On Fascist Syndicalism
By Benito Mussolini
First of all I would like to express my sympathies towards the captain of syndicalism in your Province, Alcide Aimi, who I have known for many years and whom I consider one of the best Italian Fascists, because he belongs to that category of Italians who want to create—by love or by force—a Nation of obedient and disciplined workers. Alcide Aimi could not have done better homage to me, nor could he have given me any more of a welcoming gift than what he has already done here by introducing these four labour contracts, which I carefully examined and which are the result of the organized and educational effort of Fascist syndicalism.
I am a syndicalist, a Fascist syndicalist: by this I mean that the three major tasks of Fascism are these: 1) the Party, and therefore administration of the communes and the provinces, works of culture and all else that is needed. In short, keeping our forces spiritually organized; 2) the Militia, i.e. the armed defense of the Regime; 3) and finally Syndicalism, i.e. the elevation of the working masses; an elevation using our methods of necessary severity and discipline, which avoids flattery and above all avoids lies. In other words, we must never promise more than what we are mathematically certain we can provide.
Here is the Fascist revolution, O comrades! The revolution is in the fact that forty thousand workers of this land are deployed under our banners. Revolution is when the government places the syndicates within the State and gives these syndicates—which were ignored by the old demo-liberalism—their place in life.
But we say: duties first and rights second. Ours is an Italian syndicalism. We unite all the elements of production and we set them on a common path: the Nation, that is, the collectivity to which we belong, because we are concerned with the well-being of the community as a whole. Do you understand? I believe you do, because my language is very clear. Your eyes tell me that you are very intelligent. We must continue on this path: elevate the working masses without deceiving them, and keep them rigidly faithful to the cause of Fascism and the Nation.
