It’s been nearly a half-century, 48 years to be exact, since book audiences absorbed “Armament or Disarmament” by Frank P. Zeidler.
Zeidler’s book addressed the arms race that accompanied the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. However, it still provides much for contemporary readers and its’ themes still echo today.
Zeidler served as mayor of the city of Milwaukee from 1948 to 1960. He was the last socialist mayor of a major city. The mayor was attracted to socialism in his youth because of its emphasis on peace and improving the lives of working people. Zeidler favored a form of socialism called “sewer socialism” which favored democratic government and rejected revolutionary Marxism. Sewer socialists worked to improve the health of city residents by pushing new sanitation systems and city-owned water and power systems.
In addition, the socialist mayor’s ideas also fell within the realm of Christian socialism. His religious outlook and political outlook were similar. He thought Christian men should live their ideas while in government service.
“He will utilize every political means available to change those policies which appear to be in opposition to God’s will for society, which includes freedom, justice, order, the dignity of all men and the right to develop one’s talents to serve one’s fellow man,” he wrote in “Armament or Disarmament.”
Former Arizona Governor Jan Brewer recently credited President Donald Trump’s military spending spree with boosting her state’s economy. She said defense spending provided Arizona with thousands of jobs and over $250 million in state and local tax revenue. Arizona’s six military installations and four National Guard operations account for $11.5 billion in economic output. Zeidler provided an alternative mode of thinking in the early 70’s book.
“The attempt at disarmament in some nations strikes grievously at representatives of industry, labor and the military who have made service in the armed forces a career,” he wrote. “Arms control and disarmament may certainly promote fear, fed by the prospect of lost government contracts and loss of employment. To counter these forces for war some attention must be paid to the economics of peace.”
Zeidler saw hope in the portions of the United States government that were directed toward the promotion of peace. He thought the Peace Corps, the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency and the Agency for International Development should be rolled into a Department of Peace. The idea originated in the mind of Benjamin Rush, one of our Founding Fathers, and was proposed in the Democratic Party primary presidential campaigns of Dennis Kucinich in 2004 and 2008.
The Cold War of “Armament or Disarmament” ended in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, but we are once again witnessing a world divided into spheres of influence with the growth of military alliances like the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which includes Russia, India, Iran, Turkey and Pakistan, and the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, which includes the United States, Japan, India and Australia. India belongs to both blocks. The socialist mayor advocated for a world governed by law. He pointed to Cold War treaties like the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963, which prohibited the testing of nuclear weapons in outer space, underwater or in the atmosphere, and the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970, which worked toward the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, as examples of a possible system of international law.
“Within a nation the individual member is protected from the aggressiveness of his neighbor by the rule of law,” Zeidler said. “Without respect for rule of law the stability of society would quickly be shaken and the individual would lose any opportunity for personal development. However, the individual requires protection from attack by those outside the membership of his nation.”
We’ve witnessed a retreat from the idea of international law in the last few years. Trump’s withdrawing our country from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, meant to curtail Iran’s nuclear capabilities, and the Paris Climate Accords, meant to cut climate change causing greenhouse gas emissions, are cases in point.
Zeidler ran for President in 1976 on the Socialist Party U.S.A ticket with J. Quinn Brisben as his running mate. The ticket captured a little over 6,000 votes on a platform that included transferring money away from the defense sector and toward rebuilding cities, fighting poverty and establishing a national health insurance system. This part of Zeidler’s life also sounds contemporary. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, ran for President on a similar platform in the Democratic Party primaries in 2016. Like Zeidler, Sanders has also promoted a vision of international law through international institutions.
