My latest reading of W.A. Swanberg's Norman Thomas: The Last Idealist covered Thomas' views on the Soviet Union, the 1932 platform of the Socialist Party, and Thomas' changing religious views.
Thomas was critical of the Soviet Union's tyranny,
favored "evolutionary and constitutional change" rather than violent
revolution (Swanberg on page 105), and was far from being a doctrinaire
Marxist. A number of Communists viewed Thomas as rather bourgeois, and
Thomas himself struggled to justify how he, a Socialist, could be
well-off financially, saying that he could not help living in a
capitalistic society, or that he wanted the best for his kids. At the
same time, on the issue of the Soviet Union, Thomas held out
hope that the U.S.S.R.'s tyranny would be merely transitional, and he
stated that "Russia is disproving the fallacy of the necessity of the
worship of the profit motive to make men work and work hard" (page
130). Moreover, Thomas disagreed with fellow Socialist Morris
Hillquist because Hillquist "served as counsel for the Standard Oil and
Vacuum Oil companies in their lawsuits to regain oil lands which had
been nationalized by Soviet Russia" (Swanberg on page 129).
On the
1932 platform of the Socialist Party, Swanberg summarizes it as
follows: it "favored public works, a shorter work week, agricultural
relief, unemployment insurance, the elimination of child labor, old-age
pensions, slum clearance, low-cost housing, higher taxes on corporations
and the wealthy, and the nationalization of basic industries" (page
135). Thomas conveyed a remarkable vision: "There
is no conceivable physical reason why every American family should not
be well fed, well clothed, well housed, possessing its own radio and
automobile, and, above all, free from that dread fear of tomorrow which
is the tyrant of our waking and sleeping hours" (Thomas' words, quoted on page 135).
Thomas
was critical of President Herbert Hoover for prioritizing a balanced
budget over helping those who were suffering on account of the Great
Depression, and Thomas stated that Hoover "promised prosperity
to us all but has fought off every dole except a dole to bankers [the
Reconstruction Finance Corporation]" (Thomas' words, quoted on
page 125). Thomas also criticized Roosevelt's favorable emphasis on the
importance of a balanced federal budget. One might argue that Thomas,
as a Socialist, had a statist view on government, but Thomas asserted
the contrary, saying: "I have a profound fear of the undue
exaltation of the State and a profound faith that the new world we
desire must depend upon freedom and fellowship rather than upon any sort
of coercion whatsoever." Thomas indeed defended civil
liberties when the government was attacking them in the name of
patriotism, and so in that sense he was anti-authoritarian; but I doubt
that, were Socialism to be effected, it would proceed without any
coercion by the state, for corporations and the wealthy probably would
not voluntarily contribute large sums of their money to Socialistic
programs.
I'm curious about how the nuts-and-bolts of Socialism
would work. If basic industries are nationalized, what for-profit
corporations would exist to serve as a source of revenue for the
government to redistribute wealth? I guess it depends on the definition
of "basic industries" (Swanberg's words).
On Thomas' view of
religion, Thomas became more skeptical about religion after the death of
his son, as he questioned whether a loving God would be omnipotent and
allow so many problems in the world. For Thomas, if change were to be
effected, human beings would have to be the ones to do it. Yet,
Socialists still appealed to Thomas, a former clergy-person, in their
attempt to refute the charge that they were anti-religion.