Mencken on Utopia

Mencken on Utopia

Thomas Allen

    In 1926, H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) wrote Notes on Democracy in which he expressed his views on democracy and related issues. He was a journalist, satirist, and critic and a libertarian and one of the leaders of the Old Right. In his book, he describes utopia, pages 115-124. Below is an overview of his discussion of utopia; my comments are in brackets.
    Mencken notes that in the United States, “every office-holder, when he takes oath to support the Constitution, must swear on his honour that, summoned to the death-bed of his grandmother, he will not take the old lady a bottle of wine. He may say so and do it, which makes him a liar, or he may say so and not do it, which makes him a pig.” [When Mencken wrote, the Constitution contained an amendment that prohibited the sale of alcohol — the Prohibition amendment. Much of Mencken’s hostility toward democracy and, to a slightly lesser degree, toward religion, seems to result from Prohibition. At least, Prohibition is often his prime example of democracy run amuck.]
    In spite of this dilemma, “idealists, chiefly professional Liberals, . . . argue that it is the duty of a gentleman to go into politics.” To which, Mencken replies that this remedy “is quite as absurd as all the other sure cures that Liberals advocate. When they argue for it, they simply argue . . . that the remedy for prostitution is to fill the bawdy-houses with virgins. . . . [This] device would accomplish very little: either the virgins would leap out of the windows, or they would cease to be virgins.” Then he adds, “The same alternatives confront the political aspirant who is what is regarded in America as a gentleman — that is, one who is not susceptible to open bribery in cash. The moment his leg goes over the political fence he finds the mob confronting him, and if he would stay within he must adapt himself to its tastes and prejudices. In other words, he must learn all the tricks of the regular mountebanks.” That is, he must either respond to the mob and serve it or lose his job.
    Mencken supports his argument with some examples. He notes, “It is an axiom of practical politics, indeed, that the worst enemies of political decency are the tired reformers — and the worst of the worst are those whose primary thirst to make the corruptible put on incorruption was accompanied by a somewhat sniffish class consciousness.” One example is Theodore Roosevelt entering “politics as a sword drawn against demagogy.” Yet he became a “violent and shameless demagogue.” [We may be seeing the same happening with Donald Trump. He entered the political arena as an outsider who was going to “drain the swamp,” end American foreign entanglements and wars, rebuild America, and control and limit immigration. Yet he has expanded America’s wars and filled his administration with swamp monsters. Most of the real outsiders that he appointed, he has since removed. He continues America’s Israeli-first foreign policy instead of adopting an America-first foreign policy. He is beginning to soften on immigration and give into the establishment on that issue and others. He is acting ever more like the typical establishment politician.]
    Mencken admits that a gentleman may enter politics under democracy. However, “it is almost impossible for him to stay there and remain a gentleman.” He continues, “The haughty amateur, at the start, may actually make what seems to be a brilliant success, for he is commonly full of indignation, and so strikes out valiantly, and the mob crowds up because it likes a brutal show. . . . If he retains his rectitude he loses his office, and if he retains his office he has to dilute his rectitude with the cologne spirits of the trade.” [Much of what Mencken is describing can be written about Donald Trump, a gentleman by Mencken’s definition and an amateur politician. Will he remain a gentleman or will he become another sleazy politician catering to the mob, or, more correctly, the minority that manipulates the mob? This minority resides in the old news media, the leadership of the Democratic and Republican parties, the military-industrial complex, most big businesses and big banks, the globalists, and a host of their demagogues.]
    In a democracy, “the man of native integrity is either barred from the public service altogether or subjected to almost irresistible temptations after he gets in. The competition of less honourable men is more than he can bear. He must stand against them before the mob, and the sempiternal prejudices of the mob run their way.”
    Democracy in the United States is worse than it is in Great Britain because the United States have no aristocracy to check the mob. For the most part, American Presidents were not intellectuals, and most avoid intelligent men. Likewise, has been the average American governor.
    Moreover, “[t]he judiciary, under the American system, sinks quite as low.” The U.S. Supreme Court “carries on its dull and preposterous duties quite outside the stream of civilized thought, and even outside the stream of enlightened juridical thought.” Furthermore, “few American judges ever contribute anything of value to legal theory. . . . The Constitution apparently has no more meaning to them than it has to a Prohibition agent. They have acquiesced almost unanimously in the destruction of the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments, and supinely connived at the invasion of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth.” [What would Mencken think about what the Supreme Court has done to the Bill of Rights in recent decades with the War on Drugs and the War or Terrorism?] America’s mediocre judiciary results from the average judge being a trailer instead of a leader when he was a practicing lawyer. [When the judiciary does lead with its activist judges, the results are usually worse than when it restricts itself to being a follower.] “The judicial office is not attractive, as a rule, to the better sort of lawyers.” Moreover, “judges are so often chosen for purely political reasons, even for the Supreme Court of the United States, that the lawyer of professional dignity and self-respect hesitates to enter into the competition. Thus the bench tends to be filled with duffers, and many of them are also scoundrels, as the frequent complaints against their extortions and tyrannies testify.” [An example of such a Supreme Court judge was Earl Warren, whom President Eisenhower appointed to pay Warren for delivering California's convention delegation to Eisenhower. Warren’s court was notorious for tyrannical, despotic rulings that are still destroying the country.] Mencken notes, “In the States, where judges are commonly elected by popular vote, the shyster has every advantage over the reputable lawyer, including that of yearning for the judicial salary with a vast and undivided passion. And when it comes to the Federal courts, once so honourable, he has every advantage again, including the formidable one of knowing how to crook his knee gracefully to the local dispenser of Federal patronage (in the South often a worthless Negro) and to the Methodist wowsers of the Anti-Saloon League.” [America’s judiciary, especially the federal courts, has deteriorated even more since Mencken wrote.]
    Mencken admits that the shyster does not always prevail. “[A] man of unquestionable integrity and ability occasionally gets to the bench, even of the State courts.” [Today, many State courts, especially the higher courts, have a larger percentage of competent judges of integrity than the federal courts.]

Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Federal Reserve System

Federal Reserve System
Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: Footnotes in the original are omitted.]

Perhaps the most powerful tool used by Illuminists to control a government is to control that government’s credit and issuance of money and the country’s banking system. (The fifth plank of the Communist Manifesto reads, “Centralization of credit in the hands of the state by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.”) With the control of these, comes the control of the economy. (Mayer Amschel Rothschild said, “Give me control over a nation’s economy, and I care not who makes its law.”[1]) Control of the banking, credit, and monetary systems gives the Illuminists enormous influence and power over governments. (Reginald McKenna, president of Midlands Bank of England, said, “Those that create and issue the money and credit direct the policies of government and hold in their hands the destiny of the people.”[2]) They can dictate the terms upon which a government can borrow money. With this power, they can demand and ensure that the government will grant and protect their monopolistic control of the banking, credit, and monetary systems.

To gain and consolidate control and power, the Illuminists use what is often called the Babylonian monetary system. This system depends on a strong central government, which depends on a strong central bank for its continuous financing. Thus, the government grants the bank a monopoly over the money and credit system. The central bank controls the issuance of money, which for much of the twentieth century has been debt, i.e., the money that the people use represents someone’s debt. This power gives the central bank control of the economy.[3]

After the Napoleonic Wars, the Rothschilds established central banks in all the major countries of Europe. They used their power as central bankers to urge countries of Europe to undertake a massive arms buildup although Europe was living in a time of peace. By 1886 military expenditures had become so great that they were beginning to cause Europe’s economies to stagnate. Countries could not continue their arms buildup without either internal rebellion or external war. Yet, they had spent so much money on armaments that they could not finance a war. Finally, the United States offered away out of their problem.

In 1913, Woodrow Wilson became President of the United States. One of his first acts was to sign the Federal Reserve Act into law. A few months later World War I began. This law solved the problem of financing a world war.

The Federal Reserve Act and the Federal Reserve System that it established grew out of the work of a few major bankers and their political allies. In 1910 Paul Warburg of Kuhn, Loeb and Co.; Henry P. Davison, senior partner of J. P. Morgan and Co.; Charles D. Norton, president of (Morgan’s) First National Bank of New York; Frank A. Vanderlip, President of (William Rockefeller’s) National City Bank of New York; Benjamin Strong, vice-president of (Morgan’s) Bankers Trust Co.; and A. Piatt Andrew, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, met with Senator Nelson Aldrich on Jekyl Island and secretly drafted a plan for an American central bank.[4] The essence of this plan later became the Federal Reserve System.

These bankers controlled heavy industry, oil, communications, and railroads in the United States. They had the reputation of controlling the entire money and credit of the United States. “They elected Congressmen, appointed judges, and bought and sold newspapers and publishing houses whenever they need a job done.”[5]

The first attempt at creating the Federal Reserve System failed because the bill was associated with the Republican Party, which was too closely connected with Wall Street. To solve this problem, the Illuminists decided to put the Democrats in power and have them introduce a new bill. This job was made easy when Theodore Roosevelt, the Republican President whom William Taft had succeeded, decided to run on the Progressive Party ticket. Jacob Schiff had persuaded Roosevelt to run against both Wilson and Taft[6] J. P. Morgan provided Roosevelt money and manpower to run an effective campaign. Two Morgan agents, Frank Munsey and George Perkins, practically ran Roosevelt’s campaign.[7] (Rockefeller financed Wilson’s campaign. Jacob Schiff, Paul Warburg, Bernard Baruch, Henry Morgenthau, Sr., Henry Dodge of National City Bank of New York, and Thomas Ryan, all of whom were bankers, and the first four of whom were Jews, Samuel Untermyer, a wealthy corporate Jewish lawyer, and Adolph Ochs, publisher of the New York Times, also supported Wilson.[8]) Roosevelt received more press coverage than Taft and Wilson combined. Thus, Roosevelt diverted enough votes from President Taft, who was a popular President and who opposed establishing the Federal Reserve System although the Republican platform endorsed it, to give Wilson the presidency. Wilson delivered the Federal Reserve Bank. Actually, the political influence of William Jennings Bryan (the ardent foe of the big bankers, leader of the Democratic Party’s left-wing, and Wilson’s Secretary of State) is what pushed the bill through Congress.[9] The “unseen guardian angel” of the Federal Reserve Act was Colonel Edward House, who was in constant contact with Paul Warburg while the Federal Reserve Act was being prepared and steered through Congress.

(Putting a President in office was nothing new to Morgan. J.P. Morgan and Co. and Kuhn, Loeb and Co. joined in an alliance in 1901 to form the Northern Securities Co. To stop the Department of Justice from prosecuting the Northern Securities Co. as a trust until a less vulnerable system could be worked out, Morgan, Schiff, and Paul Warburg got Theodore Roosevelt elected President in 1904. The Northern Securities Co. was the consolidation of the Rothschild empire in America. In 1869, J.P. Morgan and Co. became an international agency of the Rothschilds when J.P. Morgan and Anthony Drexel concluded an agreement with N.M. Rothschild Co. that made J.P. Morgan Co. its agent.)

The Federal Reserve System achieved the three main functions of a central bank. Private individuals owned the bank, received a profit from the ownership, and controlled the issuance of money. Through the Federal Reserve System, the owning banks could use the credit of the United States government for their own profit. They issued currency (federal reserve notes) on the credit of the United States government. The country’s entire financial resources were at the command of the Illuminists through the central bank. Perhaps most important, the Federal Reserve System mortgaged the country by involving it in perpetual war. Like all central banks, the Federal Reserve System sought to control the government by controlling loans to the government. It sought to influence economic activity and manipulate foreign exchanges. To secure its monopoly, it sought to influence politicians by economic rewards in the business world when they left government.

With the initial stock offering in 1914, six New York banks bought a controlling interest in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. They were National City Bank (a Rockefeller bank), First National Bank (a Morgan bank), National Bank of Commerce (a Warburg bank), Hanover National Bank, Chase National Bank (a Rockefeller bank), Chemical Bank, and Marine National Bank of Buffalo (later Marine Midland).[10] These seven banks acquired more than 40 percent of the stock of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Some of the leading merchant banks of Great Britain controlled most of these banks. These British banks included Schroder Bank; Morgan, Grenfell and Co. (affiliated with J.P. Morgan Co.), Lazard Brothers; N.M. Rothschild; Brown Shipley Co. (affiliated with Brown Brothers, later Brown Brothers, Harriman).

The Federal Reserve System gave the international bankers control of the money and credit in the United States. (Federal reserve notes are privately issued money backed by the taxing power of the United States government to cover losses of the banks issuing the notes.) Thus, the international bankers gained control of the economy of the United States. With control of the economy, they could control the country. With control of the economy, they controlled and exaggerated the boom-bust cycle. Insiders who knew when the Federal Reserve Bank would begin expanding the money supply could buy property and shares when they were cheap before the expansion. Then they could sell just before the Federal Reserve Bank began to contract the money supply, which they would know in advance. As the economy crashed, they could again buy shares and property cheaply, often at distressed prices of bankruptcy. If their banks had financial difficulty because of loan defaults, the Federal Reserve Bank would lend them the money necessary to protect them from bankruptcy.

For the Illuminists, 1913 was a victorious year in the United States. They obtained a vast new source of revenue for the United States government with the ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment. (In 1909, Aldrich, John D. Rockefeller’s spokesman in Congress, proposed, with President Taft’s support, amending the Constitution to grant Congress the power to levy income taxes.) This Amendment gave them unrestricted power to tax incomes and estates. With unlimited power to tax incomes and inheritance, the economy could be socialized, unlimited wars fought, and foreign socialistic governments maintained in power with foreign aid. (Without the income tax, the United States’ participation in World War I was doubtful; this tax was necessary to pay for the war.) Next came the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment, which destroyed what little remained of the federal republic that survived Lincoln’s war to destroy the South and the Constitution. This Amendment removed the elections of Senators from state legislatures and required them to be elected by popular vote. Perhaps their greatest victory came at the end of the year when the Federal Reserve bill became law. Now the Illuminists had the power to create booms and busts—and thus amass enormous fortunes for themselves.

Endnotes
1. H.S. Kenan, The Federal Reserve Bank (Los Angeles, California: The Noontide Press, 1966), p. 6.

2. Gary Allen, None Dare Call It Conspiracy (Seal Beach, California: Concord Press, n.d.), p. 41.

3. Eustace Mullins, The Curse of Canaan: A Demonology of History (Staunton, Virginia: Revelation Book, 1987), pp. 196-197.

4. G. Edward Griffin, The Creature from Jekyll Island (Westlake Village, California: American Media, 2002), p. 5.

5. Kenan, pp. 94-95.

6. Archibald E. Roberts, Emerging Struggle for State Sovereignty (Fort Collins, Colorado: Betsy Ross Press, 1979), p. 152.

7. Allen, p. 48.

8. Kenan, p. 123.

9. Martin A. Larson, The Federal Reserve and Our Manipulated Dollar (Old Greenwich, Connecticut: The Devin-Adair Company, 1975), pp. 46-47.

10. Eustace Mullins, Secrets of the Federal Reserve (1991), p. 34. Eustace Mullins, The World Order: Our Secret Rulers (Second edition, Staunton, Virginia: Ezra Pound Institute of Civilization, 1992), p. 103.

[Editor’s note: The list of references in the original is omitted.]

Copyright © 2010 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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