In the last two articles, I have shared my enthusiasm for President John F. Kennedy’s goal of strengthening “the United Nations,” as an “instrument for peace, to develop it into a genuine world security system—a system capable of resolving disputes on the basis of law, of insuring the security of the large and the small, and of creating conditions under which arms can finally be abolished.”
President Kennedy wanted the U.N. to create “a system capable of resolving disputes on the basis of Law.” That should be the objective of Freedom Democrats: “insuring the security of the large and small.” The destruction of Ukraine after Russia’s attack and the gut-wrenching bloody clash between Israel and Palestine clearly demonstrate why the U.N. must protect “the large and small.”
Kennedy put his faith in the two world powers of 1963. He assumed cooperation between the Soviet Union and the United States could bring peace and world disarmament.
His fear was that nuclear war would bring the end of humanity. Sixty-one years later, we believe it unlikely that atomic weapons will be used. My vision of world government goes far beyond disarmament.
In my opinion, it is likely that each nation will have armed forces, but the dominant power must be the United Nations. It should have a monopoly on atomic weapons and armed forces for enforcing its decisions. Bloody conflicts become unlikely; U.N. armed forces aren’t destroying a nation. They have a more practical objective: arrest the leaders who are fighting international decrees. Clearly, these leaders may have followers, and the U.N. armed forces, acting more like police than soldiers, must dissuade these supporters from turning to violence. Should a serious military challenge arise, the U.N. armed forces should be bolstered by calling on other nations for assistance. Just as the U.S. Constitution gives the central government the power to enhance its strength by calling on state militias.
Should a country file a complaint about another country, both nations must appear before a U.N. tribunal and make their case. It would be illegal and lead to possible intervention by the U.N. for a nation to ignore the complaint.
Minority groups, be they tribes or political parties, confronting genocide could also file complaints. Pol Pot’s mass murder of his political opponents in Cambodia should be within the U.N. jurisdiction.
In other words, the U.N. would be the Earth’s sovereign nation. Its mandate would be far larger than world peace. It would supervise the cooperation of nations confronting climate change; it would issue money and prevent countries from being unable to pay debts because the value of another country currency, like the dollar, soared, it would soften free trade’s impact on worker’s wages, and it would raise money for vital infrastructure projects. In an emergency, it would protect populations from famine. In short, the U.N. mission will be peace, “Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave. I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living,” in President Kennedy’s glowing words.
This change has historic examples: Italy in the 19th century turned its city states into one nation. At the end of the 18th century after the United States established the Constitution, the former colonies became a new nation under the authority of a central government capable of collecting taxes and organizing armed forces to protect every colony and prevent the colonies from going to war against each other. In each case small bodies gave up their sovereignty so that a larger sovereign could improve life. A U.N. world government would yoke the separate nations into a common body that will, in President Kennedy’s glowing vision, “build a better life for their children—not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women—not merely peace in our time but peace for all time.”
FREEDOM DEMOCRATS 