Debs, Eugene V. (Eugene Victor), 1855-1926; United States. Supreme Court
"I believe, however, in a wider patriotism. Thomas Paine said, 'My
country is the world. To do good is my religion.' Garrison said, 'My
country is the world and all mankind are my countrymen.' That is the
essence of internationalism. I believe in it with all my heart. I
believe that nations have been pitted against nations long enough in
hatred, in strife, in warfare. I believe there ought to be a bond of
unity between all of these nations. I believe that the human race
consists of one great family. I love the people of this country, but I
don't hate the people of any country on earth--not even the Germans. I
refuse to hate a human being because he happens to be born in some other
country. Why should I? To me it does not make any difference where he
was born or what the color of his skin may be. Like myself he is the
image of his creator. He is a human being endowed with the same
faculties, he has the same aspirations, he is entitled to the same
rights, and I would infinitely rather serve him and love him than to
hate him and kill him.
"We hear a great deal about human brotherhood--a beautiful and inspiring
theme. It is preached from a countless number of pulpits. It is vain for
us to preach of human brotherhood while we tolerate this social system
in which we are a mass of warring units, in which millions of workers
have to fight one another for jobs, and millions of business men and
professional men have to fight one another for trade, for practice--in
which we have individual interests and each is striving to care for
himself alone without reference to his fellow men. Human brotherhood is
yet to be realized in this world. It never can be under the
capitalist-competitive system in which we live.
"Yes; I was opposed to the war. I am perfectly willing, on that count,
to be branded as a disloyalist, and if it is a crime under the American
law punishable by imprisonment for being opposed to human bloodshed, I
am perfectly willing to be clothed in the stripes of a convict and to
end my days in a prison cell.
"The War of the Revolution was opposed. The Tory press denounced its
leaders as criminals and outlaws. And that is what they were, under the
divine right of a king to rule men.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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