“If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat,” says our conservative friend T. Paine, as he quotes Article Twelve of the 1936 Constitution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
In the U.S.S.R. work is a duty and a matter of honor for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle: “He who does not work, neither shall he eat.”
It was not the first time the words appeared in Soviet literature. Vladimir Lenin regarded it as the first principle of socialism and it figured prominently in the fifth chapter of his 1917 book the State and Revolution. Lenin was quoting from Paul’s Second Letter to the Thessalonians from which, in fairness, T. Paine was also attempting to borrow.
Lenin knew, as it would seem our friend does not, that, as we are taught in the Acts of the Apostles, early Christian communities were organized as communes. In fact, the phrase “from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs” most probably originated with those early adherents to our faith. This may have been one of several reasons Christianity survived, and eventually thrived, in an increasingly hostile Roman world. Paul reacted to those would-be aristocrats who were too gentlemanly to get their hands dirty. Lenin regarded them as capitalistic bourgeoisie. Captain John Smith encountered a similar problem in early Jamestown, when former “gentlemen” from England were too good to toil. As with Paul, this was a matter of practicality, not value.
One key difference, of course, between the Apostle Paul and the Communist Vlad was that Paul saw intrinsic worth in every individual person. Vladimir saw human worth as inexorably dependent on productivity. In fact, in his Critique of the Gotha Programme, Karl Marx joined him, explicitly rejecting the Christian formulation, changing it: “to each according to his contribution.”
The change away from early Christianity was applauded in those days by Communists, today by Republicans.
It was not always like that with conservatives. It is true they tended toward active hostility to those starving to death along roadsides during the Great Depression and even in later years. It was unremarkable in those days that a teenaged Dick Nixon would be photographed at a school event in old clothes and darkened cheeks, a caption congratulating him on his appearance as “a bum.” But Republicans also went through a Jack Kemp period not too many decades ago. Programs to help those in desperate need were greeted as well meaning but mistaken. There were, they said, better approaches. Kemp himself pushed for assistance but with incentives, regarding those who needed help as deserving a more thoughtful, responsible effort.
Today, the old conservative pattern reemerges, unfazed by actual conditions. When those actively seeking work number 6 times the number of open jobs, our friend discards the evidence. He knows the score, having been instructed by tales of long ago told to him by his mother-in-law. It seems she once worked in an unemployment office. We cannot temporarily rescue the many desperate for work for fear of contributing to the delinquency of the few who might latch on.
Other conservatives do not need even that wafer thin veneer of evidence. “Is the government now creating hobos?” asks Representative Dean Heller (R-NV). Representative Steve King (R-IA) dismisses the social safety net as having turned “into a hammock.” They are not at all alone in this new overt hostility. The unemployed are all suspected drug users who should all be tested, says one Senator.
Even the very sick are open to attack. Governor Haley Barbour (R-MS) articulates the new conservative theology as he regards Medicaid recipients. “We have people pull up at the pharmacy window in a BMW and say they can’t afford their co-payment.” Now, a couple with one child in Mississippi can’t qualify for Medicaid if they earn more than $8,150 a year. A used, very old, BMW might be gotten for about $4000.00 if you scour the state, someone checked. So, if a recipient earned the top amount and spent half their income, they could get an old, beat up BMW, although they would also be arrested for child neglect.
Republicans have always promoted policies that hurt folks. Sometimes they even quote scripture to back it up. We ought to be used to it. What is renewed, listen here Mr. Paine, is the open hostility, and a value system that says human worth itself is measurable only economically.
Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians notwithstanding, Jesus had a few things to say about wealthy folks and poor folks. As Al Franken once said, before he began running for office and had to watch himself: “From what I understand, if you cut out all the passages in the Bible where Jesus talks about the poor, about helping out the least among us, you’d have the perfect container to smuggle Rush Limbaugh’s drugs in.”