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social order with no drainage whatever, and no drain men. A
totalitarian state is such a social order. True, it resolves, after a
fashion the conflict of economic vested interests: partly by the
harassment of scapegoats, partly by armed coercion applied to all
classes, especially the workers. But the economic and social metab–
olism drops to lower and lower levels, and new centers of corrup–
tion are established. Meanwhile the population is forbidden even
to hold its nose in public, this being the totalitarian substitute for
adequate social plumbing.
It is not a satisfactory substitute and seemingly it cannot be
long endured. What will come after? Speaking as muckraker, not
as prophet, I am permitted to say only this: that Marx and the
Marxists in general have rather conspicuously neglected to write
specifications for the social plumbing of the Socialist common–
wealth; or, to my knowledge, have such specifications been written
by anybody. Perhaps I am influenced by professional bias, hut I
am convinced that such specifications are necessary.
SOME AMERICANS STILL IN SPAIN TO SOME
STALINISTS STILL IN AMERICA
You sent us here, and here we rot:
The fight we propped has gone to pot.
The Pope and all his priests in Spain
Are safe as in the Vatican;
And you who sent us, safe at home,
Are pliant to the Pope of Rome.
-Now tell us plainly, teachers dear,
Which folks our comrades most shall fear:
Grandees who boast the Pope their boss
Or Communists who kiss the Cross?
E. W. and M. McC.
