By: Luis Enrique Aguilar León
I thoroughly disagree with what you say, but I shall defend to the death your right to say it.
–Voltaire
I want a hundred ideas to germinate in my country, and a hundred buds to sprout.
–Mao Tse-Tung
Freedom of speech, if it is to be real, must be extended to all and not be the prerogative or special gift of anyone. That is the crux of the problem. It is not a question of defending the ideas maintained by the newspaper The Daily Fleet. It is a question of defending The Daily Fleet’s right to express its ideas, and the right of thousands of American citizens to read what they think is worth reading. Hard battles have been fought in America on behalf of that freedom of expression and freedom of choice. And it has been said that if one began by persecuting a newspaper for maintaining an idea, he would end up persecuting all ideas. And it has been said that there was a desire for a regime in which there would be room for the newspaper Today, of the Communists, and The Daily Fleet, of the conservative leanings. Despite that, The Daily Fleet has disappeared as a vehicle of thought. And the newspaper Today remains freer and more firmly established than ever. Evidently the regime has lost its determination to maintain balance.
For those who long for full freedom of expression to be crystallized in America once and for all, for those of us who are convinced that in this country of ours unions and tolerance among all Americans are essential for carrying forward the purest and most fertile ideals, the ideological death of another newspaper produces a sad and somber echo. For, however it may be presented, the silencing of a public organ of thought or its unconditional enlistment in the government line implies nothing less than the subjugation, by one means or another, of a tenacious critical posture. All the massive propaganda of the government was not enough. There was the voice and there was the argument. And since they did not want or were not able to debate the argument, it was dispensable to choke off the voice. The method is an old one, the results are well known.
Now the time of unanimity is arriving in America, a solid and impenetrable totalitarian unanimity. The same slogan will be repeated by all organs of news. There will be no disagreeing voices, no possibility of criticism, no public refutations. Control of all the media of expression will facilitate the work of persuasion, collective fear will take charge of the rest. And underneath the sound of the vociferous propaganda, there will remain … the silence. The silence of those who cannot speak. The implicated silence of those, who being able to speak, did not venture to do so.
But, it is shouted, the fatherland is in danger. Well then, if it is, let us defend it by making it unattackable both in theory and in practice. Let us wield arms, but also our rights. Let us start by showing the world that there is a free people, a truly free people, and that here all ideas and attitudes con coexist. Or is it that in order to save our national liberty we must begin by suffocating civil liberties? Or is it that in order to defend our sovereignty we must limit the sovereign rights of the individual? Or is it that in order to demonstrate the justice of our cause we must make common cause with the injustice of totalitarian methods? Would it not be much more beautiful and much more worthy to offer all America the example of a people that makes ready to defend its freedom without impairing the freedom of anyone, without offering even the shade of a pretext to those who suggest that we here are falling into a government of force?
Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the path that has been chosen. Instead of the sane multiplicity of opinions, the formula of a single guide, a single watchword and common obedience is preferred. This way leads to compulsory unanimity. And then not even those who have remained silent will find shelter in their silence. For unanimity is worse than censorship. Censorship obliges us to hold our own truth silent; unanimity forces us to repeat the truth of others, even though we do not believe it. That is to say, it dissolves our own personalities into a general, monotonous chorus. And there is nothing worse than that for those who do not have the herd instinct.
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“In Defense of Free Speech”
Luis Enrique Aguilar León, author
[Above article was taken from, The Democracy Reader: Classic and Modern Speeches, Essays, Poems, Declarations and Documents on Freedom and Human Rights Worldwide, edited by Diane Ravitch & Abigail Thernstrom, Harper Collins Publishers, 1992, pp. 311-312.]
{HALC Editor’s note. Replace all instances above of: “America” with “Cuba,” The Free Press with Diario de la Marina, and Today with Hoy. This article was written in May 1960. My point is, almost 50 yrs later, we’re yet fighting this battle that Cuba fought against government-controlled media?? Wonders never cease!}
Text from intro to, “In Defense of Free Speech” in The Democracy Reader:
In May 1960 Diario de la Marina, the oldest and most conservative newspaper in Cuba, was taken over by its workers, ending the papers’s criticism of the Castro regime. On May 13, 1960 the protest by Luis Aguilar (1926-2009) appeared in Prensa Libre. Two days later, Prensa Libre suffered the same fate as Diario de la Marina. Aguilar’s article was the last defense of free speech permitted in Fidel Castro’s Cuba.
The Cuban-born Aguilar attended college and received a law degree at Havana University, where Fidel Castro was also a student. Aguilar studied philosophy in Madrid and contemporary problems in France. On his return to Cuba, he practiced law, was a professor at the University of Oriente, and wrote articles critical of the Batista regime. After the Cuban Revolution he was named a member of the Revolutionary Institute of Culture.
After the trial of Hubert Matos, one of the heroes of the Cuban Revolution, Aguilar resigned from the Revolutionary Institute of Culture. Shortly after the following article was published Aguilar received a visit from the Minister of Justice, an old friend, who suggested that it was time for him to leave Cuba. He emigrated to the United States in 1960, where he became a professor of Latin American Studies, most recently at Georgetown University. [Once source cites that he passed away on February 24, 2009 at the age of 83; the other cites January 5, 2008; both listed in Key Biscayne FL as his last residence. He was survived by his wife Vera Mestre y Fernandez Mascaro.]
