JF Ptak Science Books Post 2513
[Woodcut image by J.J. Grandville, [Jean-Ignace-Isodore Gerard (1803-1847)] from Bilder aus dem Leben der Thiere ("The Public and Private Life of Animals") vol II, p. 224 =>For a good summary of Grandville's fantastic work, which is completely unrelated to this post, see Opinionated Art, here.]
This wisp of a pamphlet (printed in 1937), set out on a task to introduce the idea of a theocracy and government according to Christian revelation, winds up in a rather odd and unexpected place. If you were to remove the religious aspect of the proposals and the "theomendments" of The People's Party, you wind up with an extreme form of dictatorship in which "the Government" and "Government-Nation" is a sort of totally-dominating Socialist-Scriptural-Brutalista melange.
Outside of a new and many layered form of government (Congress, Parliament, Stateleture), there seems to be not much else--the Government owns and administers all industry (in the "Dept of Industry"). It collects taxes according to profit-and-expense of each industry and then added to the Government Fund, and then distributed to workers according to "Scriptural Ratio". Interestingly it does provide for "disabled persons" by redistributing the millions "squandered by a few rich people".
For some reason, in all of the sciences to select from, there would be a Dept. of Chemistry. There would also be a Dept of Public Health, with all aspects of health care under the auspices of the People's Government, including the "ownership, supervision, preparation" of all :drugs, apparatus, etc.".
The education of the children and people of the new order would be undertaken by the government, which would seize all school property and provide all texts for instruction, which for some reason could not be resold. That said, the new order is relatively clam and semi-withdrawn when it comes to schooling for all of the people: "In districts where race prejudices prevails there could be an arrangement for pacifying this condition by district schooling", which is really a pretty weak statement relative to the rest of what was going on.
A little further on we find out that the government owns all "industry and commerce and farming" and in discussing agriculture moves quickly somehow to the redistribution of land and housing--though the farmers would continue to own their land.
In another scary bit the government would control the means of printing for the entire country, while at the same time freedom of the press and speech "must remain free".
There would also be another excessive government control--the "National Play-Bureau", which would control all sports that produce a profit in their play.
And finally: insurance, "immigration-tariff", and banking, all become government property. All of the banks, and "everything that is of value that is connected to those establishments" will become government property.
That is a lot of supposition for five printed pages, and the entire religious corpus. as much indebted as it repeats to be in the body of Jesus Christ, there is a wide and suffocating aspect to the government control that exits here on not so much a celestial plane but an Orwellian one.
You will notice that the platform of the People's Party includes a list of offices, but has no names. I think that is mostly because this is the isolated work of one person, and the idea never got much beyond the printing of the pamphlet.
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