Argentina's Georgist Liberal Party
Eduardo Belaustegui
[Reprinted from the Single Tax Review,
September-October 1921]
Georgist Liberal Party, under the leadership of able and conspicuous
intellectuals, is now an accomplished fact in the Argentine.
The national headquarters are at C. Pellegrini, 169, Buenos Aires. We
have received samples of the propaganda literature being circulated
there in pamphlets and bill-posters. An American will be struck at
once by the fact that the portraits of Henry George and Argentina's
first president, Rivadavia, appear side by side, as the spiritual
leaders of the movement.
As illustrating the spirit and scope of the campaign now being
carried on by the Georgist Liberal Party of the Argentine, we can
perhaps do no better than reproduce in English the following manifesto
which appears on one of the wallposters above referred to:
"FELLOW-CITIZEN: These are objects clearly stated,
maturely considered, and based on the true and irrefutable
principles of political economy, which the great Argentine,
Bernardino Rivadavia, understood and attempted to apply in our
country, and which the great North American, Henry George, analyzed
and made as clear as day for all countries and all times.
The wealth, general progress and greatness of our country would be
immense if these great reforms were implanted here, and our
country's glory would be resplendent before the whole world if she
were the first to adopt them. We would show how it is possible to
pass from a social system of injustice and poverty to a state of
universal prosperity and happiness. A lesson which we are better
able to give than to wait for it from the peoples of Europe, who
have lost their way and are too deeply sunk in error.
This can be accomplished easily and rationally as soon as a large
part of our good and prudent citizens fix their attention on these
truths and high purposes and take the trouble to make them known to
their fellow-citizens. True universal suffrage, which fortunately we
enjoy, and the organic structure of our institutions, enable us to
arrive peacefully and speedily to this practical goal.
We are aware that many other problems and evils, not mentioned in
our programme, demand solution and prompt remedy: The lack of
hygiene in the home and workshop; the labor of women and children;
crime and prison reform; prostitution; marriage reform; the high
cost of living, etc.
But we know perfectly well (and anyone can learn it from the superb
works of Henry George and by his own observation) that these evils
are for the most part branches of that malevolent tree whose root is
the private appropriation of the land, and whose trunk is the
penalizing of labor and of the exchange of labor's products. If the
root is left intact, it will be waste of time to cut the branches or
even the trunk. They will only grow up again stronger than ever. But
if we destroy the root, the whole tree will fall to the ground and
will inevitably wither and die. Only then will the field be free for
other reforms.
We believe also that you should exhort, as we are doing, all your
friends, Argentines and foreigners, to join our Party, in order that
our numbers may be increased and that we may the sooner achieve for
all, for ourselves and our children, the highest well-being and
happiness that ever any century or nation has known. And we propose
to achieve this, not by suppressing or depressing human
individuality, but on the contrary by strengthening, elevating and
dignifying it.
If you think seriously on this matter, you will come to the desire
and resolve to send your adhesion to the Georgist Liberal Party. The
organization of this Party is distinctly democratic. Its authority
resides in frequent general assemblies of its adherents.
Consider that the most intelligent way of being revolutionary is to
support Georgism; and that the most intelligent way of being
conservative today is also by helping Georgism, in order to avoid
grave and imminent upheavals, caused by the impatient unrest of the
people and which cannot be solved by the imperfect social doctrines
which have been inculcated in the people, no doubt with better
intention than knowledge of human realities in general and economic
realities in particular.
To wage war on so-called Capital is a stupid error, caused by the
current confusion between Capital and Privilege, and between
Interest and Rent, things quite separate and distinct. If you
interfere with the production and peaceful possession of houses,
machines and merchandise (which are part of what really should be
called Capital), there will be fewer houses, fewer machines and less
merchandise, and we would all suffer from their scarcity. But if you
attack and interfere with the privilege of landholding, there will
not be less land, but rather that which exists will be equally open
to all. In the same way, if all certificates of public indebtedness
were annulled, none of the existing wealth in the country would
disappear; but on the contrary, the condition of all producers would
have been improved, since they would have been freed from the
enormous tax which such indebtedness means.
FELLOW-CITIZEN: - Join with us in freeing Land, Labor and Capital.
Join with us in emancipating, enriching and beautifying the life of
all who inhabit, or wish to inhabit, the Argentine.
BUENOS AIRES, April 4, 1921. THE PROVISIONAL COMMITTEE: (Eduardo
Belaustegui, Nicolas Besio Moreno, Arturo Capdevila, Enrique Crosa,
Leon Denis, Carlos A. Encina, Felipe A. Fernandez, Francisco H.
Gaibisso, Adolfo D. Holmberg, Juan P. Maglioni, Manuel M. Podesta,
Aurelio Pozzi, Rufino Rico, Winfredo Sola, C. Villalobos Dominguez.)
MAXIMUM PROGRAMME
- Abolition of Private Properly in Land (and other natural
resources), effective ownership to pass to the State. Land to be
leased in open competition to private individuals for a life
period, or to collective entities, for a limited term.
- Absolute Free Trade, internal and external.
- The Contracting of Public Debts to be prohibited.
An Important Declaration
The Argentine Association for the League of Nations -- in Article 2
of its Statutes, declares for "The doctrine of Moral law, the
sovereignty of free nations, the emancipation of those who are
oppressed, the abolition of arbitrary force, and the organization of
Europe and of the whole world into an association for the relief of
the suffering, and for the enlightenment of mankind." And further
says:
"The Argentine Association for the League of Nations
favors the constitution of democratic and parliamentary governments
emanating from the free will of the peoples and principles which
safeguard and sustain the collective and mutual interests of the
community, as e. g. (A)'Single Tax,' (B) 'Free Trade,' (C) 'Solution
of the Social Problems affecting Capital and Labor, (D) Stability of
money Exchange based upon the value of the land in each State, (E)
The settlement of all disputes that can arise between men, for the
maintenance of universal harmony."
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