Chapter XII: The Failure of Democracy in Central and Eastern Europe

To the average country-born American the period of the war has been a time of painful disillusionment. There may have been among us some who, before the war, had some accurate knowledge of what was going on in the world; but the great mass of Americans were very much shocked by the succeeding event. We took the statements of the leaders of the people in Germany and Russia at their face value. It seems to me to be very much worth while, at present, to trace the various events by which we were led into knowing what central and eastern Europe were really thinking and doing. Let us recall our first period of disappointment. We had always believed that the parties of the people in Germany, especially the great social-democratic party, had the power to prevent the Kaiser from undertaking a war of conquest. The declaration of war was to be the signal for a revolution and the creation of a republic. This was rather taken for granted, without investigation, by reading people all over the world. When we saw the entire German nation, with hardly an exception, turn quite insane with the war spirit, we sat back and wondered what this people was really like.

It was also a generally accepted theory among us that the German immigrants who came to us had left Germany because they disliked the tyranny of its government. Then, in 1914, with a suddenness that quite took our breath away, came the propaganda of "Kultur." The entire German nation, through every means it had of speaking to the outside world, informed us blandly that it possessed a system of society infinitely more efficient and desirable than democracy. "It is Germany's duty under God," wrote Bernhardi, "to give her superior culture (Kultur) to all inferior peoples." Indeed, the war itself was generally interpreted by Germans as an act of charity and self-sacrifice upon their part. At the time the idea was so new to us that it took us just three years to really comprehend what was going on in Europe. Even President Wilson, in 1916, declared publicly that we did not know the real causes of the War.

We may or may not have completely destroyed the Germany autocracy; but we may be sure we have by no means done with the system of Kultur. It is all too easily put into practice. The stupendous machinery and organizations of modern industry presents a perfect maze of social problems for solution. Kultur is, by far, the easiest way out. The direction of the whole business of life is simply turned over to a "great man" or to a small clique. People everywhere are naturally lazy and morally irresponsible. For the thinking and characterful minority there come times of mental anguish and disillusionment. To-day the times tempt us to despair. We are almost driven to lose faith in the majority and so in government by the majority. "Why not try a change," "it could not be worse;" we hear it said on every hand. So, perhaps, we in America may yet try Kultur. Certainly we shall if we again have unrestricted immigration. When democracy fails, some form of monarchy will be our only salvation from oligarchy; and an oligarchy is more dangerous to freedom than monarchy. A monarchy, with our peculiar industrial development and our great propertyless masses, means Kultur.

In the midst of the Great War came the Russian revolution. We sat back and said, "How fine! Now they are going to follow our example by building a great Russian Republic, which will soon break down the German autocracy." Even now most of us do not begin to understand what has really happened. What we do know is that the Bolshevists have not only created a state of universal starvation, disease, and despair throughout Russia, but they have also tried to spread their system throughout Europe and the world. To this end they have made foreign war and conducted an enormous and costly world propaganda. As I write we learn that, while we were voting credits and collecting funds for the starving in Russia, they were paying $30,000 to a single agent to execute a single murderous bomb-plot in New York City.

In our last chapter we quoted Mr. H. G. Wells's statement that New York City will be the next Petrograd. This observation can be, by no means, taken jocularly. Go in our present course, and Bolshevism will be, in all our larger cities and industrial districts, the natural alternative for monarchy. Compelled to choose between the two, our original American people will probably divide and civil war will result. Lenine and Trotsky did not create Bolshevism. Bolshevism grew as naturally as a rank weed on a dunghill. It sprang from ignorance and poverty and despair. It will appear wherever ignorance, poverty and despair are mixed together. Quite likely we shall have, with unrestricted immigration, a Bolshevist revolution first, then monarchy and Kultur.

A great many persons are disposed to compare the present state of central and eastern Europe with the conditions in France at the time of the French Revolution. I, for one, am not at all impressed by this easy explanation. The French Revolutionists represented and advocated a movement toward democracy for all Europe. Both the Germans and Russians have burst out upon us shouting that, in their peculiar system of tyranny and slavery, they had something better than democracy to proffer us. The average reading American throws up his hands and cries, "What in Heaven's name, will China next urge upon us, or Africa?"

What has happened to us is, after all, upon reflection, quite simple. We are placed on the defensive for democracy. And we have wisely given over trying to urge our point of view and our peculiar system upon those who not only reject it but openly despise it. No doubt this has been a severe shock to our ancient national conceit. Let me again emphasize that democracy seems to be, for the present, limited to the boundaries of certain peculiar nations. Other peoples may evolve into democracy later. But their steps will be slow. Their experience will be gained gradually. We can not help them much, if at all, by urging them merely to follow our example. Meanwhile, if there be anything precious in democracy for us, we had better bestir ourselves to save what we have left of it.