Rudyard Lynch: How World War I Built the New World Order

YouTube ^ | Feb 17, 2026 | Dad Saves America

[ProgressingAmerica]

Rudyard Lynch, host of “WhatIfAltHist,” explains how World War I turned Western civilization against honor culture and paved the way for the bureaucratic states of the 20th century. In the aftermath of mass mobilization and industrialized trench warfare, Woodrow Wilson’s vision of the global technocracy began to take shape, coming into full force after the even greater devastation of World War II. The organic, honor-based social order of the old world gave way to a managerial system that wields power by creating its own reality.

[Pelham]

The GOP connection to Karl Marx began with Charles Dana, Horace Greeley’s top aide and managing editor of the New York Tribune. The Tribune was the largest circulation newspaper in the country, and the defacto house organ of the Whig and Republican Party.

Charles Dana was a 19th century leftwing hippie who had lived on the Brook Farm commune and then trotted off to Europe to enjoy the 1848 revolutionary movements. That’s when he became pals with Karl Marx which led to the OG commie becoming a foreign correspondent for the Tribune.

1848 is of course the year that Marx wrote his Manifesto, so it’s not like he was keeping his ideas hidden. But alas the 1848 Revolutions failed so a whole bunch of revolutionaries and socialists and communists headed for the hills.

Marx landed in London, but a good many of his comrades landed in Wisconsin and Illinois and Missouri. These are the now forgotten ‘48ers, who played a role in the early Republican party. Lincoln purchased a German language ‘48er newspaper, the Illinois Staats-Anzeiger, and the resulting support he gained from the German ‘48er community is often credited with gaining him the 1860 Republican nomination.

It’s an interesting history, largely unknown today because the Civil War steals all the attention. As EK mentions Marx was a staunch abolitionist. And he while Marx supported Lincoln and the war he also criticized him for making preserving the Union the primary goal, with abolition being a distant second. If you ever run across Marx’s writing on the Civil War and slavery you will be startled at how his opinions are virtually identical to modern American ones. Everybody is channeling that old commie.

[ek_hornbeck]

And he while Marx supported Lincoln and the war he also criticized him for making preserving the Union the primary goal, with abolition being a distant second. If you ever run across Marx’s writing on the Civil War and slavery you will be startled at how his opinions are virtually identical to modern American ones. Everybody is channeling that old commie.

This is exactly on target. The left's agenda then was turning a war that was dedicated to preserving the union into a war dedicated to radical abolition and reconstruction. Their talking points became the mainstream talking points a little over a century later. After all, what do little kids learn about the Civil War in elementary and middle school history classes? Do they hear how Lincoln, Grant, and Sherman were heroes who saved the union? No, they're heroes for "freeing the slaves"!

[woodpusher]

I do not find it amazing that U.S. law has followed Calvin's Case since 1776

That is an assertion. You know all the examples of cited cases where it didn't. (Such as Sailor's snug harbor)

You are just spewing bullshit, as usual. I am well aware of the Court's opinion in Inglis v. the Trustees of Snug Harbor. Sometime you should read the opinion of the court and search for where it did whatever it is you imagine it did, and then you can give a quote and/or citation to support your vivid imagination.

[wardaddy]

History is what folks say it is
Unfortunately

We would all benefit from a more comprehensive understanding of that era today

[DiogenesLamp]

I don't regard courts as sources of information about what legislators did.

We see how modern courts twist and distort original intent according to their own preferences, so a court may or may not get something right, but one thing we know for sure is *THEY* didn't create the law. Legislatures did.

That is where an effort to understand the meaning must start. Not with courts, and especially not with courts over 100 years later. Contemporary courts would know better, so I would see more value in courts around the 1800s than the 1890s.

[woodpusher]

You can't answer a question from 1787 by referencing a legal case in 1898.

I can and I did. What cannot be done is answer a 1787 question of U.S. law by referencing a case in 1787.

[woodpusher]

I don't regard courts as sources of information about what legislators did.

Scalia and Tribe disagree, and a couple of centuries of U.S. Supreme Court precedent disagree. Your claimed source is explicitly rejected as unusable.

[Pilsner]

William Howard Taft signed the bill that would become the 16th Amendment, which was written by GOP Senator Norris Brown.

Constitutional Amendments, originating in Congress, or a Constitutional Convention, are sent directly to the states, for them to consider. The President plays no formal role.

[DiogenesLamp]

I can and I did.

According to your own views on what constitutes proof and evidence. But objectively, you are wrong.

A 100 year later court can *IMPOSE* their power on everyone, but they cannot actually change facts from 100 years earlier.

[DiogenesLamp]

Scalia and Tribe disagree, and a couple of centuries of U.S. Supreme Court precedent disagree.

The Church disagreed with Galileo. The Church was wrong.

The lesson here is that people in power don't have the power to change facts.

[ProgressingAmerica]

Yes, Woodpusher I did get this correct.

Woodpusher does not argue that the Civil War was managerial.

[ek_hornbeck]

History is what folks say it is Unfortunately. We would all benefit from a more comprehensive understanding of that era today

Some nuance in discussing historical events, as opposed to trying to frame everything in terms of "good guys vs. bad guys" or in terms of today's political disputes would help as well. But good luck finding people willing to do that.

[ProgressingAmerica]

"We would all benefit from a more comprehensive understanding of that era today"

We just need to do an end-run-around of the modern progressive historians. That will solve at least half of our problems and almost all of the blame-America ones.

We can use free and open source audio books in the public domain to achieve this purpose.

The old historians were trustworthy, meaning the old historians are useful to undermine the progressive historians of today.

[Pelham]

Correct. The only role a President plays is expressing support or opposition to an Amendment.

Some of our pop historians ignore such fine points. Woodrow Wilson always gets to be the whipping boy for the income tax and the Federal Reserve, neither of which he played any role in creating. Both resulted from Republican Congresses during Teddy and Taft. The Fed not needing an amendment.

[x]

Democrats were the anti-tariff party and more favorable towards an income tax. Republicans had been the tariff party, but a group of progressive Republicans wanted tariff reduction and would accept an income tax.

The 16th Amendment was a mistake or at least an accident:

In 1909, progressives in Congress again attached a provision for an income tax to a tariff bill. Conservatives, hoping to kill the idea for good, proposed a constitutional amendment enacting such a tax; they believed an amendment would never receive ratification by three-fourths of the states. Much to their surprise, the amendment was ratified by one state legislature after another, and on February 25, 1913, with the certification by Secretary of State Philander C. Knox, the 16th amendment took effect. Yet in 1913, due to generous exemptions and deductions, less than 1 percent of the population paid income taxes at the rate of only 1 percent of net income.

Ironically, it was Nelson Aldrich, the bitterest opponent of the income tax (Aldrich's daughter had married Rockefeller's son), who proposed the amendment, assuming it would fail to be ratified and end the income tax question for years to come. The amendment passed the Senate unanimously. The House was also overwhelmingly in favor. After the amendment was ratified the newly elected Democrat Congress lowered the tariff and imposed the income tax.

The Sixteenth Amendment was similar to the Immigration Act of 1965 in that there was a widespread consensus in support of it. It was generally assumed that the country could live with a 1% or 2% tax on millionaires. Nobody realized how much of a change it really would create. Looking back, we often assume that people were arguing about what the bill would lead to, not about what they thought it meant.

[ProgressingAmerica]

"The 16th Amendment was a mistake or at least an accident"

The 16th Amendment was neither a mistake nor an accident.

by 100%. It was fully intentional.

The historians who are claiming this idea in their terrible published history books that they have embedded into our schools are committing historical malpractice and actively covering up for progressivism with this notion.

The progressives wanted it. The progressives set out to get it. The progressives won. We lost.

[ProgressingAmerica]

"The President plays no formal role."

He can if he so chooses. As a progressive, Theodore Roosevelt was your typical hate-the-Constitution kind of guy that you'd expect from any other cockroach progressive. He was no different, he was a scourge as a president.

That said, giving a "Go Do This" speech is very formal and it is the opening role.

William Howard Taft gave the following speech just 3 months into Theodore Roosevelt's third term.

https://www.williamhtaft.org/p/t.html

Special Message to the House of Representatives and Senate in Congress Assembled

June 16, 1909

To the Senate and House of Representatives:

It is the constitutional duty of the President from time to time to recommend to the consideration of Congress such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient. In my inaugural address, immediately preceding this present extraordinary session of Congress, I invited attention to the necessity for a revision of the tariff at this session, and stated the principles upon which I thought the revision should be effected. I referred tothe then rapidly increasing deficit, and pointed out the obligation on the partof the framers of the tariff bill to arrange the duty so as to secure an adequate income, and suggested that if it was not possible to do so by import duties, new kinds of taxation must be adopted, and among them I recommended a graduated inheritance tax as correct in principle and as certain and easy of collection. The House of Representatives has adopted the suggestion and has provided in the bill it passed for the collection of such a tax. In the Senate the action of its Finance Committee and the course of the debate indicate that it may not agree to this provision, and it is now proposed to make up the deficit by the imposition of a general income tax, in form and substance of almost exactly the same character as that which in the case of Pollock v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Company (157 U. S., 429) was held by the Supreme Court to be a direct tax, and therefore not within the power of the Federal Government to impose unless apportioned among the several States according to population. This new proposal, which I did not discuss in my inaugural addressor in my message at the opening of the present session, makes it appropriate for me to submit to the Congress certain additional recommendations.

The decision of the Supreme Court in the income-tax casesdeprived the National Government of a power which, by reason of previous decisions of the court, it was generally supposed that Government had. It is undoubtedly a power the National Government ought to have. It might be indispensable to the nation's life in great crises. Although I have not considered a constitutional amendment as necessary to the exercise of certain phases of this power, a mature consideration has satisfied me that an amendment is the only proper course for its establishment to its full extent. I therefore recommend to the Congress that both Houses, by a two-thirds vote, shall propose an amendment to the Constitution conferring the power to levy an income tax upon the National Government without apportionment among the States in proportion to population.

This course is much to be preferred to the one proposed of reenacting a law once judicially declared to be unconstitutional. For the Congress to assume that the court will reverse itself, and to enact legislation on such an assumption, will not strengthen popular confidence in the stability of judicial construction of the Constitution. It is much wiser policy to accept the decision and remedy the defect by amendment in due and regular course.

Again, it is clear that by the enactment of the proposed law, the Congress will not be bringing money into the Treasury to meet the present deficiency, but by putting on the statute book a law already there and never repealed, will simply be suggesting to the executive officers of the Government their possible duty to invoke litigation. If the court should maintain its former view, no tax would be collected at all. If it should ultimately reverse itself, still no taxes would have been collected until after protracted delay.

It is said the difficulty and delay in securing the approval of three-fourths of the States will destroy all chance of adopting the amendment. Of course, no one can speak with certainty upon this point, but I have become convinced that a great majority of the people of this country are in favor of vesting the National Government with power to levy an income tax, and that theywill secure the adoption of the amendment in the States, if proposed to them.

Second, the decision in the Pollock case left power in theNational Government to levy an excise tax which accomplishes the same purpose as a corporation income tax, and is free from certain objections urged to the proposed income-tax measure.

I therefore recommend an amendment to the tariff bill imposing upon all corporations and joint stock companies for profit, except national banks (otherwise taxed), savings banks, and building and loan associations, an excise tax measured by 2% on the net income of such corporations. This is an excise tax upon the privilege of doing business as an artificial entity and of freedom from a general partnership liability enjoyed by those who own the stock.

I am informed that a 2% tax of this character would bring into the Treasury of the United States not less than $25,000,000.

The decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Spreckels Sugar Refining Company against McClain (192 U. S., 397) seems clearly to establish the principle that such a tax as this is an excise tax upon privilege and not a direct tax on property, and is within the federal power without apportionment according to population. The tax on net income is preferable to one proportionate to a percentage of the gross receipts, because it is a tax upon success and not failure. It imposes a burden at the source of the income at a time when the corporation is well able to pay and when collection is easy.

Another merit of this tax is the federal supervision which must be exercised in order to make the law effective over the annual accounts and business transactions of all corporations. While the faculty of assuming a corporate form has been of the utmost utility in the business world, it is also true that substantially all of the abuses and all of the evils which have aroused the public to the necessity of reform were made possible by the use of this very faculty. If now, by a perfectly legitimate and effective system of taxation we are incidentally able to possess the Government and the stockholders and the public of the knowledge of the real business transactions and the gains and profits of every corporation in the country, we have made along step toward that supervisory control of corporations which may prevent a further abuse of power.

I recommend, then, first, the adoption of a joint resolution by two-thirds of both Houses proposing to the States an amendment to the Constitution granting to the Federal Government the right to levy and collect an income tax without apportionment among the States according to population, and, second, the enactment, as part of the pending revenue measure, either as a substitute for, or in addition to, the inheritance tax, of an excise tax upon all corporations measured by 2 % of their net income.

WILLIAM H. TAFT

And what do you know? Magic! Yeah magic must be what it was, because Taft gives this speech on the 16th and then on the 17th Senator Norris Brown proposes an amendment but guess what?

They're entirely not related! It's just magic! Taft's words had no effect whatsoever, no no no no no sir. It can't possibly be.

For me? I do not believe in magic. The White House is fully to blame for why we have the 16th Amendment.

The

White

House

Your only two choices are Taft and Roosevelt, that is it. Now, Taft was always viewed as Teddy's do-boy, Teddy's shadow, Teddy's henchman, Teddy's rubber stamp, Teddy's yes man. Once Taft became veep, Taft spent 10 years promoting Bull Moose and never stopped promoting the Bull Moose agenda until 1911 in the famous TR/Taft split.

Taft may have been the one who gave the speech, however, this was Teddy's doing.

In general, We have the 16th Amendment because of the GOP. Those blasted, stinking progressive republicans. But specifically. We have the 16th Amendment because of Theodore Roosevelt. Full stop. Theodore Roosevelt.

[x]

There was a lot of support for the amendment rooted in antipathy to the millionaire class and a desire to make them pay, but did that mean the bill would get the necessary 2/3rds vote from Congress in 1909? That’s less likely.

If Congress had just passed an income tax law the courts could have overturned that. If the conservatives had fought the amendment in Congress, they might have defeated it.

Probably the amendment would have been passed in the next Congress or the one after that, since the Democrats took over Congress in the midterms, but we got the amendment when we got it because of a technical miscalculation by the conservatives.

[ProgressingAmerica]

"There was a lot of support for the amendment rooted in antipathy to the millionaire class and a desire to make them pay"

This. This is exactly why I named Theodore Roosevelt.

All that support and antipathy you talk about? It's true. But what does it mean? Teddy caused it to be focused on a graduated income tax. That was Teddy's talking point. A graduated income tax. That's the word - graduated income tax. Some of that "support" and "antipathy" was not real. It was fake. It was ginned up, it was astroturf. Teddy ginned it up.

Not only did he keep insisting on the need for class warfare in his State of the Union Addresses, he would also give speeches and write articles about the graduated. In his "Man with the Muck Rake" Roosevelt uses his dour attitude to pimp for the income tax and that's not even what the article is about. He just could not help it. Teddy loved him some huge government. That is who he was. He lived and breathed big huge massive government, like any other progressive. Theodore Roosevelt embodied statism and he needed it to get bigger.

Process-wise this is how we got the 16th Amendment. We really got fsssked by Teddy. It was all Theodore Roosevelt. He fsssked us.

This was not Taft. Taft may have been the guy who did the speech in 1909, but he's just a fall guy here. Taft does not deserve the blame. Roosevelt does. Taft is innocent.

You mention a lot of "ifs". Maybe one or more are true. If this, maybe that, if if here and the other if. I can buy a number of them and agree. The fact is though as the history actually happened. We in the United States are saddled with the 16th amendment because of Theodore Roosevelt, the Bull Moose Progressive Crusader. It is all singularly his fault. It was dead with Pollock, and he brought it right roaring back to life like a necromancer.

And Teddy also wanted the death tax. Which we did end up being saddled with also. Woodrow Wilson did that because Wilson was such a mirror copy of Teddy's progressivism in his true beliefs after the campaign ended.

[Pelham]

“Democrats were the anti-tariff party and more favorable towards an income tax. Republicans had been the tariff party, but a group of progressive Republicans wanted tariff reduction and would accept an income tax.”

Lincoln of course had enacted the first income tax in 1862, which was declared unConstitutional and repealed 10 years later.

Teddy R gave speeches in favor of an income tax. But I’m not sure if he was still President at the time.

The resolution that became the 16th Amendment was written by Republican Senator Norris Brown. This was 1909. Taft was President, the GOP also controlled the House and the Senate.

The income tax has Republican fingerprints all over it.

The 16th Amendment simply allows an income tax. The anti-tariff Democrat faction was hoping that it would result in reduced tariffs, which it did, but there was no requirment that it would.

The first rendition of the income tax, 1913, started at 1% and had a maximum rate of 7%. Only 4% of the population earned enough to owe income tax.

In 1913 the Army and Navy were small. Despite the recent Spanish American war we were far from a military power, so the national government wasn’t demanding a lot of money. Maybe for the Panama Canal. The administrative state bureaucracy was still tiny and not ruling every part of American life.

In 1913 the Federal government’s portion of the GDP was 3%. By contrast, every year after WWII the Federal government has spent from 18% to 24% of the GDP.