Amerikai Magyar Szó, 1987. január-június (41. évfolyam, 1-25. szám)
1987-04-30 / 17. szám
20. AMERIKAI MAGYAR SZÓ Thursday, Apr. 30. 1987. Church group advocates economic bill of rights WASHINGTON - Members of the United Church of Christ, theological descendants of the Puritans, are studying an official draft statement on economics calling for the addition of an economic bill of rights to the U.S. Constitution. It also calls for a radical redistribution of wealth from rich nations to poor nations, and creation of international institutions to facilitate such transfers. In proposing a specific amendment to the Constitution that would say all citizens have the right to access to employment, food, shelter, and health care on a par with the rights of free speech, worship, and assembly, the United Church is going far beyond most denominations in calling for radical economic changes in the nation. But church officials stressed the intent of such an amendment was secular in purpose and not an effort - like proposals to permit prayer in public schools - to import religious doctrine or belief into the Constitution. The 1.7-million-member denomination, which traces its heritage back to the first settlers in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, joins the Roman Catholic bishops and the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in drafting major statements examining the theolo- ■ gical implications of the U.S. and world economies. The 45-page draft, "Christian Faith and Economic Life," is currently being sent to the denomination's 6,400 congregations for a year of study and discussion. Results of the study, certain to be heated and controversial, will be used in writing a proposed pronouncement on economics for the denomination's 1989 General Synod, the church's highest deliberative body. "It will take us into very deep water in our conference," said the Rev. Rollin O. Russell, Southern Conference (regional jurisdiction) executive. "It asks all of us very painful questions. Are we really ready to lose our lives economicaly to save them?" STRESSING GLOBAL SOLUTIONS While similar in some respects to the Roman Catholic and Presbyterian statements, the UCC draft adopts a much more selfconsciously global perspective that stresses the world's economy as an interrelated one. "We live in a global economy, and many of the central problems discussed in the paper - poverty, militarization, environmental hazards, unemployment - cannot be resolved by one country alone," said the Rev. Audrey Smock of the denomination's Board for World1 Ministries and editor of the paper. The paper puts forth six "Christian principles of economic justice" as a basis for its proposals, saying an economic system based on the principles would: * Seek to fulfill everyone's basic material needs. * Involve all people in economically rewarding activity. “The underlying assumption of economic democracy is that all individuals have Inherent economic as well as political rights." United Church of Christ draft statement * Build communities of dignity and wellbeing. * Respect human rights and enhance freedom. * Use natural resources responsibly. * Promote international peace. The draft statement acknowledges that it is particularly critical of capitalism, but it does not endorse socialism as an alternative. It argues instead that it addresses the weaknesses of capitalism because the large majority of United Church members live under a capitalist system, adding: "The critical treatment; of capitalism in this paper does not imply approval of, or preference for, socialism or state ownership of the means of production. Rather, it reflects a strong sense of responsibility to God and to our sisters and brothers for the justice and faithfulness of the institutions in which we participate." But the paper does acknowledge that market economies, such as that in the United States, "unleashed a productivity such as the world has never seen" and "brought other social benefits including freedom to many people." At the same time, it said capitalism's "unabashed endorsement of self-interest unleashed materialism and greed from the restraints placed on it by traditional doctrines of the sovereignty of God." "In our own times," it argued, "the gift of freedom, so prized by market economics, still does not reach all people," and the system itself "largely ignores the needs of those without the ownership of economic resources." In calling for creation of an economic democracy, the draft statement echoes the pastoral letter of the Roman Catholic bishops, which called for^a "new experiment" in economic democracy as radical as the revolution that brought political democracy to the nation. "The underlying assumption of economic democracy is that all individuals have inherent economic as well as political rights," the paper asserts, calling for specific language to be added to the Constitution to protect those rights. "Such an amendment would mean a fundamental shift away from the view that the market, left alone, can guarantee livelihood to all," the draft asserts. It said the rationale for such a bill of rights is that it is "a profoundly biblical Prof* Vardy’s book on Hungarian-Americans Among the smaller nations, economically backward Hungary has been a major exporter of intellectuals in general and top scientists in particular to the more advanced countries - for example, John von Neumann, Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, Albert Szent-Gyorgyi to the United States. In light of this fact and the recent upsurge of history and sociology of ethnic consciousnes of hyphenated Americans, it was puzzling that the story of the Hungarian-Americans has not been told. Steven Béla Vardy's book fills that void. The many waves of immigrants from Hungary, beginning with the mass immigration in the 1880s and the eventual landing of close to one million Hungarians in this country, are discussed at length and with admirable lucidity. Social composition of the immigrants, gender, age, and level of literacy of economic immigrants before World War I are analyzed. Social organizations, life-styles, ideological-political orientation, the role of the churches and other religious organizations are discussed with great historical and sociological accuracy and insight. A lengthy examination of Hungarian-American journalism and publishing activity follows. Problems of Americanization and adjustment are described. The social and political polarization is presented in an objective scholarly fashion. The splintering of the Hungarian- Americans into many groups-generational, social and political cleavages, more accentuated than with other ethnic groups - may account for the less-visible success of the Hungarian - Americans as a group, despite numerous individual successes. The rise of Hungarian studies at several universities since the 1960s is duly noted as an important recent development. A comprehensive thirteen-page bibliography concludes the volume, a- gold mine for anyone interested in pursuing the subject. Zoltán Tar New School for Social Research concept," nothing as do the Catholic bishops, that the covenant between God and Israel "contained explicit instructions that Israel provide the basic necessities of life to all members of the community." Saying that a "turning point in world history" is at hand, tha paper also advocates the creation of "new international economic institutions to redistribute resources from upper-middle-income countries, high-income exporters, industrial-market economies, and the East European nonmarket economies to the two-thirds of the members of the human family who live in the low- income and middle-income economies." It recommends exploring the possibility of a progressive global tax of 1 percent to 3 percent on the gross national product of "all countries with per-capita incomes of over $2,000 a year," as a means of achieving the redistribution. The newly created institutions, it said, would "have responsibilities for the care of the environment, natural resource usage, international trade and finance, communication, and regulation of transnational corporations."
