Socialist Patriotism: Difference between revisions

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 The below quotes illustrate the Communist position on what is often referred to as the "national question". These quotes, taken from a wide range of political perspectives, including some people we have serious disagreements with (such as those of Emma Goldman or Nikita Khrushchev), touch on many aspects of the national question. Nominally, these quotes address the following topics: 1) patriotism and its application by both [[proletariat|proletarians]] and the [[bourgeoisie]]; 2) [[historical nihilism]] ([[revisionism]] and ignorance of [[world-history]]); 3) superpatriotism (national [[chauvinism]], etc) and anti-patriotism; 4) the contradiction between the [[state]] as popular [[sovereignty]] vs the state as unpopular or corrupt sovereignty; 5) the contradiction between nationalism and internationalism ; and finally, 6) American socialist patriotism in particular, and socialist recognition of America's revolutionary and working-class history.
-<blockquote>''“The government of the United States represents, as its army also does, the finances of the United States. But these finances do not represent the North American people; they represent a small group of financiers, the owners of all the big enterprises… who also exploit the North American people. Clearly they do not exploit them in the same manner that they exploit us, the human beings of inferior races… for we have not had the good fortune of being born from blood, Anglo-Saxon parents. But they do exploit and divide them, they too are divided into black and whites, and they too are divided into men and women, union and non-union, employed and unemployed.” - Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara''
+<blockquote>''“The government of the United States represents, as its army also does, the finances of the United States. But these finances do not represent the North American people; they represent a small group of financiers, the owners of all the big enterprises… who also exploit the North American people. Clearly they do not exploit them in the same manner that they exploit us, the human beings of inferior races… for we have not had the good fortune of being born from blood, Anglo-Saxon parents. But they do exploit and divide them, they too are divided into black and whites, and they too are divided into men and women, union and non-union, employed and unemployed.” - (Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara, speech to the United Nations general assembly December 11th 1964)''
 ''"The U.S. flag is your flag, you cannot allow the U.S. ruling class to own the flag. The working class of the U.S. must fight for the flag and once socialism is established it is up to the workers to decide what they want to do with flag and the U.S. as it exists." - (Fidel Castro, Addressing a group of students who did not want to associate with their flag while people from other countries sat next to theirs)''
-“Can a Communist, who is an internationalist, at the same time be a patriot? We hold that he not only can be but also must be. The specific content of patriotism is determined by historical conditions. There is the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler, and there is our patriotism. Communists must resolutely oppose the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler. The Communists of Japan and Germany are defeatists with regard to the wars being waged by their countries. To bring about the defeat of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler by every possible means is in the interests of the Japanese and the German people, and the more complete the defeat the better. This is what the Japanese and German Communists should be doing and what they are doing. For the wars launched by the Japanese aggressors and Hitler are harming the people at home as well as the people of the world. China’s case, however, is different, because she is the victim of aggression. Chinese Communists must therefore combine patriotism with internationalism. We are at once internationalists and patriots, and our slogan is, ‘Fight to defend the motherland against the aggressors.’ For us defeatism is a crime and to strive for victory in the War of Resistance is an inescapable duty. For only by fighting in defense of the motherland can we defeat the aggressors and achieve national liberation. And only by achieving national liberation will it be possible for the proletariat and other working people to achieve their own emancipation. The victory of China and the defeat of the invading imperialists will help the people of other countries. Thus in wars of national liberation patriotism is applied internationalism.” - Mao Zedong
+“Can a Communist, who is an internationalist, at the same time be a patriot? We hold that he not only can be but also must be. The specific content of patriotism is determined by historical conditions. There is the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler, and there is our patriotism. Communists must resolutely oppose the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler. The Communists of Japan and Germany are defeatists with regard to the wars being waged by their countries. To bring about the defeat of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler by every possible means is in the interests of the Japanese and the German people, and the more complete the defeat the better. This is what the Japanese and German Communists should be doing and what they are doing. For the wars launched by the Japanese aggressors and Hitler are harming the people at home as well as the people of the world. China’s case, however, is different, because she is the victim of aggression. Chinese Communists must therefore combine patriotism with internationalism. We are at once internationalists and patriots, and our slogan is, ‘Fight to defend the motherland against the aggressors.’ For us defeatism is a crime and to strive for victory in the War of Resistance is an inescapable duty. For only by fighting in defense of the motherland can we defeat the aggressors and achieve national liberation. And only by achieving national liberation will it be possible for the proletariat and other working people to achieve their own emancipation. The victory of China and the defeat of the invading imperialists will help the people of other countries. Thus in wars of national liberation patriotism is applied internationalism.” - Mao Zedong, On New Democracy
-''“I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land can never be purged away but with blood. I had, as I now think, vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed, it might be done. This is a beautiful country.” - John Brown''
+''“I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land can never be purged away but with blood. I had, as I now think, vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed, it might be done. This is a beautiful country.” - (John Brown, while he was imprisoned awaiting execution, in a letter written to his family and friends, December 2nd 1859)''
-''“We congratulate the American people upon your re-election by a large majority. If resistance to the Slave Power was the reserved watchword of your first election, the triumphant war cry of your reelection is Death to Slavery. From the commencement of the titanic American strife the workingmen of Europe felt instinctively that the star-spangled banner carried the destiny of their class. The contest for the territories which opened the dire epopee, was it not to decide whether the virgin soil of immense tracts should be wedded to the labour of the emigrant or prostituted by the tramp of the slave driver?” - Karl Marx''
+''“We congratulate the American people upon your re-election by a large majority. If resistance to the Slave Power was the reserved watchword of your first election, the triumphant war cry of your reelection is Death to Slavery. From the commencement of the titanic American strife the workingmen of Europe felt instinctively that the star-spangled banner carried the destiny of their class. The contest for the territories which opened the dire epopee, was it not to decide whether the virgin soil of immense tracts should be wedded to the labour of the emigrant or prostituted by the tramp of the slave driver?... The workingmen of Europe feel sure that, as the American War of Independence initiated a new era of ascendancy for the middle class, so the American Antislavery War will do for the working classes. They consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the reconstruction of a social world.” - Karl Marx, letter to Abraham Lincoln in 1864, congratulating him on his re-election as President of the United States''
-''“The unity of the nation was not to be broken; but, on the contrary, to be organised by the Communal Constitution, and to become a reality by the destruction of the State power which claimed to be the embodiment of that unity independent of, and superior to, the nation itself, from which it was but a parasitic excrescence; that unity of great nations which, if originally brought about by political force, has now become a powerful coefficient of social production; if the Commune was thus the true representative of all the healthy elements of French society, and therefore the truly national government, it was, at the same time, as a working men’s government, as the bold champion of the emancipation of labour, emphatically international. Within sight of that Prussian army, that had annexed to Germany two French provinces, the Commune annexed to France the working people all over the world.” - Karl Marx''
+''“The unity of the nation was not to be broken; but, on the contrary, to be organised by the Communal Constitution, and to become a reality by the destruction of the State power which claimed to be the embodiment of that unity independent of, and superior to, the nation itself, from which it was but a parasitic excrescence; that unity of great nations which, if originally brought about by political force, has now become a powerful coefficient of social production; if the Commune was thus the true representative of all the healthy elements of French society, and therefore the truly national government, it was, at the same time, as a working men’s government, as the bold champion of the emancipation of labour, emphatically international. Within sight of that Prussian army, that had annexed to Germany two French provinces, the Commune annexed to France the working people all over the world.” - Karl Marx, The Civil War in France''
-''“It is a truth which at the very least teaches us to see the hollowness of our patriotism, the perverted nature of our state and to hide our faces in shame. I can see you smile and say: what good will that do? Revolutions are not made by shame. And my answer is that shame is a revolution in itself; it really is the victory of the French Revolution over that German patriotism which defeated it in 1813. Shame is a kind of anger turned in on itself. And if a whole nation were to feel ashamed it would be like a lion recoiling in order to spring.” - Karl Marx''
+''“It is a truth which at the very least teaches us to see the hollowness of our patriotism, the perverted nature of our state and to hide our faces in shame. I can see you smile and say: what good will that do? Revolutions are not made by shame. And my answer is that shame is a revolution in itself; it really is the victory of the French Revolution over that German patriotism which defeated it in 1813. Shame is a kind of anger turned in on itself. And if a whole nation were to feel ashamed it would be like a lion recoiling in order to spring.” - Walter Benjamin, On the Question of German Philosophy''
-''“Though not in substance, yet in form, the struggle of the proletariat with the bourgeoisie is at first a national struggle.” - Karl Marx''
+''“Though not in substance, yet in form, the struggle of the proletariat with the bourgeoisie is at first a national struggle...'' ''It is altogether self evident that; the working class must organise itself at home as a class and that its own country is the immediate arena of its struggle...'' ''The workingmen have no country. We cannot take from them what they have not got. Since the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy, must rise to be the leading class of the nation, must constitute itself the nation, it is so far, itself national, though not in the bourgeois sense of the word.” - Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto''
-''“It is altogether self evident that; the working class must organise itself at home as a class and that its own country is the immediate arena of its struggle.” - Karl Marx''
+''"’For Mussulmans, there is no such thing as subordination’, Inequality is an abomination to ‘a true Mussulman’ (a Muslim), but these sentiments, (…) ‘will go to rack and ruin without a revolutionary movement.” - Karl Marx, The Future Results of the British Rule in India, article published in the New York Daily Tribune''
-''“The workingmen have no country. We cannot take from them what they have not got. Since the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy, must rise to be the leading class of the nation, must constitute itself the nation, it is so far, itself national, though not in the bourgeois sense of the word.” - Karl Marx''
+''“‘No socialist,’ remarked the Doctor, smiling, ‘need predict that there will be a bloody revolution in Russia, Germany, Austria, and possibly Italy if the Italians keep on in the policy they are now pursuing. The deeds of the French Revolution may be enacted again in those countries. That is apparent to any political student. But those revolutions will be made by the majority. No revolution can be made by a party, but by a nation.’” - Karl Marx, The Class Struggles in France 1848 to 1850''
-''"’For Mussulmans, there is no such thing as subordination’, Inequality is an abomination to ‘a true Mussulman’ (a Muslim), but these sentiments, (…) ‘will go to rack and ruin without a revolutionary movement.” - Karl Marx''
+''“The English laughed heartily when I began my speech with the observation that our friend Lafargue, and others, who had abolished nationalities, had addressed us in ‘French’, i.e., in a language which nine-tenths of the audience did not understand. I went on to suggest that by his denial of nationalities he seemed quite unconsciously to imply their absorption by the model French nation.” - Karl Marx, at the General Council of the International Workingmen's Association (also known as the First International) in 1866''
-''“‘No socialist,’ remarked the Doctor, smiling, ‘need predict that there will be a bloody revolution in Russia, Germany, Austria, and possibly Italy if the Italians keep on in the policy they are now pursuing. The deeds of the French Revolution may be enacted again in those countries. That is apparent to any political student. But those revolutions will be made by the majority. No revolution can be made by a party, but by a nation.’” - Karl Marx''
+''“‘The barbarities and desperate outrages of the so-called Christian race, throughout every region of the world, and upon every people they have been able to subdue, are not to be paralleled by those of any other race, however fierce, however untaught, and however reckless of mercy and of shame, in any age of the earth. This does not mean that the American people have an original sin that they must be cleansed of by fire and destruction. The illegitimate state shall be destroyed, not the people.’” - W.E.B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America''
-''“The English laughed heartily when I began my speech with the observation that our friend Lafargue, and others, who had abolished nationalities, had addressed us in ‘French’, i.e., in a language which nine-tenths of the audience did not understand. I went on to suggest that by his denial of nationalities he seemed quite unconsciously to imply their absorption by the model French nation.” - Karl Marx''
+''“The biggest things that are happening in the world today are on the one hand the movement of the slaves in America started by the death of John Brown and, on the other, the movement of the serfs in Russia.” - Karl Marx, letter to Friedrich Engels, October 30th 1859''
-''“‘The barbarities and desperate outrages of the so-called Christian race, throughout every region of the world, and upon every people they have been able to subdue, are not to be paralleled by those of any other race, however fierce, however untaught, and however reckless of mercy and of shame, in any age of the earth. This does not mean that the American people have an original sin that they must be cleansed of by fire and destruction. The illegitimate state shall be destroyed, not the people.’” - Karl Marx''
+''“No, I make no pretension to patriotism. So long as my voice can be heard on this or the other side of the Atlantic, I will hold up America to the lightning scorn of moral indignation. In doing this, I shall feel myself discharging the duty of a true patriot; for he is a lover of his country who rebukes and does not excuse its sins.” - Frederick Douglass, in his speech, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July, delivered on July 5th 1852''
-''“The workingmen of Europe feel sure that, as the American War of Independence initiated a new era of ascendancy for the middle class, so the American Antislavery War will do for the working classes. They consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the reconstruction of a social world.” - Karl Marx''
+''“It is a strange transition from the states to Canada. First one imagines that one is in Europe again, and then one thinks one is in a positively retrogressing and decaying country. Here one sees how necessary the feverish speculative spirit of the Americans is for a rapid development of a new country (if capitalist production is taken as a basis); and in ten years this sleepy Canada will be ripe for annexation - the farmers in Manitoba, etc., will demand it themselves. Besides the country is half-annexed already socially - hotels, newspapers, advertising, etc., all of the American pattern. And they may tug and resist as much as they like; the economic necessity of an infusion of Yankee blood will have its way and abolish this ridiculous boundary line - and when the time comes, John Bull will say ‘Amen’ to the matter.” - Friedrich Engels, in a letter to Marx on September 21st 1880''
-''“The biggest things that are happening in the world today are on the one hand the movement of the slaves in America started by the death of John Brown and, on the other, the movement of the serfs in Russia.” - Karl Marx''
+''“The tendency of the Capitalist system towards the ultimate splitting-up of society into two classes, a few millionaires on the one hand, and a great mass of mere wage-workers on the other, this tendency, though constantly crossed and counteracted by other social agencies, works nowhere with greater force than in America; and the result has been the production of a class of native American wage-workers, who form, indeed, the aristocracy of the wage-working class as compared with the immigrants, but who become conscious more and more every day of their solidarity with the latter and who feel all the more acutely their present condemnation of life-long wage-toil, because they still remember the bygone days, when it was comparatively easy to rise to a higher social level. Accordingly the working class movement, in America, has started with truly American vigor, and as on that side of the Atlantic things march with at least double the European speed, we may yet live to see America take the lead in this respect too.” - Friedrich Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England''
-''“No, I make no pretension to patriotism. So long as my voice can be heard on this or the other side of the Atlantic, I will hold up America to the lightning scorn of moral indignation. In doing this, I shall feel myself discharging the duty of a true patriot; for he is a lover of his country who rebukes and does not excuse its sins.” - Frederick Douglass''
+''“At first the contest is carried on by individual labourers, then by the work-people of a factory, then by the operatives of one trade, in one locality, against the individual bourgeois who directly exploits them… It was just this contact that was needed to centralise the numerous local struggles, all of the same character, into one national struggle between classes.” - Friedrich Engels, The Principles of Communism''
-''“It is a strange transition from the states to Canada. First one imagines that one is in Europe again, and then one thinks one is in a positively retrogressing and decaying country. Here one sees how necessary the feverish speculative spirit of the Americans is for a rapid development of a new country (if capitalist production is taken as a basis); and in ten years this sleepy Canada will be ripe for annexation - the farmers in Manitoba, etc., will demand it themselves. Besides the country is half-annexed already socially - hotels, newspapers, advertising, etc., all of the American pattern. And they may tug and resist as much as they like; the economic necessity of an infusion of Yankee blood will have its way and abolish this ridiculous boundary line - and when the time comes, John Bull will say ‘Amen’ to the matter.” - Friedrich Engels''
+''“A country like America, when it is really ripe for a socialist workers’ party, certainly cannot be hindered from having one by the couple of German socialist doctrinaires.” - Friedrich Engels, The Socialists in the United States''
-''“The tendency of the Capitalist system towards the ultimate splitting-up of society into two classes, a few millionaires on the one hand, and a great mass of mere wage-workers on the other, this tendency, though constantly crossed and counteracted by other social agencies, works nowhere with greater force than in America; and the result has been the production of a class of native American wage-workers, who form, indeed, the aristocracy of the wage-working class as compared with the immigrants, but who become conscious more and more every day of their solidarity with the latter and who feel all the more acutely their present condemnation of life-long wage-toil, because they still remember the bygone days, when it was comparatively easy to rise to a higher social level. Accordingly the working class movement, in America, has started with truly American vigor, and as on that side of the Atlantic things march with at least double the European speed, we may yet live to see America take the lead in this respect too.” - Friedrich Engels''
-''“At first the contest is carried on by individual labourers, then by the work-people of a factory, then by the operatives of one trade, in one locality, against the individual bourgeois who directly exploits them… It was just this contact that was needed to centralise the numerous local struggles, all of the same character, into one national struggle between classes.” - Friedrich Engels''
-''“A country like America, when it is really ripe for a socialist workers’ party, certainly cannot be hindered from having one by the couple of German socialist doctrinaires.” - Friedrich Engels''
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-''“This party is called upon to play a very important part in the movement. But in order to do so they will have to doff every remnant of their foreign garb. They will have to become out and out American. They cannot expect the Americans to come to the them; they, the minority and the immigrants, must go to the Americans.” - Friedrich Engels''
+''“This party is called upon to play a very important part in the movement. But in order to do so they will have to doff every remnant of their foreign garb. They will have to become out and out American. They cannot expect the Americans to come to the them; they, the minority and the immigrants, must go to the Americans.” - Friedrich Engels, The Socialist Movement in the United States''