[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 28 (Tuesday, February 23, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E260-E263]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    ``FOUR POINTS OF THE COMPASS'': BALINT VAZSONYI'S DIRECTION FOR 
                           AMERICA--PART TWO

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. GEORGE RADANOVICH

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, February 23, 1999

  Mr. RADANOVICH. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to enter into the Record  
the second major speech by my friend Balint Vazsonyi at the Heritage 
Foundation. This speech follows up on themes which Balint developed two 
years ago in ``Four Points of the Compass: Restoring America's Sense of 
Direction'' (Congressional Record,  Feb. 13, 1997) and is aptly titled 
``Following the Wrong Compass. The True State of the Union.''
  In his first presentation. Balint discussed the four principles which 
form the basis of the American system of governance as adopted by the 
Founders--the founding principles of the rule of law, individual 
rights, the guarantee of property, and a common American identity for 
all of us. In this latest effort, Balint contrasts these founding 
principles with the current social agenda of the left--social justice, 
group rights, entitlement and multiculturalism. Balint shows how this 
alternative agenda is not only contrary to America's founding 
principles, but is in direct conflict with those principles.
  Mr. Speaker, I recommend to you and my colleagues that we read and 
consider the important thoughts contained in Balint Vazsonyi's speech, 
``Following the Wrong Compass: The True State of the Union.''

   [Given at the Heritage Foundation, Washington, DC, Jan. 20, 1999]

        Following the Wrong Compass: The True State of the Union

       About two years ago, I gave a speech here with the title 
     ``Four Points of the Compass: Restoring America's Sense of 
     Direction.'' I would like to begin with a review of America's 
     response to that compass. As some of you recall, the attempt 
     was to condense the most essential, most indispensable 
     aspects of America's founding principles into a practical 
     tool--easy to remember, easy to apply. Much is said about the 
     ways America was meant to be, and what the Founders had in 
     mind. But usually it is couched in very loose terms, partly 
     because fewer and fewer people these days take the trouble to 
     actually reading what the Founders have written. Most 
     disappointingly, members of Congress who actually take an 
     oath upon the Constitution of the United States give us 
     speeches day after day, and television interviews night after 
     night, revealing in the process that if they ever read the 
     Constitution, it was a long, long time ago. Of course, they 
     might simply have a different edition.
       In any event, trying to sum up the most essential 
     principles in a manageable number, gave me the idea two years 
     ago of choosing four--because a compass has four points and, 
     like a compass, these principles have provided America's 
     bearings. And so, I proposed the rule of law--always point 
     North--individual rights, the guarantee of property, and a 
     common American identify of all of us.
       In these two years, the ``Four Points'' have been made part 
     of the Congressional Record and printed in many places: as a 
     Heritage Lecture, in Imprimis, in many newspapers and 
     periodicals, as well as in Representative American Speeches. 
     The Republican National Committee decided to publish a 
     version of it as the cover story in Rising Tide and it became 
     the foundation of the book ``America's 30 Years War: Who is 
     Winning?'' We have held panel discussions on Capitol Hill, 
     and town meetings around the country. There seems to be 
     general agreement about their validity, and opposition comes 
     only from those who have a bone to pick both with America's 
     Founders and with the U.S. Constitution itself.
       Town meetings, and the ongoing conversation with the 
     American people via radio and television talk shows in the 
     last two years, have persuaded us that is a good path to 
     follow. People find it helpful as a tool, not only in 
     debates, but also for evaluating public policy.
       Here is how it works. Every time somebody proposes a new 
     law, a new statute, or an executive order, you ask whether it 
     passes

[[Page E261]]

     muster when held against the standard of the ``Four Points.'' 
     The answers are easy because they either do or they don't. If 
     they don't, then they have no place in the United States of 
     America. Without that compass, what would make us American?
       Taking the points one by one; Everybody seems to agree that 
     the rule of law is a good thing. Alas, most people don't 
     quite know what that means. One must read Article VI of the 
     Constitution which says ``This Constitution . . . shall be 
     the supreme law of the land.'' Then, the proposition becomes 
     clear. Individual rights are more problematic because one of 
     the developments during the last 30 years was the 
     proliferation of all sorts of ``rights'' which masquerade as 
     individuals rights even though they are, in truth, group 
     rights. In other words, these rights are claimed by certain 
     people because of their membership in a particular group. Of 
     course, the Constitution does not permit any such thing. 
     Advocates of group rights learned how to dress up their 
     demands as individual rights, and it is alarming how often 
     they get away with it.
       Yet the most troubling for all critics of the Founding is 
     the third one, the guarantee of property. It is amazing how 
     strong an emotional reaction it draws, which really proves 
     what the English already knew when they wrote the Magna Carta 
     in the year 1215: That the guarantee of property and the 
     guarantee of liberty are joined at the hip. You either have 
     both or neither. The absolute ownership of property is such a 
     troubling idea for the other side that even the most 
     benevolent among them is unable to stomach it.
       The common American identity is something to which, again, 
     many pay lip service, while making the greatest effort to do 
     away with it. One person who, to my surprise, recently paid 
     lip service to it, was the President last night, toward the 
     end of his State of the Union speech. And, of course, one 
     wished for an opportunity to ask him when he was going to 
     issue the next executive order to set women against men, 
     black against white, children against their parents, and 
     South Americans against Europeans. Because that is 
     certainly what his administration has been doing in spades 
     ever since 1993.
       By now, it must be clear that there is another compass in 
     our midst, and perhaps the time has come to look at what that 
     other compass is. It, too, has four points. Its North Star is 
     the pursuit of social justice; instead of individual rights, 
     it promotes group rights; instead of the guarantee of 
     property, it advocates redistribution through entitlements; 
     and in place of our common American identity, it favors what 
     it calls multiculturalism. I think we need to examine these 
     four points and try to understand what they mean. We need to, 
     because of something the president said in his second 
     Inaugural Address.
       On January 20, 1997, Mr. Clinton called for a new 
     government for the new century. Given that in the entire 
     history of our nation the only previous call for a new 
     government was issued in the Declaration of Independence and 
     not since, I thought then and I certainly think now that, on 
     this occasion, we must take the President seriously. There is 
     also every reason that such a new government would be guided 
     by that ``other'' compass.
       What of its four points? First, social justice. The phrase 
     sounds good, always has, always will. Social justice, after 
     all, is justice isn't it? Well, the Preamble of the 
     Constitution speaks about the establishment of justice. Does 
     ``social'' add anything to that? If you look up F.A. Hayek, 
     you find that he lists about 168 nouns that have acquired the 
     qualifier ``social'' to the detriment of each and every one 
     of them. But let's take social justice at face value, just 
     for the moment. Is anyone willing to define what it actually 
     means? To date, I have not been able to find a single person 
     who can do that, because it means something different every 
     day. (I have been offering a reward of $1,000 to anyone who 
     can propose a lasting definition.) The Constitution, on the 
     other hand, is the same--day in day out. There is nothing 
     ambiguous about phrases like ``Congress shall make no law . . 
     .'' or: ``The right of the People to . . . shall not be 
     abridged,'' or: ``All legislative powers are hereby vested in 
     a Congress of the United States.'' These are finite 
     statements. For social justice to be a plausible replacement 
     for the rule of law, it would have to offer comparable 
     consistency, but of course it can not. It is almost painful 
     to watch critics of the Constitution wrestling with this 
     problem, desperately trying to claim that the rule of law and 
     the pursuit of social justice can indeed live side by side. I 
     submit they cannot and intend to demonstrate it.
       Group rights of course do not require too much explanation. 
     Again, the Constitution of the United States offers 
     absolutely no foundation for any kind of group right. In 
     fact, it knows nothing about groups, only about individual 
     citizens, or ``The People.'' There is nothing in between. 
     Thus, every group right is in fact illegitimate. The tragedy 
     is that not only judges and the executive branch, but 
     Congress, too, participated in the enactment of various 
     statutes that confirm rights upon groups. Worse yet, a 
     Republican Presidential Candidate, Senator Bob Dole takes 
     great pride in having engineered the Americans with 
     Disabilities Act--one of the more recent creations of group 
     rights. I suppose, some of you may say, ``don't disabled 
     Americans have rights?'' Of course they do: exactly the same 
     rights as every other American. They don't have rights 
     because they are disabled, they have rights because they are 
     Americans. And you can substitute anything else for 
     ``disabled'' and come to the same conclusion. There is all 
     the difference between pointing to certain people and saying: 
     these Americans have not been given their full 
     constitutional due. That's one thing. It is quite another 
     to isolate a group and say, ``we must give these people 
     their own, special rights.''
       And what could be more different than the guarantee of 
     property on one side and redistribution on the other? 
     Property is everything we own--the shoes you wear, the salary 
     you make. The other compass calls for its redistribution, 
     because certain people are ``entitled'' to it. Here is 
     another word: entitlement. Is there anything in the 
     Constitution of the United States that entitles anybody to 
     the fruits of the labor of another person? For that is what 
     entitlement means, nothing less. The only way a person may be 
     entitled to another persons's possessions is if we disregard 
     the Constitution.
       And so we come to the last point, multiculturalism. If the 
     suggestion is that we should look beyond our own borders and 
     not merely read American literature or look at solely 
     American paintings, then I would say every decent school for 
     a very, very long time has taught World History, and World 
     Literature, and World everything. We really didn't need a 
     multicultural movement for that. If on the other hand the 
     idea is that everything has the same value, and that those 
     who have not produced literature should be given literature, 
     and the rest of us be required to study it in order to give 
     the appearance that every nation has literature worth 
     reading--that's something entirely different.
       Multiculturalism claims to celebrate our diversity, so here 
     is another question: ``What is there to celebrate?'' We 
     didn't celebrate that we have arms and fingers, or other 
     things we are born with. If you look around just this room, 
     we have a lot to celebrate right here, because we are all 
     different. It is just one of those nonsensical things, except 
     that--while it is easy to make fun of it all--for many, it is 
     deadly serious. It is serious for us, too, because this 
     compass is likely to guide the 70% of Americans who give the 
     President that approval rating. And if that compass is 
     something to be taken seriously, we have to give it a name.
       Why not call the original one--the rule of law, individual 
     rights, the guarantee of property and common American 
     identity--the ``American way''? That is a fair designation 
     because these are the essentials which define America. How do 
     we find a name for the other compass? Let us work backwards. 
     Multiculturalism is really another form of redistribution, 
     only it is cultural goods being redistributed. Redistribution 
     grows out of group rights, because certain groups are 
     entitled to the fruits of redistribution, whereas others are 
     not. And, of course, the whole idea of group rights grows out 
     of the search for, and the pursuit of, social justice--
     whatever that means.
       So, here we are, looking for a name. How should one call 
     this doctrine, this compass? ``Multi'' does not suggest an 
     all-purpose label, and ``entitlement compass'' just doesn't 
     sound good. ``Good compass''? It does not make much sense. 
     How about going back to its North Star: social justice. Of 
     course, justice is something that the English already 
     contemplated in the Magna Carta and, certainly, the Framers 
     have established in the Constitution. We need to focus on the 
     first word in this two-word construct. Perchance we could 
     make a noun of the adjective? Words ending in ``-ism'' are 
     often used for political programs. If we add this to the 
     adjective, SOCIAL-ISM comes out as the logical designation 
     for this compass.
       Are we in trouble! We will be advised immediately that this 
     is not going anywhere--just look at where Joe McCarthy ended! 
     But what if he didn't go about it the right way, because 
     socialism was hurled at people as an accusation, as a 
     pejorative, derogatory term? In any event, as an inflammatory 
     word? Of course, then we were engaged in a war--cold most of 
     the time, hot some of the time--against the Soviet Union, and 
     we saw the Soviet Union as the representative of socialism. 
     Even so, McCarthy came to grief. And now, when the Soviet 
     Union is gone, most would think it ridiculous to invoke 
     socialism. But what if the problem is the way we think of the 
     word, and the way we look at what socialism is.
       That is really where I would like to get your ear today, 
     and your active help in the future.
       Socialism, I believe, is the appropriate, scholarly, 
     utterly unemotional designation of a grand philosophical idea 
     in Western Civilization. Ever since Descartes started 
     thinking about thinking, and other French philosophers 
     followed in the 18th Century, then Germans picked it up where 
     the French had left off, socialism has been in the making. 
     For a long time, then, socialism has been with us as ``the 
     other grand idea'' of Western Civilization, and will remain 
     with us as long as there is an ``us.'' There is nothing 
     derogatory about it, and there is nothing ``red'' about it. 
     Socialism is an idea about interpreting the world, and 
     charting the future, that has had the benefit of some of the 
     best minds in the history of the planet, and has held--and 
     continues to hold--tremendous appeal to vast numbers of 
     people. It deserves to be taken seriously, and it needs to be 
     engaged on philosophical grounds. In every sense of the word, 
     it holds the opposite view of everything this country was 
     built on.

[[Page E262]]

       The ``Four Points of the Compass,'' presented to you two 
     years ago, represented a set of principles. Our American way 
     is built on principles. These principles were laid down to 
     create a set of conditions within which the citizens of this 
     country can pursue their individual happiness--not social 
     justice--their individual happiness, least hindered, with the 
     fewest possible obstacles in their path. Thus, principles 
     create conditions which are simply there as a tent under 
     which people are safe and secure in their lives--their 
     livelihoods, their possessions--and are able to do their 
     best.
       Socialism, as the four points of its compass demonstrates, 
     has no principles. It has an agenda. The pursuit of social 
     justice is an agenda. The creation of group rights is a 
     continuation of that agenda. Redistributing the fruits of 
     society's combined labors is an agenda. This is extremely 
     important to realize because we have become very, very 
     imprecise in our use of words. We ought not to speak of the 
     legislative goals of the American side as an ``agenda'' 
     because voters can say: ``well, he has this agenda, and she 
     has that agenda and it's my right to choose which agenda I 
     like.'' I don't believe that the American way calls for an 
     agenda. There may be specific legislative initiatives, there 
     may be needs of the nation to be met, but I don't believe 
     that the Framers gave us an agenda. They gave us specific 
     principles, articulated as laws, within which we are free to 
     pursue to our benefit--and to no one else's detriment--
     whatever is our life's dream. So first of all, we have to 
     realize that there are principles on one side, and an 
     agenda on the other. Principles provide the floor under 
     your feet. An agenda pulls you in a certain direction. One 
     is guided by principles, one is driven by an agenda. I am 
     just trying to say this in as many ways as I possibly can.
       Socialism cannot coexist with the rule of law because the 
     most important aspect of the rule of law is its consistency. 
     Yes, the Constitution may be amended through a very specific 
     process and that's an important aspect of it. But its 
     fundamental tenets--lets make no mistake about that--will 
     never change because, if we amend those, the result will no 
     longer bear any resemblance to the Constitution of the United 
     States.
       Thus, the rule of a law functions as a constant, whereas 
     the pursuit of social justice demands that we change the law 
     everyday in order to accomplish the agenda--which also 
     changes everyday.
       I submit that the label ``socialism'' is the one tool we 
     possess that we have not used, and that could be our 
     salvation. Not only because truth in labeling always helps. 
     Let us not think of it as labeling, but as truth. The truth 
     always helps, especially against an adversary that always 
     runs from the truth. To use the word effectively, we have to 
     understand what socialism is, and what it is not. Socialism 
     is not red, or any other single color. The Soviet Union was 
     but an episode in Socialism's three-hundred-year history. It 
     was a long one, a troublesome one. But goodness knows, Nazi 
     Germany was most troublesome, even though that lasted only 12 
     years. Eventually, it passed, the Soviet Union passed, Mao 
     Tse Tung passed away, and even Castro won't live forever. All 
     these have been episodes. These are not our true adversaries. 
     Our adversary is The Idea, this intoxicating idea that is 
     able to dress up in local colors and plug into the deepest 
     yearnings of any nation.
       In America, it did so in spades about 30 years ago. It 
     found all the hot buttons of Americans, so there are millions 
     of decent Americans today who honestly believe that the 
     socialist agenda they have signed on to has American roots.
       Back to colors. Socialism may have been red in the Soviet 
     Union, but it was black in Italy where it was called the 
     Fascist Party of Mussolini, Mussolini's personal version of 
     the Italian Socialist Party from which he had been expelled. 
     It was brown in Germany under the National Socialists, but 
     currently, in the same Germany, it is green. It wears blue at 
     the United Nations. Want more colors? If you really want a 
     Rainbow Coalition, look at socialism around the world. So, 
     first let us not get stuck on color. Second, please let us 
     not get stuck on a particular regime. There is all this 
     confusion about socialism, communism, fascism. But we will 
     know how to make head or tail of them once we realize that 
     they all study the same books.
       Fascism was simply Mussolini's version for Italy, having 
     nothing whatever to do with the National Socialist German 
     Workers party--Hitler's party--which ruled Germany during the 
     years of the Third Reich. It was Stalin who thought it might 
     be just a little uncomfortable and embarrassing for the 
     Soviet Union--the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics--to 
     have Hitler, too, designated as a socialist. So he ordered 
     everyone, including his American agents--you remember, the 
     ones that McCarthy was so dastardly to expose?--to start 
     referring to Hitler's Germany as ``fascist.'' It never 
     was. It was a national socialist regime. And to point to 
     minute differences between it and the Soviet Union doesn't 
     make practical sense because the Soviet Union had 70-plus 
     years to develop its ways. Hitler's Germany existed only 
     for six years in peace time. After that it was engaged in 
     a world war. Even during those six years, it was preparing 
     the war, and so the various deviations from orthodox 
     socialism really should not cloud the issue. We have to 
     remember, also, that Karl Marx, already in the communist 
     manifesto of 1848 differentiates among no fewer than seven 
     versions of socialism, all of which he rejects in favor of 
     his own, which he calls Communism.
       Communism is nothing other than the castle at the end of 
     the climb for all socialists. And please believe me there is 
     no difference between this socialist and that socialist, and 
     social democrat, and democratic socialist, and progressive, 
     and liberal, and ``people for the third way''--we are given 
     different labels all the time. It is all socialism, and all 
     of it leads to communism--yes, communism, and let us not be 
     afraid of that word any longer. It will be a glorious time, 
     we are told, for humanity when communism is established, and 
     when social justice will have come to every man, woman and 
     child in the world, for that's what communism is: One World, 
     in which social justice has been accomplished.
       Other issues tend to be confusing as well. Generically, the 
     American way can also be called the Anglo-American way of 
     interpreting the world and charting the future. By the same 
     token, the opposite view may be called ``Franco-Germanic.'' 
     To begin with, only these four countries engaged in 
     systematic thinking about these matters over the centuries. 
     Individuals from other countries have made contributions, but 
     only in these four countries--England, France, America, and 
     Germany--have there been schools of political philosophy. The 
     four schools resulted in two conflicting ideas. They are in 
     conflict with regard to morality, law, and economic 
     principles--in conflict all the way.
       Thus, the divider has always been the English Channel and 
     not the Iron Curtain. Of course, the English Channel has been 
     there all the time, whereas the Iron Curtain was a very 
     temporary fixture--thank goodness. But if that is true, how 
     is it possible that France and England were allies in both 
     world wars? Not difficult. Philosophically, as the books in 
     our libraries confirm, the permanent alliance is between 
     France and Germany. But naturally, when France is attacked 
     and is unable to defend itself--as it happened throughout 
     this century--they reach for the people who are willing to 
     die for them. And those were the British and the Americans. 
     The alliance lasted as long as the French were in need. Read 
     French philosophers, listen to French socialists and 
     communists who are daily guests on our college campuses 
     today. Like the Germans, they preach the socialist gospel. 
     Exception: Voltaire. He admired the British political system 
     and, when he openly said so in France, the authorities issued 
     a warrant for his arrest.
       Let us, then, rid ourselves of these confusing images and 
     understand that these two gigantic ideas have been, are, and 
     will be fighting it out to the end.
       How does this affect the state of our nation?
       Last night, the President would have you believe that it 
     was just wonderful. It might be a matter of your vantage 
     point, I think. Certainly, the Dow Jones has never been 
     higher, but don't let that fool you. Having lost the 
     university decades ago, we then lost the high schools, and 
     now we have lost the entire educational establishment, all 
     the way down to the day care center. Our children are 
     being brought up to be socialists. Nothing else. Our media 
     is manned and womanned mostly by socialists. If you doubt 
     that, just remember that last week not a single network 
     carried the charges against the president on the Senate 
     floor, but yesterday when the president's case was to be 
     presented, all network programs were preempted. Congress 
     accommodates a growing number of representatives and 
     senators who think nothing of inventing entire new 
     passages for the Constitution, or reveal themselves as 
     nothing more than members of the phalanx that surrounds 
     the executive branch. United States Senators have taken to 
     announcing their verdict before, or right after, taking an 
     oath upon being impartial jurors.
       If we really mean business, we have to use our chief asset. 
     Yes, socialism is a great asset. We tend to engage in lengthy 
     discussions about esoteric matters, like high taxes, low 
     taxes, big governments, small governments. I say esoteric, 
     because they are not tangible. What is high? What is low? 
     What is big? What is small? Instead of interminable debates, 
     which our side loses almost all the time, let us look Senator 
     Kennedy, Senator Wellstone, Senator Boxer--the list goes on--
     in the eye and say: ``What you are advocating Senator (or Mr. 
     President, or Mrs. President) is covered by a very simple 
     word, and the word is socialism. If you think it's great, why 
     don't you tell us more about it?'' And: ``Why don't you tell 
     us why you believe in it?''
       ``Are you calling me a socialist, sir? I demand an 
     apology.'' ``No, sir, I am not calling you anything. You are 
     proposing a socialist agenda.'' Isn't that a great deal 
     simpler than trying to explain why it is not mean-spirited to 
     oppose the next federal education program? Isn't it a great 
     opportunity to say: ``My position on the issue derives from 
     America's founding principles; would you tell the country 
     where your position derives from?'' Unless we will find it in 
     our hearts to engage in this type of dialogue, unless we find 
     the courage to fight the elections in 2000--possibly our last 
     chance to divert a long-term disaster--by calling the compass 
     of the other side what it really is, I don't think we should 
     blame others, least of all the American people, for losing 
     that election.
       Millions of ordinary Americans appear to have accepted, and 
     be promoting, the socialist agenda. There is every reason to 
     believe that many minds would be changed if they were brought 
     fact-to-face with socialism as

[[Page E263]]

     the doctrine they are following and advocating. We must 
     explain that this is not ``hate speech,'' but simply the 
     appropriate designation. If we de-demonize and re-legitimize 
     the word socialism, and reintroduce it to its appropriate 
     place, I guarantee the outcome is going to be different. So 
     we at the Center for the American Founding are going to issue 
     a call to all good people, especially those who care deeply, 
     such as yourselves, to engage in retreats, and seminars, and 
     discussions, so that our own side can understand anew what 
     socialism is, and what it is not.
       And once we do that, we shall never look back.

       

                          ____________________