Denouncing the Horrors of Socialism

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, it is often said that capitalism is selfishness and socialism is sharing. That is exactly backwards. The only way to succeed in a capitalist society is to figure out what somebody else needs and how to get it for them better than they can get it for themselves. It might be mowing their lawn. It might be doing brain surgery on their child. We have to help our neighbor somehow.

It is true if I take $1 from Peter and give it to Paul, Paul is $1 richer and Peter is $1 poorer. What I have really done is to take from both of them $1 worth of incentive to help each other. Peter no longer has a reason to help Paul because he no longer benefits, and Paul has no reason to help Peter because he no longer needs to.

Socialism, thus, dissolves the natural bonds that hold a society together and lead each of us to help one another. Capitalism is voluntary. Peter and Paul help each other because it is in their mutual interest to do so. Socialism is compulsion. We have got to take what one has earned from helping others and give it to someone who has none.

As Lincoln said: ``It is the same spirit that says, You toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it.''

Slavery and socialism both spring from that same rotten principle. Many societies have succumbed to the siren's song of a benevolent and all-powerful government, only to awaken one morning to find that benevolence is gone and the all-powerful government is still there.

Let that not be the epitaph of the United States of American. The history of human society can be summed up in just four words: Freedom works; socialism sucks.

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