The term “democracy,” as I have said again and again, does not contain enough positive content to stand alone against the forces you dislike—it can easily be transformed by them. If you will not have God (and He is a jealous God), you should pay your respects to Hitler and Stalin.80
Once an ideology takes hold of a society, only a superior force or a superior ideology can exorcise it. To defeat a faith you must have a faith. What, other than Christianity, is the West’s alternative faith? Again, Eliot: “As political philosophy derives its sanction from ethics, and ethics from the truth of religion, it is only by returning to the eternal source of truth that we can hope for any social organization which will not, to its ultimate destruction, ignore some essential aspect of reality.”81
But if Christianity has lost its appeal and Christianity “is not an option,” the revolution will accelerate until we hit the retaining wall of reality. Perhaps Cyril Connolly was right when he wrote, half a century ago, “It is closing time in the gardens of the West.”82
America is a paradox. She remains the greatest nation on earth, the land of opportunity, possessed of a vitality and energy unlike those of any other nation. We are the most blessed people on earth. Our science, technology, and medicine are the envy of mankind. Some of us are alive today only because of surgical procedures, medical devices, and miracle drugs that did not exist when we were young. We have so much to be thankful for, and we all owe America. And while no one can deny the coarseness of her manners, the decadence of her culture, or the sickness in her soul, America is still a country worth fighting for and the last best hope of earth.
Seated on his coffin in the wagon carrying him through the Virginia countryside to his place of execution, the old abolitionist John Brown was heard to say softly, “This is a beautiful country.”83And so it is. And that is why we must never stop trying to take her back.
Some withered nerve in her brain twitched slightly, she softened, smiled, and told him a story about her grandfather who had been a page at Queen Victoria’s coronation.
“That was another world,” he said.
“Another civilisation,” she corrected him, “the one I was born into. It has died. I say: died, not vanished, because it was a living organism. A civilisation based on the family. What has taken its place is not alive; an atomised society, without security, without warmth, a chaos of fragmented mechanical relationships. O, I know as well as you do, that in my world all was not well, there was ignorance and poverty. But the right way was not to tear that world down and replace it by anarchy.
The family base should have been extended, cherished, encouraged.”
—Storm Jameson, 1966,
The Early Life of Stephen Hind
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a hang but a whimper.
—T.S. Eliot,
“The Hollow Men”
Also by Patrick J. Buchanan
The New Majority
Conservative Votes, Liberal Victories
Right from the Beginning
The Great Betrayal
A Republic, Not an Empire
AFTERWORD
Since The Death of the West was published in January 2002, the four threats to the survival of Western civilization that it identified—Third World immigrant invasions, the dying out of European peoples, the menace of multiculturalism, the rise of a world socialist superstate—have become headline issues from Melbourne to Moscow. These mega-issues will dominate our lives as totally as did the Cold War, and how we manage them will determine whether America and the West survive.
Yet, the spring of 2002 showed us how far Western politicians were out of touch with the people. Across Europe, parties of the populist Right again and again stunned the establishment. In the first round of the French elections, Jean-Marie Le Pen humiliated Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin and eliminated him from the run-off. In the climate of hysteria and hate that followed Le Pen’s showing, Dutch leader Pim Fortuyn, who had campaigned for a moratorium on immigration into Holland, the most densely populated country in Europe, was assassinated. His party went on to win a place in the new government.
When a cargo ship laden with 900 Kurdish asylum seekers landed in Sicily before Easter, the Italian government declared a state of emergency. “Police searches are needed otherwise we will be thrown out of our own country by the massive arrival of clandestine immigrants,” declared Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. “If we don’t use force to to stop them,” said coalition partner Umberto Bossi of the Northern League, “the hordes will arrive and rub out all they find, imposing their own rules and religions.”
British Tory laian Duncan Smith now says of illegal aliens, “not one … should be allowed to set foot in Britain.” Even labour has gotten the message. “We’re not advocating a ‘Fortress Europe,’” says Tony Blair, “but what we are saying is there’s got to be some order and some rules brought into the system.”
According to the Guardian, Blair’s government is considering using the Royal Navy to intercept refugee traffickers in the Mediterranean and the Royal Air Force transport planes for mass deportations. Those 20 percent showings by the far right British National Party in some working-class towns in the Midlands appear to have concentrated British political minds wonderfully.
As I also wrote in these pages, the exploding birthrate among Arab peoples, especially Palestinians, has created an existential crisis for Israel, compounded by the suicide bombers of Hamas. Paul Kennedy, who has written of the fall of nations, looked at the same demographic data as did I and wondered aloud whether the Jewish state can survive through the mid-century.
In Australia, Prime Minister John Howard was a lost candidate until he took a tough stand against the boatloads of aliens crashing into his country’s north coast. When he turned them back, he was reelected. In May, Japan’s Health Minister Chikara Sakaguchi warned that the nation’s 127 million people in the Home Islands will begin shrinking by 2008. If our birth rate is not turned around, Sakaguchi warned, “the Japanese race will become extinct.” Recent figures showed that the number of Japanese children under 15 has now fallen for the twenty-first straight year.
In the United States, President Bush’s call upon Congress to grant amnesty to illegal aliens from Mexico created a firestorm that shook the White House, as did the revelation that his INS had granted a student visa to Muhammad Atta, six months after he crashed that hijacked airliner into the World Trade Center.
Also in May, a study of census data for Southern California by the Los Angeles Times found that the mass migration of the 1990s, legal and illegal, from south of the border, had sent poverty rates soaring 28 to 68 percent in Los Angeles and its neighboring counties. Only 44 percent of the 9.5 million people living in giant Los Angeles County now speak English as their first language in their own homes.
Economically, America is becoming two nations. Socially, culturally, ethnically, we are becoming, two, three, many nations which have less and less in common with one another. Around kitchen tables and on bar stools, in restaurants and locker rooms, these issues are endlessly argued. But the modern inquisition of Political Correctness dictates that politicians remain silent, or he read out of the company of decent men.
Yet if we do not discuss them, we will not deal with them, and if we do not deal with them, our civilization will die and our country is going to come apart, and we will lose the last best hope of earth. As Bishop Butler said: “Things and actions are what they are, and their consequences will be what they will be; why then should we desire to be deceived?”
Within days of publication, The Death of the West was a national bestseller. Within weeks, contracts had been signed to have it published abroad in Russian, Chinese, and Spanish. The American people who love their country and cherish this greatest of all civilizations want these issues addressed, and it is time our elites addressed them. For, if they do n
ot, then, as Lincoln warned, this, too, shall pass away. And we cannot let that happen.
—PATRICK J. BUCHANAN
June 1, 2002
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As has been my custom after campaigns, in November of 2000, I retired to my basement office to read, reflect, and write. This book is a by-product of that sabbatical. Without the support of my wife, Shelley, in the periods of transition and new beginnings that follow those campaigns, it could not have been done.
I also want to express my gratitude, yet again, to my friend, editor, and agent, Fredi Friedman, for her loyalty and unindulgent editing. This is the fourth book of mine that Fredi has chaperoned through to publication. My thanks also to Tom Dunne, my editor and publisher at St. Martin’s Press, for his confidence and assistance and Sean Desmond, who saw the text through from word processor to the printed page.
Five friends were kind enough to read the text and to urge cuts, alterations, and additions, many of which were made: Sam Francis, Bill Lind, Scott McConnell, Bill Hawkins, and Allan Ryskind. Also, I must thank Kara Hopkins, my intrepid researcher, who dug up quotes I could only recall from memory, and mined new facts, arguments, and ideas out of books I had not before read. Without her assistance, this work would not be as complete or as persuasive as I hope it is. Finally, my thanks to Joseph Chamie at the UN Population Division for his friendly and swift response to all my requests.
NOTES
Introduction
1 “Bush Promotes Agenda for Improving America’s Readiness,” PR Newswire, May 30, 2000, p. 1.
2 Thomas Edsall, “Political Party Is No Longer Dictated by Class Status; Sex, Religion, Lifestyle Temper Education, Income,” Washington Post, November 9, 2000, p. A37.
3 Michael Barone, “The 49 Percent Nation,” National Journal, June 9, 2001, p. 1,715.
4 Terry Teachout, “Republican Nation, Democratic Nation?” Commentary, January 2001, p. 25.
5 “Text of Bush’s Inaugural Speech,” Associated Press, January 20, 2001.
6 Joseph A. D’Agostino and Timothy Carney, “Congressmen: Illegals Here to Stay,” Human Events, April 2, 2001, p. 3.
7 Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1992), p. 32.
8 “Transcript of Clinton Remarks at Portland State Commencement,” U.S. Newswire, June 15, 1998.
9 Jacques Barzun, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2000), p. 774.
10 Ibid.
11 “Remarks by the President and President-Elect Fox of Mexico at Press Availability,” Federal Document Clearinghouse Federal Department and Agency Documents, August 24, 2000.
12 Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Arlington House), p. 91.
13 Hagop Jack Touryantz, “Multifaceted Problems in Multiethnic States: Ethnic Homogeneity Through Population Exchange,” Armenian Reporter, March 20, 1999, p. 4.
14 Teachout, p. 29.
15 Donald M. Rothberg, “Bush’s One-Time Primary Challenger Endorses President, Blasts Democrats,” Associated Press, August 17, 1992.
16 United Nations Secretariat, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, World Population Prospects: The 1998 Revision. Vol. 1: Comprehensive Tables, November 24, 1998, pp. 100, 118, 152, 158, 164, 182, 202, 224, 240, 258, 268, 338, 350, 352, 366, 368, 376.
17 Gustave Le Bon, The Crowd (New York: The Viking Press, 1960), p. 13.
Chapter One: Endangered Species
Author’s Note: Unless otherwise specified, all the statistics in this chapter were published by the Population Division of the United Nations in World Population Prospects: The 2000 Revision, Highlights released on February 28, 2001, Replacement Migration: Is It a Solution to Declining and Ageing Populations?, released March 21, 2000, or World Population Prospects: The 1998 Revision, Vol. 1. All remaining figures that are not otherwise specified are from the New York Times 2001 Almanac.
1 London Times, January 16, 2000, http://www.childrenforthefuture.org/fertility%20rate%20by%20education.htm
2 Peter F. Drucker, Management Challenges for the 21st Century (New York: HarperBusiness, 1999), p. 44.
3 Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations, World Population Prospects: The 2000 Revision, Highlights, February 28, 2001, p. 1.
4 Joe Woodard, “Look Out Below!: The Plummeting Birth Rate Will Have a Profound Impact on Boomers as Well as Gen-Xers in the Next Century,” Calgary Herald, September 12, 1999, p. A12.
5 Ben Wattenberg, “Trés Gray: The Birth Dearth in Europe, Intellectualcapital.com, January 24, 1999.
6 Cheryl Stonehouse, “A Taxing Time for the Village with No Babies,” Express, November 26, 1999.
7 James K. Robinson and Walter B. Rideout, eds., A College Book of Modern Verse (Evanston, Ill.: Row, Peterson and Company, 1960), p. 370.
8 Count Harry Kessler, Walter Rathenau: His Life and Work (New York: Howard Fertig, 1969), p. 271.
9 Alistair Horne, To Lose a Battle: France 1940 (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1969), p. 10.
10 Joseph Chamie, director, United Nations Population Division, “Letter to Author,” January 17, 2001.
11 Toby Helm, “Stoiber Pins Poll Hopes on Cash for Babies Plan,” Daily Telegraph, January 3, 2001, p. 17.
12 Ellen Hale, “Graying of Europe Has Economizes in Jeopardy,” USA Today, December 22, 2000, p. A14.
13 Ibid.
14 Nicholas Eberstadt, “The Population Implosion,” Wall Street Journal. October 16, 1997, p. A22.
15 Gregg Easterbrook, “Overpopulation Is No Problem—in the Long Run,” New Republic, October 11, 1999, p. 22.
16 “The Rise of the Only Child,” Newsweek, April 23, 2001, p. 50.
17 Ibid.
18 Hale, p. A 14.
19 Ibid.
20 Jonathan Steele, “Europe Confronts the Unthinkable,” Manchester Guardian Weekly, November 8, 2000, p. 14.
21 Jonathan Steele, “The New Migration: Affluent, Controversial,” Guardian, October 30, 2000, p. 17.
22 Michael Specter, “The Baby Bust,” New York Times, July 10, 1998, p. A1.
23 Amelia Gentleman, “Wanted: More Russian Babies to Rescue a Fast Dying Nation,” London Observer, December 31, 2000; Robert Leqvold, “Russia’s Uniformed Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affairs, September/October 2001, p. 63.
24 Julia Duin, “Former Abortion Providers Find Peace, Solace in Therapy: Many See Religion as Integral to Change,” Washington Times, February 22, 2001, p. A2.
25 Gentleman, “Wanted: More Babies to Rescue a Fast Dying Nation.”
26 Chamie, “Letter to Author.”
27 Paul Craig Roberts, “Hearing the Bell Toll,” Washington Times, December 10, 2000, p. B4.
28 Anthony Browne, “UK Whites Will Be Minority by 2100,” London Observer, September 2, 2000.
29 Anthony Browne, “Focus: Race and Population: The Last Days of a White World,” Observer, September 3, 2000, p. 17.
30 “British Birth Rate Drops to Record Low,” Xinhua News Agency, May 10, 2001.
31 Peggy Orenstein, “Parasites in Prêt a Porter,” Sunday New York Times, Section 6, p. 31.
32 Ibid.
33 Ben Wattenberg, “Counting Change in Euroland,” Washington Times, January 28, 1999, p. A18.
34 “Remarks by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, India, National Prayer Breakfast, Washington Hilton, Washington, D.C.” Federal News Service, February 3, 1994.
35 “Joan Ganz Cooney: Creator of ‘Seasame Street,’” Fort Worth Star Telegram, September 26, 2000, p. 1.
Chapter Two: Where Have All the Children Gone?
1 Ben J. Wattenberg, The Real America (Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday & Company, 1974), p. 158.
2 Ibid., p. 159.
3 Ibid.
4 Allan Carlson, “The Natural Family Faces a New World Order: The Case of Population,” The Family in America, The Howard Center for Fa
mily, Religion, and Society, October 1999, p. 4.
5 Ibid., p. 5.
6 James Kurth, “The American Way of Victory,” National Interest. Summer 2000, p. 5.
7 Theodore Caplow, Louis Hicks, and Ben J. Wattenberg, The First Measured Century (Washington, D.C.: AEI Press, 2001), p. 38.
8 Eleanor Mills, “Too Busy to Have a Baby,” Spectator, September 16, 2000.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid.
11 Allan Carlson, “The Changing Face of the American Family,” The Family in America, The Howard Center. for Family, Religion, and Society, January 2001, p. 2.
12 Ibid.
The Death of the West Page 28
