The proposed Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America by the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA (Revcom) is nothing if not wordy.  It runs 99 pages, compared to the U.S. Constitution which takes just over an hour to read.  Written in 2010, Revcom’s constitution was authored by Bob Avakian, Revcom’s leader since inception.  Often described as having a cult-like following, Avakian wrote his own name into Revcom’s constitution multiple times.  Imagine if James Madison or George Washington had done that!

Take everything you know about the U.S. Constitution and America’s founding values — popular sovereignty, limited government, individual rights, and the rule of law – and throw it out the window.

Written in a messianic, moralizing tone, the document is chock full of Marxist-Leninist rhetoric and pathological loathing for all that has gone before.  Amidst Bob’s bloviating are several good reasons to reject Revcom’s proposed constitution:

The Dismantling of the USA — This document does not replace the U.S. Constitution.  It is a proposal for a brand new country (the New Socialist Republic in North America).  The document specifically refers to “dismantling” the United States.  Not only does the proposal contemplate “a multi-national and multi-lingual state”, it also sets the stage for numerous autonomous regions to be decided by elections in which only the affected minorities may vote.  Not willing to grant full independence to these regions, the proposal essentially stakes out a neo-colonialist position despite vociferously condemning “U.S. imperialism”.

One-Party Rule — The document is not just a proposed constitution. It is a manifesto whereby Revcom proclaims its desire to take control and be in charge forever.  This ‘constitution’ establishes one-party rule into perpetuity. Everything the Revcom constitution sets up is “under the overall and ultimate leadership of the Revolutionary Communist Party.”  Revcom is written into the document 31 times; no other parties are mentioned.

This is the typical communist formulation for a ‘people’s republic’.  The people are in charge, but the communist party is deemed to represent the people, so it’s really the party that’s in charge.  The state is the party and the party is the state.  This is not a ‘republic’ in any true sense of the word.

This is why the document’s pretensions to democracy are just sleight-of-hand.  For example, the people have the right to vote, but Revcom must approve many of the candidates standing for assemblies at the regional, local, or basic institution levels.  This is ‘democracy’? Hardly.

Moreover, Revcom’s constitution expressly states it is setting up a “dictatorship of the proletariat” indefinitely, until society completes the Marxist progression to communism “which is only possible on a world scale.”  History is littered with failed communist countries that never progressed beyond the dictatorship of the proletariat, starting with the Soviet Union.  Communist dictators never willingly give up power.  In addition, world communism will never happen, so the upshot is that Revcom intends to stay in power forever.

This has several implications: First, this is the rule of the party, not the rule of law. Second, whatever the party line is that day is ‘democracy’ and must be slavishly followed (the most famous example being the Soviets and Communist Party USA switch from opposing Hitler and fascism to extolling the virtues of the Molotov-Ribbentrop nonaggression pact in World War II).  Third, the communists are utopians; they promise heaven on earth.  But this will never be achieved because the dictatorship of the proletariat — with its police state, purges, show trials, gulags, and process of rooting out ‘class enemies’ — will never end.  To that point, the document states “there will still remain a need for government” even after class divisions and oppressive relations end.  This is heresy.  Under Marxist theory, the state is supposed to “wither away” and people are supposed to have complete freedom once communism arrives. For all its democratic bluster, Revcom’s proposed constitution sets up a new ruling class that will never leave power of its own volition.  How do we know?  There is not a single example in all of human history where a Marxist state moved beyond the dictatorship of the proletariat to pure communism.  It’s a fantasy.

The Folly of a Centrally Planned Economy — Revcom’s proposed constitution expressly states, “The economy of the New Socialist Republic in North America is a planned socialist economy, under the direction of the state and led by the Revolutionary Communist Party….”  More specifically, “state ownership of the means of production is the primary form of economic ownership and state planning the primary guideline in the development of the economy.”  (Another reason the state can’t wither away.)

This is standard-issue Marxism which has always proven to be both inefficient economically and disastrous for liberty.  There is no example in all of human history of central planning producing abundance and working out well.  (Any economic success Red China has had is attributable to the reintroduction of market forces, starting under Deng Xiaoping.)

Expropriation — To implement central planning, one must first seize all the means of production.  In Revcom’s New Socialist Republic, “Means of production, and other private capital and wealth of the former capitalist-imperialist ruling class of the United States of America, shall be expropriated, without compensation, and converted into state/public property.”  Further, “the private ownership of means of production and other capital, and the hiring of wage labor by owners of private capital, shall be prohibited….”  Revcom intends that, after a transition period, no private business may hire or pay employees.

The first problem with this insanity is the amount of coercion in the equation.  All owners will have their property stripped from them without recompense.  Some will not want to go along with the program.  What if people resist?  How far is Revcom willing to take this – shoot them all?  Moreover, workers are nominally given a right to strike in the planned economy, but the “needs of society” always take precedence, rendering the right to strike meaningless.  Workers of the World, Suck It Up!

The second problem with central planning is politicization, which Revcom expressly contemplates: “In order to develop the economy along socialist lines it is necessary to put revolutionary politics in command of economic matters.”  There you have it: a politicized economy.  The state will pick winners and losers and, if history is any guide, the choices will not be made according to economic efficiency or results, but according to who has friends in high places. Politicization guarantees suboptimal results, which is one reason why central planning with centrally set prices has always failed and has never produced the abundance communists and socialists promise.

The third problem with central planning as Revcom contemplates it is that none of the managers will know what they’re doing.  Central planning is not “clockwork”, the document intones.  Instead, it “is a process of struggle, transformation, discovery and learning–and is inseparable from social movements and social struggles that emerge in response to the unresolved contradictions of socialist society.”  The planning imperatives will always be changing, producing a welter of confusion.  The imperatives will be based on societal whims, and never be concerned with innovations in productivity.  Who gets hired today and for what reasons will always be changing as socialist society wrestles with its internal contradictions and struggles, and various groups fall in and out of favor.  The proverbial ‘DEI hires’ writ large – favored groups piloting airliners regardless of merit and the rest of it, as we have seen in recent years in the U.S.  Moreover, the envisioned process guarantees that important parts of production and management will always be staffed by novices who are learning on the job.  This is a recipe for paralysis, not prosperity.

Revcom is telling you up front they will not be running the economy as a business.  Decisions will be made for extraneous reasons — political and social — which are always changing.   No manager will be able to keep up with a party line in constant flux and will never develop any competency that could produce good results.  Revcom wants the chance to learn on the job, thus putting the question squarely: Why would you buy a house, figuratively speaking, from people who freely confess they don’t know how to build one?

The next problem with central planning is that it replaces the old inequality, not with equality, but with a new inequality.  Central planning requires a new managerial class (a nomenklatura). As occurred in the Soviet Union, the nomenklatura will become the new privileged class with dachas and access to international goods sold in stores ordinary citizens won’t be allowed to set foot in.

Another problem is the unsustainablity of redistribution.  Revcom’s socialist republic will overcome historic inequalities with redistribution, especially in healthcare and housing as these are “social goods and services”.  This will turn healthcare workers into slaves (if I have a right to healthcare, you have a duty to provide it).  Moreover, it will destroy the work ethic more generally.   Why pull the wagon, when you can sit in the wagon and get the same result for yourself without any effort?  Old Soviet joke: ‘We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.’  Over time, productivity and the standard of living decline.

Revcom attempts to draw a distinction between seizing the means of production and allowing the retention of personal property.  The means of production will become “common property”, while individuals are allowed to own “items of personal use and consumption.”

Keep your own stuff — sounds great, doesn’t it?  Sure, except when you remember large houses were cut up into smaller quarters to house many families in the same structure in Leninist Russia.  How many strangers can we pack into your house?  Also, the distinction is unworkable as any personal item — a house, a computer, or even a hammer — can be rented out or otherwise be used to make money (e.g., using personal computers for gig work).  There is no practical way to distinguish personal goods from the means of production. The best Revcom can hope for is to create housing police, computer police, and hammer police to keep people from using personal items for productive uses.  The coercion coefficient in this equation just went up.

All of this rests on the unfounded assumption that communism will produce such abundance that the issue of personal consumption will fade over time.  This has never happened.  It’s about as likely as a unicorn sighting.  Just ask any Cuban or Venezuelan.  Invariably, the outcome of Marxist economics has always been scarcity, poverty, hardship, and hunger for all but a privileged few.  With socialist scarcity, people are equally miserable.  Nobody owns a whole lot, because there isn’t a whole lot to go around.  But don’t worry:  You will probably be able to keep your toothbrush in Revcom’s New Socialist Republic.

Illusory ‘Rights’ — In the New Socialist Republic in North America, people have only the rights granted by the government and listed in the constitution, not innate God-given or natural rights as under the U.S. Constitution.  But what the government grants, the government can take away, unlike the American system where citizens are born with rights the government cannot usurp.

Moreover, all rights in Revcom’s constitution are not afforded to class enemies.  Instead, class enemies are to be “duly punished” during the revolutionary struggle.  Kill the Kulaks! — due process be damned.

The document recites a number of ‘rights’ that, because of one-party rule, are not worth the paper they are written on:

• The document grants a right to dissent.  On paper, expressing opposition to the republic may not be treated as a violation of law.  But what happened in other Marxist one-party states?  The Soviet constitution guaranteed free speech, but the guarantee was worthless, as the purges, show trials, and gulags showed.
• Limitations on speech continue with restrictions on the media.  All major media shall be in hands of the government and under the ultimate control of the Party.  Any other media will be funded by the government and must secure a license from the government to operate.  Just like in the Soviet Union, where every pamphlet, periodical, and book had to be licensed and was subjected to state censorship.  Moreover, licensed controlled media will have to compete with government-owned media: “Revolutionary Communist Party may also maintain and establish media directly under its leadership, to propagate its full program and viewpoint….”  Arts and culture are politicized and under the direction of the Party-controlled Executive Council.   Moreover, Revcom will produce art that meets the needs of the people.  There is no chance this will not be complete propaganda, part of making Revcom’s ideas ubiquitous.  Party art will be inspired by the teachings of … Bob Avakian.
• Revcom grants nominal freedom of religion, but the document provides that the exercise of religion may be curtailed by law and cannot conflict with government education programs.  Who knows what beliefs the state would declare out of bounds?  Creationism?  Or perhaps Christianity in its entirety, if kindred souls of Comey’s FBI are running the show.  Also, under the document, the state expressly puts its thumb on the scale in favor of atheism.
• There is much discussion in the document about relieving oppression suffered by women and minority groups.  Further, no one is to be denied rights or suffer discrimination on the basis of nationality, gender, sexual orientation, or religious or other belief.  The problem is the document countenances the government taking steps to uproot all inequality and oppression, as well as adopting “concrete measures” to compensate favored groups for past discrimination.  This guarantees institutionalized discrimination against disfavored groups and systemic enforced privilege frozen into law for favored groups.  This is the polar opposite of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution as now being interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court. Instead, Revcom’s approach reflects standard communist thinking about class enemies: some groups are always in the right no matter what and other groups are always in the wrong.  Kulaks bad, peasants good in Soviet Russia.  Rightists and intellectuals bad, Red Guards good in Mao’s Cultural Revolution.  Whites bad, blacks good in socialist South Africa (and now the United States). 
• The document establishes a number of criminal procedural and trial rights, starting with no unreasonable stops and searches.  (However, nothing is said about unreasonable seizures.)  There is also a presumption of innocence, the right to a jury trial, etc.  Revcom’s constitution embodies Marx’s magical thinking that ordinary crime will disappear once a classless society has been achieved, because crime is merely a reflection of class struggle.  No classes, no class struggle, no crime — easy!  Jails will be largely empty.  Nice bedtime story.  To believe rape is motivated by class struggle is completely delusional. 

But Revcom left itself a big out with respect to criminal procedure and all other government-granted rights — an exception big enough to drive a truck through.  The document provides for the suspension of rights in an ‘emergency’.  Who declares an emergency?  Ultimately Revcom, because Revcom under one-party rule controls everything in the New Socialist Republic.  Further, there is no limiting principle as to what constitutes an emergency.  The legislature may only advise, but not decide.  On paper, the supreme court can overturn an emergency declaration.  But the record of Marxist one-party states is not good on independence of the judiciary or on paper rights being anything more than a mirage.  There is no reason to believe the story would turn out any differently in Revcom’s New Socialist Republic where, as in all communist states that have gone before, one party wields all power and is in the business of protecting its own position (not pursuing ‘social justice’).

Repurposed Education — The state will have a monopoly on education: “All education shall be public education….”  All schools will be state schools.  There will be no private schools or homeschooling.  “[A]ll education shall be conducted in Spanish and English equally,” as well as other prominent local languages.”  The purpose of education is indoctrination: “to learn deeply about the reality of, and the basis for, the oppression of whole peoples.”  Education will move beyond indoctrination to activism.  It will train young soldiers for the revolution: “to become deeply dedicated to and actively involved in the fight to uproot and eliminate all such relations of inequality and oppression.”  We know where this can lead – Pol Pot turned 12-year-olds into child soldiers and instruments of terror who executed family members.

Politicized Military — Like everything else in the New Socialist Republic, the military is under the ultimate control of the Party.  The purpose of the military is to “[carry] forward the revolutionary transformation of society, and contributing as much as possible to this transformation throughout the world.”  The military will be used to coerce the correct “ideological and political orientation, to broad and growing ranks of the people.”  Yes, Revcom actually wrote reeducation camps into their constitution.

This is jaw-dropping.  It is the complete politicization of the military.  Not only will the military be expected to fire on its own citizens and imprison them to enforce “revolutionary transformation”, it is expected to export revolution and work to destabilize its neighbors, as Cuba has done.  The state will engage in endless wars of ‘national liberation’ until world communism is achieved.

As in communist China, the military is expected to make its own money (i.e., “contribute to their self-provisioning”).  When the People’s Liberation Army in China was told to go out and make its own money, forced organ harvesting (mass murder) on an industrial scale was the result, a multibillion-dollar business.

Finally, with respect to the military, the document pledges the New Socialist Republic “will not develop, and will not use, nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction.”  Such unilateral disarmament is hopelessly naïve.

Other

• Revcom’s constitution stipulates that 18-year-olds may serve in the legislature.  Wow. Not only that, but the executive council is elected from the members of the legislature.  Therefore, 18-year-old lunatics could be running the entire asylum.
• There is no independent judiciary.  The Party controls the prosecutorial function and defendants are given Party-appointed counsel.  The Party approves all judicial nominees, regional and national.  Thus, it is guaranteed the Party will always win.  There will be no justice in this land.

Conclusion

If you want to abolish the USA, live under despotic one-party rule, put up with the misery of a planned economy, not have any real rights, be constantly barraged by indoctrination and propaganda from government-controlled media, and have the military knocking at your door at midnight to enforce the orthodoxy du jour, then Revcom’s alternate universe is for you.  Just remember, though, that once you enter, you can never leave.

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