Policy updates, continued
The People's Secretariat for Agriculture
American agriculture, particularly in the Great Plains, was in a serious state of crisis when the Revolution began in early 1933. Low crop prices, massive land repossession, and drought conditions had already plagued Midwestern and Western communities. As these drought conditions continued to worsen, the agricultural crisis reached it's terrible apogee. The Dust Bowl, in which millions of tons of topsoil were blown away, ruined millions of hectares of farmland. The drought would continue to worsen leading into 1934, prompting one of the most drastic government industrial reorganizations in history.
It would be up to Henry Wallace and his advisers to plot the country's course through these treacherous waters. There were political concerns that had to be navigated as well as practical ones: in spite of the Party's pre-revolution propaganda romanticizing the American yeoman farmer, the Party favored farm collectivization to individual land ownership. Farmers were a core of the Party's constituency, and alienating them would be an inadvisable move.
The 1934 Basic Law contained a provision that declared all natural resources to be public property. But the provision was far from specific: was land a natural resource, to be owned publicly? Furthermore, though "prairie socialism" was a strong phenomenon, would the millions of American farmers who had lost their land accept moving onto a collective farm.
Regardless, there was real pressure to move forward with agriculture collectivization, and Wallace's eventual solutions were an innovative mixture of carrot and stick approaches. The Natural Resources Act of 1934 would declare all land, forests, mineral, animal and plant resources within the Union to be public property. A dual union-provincial agency, the Land and Natural Resource Trust (more commonly known as the Land Trust), was chartered to manage the allocation of common property. At its founding, all extant legitimate ownership titles (i.e., those not seized from those who supported the junta or nationalized by government) would be converted into stewardship titles.
Those holding stewardship titles were required to farm or otherwise work the land provided in their title to maintain rights to it. The amount of land stewarded was limited the amount that a single family, with no hired help, could reasonably be expected to cultivate (this limit based on household size of the title holder). Besides these restrictions, a stewardship title could not be revoked for any reason, and they could be inherited.
Land that had been most severely affected by the Dust Bowl would be nationalized: the Land Trust would pay farmers to give up their stewardship. Land purchased this way would be used to form agricultural cooperatives. These government supported collectives, patterned off Palestinian kibbutzim, would use techniques of soil conservation and industrialization to re-cultivate the land.
Farmers less severely affected were encouraged to charter farm collectives with their own stewardships. In exchange for collectivizing and forming new kibbutzim, they would receive technical assistance, price supports, and access to mechanization.
The kibbutz project, as it was later called, would be a considerable success and a model for future programs of voluntary collectivization. By 1940, 56% of American agricultural land throughout the Great Plains and Midwest had been collectivized. In the South, collectivization reached a plateau of nearly 80% by 1940.
Wallace used the project as a means of improving the health and efficiency of American agriculture. Hardier, higher yield hybrid strains of corn and wheat were promoted to increase productivity. A National Agricultural Research Center was established to continue developing and promoting new methods of increasing productivity.
The kibbutz project also contained subsidies to build small-scale light industries in the agricultural collectives to encourage a more even distribution between town and country, as Marx had argued for in The Communist Manifesto. One notable consequence was a revival of American breweries and distilleries, long in decline under the weight of state temperance laws. Before long, each kibbutz would have its own brewery and distillery.(1)
The People's Secretariat for Education
As part of Foster's Cultural Revolution, the entire American educational system, from top to bottom, would be totally restructured. As part of this ideological program, the old norms of hierarchical instruction were to be questioned and discarded wherever possible. The purpose of education would not be to make competent factory workers, or obedient soldiers, but thinking, reasoning and politically participating "socialist citizens".
John Dewey's school reforms would affect all levels of education, from the first grade to the university. As part of the program, traditional models of education emphasizing the regimented classroom with the dictatorial teacher would be discarded. The Deweyite school would place far more emphasis on active critical thinking and democratic discourse than it would on concerns such as attendance or punctuality. Problem solving and critical thinking would be promoted hand-in-hand with cooperative projects and civic service. Individual homework would be discarded in favor of collaborative projects; each individual would succeed or fail not only on their own brilliance, but on cultivating the talents and cooperation of their peers as well.
The new educational models heavily reflected Marxist-Leninist ideology, at least in its American expression. While the full effect of the new educational models, rapidly implemented in the mid 30s, would take decades to observe, there was little doubt among proponents and detractors that it would achieve much of what it aimed. What differed was only whether those effects would be reflected positively or negatively. Would the thinking, engaged democratic citizen be in practice little more than a herd animal, or would he become the citizen of the future the world over?
The other major educational reforms of the period were more structural than methodological. The 1934 Basic Law abolished private educational institutions, including parochial schools, and the mid 30s saw the continued battle to integrate former parochial school students into public school systems. Many feathers were ruffled, particularly among American Catholics, and the end of the Catholic educational system in America added further complexities to the growing theological disputes in Catholicism.(2)
Significant reforms were made to higher education as well. Federal and provincial support for higher education was substantially increased. Access to higher education would be made entirely free to individuals, opening up positions in all colleges and universities to be based solely on merit. Programs were established to increase the number of available slots for students at universities, and dozens of new universities were planned and chartered, some of which would eventually become among America's leaders in education.
School curricula reflected the new political climate in America. Though largely voluntary, the changes in educational curricula would be at the forefront of the Cultural Revolution, and would serve to create a "new mythology", with its own folk heroes and villains, as a new national historical and cultural narrative.(3)
The People's Secretariat for Public Safety
Originally formed out of the old National Bureau of Investigation and the United States Marshals Service, the People's Secretariat for Public Safety (informally SecPubSafe) would quickly become the UASR's dual public and secret national police force. Though largely manned by loyal party members during the 30s, it was quickly clear that it's executive officer, J. Edgar Hoover, was the one in complete control of the organization.
The public face of the SecPubSafe was its national police forces: train and shipping police, investigation units, border guards, archive guards, security for national public buildings and public officials, and the counterespionage service. It would also coordinate cooperation between provincial police forces, and take over in cases of major disasters. However, SecPubSafe contained its own secret, paramilitary police forces and espionage services. Many of the public organizations within the Secretariat also had classified divisions and secret functions. The secret police functions were under the direct control of the internal Commissariat for State Security (CSS).
Though J. Edgar Hoover had been welcomed onto the Central Committee for his role in the end of the Civil War, he was far from trusted by the rest of the political establishment. His outing as a homosexual by the Justice Secretariat's tolerance campaigns was a proverbial shot across the bow: so far he had been depicted as a wholesome patriot, ordinary and normal in every other way. His sexual proclivities, so far, had remained unmentioned.
His own organization was quickly staffed with persons whose loyalties to Hoover were dubious, but were unquestionable with regards to the Revolution. At any rate, Hoover got the message: play by the rules and do your duty, and we can have an understanding. Hoover set out to secure his position by proving where his loyalties lay.
SecPubSafe would play an integral role in the Red Terror. CSS special agents, armed with modern forensics techniques, wiretapping, Thompson submachine guns and Model 1911 autopistols, would scour the nation for paramilitaries and enemies of the state hiding out from the end of the Civil War.
The CSS would wage a two front campaign throughout the country: counterrevolutionaries would be isolated from potential sympathizers through propaganda and careful politics. Then they would be sniffed out and eliminated. The archetype of this campaign was the CSS's purge of the remnants of the KKK and other paramilitaries in the South. Isolated from sympathizers such as backwoods moonshiners by repeals of temperance laws and alcohol excises, and development programs, KKK cells were forced to undertake much more visible means of support. Following the chains of robberies, CSS units tracked down these cells. More often than not, they did not bother to take prisoners.
While many higher ranking officials in the KKK were given the People's Tribunal treatment, most rank and file militants from all groups were given far less luxurious treatment. On many occasions, captured counterrevolutionaries would be summarily executed. Hundreds, perhaps thousands more were killed trying to evade capture.
The purges and arrests were not contained to backwoods guerillas either. Southern officials in the Right Democrats or of dubious loyalty were often framed, disgraced or arrested by CSS agents. Several were outright assassinated by Public Safety. CSS largely obeyed the restrictions of its mandate: union members and members of the Worker's Party or the Left Democrats were immune from the secret police treatment. Dealing with corrupt or disloyal officials in the aforementioned organizations were dealt with by the regular forces of SecPubSafe.
1. This subject will be covered in more depth in later cultural updates. Rest assured, changes in eating and drinking habits will not be missed in cultural updates. I just do not want to clutter policy updates too much.
2. This will also be the subject of its own update(s). Religion during the Cultural Revolution will get its own full update, and the policies of major organizations, such as the Catholic Church will also be examined.
3. This will probably be the first update after I'm finished with policy updates.
Next Update: Railways, Communication, Maritime Transport
