Did Pound believe in the Constitution? Tim Romano says, >I think Pound had a fervent, sincere, idealistic belief >in the power of certain key political documents, the US >Constitution and >the >Magna Carta among them. These documents represent the unwobbling, the >precise, the firm, the inheritance of western civilization, the clearly and >simply stated Will of the Founding Fathers. These documents mean so much to >Pound that I would be very slow to dismiss these passages as statements >made >out of convenience or mere expedience. I would really like to believe that Pound did believe in the US Constitution. When I first began to study Pound, I believed that he did believe not only in democracy, but in "economic democracy." But Pound did not believe in Democracy in the sense which you do, Tim Romano, nor in the sense in which I do; nor did he believe in the Constitution the way you and I do. If he did, where did he enunciate his understanding of the Constitution? Where in the Cantos did he actually quote any part of the Constitution, in support of the basic principles which are antithetical to fascsim, namely the rule of law over men, the system of checks and balances, and the vesting of the supreme power of law-making, and the power of the purse in an elected legislature? When he spoke favorably of the Constitution, and I admit he did (in the vaguest terms) what was the context, and what he saying about the Constitution? If he liked the Constituion , what did he like about it? And if he did highly value the US Consitution, as you suggest, why was he so interested in China, Confucianism (which is an authoritarian doctrine), and in Confucian texts? And how could he reconcile these interests? Confucian texts are quoted numerous times throughout the Cantos, and at great length, while I believe quotations from the Constitution are very few and far between (perhaps there are none at all). So why the far, far greater interest in Chinese imperial texts? Allow me to suggest why, I think, he did not care about those features of the Constitution which enshrine the values suitable for a Republic; and why he put such an emphasis on Confucian texts. Pound composed a list of classics, a sort of literary canon to be used as compasses for the new "totalitarian synthesis." The list, included at the end of the Guide to Kulchur, is entitled "AS SEXTANT," and has seven headings: "I The FOUR BOOKS (Confucius and Mencius). II HOMER . . . III The Greek TRAGEDIANS . . . IV DIVINA COMMEDIA . . . V FROBENIUS . . . VI BROOKS ADAMS: Law of Civilization and Decay VII The English Charters, the essential parts of BLACKSTONE . . . The American Constitution." Pound's attitude can be gauged partly by the fact that the Confucian classics appear first on the list, while the U.S. Constitution appears last. No valid assessment of Pound's thought is possible without acknowledging that works like the Confucian Analects and the Ta Hio have a primary significance for the poet OVER and ABOVE any documents or texts belonging to Western tradition, such as the U.S. Constitution, which Pound regards merely as an "amenity". Pound states this straightforwardly in a brief paragraph after the seven headings: As the FOUR BOOKS contain answers to all problems of conduct that can arise, a man who understands them may regard the other six com- ponents of this list as amenities rather than necessities (GK, 352). So Pound believed the Constitution was not a "necessity", that it was an "amenity"; while the Four Books contain "answers to all problems". Pound believed that the social stability of over two thousand years of Chinese history was reflected in the stability of the Chinese literary canon. The "Four Books" were the essential basis of virtually all official scholarly research during this long stretch of time. No similar claim could be made for any Western set of texts. The ideological and religio-philosophical tension that exists between such works as the Bible, the writings of Plato and Aristotle, the records of the deeds of the Roman Emperors, the writings of the Church Fathers, the Koran, the prose and poetry of Renaissance authors, and the writings of the American Founders -- that is to say, the tension which exists between works which have significantly affected the development of Mediterranean and Euro-American civilization -- cannot be resolved to Pound's satisfaction. Pound craved order. Thus, the Guide to Kulchur begins with a quotation from the Confucian Analects. Said the Philosopher: you think that I have learned a great deal, and kept the whole of it in my memory? . . . It is not so. I have reduced it all to one principle (GK, 15). Pound says elsewhere that he is interested in a text that can be used "against ambiguity." It is difficult for him to locate it in the Western tradition. Thus, the answer to the question "Why Pound's interest in China" is to be found not merely in the myth of Chinese social stability (as opposed to the relatively chaotic succession of civilizations in the West), but in the fact that a small set of texts can be used as the basis of a project to construct a stable social order, as Chinese history appears to show. Never mind the fact that, in addition to the Confucian canon, there is a Legalist philosophical canon, a Buddhist religious canon, and a Taoist canon, and that members of these various schools of thought have tried to synthesize such contradictory philosophies. Never mind that study of the intricate relationships between these different strands of Chinese thought yields as many ambiguities, quandaries, and contradictions as the study of Western intellectual history. Pound preferred to believe the myth of one set of texts, because the Confucian texts did dominate, for the most part, the propagation of official ideology, and they allowed him to "reduce it all to one principle." The principle was the identical with the central tenet of fascism: A strong and good man can bring order. It is a doctrine which is not consistent with democracy, with a republic, or with a constitutional form of government. Why? Because the basic principle of Constitutional government is the axiom: all men, no matter how strong they are, or how good they may appear, must be subject to the law, a law which is made by elected representatives. Regards, Wei ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com