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Title: The Ballot Humbug Author: Lucy E. Parsons Date: September 10, 1905 Language: en Topics: class struggle, working class Source: The Liberator Notes: Chicago
Whatever we hear from all quarters we are very apt to believe, whether
it requires some effort to believe, whether it is true or not,
especially if it requires some effort to examine it. Of all the modern
delusions, the ballot has certainly been the greatest. Yet most of the
people believe in it.
In the first place, it is founded on the principle that the majority
shall lead and the minority must follow (no matter whether it will be
any advantage to the majority to have the minority follow them or not).
Let us take a body of legislators, absolutely honest, and see what they
can do. A, B and C have each a distinct principle to carry out, and
there is no good reason why each one should not carry out his principle
to a certain extent without interfering with the other two. Politics
steps in and says: let us decide this matter by the ballot, for that is
fair. What is the result? A and C finally reach a compromise and unite
by giving up a portion of their ideas. A and C are then the majority and
B’s principles get no further consideration, but are simply ruled out of
existence. This is majority rule.
Notice the result. Instead of three well-defined principles that might
have been continued, developed and enjoyed, we have lost one altogether,
and corrupted the other two. This is the inevitable result of majority
rule in a legislative body which attempts to manufacture laws to enforce
upon people of large communities who have all kinds of conflicting
interests.
Of course it is better to have majority rule if it represents the real
wishes of a large number of people than to have minority rule which is
only in the interest of the few, as is the case today, where all laws
are practically in the interest of the capitalistic class. But the
principle of rulership is in itself wrong; no man has any right to rule
another man.
Of course, if one is invading the rights of another, he must be
restrained. This is not rulership, but self-preservation. Let us see for
example, how our law factories are operated. A corruptionist works a
majority as follows: He hires a tool called an attorney or lobbyist to
hang around the capitol and buttonhole the members of the legislature
and present to them his scheme in the brightest colors and in a way that
will make it appear to be a great blessing to the country. In this way,
together with some graft, he usually gets the votes of the majority of
the members.
If the scheme to be put through is so barefaced that the majority cannot
be misled into voting for it, then the job is done by a compromise. The
lobbyist has persuaded A that the bill is all right, and B, being
opposed to it—but favoring some other scheme that A opposes—it is only
necessary to get B to agree to vote for the bill on condition that A
will vote for B’s bill when it comes up. This scheme is called honest,
or at least “all things are fair in politics.” The lobbyist who is
running A might have put the two jobs up with the lobbyist who was
running B.
Thus do our lobbyists use one member of the legislative bodies against
another to pry a fat job out of the people for the benefit of the
moneybags. It makes no difference who the member of congress may be, or
what his principles may be—the job can be worked on him just the same.
Therefore, what does the people’s voting amount to in the choice of
members?
Let us take this example: Suppose a legislature is composed of
ninety-nine members; on the above scheme, twenty-five will make a
majority, even if all are present; the twenty-five swap jobs with
twenty-five more and thus make fifty votes—a majority of one. The
lobbyist makes it his business to know how many are sick or absent, or
he strives to bet the worst opponents on commissions or investigating
committees out of town. But there is much in trading votes, for each
member generally feels like keeping his trades to himself, or can be
persuaded to do so, therefore it is easy to trade A’s vote with B, C, D
and E and make each one think that he alone traded with A. In this way
ten such men as A can easily get four a majority of ninety-nine, and ten
such men are not hard to find when capital has use for them.
But this is not the end. A cannot trade with F, so A introduces a bill
or an amendment repulsive to F and then agrees to drop it on condition
that F will either vote for the bill or be absent when it comes up.
These are some of the tricks played in law-making.
Can you blame an Anarchist who declares that man-made laws are not
sacred? Society would not disband or revert to barbarism if laws were
done away with. With thousands of laws being enacted and hundreds of
corruptionists playing their tricks, what becomes of the voter’s victory
at the polls? What becomes of his reforming all things by the use of the
ballot? So long as he is willing to submit to a bad law until it is
repealed, what better leverage do rogues want on humanity?
The fact is money and not votes is what rules the people. And the
capitalists no longer care to buy the voters, they simply buy the
“servants” after they have been elected to “serve.” The idea that the
poor man’s vote amounts to anything is the veriest delusion. The ballot
is only the paper veil that hides the tricks.
Can you blame an Anarchist when he sees a political bummer conniving for
a job in a law factory that he fails to see anything sacred about him,
or his laws? We know there never was a law passed that ever prevented
one single crime from being committed. We know crime will cease only
when men are taught to do good, because it makes them happier to do
right than wrong. We know that if passing laws would have prevented
crime or made men better, that we would all be angels by now.
We say: Turn the law factories into schools and place scientists in them
to teach the truths of human solidarity, love and fraternity, and make
these possible by abolishing monopoly in the means of life, and mankind
will quickly develop that which is best, noblest and purest in his
nature.