Here's an interesting column by Walter Williams regarind the 20th century..
THIS YEAR MARKS the last year of the 20th
century. The century will be remembered for
unprecedented technical progress, advance of
knowledge and improvements in living
standards.
It will be also remembered as mankind's most
brutal century. International and civil wars have
yielded a death toll of roughly 50 million lives.
As tragic as that number is, it's small in
comparison to the number of people murdered
by their own government.
R. J. Rummel, professor of political science at
the University of Hawaii and author of "Death
by Government," estimates that since the
beginning of this century governments have
murdered 170 million of their own citizens.
Top government murderers are: the former
Soviet Union, who between 1917 and 1987
murdered 62 million of their own citizens, and
the People's Republic of China, who between
1949 and 1987 murdered 35 million of its
citizens. In a distant third place were the Nazis,
who murdered about 21 million Jews, Slavs,
Serbs, Czechs, Poles, Ukrainians and others
deemed misfits such as homosexuals and the
mentally ill.
Less well known murdering governments
include Turkey, who between 1909 and 1918
murdered close to 2 million Armenians. Two
million Cambodians lost their lives under the
Khmer Rouge; Pakistan's government murdered
1.5 million people; and Tito's Yugoslavian
government murdered a million citizens. Our
southern neighbor, Mexico, murdered about 1.5
million of its citizens between 1900 and 1920.
Professor Rummel estimates that prior to the
20th century, government murder, from the
Christian Crusades and slavery of Africans to
witch hunts and other episodes, totaled about
133 million.
We might ask why the 20th century was so
barbaric. Surely, there were barbarians during
earlier ages. Part of the answer is that during
earlier times there wasn't the kind of
concentration of power that emerged during the
20th century. Had Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong
and Adolf Hitler been around in the 18th
century, they could not have engineered the
murder of millions of people. They wouldn't
have had the authority. There was considerable dispersion of jealously
guarded political power in the forms of heads of provincial governments
and principalities, nobility and church leaders whose political power
within their spheres was often just as strong as the monarch's.
In the case of Germany, when Hitler came to power, he inherited
decades of consolidation by Bismarck and later the Weimar Republic
that weakened local jurisdictions. Through the Enabling Act in 1933,
Hitler destroyed any remaining local autonomy. The decent Germans,
who made Hitler's terror possible, would have never supported his
territorial designs and atrocities.
Decent Americans are paving the road for tyranny just as Germans did.
In the name of one social objective or another, we are creating what the
Constitution's Framers feared -- concentration of power in Washington
and the creation of a superstate. The Framers envisioned a republic.
They guaranteed it in Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution, making an
individual state's authority competitive with, and in most matters
exceeding, federal authority. Now it's precisely the reverse. In the pursuit
of lofty ideals like health care, fighting crime and improving education, we
Americans have given up one of our most effective protections against
tyranny -- dispersion of political power.
Try this thought experiment. Pretend you're a tyrant. Among your many
liberty-destroying objectives are extermination of blacks, Jews and
Catholics. Which would you prefer, a United States with political power
centralized in Washington, powerful government agencies with detailed
information on Americans and compliant states or power widely
dispersed over 50 states, thousands of local jurisdictions and a limited
federal government?
You say, "Williams, what happened in Germany could never happen
here." I'm betting that Germans who lived prior to the end of the Weimer
Republic would have said the same thing.
THIS YEAR MARKS the last year of the 20th
century. The century will be remembered for
unprecedented technical progress, advance of
knowledge and improvements in living
standards.
It will be also remembered as mankind's most
brutal century. International and civil wars have
yielded a death toll of roughly 50 million lives.
As tragic as that number is, it's small in
comparison to the number of people murdered
by their own government.
R. J. Rummel, professor of political science at
the University of Hawaii and author of "Death
by Government," estimates that since the
beginning of this century governments have
murdered 170 million of their own citizens.
Top government murderers are: the former
Soviet Union, who between 1917 and 1987
murdered 62 million of their own citizens, and
the People's Republic of China, who between
1949 and 1987 murdered 35 million of its
citizens. In a distant third place were the Nazis,
who murdered about 21 million Jews, Slavs,
Serbs, Czechs, Poles, Ukrainians and others
deemed misfits such as homosexuals and the
mentally ill.
Less well known murdering governments
include Turkey, who between 1909 and 1918
murdered close to 2 million Armenians. Two
million Cambodians lost their lives under the
Khmer Rouge; Pakistan's government murdered
1.5 million people; and Tito's Yugoslavian
government murdered a million citizens. Our
southern neighbor, Mexico, murdered about 1.5
million of its citizens between 1900 and 1920.
Professor Rummel estimates that prior to the
20th century, government murder, from the
Christian Crusades and slavery of Africans to
witch hunts and other episodes, totaled about
133 million.
We might ask why the 20th century was so
barbaric. Surely, there were barbarians during
earlier ages. Part of the answer is that during
earlier times there wasn't the kind of
concentration of power that emerged during the
20th century. Had Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong
and Adolf Hitler been around in the 18th
century, they could not have engineered the
murder of millions of people. They wouldn't
have had the authority. There was considerable dispersion of jealously
guarded political power in the forms of heads of provincial governments
and principalities, nobility and church leaders whose political power
within their spheres was often just as strong as the monarch's.
In the case of Germany, when Hitler came to power, he inherited
decades of consolidation by Bismarck and later the Weimar Republic
that weakened local jurisdictions. Through the Enabling Act in 1933,
Hitler destroyed any remaining local autonomy. The decent Germans,
who made Hitler's terror possible, would have never supported his
territorial designs and atrocities.
Decent Americans are paving the road for tyranny just as Germans did.
In the name of one social objective or another, we are creating what the
Constitution's Framers feared -- concentration of power in Washington
and the creation of a superstate. The Framers envisioned a republic.
They guaranteed it in Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution, making an
individual state's authority competitive with, and in most matters
exceeding, federal authority. Now it's precisely the reverse. In the pursuit
of lofty ideals like health care, fighting crime and improving education, we
Americans have given up one of our most effective protections against
tyranny -- dispersion of political power.
Try this thought experiment. Pretend you're a tyrant. Among your many
liberty-destroying objectives are extermination of blacks, Jews and
Catholics. Which would you prefer, a United States with political power
centralized in Washington, powerful government agencies with detailed
information on Americans and compliant states or power widely
dispersed over 50 states, thousands of local jurisdictions and a limited
federal government?
You say, "Williams, what happened in Germany could never happen
here." I'm betting that Germans who lived prior to the end of the Weimer
Republic would have said the same thing.
