Page:Meet the Communists (Flynn).djvu/6

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or imprisoned is cheered by the people. The Communist program of immediate action, that the big landed estates, the banks, and all the resources and industries of the country be nationalized meets with the heartiest approval of the people in country after country.

"Why return them to traitors who may again sell out to a new crop of Nazis? Why give them back the means to rule and exploit us?" the people ask. They are determined to crush "the men of the Trusts," to prevent the rebirth of fascism. They burn with hatred of those responsible for the bloodshed, ruin and death that engulfed every family and desolated their countries. The liberated people will never return power into such hands again. They are turning away from capitalism toward a new kind of democracy; yes, toward Socialism in Europe today.

Capitalism, like the system that preceded it—feudalism, when men were serfs tied to the land, has become its own grave-digger. It has been tried and found guilty of untold crimes in our generation. It has brought humanity to the brink of extinction.

Do we in America have to duplicate the actual experiences of Europe and Asia before we understand their thinking? Must we be plunged into fascism and war by the reactionary policies of the "men of the Trusts"? Whether Americans are fully aware of it or not, the fact is that there are already millions of people living under Socialism in the Soviet Union, and millions more will never feel that their children are safe under capitalism. They do not want capitalism as a way of life any longer. Capitalism exploits the people at home and colonies abroad; capitalism breeds war, fascism, poverty, slums, child-labor, unemployment; it regularly and inevitably calls forth crises of depression and shutdowns; it breeds racial and religious hatred, and makes a mockery of the words Peace! Security! Happiness! Brotherhood!

Millions of men and women are determined that these words shall become realities for the children of tomorrow, that these children shall be safe from the ravages of war and the crimes of fascism. That's why they have confidence in the Communists, who are militant fighters with faith in the peo-

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