Democracy Discarded

One of the most important and rational pronouncements ever made by Signor Mussolini was delivered by him, last week, to the Chamber of Deputies, in presenting the new electoral law (TIME, March 5).

This measure has been denounced as abrogating democratic suffrage and placing the nomination of candidates in the hands of a Fascist oligarchy topped by Il Duce. He met these charges last week, thus:

"The masses are quite incapable of forming their own minds, much less of choosing men. . . . Where 100 persons gather, they are fatally led astray by two or three demagogues. . . .

"To leave the choice of candidates to our electorate . . . really means to abandon choice to a few intriguers. . . ."

The alternative presented by Il Duce is, of course, to replace the "intriguers" and "demagogues" by his own "disciplined" Fascisti. Once the premise is admitted that the latter are preferable to the former, the rest of the argument follows as a logical matter of course.

By postulating his premise, publicly once and for all, Il Duce stood forth, last week, as the world's one supremely courageous enemy of democracy. He enlarged upon his thesis crisply and smashingly, thus: "All existing electoral systems neglect the reality of life which is that, isolated, individuals do not exist or have negligible value. Society is not merely a conglomeration of men. . . . Fascismo wishes to create a regime of authority with a strong Government possessing ample powers but founded on the masses and keeping close to the masses. . . . All who have Fascismo at heart wish to create a regime whose ruling class can always draw from the people the men necessary to its constant renewal. . . . The problem of government cannot be solved by trusting in the illusory dogma of popular sovereignty, but it can be solved by the wise choice of a few leading statesmen."

The Chamber of Deputies continued, of course, too overawed to make any response to Signor Mussolini except applause.