ITALY: Multiplex President

In the 21st Century historians will record—so every true Fascist believes—that it was Benito Mussolini who gave to mankind in the 20th Century a new and better kind of state: the Corporative State.

Last week on the frowning Capitoline Hill, a site as ancient as Rome itself, II Duce convened the first General Assembly of the Corporative State in the Hall of Julius Caesar.

“This is the most imposing event in the history of Italy,” said her 20th Century Caesar. “Indeed it is unprecedented in any history.”

In the past eight years antiFascists have remarked that the birth of the Corporative State seems to take place in Italy. with appropriate rejoicing, about as often as a diva’s farewell. Was this really it at last?

Answer: No. The Corporative State, like Topsy, just grows. It reached adolescence years ago, cannot reach manhood for some years to come.

Manhood will not come until Il Duce feels able to withdraw his personal guidance from the manifold and multiplex organs of state he is creating. Today they are in virile flux. The goal is to create government by men responsible not primarily to geographical constituencies or obedient to the results of counting noses; but government by men drawn from the ranks of production representing primarily agriculture and industry, labor and capital, trade and the professions. In the General Assembly sat last week not “the Deputy from Padua” but, in effect, “the Deputy from Wheat,” “the Deputy from Mercury,” “the Deputy from Wine.”

Most emphatically Il Duce is not yet ready to turn over Italy to some 800 Deputies or Delegates of this new sort who make up the General Assembly of his Corporative State. Before convening them last week, the Dictator appointed by absolute fiat a Vice President to each of the 22 Fascist Corporations. The Assembly then elected him President of each & every Corporation.

Thus Benito Mussolini, for the time being, is the President from Agriculture, the President from Banking, the President from Metallurgy, etc. To his enemies, naturally, the Corporative State is therefore just Benito Mussolini and a laugh. To the Italian people it is a new world of thought grooves and action grooves along which they must move.

Orating last week, Multiplex President Mussolini stressed once again the primacy of production. “The Fascist Revolution will maintain the principle of the equality of all individuals before the State.” he cried, “and will add another: the equality of all individuals in their obligation to work as a social duty!”

Italians call their present Chamber of Deputies the “Hara-kiri Chamber” because it is slated to commit suicide at II Duce’s invitation and be replaced by either the small National Council of Corporations or the large General Assembly of the Corporative State. Since Mussolini was believed to favor the Council, there was a rustle of Fascist surprise last week when he seemed to destine the Assembly to succeed the Chamber of Deputies. “This Assembly,” said Il Duce, “will substitute for another institution which belongs to a phase of history now relegated to the past.”

Amid exuberant Italian shouts of “Viva Mussolini! Viva Stato Corporativo!” the Dictator raised a restraining hand. “Do not expect miracles,” he said. “In the economic realm they are not possible. Since the old system has failed we are obliged to build anew. Our system is not a point of arrival but a point of departure.”