So I was reading 'Reds!' again...

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

So I was reading Reds!: A Revolutionary Timeline (http://fools-gold.org/aaron/reds/) again last night. For those of you who don't know, this is an exercise in Alternate History in which a small change of events (Pres. McKinley's Assassination doesn't happen) ultimately leads to a socialist revolution and a Union of American Socialist Republics.

While I was going through it again, I discovered that the author of this piece had written what, I believe, actually offers a pretty solid framework for a Socialist American Constitution (http://fools-gold.org/aaron/reds/#constitution).

I would like to see what everyone thinks of this fictitious document. For a work of speculation, I found it to be surprisingly thorough. In my view, this is pretty close to what a constitution for a socialist democracy would look like.

[John Nada]

I wish this really happened.:(

Why is it called the "Union of American Socialist Republics"? They USSR was (in theory) supposed to be a union of several nations. I don't see any mention of the right to self-determination. It was a topic brought up at the Stuttgart Conference where in this timeline the Socialist Labor Party attended, and Lenin made a big deal about the rights of colonized peoples. John Reed and co. in this Alternate History is seemingly is ignorant of this. In here he talks about giving away Hawaii, Alaska, the Philippines, ect. to imperialists. Yet in real life he was very much in favor of the right to self-determination: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/baku/ch04a.htm

Also at the time there was a debate on racism and oppression against African-Americans: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/2nd-congress/ch04.htm#v1-p121 The old Socialist Party and even the new Communist Party at first didn't have a particular good line(sometimes outright racist) that appealed to them, and didn't really try to reach out to them. The IWW did reach out and organize, and later the CPUSW and the SWP there was a more serious attempt to analysis their plight. Both Trotsky and CPUSA member Harry Haywood thought that African-Americans were part of an oppressed nation: https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/swp-us/3rdconvention/swp02.htm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Haywood The Black Belt would've been on the front line of the reactionary Democrat counterrevolutionary rebels. Du Bois was a high-ranking official(in the timeline) who(IRL) wrote about the Black Belt and would've been aware of the issue.

Where's the right of self-determination of oppressed peoples(Hawaiians, Inuit, Native Americans, Puerto Ricans, Blacks, Filipinos, ect.)? They don't have to exercise that right, but it was a big deal at the time, considering the world looked like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_empires_and_colonies_around_World_War_I .png

It's funny it looks like the Soviet Constitution, except no 7 hour, 5 day(IIRC) work week, with 2 weeks paid vacation. If I were to write it I'd throw in abortion on demand, paid for by the state.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

@Juan Moreno

It's called the Union of American Socialist Republics because in this timeline, all of the states essentially become semi-autonomous socialist republics and communes.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I think the entire thing is fairly inexplicable. It obviously wants to describe a "Red" US, with states, with an executive president, and with "people's" secretaries instead of regular secretaries but - why? I mean, first of all, a transitional period is a time of constant political change. Political developments can easily make the structures prescribed by the constitution obsolete, and give other structures increased importance. This happened with the Soviet of Labour and Defence, for example, in Soviet Russia.

And why retain states at all? The federal structure of the RSFSR was a concession to the right of various nationalities of the former Russian Empire to self-determination and the situation on the ground. The various states of the US are not nations, however, and they're anachronisms even at this point. At best one might imagine a socialist federation of North America, encompassing also Quebec, native areas, Hawaii, Puerto Rico etc. As for mainland America, however, is there any need to have South Carolina as a separate state? That would just encourage them.

Finally, the rights enumerated in the constitution are all nice and so on, but if taken seriously, they would be a millstone around the neck of the workers' government. Independent trade unions led by the union bureaucracy, protected churches harboring counter-revolutionaries, an activist court system interfering with the protection of the revolution and so on - even Lincoln had to suspend protections similar to these to wage a civil war.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

@Xhar-Xhar

It's based on the precept that Americans would never accept socialism without a bill of rights to go along with it. That said, if you read the rest of the timeline you'll find that this still doesn't prevent the workers' government from instituting the Red Terror. In this case, of course, their particular Red Terror is a bit more narrow in its targets as it only goes against those who are specifically acting in or financially supporting counter-revolution. They make a point of showing that just because someone says something stupid does not automatically make them a counterrevolutionary.