that is still available to the United States and which has been employed? And aren't you underestimating the tactical efficacy of our power? For example, may we not be significantly affecting the revolutionary process in Latin America? So isn't it a very real and serious problem that we are using what power we do have to halt the processes of change?

Hans Morgenthau / Yes, you

are correct.

United States world," which

"stability throughout the

is

committed

is

a polite

to

Of course

way of referring to the mean? It means that

quo. For what does stability

the

status

things

ought to remain as they are. Unfortunately for this kind of much of the so-called Third World there is revolutionary ferment. That is to say many of the so-called developing nations which are really not developing, but are now politely called developing after they had been first called underdeveloped are in a prerevolutionary or revolutionary state. And the choice before us is really not between the status quo and revolution, but between one kind of revolution and another kind of revolution. Large segments of the Catholic Church in Latin America have realized this and are trying to act upon it. But we don't. policy, in

—

—

Donald ZAGORiAf /

I

potency of power.

seems

It

would to

word for the what has been said

like to put in a

me

that

* Tom Farer teaches law at Rutgers-Camden University. He was formerly Special Assistant to the General Counsel of the U.S. Defense De-

partment. t Donald Zagoria teaches politics and government at Hunter College. His books include Vietnam Triangle and The Sino-Soviet Conflict.

198

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

so far relates specifically to the failure of our policy in Vietnam. What we have is the impotence of American policy in Vietnam. But let's look at a few other things that have taken place in the past twenty years. The Russians have intervened successfully in Czechoslovakia and have consolidated their sphere of influence in Eastern Europe. The United States intervened in the Korean War quite successfully. In Iran and Guatemala it overthrew governments. In the sixties it intervened in the Dominican Republic quite

successfully from

its

point of view.

It

continues to inter-

vene in the Chinese civil war, to the extent, at least, that it has maintained Chiang Kai-shek in power in Taiwan and blocked Communist China's admission into the United Nations. The intermediate powers of the world are nervously talking about a Soviet-American condominium. ServanSchreiber has made a career out of talking about American economic power in Europe. Also, the United States has used the threat of nuclear power "successfully." On two occasions we threatened China with the use of nuclear weapons: once in the Korean War, which was brought to an end soon thereafter, and again in the Taiwan Straits in 1958. The nuclear threat was also used implicitly and successfully against Russian missiles in Cuba in 1962. So it seems to me that there are quite a few instances of the potency of power, and I think what we're really talking about here is the impotence of American power in Vietnam, precisely because our goals in Vietnam were simply unattainable.

Hannah Arendt / I talked about Vietnam only marginally. What really strikes me is the loss of power within the United States and by this I mean very simple things. Everybody knows that only a small percentage of crimes result in arrests. Anyone who wants to rob a bank has nine

chances out of ten of getting away with it unpunished. This means that the police no longer have the power to do their job.

That

this, in turn,

frustration

is

gives rise to an

obvious; so the police

enormous sense of

when they have

stu-

The Impotence of Power dents on a

campus or

199

the demonstrators in Chicago as

sit-

ting ducks before them, overreact, because finally they've

"got" somebody. Power in the simple sense of "I can" has decreased within the United States. Professor Morgenthau talked about the impotence of the individual; and this feeling of impotence has overtaken a generation which had every reason to be proud of their power in the civil rights movement. The disappointment experienced after that must have been much worse than if it had come upon people who were not used to acting, who didn't have the appetite for action. And the curious thing is that while the individual feels more and more impotent, the government also becomes more and more impotent. The mailmen can no longer distribute the mail. The garbage

men can no

longer remove the garbage. No one knows what do with the traffic. The railroads are either nonexistent or so bad one shudders to sit down in the cars. All this is a loss of "I can." And that is what I understood by the impotence of power. As to the potency of American power outside the United States, Mr. Steel, I believe, wishes to comment.

to

Ronald Steel / used

its

power

In

many

cases

when

the United States

in foreign policy, of course,

it

has had

short-term effects that were in line with the intentions of those

who applied

the power; but

I

think in most of the

instances just mentioned, the United States did not succeed in bringing

about the kind of change, structural change,

was intended. At best they've led to a stalemate; at worst they've served as a kind of Band-Aid which has simply covered up a continuing, festering revolutionary situation. What I was trying to suggest was not that the United that

States didn't

have real power, but that possession of

this

power was causing a really dangerous gap between what was possible, what was feasible, and what was desired by the policy-makers, that there was a confusion between the two and that the existence of this power created an inflated

—

200 rhetoric

Dissent, Power,

and an

inflated sense of

and Confrontation

world mission, which was

so troublesome.

Hans Morgenthau /

I just

want

to say a

word about Pro-

fessor Zagoria's assertion that the United States

as powerless as

it

has been

made

is

not quite

out to be. You're cer-

tainly correct with respect to certain fields. But that does

from the soundness of our analysis concerning the impotence of American power. And I don't mean exclusively in Vietnam, although Vietnam is the epitome of it. But take Korea: Can you imagine thirty years ago, or fifty or a hundred years ago, that a country of the power of North Korea would have done to American military power what North Korea has done, seizing the naval vessel the Pueblo and its entire crew?

not, I think, detract

Zagoria / Because the Vietnam

War was

going on.

the Vietnam War had Korea might have done the same thing. And we might have done nothing about it. Furthermore, if you're right, if the Vietnam War absorbs to battle a all the disposable power of the United States couple of hundred thousand pa jama-clad peasants how powerful is the United States? While you were talking, I remembered the famous case which happened more than a hundred years ago, the so-called Don Pacifico case. A Maltese Jew with a British passport had his house in Greece sacked during Easter, and he appealed to the British government a situation obviously infinitely milder than the seizure of the Pueblo. But this became a great diplomatic crisis in which Greek property was seized and the British fleet was ordered to blockade the port of Piraeus. Cases like Don Pacifico's have occurred many times in recent years to American citizens and the United States hasn't done a thing. Clearly there has been a profound change in

Hans Morgenthau / No, even

not been going on

I

if

believe North

—

—

—

the usability of our available force as effective power.

— The Impotence

of

Power

201

Robert Jay Lifton* / Mr.

Steel referred to the snare

and delusion of power. There's a sense in which material power is always empty, because there's some underlying image beneath it of conquering life and death, or ordering life and death, which man is never quite able to achieve. Today we seem to be at a historical juncture where at least two, and perhaps many more, revolutionary factors have undermined whatever small capacity man had to do this ordering. First, the speed of historical change with the our traditional symbols: This has contributed in a major way toward taking our sense of subjective power away from us. Another important factor already commented upon tonight is, of course, the impact of nuclear weapons, which loss of

—

—

in themselves I think create psychological forces that totally

undermine any possible balance of

of our capacity to accept oui mortality

life

and death, or

—always

a tenuous matter in any case. At moments it seems that the students and the blacks are the only ones who, without speaking to these problems and they don't speak to them directly seem to act upon them, countering these forces with a vision of a new way of life. The discovery of a way of life is always a source of human power, as opposed to more destructive material or weaponry forms of power. I wonder if any of the panelists would address themselves to this larger question of the loss of a subjective sense of power and its sources, and the capacity to reestablish it.

—

Ronald Steel / You mentioned blacks. Isn't this a very

the students and the good example of a source of power

being created within the society, within the community? If it's possible for students and blacks to be effective, then it's because the concentrated power of the state is ineffective in these very areas in which these political movements have chosen to express themselves. And isn't this a parallel with * Robert Jay Lifton teaches psychiatry at Yale University and is the author of Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima and a number of other

books.

202

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Vietnam? Where a revolutionary army is capable of holding off a great military power like the United States? By the same token insurrectionary movements in the United States, although not able to achieve their ends, have been able to express themselves and to disrupt society because the kind of power that's applied against them isn't efficacious. Now I'm not sure that's exactly what you meant, but doesn't the fact that a great military power is in effect hamstrung by the enormity of its power make possible the creation of these other foci of power which have to operate within it? Like an organism breaking up?

—

Hannah Arendt / I think, Professor Lifton, you are enAnd that's precisely what we did not talk about, at least I didn't. And I can also say why not. You

tirely right.

seem

be saying that

to

this subjective feeling of powerless-

if the person would whole thing would be changed. Whereas I thought that if people feel impotent, which we agreed upon, they have a serious reason for doing so that is, that power is not always a delusion and a snare, nor does power itself depend on subjective feelings, but that one can test power, that it is something objective. If people today feel impotent, in the areas we were discuss-

ness

is

the source of impotence, that

feel differently, then the

because they are. Indeed, under present conditions they were to feel powerful, then they would really have fallen prey to delusions and snares. That was our underlying assumption, that we are dealing here unfortunately with an objective reality in the world, to which people are reacting. ing, they feel entirely rightly so, if

Ithiel de Sola Pool / No, we are not in agreement on and Lifton together have been raising a very important point. Power, not pow-

that assumption. Professors Zagoria

erlessness, is often the "objective reality." It is a reality

"power at the end of a gun," as we see in movements all around the world. It is objective that there is power in the American government

that there is terrorist

reality

The Impotence

of

203

Power

today. The American government has enormous power, and thanks to that power in most situations in the world in the last few years it has succeeded. Most of those situations are ones that you don't think of because they were not crises. America's score in major crises may be a little different, but in most of the world the basic objectives of American foreign policy have prevailed for most of the time in recent years without crisis. I don't want to take us off onto a discussion of Vietnam as to the degree of American success or failure because that would take all evening; but it is and they too ready an assumption that, whatever the costs

are enormous

—American

—

policy in Vietnam

is failing. It

hope of doing something by Hanoi it is not failing. Rather than assess the extent of American success or failure within Vietnam I would argue that the attempt to achieve our legitimate or illegitimate goals by naked force is internally destructive. It's not that we don't have the force we have plenty but that the attempt to achieve our goals by naked force can destroy the nation that persists in that course, by creating alienation, rejection, and contempt within its own society. is

failing in terms of the original

easily, but in terms of preventing a takeover

—

—

Hans Morgenthau /

I,

too, think that Dr.

Lifton has

power was empirical, usable within a viable framework of life and death. You could prove to yourself and others how powerful you were by going to war. And you came out either defeated or more powerful. Today, a government such as the United States has it in its hands not only to prove its power vis-a-vis all other nations, but, you may say, vis-a-vis all mankind, to make an end to life on earth. In the past, however enormous the catastrophe was, however enormous the loss of life was, either you believed in an individual life after death, or you believed in "Roma aeterna" the civilization which will never die or you, at least, believed that your children would carry on where you have left off, or that the tree you planted would grow and testify to your raised a very important point. In the past,

—

—

—

204

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

But now that you have the potentiality of ending life men cannot simply live on as they have lived before unaffected in their psyches by this knowledge. And I think, as Hannah Arendt has pointed out, much of the unrest on the campuses is an unconscious or half -conscious life.

completely,

reflection of this existential fact.

Adam Yarmolinsky* /

Until the last few minutes I was troubled by a considerable sense of unreality here in the panel and a kind of nostalgia that I did not expect to find in this forum. It does seem to me that we are no less and no more powerful as a government, or, indeed, as a conglomeration of various kinds of power, than we were fifty years ago or more. You know, one of the reasons that we got into the mess in Vietnam was that a kind of a euphoria spread through the administration when it realized that the doctrine of "massive retaliation" didn't make any sense, that it was a nonsense doctrine which could not be carried out, and that, indeed, the power of nuclear weapons was something that could not in fact be exercised. And everybody thought wasn't it great to be able, instead, to depend on the Green Berets individual soldiers pitted against each other; this created a false notion that Green Beret counterinsurgency was the kind of power that operated on so small a scale that you could do something with it. To turn to another matter that Hannah Arendt raised, the clearance rate for crimes: Analyses of FBI statistical

—

reports lead

me

to believe that actually we're solving a

larger percentage of crimes than before.

more crimes are being reported

I

think that far

—although

the

number

is only a random relation between reported crime and actual crime. But if we look back to the administration of justice and the enforcement of law fifty or a hundred years ago, I don't think we have any reason to be fearful that

reported

is still

a tiny fraction of the total so there

* Adam Yarmolinsky teaches at Harvard Law School, was a Deputy Assistant Secretary in the U.S. Defense Department, and is the author of The Military Establishment: Its Impact on American Society.

The Impotence

of

205

Power

if we look back to the collechundred years ago things were a lot

things are worse. Certainly tion of garbage a

worse. It isn't at all clear to me that we should be thinking about a past golden age in which power could be exercised in rational and sensible fashion.

The one conclusion

would draw

that I

is

that

effective to the extent that there is a consensus

power

among

is

those

who submit themselves to the exercise of power. And that's why power works within a sovereignty and that's why outside the limits of sovereignty

And

power scarcely works

at all.

something that people who wield power in government have come to learn and recognize more than some of those on the panel have suggested they do. The change that has occurred in this country is not a change in the exercise of power or the availability of power; it's a change in the conditions under which we try to exercise power and it is a change in the resistance to the exercise this is

power by legitimate or legitimating forces. This, I sugwhat is creating our difficulties today and it is to this that we must address ourselves. And if there's one of

gest, is

quality that that I've is

I

think

missed a

we need little bit

in addressing ourselves to

it

in the discussion thus far,

it

the quality of patience.

Nat Hentoff / The

question of legitimacy has

its

other

power that may be illegitimate. Perhaps we can focus a bit on what might be called the moral dimensions of power. Whether power is side,

and

that involves the exercise of

potent or seemingly potent or partially potent, as exercised by this government, what is the responsibility of intellectuals in terms of acting to legitimate

what

to

many

of us seems like illegitimate power? Since you, Professor

Pool, have had a dialogue on this with

Noam Chomsky,

perhaps you might want to address yourself to

this

matter

of the responsibility of intellectuals.

Ithiel de Sola Pool /

Noam Chomsky.

You

say I've had a dialogue with

That's not quite accurate; he's had a

206

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

monologue with me. [laughter] Chomsky's position as I understand it I hesitate to put words in his mouth though he doesn't hesitate to put words in mine is that the government is evil, that the system is evil, and that intellectuals therefore have an obligation to stand outside it and

—

criticize. I don't

—

accept his premises.

think there

I

is

a

useful role for the critic, but also a useful role, probably

an even more useful

person who works within moral values, and for nonviolent,

role, for the

the establishment for

nonforceful modes of exercising power. If I believed that we faced some kind of malevolent centralized power such as that of a totalitarian regime, I would find myself with Chomsky. But that is not the situation. I question the statement made at one point this

evening alleging that there is increasing centralization of power. That is not at all correct. It is true that we are much more victims of each other in a complex society. We are not increasingly the subjects of one centralized power but rather all of us are dependent on all of us. A striker can bring us to a halt, a student militant can bring us to a halt, a dean can bring us to a halt, or Wall Street can bring us to a halt. It's not correct to say that a closed, centralized establishment is ruling us.

Nat Hentoff / So

far, the

emphasis has been on the

"The Impotence of Power." And I wonder, first from the panel and then from the audience, whether the kind of bleakness that (to me anyway) this title connotes is their view of the future. Or whether any of you think there is a way, if not through government, through some other source for power to be used humansubject as titled,

istically,

—

regeneratively

as,

let's

say,

the students are

trying to thrust toward.

Ronald Steel /

I

have relatively

little

faith in

power

being used morally because new people come into government and say we're going to do moral things. When you have that kind of enormous power and there are no re-

The Impotence straints

may

on

it,

of

207

Power

you're going to use

it

for ends which

you

think, or can justify, as being moral. I think that

it's

very hard for anyone marshaling such enormous power to use it in noncoercive ways. I would apply what I suppose is a more cynical approach and say that perhaps the most efficacious way of limiting arrogantly used power would be the creation of other sources of power. Surely the possession of the bomb by the Soviet Union has served as a restraining influence on American power. I think that when China develops her nuclear capacity, that again is going to be a restraining influence on American power.

Hannah Arendt /

I

don't believe

it

is

valid to talk in

such categories as the moral or humane use of power. Rather, there are certain goals that are unattainable for a people which is constituted as the American republic is. President Kennedy of whom I have a slightly higher opinion than some members of this panel Kennedy once said that it's still an open question whether this form of

—

—

government will survive the twentieth century. The key point is not whether the country can summon up such an enormous arsenal of violence that it finally can impose the Pax Americana which is unlikely in the near future

—

but not at all impossible in the long run. The point is that if we were to use that power in this way, then I am certain that the republic could not survive. So that is really what

we

cant that there

are concerned with.

I find it

most

signifi-

now almost

a unified opinion in this country that this War should stop. It used to be believed that if the United States withdraws and admits its first defeat there would be a terrific backlash reaction; I don't believe that any longer. I feel that nearly everybody is ready to accept it. As long as we are constituted as we are now, imperialist

is

adventures are unlikely to succeed. Imperialist powers

since the beginning of imperialism have been afraid of ish,

its

on the home government. When the Britfor instance, in the twenties were told that there was

boomerang

effect

208

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

only one way to solve the Indian question and that was by "administrative massacre," then the whole country knew that to take such action would lead to the end of the government of England, as they knew it. And this is the situation we are in today. One could conjecture that this may change, and perhaps one day this country will be willing to do what the English government did not do. But that would be a murderous end to the republic as we know it and the end perhaps not of the United States but of the unique character of the country. Now as to this power business: Power can be checked only by power, as Montesquieu said, and as the founding fathers knew very well; namely, only power can check power without destroying it. Of course you can destroy power by wiping out those exercising certain powers. But to check power through power means that afterward the power is not wiped out, nor are the wielders of power. I'm not sure that this check and balance play of power versus power can still follow the old eighteenth-century rules, laid down by Montesquieu and accepted by the founding fathers, now that it is played between the United States, Soviet Russia, and soon enough China. Mutual deterrence seems not to work since both parties, when the limit of overkill was reached, could not be persuaded to say "enough is enough." And we all know, of course, that there are certain vested interests behind this inability namely, the military-industrial-labor (and, partly, university-research) complex. It is almost impossible to believe in the reality of this fantastic situation. So we shall be able to kill Russia not just three times over but five or fifty times over. What difference does that make? In other words, we change nothing by adding more and more. I want to keep all moral considerations out of this question. It is as though we have somehow gotten onto a track on which we can only go faster and faster and faster downward. Now this all looks very gloomy. But things always look very gloomy if you simply extrapolate present negative

—

The Impotence

of

209

Power

trends and forget that these trends can be interrupted, quite abruptly, and then, luckily,

we

shall all be wrong.

Such unexpected miracles constantly happen in human history; and without such miracles, we would long ago have died a natural, or rather unnatural, death.

Nat Hentoff /

I would again like to try to bring in some moral dimensions. A. J. Muste used to emphasize

that

it is

superficial to be against a particular war, whether

—

Vietnam or any other specific war and he had a lot of them to be against in his lifetime. One has to be, he kept saying, against the

you

way

of

life,

the system of values, if

like, of the country, of the society, that

allows a Viet-

nam War to occur. Now that, it seems to me, is what George Wald is talking about, what Noam Chomsky is talking about, what the students have been talking about, what Eldridge Cleaver was talking about. Now does anyone on the panel feel that from them there will be sources of counterpower that can change the way of life that leads to war?

Two

Panelists in Unison / No.

Ithiel de Sola Pool / First let me just make a brief statement about the phrase "the students" that has been used several times very, very misleadingly. The phrase of course, refers to a certain

movement

participated in

small minority among students. Certainly bulk of "the students."

We

want

to distinguish

it

is

by a

not the

between the kind of movement

—

that A. J. Muste was talking about which is destructive of a society, because it quite deliberately rejects the so-

—

and the kind of movement which seeks reform, which seeks change, and which feels that somehow there is a relationship between it and the national leadership, between it and the society of which it is a part. Let's take a few examples. The labor movement has been a movement of protest against certain evils in this country and

ciety

210

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

against certain abuses of power in this country, but always with the conviction that labor had friends in Washington. It sensed that it had a certain amount of governmental support. Therefore, it was not a movement in rejection of society.

Or, to take another example, in Czechoslovakia recently the students went on a long strike, and the public opinion

showed that 85 percent of the public supported the student strike. In the face of an external enemy the Czech movement of protest became a national movement that identified with its country, rather polls in Czechoslovakia

than rejecting

it.

Or

to take

another example, the

civil

movement, which Hannah Arendt talked about, was a great experience for American society. Again it was a rights

movement against evil, but again with a conviction that men who were the national leadership were basically in some kind of rapport with the movement, that they

the

shared a

common

differences with

goal, for all the

them and

movement's

tactical

dissatisfactions with particular

events.

Mr. HentofT asked only

if

if

movements of

we

see

protest

any hope. I would say that and reform can be given

that kind of relationship with the leadership of society I see any basis for hope. The minute that we find ourselves in a situation where the basic attitude of the protesters and the dissidents is that the whole society is

would

evil

and must be destroyed, and

common

that they

with the government, then bad shape.

I

have nothing in

think we're in very

Nat Hentoff / I would just reply that I think of George Meany and Bayard Rustin and I would disagree. We have fundamentally different kind of leadership with

to create a

which

it is

possible to relate.

Robert Sussman Stewart* / I'm a seems *

to

me

Robert Sussman Stewart

Book

Division.

bit troubled

by what

the panel's rather conventional use of the term is

Editor-in-Chief of the McGraw-Hill Trade

The Impotence

—

power onry.

of

211

Power

as efficiency, action, government, military, weap-

And

I

particularly want to

would agree

know

that perhaps the issue is

in the sense that

we now

live in

Hannah Arendt more complicated

if

an age where there are

different styles of power, and different techniques of power. Take Bucher [who was charged with "surrendering" his ship Pueblo to the North Koreans]. Bucher, surprisingly, proved a very powerful figure and was not court-martialed. I don't think that would have happened a decade ago. And he was one man against a very large establishment. I bring him up as an example to illustrate that it is possible sometimes for one man setting himself on fire, so to speak, to be surprisingly powerful. A certain kind of power was generated by just one thousand students in Chicago getting the police to hit them. It's a very complicated time: there are many types of power, power can be applied in a wide variety of ways, and power can be psychological as well as military. But, of course, the major struggle in our nation is against those who concentrate on mobilizing more weaponry, more missiles,

more

rockets,

and so on.

Hannah Arendt /

I do not consider weaponry to be a distinction between power and the means of violence and I am probably in disagreement with nearly everybody in that I do not believe that power grows out of the barrel of a gun. I know that from Mao to the ultra-

power.

I

make

right everyone thinks so. But I think that out of the barrel of a gun grows violence, and immediate obedience, which

then immediately ceases not power.

when

the

gun

is

removed. This

is

You mentioned also different styles of power. If we had held this panel a year ago when McCarthy and Kennedy were trying to work through the usual political channels to change policy I would have been much more hopeful than I am after the two party conventions. (I am not concerned here with the elections, just the conventions.) When I watched them, one thing was quite clear. Neither party believed any longer that they should draft the man who

212

Dissent, Power,

had the most appeal

and Confrontation

and would be most nominated the man who had most power within the party. People have always accused the party machines of picking the most popular candidate: I have considered this a rather sound principle, because that was the only way in which one could be sure that the parties were responding, to a certain extent at least, to the country at large, and not only to the party bosses. But this time it was quite clear when they nominated in the country

likely to win. Both parties

Humphrey that they thought, Well, at least we are holding onto the power in the party; to hell with the elections. And I

also believe

—though

man more

this is

perhaps more debatable

win the necessary independent vote, which the Republicans always need, was Rockefeller, and not Nixon. So, from my point of view, the same thing happened in Miami as in Chicago. I never have been greatly in love with the party system. And I have repeatedly stressed that democracy or republican government is much older than the party system; that the party system is really relatively very young; and that one should not feel that if we develop different ways of organizing ourselves, and electing our representatives, that that is the end of democracy. I, therefore, never believed that it was a good idea to export the worst part of the American system namely, the party system, which now has come to be regarded as synonymous with democracy. If McCarthy or Bobby Kennedy both opposed the party machine and both had the people with them in the primaries had gotten the nomination, then I probably would talk very differently today. Or if I believed now that real reform, real democratization of the major parties is going to occur. But I do not believe this likely. Those pressing for reform don't realize what they're up against. Indeed it is the party machinery that actually makes the that the

likely to

—

—

—

citizenry impotent.

The only way in which governments with their monopoly of the means of violence can be overthrown are military coups d'etat. Revolutions don't happen as the result

The Impotence of

of

Power

armed uprisings

—they occur through

the powers that be, that

power, namely,

its

213

is,

when

ability to

disintegration of

the government loses

command

the

means of

its

vio-

lence. The "power is in the street," as the saying goes, when commands are no longer obeyed. And even then you need somebody to pick up that power, an individual or a

group. Without Lenin and the group he succeeded in persuading to follow him, there would never have been an October Revolution in Russia. But there would also have

been no October Revolution without the February Revolution, the sudden breakdown of the regime, the responsibility for which can be assigned to nobody. In France, in May 1968, the whole web of government suddenly came except apart, but there was no one to pick up the power of course de Gaulle. If the moment passes by, things heal somehow and forms of government can go on for a very long time in history after having lost their authentic power. The best example of this is the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy a miracle of longevity without any real power, completely disintegrating within and yet somehow surviv-

—

—

ing for a long time.

To return to our present situation, I believe that if something could be done about the party machines, and we could get the citizens to be truly citizens, the people really functioning in their roles as citizens, that could mean very much. But that, clearly, is no easy matter.

Stephen Rousseas* / Mr. Pool, in your evaluation of Mr. Muste, you said that since he raised fundamental moral questions about the kind of a society we lived in, that he was thereby being "destructive." And you also

New Left as being a "neofascism of the go back to the 1950s when such leading intellectuals in this country as Daniel Bell and Seymour Martin Lipset, along with Raymond Aaron in France characterized the left." I'd like to

* Stephen Rousseas teaches economics at Vassar College, and is the author of several books, including Death of a Democracy, on how the junta seized power in Greece.

214

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

(now joined by Brzezinski with his neologisms of techneand postindustrial society) were telling us

tronic society

fundamental problems of induswere just a few mopping up operations to be performed, carry-overs and remnants from the New Deal. Indeed, Lipset even went so far as to say that we had already achieved the good society. And earlier in the evening, too, you made it quite clear that you thought the primary role of the United States was to enable this "good society" to permeate throughout the world. In the 1960s I think their optimism has been totally negated. But what strikes me as very peculiar is that these people even in the 1960s are still dismissing the left for example, Bell in his latest exchange with Keniston as having degenerated into a vulgar kind of Marxism. I would like that we'd solved all the trial society; that there

— —

to suggest that if the

New

Left

is,

indeed, indulging in

unsophisticated types of analyses which

we academics

don't like because they're not analytically rigorous, that this is

our responsibility

—

the responsibility of the intel-

which grew up in the thirties, found the fifties, and sold out in the sixties. And it is

lectual generation itself in

instructive that

it

that

is

exactly these people

New

who

are being

would argue instead of the Mustes, the destructiveness is on the

so critical of the

Left.

At any

rate, I

other side.

Ithiel de Sola Pool / In the first place I'm not going defend everything that every sociologist wrote in the

to

Nor did they all say the same thing, or things so What they as a group wrote was mostly and partly wrong. What was common to a lot of

1950s.

easily capsulated. right

the writing you're talking about

was recognition

that prob-

lems of production that had been the central problems of an industrial society were not going to be the problems of the future. In some senses I think we can talk about a postindustrial society. But what we're seeing now is that this, far from leaving everybody happy and contented and purring, can be compatible with and perhaps create ten-

The Impotence of Power sions of

its

ogists are

own.

Why

215

this leads

somehow morally

you

to

say that the sociol-

responsible for the situation

I'm not sure, so I won't try to argue the point. Now as to A. J. Muste, I certainly would not say that there is no room in the world for critics and prophets who reject the society totally. As provokers of thought and writers of moving tracts they have a place. What I said was that when large movements, when substantial elements of a generation come to feel that way, then we're in bad shape. When a person as perceptive and sophisticated as Hannah Arendt describes American foreign policy as "imperialist adventures," then I say we're in bad shape. This is not to say that there is any reason why a person cannot be a Muste or a Thoreau or a Jesus and take a view that rejects a society totally. But unless the leadership of a society is able to incorporate, to channel if you wish, these feelings into partial support of itself, to be able to let most people feel that their moral views are somehow represented by the leadership, then we're in bad shape.

Hannah Arendt / that phrase back,

I just

want

by no means.

I

do not take do believe that they have And I think the United of policy with the end of terribly carelessly words so please be clear that I

to say that I

been "imperialist adventures." States was sucked into this kind World War II. But I know how and terms are being used today, said "imperialist"; I did not say totalitarian. And in my vocabulary there is a great difference between the two.

William Pfaff* / Could

I go back to the point Miss Arendt raised a few minutes ago about the particular relevance of all this to the United States? It does strike me that it's a peculiarly American problem that we're talking about, that there's a mood here in most of the discussion almost a mood of despair which would not be evident

—

—

*

William Pfaff, a consultant to the Hudson Institute, is author of a of books on foreign policy. The most recently published is Conto Freedom, a study of the problems of liberalism and democracy.

number demned

216

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

in the same kind of discussion in the other countries which have these problems that is, the problems of impotence of power, a sense of the breakdown of communication, a breakdown of the relations of individual to government, and so on. I think the despair is present because of a particular thing about the United States: that this is not a society that distinguishes or can distinguish, historically, between the political nation and the nation as a culture. There's no preexisting society here, no Pays Reel. We cannot contemplate a second republic; the French can easily contemplate a sixth republic. So for Americans the political society is all that we have, and if we lose that, we have lost everything. The essence of the nation is not land

—

or a culture, but a covenant, a political covenant. So I think there is a justified despair here, which ex-

American students are saying, a despair the French students did not have. The French students had hope for a new society even if it was very difficult to define and was left largely undefined. Here one has the sense at least among some elements of the New Left, some of the students of the kind of spirit associated with fascism. They feel the need they even long for an apocalyptic cleansing of the world. They see this cleansing of the world as their mission. So if this is the presses itself in what the

—

—

—

—

do we need radical change or reconanswer? Or let me put it this way: Do we need a radical reasonableness, reconciling it directed toward reconciling this country to itself and to a liberal politics of limit?

American

situation,

ciliation? Is the latter a conservative

—

Hannah Arendt / I agree with you that this country is based on a covenant. I agree also about the elements of despair, though I think it is also present in France. And I would add one more thing, that is perhaps especially true for people who were not born and raised in this country. This still perhaps is the freest country in the world. It still is. And this is the reason why one gets so very alarmed about the danger to this republic. This is the last,

The Impotence

of

217

Power

or at least the best, chance perhaps for hundreds of years come. I think that this is also the feeling among the students. But I have become rather concerned that there

to

an element of running amuck among the students, all the rebellious segments of the population. I'm

is

among

not afraid of rebellion.

And

certainly rebellious students

are fun to teach. But this running

amuck

is

another matter

entirely.

Klaus Meschkat* / I'm

originally

from the Free University, and teaching. I find

it

at the

interesting in

from West Berlin,

moment

New York

in

what an easy way society

and present national leadership are considered So,

it

is

asserted that people

who

reject

identical.

this

national

leadership are also rejecting society. If the analysis of Hannah Arendt is correct, and if it could be generalized little bit more, which I think it can, it does not only apply to the party system and to capitalist democracies in Western Europe. Then this national leadership and this would be the consequence of the argument of Hannah Arendt is the product of the specific mechanism of usurpation. That's to say, this national leadership which we're still used to think of as the result of a democratic process, but which she described as a denial of the democratic process, not leaving the majority of the population any real choice. We have witnessed this process in the United States and we witness it in countries like West Germany and in other countries in Europe. Now against this there is a movement of people who are deprived of influence and power, who cannot overcome their powerlessness through any of the regular channels. They seek to overcome their powerlessness by new forms of organization, which, in a way, are not so very new but in a certain tradition, a tradition which I would link with the tradition which starts from the Paris commune and later the experiment of the Soviets, and of many forms of direct democ-

a

—

—

*

Klaus Meschkat teaches

at

New York

University.

218 racy

Dissent, Power,

—

think this

I

so-called

is

and Confrontation

the essence of the attempts of the

New Left.

Now one can, of course, debate the validity of many individual measures which have been applied in this struggle, or

methods of confrontation; but

certain age group, in

Germany

and,

I

at least

among

a

think, the United

attempt to overcome powis a conscious negation of the existing power structure, has more legitimacy than what is to be found on the other side. That's to say, the existing state power is no longer considered to be legitimate. And then the process happens which was described: if state power is no longer considered to be States,

it is

erlessness,

felt that overall this

which

is

legitimate, the state

not yet power but which

must resort

to

naked and brutal

force.

This is the process which we are witnessing and which is not sufficiently emphasized. This counterforce we have seen traditionally in history, as in the form of fascist movements. What we have begun to see in recent times so-called "unfortunate incidents," police riots, things like that is in fact the beginning of a display of naked force by the state apparatus, because that's the only means to suppress this movement which is essentially in the best tradition of democracy against what cannot any longer be called a democratic process.

—

Hannah Arendt / Mr. Meschkat, I know your example of the Paris commune and of the Soviets. You could push it farther back, and come to the JefTersonian wards, the ward system which Jefferson wanted to have in America,

and also the revolutionary societies in Paris, which were then destroyed by Robespierre's terror. I would agree with you that this is the only type of government in the modern era which developed new forms, unknown before, and which contained a certain promise. But we should not forget that they have always perished. And we should ask ourselves in all seriousness I

very

much doubt

if

why

they perished. Moreover,

these forms have

any validity today

in these disintegrating cities with their kinds of inhabi-

The Impotence tants.

of

219

Power

All these Soviets or councils or the sort of direct

democracy via the town hall, in which America has had an especially long and solid tradition, have always been on a small scale. To what extent these things can function in mass society is entirely open to question. Now, with regard to your comment on the beginning of a display of naked force by the American government, you certainly can put this forward as a hypothesis; indeed, there may be the beginning of such a trend. But to then conclude from a hypothesis that there is no longer any democratic process here that you cannot do. local

—

Klaus Meschkat / I do it on the basis of a comparison with tendencies in various countries. And I think you can see the same tendency in the transformation of the police apparatus not only in the United States, as in Berkeley and other places, but also in many countries of Western Europe.

Hannah Arendt / And how about the countries in EastMuch worse. And what do the people do

ern Europe? there?

we

They

also react against their bureaucracy, just as

react against our bureaucracy.

William Lineberry* /

I

find

it

paradoxical that in a

power" I have heard a great deal about such things as imperialism, the arrogance of power, the centralization of power, and, indeed, the impotence of the people in the face of the coercive might of centralized state authority. But I've heard very little said basically about restraint in the use of power or about restraints on power. Professor Morgenthau indicated earlier that the federal government was impotent, for example, to intervene on the campuses in the face of student rebellion. I wonder, is it impotence that is involved in a situation like this, or is it sensible restraint on discussion devoted to "the impotence of

* William Lineberry, formerly with the Foreign Policy Association, an executive editor with the Council on Foreign Relations.

is

220

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

the part of the federal authorities? Similarly,

tence

if

we do

down one

not respond

when

the North

of our reconnaissance planes, or

is it

impo-

Koreans shoot is it

intelligent

restraint that is involved here?

Hans Morgenthau /

It is impotence. You see, it is an two hundred determined students could ruin a university. Against that kind of thing, the university authorities are powerless. If your policies create or make possible the development of two hundred students resolved to destroy the university, the game is up. You can call the police of course, you can even execute every tenth rebel student if you wish, or all the rebels. But as I've said before, that does not solve the problem. It eliminates those who are the immediate human manifestations of the problem.

existential fact that

William Lineberry / Professor Morgenthau, you mentioned the Don Pacifico case and I had the feeling that perhaps you were, subconsciously, yearning for those days when in fact power could be employed in such a manner. Is it not in fact an advance over times like that, that power now is used with much greater restraint in the face of such relatively trivial cases? And even in the face of a Pueblo seizure?

Hans Morgenthau / Power today restraint. Just

is

compare present wars

not used with great to

wars in the nine-

teenth century.

William Lineberry / What about Vietnam?

Hannah Arendt / Look at Vietnam. For heaven look at the country. What we have done there. William Lineberry / But examples of restraint?

doesn't

sake

Vietnam show certain

The Impotence

of

221

Power

Hannah Arendt / There

is

restraint. Just look at the

havoc wrought on the country

and on

some

restraint, but not great

civilians.

Frank Bassin / potent, is

it,

Professor Morgenthau, power

if it's

is

not im-

used as a defensive measure in

ting the offensive onslaught of

power

offset-

itself?

Hans Morgenthau / This is very abstract. Can you me an example of what you have in mind?

Frank Bassin / ful nations,

give

between two powerimpotence on each side?

If there's a standoff

would you

call that

Hans Morgenthau / You have

a point, especially

if

you

speak of mutual deterrence with nuclear weapons. Certainly the power of the United States is effective in restraining the Soviet Union, and the power of the Soviet Union is effective in restraining the United States.

Frank Bassin / Then you

can't talk of impotence.

Hans Morgenthau / You

can. Because that

power

is

not

only the threat that you might use it, destroying yourself as well as the enemy, which preserves peace and a modicum of order. It is not power which you can

usable. It

is

way a king in the Middle Ages used his power and governed. Or, as in times past, when the government of the United States decided to change the outside world through its power, and changed it. This nuclear power is

use the

something quite different, something negative.

Tom Farer /

There were two points you made, Dr. One was that the party system

Arendt, that puzzled me. as

it

presently exists

is

a critical obstacle to the reestab-

222

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

—

—

I wasn't quite sure what but I suppose community. Which implies that there is a kind of consensus which is not being reflected in the political process. For purposes of debate, I'd suggest that perhaps the really critical problem in the political process is rather the breakdown in the consensus and that this is in part the consequence of the entry of new groups into the po-

lishment of

more

civil

litical process.

The other point, which probably surprised many peowas your suggestion, Dr. Arendt, that power does not

ple,

I suppose there are really two forms of power. There is power in the form of a manipulation of symbols or what we call moral power, appeal to morality. And there is physical, material power. Now surely this second kind of power does corrupt, in the sense that the only way one uses physical power is to enlarge the area of your influence in relationship to other groups. And that's usually, I think, what we mean when we say corruption. But even in the case of nonmaterial power, the manipulation of symbols, if by doing that you increase your own influence, isn't this a tendency toward corruption?

corrupt.

Hannah Arendt / Your

second kind of power I would and not power. If somebody holds me up in the street, he can be absolutely sure that I will obey him. I do not consent, but I obey until he turns the corner. call violence,

—

And

then

Power, munities

I

try whatever I can. think,

I

—

is

actually

a natural property of all of all

human

groups,

Power becomes corrupting only when

it

is

human com-

qua groups. the power to

a widespread notion that all politics has to do with who rules whom. I don't agree with that. I believe that the power which constantly is being exerted is the power of one group against another group in a continuing rule.

There

is

The only power power to rule. Now you can rule over willing subjects and unwilling subjects. To the extent that you rule over willing subjects, you can say that they interplay of power. This does not corrupt.

that does corrupt

is

the

The Impotence

of

223

Power

have consented to be ruled. And this was in a way true for all medieval forms of government. But it is not our concept of government. Our way is that we form the government and we elect our representatives who then govern, but do not rule. On the other hand, the power we would exert in any country that we occupy in order to rule, this kind of power is certainly corrupting for the ruler as well as the subject nations. After the second world war, Camus, when asked to accept an official post in the occupation administration in Germany, replied: "Je ne me sens pas la profession d'un occupateur" He didn't mean France shouldn't occupy Germany, he only meant he didn't want to get corrupted that way. But to throw all power, so to speak, out of the window, morally, because power can be used in a way which then will corrupt people, this I think is really to throw the baby out with the bath water. .

Adam Yarmolinsky /

Right

now

at

Harvard, as

I

.

.

think

many people

are aware, there's a great controversy about pass-fail and abolishing grades. A couple of hundred years ago, students who didn't earn good grades were beaten.

At Harvard College.

I just discovered this the other day. Students today, I take it, would not accept being beaten. But does this mean that the authorities are impotent? I don't believe so. What it means is that the job of governing is a more challenging job because it is more difficult;

and

if

you can do

it

right, it's

more worthwhile.

I

don't

believe that two hundred students in a university could

wreck it, no matter how determined they were. They could wreck it only if the president and the administration behave the way a number of presidents and administrations have behaved recently; they can wreck it if faculties follow that ancient precept: "When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout." But you don't have to behave that way. It isn't required. And it isn't required that administrations, forgetting that

war

is

too important

to turn over to the generals, say, well it's a police matter,

so

we

will turn

it

over to the police. This

is

stupidity,

and

224

Dissent, Power,

stupidity usually has in

America today,

and Confrontation

bad effects. It's having bad effects had bad effects for thousands of

it's

years. But I don't believe that stupidity

is

inevitable. I

worth fighting against stupidity. Now, Hannah Arendt mentioned that the war in Vietnam has been fought without restraints. Well in fact

think

it's

Hannah Arendt / I didn't say that. I said, compared to And I even qualified that and said some re-

other wars.

were being exercised, but not great

straints

restraint.

Adam Yarmolinsky / Well I would say that the war in Vietnam is being fought with more restraints than has ever been the case in the past. And Hannah Arendt / Ever?

Adam Yarmolinsky / Yes, ever. And I yield to in my desire to see the war ended and my feeling

—and

I

include myself

—made

no one that

we

a terrible mistake in get-

But I know what and there are others in the audience who are familiar with them; and while they're not enough because the situation is wrong to begin with, they are greater than restraints have ever been in the past. Now, this doesn't mean that today you can never exercise power effectively, but rather that you can't exercise power effectively if the premises on which you're exercising it are wrong. Not that we are imperialist. I've always underting into this situation in the first place.

some of those

restraints are,

stood imperialist to

or territory and we're wrong, we

mean

that we're seeking either trade

believe we're not seeking either. But made a mistake. And we've made other I

mistakes, and what

is

intelligent attention to

called for here, I think,

how you can

is

a

little

avoid mistakes.

Take the case of what went on in the Chicago and Miami conventions. I can't speak for the Miami convention, but the delegates to the Chicago convention were chosen at a time and in such a way that anyone who studied the

Power

The Impotence

of

situation could

have predicted they would not be respon-

225

sive to the will of the majority of the party or the majority of the country,

or even the majority of people

who

voted in primaries. This is a situation that has to be changed. We happen to have a commission in action now in the Democratic party which may be able to change it.

But

we

work

we're not going to be going to take a lot of work, a lot of patience, and effort, but it is this kind of thing, it is the application of intelligence over long periods, with great perseverance, that will I believe make power effective and if

don't

able to change

it.

at that task,

It's

responsive.

Nat Hentoff / With

regard to the point about American and I'm sure Professor Yarmolinsky knows whereof he speaks, apparently the ravaged Vietnamese people have more reason to be grateful than they might have imagined before this evening. restraint,

Hans Morgenthau /

I

must say

the emphatic statement that no

I

war

am

quite

amazed

at

in the past has ever

been fought with greater restraint than the war in Vietnam. Consider that during the First World War, there was a strict limitation of warfare to combatants, to military personnel; that prisoners were taken and treated reasonably well, as were the enemy wounded; that if civilians, in rare instances, were in any way attacked, there was an outcry in the world about it. Clearly, since then, there has been a moral degeneration in the methods of warfare, which has led us into a kind of new barbaric age. I'm simply incapable of factually following the argument that

war in Vietnam is being fought with great restraint. Of course it is fought with considerable restraint insofar as we refrain from actions which would provoke the Chi-

the

nese or the Russians to intervene. But within these limits, it is fought with a savagery which I find appalling, especially in its indiscriminate killing of civilians and prisoners and wounded. The restraints are tactical limitations

226

we

Dissent, Power,

set,

and Confrontation

perforce, because of fear of Russian or Chinese

intervention, or fear of using such massive, lethal violence

as to bring down world condemnation upon ourselves. Within those limits we are barbarically unrestrained. So the restraints we do apply are, obviously, not self-chosen restraints, but imposed on us precisely by what we have been calling "the impotence of power." Just as our military failure in Vietnam is a prime demonstration of the "impotence of power."

Afterword It is

Ithiel de Sola Pool

not often that one gets a chance to deliver those witty

ripostes that one thinks of on the

w ay home. Maybe r

it

is

dreams, they turn out to be not

just as well, because, like

so brilliant when one is given that chance. Nonetheless, I welcome the editor's kind offer that allows me to reaffirm in the cold light of 1971 a number of views that were so

starkly at odds with the rest of the panel that the reader

may wonder if he

read me right. Let us consider first four fashionable cliches about power, all of which are clearly false. 1. People are increasingly powerless in modern society. 2. Power in America is increasingly concentrated. 3. It is more moral to be a critic than a member of the Establishment. 4.

Power

is

a

bad

In reality, there

power

thing. is

no clear trend in the allocation of working each way. No

in this country; forces are

doubt, people in

modern

cities

are increasingly powerless

insofar as they rely on electricity and trucking that can be

powerful insoother such and far as the same electricity and trucking standard higher leisure and a facilities allow them more concentrated increasingly living. of Power may become as the number of newspapers declines, but increasingly dispersed as xerography and CATV undermine the concut off

by

strikes; but they are increasingly

The Impotence

of

227

Power

centration of control of the channels of communication. One could go on with such lists of contradictions for pages.

Polemicists

may draw

conclusions about what

is

happen-

must insist on evidence, and the evidence is not there. There is no unidirectional trend in the allocation of power in American society. The contention that the true vocation of the intellectual ing without regard to hard facts; social scientists

to be a critic of society is equally oversimple. The advocates of that Cassandra morality contend that the intellectual is honest only when he cries "shame," and is a whore when he does not. Such simplistic notions of the uses of human intellect ill befit intellectuals. Society needs is

both

men

of the

mind who seek power

to achieve social

goals and others to criticize them. Society,

it

is

not reward them equally. Sometimes the critic

true, does

may

find

himself persecuted and often poorly paid. In these respects his path may be hard, but intellectually it is easy. The Cassandra need not be careful about facts nor subtle in distinctions. The prophet or the writer in the protest press need only be eloquent. He need be neither accurate, informed, nor correct; if he is evocative it is enough. Much harder intellectually is the role of the responsible intellectual who chooses to measure his achievement by the actual change he produces in the condition of man on earth. He may sometimes be better paid and, in a democratic society which does not purge the opposition when the regime changes, he enjoys honors and some security. But intellectually his job is much harder than that of the critic. Whether his field is health or living standards, or politics, or preservation of peace, he must have realism about facts, a discipline in analysis, a subtlety and dedication in his use of knowledge that the critic never knows. Also, he must play the power game to place himself where he can implement his ideas. His reward is saving lives or

making them more tolerable. The notion that power is evil, suggested by those who use the word the "Establishment" as a swearword, is,

228

when

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

more power are One minute they deplore the power

stated explicitly,

sufficiently

often implied than asserted.

Even

silly

that

it

is

the critics of

ambivalent about it. of the United States, and the next moment they deplore the powerlessness of the people. Clearly power is good, and what one might deplore is the way it is distributed. The irony is that it was in the service of the highest goals, democracy at home and peace in the world, that, by social legislation and armed might, we have created the concentration of power in Washington that alarms my fellow panelists. We are witnessing a realignment that brings the left around to share the conservative's fear of Federal power and foreign entanglements. There may be some merit to this rediscovery by liberals and radicals of the dangers of concentrated state power, but equally clearly that power has been the condition for doing good, both at home and abroad. Yet, if you believe my colleagues in this volume, all attempts to use Federal power, both at home and abroad, are unmitigated failures. Happily, the experience of a year or so since those alarums were sounded makes that total gloom look at best a little bit hysterical. Some of last year's nightmares recede to perspective in the cold morning of 1971. Glib remarks about the demands of "the students" or "youth" (meaning, of course, that minority

among them who

are children of the urban intelligentsia turn out to be cliches of the

sent off to elite colleges)

moment, forgotten a year later. The young are not demanding anything other than that modicum of peace, opportunity, and respect that we all want. So too cliches about the "failure" of American power in the world, and particularly in Vietnam, look a bit threadbare a year later.

The

lines American power has drawn continue to hold in Vietnam, the Middle East, and Europe, and in Vietnam at decreasing cost and sacrifice. But let us not belittle the genuine concern expressed in the phrase, "the impotence of power." Naked power is impotent. Those who try to impose their will by pure force

The Impotence

of

Power

229

on people who are not persuaded find that they must use ever larger amounts of violence to exterminate those

That

is

the history

till

ultimately they seek

—

who oppose them and still they fail. of aerial bombardment for political

purposes, the history of Stalinism, and the history of Hitlerism.

American military power

is enormous. It bears temptatemptation to rely excessively upon armed might and thus be drawn down that fatal path of trying to use naked violence to achieve political goals. What makes the temptation greater is the shocking ineptness of America's performance in the use of the other major instruments of power: money, intelligence, and

tions

with

—

it

the

ideology.

America has abundant resources in all of these nonviomeans of influence. Our superpower status in arms is less, in fact, than our superpower status in wealth, science, or democratic heritage. Furthermore, the world is receptive to American influence in all of those respects. Yet lent

foreign aid barely squeaks through the U.S. Congress. countries spend a larger proportion of their GNP on foreign economic assistance than we do. Intelligence, instead of being treated as an essential means for understanding the world around us in order to achieve security peacefully, is treated by most Americans as a devious

Many

necessity at best. This anti-intellectualism

is,

ironically,

most prevalent among our intelligentsia, most of whom see the CIA as the epitome of evil rather than recognizing their brothers in the search for knowledge. The extraordinary performance of that agency in the 1950s in helping the free left intellectual community around the world is more often described as a scandal than as a matter of pride. Today, thanks to the self-destructive hostility of the American intelligentsia, the United States government (despite all its power) no longer dares help build free institutions for the world intellectual community in any serious way. In general, its ideological efforts are starved and minimal. The USIA has less than one-third of 1 percent

230

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

of the budget of the Department of Defense. Given that quantitative measure of how little we care about ideological influence,

we are

not going to do well qualitatively

either.

A War

basic

American foreign policy

objective since

World

has been the discouragement of expansionist adventures by power-hungry regimes. Lines were drawn after World War II, and (rightly or wrongly) the American government concluded that peace in the world depended upon respect for those lines. In general, that policy has been a success, so much so that many people nowadays belittle the danger. They no longer see the world confronted by armed movements of true believers waiting to

jump

II

into

any power vacuum

that offers itself.

The basic

have held with minor revisions for a quarter of a century. In a rapidly changing world where nothing can ever be permanent that is quite remarkable. The stability of the basic lines of the postwar world is testimony to the efficacy of American power, but not necessarily to its wisdom. Was the exercise of line-drawing necessary? In my opinion, the answer is clearly yes. One would have to be totally naive to think that the kind of power-oriented rulers who dominate the various communist regimes (holding as they do an ideology committed to expansion of their power) would have acted in any other way than to move into power vacuums if such had existed. East Europe, Korea, Vietnam, Tibet, are evidence enough. Success at expansion would have been a learning experience for them, encouraging them to try again. The American policy of containment was justified. If today substantial parts of the communist world are less obviously expansionist than in 1950, it is because they experienced a different learning experience. Attempts at expansion of power, whether in Asia, Europe, or the Middle East, have not paid off very well for those that lines

it. In the face of containing reactions, attempts at expansion have seldom succeeded. They have aroused resistance, and they have led the initiators as well as us into

tried

The Impotence

of

Power

231

painful troubles and dangerous small wars. American military

power has thus been, and remains, a guarantor of

peace, freedom, and stability in the world, painful as the exercise has been.

But drawing lines backed up by arms is a strategy of very limited effectiveness. No policeman at the gate can stop every clever incursion. No amount of threat will cure those discontents in unstable countries that

make

the pres-

No

degree of containment guarantees liberalization within the communist world or the erosion of its chiliastic fanaticism. For such purposes naked power is totally impotent. To do better than to stand eternally on guard, terrified of every change, American foreign policy must learn how to use, far more skillfully than it has, the instruments of money, intelligence, and politics, to which armed power is but a supplement. ent lines fragile.

Afterword

Ronald Steel

Despite my hesitation in appending an afterword to an afterword, thereby confirming that no one ever has the last word on anything, I fear that Mr. Pool's efforts to clarify the reader

may

have resulted in even greater confusion.

I

suspect that the reader did indeed read his original re-

marks right, and that the afterword contributes less to his argument than to the release of a certain amount of steam. Without trying to weigh the merits of social scientists, like Mr. Pool, who "insist on evidence," in distinction to "polemicists" (presumably his critics), who have no regard for "hard facts," and without discussing the agonies of power suffered by those whose "reward is saving lives" in contrast to the protester who "need be neither accurate, informed, nor correct," it is obvious that something more is involved in the problem of the exercise of power than the respective virtues of those who affirm and those who protest. What is involved is a real issue which has been dealt with extensively during the discussion of whether the accre-

232

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

power has brought the benefits, both it was ostensibly established to provide, or whether in fact the growth of governmental power has led to the erosion of its effective exercise and to the detriment of the interest of those it was supposed to serve. This is not a partisan issue, nor one which could normally be expected to align social scientists on one side and what Mr. Pool refers to as the "self-destructive intelligentsia" on tion of governmental at

home and abroad,

One may have differences of opinion about the way power is used or even whether there is such a thing as

the other.

an impotence of power, but it is hard to see what this has do with the virtues of those who decide to exercise power

to

rather than to criticize

its

abuse.

No

one on the panel except Mr. Pool said it is more moral to be a critic than a member of what he calls the Establishment, or that power in itself is a bad thing. The phrases are his, introduced for the purpose of serving as straw men to be blown down with salvos of ridicule. However, even these extreme statements do not appear as far out as some of Mr. Pool's assertions, ostensibly based on "hard facts," such as: city dwellers are "increasingly powerful" because "electricity and trucking and other such facilities allow them more leisure and a higher standard of living" ; or that "it was in the service of the highest goals, democracy at home and peace in the world, that ... we have created the concentration of power in Washington"; or that youthful protesters are exclusively "children of the

urban

intelligentsia sent off to elite colleges"

State?]; or that the

mark

[like

of anti-intellectualism

failure of intellectuals to recognize

CIA

Kent

is

the

agents as "their

brothers in the search for knowledge."

The

real difference between

Mr. Pool and the other pan-

not over "hard facts," or the virtues of being a "responsible intellectual" who works for the Establishment rather than a careless "Cassandra." Nor is it even over the

elists is

central question of whether the concentration of

power

in

the central government has often not only been detrimental to the well-being of its citizens

but also increasingly

effective in dealing with the central

problems of

in-

society.

— The Impotence Rather

it is

of

Power

233

over the use of American power, particularly

military power, to bring about the kind of world order desired

by those groups which determine American foreign

policy.

Defining American interests as resting upon the preservation of the ideological boundaries drawn after the Secthat peace depends upon The defense of anticommunist regimes in such places as Vietnam is therefore, by such definition, an act of "peace-keeping." "American military

ond World War, Mr. Pool argues respect for those lines.

power," w e are told, "remains a guarantor of peace, freedom, and stability in the world." Mr. Pool admits that we have failed in our effort to achieve our political ambitions through the application of naked force, and suggests we put greater emphasis on such nonviolent means as foreign aid, the CIA, and USIA. Violence is now ruled out because it has failed. But is this not an admission of an impotence of power? And although bribery, subversion, and propaganda are preferable to fragmentation bombs and napalm, do they not also indicate the limitations imposed on even the greatest military and economic power? The lesson of Vietnam is not only that the world's most powerful nation has been unable to exert its will, but also that ideological line-drawing has become obsolete and even r

irrelevant. In the quest for a

more

rational foreign policy,

1945 have no from Indochina, a

the defenders of the ideological frontiers of

monopoly on "hard

facts," and, judging

rather poor record in "saving lives."

Afterword

Nat Hentoff

Professor de Sola Pool's Afterword

is, I

believe, a particu-

document of these times. I commend its careful study to anyone involved in being a freer citizen and especially to those still young in the potentialities of citizenship, professionalism, and what it is to be an intel-

larly significant

lectual. It is

precisely this kind of Orwellian triplethink that has

234

Dissent, Power,

—

and Confrontation

made this country so feared abroad and within. We can help humanize America and regenerate its beginnings byexamining the deeds and rationalizations of our de Sola Pools most thoroughly and then taking great care to avoid the route they have followed. Let him remain with his "brothers in the search for knowledge," the CIA.

—

7 EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

The Debris of Marxism

Panelists:

JOEL CARMICHAEL

EKKEHART KRIPPENDORFF HAROLD ROSENBERG Moderator:

UGO STILLE

Discussants:

Eric Bentley

Max Geltman

Murray Bookchin James Johnson Leo Sauvage

Sidney Morgenbesser Sol Yurick Afterwords:

EKKEHART KRIPPENDORFF HAROLD ROSENBERG

This TFI discussion was held on August 4, 1969.

[UEEEEEH] Ugo Stille / When

title

discussion,

felt

I was first told the "The Debris of Marxism," I

of tonight's it

implied a

note of complacent, even contemptuous, superiority which

appeared totally unwarranted. It seems to me that Marxism is still a very lively, solid phenomenon in the world. But both Joel Carmichael and Harold Rosenberg will clarify for us, I believe, somewhere in their remarks, why they consider the term "debris" appropriate. We'll begin with Mr. Carmichael.

Joel Carmichael /

thought the title a good one because young people all over Europe and America busily rioting and creating public situations in which the main point, as I understand it, is that they are it

I

refers to a lot of

against "systems."

They

rather find systems as such bor-

and thoroughly outmoded. At the same time, however, they use a sort of vocabulary that relies heavily upon recollections of Marxism. I'm not now talking about those very few students and young people who are in fact Marxists and say so. I'm ing,

corny,

philistine,

traditional,

talking about a lot of others

who make

a point of being

and use slogans that they think are objective and impersonal, but which actually stem from Marxism. So one can refer to the "debris" of Marxism in the sense that these youths are inspired in some way by emotions and attitudes generated by Marxism, but they reject entirely the intellectual structure of Marxism, precisely be-

unaffiliated ideologically

237

238

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

cause they object to systems as such. They are operating with only fragments and morsels, scraps drawn from collapsed systems which, if they were to arise in their integrity, would be rejected by most of these young people as a matter of principle. Now this is an absurd situation, because Marxism was, of course, a sort of system. It may be considered by many to be a pernicious system, an outmoded system, a totally collapsed system. Nevertheless it had the rationale of a system. When one spoke of making a revolution or taking power or doing any of the great many things that Marxists traditionally tried to do, there was a reason for doing those things within that particular system. When the system is rejected as a system, and nothing remains but isolated concepts and even sometimes merely slogans, I think the situation becomes absurd. I think it ridiculous for young people to use words like revolution outside of any context whatsoever.

When

young man, Cohn-Bendit, says

that extremely able

emotion that the revolution must not a Marxist and he himself would reject

in a voice throbbing with

go on, he

is

—

suppose. What he's doing, as I see it, is striking a romantic attitude, a theatrical pose; and I think that's pernicious, because it confuses people. It confuses himself, his audience, and all the people who talk about him. It's that idea,

I

my

mind, calling in

this abstract,

emotional, dramatic, attitudinizing

a revolution

when

way for would have made

a revolution

absolutely pointless, to

all the rationale that

—

both sensible and possible and, according to the ideas of Marx and Engels themselves, absolutely inevitable have been totally discarded, dropped by the wayside, with nothing whatsoever left but a romantic gesture.

—

I'm not now even discussing the debris of Marxism in another sense in which one might legitimately say that Marxism has in fact been exploded not only as a system but also as a political movement. When the Russian Bolsheviks took power in the name of Marxism in 1917 and tried to institute socialism the only viable Marxist com-

—

The Debris

of

Marxism

239

munity, if you could call it a Marxist community, that exists except for the Chinese, who are doing the same thing and on an even more slender basis they totally wrenched themselves out of the context of Marxism as such, totally destroyed Marxism, and at the same time proclaimed it as

—

a state ideology. That led to the slaughter of of people.

A

many

millions

totally pernicious, indefensible situation.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / When topic, I thought

it

I

was probably a joke

—

ligent joke but nevertheless a joke

bris" of Marxism, an historical

heard about

—maybe an

to talk

this intel-

about the "de-

phenomenon which, both

movement and as an attempt to understand and come to terms with the problems of modern society, has proven to be rather effective and successful. You must admit that Marxism as a political movement and as a rational system has, after as you call it, Mr. Carmichael all, revolutionized about a third of mankind, however much you disapprove of the particular ways that Marxism is being applied and I would be certainly among those who criticize the Soviet Union for perverting Marxist ideas. Nevertheless, Marxism has proven a rather effective and as a political

—

—

—

lasting system.

Secondly, roughly speaking, in all underdeveloped countries the majority of the political elites consider themselves, at least subjectively, Marxists or socialists of some sort. As to the young people in this country, I agree with you that many of them use Marxist terminology, Marxist slogans, as you said. But in discussing that, you are not

Marxism, but about the young people. said his voice was throbbing with emotion. I must say your voice wasn't particularly cool and detached; it was also throbbing with emotion. But all that is beside the point. I think basically you are correct about the young generation, in terms of their being antisystem and using Marxist slogans. This should really talking about

You mentioned Cohn-Bendit and

be our starting point. First of all, we have

to

understand that there

is

a con-

240

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

siderable fringe section of youth which do not fall any more into the established and pregiven patterns of society.

Why own

is it

that the only

own

way

for them to understand their

and the role of their counby and large, in rediscovering concepts, and analytical tools, slogans, methods of insight into economics and politics derived from Marxism? They have, after all, the liberal interpretation of the society in which they live, which dominates nearly all thinking and provides so many other possible clues for them with which they are expected to understand their situation. So we have to ask ourselves why the liberal ideology seems so obviously unable to reach them anymore, why they turn to Marxism instead. Now, I don't really know how you define Marxism. To say Marxism is a system is a rather loose and vague defisituation, their

society,

try in the world seems to

lie,

does not get to the root of the Marxism as an established state ideology of the Soviet Union is something very different from Marxism as an analytical method. And Marxism as a historical phenomenon is again something else than what the Chinese at this point are doing. To say that talking about revolution has become a sort of emotional gesture without any content only shows that you are applying a concept of Marxism that you might have taken out of some "classical" textbook, and have not realized that Marxism as a tool of understanding needs permanent reapplication and rethinking about reality which leads to a concept of revolution no longer simply derived from 1789 or 1776 or 1917, or even from 1949 China. We in the West will have to develop a quite different concept of revolution, not the "classical" one at all. And the people who talk today about revolution, be it in France or be it in this country, do, indeed, have a different concept of revolution, which is a creative way of interpreting Marx and applying nition. I think this really

matter.

Marxism

what Marx had

is

a very complex thing.

to say to society today.

Harold Rosenberg /

Well,

I'll

debris of Marxism." First of all

defend the idea of "the

Marxism

is

a system;

I

— The Debris

of

Marxism

241

how anybody can question that. And it's a system as Marx himself said, has as its indispensable ax-

don't see

which,

iom

the idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

don't think that

anybody here would want

to

Now

I

defend the

notion that Marx's concept of the dictatorship of the prolehas changed. I

tariat is still valid; the proletariat itself

don't want to go into the history of all this, but Lenin him-

decided that Marx's idea of the spontaneous uprising was not to be relied on, and therefore the party of professional revolutionaries was necessary. What is the debris of a system? The debris of a system means that the system has entered into popular culture this is exactly the case with the students who quote Marx without bothering to read him. self

of the proletariat

Joel Carmichael / Not

as a system.

Harold Rosenberg / Marxism has

entered their minds as

a debris, and this

Modern

is

what culture

is.

culture

is

the

debris of intellectual systems, as older cultures were the debris of mythic systems. All systems enter into culture as

—

this is another way of saying that they become popular. Systems are for priests, professors, and ideolo-

debris

But when they begin to become popular Rosa Luxemburg said, the idea enters into the

gists.

masses

—

the system breaks

down

—when,

as

life of the

into debris. Active people

don't think in terms of systems, but the insights which

philosophers present systematically become catchwords and stimulate attitudes. In other words, they become part of the popular imagination. This

Even

is

what Marxism has become.

in the Soviet Union, even in China, even in Al-

bania, there

is a popular Marxist culture counterposed to or distinct from the system maintained by the bureaucracy.

This became evident in Czechoslovakia. The Marxist

due of freedom and

resi-

was the basis of Trotsky's belief that as long as the Soviet Union adhered to Marxism in some way, it would emerge again as a "workers' state" in one form or another. But not in the form necessarily of a preconceived organization and set of class

solidarity

242

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

concepts or of what some of the critics of

Marxism have

by codes in the twentieth century and they don't make revolutions by codes, though they may imagine that they do. At this point we have to deal with your complaint, Joel, that the young people are involved in poses. Can you imagine a revolution that is not called a "code." People don't live

—

involved with poses?

Joel Carmichael / But

Harold Rosenberg /

there's something else.

Yes, there

is

something

else.

And

it

comes out through the poses. A revolution is a dramatic event in which individuals and masses play roles. The socialist movement preceded Marx, and Marx tried to codify it into what he called "scientific socialism." Maybe that wasn't such a good idea, although the word "scientific" had almost a sacred aspect in the nineteenth century. The scientific side of

Marxism demanded

that

it

the idea of the triumph of the proletariat intuition.

tem

Now

be a system, but was a dramatic

the Marxist system has collapsed

—

this sys-

that cannot exist without the idea of the ultimate tri-

umph of the proletariat anticipated as a natural phenomenon. Once you discard that dramatic-mystical expectation, Marxism as a system collapses; and the notion of the revolutionary self-activation of the proletariat was discarded not only by Lenin but before him by Bernstein.

But when a great mind and a system with a great prohave existed, it is precisely their debris that contain the most interesting and the most useful things in that system. Historical evolutionism as a system has collapsed, Freudianism as a system has collapsed, Reichian analysis all these systems collapse. As a matter of fact, the idea of making systems is a Central European idea which we don't have much feeling for in this country. This is one of the nice things about America, that we don't create systems though we tend to adopt them. Still, practical matters here are not decided by an academy where one professor wins out over other proliferation of insights

—

—

— The Debris

of

Marxism

243

method prevails and all the professors apply the method. ... In short, the professorial revolution has collapsed. Instead we have the "students' revolution" or the revolution of people who don't like the system. What is the issue then, in regard to this collapsed system of Marxism? For Americans it is the problem of American culture its inability to maintain continuity. When we think about the 1930s we are aware that some people here bought a system the intellectuals gave themselves to Marxism. But the moment they found out that this Marxist system didn't work (from the moment of the Soviet-Hitler pact) they behaved as if they had been sold a very bad second-hand car. They did not attempt to replace worn-out parts; they did not try to correct the system through their own experience; they simply said: We were taken for a ride, now let's get rid of it henceforth we will do withfessors, until a single

—

—

—

out

it.

As

a result the

the world. This

American

is,

I

left lost

touch with the rest of

think, the serious problem, because

Marxism did provide intellectuals could

a terminology by which American keep in touch with the world. That is,

Marxism contained a

basic, critical analysis of capitalism

which could have been, and still can be, of enormous value in transcending local and transient issues. This is evident even in the debris of Marxism.

Ugo Stille / I don't see why you stop at that. Let's take your analysis as true, and I think it is true for American intellectuals, up to a point. But then you see the phenomenon of a very wide protest movement not only in this country but all over the world rather inchoate, rather confused, with several origins, and yet if you search for a single unifying motif and source, you still get back to Marxism. It is misinterpreted, it is simplified, but somehow Marxism whether you call it a debris or a system it's still today a reality which is widely discussed by a lot of the young protesters and is a basic source of their ideas and inspiration. So let's analyze where it is today.

—

—

—

244

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Joel Carmichael / I did not make myself clearly understood if I seemed to imply I thought Marxism unimportant. On the contrary, I think Marx may be called without any exaggeration if you link his personality to the actual product of his thought and you include his personal activ-

—

ity that

influenced other people

—

I

think

Marx

called the most influential individual in history.

can be

It's

quite

true that his ideas or various interpretations of his ideas

govern more than a third of the human race. However, I think the reason for that has nothing to do with the merits of the system at intellectual

all,

complex

nor with the persuasiveness of the Marx created. Rather it has to do

that

with the brute fact of the practical success in certain big countries of parties claiming to be Marxist. The success of the Bolsheviks in taking power in Russia, although it seemed to be a triumph of Marxism, became an absolute contradiction of the essence of Marxism. Harold has summed up that issue as the concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat that arises out of the tug of history itself, out of the bowels of history, because of the progression, the ascension that Marx found by transposing Hegel's logic into social affairs. It creates a situation in which ultimately capitalism destroys itself, as everybody knows; the expropriators are expropriated, the husk is burst asunder by the rise of productive forces,

From

and so

on.

the point of view of that system, the proper coun-

try to go socialist was, of course, an advanced industrial

society like

when

Germany

or the United States. Accordingly, power in Russia, they encoun-

the Bolsheviks took

tered the collapse of their ideas at the very

moment

that

they personally were successful. Even a clever fellow like Trotsky, the ablest writer they had, was reduced to saying that the reason capitalism had collapsed in Russia was because it snapped at its weakest link. In my opinion that's the most false, most pedestrian, most crass, and most philistine statement Trotsky ever made. It contradicted all the ideas he had ever had as a

Marxist.

It

contradicted, for that matter,

common

sense.

Because as soon as you see what Marx meant by the dia-

The Debris

of

Marxism

245

lectical contradiction inherent in

bourgeois society,

how

industrial capitalist society unwittingly creates the prole-

own destruction, and so on, it's from Marx's point of view all this had to take place in an advanced industrial country. It fits in with the particular logic that Marx had developed. But the so-called tariat as the agent of its

clear that

of Marxism in underdeveloped countries is a pseudosuccess as an ideational matter; because it's a purely political success in which people, taking political power in a certain country, become powerful state figures and force most other people to talk about themselves and spread their ideas, not by the virtue of the merit of the ideas themselves or the historical operation of those ideas, but by sheer force. As for what Mr. Stille called the system that's now being discussed, it's not a system at all. It consists of a few slogans that are powered, not by ideas, not by the logical complex that Marx had created, but by an element in Marxism that had been concealed for a long time by the weight of its own erudition namely, paranoia and idealism. Marxism covered those things up because it's such a complex system. It has many pivotal intellectual tools, so that seemingly the entire universe can be talked about perfectly profitably, very fruitfully. When that system was destroyed and it lay about in debris, what remained was middle-class paranoia and idealistic, messianic desire for a "new world." Marx thought the rate of interest had to fall; society had to be polarized, the rich getting smaller and smaller in number and richer and richer per capita the poor getting more and more numerous and poorer and poorer, until, finally, maddened by misery, they blew the whole thing up. Today nobody would dream of defending this notion of success

—

;

polarization of capitalist society, the falling rate of interest,

the dictatorship of the proletariat

made Marxism

—

all of the things

a system. So what is left of the system? Nothing but a veneration, in my opinion, for the figure of Marx as a Promethean intellectual changing the world by books. that

246

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Ekkehart Krippendorff / I'm

afraid what you have been saying has nothing whatsoever to do with what Marx really wrote. There is no point quoting out of context one sentence from Das Kapital, twenty-third chapter, which has nothing to do with the essence of what Marx says. And the essence is not so simple as to be packaged in this fashion reduced to simple cliches, the way it has been written

— up

in every high-school textbook. I

must say you appear to have no understanding whatMarx and Marxism is all about. To say that

soever of what

the Marxist system culminates in the dictatorship of the

and to interpret that complex concept so crudely and naively is truly a reductio ad absurdum. And to say that Lenin simply rejected that concept is also absurd, since actually Lenin worked on that concept for his whole intellectual lifetime: what it is all about and how complex that structure is and what that means in regard to the proletariat

dictatorship of the bourgeoisie as the essence of constitu-

and so forth. These are very complex problems which just can't be reduced to a high-school level as was done here.

tional democracy,

Ugo Stille / The

trouble seems to be that you, Mr. Carmichael, have taken Marxism as a kind of rigid, static system. You tend to completely overlook the fact that there has been a development in Marxism. In the last sixty years practically every generation has rethought certain Marxist

them in a different way. one of the strengths of Marxism. If you limit your analysis to what Marx said in a certain year, it is easy for you to be right, but you will not reach too far. Instead, I hope the discussion will get around to what the meaning of Marxism today is. What do people who call themselves Marxists mean? principles, has tried to interpret

This,

I

think,

is

Joel Carmichael / Harold and ism a system, but

it's

far too intelligent to

I

have been calling Marx-

quite true, of course, that

make

it

Marx was

out to be a system himself.

The Debris

And

I

of

agree.

Marxism It's

247

always possible

to say,

Well,

it's

not

exactly a system because, although he said this here, some-

place else he said something else. And of course that's quite true, because he actually spent only a few pages developing some things later taken up by Engels to become a sort of system. That's

one of the main reasons

I

think that

discussion between Marxists has been absolutely endless for generations. There's no

When

way

of establishing anything.

say Marxism is a system, I'm saying rather it is grosso moto, it's a sort of rough, compulsive framework for the development of a certain view he had of the progression of history and society. Naturally, it's impossible to persuade anybody that my interpretation of this system is the only interpretation possible. Lenin in his will said that Bukharin was the favorite of the party and their major theoretician. However, Lenin went on to say that he often doubted that Bukharin had really got the grasp of the dialectic. So Stalin used this with crushing effect on Bukharin just before he had him killed. He said, So we have here a man present, Bukharin, "the greatest theoretician of the party," and he doesn't understand the dialectic. It's too complicated. But Lenin thought he was the greatest I

I regard that as an absolutely crushing criticism of an attempt to make Marxism, not in its totality but in its essence, very complicated. I think in its essence it's quite simple but in its totality it's endlessly complicated.

theoretician in the party.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / To understand what that very complicated system which Marx developed is all about, you have to go back into the whole anthropological concept of man as a producer who produces his own environment, and so on, into his philosophical and sociological conception of alienation. This anthropological analysis is a precondition for the understanding of that usually oversimplified concept that man and human institutions are modes of production, and the modes of production are determined by the particular ways in which related to the

248

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

people assemble in order to produce commodities, produce produce their own institutions and their own environment. However, if one simply says everything in Marx is based on the economy and the economic structure, one can derisively say: Ha ha ha, it's obviously not true that the capitalists run America, because there are conflicts between the big corporations and the government. In that simplistic way, of course, you can always put down Marx and Marxism, and you can also refute Marx about certain predictions which he made. Any brainwashed schoolchild can recite that argument about the Soviet Union being the least likely place where, according to Marxism, revolution could possibly take place. But this is simplistic nonsense setting aside Marxist theoretical developments over the years even in terms of Marx himself. Read some of his observations in his writings on colonialism and colonial dependency. Read his replies to the Russian comrades who corresponded with him, in which Marx explicitly wrote that, having studied the situation further, he now realized that there was more of a chance in Russia for socialist revolution than he had assumed originally. As to the concentration of wealth among fewer and fewer capitalists and the masses getting poorer and poorer: world-wide, with regard to the poor underdeveloped and the rich capitalist nations, and to people within many countries, this is just what seems to have been occurring certainly on a relative basis. And for the United States, for example, we know the statistics that the concentration of wealth at the top has been increasing. So has the concentration of power and control by fewer and interconnected corporations, over bigger and more important sectors of intellectual things, transform nature,

—

—

the economy.

And

this interconnection of corporations is

growing, of course, internationally.

Now Marx was the first one, back in 1848, to point out the inevitable penetration of the whole world by the capitalist modes of production; how this was leading, worldwide, to a "division of labor" and a separation into the

The Debris

of

Marxism

249

—about which

large mass of underemployed poor people

everybody talks today

—and

capitalist exploiter nations

global scale,

we

see

how

a small class of privileged

on the other

side. Here,

Marx analyzed only Marxists who

correctly

on a

the basic

are able laws of capitalism; and it is today the "development of underdevelopment"

to explain

within the framework of the capitalist-imperialist system,

while the liberals deplore "morally" the obvious failure of schemes like the "development decade," without being able to understand it. Also I can assure you that Marx himself was fully aware of the relativity of poverty. Using a parable, he wrote that if a house is small compared to a larger house, it becomes tiny when it stands next to a palace. Marx would never argue that the working class has to sink deeper or remain at a specifically low level to qualify as a proletariat. Marx takes account of psychological deprivation, too. He speaks, for example, of the worker just selling his working power and not recognizing himself in his own product. This is part of the concept of alienation we all talk about today. These are just a few of the many, many aspects which are relevant for those people who today discover, or rediscover, the relevance of Marxism, as opposed to the oversimplifying popularizers' and critics' version of what is supposedly Marxism. To say that the successes of Marxism or the coming into being of the Soviet Union and Red China, Cuba, Yugoslavia, and so on, is purely due to a few power-hungry individuals for

whom Marxism was

nique of manipulation

—

instrumental, a tech-

that really overlooks a

whole host

who have studied many, many years, who have stud-

of things, including millions of people

Marx and Marxism

for

ied Engels, Kautsky, Lenin, Trotsky

(who has

just

been

called "a clever fellow" while he could have intellectually

put anybody in this room into his pocket). Millions of committed people have been involved, not just a dozen power-hungry individuals. If the latter were the case, I must say it would have been the most remark-

250

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

dozen determined revoluon a false, discredited, outmoded system, should have revolutionized the world to such a degree. If we want to talk about debris, then we able, incredible success: that a

tionaries, basing themselves

should be talking about the debris of liberalism. Nobody

seems

to

even understand anymore what that means.

Ugo Stille / Now balance,

I

that we've reached the right emotional

think that the audience should be called in to

participate.

Sidney Morgenbesser* /

I

wonder

ever talked to any of the students. extent the others on the panel there's

—

no unified system that

if

Mr. Carmichael has and to some

think he

I

—

are maintaining that, since all the

students support,

therefore the students individually don't have systems and

they have

debris and slogans. This

is simply false. have complicated views, sometimes as complicated as any of the professors have. Whether they're right or wrong is another issue. But they do have individual systems, not just debris and slogans even though there's no one unified system. Secondly, the thing Marx spent most of his life on was

all

Lots

is

of these

individually,

students,

—

the theory of capitalism, so right to say that

Marxism

is

it

would seem

dead,

is

a debris,

to if

me

quite

no living

economist took his theory of capitalism seriously, if all economists today disregarded it. But this is also false. Marx's attempted proof for the instability of capitalism is still being treated with a great deal of respect. Schumpeter had high regard for Marx; so do many economists in England Goodwin, SrafTra, Joan Robinson, among others. Now I think the heart of Marxism as a scientific system

—

is

an attempt

to

prove the instability of capitalism.

Voice / [scathingly] By *

the dialectic.

Sidney Morgenbesser teaches philosophy

at

Columbia University.

— The Debris

— of

Marxism

251

Sidney Morgenbesser / Nonsense! As far as the attempted proof of the instability of capitalism is concerned, it doesn't depend on dialectic for a minute. I don't think the proof quite goes through, but economists differ on that.

Harold Rosenberg /

I

agree that the kids can have sys-

tems, but in that case you're talking about art. ferent individuals

make up

different systems

of similar notions, that's what

is

called art.

When

dif-

on the basis

Someone looks

Cezanne and makes up an aesthetic system and that's art. Then someone else looks at Cezanne and he conceives cubism, and someone else looks at Cezanne and arrives at minimalism. But Marx set forth a universal, scientific sysat a

tem, scientific socialism.

He

wasn't just codifying a lot of

ideas.

Now when

I

say debris, I'm taking

like debris. I think that

when good

it

very seriously.

I

ideas are being dis-

seminated throughout society, the results, creatively, are much better than when one good idea or system is kept within a kind of cabal which develops a whole theology about it. In other words, I'm not at all against the fact that there's been an explosion of Marxism and a fallout.

Sidney Morgenbesser / Do you identify commitment

to

a system with commitment to a theology? That you can't

defend your commitment critically?

Harold Rosenberg / Wait a minute. Marx had to be considered

have said in an two lights. One was his trenchant criticism of the capitalist system as a structure that one cannot get away from, or simply put down. Marx's other aspect is his concept of action. My piece was called "Criticism and/or Action."* The action idea is what we are referring to when we speak of the application of Marxism in the Soviet Union and China, and article that

*

New

The

article is included in

York, 1970).

my Act and

Harold Rosenberg

I

in

the Actor

(World Publishing,

252

Dissent, Power,

As

so on.

me

say

and Confrontation

far as Marx's critical system

first

of all that

it's

is

concerned,

let

anti-Marxist to accept that sys-

tem by itself, i.e., without the conclusions regarding action. I do accept it generally by itself, without the action component. But I regard this as an anti- or un-Marxist gesture. Because Marx himself insisted that criticism of the capisystem, no matter how accurate, was not what he was

talist

—

if this criticism did not carry with it the revolutionary proletarian action. The mystery of the Marxist system lies in what Marx expected the proletariat to do. If the proletariat does not do it, then you have in Marx a brilliant man, with brilliant analyses, criticisms, insights don't think any of us want to run Marx down as a thinker but Marxian scientific socialism must be abandoned.

after

—

—

Joel Carmichael / Of course, nobody denies that Marx was an unusually able man. But it also seems to be absolutely irrelevant. You say yourself, Harold, that you think his system wrong,

outmoded, in debris. That's the point.

Sidney Morgenbesser /

"Marxism"

name

We

all of

in a variety of ways.

us have used the

"Marxism"

for a general orientation about

man

is

word

used as a

as actor.

It's

also applied to a general theory of society and to a general

approach

to history.

Many

of these theories are no longer

acceptable to us. There's no definite Marxist theory of history or society that we all now can uphold. Moreover many of the so-called Marxist intellectuals in the thirties were quite ignorant about the history of thought and the history of philosophy.

They believed

silly things

about the ideal-

and the empiricists; Marx seemed to them almost a revelation from on high. So, once again, as a theory, ists

like this

time about history or philosophy, it is at best a first approximation. What does remain is the thing to which Marx devoted so much time: a detailed attempted economic proof that capitalism as a system was unstable and in the long run would collapse. I submit that to say that that part of Marx which I consider central for this discussion

—

The Debris

of

Marxism

253

—

is not worth attention seems to be a complete overstatement. And to say that no one takes that seriously anymore is

simply

false.

Young Man a couple of

Audience / This argument strikes me like monastic philologists up in their tower while in

and New Leftists are running around the courtyard and you have the Third World about to storm the walls. I think Mr. Krippendorff is the only one who touched on the essential question, that in both Western Europe and North America advanced capitalist societies have produced people who appear to have some sort of revolutionary character and I'm talking about ourselves the blacks

—who is

—

aren't of the traditional proletariat.

And Marxism

the system which these potential revolutionaries

are

using to analyze society. Marxism also gives us a sense, a dialectical sense, of how to predict what's going to happen, and serves as an invaluable guide to revolutionary

planning and action.

Murray Bookchin* / this

I'd like to

add some remarks on I coedit Anarchos

before Mr. Krippendorff comments.

magazine, but in a certain sense I too can call myself a Marxist. A friend of mine once put it very well when he said that he's a Marxist in the same sense that he's a Darwinian. He accepts the dialectic, Marx's theory of alienation,

so

do

I.

and the

brilliant analysis of

commodity

rela-

Marx developed

in volume one of Capital. And In this sense I've been a Marxist for many years,

tions that

but the problem to my thinking is that Marxism is no longer applicable today in the same way that it was in

and earlier. Capitalism has undergone transformations that Marx could not be expected to foresee a century or so ago. He made a brilliant analysis of industrial capitalism what many people call laissez-faire capi-

the 1930s

—

*

Murray Bookchin

thetic

is

coeditor of Anarchos and the author of Our SynCities, and Post-Scarcity Anarchism.

Environment, Crisis in Our

254

Dissent, Power,

talism

—but

emergence of I

what

we

are

and Confrontation

experiencing

now

the

is

state capitalism.*

don't regard Russia as a socialist country;

—

I

think

development the Russians, I mean, and I can add the Cubans and Chinese is along state capitalist lines. You also have very important developments going on in the United States, especially among young people. These developments are typified by what students at one university told me: There are only about thirty Marxists on campus and over three hundred flipped-out anarchists. The anarchists are the ones who are engaged in all the action; the Marxists merely rush to the forefront with a "banner" and are ready to "lead" everyone. This, I believe, is typical of what happened among the students in France in May-June, 1968. Now what are the limitations of Marxism? And how do you transcend Marxism in the dialectical sense, and go further to apply a dialectical approach so that you can understand the new system of relationships that are emerging? Here, in the United States, a great deal of revolutionary energy is being created by relative material abuntheir

—

—

dance.

A

lot of

kids are flipping out.

Many

of them are

going into the radical movement not because they are or expect to be factory workers or because they feel material oppression; what bothers them is that they have been turned into commodities, mere objects.

Marx grasped

this

sense of spiritual immiseration in his early works, but

he moved on and developed his theories mainly around economic exploitation. Now we find Marxist movements the classical socialist movements of our time whose orthodoxy serves to obscure rather than clarify the later

—

* These remarks are not intended to mean that Marx did not anticipate the possibility of state capitalism (in the Grundrisse of 1857-59 he even raises the possibility of automation) ; but he certainly did not understand its cultural and social implications nor could he be expected to do so. Marx's social analysis is based almost entirely on the industrial capitalist development of his time and its most characteristic cultural expression the moral calculus of Bentham. Murray Bookchin

—

—

The Debris situation.

of

Marxism

255

These movements either put down the present

"life-style" revolt or ignore

it

completely.

What

they don't

understand is that the kids are fighting not for socialism but for communism. Yes, many of the kids, by their tribalism, their attacks on bourgeois sexuality and bourgeois spiritual oppression, are fighting not for socialism but for

—

communism whether they know it or not. They are fighting for communism and a new anarchic dimension to social life

—an

emphasis on spontaneity

—and

not merely

for winning the proletariat but for winning the entire gen-

young people have tasted material abundance and have become disgusted by it and by what it stands for. They have seen the American Dream turn into an American Nightmare. How, then, in a real dialectical sense, do you assimilate what Marxism has to teach and go beyond it to deal with this new phenomenon: this problem of spiritual poverty, of revolutionary unrest generated not by material immiseration but by relative abundance and the reduction of the individual to a commodity, including the contradiction between town and country, and the crisis in ecology? And what of the struggle against hierarchy as such? After all, Leninism completely incorporates hierarchical elements into its theory and practice, despite its demand for a eration of youth. These

"classless" society.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / You all raise many And I do not have nice, neat answers. I'm

tions.

ques-

not a

computer in which you can put a coin and here's the simple answer in a capsule. To begin with, many things which some consider wholly new developments in capitalism were, in fact, already analyzed by Marx himself. Take this whole problem of socalled state capitalism, the expropriation of the individual

and the replacement of the individual capitalby the corporation manager, and so forth. In Marx's 1859 Grundrisse not yet translated this is developed quite far. And in quite a few pages in volume three of capitalist, ist

—

—

256

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Das Kapital, Marx very

clearly spelled out that the individual capitalist is being replaced by the manager, who is no longer an individual capital owner, an individual entrepreneur, but that a managerial class is being formed.

And from

this follows logically state capitalism, the

tification of state

iden

power, of government, with corporate

structures.

chapter of Galbraith's book The New Industrial State could have been written without Marx. And toward the end of that book where Galbraith tries to

Not even the

first

refute the Marxist analysis, he

comes up with very vague managers may become

suggestions, saying that corporation

more enlightened and reduce their companies' involvement in armaments production and purely industrial profit acand should turn also to urban development and education and other social or public-interest areas. This is

tivities

a purely idealistic hope, of course, but its basic analysis could not have been written without Marx, either. Now as to the application of Marxism to present conditions, I agree with you that this is an enormous problem. Already Lenin, fortunately, was not a dogmatic Marxist. Rather Lenin applied the essence of Marx's analysis in a new creative way. In that sense, Mao is also not a Marxist. He would say, Go to hell with your stereotypes, such as "the proletariat," we have the peasants. That was a very

by the Chinese between 1920 and 1940, until it was realized that a peasantry does constitute a revolutionary class. This was a productive application of

bitter lesson learned

certain basic insights into the functioning of a specific society.

Today in modern, late capitalism we should, of course, not be looking for the classic revolutionary proletariat; we might lose sight of exactly those groups who at this point what I would call the revolutionary subject. We should look rather to where deprivation today appears in new forms, such as among the fringe elements of the young generation, and within the technostructure itself where constitute

technicians and professionals

become more and more

al-

The Debris

of

Marxism

257

ienated from the system of capitalism in which they work,

and experiencing to some degree its contradicTake for example the March 4 movement at MIT. Marx was certainly mistaken as far as timing is concerned. So what? He was not wrong as far as I can see in his prediction about the basic instability of the system. The fact that the state has to move in to protect the big corporations by all sorts of means, not only with indirect subsidies via armaments but by direct subsidies, proves the realizing

tions.

basic instability of that system. There are cracks in the

wall everywhere testifying to this instability, and to these contradictions, and everybody is nervous and apprehensive about what may happen. Thus, this transformation into late capitalism to

my mind

Marx Marxists who

is

are so-called

no argument against certain

had. The trouble

basic insights which

still

is

the thirties, and those concepts are also written tain textbooks

and then everybody uses

show that Marxism Mao would probably agree.

ism

to

is

that there

are used to the concepts of

up

that alleged

in cer-

Marx-

a ridiculous phenomenon.

As to anarchists, there have always been strong anarchist elements in the socialist movement. One can even say that to some degree, strategically speaking, anarchism and socialism do go together strategically, not tactically, speaking, and not in the essentials of analysis. Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, Gramsci argued very effectively against the anarchists

—

as analysts and as tacticians. But in the strategic, long-

range perspective there

is

a coinciding of attempts to de-

stroy a particular political structure, the

modern

state,

and

with new forms of self-organization or selfdetermination. Self-determination in terms of the governing of communities, of factories, of schools, and so on and so replace

it

forth.

All this implies new concepts of revolution which are emerging and which cannot be described in those classical notions of revolution, of storming the White House and storming City Hall by a mass of proletarians marching with red flags. That's not the revolution we will see and

258

Dissent, Power,

experience.

It

might

still

have been

to

and Confrontation

some degree

the case

in China, but certainly not in our societies.

We

need a whole new concept of revolution. The fact movements today use as their rhetoric certain stereotypes is partly, perhaps mainly, the fault of their teachers, who have not provided them with a more sophisticated revolutionary framework of thinking. So as they search on their own, they come across the stereotyped sort of simplified Marxism and even Stalinist texts. If you read the Black Panther newspaper you see that quite understandably, given their needs and the lack of a sound Marxist analytical tradition here they apply Marxism as if it were a newly found toy which miraculously explains all the riddles of the world. I am confident that they will go through this phase and come to realize a deeper understanding of these concepts and develop creatively revolutionary strategies and tactics applicable to their specific that the radical

—

—

American

situation.

Max Geltman* / The

idea of

Marxism now

in debris is

But certainly I look upon the debris more negatively than Harold Rosenberg or Mr. Joel Carmichael. Of course the man here who is most wrong about Marx is the gentleman who defends him most vehemently, Mr. KrippendorfT. There is nothing in Marx no book, no pamphlet, no marginalia in which he could find the quotations he cited. On the other hand, it may shock those who applauded Mr. Krippendorff to be informed that there was no man more procolonial than Karl Marx in his day. Marx applauded the American-Mexican invasion. The notion of brilliantly apt.

—

—

Marx being

anticolonial is totally absurd. Marx considered colonialism progressive. He didn't care if slavery was introduced as far down as Tierra del Fuego. He said that America represented progressive capitalism. Marx regarded capitalism as a highly progressive concept. He * Max Geltman is a regular contributor to National Review and the author of Confrontation: Black Power, Anti-Semitism and the Myth of

Integration.

I

The Debris

of

Marxism

259

wrote about that voluminously. By contrast, the little bit he wrote about alienation was when he was twenty-two or so before he wrote the Manifesto, before he wrote his anti-Semitic work on the Jewish question, before he even wrote his doctoral thesis. And that bit of marginalia from Marx as a boy is picked up and hailed as the true and profound Marx. Now the thing about Marx is that unfortunately he has been only too successful. There isn't anything the Russians have done that you cannot find in Marx. And if you don't believe every jot and tittle of Stalinism comes from Marx, read Marx's circular to the Communist League in 1850, two years after the Manifesto. And there he will tell you about the development of the terror of the Studentin which, today, imitates some of the Hitler Youth of the thirties, as I've written, and as Bruno Bettelheim has

—

—

written.

—

In a letter to Engels, Marx wrote, "Our system" quote word for word "Our system is a German system, our ideology is a German ideology." Marx wrote this in answer to the French system of socialism which he denigrated. By the way, he also said the Anglo-Saxons would probably never understand it. And as for the Americans, Marx gave up altogether; don't feel so upset, because he knew you'd never dig it. He knew that his was a German system. And if you read German there's a pamphlet by a Nazi intellectual* entitled From Marx to Hitler, which

—

shows how much indebted the Nazis were to Marx's circuand to the Manifesto which I call the first totalitarian manifesto, because the three most operative words in it are statification, centralization, and industrial armies to coerce agriculture. Now what did Stalin do ex-

—

lar of 1850,

cept this?

What

did

Mao

Tse-tung do, except this: provide

an industrial army for agriculture. And Marx says, You'll make them work. Now everybody knows Marx's predictions have not held * Willibald Schulze.

260

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

up his economics was nonsense, the dialectic doesn't work, and scientific socialism, of course, is absurd. So, what the hell is left? What's left is the circular of 1850 to which all terrorists are indebted. What's left is the fact that when Marx died and was buried in Highgate Cemetery, about eight people showed up, because the English working class ;

despised him, the English working-class leaders wouldn't show up under pain of death.

Ugo Stille / As to

moderator, I, for one, would like hear from some members of the audience who are of

the

New

Left, to discuss

what Marxism means

to

them

to-

day.

Joel Carmichael / But most of the New Left people are not Marxists. Take Cohn-Bendit or Rudi Dutschke. Those are the kind of people who have reduced Marxism to a cluster of slogans, of a purely

emblematic value.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / I'm sorry, you have never read a line of Rudi Dutschke. He has never been published in this country.

Joel Carmichael /

I

read him in the

German newspa-

pers.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / German newspapers! That proves once again that your point is based on ignorance. In any event, these young men have been blown up out of proportion by the press as leaders which they never really were. Cohn-Bendit was one of many thousand people in that movement, but the press wanted an individual to focus on, so they picked Cohn-Bendit. He is young, twenty-three years old, but he has written a very intelligent book. You might disagree with many things he has to say, but given his youth and his relative naivete about it's still a first-rate book which most of the things being written by

history and political theory, is

by far superior

to

The Debris

of

Marxism

the established people

261 in his

own country and

the

in

United States. But, in any event, the movement does not function in terms of individual leaders. Isn't it just too bad that you can no longer neatly identify everything: this is the movement, so-and-so is the leader, this is the hierarchy, first,

second, third

man

in

command. That's what

the whole

Establishment continually tries to tell us [applause] organize a party, play according to the rules of the game, as we have laid it out. Instead there is an unorganized, diffused kind of movement, which grows in all sorts of ways and which cannot be so easily repressed by rounding up leaders. And what do you, up here with me on this panel, have to tell these people in the movement, some of whom came here tonight? Obviously nothing that has relevance to their concern and action to today and to:

—

morrow, and the day thereafter.

Harold Rosenberg /

Just a minute.

We've already had

several soap-box speeches flung at us. Calling for action

and accusing a man of not knowing what he's talking about when he says he's read something in German newspapers that has nothing to do with debate, it has to do with soap-box agitation and I think those of you who applaud this ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Mr. Krippendorff said that today's Marxists are really Marxists through being anti-Marxists. He said that Lenin developed a new approach by being opposed to certain concepts of Marx. He said that Mao did this even more so. In other words, he's saying you make use of Marxism by criticizing and modifying it. I think we could agree about that. And that's what's called debris. That is where you have a lot of ideas lying around. Nobody accepts the system as given, but people pick up pieces of it, an idea here, a concept or mode there, and make something out of them. This is what we mean by culture, and the word culture and the word debris are practically synonymous, [audience laughter] Now, I don't want to hear all this

—

262

Dissent, Power,

piety.

up out

and Confrontation

We're not a mass meeting. We're not going to get of here and march down to City Hall. And to insist

it isn't worthwhile discussing a subject because the people who are here are not going to do anything about it forthwith is simply degrading. People attend panel discussions and introduce the tactics of mass meetings and accuse the other panelists of not being as activist as they are. I don't know what Mr. Krippendorff is doing to overthrow the capitalist system, and I really don't want to put him to that test. But I don't think anybody else here should be put to that test either. I think that we ought to respect each other to the extent of talking about ideas and not challenging other people's integrity.

that

Eric Bentley* / I missed the beginning but I've heard an hour of discussion. It seems to me fundamentally at cross-purposes, which could be instructive in itself. Underlying even this last comment about manners is the real issue. Now, point number one: You can't discuss Marx, not in this kind of practical context that we have today the way he was being discussed when I came in by Mr. Carmichael. That's like discussing Christianity solely in terms of the beliefs of Jesus. The historical fact is that at this moment behind the world communist and socialist movements stands only one thinker of the first rank and that is Marx he has this position of seniority. One might agree on this, disagree on that, he may have been found wrong on the other. Nevertheless, the fact is that if you join this world force toward socialism, you're joining Marx to a very considerable extent whether or not you call yourself a Marxist. Like

—

Mount

Everest,

Marx

is

there as a major thinker, the

senior thinker in that world movement.

Point

number two: Marxism

is

not merely the definition

of a philosophy but also denotes a world historical movement of more than one hundred years' duration and ex* Eric Bentley's to Die,

and Theatre

books include Bernard Shaw, Time of

Commitment.

to

Live and Time

The Debris

of

Marxism

263

tending over the whole globe. For Marxists, for socialists and communists, Marxism is not just a philosophy with which one agrees; it is a belief to which one assents and

—

committed to and on which one acts. The relation to is very crucial and was discussed by Marx himself in the very beginning, with everything put on the basis of

is

action

process.

So

—although

hall, as

there is no question of our all leaving the Harold Rosenberg was deriding, and taking action

in the nineteenth-century sense of storming City Hall

—

a deeper sense, yes, taking action and taking sides

very

much what

it's all

are people here

about.

who

And

it

is

is

in

significant that there

are committed to the American

There are

—

way

hear it, I smell it, I feel it. There are also some people here who are committed to what one speaker called communism, as distinct from socialism. I think this is right, that largely the revolt in this country is a revolt for comof

life,

that

is

to say, to capitalism.

munism. The time has come, is

when one should say if one for communism." This is us are saying to Congressional people who in fact,

part of this revolt, "I

what some of

I

am

Amendment stuff of twenty has nothing to do with membership in the communist party. But one should say, "I am a Communist, that is, I'm against the whole capitalist way of life, I wish to destroy it, I'm part of this effort." Now ask, contrary to all the Fifth

years ago. Of course,

in this

it

movement, the chief theoretician

Sidney Morgenbesser /

you seem

is

Marx.

to be saying that one is a Marxist, and vice versa; that to be Marxist and to be opposed to what the New Left or the students are doing is a contradiction in terms. That seems to me silly. Many Marxists don't fit that formula. Eugene Genovese, for example, isn't of the New Left, but he considers himself a Marxist. In turn, some New Leftists do not consider themselves Marxif

one

ists.

is

in favor of the

Eric,

New

Left, then

264

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

can be wrong on the numbers, but my New Left is that it's predominantly Marxist. Though some of it may be pretty amateurishly

Eric Bentley /

I

impression of the Marxist.

Robert Silvers* / As I understand Sidney, he is saying who consider themselves very serious Marxists and radicals who sharply differ with and criticize

there are people the

New

Left from a Marxist standpoint.

Eric Bentley / This is part of the history of Marxism and has happened from the very beginning. When one section of the

movement has a critique, it wants to throw Group or individual differences

the others out as heretics.

among Marxists have been

Leo SAUVAGEf /

perennial.

Let's take a practical example. In

May

French student movement at Nanterre with CohnBendit started against the communists and without the Marxists. Even the Trotskyites split at the moment of Nanterre because they said they wouldn't follow "an adven'68, the

turous petit-bourgeois Putsch" using the same expression the communists used for Castro in '58. So only some of

And the whole Cohn-Bendit beginning was a thrust both against the bourgeois establishment and against the communist establishment. I don't know for certain about the American movement, but even in the American movement I have the impression that Marxism is secondary. But certainly in the French movement of '68, Marxism was not only not a part of the movement, Marxism was outside and against the Trotskyites went along.

movement

at the

the movement.

Eric Bentley / against the

It's

a mistake to assume that revolting is a sign of a revolt against

Communist party

The New York Review. American correspondent of the French newspaper

* Robert Silvers is editor of

Le

t Leo Sauvage Figaro.

is

The Debris

of

Marxism

265

one makes the assumption that the Commuit has been in the last thirty years or more is the standard-bearer of Marxism, then everything I have said surely goes out of the window. Actually I think what Cohn-Bendit was doing was more Marxist than what the French Communist party had been doing for a long time.

Marxism.

If

nist party as

It's

exactly as in the history of Christianity or any other

living system of belief.

You

cannot keep

it

in the party

or the church.

Harold Rosenberg / first

spoke.

I

said that

Eric, you were not here when I Marxism is turning into a form of

You could almost call it a form of folklore and I'm not using this in a derogatory sense at all. Because when an idea or a system of ideas becomes popular, the people begin to get the feel of it and they begin to diverge in their formulations of it. At that point, when many individuals make their own variants of the system, you're dealing with an art form in the broad sense of the word. Consequently the many different forms coming out of the same source can constitute a movement, but you can't predict anything about it, which is the essential situation of Marxism today.

culture and that's what you're saying really.

to dissociate Marxism from all those forms has taken on historically in China, in Yugoslavia, in the Soviet Union, in Czechoslovakia, then you are dealing with culture rather than with a defined system of ideas. You're dealing with a broken-down system which has now If

you want

which

begun

it

to enrich the life of mankind. think you're really saying.

And

that's

what

I

Eric Bentley / Yes, but I don't want to totally dissociate it from the people of China, the Soviet, etc. As Mr. Krippendorff was saying, in China, for example, you cannot dissociate Marxism from everybody except three leaders who read books all the time. I think the Marxism was down there in the Communist party of China and among millions of people. Similarly in the Soviet Union while

266

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

making

certain dissociations, nevertheless the revolt, the pressure for change by people in the Soviet Union today, is also Marxism, revolt within a Marxist framework.

Harold Rosenberg /

That's right, that's what

I

mean by

culture and against the system.

Joel Carmichael / You seem to be using Marx as a simple synonym for a rather broad, vague movement that you happen to approve of. Eric Bentley / The approval movement.

Joel Carmichael /

I

think

isn't

vague; neither

clear that

it's

—

the

is

Marxism

is

widely used in exactly the way Harold said as an aspect of folk culture. It has become a simple emblem, a symbol of something else, which boils down to a stance against society in the hopes that the society can be changed, if necessary, by force. That is the total reduction of all Marx's systems in the past in these inchoate movements. The same sort of people use the names of Trotsky and Che Guevarra symbolically, without any interest in Trotsky as a thinker. The actual intellectual or ideological content behind those symbols has been totally forgotten, is of no real interest to them. Marxism is simply no longer viable as a complex of ideas for many of the people who are referring to Marx and citing Marxist slogans.

Sol Yurick* /

First of all,

want, that any system

I'll

grant the point,

if

you

a fiction. All systematized analyses, all attempts at a kind of social mathematics are ficis

is flexible and changes country at this point, as well as with historical conditions, is perhaps the best analytical tool to

tions.

But the Marxist system which

from country

* Sol icals

and

to

Yurick contributes social and is

the author of the novels

political essays

The Warriors,

to

Fertig,

various periodand The Bag.

The Debris

of

Marxism

267

use in understanding what society

is

about, and especially

America.

You

Marx when New relief. You can't Marxist system when

can't talk about the irrelevance of

York City alone has 1,200,000 people on talk about the irrelevance of the

about spiritual deprivation of students to very concrete actions. It's viable, it's meaningful. Now you say it's all reduced to people shouting slogans. What are about one hundred titles on Marxism doing in the Eighth Street Bookstore? New ones keep appearing, they keep being bought, they keep being read, people analyze constantly. So I would say Marxism here is obviously not just a matter of slogans and it's far from you're

talking

which leads them

irrelevant.

Joel Carmichael / The Marxist movement has a mass following in this country?

Sol Yurick /

It's

getting stronger every day.

Joel Carmichael / That's what they've been saying a hundred years.

for

James Johnson / Perhaps Mr. Carmichael's and Mr. Krippendorff's disagreements are part of a general probthat we in America have. That is, the really high point of American involvement with Marxism as a closed system which is one particular way of understanding

lem

—

Marxism, namely, the ties.

And

—

way was during the thirAmericans became involved with

Stalinist

the fact that

Marxism

in a large way at that particularly unfortunate time in the history of Marxism may have something to do with the fact that Mr. Krippendorfl who is not subject to this problem and is talking from a different perspective finds difficulty in understanding what Mr. Carmichael is talking about when he speaks about the system which has collapsed. A further observation: If we look at the history of

—

—

268

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Marxist parties, trie times when Marxism has been a closed system are precisely those times when the revolutionary goals were the least prominent and were the farthest from being achieved, namely, during the Second International, when the German Social Democratic party reduced Marxism to a closed system as did the Bolsheviks in the Third

—

The most creative periods of Marxism seem to coincide with the breakdown of one of these closed systems. So rather than just debris today, we may be witnessing I'm not saying we are, but we may be witnessing a new creative period in Marxism, which doesn't bother International.

—

—

me

I don't consider myself a MarxBut I don't consider anyone who says he is a Marxist to be more a victim of a closed system than someone who says he is a liberal democrat. Possibly less.

particularly, although

ist.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / Perhaps

I

can clarify the

distinction that was mentioned between socialism historical, political, ideologically defined

Marxism. The tries that I

— a —and as

movement

New

know

Left in this country, and in all counof or have been reading about, I would

consider part of the broad spectrum of socialist movements. That they all imply Marxist analyses does not make these movements Marxist movements. In fact I think a "Marxist movement" is a contradiction in terms.

Marxism

is

an analysis, an analytical attempt

stand society, that carries with

it

to

under-

the obligation to act

the insights gained through theoretical

work

—and

upon vice

versa: Marxism implies a commitment to revolutionary action for the emancipation of man, which carries with it the obligation to rational, theoretical clarification and articulation. But I, for one, would not proclaim myself a

true Marxist, simply because I don't think I know enough. I mean this without phony humility. I have a deep respect for people

who have

a knowledge of history, society, and

economics, which I don't have yet, though I hope one day to acquire it. But I know quite a few persons of whom I would say: Yes, these are real Marxists, because they do

The Debris

of

Marxism

269

have both adequate analytical and intellectual capacities and knowledge. As yet I have not studied and thought long enough and hard enough. So I would consider myself a socialist in principle and a part of the general socialist movement, but with many empty spots still in my landscape which I can't yet fill in. I know that I'm committed to certain politics, to a certain analysis of society, to the

destruction of this capitalist society and to

by other forms of I

am

political

and

committed in solidarity

be expressed very often as a

What I'm

replacement

And

groups working this solidarity has

to all those

actively for a socialist society, even if to

its

social organization.

critical solidarity.

is an analysis of from a Marxist perspective. Then we can see whether somebody who considers himself a liberal can explain American developments domestically and abroad, in better terms than by applying certain

the

American

interested

in

discussing

situation

Marxist categories.

Harold Rosenberg / Mr. KrippendorfT

evidently has a

theory, which he feels owes something to Marxism, of

what's going on in America today. I'd like to hear what

he thinks.

Ekkehart Krippendorff /

I

did not

mean

had a fully developed theory. Obviously what will leave

many

loopholes. Personally,

I

to I

imply say

I

now

have been trained,

as a political scientist and social scientist, to see relationships

and contradictions between socioeconomic and poand to analyze the ways and means by

litical structures,

which societies try to deal with their inherent conflicts under varying political and historical circumstances. In capitalist societies the contradictions are basically contradictions between labor and capital, or rather between the overabundance of capital and the underavailability of

investment possibilities for this capital. Capitalist systems seek to perpetuate themselves as do other social systems by developing various self-preservation techniques. One

—

—

270 is

Dissent, Power,

the attempt to manipulate

and

and Confrontation

deflect contradictions in-

ternationally and thus mitigate or resolve them internally

for the while within a given advanced capitalist country. Another technique is the psychological manipulation of the masses, of workers and consumers generally, which was not foreseen as a possibility back in the 1920s and 1930s at least not to such a degree. It is a new phenomenon which we have to cope with. Also the active role of the political structure, the state, as a mass-manipulating instrument, both manipulating the masses and controlling

—

capitalist producers, operators of big corporations (some-

times against their short-range interests or the interests of a specific group of corporations) is again a relatively new phenomenon which we have to learn to understand better,

and

to deal with. All this does not mean that the basic contradictions have been eliminated, only that their effects have been modified, that the class structure of most capitalist societies has been concealed. To some degree the externalization of internal contradictions was already taking place around the turn of the century the discovery of imperial-

—

ism, as a

means of

social control, social imperialism,

nationalism. But this has been refined in

1950s and 1960s:

in

new

new forms

and

in the

versions of imperialism, mean-

ing the indirect control of other economies in order to find market outlets and investment possibilities for surplus capital. Wherever possible the surplus American capital has been invested in highly industrial countries like Western Europe or in Canada or South Africa. In addition, we see a growing need on the part of the highly developed capitalist economies to control non-Western societies in order to have access to their raw materials and their energy resources. The capitalist system cannot survive without having access to these raw materials and to those markets. But, in any event, in these areas large profits are made, and profits are the cornerstone, the basis of the capitalist system. So we experience this new form of colonialism. Since the break-away from the capitalist

The Debris

of

Marxism

271

system by the Soviet Union, and in the forties by China, seen a new adaptation of imperialism: the Western regimes trying to organize the rest of the world politically in such a way that it should support the highly developed capitalist countries, to transform much of the world in such a way that it would not be in basic disagreement with, but would harmonize with, the interests of industrialization and highly developed capitalism in the metropolitan countries. Thus we have an externalization of conflicts: the classical Marxist principle, that capitalism breaks down because its internal contradictions lead to mass poverty and concentration of capital, is externalized, becoming a global

we have

phenomenon.

We

see

now

that capitalist contradictions,

allegedly overcome, reemerge also as psychological frustrations, not just of affluent class

workers but of young members of the

who drop

out of the system,

who

are not

anymore to be part of a system which they recognize emotionally and intuitively as being irrational, and which does not serve their own needs and expectations. With all this, we observe the emerging of new political

willing or able

forms which at this point have not been adequately defined and determined in clear-cut structures of organizations and which do not follow the traditional patterns. In any event,

we

see

many

signs that this capitalist system even-

tually will break down, that the manipulation and exter-

contradictions will not succeed in system particularly as the liberation movements in the Third World grow, and those societies refuse to play the useful, subservient roles assigned to them. This can lead to various consequences. One extreme consequence is the attempt at stabilizing this sociopolitical system by resort to outright state violence, usually called fascism. There are also more moderate techniques, such as the parliamentarization of politics, manipulating or forcing oppositional groups into parliamentary behavior,

nalization

of

its

maintaining the

—

into accepting certain "rules of the

game"

—

a rigged

game

272

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

—

of course thus taking the revolutionary or change-oriented impetus out of revolutionary movements. Reducing, so to speak, revolutions to panel discussions.

But the contradictions can also lead

—

to

forms of basic

—

means to revolution which can then take (a) the form of mass upheavals such as the recent, nearly successful one in France; or, more likely, (b) a permanent pattern of subversion of the system by breaking up or disrupting sectors of the system's "reproductive mechanisms" such as the universities, which are increasingly becoming central to the "reproduction" of

sociopolitical change

that

the highly technologized systems in terms of trained technicians, and so forth. If that sector can be paralyzed which seems to be taking place in the beginnings, in the bud, so to speak then this could lead eventually to a paralysis of the whole system. To prevent this, most likely America, as well as Western Germany, France, and Italy, will experience new forms of fascism not necessarily resort to outright political repression via SS columns marching down the streets and locking people up, but by more subtle, sophisticated methods such as breaking up leadership groups,

—

—

blocking certain developments, manipulating, subverting and co-opting revolutionary groups, and by breaking up organizations like the Black Panthers, SDS [sound of siren outside], and so on, which at this point are still fringe groups. Done this way, the repression can gain the

support of the large majority, since those, after all, are "lunatic fringe," "negative elements," "truly destructive." Consequently such tactics may be supported by most liberals, perhaps including the majority of this audience.

tacit

This

is

something that we see happening at

this point in

this country. I feel this country may suffer a new version of fascism because at this point the forces to block this development are not yet strong enough. Those forces will be weaker still if our movement organizes itself as the Establishment always urges: "form a party, vote, participate, run candi-

dates,

and so forth."

The Debris

of

Marxism

Our movement

273

will be strengthened

—and

in order to

discuss this the analytical competence of all those feel

committed

to that

movement

will be required

—

it

who will

be strengthened if traditional forms of political organization are avoided and a subversive strategy is followed instead. And I see this process, at least emotionally and intuitively, happening even if it is not yet conceptualized, articulated, and formulated as a strategy.

The

possibility of fascism

is

directly related to the

strength or weakness of the revolutionary

movement makes room will prevent

the

it

A weak movement

left.

for fascism, a strong

from succeeding. True, the

movement arouses fear

in

the

initial growth of Establishment and

pushes it, possibly, toward fascist solutions. But then, if our movement does not have the stamina to carry through and become strong, the new fascism will triumph. In other words, if a movement starts, produces right-wing reaction, and then gets intimidated and steps back, that will only strengthen the forces from the right. I see here the danger of all liberal advice. Indeed, rightwing reaction is already growing here. Radicals are already locked up, killed, or exiled, and more frame-up prosecutions and official murders of radicals are under way, with increasing momentum, even now as the campuses are temporarily quiet. So you see the choice before us: resist and grow stronger or the repression will clamp down more and more, even though it takes new, less naked forms accepted by the vast, manipulated majority a manipulation in which the liberals help the establishment by placing law, order, good behavior, and constitutional government over and above the necessary socioeconomic

—

changes.

Sidney Morgenbesser /

I

think the issues have been

oversimplified. First of all there's no evidence for your

general position about imperialism and economic surplus that in the mature state of capitalism there is a dearth of investment possibilities at home and therefore you have to invest abroad. As a matter of fact, I see no theoretical

—

274

Dissent, Power,

reason at

all,

and Confrontation

from the economic point of view, why Amer-

ican capitalism can't keep going by having certain kinds of domestic investment, and, indeed, the percentage of

American capital invested in underdeveloped Asia is quite minor with most of the investment in Western Europe,

—

not in underdeveloped countries. There's no great American investment in Vietnam. can't account for the

Vietnam

War

You

in terms of the needs

American economy for investment or for raw materials As to the amount of investment of the American government in the military from the end of the Second World War, it is not greater than the amount of such inof

there.

vestment in Soviet Russia try's real income.

—

proportionately, to each coun-

And from 1930

to 1938 the amount of investment of American government in the military was comparatively low and that was the period of real crisis in capitalism. Right now American capitalism is not in danger.

the

—

national growth

Its

is still

high. There's no evidence that

amount of investment opportunity is low in America and Europe. So it doesn't seem to me that the theory you

the

gave

is

viable.

Nor can you account

for the black movement solely in terms of dissatisfaction with capitalism. All in all, I see the situation rather in terms of specific evils to end, and specific goals to fight for: to fight, for example, to stop the War; to cut the military way down; to restructure medical care and make it available to all; to push for various ways

income more equitably; and so on. take the Vietnam situation. I don't think it's true to say that the New Left was originally very helpful in to redistribute

And

resist

movements

Voice / They

in this country.

started them. not. The New Left did movement was initially When the resist movement

Sidney Morgenbesser / They did not start the

laughed

at

by

resist.

the

The

New

resist

Left.

The Debris

of

Marxism

275

its early meeting in Central Park some of us from Columbia faculty went down. But only three students came with us. The New Left looked upon us contemptuously as doing a middle-class thing. They were going to go out and really work with the Puerto Ricans and blacks from the ghettos be really revolutionary. They were not going to be with this middle-class thing of war resistance. Now why are some of us worried about all this talk about "revolution"? Because if you talk about revolution and do not talk in some detail as to what kind of an economy you want to have after that, you're going to have little support. Either you want a Yugoslavian kind of economy, a Czechoslovakian kind, a Chinese kind, or a Soviet kind, or what? You have to indicate that now. Unless you're going to be pragmatic and fight for and against specific things but you're not pragmatic, you want a total revolution. Then, if you're serious, you have to outline what kind of an alternative you want. There's no chance in America, as far as I can see, to

had the

—

—

have a Yugoslavian system or a Czechoslovakian system with factory-type control and with factory decisions as to output. If you're for centralized decision-making, then I

want

to see

think

that

why you

think that'll

work

so well. If

you

than centralized decision makes for repression, I don't think the history of the Soviet Union supports you. We've seen what happens with certain kinds of centralization. Moreover, as a Marxist you really can't believe that there's going to be a revolution through some student dissent and some black militance, when the chance of revolutionizing the workers seems slight unless there's going to be a total transformation of some magical nature. Recapitalism

rather

—

number of students who are against are also revolutionaries is minimal. A lot of them are against the War but are perfectly willing for the member,

the

too, that the

War who

system to continue. So

I

don't see what basis

faith in the possibility of revolution.

you have for

Nor what kind

system you want to put as an alternative. So what's

of a

left is

276

Dissent, Power,

to fight

on

specific issues,

which

is

and Confrontation

exactly what these de-

spised liberals are doing.

Ekkehart Krippendorff / To the extent your points seem valid, we must allow for

that

some of

the briefness

with which I had to present some very complex matters about surplus value, investments, and so on. If we had many hours to discuss it all through we might be able to see and even agree on who is correct. I would only mention Vietnam for a moment. Firstly, there are American investments in Vietnam and in neighboring countries, and the importance of the raw materials of Indochina has been mentioned by economists. But, in any event, we all know that even if America had no direct investment whatsoever there, that does not mean the War is not being fought for any imperialist, long-range-strategic, economic

—

— —

security reasons. This has to be seen in a broader world-

wide context of strategy. A few words now about the

New

many people here who and who are opposing the

that there are

worried,

constitutes a revolutionary subject I

explained

Now

it

is

Left here.

I

are troubled,

observe are

who

system. Whether that

open

to questions.

But

in terms of the contradictions of the system.

am

not responsible for every action they are takMarxism or socialism responsible for every stupidity they might commit, or for their not doing this or I

ing. Neither is

which the liberals are doing. Next, a point which is so frequently made. "If you want to change the system, give me the alternative. What's your blueprint? If you don't show me what the alternative is, then I can't follow you." Well, I would only say that the American Revolution would never have taken place if the people had asked: "What is your blueprint?" They knew what they were against. But blueprint? No. They would turn over in their graves if they saw what the American society and governthat

ment have become today. Revolutions are never

started

by

showing a blueprint. Revolutions are processes. After outlining certain contradictions and supporting one class

The Debris

of

Marxism

277

against the other, risks are involved as to

were made,

it

how

things will

a process. Even if a nice blueprint would change greatly in the process.

develop. Life itself

is

Sidney Morgenbesser / I don't think the example of the American Revolution is a good one because it really wasn't a revolution in your sense nor in mine. But let's take it. At least it was clear what the objective was: local home rule.

As vague

as that.

Now what's

your analogy? That decisions

made as they are now, either by capitalists or by Congress? By whom then? Who will make the decisions? Is the decision going to be made by a centralized group? Or what? are not going to be

Ekkehart Krippendorff / There they have been stated revolutionaries did.

—more

are alternatives.

clearly than the

And

American

Murray Bookchin /

Yes. In the 1968 uprising in France such alternatives were also presented and discussed meantime, here, we can all see the despair that is being produced by the breakdown of bourgeois institutions. Our whole society is decomposing. You cannot sit back smugly and say that this society is stable. Alternatives have been presented and they are revolutionary alternatives, not liberal alternatives in any sense of the word. In May-June 1968 in France, the workers came close to adopting a new alternative. They had occupied the factories and the question was whether they would hold the factories and work them? Would they take control of the ;

and manage them from below? They had factory committees and they could have controlled the entire economy of France, but they were not fully prepared to follow factories

this

course of action.*

* I would add here that the May-June events in France took everyone by surprise and were not preceded by the far-reaching ferment and educational process we usually associate with major revolutionary developments. Moreover, the French Communist party, a party totally committed to the existing social system, played an extremely vicious role in confusing the working class. Murray Bookchin (February 1971)

—

278

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

To ignore the real alternatives that existed and were almost followed would be sheer myopia. Alternatives are also being proposed by hippie youth in their own way. You may regard them as distorted, incomplete, unsatisfactory. But the most important point, in my view, is that sweeping challenges are now being made to hierarchy in any form to the w hole system of hierarchy as such whether draped in a red flag or in a red-whiteand-blue flag. The value of participating in the formal routinized political process that exists today is being questioned throughout the United States. People are trying to take control of their own lives; experiments are being made in new types of personal and social relationships unalienated relationships; ecologists and young people generally are working on new systems of decentralization;

—

—

attempts are being facets of life;

made

and so

T

to restore the

human

scale in all

forth.

Joel Carmichael / I think to meet Sidney Morgenbesser's points you would have to show that there's an absolutely ineluctable material factor that's going to lower the stand-

ard of living of the middle classes and the American working classes to such a degree that it will really drive them into the revolutionary camp. You have to show that in the very nature of the process there's something that the capitalists themselves and the government simply cannot avoid. If you cannot show that concretely in terms of actual economic data, I don't think that you have any case. There's not the smallest prospect, as far as anybody, I think, could maintain now, that the bulk of the American working class is going to be revolutionized.

Murray Bookchin / I recently spent several weeks talking with many American workers in the Midwest and I can you there is massive dissatisfaction in the factories. I'm not trying to present a so-called "classical" Marxist analysis. I have a strong respect for Marx's statement "Je ne

tell

suis pas

un marxiste!"

—when he heard what many people

The Debris

of

Marxism

279

name. What I'm simply saying is that I black and white workers and found massive dissatisfaction. And not only over wages and rising inflation. They were dissatisfied with things that also disturbed the French workers in May-June 1968; they were fed up with the work ethic, with the factory system, with the senselessness of the things they were producing, with speed-ups. In Sterling, Michigan, workers went on a wildcat strike for three weeks and paralyzed some twenty or more factories over a safety issue which might have been regarded as trivial in the 1930s. This wildcat strike and many others like it were spearheaded by young workers, pulling out the older workers who were giving them longfaced sermons about John L. Lewis, the New Deal, and the virtues of liberalism, patience, and obedience to the union were saying talked with

in his

many

leadership.

Joel Carmichael / You spoke of

that massive strike, the

who occupied

the factories in France. very instructive from the point of view not only of Marxism, but of common sense, that something that had been dreamed about for generations by Marxists, the idea of having a general strike, came to nothing in France. There was never a general strike like this in history. Nobody would have predicted, generations ago, that perhaps 90 per cent of the working class of a big industrial country would occupy the factories. Marxists used to spend a lot of time figuring out how they could do it, whether it could be done. And what would happen to the state that would, naturally, be destroyed once such a huge working class actually occupied the factories. But what happened in France was absolutely nothing. Eight million people occupied the

eight million workers I

think

it's

factories for real

and there was not the smallest

political

consequence. All they did was put de Gaulle back into power.

Max Geltman / Some

of this discussion reminds me of a sardonic remark Sidney Hook once made at a panel dis-

280

and Confrontation

Dissent, Power,

when someone shouted at the top of his lungs, "You can't open your mouth in this country!" Hook looked at him and said: "If you opened your mouth any wider, you'd swallow your Adam's apple." But this is part of the cant about the tyranny of America. The passion with which cussion

young man on the left talks is really incredible. And was not a word of Marxism in it. The working class in Germany prior to Hitler was the most organized in the world. Marx, Engels, Babel, Kautsky, Lenin, all said so. And then in Germany there developed what was called the "beefsteak Nazi" brown on the outside and red on the inside. The best recruits for Nazism came from the militant working class, and those were the group called beefthat

there

—

steak Nazis.

In America Marxism went wrong in another way, concerning the proletarianization of the working class. In

America the working

class

is,

fortunately, the most con-

—

servative force in the country today

original sense.

I

mean

conservative in the

the blue-collar workers. Fortunately

you cannot revolutionize them with your tactics. Just keep up your tactics and this working class will become more conservative, which is wonderful. Marcuse has understood this. Herbert Marcuse has said: We reject the working class as the revolutionary force. And Fanon said: We want a

new Lumpenproletariat

as the revolutionary class

—

the

new

pimps, the prostitutes, the petty thieves, this is the revolutionary class of Fanon. But the American working class will reject you. Since I want to conserve this society, New Left rhetoric and tactics simply help me to keep the country surviving and prospering.

Afterword

Ekkehart Krippendorff

The publication of

the foregoing discussion warrants a few

brief remarks in retrospect: It

this

was obviously a mistake on "program." Even

if

my

part to participate in

the liberal nonposition

had been

presented more coherently and more intelligently than was

— The Debris the case,

Marxism

of

it still

281

would have remained a "theater" for

ideas,

irrelevant to the real conflicts antagonizing groups, classes,

and nations today as well as yesterday and tomorrow. This incestuous mutual confirmation of disagreements over agreements, the self-congratulatory self-righteousness of being progressive, will probably still go on for some years to come it makes you feel good, you have exchanged "ideas," you belong somewhere, you stand for everything that is good and against everything that is bad. But it should be clear by now that all who take their commitments seriously and who try to go to the root of things i.e., to be radical should avoid this Theatre. It won't be long before the association of one's name with it will become an embarrassment rather than a prestige asset (and I, for one, am embarrassed already). This will be a re-

—

—

flection of the

growing strength of the

the final demise of

American

socialist force

and

liberalism.

February 1971

Afterword Krippendorfl

Harold Rosenberg

is right.

He

should not discuss but hit people.

Though Krippendorfl admitted

had not knew that everyone who disagreed with his version of Marxism was a fool or a scoundrel. Poor Marx! To have become an object of such that he, himself,

yet gotten to the bottom of Marxism, he

misguided

faith.

Panelists

and Moderators*

El El HI El HI El

HANNAH ARENDT

is

University Professor of Political

Philosophy at the New School for Social Research. Her books include The Origins of Totalitarianism, The Human Condition, On Revolution, and On Violence.

JOEL CARMICHAEL's

books include Karl Marx: The Short History of the Russian RevoMasterpiece, and the forthcoming Trotsky.

Passionate Logician, lution, Stalin s

A

NOAM CHOMSKY, professor of linguistics

at

MIT,

is

au-

thor of Syntactic Structures, Cartesian Linguistics, and Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. His political books include At War with Asia and American Power and the New

Mandarins.

RAMSEY CLARK, States, is

former Attorney General of the United the author of Crime in America.

DAVID DELLINGER

is

the well-known peace activist and

co-founder of Liberation Magazine. in the Chicago Eight "conspiracy" of Revolutionary Non-Violence.

PAUL GOODMAN, critic, is

of the defendants is

the author

novelist, poet, playwright,

and social

the author of

* Discussants

One

many

trial,

he

books, including Growing

Up

are identified in footnotes within the text of each dis-

cussion.

283

284

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

Absurd, People or Personnel, Like a Conquered Province, and Utopian Essays and Practical Proposals.

TOM HAYDEN was a founder of SDS and has been a New Left activist in the ghetto, on campus, and at the

Democratic Convention. His

latest

book

is

1968

Trial.

NAT HENTOFF

is a staff writer for The New Yorker, columnist for Village Voice, and Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Education of N.Y.U. Author of four novels, his books of social criticism include The New Equality and Our Children Are Dying.

MURRAY KEMPTON

is

the author of Part of

Our Time

and America Comes of Middle Age. His commentary is heard regularly on CBS News and he contributes a monthly column to The New York Review.

EKKEHARD KRIPPENDORFF,

formerly professor of

ternational relations at the Free University of

West

in-

Berlin,

teaches at the John Hopkins University Bologna Center in Italy. contributor to various political journals, he is the

A

author of The American Strategy (1970, in German).

JEREMY LARNER's

books include the novel, Drive,

He

Says, and an account of the Eugene McCarthy presidential campaign, Nobody Knows. He was a speechwriter for

Senator McCarthy in that campaign. Currently he

is

teach-

ing at the Institute of Politics at Harvard.

ROBERT LOWELL's

books and the collections of his

poems include Lord Weary s Castle, Life Studies, Imitations, Old Glory, The Mills of the Kavanaughs, For the Union Dead, Near the Ocean.

NORMAN MAILER's books include the novels

The Naked and the Dead, Bar bar y Shore, The Deer Park, and An American Dream, and such books of social commentary as

Panelists

and Moderators

285

Armies of the Night, Fire on the Moon, and The Prisoner of Sex.

HERBERT MARCUSE's

books include Eros and CivilizaReason and Revolution, One-Dimensional Man, Negations, and Essay on Liberation. tion,

HANS

J.

MORGENTHAU

is

versity of Chicago,

Distinguished Service Pro-

Modern History

at the Uni-

and Distinguished Professor

in Political

fessor of Political Science and

Science at the City University of New York. His books include Politics among Nations, The Purpose of American Politics, Politics in the Twentieth Century, A New Foreign Policy for the United States, and Truth and Power: Essays of a Decade,

1960-1970.

CONOR CRUISE official

O'BRIEN, formerly

a United Nations

and Albert Schweitzer Professor

member

at

N.Y.U.,

is

a

of the Irish Parliament. His books include Parnell

and His Party, To Katanga and Back, Writers and Politics, United Nations: Sacred Drama, Conor Cruise O'Brien Introduces Ireland, and Murderous Angels, a play.

ITHIEL DE SOLA POOL at

is

professor of political science

MIT. His books include The Economic Conditions

of

Freedom, Satellite Generals: Military Elites in the Soviet Sphere, Communications and Values in Relation to War and Peace, and Candidates, Issues, Strategies: A Computer Simulation of the 1960 and 1964 Elections. Political

HAROLD ROSENBERG is art critic for The New Yorker and professor at the University of Chicago with the Committee on Social Thought. He has contributed literary criticism and social analysis to numerous periodicals, including essays on Marxism and socialism. His latest book is Act and the Actor.

ARTHUR M. SCHLESINGER, President

Kennedy and

is

JR., was special advisor to Albert Schweitzer Professor of

286

Dissent, Power,

and Confrontation

American History at the City University of New York. His books include The Age of Jackson, The Age of Roosevelt, The Vital Center, The Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House, and The Crisis of Confidence: Ideas, Power and Violence in America,

ROBERT B. SILVERS is Editor of The New York Review and a member of the Board of Directors of Theatre for Ideas.

RONALD STEEL, a former Foreign Service officer and a Congressional Fellow of the American Political Science Association, has contributed articles on U.S. foreign policy to many periodicals. His books include The End of the Alliance and Pax Americana.

UGO STILLE is (Italy)

United States correspondent for the Milan

newspaper Corriere Delia Sera.

RON YOUNG

is National Director of Youth Work for the Fellowship of Reconciliation. He was Coordinator of the New Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam's March Against Death and mass rally in November 1969 in Washington, and Coordinator of its mass demonstration at the White House on May 9, 1970, following the Cam-

bodian invasion.

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