ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SPARGO AND ARNER
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ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
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MACMILLAN & CO., Limited
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9 r(^C»4-e
Elements of Socialism
A TEXT-BOOK
BY
JOHN SPARGO
AUTHOR OF KARL MARX, HIS LIFE AND WORK, SOCIALISM, A
SUMMARY AND INTERPRETATION OF SOCIALIST
PRINCIPLES," ETC., ETC.
AND
GEORGE LOUIS ARNER, Ph.D.
LATE INSTRUCTOR IN ECONOMICS IN DARTMOUTH COLLEGE
ileto gorfe
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1916
Copyright, 1912,
Bv THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped. Published February, 1912. Reprinted
March, 1913 ; March, 1916.
Norfoooti #rtB» :
Berwick & Smith Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
CONTENTS
PART I
SOCIALISM AS A CRITICISM
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Introduction . . 3
II. Capitalist Society 7
III. Planless Production 19
IV. Poverty 30
V. Leisure and Luxury 44
VI. Individual and Social Responsibility . . .53
PART II
SOCIALIST THEORY
VII. Introductory 61
VIII. Social Evolution 65
IX. The Economic Interpretation of History . . 76
X. Industrial Evolution 91
XL The Class Struggle Theory 100
XII. Value and Price 116
XIII. Surplus-Value 141
XIV. The Law of Concentration 157
XV. Monopolies and Trusts 168
PART III
THE SOCIALIST IDEAL
XVI. The Utopian Socialist Ideal
XVII. The Ideals of Modern Socialism
XVIII. The Socialist State — Political
XIX. The Socialist State— Economic
XX. Socialism and the Family
iii
. 187
. 201
. 212
. 224
. 240
IV
CONTENTS
PART IV
CHAPTER
XXI. The
XXII. The
(1
(2
(3
(4
(5
(6
(7
(s:
(9
(10
(11
(12
(13
(14
(15
(16
THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT
PAGE
Rise and Growth of Modern Socialism . . 255
National Socialist Movements . . . 266
Germany 266
France 275
Austria 279
Belgium 281
Italy 283
Great Britain 285
The United States 292
Russia 301
Finland .* 305
The Scandinavian Countries .... 306
Holland 308
Switzerland 309
Spain 310
Poland 310
Hungary 311
Other Countries 312
PART V
POLICY AND PROGRAM
XXIII. Socialism and Social Reform 317
XXIV. The Reform Program of Socialism .... 337
XXV. Some Objections to Socialism 354
PART I
SOCIALISM AS CRITICISM
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Beginning of the Socialist movement: In the early part
of the nineteenth century, that splendid century of progress
in science and invention, of capitalistic expansion, philo-
sophic individualism, and economic laissez faire, arose the
deep-seated and far-reaching popular movement which we
call Socialism. Like every other great movement in history,
it was at first weak and insignificant. It consisted of little
more than a vague groping for a way of escape from the evils
of the time. Its adherents were for the most part poor men
without influence, victims of poverty and oppression, led
by a few idealists. Thus, it was not essentially different
from the movements of protest which in all ages have chal-
lenged and assailed recognized injustice.
But the new movement soon passed out of this stage of
its development, and became a conscious, disciplined force
with its positive and negative sides well defined. The rapidly
growing industrial system gave a great impetus to science.
The principle of universal evolution and the methods of
science profoundly influenced every department of human
thought and activity in the leading countries of the world.
Under that influence Socialism took shape as a powerful
force aiming at the destruction of an economic system in
which a few are enabled to appropriate most of the advan-
tages of industrial effort and progress, and at the develop-
ment of a new economic system based upon cooperation,
democracy and justice, and insuring equality of opportunity
to all.
Importance of the movement: In spite of ridicule, ostra-
cism and bitter persecution the Socialist movement has made
phenomenal progress. Its representatives are to be found
in the parliaments of all the leading nations. The political
strength of the movement is indicated by the fact that nearly
3
4 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ten million votes are cast for its parliamentary representa-
tives throughout the world. Of course, the movement is
much stronger numerically than even these figures indicate.
Making due allowance for the fact that in most countries
women do not enjoy the parliamentary franchise, and the
further fact that in many countries a large part of the adult
male population is also excluded from the right of the franchise
by property and other restrictive qualifications, it is probably
a conservative estimate that forty million adults are Social-
ists and would vote for Socialist representatives if they could.
Obviously, such a movement demands and deserves
serious and candid investigation and study. To be effec-
tively and efficiently supported if good and wise it must be
understood. To be effectively and efficiently opposed if evil
and unwise it must likewise be understood. An understand-
ing of the principles of Socialism, of the aims and methods
of the movement, has become an essential condition of
intelligent citizenship. The wilful and ignorant misrepre-
sentation of Socialism in which many of its opponents have
indulged is not only powerless to check the progress of the
movement, but extremely dangerous. Nothing is more
dangerous in a democracy than appealing to prejudice in
the discussion of matters of this kind.
Difficulties of definition: It is not an easy matter to
formulate a satisfactory definition of Socialism. The task
has been attempted by numerous writers, friendly and other-
wise. That the definitions of Socialism by its advocates
differ considerably from each other has been made the basis
of much rather unreasonable criticism. A definition is
simply a brief explanation of the thing defined. When the
thing to be defined is at once a comprehensive criticism
of society, a philosophy interpreting the social conditions
and institutions criticised, a forecast of the future de-
velopment of society, and a movement with a program
based upon these and intended to remove the evils com-
plained of and to bring about the social ideal forecasted,
definition is necessarily very difficult and hazardous.
That the definition of one man should over-emphasize
the critical aspect of Socialism, that of another its philosophi-
cal basis, that of a third its forecast and that of yet another
its program is inevitable. The cheap sneer that there are
INTRODUCTION 5
"fifty-seven varieties of Socialism" is an exceedingly petty
criticism. We must bear in mind that difference in defini-
tions is by no means the same thing as contradiction. It
is safe to say that the recognized leaders of Socialist thought
have defined Socialism with quite as large a degree of unan-
imity and as small a degree of antagonism as have been shown
by the recognized leaders of any department of thought,
if we omit those relating to and conditioned by the exact
sciences.
Provisional definition: As we have already intimated,
Socialism may be conveniently divided into four parts.
No study of Socialism can be satisfactory, no definition of
it can be complete, which does not consider it as (1) a criti-
cism of existing society; (2) a philosophy of social evolution;
(3) a social forecast or ideal; (4) a movement for the attain-
ment of the ideal.
As a provisional definition, then, we may accept the
following: Socialism is a criticism of existing society which
attributes most of the poverty, vice, crime and other social
evils of today to the fact that, through the private or class
ownership of the social forces of production and exchange,
the actual producers of wealth are exploited by a class of
non-producers; a theory of social evolution according to
which the rate and direction of social evolution are mainly
determined by the development of the economic factors of
production, distribution and exchange; a social forecast
that the next epoch in the evolution of society will be dis-
tinguished by the social ownership and control of the prin-
cipal agencies of production and exchange, and by an
equalization of opportunity as a result of this socialization;
a movement, primarily consisting of members of the wealth-
producing class, which seeks to control all the powers of the
State and to bring about the collective ownership and con-
trol of the principal means of production and exchange,
in order that poverty, class antagonisms, vice and other ill
results of the existing social system may be abolished, and
that a new and better social system may be attained.
ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. Socialism arose as a movement of protest, and through the accept-
ance of the principle of evolution became a conscious, disciplined force
with a definite aim.
2. Politically, Socialism is represented by a great international party
with nearly 10,000,000 voters and 40,000,000 adult sympathizers.
3. Socialism must be considered as a criticism of existing society,
as a philosophy of social evolution, as a social forecast or ideal, and as
a movement for the attainment of the ideal.
QUESTIONS
1. In what way has science influenced the character of Socialism?
2. What is the chief aim of the Socialist movement?
3. Give a provisional definition of Socialism.
CHAPTER II
CAPITALIST SOCIETY
I
Point of view in Socialist criticism: The Socialist criti-
cism of society is essentially constructive and impersonal.
This is not always apparent to the casual reader of, or
listener to a popular presentation of Socialism, but if the
speaker or writer is really representative of Socialism at its
best his criticisms of institutions are directed toward the
determining economic conditions and their consequences,
and his criticism of men has for its purpose the desire to
give concrete examples of types and classes as they are
affected by economic conditions. Karl Marx makes this
perfectly clear in the preface to the first volume of Capital.1
This criticism, moreover, has always the transformation of
society through changes in the basic economic conditions
as its motive. This assumption of the fundamental economic
basis of society and social institutions is essential to Social-
ism. As we shall see later in our study, psychological and
other factors in social evolution are not excluded. They
are simply regarded as subordinate to the economic factors.
Socialism and decadent institutions: Socialists do not
devote much attention to the criticism of unimportant or
decadent institutions. Attempts to direct Socialist attacks
to the surviving remnants of feudal society have largely
"I paint the capitalist and landlord in no sense couleur de rose.
But here individuals are dealt with only in so far as they are the person-
ifications of economic categories, embodiments of particular class-
relations and class-interests. My standpoint, from which the evolu-
tion of the economic formation of society is viewed as a process of
natural history, can less than any other make the individual responsible
for relations whose creature he socially remains, however much he may
subjectively raise himself above them." — Karl Marx, Capital, vol. I,
p. 15, American edition.
7
8 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
failed for the reason that the Socialists are interested in
and mainly concerned with the vital power of Capitalism.
Both in Germany and England, for example, all efforts to
induce the Socialists to direct special attacks against the
institution of monarchy have failed. At the International
Socialist Congress at Amsterdam, in 1904, M. Jean Jaures,
the French Socialist leader, boasted of the fact that France
had long been a republic and rebuked the German Social
Democrats for acquiescing in the continuance of the mon-
archy. He was replied to by Herr Bebel to the effect that,
while the German Social Democrats desired a republic they
would not make it a special issue, because it was not worth
while. So long as the capitalist state exists, whether its form
be monarchical or republican, its power will be used to
defend the privileges and powers of the capitalist class.
Therefore, the abolition of the capitalist system itself is the
really important goal.
The capitalist class: With the final overthrow of feudal-
ism and the aristocracy of birth by the victorious middle
class at the time of the French Revolution the foundation
was already laid for a new aristocracy of wealth. The inven-
tion of power machinery and the consequent concentration
of industry in factories, made individual ownership of the
instruments of production by the workers themselves an
impossibility. Those producers who were first to take
advantage of the new methods, or who had the greatest
advantages in such important matters as power, markets,
labor supply or raw materials, soon became the sole owners
of industry. Thus was established a new class whose mem-
bers, like the great land-owners, have been able to draw a
perpetual income from industry, even when performing no
directive labor.
It is true that many members of this class perform a
high grade of labor, as managers, for which they are liberally
paid, but the greater part of their income is the direct or
indirect result of ownership of the means of production and
is not in any sense in proportion either to need or to ability.
Those persons, then, whose income is wholly or principally
derived from the labor of others as a result of their ownership v
of the means of production constitute what the Socialist
knows as the Capitalist Class.
CAPITALIST SOCIETY 9
The proletariat: The concentration of the ownership of
the means of production, and the growth of cities and factory-
towns, transformed the journeyman of handicraft industry
and the peasant of feudalism into the propertyless wage-
worker of modern industry. With no control over his means
of livelihood, he is obliged to accept the current rate of
wages for the kind of labor he performs, pay for the goods
he consumes a price which is set by conditions over which
he has no control, and live wherever the capitalist entre-
preneur may locate his factory.
In the early days of the capitalist system, class lines
were loosely drawn and it was possible for a man of ability
to rise from the working class to the capitalist class. But
as the system becomes more rigid and more complex the
passing of a proletarian into the capitalist class becomes all
but impossible. He may leave his class in spirit and become
a retainer of the capitalist class, but generally, and unless
specially favored, he remains in fact a proletarian.
Who constitute the proletariat? The proletariat properly
includes not only factory workers and day laborers, but clerks
in business houses and salesmen in mercantile establish-
ments. The farm laborer in Europe is still a feudal peasant
to a very large extent, but in America, so far as he is not the
son or heir of a middle-class farmer, the farm laborer is
essentially a proletarian. The word "proletariat" is of Ro-
man origin. In ancient Rome it was applied to a large class
of free citizens without property or certain means of exis-
tence. The modern technical meaning of the word connotes
the class of workers who do not own the tools and imple-
ments of their calling, the wage-working class in general.
In common usage, however, the word is used to describe
the entire class of workers who own no property.
Wage slavery: Socialists frequently speak of the condi-
tion of the proletariat under Capitalism as "Wage Slavery."
This term is sometimes objected to on the ground that the
worker is free to give up his job and move from place to
place at will. He is thus in a very different position from
that of the chattel slave of antiquity, or even that of the
feudal serf.
The Socialist replies that while the worker is theoretically
free he is in fact enslaved; that while the law does not
10 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
enforce wage slavery, it is enforced by conditions more
effectually coercive than statutes could be. There is always
an army of unemployed ready to take the jobs that the
discontented may vacate, and the choice that confronts the
worker is usually a choice between holding his job or falling
to poverty or even pauperism. If he moves from one factory
to another, he only changes masters, still working under the
same general conditions. The average worker cannot hope
to find relief in private business enterprises. The risk is too
precarious, for the majority of small business enterprises
fail.
Except in rare cases, agricultural employment offers no
way of escape to the factory worker. The wages of farm
laborers are generally far lower than those of industrial
laborers and for one accustomed to city life the loneliness
of the country is often intolerable. The farmer who prospers
must combine a high degree of specialized technical skill
with good business ability, and these things the factory-
trained worker lacks and cannot easily learn. The farm offers
no solution. The term "wage slavery" is therefore hardly
an exaggeration.
Herbert Spencer on wage slavery: That the system of
wage-labor is a form of slavery is sometimes contended by
opponents of Socialism as stoutly as by the Socialists them-
selves. Herbert Spencer, for example, argues this with
as much earnestness and force as any Socialist writer. He
says: "The wage-earning factory-hand does, indeed, exem-
plify entirely free labor, in so far that, making contracts at
will and able to break them after short notice, he is free to
engage with whomsoever he pleases and where he pleases.
But this liberty amounts in practice to little more than the
ability to exchange one slavery for another; since, fit only
for his particular occupation, he has rarely an opportunity
of doing anything more than decide in what mill he will pass
the greater part of his dreary days. The coercion of circum-
stances often bears more hardly on him than the coercion
of the master does on one in bondage." l
The middle class: Between the true capitalist class and
the true proletariat stands a somewhat indefinite middle
class, composed of small capitalists, professional men, salaried
1 Herbert Spencer, The Principles of Sociology, vol. Ill, p. 525.
CAPITALIST SOCIETY
11
or semi-independent business men and land-owning farmers.
The lines of demarkation between the middle class and the
classes on either side of it are not always clearly distinguish-
able, but the types of the three classes can be distinguished.
The middle class has not the fixed characteristics of the other
two. Its members are usually either striving to reach the
capitalist class or struggling desperately to avoid sinking
into the proletarian class. The small business man sees
his business absorbed into a combination and becomes
himself either a salaried employee or a wage-worker. The
small capitalists seem to be increasing in number, but their
influence in the management of industry is diminishing.
Pride of property usually makes the small business man
an ally of the true capitalist class, although there are many
examples of adherence to the cause of the proletariat by
members of that group. The professional man is becoming
increasingly dependent upon the capitalist class for support
and is usually conservative, although large numbers of
professional men and women sympathize with the pro-
letariat and many become active leaders in proletarian
movements. The proportion of farmers owning their land
is steadily diminishing1 and the farmer is becoming more
and more dependent upon capitalist agencies for the market-
ing of his product. These facts are forcing large numbers
of farmers into sympathetic relations with the proletariat.
TABLE I
CHANGE8 IN FARM TENURE IN THE UNITED STATES8
Total
Number of
Farms.
Number of Farms Operated by
Per Cent, of
Farms Operated
Year.
by
Owners.
Cash
Tenants.
Share
Tenants.
Owners.
Cash
Ten-
ants.
Share
Ten-
ants.
1900...
5,739,657
3,713,371
752,920
1,273,366
64.7
13.1
22.2
1890...
4,564,641
3,269,728
454,659
840,254
71.6
10.0
18.4
1880...
4,008,907
2,984,306
322,357
702,244
74.5
8.0
17.5
1 See Table, Changes in Farm Tenure in the United States.
8 U. S. Census Reports, 1900, Vol. V, p. Ixxvii.
12 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
When Marx predicted the more or less rapid extinction of
the middle class he referred primarily to fche class of petty
manufacturers and merchants. It is evident that, so far
from becoming extinct, this class has numerically increased.
This increase is probably accounted for in part by the fact
that economic pressure forces large numbers of wage-workers
into the lower ranks of the middle class, most of whom fail
and fall back into the proletariat after a brief struggle.
This movement is always going on. Wage-workers who find
it impossible to secure employment take their small savings
and attempt to make a living in the petty retail trades,
most of them failing and sinking into a worse condition
than that from which they hoped to escape. The same may
be said of thousands of wage-earners too old for work, or
incapacitated by disease or accident. Those who do not
utterly fail may be roughly divided into three groups:
(1) those who eke out a scanty living rarely or never superior
to that of the wage-earning proletariat; (2) those who cease
to do business on their own account and become salaried
employees, as agents and managers for large corporations;
(3) those whose business establishments are absorbed by
large concerns and who become small stockholders.
Industrial organization: The magnitude of modern indus-
trial enterprises, and the great amounts of capital necessary
for their establishment and operation, make individual owner-
ship impossible as a general rule. Individual capitals must
be combined. The simplest form of combination in owner-
ship is the partnership in which two or more capitalists
agree to engage in an enterprise together and share in the
profits in proportion to the capital which each has contrib-
uted. If, however, these capitalists apply to the State and
receive a charter entitling them to act as a business unit
they acquire, as a corporation, a new status. They not only
have all the advantages of combined capital, but the addi-
tional advantages of perpetual life, limited liability, flex-
ibility of organization and concentration of power. Mem-
bership in the corporation consists simply in the ownership
of stock, which can be freely bought and sold.
These advantages have made the corporation the charac-
teristic form of industrial organization under capitalism,
and the result has been the development of a distinct indus-
CAPITALIST SOCIETY 13
trial State within the political State. And by virtue of its
control of the means of livelihood the industrial State is the
more powerful and largely controls the political organization
of society. And, while since the eighteenth century the forms
of the political State have become more democratic, the
industrial State remains in the hands of the few. It is not
even an aristocracy, the rule of the best, but a plutocracy,
the rule of the richest.
Gains under capitalism: While capitalism has brought
with it many evils which were relatively unknown in the
earlier stages of industrial evolution, it is at the same time
a distinct forward step. Contrary to a very common ,; .im-
pression, recognition of this fact is inherent in the pr ulo*-
ophyof Socialism. Few apologists of capitalism have- more
clearly perceived, or more eloquently described the immense
benefits, both material and spiritual, of the capitalist era
than Karl Marx himself.1
Machinery has increased the productivity of labor man|
fold. While the most apparent benefits of this gain have gontf
to the capitalists, still the workers have made real and sub-
stantial progress. The proletarian is still propertyless, but
he consumes more goods, of greater variety and better qual-
ity, than did his ancestors of the journeyman and peasant
classes. The proletarian in Western Europe and America
is better educated than the feudal gentleman. He is rapidly
becoming emancipated from superstition and freed from
intellectual and spiritual bondage. Travel has been cheap-
ened beyond all dreams of a century ago. Famine and
pestilence are almost unknown. Disease has been so checked
that the average length of life is greater by fifteen years
than before the industrial revolution. Wars have become
less frequent and the nations of the world are closer together
than ever before.
II
Relative vs. absolute well-being: While it is true that
in an absolute sense the working classes are better off, there
has been a relative loss. A far larger share of the total
product of industry is now taken in the form of rent, interest
1 See, e. g., The Communist Manifesto, Part I.
14 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and profits than ever before, and the classes in society who
gain their income from such sources are growing in wealth
and power more rapidly than are the working classes. The
essential thing is not income but property. Vested interests,
property rights, special privileges, rule the world and make
democracy impossible. To be a well-fed slave is not a high
ambition, and unless the workingman can gain in independ-
ence, self-respect and a sense of responsibility no superficial
reform will carry with it much enduring satisfaction, no
government and no social order can be stable. But even
j\ far as these superficial things go, capitalistic society does
not'V?ive to the proletariat its share of the benefits of progress.
W&^ges: The compensation of the producer under capital-
ism is) determined neither by his needs, nor by the value
of t?ne product that he gives to society. Laboring power is
a (Commodity that is bought and sold on the market, and
tpe price of which at any given time is determined by the
l.tws of supply and demand. In the long run, the wages of
jany given class of labor equals its cost of production. Thus
tabor becomes as impersonal as so much steam or water
power, and is placed on the same level with capital and land
as one of the three factors in production in the currently
accepted economic theory.
The "iron law of wages": The statement of the law of
wages by some Socialists in Lassalle's phrase, "the iron law
of wages," needs some qualification. According to this
theory, wages can never permanently rise above the require-
ments of a bare subsistence, for if they should so rise the
number of children would increase, thus increasing the
supply of labor and drawing the wage back to the bare
subsistence- level. This theory has been disproved by ex-
perience, for as a matter of fact wages have permanently
risen. Both nominal wages, or wages expressed in money,
and real wages, or the sum of satisfaction that the laborer
is able to enjoy as the result of his labor, have materially
increased within fifty years and increased even more in the
preceding fifty years.
It frequently happens that the workers in one town
receive higher wages and enjoy a higher standard of living
than workers in another town who do exactly the same kind
of work. The peculiar circumstances attending the indus-
CAPITALIST SOCIETY 15
trial development in various localities exert a greater influ-
ence upon the standards of living than is commonly recog-
nized. As an illustration : In one town the woolen industry
was first established by English workers accustomed to a
relatively high standard of living, and in another town by
Belgians accustomed to a relatively low standard of living.
In course of time, through the migration of workers and other
causes, these characteristics disappear and in both towns the
industry is carried on by a cosmopolitan industrial popula-
tion. But the standards of living are not equalized. Wages,
both nominal and real wages, continue to be higher in the
former town than in the latter. In other words, there are
local standards of living established by local usage and
tradition.
The standard of life: The principal fallacy in the "iron
law of wages" in its extreme form is that the changing
standard of life is not taken into account. The gains in
the wage scale which are attained from time to time are
not all absorbed in larger families, but a large part, and often
the whole, of the gains go toward a greater abundance of
material goods, education and recreation. As a matter of
fact, the theory that any substantial increase of wages will
lead to an increase in the size of families is absolutely unten-
able. From the time of Adam Smith it has been recognized
that low wages, extreme poverty and large families go
together.1 No single fact concerning population is better
established than that the fecundity of the poorer classes is
always greater than that of the well-to-do classes. In all
countries the wealthiest classes are most infertile.2
The number and character of the wants, the satisfaction
of which appear to a man as necessary, constitute his stand-
ard of life. The typical wage will, in the long run, be just
sufficient to maintain this standard and provide for the
reproduction of labor. At any given time and place the wage
may be higher or lower than the type. In the first case there
will be expenditures for luxuries and a tendency toward a
higher standard of life; in the second there will be poverty
with occasional or chronic pauperism, and a tendency
1 Cf.? The Wealth of Nations, vol. I, ch. viii.
2 This subject is discussed at length in The Common Sense of the Milk
Question, by John Spargo.
16 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
toward a lower standard of life. Taking the Western world
as a whole the standard of life of the proletariat has steadily-
risen. This is not usually apparent from year to year, but
from generation to generation the gain is clearly marked.
It is particularly obvious as between the first and second
generations of European immigrants in the United States.
This fact of the rising standard of living, far from being
an argument for a continuance of the present system, is the
one thing that makes industrial democracy possible, necessary
and inevitable. It is a demonstrable fact that the higher the
standard of life the greater will be the resistance offered to
any lowering of that standard. A people with a low standard
of living can be exploited, robbed, bullied, and even mur-
dered in cold blood, without offering effective resistance. The
Russian moujiks splendidly illustrate this fact. A people
with a high standard of living, on the other hand, are jealous
of their rights and quick to see and resent any infringement
of them.
The standard of life everywhere tends to rise. There are
always unsatisfied wants just beyond the necessities of life
which will be satisfied at every opportunity. As soon as
the satisfaction of a want becomes habitual it becomes a
part of the standard of life. Imitation has a great deal to
do with this tendency to raise the standard of living. Where
approximate equality in wealth prevails and men rarely
come into direct contact with those whose standard of life
is higher than theirs, the advance is slight and simply follows
the increase of income. But where differences in wealth are
great, the highest standard becomes the model which all
strive to copy. Rich women set fashions which factory girls
feel they must follow. Expecially is this true where a
democratic philosophy has been preached, and where there
is a tradition of those who have successfully crossed class
barriers. In such a community there will be vigorous resist-
ance, not only to a lowering of the standard of life, but to
any interference with the rising of the standard, either by
law or by economic exploitation.
Economic pressure and resistance: In the earlier stages
of social evolution it was the limitations of the physical
environment which pressed upon the individual and pre-
vented the full satisfaction of his wants. War, slavery,
CAPITALIST SOCIETY 17
feudal landlord, monarch and crystallized religious forms
have successively and together suppressed the natural prog-
ress of mankind. All these forms of social pressure were
largely economic in their origin, but the most prevalent
form of social pressure under capitalism is more purely
economic than any earlier form.
The older checks on progress have lost much of their force.
Invention and discovery have pushed back the physical
limitations, wars are less frequent, chattel slavery is abol-
ished, the feudal landlord and the monarch are anachronisms,
and religious terrorism has lost much of its force. The great
repressive force now is the capitalistic domination of indus-
try, the wage system by which labor is deprived of a large
part of its product, and the limitation of industrial produc-
tion for the sake of greater profits and a higher standard
of life for the few at the expense of the many. Organized
capitalism stands like a rock against any relative gain on
the part of labor. It imports laborers with a lower standard
of life to lower the standard at home. Less personal and
more active than any of the older forms of pressure, except
the physical limitations themselves, capitalism not only
endeavors to prevent the standard of life from rising but
attempts directly to lower it.
To this pressure the proletariat offers a resistance pro-
portionate to the gains already made. This resistance is
not always conscious, and is not usually consciously directed
against the real source of the pressure, but wherever there
is a protest meeting, a labor union, a strike, a proletarian
political party or a social revolution, this resistance is mani-
festing itself. When this resistance is consciously directed
against capitalism and towards industrial democracy and
social freedom, all the essentials of a Socialist movement
may be said to exist.
18 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
I
1. Socialist criticism is essentially constructive and impersonal.
2. The invention of machinery and the rise of factories brought
about the reconstruction of social classes, the capitalist owners of the
means of production becoming the dominant class and the proletariat,
composed of propertyless wage-workers, the subject class.
3. Between the capitalist class and the proletariat is a middle class,
less definitely constituted than either, and with the interests and
sympathies of its members divided.
4. The capitalist age has been one of great material progress, with
a distinct gain in the absolute well-being of the majority.
II
5. The compensation of labor under capitalism takes the form of
a competitive wage, and the typical wage is just sufficient to maintain
the current standard of life of the laborer and his family.
6. The standard of life tends to rise from generation to generation,
creating a continually strengthening demand for higher wages.
7. The capitalist domination of industry acts as a great repressive
force tending to lower the standard of life of the proletariat.
QUESTIONS
1. Why do Socialists refuse to direct special attacks against the
institutions of monarchy?
2. What are the dominant characteristics of the capitalist class?
Of the proletariat?
3. What reasons are there for considering the position of the pro-
letariat one of wage-slavery?
4. What are the advantages of the corporation as a form of business
organization?
5. In what respects has the working class gained through capitalism?
6. Distinguish between absolute and relative well-being.
7. Criticise the "Iron Law of Wages."
8. What is meant by the "Standard of Life"?
9. How is the standard of life related to the wage system?
Literature
Ely, R. T., and Wicker, G. R., Elementary Principles of Economics,
Part IV, Chap. III.
Marx, Karl, Capital, Vol. I, Parts II and VI.
Spargo, John, The Common Sense of the Milk Question, Chap. I;
The Substance of Socialism, Part III.
CHAPTER III
PLANLESS PRODUCTION
The competitive system: America has grown up in the
spirit of the laissezfaire philosophy: we have been taught
to believe that if the government and the monopolists
would not interfere, individual self interest working in the
spheres of production and exchange would bring about the
highest possible social efficiency. America has been the
paradise of this laissez faire individualism. With mil-
lions of acres of free land to which the dissatisfied could
go, and a continent to develop; with the absence of tradi-
tional authority and the presence of the most adventurous
spirits of all countries, it is no wonder that individualism
and competition appeal to the typical American. Then,
too, the idea of the "Survival of the Fittest" introduced by
Darwin, gave to competition a new scientific basis, so that
even in these days of huge combinations, when Judge Gary
of the United States Steel Corporation testifies before a
Committee of the House of Representatives that competition
in the steel industry is dead,1 a large element in the American
population still wishes to destroy the "Trust" and rely upon
competition to bring about substantial social justice.
This idea of the effectiveness of competition was illus-
trated by an economist of a past generation by a description
of the provisioning of London, holding it to be self-evident
that no public or monopolistic agency could meet the com-
plex and multiform needs so well as they were met by the
blind working of competition. But the people of London
were not all fed. Perhaps as many as thirty per cent had
to go hungry part of the time, then as now. Competition
falls far short of efficiency.
Lack of coordination: In the laissez faire philosophy
it was forgotten that individual liberty must be limited
1 Vide reports in the daily press, July, 1911.
19
20 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
in order to bring about the maximum of social liberty.
Darwin and his immediate followers failed to emphasize
as Kropotkin has done the importance of cooperation as
a factor in evolution. Competition is chaotic, it has no
organization. It is simply the outgrowth of the ages before
modern science was born. A scientific age demands scien-
tific methods, and competition in industry is the reverse of
scientific
Under competition there is no way of estimating the
demand. Producers work blindly and hope to be able to
dispose of their products at a profit. There is no apportion-
ment of the work among the various producers, so that no
producer knows how much of the supply it will pay him to
produce. This is especially evident in agriculture within a
limited market. If the price of potatoes has been high each
farmer will plant a large acreage of potatoes, with the result
that in the next season there will be an over-supply of a
bulky and perishable product which cannot be profitably
disposed of. Competition, therefore, results in great fluc-
tuations in price, gambling in the necessities of life, numerous
business failures, irregular production and consequent injury
to the working class.
Unnecessary duplication: Anyone who has lived in a city
which rejoiced in two or three different telephone systems
can appreciate the disadvantages of competition. Every
business man must have "both 'phones," and whenever
one wishes to call a friend on his "Independent" telephone
he discovers to his sorrow that the friend has a "Bell."
Nothing is gained by this expensive duplication and incon-
venience, for either extreme or "cut-throat" competition
must go on until one company is financially ruined, or the
companies must agree on a rate, thus giving no advantage
over monopoly. Much money has been wasted in paralleling
railroads. Capital diverted from industry for the purpose
of building unnecessary roads is a social loss. Often a rail-
road is built as a huge blackmailing scheme, built with the
preconceived plan of selling out to the competitor. Real
competition in public service facilities is practically non-
existent and impossible for any considerable length of
time.
In the process of exchange the wastes of competition are
PLANLESS PRODUCTION 21
obvious. Several grocery stores in a small town carry-
identical stocks of goods, duplicate floor space, stale goods,
managers and clerks, while one large store with branches as
the town became larger could supply the needs of the town
much more cheaply and could afford to change stock more
frequently. The distribution of the milk supply where a
dozen milk wagons serve a single street needs only to be
compared with the postal delivery system to illustrate the
wastes of competition. In manufacture the wastes of com-
petition are equally obvious. Even now that a considerable
degree of monopoly has been attained, there are far more
factories than would be necessary under an efficient and
economical system of production.
Advertising: One of the greatest wastes in the marketing
of commodities is in the matter of advertising. Advertising
has, of course, a legitimate place in business life and would
to some "extent be necessary in a Socialist commonwealth.
It is necessary to make a market for a new product, to call
attention to the advantages of new methods over old. But
it is not necessary to spend huge sums in persuading people
to buy one brand of a standard article rather than another
equally good. The excessive advertising of soaps and break-
fast foods illustrates this waste.
Advertising also offers a means of influencing the press
in a manner and to a degree that is socially dangerous and
undesirable. Newspapers and magazines cannot live with-
out advertising, and the judicious placing of advertising
matter, or the threat of the withdrawal of such matter
already placed has changed the editorial policy of many
newspapers and magazines.
The wastes of duplication can also be seen in personal
advertising by travelling salesmen. The "drummer" equally
with the printed advertisement has a legitimate function
to perform in keeping retail dealers in touch with the larger
business world, persuading them to introduce novelties,
and saving to the retailer the expense of going to the city
to place an order. But it is clearly an economic waste when
salesmen from several wholesale houses visit one small
grocer within a single week, trying to persuade him to in-
crease his stock of standard goods.
Useless vocations : The capitalist system makes necessary
22 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
many vocations which are not socially productive, and which
draw large numbers of the ablest men and women from pro-
ductive work. With the socialization of capital these voca-
tions would largely disappear and a heavy tax upon the
producing population be saved.
(1) Lawyers: There were 114,703 lawyers in the United
States according to the census of 1900, the increase of law-
yers between that and the previous census being much
more rapid than that of the total population. It is safe to
say that now (1911) there are more than 140,000 persons
in the legal profession in this country. Probably nine-tenths
of the litigation and an even larger part of legal business
transacted out of court involves property rights and other
issues directly resulting from capitalism. While the social-
ization of capital would probably not do away with the
legal profession in its entirety, it is evident that the number
of lawyers would be greatly reduced.
(2) Soldiers: Since the only function of the army and
navy under capitalism is to extend foreign markets and
coerce rebels against capitalist authority, militarism cannot
survive the present industrial system. This will release
for socially beneficial work not only the 100,000 men in the
army and navy, but the greater army engaged in the manu-
facture of the munitions of war, in the provisioning and
serving of the army and navy, and in the administrative
bureaus. The cost of militarism to the country, exclusive of
pensions, is $300,000,000 a year. The same amount spent
in productive labor would add tremendously to the wealth
and well-being of the nation. A simple, inexpensive and
democratic system of national defense could easily be sub-
stituted for the present wasteful and undemocratic
system.
(3) Bankers and brokers: The number of persons in the
United States engaged in these occupations is constantly
increasing. In 1870 the number was 10,631. By 1880 it
had risen to 15,180, and by 1890 to 30,008. By 1900 the
number was 73,277. Thus the number of bankers and brokers
has been steadily increasing three times as fast as the total
population. In addition to this army of men a very con-
siderable part of the 1,000,000 clerks, copyists, bookkeepers,
accountants and stenographers enumerated in the census of
PLANLESS PRODUCTION 23
1900 were employed in banks and brokerage houses. To a
very large extent, these occupations are socially unproduc-
tive and wasteful. The banking operations which would be
necessary under Socialism would employ only an insig-
nificant proportion of those now directly or indirectly
engaged in banking. The broker is purely a social parasite,
and as such would have no place in a rationally conducted
society. He would be given useful work and thus trans-
formed from a parasite to a useful and productive member
of society.
(4) Agents: Another unnecessary group which would be
practically eliminated under Socialism is that of insurance,
real estate and sales agents, which in 1900 numbered in the
United States 241,333 persons. State insurance would not
need agents. Land would not be bought and sold. Sales
agents would have only the limited function of introducing
new classes of goods with which people were unfamiliar, a
function similar to that of the travelling salesman under
Socialism.
The premium on dishonesty: Competition and the profit
system make it almost impossible for men to succeed in
many lines of business without resorting to deception, unfair
advantage and adulteration of goods. Profits are gained by
reducing the expenses of production and selling at the highest
possible price. The sale of cotton and shoddy for wool, the
addition of glucose to sugar, injurious preservatives in food-
stuffs, poor building materials sold for good, deodorized eggs
and embalmed beef, bogus mining stocks, "city lots" in a
Florida swamp, railway rebates, manipulation of legislatures,
two hundred per cent, on chattel loans and a thousand other
nefarious devices have been developed by a laissez faire
competitive system. When one competitor resorts to such
means the others must follow or go out of business. Restric-
tive legislation is bitterly fought by personally honest men.
One method of deception is hardly made illegal before another
is devised. The spirit of the law is violated and the letter
upheld. Government inspectors must watch all forms of
manufacture to detect violations of the law, and it becomes
an advantage to the manufacturer to bribe the inspector.
Nor must it be forgotten that practically the entire system
of government regulation and inspection with its army of
24 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
employees and expensive departmental machinery is a social
waste, made necessary by the nature of capitalism.
To these evils must be added the danger to the health and
lives of the workers under the profit system. Every safety
device costs money and the manufacturer not unnaturally
hesitates to incur the expenditure lest it reduce the margin
of profit. One manufacturer may even wish to guard his
machinery, but find himself unable to do so unless his com-
petitors do the same, and even he will fight a law compelling
him to protect the lives of his employees. So it is with
sanitation. Even a private monopoly is more likely to
safeguard the health of its employees than is the best indi-
vidual employer under competition.
Over-production and under-consumption : In the struggle
between competing producers it frequently happens that
the public demand for an article at a certain price is over-
estimated. Or the price may be temporarily above the
normal, and manufacturers in either case run their factories
to their fullest capacity and produce more than can be profit-
ably disposed of. Competition in selling drives the price
down until sellers prefer to hold goods rather than to sell.
The factories are then closed, the employees are thrown out
of work, and production is only resumed after the accumu-
lated product has been gradually marketed. A series of
profitable years often stimulates production to such an
extent that there comes to be what is known as "general
over-production." In nearly all lines of industry the prod-
ucts exceed the demand at prices which yield a surplus to
the manufacturer.
But at the same time that warehouses are loaded with
unsold goods thousands of consumers are going without
them, simply because they cannot afford to buy. The real
problem is not over-production, but under-consumption.
True, over-production — the production of more than can
be consumed to the advantage of the consumers — is possible
in some industries, but general over-production is impossible.
The capacity of society to expand its wants for more and
better goods is practically unlimited, and it is always possible
for the average man to consume the equivalent of what he
produces. The producers and consumers in general are the
same individuals viewed from different viewpoints, and if
PLANLESS PRODUCTION 25
each family were able to consume the equivalent of what its
members produced there could be no question of over-
production.
The tendency of monopoly in industry is toward the better
regulation of production and the elimination of over-pro-
duction and its results. But not until this tendency to the
monopolization of industry reaches its culmination in social-
ization will the real problem of under-consumption be solved.
Crises: The whole period of capitalist industry has been
marked by periodic fluctuations in business conditions. A
period of prosperity is followed by a crisis, a panic in the
world's markets, and a period of business depression and
social distress. There have been four "major crises" in the
United States, those of 1837, 1857, 1873 and 1893. The
major crisis seems to come at intervals of about twenty
years, that of 1873 being hastened by conditions following
the Civil War. Minor panics and crises have usually alter-
nated with major crises, giving a period of business depression
about once in every ten years.
Crises are commonly explained as a result of an over-
expansion of the credit system. Bank credit is loaned to
business men in too large quantities and on too little security.
Easy credit tempts men to take too great business risks,
and when their notes become due they are unable to pay.
The bank which has guaranteed their obligations then fails,
and with the close interrelation of banks and business houses,
one after another is drawn into bankruptcy until the busi-
ness world is paralyzed. A crop failure may precipitate a
panic by diminishing the purchasing power of farming com-
munities, thereby reducing the profits of manufacturers and
making them unable to meet their notes. Whatever its
cause, a panic is bound to grow. Business is founded on
credit and credit is almost destroyed. Even the securities
on which credit is based fall in value, and money itself is
hoarded, thus reducing bank reserves.
This is one side of the problem. On the other side stands
the fundamental difficulty that the high profits of a pros-
perous time increase the relative gains of the capitalist class
as against those of the proletariat. These additional gains
are transformed into capital which must be re-invested in
further production. With its lower relative income the great
26 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
consuming proletariat cannot buy its own product. Its
purchases fall off as in the case of the farmers at the time
of a crop failure. Goods lie unsold in warehouses and the
profits of manufacturers from which loans were to be repaid
are not forthcoming. This situation breaks at some point
and a panic ensues. Unemployment following the panic
still further reduces the purchasing power of the people,
and it is only after the surplus has been consumed by the
capitalist class, their servants and those who produce goods
and services for them, or after some of the surplus has been
given away in the form of charity, that the normal level
can be regained and the entire process begun anew.
Passing of the competitive era: Unregulated competition
is largely a thing of the past. Competition through price is
modified to such an extent that the ruinous cut-throat com-
petition of a generation ago is practically unknown. There
is still some degree of competitive price in the wholesale
trade in staple goods, but it is incidental and relatively
unimportant. There is also a form of competition in the
retail trade, consisting of advertising and other attempts
to "get the business," but price agreements prevent the
disastrous consequences of unregulated competition. Thus
some of the evils of competition are eliminated through the
increasing magnitude of the business units. In many indus-
tries this process has gone still further and has culminated
in monopoly. The tendency of monopoly in industry is
toward the better regulation of production and the elimina-
tion of over-production and its results. But it brings with
it greater concentration of wealth and a higher degree of
direct exploitation, so that monopoly is not in itself a solu-
tion of the basic industrial problem.
The waste of labor: The capitalist system requires at all
times a great reserve army of laborers who, ordinarily unem-
ployed, can be called into active service in times when
production needs to be increased. In the United States
from one to three million workers1 capable of adding enor-
1 This is admittedly a very vague and unsatisfactory statement to
make upon such an important subject. Adams and Sumner with
wisdom and truth remark that "there is no more difficult topic in the
whole range of labor problems, and few so important, as this subject
of unemployment" (Labor Problems, p. 519). Upon no problem of
equal importance do we possess less exact information. The number
PLANLESS -PRODUCTION 27
mously to the social wealth by their labor are constantly idle.
The relatively inefficient, the so-called "unemployed," who
might be producing something at least, are usually not
employed at all, but supported by charity. When to these
are added the idle rich and their servants and retainers, the
producers of ostentatious luxuries for the plutocracy, those
employed in the unproductive and parasitic occupations
already enumerated, and the vast number of workers whose
labor is largely wasted through poorly organized private
enterprise, it will at once be seen what a tremendous
waste of labor-power is involved in the chaotic and planless
capitalist system. It is certain that with the elimination of
all this waste a far higher standard of life than the present
average could be maintained with comparatively short hours
of labor.
Agricultural production: Although the tendency in manu-
facture and commerce is towards concentration and the
elimination of the evils of competition, the tendency in
agriculture is apparently the reverse. The great "bonanza
farms" of the West and the great plantations of the South
are being broken up into smaller holdings. The number of
farms as shown by the census is steadily increasing. In
Europe this same process is going on. Great estates are
being divided into small farms and sold to peasants on State
credit. Is competition, then, effective and desirable in
agriculture?
The same evils of lack of coordination and unnecessary
duplication exist in agriculture as in industry. The inde-
pendent farmer is not in touch with the consumer and
cannot tell in advance what acreage it will be worth while
for him to devote to each crop. The risk which each farmer
must assume is, in proportion to his capital, very great.
Drought, frost, hail or insect pests may destroy his whole
crop and reduce him to poverty. In spite of the apparent
of unemployed workers rarely falls below one million, even in "good"
times. In "bad" times it frequently rises to considerably more than
three millions. For example, 1900 was by no means a very "bad"
year, but, according to the federal census of that year, thirty-nine
per cent, of the male workers, 2,069,546 persons, were idle from four
to six months of the year (U. S. Census, Special Reports, volume on
"Occupation," p. ccxxxv). The conservatism of the statement in the
text is evident (cf. Hunter, Poverty, ch. I).
28 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
increase in competition, the real tendency is toward its
elimination. In the first place, there is a marked concentra-
tion of farm ownership, as we have already seen.1 In the
next place, the marketing of farm produce has passed out
of the hands of the farmers themselves. Instead of being
able to sell direct to the consumer, they must reach him
through an army of middlemen whose functions are becom-
ing more and more concentrated. The industrial functions
which formerly constituted a large part of farming have
passed out of the farmer's hands. He no longer makes
butter and cheese, nor does he peddle milk about the city.
These functions are capitalized and concentrated. The more
expensive farm machinery, like threshing machines and
reapers, are either owned cooperatively or owned and
operated by those who specialize in that part of farm work
and make it their business.
Some of the evils of unrestrained competition are partially
avoided by the crop reports and recommendations of the
Department of Agriculture, an example of collective action
saving the individual from the evil consequences of an
inefficient individualism. A similar service is performed by
associations and unions of farmers engaged in producing
certain groups of crops. So keenly is the necessity of elim-
inating competition felt at times that violence is resorted to
for the purpose of regulating production, as by the tobacco
planters of Kentucky, for example. The separate farm may
remain, but competition is no more desirable in farming
than in the other branches of production.
Where competition may persist: Competition as a regu-
lator of industry is a failure. It is unscientific, it lacks adapt-
ability and coordination, it involves too much individual
risk, it involves social loss in duplication of plants, machines
and men, it wastes men and money in advertising, it brings
about adulteration of goods and cheap construction, and it
increases the danger of under-consumption and crises. But
a certain kind of competition would remain either under
private or public monopoly. It is socially advantageous to
have men and groups of men strive toward greater efficiency.
A healthy rivalry between farmers to keep up the best farm,
and to produce crops of the highest quality in the greatest
i See Table I, p. 11.
PLANLESS PRODUCTION 29
quantity adds to the social wealth and well-being, as does
the rivalry of the same sort between manufacturing establish-
ments and transportation lines. A competition between men
for position and public honors when the reward is clearly
placed on a basis of efficiency and merit, results in a distinct
social gain. It is entirely possible to retain all the benefits
of competition without enduring its evils.
SUMMARY
1. Industrial competition necessarily involves great social loss
through the duplication of establishments and services, and in the
advertising of goods.
2. The capitalist system makes necessary many socially unproductive
vocations.
3. Privately organized industry offers irresistible temptation to
dishonesty and fraud.
4. The risks of capitalist industry give rise to periodic crises which
bear most heavily upon the working class.
5. Competition in the form of personal and group rivalry for social
efficiency, position and honor may persist without industrial competi-
tion.
QUESTIONS
1. Why does competition fail as a regulator of industry?
2. Give examples of unnecessary duplication in industry.
3. Discuss the Socialist position in regard to advertising.
4. Explain the relation between the capitalist system and the voca-
tion of law.
5. What is meant by over-production? Under-consumption?
6. Why does capitalist society fail to utilize all of the available
supply of labor?
7. How is the farmer affected by the capitalist system?
8. What would be the place of competition under Socialism?
Literature
Ely, R. T., Socialism and Social Reform, Part II.
Hunter, Robert, Poverty.
Hyndman, H. M., Commercial Crises of the Nineteenth Century.
Kelly, Edmond, Twentieth Century Socialism, Book II.
Reeve, S. A., The Cost of Competition.
Simons, A. M., The American Farmer.
CHAPTER IV
POVERTY
What constitutes poverty? Our definition of poverty has
been somewhat anticipated. Poverty is at once an absolute
and a relative condition. As an absolute condition, it may
be defined as an insufficient supply of those things which
are necessary to maintain efficiency in the conditions existing
at a given time and in a given place. A family may be said
to be in poverty when its income is insufficient to provide
for all its members the things necessary to maintain them
in a state of physical efficiency. This is true regardless of
the fact that the income would have sufficed to keep another
family at the standard of efficiency in some other place, or
in the same place at some other time. Thus poverty is a
relative condition. The Chinese coolie can supply all his
felt wants, and maintain himself efficiently, according to
Chinese standards, on a wage which would mean starvation
to an Italian laborer. In turn the Italian laborer can main-
tain himself efficiently and save money on a wage entirely
insufficient to efficiently maintain an American workingman.
A family with a three dollars a day standard — that is, a
family living under conditions in which it takes three dollars
a day to procure the things necessary to physical efficiency —
is just as poor on an income of two dollars a day as a family
with an income of fifty cents a day where the necessities of
physical efficiency can be procured for seventy-five cents a
day.
Whenever the income of a family is so low that it does not
make possible the maintenance of all its members in a state
of efficiency, and there is a lack of any of the things essential
to the attainment of that end, there is poverty. When the
income falls so low that it must be augmented by public
or private charity, we have the development of poverty
to pauperism. This condition is poverty at its worst. Pau-
30
POVERTY 31
perism is the last refuge of the weak, the aged, the sick and
infirm, and other victims of the human struggle.
The extent of poverty: There is no way of obtaining a
very accurate measure of the amount of poverty existing
in any city or in any nation. The extensive statistical work
of the United States Census Bureau throws very little light
on American poverty. Practically the only useful data avail-
able have been gathered by students and social workers in
private investigation or are contained in the reports of public
and private charities.
For England the investigations of Mr. Charles Booth
in London and Mr. B. S. Rowntree in York are the most
illuminating sources of information. Mr. Booth found that
of the population of London about 30 per cent was living
below the poverty line, and in York Mr. Rowntree found
27.8 per cent in poverty, and that in 1899, a year when
trade was more than usually good. The standard of living
in America is a little higher than the English standard.
Therefore, the poverty line must be set a little higher here
than in England to make any comparison of value. If this
be done, there is little or no evidence that conditions here
are much better than in England. During the year 1903
the public authorities in Boston aided 136,000 persons, or
more than 20 per cent of the population. The value of
these figures is greatly impaired by the fact that we have
no means of ascertaining how many duplications they con-
tain. That the number of such duplications is considerable
will not be doubted by anyone who is at all familiar with
the subject. On the other hand, the figures do not take into
account the large number of persons relieved by voluntary
philanthropic agencies and private individuals. That these
would more than cancel the number of duplications in the
statistics of public relief is beyond question. So we get
the startling fact that at least 20 per cent of the population
of the city of Boston reached the level of pauperism in the
year 1903. Of course, the number of poor persons, that is,
persons whose income was insufficient to provide the things
necessary to the maintenance of efficiency, was very much
higher. By no means do all who are poor apply for charity.
Self-respect keeps many who are desperately poor from
doing so.
32 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
It is estimated by Robert Hunter that in our large cities
there are rarely less than 25 per cent of the people in poverty.
Studies of unemployment tend to confirm this estimate.
Fully 30 per cent, of the wage-earners are unemployed for a
portion of the year, their incomes are irregular and they are
therefore extremely liable to fall below the poverty line.
To unemployment must be added the disability of wage-
earners by sickness and accident. The eminent authority on
vital statistics, William Farr, estimates that for every death
two persons are, on an average, seriously ill, and three per-
sons so ill as to require medical attention.1 Dr. Farr was
one of the greatest, if not the greatest, of all the statisticians
of history, and his estimate was based upon an exhaustive
study of the mortality and morbidity experience of the
United Kingdom. As Professor Irving Fisher remarks,
there is every reason to believe that Farr's conclusion is
nearly as valid as when he wrote, about forty years ago.2
If, then, we apply Farr's estimate to the United States, in
which about 1,500,000 persons die each year, we get the
startling result that something like 3,000,000 persons in
the United States are at all times seriously ill. Of course,
we have to be cautious in thus attempting to apply figures
based upon British conditions a generation ago to the United
States of the present day. Still, Professor Fisher, after
checking the result in various ways, concludes that the esti-
mate based upon Farr's crude rule is a fairly conservative
one.3
In 1900, of the total population of known ages in Con-
tinental United States the age-group twenty to sixty-four
years inclusive constituted 51.5 per cent. Assuming that
percentage to have been about the same in 1910, there were
in that year 47,365,717 persons between the ages of twenty
and sixty-four years, inclusive. Mr. Edward Bunnell
Phelps, editor of The American Underwriter, and one of
the best statistical authorities in America, has calculated
that Professor Fisher's estimate of 3,000,000 seriously ill
is too conservative; that there are at least that number of
persons in the United States between twenty and sixty-
1 Fair, Vital Statistics, pp. 512-513.
8 Report on National Vitality, by Professor Irving Fisher, p. 34.
8 Fisher, op. cit.
POVERTY
33
four years of age, inclusive, ill enough to require medical
attendance. And these years, it will be noted, are the most
important working years. In furnishing this estimate to
the present writers, Mr. Phelps calls attention to the fact
that some seven years ago one of our very best statistical
authorities tabulated the number and percentages of Odd
Fellows reported as sick in twenty-nine different States,
and found that of the total membership of that organization
in those States an average of 7.85 per cent, were sick. One
of the large health and accident insurance companies pub-
lishes a carefully tabulated statement which shows that on
an average ten per cent, of its policy-holders between the
ages of twenty and sixty-four years, inclusive, are sufficiently
ill to warrant the payment of sickness claims. Dr. Farr's
estimate that 2,000,000 in the United Kingdom are ill enough
to require medical attention was equivalent to saying that
that 6.3 per cent, of the total population was sick. The
medical director of another large health and accident com-
pany estimated that in the United States, on an average,
fully 5 per cent, of all persons in the age-group named are
ill enough to need medical attention. If we average these
several estimates and apply that average to the population
in the age-group named, the result is almost startling:
ESTIMATES OF HABITUAL
ILLNESS
IN
UNITED STATES
Basis of Estimate.
Popu-
lation, Ages
20-64.
Probable
No. of Cases
of Sickness.
47,365,717
47,365,717
47,365,717
47,365,717
3,718,209
4,736,572
2,368,286
Dr. Farr's figures, 6.3% of
2,984,040
Total number of sick persons estimated according to
the average of
3,451,777
It would seem, therefore, that, on an average, at least
3,000,000 persons between the ages of twenty and sixty-four
are sick. Not all of these are of the working class, for
the fires of fever burn in mansion and hovel. Many
are wealthy, many are of the professional class. How many
34 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
are bread-winners with families dependent upon them we
do not know. Probably not less than 1,500,000. We do
know that diseases of all kinds, and especially the most
dangerous, like tuberculosis and pneumonia, are more
prevalent among the wage-earners than among any other
class.1 It is perfectly obvious therefore, that disease
greatly adds to the poverty of the masses. According to Mr.
Hunter there were in 1904 at least 10,000,000 persons in
poverty in the United States. There is no evidence that
poverty is diminishing. All the organized charities are con-
stantly enlarging their scope, and are pressed to the limit
of their capacity in relieving misery. The cry of helplessness
which ascends from our great organized agencies for phil-
anthropic relief is appalling.
The pauper: The greater part of the families living in
poverty do not become paupers. They strive to maintain
their self-respect. They struggle bravely to increase their
incomes, and by small economies manage to avoid applying
for relief. Even the very poor will sacrifice part of their
meagre incomes to help their neighbors and friends tide
over a period of exceptional distress and to save them from
becoming paupers
But the typical pauper has lost the self-respect of poverty.
Take the pauperism of the tramp, for example. The tramp
is not necessarily unhappy, nor does he suffer keenly. He
cheerfully relies upon his stronger neighbors, or upon organ-
ized charities, to keep him from starvation. This form of
chronic pauperism is a disease of character, more hopeless
than crime itself. But it cannot be denied that capitalism
puts a premium on this parasitic life. The tramp on the
whole has an easier life and is often much better fed than the
hard-working laborer. It is estimated by Mr. James Forbes,
Director of the National Association for the Prevention of
Mendicancy, that there are not less than 250,000 such tramps
in the United States The tragedy of this aspect of the
problem lies in the fact that, very often, the most promising
and healthy boys of the working class find their way into
the ranks of trampdom. The monotony of the average wage-
earner's life, and the periodic unemployment which destroys
ambition and thrift, are perhaps mainly responsible for this.
1 Cf. Fisher, op. cit., p. 22.
POVERTY 35
Another form of chronic pauperism, closely allied to that
of the tramp, but differing from it in important respects, is
that of the shiftless and inefficient families who are always
dependent upon public and private charity. If there is a
man at the head of the family he is generally unemployed,
even in times when there is relatively little unemployment.
The truth is that he is unemployable. The cause may be
inefficiency and inability to apply himself to any task, how-
ever simple, or it may be sickness, or drunkenness, which
is itself a form of sickness. Or the cause of his failure
may be the characteristic which we call laziness. But lazi-
ness is probably always a result of defective conditions closely
allied to poverty, and rarely or never the primary cause of
poverty. Back of the inertia, lack of ambition and staying
power which manifest themselves in what we call laziness
are the untoward conditions born of poverty, such as mal-
nutrition, neglect of disease, lack of training, failure to
discover in the formative years of life the natural aptitudes
of the boy who thus develops into the pauper. How many
families of this class there are we have no means of ascer-
taining in the present chaotic state of our statistics of relief.
That the number is frightfully large is certain. They go
from one charitable agency to another until they have gone
the entire round, and then they begin the circuit anew.
To these classes of paupers who are the victims of moral
deficiencies, diseases of character which flourish in capital-
ist society, must be added the large class whose pauperism
is less directly the result of moral disease, but is the result
of old age, physical infirmity due to disease and accident,
the idiotic, the insane, the widowed and orphaned. There
are more than a quarter of a million such men, women and
children living in institutions at the public expense, in addi-
tion to the vast number supported outside by public and
private philanthropy. Altogether, pauperism presents an
appalling picture of human wreckage.
Poverty and the child: Nowhere are the ill effects of
poverty more strikingly manifest than in the lives of the
children of the poor. During the period of rapid growth
in mind and body poverty creates an environment for the
child which robs it of its chance of a full and healthy develop-
ment, without which an efficient manhood or womanhood
36 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
will be impossible. Robbed of physical and intellectual
opportunities in the most important years of all, the child
of poverty is heavily burdened in the race of life.
It is a well-known fact that the death rate among the poor
is very much higher than among the well-to-do. This is
especially true of the infantile death rate. Dr. Charles R.
Drysdale, an eminent authority, declared some years ago
that the death rate of infants among the rich was not more
than 8 per cent., while among the very poor it was often
as high as 40 per cent. In aristocratic Brookline, Mass., the
death rate of children under one year per 1,000 births in the
year 1900 was 96.9, while in Fall River, an industrial town
in the same State, it was 260.2. Yet the experts say that,
upon the whole, the babies of the poor are just as strong
and healthy at birth as those of the rich, and that post-
natal, rather than pre-natal, conditions are responsible for
the terrible difference in the death rate. Except for poverty
and other evils resulting from capitalism, there is no apparent
reason why the death rate of babies anywhere in the United
States should be materially higher than in Brookline. This
means that in the prosperous year of 1900 more than 200,000
babies under one year of age needlessly died in the United
States. Not all were victims of poverty, of course, but
a vast majority were victims of poverty, ignorance, lack of
care and other evils which appear to be inseparable from
capitalist society.
Terrible as these figures are, they by no means represent
the worst, evils of poverty as it affects the child. At least
the suffering of those who die in infancy is of short duration.
Death is all too often an escape from long continued priva-
tion and suffering. Recent investigations in this country
and in Great Britain have revealed the fact that an alarming
number of poor children of school age are chronically under-
fed and otherwise neglected. Victims of malnutrition and
diseases incidental to malnutrition, an alarming percentage
of the children in our public and parochial schools are not
only backward in their studies, but as a result of the com-
bination of their physical and mental disadvantages they
are continually augmenting the ranks of the inefficient who
fall into pauperism, the shiftless, the intemperate, the vicious,
the lazy and unemployable.
POVERTY 37
Closely related to these conditions is the evil of child
labor. Of the great army of children employed in mines,
factories, workshops, street trades and farming occupations,
the vast majority are victims of poverty. That a large num-
ber of such children come from families who manage to
keep slightly above the line of poverty is indisputable, but
it must be borne in mind that very often such families main-
tain that position only by adding the wages of the children
to those of the adult bread-winners. Where a child earns
two dollars a week, for instance, that sum may mean the
difference between staying above the poverty line or falling
below it. It may mean the difference between living in a
hovel on a mean street where it is hard to be "respectable,"
and living in a better neighborhood. One terrible fact is
that the children who are forced thus early into the labor
market are the children least fitted for it. Child labor is
quite unnecessary in this age of marvellously productive
machinery and unemployed adults. But if it were necessary
for little children to labor at all, those chosen for labor should
be the strongest and best fitted to bear the strain. But the
strongest and best developed children are the sons and
daughters of the rich and well-to-do classes, and these are
never torn from the playgrounds to enter the factories and
mines or to face the perils of the street trades. It is always
the children of the poor who are forced into the labor market,
and the poorer the family the more necessary becomes the
income derivable from the labor of its children. Thus child
labor is a link in a chain of vicious circumstance. The
child whose infant years were spent in an environment
which weakened it physically and so sapped the foundations
of all strength, mental and moral as well as physical, and
whose years of school life continued the cruel process, is
subject to the further weakening of all that makes for strength
of body, mind and character.
The prevention of child labor : It is manifestly impossible
to end child labor by appealing to the parents of the children.
The pressure of poverty forces them to send the boy or girl
to work. Meagre though the wage of the child may be, it
is often an important item in the family budget. It is vain
to urge that the child becomes a competitor of his father,
that child labor leads to low wages for adult workers. The
38 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
parents know that. But they also know that the process
is not an immediate one, that the employment of the indi-
vidual child does not immediately and directly reduce the
wages of the particular adult worker. The process is a slow
and indirect one, subtly hidden in the complex mechanism
of capitalist production. The wage of the child, on the other
hand, is a direct and immediate gain. It means increased
comfort at once. Likewise, it is useless to appeal to the
employers to put an end to child labor. So long as child
labor appears profitable the capitalist will not end it in
response to appeals for sympathy for the child. In com-
petitive industry the most kindly employer must take all
the advantages for profit making which his competitor
takes or go out of business; in industries wholly or partially
monopolized the incessant demand of the stockholders for
dividends forces the directors and managers to employ
every profitable device and method.
To stop child labor, then, legislation is resorted to. Every
attempt to enact such legislation is bitterly opposed by those
who profit from child labor. The laws when enacted are
flagrantly violated. Still, despite all difficulties, something
has been done in the direction of checking the worst abuses.
The Socialist favors every effort to prevent child labor by
legislation, and nearly every Socialist party in the world de-
mands the prohibition of the labor of all children under
sixteen years of age. But the Socialist sees in child labor
only another symptom of social disease inseparable from
the capitalist system, and believes the disease to be remedi-
able only through the socialization of production and ex-
change.
Poverty and old age : One of the most tragic phases of the
problem of poverty is that of the aged poor. After a life-
time of hard work thousands of sober and industrious men
and women pass the years of old age, when they are no
longer able to work, in destitution, dependent either upon
charitable agencies, or upon relatives who by contributing to
the support of their dependent relatives diminish their oppor-
tunities to save a competency for their own old age. Obvi-
ously, there must be something radically wrong with a social
system which does not make it possible for a worker after
forty years or more of industry to live comfortably for ten,
POVERTY 39
fifteen or twenty years when he is no longer able to work.
Thrift is no remedy for the evil, and it is useless to argue
that the workers should save enough to keep them in their
old age. That is possible in some cases. It is a fact that
many of the aged poor might have been enjoying comfort
had they been prudent and frugal in early life. But the
average wage-earner does not earn more than enough to
maintain himself and family in efficiency, even if every
penny of his earnings is wisely directed to that end. For
the average wage-earner saving is only possible at the expense
of efficiency, either that of himself or some member of
the family. Saving under such conditions means stinting,
either by reducing the amount or lowering the quality of
food, clothing or education, or by reducing the comforts
and advantages arising from good housing accommodations.
To those who have been accustomed to live in relative
comfort dependence in old age involves the most intense
suffering and humiliation. Of all the fears which beset the
working class the fear of a beggarly old age is perhaps
the most generally felt and the most dreaded. To avoid
its realization men and women of the working class sacrifice
much present comfort, and many of the necessary requisites
of an efficient life, in order that they may have something
upon which to rely in their old age. Even when a little
is saved in this manner, the difficulties of safe investment and
the dangers of loss are great.
Evil results of poverty: Poverty is not only an evil in
itself, but it is the direct cause of many other evils. Crime
is to a very large extent the result of poverty. The com-
monest of all forms of crime is theft, and it is perfectly well
known that robbery, burglary, pickpocketing, and other
crimes of this class increase with every depression in trade.
As wages decrease and the number of the unemployed
increases the number of cases of larceny of all kinds grows.
There is more theft in winter than in summer. In general
it may be said that whenever the conditions of life become
harder than usual for the poorer classes crime increases.
Crime is the reaction of the relatively strong man to economic
failure and oppression, just as pauperism is the refuge of the
weak.
While crime is by no means confined to the male sex, the
40 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
true female counterpart of crime in the male is prostitution.
The life of a prostitute is not attractive and few enter it
from choice. The life involves social ostracism and loss
of self-respect, together with the abandonment of all that
women value most highly. Except in the cases of a relatively
small number of moral degenerates, the ranks of those who
depend upon prostitution for a living are recruited from those
who have failed otherwise to maintain themselves. Wherever
investigations have been made into this subject a very close
relation has been shown to exist between low wages and
irregular employment and prostitution. Universally, the
proportion of prostitutes who find their way into the ranks
of those that walk in shame from such poorly paid occupa-
tions as those of dressmakers, milliners, saleswomen, button-
hole makers, cloakmakers and the like is very large. What
is even more significant is that every depression of trade
affecting these and similar occupations in the form of unem-
ployment or decreased wages is immediately followed by a
large increase in the number of prostitutes. At the National
Purity Congress in 1895 the number of public prostitutes
in the United States was estimated at 230,000. Other
estimates are much higher, one investigator placing the
number at 600,000.* Whatever the number may be, it is
probably safe to say that five-sixths of all public prostitutes
are victims of poverty.
The relation of poverty to disease has already been suffi-
ciently noted for our present purpose. It is not only one of the
most active causes of such diseases as tuberculosis and
pneumonia, but it is an important factor in the causation
of that form of disease which is so often mistakenly treated
as a crime, drunkenness. It is often said that drunkenness
is a principal cause of poverty. That it frequently appears
as the direct and immediate cause is true, but it must not
be forgotten that it is itself, in many cases, the product of
poverty and its concomitant conditions, overwork to the
point of exhaustion, malnutrition and physical weakness,
crushed hope and desperation of despair. Here as in so
many other directions poverty tends ever to perpetuate
itself. That is its worst feature
Causes of poverty: Not so long ago it was very generally
1Cf. Bliss, Encyclopedia of Social Reforms. Art. "Prostitution."
POVERTY 41
contended that poverty was almost entirely due to the
faults of the poor themselves, to moral defects in the indi-
vidual rather than to defects in the economic and social
environment. That view has been abandoned. Dr. Edward
T. Devine, for example, admits that "the tradition which
many hold that the condition of poverty is ordinarily and
as a matter of course to be explained by personal faults of
the poor themselves is no longer tenable. Strong drink
and vice are abnormal, unnatural and essentially unat-
tractive ways of spending surplus income."1 The Socialist
takes the same view of the problem and to all such questions
as "Does poverty exist because people are shiftless, lazy,
intemperate, dishonest or depraved, or because they have
too many children?" answers with a vigorous negative. He
agrees with Dr. Devine further "that personal depravity
is as foreign to any sound theory of the hardships of our
modern poor as witchcra t or demoniacal possession; that
these hardships are economic, social, transitional, measurable,
manageable."2 He holds that all foregoing moral distressful
phenomena are the direct and indirect results of conditions
arising out of the economic system and inherent in its very
nature. In a system which enables a relatively few owners
to appropriate a large part of the products of industry
regardless of effort on their own part, and where the actual
producers can rarely take more than sufficient to keep them
from day to day and week to week, poverty is inevitable.
Charity not a solution of the problem: Society no longer
intentionally permits any of its members to starve. When
extreme poverty confronts us an attempt is usually made to
relieve it. For this purpose numerous and costly organiza-
tions exist, and in addition to this organized charity there
is a large amount of personal effort directed to the same end.
The effect of charity, however skillful and well-intentioned
its dispensers may be, is often disastrous. It places the
individual in a position of cringing dependence and destroys
self-respect by invading the privacy of the home to make
inquiries which are necessary to prevent imposition.
But apart from these criticisms, and even if none of them
were true, it would be a sufficient criticism to make of the
1 Charities and the Commons, Vol. XIX, p. 1104.
2 Misery and Its Causes, by Edward T. Devine, p. 11.
42 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
attitude of those who hold that charity is a sufficient solu-
tion of the poverty problem to point out the confessed
inability of our charity organizations to remove more than
a tithe of the poverty existing in society under normal con-
ditions. There is no large city in America in which any or
all of the philanthropic agencies are or have ever been in a
position to raise sufficient money to raise above the poverty
line all who have fallen below it. This fact was shown in a
striking manner during the discussion, in 1907, of the report
of the New York State Conference of Charities and Correc-
tions of the committee of that body on wages and the
standard of living. The committee reported that the lowest
amount upon which a family of five could be supported in
decency and health in New York City was about eight
hundred dollars a year. Commenting upon the fact that
many thousands of families have a total income of ten dollars
a week or less, and that after allowances are made for sick-
ness, holidays and occasional unemployment, the total income
of such families does not exceed four hundred and fifty
dollars a year at best, Dr. Devine frankly admitted that it
would be impossible for organized charity to make up the
deficiency for all such families, and so place them just above
the poverty line. Such a policy would, he declared, lead to
financial bankruptcy.1 In other words, the charitable
societies cannot hope to add to the wages of those workers
whose incomes are inadequate to maintain themselves and
families at the point of efficiency, enough to enable them
to do so. Therefore, there must still be poverty which
organized charity can neither promise nor seriously hope to
remove.
The Socialist view of poverty : Any open-minded Socialist
must recognize that some of the evils of poverty can be
relieved without disturbing the present social order. Muni-
cipal milk stations for the supply of milk for infants, free
meals for school children, medical inspection, child labor
laws, farm colonies for the unemployed — these and a multitude
of similar reforms are possible within the capitalist system.
But so long as capitalism remains and wages are determined
by competitive methods poverty will continue to blight the
world. It will be removed only when the basic industries
1 Charities and the Commons, Vol. XIX, p. 1083.
POVERTY 43
have been brought under social ownership and control.
So, while rejoicing in all measures of amelioration, the Social-
ist concentrates his attention upon abolishing the funda-
mental causes of poverty, trusting that the effects will dis-
appear when the causes are removed.
SUMMARY
1. A family is in poverty when its income is insufficient to provide
those things which are necessary to maintain the efficiency of its mem-
bers in a given time and place.
2. The effects of poverty are most evident in the lives of children.
Under conditions of poverty the infantile death rate is very high and
the growth of the minds and bodies of children is impaired.
3. Poverty is a direct cause of crime, prostitution, disease and
intemperance.
4. Charity is entirely inadequate for the relief of poverty, and con-
tributes nothing toward its cure.
QUESTIONS
1. Distinguish between poverty and pauperism.
2. What basis have we for estimating the extent of poverty?
3. What are some of the causes of pauperism?
4. Discuss the causes and the social effects of child labor.
5. Show how poverty acts as a cause of crime.
6. What is the social effect of charity?
7. What is the Socialist attitude toward poverty?
Literature
Devine, E. T., Misery and Its Causes.
Fisher, Irving, Report on National Vitality, Its Wastes and Conserva-
tion.
Hobson, John A., Problems of Poverty.
Hunter, Robert, Poverty.
Rowntree, B. S., Poverty, a Town Study.
Spargo, John, The Bitter Cry of the Children. The Common Sense of
the Milk Question, Chaps. I-VI.
CHAPTER V
LEISURE AND LUXURY
Capitalist and manager : The capitalist as such has nothing
to do with the management of the industry in which he
holds stock. As a capitalist owner of a textile mill he need
not know the difference between gingham and worsted.
He may be a child or an idiot. If he does useful work in the
management of the industry, as capitalists of a generation
ago often did, he is to that extent a laborer and is entitled
to the rewards of labor. As a matter of fact, he usually
gets these rewards over and above his income as a capitalist.
The shrewd business man who so directs an undertaking
that it yields an increasing revenue without raising prices
or lowering wages is undoubtedly performing a real service
for society, and should receive a salary proportionate to
that service. But when the gain comes through monopoly,
special privilege, injury to the consumer or injury to the
producer, society receives no benefit for which it should be
called upon to make any payment. The business man who
works for himself and against the interests of society deserves
no consideration and no reward.
Socialists do not wish to deny to the real captains of
industry a reward equivalent to the social value of their
share in production, any more than they wish to deny to
the least efficient laborer the equivalent of the social value
of his share in production. Socialists do charge, however,
that even the salaries of those engaged in the management
of industry as it is at present conducted are not proportioned
to the share of the recipients in production. "To him that
hath shall be given" seems to be the rule to-day, as of old.
Men who have wealth or influence with the wealthy can
obtain positions with salaries far in excess of the value of the
services rendered. Capitalism also richly rewards services
which are socially undesirable and unnecessary. Brokers,
44
LEISURE AND LUXURY 45
speculators, commission merchants, corporation lawyers,
lobbyists, and many other groups are paid large salaries
although society would be better off if they did not exist.
Unearned wealth: The incomes of capitalists and land-
owners are unearned. They bear no relation whatever to
the productivity or the needs of those who receive them.
There are other methods of getting unearned incomes, such
as betting, swindling, begging and plain robbery. These
methods are admittedly dangerous, demoralizing and crim-
inal. But any form of unearned income is regarded as socially
harmful by the Socialist, except where it takes the shape of
a social gift for the maintenance of one who is incapacitated
from labor. The unearned income of the capitalist is not
a social gift, but a sum extorted from the producers through
the mechanism of our industrial system.
Inheritance: It is difficult to see why children, distant
relatives or strangers should inherit the wealth of a deceased
man in the production of which they have had no share.
We no longer recognize the right of inheritance to political
offices or honors. Hereditary royalty, nobility or dignity
is almost universally looked upon as undesirable, but capital-
ist society upholds the much more dangerous inheritance of
capital with the same unquestioning faith that feudal society
had in hereditary royalty. The fortune accumulated by a
man of ability in a lifetime of honest effort may be inherited
by a son or other heir, who, despite his mediocre ability,
and the fact that he renders little or no service to society,
thereby enjoys all the benefits of wealth.
It is not the inheritance of purely personal property to
which the Socialist objects, but the inheritance of capital,
stocks and bonds representing ownership and control of
industry, and land titles which confer upon their owners
the power to absorb part of the wealth of society in the form
of incomes derived from the exploitation of the labor and
needs of others. There is no reason why society should assert
the ownership of those forms of personal property which
have none of the foregoing characteristics, except in such
rare and exceptional circumstances as might lead even a
capitalist State to do the same.
Advantages of wealth: From the point of view of social
power it is the ownership and control of industry rather than
46 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
income which counts. The man who owns can control.
But aside from this social power a large income gives advan-
tages which may not in themselves be harmful to society,
but the enjoyment of which by the few to the exclusion
of the many constitutes a social injustice. Among these
advantages are education, travel, luxurious and beautiful
homes, better care when ill, protection of childhood and old
age. The man of wealth is free to seek the most skill-
ful physicians and the most healthful climate. He need
not wait for complete prostration before seeking medical
aid. From these advantages the poor man is practically
debarred. The higher death rate among the poor than among
the rich is a matter of common knowledge. Among 10,000,-
000 well-to-do persons the number of yearly deaths is prob-
ably not more than 100,000; among the best paid wage-
earners the number is probably not less than 150,000; and
among the poorest paid workers the number is probably not
less than 350J000.1 Money may purchase life itself.
The privilege of being able to devote his life freely to the
work of one's choice, regardless of its income yielding power,
is inestimable. Genius is not necessarily associated with
money-making ability, and many of the greatest artists and
writers have been able to develop their talents only through
their freedom from the necessity of making a living.
Previous to the industrial revolution the productivity of
society was insufficient to support more than a relatively
few in comfort and to afford leisure for cultural develop-
ment. With the development of labor-saving machinery
it becomes possible, for the first time in history, to realize
any normal and healthy desire and still perform a just share
of the necessary labor of society. Sufficient leisure for the
development of talent is demonstrably possible for all in a
society in which the most highly developed methods of
production and organization are fully utilized. Culture
and labor need not be divorced in modern society.
The leisure class : The existence of social classes, generally
hereditary in character, exempt from the work of production
and thus able to devote themselves exclusively to certain
honorific employments, such as warfare, politics and relig-
ion, has been characteristic of every age since the end of
1 Poverty, by Robert Hunter, p. 144.
LEISURE AND LUXURY 47
primitive communism. These classes have played a tre-
mendous part in social evolution, for without them culture
and civilization could hardly have been developed and pre-
served. The Pericleian Age in Greece, for example, was
only possible with many slaves for every free citizen.
Under capitalism the predominant leisure class has been
placed upon an entirely new basis, that of wealth regardless
of any real or pretended services to society. This class is
also to a large extent hereditary in character. It maintains
itself by the exercise of its power of control over the means
of production as surely as did the nobility of feudal times
through land ownership. Inheritance of capital crystallizes
class distinctions and makes equality of opportunity impos-
sible. The inheritance of great landed estates in feudal
times carried with it a sense of responsibility to society, and
especially to the serfs and peasants. The feudal lords at
least served society to the extent of assuming the risks and
responsibilities of warfare, and of preserving, in conjunction
with the church, the culture and civilization of the past.
But this new leisure class performs no social service whatever.
The inheritance of capital tends to perpetuate a class having
no direct contact with the sources of its income, no feeling
of social responsibility and no knowledge of the life of the
producing class. The most conspicuously idle and extrava-
gant of the capitalist class, those who do not perform even
the most perfunctory directive functions, and cannot be
considered as other than social parasites, live on incomes
derived from inherited capital. Now that politics, art,
education, and even military protection, are possible upon
a thoroughly democratic basis, the Socialist sees no reason
for maintaining in luxury a social class which does not and
cannot justify its existence by some definite social service
which it performs with peculiar efficiency.
Ostentatious expenditure: Wealth in the form of capital
gives the owner power over the lives of men. Wealth with
large income enables the possessor to enjoy comforts and
luxuries denied to other men, and the possession of wealth,
or even the appearance of being wealthy, brings honor and
social prestige. There is therefore a great temptation to
spend large sums ostentatiously in order to be regarded as
rich, rather than for the direct pleasure or benefit the
48 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
expenditure will bring. Expensive dinners and balls, ex-
travagant houses, furnishings and dress, and e\en philan-
thropy, are frequently attributable to the desire for social
prestige and honor. Often this object is attained by the
wearing of certain forms of dress, or living in such a way that
productive labor is impossible, thereby indicating that one
belongs to a class wealthy enough to be free from labor.
The silk hat, the monocle, the walking stick and the patent
leather boots of an English gentleman are neither comfort-
able nor especially useful, but it is plainly evident that no
one could do an hour's honest work in such an outfit. In
its origin, at least, that fact is responsible for the outfit.
Ostentatious expenditures by the very wealthy indirectly
help to protect them in their social position. In the effort
to share in the social homage and prestige bestowed upon
rich families many a middle-class family imitates these
extravagances to the point of financial ruin, and so is effec-
tually prevented from obtaining real power. If we analyze
our expenses, even the relatively poor among us will find
that a surprisingly large proportion goes for ostentation,
but this can hardly be avoided. As long as class distinctions
are so great it is practically necessary to imitate and con-
form, particularly in dress, or else be subject to ridicule.
The necessity of keeping up these ostentatious expenditures
in order to maintain appearances constitutes in the aggregate
an immense social loss. If it were not for the social necessity
of keeping up the appearance of prosperity, real prosperity
would be more easily obtained, and labor could be applied
to a greater social advantage. The pace in ostentatious
expenditure is set by the idle rich and everyone else is com-
pelled to live as nearly as possible to that standard under
the penalty of being stamped as socially inferior.
The servant and society : The productivity of labor having
increased much more rapidly than wages, the socially pro-
ductive laborers themselves cannot purchase and consume
their own product. Production must either be checked,
therefore, and the resulting army of unemployed supported
by charity, or the non-producing class must be so increased
that the social product may be consumed. The servants
and retainers of capitalism and the producers of certain
kinds of luxuries for the capitalist class perform this function
LEISURE AND LUXURY 49
by assisting the capitalist class in the consumption of goods.
At the same time, they add to the sum of personal and
social satisfaction which the owning class is able to enjoy.
It may well be questioned whether a rational society would
tolerate the existence of a servant class, except for the service
of the sick and infirm. Such service might be regarded as an
occupation of peculiar dignity and honor. But the idea
that the whole life of one human being should be spent doing
the work of and making comfort for another human being
capable of doing it for himself is repellant to the ideas of
freedom and equality. Many a rich idler whose life is of
no benefit to society not only consumes an income repre-
senting the labor of many producers, but wastes still more
on the employment of personal servants. The rich man
must have his valet and the rich woman her maid to assist
them in dressing. The spectacle of one healthy person
employing another healthy person to button his shoes or
comb her hair, as the case may be, is so ludicrous that the
parasitical nature of these forms of service is obvious. But
a large part of the work performed by the servant class is
none the less parasitical because less obviously ludicrous.
We are not at present concerned with the question whether
or not this form of useless labor will wholly disappear with
the coming of Socialism. What concerns us is the social
waste in present society represented by the servants and
retainers of the capitalist class. It is true that a large
majority of those engaged in ordinary domestic service
are employed by the large middle class, rather than by the
relatively small class of the very rich, but the number of
servants and retainers of the latter class is greater than the
entire number of domestic servants. In this class of servants
and retainers is included such personal servants as valets,
footmen, waiters, and the like, as well as the secretaries,
private tutors, hired "companions" and the physicians who
confine their professional service to the wealthy for extrava-
gant fees. It includes also the editors, publicists, lawyers
and preachers whose energies and talents are devoted to
the task of defending the present social order for pay. The
burden of the capitalist class upon the producers can only
be realized when its vast army of servants and retainers is
taken into account. From an economic point of view, the
50 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
servant and the retainer are producers of utilities for indi-
viduals or groups of individuals, but they are not producers
of social wealth. Every such servant or retainer means one
more laborer taken from social production, and so much
more work to be done by the producers who are left.
The social effect of luxury: It is a common fallacy that
anything which "makes work" is advantageous to labor.
When some millionaire indulges in a particularly wild ex-
travagance it is not unusual to hear it said that he is per-
forming a social service by "putting money into circula-
tion." It might as well be said that a vandal who amused
himself by smashing windows was a social benefactor because
he caused people to spend more money and made work for
glass-blowers and glaziers, as that any good results from
useless expenditures in any other form. Every plate-glass
window has been produced by an expenditure of human
effort and its unnecessary destruction means so much social
loss. The labor of society consists of the replacement of
goods which have been used up or destroyed, and devising
new kinds of goods which will add to human efficiency and
happiness. Waste and luxury from a social point of view
mean a squandering of the products of labor, and a diverting
of productive energy to useless ends.
The fallacy that labor spent upon the production of luxuries
which are an exclusive class privilege somehow benefits the
laboring class arises from the confusion of wealth with money.
Real wealth consists of production and consumption of goods.
Of the total estimated wealth of the United States, gold,
the only standard money, constitutes little more than one
per cent. Its value depends upon its exchangeability for
other things. The real social effect of excessive luxury is
the destruction of social wealth in the accumulated products
of labor power. If a man with an income of a million dollars
a year should live according to the standard of an Italian
laborer, his income would be quite as freely circulated as
though he spent it all on steam yachts, palatial dwellings
or jewels for courtesans. This money, whether invested
or deposited in banks, would be in constant circulation.
Degeneracy as the result of great wealth : It has been well
said that society rots at both extremes; the rich rot from
luxury and the poor rot from poverty. Great wealth is not
LEISURE AND LUXURY 51
an unmixed blessing. Idleness and lack of social respon-
sibility combined with the gratification of every whim, lead
to dissipation, self-indulgence and other evils which result
in the demoralization of the individual. A parasitic existence,
whether in the plant or the animal kingdom, or in human
society, brings about changes in the organism which unfit
it for any further independent existence. It used to be said
that a family passed from shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves in
three generations, and perhaps the saying was to a certain
extent true when the country was new and men stood more
nearly upon their own merits. But at present, when fortunes
are so immense, it takes little ability to keep them together,
and the degenerate who otherwise would be earning the
minimum wages at unskilled labor, or be in the care of some
institution, is enabled to give monkey dinners and waste
wealth in other equally foolish ways, and even then is unable
to materially reduce the capital which he has inherited.
A few such individuals might be kept in custodial institu-
tions, but it is obvious that only a very small number of
the most flagrant cases could be thus dealt with. The only
remedy for the degeneracy which is commonly associated
with the inheritance of immense wealth is to stop producing
degenerates of this type. This can be done by abolishing
the conditions which permit an idle class to live in luxury
while the producing class languishes in poverty.
52 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. The function of the capitalist as such needs to be distinguished
carefully from that of the director of industry, who in that capacity
is a producer.
2. The inheritance of capital perpetuates class distinctions and gives
rise to a group of capitalists who have no directive functions.
3. Leisure is necessary for the development and continuation of
civilization and culture. Before the time of machine production
leisure was possible only to a few. Now it could become possible for all.
4. Servants and retainers of the rich are socially unproductive work-
ers, and a burden on society.
_ 5. Luxury involves social loss, and the diversion of labor from occupa-
tions which are socially productive.
QUESTIONS
1. Explain the attitude of the Socialist toward the "Captain of
Industry."
2. Why distinguish between the inheritance of capital and the inher-
itance of such personal property as jewelry and paintings?
3. If a leisure class was socially advantageous in the Middle Ages,
why is it not so now?
4. Discuss the social effect of frequent changes in fashion.
5. Make a list of occupations which would be regarded by Socialists
as socially unproductive.
6. What is the fallacy in the expression, "Spending money makes
trade good"?
7. How may great wealth bring about degeneracy?
Literature
Ely, R. T., and Wicker, G. R., Elementary Principles of Economics,
Ch. IV.
George, Henry, The Menace of Privilege.
Veblen, Thorstein, The Theory of the Leisure Class.
CHAPTER VI
INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
Socialism and Individualism: It is a very common error
to regard Socialism and Individualism as antithetical con-
cepts. As a matter of fact, there is no antagonism between
the two. The Socialist contends that true individualism
is impossible under capitalism and that fact constitutes no
small part of his indictment of the existing social order.
Individualism is not an absolute but a relative term.
There has never been a time when any individual could live
his life within the boundaries of human society absolutely
untrammeled by the lives of others or their requirements.
The most despotic monarch has always been bound in some
degree by convention, influenced by advice, restrained by
fear of revolt or coerced by circumstance. Even when
exceptional liberties of individual activity are enjoyed by
favored individuals or classes they are never absolute and
unlimited. Absolute individual freedom is hardly conceiv-
able, even as an abstract conception. It is very evident that
by its very nature society places upon the liberty of every
individual some limitation, some restraint. It is equally
evident that when excessive individual liberty is granted to
an individual or a class, enabling that individual or class
to oppress other individuals or other classes, true individual-
ism does not exist. Neitzsche's Superman is often referred
to as the perfect apotheosis of individualism, but that view
is not warranted, for the reason that he could only exist
by crushing the individuality of others. True individualism
is inseparable from equality of opportunity. The freedom
and opportunities of each individual must be bounded by
the equal freedom and opportunities of every other indi-
vidual.
Capitalism and Individualism: Under a system which is
properly described as wage-slavery the workers have little
53
54 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
freedom or opportunity for individual development. Their
lives are forced into narrow grooves, individual initiative is
discouraged, and they have no time for creative effort out-
side of their working hours, even if they should feel the need
of it. Leisure is a necessary condition for creative effort,
and that is an unknown luxury to most wage-earners. Life
is reduced to a dull level of deadly monotony, a joyless round
of work at daily tasks which are heavy, irksome and unin-
spiring, mitigated by cheap recreation, often brutalizing in
its effects, by eating and sleeping. Relatively few members
of this class ever reach distinction. The great majority of
the distinguished men and women of one generation are the
sons and daughters of the moderately wealthy and comfort-
able middle classes of the generation before. When a mem-
ber of the wage-earning class does rise to a place of distinc-
tion it is a fact considered worthy of special comment and
we get the impression that the number of such successes is
greater than it really is. Even the leaders of the workingmen
in their struggles frequently come from the classes above.
While the rich enjoy many more opportunities for the
development of individuality than do the wage-earners, as
a class their lives are not characterized by a gain of individ-
uality commensurate with their privileges. The rich society
woman who is enslaved by the customs and conventions of
the world in which she lives, and exhausted by the aimless
round of social duties and vulgar dissipation which com-
prise such a large part of her parasitic existence, is as much
enslaved by her wealth as the poor seamstress is by her
poverty. Her life becomes just as monotonous and irksome,
and equally prevents the development of individuality.
Such a woman has often as little time and energy left for
creative work and self-expression as her poorer sister. Even
the active capitalist, the typical captain of industry, is not
free from the narrow bondage of wealth. We speak of such
a man as owning so many millions of dollars, but it would
be nearer the truth to say that the millions of dollars own
him. Absorbed in the task of getting wealth, the task be-
comes an obsession. Money ceases to be a means, it becomes
an end: it is no longer servant, but master. Life becomes a
narrow and sordid existence from which it is impossible to
break. When he retires in old age he is unhappy because
INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY 55
he finds too late that he has lost the capacity for rational
enjoyment.
Perhaps the greatest opportunities for individual develop-
ment and expression are enjoyed by the most prosperous
and independent section of the middle class. The person
whose income is secure and large enough to permit the leisure
and the comfort essential to a high order of creative work,
and is not burdened with the anxiety involved in the owner-
ship of millions, is more to be envied than any other member
of society. A large proportion of the artists, scientists,
inventors, statesmen, philosophers and writers have come
from this section of the middle class. It is only too true that
a vast number of those who enjoy these advantages do not
profit by them. The corrupting influence of the example of
the idle rich is a factor which must be reckoned with. It
is no wonder that the lives of so many who might profit
by their available opportunities become mere shoddy imita-
tions of the lives of the richer class above them, lives of
vain attempt to appear to be something which they are not.
To sum up: for the great mass of the people the condi-
tions of capitalist society make a worthy individualism
impossible. It will not be possible until parasitic idleness
and brutalizing overwork have both been abolished. The
goal to be aimed at is the realization of Mr. Ruskin's fine
saying that "Life without industry is guilt; labor without
art is brutality." Not until all men are usefully employed
at work which is worth the doing and of itself a pleasure,
and the work is done under conditions which are healthful,
and rewarded with the leisure and the material goods
necessary to the fulfillment of every legitimate craving for
knowledge, for beauty and self-expression will true individ-
ualism be possible.
Class education: Where social classes exist it seems
inevitable that the educational system as a whole should
tend to perpetuate the class division. Consciously or uncon-
sciously, the private school sharpens class distinctions and
fixes an almost impassable barrier between the rich and the
wage-earning classes. The public school, left to the children
of the relatively poor, makes other social contacts impossible.
These differences maintained throughout the formative years
of life form habits of thought which can hardly be broken.
56 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Thus the individuality of the rich child and the individuality
of the poor child are merged with the spirit of their respective
classes. Their sympathies are narrowed and they are
rendered almost incapable of entertaining feelings of true
social unity and democracy.
" Benevolent feudalism" : When a member of the capitalist
class comes to a realization of the effects of poverty, and
honestly wishes to improve social conditions, it does not
occur to him, as a rule, to consult the wishes of the people
he would help. His attitude is substantially that of the
paternal feudal lord who considered it his duty to care for
his villein tenants. To alter the conditions of life by paying
higher wages is usually beyond his individual power, and he
is not likely to do so in any case. He is willing to give to
the workers out of the wealth which he receives many of
the things which he thinks they ought to have. He is not
even willing to give them money outright as private largess,
because he fears that they would not spend it wisely.
We find, then, as a striking phenomenon of the capitalist
system, "philanthropy" in all its forms. The conspicuous
gifts of libraries and universities are familiar to everyone,
but it is the so-called "welfare work" which touches the
working class most directly. The building of model tene-
ments, the establishment of clubs and lunch rooms, sick
benefit funds and the Christmas turkey all supply the bene-
ficiaries with things desirable in themselves, but it is ques-
tionable whether the consequent loss of independence and
self-reliance does not outweigh any possible benefit received.
The danger is all the greater when, as is usually the case,
the gift is made in such a manner as to increase the power of
the giver over the lives of the work-people. This feudal
assumption of personal responsibility for the social life of
others effectually destroys all feeling of collective responsi-
bility, and makes the worker a slave in his social as well as
his economic relations. It is not surprising that the working-
man should resent this social dictation, nor that he should
be charged with base ingratitude toward his generous bene-
factor. Neither side is capable of understanding the motives
and feelings of the other. The matter may perhaps be put
in a clearer light by instancing the case of the benevolent
capitalist who logically carried his welfare plans a step
INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY 57
higher in the social scale and announced that he would
furnish saddle horses for the free use of all his employees
who were receiving salaries of $2,000 or over. He was much
chagrined when the employees informed him that they would
much prefer an increase of salary.
Social responsibility: While there is little direct respon-
sibility to be attached to any individual in the present social
order, and while it is not desirable for any individual to
assume such responsibility, we must recognize a collective
responsibility, in which we share as individuals, for the
existence and perpetuation of evil and unjust conditions.
Responsibility can only be attached to a man in his capacity
as a member of society. His will and individuality can only
be effectively expressed through the social organization, and
a form of society which is composed of antagonistic classes
is a very imperfect medium for the expression of whatever
sense he has of personally sharing in the collective respon-
sibility.
Perhaps the greatest social advantage which results from
the class consciousness of the workers, and the organization
based upon it, lies in the fact that they offer the most serv-
iceable medium for the expression of this sense of personal
participation in the collective responsibility for evil and
unjust conditions. The working class is so numerous that
its organization offers to the individual, even though he
does not belong to the working class, the most effective
medium through which to express his sense of being a sharer
in the collective responsibility for the ills of society, and
the most efficient method of contributing to their removal.
Class ethics may not be the highest ethics imaginable, but
the ethics of the class in revolt, which is organized to abolish
classes and class rule, is the highest attainable here and now,
and, therefore, the most efficient ethics. When the means
of production and exchange have been made subject to
social ownership and control, their advantages socialized
and classes abolished, the machinery of the class-less State
will make possible the perfect expression of the individual's
sense of sharing every social responsibility.
58 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. Socialism and individualism are not antithetical concepts. Indi-
viduality can only be expressed through the medium of social organiza-
tion.
2. Under capitalism there is little opportunity for the development
of individuality either among the poor or among the rich.
3. Class education forms habits of thought which restrict individual-
ity and the power of self-expression.
4. The conscious organization of the working class offers the best
medium for personal participation in the collective social responsibility.
QUESTIONS
1. What limitations upon individual activity must be imposed by any
social group?
2. What is the effect of inequality in social position upon indi-
viduality?
3. How does capitalist society restrict the freedom of the working-
man? That of the capitalist?
4. Discuss the social effect of philanthropy.
5. What are the conditions of effective social responsibility?
Literature
Ghent, W. J., Our Benevolent Feudalism. Mass and Class.
PART II
SOCIALIST THEORY
CHAPTER VII
INTRODUCTORY
The influence of Karl Marx: As we turn from the Social-
ist criticism of existing society to the more positive aspects
of Socialism we encounter the personality of the greatest
thinker and most powerful influence in the history of Social-
ism, Karl Marx. Professor Thorstein Veblen has said: "The
Socialism that inspires hopes and fears in the world to-day
is of the school of Marx. No one is seriously apprehensive
of any other so-called socialistic movement, and no one is
seriously concerned to criticise or refute the doctrines set
forth by any other school of 'Socialists.' The Socialists of
all countries gravitate toward the theoretical position of
avowed Marxism. In proportion as the movement in any
given country grows in mass, maturity and conscious pur-
pose, it unavoidably takes on a more consistently Marxian
complexion."1
The greatness of Karl Marx is freely admitted by the most
implacable opponents of Socialism as well as by its most
ardent advocates. The words "Socialism" and "Marxism"
are practically synonymous in the vast literature of the
subject which has been produced during the last thirty or
forty years. Whatever modifications his followers may have
made in his theories, or may yet be compelled to make, one
fact stands undisputed by friend or foe, namely, that the
great international Socialist movement finds in those theories
its justification, its intellectual weapons for defense and
attack, the rationale of its aspirations toward a better and
happier state of society and the bedrock of its assurance in
the ultimate attainment of that goal.
Saint-Simon, Fourier and Owen: It is commonly said
that Marx found Socialism a Utopian movement and trans-
formed it into a scientific movement. Prior to Marx Social-
1 Quarterly Journal of Economics, XXI, p. 299
61
62 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ism was the name given to a variety of communistic schemes
devised and advocated by men who regarded themselves as
the discoverers of the true remedy for all social ills. For our
present purpose it will be sufficient if we regard the Utopian
method as represented by the three great Utopians of the
early part of the nineteenth century, Saint-Simon and Fourier
in France and Robert Owen in England.
These names are of special significance to us in this study.
It was the Saint-Simonian form of Socialism which first
awakened the interest of Marx; it was here in the United
States that the principal Fourierist experiments were made,
enlisting so many of the most brilliant minds of the latter
part of the first half of the nineteenth century; it was to
the schemes of Robert Owen that the word "Socialism" was
first applied, in 1833, and Owen also made his most ambitious
experiment in the United States, at New Harmony.
But there is another and weightier reason for the grouping
together of the three names. It enables us to avail ourselves
of the masterly description of Utopian Socialism by Frederick
Engels, perhaps the most lucid brief statement of the matter
ever written. He first describes how the French philosophers
of the eighteenth century, the forerunners of the Revolution,
proclaimed the "Kingdom of Reason" and refused to recog-
nize any authority other than that of reason in religion,
ethics, natural science, politics, or anything else. By reason
they judged society and all its institutions. They condemned
society as a whole and every existing social institution as
irrational. What was needed was a Kingdom of Reason,
the rule of Eternal Truth. Engels then proceeds to show
that the Utopian Socialists, while holding a very different
objective ideal from that of the eighteenth century phil-
osophers, shared their philosophy.
"One thing is common to all three. Not one of them ap-
pears as a representative of the interests of the proletariat,
which historical development had, in the meantime, produced.
Like the French philosophers, they do not claim to eman-
cipate a particular class to begin with, but all humanity
at once. Like them, they wish to bring in the kingdom of
reason and eternal justice, but this kingdom, as they see it,
is as far as heaven from earth from that of the French
philosophers.
INTRODUCTORY 63
"For, to our three social reformers, the bourgeois world,
based upon the principles of these philosophers, is quite as
irrational and unjust, and, therefore, finds its way to the
dust-hole quite as readily as feudalism and all the earlier
stages of society. If pure reason and justice have not,
hitherto, ruled the world, this has been the case only because
men have not rightly understood them. What was wanted
was the individual man of genius, who has now arisen and
who understands the truth. That he has now arisen, that
the truth has now been clearly understood, is not an inev-
itable event, following of necessity in the chain of historical
development, but a mere happy accident. He might just
as well have been born 500 years earlier, and might then
have spared humanity 500 years of error, strife, and suf-
fering."
With such a basis it was inevitable that Utopian Social-
ism should take the form of moral judgments, denunciations
of the wickedness and selfishness of the rich and powerful
on its critical side, and of colonizing schemes on its positive
side. Fourier waited one hour at noon every day for twelve
years for the coming of a philanthropist with the gift of a
million francs, with which the happiness of the human race
would be secured. The pathetic picture illustrates the
essential feature of Utopian Socialism — the perfect plan
had been devised; only the money was lacking. Once
adopted, the plan would end poverty, misery and all other
social evils.
The Marxian synthesis: Marx began his career as a
Socialist by assailing the ideological basis of Utopian Social-
ism. More than a decade before the publication of the
epoch-marking discoveries of Charles Darwin and Alfred
Russell Wallace, and long before Herbert Spencer, then a
young man in his twenties, had been heard of, he was apply-
ing the theory of evolution to society, and assailing the very
foundations of Utopianism.
With the publication of the Communist Manifesto, in 1848,
arose a new school of Socialism which laughed all the fanciful
schemes of communistic colonization to scorn and based its
whole argument for and faith in a better society upon the
broad fact of evolution. The Darwinian theories greatly
aided the development of this new school by establishing
64 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
the fact of evolution, and it was at once natural and proper
that the new school of Socialism should claim to be scientific.
Marxian Socialism is therefore internationally known as
scientific Socialism in contradistinction to Utopian Socialism.
The philosophical basis of Marxian Socialism consists
of a synthesis of three distinct but correlated theories. The
first, which Marx called the materialistic conception of
history, explains the motive force in social evolution, its
causation; the second, the class struggle theory, explains
the mode of social evolution as distinguished from its causa-
tion; the third, the theory of surplus-value, explains the
basis and origin of the class antagonisms in present society,
and the development of society in the direction of Socialism.
It is with this philosophical synthesis we are concerned at
this stage of our study.
SUMMARY
1. The theory of modern Socialism is inseparable from the construc-
tive thought of Karl Marx.
2. The theory of modern Socialism does not admit of arbitrarily
constructed Utopian ideals.
3. The philosophical basis of Marxian Socialism is a synthesis of the
theories of the economic interpretation of history, of the class-struggle
and of surplus-value.
QUESTIONS
1. Discuss the position o» Marx in Socialist thought.
2. What was the earliest meaning of the word Socialism?
3. What is the essential difference between Utopian and Marxian
Socialism?
CHAPTER VIII
SOCIAL EVOLUTION
Socialism and the principle of evolution: The principles
of scientific Socialism are almost meaningless without a
comprehension of the evolutionary character of life and of
society. Scientific Socialism studies the evolutionary changes
that have taken place in society from the simplest human
groups in primitive savagery to the complex world society
of to-day. It investigates the causes of the changes which
have taken place, and the causes which are operating in
the world at present. It recognizes that the evolutionary
process is not yet complete, and points out the next step
in social evolution, which Socialists believe will be to a world
society based upon cooperative production, and cooperative
use of natural wealth, for the benefit of all, as contrasted
with the present stage of development, in which wealth
is produced and used largely for the benefit of a few.
The evolution of social groups is recognized by non-
Socialists, but they generally confine themselves to a descrip-
tion of past conditions, without applying the results of their
observation in the formulation of social theories, or in the
forecasting of the future course of development.
Evolution and revolution: Darwin and his immediate
followers believed that evolution was the result of infini-
tesimal variations in existing forms, which gradually
accumulated when they proved of advantage to the indi-
vidual, and in time resulted in new species. The development
of new forms of life would therefore be a process so slow as
to be imperceptible except by the comparison of two periods
separated by thousands of generations of individuals. A
more recent school of biology believes that changes come
more suddenly. New environmental conditions cause many
members of a species to depart greatly from the type, so
that in one generation there are individuals so different from
65
66 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
their parents that they may be classed as a new variety.
Some of these individuals, if bred to others of like character,
will breed true without reversion to the older type. This
is the theory of evolution by mutations of which Hugo
DeVries is the greatest exponent. According to this theory,
the development of new species, instead of depending upon
an incalculably slow process of modification, frequently
results from relatively sudden changes. In other words,
there are sudden leaps or "mutations" in the process of
evolution. This theory has been of great interest to Socialists
because by analogy it appears to support the view that social
transformation may be relatively sudden, and not conditioned
by a slow process of almost imperceptible change.
However conflicting these views may seem to be, they are
in fact not conflicting bui; complementary. Just as Darwin
himself "recognized both lines of evolution," that variations
might arise suddenly, as De Vries claims, or gradually and
almost imperceptibly, so the best thoughts of the modern
Socialist movement reconcile both views of social evolu-
tion. Revolution is not the opposite of evolution. As nature
accomplishes changes by slow and gradual processes, by
erosion and climatic cycles covering hundreds of thousands
of years, so also it works by sudden changes, earthquakes,
volcanic eruptions, and the crashing together of worlds in
space.
Socialism, then, recognizes the existence of both gradual
and relatively sudden changes in social organization. When-
ever forces, physical or social, meet with but slight resistance,
the changes they effect are slow and gradual. But when
forces are checked by the inertia of the mass on which they
work, or by the opposition of other forces, an accumulation
of energy results, and when a crisis comes the change is
sudden and often catastrophic.
Animal and human societies: Professor Giddings defines
sociology as the "science of the natural groupings and
collective behavior of living things, including human beings."
The lower animals, and even plants, live in groups and have
a form of social organization. Among ants and bees this
organization is very complex and involves division of labor
and indirect processes to a high degree. Evolution was not
always the result of struggle and the survival of the strongest
SOCIAL EVOLUTION 67
and most cunning, but mutual aid, companionship and
cooperation played a large part in the processes of develop-
ment.
Family life begins far back of human society. The
organization of groups for offense and defense and for the
gathering of food are so common among animals that exam-
ples need not be cited. They will occur to everyone. All
these forms of cooperation had their effect on variation and
survival, and it was not always the strongest or best adapted
individuals who survived, but the forms best equipped with
a social nature. When man first appeared he was already
equipped with a social heredity of association and coopera-
tion which enabled him, in spite of his naturally defenseless
condition, to hold his own in the struggle with other animals.
No existing human society is so low in the scale of evolu-
tion as was that of primitive man, but the evidence is
conclusive that man was always a "social animal," probably
evolving in the form of social groups through the slow stages
from anthropoid to man, so that even if we could observe
in retrospect the complete process, it would be impossible
to fix within a hundred thousand years the time of the
appearance of a group form which was distinctly human.
But although social evolution had its beginnings far back
of the human race, for our present purpose the study of
human societies is sufficient.
The social mind: "The mental and moral elements of
society are combined in products that are called by such
terms as the common feeling, the general desire, the moral
sense, the public opinion, and the general will of the com-
munity, which it is convenient for the sociologist to name
collectively the social mind."1
With the development of man and his differentiation into
races, society became more and more complex, and in the
place of the instinctive habits of lower animals there devel-
oped the social mind. The basic ideas which form the content
of the social mind are economic. Individual experiences
of utility, such as the discovery of the food value of a plant,
are developed and communicated by means of association
and become the common property of the group. Where
useful things were limited in quantity and the supply was
1 Franklin H. Giddings, Principles of Sociology, p. 132.
68 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
not equal to the demand the ideas of wealth and value must
have entered the primitive social mind. Private property-
was probably somewhat later in origin.
The necessity of protecting the sources of food supply
gave rise to the recognition within the group of a common
territory, and the exclusion of other groups from these
hunting or fishing grounds. Warfare developed leaders
and allegiance, and welded the group into a political organ-
ization of a primitive type.
Primitive man began to think and to talk about himself and
his environment. The world seemed full of mystery. How
could he hunt in a dream when his friends swore that he
had not moved? The echo and the shadow puzzled him.
The mighty forces of nature awed him. There must be a
power greater than himself, and since he could not think
of forces as impersonal, he imputed personality to that
power. There must be a spirit apart from the body or he
could not hunt in his dreams. Thus were evolved the ideas
of anthropomorphic gods, spirits and ghosts. His friends
slept and afterwards reported dream adventures, so his
friends dead had gone away to the "happy hunting grounds"
to stay. Thus at a stage earlier than any now represented
by even the lowest modern savages, the social mind contained
ideas economic, political and religious, ideas which effectu-
ally differentiated him from his ancestors.
The family: There is no unanimity of opinion among
sociologists as to the form of the primitive family. Prac-
tically all forms of the family known among men are to be
found also among lower animals. The simplest theory, and
one which has never been disproven, is that primitive man
lived in a state of practical promiscuity with no form of
marriage. It is true that nearly all if not all of the peoples
now in existence have some form of marriage, but the tie
is often only temporary. There is evidence that every race
has passed through a social stage in which the only relation-
ships were those traced through the mother, the obvious
reasons being either the failure to recognize the part of the
father in the child or the difficulty of determining its pater-
nity. It is doubtful if for one-tenth of the life of mankind
paternal relationships have been anywhere recognized.
The most primitive races now living have very elaborate
SOCIAL EVOLUTION 69
systems of kinship through the mother, and these systems
are remarkably similar between groups in a similar stage of
development, no matter in what part of the world they
may live. The American Indian, the Australian Bushman
and the primitive European all had the same complex
maternal family organization.
Perhaps through the conquest of another people and the
appropriation of its women, the relation of father to child
began to be looked upon as important, and finally modified
the mother family to the extent that maternal relationships
were often disregarded. It is only in very recent times and
in a relatively high civilization that a monogamous family
becomes the rule and relationship is traced both through the
father and through the mother. A stable monogamous
family is a high ideal which is yet far from being fully
realized.
The clan : As the children of a common mother recognized
their bond of kinship from the beginnings of human society,
it was natural to continue the bond from generation to
generation and so form the clan or gens. Under this system
all descendants through female lines of a common female
ancestor, often so remote as to be mythical, were counted
as kin, thus forming the social organization next broader
than the simple family. It is as though under our system
the children all took the name of the mother instead of that
of the father from generation to generation, and all persons
having the same surname were considered as kin and bound
to aid and assist one another in every way possible. A son
then belonged to the clan of his mother, but his children
belonged to the clan of their mother, and were not recognized
by their paternal relatives and were under no obligations to
them.
When the transition came from the mother family to the
father family, the clan also changed its nature and maternal
relationships were disregarded. This form can be more easily
understood, for it is the familiar system of Scotland and
Ireland, where such clans as the McDougalls and the O'Neills
have maintained their organization almost to the present
day.
For the purposes of common religious ceremonies from
two to five clans sometimes combined into a phratry. The
70 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
origin of the phratry was probably the subdivision of a
single clan, the various divisions retaining memories, and,
later, traditions, of their former unity.
The tribe and the confederacy: The ancient clan was too
weak in numbers to engage in war or to inspire respect in
the minds of possible enemies, so a number of clans were
united into a tribe. The tribe was organized under the
leadership of its elders and its own war chiefs and occupied
a fairly definite territory when not migrating from one sec-
tion to another.
The more advanced peoples were still further organized
into tribal confederacies, such as the league of the twelve
tribes of Israel and that of the Iroquois. These confed-
eracies were the highest forms of political organization
attained in savage or barbarous society and sometimes
attained to the proportions of powerful states.
Probably the best example of tribal organization based
upon kinship is that of the Iroquois as described by Lewis
H. Morgan. About the time of the first Dutch Settlement,
five Indian tribes, occupying a territory now included in
the State of New York, formed a league or confederacy.
In 1715 a sixth tribe, the Tuscaroras, was admitted, but not
to full equality.
Primitive communism: In tribal society there was no
conception of private property other than that directly
associated with the person. Much of the trouble between
the whites and the Indians of America has been due to the
failure of the Indian to comprehend our idea of private
property in land. In tribal communism any object not
in use is looked upon as common property. The spoils of
the chase are always impartially divided, and the hoarding
of food or other useful things is not tolerated. Even dwell-
ings are rarely private. Among the Iroquois the members of
the same clan living in the same village occupy one com-
munal dwelling. Even the lazy are in no danger of starva-
tion. They are welcome to share in the food provided in
any lodge, but they are obliged to suffer scorn and abuse
from their hosts, especially from the women.
The ideas of primitive communism are hard to eradicate.
They survive in the universal hospitality of all simple folk
the world over. The Russian moujik cannot be reconciled to
SOCIAL EVOLUTION 71
the division of the communal lands of the mir. The "thieving
propensities" of the Southern negro do not come from a
criminal nature, but from the failure of a simple barbarous
people fully to appreciate the conception of private property.
Private property: In order that anything may become
private property it must not only be appropriated by an
individual, but society must acknowledge his right of
possession. The only forms of individual property so sanc-
tioned by society under tribal communism were weapons,
personal ornaments, and trophies of the chase or of war.
As society became more complex, the elders of tribes and
war-chiefs were permitted to appropriate more than a pro-
portional share of the booty of a successful raid. When war
captives began to be kept alive as slaves instead of being
killed, the custom arose of considering them as the private
property of the chief. It is only under civilization that
private property in land appears. Land ownership by
groups and families leans naturally to ownership by indi-
viduals. Private property in the social means of production
aside from land is almost entirely the product of capitalist
society. Never before, except in agricultural and great
building operations, were armies of men employed in pro-
ducing for individual owners of the means of production.
From savagery to barbarism : Morgan l divides the proc-
ess of social evolution into three main epochs — savagery,
barbarism and civilization. Savagery and barbarism in
turn may be divided into three main stages — lower, middle
and upper. As in the case of all forms of evolution, progress
is slowest in the earlier stages, and it has been estimated
that nine-tenths of the life of the human race has been spent
in the epoch of savagery and about one-hundredth only in
the epoch of civilization.
The first stage of savagery alone probably lasted longer
than all subsequent stages of human evolution combined,
so that while the progress made by mankind in this stage
was very slow, the absolute gain was very great. No race
of to-day is so low as the first stage of savagery in which
mankind still lived in the tropical forest, probably in trees,
and subsisted on fruits, nuts and roots, and probably raw
meat and fish. During this period man first developed
1 Ancient Society, by Lewis H. Morgan, p. 9 et seq.
72 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
articulate speech and learned to use clubs and stones for
defense and attack.
With the discovery and control of fire begins the middle
state of savagery. Coincident with this great advance
comes the use of rough chipped stone implements. Dis-
covery and invention thus enabled the savage to enlarge
his menu and to make his food more palatable by cooking.
The lowest tribes of to-day are living in the middle stage of
savagery.
The higher stage of savagery is marked by the use of the
bow and arrow, wooden vessels and utensils and polished
stone implements. Many Asiatic and African tribes are
still in this higher stage of savagery as were our own North
Western Indians until comparatively recent times.
From barbarism to civilization: The transition to bar-
barism was marked by the invention of pottery, which was
probably first made by covering wooden or wicker vessels
with clay and burning out the wood. In this stage animals
were domesticated and agriculture began. Most of the
North American Indians were in the lower stage of barbar-
ism at the time of the settlement of the country by Euro-
peans, and not savages as is generally supposed.
In the middle stage of barbarism, represented by the
Indians of Mexico and Peru, agriculture was further devel-
oped and dwellings were built of stone and sun-dried brick.
The softer metals were known and used. In the East the
middle stage of barbarism is represented by such nomadic
groups as those of Abraham and Jacob before the Egyptian
captivity.
The higher stage of barbarism begins with the sm'elting
of iron. It is the age of mythology and epic poetry, the age
of the Homeric poems and the Norse Sagas.
These stages have differed in different parts of the world
only in so far as the natural environment has differed. In
regions where metals were rare the development of metal
working was slower than that of agriculture and pottery.
By reason of their invention of a primitive calendar and their
near approach to a written language, the Mayas of Yucatan
might perhaps be classed as barbarians of the higher class,
or even as approaching civilization, although they had not
learned to smelt iron.
SOCIAL EVOLUTION 73
It is only with the development of a written language, as
distinguished from primitive picture writing, the destruc-
tion of social organizations based upon kinship, the wider
utilization of natural and manufactured products, and the
beginnings of science that we have civilization. The first
known civilizations originated in Egypt and Babylonia
about the year 4000 b. c. These early civilizations were
but beginnings and were participated in by only a small
part of the people in the countries in which they arose.
Ancient civilization: The elements of culture developed
in the valleys of the Nile and the Tigris-Euphrates were
appropriated successively by the other peoples of South-
western Asia and the Mediterranean basin, and received
new additions through the varied experiences of the different
peoples, until the new civilization culminated in the mag-
nificent literature, art, architecture and philosophy of the
Age of Pericles in Greece. But ancient civilization was never
the possession of the many. Culture, refinement, art and
literature are impossible without leisure and freedom from
drudgery. Ancient civilization was built on slavery. Athens,
so far as its 20,000 citizens were concerned, was nearer the
Socialist ideal than any equally large community before or
since, but the slaves, who probably numbered nearly 200,000,
were entirely outside the Athenian civilization, and were
simply the labor-saving machines which made that civiliza-
tion with its culture possible. The complete separation of
culture and civilization from production ultimately led to
the degeneration of the leisure class, which, enervated by
luxury and dissipation, could not retain its power. The
development of philosophy was checked by a wave of oriental
mysticism. Rome then became the leader of civilization,
but the conditions of its environment led to conquest and
empire with the consequent development of law and admin-
istration, rather than literature and art. Then came the
infiltration and, finally, the invasion of the empire by the
barbarian North, and the slow process of the absorption and
democratization of ancient civilization by the whole popula-
tion of Europe, a process in which the medieval church
played a prominent part.
Modern civilization: From one point of view, the Middle
Ages seem no more advanced than the first stages of civiliza-
74 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
tion in Egypt. As in Egypt, almost the only scholars were
priests and monks, and the mass of the people were bar-
barians. The same course of development and adaptation
had to be repeated, but on a far larger scale. Little of real
value was lost, but instead of twenty thousand Athenians,
there were millions of Europeans to civilize and two thousand
years were needed to accomplish the task. Modern civiliza-
tion is in some respects no higher than that of Greece, but
it is on an infinitely grander scale. Its greatest original
achievements are its science and its control of the forces of
nature. As before we must have leisure and freedom from
drudgery in order to become civilized, but for the first time
in all the history of man the time has come when machines
can be made to do the drudgery, and the powers of man
released, so that he may develop a real civilization which
all may enjoy, and not merely a favored few.
SOCIAL EVOLUTION 75
SUMMARY
1. Modern Socialism finds its justification in the principles of uni-
versal evolution, and its hope for the future is based upon its inter-
pretation of the past.
2. The earliest human society was based upon kinship and primitive
communism. From these beginnings Society had slowly evolved into
the complex world civilization of to-day.
3. The main stages of social evolution are savagery, barbarism and
civilization. Civilization begins with the destruction of kinship or-
ganization and the development of written language.
4. Ancient civilization was the possession of the few and had its
economic basis in slave labor. Modern civilization is the possession of
the many and is based upon machine production.
QUESTIONS
1. Why do modern Socialists consider the principle of evolution as
a necessary part of their theory?
2. What special significance do Socialists find in the "mutation
theory" of De Vries?
3. What is meant by the "social mind"?
4. Explain the probable origin of the clan or gens.
5. Give examples illustrating the survival of the spirit of primitive
communism.
6. What was the probable origin of private property?
7. What are the characteristic features of each of the stages of
savagery? Of barbarism?
8. What are the essential features of civilized society?
9. What are the essential differences between ancient and modern
civilization?
Literature
Darwin, Charles, Origin of Species. Descent of Man.
De Vries, Hugo, Species and Varieties, their Origin by Mutation.
Engels, F., Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.
Giddings, F. H., Principles of Sociology.
Howard, G. E., History of Matrimonial Institutions.
Morgan, L. H., Ancient Society.
Parsons, Elsie Clews, The Family.
Spencer, Herbert, Principles of Sociology, Vol. I, Part I.
Westermarck, E., History of Human Marriage.
CHAPTER IX
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY
The motive forces in social evolution: So far we have
been outlining roughly the evolution of society from savagery
to civilization. The next question is "Why have these
changes taken place?" The problem is complex. Man has
always lived in society and has been obliged to adapt him-
self to his social environment, and the social group in turn
has always occupied some part of the earth's surface in a
physical environment to which it has been obliged to adapt
itself. The climate, soil, contour of the land, presence or
absence of water, the flora and fauna have all had their
influence upon man, and man has also modified his environ-
ment.
Many writers have ascribed the changes in social organiza-
tion to man's own will and to the influence of great leaders.
But while it is true that men sometimes rise above their
environment, the "Great Man Theory" minimizes the limita-
tions of environment, both social and physical. Other
writers have gone to the opposite extreme and attempted to
interpret history by the physical environment alone, leaving
out of consideration the influence which men have been able
to exert over their own destiny by modifying their environ-
ment.
The Socialist theory: Modern scientific Socialism has for
its philosophical basis the Marxian theory of historical
development, which many Socialist writers of the present
day call the Economic Interpretation of History. Marx
and Engels, who were the first to develop the theory, called
it the Materialistic Conception of History. The advantages
of the former term over the latter are, first, that the specific
term "economic" is more accurately descriptive than the
term "materialistic," and, second, that it obviates the mis-
understandings which arise from the confusion in the popular
76
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 77
mind of the word "materialistic" with the doctrines of philo-
sophical materialism. The essence of the theory is that the
rate and direction of social evolution are mainly, but not
exclusively, conditioned by the development of the methods
of production and exchange. It does not exclude other
factors, but subordinates them to the economic factor.
Origin of the theory: While it is true that earlier writers
laid the foundations of the theory of the economic motiva-
tion of society, or anticipated it, Karl Marx was the first to
formulate it and cause it to be recognized as a theory of
great philosophical importance. This is probably his great-
est single contribution to the thought of the world.
The first indications of the theory in any of the writings
of Marx are to be found in his little known work, Die Heilige
Familie, which was published in 1845. But it was not until
the publication of his Contribution to the Critique of Political
Economy, in 1859, that he attempted to elaborate the theory.
In the preface to that work Marx wrote:
I was led by my studies to the conclusion that legal relations as well
as forms of state could neither be understood by themselves, nor ex-
plained by the so-called general progress of the human mind, but that
they are rooted in the material conditions of life, which are summed up
by Hegel after the fashion of the English and French of the eighteenth
century under the name " civic society"; the anatomy of that civic
society is to be found in political economy. The study of the latter
which I had taken up in Paris, I continued at Brussels whither I immi-
grated on account of an order issued by Guizot. The general conclusion
at which I arrived and which, once reached, continued to serve as the
leading thread in my studies, may be briefly summed up as follows:
In the social production which men carry on they enter into definite
relations that are indispensable and independent of their will; these
relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development
of their material powers of production. The sum total of these rela-
tions of production constitutes the economic structure of society — the
real foundation, on which rise legal and political superstructures and to
which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode
of production in material life determines the general character of the
social, political and spiritual processes of life. It is not the conscious-
ness of men that determines their existence, but, on the contrary, their
social existence determines their consciousness.1
Marx proceeded to illustrate the value of the theory as a
method of historical interpretation by sketching in bold and
1A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, by Karl Marx,
translated from the second German edition by N. I. Stone, p. 11.
78 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
vigorous outline the interrelation of economic methods and
social and political institutions:
At a certain stage of their development, the material forces of pro-
duction in society come in conflict with the existing relations in produc-
tion, or — what is but a legal expression for the same thing — with the
property relations within which they had been at work before. From
forms of development of the forces of production these relations turn
into their fetters. Then comes the period of social revolution.
With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense super-
structure is more or less rapidly transformed. In considering such
transformations the distinction should always be made between the
material transformation of the economic conditions of production which
can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal,
political, religious, aesthetic or philosophic — in short, ideological forms
in which men become conscious of the conflict and fight it out. Just
as our opinion of an individual is not based on what he thinks of himself,
bo can we not judge of such a period of transformation by its own
consciousness; on the contrary, this consciousness must rather be ex-
plained from the contradictions of material life, from the existing con-
flict between the material forces of production and the relations of pro-
duction. No social order ever disappears before all the productive
forces, for which there is room in it, have been developed; and new
higher relations of production never appear before the material con-
ditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society.
Therefore, mankind always takes up only such problems as it can solve:
since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the
problem itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for
its solution exist or are at least in the process of formation.1
Delimitation of the theory: Marx and Engels sometimes,
in controversies with their critics, over-emphasized the
influence of the economic factor in social evolution and made
their statement of the theory too absolute. This Engels
himself freely admitted toward the close of his life. Thus,
in 1890 he wrote to a student: "Marx and I are partly
responsible for the fact that younger men have sometimes
laid more stress on the economic side than it deserves. In
meeting the attacks of our opponents, it was necessary
for us to emphasize the dominant principle denied by them;
and we did not always have the time, place or opportunity '
to let the other factors which were concerned in the mutual
action and reaction get their deserts."2 In another letter
he says: "According to the materialistic view of history,
xIdem, pp. 12-13.
a Quoted from the Sozialistische Akademiker, 1895, by Seligman,
The Economic Interpretation of History, pp. 142-143.
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 79
the factor which is in last instance decisive in history is the
production and reproduction of actual life. More than this
neither Marx nor I have ever asserted. But when any one
distorts this so as to read that the economic factor is the
sole element, he converts the statement into a meaningless,
abstract, absurd phrase. The economic condition is the
basis, but the various elements of the superstructure — the
political forms of the class contests, and their results, the
constitutions — the legal forms, and also all the reflexes of these
actual contests in the brains of the participants, the political,
legal, philosophical, theories, the religious views . . . —all
these exert an influence on the development of the historical
struggles, and in many instances determine their form."
From these statements of the theory by its originators it
will be seen that it is no part of the theory that every phenom-
enon of social evolution can be explained by economic facts,
or traced to economic causes. Much of the criticism which
has been directed against the theory has rested on the
assumption that it involved a denial of influence to all other
factors. The economic interpretation of history may be
defined as the theory that the rate and direction of social
progress are determined mainly, but not wholly, by the
economic conditions existing — principally the methods of
producing wealth and the social relations which these
involve.
Economic interpretation and religion: The theory has
been especially subject to attacks and misrepresentations
because of its assumed hostility to all forms of religious
belief. On this point its dogmatically atheistic friends and
its dogmatically religious enemies have been equally guilty
of misunderstanding and misstating the subject of dis-
cussion. Religion is, fundamentally, man's attempt to put
himself into harmonious relation with, and to discover a
satisfying interpretation of, the forces of the universe. The
more incomprehensible those forces, the greater man's need
of an explanation of them. The Marxian theory does not
deny that men have been benefited by seeking an inter-
pretation of the universe, or that the quest for such an
interpretation is compatible with rational conduct. It does
not offer any answer to the great questions, Whence? Why?
Whither? which mankind in all stages of its development has
80 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
asked concerning life itself and the universe, the answers to
which it has made the framework of its religion. Nor does
it deny that such questions may be answered. The theory
does not include these questions and, therefore, cannot in
any sense be regarded as a substitute for religious belief.
The bearing of the theory upon religion is purely inter-
pretative. Marx in his work could not ignore such an im-
portant and universal phenomenon as religion. He saw that
the religion of a people, like their laws and their politics,
always bears a marked relation to their mental development
and their special environment. The savage ascribes person-
ality to everything which exhibits phenomena which he
cannot otherwise explain, and thus develops an animistic
philosophy involving every striking fact in his environment.
To the Israelites of the formative period Jahve was a tribal
god, similar to the gods of other tribes about them, but
fortunately more powerful. With the development of the
national spirit, Jahve became a King and Supreme Lord
of the Theocracy. In times of oppression and war Jahve
was a God of Battles, while under other conditions be became
a God of Peace.
In almost every religion, the conception of the future
life is, in its early stages at least, an idealized reflex of the
terrestrial life. A hunting tribe believes in a future life in
which game is plentiful. A people accustomed to disagree-
able labor and poverty looks forward to a future life of ease
and luxury. The earthly hierarchy is reproduced in the
heaven, and a society of caste is included in the concept of
heaven when it exists below.
It is not a denial of the truth of any form of religion to
give a rational explanation of its origin and the forces shaping
its development. It is not a denial of the doctrines of the
Roman Catholic Church to explain its form of organization
and the statement of its creed by the conditions attending
its origin and development within the Roman Empire, its
political function as the successor of the Empire in Western
Europe, and the economic environment of feudalism.
Neither do we deny the benefits resulting from the Protestant
revolt by attributing the revolt itself to economic condi-
tions, rather than to the personality and genius of Martin
Luther. Students of comparative religion and Biblical
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 81
criticism find the method of economic interpretation as
helpful and illuminating as do the students of history and
politics.
Economic interpretation and "free will": It has been
charged that the economic interpretation of history denies
the freedom of the will and presents a fatalistic view of
society. This charge arises from a misconception of the
basis of the theory. It is not a theory of the motives of
individuals, but an explanation of the actions of social
groups. We simply say that a social group will adapt itself
to economic conditions or perish. When the game in a
certain district is killed off, the primitive inhabitants must
turn from hunting to fishing, or to a vegetable subsistence.
Any individual is perfectly "free" to continue his hunting,
but the chances are that he will starve to death.
The point may be illustrated by the theories of mass
statistics. It is safe to predict that approximately 500,000
people will travel in the New York subway to-morrow, but
no individual is thereby compelled to breathe bad air. Any-
one is perfectly free to stay at home or to walk, without
appreciably affecting the business of the Interborough Rapid
Transit Company. The economic necessity of earning a
living, however, and the fact that for a million of people
the subway is the most rapid and convenient means of
reaching the business districts where they are employed,
combine to make the use of the subway definitely pre-
dictable.
As a matter of fact, the amount of "free will" which we
enjoy is vastly over-estimated. A very large part of the
actions of our individual lives are determined by the neces-
sity of making a living. The bookkeeper does not add
columns of figures ten hours a day because he loves the work,
nor does a miner dig coal because he prefers fire damp to
pure air. Even our choice of occupations is not entirely a
free one. The chances are strong that the son will follow
the same general line of work as the father. The lawyer's
son may become a lawyer, a physician, or an engineer, but
he is not very likely to become a laborer, except as a result
of failure at some other chosen task. Likewise, our religion
is rarely our free and deliberate choice. The chances of a
Jewish child entering the Roman Catholic Church are slight,
82 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
but a child of Roman Catholic parents is very likely to
follow his parents into that church.
Economic interpretation and ethics: According to the
theory of economic causation, the economic basis of any
society is largely influential in determining its moral con-
sciousness. That which is immoral and socially condemned
is that which is conceived to be harmful to the social group,
either in the present or in the future. Since any interference
with the prevailing method of gaining a livelihood must
threaten the life of the group, conformity to the conceived
economic interests of a group becomes its standard of virtue.
Thus in primitive societies virtue involves loyalty to fellow
tribesmen and the slaughter of enemies, physical strength,
courage, sacrifices to the mysterious powers which control
subsistence, and, where living conditions are very hard,
the killing of the aged and infirm. In more advanced
societies, respect for the private property of men in goods,
slaves and wives becomes virtuous. As economic life becomes
more complex, the moral code is expanded, involving a
multitude of social relations unknown to men of an earlier
stage of social development.
Class ethics: Just as the vertical division of society into
tribes and nations results in tribal and national moral codes,
so the horizontal stratification of society into social classes
brings about distinct class ethical codes. When it was immoral
to kill a freeman it was no infraction of the moral code, no
offense to the prevailing moral sense of the group, to kill
a slave. The feeling of solidarity and common interests
involves only the class, and since in a class state it becomes
almost impossible to conceive of any action which would
benefit all classes equally, the classes come to have divergent
codes of ethics. But it is always the ethical code of the ruling
class which constitutes the recognized standard of morality
at any given time. In the words of John Stuart Mill:
"Wherever there is an ascendant class, a large portion
of the morality emanates from its class interests and its class
feelings of superiority. The morality between Spartans and
Helots, between planters and negroes, between princes and
subjects, between nobles and roturiers, between men and
women, has been for the most oart the creation of these
class interests and feelings."1
1 John Stuart Mill, On Liberty.
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 83
The capitalist regards as virtuous honesty and fidelity
to terms of contracts as between members of his class, and
on the part of others toward members of his class, but is
not strongly condemned by his fellows for himself breaking
a wage agreement or for fleecing a "lamb" on the stock
market. Charity is a virtue, and direct personal injury,
even to a worker or any of his family, is wrong; but under-
mining the health, destroying the lives and impoverishing
the workers in the "legitimate" pursuit of business does not
infringe the moral code.
The wage-working class is also developing a code of ethics
based on class loyalty, class solidarity and class conscious-
ness. The wage-worker regards as virtuous strict fidelity
to class interests and consistent opposition to the special
interests of the capitalists, and detests the "scab" as a
traitor to his class. The divergence of the ethical standards
of the two classes is very clearly shown by the newspaper
comments on the occasional acts of violence by strikers and
their sympathetic allies. An assault upon a strike-breaker
is regarded with horror by the capitalist press, while in the
labor press it is very often condoned and excused. The
strike-breaker has violated class ethics in a struggle which
involves the most fundamental interests of the strikers and
their families. The law does not enforce the ethical code of
the working class because it is the subject class, and the
law always reflects the ethical concepts of the ruling class.
So the striking workman must either submit to defeat
through the employment of men of his own class who violate
its ethics, or resort to the primitive methods of enforcing
the moral code.
Superiority of working class ethics: While any code of
class ethics must necessarily have many shortcomings, the
ethical code of the working class is infinitely superior to that
of the capitalist minority. It is superior, in the first place,
because it is formulated in the interest of the great majority,
while the ethical code of the capitalist class is formulated in
the interest of a minority. It is superior, in the second place,
because it assails with the greatest force of numbers possible
in a class state the evils which injure the greatest number of
persons. The well-being of the mass of mankind is advanced
in proportion to the degree in which the ethical code which
84 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
reflects the interests of an increasing proportion of the whole
mass is recognized. This is only another way of saying that
the maximum of satisfaction will result from the moral code
which is the reflex of the maximum of human interests.
As an ideal no ethical code based upon class dominance can
satisfy. The perfect ethical code will not be bounded by
class interests. The ethical code of the working class is the
nearest approach to that ideal we have yet attained, for it
reflects the largest proportion of the totality of human
interests.
Economic interpretation and law: In primitive society the
ethical code was established by custom and its violation
punished directly by the group. As society becomes more
complex, custom develops into law which defines in detail
the interrelations of men and states. Laws vary infinitely
according to time and place, and their form and content are
determined largely by the economic interests of the law-
making class. Laws not only reflect the economic and social
conditions of the time, but are designed for the purpose of
preserving those conditions in so far as they are regarded
as being necessary to the maintenance of the rule and power
of the ruling class. This fact was frankly asserted in the
class legislation of all ages previous to the capitalist era.
The slave or the serf received little or no consideration,
even when in the majority. Law is therefore essentially
conservative, lagging behing the social advance and rarely
recognizing a new condition until it has become established
through force or the effective threat of force.
The laws of capitalist society are likewise designed to
preserve the existing conditions essentially unchanged. The
greater part of our legal codes are taken up with rules for
the protection and definition of private property. The
assumption that all men are equal before the law is made to
operate in favor of the property-owner, since the machinery
of the law is chiefly concerned with his protection, and does
not recognize the weaker position of the poor litigant who
cannot employ the best legal talent.
Class influence upon legal codes: The influence of class
is strongly marked in all our legal codes. The old principles
have been strengthened with every change in property
forms, but the corresponding interests of the wage-workers
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 85
have been neglected. In the matter of the wage contract
and the responsibility of the employers for the dangers of
employment the law rarely interferes, except in a half-
hearted way, while the minutest details of property rights
are covered by statutes. When a law is made to apply to
both labor and capital, as in the case of the Sherman Anti-
Trust Act, it is enforced against labor, but is ineffective
against capital.
Thus are laws enacted and enforced in conformity with the
economic interests of the dominant class, and the only
progressive steps taken conform to the recognized economic
interests of the majority, the working class, which, in the
countries where manhood suffrage obtains, is able to obtain
concessions by effectively threatening the supremacy of the
ruling class.
The great man in history: To what extent are individuals
responsible for great social changes? No one denies that
Napoleon Bonaparte influenced the course of European
history, or that Karl Marx influenced the development of
the Socialist movement. But a man in the present day,
having all the qualities and gifts of Napoleon, could not
influence the history of Europe in the same way or to the
same extent. If Karl Marx had lived before the Industrial
Revolution he would not have formulated the Socialist
theories which are associated with his name. On the other
hand, Europe would have developed in political and indus-
trial organization substantially as it has done if Napoleon
had never left Corsica, and there would have been a Socialist
movement and an economic interpretation of history if
Marx had never lived. It is only when economic conditions
are ripe that individuals appear to exert a determining
influence upon historical developments. Great individualities
which profoundly influence the course of historical develop-
ment do not exist of themselves, independent of conditions.
They are the products of favorable combinations of economic
and social circumstances, of a perception of needs formed in
the matrices of such combinations of circumstance, or of
crises which conduce to the highest development of qualities
of initiative and leadership which would otherwise either
remain dormant or be directed to other ends. There are
certain limits between which a man may freely act and within
86 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
whicn he may succeed, but these limits are defined by
economic and social conditions. Even the limited area of
freedom indicated is in fact still further restricted by such
factors as heredity.
Marx tells of an inventor who devised a multiple loom as
early as the fifteenth century. Perhaps in one sense he was
greater than Hargreaves, but the economic conditions were
not ripe for such a loom and the man was put to death and
his invention destroyed. When the domestic system had
developed and the embryonic capitalist forms were ready
then the power loom was developed, and its inventors have
been universally acknowledged as great men.
Applications of the theory to American history: The
greatest value of the theory of the economic interpretation
of history lies in the fact that by means of it we can explain
the origin and development of the various stages of social
evolution and their relation to each other. In the preceding
chapter we have sketched the main lines of social evolution
and seen that each fundamental change in the organization
of society, and even each general advance in culture, arose
from changes of an economic character to which they can
be traced with practical certainty.
But while this is the chief value of the theory, it also has
value as an explanation of a large part of the important
specific events of history. For our present purpose it will
be sufficient to consider, briefly, a few of the most conspicuous
events in American history in the light of the theory.
It was the commerce of the handicraft stage, checked by
the pastoral barbarians of Turkey and Persia, which led
to the imperative demand for a new route to India and sent
forth such adventurers as Columbus, Vasco da Gama and
John Cabot. The Norse discovery of America about the
year 1000 was futile and without influence upon the develop-
ment of Europe because there had not yet arisen the need
for a new outlet for trade and colonization.
Every war which the United States has fought has been of
economic origin. The Revolutionary War was due to the
economic exploitation of America by England. The war
of 1812 was due to England's interference with our commerce.
The Mexican War was due to land hunger on the part of the
agricultural South which was losing in the competition with
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 87
the industrial North, a competition more bitter even than
that which preceded the Protestant revolt in Europe because
it was between the agricultural stage of social evolution and
the industrial stage, whereas in the earlier European struggle
the conflict was between two stages very much nearer to
each other, the agricultural stage and the handicraft stage.
The South must extend its area and its institutions, including
slavery, or be crushed by the North. Mexico was the
unhappy victim. The Civil War, while it arose over the
right of secession, apparently an exclusively political ques-
tion, was in reality the culmination of the same great struggle
between two different and widely separated economic stages,
the agricultural and the industrial, and ended, as was
inevitable, in the victory of the higher stage. The Spanish-
American War was fundamentally due to the prevention of
the free development of the Cuban sugar industry through
Spanish misrule, and the consequent interruption of a profit-
able American trade.
Objections to the theory: The principal criticisms of the
economic interpretation of history can be grouped as follows:
(1) the alleged antecedence of social organization to the
economic environment; (2) the claim that the theory is an
insufficient explanation of the facts; (3) the claim that it is
"sordid."
Concerning the first criticism, it is a sufficient reply to
state the fact that the question of the priority of society or
environment is not involved in the theory. No social change
can take place without the existence of both society and
environment. A certain amount of variation is possible
in a static environment, but when environmental changes
take place it is the best adapted forms which survive the
new conditions. Social groups can also transform their
environment within narrow limits, as Holland has been
transformed by its people and as the desert is made productive
by irrigation. But it is just in these cases that environ-
mental influence is most pronounced. Everyone knows
how the history of Holland has been conditioned and deter-
mined in conformity with its economic conditions, and
irrigation at once makes possible the existence of a civilized
society where it was not possible before.
The second criticism, that the theory is insufficient as an
88 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
explanation, is only valid when directed against exaggera-
tions of the theory. The criticisms of Eduard Bernstein and
other members of the " Revisionist" group within the inter-
national Socialist movement, for example, apply not so
much to the theory itself, as Marx and Engels developed it,
as to the crude applications of it by some of their disciples.
As Frederick Engels himself has remarked, "It is unfor-
tunately only too common for a man to think he has perfectly
understood a theory and is able forthwith to apply it, as
soon as he has made the chief propositions his own." 1
It may be freely admitted — as Engels himself has done —
that in their earlier statements of the theory Marx and
Engels were not always careful to make it clear beyond the
possibility of honest misconception that they recognized the
influence of spiritual and other non-economic factors upon
historical development. But he who would either employ
or judge a theory must take it in its most developed form,
that is, in the form which comprises the fullest and maturest
thought of the minds responsible for the theory. Criticisms
of the theory which confine themselves to the earlier and
cruder statements of it, and ignore the later developments
and improved statements of it, is not honest criticism. It
may also be admitted that, even in the statements of the
theory by Engels toward the end of his life, the sense of
proportion is not perfectly maintained, and that the sphere
of influence ascribed to spiritual and ideological factors is
too limited. But these things do not touch the essentials
of the theory. It is a sufficient reply to the objection that
the theory does not afford a sufficient explanation of the
whole progress of human history, to point to the fact that
neither Marx nor Engels claimed that it did anything of the
sort. It is essentially a criticism directed against a mis-
conception and misstatement of the theory, rather than
against the theory itself.
Not much time need be wasted in a discussion of the
criticism that the theory is sordid, and that it is unworthy
of humanity to attribute its activity and its progress to
economic conditions. The question to ask is not "Is the
theory pleasing?" but "Is it true?" We might as well
deny that the beauty of the rose is made possible only
1 Engels, Anti-Diihring.
THE ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY 89
through the unlovely soil in which its roots are sustained,
as refuse to admit that the finest idealism may be rooted in
the commonplace processes of making a living.
General acceptance of the theory: Through the general
acceptance of the principle of evolution and the idea of the
continuity of the historical process, the economic interpreta-
tion of history has gained acceptance far beyond the limits
of the Socialist movement. People may differ as to the
application of the theory and the conclusions to be drawn
from it, but there is no longer any great opposition to the
theory in its application to the great social transformations
of the past, to religious forms, to ethical and legal codes
and to a large number of important specific historical events.
In the light of the theory we are now in a position to
discuss the development of the economic organization of
society as the basis for a further treatment of Socialist
theories and ideals.
00 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
i. Socialists regard economic forces as the chief factors in the bring-
ing about of social change.
2. The Economic Interpretation does not exclude the "spiritual
factors"; it is not fatalistic and does not deny free will.
3. The economic factors largely determine religious forms, ethical
standards and the content of legal codes.
4. The Economic Interpretation of History applies primarily to the
explanation of stages in social evolution, but at the same time it
directly explains many specific historical events.
QUESTIONS
1. What was the origin of the theory of the Economic Interpretation
of History?
2. Why is the term "economic" preferable to "materialistic" in
this connection?
3. What factors other than the economic have influenced history?
4. In what ways have the economic factors influenced religious
forms? Ethical codes?
5. How are economic class distinctions reflected in legal codes?
6. What is meant by the "Great Man" theory of history?
7. Illustrate the economic interpretation theory by events in Ameri-
can history. In English history.
8. What are the chief objections to the theory and how do Socialists
answer them?
Literature
Hillquit, M., Socialism in Theory and Practice, Chap. Ill and IV.
Kautsky, K., Ethics and the Materialistic Conception of History.
Marx, Karl, Capital. Contribution to the Critique of Political
Economy, Preface.
Rogers, J. E. T., The Economic Interpretation of History.
Seligman, E. R. A., The Economic Interpretation of History.
Simons, A. M., Social Forces in American History.
Spargo, John, Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation of Socialist
Principles, Chap. IV.
CHAPTER X
INDUSTRIAL EVOLUTION
The economic stages: Any classification of economic
history must necessarily be somewhat arbitrary, for the
whole process of development has been subject to variation.
In different parts of the world the social groups have lived
under varied environmental conditions.
Some writers have divided economic history into stages
on the basis of labor forms, as:
(1) Independent or communal labor with slaughter of
enemies.
(2) Slavery and serfdom.
(3) Wage-labor regulated by individual contract.
(4) Collective bargaining.
Other writers have taken the process of exchange as the
basis of classification and describe three stages:
(1) "Truck" or barter economy.
(2) Money economy.
(3) Credit economy.
Perhaps the most common classification is that based on
production and the increasing control of man over nature.
The division is into five stages:
(1) The stage of direct appropriation.
(2) The pastoral stage.
(3) The agricultural stage.
(4) The handicraft stage.
(5) The industrial stage.
Finally, the German economist, Buecher, classifies economic
history on the basis of the development of the economic unit:
(1) The stage of household economy.
(2) The stage of town economy.
(3) The stage of national economy.
(4) The stage of world economy.
These classifications are not at all conflicting, and all are
91
92 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
suggestive. The two last classifications, however, best
explain the historical process.
The stage of direct appropriation: This is the primitive
stage of human development in which man lived by hunting
and fishing, and by the vegetable foods, such as nuts, fruit
and roots, which could be obtained without cultivation.
It corresponds to the epoch of savagery in social evolution.
Exchange and the transfer of goods are unimportant.
Primitive communism is the rule and there are no sharply
marked social classes.
There is a marked difference between tribes in this stage
who live chiefly by hunting and those who life chiefly by
fishing or subsist on a vegetable diet. The hunting tribes
are more warlike, occupy a larger territory and are generally
of a higher physical type. Their dwellings are very simple
and usually temporary. Fishing tribes are peaceful and
occupy restricted territories near the sea coast. They build
permanent dwellings and construct boats and fishing imple-
ments.
The pastoral stage: This stage is marked by the domes-
tication of animals, and the care of large flocks of sheep
and herds of cattle. Pastoral groups are usually migratory
or nomadic, wandering from place to place in search of the
best pasturage, and living in tents. This stage corresponds
with the middle stage of barbarism in Europe and Asia.
The life of the Hebrew patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob, as described in the book of Genesis, is a perfect
example of life in the pastoral stage.
Slavery became general in the pastoral stage and the con-
ception of private property was greatly extended. Social
distinctions became clearer. Men of great wealth like
Abraham were powerful chiefs, and were absolute rulers of
the households of wives, concubines, descendants, followers,
and slaves. Private property in land was not yet generally
recognized and there was little commerce. Such commerce
as there was took the form of barter.
The agricultural stage: The agricultural stage opens up
an entirely new field of activity to man. Having already
learned the food uses of fruits, grains, nuts and roots, and
how to manage animals, he now combines his knowledge and
becomes a plant producer. A denser population becomes
INDUSTRIAL EVOLUTION 93
possible. Fertile valleys like those of the Tigris-Euphrates
and the Nile become the homes of millions of men. The idea
of land ownership first developed in the agricultural stage,
although even then ownership by the village community,
rather than by the individual, was the rule. Slavery grad-
ually developed into serfdom, a condition of servitude in which
the subject enjoyed more privileges than under slavery, but
was not free to migrate at will. Commerce grew in impor-
tance, mainly because the wealthy class grew in strength and
demanded foreign luxuries. The denser population made
necessary a more efficient government and more detailed
laws. This is the stage of the Babylonian Code of Ham-
murabi and of the Mosaic law. It was during the agricultural
stage that the civilizations of antiquity developed.
The agricultural stage persisted through the early Middle
Ages and developed into the so-called manorial economy
and its political counterpart, the feudal system. In the
thirteenth century the population of England was largely
concentrated in villages or manors ruled by a lord, to whom
the people were bound. The land of the manor was divided
into three great fields which were cultivated in rotation,
one always lying fallow. Each villein tenant held a strip
of land in each of these fields which he was entitled to
cultivate and was required to devote a part of each week
to the cultivation of the part of the land especially reserved
for the lord of the manor.
The handicraft stage : With the development of the cities
and the commerce of the later Middle Ages, the trades
and hand manufacture became predominant and the agri-
cultural organization as represented by the feudal system
and the manor began to decline in relative importance.
Towns which had become centres of trade won their inde-
pendence from the feudal lords, and the handicraftsman who
had long plied his trade as a servant on the feudal estate
gained an independent and powerful position.
As the town was first a trading centre the first rulers of the
towns were the merchants, who in the twelfth century in
England were organized into guilds which at once protected
trade and formed the basis of the political organization of
the towns. As the craftsmen grew in numbers and importance
they were admitted into the merchant guilds, which they
94 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
later supplanted with their own craft guilds. These craft
guilds grew so powerful that by the fourteenth century they
were the real rulers of the English cities.
Each trade has its own guild of masters presided over by
its own alderman, who in conjunction with the aldermen
of other guilds formed the governing body of the town.
Membership in a guild was usually confined to those who
had served their apprenticeship and later had worked as
journeymen and become masters. As the system became
more rigid it became increasingly difficult for journeymen
who were entitled to join the guilds and thus become masters
to secure admission to membership in the guilds without
powerful influence to assist them. For their own protection
the journeymen organized other guilds of their own, the
"Bachelors' Companies," which in organization and tactics
were somewhat similar to a modern trade union.
The next step in industrial evolution, which bridges the
gap between the true handicraft stage and the industrial
stage is known as the domestic system. The guild master
became a petty capitalist who received the raw materials
from a middleman and gave them out to artisans who lived
largely in the country and devoted a part of their time to
agriculture. These artisans, who were the successors of
the journeyman, had no control over the marketing of the
product of their labor.
The industrial revolution: Then came the sudden and
fundamental change in methods of production which fol-
lowed the invention of the steam engine and power machinery
in the last half of the eighteenth century. Every previous
change in the forms of industry had been so slow as to
cover many generations in the process of transition, but this
was rapid and relatively sudden, a true industrial revolution.
The manufacture of textiles was at this time the most
important industry in England. Under the handicraft and
the domestic systems, all the work of spinning and weaving
had to be laboriously done by hand. The first of the series
of great inventions came in 1738, when Kay invented the
flying shuttle. Then came Hargreaves' spinning jenny, in
1767, then Arkwright's water frame and the combination
of the two into the "mule" by Crompton. Cartwright then
developed the power loom and Whitney's cotton gin increased
INDUSTRIAL EVOLUTION 95
the supply of raw material. With the application of steam
power to spinning and weaving the domestic system came
to an end. It was no longer profitable to send out work
to be manufactured in homes. The workmen had to be
gathered together into factories where the power could be
economically applied. The master craftsman, who had
become the merchant under the domestic system, giving out
work and selling the product, now became the owner of
the factory, while the journeyman, with his ranks recruited
from the peasants of the country estates, became the factory
worker, the proletarian of the modern industrial world.
The transition came so rapidly as to cause a great deal of
distress and social anarchy. An entirely new set of economic
conditions had to be faced, and governments and laws formed
under the old system were incapable of adaptation to the
needs of the worker for protection. The new machines could
be operated by children better than by the old weavers and
spinners, and the struggles of the displaced workers to gain
a livelihood form one of the most tragic chapters in the
history of industrial development. Weavers who had made
a comfortable living by the labor of eight hours a day,
supplemented by the products of their little farms, now could
barely keep from starvation by working sixteen hours out
of twenty-four. Children had always worked under the
old system, but the work had been done at home, and was
divided between the apprentice work at the loom and the
outdoor work of the farm. Under the new system they were
massed together in factories under masters who had no
personal interest in them, and worked fourteen hours a day
under frightfully unsanitary conditions. The first attempts
of workmen to organize unions were checked by stringent
and often savage jaws. /The popular resentment very natu-
rally led to machine-breaking riots. The old land-owning
aristocracy was obliged to yield political power to the new
lords of industry and England became a capitalist state.
The industrial stage : This is the stage of economic evolu-
tion in which the civilized world lives to-day. Production
is carried on by means of power machinery on a large scale.
This machinery is owned and controlled by a distinct class.
Industry is so specialized that no one workman turns out a
finished product which is to any large extent his own work.
96 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Trade and commerce have been developed until markets
are international, and a credit system has taken the place of
cash payment.
But although our age is essentially industrial, all of the
other stages of production are still represented at the present
day. Not only are there tribes and peoples in various parts
of the world who represent all of the earlier stages of indus-
trial evolution, but in our own civilization all the older forms
of production are to be found. The stage of direct appropria-
tion is represented wherever there are things of value to be
taken by man direct from nature, for his own use. Hunting
and fishing are by no means abandoned. The pastoral stage
is represented by the great cattle and sheep ranges of the
West and of South America and Australia. Agriculture never
even declined in absolute importance, although other forms
of production have developed since the agricultural stage
which, because of their greater relative importance, have
become the characteristic and dominant economic forces.
Handicrafts are still carried on wherever machine methods
have not been introduced, as in bricklaying, and for certain
purposes nearly all the old crafts are carried on to-day.
The domestic system has degenerated into the sweatshop
and become one of the worst forms of modern exploitation.
Old forms do not die. They simply change in relative
importance.
The development of the economic unit: Along with the
increase in the power of man to control the forces of nature
has come a progressive enlargement of the economic unit.
The number and variety of wants has continually increased,
and a progressively greater and more intricate organization
of society becomes necessary. The stages in this process
may be described as follows:
(a) Independent household economy: Production was at
rirst, and even later in the pastoral and agricultural stages,
carried on by the household. The products were likewise
consumed by the household. Trade and commerce were
unimportant before the handicraft stage. The Greek house-
hold from which we get our word "economy" was an inde-
pendent economic unit. Agricultural products were grown
for use and not for commerce. Slaves skilled in all trades
were employed and there was very little which any member
INDUSTRIAL EVOLUTION 97
or retainer of the household needed to get from beyond the
estate. The life of a savage or barbarous family is a more
simple example. The man does the hunting and fighting,
the woman makes the clothing, prepares the food and bears
the burdens. The family can exist comfortably without
any dependence upon the rest of the world.
(b) Town economy: With the building of cities and the
diversification of industry, the independent economy became
impracticable. It was more profitable for the weaver to
give all his time to his trade and buy his food supplies else-
where, giving in exchange his cloths or the money received
from their sale. But it was no more than an extension of
the household economy for little was used which was not
produced within or near the town. Commerce was largely
local, and the town could exist without regard to the State
or other towns.
(c) National economy: With the improvement of the
means of communication, and the perception of the advan-
tages of trade between cities, the nation became the economic
unit. In England the products of the mines of the South-
west were exchanged for the agricultural products and the
manufactures of the East and North. The town was no
longer self-sufficient and independent. But the nation still
produced all that it needed to consume. The period of
national economy was marked by the welding together of
towns and principalities into powerful modern States. To
enhance the importance of the nation, taxes on internal trade
were abolished and tariffs were imposed on imports from
other countries. Patriotism was encouraged and sectional-
ism discouraged. Thus national economy supplanted town
economy.
(d) World economy: The stage has now passed when
there is an advantage in maintaining a national economy.
The railway, steamship, telegraph and ocean cable have
brought the nations of the world nearer together than
provinces were during the development of national economy.
Markets have become world-wide. No country is entirely
self-sufficient, and such countries as England are so dependent
upon other nations that even a temporary check to commerce
involves great hardship, as when the American Civil War
stopped the importation of raw cotton and reduced the
98 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Lancashire operatives to abject poverty. Capital knows no
national lines. It is essentially international. The migration
of masses of laborers from one country to another in response
to the demands of industry, the spread of education and
increasing ease of international communication have resulted
in a highly developed sense of international solidarity of
class interest. National lines which once served to extend
the economic unit from town to nation, now impede further
growth, and patriotism, which was once a broadening senti-
ment tending to replace excessive loyalty to the town by a
larger loyalty to the nation, has in its turn become, in its
extreme forms, a hindrance to further development and a
menace to the peace of the world.
INDUSTRIAL EVOLUTION 99
SUMMARY
1. Economic history may be divided into stages on the basis of the
increasing control by man over nature.
2. In the first stage men live by hunting and fishing; the second is
characterized by the domestication of animals and the introduction
of slavery; in the third stage agriculture is developed; the fourth is
characterized by handicraft industry and the fifth stage begins with
the development of power machinery and the factory system.
3. These stages have differed materially in different parts of the
world and their form has been modified by geographical and climatic
conditions.
4. A new method of gaining a livelihood does not usually displace
an older form, but subordinates it, thus adding to the complexity of
economic life.
5. Economic history is also classified on the basis of the progressive
enlargement of the economic unit from the household through the town
and nation to a world economy.
QUESTIONS
1. What are the characteristic features of the stage of direct appro-
priation? Of the pastoral stage? Of the agricultural stage?
2. Describe the manorial system. In which stage does it belong?
3. Explain the organization and functions of the craft guild.
4. What was the domestic system of industry?
5. What is meant by the "Industrial Revolution"?
6. Name the chief inventions which brought about the industrial
revolution.
7. Compare the industrial stage with the handicraft stage.
8. Characterize the household economy, the town economy, the
national economy.
9. What facts lead us to expect the realization of a world economy?
Literature
Buecher, C, Industrial Evolution.
Coman, Katherine, The Industrial History of the United Stales.
Ely, R. T., Studies in the Evolution of Industrial Society.
Hobson, J. A., The Evolution of Modern Capitalism.
Morgan, L. H., Ancient Society, Part I, Chap. II and III.
Spencer, Herbert, Principles of Sociology, Vol. Ill, Part VIII.
Toynbee, A., The Industrial Revolution, Chap. IV.
CHAPTER XI
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY
The theory stated : The class struggle theory is a part of
the economic interpretation of history. Ever since the
dissolution of primitive tribal society, the modes of economic
production and exchange have inevitably grouped men into
economic classes. In his Introduction to the Com-
munist Manifesto Frederick Engels thus summarizes the
theory:
"In every historical epoch, the prevailing mode of eco-
nomic production and exchange, and the social organization
necessarily following from it, form the basis upon which is
built up, and from which alone can be explained, the political
and intellectual history of that epoch; and, consequently
the whole history of mankind (since the dissolution of primi-
tive society, holding land in common ownership) has been a
history of class struggles, contests between exploiting and
exploited, ruling and oppressed classes; that the history
of these class struggles forms a series of evolution in which,
nowadays a stage has been reached where the exploited and
oppressed class — the proletariat — cannot attain its emancipa-
tion from the sway of the exploiting and ruling class — the
bourgeoisie — without at the same time, and once and for all,
emancipating society at large from all exploitation, oppres-
sion, class distinctions, and class struggles."
Analysis of the statement: In this statement there are
several important propositions. First, that class divisions
and class struggles arise out of the economic life of society.
Second, that since the dissolution of primitive society,
which was based upon communism, mankind has been
divided into economic classes, and that all its history has
been a history of struggles between these classes, ruling
and ruled forever warring against each other. Third, it is
implied rather than stated that the different epocns in human
100
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 101
history have been characterized by the interests of the ruling
classes of these epochs. Fourth, that a state has now been
reached in the evolution of society in which the struggle
assumes the form of a contest between the proletariat and
the capitalist class. Fifth, that the proletariat by eman-
cipating itself will destroy all the conditions of class rule,
and in doing so will emancipate all society from the evils
attendant upon class struggles.
Opposition to the theory: No other phase of the Socialist
philosophy has attracted so much criticism as this doctrine
of the essential antagonism of social classes. The criticism
has taken two distinct forms — that of denying the existence
of social classes, and that of accusing the Socialists of
fomenting class hatred.
That there are no class distinctions in America has been
a part of the national tradition. The absence of legalized
caste and of all titles of nobility, and the numerous examples
of self-made men — the rail-splitter who became President,
and the millionaires who as poor boys sold newspapers on
the streets — lend support to the tradition. There is no
formal legal barrier separating the classes, and the nouveau
riche is still a familiar type. This form of criticism is based
upon the false assumption that a social class must necessarily
be a crystallized social group, the membership of which is
based upon inheritance. But though we have no hereditary,
titular ruling class, the division of the population into classes
is very obvious.
The second form of criticism directed against the theory
tacitly admits the existence of social classes, but denies that
they are based upon antagonistic interests which are irrecon-
cilable. It asserts that the major interests of the two classes
are identical, and ascribes all industrial conflicts to "unfor-
tunate misunderstandings between capital and labor," or
to the work of "dangerous agitators." It accuses the
Socialists of inciting the workers to violent assaults upon the
industrial order, from which assaults the workers themselves
must suffer equally with their employers.
This criticism, it may be admitted, is generally honest
and sincere. It is based upon an entire misconception of the
whole theory, however. It assumes that the Socialists are
engaged in creating a class struggle, instead of which they
102 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
are simply directing attention to the existence of a class
struggle resulting from the conditions of social evolution.
The class struggle is, from the Socialist point of view, simply
a law of social development, for which the Socialist is as
little responsible as Newton was for the law of gravitation.
There were class struggles thousands of years before there
was a Socialist movement.
Definition of the word "class": It will help us to avoid
much confusion and misunderstanding of the theory if we
start with a clear conception of the meaning of the word
"class." What is an economic class? In order that we may
intelligently discuss any theory based upon the existence
of economic classes we must first of all be able to answer
that question.
In the first place, the term obviously refers to a grouping
of individuals based upon economic relation and status.
It does not refer to the grouping which results from a selective
process based upon the choice of the individuals because
they are congenial to each other, or because they hold certain
ideas in common. Such a grouping, however large it might
be, would not be an economic class. It is not enough to say
that the grouping must be based upon economic relation and
status, however. All the persons connected with the steel
industry, for instance, from the multi-millionaire head of a
corporation to the poorest paid laborer, might be regarded
as a class, because of that economic relation and status,
that is, because they were all engaged in a distinct branch
of economic activity, regardless of the fact that the multi-
millionaire on top and the laborer at the bottom might
well be said to live in different worlds.
The income basis: Many writers have taken income as
the most satisfactory basis for the classification of society
into economic classes. Mr. W. H. Mallock, for example,
in his Classes and Masses, makes relative income the test
of class membership, and arbitrarily divides English society
into classes accordingly. By this method a skilled artisan
earning two pounds a week and a feeble-minded pensioner
of a rich relative living upon two pounds a week are regarded
as belonging to the same "class," despite the fact that the
artisan has never known the luxury of a week's rest, and
that the pensioner has never done a day's work. The income
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 103
basis results simply in the old, crude and unscientific division
of society into rich and poor.
The source of income basis: The only satisfactory basis
for the classification of society is that of similarity of eco-
nomic functions and interests in the prevailing economic
system. In other words, source of income, rather than
amount of income, is the test of class membership. In every
form of industrial society there appears a social class forma-
tion based upon the source of income or mode of obtaining
the necessities of life common to the members of the respec-
tive classes. Within each class the individuals may compete
against each other, each striving to obtain as large a share
as possible of the total available wealth, but the unity and
solidarity of the class as a whole is invariably shown by its
resistance to any attack made upon its material interests
by any other class. The characteristic features of an eco-
nomic class, then, are that its members are united by their
general economic interests, and that as a whole the class
opposes every attempt of any other class to invade its
interests.
We may say, therefore, that an economic class consists
of an aggregate of persons having similar specific interests
in the prevailing economic system, and whose functions in
that system are likewise similar. Thus it is the special
interests of the producers, as producers, which make them
a class. They may share certain important general interests
with all the rest of society, but their particular interests as
producers they hold against all the rest of society. By
similarity of functions we do not mean identical functions.
Miners and bakers are engaged in very different occupations,
but they perform similar functions in the sense that they
are producers of wealth and not mere consumers. As
against all who are consumers of wealth merely, they have a
common class interest.
Antiquity of class divisions and struggles : Class divisions
have existed ever since slavery began in the epoch of barbar-
ism. When prisoners of war began to be exploited rather
than killed, society became for the first time divided into
definite classes. The conflict of interests between master
and slave is obvious. The class struggle existed even though
the ignorance, degradation and lack of opportunity for dis-
104 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
cussion which limited the slaves made effective resistance
impossible. Sporadic revolts were always crushed with
relentless brutality.
The feudal age is one of recognized social class distinctions.
The conspicuous divisions were between lord and serf,
whose interests were as obviously antagonistic as those of
master and slave in the preceding regime. Feudal class
distinctions also arose through conquest, as, for example,
the subjugation of the Britons by the Saxons and, later, by
the Normans. As we have seen, the freemen who settled
in the towns as tradesmen and craftsmen developed by the
eleventh century a powerful middle class, closely organized
in guilds and gaining control of some of the most important
sources of wealth. The interests of this class were opposed
to those of the feudal nobility just as were the interests of
the serfs, but they were better able to make effective resist-
ance and to wage war upon the nobility. By the beginning
of the nineteenth century this class had won a complete
victory and itself became the dominant, ruling, employing
class.
Character of classes in capitalist society: The capitalist
class in its victory brought with it out of its life as a subject
class the theories of political democracy and laissez faire.
It established the modern State in such a form that no legal
guarantee of the integrity of any class was possible. The
rigidity of class divisions under feudalism was broken and
passage from class to class became common. But the de-
velopment of the economic has accomplished by a gradual
and almost imperceptible process that which the State
could not do. It has made the passage from the lower class
to the class above increasingly difficult, and, while there
is no guarantee as yet of the absolute integrity of the master
class, practically that result has, to a very large degree,
been attained. Transition from the status of wage-worker
to that of capitalist, which was common and relatively easy
in the earlier stages of capitalism, becomes increasingly
rarer and more difficult with the era of concentration and
the immense capitals required for industrial enterprise.
Passage from the lower class to the upper tends to become
almost as rare as the transition from pauperism to princedom
in the Old World. An impecunious coachman may marry a
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 105
princess, and so enter the sacred circles of royalty. Such
instances are little rarer than marriages between common
laborers and the daughters of our lords of industry and
finance. Thus class lines tend to become permanently fixed.
The principal and characteristic class division of capitalist
society is that which separates the employing, wage-paying
class from the employed, wage-receiving class. It is clear
that where it is to the interest of the employer to produce
as cheaply as possible and sell at the highest rate of profit,
his interest conflicts with that of the wage-worker, who
wishes to get the highest possible wage for the least possible
effort, and who has no responsibility for the conduct of the
business as a whole. The exceptionally loyal and efficient
man may become a foreman, or even a partner in the business,
but if all employees were equally loyal and efficient they
would be no better off, as a group, than now. If they turned
out a greater product, their wage under the competitive
wage system might even be less. As employer and employee,
then, their particular interests are fundamentally antag-
onistic.
The Economists on class divisions: The contention is,
then, that the employer as such and the employee as such
have opposing interests for which they must struggle in order
to maintain or improve their status, and that in consequence
society becomes stratified along the lines of these class
divisions. These facts have been perceived clearly enough
by some of the great economists. Thus, Adam Smith, in
his Wealth of Nations, states the matter as clearly and forcibly
as any Socialist of the present day:
"The workmen desire to get as much, the masters to give
as little, as possible. The former are disposed to combine
in order to raise, the latter in order to lower the wages of
labor. . . . Masters are always and everywhere in a sort
of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise
the wages of labor above their actual rate. To violate this
combination is everywhere a most unpopular action, and a
sort of reproach to a master among his neighbors and equals.
. . . Masters too sometimes enter into particular combina-
tions to sink the wages of labor. . . . These are always
conducted with the utmost silence and secrecy until the
moment of execution. . . . Such combinations, however, are
106 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination
of the workmen; who sometimes too, without any provoca-
tion of this kind, combine of their own accord to raise the
price of labor. . . . They are desperate and act with the
extravagance and folly of desperate men, who must either
starve or frighten their masters into an immediate compliance
with their demands. The masters upon these occasions
are just as clamorous upon the other side and never cease
to call aloud for the assistance of the civil magistrate, and
the rigorous execution of those laws which have been enacted
with so much severity against the combinations of servants,
laborers and journeymen."1
The basis of the class struggle, and the fact that an
improvement in well-being intensifies rather than checks
class strife, are clearly suggested by the following passage
from John Stuart Mill:
"Notwithstanding the effect which improved intelligence
in the working classes, together with just laws, may have in
altering the distribution of the produce to their advantage,
I cannot think it probable that they will be permanently
contented with the condition of laboring for wages as their
ultimate state. To work at the bidding and for the profit
of another, without any interest in the work — the price of
their labor being adjusted by hostile competition, one side
demanding as much and the other paying as little as possible
— is not, even when wages are high, a satisfactory state to
human beings of educated intelligence, who have ceased to
think themselves naturally inferior to those whom they
serve. They may be willing to pass through the class of
servants on their way to that of employers; but not to
remain in it all their lives."2
Common general interests of the classes: Aside from
these special relations, the classes have many things in
common. As in the case of the lord and the serf, the capital-
ist and the laborer may belong to the same church and
have religious interests in common, but even here, more than
ever before since the founding of the Christian Church,
religious bodies tend to give the same recognition to class
1 Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, Vol. I, Book I, chap. viii.
2 John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy, Book IV, chap.
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 107
lines as do secular organizations. A poorly dressed woman
feels as much out of place in an aristocratic church as she
would in an aristocratic club. The classes may also have
common racial and national interests, and these may at
times even counterbalance their economic antagonism.
They may even have a common industrial interest in the
development of an industry in which they are engaged, and
fear equally the results of depression in trade or of hostile
legislation.
Individuals versus classes: There will always be found
in every class individuals who either do not recognize their
class interests, or who consciously ignore them. To the
former group belong those workingmen who, unconscious of
their class interest, take the side of their employers in
industrial disputes, refuse to join labor organizations and
boast of their loyalty to their employers. To the latter
group belong those who subordinate the class interest which
they clearly perceive to some other interest which they
regard as being more important. Among such interests
may be mentioned the racial and religious interests. Thus
we find workingmen of one race joining together to exclude
the workingmen of another race from employment and from
social and political recognition, frequently enabling the
capitalist class to increase its powers of exploitation through
using one set of workers to fight the other. Thus, too, in
all periods of social transition we find members of the ruling
class making common cause with the class in revolt.
Marx calls attention to this fact in a memorable passage :
"Finally, in times when the class struggle nears the
decisive hour, the process of dissolution going on within the
ruling class, in fact within the whole range of old society,
assumes such a violent, glaring character that a small
section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the
revolutionary class, the class that holds the future in its
hands. Just as, therefore, at an earlier period, a section
of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie, so now a portion
of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat, and in par-
ticular a portion of the bourgeois ideologists, who have
raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically
the historical movements as a whole."
It is very evident that a fair statement of the theory as
108 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Marx and Engels conceived it is itself a sufficient reply to
those critics of the theory who have pointed to the fact that
men like Robert Owen, Marx, Engels, Lassalle, and many
others who have played an important part in the history of
the Socialist movement itself have come from the ruling
class. Crude statements of the theory by ill-informed ex-
ponents may offer some excuse for such criticism, but it is
manifestly foolish and unfair to judge any theory by the
crudest and least capable presentation of it.
Revisionist criticism of the theory: While the dominant
and all-absorbing conflict in present society is that which
goes on between the wage-paying and wage-receiving
classes, these two groups do not constitute the whole of
society. This is especially true in the United States which
is still very largely an agricultural nation. We must con-
sider the rather inchoate and ill-defined interests of the large
so-called middle class, consisting of farmers, retail traders,
petty manufacturers, and so on. Marx and Engels, as
noted in an earlier chapter, regarded the imminent dis-
appearance of this class as certain and self-evident. Assum-
ing so much, they could ignore its existence as a transitory
incident and present the picture of a conflict in which the
lines are automatically fixed, or perhaps a better expression
would be, a conflict in which an instinctive alignment of
society takes place upon the basis of ascertainable and con-
flicting economic interests.
Bernstein and other Socialists of the Revisionist school
have criticised the theory in this particular, and pointed to
the fact that the middle class has not yet disappeared, but
is even increasing in numerical strength through the increase
in the number of small stockholders. Bernstein suggests
too, that the workers cannot properly be regarded as a
homogeneous class. Admitting that under capitalism the
wage- workers have more common interests than conflicting
ones, and in that sense constitute a class, he holds that the
abolition of capitalism would at once reveal the fact that
the proletariat consists of many diverse elements, differing
greatly from each other, and, therefore, bound to divide
into new classes instead of abolishing all classes as Marx
and Engels predicted.
Granting that Bernstein is right in criticising the assump-
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 109
tion in the Communist Manifesto that the workers are a
homogeneous mass, equally devoid of property, family and
independence, it does not follow that we must accept his
view that the differences in needs and interests will remain
unmodified after "the propertied and governing classes are
removed from, or deprived of, their positions," and become
the basis of a new arrangement of classes. The criticism fails
in that it presupposes a sudden transformation from capital-
ist ownership to Socialist ownership, without any serious
modification of the position and constitution of the pro-
letariat.
Relation of the middle class to the proletarian struggle:
In the acute phases of the struggle between the capitalist
class and the proletariat, the middle class occupies a very
unenviable position. Many of its members are struggling
desperately to avoid sinking into the proletarian class, while
many others are struggling out of the working class into the
ranks of the class above. It is impossible to state with
exactitude the attitude of this indefinite class toward the
proletarian class in its struggle against the capitalist class.
In general it may be said that, just as a man whose income
is wholly or principally derived from the labor of others,
through the ownership of the means of production and ex-
change, is a member of the capitalist class, so a man whose
income is wholly or principally derived from his own labor
is a member of the working class. In general, that section
of the middle class which depends wholly or in principal
part upon rent, profit and interest for its maintenance will
manifest little sympathy with the producing class in its
struggles. On the other hand, the sympathies of that section
of the middle class which depends primarily upon its own
labor, and only secondarily upon rent, interest and profit,
will, in general, manifest little sympathy with the capitalist
class.
The middle class is inclined to oppose the pretensions of
the capitalist class, but at the same time little inclined to
sympathize with the working class. It fears most of all
the interruption of business. The members of the middle
class as a rule would prefer to have all class conflicts cease,
but care very little how a settlement is effected. It is from
this class that we hear most about the "essential identity
110 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
of interest" of the workers and their employers. The mem-
bers of this vague class suffer both from high prices and the
increasing power of the workers to demand high wages.
They blame the "Trust" for all their major ills, and the
"agitators" for all their minor ones. Having no well denned
interests as a class, the middle class pursues no consistent
policy. It sees in the manifestations of the class struggle
little more than personal inconvenience, and does not rec-
ognize its far-reaching significance. But with the growth
of the great monopolies, which exploit the petty traders and
small farmers almost as much as they exploit the wage-
workers, though in other ways, there is a marked tendency
on the part of a considerable proportion of the middle class
to make common cause with the worker in the one sphere
where such unity is possible, that of political activity.
Expansion of the concept of class: As a result of the
criticisms directed against the class struggle theory in its
narrowest form, and the experience which they have gained,
the Socialist parties of the world manifest an increasing
tendency to expand the meaning of the term "working
class." Wilhelm Liebknecht, the astute political leader of
the German Social Democracy, in a paper which was post-
humously published, wrote : "A tiny minority alone demands
that the Socialist movement shall be limited to the wage-earn-
ing class. . . . We ought not to ask 'Are you a wage-earner?'
but 'Are you a Socialist?' If it is limited to the wage-earners,
Socialism cannot conquer. If it includes all the workers and
the moral and intellectual elite of the nation, its victory
is certain." Liebknecht then continues to argue that the
Social Democracy is "the party of all the people with the
exception of two hundred thousand great proprietors, small
proprietors, and priests."
Class consciousness: The recognition of the existence of
social classes, and of the interests upon which they are
based, is what the Socialist means by "class consciousness."
The capitalist who accepts the system as it is, and joins
with the other members of his class to embrace every advan-
tage which presents itself is class conscious. Likewise,
the worker who recognizes that in the long run his interests
are those of his class, and who joins with his fellows to obtain
a larger share of the product of their labor, is class conscious.
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 111
The Socialist argues that the whole working population
must be aroused to a recognition of their class interests.
The victory of the capitalist class in the struggle would
mean the destruction of democracy in a hopeless capitalist
despotism. On the other hand, the victory of the working
class would not result in class despotism, the substitution
of one ruling class for another, as all previous class triumphs
have done, but in the abolition of the conditions without
which no class rule can exist, namely, class ownership and
control of the things upon which society as a whole depends.
Class consciousness does not mean class hatred : Because
they seek to arouse the workers to a consciousness of their
class interests, the Socialists are often bitterly condemned
and accused of seeking to stir up class hatred. This is
very obviously an unjust charge. Whether the class struggle
theory be accepted or not, it is essential that it be not mis-
represented. The Socialists do not create the class struggle.
If we admit its existence, we must admit that it has its
roots in economic conditions which the Socialists have not
shaped, but which have developed in the course of centuries
of evolution. What the Socialist does is to call attention
to the class struggle and to the antagonism of economic
interests which creates the struggle. By awakening the
workers to a recognition of the class struggle and the forces
which determine its existence, Socialism tends to divert
the wrath and the revolt of the workers from individual
employers to the system itself, because it compels them to
see that the capitalist class, like their own, is a product of
evolution, and that the individual capitalist is no more
responsible for conditions than the individual wage-worker.
By discouraging the idea of independent personal attack,
and fostering belief in association upon class lines for the
purpose of improving conditions by economic and political
activity, Socialism has undoubtedly done much to make the
peaceful, evolutionary solution of the labor problem possible
through political channels. It must, therefore, be regarded
as one of the great constructive forces of modern times.
Organization of laborers and capitalists : With the advent
of machine production and the development of the factory
system, the old system of bargaining between masters and
wage-workers assumed a new form. Under the domestic
112 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
system there was a large degree of competition, both among
the masters and among the wage-workers, and although
the masters had a certain advantage of position the journey-
man was still able to obtain a relatively large share of the
product. The individual or corporate employer of hundreds
of working people, on the other hand, has an overwhelming
advantage, especially where little skill is involved and when
labor-saving devices are being continually introduced. The
employer can fix a wage-scale which the worker must accept
or leave. There is no bargain.
If, however, all or a large part of the available labor is
organized, so that a strike against the employer's wage-scale
will effectually close the factory, the workers can have some
bargaining power. Labor unions appeared almost as early as
the beginnings of capitalistic concentration and have been
from the first bitterly opposed by the employing class. Fail-
ing to crush the unions by legislation directed against com-
bination, the employers themselves resorted to the organiza-
tion of associations for the protection of their interests
against the demands of the labor unions. Thus they were
able to do away with a great deal of the competition in their
own ranks for labor, which the unions had taken advantage
of in their efforts to increase wages. The result has been
the intensification of the class struggle. Highly organized
associations of employers are lined up in opposition to the
gigantic federations of labor unions, and the conflict becomes
more and more severe from year to year.
Thus we have a regimentation of the forces of industry
in which industrial initiative, on both sides, is subordinated
to the interests of the class; a manning of forces like great
armies on the field of battle. The directive and admin-
istrative genius of the capitalist class must not only manage
industry itself, but must devote a large part of its attention
to the organization and leadership of the capitalist forces
in the class war. The directive and administrative genius
of the working class must in like manner be devoted to the
organization and leadership of the forces of that class. But
unlike the leaders of the capitalist forces, the labor leaders
have no voice in the direct management of the industrial
processes, and are, therefore, at a big disadvantage.
The weapons of class warfare: The first and most prim-
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 113
itive form of class warfare is that of physical violence. It
is the natural expression of a feeling of outraged justice.
The only method of struggle open to the slave of antiquity
was that of murderous revolt. Even the early revolts against
the capitalist system took the form of machine smashing.
Violence is always met by violence, and the greater resources
of the masters in every age, together with the alienation of
public sympathy which occurs when it is resorted to, make
an appeal to violence a very dangerous thing for the working
class. The recognition of this fact has sometimes led em-
ployers secretly to incite violence in order to discredit the
workers and justify repressive measures.
Organized labor is able to use the strike or the threat of a
strike as a means of enforcing its terms. The capitalist
analogue of the strike is the lockout, in which the employer
refuses all work to the men until they agree to his terms.
The boycott directed against the products of a particular
establishment, or against all goods made by non-union labor,
has as its counterpart the blacklist of the employer directed
against the workman who has been active in asserting the
interests of his class. The blacklist is very effective in
checking the activity of potential union leaders.
The capitalist control of the State enables the employers
to call to their assistance the police and the militia, and even
the regular army of the United States. Still more important
is the power to bring about class legislation and, through the
judiciary, class interpretation of the law. The power of
the judiciary over legislation has been developed in the
United States to a greater extent than in any other country.
The Supreme Court may annul any law passed by Congress
by declaring it unconstitutional, and only by the slow
processes of death, resignation and appointment can the
court be reconstituted and such an opinion reversed. Im-
peachment proceedings are only possible in cases of personal
misconduct, and even then are too cumbersome for practical
use. Not only can the Supreme Court nullify legislation,
but it can directly legislate by reading into a law a signif-
icance which has been expressly rejected by Congress. These
powers were never specifically given to the court, but the
customs and precedents of a century have given to the
exercise of the powers practically all the authority of constitu-
114 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
tional sanction. The power of the judiciary is used with
damaging effect upon the unions by means of the issuance
of injunctions in labor disputes. Under an injunction
directed against any or all persons involved in labor troubles
a striker or union official can be arrested and imprisoned
without jury trial.
Political organization of the proletariat: To meet and
overcome the capitalist use of the agencies of the State,
the forces of labor in every industrial nation are being forced
into political activity upon class lines. Class conscious
working people are everywhere organizing into Socialist or
Labor parties for the express purpose of gaining control of
the machinery of the State. The capture of the State by the
proletariat, through political education and organization of
the workers, is the primary aim of all Socialist parties.
With the conquest of the powers of the State by the pro-
letariat class ownership of the means of production and
exchange will be abolished. Then, for the first time in
history, will true democracy, true Socialism and true indi-
vidualism be possible. This does not mean that there will
be a perfect human society in which no differences will
exist. There may even be classes in a certain sense of the
term, but not the present horizontal stratification of society.
There may be social struggles, struggles between races and
religions, but these are no part of the problem of Socialism,
which concerns itself only with the next step in social
evolution.
THE CLASS STRUGGLE THEORY 115
SUMMARY
1. History has been largely a record of struggles between economic
classes.
2. In modern society the class struggle assumes the form of a con-
flict between the capitalist class and the proletariat.
3. The basis of the class divisions is a difference in source of income
and not in the amount of income.
4. Class consciousness is the recognition of the existence of social
classes and of the interests on which they are based.
5. Both great economic classes organize their forces and both use
all the available industrial and political weapons in the prosecution
of the struggle.
QUESTIONS
1. What do Socialists mean by the class struggle?
2. What are the principal criticisms of the theory of the class struggle,
and what are the Socialist answers to these criticisms?
3. Why cannot the amount of individual wealth be taken as a basis
of class division?
4. What is meant by the middle class, and what is its relation to
the class struggle?
5. Explain what is meant by class consciousness.
6. What is the social function of the employers' association?
7. What is the place of the trade union in the class struggle?
8. What is the purpose of the blacklist? The boycott?
Literature
Ghent, W. J., Mass and Class.
Kautsky, K., The Class Struggle (Das Erfurter Program.)
London, Jack, The War of the Classes.
Marx, K and Engels, F., The Communist Manifesto.
Mitchell, John, Organized Labor.
Simons, A. M., Class Struggles in America.
Spargo, John, Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation of Socialist
Principles, Chap. VI.
CHAPTER XII
VALUE AND PRICE
Introductory remarks : We come now to that phase of our
subject which is the most difficult, namely, the political
economy of Socialism in general and the much disputed
theories of value and surplus-value in particular. Enough
books and pamphlets have been written explaining, attack-
ing and defending these pivotal Marxian doctrines to form
a large library by themselves. Contrary to the old adage
that "in a multitude of counsellors there is wisdom," the
student is more than likely to be confused by the multitude
of counsellors represented by this voluminous literature.
The subject is necessarily somewhat abstract and difficult.
To master it requires patience and perseverance together with
at least ordinary capacity for mental perception. If the
student has these, the most elemental requisites of sound
scholarship, he will find that the difficulties to be mastered
are only great enough and numerous enough to stimulate
his intellectual ambition and energy.
Pitfalls to be avoided: The way of the student will be
made easier if certain common causes of confusion are fore-
seen and avoided. One of the most common of these causes
of confusion lies in the fact that many students and critics
of Marx enter upon the study of his theories with precon-
ceived mental concepts more or less clearly defined, but alto-
gether erroneous, of which they do not divest themselves.
With this bias as a foundation they are practically unable to
get a mental picture of Marx's theories which is not more or
less distorted by their preconceived errors. For example,
the student who has read a little political economy and
something less of Socialism has heard or read the claim made
by some critics of Marx, such as Mr. W. H. Mallock, that
the central idea in Socialist economics is that all wealth is
the product of ordinary manual labor, and, therefore, ought
116
VALUE AND PRICE 117
in justice to belong to the laborers. Later on he encounters
the formula in which Marx states his proposition that the
value of commodities is determined by the amount of socially
necessary human labor power which they represent. If his
mind were not already warped and biased, he would investi-
gate the theory of which the statement quoted is the formula,
instead of which he is very apt to regard it as a confirmation
of the altogether absurd statement of Marx's theory made
by his critics. To avoid this pitfall which has trapped so
many unwary feet, it is necessary that the student should
divest his mind of all preconceptions of the subject and begin
his study of Marx with an open mind, as though he had never
before heard of Marx, of wealth, of value or of labor. That
is the only attitude compatible with sound scholarship.
Another prolific source of error to be avoided is the unschol-
arly habit of beginning a study in the middle, or anywhere
else than at the beginning. This habit is one which is at all
times to be avoided, but in the case of a thinker like Marx
it is especially dangerous. For Marx moves with precise
method in his reasoning, step by step. If we do not begin
with him at the beginning and follow him closely we cannot
hope to escape confusion and difficulty. We may think
that we know perfectly the meaning of such terms as
"wealth," "capital," "labor" and "value," and that we need
not stop to consider his definitions. If that is our attitude
we are doomed to inevitable confusion. We think of capital,
for example, as consisting of things — "wealth used for the
production of new wealth" — but when Marx uses the word
he is not referring to things at all. He is referring to some-
thing very different, namely, an abstract quality, a social
relation between persons expressed through the medium of
things. We shall have occasion to refer to this particular
term at greater length hereafter; it is sufficient here and now
to cite the one example of the confusion which must arise
if we begin our study anywhere else than at the beginning.
We must close this admonitory introduction with one
other warning. The student must not attempt to divide the
synthesis of Marxian theory and regard its parts separately.
He must not attempt to study the theory of value as a
thing apart from, and having no necessary connection with,
the economic interpretation of history. If he does he will
118 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
not only miss the most significant contribution of Marx to
modern thought, but he will inevitably be forced to disregard
the boundaries of the theory of value, if we may use the
term. In other words, where Marx says that under such and
such conditions, and only then, certain consequences result
from certain causes, the student who does not observe the
qualification in the statement, will find many instances
where such consequences do not result from such causes.
He will therefore decide that Marx was mistaken, instead
of which he mistakes Marx. Where Marx said that under
certain definite conditions A would cause Z, the student
has supposed that A must cause Z under any conditions.
Marx's sociological viewpoint: Political economy, or
economics, may be denned as the science which investigates
and explains the nature and source of wealth, and seeks to
discover the laws which govern its production, distribution
and exchange. In its broadest sense it also has to do with
the regulation of man's social activities in so far as they affect
the production, distribution and exchange of wealth. The
science of economics, as such, is not limited to the investiga-
tion and explanation of the phenomena of which it treats
under any specified conditions. That is to say, it may very
properly deal with the subject of wealth in all its aspects
at any period of history, or in any place.
By the opening sentence of his great work, Capital, Marx
makes it perfectly clear that he deliberately limits himself
to the subject of wealth production and exchange under cer-
tain sharply defined conditions, which limitations we must
observe in order to understand him. Calling his work an
analysis of capitalist production, he says in the first para-
graph: "The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist
mode of production prevails presents itself as an immense
accumulation of commodities, its unit being a single com-
modity. Our investigation must therefore begin with a
single commodity."
The significance of this opening paragraph for us, at
present, lies in the fact that it makes perfectly plain the
sociological viewpoint of Marx, and the close interrelation
VALUE AND PRICE 119
of his theory of social evolution and his economic theories.
It is only in societies in which the capitalist mode of pro-
duction prevails that wealth assumes the form of massed
commodities. In other stages of social development wealth
assumes other forms, but in these we are not interested,
our purpose being simply to analyze the capitalist mode of
production. It is obvious, therefore, that our first step must
be to understand the nature of the unit of wealth, the single
commodity. The familiar illustrations drawn from the life
of Robinson Crusoe on his island, and of the "economic
man," will not assist us, for neither has any place in a society
characterized by the capitalist mode of production. Thus
at the very outset we are compelled by the inexorable logic
of Marx's method to recognize the unitary character of his
theoretical system. It is one whole. His economic theory is
simply the application of his general theory of historical
development to a particular epoch, the epoch of capitalism.
Definition of commodity: Within the capitalist stage of
social development, then, the unit of wealth is a commodity.
It follows, therefore, that the production of wealth must
take the form of the production of commodities. But what
is a commodity? Marx answers in a very lucid manner:
a commodity must first of all be a material object which by
its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another.
It makes no difference what the nature of such wants may be,
or how they are satisfied. Whether the object satisfies a
fundamental physical need, as food does, or merely gratifies
our fancy and gives us pleasure, as a toy gratifies the fancy
of a child, is unimportant. Whether it serves directly as a
means of subsistence or indirectly as a means of production
matters not. The essential point is that a commodity must
possess utility, it must be useful in the broad sense that it
possesses the quality of satisfying some human need or
desire. This property of an object is called its use-value.
But a thing which possesses use-value is not of necessity
a commodity. Not all objects which possess utility can be
called commodities. Air and light, for example, have un-
bounded utility and are absolutely indispensable to life, but
they are not commodities. To call sunlight a commodity,
as Professor Nicholson does,1 is to destroy the value of the
1 J. S. Nicholson, Elements of Political Economy, p. 24.
120 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
term for intelligent discussion. Air and sunshine are not
commodities, but what the economists call "free goods."
Even the thing which I make for my own use, which per-
fectly satisfies some need of mine, and has very great use-
value, is not necessarily a commodity. The question arises,
then, what other quality than use-value must a thing
possess to be a commodity? Marx answers that, in addition
to being a utility, it must also possess the quality of being
exchangeable — it must have exchange-value. A commodity,
then, is an object which has two fundamental qualities,
namely, the quality of being useful and the quality of being
exchangeable for other objects.
Exchange-value: When we say that an object has ex-
change-value we mean that it is salable, exchangeable for
other things. But exchange and sale are terms which refer
to human actions, social relations between two or more per-
sons, and not to any physical properties of the things sold
or exchanged. The use- value of a thing, as we have seen,
is a quality that is inherent in the object itself. The thing
I make for the satisfaction of my own needs possesses the
inherent quality of use-value, but if I try to sell it or to
exchange it for something else which I desire, I find that no
one will buy it, or take it in return for what I want. No
one desires it. Here we have the index to the solution of
our problem: exchange-value is a social concept. It is
based upon desirability. In order to have exchange-value,
a thing must have the quality of being useful to and desired
by others than its owner. When a thing is desired by others
we say that it has social utility, the quality of being useful to
others.
An object becomes a commodity, then, only when it has
two qualities: (1) It must have utility — be capable of
satisfying some want or desire on the part of its owner; (2)
It must have social utility — be capable of satisfying some
want or desire on the part of some person other than its
owner.
Exchange of commodities: In primitive society the pro-
duction of wealth was carried on by individuals for their
own use. But in modern society, industrial society, produc-
tion is carried on by social groups principally for exchange.
That is to say, the persons employed in a factory are not
VALUE AND PRICE 121
engaged in making things which they themselves, or their
employer, desire and expect to use, but things which other
people are assumed to desire for their use and to be willing
to buy. So the economic life of capitalist society is concerned
with the production of commodities and their exchange at a
profit. That is what the Socialist means when he declares
that under capitalism production is carried on for profit
and not for use.
This exchange of commodities is not carried on through
barter. The maker of one commodity, say shoes, does
not go to the maker of another commodity, say bread,
and barter shoes for bread. Production and exchange are
conducted upon too vast a scale for that. The exchange is
carried on through the medium of one important commodity,
money. To say that a pair of shoes will sell for so much
money and that the money will in turn buy twenty-five
loaves of bread is to say that one pair of shoes will exchange
for twenty-five loaves of bread, or, in other words, that the
exchange- values of twenty-five loaves of bread and one pair
of shoes are equal.
Determination of relative exchange-values: Now, the
question arises, what is it that determines the relative ex-
change-values of commodities? Let us suppose that pink
parasols and wheel-barrows are selected from among the
multitude of commodities because they happen to be approx-
imately equal exchange-values and, at the same time, very
much unlike each other. How shall we account for the fact
that two commodities so dissimilar in appearance, and whose
functions are so different, come to be exchanged upon an
equality in the market? To be able to answer that question
is to understand the principal economic mechanism of
capitalist society, and that is our only objective.
At first thought our analysis of a commodity seems to
offer a ready solution to the problem. If a thing may be
a use-value and yet be valueless in an economic sense, and
if in order to have any exchange-value at all it must be a
social use-value, then it is natural to suppose that relative
degrees of social utility determine relative values. The
familiar "marginal utility," "final utility" and "supply
and demand" theories of value are all based upon this
fundamental assumption. As we shall have to discuss these
122 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
theories later on, we need not pause to consider them here,
except to say that the Marxian theory of value does not
involve the assumption that relative social utility has no
influence upon exchange-value. But, whatever influence
relative social utility may have upon the exchange-value of
individual commodities of the same kind, as silk hats, for
example, it is obviously not an explanation of the relative
values of different kinds of commodities when exchanged
against each other. The relative social utility of the wheel-
barrow may differ from the relative social utility of the
parasol quite as much as the two commodities differ in
physical appearance and in function. We may introduce a
third commodity, differing equally from both the others,
alike in general characteristics and in relative social utility
— a pair of spectacles, for instance — and find that it exchanges
for either of the others upon a basis of equality.
Views of the pre-Marxian economists : If at this stage we
pause to analyze any number of commodities, we shall find
that when we have carefully observed and noted all their
differences they have at least one quality in common. They
may differ in size, shape, weight, color, texture, function,
simple utility, social utility, in short, in every respect except
one — they are all products of human labor, or, as Marx
would say, crystallizations of human labor-power. It is
an axiom of political economy that all wealth is the result
of an application of human energies to natural resources,
and every unit of wealth is, therefore, an embodiment of
labor-power. Here, then, say the Socialists, we have at
least a hint of the solution of the great problem which lies
at the heart of the system of exchange in capitalist society.
The amount of labor-power represented by these various
commodities is in some manner connected with their relative
values. So far, no modern economist will disagree. That
there is some relation between the labor spent in producing
economic goods and their value is universally admitted.
Most of the great economists before Marx held the view
that the relative value of- commodities to one another is
determined by the relative amounts of human labor-power
consumed in their production. With slight variations, this
theory was held by nearly all the great economists from Sir
William Petty in the seventeenth century to John Stuart Mill
VALUE AND PRICE 123
in the latter half of the nineteenth century. A few citations
upon this point must suffice:
Petty' s view: Sir William Petty takes silver and corn for
comparison:
"If a man can bring to London an ounce of silver out of
the earth in Peru in the same time that he can produce a
bushel of corn, then one is the natural price of the other;
now, if by reason of new and more easy mines a man can
get two ounces of silver as easily as formerly he did one,
then the corn will be as cheap at ten shillings a bushel as
it was before at five shillings a bushel, cceteris paribus." x
Adam Smith's view: Adam Smith, in his Wealth of
Nations, takes the same view:
"The real price of everything, what everything really costs
to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble
of acquiring it. What everything is really worth to the man
who has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of it or
exchange it for something else, is the toil and labor which it
can save to himself, and which it can impose on other people.
. . . Labor was the first price, the original purchase money,
that was paid for all things. ... If among a nation of
hunters, for example, it usually costs twice the labor to
kill a beaver which it does to kill a deer, one beaver would
naturally be worth or exchange for two deer. It is natural
that what is usually the produce of two days' or two hours'
labor, should be worth double of what is usually the produce
of one day's or one hour's labor."2
Ricardo's view: "To convince ourselves that this (quan-
tity of labor) is the real foundation of exchangeable value,
let us suppose any improvement to be made in the means
of abridging labor in any one of the various processes through
which the raw cotton must pass before the manufactured
stockings come to the market to be exchanged for other
things; and observe the effects which will follow. If fewer
men were required to cultivate the raw cotton, or if fewer
sailors were employed in navigating, or shipwrights in con-
structing the ship in which it was conveyed to us; if fewer
hands were employed in raising the buildings and machinery,
1 William Petty, A Treatise on Taxes and Constitutions (1662), pp.
31-32.
2 Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, Vol. I, chaps, v-vi.
124 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
or if these, when raised, were rendered more efficient; the
stockings would inevitably fall in value, and command less
of other things. They would fall because a less quantity
of labor was necessary to their production, and would there-
fore exchange for a smaller quantity of those things in which
no such abridgment of labor had been made." l
John Stuart Mill's view: John Stuart Mill is less definite
than Ricardo, but he says that "Every commodity of which
the supply can be indefinitely increased by labor and capital,
exchanges for other things proportionately to the cost neces-
sary for producing and bringing to the market the most
costly portion of the supply required."2 Elsewhere he says
that of the component elements of cost of production, "the
principal of them, and so much the principal as to be nearly
the sole, we found to be labor."3
Meaning of the labor theory of value : It would be exceed-
ingly disingenous to suggest that all these great economists4
regarded all labor as being of equal value, and considered the
labor of an unskilled laborer to be equally as valuable, hour
for hour, as that of a highly skilled artisan. It would be
equally disingenuous to suggest that in the term "labor"
they included nothing but ordinary manual labor, or that
they held the labor value theory in the absolute sense as
meaning that if a good workman made two coats in the same
time as it took a poor workman to make one coat, the two
coats would only equal the one in value. While it is not
always made as clear as it might be, it is evident that in
1 David Ricardo, Principles of Political Economy and Taxation,
chap, i, § iii.
2 J. S. Mill, Principles of Political Economy, Book II, chap. vi.
3 Idem, Book III, chap. iv.
4 To the list of authors quoted might well be added the names of
Benjamin Franklin and Henry Charles Carey, two of the most original
of our early American economists. Franklin regarded trade as being
"nothing but the exchange of labor for labor, the value of all things
being most justly measured by labor." (Remarks and Facts Relative
to the American Paper Money [1764], p. 267.) Carey went even
further, and contended that the value of all commodities, and evon
of land, is determined by the labor necessary, under present conditions,
to reproduce the commodity, or, in the case of land, the labor necessary
to bring new land to the same stage of productiveness. See his Prin-
ciples of Political Economy (1838-1840). Carey is in many respects
worthy of much more consideration than he has ever received at the
hands of his own countrymen.
VALUE AND PRICE 125
saying that the value of commodities is determined by the
labor spent in their production they were referring to an
average process, a general rule, not to its manifestation in
particular individual commodities. It is also evident that
they were referring to average labor, that is, labor of average
skill and productivity. Finally, it is evident that, with rare
exceptions, the economists who accepted the theory that the
basis of the value of commodities is the labor crystallized
in them meant social labor, rather than the labor of particular
individuals or sets of individuals. Thus, when Ricardo, in
the passage already quoted, refers to quantity of labor,
he includes not merely the labor of those immediately con-
cerned in making stockings, but all the indirect labor, even
to the building of the ships in which the raw cotton is
transported.
Marx and the labor theory of value : Marx further devel-
oped the concept of social labor as the basis and measure of
value. He saw that machine production had made it
impossible to measure exactly the labor spent in the produc-
tion of any single commodity. He recognized the futility
of making any attempt to do anything of the kind. If we
take even a very simple article made by hand labor, it is
practically impossible to determine the amount of social
labor it embodies. Let us consider an ordinary table: even
if we could measure the individual labor spent in felling the
tree and sawing it into the boards of which the table was
made, and the labor of the man who made the table itself,
we could not measure the share of the social labor expended
in making the tools used, the labor of the tool-makers and,
before them, the coal and iron miners. We could not measure
what share of the total volume of labor spent in constructing
the railroads over which the lumber was hauled is repre-
sented in the table. When we pass from such simple hand
labor to the complex machine production of modern indus-
try, it at once becomes apparent that no human intellect
could ever calculate the amount of social labor contained
in any given commodity, and that in the actual process of
exchanging commodities in every-day life there can be no
calculation of the relative labor content of individual com-
modities by individual purchasers and vendors. When we
go into the market to buy goods we do not make a mental
126 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
calculation and as a result refuse to pay as much for one
article as for another upon the ground that it required less
social labor to produce it, and that it is therefore of less value.
If the value of commodities is determined by the social labor
expended in their production, the law must be a general one,
applying to the system of production and exchange as a
whole, rather than to individual commodities, and it must
operate automatically, as it were.
This is, in fact, exactly what Marx claims. Setting out to
discover the general law of value in capitalist society, the
principle which determines the value of masses of products
against other masses of products, and of dissimilar products
against each other, rather than the value of unit commodities
against other units of the same kind, he concludes that the
value of commodities, as a rule, is determined by the amount
of socially necessary human labor power represented by
them. In other words, the value of commodities is deter-
mined by the amount of social labor necessary, on an average,
under the conditions existing at a given time and place,
to reproduce them. This is not determined absolutely,
in individual cases, but approximately in general, by the
bargaining and higgling of the market, to adopt a phrase
used by Adam Smith.
II
Misdirected criticisms of the theory: With the theory
thus delimited, we are in a position to consider some of the
criticisms of it which have been made by non-Socialist
economists.
(a) As to "unique values": One of the most common
criticisms of the Marxian theory of value assumes its applica-
tion to every article of value, and ignores the fact that, as
we have seen, Marx specifically limits its application in such
a manner as to exclude a large number of such articles. Let
us consider, for example, the category of what modern econ-
omists call "unique values" or "scarcity values," articles
which owe their value to their extreme scarcity, which can-
not be reproduced by labor, and the value of which is ob-
viously independent of the amount of labor which was origi-
nally necessary to produce them. To this category belong
VALUE AND PRICE 127
such articles as great auk's eggs, rare postage stamps, auto-
graph letters, rare manuscripts and other articles associated
with great personages and events — such as Napoleon's snuff-
box, Oliver Cromwell's sword, or the mummy of Rameses.
We need only to consider the terms in which Marx formu-
lates his theory to see the irrelevance of all that criticism
which argues that, because such unique values cannot be
accounted for on the basis of the labor spent in their pro-
duction, the labor theory of value must be defective. As
an explanation of all values of every kind it may be admitted
that the theory is not all-inclusive. But that is judging it
upon a wrong basis, and differs only in the degree of its
stupidity from condemning the theory because it does not
explain how the circle may be squared. Such articles are
not reproducible by labor, that is to say, no possible amount
of human labor could reproduce the exact utilities in them.
Napoleon's snuff-box or Cromwell's sword might be exactly
duplicated as regards their physical properties, but the
special quality which gives them their great value, their
association with the great historical personages to whom
they once belonged, is not reproducible. A morbid collector
might be willing to give a fortune for an authenticated tooth
of Julius Caesar, but that fact would not in any manner
tend to weaken the Marxian theory of value. That theory
deals with the system of production and exchange prevalent
"in those societies in which the capitalist mode of production
prevails" and the production of Napoleon's snuff-boxes,
Shakespearian folios, great auks' eggs and Caxton books is
not a part of that system.
But let us consider "scarcity values" of another kind.
A man walking across the desert picks up a diamond, then
another, and yet again another. The exertions of a few min-
utes have given him diamonds valued at thousands of dollars.
How is the value of the diamonds determined? Surely not
by the labor which was spent in picking them up. That
much is self-evident, and those critics of the Marxian the-
ory who, like Bohm-Bawerk, suppose meteoric lumps of
gold falling to earth and being picked up, and imagine that
the theory can be thus easily disposed of, overlook its
central idea. In the case of the diamonds, their value is
determined by the amount of social labor necessary, on an
128 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
average, to reproduce them, that is, to secure an equal num-
ber of carats of equal purity. If diamonds could be normally
obtained so easily their value would fall to zero: they would
become what the economists call "disutilities." So in the
case of Professor Bohm-Bawerk's imaginary lump of meteoric
gold: if gold usually fell from the heavens in big lumps,
so that all we needed to do to secure a sufficient supply was
to go and gather the lumps, the value of gold would be deter-
mined by the amount of labor necessary, on an average, to
gather it up. The value of gold might then fall below that
of coal or iron.
(b) The meaning of "labor": What do we mean by
"labor"? One of Marx's critics, Mr. W. H. Mallock, who
criticises the definition of labor which Marx gives, himself
defines it as "the faculties of an individual applied to his
own labor,"1 as distinguished from "ability," which consists
of the intellectual faculty of direction applied to the superin-
tendence and direction of the manual labor of other people.
Against this silly jumble of words, which means nothing,
let us set the luminous and lucid definition of Marx: "By
labor power or capacity for labor is to be understood all
those mental and physical qualities existing in a human being
which he exercises when he produces a use-value of any
description."2 In the light of this definition it becomes
very evident that all the numerous criticisms which rest
upon the assumption that Marx regarded only ordinary
manual labor as creating value fall of their own weight.
Like all other economists, Marx includes in his concept of
labor every form of productive effort, mental as well as
physical.
The meaning of the term "socially necessary human
labor" which Marx uses may be more easily expressed by
the term abstract labor. It must be confessed that this is
somewhat difficult to comprehend. It is easy to see that,
because the word labor may be equally applied to simple,
unskilled manual labor and to labor which is highly skilled
and specialized, any theory which makes labor the determi-
nant of value must lead to difficulty and confusion unless
1 Socialism, by W. H. Mallock, M.A., of England, The National Civic
Federation, New York, p. 36.
2 Capital, by Karl Marx (Kerr edition), Vol. I., p. 186.
VALUE AND PRICE 129
some means is employed whereby all labor is reduced to one
common denominator. This Marx does by reducing all
kinds of labor to simple, abstract labor.
In other words, Marx regards highly skilled labor as so
much ordinary unskilled labor multiplied. An hour of
skilled labor contains several hours of simple, unskilled labor,
for we must somehow and somewhere reckon the social labor
spent in acquiring the skill. This reduction of superior
labor to average, unskilled labor appears to be purely
arbitrary, and makes labor as abstract a term as value. It
is true that average unskilled labor varies greatly in char-
acter in different countries at different times, but in a given
society it is as stable as anything human can be. But while
this reduction of all labor to terms of average unskilled labor
appears to be purely arbitrary, in reality it is only a theo-
retical formulation of an empirical law of every-day life. The
reduction of all forms of labor to one common form or
standard is made every day in actual exchange. Commodi-
ties varying greatly are uniformly valued in money. But
money itself is a commodity, and the exchange through its
medium of other commodities which are the products of
many different kinds of labor, implies the ultimate reduction
of the value of all to the value-basis of one. This process,
too, like the determination of value itself, is not the result
of conscious effort on the part of individuals or of society,
but goes on unconsciously and indirectly, through the
higgling of the market. There is not, and cannot be, any
absolute measure of value. All value is relative — the value
of commodities being measured by other commodities.
Neither is there any absolute measure of the labor time
contained in commodities. All that Marx claims is that
by a social process, namely exchange, the ratio of which is
determined by the higgling of the market, all forms of labor
are ultimately expressed in, and therefore measured by,
simple human labor.
(c) Productive ability: It is sometimes urged that the
Marxian theory of value is deficient in that it excludes, or
at least does not duly regard, directive or managerial ability.
It is only necessary here to point out that in so far as this
directive ability is productive in any sense it is clearly
comprehended by the definition of labor which Marx gives,
130 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and which we have already quoted. So far as the claim is
made that profits are really nothing more than proper
rewards for the exercise of such directive ability, we shall
consider it under Surplus- Value.
The price-form (or price-expression) of value: In con-
sidering the nature of commodities we saw that in order to
be a commodity an article must have two characteristics:
it must be a useful object — using that term now in its
ordinary, non-technical sense — and satisfy some need of a
particular individual, and it must be an exchangeable
object, having a social use-value. The usefulness of an
object to its owner, using the term "usefulness" as before,
may be said to be its value in its natural form, while its
exchangeability may be said to be its value in social form.
It is only the latter form of value which the science of eco-
nomics considers. The simple utility of an object may be
considered and estimated by itself, without regard to other
objects, but not so its exchange- value. If we take a barrel
of flour we can at once perceive its simple utility. So many
loaves of bread can be made from it, which will provide
us with food for so many days. To ascertain this we do not
need to compare it with any other object. But if we desire
to estimate its value in an economic sense, its worth, we
are compelled to consider, not its inherent qualities, but
its relation to other objects.
Considered as economic values, all commodities are con-
crete expressions of human labor. This common quality
makes them exchangeable against each other. But the
direct exchange of commodities is not a practicable way of
carrying on the exchange relations of modern society. So
all commodities are exchanged through the medium of one
commodity, called money. Thus, the value of all commod-
ities is expressed in quantitative terms of the medium of
exchange, that is, in amounts of money. If commodities
were exchanged for each other by means of direct barter,
it would be found that some commodities would exchange
equally for some other commodities, because they happened
to represent equal amounts of socially necessary human labor.
Thus, a bushel of wheat and a yard of linen might be equal
values. Other commodities, representing unequal amounts of
socially necessary labor, would be exchangeable according to
VALUE AND PRICE 131
their relative social labor content. A yard of silk, for
example, might be worth five yards of linen and a ton of
coal worth two yards of silk.
Money : Let us suppose that it was desired to adopt some
one of the foregoing commodities as a standard of value, by
which the value of the others might be measured and through
which they might be exchanged. The commodity so chosen
would become money, and the system of exchange would
become a system of money economy. If we look over the
list of commodities and consider their special characteristics
we shall note at once that two of them, wheat and coal,
are too bulky to serve conveniently as media of exchange.
It would not be convenient to transfer such bulky payments
as five tons of coal or fifty bushels of wheat each time ten
yards of silk changed hands. Linen would be a far better
medium. In case it was selected it would be money and the
value of the other commodities would be expressed in yards
of linen.
In various times and places hides, salt, shells, wheat,
powder, tobacco, and a multitude of other things have served
as money. But for various reasons the precious metals,
gold and silver, have been most favored by trading nations.
How did gold come to be chosen as the standard of value
by most of the great modern nations? Because gold was
relatively rare and it required a large amount of labor, on
an average, to procure a small quantity of it; a very small
piece had a very high value as compared with, say, iron.
This made it admirable as a medium of exchange for the
reason that a large value in gold could be carried or stored
away more easily than an equal value in a bulkier commod-
ity. Thus, before its advantages caused its selection as the
value-measure of commerce, gold was a commodity like
all other commodities, subject to the same laws. Even now
all gold is not money, and such part of the gold supply of
the world as is not money is subject to the same laws as
all other commodities, subject, of course, to the qualification
that the monetization of gold protects it and gives it a
measure of monopoly-value.
Relation of price to value : Before we can exchange goods
through the medium of money we must somehow reduce the
value of the goods to money terms. Value has no corporeal
132 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
existence, that is, no existence apart from the comparison
of things with each other. It is an abstraction. When we
express the value of a given commodity in money terms,
we really measure it first of all in money, and, through
money, in other commodities. This measure of value we
call price. Although some economists use "price" and
"value" as interchangeable terms, they are not synonymous
and should not be so used. They are closely related but
not identical. If value were an absolute thing an absolutely
perfect price-form would be identical with the value. Neither
of these conditions exists, however, and, as an approxima-
tion of value, price is subject to many fluctuations. In a
free market, prices sometimes fall below and sometimes rise
above values. If we conceive value as production cost plus
average profit we shall be able to understand this more
clearly. The production cost of commodity A and com-
modity B being equal, their values are equal. But in actual
trade A may, for some time, sell for either more or less than
B. In a free market — and of such Marx wrote — this is a
result of the relation of supply and demand to each other
with regard to the commodity affected.
If the supply of commodity A greatly exceeds the demand
for it, the price will naturally fall. If the demand greatly
exceeds the supply, on the other hand, the price will rise.
In the case of commodity B there may be a more perfect
equilibrium between supply and demand, so that its price
remains stable and closely approximates its real value. Thus,
we have the phenomenon of equal values selling at unequal
prices. But we must not forget that the unequal prices do
represent equal values. That this is the case we can easily
ascertain by watching closely the effect of supply and demand
upon prices, and noting how narrowly it is bounded by
value. Over-supply causes a depreciation of prices. But
presently supply slackens. Producers will not continue
production at their usual rate of speed unless they can get a
price approximately equal to the value of their commodity.
As a result of the diminished supply, prices rise. Or again,
prices are soaring as a consequence of an insufficient supply.
Demand is brisk, but supply is slow and sluggish. Presently,
there is a perceptible slackening of demand, or a perceptible
stimulation of supply, or both. Prices fall in consequence.
VALUE AND PRICE 133
It is not denied, therefore, that the relation of supply to
demand has a very important effect upon trade, that it
causes many of the commercial crises through fluctuations
of prices. All that is claimed is that it is not the determinant
of value, and that it is value, as such, which sets the limits
to the influence of supply and demand upon prices.
The "marginal utility" theory: As a theory of value, the
so-called "Austrian" theory of final or marginal utility does
not differ, except in the form of its expression, from the
old supply and demand theory. All that we have said of
the latter theory applies to it. According to this theory,
the value of anything is determined by our estimate of its
capacity to satisfy the wants of ourselves or others, in other
words, by its desirability — to quote Jevons — or the degree
of its social utility. To say that the value of an object is
determined by its power to give satisfaction, as Menger,
Jevons and others do, and to say that it is determined by
the amount of labor socially necessary for its production,
as Marx does, appears to involve a violent contradic-
tion.
But if Menger and Jevons really mean by value what
Marx means by price, and not what he means by value, the
contradiction disappears. On the other hand, if we assume
that Menger and Jevons are not referring to price but to
value, and find that they admit that the influence of marginal
utility, is like that of supply and demand, ultimately bounded
by the amount of social labor, while Marx admits the
influence of marginal utility in that sense — that is, upon the
price-form of value rather than upon value itself — the
violent contradiction also disappears. Among the Socialist
writers of to-day there is an increasing tendency to regard
the Marxian theory of value as including the marginal utility
theory.
Propositions to be established: It is our present purpose
to attempt to establish two propositions. They are (1) that
the marginal utility theory of value is the supply and demand
theory under another name; (2) that Marx's theory of value
definitely includes all that is important in the theory of
marginal utility. In order that we may not misunderstand,
or misstate the theory, we will adopt the statement of it
made by Professor Seligman, one of its leading exponents,
134 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
italicizing a few passages in order to attract special attention
to them:
"If a starving wayfarer suddenly spies an apple, it will have a supreme
utility for him because it stands between him and death. If he finds
a second apple, it will still be welcome, but it will fill a somewhat less
intense want. With every additional apple his appetite will be more
appeased, until with, let us say, the tenth apple he will reach the point
of satiety and be on the margin of doubt whether to consume any more.
The utility of each apple — its capacity to satisfy his desire — has dimin-
ished until the tenth apple is the last which affords any utility at the
moment. The utility of this tenth apple is called final because it is
the final apple, or marginal because on the margin of desire.
"It is plain that the marginal utility of any apple depends on the
quantity at one's disposal. The greater the quantity, the less keenly
will he feel the particular want. If he had only five apples, the marginal
utility of the fifth would be considerable because his last want satisfied
would still be urgent. The degree of marginal utility depends on the
strength of the want last satisfied, or, it might be said, on the urgency
of the next satisfied want.
"The second point to be noted is that at any given time the utility
of each apple is equal to that of the la t and therefore to that of any
other (of the same size and quality). If the available supply is five
apples, any one of the five apples may be considered the final or marginal
unit, that is, the last unit in point of time. The wayfarer will lay his
hands on any one of the five without particular choice; whether he be-
gins with one or with another is immaterial, because he knows that one
is as good as another.
"Thirdly, in estimating the utility of the entire supply of apples,
we must distinguish between the total utility and the marginal utility
of the stock. The total utility of a stock is obtained by adding the
utility of each additional apple to that of its predecessor. It will ac-
cordingly grow until the point of satiety has been reached. Ten apples
possess more total utility than five. The marginal utility of the stock,
however, is always equal to the marginal utility of the final unit multi-
plied by the number of units. The marginal utility of two apples will
be twice that of the second, of four apples, four times that of the fourth.
Here, as before, the marginal utility of the stock will increase, but not
up to the point of satiety. After a limit has been reached, the marginal
utility of a stock begins to decline. The marginal utility of eight apples
may be less than that of five, even though the total utility is undoubt-
edly more.
"... When we speak of the marginal use of a commodity to any one, we
think of him as on the brink of not wanting any more. He may reach
the margin because, with the diminishing utility of each increment, he will,
if the supply is large enough, come to the point where there will be no
consciousness of any economic value at all."1
Proposition I: Professor Seligman's statement of the
theory is very lucid and simple. From it we gather that the
*E. R. A. Seligman, Principles of .Economics (1905) pp. 177-178.
VALUE AND PRICE. 135
marginal utility of commodities is inversely proportionate to
the quantity available. If there were only one apple, the
starving wayfarer would be willing to give all he possessed
to secure it. Having consumed it and nine others, he is
willing to take a tenth, but is so near the point of satiety
that he will give little or nothing for it. Offer him a hundred
more and he will spurn them. He does not want them; they
are not utilities now, but disutilities. What is this indeed
but the supply and demand theory?
Instead of a hungry wayfarer, let us take a whole com-
munity. Apples being very scarce command high prices.
There is a large effective demand for them. For every apple
there are ten bidders. Now, some enterprising dealer,
hearing of the good market for apples, brings in a hundred
bushels and offers them for sale. The price he gets, while
still high, is less than the price which apples brought before
when there were ten bidders for every apple. Now a second
dealer appears with a thousand bushels, so that there are
more than enough apples to satisfy the demand, and, in
consequence, apples fall in price. In the language of the
final utility theory, their degree of utility has decreased
as the quantity available has increased. If a third dealer
should bring in a thousand bushels more, it would be impos-
sible to give the apples away, perhaps. They would be
valueless, or, in Professor Seligman's words, "the utility
is zero and the commodity is no longer an economic
good."
Jevons, to whom more than to any other economist of the
English-speaking world, the development of the theory is
due, admits that the final degree of utility "varies with the
quantity of commodity, and ultimately decreases as that quantity
increases. ,n Oddly enough, he chooses for an illustration
of his theory exactly the same example as Lord Lauderdale
chose in 1804 to illustrate his theory of the dependence of
value upon the interaction of demand and scarcity, and his
reasoning is the same. Says Lauderdale: "Water ... is
one of the things most useful to man, yet it seldom possesses
any value; and the reason of this is evident ; it rarely occurs
that to its quality of utility is added the circumstance
of existing in scarcity; but if, in the course, of a siege, or
1 W. S. Jevons, The Theory of Political Economy, p. 62.
136 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
a sea-voyage, it becomes scarce, it instantly acquires
value."1
Compare this with Jevons: "We cannot live a day without
water, and yet in ordinary circumstances we set no value on
it. Why is this? Simply because we usually have so much
of it that its final degree of utility is reduced nearly to zero.
. . . Let the supply run short by drought, and we begin to
feel the higher degree of utility, of which we think but little
at other times." 2
Unless we are to revolutionize the English language and
change its entire vocabulary, these citations must be regarded
as sufficiently proving our first proposition, namely, that
the marginal or final utility theory of value is, fundamentally,
the same as the supply and demand theory of an earlier
generation of economists. As such, it is subject to the limita-
tions set for it by the nature of value itself. Marginal
utility does not confer value upon the masses of commodities
the exchange of which constitutes the trade of capitalist
society, however much it may affect the realization of the
value in price form of any particular commodity at any given
time or place. This is the essential point to be made against
the theory as a theory of value. That considered as a state-
ment of the influence of relative scarcity or abundance upon
prices it is in some respects superior to the older formulations
of the same principle, and more useful as an explanation
of particular price movements, may be granted by the most
orthodox Marxist.
Proposition II : Our second proposition, that the Marxian
theory of value includes all that is important in the marginal
utility theory, can, we believe, be easily established. We
accept as our initial premise the conclusion arrived at as a
result of the consideration of our first proposition, namely,
that the marginal utility theory is of importance only as a
statement of the main cause of price fluctuations in a state
of free competition. Now, Marx never at any time denied
the influence of relative scarcity and abundance upon prices.
On the contrary, his whole theory involves recognition of
the fact that the interaction of supply and demand — or as
1 Lauderdale, An Inquiry into the Nature and Origin of Public Wealth,
p. 16
a Jevons, op. cit., p. 62.
VALUE AND PRICE 137
we may now say, the degree of utility — regulates "the tem-
porary fluctuations of market prices."1 His explanation of
the manner in which the "higgling of the market' ' fixes
the ratio of exchange between different commodities may be
cited in proof of the fact that he gives it full recognition.
But what Marx does is to point out the limitations of this
influence, imposed upon it by value itself. When supply
and demand are equal, prices are said to represent "true
value," or "pure value." Under such conditions, when
supply and demand balance each other, what creates value ?
Nor is Marx blind, as Bohm-Bawerk and his followers
allege, to the varying degrees of utility. His theory rests
upon the fundamental assumption that value is inseparable
from social utility as distinguished from mere usefulness.
The most useful thing, inherently considered, for which
there is no effective demand can have no value, no matter
how much labor has been consumed in its production. All
his reasoning implies a recognition not only of general social
utility, but of relative social utility. When he uses the term
"socially necessary labor" it is not merely "average" labor
that he refers to. A commodity may have been produced
in the average labor time, but if that time was not spent
for a "socially necessary" purpose, that is, if the commodity
itself was not socially necessary, it would be wrong to speak
of the commodity as embodying so much socially necessary
labor. If a man in the tropics makes snowshoes, even though
he makes them with average speed and skill, the snowshoes
will not be the embodiment of "socially necessary labor"
any more than they themselves will be socially necessary.
If a trader takes a lot of panama hats to the arctic circle
the hats will have no value, even though each one consumed
in the making an average amount of labor, time and skill.
The reason is obvious: there is no demand for the hats —
they are not socially necessary, and, therefore, are valueless.
It is a very puerile criticism to point to the fact that the
hats are so many "embodiments of human labor," and to cite
the illustration as a "refutation" of Marx's theory. In the
first place, the hats themselves do not conform to the
fundamental requirement of the theory that commodities
must be social use-values. In the second place, the labor
Walue, Price and Profit, by Karl Marx, p. 24.
138 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
embodied in the socially unnecessary hats cannot, in that
time and place, be considered as "socially necessary labor."
The term as Marx uses it is an extension of his concept of
social use-value to the labor spent upon the production of
an object. It is therefore quite evident that Marx never
loses sight of the factor of relative utility. All that the theory
of supply and demand, and its modern statement the theory
of final utility offers is a mode of explaining the fluctuations
of prices around the norm of value. And that is included in
the Marxian theory.
Jevons' admission: On the other hand, it remains to be
said that the claim here set forth of the limitations of the
marginal utility theories, under whatever name they may
be put forth, has been substantially admitted by no less an
authority than Professor Jevons himself. It is admitted
by Jevons that the final utility of commodities is not, in
actual practice, determined independently of the labor neces-
sary for their production. He says in one passage of his
celebrated work that his theory of final utility "leads directly
to the well-known law, as stated in the ordinary language of
economists, that value is proportional to the cost of pro-
duction."1 He rests his whole logical structure ultimately
upon labor, making it the final determinant of value. His
argument is as follows:
(A) The cost of production determines supply.
(B) Supply determines final degree of utility.
(C) Final degree of utility determines value.
If A, cost of production, determines B, degree of utility,
and C is in turn caused by B, is not A the ultimate cause of
C? The greater contains the lesser, and the Marxian theory
of value contains all that there is of value in the theory of
marginal utility.
Monopoly-price: In view of the foregoing, it is only
necessary to refer briefly to the subject of monopoly-price.
When we discuss the subject of value and price we assume
free market conditions. Under such conditions prices may
for a time rise above or fall below values, but sooner or later
the equilibrium of the two forces will be restored and prices
will approximate values. Where monopoly or near-monopoly
exists, we have to reckon with a new factor, the artificial
1W. S. Jevons, The Theory of Political Economy, 3rd ed., p. 186.
VALUE AND PRICE 139
elevation of prices above value — virtually an abrogation of
the law of value. The development of great monopolies and
near-monopolies has greatly increased the number of com-
modities which, for considerable periods, are placed outside
of the sphere of the labor theory of value, their price being
determined solely by the desire of the buyers on the one
hand, and, on the other hand, the power of the sellers to
control the supply.
140 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. Marx maintains throughout his work a sociological point of
view, and discusses production only under the social conditions of
capitalism.
2. An object is a commodity and has exchange-value only when it
possesses social utility.
3. The relative exchange-values of commodities are determined by
the average amount of socially necessary human labor needed to re-
produce them at a given time and place.
4. The price of a commodity fluctuates about its value in response
to the interaction of supply and demand.
5. There is no essential difference between the marginal utility
theory of value and the supply and demand theory; and the Marxian
theory definitely includes all the important features of other theories
of value.
QUESTIONS
1. How does Marx define Labor?
2. What are the limits of Marx's study of economic production?
3. What is a commodity?
4. What, according to Marx, determines relative exchange-value?
5. How does this position compare with the view of Petty? Of
Adam Smith? Of Ricardo? Of J. S. Mill?
6. How are unique values determined?
7. Explain how the labor theory can be applied to the determination
of the value of diamonds?
8. Explain the concept of abstract labor.
9. What is meant by price? How is it determined?
10. What is the difference between price and value?
Literature
Boudin, L. B., The Theoretical System of Karl Marx.
Deville, G., The People's Marx.
Hyndman, H. M., The Economics of Socialism.
Marx, Karl, Capital (especially Vol. I.). A Contribution to the
Critique of Political Economy. Wage Labor and Capital. Value, Price
and Profit.
Spargo, John, Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation of Socialist
Principles, Chap. VII and VIII.
CHAPTER XIII
SURPLUS-VALUE
Introductory: We have already noted the fact that the
form of industrial society in which we live, and which we
call capitalism, is characterized by the production and
exchange of commodities or wares, salable goods. The sole
motive of capitalist enterprise is the sale of goods at a profit.
So long as the capitalist can obtain a satisfactory profit he
does not care — except in rare instances, which need not be
considered — what kind of commodities he deals in. If a
greater profit can be obtained from the manufacture and
sale of shoddy clothing than from the manufacture and sale
of good clothing he will, so far as he is free to do so, concern
himself with the former. This is too obvious a fact to require
demonstration. It is one of the commonplace expressions
of every-day life that men are in business "for the profit
there is in it." This is not a moral criticism of capitalist
society, but a simple recognition of one of its essential and
characteristic features.
The objective of capitalist production being the realiza-
tion of profit, it follows that if our analysis of capitalist
society is comprehensive and helpful we must learn a good
deal about profit, its nature, its origin and its function in
the social organism. Marx's theory of surplus- value is an
explanation of these phenomena.
Exchange of equal values : In our discussion of value and
its price-form we saw that the exchange of commodities
takes place through the medium of money, itself a commodity.
We are now to consider the process of exchange itself. That
somehow or other profits are realized through the exchange
of commodities is evident, but that does not mean that the
proportion of the total of existent values which we call
profit is created by exchange. On the contrary, it is very
easily seen that it is not. If two men, A and B, exchange
141
142 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
goods of unequal value tor each other, unit for unit, it is
certain that one will receive a larger for a lesser value, and
so profit by the transaction. It is equally certain, however,
that no new value is created by the transaction. The sum
total of values is the same after the transaction as before,
only a change in ownership has taken place, not a change in
the magnitude of the values themselves. We shall have to
return to this subject later on: for the present it is enough
to note that, even when unequal values are exchanged,
profit is not created by the act of exchange.
Upon the whole, the exchange of commodities takes the
form of the exchange of equal values. This does not mean
that all commodities are exchanged for one another, unit
for unit. A lead pencil is not exchangeable for an auto-
mobile. What is meant is that, as a general rule, capitalist
exchange consists of the exchange of equal values, not of
unequal ones. The basis of value being the abstract labor
represented by the object of value, the rule is that commod-
ities representing equally sums of abstract labor will exchange
for one another upon a plane of equality. If the unit of
commodity A represents a social labor content of 100 and the
unit of commodity B represents a social labor content of 10,
then the exchange-value of A as compared with that of B
will be as ten is to one — it will require 10 units of B to pur-
chase 1 unit of A.
Advantageous exchange without profit: Let us suppose a
case of simple exchange. A farmer has 100 bushels of wheat
which he desires to exchange for, say, farm implements.
A manufacturer of farm implements who desires the wheat
offers the farmer a mowing machine, a plow and a horse-
rake, the three implements being approximately equal to
the wheat in value. If the value of the implements was
materially less than that of the wheat the farmer would
not agree to the bargain: he would prefer to sell the wheat
for money and with the money buy the implements he desired.
On the other hand, the manufacturer would likewise be
careful to insist upon getting a value in wheat equal to the
value of the implements he was giving. The transaction is
equally beneficial to both parties, each obtains a use-value
for what is, to him, not a use-value. But there is no increase
of value as a result of it, no profit.
SURPLUS-VALUE 143
If the exchange instead of being made directly had been
made indirectly through the medium, the farmer selling his
wheat for 100 dollars and then paying 100 dollars for the
implements to the manufacturer, who in turn paid 100 dol-
lars for the wheat, the result would not be different. Exchange
of commodities does not add to the magnitude of their
value any more than the act of changing a twenty-dollar
bill for twenty one-dollar bills adds to the amount of money.
Wholesale exchanges: Stated in this simple form, it is
easy to see that exchange does not add to value. But the
wholesale exchange which goes on in capitalist society re-
quires a vast and complicated mechanism to be exclusively
devoted to the circulation of commodities. The farmer and
the manufacturer of implements are not personally acquainted.
They may be separated by hundreds or even thousands of
miles. So the farmer sells his wheat for cash to dealers who
send it to markets scores or even hundreds of miles away,
where it is sold for cash to the consumers. On the other
hand, the farmer buys his implements for cash from a dealer
who has previously bought them from the manufacturer and
paid the cost of their transportation. The flour is sold to
the consumer at a price considerably higher than the farmer
received for it, and the farmer in turn pays more for his
implements than the manufacturer's price. Sometimes these
price increments are spoken of as profits, but they are not
profits at all. The cost of transporting the wheat from the
farm in Dakota to the market in Chicago or New York, to
the point where it becomes accessible to the consumer, of
storing it properly, and of retailing it in the quantities
needed by individual consumers, must be met, and is properly
part of the cost of production. For the wheat has not been
"produced" in an economic sense until it has been made a
utility to the consumer. The same thing may be said of
the implements which the farmer buys, and of all commodities
in general. Thus to the first, or simple, production cost,
illustrated in the cost of producing wheat on the farm from
sowing to threshing, and in the manufacture of shoes at the
factory from the raw material, leather, to the finished goods
packed for shipment, there is added an additional cost
which brings the total to what we may call the final, or
social production cost. Just as relative exchange values
144 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
are measured against each other in terms of abstract labor
by the higgling of the market, so are these elements of final
production cost adjusted and balanced.
The exchange of unequal values : The exchange of unequal
values does not in the slightest degree affect the principle
we are discussing. While normal exchange is the exchange
of equal values, the exchange of unequal values is not infre-
quent. A large number of the class of middlemen, jobbers,
brokers, dealers, speculators, and so on, do make profits
through unequal exchanges, by "selling dear/* as we say.
But again, the sum of value is not affected by such exchanges.
No part of that proportion of the sum of values which we
call profit is created by exchange.
"Buying cheap and selling dear" is therefore no explana-
tion of the gains to the capitalist class as a whole. And that
is the essence of our problem. We are not interested in the
fact that A makes an exchange with B and that A gains
what B loses, any more than we are in the fact that a pick-
pocket takes another man's money. In that case, also, one
gains and the other loses; but there has been no addition to
the sum of existent values. Individual members of the
capitalist class do lose, and their losses may, and often do
represent the gains of other individuals in that class, but the
capitalist class gains as a whole, and it is the sum of that
gain which we must explain.
How wealth is produced: Profits are a part of the total
wealth of society. That wealth is the product of a union
of labor and the forces of nature. The phrase, "Labor is the
source of all wealth" is occasionally met with in a certain
type of Socialist literature, but it is no part of Socialist
theory. In particular, it is not a part of the Marxian theory
of surplus-value as many writers suppose. On the contrary,
Marx takes particular care to make it clear that he does not
regard labor as the sole source of wealth. He quotes with
approval the words of Petty that "Labor is the father and
earth the mother of all wealth." He no more concerns
himself with the exact share of each of these agents in pro-
duction than we concern ourselves with the exact share of
each parent in the life of a child.1 What he does contend
^'The use-values . . . i.e. the bodies of commodities, are combina-
tions of two elements — matter and labor. If we take away the useful
SURPLUS-VALUE 145
is that labor is the source of all economic value. When
critics assail the Marxian theory on the ground that it makes
labor the sole source of wealth, they prove their ignorance
of Marx and their inability to distinguish between wealth,
consumption goods, and their value — an abstract quality.
The nature of capital: It is one of the characteristics of
"those societies in which the capitalist mode of production
prevails" that the laborers do not own the means of pro-
duction, the land, tools, machinery, factories and raw mate-
rials. Machine production upon a large scale makes it
impossible for the individual laborer to own these things.
Industrial evolution has separated the laborer from the
ownership of the material requisites of production. The
ownership of these things by others than the actual users of
them is the essence of the class division of capitalist society.
Capital, therefore, is not to be defined simply as "wealth
that is used to produce more wealth." It is all that and
something more. It involves the social relation of produc-
tion. Robinson Crusoe's spade and the familiar Indian's
bow and arrow used to illustrate capital in ordinary economic
discussion do not constitute capital at all as the Socialist
uses the word. Wealth used to produce more wealth under
certain conditions is capital. Under other conditions it is
not capital. Just as bricks do not constitute a house except
when they bear a certain relation to each other, or as a
negro is only a slave under certain conditions, though he is
always a negro, so a machine is only capital under certain
conditions. The concept of capital is inseparable from the
fundamental concept of capitalist production, namely, pro-
duction and exchange for profit. Capital is wealth that is
used for the production of more wealth with a view to the
realization of profit through its exchange. This is what
the Socialists mean when they say that capital is a "social
relation expressed through the medium of things." And
labor expended upon them, a material substratum is always left, which
is furnished by Nature without the help of man. The latter can work
only as Nature does, that is, by changing the form of matter. Nay,
more, in this work of changing the form he is constantly helped by
natural forces. We see, then, that labor is not the only source of
material wealth, of use-values produced by labor. As William Petty
puts it, labor is its father and the earth is its mother." — Karl Marx,
Capital, Vol. I, chap, i, p. 50. (Kerr edition.)
146 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
when Socialists speak of the "abolition of capital," it may
be added, they speak only of the abolition of that relation,
not of the material things.
Let us look briefly at the special form of social relation-
ship between the capitalist and the laborer which results
from the ownership by the former of the means of production.
The capitalist wants to unite the productive power of the
laborer to the means of production which he owns in order
that he may make profit out of the result of the union.
The laborer, on the other hand, must use the means of
production which the capitalist owns if he is to produce
wealth at all, and unless he does produce wealth he cannot
live. He cannot buy the means of production from the
capitalist. The only thing open to him is to sell that which
he has which the capitalist is anxious to buy, namely, his
laboring power, his capacity to produce new value.
Labor-power is a commodity: We come now to a rather
startling proposition, that the labor-power which the
capitalist buys is a commodity subject to the same laws as
all other commodities. To class human labor-power with
pig-iron as a commodity may at first seem rather fantastic,
but it is by no means an unwarranted classification. To be
a commodity labor-power must have three qualites: (1)
It must possess use-value; (2) it must possess exchange-
value; (3) its value must be determined by the amount of
abstract social labor which is represents, the socially neces-
sary labor which it embodies.
That labor-power possesses the first of these qualities
needs no demonstration. Its use-value is obvious. It is
also evident that it has exchange value. It is salable.
We speak of the "labor market" as freely and naturally as
we speak of the "wheat market." Or we speak of labor being
"cheap" or "dear" just as we do in the case of ordinary
commodities. The price of labor, wages, like the price of
all other commodities, fluctuates. It may be temporarily
lowered by the preponderance of supply over demand, or
elevated by the increase of demand over supply. It may be
made the subject of monopoly in certain cases, just as the
prices of other commodities may be made the subject of
monopoly. So far, then, the analogy holds good. But
can we say that the value of labor-power is determined by
SURPLUS-VALUE 147
the amount of socially necessary labor-power it repre-
sents?
Ricardo held that the natural price of labor depends on
"the price of the food, necessaries, and conveniences required
for the support of the laborer and his family," and that as
the price of these things rises or falls so will wages rise and
fall.1 From this principle Lassalle developed his famous
"iron law of wages" which greatly influenced the Socialist
propaganda. But while wages do tend always to approximate
the cost of the subsistence of the workers and their families
in any given time and place, under the conditions and accord-
ing to the standard of living generally prevailing, there are
many other factors to be considered. As Marx points out,3
the law is much more elastic in its operation than Lassalle
supposed. The living commodity is not a dead thing. First
of all, the fluctuations of price caused by the interaction of
supply and demand are very much more important than
LassahVs "iron law" implies. Second, "the standard of
living" is a very elastic term, and varies according to occupa-
tional groups, in different localities according to traditional
influences, according to race and nationality, and to the
general advancement of culture and the state of political
development, expressing themselves in legislation for com-
pulsory education, sanitary reforms, and other things which
raise the standard of living. Finally by organization the
workers may and do materially improve their standards of
living.
Wherein labor-power differs from other commodities:
Within the limits indicated, labor-power is a commodity
like any other. But there are important respects in which
it differs from every other commodity. In the first place,
"labor-power is not something apart from men, but is
inseparable from, and closely bound up with, the lives of
human beings. Beneath its price are psychological, physio-
logical and historical conditions that do not affect other
wares, and which introduce an element of permanence into
money wages greater than exists in regard to other goods." s
1 Ricardo, Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, chap, v.,
§35.
2 Cf ., Value, Price and Profit, by Karl Marx, chap. xiv.
* The Road to Power, by Karl Kautsky, p. 104.
148 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Wages do not respond freely to fluctuations in the prices of
the goods which enter into the laborer's standard of living
for the reasons already indicated. When prices rise, wages
are slow to follow. And even when prices fall, wages, while
they must ultimately follow, do not immediately fall.
Moreover, they do not fall at the same rate as prices in
general.
The laborer is in a peculiar position. He enters the labor
market as a seller of his one commodity, labor-power. That
commodity is not a thing apart from himself as are all other
wares, but is a part of himself. Having sold his labor-
power, he must go into the goods market and become a
buyer pure and simple. His interest as a consumer is to buy
cheap. Low prices are advantageous; high prices are dis-
advantageous. Having sold his labor-power to the capital-
ist, he confronts the product of that labor power in the
goods market as a ware offered for sale by the capitalist
who appeared in the labor market as a buyer of labor-
power, but now appears as a seller of labor product.
These differences between labor-power and all other com-
modities are all incidental to a greater difference. Labor-
power is used up in the production of other commodities,
embodied in them as it were. In this respect it resembles
all other commodities which, as raw materials, are similarly
used up. But labor creates new value in the process of being
used up, and this quality no other commodity has. In the
manufacture of shoes, for example, machinery, leather and
labor-power are used. The leather is used up, transformed,
but it does not add to its own value. Machinery is used
up to a degree, but it does not add to its own value. It
loses a part of its value through wear and tear and adds it
to the value of the raw material, to reappear in the value of
the product, shoes. But labor-power does increase its own
value in the process of being consumed.
Surplus-value: For the commodity he sells the laborer
receives its value, measured by the price-form, wages. As
we have seen, his commodity is a somewhat peculiar one
and its price laws are in some important respects peculiar
to itself. But for the purpose of illustration we will disregard
these peculiarities and assume that the laborer receives the j
full value of his commodity, the social labor cost of its pro-
SURPLUS-VALUE 149
duction. When purchased by the capitalist, this commodity,
like every other, belongs to the purchaser. Its use-value
belongs to him, and no more belongs to the laborer who sold
it than the sugar a grocer sells belongs to him after the sale.
The laborer has received the exchange-value of his commodity
in return for its use-value. Now, in being used up, the power
to labor which the laborer sells and the capitalist buys will
produce more than the equivalent of its own value. It may
produce twice the equivalent of its own cost of production,
twice its own value and price — the two terms being in this
case identical. This is the central idea of the Marxian theory
of surplus-value.
How surplus-value is produced: The capitalist buys the
labor-power of a given number of laborers for ten hours a
day. He pays the market price, wages, for this labor-power
and has it used up — just as raw materials are used up — to
produce other commodities for sale. When they have worked
five hours, let us say, the workers have produced value
equivalent to their wages. If they stopped at that point,
the capitalist would find added to the raw materials by labor-
power value equal to the price paid for the labor-power.
But the workers do not stop at this point. They go on
working for five hours more, creating further value. These
figures are, of course, arbitrarily chosen to illustrate a prin-
ciple. The principle itself would not be effected if we
assumed the working day to be twelve hours and further
assumed that it required ten hours to produce the value of
the labor-power. According to our illustration, then, each
worker gives the product of ten hours' labor in return for the
product of five. This balance represents the surplus-value
(mehrwerth) of the capitalist.
Such is the theory. We may further illustrate it by the
following example: Assume the average cost of subsistence
for a laborer and his family in a given time and place to be
$1.00 a day; that wages are equal to the cost of subsistence,
namely, $1.00 per day, and that it takes, on an average,
five hours' labor to produce that amount in value. A manu-
facturer employs 1,000 hands at $1.00 per day per man,
and the length of the working day is ten hours. The daily
cost of labor-power is, therefore, $1,000.00. The value of
raw materials used is also $1,000.00. The value of machinery
150 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and plant is depreciated to the extent of $100.00 a day. At
the end of ten hours it is found that the total values resulting
from the combination of these is greater than the sum of
all three by a sum exactly equal to the value of the raw
materials or that of the labor-power. The capitalist
paid, —
For labor-power $1,000.00
For raw materials 1,000.00
For repairs, replacement of machinery, etc... 100.00
$2,100.00
He receives for the gross product 3,100.00
The surplus-value is, therefore 1,000.00
It is obvious that this increase of value does not come into
being of itself. It can only have one origin, in the living
force, labor-power. Just as the simplest concept of wealth
involves the act of transforming some natural object by
human effort, so here human effort has been transforming
raw materials and creating new values.
Division of surplus-value: The surplus-value created by
the laborers does not of necessity all belong to the capitalist.
He may and generally does have to divide it with others,
landowners, money-lenders, and so on. The sum total of
surplus-value created by the laborers constitutes the fund
from which all rents, interests and profits must be paid.
It is from this fund, too, that capital is replenished and
increased, including the capitals necessary to the conquest
and development of foreign markets. The division of the
surplus-value sometimes causes much strife as, for example,
when landlords insist upon getting the lion's share and are
bitterly opposed by the capitalists.
The workers have little interest in these struggles over the
division of the surplus-value they create, except in so far
as the struggles give rise to political or other conditions
which enable the workers to improve their own conditions
by taking advantage of the divisions in the ranks of the
exploiting class. It does not matter to the workers whether
more or less of the surplus-value goes to a particular section
of the exploiting class. Their interest is to give a minimum
of surplus-value, to be exploited as little as possible. On
the other hand, it is to the interest of the entire class of
SURPLUS-VALUE 151
those who share the surplus-value to resist the efforts of the
workers to reduce its amount, and to force them to give
up as much as possible. This is the casus belli of industrial
conflict, the motive of the class war. The cause of class
antagonisms is surplus-value, not the speeches and writings
of "agitators"; not the labor unions. These are effects, not
causes.
Rate of surplus-value and rate of profit : As we have seen,
of the total mass of capital which the capitalist advances,
only one portion, the amount paid for labor-power, adds to
its own value and produces an excess, or surplus- value. That
portion of the capital which is expended on raw materials
and other means of production does not change the magnitude
of its own value in this manner. Therefore Marx calls the
former portion variable capital, and the latter portion
constant capital. In our illustration we assumed the amount
of surplus-value to be exactly equal to the variable capital.
In the language of Marx, the ratio of surplus-value to
variable capital is 100 per cent, in this case. This expresses
the degree of the exploitation of the workers. That is, they
are exploited at the rate of 100 per cent, both as regards
value and number of hours of labor. We are not concerned
with the actual rate of surplus-value, but with the illustra-
tion of the principle.
Now, it will be observed that the foregoing ratio is by no
means the ratio of profit. In other words, rate of surplus-
value and rate of profit are wholly different conceptions,
though they are frequently confused with one another. To
find the rate of profit we must consider the total capital,
constant as well as variable. Thus, the ratio of surplus-
value to variable capital is 100 per cent, but the ratio of
surplus-value to the whole capital is 47.6 per cent. This last
gives the rate of profit. Let us now suppose that, instead
of the price of labor-power being fixed at its proper value,
it falls considerably below it, as a result of an excessive
supply. The capitalist now pays 80 cents per day instead
of $1.00 as before. The variable capital will now be $800.00
instead of $1,000.00 as formerly. The value of the product
at the end of the day will be the same. The rate of surplus-
value — the degree of exploitation — will rise, and so will the
rate of profit. The capitalist now pays,
152 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
For labor-power $800.00
For raw materials. 1,000.00
For repairs, replacement of machinery, etc _ 100.00
He receives for the gross product 3, 100.00
The surplus-value is, therefore 1,200.00
$1,900.00
Thus, the rate of exploitation, that is, the ratio of surplus-
value to variable capital, rises from 100 per cent to 150 per
cent, while the rate of profit, the ratio of surplus-value to
the total capital, rises from 47.6 per cent to 63.1 per cent.
Expressed in hours of labor time the workers now give up
six hours above the number required to replace their wages
instead of five hours as before.
It may happen, however, that the increase in the rate of
surplus-value will be accompanied by a decrease in the rate of
profit. The capitalist is always trying to cheapen produc-
tion by (a) lowering wages, (b) lengthening the working day,
(c) increasing the productivity of labor. To the first two
methods there are very obvious limits — physical endurance
of the workers, legislation, and so on. The main energies
of capitalist management are directed to the third method,
through better organization, improved machinery, reduction
of wasteful expenditures, and the like. Therefore, there is
at all times going on a process which Marx calls the changing
organic composition of capital. In other words, the relation
of variable to constant capital changes from time to time.
The portion of capital laid out in wages decreases, increased
production resulting without any corresponding increase —
but sometimes even a decrease — in the number of workers
employed and the total expenditure upon wages. Thus,
assume that the capitalist pays,
For labor-power $600.00
For raw materials 1,500.00
For repairs, replacement of machinery, etc 100.00
And that he receives for the gross product. . . 3,400.00
The surplus-value is 1,200.00
$2,200.00
The rate of surplus -value is now 200 per cent, but the
rate of profit is 57.2 per cent.
SURPLUS-VALUE 153
Dangers of a too narrow interpretation of the theory:
Many criticisms of the theory, including those of the leading
members of the Revisionist school, are based upon interpreta-
tions of the theory which are too narrow and dogmatic.
These criticisms have the same cardinal defect that vitiates
some of the expositions of Marx's theories by his dogmatic
and unphilosophical followers. They interpret Marx's
theoretical conclusions too narrowly and in that form attempt
to apply them to actual life. For example, Marx reasoned
his theory of value with mathematical method and exact-
ness, but he knew perfectly well that in actual life the law
could not and did not operate with anything like the pre-
cision and inflexibility which he employed in its demonstra-
tion. No law ever does. He assumes, for the purpose of
elaborating his theory, that all commodities are sold at
their value, but later on he admits that such is not the case,
that the prices of commodities are usually either higher or
lower than their value. But this could not be understood at
all except by the aid of the law of value. While a narrow
and rigid interpretation of the theory of surplus-value would
lead to the conclusion that the workers are never exploited
except directly as producers, through wages, such an inter-
pretation would be wholly unwarranted. Some of the
doctrinaire followers of Marx have so interpreted the theory,
however, and made it the theoretical basis for a practical
policy which would prevent the Socialist movement from
participating in many reform movements of immediate
concern to the workers. But not so Marx. He shows very
clearly that the workers are exploited as consumers1 also,
and this secondary exploitation tends to become more
important with every advance in the direction of monop-
oly.
In like manner, many of the critics of the theory have a
very much narrower conception of labor than the Marxian
theory justifies, if we consider the theory itself rather than
the examples which Marx uses to illustrate it. To assume
that Marx disregards the productivity of managerial labor,
the organization and direction of industry, is foolish in the
extreme. On the contrary, Marx describes with great clear-
ness the development of a special type of "labor," that of
* Capital, Vol. Ill, pp. 715-716.
154 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
direction — a class whose "established and exclusive func-
tion" is the work of supervision.1 So far as any person
shares in the necessary labor of production, including in
the term "production" all the processes involved in the
transformation of the raw material into the finished product
delivered to the consumer, that person is performing useful
labor. But the capitalist, as such, performs no labor. Or,
to put the matter more clearly, whatever any person receives
over and above the value of productive labor performed,
is of necessity a sum exploited from other people's labor.
There is no other explanation of the phenomena of pure
profit.
The theory does not involve the ethics of distribution:
One of the most common misconceptions of the theory, a
misconception which has served as the basis of many crit-
icisms, is that which regards it as involving the ethics of
distribution. The usual statement is that the theory of
Marx leads to the conclusion that "All wealth is produced
by labor, and should, therefore, belong to labor." It is then
assumed that in the Socialist State an ethical system of
distribution will be realized, based upon the labor-value
theory, and that each worker will get approximately the
value of his own labor product, minus his share in the
necessary social charges. There is nothing in the Marxian
theory to support either the statement or the assumption
based upon it. Marx nowhere reasons that the workers
ought to get the full value of their labor. Indeed, as Engels
points out, Marx opposed the earlier Socialists of the Ricard-
ian school for confusing economics with ethics. He based
his whole argument for Socialism, not upon the right of
the producers, but upon the impossibility of the capitalist
system to last, the inevitability of the development of
capitalist industry to the point where the industrial and
legal forms of capitalism can no longer contain it. Marx
invariably scoffed at the "ethical distribution" idea, and
when the Gotha Platform of the German Socialists was
adopted in 1875 he was very much incensed, not only because
he regarded its opening sentence, "Labor produces all
wealth," as wrong in itself, but because it seemed to him
to lead directly to the old idea that Socialism must rest its
1 Capital, Vol. I, chap, xiii; Vol. Ill, chap, xxiii.
SURPLUS-VALUE 155
case upon the right of the producer to the whole of his
product, instead of upon the inevitable breakdown of capital-
ist society. In other words, Marx never took the position
that Socialism ought to take the place of capitalism, because
the producers of wealth ought to get the whole of their
product. His position was that Socialism must come, simply
because capitalism could not last. It would, of course, be
idle and disingenuous to deny that of the actual propaganda
of the Socialist movement no small part consists of moral
protests against the manifest injustice of capitalist society,
and of arguments in favor of a juster social system. But
these things are not included in the Marxian theories. In so
far, the Socialist movement is bigger than Marx. Even if
his entire system of philosophy could be destroyed, the
inequalities existing, the striking social contrasts of extreme
wealth and extreme poverty co-existent, the undeniable fact
that useful labor often brings only a life of hardship while
luxury and ease are often the portion of those who do no
labor at all, would undoubtedly afford a basis for a movement
aiming at the collective ownership of the means of production.
With that we are not concerned at present. The important
point is that, according to Marx, the concentration of
capitalism must go on until it bursts its shell and a new
epoch is ushered in.
156 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. The sole motive of capitalist enterprise is the realization of a
profit from the sale of goods.
2. Labor is not the source of all wealth, but it is the source of all
economic value.
3. Capital is a social relation expressed through the medium of
things the possession of which by the capitalist makes it necessary for
the laborer to sell his commodity, labor-power, to the capitalist.
4. The difference between the total value produced by labor and the
value of the labor-power consumed in its production, is surplus-value,
the rate of which is the measure of exploitation.
5. The difference between the value of the finished product and
the total cost of production is profit. The rate of profit does not
necessarily correspond to the rate of surplus-value.
6. The theory of surplus-value does not involve the ethics of dis-
tribution.
QUESTIONS
1. Discuss the relation of exchange to profit.
2. Criticise the statement: "Labor is the source of all wealth."
3. Distinguish between the Marxian and the current economic
definition of capital.
4. How is the value of labor-power determined?
5. What is the essential difference between labor-power and other
commodities?
6. What is surplus-value? How is it produced?
7. Explain the process of the division of surplus-value?
8. How is the rate of profit determined?
9. What is secondary exploitation?
Literature
See references at close of preceding chapter.
CHAPTER XIV
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION
The stages of capitalism : The period of domestic industry
in which, the guild organization having broken down, the
mass of craftsmen were employed under the wage system
by masters who were no longer craftsmen themselves, may
be considered as the first stage of capitalism. This period
was characterized by what Marx calls merchants' capital —
capital invested in raw materials and finished goods rather
than the tools of production. In some industries the massing
of large numbers of workers in factories had already begun,
but they still remained hand workers.
The second stage of capitalism began with the age of
machinery. Industrial capital in the various forms of
factories, machinery, and means of transportation became
more important than merchants' capital. Competition
between capitalists on the one hand, and between wage-
workers on the other, was the rule. The policy of laissez-
faire was the accepted ideal and competition was regarded
as the life of trade.
The third and last stage of capitalism is marked by the
concentration of industry and the elimination of competition.
Writing before this stage had fairly opened, Marx predicted
that competition would destroy itself, that the business units
would continuously increase in magnitude until at last
monopoly emerged from the competitive struggle. Competi-
tion being self-destructive inevitably breeds monopoly.
This monopoly becoming a shackle upon the system of pro-
duction which produced it, must in turn give way to some-
thing else, namely, the socialization of industry. Says
Marx: "The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the
mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished
along with it, and under it. Centralization of the means of
production and socialization of labor at last reach a point
157
158 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
where they become incompatible with their capitalist
integument. This integument is burst asunder. The knell
of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators are
expropriated."1
Criticism of the theory: This view has been generally
accepted by Marx's followers. The disappearance of the
middle class and the reduction of most of its members to
the ranks of the proletariat have been regarded as self-evident
truths of Socialism. But within recent years the theory has
been subject to a good deal of criticism, both from within
and without the Socialist movement. Many of the leading
Socialists in Europe and America have participated in the
discussion, and while the results of the discussion have
been rather inconclusive thus far, it is now very generally
admitted that the middle class is not disappearing in the
manner and at the rate which Marx anticipated; that petty
industries have not all been swept away; that small retail
establishments still persist, and, in some cases, increase in
number and that concentration in agriculture does not
manifest itself in the form of immense bonanza farms swal-
lowing up all the smaller farms.
Bernstein points out that the number of share-holders
in industrial corporations is increasing, and that in England
in 1898 there were more than a million share-holders. The
share-holders in the Manchester Canal amount in round
numbers to 40,000, and in Lipton's there are more than
74,000 share-holders. The number of taxable incomes is
increasing, and the increase is most noticeable in the number
of moderate incomes. A similar thing is seen in Germany.
In Prussia the population doubled in the period 1854-1898,
but the number of persons with incomes of more than
$750.00 a year increased sevenfold. Similar figures are
quoted from other countries to show that, judging by income
standards, the number of persons in the middle class is on
the increase.
Persistence of small industrial units r Critics of the theory
also point to the persistence of petty industrial establish-
ments and small retail stores in support of their position.
That a great many such establishments and stores do exist
is undeniable. There are many trades and branches of
1 Capital, Vol. I, p. 837.
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION
159
trades which can be carried on just as cheaply on a small
scale as on a large scale, or nearly so. This is the case with
different branches of wood, leather, and metal work. A
great deal of misunderstanding exists upon this point. It
is not denied that there is an enormous development in the
direction of larger industrial units, but that the small fac-
tories and workshops can and do continue to exist in large
numbers. For example, if we take the figures given in the
reports of the Prussian census for 1907,1 we shall see both
these facts very clearly. The figures refer to mercantile and
manufacturing establishments:
TABLE III
ESTAB LISHMENTS.
Numbers.
Persons Employed.
1895.
1907.
1895.
1907.
Quite Small (1 person only)
1,029,954
593,884
108,800
10,127
' 380
191
955,707
767,200
154,330
17,287
602
371
1,029,954
1,638,205
1,390,745
1,217,085
261,507
333,585
955,707
2,038,236
2,109,164
2,095,065
Very Great (501-1000 persons)
Giant (1001 persons and over)
424,587
710,253
1,743,336
1,895,497
5,876,083
8,332,912
The decrease in the number of establishments classified as
"quite small" indicates nothing except the passing out of
existence of a percentage of household industries. The
increase in the "small" and "medium" establishments is
quite as marked and as remarkable as the increase in the
"very great" and "giant" establishments. The figures do
indicate a very real tendency to concentration, however.
While the number of establishments increased only 8.73
per cent the number of persons employed increased 41.81
per cent.
American statistics : Far more important than increase or
decrease of the number of units is their relative significance
aThe figures are taken from Bernstein's Evolutionary Socialism,
p. 57. They appeared originally in this form in Die New Zeit, XV. 2,
p. 597.
160
ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
in the total production. This phase of the subject has been
very ably and comprehensively dealt with by Mr. Lucien
Sanial, a well-known Socialist statistician. He takes twenty-
seven of the most typical manufacturing industries and com-
pares the number of establishments, number of persons em-
ployed and amount of capital invested in the years 1880,
1890 and 1905. He shows that there was a decrease in the
number of establishments from 1880 to 1905 of 35.3 per cent,
accompanied by an increase in the number of persons
employed of 60.2 per cent, while the capital invested in the
smaller number of establishments was 262.6 per cent greater
than the capital invested in the smaller number.
TABLE IV
Year.
Number of
Establishments.
Number of
Workers.
Capital.
1880
63,233
51,912
44,142
1,080,200
1,611,000
1,731,500
$1,276,600,000
1890
3,324,500,000
1905
4,628,800,000
In another table Mr. Sanial takes forty-seven industries.
These forty-seven industries comprised 29,800 establish-
ments in 1900. By 1905 the number had fallen to 26,182.
Side by side with this decrease in the number of establish-
ments there was a marked increase in the amount of capital
invested, which was $1,005,400,000 in 1900, and $1,339,-
500,000 in 1905. In the same five years the number of
workers increased only from 618,000 to 749,000. Here,
again, in this group of the smaller industries we find the same
evidences of concentration — fewer establishments, large
increase of capitals and an increase in the number of wage-
earners which is not equal to the increase in capitalization.
But even more significant than any of these figures are
those which show the relative portion of the total volume
of manufacture for which the small establishments are
responsible. Table No. IV shows that the two largest classes
of establishments number only 24,163, 11.2 per cent of the
total number. But they represent 81.5 per cent of the total
capital, $10,334,000,000 and employ 71.6 per cent of all the
wage-workers in manufacturing industries.
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION
161
TABLE V
MANUFACTURING ESTABLISHMENTS, 1905 >
Capitals.
Num-
ber.
Per
Cent.
Total
Capital.
Per
Cent.
Number of
Workers.
Per
Cent.
Less than $5,000
$5,000 to $20,000
$20,000 to $100,000
$100,000 to $1,000,000...
Over $1,000,000
71,162
72,806
48,144
22,281
1,882
32.9
33.7
22.2
10.3
0.9
$165,300,000
531,100,000
1,655,800,000
5,551,700,000
4,782,300,000
1.3
4.2
13.0
43.8
37.7
106,300
419,600
1,027,700
2,537,550
1,379,150
1.9
7.7
18.8
46.4
25.2
These figures conclusively prove that industrial concentra-
tion is an indisputable fact, so far as the United States is
concerned at least. Here, as in Europe, numerous petty
industrial establishments continue to exist, but their influence
is relatively insignificant. The above table shows that the
establishments capitalized at less than $5,000.00 constitute
32.9 per cent of the whole number of establishments, but
represent only 1.3 per cent of the total capital and 1.9 per
cent of the total number of wage-workers employed. This
process is not confined to the United States, but goes on in
every industrial nation.
The persistence of petty industries is unimportant : From
the Socialist point of view the persistence of small industrial
enterprises is not only quite unimportant, but is, for a long
time to come at least, inevitable. They may even continue
to exist under a Socialist regime. The preparedness of
society for Socialism, for social ownership and control, is
not to be determined by the number of little industries and
business establishments that still remain, but rather by the
number of great ones which exist. Karl Kautsky argues
this very ably. The ripeness of society for Socialism is not
to be disproved by the number of wrecks and ruins which
abound. "Without a developed great industry, Socialism
is impossible," says Kautsky. "Where, however, a great
industry exists to a considerable degree, it is easy for a
Socialist society to concentrate production, and to quickly rid
itself of the little industry."3
While some petty industrial and business establishments
1The table is quoted from Socialism Inevitable, by Gaylord Wilshire,
p. 326.
2 Kautsky, The Social Revolution, p. 144.
162 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
undoubtedly do exist, and even increase in number, the
increase of large industrial establishments employing many
more workers and much larger capitals is much greater.
The same thing is true of the retail trades. Furthermore,
these petty industries are very transient and unstable, being
absorbed or crushed out of existence as soon as they get
big enough to be worthy of attention on the part of the power-
ful industrial corporations, either as competitors to be feared
or as desirable tributaries. So long as they simply maintain
their owners at or near the average wage-earner's standard
of life they pass unnoticed, but once they manifest signs of
becoming prosperous and potentially dangerous as competi-
tors they are either absorbed or relentlessly crushed. The
small corner drug store may exist as an individual enterprise,
but generally it can only do so if its "proprietor" consents to
become virtually an agent for some great corporation. If he
refuses, he is very likely to find himself matched against a
competitor who can ruin him. In all our large cities to-day
there are drug stores, cigar stores, restaurants, saloons,
grocery stores, and so on, which are owned by great corpora-
tions having branch establishments all over the country.
Concentration of control : We must be careful to recognize
the fact that concentration of control may be just as import-
ant as concentration in industry. It may be true that 75,000
stock-holders own stock in the Pennsylvania Railroad, but
the influence of the stock-holder is negligible, and the power
is as effectively concentrated in the hands of a few men as
though they owned every share of the stock. This concentra-
tion of control in the hands of a few is more important than
is generally realized in the discussion of the subject of con-
centration. It enables the operation of industry to be carried
on for the benefit of a class, and so adds stability to class rule.
Concentration in agriculture: The most damaging criti-
cisms of the theory are those directed against its application
to agriculture. Marx conceived the general process of indus-
trial development, including the more or less rapid extinction
of petty production, to be repeated in agricultural industry.
He regarded the small farm as being incompatible with the
development of a really rational agriculture, just as the small
workshop was incompatible with really rational production,1
!Cf., Capital, Vol. Ill, pp. 724,938-939, etc.
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION 163
that is, production in the most efficient manner. Ration-
alizing agriculture and rendering it capable of being conducted
upon a gigantic scale seemed to Marx to be an inevitable
result of capitalistic development. The advance of agricul-
tural chemistry and the invention of power machinery to
take the place of most of the cumbrous and slow hand labor
of the farm implied, he believed, the practical extinction of
the small farm through the old method of big fish eat little
fish, numerous small farm units being concentrated into a
few large ones, operated by capitalists.
For a few years it seemed as if this prediction was being
rapidly fulfilled, especially in the United States through the
great "bonanza farms." But in recent years there has been
a marked tendency in the opposite direction, both in this
country and in Europe. The number of farms is not decreas-
ing, but increasing; there is no increase in the average farm •
acreage to suggest the absorption of smaller farm units
by larger ones, but a decrease. As we have seen in Chapter
II, the increase in the number of small farms is accompanied
by a decrease in the percentage of farm operators who own
their own farms. Hence, in the discussion of the subject,
the critics of Marx and those of his disciples who cling to
the belief that the theory of concentration holds equally
good in agriculture and manufacture rely upon the same set
of figures. One side points to the increase in the number
of farms, while the other side points to the decrease in the
proportion of free and unencumbered ownerships.
Concerning the actual ownership of the farms operated by
tenants we know very little indeed. It is possible that a
full investigation of the subject would reveal the fact that
concentration of farm ownership has proceeded much further
than is commonly supposed. The same may be said of farm
mortgages. In 1890 the mortgaged indebtedness of the
farms of the United States was $1,085,995,960, a sum almost
equal to the value of the entire wheat crop. Here, again,
we know very little about the ownership of farm mortgages.
That many of the insurance, banking and trust companies
have large investments in them we know, and this, too, is a
phase of concentration of farm ownership which must be
taken into account. Moreover, as we also noted in Chapter
II, the modern American farm is undergoing a great trans-
164 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
formation in that many of the things formerly regarded as
essential to the farm are now separated from it. Butter-
making and cheese-making have largely passed from the
farm to the factory. In other words, division of labor and
the introduction of machinery have led to the absorption of
many of the functions of the farm by capitalistically owned
factories. To these considerations may be added the increas-
ing divorce of the farmer from the ownership of the necessary
equipment of the industry under modern conditions, includ-
ing the grain elevators, the cold storage houses, and even the
railroads.
Permanence of the small farm: A consideration of the
foregoing factors puts the subject of agricultural concentra-
tion in a new light, and suggests that there are processes of
concentration going on of which Marx never dreamed, and
which are not obvious. At the same time, even when those
things are taken into account, it must be admitted that the
concentration Marx had in mind, namely, the elimination
of small scale agricultural production by means of the superior
force of production possible upon farms of immense size,
conducted upon capitalist lines, is not apparent anywhere.
The small farm, therefore, cannot be regarded as transitory,
a relic of the past, but must be regarded as one of the most
important factors in our economic system, destined to con-
tinue as such for a long time to come, perhaps permanently.
Concentration of wealth: We need only briefly consider
the concentration of wealth. It is a rather common error
to confuse the concentration of wealth with the concentra-
tion of capital. If all the units in a given industry were to
be united in a single industrial corporation, that would be a
perfect example of the concentration of capital. But it is
not inconceivable that every one of the owners of the units
might have a share in the corporation exactly equal to the
capital value of his particular unit. There would then be
no concentration of wealth as an immediate result of the
concentration of the industry itself. That concentration of
wealth might later develop from it is beside the point of
discussion.
The principal bearing of this question upon Socialist
theory is the test it provides of one of Marx's most famous
generalizations, that the middle class must disappear and
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION 165
society come to be represented by two polar classes, the rich
capitalist class and the proletariat. There is probably no
subject of equal importance in the whole realm of economic
discussion upon which it is more difficult to get conclusive
evidence. The principal data are (1) statistics of taxable
incomes and inheritances in countries where these are taxed;
(2) the number of savings bank deposits; (3) statistics
relating to the number of investors in industrial and com-
mercial enterprises. The inherent defects of all three sources
are easily seen and universally admitted. We need only note
some of the most important defects.
Defects in principal sources of evidence : With respect to
income taxes the universal tendency is to understate the
amount of large incomes. It was this tendency which once
caused a British prime minister to declare that the income
tax had made a nation of perjurers. The statistics of inher-
itance taxes do not reveal all the truth, for the reason that
where such taxes are imposed it is a common practice for
large land-owners and other property-owners to transfer their
properties to their heirs during their lifetime, thus escaping
the tax. This has been notoriously the case in England since
the imposition of the so-called "death duties." The number
of savings banks deposits is of very little value as evidence
in this discussion, because a very large proportion of the depos-
its are made by children, petty savings. On the other hand,
many business men make it a practice to place deposits in a
number of savings banks, and their deposits, being relatively
large, innate tho average and destroy the value of any average
of per capita deposits. Spahr shows, for example, that in
New York, while the number of savings bank deposits was
more than twice the total number of families, two-thirds
of the families had no bank accounts at all, nor any other
registered property whatsoever.1 The statistics relating to
the number of share-holders in corporations are equally
worth1 -ss. We have no means of knowing what proportion
of tne total number consists of petty investors, people who
own one or two shares in a single company at most, repre-
senting their entire capital, and what proportion is made
up of duplications — people who are investors in many
1 The Present Distribution of Wealth in the United States, by Chas.
B. Spahr, p. 57.
166 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
corporations, and so appear again and again in the total
number.
Definite evidence of concentration: But while we cannot
measure with- any degree of accuracy the concentration
which has taken place, there is overwhelming evidence of the
fact that it has been considerable. The fact is hardly dis-
puted by anybody. While in the United States great
extremes of wealth and poverty were relatively unknown in
the early part of the nineteenth century, to-day such extremes
are common, and multi-millionaires and paupers are about
equally characteristic of our social life. The most careful
investigation of the subject yet made is that made in 1895
by the late Dr. Charles B. Spahr, who found that 44 per cent
of the families in the United States owned practically no
property at all; that seven-eighths of the families owned
barely one eighth of the national wealth, and that one per
cent of the families owned more than the remaining ninety-
nine per cent.1 It is certain, moreover, that since that
time there has been a marked increase in the degree of con-
centration.
The Socialist view of concentration : The concentration of
economic power and of social wealth in the hands of a class
is a necessary stage in economic evolution, through which
society must pass before it will be possible to conduct pro-
duction upon a cooperative basis with collective responsibil-
ity. The evils which result are incidental and it would be .
foolish to check the economic development because of the
pain which it involves, even if that were possible. Wherever
injury can be minimized it is worth while to do so, and, so
far as the workers are concerned, it is necessary for them to
combine for that purpose. That is the reason for trades
union activity and for political activity directed toward
remedial social reforms. Within capitalist society itself the
industrial forms of a new society are being fashioned. Along-
side with this process the education and organization of the
workers is going on. The workers of a century ago could
not have established an industrial democracy, even if they
had been educated and trained to participate in democratic
government. They were limited by the isolated hand pro-
duction of the time. But society has made tremendous
1 Spahr, op. cit., p. 69.
THE LAW OF CONCENTRATION 167
strides. We are already in the presence of great monopolies
which appear to the Socialist as industrial forms ready for
the spirit of democracy, of Socialism.
SUMMARY
1. Under capitalism there is a uniform tendency toward the con-
centration of industry in the hands of the few.
2. The persistence of competition in petty industries is relatively
unimportant and does not invalidate the theory of concentration.
3. The same tendency is shown in modern agriculture through the
decreasing proportion of farms owned by their operators, and in the
increasing dependence of the farmer upon capitalist industry.
4. Wealth as well as capital tends towards class concentration.
QUESTIONS
1. Characterize the three stages of capitalism.
2. On what grounds is the theory of concentration attacked?
3. How may the persistence of small industries be explained?
4. What was the theory of Marx in regard to agricultural concen-
tration? How must it be modified?
5. Along what lines is the dependence of the farmer upon capitalist
industry increasing?
6. What are the difficulties involved in determining the degree of the
concentration of wealth?
7. What is the Socialist attitude toward the concentration of wealth
and industrial power?
Literature
Bernstein, E., Evolutionary Socialism, pp. 40-73.
Kautsky, K., The Social Revolution, pp. 37-65, 137-167.
Marx, Karl, Capitol, Vol. I, chap, xxix-xxxii; Vol. Ill, chap, xxxvii and
xlvii.
Spahr, C. B., The Present Distribution of Wealth in the United States.
Spargo, John, Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation, chap. v.
Wilshire, G., Socialism Inevitable.
CHAPTER XV
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS
Advantages of large scale production: The industrial
revolution demonstrated the overwhelming advantages of
division of labor and power machinery over the old handi-
craft system. With the improvement of transportation
facilities the early form of the factory system is in turn
supplanted by a system of large scale production whose
units are immense factories, often employing thousands of
hands. Large scale production saves in the purchasing of
raw materials and in the application of power. Materials
and coal can be purchased in train loads cheaper than in
car loads. Five thousand horsepower costs much less than
ten times as much as five hundred horsepower. Large scale
production makes possible the use of expensive machin-
ery and the attainment of a high degree of mechanical
efficiency in consequence.
The labor cost is relatively less. Greater subdivision of
labor makes larger production possible. The cost of superin-
tendence is relatively lower, and the whole organization can
be made more efficient and more nearly perfect than would
be possible with production on a small scale. Different
grades and kinds of goods can be made in different plants
belonging to the same concern, and each plant can run con-
tinuously on the same grade, thus saving the cost of changing
machinery. By-products can be fully utilized. The butcher
who kills three or four animals a week can use nothing but
the best parte of the meat and the hide, but in a great packing
house not an ounce of material need be wasted. Petroleum
could be distilled on a small scale, but the residuum would
be wasted and only the kerosene used. In a Standard Oil
refinery the petroleum yields not only kerosene and gasoline,
but also lubricating oils, paraffine, aniline dyes, coal tar,
vaseline, drugs of many kinds, and even the chief constitu-
168
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 169
ents of commercial rubber. A large concern can much more
easily experiment with new methods and new by-products
than a small one.
These are the natural and legitimate savings of large scale
production. The power of large capital also obtains for a
great enterprise special privileges from state and local
governments and from railroad and steamship companies.
Companies and corporations producing on a large scale are
enabled to undersell their competitors in one locality and
crush them, while keeping up prices elsewhere.
The advantages of large scale production are limited by
the "Law of Diminishing Returns," and there is undoubt-
edly a point of maximum efficiency in the unit of operation
beyond which it will yield less than a proportionate return.
In the steel industry it is estimated that this point of
maximum efficiency can be attained by the investment of
$30,000,000. This investment will give all the advantages
of large scale production.
Advantages of combination: But while such a concern as
the Cambria Steel Company may be able to produce steel
as cheaply as the United States Steel Corporation, the latter
has many advantages due to the harmonious working
together of many scattered units of operation. The advan-
tages of the unit of maximum efficiency can be retained and
the additional advantages of combining competing plants
obtained. In the first place, fewer salesmen are needed.
Where before the combination each establishment was
obliged to maintain its staff of salesmen in all the cities in
which its output was sold, under the combination, a single
selling agency with its branches is entirely sufficient. The
Distilling Company of America could thus dispense with the
services of three hundred salesmen and save $1,000,000
annually.1 The American Steel and Wire Company retained
only fifteen or twenty salesmen out of the force employed
by the companies making the combination, "between two
and three hundred men."2 A similar saving can be made in
advertising.
Where the product is bulky and the freight cost relatively
high, great advantages can often be effected by shipping
1 Montague, Trusts of To-day, p. 48.
2 Report of The Industrial Commission, Vol. I, p. 1018.
170 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
to the consumer from the nearest plant, thus saving cross
freights. Combination in production permits the strategic
location of plants, from which distribution can be made with
a minimum of waste. Mr. John W. Gates, of the American
Steel and Wire Company, testifying before the Industrial
Commission, said: "I should think that the cross freights
would amount to half a million or a million dollars. It is
a saving in that particular."1 With their greater size and
capital big concerns can maintain distributing stations in
all parts of the country, shipping there in train-load lots
and saving the additional cost of small shipments.
In many industries in which combination has taken place
there are great advantages due to the integration of allied
industries. Before the organization of the United States
Steel Corporation the manufacture of such finished products
as tubes and tin plates was carried on by separate concerns
which purchased the steel from other corporations engaged
only in the production of the rougher steel products. The
combination effected a saving by making all of the transfers
of material from the iron mine to the final sale simply matters
of bookkeeping.
Where competition has brought into existence an excessive
number of plants, the combination can dismantle and aban-
don a large proportion of them with profit. An extreme
example of this form of economy is found in the history of
the so-called " Whiskey Trust." Eighty-one distilleries went
into the original combination in 1887 and all but ten or
twelve of the plants were closed soon afterward and pro-
duction concentrated in the largest, best equipped and most
conveniently located houses.8
By comparative accounting and demonstration as between
plants, all can be kept up to the highest possible efficiency.
A new form of competition is inaugurated between the
superintendents and men of different plants for the turning
out of the largest product at the lowest cost.
Large scale production and monopoly: Monopoly strictly
means that the total supply of the commodity in question is
controlled by one person or group of persons. In practice
1 Report of the Industrial Commission, Vol. I, p. 1030.
* Report of The Industrial Commission, Vol. I, p. 170. Testimony of
C. C. Clark.
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 171
the term is used to signify the control of so mucn of the
supply that the market price can be fixed at the point of
highest net return. A corporation controlling three-fourths
of a given product can usually control the price, for the other
producers could not supply the market if they tried, and
the majority of purchasers must come to the large producer.
Then it is always possible for such a concern to crush the
others if they become too troublesome. Therefore, the small
manufacturers generally agree to sell at the monopoly price.
Neither large scale production nor combination, nor both
together, necessarily constitute monopoly. Just before the
organization of the United States Steel Corporation, there
were several independent steel companies organized on a
national scale, enjoying nearly all the benefits of large scale
production and combination. In general the threat of price
cutting brings all such competitors to an agreement which
affects the consumers in practically the same manner as a
monopolistic combination.
Industrial monopoly is usually the result of the combina-
tion of a number of small producers for the purpose of
avoiding the evils of competition. Combination may be
effected by outright purchase of one concern by another, by
the leasing of the property of one by another, by the organ-
ization of a new corporation to take over the business of two
or more older concerns, or by means of the pool, the trust
or the holding company.
Monopoly may also result from a number of other causes.
Chief among these are (a) control of the supply of raw
material, such as coal and iron-ore deposits; (b) special
advantages granted by the State, such as franchises, patents,
trademarks, land grants, protective tariffs, and the like;
(c) special advantages conferred by quasi-public action, such
as preferential rates, rebates, exceptional transportation
facilities, and the like, granted by railroad and steamship
companies and other similar corporations. Then there are
the monopolies which are commonly termed "natural monop-
olies," consisting mainly of public service enterprises, such
as railroads, telegraphs, telephones, waterworks, gas and
electric lighting and street railways. These are called natural
monopolies because the conditions of their existence prac-
tically preclude the possibility of effective competition. To
172 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
duplicate any one of the public services named in any city
would be too obviously wasteful to be tolerated. Competing
water companies or competing street railway companies
are not practicable. There is an apparent exception to this
rule in the case of the telephone service, for in many cities
there are competing companies. But here again the waste
is so obvious, and the confusion and inconvenience necessarily
arising from having to use two or more systems in order to
get a full local telephone service so great, that the exception
to the rule is more apparent than real.
Monopolies in the United States : The pool, the legal trust
and the holding company have been the forms which monop-
olistic combination has assumed in the United States at
different stages of its development. These three forms are all
illustrated in the history of the oil industry. Previous to
1874 the oil business in America was still in its infancy. Com-
petition generally prevailed. Such attempts at agreement
as the South Improvement Company (1871) and the National
Refiners' Association (1872) completely failed to effect the
object in view. In 1874 the principal refiners, of whom the
members of the Standard Oil Company of Ohio were already
the strongest, met and agreed to divide the markets among
themselves and to abstain from all price cutting. This agree-
ment, which became known as the Standard Alliance, was
a pool. This pool was further strengthened by an exchange
of stock among its members.
In 1882 it was felt that the pool was too loose a form of
organization and a new form was devised which became
known as a trust. A board of nine trustees was chosen by
the refiners and the stock of all the leading oil companies
was deposited with them, the former stock-holders receiving
in exchange trust certificates to the value of the stock they
deposited. All dividends were then paid to the trustees and
by them paid to the holders of trust certificates in proportion
to their holdings.
The trust was declared illegal under the common law by
the Supreme Court of Ohio in 1892. Having ignored the or-
der of the Court, it was attacked in contempt proceedings,
after which the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey was char-
tered in 1899 as a holding company with the power to hold
and vote the stock of any oil company. The chief difference
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 173
between this form and the trust was that the new form was
regularly incorporated and had directors instead of trustees.
The holding company is also commonly called a trust when
it has monopoly power.
Examples of all forms of combination are familiar to-day
and the prices of a very large part of the necessities of life
are fixed by monopolies at the point of highest net return.
Advantages of monopoly: As lately as the middle of the
nineteenth century it was thought that the limit of large
scale production was reached when the owners of the business
could no longer personally supervise the work of production.
Now all is changed. The development of the great industrial
corporation has removed the owner farther and farther from
the process of manufacture. Whole great national industries
are now controlled by gigantic corporations. Still others are
monopolized in the form of pools and agreements for the
regulation of price and output.
The monopolistic combination has all the advantages of
large scale production, such as saving in the purchase and
sale of goods and the application of power, in labor, in organ-
ization and the utilization of its by-products. It has also
all the advantages of combination, such as saving in the
number of salesmen, saving in cross freights, and concentra-
tion at points of greatest advantage. Not only does it have
these advantages in the highest degree, but it is able to con-
trol the market for raw materials and finished products, to
regulate the output according to demand, and fix the price
at the point of highest net return.
Monopolies arising out of franchises, patents, trademarks,
land grants, protective tariffs, and other privileges granted
by the State, or from the favoritism of other corporations
have most of these advantages. Monopoly arising out of
pure combination is almost always complicated by some
alliance with these monopolies of privilege. It is practically
impossible to consider them apart. For example, much of
the strength of the United States Steel Corporation has
come from protective tariffs, franchises and patent rights.
Has competition been fairly tried? It has been asserted
that monopoly is exclusively the result of these artificial
conditions, and that the removal of the various forms of
special privilege would destroy monopoly and make com-
174 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
petition real. This is the position not only of the so-called
Jeffersonian Democrat, but of the philosophical anarchist.
But the J. & P. Coats Company, which practically controls
the cotton thread market of the world, grew up in free trade
England, and in the American and German combinations
the growth of combination has not been confined to the
industries which have received the greatest privileges. Pro-
tective tariffs and other privileges have undeniably hastened
the formation of monopoly, but the inherent advantages of
monopolistic combination would of themselves be a sufficient
and compelling reason for the development which has taken
place.
Competition is inherently self-destructive. Unchecked, it
becomes a war to the death, ending in the ruin of the weaker
competitors. Such cut-throat competition is usually checked,
however, before this end is reached. Generally an agreement
is reached which from the point of view of the public is
virtually a combination. The Socialist contends that some
form of monopoly is inevitable, and also that nothing short
of a paralysis of the genius of a people will ever prevent
them from availing themselves of all the advantages of large
scale production, combination and monopoly. Whenever
it becomes apparent that a decided gain will result from
combination, nothing will be able to check the tendency
toward monopoly. Upon no other hypothesis can we explain
the persistence with which the great corporations have
opposed all restrictive legislation, enlisting the ablest legal
talent of the country in the work of devising ways and means
of evading and defeating the object of such legislation as
has been passed and preventing the adoption of still further
restrictive measures.
Restraint of trade: Monopolies and combinations have
been attacked on the ground that they are contracts in
restraint of trade. This term has undergone a decided
transformation since combination assumed its present form.
In the earlier common law restraint of trade meant the
restraint of the freedom of carrying on one's personal voca-
tion or trade. As early as the reign of Henry V of England
an action was brought on a bond in which a dyer had con-
tracted not to use his art in a certain city for a period of
six months. The bond was declared void. Under modern
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 175
conditions the common law is interpreted as restraining any
interference with competition, if the restraint is injurious
to one of the parties to the contract or is likely to result in
injury to the public. Under the common law, then, any
agreement to raise prices is invalid and criminal. The
"trust" agreement has been held to be invalid; and a cor-
poration which permits its stock to be deposited with a
board of trustees for the purpose of avoiding competition
is liable to the forfeiture of its charter. The cases inder the
common law have all been decided in the State courts, and
it was generally possible for the defendant monopoly to
reorganize in another State, where action would not be
brought against it.
The Sherman anti-trust law was passed in 1890, giving to
the Federal courts jurisdiction in cases of restraint of trade
where the trade in question was between states, between the
United States and a foreign country, or in the District of
Columbia. An attempt was made at the time to include in
the law an exception in the case of "reasonable" restraint
of trade, which was valid under the common law. But the
amendment was rejected by Congress, and the law expressly
states that "every contract, combination in the form of a
trust or otherwise, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or
commerce is . . . illegal."1
The law has been applied in a number of cases, and has
been upheld as constitutional. In most of the cases tried
under this law the net result has been that the form of com-
bination has been altered without material change in fact.
The law has been most effective when applied to labor
organizations. In the decisions in the cases of the Standard
Oil Company and the American Tobacco Company, in May,
1911, the Supreme Court of the United States read into the
law the exception which Congress had refused to include
in it, so that the law now reads in effect "Every contract
... in unreasonable restraint of trade ... is illegal."
Thus monopolistic combinations as such are not forbidden,
and it lies wholly within the province of the courts to deter-
mine whether any particular combination is injurious to the
public or to any of its members.
Present status of monopoly: The fact of monopoly was
1 U. S. Comp. Stat., 1901, p. 3200.
176 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
not in the least affected by the Supreme Court decisions in
the Standard Oil and Tobacco cases in May, 1911. The
holding corporation as such was not declared illegal. The
stock of the corporation maintained the same high price as
before. The Sherman Act has failed to bring about competi-
tion in the place of monopoly. Monopolies may continue
as before with such slight modifications and changes in
their form of organization as the courts may suggest. The
control of industry is even easier than before, because there
is no longer any uncertainty as to the application of the law.
Regulation of monopoly: The only method of coping with
the evils of monopoly left to those who oppose public monop-
oly is that of regulation by the State. Those who urge this
method argue that as the corporation is a creature of the
State, an artificial person, the State is in a special sense
responsible for it. The form of regulation which offers the
greatest promise and is most generally advocated is federal
incorporation of concerns doing an interstate business, with
the right to regulate prices exercised by a commission sim-
ilar to the Interstate Commerce Commission, which has the
power to regulate railway rates. Federal incorporation is
advocated by President Taft, and Judge Gary of the United
States Steel Corporation has expressed his willingness to
have the Government fix prices in such a way as to guarantee
good dividends to the stock-holders.
Such regulation will probably be extensively tried, and the
trial will mean that the theory of the possibility of conduct-
ing industry upon a competitive basis is definitely abandoned.
The question of regulation will then resolve itself into a test of
strength between the industrial State and the political State.
If the industrial State with its plutocracy is able to dictate
to the political State and control the commission charged
with the task of regulating the corporations, then dividends
will continue to be paid on watered stock, prices will still
remain at the point of highest net return and the corpora-
tions will be more safely entrenched than before.
The Socialist view of State regulation : From the Socialist
point of view, the objections to regulation are its inherent
wastefulness, its bureaucratic nature and its ineffectiveness.
(1) Regulation is inherently uneconomical in that prac-
tically all the labor it involves is unproductive and unneces-
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 177
sary, or, at least, only necessary to avoid the evils of a
defective system which might be replaced by a better one.
Regulation really means that, in addition to the social labor
necessary to production society must, through the State,
expend still further social labor, simply to compel the monop-
olist to observe the rules which society in the exercise of its
sovereignty has decided shall govern production. These
rules the monopolist is constantly tempted to break, because
at every turn they hamper him in his effort to gather profits.
No one has yet made a serious and exhaustive study of this
question and attempted to compute the cost to the nation
of the measure of regulation we have already tried. That
the sum would be enormous if computed is evident. Take
the regulation of railroads, for example: the cost of all the
federal and state legislation enacted for the purpose of
regulating the railroads, its interpretation by the state and
federal courts in the almost innumerable conflicts which have
arisen under it, of the army of persons and the costly machin-
ery of government employed in its enforcement, including
such expensive agencies as the Interstate Commerce Com-
mission, must all be reckoned. All this expense is incurred
in order that we may retain private monopoly and at the
same time protect ourselves against its worst evils. The
true cost of railway service to the people is not the amount
they pay to the railroad companies, but that amount plus
what they spend in "regulating" the ra ways.
(2) The natural and instinctive tendency of the monopolist
is to strive to evade all restrictions imposed upon him which
in any manner interfere with his profits. To make the regula-
tions adopted effective, it is necessary to demand from the
monopolist a vast amount of nformation concerning his
business. To be of any service this nformation must be
examined, tabulated and checked — for which work the main-
tenance of an expensive bureau is necessary. To detect and
frustrate attempts to evade the law, and to punish violations
of the law, inspectors, detectives, attorneys and prosecutors
must be employed in large numbers. As a result of this
organized interference with business and business methods
by the State we have developed a bureaucratic form of
government very different from the simple democratic form
of government which formerly prevailed.
178 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
(3) Regulation must ultimately fail for the reason that
the gain to the monopolist which evasion or violation of the
regulations imposed upon him, when it can be accomplished
with safety, is an incentive against which the State is unable
to contend successfully. It is the same principle which
makes it almost impossible for the authorities to prevent
the sale of liquor in a prohibition state. So long as the State
permits the private monopolist to exist, it can accomplish
little of permanent value by imposing restrictions upon him
which make it impossible for him to obtain the profits he
would otherwise receive. He will bribe the State's officials
where possible, and secure immunity while he violates the
law. Where that is impossible, he will engage the brightest
and ablest minds in the nation to make a way whereby the
forbidden fruit can be obtained. Thus the State must always
be in the position of having many of the ablest and keenest
minds devoted to the special task of outwitting it. At best,
regulation thus becomes a war between the social organiza-
tion, the State, and a class of monopolists.
Private versus public monopoly: Private monopoly is
universally dreaded, and justly so. Monopoly gives power
which it is not safe to entrust to any group of men in a
commonwealth. It is essentially oligarchic, the rule of the
many by the few. This is true regardless of the number of
stockholders. The United States Steel Corporation may have
forty thousand stockholders, but the real power of the con-
cern is vested in a small group of financiers as surely as if
they owned all of the stock themselves. Such great con-
centration of power is destructive of personal liberty, the
freedom of speech and the press, of political democracy itself.
Its destructive work is done in subtle and insidious ways.
Churches and colleges are often bribed with gifts to become
the defenders and apologists of plutocracy. Ministers and
teachers are rarely purchased directly, but they are supported
financially, praised and promoted in proportion to their faith
in and devotion to the existing order.
Under monopoly, prices are always fixed at the point of
the highest net return. In this sense, monopoly-price is
always high price. "Get out of the consumer all that you
can" is the motto of monopoly. Only thus can Standard Oil
pay forty per cent, dividends and American Tobacco twenty-
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 179
five per cent, when the current rate of in terestis less than
five per cent. Other monopolies pay similarly high dividends
but conceal them by means of over-capitalization. But while
monopoly-price is high price in the sense defined, it does not
follow that under monopoly the consumer has to pay higher
prices for the commodities he consumes than he would have to
pay if competitive methods prevailed. Sometimes, indeed,
the reverse is true. By fixing the price of commodities at the
point of the highest net return is meant fixing the price ai
the level which gives the maximum of profit upon the whole
output, rather than upon the unit commodity. Thus, more
profit can be made by selling a large number of pins at five
cents a package than could be made by selling a very much
smaller number at ten cents. Regardless of other factors,
monopoly always determines prices according to this rule.
Sometimes, owing to economies in production, it can reap
enormous profits while maintaining prices at a level which
under competition would have left only a very narrow
margin of profit. Thus, while the Distilling and Cattle
Feeding Company raised prices, the Standard Oil Company,
on the other hand, steadily reduced the price of oil and
other products. The Sugar Trust, while it raised prices
above the level reached during the period of relentless cut-
throat competition which ruined nearly fifty per cent, of the
independent refiners before the American Sugar Refining
Company was formed, still did not raise them to the high
level maintained for a long period at an earlier stage of the
competitive era of the industry. On the whole, however,
it is safe to conclude with Prof. Jenks, that monopolistic
combinations have with practical uniformity either main-
tained or raised prices.1
Potential good in monopoly: But while private monopoly
is admittedly fraught with danger to the public welfare, it
would be a mistake to regard it as other than a step in the
direction of a saner and juster industrial economy. Great
as are its disadvantages, its potential advantages are equally
great. The elimination of wasteful and anarchical methods
is in itself a good and desirable thing: what is wrong is the
fact that the resulting benefits are enjoyed by the few and
not by society as a whole. There has been some positive
M. W. Jenks, N. Amer. Review, June, 1901.
180 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
social gain in that the monopolization of industry has been
largely accompanied by a modernizing of plants, large, well-
ventilated factories taking the place of dingy, unsanitary
sweatshops and factories. Despite the revelations of condi-
tions in the Pittsburgh steel mills made by the investigators
of the Sage Foundation, this is generally true of all industry
which has passed from competition to monopoly.
From a Socialist viewpoint, then, indiscriminate abuse of
monopoly is unwise and unscientific. The Socialist regards
monopoly as a necessary step in the evolution of industry
from wasteful and injurious competition to a social monopoly
with all its benefits socially enjoyed. According to this
view, social monopoly is at once the next step in evolution
and the solution of the so-called Trust Problem.
Public ownership : The greatest progress in public owner-
ship has been made by municipalities. It usually begins
with the water supply. Municipal ownership of the water
supply system is very general in Europe. Even in the United
States, where municipal ownership has made less progress
than in Europe, sixty per cent, of the water systems are
municipally owned and operated. Other public services,
such as gas, electric light, power and heat plants and street
railways, remain for the most part in private hands on this
side of the Atlantic. In Great Britain, on the other hand,
more than half the gas consumed is supplied by municipalities
owning and operating their own systems. Experience has
demonstrated the superiority of public enterprise over
private enterprise in this important service. Comparing
cities of the same size, it is a notable fact that in those cities
where the gas supply is privately owned and operated, only
about half as many people per 1,000 of population use gas
as where the service has been municipalized. The average
price of gas per 1,000 cubic feet is lower under public than
under private ownership. Nor are these the only advantages.
As a rule, the wages of the workers employed in municipally
owned gas-works are higher than those of similar workers
employed by private companies, and their hours of labor
are less. The service is more efficient and complaints are
more readily adjusted. It has been found that the municipal
administration is generally more progressive than the
private company and more ready to adopt new inventions
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 181
and improvements. In addition to these very substantial
benefits, the net earnings of the municipal undertakings are
considerable, and in many cities large sums are applied from
these earnings to the reduction of taxation or to the cost of
new improvements. Manchester, for example, devotes more
than $600,000 a year to the reduction of taxation from the
net profits of its gas supply.
Another public service which in American cities remains
almost entirely in private hands, while in Great Britain it is
largely municipalized, is local transportation. Practically
every large city in Great Britain owns and operates its own
street railways, or is preparing to do so. Also, nearly every
large city owns and operates its electric lighting system,
and more than half the capital invested in this industry in
Great Britain represents municipal undertakings. In both
these services municipal ownership results in benefits simi-
lar to those enumerated in connection with the gas sup-
ply. Naturally, these advantages have given a great impetus
to public ownership in Great Britain. Glasgow and several
other cities have municipal telephone systems. Colchester
has an oyster fishery. Many of the large cities conduct
farms in connection with the disposal of their sewage, instead
of wasting the sewage and polluting lakes and rivers as is too
often done in this country. Birmingham, for example, sells
enough stock, wool, crops and other farm products to yield
a revenue of $125,000 a year.
In addition to all the advantages enumerated, public
ownership tends to prevent graft and political corruption.
This is almost self-evident, despite the frequency of the
argument that the extension of public ownership would
make graft more general. Every careful investigation of the
causes of graft and political corruption in American cities
has traced these evils to two main sources, the granting of
franchises and the letting of contracts. When an Alderman
is paid for his vote by a franchise-seeking corporation it is
evident that public government is corrupted by private
monopoly. It cannot be denied that the desire and effort
of private monopoly to exploit society and make a profit
out of its needs is the main cause of graft and corruption
in our municipal politics. The remedy for this is to supplant
private monopoly by social monopoly. It will be seen, then,
182 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
that the arguments for public ownership, even under the
present system, are numerous and strong.
State Socialism: The extension of government ownership
and State interference with industry, unaccompanied by any
change in existing class relations or increase in the power
of the people as against the power of capital, is sometimes
called State Socialism. The term is not a felicitious one.
Many Socialists object to its use and urge the use of the
term "State Capitalism" as being more accurate — on the
ground that the State simply takes the place of the individual
capitalist or the corporation, and carries on industry in the
old manner without any material change. The term State
Socialism is here used with this explanation.
Every country has a certain amount of State Socialism.
The postal service is a government monopoly in every
civilized country. So are the coinage of money and the light-
house and life-saving services with few exceptions. Most
countries except the United States own and operate the
telegraph and telephone services in connection with the
postal system. State insurance against sickness, accident
and old age is common. Prussia and Italy own the railroads
within their borders. Switzerland owns all its water power.
France has a monopoly of tobacco and Sweden of alcoholic
liquors. Japan has gone far along the path of State Social-
ism, owning railroads, telegraphs and many manufacturing
monopolies. Australia and Now Zealand have gone even
further in the direction of State Socialism and are also more
democratically organized than the other countries named
with the single exception of Switzerland.
However desirable State Socialism may be as a corrective
of some of the worst evils of competition, or of private
monopoly, it cannot be regarded as a solution of the social
problem. The fundamental criticisms which are made
against the industrial system in countries where private
ownership is more general are made against the industrial
system in countries having the largest measure of State
Socialism. The same class distinctions exist, the class
struggle continues, the proletariat still gets only a wage
determined by competition in the labor market and lives
near the poverty line, the capitalist is lord of the industrial
State and through the power thus acquired becomes directly
MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS 183
the ruler of the political State. State ownership is not only
not Socialism, but it is not of necessity a step toward it.
The failure of State Socialism to do away with poverty
and other evils is therefore not a valid argument against
Socialism. In general, however, Socialists favor the exten-
sion of government ownership. They look upon it as the
development within the capitalist order of the political and
industrial forms which the proletariat will some day inherit
and transform into the Socialist State.
184 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. Large scale production saves in the purchase of raw materials
in the marketing of the product, in the application of power, in labor,
and in the utilization of by-products.
2. Combination saves in the cost of salesmen, in the elimination of
cross-freights, in the elimination of poorly located plants and in com-
parative accounting and demonstration.
3. Monopolistic combinations embody the advantages of large scale
production and combination with the power to control markets and
prices.
4. Monopoly in spite of its dangers is a distinct forward step and is
an inevitable feature of modern industrial conditions.
5. Socialists regard State regulation of monopoly as wasteful, bureau-
cratic and ineffective.
6. The public ownership of public service utilities and "State Social-
ism " have distinct advantages, but eannot be regarded as solutions
of the social problem.
QUESTIONS
1. What are the specific advantages of large scale production?
Of combination? Of monopoly?
2. What have been the usual forms of monopolistic combination in
the United States?
3. What are natural monopolies? Why are they so called?
4. What is meant by the "Doctrine of restraint of trade"?
5. Why do Socialists regard State regulation as likely to fail?
6. How may monopoly benefit the consumer?
7. What are the advantages of the public ownership of traction
facilities? What are the objections to public ownership?
8. To what extent do we have "State Socialism" in the United
States?
Literature
Ely, R. T., Monopolies and Trusts.
Howe, F. C, The City, the Hope of Democracy, Chap. IX.
Jenks, J. W., The Trust Problem.
Report of the United States Industrial Commission, Vol. I.
Ripley, W. Z. (editor), Trusts, Pools and Corporations.
Shaw, Albert, Municipal Government in Great Britain.
Tarbell, Ida M., History of the Standard Oil Company.
PAET III
THE SOCIALIST IDEAL
CHAPTER XVI
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL
The ideal of perfection: In every age of civilization there
have always been idealists who, realizing the imperfections
and injustices of the world as it is, have endeavored to
formulate their conceptions of the world as it ought to be.
Mankind has always had a weakness for these beautiful
pictures of a perfected world, and many of them have given
rise to sects and societies working for the realization of the
ideal. The picture drawn is usually nothing more than the
literary expression of the author's dreams, without any
intention of starting a movement or a revolution. Its in-
fluence in bringing about social changes depends upon the
social and economic conditions existing at the time in the
land of its origin. The Utopian ideal frequently merges
imperceptibly into the concept of a future life beyond the
grave, and in writings of a mystical type it is sometimes
difficult to tell which is meant, the earthly paradise of the
future or the paradise in which dwell the spirits of the blessed
dead.
The Utopias present themselves to us in almost infinite
variety and they form one of the most interesting chapters
in the world's literature. It will be impossible for us to
do more than notice briefly a few of the most important of
these pictures and the movements which have followed
them.
Ancient Utopias: One of the first definite pictures of an
ideal world is the Republic of Plato, one of the great master-
pieces of literature. It is remarkable that even the great
Athenian philosopher could not conceive of a society which
was much more than the Athens he knew and loved with
the more obvious defects removed. Communism still existed
to a very large extent in Athens, but only within the limited
cultured class. Beneath were the slaves, who far out-
187
188 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
numbered the citizens and by their labor gave to the Athe-
nians the leisure to develop their culture. The wife was only
a sort of superior domestic slave without personality of her
own. So Plato extends the idea of communism in the
Republic, introduces community of wives and children, and
founds his whole ideal state upon slavery. Thus the Republic
was little more than a description of the then existing Athens
idealized. Although there are many features of this Utopia
which are repulsive to the mind of the twentieth century,
it undoubtedly pictured for the Athenian of Plato's day a
higher and nobler ideal than he had heretofore known.
The Republic was written in the midst of the most wonder-
ful civilization of antiquity by one of its greatest philosophers.
Three centuries later, amid the ruins of an idealistic civiliza-
tion which had been paralyzed by the moral degeneracy of
its ruling class and crushed by foreign military power, a
man of the people began to preach the ideal of a perfected
and regenerated state on earth blended with the ideal of
another life of bliss beyond the grave. His preaching and
tragic death brought about the formation of an organized
group which, in the face of relentless persecution and martyr-
dom, carried on the Master's preaching and laid the founda-
tions of organized Christianity, the most influential of all
world movements. It is especially noteworthy that this
movement was in its origin essentially communistic, for it
is recorded that "all that believed were together, and had
all things common; and they sold their possessions and
goods, and parted them to all, according as any man had
need."1 And again, "not one of them said that aught of the
things he possessed was his own; but they had all things
common."2 From the point of view of its influence upon
the lives of men no other Utopian ideal can rank with the
"Kingdom" which Jesus proclaimed.
Sir Thomas More and his "Utopia": The work which
has given its name to all speculations as to a perfect society
had its origin in the social unrest of England during the
Reformation period, and was written by a man who as Lord
Chancellor of England disagreed with his royal master,
Henry VIII, and paid the penalty on the scaffold. Its
1 The Acts, chap, ii, 44.
2 Idem, chap, iv, 32.
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 189
literary form has been very generally followed in the later
Utopias.
Until the Great Plague of 1348-49, which killed half the
population of England, agricultural interests were still of
first importance, and the manorial system still prevailed.
After the plague there was a scarcity of labor and wages rose
rapidly until parliament passed the "Statute of Laborers,"
fixing wages at the rate which had prevailed before the
plague. This resulted in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381, and
a partial victory for the laborers. As the towns grew and
the woollen trade became more important, the landlords
enclosed the manorial lands and became sheep raisers, thus
dispensing with the services of a large part of the trouble-
some laboring class, dispossessing them from their homes
and driving them into the towns to become common laborers,
or, in many cases, reducing them to vagabondage, crime and
beggary. It was the natural hardship of the transition
period between the old and the new, but More saw only the
distress of the people and demanded a return to the happy
days of the agricultural stage.
The Utopia (1516) "contains the criticism of a great
philosopher on the industrial and social changes marking
the opening of the age of capitalism."1 The criticism of
early sixteenth century society takes the form of a contrast
of the ideal commonwealth "Utopia," which is supposed
to have been visited by an explorer in the recently discovered
New World. More points out the growing contrast between
the rich and the poor in England, the evils of low wages
and the oppression of class by class. He attacks property
rights in all forms, and condemns evil conditions whether in
State, church, or in the hearts of individuals. The con-
demnation of the rich parasites and their "retainers and
loitering serving men," the charge that private property
gives rise to crime, which is chiefly committed against
property, and the scathing denunciation of war and mili-
tarism, all sound very much like the social criticism of
to-day.
In Utopia these evils do not exist. Property is held in
common, "every family maketh its own garments," six
hours a day are given to labor and there is no exploitation,
1 Socialism Before the French Revolution, by W. B. Guthrie, p. 92.
190 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
all able-bodied persons work, even women and the clergy.
Monogamous marriage exists, regulated by the State for the
good of society; money does not exist, and gold is put to
base uses; the government is an absolute monarchy, but the
monarch is elected by the people.
The Utopia did not give rise to any sect, party or move-
ment, but the beauty of the ideal and the perfection of its
literary dress have made it one of the immortal masterpieces
of literature. As such it has had a great and beneficent
influence during nearly four hundred years.
Utopias of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: In
the two centuries after the time of More a number of note-
worthy Utopias were written. Tommaso Campanella, a Cala-
brian monk, wrote The City of the Sun (1623), a fanciful
work which is believed to have inspired the Jesuits to under-
take their communistic experiments in Paraguay. His work
is in many respects similar to Plato's Republic. His ideal
involves communism in goods and wives, but slavery is
prohibited and work is common to all. A contemporary of
Campanella, Francis Bacon, statesman and philosopher,
wrote the New Atlantis (1627), a distinctly philosophical
romance. The work is a romantic description of an imaginary
ideal State in which the happiness of the people is attained
by means of the political machinery under State guidance.
In a sense the work is incomplete, for the author did not
live to fulfil his intention of publishing a complete model
of the laws necessary for such a commonwealth. James
Harrington's Oceana (1656) was written during the period
of the author's self-imposed seclusion following the execu-
tion of his friend, Charles I. Half romance and half treatise,
its style was probably suggested by More's great work, but
the ideal which it presents is a very different one. Harring-
ton is first of all a republican. The rulers of ideal common-
wealth are all elected by the people, by ballot, the term of
office being three years. The Senate discusses and debates
laws, the people decide upon their adoption and rejection,
and the elected magistrates execute them. Private property,
as such, is not interfered with, but landed property, being the
most important form of property, the one which confers
greatest power, is so distributed that no one person can
obtain more than a certain fixed revenue from it. After the
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 191
Restoration of Charles II, Harrington was imprisoned in the
Tower of London for treason. Morelly in the next century
with his Basiliade (1753) and Code de la Nature (1755),
marked a distinct advance in the direction of modern thought.
For the former work he adopted the medium of fiction
usually chosen by Utopians, but the latter work is a treatise,
frankly analytical and philosophical in form. He had a pro-
found influence in forming the social theories of the French
Revolution. The period of the Revolution itself gave rise
to many Utopias, of which those of Boissel, Babeuf and
Barnave are the best known.
Saint-Simon: We come now to that remarkable group of
Utopians, Saint-Simon, Fourier, Owen and Cabet, whose
influence upon the Socialist movement as we now conceive
it was by no means small. The first of these, Count Henri
de Saint-Simon, was born in 1760, and lived through the
stirring times of the reign of Louis XVI, the Revolution and
the First Republic, studying and experimenting. His first
published work appeared in 1802, but it was not until 1817,
in L' Industrie, that he began to teach his views in regard
to society. The best expression of his theory, however, is
contained in Le Nouveau Christianisme, published in 1825.
It was this work which first aroused the interest of Karl
Marx in the subject of Socialism.
The recent Revolution and the economic conditions of the
Restoration gave Saint-Simon the basis for his theories.
He believed that the goal of social activity is "the exploita- _
tion of the globe by association^" In some respects he comes &
remarkably near to the viewpoint of the later scientific
Socialists. For example, the idea that political questions
and political institutions are based on economics appears in
U Industrie, where he points out that politics is really after
all nothing but the science of production and foretells the
future complete absorption of politics by economics. While
he had nothing like a conception of the theory of class struggles
in the modern Socialist sense, at times he came very close
to it. In his very first work he insisted that the French
Revolution was essentially a class war, and that the Reign
of Terror was the reign of the non-possessing masses. His
concern is always for the workers, "the class that is the most
numerous and the most poor." Still, his perception of class
192 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
antagonisms is not deep enough to prevent him from building
his Utopia around the idea that the bankers, merchants,
manufacturers, and other sections of the bourgeoisie will
become at once servants of the whole of society, divested
of their class feelings and interests. This is not remarkable
in view of the fact that modern industry was only beginning
in France when Saint-Simon wrote, but the fact marks his
whole thought as essentially Utopian. The religious side
of Saint-Simonism is important, if mystical. The existing
forms of religion are all to be abolished, and a new ethical
order founded upon the teachings of Jesus, having for its
object the amelioration of the conditions of the poor. After
his death Saint-Simon's teachings were taken up by a band
of devoted disciples, but vain and fanatical leadership
demoralized the movement, and it became the prey of
freaks who dragged it into the mire and thoroughly dis-
credited it.
Fourier : The work of Charles Fourier was much more far-
reaching in its influence than that of Saint-Simon. Fourier
was born at Besancon, France, in 1772. He was the son of
a wealthy merchant and received a legacy of about 80,000
francs upon the death of his father in 1781. It is said that
he lost practically the entire sum during the siege of Lyons
in 1793. In 1812 he received a second legacy from his
mother's estate, which yielded him an income of about 900
francs a year, and this enabled him to abandon commerce
and devote himself to the study of social problems. In
1803 his first work appeared, an essay in which Fourier
developed the idea that in order to have universal peace
it was necessary to establish a universal empire. Fourier's
social theories are contained in the following works: The
Theory of the Four Movements and of the General Destinies,
1808; Treatise of Domestic and Agricultural Association,
or Theory of Universal Harmony, 1822; New Industrial
World, 1829; False Industry and Its Antidote, Natural,
Attractive Industry, 1835.
Fourier differs from all the other Utopians in that he does
not make his appeal to the sentiments of men, but to their
material interests. He does not condemn society because of
the sufferings it inflicts upon the poor, but upon the waste-
fulness and anarchy of production. His cry is for "Order"
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 193
and "Harmony," not for "Justice" or "Fraternity." That
happiness for all mankind would result from this social order
Fourier believed, and so much was implied in all his teach-
ing. But it was not his primary concern. Like Saint-Simon,
he was essentially religious and his theories were closely
related to his religious conceptions. But his religion is very
unlike Saint-Simon's: it is more philosophical and less hu-
manitarian and emotional. He regards the whole universe
as God's harmonious creation. Its wonderful harmony
impressed him as the model man ought to copy in his social
arrangements. God never wasted effort and therefore the
passions and instincts with which man was endowed were
meant by God to be used. Every human passion, therefore,
must have its place, and only that society is worthy which
offers full opportunity for their free exercise.
Such is Fourier's philosophy, briefly stated. Upon it he
rests the most elaborate scheme ever devised by any Utopian
writer, and that fact makes all the more remarkable the great
vogue it obtained. It is impossible here to do more than
outline the main features of Fourier's system. The social
unit is the Phalanx, not the State as with Saint-Simon and
most of his predecessors. The normal Phalanx consists of
four hundred families, or eighteen hundred persons, living on
a square league of land, self-contained and self-supporting.
This Phalanx provides its members with every opportunity
for the free development of the most varied likings and
capacities. The principal edifice, the communal dwelling,
is a Palace, which Fourier describes in great detail. It con-
sists of a double line of continuous buildings, about 2,200 feet
in length. There are dining-halls, study rooms, a library,
workshops for noisier occupants — far removed from the
quiet centre — a hotel with apartments for strangers, and the
apartments of the members are so varied as to meet every
individual need and preference. The various phalanges are
ultimately to form a great federation with a capital at
Constantinople. The chief ruler of the world will then be
the Omniarch, and he will be assisted by three Augusts,
twelve Cesarinas, forty-eight Empresses, 144 Kalifs, 576
Sultans, and so on.
An essential feature of his system was the emphasis placed
upon the education of children. Give useful vent to every
194 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
passion and desire, he reasoned, and all will be well. Children
love to play in the dirt, for example, therefore the passion
must be given free play. But it should not be wasted. The
children can be organized into "little hordes" to remove the
dirt from around the Palace — a rather queer anticipation of
the boys' street cleaning brigades of some of our cities. There
is nothing of communism in Fourier's scheme. The property
of the Phalanx is to be held by stockholders. It is not
necessary to hold stock in order to be a member, nor need
one be a member in order to become a stockholder. Every
member must labor at rates fixed by the council. At the
end of the year an inventory is made and the profits are
divided— five-twelfths to labor, four-twelfths to capital,
three-twelfths to skill or talent.
But the most fantastic part of Fourier's system is his theory
of cosmogony. As one reads it to-day it is impossible not
to marvel that so many brilliant minds were attracted by
Fourierism. The life of each planet, including the earth,
is 80,000 years. The period of infancy is 5,000 years, that
of ascending development 35,000 years, that of descending
development 35,000 years, that of senility 5,000 years.
Within the life of the earth the human race must pass through
thirty-two periods. We are now in the fifth period, civiliza-
tion. The eighth period will be that of Harmony and will
bring complete happiness. Then there will develop a "polar
crown," which will revolutionize the globe. The ice will
disappear from the arctic circles and there will be no torrid
zone, for climate will be equal all over the world. Wild
beasts will disappear and new animals, useful to man, will
take their place. Even the water of the ocean will acquire
a new use — it will become lemonade, so that he who desires
to quench his thirst need never want.
Fourier's relation to Socialism: Such were the teachings
of the man whose most brilliant disciples were to be found
here in the New World, where his social system received its
most important trials. What, it may well be asked, have
these theories to do with Socialism — how does Fourier enter
into the history of the movement at all? In the first place,
Fourier is not in a true sense of the term a Socialist. His
basic idea is rather that of establishing harmony between
labor and capital. He comes near to the modern scientific
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 195
Socialists in one respect, namely, in his criticism of existing
society. With rare literary charm he satirizes the bourgeoisie
in a manner which makes one wonder that so keen a satirist
should manifest so small a sense of humor. His criticism
of the position of woman is most masterly. It is to him
we owe the idea that the degree of woman's emancipation is
the best measure of the general emancipation of any society.
Then, too, Fourier's conception of social evolution, and his
division of the history of mankind into epochs, is an inter-
esting anticipation of the evolutionary basis of modern
Socialism. Finally, as one of the last of those great move-
ments for the remolding of society to conform to an abstract
principle, it must be considered in any study of the develop-
ment of the Utopian tendency to the point where it loses
itself in the new movements of science.
Robert Owen: By far the greatest of this group of Utopi-
ans is Robert Owen, sometimes called the "Father of Modern
Socialism." Born in 1771, of poor parents, Owen was one
of those who acquired a fortune out of the commercial mael-
strom which attended the birth of the Industrial Revolution
in the series of inventions that culminated with Watt's
steam engine and Cartwright's power loom. While he was
yet in his teens Owen rose to a prominent position as a manu-
facturer. He saw the appalling misery and poverty which
attended the new industrial regime, and was especially
struck by the terrible suffering of little child workers, who,
from the age of five, were compelled to work as many as
fourteen hours out of the twenty-four, by night as well as
by day, and subjected to almost incredible cruelty and
hardship. Owen began an agitation in Manchester which
led to the passing of the first factory act, in 1802, by the
Peel ministry.
Owen is best known by the Utopian experiments he made
at various times and places, of which New Lanark, Scot-
land, and New Harmony, in the State of Indiana, are the
most important. The first of these was an example of
paternalism, a sort of "benevolent feudalism"; the second
was an example of modified communism. Owen went to
New Lanark on the opening day of the nineteenth century
to assume the management of a large cotton mill, of which
he was part owner. The factory employed more than two
196 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
thousand persons, and was widely known as "the best
regulated factory in the world." But even here Owen found
conditions so bad as to be positively revolting, and at once
set himself to the task of improving them. He established
infant schools, among the very first of their kind, and set
apart certain hours in the afternoon for the instruction of
the child-laborers. Prior to his coming children of five and
six years of age were employed from six in the morning to
seven in the evening and then compelled to go to school.
He shortened the hours of labor for all employees, raised
wages, introduced sanitary reforms, relieved the workers
from the clutches of unscrupulous traders who exploited
them shamefully through a vicious credit system, establish-
ing a store to supply them with goods at cost and making
payment of wages more frequent. In short, all that phi-
lanthropy could devise or suggest was attempted. New
Lanark acquired a world-wide reputation as the centre of
the greatest social experiments in history. Distinguished
men from all parts of the world visited the place and with
a unanimity that is a rare tribute to Owen's skill and sincerity
praised it highly. Again and again Owen was forced to
make great financial sacrifices and change partners. Al-
though the business paid handsomely, there was almost
invariably an objection by his partners to the expenditure
of so much money upon what they could not but consider
a foolish object. For twenty-nine years Owen kept up the
New Lanark work and then turned to the advocacy of com-
munism, the second phase of his social career.
At New Lanark, through his educational experiments,
Owen had become impressed with the idea that human
character is largely formed by and dependent upon environ-
ment. This he made the basis of an educational propaganda
that was very far-reaching, and that drew forth the most
bitter attacks by those who regarded his assault on the
doctrine of the freedom of the will as an attack upon all that
religion meant. In 1817, when the British government was
discussing the best means of remedying the frightful distress
of the period, Owen proposed a plan, the essential feature of
which was that the government should establish commu-
nistic villages. From this time onward he gradually lost
interest in mere philanthropy. He wrote and lectured
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 197
incessantly, advocating the establishment of cooperative
communities. Like Fourier, whose work he always claimed
to have to a large extent inspired, Owen hoped for a great
federation of the world to come from these communities.
His ideal is cooperative industry with perfect equality
between the sexes. To the establishment of cooperative
"colonies" Owen devoted nearly all of his large fortune.
Of these experiments that of New Harmony was the most
important, alike as regards size and influence.
Owen did not write a work analogous to the romance of
More. His theories and ideas are stated in a formidable array
of pamphlets, manifestos, lectures, debates and philosophical
treatises. Toward the end of his life, when his mind had
already become feeble, Owen brought much discredit upon
his ideas by his own eccentric conduct. But if we take his
life as a whole, up to the point where his mental grasp be-
comes weak, we see a singularly noble and unselfish character,
devoted with a courage and an enthusiasm that are rare
to the welfare of humanity. His practical achievements
were by no means small. He laid the foundation of England's
factory legislation; he started infant schools; he directly
inspired the great cooperative movement, for the Rochdale
movement was the result of the success of New Lanark;
he was one of the pioneers of trades unionism, presiding at
the first organized congress of labor unions as far back as
1834. He was a man in whom the practical and the ideal
were strangely blended. Essentially a Utopian, he was
nevertheless a shrewd man of business. It is said of him
that when on one occasion he submitted some scheme of
social organization to the British government, and its con-
sideration was postponed to the next session of parliament,
he cried out to his friend Lord Brougham, "What! will you
postpone the happiness of the whole human race to the next
session of parliament?"
Cabet: Etienne Cabet, a French physician, was the leader
and inspirer of the last of the great Utopian movements.
He was at first an active politician, his activities leading
to his exile for five years. These five years were spent in
England, where Cabet came under the influence of Owen.
Returning to France in 1839 he published his famous Utopian
romance, Voyage en Icarie. The plot of the book is essen-
198 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
tially similar to that of More's Utopia — it is the journal of
one who has travelled among a strange and unknown people.
Cabet's system is very much that of Owen. He advocates
communism, and outlines a plan for the inauguration of the
new regime. This plan, or program, includes progressive
income taxes, abolition of the right of inheritance, establish-
ment of agricultural colonies and national workshops, and,
above all, completely free education. The book created a
tremendous furore in France, and in 1847 Cabet believed
that he had four hundred thousand workers ready to go to
America to found his ideal commonwealth. Actually, how-
ever, the number of those who went was extremely small.
Dissensions arose and split the movement, Cabet himself
being expelled in 1856. He had grown dictatorial and nar-
row and intolerant and his expulsion was the natural expres-
sion of the revolt of the younger element. The movement
never recovered from the split, and, like so many other
Utopian movements, gradually degenerated and disappeared
without leaving any material impress upon the life of that
world which it was designed to transform and regenerate.
The modern Utopians : The Utopian literature of the last
half century has been thrown into the background by the
stronger appeal of the Marxian thought and movement,
but in literary quality and wealth of imagination much of it
is of a very high order. Edward Bellamy, in Looking Back-
ward, describes a great machine-made state in which every-
thing is run with the precision of clock-work. It is the most
mechanical of all the Utopias, and leaves very little room for
the development of individuality. Nevertheless, its appear-
ance, in 1887, gave a great impetus to the Socialist "move-
ment' ' of the time, by suggesting plausible solutions to
many practical problems which perplexed a great many
persons. It contributed in no small degree to separate the
Socialists and the Anarchists of the period more definitely
than had been done heretofore. This was a natural result of
Bellamy's emphasis of the State. On the other hand, the
book probably contributed in some degree to the creation
of the fear that Socialism must involve bureaucracy. Five
years after Bellamy's book appeared William Morris pub-
lished his News from Nowhere. In literary quality this is
by far the best of all the modern works of its kind, and as
THE UTOPIAN SOCIALIST IDEAL 199
an example of English prose it ranks high. Morris's soul
revolted against Bellamy's mechanical and unlovely common-
wealth, and News from Nowhere was a counterblast, as it
were. In his desire for freedom of the individual Morris
swings to the other extreme from Bellamy and pictures a
State which might be described as anarchist-communism
with an idealized pastoral and handicraft system as its basis.
William Dean Ho wells in A Traveller from Altruria contrasts
the present with the ideal and takes a position midway
between that of the practical Bellamy and Morris the idealist
and poet. H. G. Wells, on the other hand, views the world's
problems as an engineer and suggests rather than describes
their solutions.
Value of the Utopian ideal: Despite all their eccentricities
and failings the Utopian Socialists have greatly benefited
mankind. They have rendered a great service by their
criticisms of existing society, and by holding out the inspira-
tion of a definite ideal. It has always been too common for
men to accept things without questioning them, to assume
that whatever is is right, and that what is must continue
to be. The Utopians have bravely challenged this conserva-
tism and forced millions of men and women to move in the
direction of progress, who otherwise would not have moved
at all. It matters little that their plans were impracticable,
nor even that any serious attempt to carry them out would
have brought about a worse condition than that which
their authors sought to remedy. The inertia of conservatism
and the inexorable forces of social evolution made the accept-
ance of their plans impossible, but nothing could prevent
mankind from seeing the evils which these prophets of a bet-
ter social order decried, and so, even though we speak of the
"failures" of dreamers like More and Owen, it must be con-
fessed that much of the progress we have made has been
directly inspired by them. Their success lay in other direc-
tions than they dreamed.
200 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. In every age men have pictured an ideal world to be attained by-
moral regeneration or by the adoption of a specific plan.
2. These Utopias have had their bases in the economic conditions
of the time in which they were written and usually picture the ideal
by contrast with the real.
3. The most influential of the Utopians of modern times were St.
Simon, Owen, Fourier, and Cabet, who served as the fore-runners of
the modern Socialist movement.
4. The Utopian ideals have rendered great social service by their
criticisms of existing society, and by shaking the inertia of conservatism
and stimulating progress.
QUESTIONS
1. Upon what does the influence of a Utopia in bringing about social
changes depend?
2. Discuss the Utopian ideal of Plato.
3. What were the social conditions giving rise to the Utopia of Sir
Thomas More?
4. Characterize briefly The City of the Sun. The New Atlantis.
The Oceana.
/£ What elements of modern Socialism are to be found in the teach-
ings of St. Simon?
/ 6. What is the significance of Fourierism to Socialist thought?
7. What is the position of Owen in Socialist history?
\ 8. Characterize the work of the modern Utopians.
\ 9. What essential features are common to the ideals of all the
^Utopians?
\10. What positive results have the Utopians accomplished?
Literature
In addition to the works of the Utopian writers themselves, as men-
tioned in the text, the following books will be found useful.
Engels, F., Socialism, Utopian and Scientific.
Guthrie, W. B., Socialism before the French Revolution.
Hillquit, M., History of Socialism in the United States.
Kaufman, M., Utopias, or Schemes of Social Improvement.
Morley, H., Ideal Commonwealths.
Podmore, F., Life of Robert Owen.
Wolsey, T., Communism and Socialism.
CHAPTER XVII
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM
Socialist ideals, old and new: While he may not dream
with the Utopian Socialist of a perfected humanity, the
Marxian Socialist has many ideals in common with the
Utopian Socialist. The main difference between the two
types lies in the bases of their hopes for the attainment of
their ideals, rather than in the nature of the ideals themselves.
For example, the Marxian Socialist is as conscious of the
wastefulness and anarchy of the modern system of produc-
tion as Fourier himself could possibly have been, and just
as anxious to have a well-ordered productive system with
all its waste and disorder eliminated. Moreover, he is quite
as confident as Fourier ever could have been in his most
sanguine moments that sooner or later the system of pro-
duction will be so transformed. But he does not rest his
hope for the attainment of that ideal of a well-ordered plan
of production upon the merits of any scheme or plan, nor
yet upon the ability of himself or others to persuade the
world to improve its industrial methods. He simply rests
upon the facts of evolution and their logic. If order is to
be established in production it will not be because men have
been persuaded that waste is against the moral law, but
because that force which lies back of all progress, which is
forever reducing the pain cost of life, impels the change.
In a word, because they have discovered a better way.
Socialism essentially idealistic: Every Socialist is of
necessity an idealist. He could not be a Socialist in any real
sense of the word unless he had first measured the existing
reality by some standard. That standard is his ideal. He
measures the world as it is by some conception of what it
might be, and that conception translates itself into what it
ought to be. It is sometimes said that the Marxian theory
robs Socialism of its idealism and makes it harsh and mechan-
201
202 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ical; that it takes the splendid moral passion of the move-
ment and binds it down. Such criticism comes alone from
those who do not know the Socialist movement. No one
who is at all familiar with the history of the movement
will contend that it has manifested less idealism since Marx
than before him. The life of Marx himself is a splendid
example of the loftiest idealism, and the upbuilding of the
movement in the various countries has involved an amount
of sacrifice on the part of its devotees which nothing but a
great ideal could have inspired. No other movement in
history, with the exception of early Christianity, has called
forth so much heroic sacrifice, and service during so great a
period and in face of such great odds.
The ideal of international solidarity: Modern Socialism is
essentially international. Its great birth-cry, the Communist
Manifesto, called upon the workingmen of all countries to
unite, and from that day to the present the ideal of inter-
national working-class solidarity has been before the move-
ment. The vision of a great world unity is older than Marxian
Socialism, older even than the Christian religion. The ideal
of internationalism is, therefore, not peculiar to modern
Socialism. But that is equally true of all its ideals of per-
sonal freedom, of peace, of fraternity. All the great and noble
aspirations which the prophets of all the ages have voiced
find expression in the Socialist movement. What is peculiar
to the movement is the basis it offers for faith and hope of
their realization.
Unlike the Utopian Socialists of an earlier generation, the
Socialists of to-day do not concern themselves with schemes
for the formal federation of the world into a great world-
republic. They waste no time devising schemes of federation
similar to that of Fourier's hierarchy. What is far more
important than any formal unity is the unity of spirit which
the movement breathes in all its propaganda throughout the
civilized world. International congresses of workers may or
may not be progenitors of international parliaments of the
Socialist nations of the world. One thing is certain, namely,
that the Socialist movement, by holding out the ideal of
international solidarity, is hastening the realization of a
lasting world peace.
Socialism is not anti-patriotic: But while the ideal of
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM 203
internationalism is fundamental to Socialism, we must not
make the mistake of assuming that Socialism involves anti-
patriotism, that there is anything incongruous in a Socialist
being a loyal citizen of the country or state in which he lives,
and of being ready to defend it against attack, if necessary.
The Bebel who in the Reichstag opposed Bismarck and pro-
tested against the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine as an outrage
was quite logical when, on another occasion, in his debate
with Domela Nieuwenhuis, the Dutch Anarchist leader, he
declared that in case of an attack upon Germany by Russia,
for example, the Social Democracy would rally all its forces
to the defense of the Fatherland. Because they are inter-
nationalists in their ideals it does not follow that Socialists
must be anfo"-nationalists. A normal and sane patriotism,
a love of country which does not rest upon hatred or envy
of some other country, is no more opposed to the wider ideal
of internationalism than is the love of one human being for
another.
Socialism and universal peace : The vision of world-peace
which the Hebrew prophet proclaimed when he foretold the
coming of a time when the social consciousness of the world
must destroy war and forge its weapons into tools of peaceful
industry finds its expression in the Socialist propaganda of
to-day. Professor Theodor Mommsen, the eminent historian,
said of the Social Democracy that it was the greatest peace
organization in the German Empire. Similar observations
have been made from time to time concerning the role of the
Socialist movement of the world in the great war against
war. The Socialist parties of all the world are pledged to
resist the encroachments of militarism and to foster the
development of friendly relations among all the nations of
the earth. This is not due merely to a moral conviction that
war is wrong and that peace is right and desirable.
The reason for this attitude toward war, the reason why
the ideal of universal peace plays such a large part in the
Socialist propaganda, is not far to seek. In the last analysis,
the heavy burdens of war fall upon the working class. Not
only has the working class suffered most from wars in the
past by furnishing most of the victims, but it is most injured
by the heavy burden of present day militarism. To divert
this wasteful expenditure, which is growing larger every year,
204 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
from the channels of waste into channels of fruitful social
expenditure is one of the tasks which the Socialist movement
is everywhere demanding the parliaments of the world to
undertake. What this would mean in the way of releasing
vast resources for the work of building up instead of destroy-
ing cannot be computed. In the United States during the
thirty-year period, 1879-1909, we spent no less than 71.6
per cent of our total national income1 upon wars past and
present and to prepare for future wars. With that sum set
free what might we not do in the way of social reform?
The basis for world peace : War will be banished from the
earth, but not as a result of the inspiration of the minds and
hearts of men by some poet's noble plea for peace, nor
because some great artist like Verestchagin paints war with
so much terrible reality that men and women will rise up
and declare that the time has come at last to beat the swords
into plow-shares. It will be banished because it becomes
unprofitable. With rare exceptions, wars have always been
carried on in the interests of ruling and exploiting classes.
The hope for world peace is inseparably interwoven with the
hope of the world's proletariat. So long as there is class
ownership of the means of production and class government,
so long must the workers in one land pile up surplus products
which the master class will seek to force upon the market
somewhere and somehow, even if it requires war to do it.
But once the production of wealth is made a collective
responsibility the workers will cease to pile up a surplus
product; they will no longer be compelled to invade other
lands to dispose of their surplus or be crushed beneath it,
victims of the plethora of their own production.
The foundations for world peace are being prepared by
capitalism itself, just as the foundations of Socialism are
being prepared by it. For its own ends it has broken down
many of the divisions which kept the people of the different
nations from understanding each other, and subjected the
workers of many lands to one common form of exploitation.
Its methods, resources, inventions, and, especially, its means
of communication, have done much to lay the foundations of
the world peace foresung by so many of humanity's choicest
1 From a statement by Mr. Hamilton Holt, in the New York Times,
September 3, 1911.
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM 205
spirits. The nations have been brought closer together,
education has become to a large extent the property of the
masses, at least in its elementary forms. The workers have
thus a key with which they can unlock the World's Treasuries
of art, science, philosophy, literature, and no power can take
from them the power which, sooner or later, they will exercise
to erect the temple of universal peace.
Immanuel Kant, the great German philosopher, published
an essay in 1795 in which he made the remarkable declara-
tion that universal peace could never be realized until the
world should be politically organized, and that the world
would never be politically organized until a majority of the
nations had a representative form of government. That
condition has now been fulfilled. Perhaps we are nearer
than we think to the age when war among nations will be
only a hideous memory. Be that how it may, the ideal of
world peace which inspires the modern Socialist is not a
hope that is woven of the stuff of which dreams are made.
It rests upon the basis of solid reality. Social evolution has
made the realization of the ancient dream possible. More-
over, it has developed the class whose interest it is to make
war against war. "The alliance of the working classes of all
countries will ultimately kill war," declared the General
Council of the International Workingmen's Association in an
address written by Marx. The bringing together of millions
of men and women of all lands into the international Socialist
movement is one of the greatest triumphs of peace.
Social peace within nations: The Socialist ideal of peace
involves more than the abolition of war between nations. It
is more fundamental, more inclusive, than that and involves
the abolition of social war within nations. Here, too, the
scientific Socialist shares a great deal with his Utopian fore-
runners. The word " Commonwealth" which we apply to
the State, meaning common weal or well-being, is in itself
an admirable epitome of a great ideal. "This is a place
where well-being is common to all," we say when we apply
the term commonwealth to a State. We imply that there
none is poor or other than well; that the interests of each
individual are bound up with the interests of all other
individuals and identical with them. "One thing ought to
be aimed at by all men," says Cicero, "that the interest of
206 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
each individually, and of all collectively, should be the
same." But no modern State is a commonwealth in this
sense. Between the "haves" and the "have-nots", the
payers and the receivers of wages, the makers and the takers
of wealth, there is war and bitter strife.
The modern Socialist cherishes the ideal which the word
"commonwealth" properly signifies. He believes that the
noble standard set by Cicero will be attained once the
economic conditions are prepared for it. But while the Marx-
ian Socialist thus shares the hope and ideal of the Utopian
Socialists of all past generations, he differs from them as
much as the greatest astronomer of the twentieth century
differs from the poorest and humblest astrologer of the
ancient world. For all the Utopians based their faith in the
realization of their ideals upon some genius, some scheme
devised or principle discovered. The scientific Socialist,
on the other hand, knows that no society ever came thus
into being. He knows that the present is the child of the
past and must be the parent of the future. If we would
catch even a glimpse of the future we must study the develop-
ment from past to present. Lammenais says somewhere,
''If we separate it from the past the present is silent as to
the future." Studying the evolution of society the Social-
ist of to-day finds a new basis in realism for his idealism.
That which first divided mankind into classes was property
and ever since property has continued to be the dividing
force. But it is never simple property, the possession of
goods, which creates class divisions. The basis of feudal
class divisions was not the ownership of stores of things, but
of the land from which things must be produced. The
class basis of our present industrial society is not the posses-
sion of goods and money by the master class, but the posses-
sion of the means of production essential to the life of all
society. The forces of evolution have created a class whose
power is irresistible, namely the proletariat. The same forces
of social evolution compel this class to accept the role of
establishing the necessary conditions for the realization of
the ideal of social peace and common weal.
For if it be true that class ownership of the means of
social life is the basis of class division and class rule, together
with their evil results, then it must follow that with the
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM 207
destruction of class ownership the class ownersh p and rule
must disappear. The task of the proletariat, therefore, is to
abolish that which prevents the realization of the ideal of
social harmony. Thus, the German Socialists in the Erfurt
program declare that the transformation from capitalist
ownership of the means of production to collect ve ownership
"means the emancipation not only of the proletariat, but
of the whole human race which suffers under the conditions
of to-day. But it can only be the work of the working class,
because the other classes, in spite of mutually conflicting
interests, take their stand on the basis of private ownership
of the means of production, and have as their common object
the preservation of the principles of contemporary society."
It may be said that the Socialist movement of to-day is
vibrant with a passionate faith in the ages-old ideal of a state
n which men "dwell together in unity," as the Bible has it,
being made realizable and attainable through the working
masses acting in response to the most pr mal of all laws,
the law of self-preservation. It may sometimes happen that
in the bitterness of the class conflict the ideal is forgotten,
that some of those who fight against the rulers of to-day
harbor in their hearts the hope of themselves becoming
rulers and oppressors to-morrow. But if the means of pro-
duction and exchange are made social property — and that
is an essential condition of Socialism — the possibility of class
rule will have been destroyed. Thus the organized Socialist
movement represents not merely the massing of the forces
which can and must destroy war between nations, but also
the massing of power which will ultimately put an end to
social war within the nations.
Equality of opportunity : But social peace is not the whole
of social well-being. It is at best only one of its fundamental
conditions. The advantages and opportunities which have
been developed through the long centuries of evolution must
be socialized and made free to all. This is not the ideal of
equality which is fundamental to most of the great Utopias.
The modern Socialist does not look for equality and does
not desire it. Nature's law is inequality — and the law is
universal and immutable. As in 'the physical world the
mountain contrasts with the plain and the valley, so there
must always be inequalities of human capacity, character and
208 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
attainment. The ideal of the modern Socialist involves
equality of opportunity only, and that to the end of a
glorious inequality, rather than the comfortable equality of
the Utopians.
Accustomed as we are to accept the idea of all men being
born "free and equal," the claim for equal opportunities for
all seems moderate and reasonable and far from revolution-
ary. In point of fact, however, no more revolutionary claim
could be advanced. A serious attempt to realize it would of
necessity involve a complete transformation of nearly every
social relation. It is impossible to conceive of a system
affording an equal chance to every child born into the world
which does not begin with the right of every child to be
well born. But that in turn involves the right of every mother
to all the care and protection which human power can give,
all that science and social organization can do to shield her
from danger during the whole period from conception to
childbirth. Nay, more, it includes the equal right of all
men to healthy surroundings and conditions in order that
they may develop the maximum of physical strength and fit-
ness for parenthood available to them. The claim involves
doing away with the contrast which presents itself in the
cruel overwork of one set of mothers and the carefully pro-
tected rest of another set of mothers. It involves doing
away with the hideous contrast of the slum and the mansion.
In a word, equality of opportunity cannot become a fact
until we have solved the problem of overwork on the one
hand and idleness on the other, the whole industrial problem,
in fact.
To say that the Socialist ideal is equality of opportunity
for all does not mean that all must have identical opportu-
nities, regardless of ability or inability to use them advanta-
geously. It would be folly to waste social effort attempting
to force a musical education upon a deaf mute, for example,
or to give painting lessons to a color-blind child. What is
meant is that every child should have an equal chance to
develop whatever talent it may have. The cruel and anom-
alous contrast of idle men and toiling children must disappear.
No moral aspiration must be crushed by poverty in a state
saturated with wealth.
Socialism does not seek to make men equal: There is
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM 209
probably a much greater degree of equality in natural human
capacity and talent than has been generally recognized.
The trend of modern scientific thought is to recognize that,
within the species, inheritance counts for much less than
environment. The moral frequently drawn from the famil-
iar comparison of the descendants of the Juke family and
the family of Jonathan Edwards is vitiated by the fact
that the environment is not taken into account. Suppose
the Juke children had been transplanted into the Edwards
environment and the Edwards children into the Juke
environment, would the results have been the same? It is
not necessary that we should attempt to answer that ques-
tion, here and now.
Recognition of the fact that a great deal of the intellectual
and moral superiority which exists among men is due to
specially favorable circumstances, rather than to the inherent
superiority of the individuals, does not involve acceptance
of the ancient ideal of equality. The modern Socialist ideal
is not a great level plain of comfortable mediocrity. It
would not level down, binding the stronger to the level
attained by the weaker, but it would simply strike from the
spirit of humanity all that binds it and holds it down.
Instead of placing the conditions most favorable to the devel-
opment of special genius at the disposal of one class only, it
would make those conditions the common heritage of all.
Socialism and the individual: Obviously, a society based
upon equality of opportunity as we have described it would
not crush individuality. On the contrary, no other basis for
true individualism is possible. Not until each individual is
born heir to all the resources of civilization, free to take
whatever he can assimilate, will the full flowering of a worthy
individualism be possible. In the past Socialists have too
readily accepted the definitions of their critics and regarded
Socialism and Individualism as opposing principles. But in
truth Socialism and Individualism rightly considered are
but different aspects of the one great ideal. Not until
opportunities are assured to all will they be secured for any.
Only that society which socializes all its opportunities for
healthful living, for knowledge and beauty will ever be able
to conserve all its intellectual and spiritual forces and prevent
their waste. Only in such a society will Life and Art be united,
210 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
so that all lives may be useful and beautiful. The mag-
nificent achievements of the Athens of Sophocles and Prax-
iteles were made possible only through the communism of
opportunity which her vast system of public ownership
afforded, enabling her to reach through her communism
of opportunity the highest development of individualism
the world has yet known. And in like manner we shall find
that the highest individualism is possible only where the
means of the common life are not controlled by individuals
or classes, but by the whole body politic.
Basis of the Socialist ideal: The Socialist ideal rests,
ultimately, upon that fundamental principle which Paul per-
ceived, namely, that "we are all members one of another."
We are social animals, as Aristotle wisely observed. We
became human through being social, in all probability.
While some suffer more severely than others from the evils
which arise out of our social mal-adjustments, yet it is true
that we all suffer. The richest among men cannot realize
healthfulness, beauty, joy and inspiration in life in a world
that is diseased, ugly, miserable and sordid to the last degree.
The good of the individual is, happily, not separable from
the good of all other individuals. Fortunately, the fever
which starts in the hovel spreads also to the mansion. Like-
wise the ugliness which stamps the lives of the poor stamps
also the shoddy splendors of the rich. If there is one fact
more plainly evidenced by human progress than any other,
it is that individualism flourishes best where the opportu-
nities for health, for knowledge, for beauty and for joy are
most widely diffused.
"Where there is no vision the people perish." The Social-
ist movement of to-day is keeping alive in the hearts of men
the vision of a world in which the highest good of each appears
as the first fruit of the devotion of each to the common good;
of a social order in which community of interests shall pass
beyond the boundaries of family, of city and nation and
unite all mankind in bonds of peace and fellowship. No
virtue will be lost, even though old virtues may take new
forms. Courage, for example, which we have so long asso-
ciated with war, will find a more generous development in
the services of peace. And the strength and daring which has
developed our great economic forces, heedless of the ugliness
THE IDEALS OF MODERN SOCIALISM 211
and suffering they involved, will not remain idle and become
atrophied. They will find their fullest and most joyful
expression in the organization of those forces to make the
world beautiful and glad and free.
SUMMARY
1. Socialism is essentially idealistic, but modern Socialism bases its
ideal upon the logic of evolution, and not upon the merits of any scheme
or plan.
2. Socialism upholds the ideals of international solidarity, universal
peace and human brotherhood.
3. Socialism aims also at the ending of the class struggle and the es-
tablishment of peace within nations.
4. Socialism seeks to establish equality of opportunity, not equality
of wealth or ability.
5. It is only with equality of opportunity that true individualism
can be developed.
QUESTIONS
1. How does the ideal of modern Socialism differ from the Utopian
ideal?
2. In what ways does the Socialist movement make for international
peace?
3. What is the basis for the Socialist hope for world peace?
4. Is it true that "Socialists advocate the class struggle"?
5. In what sense does equality form a part of the Socialist ideal?
6. Why is it incorrect to regard Socialism and individualism as
antithetical?
Literature
Angel, Norman, The Great Illusion.
Kautsky, K., The Social Revolution, Part II.
Morris, William, and Bax, E. B., Socialism, its Growth and Outcome.
Chap. XXI.
Spargo, John, The Spiritual Significance of Modern Socialism. The
Substance of Socialism.
The Fabian Essays.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE SOCIALIST STATE — POLITICAL
No detailed prediction: Socialists are constantly con-
fronted with a demand for a detailed description of the
Socialist society of the future. This it is impossible to give,
since all the forces which made for social change cannot be
known. Any such prediction would necessarily be pure
Utopian romance. Wilhelm Liebknecht, the great leader of
the German Social Democracy, replying to such a request
from an opponent in debate on one occasion said:
"Never has our party told the workingmen about a 'state
of the future,' never in any other way than as a mere Utopia.
If anybody says, 'I picture to myself society after our
program has been realized, after wage labor has been abol-
ished and the exploitation of men has ceased, in such or such
a manner/ well and good: ideas are free, and everybody
may conceive the Socialist State as he pleases. Whoever
believes in it may do so, whoever does not, need not. These
pictures are but dreams, and Social Democracy has never
understood them otherwise."
It is possible, however, while adhering strictly to the
scientific method and spirit, to set forth some of the condi-
tions which must obtain in a Socialist society. We can
interpret tendencies in the light of known economic laws,
and determine very definitely some conditions which must
exist under Socialism, and some conditions which are incom-
patible with it. Social forms cannot be made to order;
they are the product of the collective intelligence operating
within the limits fixed by the economic environment. Changes
in the social order must come, and they will be in the direc-
tion of further progress. A knowledge of the past and a
recognition of the laws of social evolution enable us to tell
something of the future organization of society. In a like
manner Morelly, in 1756, predicted the downfall of the
212
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 213
Bourbon monarchy in France and the establishment of a
state free from feudal privilege, but he could not by any
possibility foresee the great material and cultural develop-
ments of the nineteenth century in all their bewildering
detail, and when he did attempt to picture the special forms
of the future social state the result was fantastic.
The next step in social evolution: The concentration of
capital, the ever enlarging scale of production, the with-
drawal of the actual owners from the management of indus-
try, the education and organization of the working class,
the raising of the standard of life making exploitation more
difficult, the increasing democratization of the State and the
enlargement of its economic functions, all indicate that the
next stage in social evolution will be marked by the social-
ization of the principal means of production and exchange.
The present industrial and governmental systems are so
shaping themselves as to make socialization possible, and
the masses are rapidly reaching the point at which they will
be able to end economic exploitation and when they will have
the ability to administer an industrial democracy.
Will the State "die out"? An unfortunate confusion of
thought often arises over the attitude of Socialists toward the
State. This is due to the fact that many Socialists have
given to the term "State" a significance much narrower than
that which it bears in current usage. Engels, for example,
writes: "The first act by virtue of which the State really
constitutes itself the representative of the whole of society —
the taking possession of the means of production in the name
of society — this is, at the same time, its last independent
act as a State. State interference in social relations becomes,
in one domain after another, superfluous, and then dies out
of itself; the government of persons is replaced by the admin-
istration of things, and by the conduct of the processes of
production. The State is not 'abolished.' It dies out.11 On
the same subject, Bebel says: "The State is the inevitably
necessary organization of a social order that rests upon
class rule. The moment class antagonisms fall through the
abolition of private property, the State loses both the neces-
sity and the 'possibility for its existence." But further he
says that "an administration is requisite that shall embrace
all the fields of social activity. Our municipalities constitute
214 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
an effective basis thereto. At the head of the local admin-
istration stands the central administration — as will be noted,
not a government to rule, but an executive college of admin-
istrative functions."1 Now, it is obvious from the qualifica-
tions implied in these statements by Engels and Bebel that
neither of them used the word "State" in the customary-
sense. An "administration of things" would be impossible
except through some form of "government of persons."
The political State and the industrial State : It may almost
be said that within the geographical boundaries of modern
nations there are two States rather than one. Probably in
no previous age has there been as complete a separation
between political and industrial organizations. The political
State, the whole political organization of society, was eco-
nomic in its origin. Under feudalism the hierarchy of land-
owning lords directed both the State and the characteristic
agricultural organization. Under the Town Economy the
aldermen of the various guilds constituted the city govern-
ment. But when the democratic movement of the eighteenth
and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries destroyed
autocracy in Western Europe and America, established con-
stitutional governments and broadened the suffrage so as to
enfranchise, in some countries, practically all males above
the age of twenty-one years, the lords of the new capitalist
industry did not oppose or directly control the political
State, but preaching the doctrine of laissez faire, proceeded
to organize that which for all practical purposes is a distinct
industrial State within the political State, yet not of it.
By the end of the nineteenth century the process was prac-
tically completed. The empire of business, autocratic in
form, controlled the lives of the people far more than the
political State, and taxed them more heavily. By insidious
means it succeeded in controlling government for its own
ends, confining the functions of the political State largely
to the protection of private property. Socialism sees as the
logical outcome of this process the consolidation of the indus-
trial State with the political State, retaining of the industrial
State the organization and administration of industrial
1 Engels, Socialism., Utopian and Scientific, p. 76 ; Bebel, Woman
under Socialism (translated by Daniel De Leon), p. 272; Idem, p. 275-
276.
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 215
affairs, and of the political State democracy and representa-
tive government.
Recent socialization of the State: This process of con-
solidation has already begun. From the point of view of those
who would maintain the autocracy of business, the extension
of the suffrage and of popular education was fatal. The
consciousness of the domination of society by business
interests is reflected in the universal social unrest and the
popularity of all attempts to weaken the organization of
capital. The power of the industrial State to dominate
the political State has passed its climax. The doctrine of
laissez faire has lost its force and popularity, ' and the State
instead of being looked upon as the oppressor, becomes the
medium through which people are attempting to assert
control over the industrial order. Partial victories have
already been won. The State is extending its control far be-
yond the limits set by the political philosophy of a generation
ago. In the United States the Interstate Commerce Act
of 1887 formed an entering wedge. The commission formed
by that act, though never in any sense radical, has in many
cases asserted its power in opposition to the interests of the
railroads. The establishment of the Department of Com-
merce and Labor with its bureaus of Corporations, Manu-
factures, and Labor, was an important step in the direction
of socialization. The significance of this department lies
rather in its great possibilities of further extension than in
the work of investigation and supervision which it is already
able to do.
In like manner the State is broadening its scope into other
fields. Postal savings banks have been established against
the opposition of the banking interests, and the establish-
ment of a parcels post system in spite of the opposition of
the express companies seems to be one of the certainties of the
near future. The national and state agricultural experiment
stations and their bulletins and other educational publica-
tions have been of tremendous value to the farming popula-
tion. The great irrigation and drainage projects, the build-
ing of thousands of miles of roadways, the construction of
the Panama Canal, the reservation and protection of forests,
are all enterprises, essentially socialistic in nature, of untold
social value, for the carrying out of which private enterprise
216 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
is either too timid or demonstrably incapable. The State and
local governments contribute to the socializing process
through free education, the administration of institutions for
the mentally and physically infirm, the organization of
charities, the reservation and beautifying of parks, the con-
struction of canals, the ownership and operation of water-
works, gas and electric plants, docks and ferries, fire-fighting
and street cleaning services. The interest of the State in the
industrial order has been asserted by laws, however imper-
fect, restricting child labor, providing for employers' lia-
bility, limitation of the hours of labor for women, the in-
stallation of safety devices, factory inspection, supervision
of building construction, and so on.
Necessary functions of the Socialist State: Any State
must maintain order and suppress violence. It must have
the power to define crime and apprehend and punish crim-
inals, and to restrict the liberty of those persons who by
their conduct would deny equal liberty to others. It must
determine the manner in which the political activities of the
individual shall be exercised. It must determine the rights
and limitations of the ownership of property. It must
enforce contracts and administer justice in civil affairs. It
must have the power to collect taxes and use the proceeds
of taxation in the public interest. And it must deal with
foreign States in the adjustment of international relations
and have the power to protect itself from external aggression.
In addition to these general powers, the Socialist State
must have the power to own and operate industries and
transportation systems of all kinds, in so far as they can be
so owned and operated to the public advantage. It must
have the power to regulate private and cooperative industries
and to protect the broader interests of all the people against
the special interests of individuals and groups. It must
guarantee a minimum compensation to labor and provide
opportunities for its productive employment. It must have
the power to make and enforce rules of sanitation. It must
administer a comprehensive system of social insurance. It
must provide full educational opportunities for all, both
cultural and technical, and must provide opportunities for
the advancement of knowledge through research and experi-
mentation.
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 217
The Socialist State must be democratic : In order to carry-
on these functions in the interest of the whole people, the
interests of all must be consulted. A Socialist State without
democracy would be an impossibility. Moreover, the tend-
ency of modern times toward democracy is too strong and
fundamental to be seriously checked. The State which
must assume supervision of industry is already to a large
extent democratic in form in most industrial countries. The
most important barrier to the realization of the substance of
democracy as well as the form is the private ownership of
capital. The destruction of capitalism must be the work
of the whole people, and there is no reason to suppose that
the ideals of democracy which have become so firmly en-
trenched will be abandoned when their realization becomes
possible.
Tyranny is only the rule of the ignorant by the shrewd,
and with universal education it becomes impossible. Where
men can read they cannot be kept in ignorance of arbitrary
misrule. Even now, the most stringent laws are ridiculously
ineffective against the conscious opposition of a majority,
or even of a strong minority.
Meaning of democracy: Democracy does not mean that
everything must be decided by popular vote, including the
selection of every official. In a real democracy it must be
possible for every voter to be well informed concerning the
persons and measures to be voted upon. Democracy means
simply a form of society in which the collective will can be
effectively expressed in regard to any matter in which there
is a conscious collective interest.
Democracy necessarily involves the extension of the
suffrage to all adults who are capable of forming a rational
opinion on public questions. The extension of the suffrage
during the nineteenth century has been one of the greatest
social gains under the capitalist regime, and there is no
question in the minds of Socialists as to the desirability of
its further extension to include women as well as men. The
line can only be logically and fairly drawn at some other
point than that of sex, as, for example, to exclude minors,
criminals, lunatics, idiots and aliens, regardless of sex.
Coercion in the Socialist State: It is futile to talk of
a Socialist State absolutely free from coercion. Freedom
218 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
from coercion and restraint is an ideal which most Socialists
hope may ultimately be realized, but any form of social
organization must have the power to protect itself from
anti-social forces. Even Peter Kropotkin,1 in his non-
coercive anarchist-communist society would expel those
individuals who proved unwilling or unable to abide by the
social will. But coercion in a democratic administrative
State not dominated by class interests would be something
very different from the coercion exercised by class-ruled
states of the past and the present. Coercion would be re-
sorted to only to enforce the carrying out of the social will.
Taxes must be collected, conflicting interests may arise be-
tween individuals and between groups and have to be de-
cided. There must be the power of enforcing such decisions
or they will be valueless. This does not mean tyranny or
the arbitrary exercise of force. Even under a State so
much dominated by class interests as the State of to-day is,
the average citizen is rarely conscious of its coercive power.
Only a small minority ever feels directly the "strong arm
of the law." In point of fact the coercive power of custom
and fashion is much more generally felt. The great majority
of citizens recognize that laws are necessary for the smooth
working of the social machinery, and if a number of citizens
do not approve of the form or general character of a law
they do not refuse to obey it, but proceed to agitate for its
repeal or reform, as the case may be. When laws are made
in the interest of the whole people, and not in the interest
of a class, as now so often happens,- conformity will be much
easier and more general than now. It is not easy to see how
any but the mentally diseased and the anti-social would-be
exploiters of their fellows would ever feel the coercive power
of the Socialist State.
Socialism and individual liberty: A democratic society
would not enact legislation which would restrict the liberty
of its own members unduly. Men do not voluntarily forge
chains to bind themselves. Freedom of movement and
migration would not be restricted except where it endangered
others, as in the case of a person suffering from a contagious
or infectious disease. There would be freedom from arrest,
except for infringing upon the rights of others, with com-
1 Kropotkin, The Conquest of Bread.
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 219
pensation for improper arrest. Respect for the privacy of
domicile and correspondence; liberty of dress, subject to
decency; free speech and publication, subject to the pro-
tection of others by the State against insult, injury or inter-
ference with their recognized rights, and the responsibility
of the individual to the State, are all rights which a Socialist
State could not deny. The individual must be free in all
that pertains to art, science, philosophy and religion, and
their teaching, subject to well understood, though perhaps
not easily definable rules. Liberty is not license. The
Socialist State, while giving full freedom to the artist, would
not be likely to tolerate obscenity in the name of art. Liberty
in science does not mean that every amateur biologist must
be permitted to experiment upon live animals, or upon
criminals, without regulation, simply because he chooses to
invoke the freedom of science. Religious liberty does not
mean that the State would not interfere to prevent or punish
crimes committed in the name of religion. Liberty of indi-
vidual activity must always be limited by the equal rights
and privileges of others. Any other principle would involve
the assertion of one person's freedom and its protection at
the expense of the freedom of some other person or persons.
International relations: The establishment of a "World
Economy"1 must necessarily have the effect of softening the
differences between nations and of bringing about something
approaching a world federation. But differences in language,
and in special economic and social problems, will probably
act as barriers to the complete merging of nations. The
development of arbitration, and the establishment of the
Hague Tribunal, are indications of the way in which inter-
national differences will be settled in the future. Since
under Socialism there would no longer be any object in
warring for foreign markets, the chief cause of present inter-
national difficulties would disappear. There would be less
need for a diplomatic and consular service than at present,
but undoubtedly each of the great nations would maintain
representatives at all the leading foreign capitals, alike as
agents of direct communication between governments and to
give service to travellers.
Socialism and the administration of justice : Under Social-
1 See p. 97.
ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ism, as now, justice must be administered by the State. It
must, however, be further socialized and made free. Court
fees and attorneys' fees are undemocratic because they give
the advantage to the wealthier litigant. The delays of the
law and the unrestricted right of appeal on technicalities
are used to wear out the poorer litigant. These inequalities
must be abolished. Law itself would probably be simplified
so that a layman could understand it, and a great deal of
present law, rendered necessary by the capitalist organiza-
tion of society, would become obsolete. The abolition of
private capital and exploitation would destroy the motive
for the greater part of the crime of capitalist society and the
object of most civil litigation. The administration of justice
in the Socialist State, therefore, would, to a very large extent,
be confined to the equitable adjustment of the industrial
relations of individuals and cooperative groups.
Education in the Socialist State: Free public education
from the kindergarten through the university is essential
to equality of opportunity. It is equally true that equality
of opportunity requires that a certain amount of education
as a minimum shall be enforced by the State. The matter
of education is socially too important to be left to the children
themselves, or to their parents even. The State must assume
the responsibility of developing the maximum of efficiency
in its future citizens. The Socialist State would be able to
provide the fullest opportunity for vocational training, so
that the natural aptitude of the individual could be consid-
ered and taken advantage of. For example, the boy with a
natural aptitude for mechanics could be given, in addition
to the required cultural instruction, special vocational train-
ing, a regular apprenticeship in fact, in the collective work-
shop or factory. The boy with a natural aptitude for chem-
istry could be given the special facilities best adapted to
develop that aptitude and insure his maximum of efficiency
as a producer. Not only would the State make education
free in the sense of providing tuition and books without fees :
it would go further and provide that without which these
are of no avail — security of maintenance during the period
of education. Establishing its own standards for entrance
into various careers the State would be able to provide
against too many entries for certain occupations and too few
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 221
for others. In principle such a system already exists in
embryo in the scholarships offered by our great universities
and colleges. What is needed is a system of education which
will give to every child opportunity to develop its special
gifts, and so provide the State with the largest number of
contented and efficient workers.
Altered functions of the State under Socialism: Under
capitalism the chief functions of the State are directed to
one end, the maintenance and protection of private property.
Under Socialism, while private property would not be abol-
ished, it would be of less importance than now. The chief
functions of the State would then be (1) the maintenance
of the greatest amount of individual liberty compatible with
the equal liberty of all — in other words, the protection of
individuals and groups of individuals from exploitation, and
(2) the administration and regulation of socialized wealth.
The democratic State is simply a conveniently denned
organization of society acting in a collective capacity for the
highest welfare of its members.
The transitional State: No new order can spring full
grown and perfect from sudden revolution. Even the analogy
of the "mutation" theory does not justify such a belief.
The transition is already in progress. Every move in the
direction of the socialization of the State, while not in itself
necessarily socialistic, is a part of the adjustment of transi-
tion. Long before any nation consciously and voluntarily
adopts the Socialist ideal, it will have already tried many
of its features. The Industrial Revolution was a century in
progress, and no other social transformation so fundamental
and far-reaching was ever before accomplished in twice that
length of time. Social evolution has always been a con-
stantly accelerating process, and it seems probable that the
social revolution now in progress will reach its culmination,
Socialism, in a shorter length of time than any of the great
social changes of the past. This is probable because of the
better historical perspective in the minds of those whose
interest it is to hasten the revolution, and the more widely
diffused consciousness of impending change and understand-
ing of its nature. But the various elements of the Socialist
ideal will not be realized at once, as a result of a single
stroke, a sudden change. There must of necessity be a
222 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
period of transition during which we more or less con-
sciously shape the State to our ideal.
The Socialist State not static: Even after the Socialist
ideal has been to all intents and purposes attained, there will
still be an infinity of progress ahead of it. The evolutionary
point of view has put an end to the ideas of finality and
perfection. The social ideal always recedes with its pro-
gressive realization, and every step forward opens new vistas
of possibility of which the most far-seeing had not dreamed.
Socialism is only one more step in the eternal process of
evolution. As in every previous forward step, some undesir-
able features of the old order will probably be carried into the
new, some unlooked-for evils may appear and form the basis
for an argument in favor of the impossible return to the
"good old days." It may even be that some desirable
features of the present order will be lost. But the result
will be good upon the whole and make for larger, happier,
fuller lives. Progress will continue. Problems will be solved
and new problems take their place in the minds and hearts
of men. The ideal we now look forward to and name Social-
ism may in its turn be replaced by another social order, a
stage of evolution of which we can have no perception to-day,
any more than the pastoral Israelites could have had of the
modern age of capitalism.
THE SOCIALIST STATE— POLITICAL 223
SUMMARY
1. Modern Socialists do not attempt to give a detailed description
of the Socialist State, but they do point out certain conditions which
must logically result from continued progress.
2. The modern state which has been largely separated from the in-
dustrial process is now gradually expanding and assuming a greater
variety of economic functions.
3. The Socialist State will be the result of a continuation of this
process and of the achievement of full political and industrial democracy.
4. The Socialist State will not be static, and the possibilities of prog-
ress are infinite.
QUESTIONS
1. Why must modern Socialists refuse to make predictions in regard
to the details of the Socialist State?
2. What did Engels mean by the "dying out" of the State?
3. What significance do Socialists see in the extension of public
ownership?
4. Why is democracy essential to Socialism?
5. What are the necessary limitations upon individual liberty?
6. What changes in the manner of administering justice would be
necessary under Socialism.
7. Why is free public education necessary to Socialism ?
8. Explain what Socialists mean by the Social Revolution.
9. How do modern Socialists differ from the Utopians in respect to
the finality of their ideals?
Literature
Bebel, A., Woman Under Socialism.
Engels, F., Socialism, Utopian and Scientific.
Hillquit, M., Socialism in Theory and Practice, Part I, Chap. V.
Spargo, John, Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation of Socialist
Principles, Chap. IX.
Wilson, Woodrow, The State, Chap. XV and XVI.
CHAPTER XIX
THE SOCIALIST STATE — ECONOMIC
Introductory: Socialism is sometimes objectively denned
as "the social ownership and control of all the means of
production and exchange." According to this definition,
there could be no possibility of any form of private property
except in goods used in direct consumption, and even the
apportionment of these must be controlled by some social
authority — presumptively the State — in which the owner-
ship of the means of production, distribution and exchange is
vested.
To state this proposition clearly is to reveal its absurdity.
Every simple tool would have to be made collective property.
It is perfectly evident that the millions of Socialists throughout
the world are not trying to bring about public ownership
of hand-saws, spades, market-baskets and wheel-barrows, all
of which are means of production or exchange. Even if such
a thing were otherwise conceivable, it would involve such a
bureaucratic form of government as not even the most
fanciful of the writers of anti-Socialist fiction have devised.
There must be something wrong with our definition, then.
Of this we may be assured, in the first place because no con-
siderable number of rational beings could seriously desire
the government to own and control all things which under
any circumstances could be used as means of production or
exchange, even if it were possible to draw a hard and fast
line between consumption goods and production goods. In
the second place, it would be impossible to rouse the citizens
of any State or city to rebel against the private ownership
of hand-saws or market-baskets in sufficient numbers to bring
about their ownership by the collective authority, the State
or the city.
The essential principles of Socialism : If we turn back to
Chapter I, and compare the definition there given with the
224
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 225
one we are now discussing, the difference between the two
will at once appear. That difference is fundamental. In-
stead of defining Socialism as involving the social ownership
of all the means of production and exchange, the definition
with which we began our study defines it as involving "the
collective ownership and control of the principal means of
production and exchange, in order that poverty, class
antagonisms, vice, and other ill results of the existing social
system may be abolished, and that a new and better social
system may be attained."1
This definition places the matter in a wholly new light.
Instead of owning and controlling every means of production
and exchange, down to spades and wheel-barrows, jack-knives
and baskets, we are to picture a State which owns and con-
trols only the principal means of production and exchange,
and leaves all other means in private hands. And the
definition considered as a whole makes it perfectly clear
that the means of production and exchange to be socialized
and made subject to social ownership and control are those
which in present society are used by individuals or a class,
and used by their owners to exploit the actual producers of
wealth. Objectively considered, therefore, Socialism consists
of (1) a method — the social ownership and control of those
means of production and exchange which are now used to
exploit the producers of wealth; and (2) a result — the
abolition of various evils resulting from the present form of
ownership, such as poverty, vice and class antagonism, and
the improvement of society as a necessary consequence.
Authenticity of this definition : Which of these definitions
is authentic, it may be asked. Are we to accept that which
declares that the social ownership and control of all means
of production and exchange is aimed at, or that which limits
social ownership and control to the principal means of pro-
duction and exchange? For answer we must turn to the
recognized leaders of the movement, and to its authorized
statements. It is true that in the popular literature of
Socialism the former definition is sometimes used, but it is
almost invariably explained that the social ownership of such
essentially individualistic means of production and exchange
as those we have mentioned above is not contemplated, but
1 See p. 5
226 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
only those social means of production and exchange which
are owned by a class of non-producers and by them used to
exploit the producing class. In other words, the context
almost invariably shows that the first definition is used to
convey the meaning which the second definition more accu-
rately expresses. In like manner, such phrases as "the
abolition of private property" are frequently encountered
in the propaganda literature of Socialism, though less fre-
quently than formerly. But here, again, the context almost
invariably points out that only the abolition of certain forms
of property is meant, not the abolition of private property
in general. However we may criticise these popular presenta-
tions of Socialism for their failure to state the principles of
the movement with precision and accuracy, we cannot with
any degree of intellectual integrity ignore the meaning which
the context makes obvious and assail the defective formula
merely. That is pettifogging. Nor are we justified in
selecting always the weakest statement of the case for Social-
ism, the most vulnerable. Socialism, like every other great
principle or movement, can only be fairly and adequately
judged by the strongest presentation of its case that can be
made.
View of Marx and Engels : That we are right in saying that
Socialism does not aim at the abolition of private property
in all forms could be easily proven by citations from prac-
tically every Socialist writer of recognized authority, both
in Europe and the United States, and from many Socialist
programs, manifestos, and other official declarations. For
our present purpose it will be sufficient to quote from that
classic statement of the Socialist position which has been
the inspiration of almost every Socialist writer of consequence,
the Communist Manifesto. Marx and Engels take up the
charge that the movement aims at the abolition of private
property and reply to it. In quoting from their reply we
change the word "Communism" to its latter day equivalent,
"Socialism," to avoid confusion:1
"You are horrified at our intending to do away with
private property. But in your existing society private prop-
erty is already done away with for nine-tenths of the popula-
tion; its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence
1 The reason for this change will appear from the discussion on p. 259,
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 227
in the hands of those nine-tenths. You reproach us, therefore,
with intending to do away with a form of property, the
necessary condition for whose existence is the non-existence
of any property for the immense majority of society.
"Socialism deprives no man of the power to appropriate
the products of society: all that it does is to deprive him
of the power to subjugate the labor of others by means of
such appropriation."
Central motive of Socialism: From the foregoing it will
be readily seen that the essential feature of Socialism is
not a form of industrial ownership and management, but
an adjustment of social relations. The central idea of Social-
ism is the class struggle, not public ownership. The principal
aim of the movement, that which gives it force, is the deter-
mination to do away with the power of a class of non-pro-
ducers to exploit the producers. To accomplish that end
it is proposed to take out of the hands of the exploiting class
the power of the State, and that property which makes it
possible for the owners to exploit the labor and needs of
all the rest of society. Public ownership is, therefore, only
to be regarded as a means to an end, not the end itself.
A secondary motive of the movement is the more efficient
organization and administration of industry, so that there
may be less waste and larger social returns.
The place of private industry: Let us suppose the case of
a man owning a small farm which he cultivates himself,
and from which he manages to obtain a living for himself
and family. We may consider it in two aspects, as property,
and as an agency of production. As property the farm is,
even under the present system, subject, like every other
form of property, to the ultimate ownership of the State.
Under Socialism this principle would of necessity be retained
in the organic law of the State. The actual title to the land
would be vested in the State, but the individual would have
a full use-right, granted by the State and protected by it.
Considering the farm as an agency of production, we are
at once confronted with the question, what possible reason
could the Socialist State have for denying the right of that
farmer to operate the little farm in his own way and to his
own advantage? So long as he did not exploit the labor and
needs of others the State would not be likely to interfere
228 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
with him. For the Socialist State is not a class power,
distinct from the people as a whole, and reflecting class inter-
ests. It is the people, and reflects their interests. It is not
possible to conceive the citizens of any community generally
deciding to take such a farm out of the hands of the indi-
vidual and bringing it under the management of the com-
munity in the absence of any sense of exploitation, except
for one reason, namely, an acutely felt need of a superior
management of the farm. It is conceivable at least that con-
ditions might arise in which, agriculture having failed to
such a degree that famine confronted the nation, it would be
necessary for the State to assume full charge of all agricul-
tural operations, to store the product and dole it out in
carefully measured rations. This is not all likely to happen,
of course. The illustration serves to make clear that in any
society, under certain conditions, the collective need might
involve the suppression of private enterprise. But as a
general rule, it is safe to say that social ownership and con-
trol will be substituted for private ownership and control
because the latter results in the exploitation of the producing
class by a non-producing class.
Individual competition with the State : It may be argued
that our illustration is somewhat inconclusive. That agri-
culture seems peculiarly fitted to individual production, and
that the real test of the principle we are discussing must be
its application to some form of industry that is essentially
collective in its methods. Such an industry is shoemaking,
for example. Let us suppose, then, that the shoemaking
industry has been socialized and is now carried on in State
owned factories. The citizens as a whole are satisfied with
the results. The shoes are good; the workers are well paid;
the consumers of shoes get better value than would be pos-
sible under capitalist production. But A, who is a shoe-
maker, is a man of marked individuality. He hates his
employment in the State factory, where he is only a maker
of parts of shoes. He wants to make shoes by hand in the
old-fashioned way, to put into each pair of shoes something
of his own individuality. So long as he can find no one who
wants shoes made in that way, no one who is dissatisfied
with the factory product, he will be a dissatisfied man, his
individuality will be repressed, not by the State, as such,
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 229
but by the general indifference of society to his point of
view. In this respect he will be no worse off than are all
such workers in present society. But suppose that B, who
wears shoes but does not make them, dislikes the factory
product, and desires above all else to wear things made
specially for him, things which express the individuality of
the makers and of himself. If under such circumstances A
and B can agree upon terms, there is no reason why A should
not make shoes for B. There is no exploitation. Such com-
petition with the State on the part of private producers
might well be encouraged rather than discouraged. If the
private production made headway faster than the State
production, despite the enormous advantages enjoyed by the
State, it would mean that its efficiency was greater. In that
case, the State factory would have to improve its methods
or fail and be supplanted by the more successful private
production.
Voluntary cooperation : This principle is not vitiated by
its extension to cooperative production. If A finds after a
while that B is not the only person with a taste for hand-
made shoes, and that there are many other shoemakers like
himself who desire to get away from the factory to become
makers of shoes in their entirety, instead of makers of parts
of shoes, he may undertake to bring them together and form
a cooperative association for the production of shoes. If
they all work together and either share equally the values
produced, or each man keeps the value produced by himself,
the position will be as though A and B only were concerned,
there would be no exploitation. But suppose that A
instead of organizing a cooperative association, simply per-
suaded the other shoemakers to work for him for wages.
Still the result would not be materially different. He would
not be able to exploit them, simply because they could
refuse to work for less than they could get working for the
State. If they worked for less it would be because they valued
the pleasure derived from the hand-work as being equal at
least to the difference in their pay. So long as the manu-
facture of hand-made shoes was continued upon a small scale
the State would ignore it. This it would do for the simple
reason that there would not be any popular resentment,
the overwhelming majority of the citizens being content
230 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
to wear the factory-made shoes. In all probability, the manu-
facture of hand-made shoes would be regarded as a fad, and
those who insisted upon having such shoes would be regarded
as faddists. The private workshop and the cooperative
workshop would be under the supervision of the State,
which would be able to regulate the sanitary conditions,
the hours of labor, conditions of employment, and if neces-
sary, even the wages and the prices of the products.
Such competition not dangerous: But suppose the indi-
vidual or cooperative production of shoes should become
popular and these forms of production should grow in
importance as a result, would the Socialist State be seriously
affected? Not at all. First, we must recognize the fact
that if the demand for hand-made shoes became general the
State itself would have to change its methods of production,
or, at least, to add production by hand to machine produc-
tion. If the demand should not become general enough to
compel the State to do this, the voluntary enterprises might
go on and grow until either they absorbed the greater part
of the manufacture of shoes, or the citizens decided to take
them over and make the hand production of shoes the general
and dominant method.
In other words, whenever the citizens of the State came
to the conclusion that the social interest would be best
served by putting an end to either one form of production
or the other that would be the law. It is impossible, there-
fore, to say that the Socialist State will never attempt under
any circumstances to suppress individual or cooperative
production. All that we are justified in saying is that the
fundamental principles of Socialism do not involve such
suppression of necessity, and that it is a reasonable assump-
tion that in the absence of a general resentment of exploita-
tion no such suppression need be expected.
Industries specially adapted to voluntary enterprise: It
may be freely conceded that there are many things not at
all likely to disappear altogether which are admirably
adapted to individual production. Articles of luxury made
to meet individual tastes are essentially of this order. The
manufacture of chairs, for example, might in general be
carried on in State factories. But if one citizen of eccentric
taste should demand a chair of special design and make —
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 231
to be made from cigar boxes used by celebrities, let us say —
it is more than probable that he would have either to make it
himself as an avocation or set apart enough of his income to
pay some individual who would like the task. In either case,
no harm would be done to anyone. The individual would
not be likely to accept the work for materially less than he
could get making ordinary chairs in the State factory. If he
got more, well and good; if he agreed to take less, regarding
the special inspiration and pleasure of his work as an addi-
tional reward, that, also, would be well and good. He would
not be exploited. The State as employer would stand as the
guarantor of his freedom, even if it did not interfere between
him and his employer.
Main divisions of industry under Socialism: There is,
then, nothing in Socialism that is of necessity incompatible
with private industry or industry carried on by groups of
voluntary cooperation. All authoritative exponents of
Socialism agree that the Socialist State may, and probably
will, include three forms of production and exchange: (1)
individual production and exchange; (2) cooperative pro-
duction and exchange upon a voluntary basis; (3) production
and exchange by the State. The limits of the first two
have been sufficiently described, and it will, for the present,
be a sufficient description of the third to say that it embraces
all production and exchange which the people decide must
be undertaken to secure freedom from exploitation of their
labor and needs on the one hand, and satisfactory service
upon the other hand.
It is evident that, according to this analysis, the State
under Socialism must assume an infinitely larger amount of
economic power and responsibility than it now has, or than
it ever has assumed in the past. While the scope left for vol-
untary enterprise would be much larger than is generally
supposed, it is nevertheless true that the great bulk of
capitalist industry would have to be taken over by the State.
All the social means of transportation and communication;
all the extractive industries, such as mining and lumbering;
all the public services now controlled by corporations, and
all the principal manufactures would have to be under-
taken by the State, subject to the provisions already laid
down.
232 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Use of the word "State" : Thus far we have used the word
"State" in connection with the socialization of industry in
rather a loose way to describe organized society as dis-
tinguished from groups of citizens. We have used the term
in one place to connote the political organization of the
nation, and in another place to connote the political organiza-
tion of the municipality. It is necessary, therefore, to point
out that it is by no means implied in the Socialist theory
or the Socialist ideal that all economic functions are to be
centred in the political organization of the nation. Some
forms of production and exchange are by their very nature
best adapted to national organization. Mining, steel making,
and means of interstate transportation and communication
fall naturally into this group. Other forms of production
and exchange are better adapted to the smaller unit of
political society, the municipality.
A centralized State not implied : It is impossible to classify
the various forms of production and exchange and the eco-
nomic functions which arise from them, and decide which
will be undertaken by the nation and which by the State
or city. Any attempt to do this would of necessity be useless.
Socialism will inherit the forms evolved by capitalism and
will have to begin with them. Where capitalist production
has developed national organization, the Socialist State will
start with that form, continue it if it seems best to do so,
abandon it and adopt a process of gradual decentralization
if that seems best. Where capitalist production has confined
itself to local organization the Socialist State will, of necessity,
begin with that, and either continue it or change it for a more
centralized national form, according as experience may deter-
mine. Favorable natural conditions and historical develop-
ment have combined to make certain localities the centres
of certain kinds of production. One city is thus primarily
identified with the shoemaking industry; another with the
manufacture of textiles; another with the manufacture of
paper, and so on. It is highly probable, therefore, that under
Socialism, these cities will continue for a long time, perhaps
even permanently, to be identified with the same industries.
Thus, one municipality will manufacture shoes, another
paper, another steel, and so on. Other cities may not
specialize, but produce a large proportion of the things
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 233
necessary to their existence, and so be relatively independent,
like the great independent city-states of the Middle Ages.
The direction of industry : The State, still using the term
in a general sense to designate organized society, must
assume the functions now performed by the capitalist class
as a whole, including the functions of the entrepreneur, in
so far as these functions are in any manner necessary to the
employment, organization, superintendence and direction of
labor. But the relations between the State as employer and
the worker as citizen will of necessity differ greatly from
those which exist between the wage-earner and the capitalist
employer. This fact has led to some interesting speculations
concerning the manner in which industry will be organized
and conducted. Some Socialists have suggested that the
workers in each industry will control that particular indus-
try, choosing their own superintendents, determining their
own wages and hours of labor, and all similar matters, by
popular vote. There is no reason why we should suppose
that anything so anti-social and undemocratic will take place.
The persons employed in a given branch of industry are not
the only ones affected by it, and, therefore, interested in its
management. Whether it is efficiently conducted or other-
wise is a question which concerns society as a whole. If to
have everything decided without reference to the workers
would be undemocratic, it would be equally undemocratic
to have the workers make the decision without reference to
the rest of society. The probability is that all such matters j
will be decided by joint boards composed of representatives!
of the State and of the employees, with provision for the J
arbitration of matters upon which the joint boards cannot!
agree. Some Socialist writers point to the fact that the labor
unions and employers' associations sometimes form such joint
boards to determine wages, hours of labor and similar matters,
and suggest that here is an organism already developed to
discharge that function in the Socialist State.
The remuneration of labor: When we come to consider the
question of the manner in which labor will be remunerated
in the Socialist State we are confronted at the outset by a
very popular error. It is believed that Socialism involves
equal remuneration to all workers, regardless of the nature of
the services performed, and that the basis of remuneration
234 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
must be the Marxian theory of value, each producer receiv-
ing the value of his product, minus his share of the necessary
social expenditures incurred through the government. Since
all people can never be expected to produce exactly the same
amounts, there seems to be a glaring contradiction in these
two principles. So, in fact, there is, but the contradiction
has nothing to do with Socialism, which is based upon
neither of these principles, nor upon both of them combined.
Equality of remuneration is not at all a necessary condition
of Socialism, and there is probably no Socialist of standing
who so regards it. Likewise, there is no Socialist of recognized
authority who believes that it would be possible to deter-
mine, even approximately, the contribution of each worker
to the social product. The very nature of collective produc-
tion makes it impossible to determine the share of any
individual in the total product. Any attempt to do so would
of necessity fail. Whatever the necessary basis for a Socialist
system of remuneration may be, it is not the determination
of the value of the individual labor product, and the pay-
ment of value for value. Marx's theory of value, as we have
seen, is not the basis of an ethical system of distribution
to be realized in an ideal society, but a general explanation
of the workings of capitalist society.
The Socialist State will develop existing forms : We must
never lose sight of the fact that the Socialist State will not
be a fresh start in history, independent of the present State.
It will be a development of the present State, and will
inherit from the present State certain social forms and con-
ditions. One of these forms is the wages system, and one
of the conditions is that unequal payments are made for
different kinds of services. Now, while it is quite conceiv-
able that ultimately, after many generations of experiment,
the wages system will be entirely discarded, and production
and distribution based upon Louis Blanc's motto "From
each according to his ability; to each according to his
need" it is certain that a long period of time must elapse
before society will have attained the degree of perfection
necessary to the attainment of that ideal.
The Socialist State will take the wages system and modify
it to suit its own needs. Instead of being used as a means
to exploit the producers, the wages form of remuneration
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 235
would, under Socialism, be used to give to the workers a
maximum of goods, or their equivalent, in return for the
minimum of labor time compatible with social well being.
The ideal to be aimed at is approximate equality of income,
but in the meantime to make the standard of income as high
as possible, letting the actual amount be determined by the
free operation of the law of supply and demand. Suppose
there should be an over-supply of labor in one branch of
industry and an under-supply in another branch: in that
case it might be necessary to reduce wages in the first and
to increase them in the second, thus drawing some of the
surplus labor to the place where labor is more needed. There
is no reason at all why an unattractive piece of work, tedious,
disagreeable, dirty or dangerous, should not be made attrac-
tive, either by offering higher wages than the wages paid for
other work, or the same wages for a smaller amount of labor.
In this manner freedom of choice of occupation is possible,
and compatible with the interest of society as a whole.
Here, again, we must consider one of the popular shib-
boleths of Socialism, the cry that the wages system must be
abolished. What is meant is that the social relations in-
volved in the wages system of to-day must be abolished.
This result would be attained by the method here outlined.
Instead of a money payment based upon the cost of the
workers' subsistence, and as far from equal to the value of
his product as possible, wages under Socialism would repre-
sent as high a standard of living as the collective intelligence
and skill could attain, and an approximation to an equal share
in the products of labor, having due regard to the excep-
tional services for which society, with the assent of its mem-
bers, freely gives exceptional rewards.
Disagreeable and dangerous work: We have somewhat
anticipated the old question, Who will do the dirty and
dangerous work under Socialism? We have dealt with it
from one point of view only, however, and may now profit-
ably discuss it from another point of view. Much of the
dangerous and disagreeable work now done by human labor
could be done equally well or even better by machinery, if
we were socialized enough to demand it. A thousand illus-
trations might be cited to support the contention of Professor
Giddings that modern civilization does not need the drudgery
236 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and life-destroying labor of many of these occupations, that
if they were suppressed inventive brains would quickly
devise mechanical devices to do the work more effectively.
When the British government forbade the employment of
women and girls to do the heavy hauling underground in
the mines — but not until then — mechanical devices were
invented to do the work. When the conscience of England
compelled the government to stop the practice of forcing
little boys and girls through chimneys to clean them, mechan-
ical devices were soon forthcoming. So it has been in every
age. Most of the dirtiest, ugliest and most dangerous work
of the world could be made clean, pleasant and safe, if only
the inventive genius of the race were challenged to accom-
plish that end.
Unnecessary dirty and dangerous work: And then, too,
it must be remembered that a great deal of this sort of work
is necessary only to the capitalist form of industry. Take,
for example, the one matter of advertising: no one has ever
computed the amount of dirty and even dangerous labor
which it involves. And all through the anarchy of modern
production runs the stream of waste labor, much of which
is hard, dirty, disagreeable and dangerous. For the residuum
of such labor which might remain, the irreducible minimum,
Socialist society would be far better equipped than is capital-
ist society. To-day no element of choice can enter into the
doing of such tasks in the majority of cases, no idea of per-
forming a social service. Those who undertake them are
helpless and defenceless. When they fall to death society
does not heed; when they do not fall to death, but live on
doing the dangerous thing or the disagreeable thing, society
does not feel grateful to them, but, on the contrary, treats
them as pariahs and outcasts. In a society saturated with
the social spirit, a true democracy, such tasks would bring
rich rewards and those who performed them would be re-
garded as heroes.
Protection of the workers: In the industrial economy of
the Socialist State the loss of a human life, or its needless
impairment, would be a calamity. Under capitalism the loss
of human lives is insignificant in comparison with the loss
of dividends. Nowhere in the history of capitalism has any
effort been made to reduce the appalling martyrdom of labor,
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 237
the killing and maiming of the workers, except under press-
ure, either of the State or of the organizations of the workers.
Even the State of to-day, only partially democratic on its
political side, and still less democratic on its economic side,
shows a far higher regard for the life and health of the pro-
ducer than the best capitalist concerns. When the most
enterprising and best equipped capitalists in the world
attempted to cut the Panama Canal, their efforts were
attended by a terrible amount of human slaughter, the life
and health of the workers was hardly considered at all.
But when the work was undertaken by a great modern State,
the slaughter ceased, proving once more that in all that
counts for most, alike in quality of product and care of the
human producers, the State, imperfect as it is, is more
efficient than any capitalistic enterprise. In the Socialist
State adulterating the food of the people to the detriment
of their health, crowding them into disease-breeding hovels,
exposing them to needless perils to life and limb in a passion
for "cheapness" would appear in their true light as the most
dangerous of all practices, more perilous to the State than
besieging armies without its gates. Not only would the
collective interest and intelligence demand that every possible
protection be given to life and limb, but the State would,
for its own interest, insure every worker against sickness,
accident and old age.
Credit functions : All the credit functions would of neces-
sity have to be monopolized by the State in the Socialist
regime. The place of credit would, of course, be much less
important than now. Commercial credit as we know it
would disappear. Credit to individuals might be necessary
to some extent, and this the State could easily give upon
terms which no private creditor could give and make a
profit by the transaction. Credit and banking have never
yet fulfilled their proper social functions. Credit has always
been a means of oppression, as well as the basis for the
gambling which goes on upon the produce and stock ex-
changes. Whatever advantage there may be in a system of
credit should be socialized, only its anti-social features being
destroyed.
Money under Socialism: Many of the older Socialists
argued that the Socialist State must abolish money and
238 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
substitute some form of "labor checks," exchangeable for
consumption goods at the public stores. Among recent
writers this view has been expressed by the late Mr. Edmond
Kelly.1 This view is almost universally based upon the
assumption that the Socialist State must accept the labor
standard of value, and base upon it an ethical system of
distribution. To most Socialists, however, the character of
the medium of exchange seems a matter of very minor
importance. There is nothing in the nature of Socialism
which involves the abolition of money. It is not at all
unlikely that future generations may be compelled to adopt
some more stable standard of value than the gold standard,
and to devise a more convenient medium of exchange. That,
however, is pure speculation. All that can be wisely said
here is that money, in practically its present form, will con-
tinue to be the medium of exchange for a long time in the
Socialist State, so far as it is possible to see at the present
time.
Land and rent : As we have already seen, there would be
no reason for denying the right of individuals to the use-
value of land. The security of the individual in this right
would be guaranteed by the State, subject to the right of
the State to take the land for any public purpose, a right
with which we are already familiar, alike as a theory and
as a practice of government. But while the State would not
interfere with the private use of land, it could not in justice i
permit individuals to enjoy land rents. It would be obliged '
to tax the socially created value of land to the full, and it
would be obliged, also, to deny the right of any individuals
to hold land in idleness. Improvements upon land made by
individuals, whether in the form of clearing and fertilizing
the soil, or the construction of buildings, would be regarded
as a direct contribution to the social wealth to be rewarded
according to its value.
Conclusion: In this rough outline of the economic struc-
ture of the Socialist State, toward which society is apparently
moving, there are many gaps. We have attempted to sketch
only the main conditions which we believe must characterize
the class-less industrial democracy of the near future. We
have confined ourselves to those things which appear to be
1 Twentieth Century Socialism, by Edmond Kelly, pp. 307-313.
THE SOCIALIST STATE— ECONOMIC 239
the necessary outcome of present conditions and tendencies.
Such a State bears very little resemblance to the oppressive
bureaucracy sketched by the enemies of Socialism. Far
from suppressing individual freedom and initiative, such an
economic system would provide the necessary soil for the
development of a noble individualism, and for those fruits
of a noble individualism, a great art, a worthy literature, a
generous culture and a fraternal State.
SUMMARY
1. Socialism involves the collective ownership only of those things
which are socially used. Social ownership is looked upon not as an
end in itself, but as a means of abolishing exploitation.
2. Where no exploitation is involved, private ownership will probably
remain unchanged under Socialism.
3. The Socialist State will develop existing forms, and it does not
involve the establishment of a centralized bureaucratic regime.
4. The Socialist State must assume a monopoly of credit functions
and of final land ownership.
QUESTIONS
1. Why are Socialists indifferent as to the form of ownership of minor
productive enterprises?
2. Criticise the use of the phrase "abolition of private property."
3. What is the principal aim of the Socialist movement?
4. Give examples of industries apparently adapted to private enter-
prise under Socialism. To voluntary cooperation.
5. How may the disagreeable and dangerous work be done under
Socialism?
6. What is the Socialist attitude toward money and credit?
7. What is likely to be the form of land tenure under Socialism?
Literature
See references at the close of the preceding chapter, also : Kelly, E.,
Twentieth Century Socialism, Book I, Chap. Ill, and Book III, Chap. I
and II.
e©
CHAPTER XX
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY
Alleged antagonism of Socialism to the family: One of
the most common ideas concerning Socialism, is that it would
destroy the family organization. It is charged that the
advocates of Socialism oppose the family based upon monog-
amous marriage, and that they hope to destroy it and make
sexual relations independent of any interference on the part
of the State. Sometimes it is added that Socialism necessar-
ily involves these things, and the most promiscuous sexual
relations, according to the fancy and desire of the individuals.
This is the substance of the criticism which is summed up
in the charge that Socialism involves what is euphemistically
called "Free Love."
It is an old charge which has been levelled against nearly
every great movement in history at some time or another.
It was made against the early Christians. Centuries later
it was made against Luther and his followers in the Protestant
Revolt. In the political field we have one of the most con-
spicuous examples of its use against the founders of the
present Republican party. In Fremont's campaign, in 1856,
the cry of "Free soil, free speech, free labor and free men,"
was parodied by the enemies of the new party into the
insulting cry, "Fremont, free soil, free niggers and free
women."
Origin of the charge: Before we proceed to discuss the
relation of Socialism to marriage and the family we may
with advantage consider the origin of the charge that it is
opposed to them and aims at the abolition of monogamous
marriage. The criticism is a heritage of the modern Socialist
movement from the Utopian movements of the past.
Plato's Republic, as we have seen, communalized women as
well as goods. The two forms of communism went together.
It might almost be said that he anticipated most of the
240
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 241
modern theories of eugenics and stirpiculture. In his ideal
commonwealth all sexual relations are regulated by the State
and confined to persons possessing certain qualifications of
age and physical, mental and moral fitness. As Professor
Jowett has pointed out,1 it was not "free love" at all, but
rather a very highly developed form of State regulated
stirpiculture, which eliminated personal choice and desire
almost entirely.
It is not difficult to understand Plato's motive. The
essence of Utopianism is the faith that for all the ills of
suffering humanity a remedy can be found or devised; that
all its ill-working institutions can be set right. In this spirit
of faith every institution which has not worked with perfect
success has been subjected to the most searching criticisms
and the most ingenious experiments by Utopian inventors.
For minds of this type, the marriage relation and the family
have at all times offered abundant challenge and opportu-
nity. It must be confessed that, however sacred we may regard
it as an institution of fundamental social importance, mono-
gamic marriage is very far from being perfectly successful.
The proportion of failures is unhappily great, so that mar-
riage is spoken of as a lottery in which there are many more
blanks than prizes.
Religious origins of hostility to marriage : So universal has
been the recognition of the comparative failure of all marriage
systems that the passion for perfection has almost invariably
led to one of two forms of opposition to marriage — the con-
demnation of sexual intercourse, on the one hand, or sex-
communism, on the other. This is especially true of religious
movements based upon the desire for perfection. Thus,
we have the celibacy of early Christianity and some of the
later sects of religious communists, like the Shakers, for
example, and the sex-communism of the Waldenses, the
Anabaptists, and, in this country, the Perfectionists. No
one can frankly study the history of sex-communism and
its opposite, celibacy, without reaching the conclusion that
both forms of hostility to marriage have commonly sprung
from religious zeal and fanaticism. That all such schemes
were inspired by the purest motives need not be denied,
even by those who are most repelled by the schemes them-
1 Introduction to Plato's Republic, 1st Ed. Vol. II, pp. 145-147.
242 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
selves and the abuses which invariably attended them —
such as licentiousness, sex-perversion and self-emasculation.
Secular origins of sex-communism: Celibacy is almost
always religious in its origin. The early Christian church
stamped it as the highest ideal and marriage as at best an
evil, a concession to the flesh, a carnal indulgence. Where
antagonism to the family appears in connection with com-
munistic movements it almost invariably takes the form of
sex-communism, more or less strictly regulated. Rarely
or never does it take the form of celibacy. The reasons for
this are not difficult to discover. All such experiments in
Utopia making are attempts to establish the basis of a new
social order within the old order. Every precaution must
be taken to exclude the hostile principles and influences of
the old order, less they destroy the new ideal order in its
cradle, so to speak. Private property and the inheritance
of property being so closely identified with the separate
family, it is easy to understand how the founders and invent-
ors of communistic movements and schemes have almost
universally regarded individual marriage and separate family
life with fear as a certain means of reversion to the old
order of private property. Next to this fear of the disin-
tegrating influence of monogamic marriage and family life
comes the fear that unless the State in some manner controls
sexual relations and procreation, population must outrun
the means of subsistence. We know now, however, that
population always tends to abnormal and unsafe increase
where the standard of life is lowest and there is most poverty
and pressure.
Modern Socialists and the charge: We have considered
thus far only the chief sources of the hostility of communistic
Utopias, both secular and religious, to marriage and the
family. It is not strange that many honest and sincere
men and women should believe that Socialism is but the
modern expression of the same general aims, and that it
seeks to abolish monogamic marriage and family ties. Nor
is it strange that the enemies of Socialism in their defense
of the present order should attempt to create prejudice
against the movement by charging it with that purpose
and aim. It may also be freely admitted that, like all
popular movements directed against the existing order of
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 243
society, the Socialist movement in its early stages attracted
to itself many who were not really Socialists at all, but were
merely in revolt against the existing social order, or some
phase of it. Thus, in the early stages of the Socialist move-
ment, the lines between the Socialists and the Anarchists
were not at all sharply drawn. At such a period of the
movement every one dissatisfied with existing conditions is
welcomed, and so visionaries of all kinds naturally unite
under the banner of Socialism and in its name advocate
ideas which are not at all essential to the Socialist theory
or the Socialist program. In this respect, again, the history
of Socialism does not differ from that of Christianity.
It is also true that individual Socialists of prominence in
the present day Socialist movement have speculated freely
concerning the future of monogamic marriage and the
family, and the changes in them which must result from the
reorganization of society. Among these we may mention
August Bebel, the famous German Socialist leader, whose
views are set forth in his book, Woman and Socialism, and
William Morris and Ernest Belfort Bax, whose views are
set forth in their joint work, Socialism, Its Growth and
Outcome. Only the most foolishly narrow-minded would
attempt to restrain or restrict honest thought upon a problem
of such vast magnitude and importance, for it is only through
such thinking that progress is made possible. At the same
time, we must bear in mind that the Socialist movement
has a right to say, as it does say, in fact, that such views
are the views of the individuals responsible for them, not of
the movement. The Socialist movement must be judged
by its mass, not by a few individuals. The movement as a
whole can no more be held responsible for the personal views
of any man, however prominent he may be, upon the ques-
tion of marriage, than for the views of other men upon
vivisection, vegetarianism, prohibition, the Synoptic gospel
or any one of a multitude of questions upon which men hold
different opinions.
We need not pay very much attention to that form of
criticism which winnows the pages of Socialist history and
gathers examples of individuals who have violated the ac-
cepted code of morality, and makes the compilation the basis
of an attack upon the Socialist movement and its propaganda.
244 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
It must be said that there is not a party or a movement of
any magnitude in all history which could not be attacked
in the same way with at least as much success and justifica-
tion as can the Socialist movement. One does not have to
read far into the history of Christianity itself in order to
discover evidences of unspeakable licentiousness and lust.
Similarly, one does not need to read far into the history of
Roman Catholicism to find the evidence of degenerating vice
existing among clergy and laity alike, despite the most beau-
tiful theories, the vice sometimes throned in the papal chair
itself, as, for example, under Alexander VI. Likewise, one
does not read far into the history of the Protestant Revolt
before he encounters similar evidences of vice clothed by
religion. Even in contemporary life it would not be at all
difficult for an industrious enemy of religion to compile a
formidable list of deeds of vice and crime committed by
individual Christians, Catholics and Protestants alike. But
to make such a list the basis of an attack upon Christianity
in general, or upon Protestantism or Catholicism in partic-
ular, would be puerile indeed. It is equally puerile to make
the deeds of individual Socialists the basis of an attack
upon the whole movement.
Capitalism destroys marriage and family life : That mono-
gamic marriage and family life do not flourish under the
existing industrial system is an evident fact which has always
afforded the propagandists of Socialism material for one of
their strongest indictments of capitalism. Divorce has
become so prevalent that marriage as an institution is hardly
more stable than it was in Rome in the fifth century. If
we add to divorce the widespread prostitution we are forced
to the conclusion that monogamous marriage can hardly
be regarded as the dominant characteristic of our sex rela-
tions.
Divorce : The first serious attempt to measure the magni-
tude of the divorce problem was made in 1887 by the United
States Department of Labor, under the direction of the late
Carroll D. Wright. It was in many ways a disappointing
study, for it revealed little more than the fact that within
twenty years so many divorces had taken place, more than
in any other country of the world except Japan. It seemed
to justify the conclusion that a majority of the divorces were
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 245
due, either directly or indirectly, to economic causes, but
even there the study was sadly inconclusive. The one fact
which stood out was that in the twenty year period, 1867-
1886, the total number of divorce decrees was 328,716. The
fact seemed alarming, but it was practically impossible to
judge its real significance, for there was no way of telling
how many marriages had taken place in the same period.
In some of the states no records of marriages had ever been
kept.
In the year 1906 a new statistical study of the problem
was begun under the direction of the Bureau of the Census,
and completed in 1909. Owing in large part to the fact that
the methods of registering and recording marriages in the
various states had become fairly uniform since 1887, the
new study affords a much clearer view of the problem than
the old one. In the twenty year period, 1887-1906, the
number of divorces was 945,625. In other words, marriage
was dissolved at the rate of 47,281 cases each year, 3,940
each month, more than 130 each day. The divorce rate
increased faster than the marriage rate. One marriage in
every ten is dissolved by divorce. The rate varies greatly
in different states, ranging from zero in South Carolina,
which does not grant divorce at all, to one in every four or
five marriages in several other states. Two-thirds of the
divorces are granted to women, the most frequent causes
assigned being "desertion" and "cruelty," both of which
terms are, in practice, largely mere technicalities, making it
possible for either party to bring suit without heaping dis-
grace upon the other. These reasons, therefore, are largely
fictitious and serve to cloak the real reasons in a great many
cases. This is indicated by the fact that few of the suits
brought on these grounds are defended.
There is perhaps hardly another subject concerning which
so many popular generalizations are without foundation in
fact: the divorce rate is not materially affected by the
character of the divorce laws; alimony plays a very small
part, for in eighty per cent of fHe suits Drought by women
alimony is not even asked for: divorce is not generally
simply a meansTo "change partners," for divorcees do not
marry at a greater rate than widows and widowers, nor does
re-marriage take place sooner after the divorce than after
246 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
bereavement, as a rule; divorce is not lightly resorted to,
apparently, without a serious attempt on the part of both
parties to endure the marriage bond, for most divorces take
place after four years of married life, and the average is
something over nine years; the divorce rates of Unitarian
Massachusetts and Mormon Utah do not materially differ
from that of Louisiana with its large percentage of Catholics;
the "divorce colonies" at Reno and elsewhere do not mate-
rially affect the problem, for eighty per cent of all divorces
are granted in the State in which the marriage was con-
tracted. More important than any of these factors, appa-
rently, is the price of divorce, the cost of obtaining it. And
this fact would seem to indicate that if the cost was so
reduced as to make divorce accessible to all the number of
divorces would be increased. Obviously, to increase the
price so as to make it prohibitive to a still larger number of
people would be no solution of the problem, and would
simply create another class privilege.
Prostitution : Another menace to monogamous marriage
and family life is prostitution. There is, of course, no means
of ascertaining the exact number of prostitutes or their
patrons. It has been estimated1 that there are from forty
to fifty thousand professional prostitutes in New York City
alone, and possibly as many more who occasionally add to
their income in that manner. Averaging the best estimates
available we get an estimate of 300,000 prostitutes for the
whole of the United States. Appalling as it seems, this
estimate is probably not too high. The number of men
patrons of these women cannot be less than ten times as
many. In other words, at least three million men are con-
cerned in this worst of all forms of sex promiscuity.
It would be exceedingly foolish to attempt to ascribe all
prostitution to capitalism. Prostitution is much older than
capitalism. It existed in Babylon, in Greece, in Rome, and
all through the Middle Ages, sometimes under the guise of
religion. It exists to-day in all parts of the world, in India
as well as in the United States. Nevertheless, it is admitted
by all students of the problem that poverty is one of the
1 By Hon. Elbridge T. Gerry and Police Superintendent Byrnes in
1893 — vide statement of the former at the World's Congress on Social
Purity in that year.
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 247
main reasons why so many girls and women become prosti-
tutes. The proportion of low paid workers who become
prostitutes is exceedingly high, and, as we have seen in an
earlier chapter, every period of depression in trade adds
to the number. Whatever may have been the case in ancient
times in those countries where the prostitute was honored
above the wife, in modern society women do not voluntarily
choose the life, except in rare cases. But it is not difficult
to understand why women become prostitutes when it is
remembered that it is probably true that there are more
women who earn twenty-five hundred dollars a year by the
sale of their bodies than there are women in all businesses
and professions who earn an equal amount. The evil can
never be remedied until the economic evils inseparable from
capitalism are done away with.
Masculine vice: So much for the woman's side of the
problem. On the man's side there is also an important
factor of economic causation to be considered, namely, the
increasing difficulty of early marriage with an assurance of
sufficient earnings to support a wife and family. The crowd-
ing of young men into the big cities through the drift from
the country, which is one of the most marked results of
industrial evolution, naturally leads to the patronage of
the brothel. The principle is not different from that which
has at all times caused the brothel to flourish near the
garrison in military centres. The income of the average
young man may provide a comfortable living for himself,
and even permit a higher standard of living than that to
which he has been accustomed, but if it does not suffice
to warrant founding a family the result is almost certain to
be the development of a selfish indulgence which manifests
itself in many forms — vice among them.
Indirect economic causes: To these direct economic
causes of prostitution must be added the indirect causes, of
which the low standards of morality engendered by over-
crowding and other poor housing conditions, and the forcing
of boys and girls to work in the most dangerous period of
adolescence where they must associate with large numbers of
older persons and learn their ways, may be mentioned as
examples. It is not necessary to go to the extreme of claiming
that prostitution is solely due to economic causes in order
248 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
to show that economic causes contribute very largely to its
existence.
Socialist criticisms of the family : A candid study of the
criticisms of the family in modern Socialist literature will
reveal the fact that most of it has been directed, not against
marriage and family life, but against their abuse under
capitalism, against the shortcomings due to the capitalist
system. Thus, marriage for reasons other than love, for
money, title, and social position, has been denounced as
"legalized prostitution," which ought to be abolished equally
with the commoner and grosser forms of prostitution. But
to say that marriage for money is a form of prostitution within
wedlock, that no marriage is worthy the name which is not
based upon affection, is not to attack marriage itself. On
the contrary, it is to elevate marriage and attack one of the
forces which militates against its success. The Socialist
critics of society have as a matter of fact idealized marriage
and made that ideal conception a club with which to attack
capitalist society and capitalist class rule. By the employ-
ment of young children, often in competition with their
fathers; by forcing women to leave their homes and the
care of their families to work in factories; by over-crowding
in tenements, low wages, high rents, and numerous other
evils, capitalism has done much to prevent the development
of true monogamy and ideal family life.
Such has been the substance of the criticism of Socialists
from the very first. Marx and Engels, in the Communist
Manifesto, declare it to be "self evident" that prostitution
in all its forms, public and private, the legalized prostitution
described above and the ordinary prostitution of the brothel,
will disappear under Socialism. Passages from the Manifesto
are sometimes torn from their context and quoted in an
attempt to prove that Marx and Engels wanted to destroy
marriage, but the deceitful trick is as foolish as it is dishon-
orable. No honest mind can read the Manifesto without
recognizing that so much of it as relates to the family is a
vigorous criticism of those evils of capitalism which militate
against the realization of anything like an ideal family life,
and a declaration that under the new order those evils will
vanish.
Frederick Engels on the subject : In like manner, Engels,
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 249
in his little book, The Origin of the Family, Private Property
and the State, takes up the same theme and comes to much
the same conclusion. Tracing the development of monogamy-
through the institution of private property and its bequest
and inheritance, he comes to the conclusion that the eco-
nomic causes which brought about monogamy are now about
to disappear. This argument has sometimes been disin-
genuously used by the enemies of Socialism to show that
Engels advocated the abolition of monogamic marriage.
Its use in that manner is as foolish and dishonorable as the
similar use of the Manifesto referred to above. The argu-
ment of Engels is as follows: monogamy arose through
private property and the need of a system of bequest and
inheritance. But it was one-sided monogamy. It applied
strictly to women, and did not prevent men from indulging
in polygamy, either secretly or openly. Now, the abolition
of private property in the means of production, which is the
overwhelming part of inheritable wealth, will not destroy
monogamy. It will do away with prostitution, and, by
placing woman upon a plane of equality with men, will make
monogamy realizable — for men as well as for women. He
accepts Bachofen's view that the progress from group marriage
to monogamy was mainly due to women, and predicts that
if woman is made equal to man politically and economically,
there will be further progress toward real, complete monog-
amy: "Remove the economic considerations that now force
women to submit to the customary disloyalty of men, and
you place women on an equal footing with men. All present
experiences prove that this will tend much more strongly
to make men truly monogamous, than to make women
polygamous."1 Engels refuses to make any forecast about
the family, except that love will become the only motive for
marriage once women's economic equality with man is
established:
"What we may anticipate about the adjustment of sexual
relations after the impending downfall of capitalist produc-
tion is mainly of a negative nature and mostly confined to
elements that will disappear. But what will be added?
That will be decided after a new generation has come to
maturity: a race of men who never in their lives have had
1 The Family, Private Property and the State, chap, iii, §4.
250 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
any occasion for buying with money or other economic
means of power the surrender of a woman; a race of women
who have never had any occasion for surrendering to any
man for any reason but love, or for refusing to surrender to
their lover from fear of economic consequences. Once such
people are in the world, they will not give a moment's
thought to what we to-day believe should be their course.
They will follow their own practice and fashion' their own
public opinion about the individual practice of every per-
son— only this and nothing more."1
Socialists have no theories of marriage or the family : The
foregoing lucid statement by Engels admirably epitomises
the position of the Socialist movement of the entire world.
Nowhere, at any time in the history of the movement, was
it ever a part of the Socialist creed to abolish marriage or to
weaken or transform the family. Everywhere, and at all
times, the movement has aimed at the abolition of those
forces which corrupt marriage and weaken and endanger
the family. Socialism involves no theory of the origin of
the family, no theory of its future development. All that
it does is to perceive clearly the forces at work in society,
forces inseparable from capitalism, which are to-day disin-
tegrating monogamic marriage and the family. These forces
it is opposing with all its might, and it may therefore be
said to be the one great movement which tends to save the
family from utter ruin, the one movement which makes for
a perfect monogamy, the family which has its roots in the
love of one man for one woman.
That the Socialist State will, for its own preservation no
less than for the sake of the children, exercise some control
over marriage may be regarded as certain. It may be that
it will make marriage a civil contract, compelling all persons
to be married by a civil authority, according to certain civil
forms, leaving them free to add any sacramental forms they
choose so long as they are not in conflict with the civil law.
At all events, it seems reasonably certain that marriages
will have to be registered . by the State, and parents held
responsible for their children's welfare. It is also more than
likely that the Socialist State will forbid the marriage of
persons suffering from certain forms of disease and from
lOp. tit., p. 101.
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY 251
certain physical and mental defects. So much seems certain,
because it is already demanded by enlightened sentiment
all over the civilized world.
SUMMARY
1. Nearly every great movement in history has been charged by
its opponents with attempting to destroy the family.
2. The disintegration of the family is rapidly taking place under the
present social order.
3. Many Socialists have criticised the shortcomings of the institu-
tions of marriage and the family under Capitalism.
4. Socialists as such have no theories in regard to the future of the
family and have no desire to abolish it.
QUESTIONS
1. What is the origin of the charge of "free love" as directed against
the Socialists?
2. Discuss the origins of sex-communism.
3. How does the existing industrial system affect the institution of
marriage?
4. Discuss the theories as to the cause of the increasing divorce rate.
5. What restriction would a Socialist State be likely to impose upon
the marriage relation?
Literature
Bebel, August, Woman Under Socialism.
Engels, F., Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State,
Chap. II.
Kelly, Edmond, Twentieth Century Socialism.
Lichtenberger, J. P., Divorce.
Morris, W., and Bax, E. B., Socialism, its Growth and Outcome,
Chap. XXI.
Spargo, John, The Spiritual Significance of Modern Socialism.
Vail, Charles H., Modern Socialism.
PAET IV
THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT
CHAPTER XXI
THE RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM
The background : The period from 1830 to 1848 witnessed
the beginnings of the political activity of the proletariat.
Capitalism was now fully established. The accession of the
"citizen king" in 1830 marked the final triumph of the
bourgeoisie in France, and the Reform Bill of 1832 destroyed
the power of the land-owning aristocracy in England. As
the old class struggle ended the newer struggle between the
capitalist class and the proletariat assumed first importance.
In England this new struggle at first took the form of an
agitation for political democracy. The Working Men's
Association was formed to carry on the agitation for the
extension of the franchise to the working class. In 1838
this association, aided by some radical members of the House
of Commons, drew up a bill, the so-called "People's Charter,"
from which the movement derived the name Chartism.
Great mass meetings were held in all parts of Great Britain,
newspapers were established, the country was flooded with
pamphlets and broadsides, and hundreds of thousands of
names were signed to parliamentary petitions. In a very
few years the Charter had undoubtedly won the moral
support of a majority of the British people, but the follies
of the leaders of the movement and their petty quarrels
and jealousies caused many of its adherents to forsake it.
Finally, the movement became merged into the general move-
ment of Liberalism.
In France the class conscious portion of the proletariat
supported Louis Blanc in his agitation for the establishment
of "social workshops," to be established by the State and
operated and managed by the workers themselves under the
general supervision of the State. Unlike many other
Utopians, Blanc placed no reliance upon private capital.
He regarded democracy as the first essential of social regenera-
255
256 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
tion. His social workshops were to develop through their
superior merit until they absorbed the whole of capitalist
industry.
Another movement of a broader character, but less defi-
nitely proletarian, had its roots in Mazzini's work for Italian
unity and freedom. Following the Young Italy movement
came the Young Europe Association, founded by some of
Mazzini's followers. As an offshoot of this movement some
German refugees in Paris formed the Young Germany
Society. This society, under the various names of "League
of the Just," "League of the Righteous," "Communist
League" and "International Alliance" was more intimately
connected with the later Socialist movement than any of the
other organizations of the period. It was for the Communist
League that Marx and Engels wrote the Communist Mani-
festo.
Conditions in 1847: By the year 1847 Utopianism had
passed the climax of its strength. Owenism had never recov-
ered from the failure of the experiments made in England
and America, and was now an unimportant sect. Saint-
Simonism had degenerated under the leadership of Bazard
into an indecent travesty of Saint-Simon's ideas. Fourier-
ism, discouraged by the catastrophic ending of the Brook
Farm experiment, was fast losing ground. The only com-
munistic movements which possessed real vitality were
those represented by Cabet and Wilhelm Weitling. The
Communism of both was essentially Utopian, but it was
distinctly proletarian. Its basis was the crude class doctrine
of the "Rights of Labor," and its appeal was based upon
Brotherhood, Justice, Order and Economy.
We have already considered Cabet in another chapter.1
Weitling alone among the Utopians was a man of the people,
a true proletarian. By trade a tailor, during his wanderjahre
he had come into contact with the Communist movement,
and in 1838 published his first book, The World As It Is
and As It Might Be. This was followed four years later by
The Guaranties of Harmony and Freedom. Weitling was a
proletarian agitator of the highest type, and in some features
of his theory comes very close to some of the ideas of Marxian
Socialism. He may be considered the personal connecting
1 See p. 197.
RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM 257
link between the Utopian movements and modern, scientific
Socialism.
With Utopiamsm moribund, or being transformed into a
proletarian movement, and the working class stimulated to
political activity, the materials were ready for the develop-
ment of a new and unified Socialist movement. This task
was accomplished in the next generation, and the dominant
personality in the new phase was Karl Marx.
Biographical: Marx was born at Trier, Germany, in 1818.
His father, Heinrich Marx, was a lawyer of prominence and
comfortable fortune who held a government position. A
Jew, the descendant of a long line of rabbis, he became a
Christian in 1824, six years after the birth of his famous son.
Karl Marx studied philosophy and law at Bonn and Berlin
and received his doctorate at Jena in 1841. After the sup-
pression of a radical daily newspaper of which he was editor,
he went in 1843 to Paris, where he joined a remarkable group
of radicals, among whom were Heine, the poet, the Anarchists
Proudhon and Bakunin, and the Utopian Cabet. At this
period Marx became interested in the teachings of Saint-
Simon.
It was in Paris, also, that Marx first met, in 1844, the man
whose life was destined to be inseparably linked to his own,
Frederick Engels. Two years the junior of Marx, Engels
was the son of a wealthy German manufacturer who had
large interests in Manchester, England, to which Engels
eventually succeeded. The friendship and literary partner-
ship of Marx and Engels lasted until the death of Marx in
London in 1883, and was never clouded by a single quarrel
or unpleasant difference of opinion. In 1845 the two friends
went to Brussels and there organized the German Working-
men's Club, a sort of labor union, one of the members being
Wilhelm Weitling.
In 1847 Marx. and Engels and the whole Brussels group
became affiliated with the International Alliance and pro-
ceeded to bring about its reorganization. They had joined
for this purpose at the request of a few of the more active
spirits in the movement. A congress was called in London
at which Marx was represented by Engels and Wilhelm
Wolff, one of their staunchest supporters. On behalf of
Marx, Engels and Wolff outlined a program which was
258 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
approved, despite the bitter opposition of Weitling and his
followers. These latter were thoroughly imbued with the
conspiratory methods which had hitherto prevailed. They
believed that secret organization and sudden uprisings were
the only fruitful methods of working class action. The
Marxian program, on the other hand, discouraged these and
advocated open agitation and the building up of a great
political party of the proletariat. Engels and Wolff having
succeeded, a resolution was passed asking Marx and Engels
to formulate a declaration of principles and a practical
program for the movement.
At a second meeting of the congress, in November, 1847,
Marx was present and read the program and declaration of
principles which he and Engels had prepared. The whole
was a draft of the Communist Manifesto, and was enthusi-
astically adopted. This made Marx and Engels the acknowl-
edged leaders of the movement.
The subsequent life of Marx and Engels was devoted to the
Socialist movement, to the formulation of its theoretical
basis and its tactics and policies. Marx published his
Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy in 1859,
the year in which Darwin's Origin of Species appeared. The
first volume of Das Kapital appeared in 1867. Poverty,
the exigencies of the movement and ill-health combined to
prevent Marx from finishing the two remaining volumes,
but after his death the manuscripts were completed and
edited by Engels, who published the final volume just before
his death in 1895.
The Communist Manifesto: The new Marxian program
was complete in January, 1848, and published in February.
Its publication is usually considered as marking the begin-
ning of the modern movement. The Manifesto was the first
clear and definite statement of scientific Socialism. Its
twenty-five pages of vigorous and incisive German sets forth
the history and character of class struggles, the character
of modern social classes, and the position of capitalism in
industrial evolution. All this is interpreted as pointing out
that the next stage in evolution will be characterized by the
abolition of private capital and the socialization of produc-
tion and exchange.
The Manifesto was a rallying call to the proletariat, the
RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM 259
workers' Declaration of Independence. Its inspiring keynote
"Workingmen of all countries, Unite!" has been the watch-
word of Socialism from that day to this. The Manifesto
put an end to Utopian Socialism. The ideological conception
of society with its resulting belief that capitalism must be
regarded as a wicked invention by greedy and cruel men, to
be destroyed by triumphant virtue, was effectually destroyed.
The Utopian viewpoint could not again prevail as a basis for
Socialist agitation, except locally and for very brief periods.
But the proletariat was not yet ready to unite upon the
great scale Marx and Engels had hoped for. Although they
were not so sanguine as many of their followers, Marx and
Engels underestimated the shortcomings of the proletariat
and the forces of division. It is only after sixty years that
a new generation is actually answering the rallying cry upon
a grand scale and working effectively along the lines laid
down by Marx and Engels in 1848.
"Communism" and "Socialism": The use of the word
"Communist" by Marx and his followers needs some explana-
tion. In 1848, the word "Socialism," which had been first
used to describe the theories of Robert Owen, was used to
describe all forms of the decadent Utopianism. Marx and
Engels desired to wean the movement entirely away from
Utopianism. This fact alone would have caused them to
avoid the use of the word "Socialism" in connection with
their theories. On the other hand, the working class ele-
ments to unite which the Manifesto was written were all
known as Communists. The word "Communism" was there-
fore the logical one to use to describe the aims of the move-
ment. Since that time, however, the meanings of the words
Communism and Socialism have been exactly reversed, and \
the latter word is used to describe the movement based j
upon the teachings of Marx, while the former word signifies
the common ownership of all wealth, both in consumption
and production goods. The most superficial examination of
the Manifesto will show that Marx and Engels were not
Communists in the modern sense of the word, but Socialists.
The revolution of 1848: The day on which the Communist
Manifesto was published in London saw the outbreak of
revolution in Paris. The social discontent which Marx and
his friends had sensed, and which many of them regarded as
260 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
the sign of the coming of an immediate Social Revolution,
broke forth in open revolt. Louis Philippe was driven from
the throne and a Republic established. Nor was France alone
affected. All Central and Western Europe felt the force
of revolutionary activity, and it is not surprising that some
of the Socialists believed that the Social Revolution had come.
But when the excitement was over and the time for recon-
struction had arrived it was soon discovered that the Revolu-
tion was only the revolt of the bourgeoisie against the
survivals of feudal restrictions. A real impetus was given
to the democratic movement, however, and to that extent
the proletariat was benefited. But at the end of the struggle
capitalism was stronger than ever before, the proletarian
leaders were driven to exile in most cases, and the new
movement seemed to have been crushed at its very inception.
As a concession to the proletariat, and in return for their
assistance, Louis Blanc and two or three other leaders of
the working class were given places in the French Provisional
Government, and Blanc at once pressed his plan for the
establishment of social workshops. So great was his follow-
ing that the government did not dare to oppose him openly.
National workshops were accordingly established, but in
such a manner that Blanc denounced them and disclaimed
all responsibility for them. Instead of employing skilled
workers at productive work, the workshops were filled with
a mob of incompetents who could not otherwise find employ-
ment and were given unproductive labor. The result of the
subsequent government investigation, and the confession of
the director of the workshops, prove that they were estab-
lished with the deliberate purpose of discrediting Blanc and
his theories.
The reaction: The uprisings of 1848 had accomplished
little from the point of view of the proletariat, and the next
few years record very little of interest except the literary
work of Marx and the preparation of the leaders of the later
movement. Most of the revolutionary leaders of France and
Germany were in exile, and London was practically the
only important centre of radical thought and activity. The
movement fell into the hands of impatient advocates of
immediate revolutionary uprisings, and in 1850 Marx with-
drew from the Central Committee of the Communist Alliance
RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM 261
with a statement in which he warned the members that they
would have to pass through "fifteen, twenty, fifty years" of
strife in order to change conditions and make themselves
fit for political power. The attitude of the majority he
characterized as the substitution of revolutionary phrases
for revolutionary evolution.1 The Alliance survived the
withdrawal of its leader barely two years, and for the next
twelve years there was practically no formal organization of
the Socialist forces.
The "International": The next decade brought with it
renewed activity. The Universal Exhibition at London in
1862 brought together representatives of the working classes
of England, France and Germany and did much to stimulate
the feeling of working class solidarity. In 1864, largely
through the inspiration of Marx, a congress composed of
English workingmen and their sympathizers, revolutionary
exiles from the Continent living in England, and delegates
from France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Switzerland was
held in London and resulted in the formation of The Inter-
national Working Men's Association.
The program of the Association was written by Marx,
and was enthusiastically adopted after one offered by
Mazzini had been rejected. It reaffirmed the principles of the
Communist Manifesto and ended with the old rallying cry
to unite. The "International" thus born rapidly extended
to all the countries of Central and Western Europe and to the
United States and Australia. It played an important part
in the labor troubles which occurred in several countries,
and for several years was an important force in international
politics. Its congresses were devoted to the discussion of
social and labor problems. Thus, the International was
something more than a mere revival of the Communist
League. It was the first real attempt to organize the workers
internationally, embracing both the economic and the politi-
cal forms of organization. The Communist League had
touched only a few choice spirits. The International, on
the other hand, embraced practically all the organization
of the workers, and its story forms one of the most stirring
chapters in the whole history of the labor movement.
Divergent elements: The declaration of principles to
1 Quoted by Jaures, Studies in Socialism, p. 44.
262 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
which all members of the International had to subscribe
was essentially a Socialist document. It set forth that the
emancipation of the working class must be the work of the
workers themselves. The struggle for this emancipation
is not a struggle to place the workers in the position of a
ruling class, but a struggle to abolish all forms of class rule.
The economic dependence of the workers upon those who
own and control the instruments of labor forms the basis of
every kind of servitude, social misery and spiritual degrada-
tion. Therefore, every political activity of the working
class must be directed to their economic emancipation.
But the International comprised many elements to whom
the declaration of principles meant very little. Its greatest
weakness as well as its greatest strength lay in the fact that
it embraced too many diverse elements. Although Marx
was its dominating spirit, the International was by no means
unitedly pledged to his principles. In addition to the real
Marxists there were those who still believed in conspiratory
action, those who followed Proudhon, .those who relied solely
upon the power of the trade unions and those to whom
nothing was important except political democracy. To
Marx the most important need of the time seemed to be the
union of the workers. Everything else must be subordinated
to that end. Thus we find many compromises and contra-
dictions in the history of the International, as, for example,
when the Geneva Congress in 1866 defeated an amendment
in favor of an eight-hour work day and adopted a resolution
in favor of ten hours, and when the Lausanne Congress, in
1867, passed a resolution declaring that only in individual
cases, where the father was incapacitated, should the State
undertake the education of children!
Decline of the International: After the congress of 1868
the Russian Anarchist, Michael Bakunin, joined the Inter-
national and precipitated a conflict between the Anarchist
members and the followers of Marx. The struggle became a
titanic intellectual duel between Marx and Bakunin, the
two men who even now are regarded as the foremost repre-
sentatives of their respective movements. Marx was vic-
torious, but in the victory the International itself was de-
stroyed. In 1872, in order to avert further danger from the
anarchists, the seat of the General Council was transferred
RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM 263
to New York, where Marx had a considerable following
among the German exiles. This removal was designed
simply to hide for a time the fact that the International was
destroyed in order to keep it out of the hands of Bakunin.
In 1876 a "congress" of eleven delegates met in Philadelphia
and formally dissolved the organization.
The form of organization died, but the work and the
spirit of the International remained. It had, in some degree,
accomplished the international unification of the proletariat
and inspired it with a consciousness of proletarian solidarity.
More than that, it had materially aided the formation of
Socialist parties in several countries.
The "New International" : The later history of the inter-
national Socialist movement must be considered in its sepa-
rate national phases. Before the decline of the International
the rise of the German Social Democracy had already marked
the beginning of a new era in the history of Socialism. From
1872 to 1889 the strength of Socialism grew steadily through-
out Europe and America, preparing the way for a new
International.
On July 14, 1889, the first of a new series of international
congresses was opened in Paris, and the event was hailed
as the establishment of a New International. The subsequent
congresses of the international Socialist movement have been
held at Brussels (1891), Zurich (1893), London (1896), Paris
(1900), Amsterdam (1904), Stuttgart (1907), and Copen-
hagen (1910). In conjunction with the Stuttgart Congress,
an International Congress of Socialist Women was held,
representing the women's movements of the leading coun-
tries. This was repeated at Copenhagen and has now
become a permanent feature of the international movement.
The new International is really a federation of autonomous
national Socialist parties, united for the common purpose
of bringing an end to the world-wide system of capitalist
exploitation. It is united in its adherence to the funda-
mental theories of Marxian Socialism. As an organization
it exercises no authority over the various affiliated parties,
either in matters of theory, program or methods. Since 1900
a permanent International Socialist Bureau has been main-
tained at Brussels, with a secretary who is the one permanent
and paid officer of the International movement. The
264 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
bureau itself consists of non-resident delegates from every
Socialist party affiliated with the International.
The growth of the international party has been rapid, and
at the present time (1911) its total voting strength is esti-
mated at over nine millions. Its greatest numerical strength
is in the four countries of Germany, France, Austria and the
United States, in the order named. Considered in propor-
tion to population the order would be very different. Finland
and Belgium rank with Germany, while the United States
falls very far down the list.
RISE AND GROWTH OF MODERN SOCIALISM 265
SUMMARY
1. The period from 1830 to 1848 was marked by the decline of Uto-
pianism and the rise in Western Europe of broader proletarian move-
ments.
2. The era of modern Socialism begins with the Communist Mani-
festo of 1848, which first outlined the principles upon which it is based.
3. The International Workingmen's Association was the first great
Socialist organization, but it was composed of many divergent elements
and was wrecked by the dissension between the Socialists and the
Anarchists.
4. The "New International" dates from the Congress of Paris in
1889. It is a federation of autonomous national Socialist Parties,
having a combined voting strength of over 9,000,000.
QUESTIONS
1. What is the significance of Chartism in the history of the Socialist
movement?
2. What is the place of Weitling in Socialist history?
3. What were the points of difference between Weitling and the
Marxians in 1847?
4. Discuss the bearing of the Communist Manifesto upon the subse-
quent Socialist movement.
5. Why did Marx and Engels call themselves Communists instead
of Socialists?
6. What results did the Revolution of 1848 accomplish?
7. Describe the characteristic features of the International.
8. What were the elements of weakness in the International?
9. Describe the form of organization of the "New International."
Literature
Ely, R. T., French and German Socialism in Modern Times.
Hunter, Robert, Socialists at Work, Chap. X.
Kirkup, Thomas, A History of Socialism.
Rae, John, Contemporary Socialism, Chap. Ill and IV.
Spargo, John, Karl Marx, His Life and Work.
CHAPTER XXII
the national socialist movements
(1) Germany
Origins: Through priority of origin as well as present
strength, the German Social Democracy claims our first
consideration. The most prominent figure in the early
history of the German movement is Ferdinand Lassalle.
While Marx and Engels were both Germans, they were in a
very special sense cosmopolitans, and each of them spent
his life outside of Germany. Lassalle was born in 1825.
Like Marx, he was of Jewish descent. At the age of twenty-
three he joined the Socialist wing of the revolutionary move-
ment of 1848, his activities leading to his imprisonment for
six months and exclusion from Berlin for ten years. His
first real opportunity came during the bitter struggle of 1862
in which Bismarck became master of Prussia. He entered
political life with a vigorous propaganda by lectures and
pamphlets in which he differed from the other political parties
and subordinated the political aspects of the struggle to its
social aspects. He had at first contemplated joining the
Liberals, but found them half-hearted in their advocacy of
democracy. It was then that he proposed the formation of
an independent Socialist party. The proposal met with a
ready response, and in May, 1863, the General Working-
men's Association was founded with Lassalle as its president.
The Association adopted a program, written by Lassalle,
which aimed chiefly at the abolition of the three-class system
of voting, which still obtains in Prussia. During the remainder
of his short life Lassalle worked for the cause with feverish
activity, writing, lecturing and organizing with almost
superhuman energy. In August, 1864, just fifteen months
after the formation of the new party, Lassalle was mortally
wounded in a duel, and his brief but remarkable career was
thus brought to an ignoble end.
266
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 267
As a revolutionary agitator Lassalle stands almost without
a peer. That no little of the sensational success which
attended his agitation was due to favorable circumstances
rather than to any personal qualities may be granted. The
fact remains, however, that he was a man of remarkable
talents. At the same time his defects of character were
serious. He was vain, lacking in self-restraint and essentially
an aristocrat. His manner of life was that of a self-indulgent
man of fashion, and he did not always place the interests
of the proletarian movement above his personal pleasures
and ambitions.
The period of organization: After the death of its leader
the General Workingmen's Association went through a
period of depression. Lassalle had been practically a dictator
and the association had therefore not developed self-govern-
ment. The movement proved to be something more than a
personal following of Lassalle, however, and after some three
years of difficulty began to make considerable progress,
especially in Prussia and North Germany. Meanwhile a
rival organization had grown up in Saxony, South Germany,
under the leadership of Wilhelm Liebknecht and August
Bebel, followers of Marx. In 1869 this Southern association
met in convention at Eisenach and organized the Social
Democratic Workingmen's Party. Both the Lassallean and
the Eisenach elements were represented in the North German
Diet, seven Socialists being elected to that body in 1867.
The Franco-Prussian War checked the Socialist agitation
for a short time, and in the first elections to the German
Reichstag only two Socialists were elected. The parties
soon revived, however, and in 1874 their combined vote was
340,000, nine representatives being elected to the Reichstag.
Union of the two parties : Both the Eisenach, or Marxist,
party and the Lassallean association had met with persecu-
tion from the police at every step since their organization,
and by this time the need for unity of the two forces had
long been apparent and discussed. While the two organiza-
tions had a common object there were a number of differences
in theory and tactics — the differences between the theories
and tactics of Marx and those of Lassalle.
The union of the two factions was finally effected at Gotha,
in 1875. The Lassalleans were in the majority, and in the
268 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
interests of harmony the leaders of the Marxist forces con-
sented to the program drafted by the Lassalleans. By far
abler than the leaders on the other side, the Marxist leaders
manifested great wisdom and courage in taking this step,
despite the protests of Marx himself. The program opens
with the statement that ' 'Labor is the source of all wealth
and all culture, and as useful work in general is possible
only through society, so to society, that is to all its members,
the entire product belongs; while as the obligation to labor
is universal, all have an equal right to such product, each
one according to his reasonable needs." This, together
with the reference to the "Iron Law of Wages" in the follow-
ing section, is purely Lassallean, as is the demand for
"Socialistic productive associations with State help under the
democratic control of the laboring people."
Marx wrote from London a bitter denunciation of the pro-
posed program. He was not opposed to union. On the
contrary, holding that ' 'Every step of real movement is
worth a dozen programs," he would have had them unite
upon almost any basis except that of a program which he
regarded as fundamentally false. He attacked the Lassallean
principles contained in the program and denounced them as
"utterly condemnable and demoralizing to the party."
Had this letter been published at the time it would have
defeated the efforts to unite the two elements. The letter
was not published until many years afterward, however, and
although Marx was furious at the time, on account of the
rejection of his advice, time has shown that the defects of
the Gotha program were not important enough to offer a
real barrier to the progress of the movement.
The "exceptional laws" : At the election of 1877 the united
party polled half a million votes and elected twelve members
to the Reichstag. This revelation of the strength of the
movement aroused and frightened Bismarck. His rule was
challenged and he answered with repression, the Junker
dominating the statesmen. A pretext for the repression was
found in the attempts made upon the life of the Kaiser by
two irresponsible fanatics. Although it was very evident
that the Socialists had nothing to do with either attempt,
Bismarck accused them of complicity and forced through the
Reichstag severe laws which suppressed all Socialist news-
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 269
papers, the holding of public meetings, and even the formal
organization of the party. During the remainder of Bis-
marck's rule the only forum open to the Socialists was the
tribune of the Reichstag itself. The affairs of the party
had to be conducted largely from Switzerland, even its
official organ, the Sozial Demokrat, being published from
there and smuggled into Germany.
For a time the growth of the party was checked. The
voters were openly intimidated and many of the leading
Socialists were exiled. In 1881 the vote of the Social Demo-
crats fell to 312,000. But a movement like Socialism thrives
on oppression, and when in 1890 the Social Democrats polled
1,427,000 votes, three times the vote of 1877, the govern-
ment abandoned Bismarck's policy of repression and the
exceptional laws were repealed.
The Erfurt Congress: In 1891 the party was again per-
mitted to hold a convention upon German soil. It met at
Erfurt and adopted a new program in place of that adopted
at Gotha. The Erfurt program eliminates all the semi-
Utopianism of Lassalle, and is one of the best short state-
ments of Marxian Socialism ever made. It begins as follows :
"The economic development of the bourgeois society
leads by a necessity of nature to the downfall of small
production, the basis of which is the private property of the
workman in his means of production, and transforms him
into a proletarian without property, whilst the means of
production become the monopoly of a comparatively small
number of capitalists and great land-owners."
The program goes on to describe the class struggle, and
the necessity of collective ownership of the means of pro-
duction for the emancipation of the proletariat. This social
transformation at the hands of the working class must
come through political action, and in emancipating them-
selves they will free humanity. The specific demands are
well stated, and the whole program is an indication of the
great intellectual advance made by the party in the sixteen
years which had elapsed since the Gotha Congress. The
Erfurt program still stands as the theoretical basis of the
German Social Democracy after twenty years of experience
and criticism.
Later growth: The strength of the Social Democrats has
270
ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
steadily increased since the Erfurt Congress. The following
table shows the growth of the party's electoral strength
since the establishment of the Empire:
TABLE VI
GROWTH OF THE SOCIALIST VOTE IN GERMANY
Year.
Socialist
Vote.
Percentage
of
Total Vote.
Members
Elected to
Reichstag
1871
124,655
351.952
493,288
137,158
311,961
549,990
763,128
1,427,298
1,176,738
2,007,076
3,008,000
3,258,968
4,400,000
3.0
6.8
9.1
7.6
6.1
9.7
10.1
19.7
23.3
24.0
24.3
40.0
2
1874
9
1877 . .
12
1878
9
1881
12
1884
24
1887
11
1890
35
1893
44
1896
57
1903
81
1907
43 »
1912
110
The gain in the total vote in 1907 was made in the face
of a concerted campaign against Socialism made by the
government and all the other parties of the Empire. Every
Socialist candidate met with a united opposition supported
by almost unlimited funds. Over ten million anti-Socialist
pamphlets were distributed, and speakers were sent to every
possible social and literary club. The chief cause of the
relative weakness of the Social Democrats in the Reichstag
lies in the fact that the Empire has never been redistricted.
The great cities, which are the strongholds of the Socialists,
have the same number of representatives that they had in
1871. The Centre, or Roman Catholic, party — which is next
to the Social Democracy in numerical strength — has its
strongholds in those sections of the country which have not
materially increased their population since 1871. Although
this party polled only 2,183,384 votes in 1907, or 1,075,584
votes less than the Social Democrats, it had 108 representa-
1 Increased to 52 in the by-elections between 1907 and 1911. The
report of the party to the International Congress at Copenhagen in 1910
showed that the party had also 185 representatives in the various
parliaments of the federated States of the Empire.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 271
tives in the Reichstag as against the 43 of the Social De-
mocracy.1
The dues-paying party membership has increased 57.7
per cent since the election of 1907, the total number in 1911
being 836,562. In the nine by-elections which took place
in the year ending August 1, 1911, the party vote averaged
47.37 per cent of the total vote cast, as against an average of
40.46 per cent in the contested elections of 1907. The Social
Democracy controls many of the larger German cities, and has
at present 8,910 municipal representatives in the Empire.2
Revisionism: Within recent years a movement for a
moderation of theoretical statement and for opportunism
in political tactics has grown up within the party and been
greatly exploited by the non-Socialist press. The best
known representative of this movement is Eduard Bern-
stein, a trusted leader of the party from the early days of
the exceptional laws. The principal points upon which he
centres his attack on the accepted theories of Socialism
have been dealt with elsewhere. Bernstein's book, Die
Voraussetzungen des Sozialismus,3 made a tremendous sensa-
tion when it appeared in 1899. Although the proposals of the
Revisionists have always been defeated by large majorities in
the party congresses, they have gained steadily in influence.
At the Magdeburg Congress in 1910 the point at issue
between the two elements was on a question of practical
tactics. One of the strictest rules of the party is that its
representatives must not, under any circumstances, vote for
the budget of the government. The argument is that such
an act would be voting money to an anti-Socialist govern-
ment. It happened that in the Grand Duchy of Baden the
Socialists held the balance of power between the liberal
government and a conservative clerical opposition. Deem-
ing it unwise to play into the hands of the latter, the Social-
ists, led by Dr. Frank, voted for the budget. At the Magde-
burg Congress, Bebel moved a resolution mildly censuring
1 In January, 1912, the Social Democracy became the strongest single
party in the Reichstag, the Centrists returning only 93 members.
2 Vide Report of Executive Committee to Party Congress at Jena,
Sept., 1911.
3 Published in English translation under the title, Evolutionary
Socialism, New York, 1910.
272 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
the Baden leaders. For Dr. Frank, who is one of the ablest
and best loved men in the German party, Bebel expressed
his affectionate regard, calling him his youngest son, his
Benjamin. But while the resolution of censure was as mild
as it was possible for such a resolution to be, BebePs attack
upon the position taken by Dr. Frank and his colleagues
was keen and bitter. At an evening session, Dr. Frank
announced that he and his colleagues could not agree to
abide by the resolution. Aroused by this declaration, the
"orthodox" element insisted then and there upon adding a
rider to the resolution warning the Baden delegates that in
the event of their refusing to obey the resolution they would
be expelled from the party. Realizing the seriousness of his
position, Dr. Frank begged the Congress to adjourn the
discussion until the next morning. This the Congress
refused to do and Dr. Frank and some sixty delegates with-
drew from the Congress, whereupon the rider was adopted.
Bebel, who had not been present during the evening session,
was greatly grieved when he learned what had taken place.
Of course, the event was widely hailed as a "split" in the
ranks of the party. That it came perilously near to a
disastrous break in the solidarity of the party is freely
admitted. Later Dr. Frank and his colleagues came back
to the Congress and gracefully accepted the decision of the
majority. The event proved to the world the strong sense
of party loyalty and unity which dominates the German Social
Democracy.
The Social Democracy and trade unionism : The industrial
development of Germany was late in beginning and the first
trade unions were not organized until the inception of the
Socialist movement. From the very first the Marxist ele-
ment favored the formation of workmen's associations
(Gewerkschafteri) and the Lassallean element from 1869.
Thus the two movements have largely developed side by
side, and there has never been the bitter misunderstanding
and hostility which has marked the relations of the two
movements in England, where the trade union movement
was already well established when the modern Socialist
movement appeared. The political party and the industrial
organization are regarded as equal parts of one movement.
This has given the Social Democracy a great advantage,
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 273
for the rapid industrial development of the country has
forced a corresponding growth of the trade unions, and this
in turn has meant a constant increase in Socialist strength.
The great bulk of the trade unions of Germany are Social-
istic in their sympathies. There are, however, some minor
non-Socialist unions which are called "Yellow Unions" in
contradistinction from the "Red Unions," which support the
Social Democrats. The total trade union membership is
about two and a half millions, two millions belonging to the
"red" unions and half a million to the "yellow" unions.
Leaders of the Social Democracy: The foremost of the
older political chiefs of the party was Wilhelm Liebknecht.
A lineal descendant of Martin Luther, Liebknecht was born
into the same educated middle class as Marx. As early as
1848, when he was twenty-two years of age, he became
connected with the revolutionary movement, and was one
of the group of exiles which gathered around Marx in Lon-
don during the period of reaction. He was one of the
founders of the Eisenach party, and one of those primarily
responsible for bringing about the unity of the movement
at Gotha. He was elected to the North German Diet in
1867, and was a member of that body and of the German
Reichstag the greater part of his life from that time until
his death in 1900. He served many terms of imprisonment
for the cause he loved and served so well.
August Bebel, a master turner and largely self-educated,
the present leader of the German party, has often been
called the ablest parliamentary debater in Europe. After
Liebknecht returned to Germany, in 1862, Bebel, who was
already active in the trade union movement, but was not a
Socialist, formed an acquaintance with him. In 1866 Bebel
definitely allied himself with the Socialist movement of the
time, and later became one of the founders of the Eisenach
party. While admitting the influence of Liebknecht, Bebel
himself says that he came to Marxism by way of Lassalle. He
entered the Reichstag soon after the establishment of the
Empire and is still an active member of that body.
The foremost theoretician of the party is Karl Kautsky.
He is perhaps the foremost living authority upon Marxian
Socialism. In some respects he is carrying on the work of
Frederick Engels just as Engels carried on the work of Marx.
274 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
The older leaders of the German party are rapidly giving
place to younger men, and there has been a noticeable
increase in the proportion of leaders who have themselves
come from the working class. There are two reasons for this:
First of all, the proletariat is becoming more self-reliant
and no longer has to depend upon middle-class "intellec-
tuals" to the same extent as in earlier days. Secondly,
class lines are being drawn more closely in German politics,
and relatively fewer men of the type of Marx, Lassalle, and
Liebknecht leave their class to cast their lot with the pro-
letariat.
Among the noteworthy younger leaders of German Social-
ism may be mentioned Karl Legien, the leader of trade
unionism, George Ledebour, a powerful orator and debater,
Albert Siidekum, the leading authority in Germany on
municipal problems, and Herman Molkenbuhr, the present
floor leader of. the party in the Reichstag.
The women's movement: The party maintains a Social
Democratic Women's Bureau for the purpose of carrying on
special propaganda among proletarian women. There are
at present (1911) 107,693 women who are dues-paying
members of the party. Women take a very prominent part
in the affairs of the party. The first National Women's
Convention of the party was held in March, 1911, and was
effective in emphasizing the party's strong support of woman
suffrage. The best known of the women leaders of the party
are Clara Zetkin, an able agitator and editor of Die Gleichheit
("Equality"), a paper which has 95,000 subscribers,1 and
Rosa Luxemburg, best known on account of her writings and
speeches in support of the extreme Left of the party.
Much attention has been given to the juvenile movement.
Until 1908 there were two central organizations of Young
Socialists under the leadership of Karl Liebknecht, the son
of Wilhelm Liebknecht. In that year a law was passed
making such organizations illegal, but the party has found
a way to maintain the essential features of the movement
without formal organization.
Press, literature and education: The number of daily
newspapers owned and controlled by the party has increased
from 65 to 87 since 1907, and their combined circulation is
1 Report to Jena Congress, 1911.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 275
well over a million copies a day. These papers are published
in fifty-seven printing establishments owned by the party.
There are also many weeklies and monthlies. Germany
takes the first place among the nations in the character and
quantity of its Socialist literature, particularly in the field
of theory. The work of the leading German writers has
been translated into all European languages, and until
very recent years was the chief literary support of the world
movement. The party maintains a permanent school at
Berlin for the training of writers and speakers, and carries
on a very vigorous educational propaganda throughout the
country.
(2) France
Foundations of French Socialism: As we have already
seen France played a brilliant part in the earlier Utopian
phases of the Socialist movement. Many writers have con-
sidered Socialism to be essentially French in its origin
dating from the Encyclopedists, notably Rousseau, in whose
works we do find some glimmerings of Socialist philosophy.
Through Morelly and Mably these ideas were continued
and developed down to the Revolutionary period, when the
works of Boissel and Babeuf appeared. Then came Saint-
Simon, Fourier, Cabet and Louis Blanc. The latter came
nearest to modern Socialism but his work did not give rise to
a permanent movement. After 1848 French radical thought
was dominated for many years by the Anarchism of
Proudhon and Blanqui, during which time Marxian Socialism
hardly obtained a foothold in the land where Marx had first
declared himself a Socialist.
The International Working Men's Association had been
the outcome of the visit of French workingmen to London
in 1862, and the organization was always numerically strong
in France. But the French members were Anarchists rather
than Socialists and always voted against collectivist proposals.
M. de Molinari said in 1869 that out of every ten French
workingmen who had any interests beyond eating and drink-
ing, nine were Socialists, but he used the word Socialism
to include all kinds of radicalism, especially the schools of
Proudhon and Blanqui. The crushing defeat of the Paris
276 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Commune, followed by the speedy disruption of the Inter-
national, served to scatter still further the forces of the
French proletariat. The Commune had no connection with
Socialism, being simply a protest of Paris against the humil-
iating peace of 1871, and a demand for municipal autonomy.
All the radical forces, including those represented in the
International, joined in the movement, and all suffered from
the punitive measures adopted by the government.
Rise of the new Socialism: During the first years of the
Third Republic the chief centres of Socialist activity were
small groups, called "Students' Circles," organized by Jules
Guesde and Gabriel Deville. Guesde is one of the heroic
figures of the international Socialist movement. A revolu-
tionist from his youth, the first object of his attack was the
Bonapartist Empire. He served six months in prison in
1865, when he was twenty years of age, and six years later
led the republicans in the capture of Montpellier. Sentenced
to exile or imprisonment for five years, Guesde chose exile
and went to Geneva, where he came into touch with the
Socialists. He soon joined a branch of the International
and assisted in the establishment of a daily newspaper.
Later he became a travelling agitator and went from town
to town through Italy and Switzerland, preaching the gospel
of Socialism with the ardor of a medieval religious zealot.
Often hungry, homeless and ragged, he lived only for the
"Cause." If he could get hold of one man in a town who
manifested the slightest interest, Guesde rarely left him
until he had won him over. In every town he would leave
a small group of converts fired with something of his own
enthusiasm. In 1876 he returned to France and immedi-
ately took up the work of Socialist propaganda. He estab-
lished a paper, L'Egalite, wrote for other papers, and, in
addition to this heavy labor, rushed from one end of France
to the other, carrying on a restless propaganda and forming
little Students' Circles everywhere. He did not as yet
attempt to form a party. The time for that had not arrived.
With rare genius and foresight he selected the promising
young men in all the cities and awakened their personal
interest. He was laying his foundations broad and deep.
In 1878 a trade union congress was held at Lyons. Guesde,
who was a delegate to the congress, had already drawn
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 277
many of the younger leaders of the unions to his side, and
an attempt was made to get the congress to indorse the
principles and program of Marxian Socialism. In this they
signally failed. But in the following year the Socialist
program was adopted by a large majority at the trade union
congress at Marseilles. The program was written by Guesde
and Paul Lafargue, a son-in-law of Marx. In the following
year, 1880, the Socialist delegates to the trade union con-
gress at Havre were in a minority and were refused admission
by the old and conservative leaders. Excluded from the
regular congress, the Socialists met independently in a
separate congress. So successful were they from that point
onward that the conservative organization ceased to exist
after holding one other poorly-attended congress in 1881.
The new Socialist movement in France was now fairly
launched.
Party dissensions: In 1882 the new party split into two
parties. One party represented strict Marxism, and was
headed by Guesde, Lafargue and Deville. The other party
represented political opportunism, and was headed by Paul
Brousse and Benoit Malon. The opportunists called the
Marxists "Impossibilists" and themselves by contrast
"Possibilists," and these terms are now largely used in
Socialist controversy everywhere. In 1887 a partial recon-
ciliation was effected, and the first Socialists were elected to
the Chamber of Deputies. By 1891 the "Possibilists" had
split into two groups, again over questions of tactics. There
was still another considerable group of independent Social-
ists led by Jean Jaures and Etienne Millerand and supported
largely by middle-class radicals. If we add to these elements
the semi-Anarchist Blanquists, we have five distinct elements
in the French Socialist movement of the time.
The united parliamentary group: In 1893 the election of
forty Socialists to the Chamber of Deputies, by a combined
vote of nearly half a million, led to better feeling. Largely
through the activity of Jaures and Guesde the deputies of
all the factions organized into a united parliamentary group,
Jaures being chosen as its leader. No better man could
have been selected for the position. In 1885, at the age of
twenty-six, while Professor of Philosophy at the Ecole
Normal Superieure, Jaures was first elected to parliament
278 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
as a radical. He was defeated in 1889 and at once returned
to his university work. His reputation as a scholar was
already national. In 1893 he was again elected to parlia-
ment, this time as a Socialist. Since that time he has been
the most striking figure in the French movement and one
of the most striking in the political life of Europe. As an
orator he has no peer in the parliaments of Europe. He
is always in the forefront in parliamentary debates, is a
tireless propagandist, and at the same time edits the leading
Socialist daily newspaper in France, U Humanite. In addi-
tion to all this work he manages to find time for scholastic
work, and his collection of sources for the history of the
French Revolution will form the basis of all future attempts
to write the history of that period. He is also engaged in
the preparation of a monumental history of Socialism.
The Dreyfus case: In 1898 the cordial relations between
the various Socialist groups were interrupted by the Dreyfus
affair. Guesde and his followers, the "Impossibilists,"
refused to have anything to do with the matter, but Jaures
actively espoused the cause of the accused Captain and
conducted a brilliant parliamentary campaign which led
to the reopening of the case and the ultimate exoneration
of the victim. To add to the difficulty, M. Waldeck-
Rousseau, when he became premier in 1899, made a bid for
Socialist support by inviting Millerand to join his ministry.
With the open support of Jaures, Millerand accepted. This
was too much for Guesde and his followers to tolerate,
especially since the ministry of M. Waldeck-Rousseau in-
cluded also General de Gallifet, who in 1871 had crushed
the Commune with almost fiendish brutality. The followers
of Guesde and Eduard Vaillant, a veteran Socialist who had
also been a leader in the Commune, broke with the par-
liamentary group, and the members of the two factions
became open enemies.
The reunion: The breach in the French party was the
chief matter considered at the International Congress at
Amsterdam in 1904. Nearly all the great orators of the
party participated in the debate, but it is chiefly remembered
as a great duel between Bebel, the strict Marxist, and Jaures,
the practical Revisionist. The victory rested with Bebel
and the congress decided in favor of the position taken by
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 279
Guesde and Vaillant. Jaures loyally submitted to the
decision of the majority, and upon the return of the French
delegates to France all the Socialist factions were merged
into the "French Section of the Workers' International
Party," with a Marxian program and a policy of strictly
independent political action.
The Socialist vote: In spite of division, the Socialist
vote has increased at every election. In 1887 it was 47,000.
In 1893 it rose to 440,000. In 1906, the first year after the
reunion, the vote was 877,999, and 54 deputies were elected.
In 1910 the vote was 1,106,049, an increase of twenty per
cent with a practically stationary population. Seventy-six
deputies were elected, eighteen of them from the Depart-
ment of the Seine, which includes Paris, and the remainder
divided among 31 of the other 86 Departments of the
Republic. The party elected two additional members in
the Department of the Seine in 1911, making the parlia-
mentary representation seventy-eight members. The party
is represented in the Cantonal Councils by eighty-one
General Councillors and sixty-three Arrondissment Coun-
cillors, and there are about 3,800 members of the United
Socialist Party in municipal councils. A large number of
important cities are controlled by the Socialists.
The large "Radical Socialist" party in France is not really
Socialist at all, but corresponds more nearly to the "insur-
gent" wings of the two dominant parties in the United States.
MM. Briand and Viviani, who entered the Clemenceau
ministry in 1907, Briand afterward becoming Premier, are
no longer recognized as Socialists, although both were
formerly prominent members of the party. Viviani had
ceased to be a member of the party long before he accepted
his portfolio in M. Clemenceau's cabinet, while Briand
was immediately expelled by the party.
(3) Austria
The early movement: The first Austrian Socialist organ-
izations formed a part of the German movement. The
Austrians had been represented in the Eisenach Congress
in 1869 and were active participants in the International.
280 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
When the German Empire was formed the Austrian Social-
ists were cut adrift from their German comrades, and the
movement went through a long period of depression. Austria
was slower in industrial development than Germany, and
the difficulties of propaganda were increased by the differ-
ences of nationality and language within the Empire. Agita-
tion had to be carried on in seven or eight languages and
racial and national jealousies prevented effective organiza-
tion. Then, too, the Anarchist element was relatively strong
and the energies of the Socialists were largely absorbed in
the struggle against Anarchism.
The turning point of the movement was at the Congress
of 1888, held at Hainsfeld, near Vienna. At this congress
the Anarchists were routed and a unified party formed with
separate autonomous divisions. The first task of the new
party was to work for universal and equal suffrage. Under
the old law the electorate was divided into four classes:
(1) The aristocracy and high clergy; (2) the great capitalists;
(3) the middle class in cities; (4) the peasant proprietors.
Each class was entitled to a certain proportion of the 353
members of the Reichstag. The first victory of the Socialist
agitation was the creation of a new electoral class or curia,
consisting of the proletariat, entitled to elect 72 additional
deputies. The first election under the new law was held in
1897 and resulted in a vote of nearly 750,000 for the Social-
ists and the election of fifteen Socialist deputies, seven of
these coming from Bohemia.
The later movement: The agitation for universal and
equal suffrage continued, and fear of a revolution caused the
government to grant, in January, 1907, equal suffrage to
all men over the age of twenty-four. In the elections held
under the new law the following May the Socialists polled
1,041,948 votes and elected 87 deputies. Of these, fifty
were Germans, twenty-four were Czechs, six were Poles, five
were Italians and two were Ruthenians. The so-called
"Christian Socialist Party" of Austria is a Catholic party,
bitterly opposed to the whole Social Democratic movement.
The best-known leader of the Austrian Social Democratic
Party is Victor Adler, a physician who gave up his pro-
fession to engage in Socialist journalism and politics. Adler
is not merely one of the greatest scholars of the international
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 281
movement. He is also one of its best organizers, and as a
parliamentary leader has few equals. Even his most bitter
political enemies admit that Adler is the ablest leader in the
Austrian parliament.
(4) Belgium
The political movement: The first definite political organ-
ization of the Belgian proletariat was formed in 1885. Its
primary object was to unite the workers against the capitalist
despotism which in the "Workshop of Europe" is perhaps
more absolute than anywhere else in the world. The Con-
gress of 1885, held at Brussels, was not interested in theories,
and although the program adopted by it was essentially
Socialist, the word was not used and the organization took
the name Belgian Labor Party. After eight years of agita-
tion ending in a political strike involving 250,000 men, the
government granted a constitutional amendment which gave
a limited suffrage to the working class, which had heretofore
been wholly without political power. In the first election
held under the new law the Socialists polled 345,959 votes
and elected twenty-nine deputies. The government replied
by a new electoral law raising the voting age to thirty years,
requiring a local residence of three years, establishing a more
rigid class electoral system and giving four votes each to
the richest class. In spite of these obstacles, the party in
1895 obtained representation in 288 municipal councils,
with a majority of the members in seventy-eight. In the
partial elections for parliament in 1896 the party vote in
the districts where elections were held was more than
doubled, although no new seats were gained.
The growth in voting strength since 1906 has been slow,
but the party itself is in a much stronger position than ever
before. With a total population of only seven millions,
the Socialist vote in 1910 was 483,241. The party now has
thirty-five deputies, twenty-one per cent of the total num-
ber, and seven senators in the Belgian parliament, giving
them second place in relative parliamentary representation
among the Socialist parties of the world, and this in spite
of the unequal franchise law. In addition the party has now
850 representatives in municipal councils.
282 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Leaders: Belgian Socialists were very prominent in the
International. Caesar de Paepe, a friend of Marx and an
indefatigable agitator, was one of the moving spirits in the
International and one of its ablest leaders. After the death
of the International he directed his energies for many years
to the hopeless task of bringing about harmony between the
followers of Proudhon and Marxists like himself. Fortu-
nately, he was able to participate in the formation of the new
party in 1885, though he narrowly escaped being excluded
from the congress, so weary were the delegates of the long
years of fruitless controversy over matters of dogma and
theory. To the congress of 1890 the old man addressed a
letter warning the members of the party to preserve unity
above all things, to keep the party broad enough to permit
of the extreme radical and the opportunist working side by
side, each in his own way. Soon after that he died in the
south of France. Since the death of Jean Volders and
Caesar de Paepe the foremost leaders of the party have been
Eduard Anseele, head of the great Cooperatives, Emile
Vandervelde, the parliamentary leader in the Chamber of
Deputies and the party's leading theoretician, and Camille
Huysmans, who is the permanent secretary of the Inter-
national Socialist Bureau.
The Cooperatives: The most distinctive feature of the
Belgian movement is the degree to which it has developed
cooperative production and distribution. In 1879 Anseele,
then a printer in Ghent, founded in that city the "Vooruit,"
a workingmen's cooperative club to which was attached a
small bakery. The movement thus begun spread rapidly,
and extended to all the important towns of Belgium. Ghent
now has a large club in the best part of the city with a
department store and a cafe, all directly owned and operated
by the members of the "Vooruit." The Maison du Peuple
in Brussels is a magnificent building where most of the im-
portant party congresses are now held. In addition to
cooperative stores, bakeries and restaurants, the cooperative
plan has been successfully extended to brewing and cigar-
making establishments, boot and shoe factories, printing
shops, cotton mills and dairies. In December, 1909, there
were 174 cooperative societies with 140,730 members organ-
ized into a national federation. The annual sales of the
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 283
cooperative distributive stores amounted to $7,846,484 with
profits to the cooperators of $744,101. The party is largely
financed by its cooperative associations.
(5) Italy
Formation of the Italian party: The Italian sections of
the old International, like those of Spain, were largely
controlled by Bakunin. From the beginning, therefore, the
Anarchists were relatively strong in Italy, and that fact
made the progress of Marxian Socialism rather slow. In
1878 the attempt of an Anarchist to assassinate the King
gave the government a sufficient pretext for initiating a
policy of repression directed equally against the Anarchists
and the Socialists, although the latter were in no manner
concerned in the mad act of Passanante, and had completely
severed connections with the Anarchists in 1877. Forbidden
to carry on an open agitation, and prevented from holding
their national congress in 1880, and otherwise hindered, the
various existing Socialist groups temporarily adopted a new
line of policy. Dropping the propaganda of Socialism, they
commenced an agitation for universal suffrage, joining forces
with all the non-Socialist elements who were in favor of
that reform. By 1881 this movement had grown so formid-
able that twelve hundred societies sent delegates to a great
national congress held at Rome, under the presidency of
Garibaldi. The government now felt it prudent to yield
to the demand, at least in part, and a franchise bill was
quickly passed. Full of restrictions, the measure never-
theless greatly extended the suffrage.
Then the various Socialist groups once more asserted
their real purpose and united for the campaign, as there was
as yet no national party. Thirteen candidates were put
forward, two of whom were elected. The thirteen Socialist
candidates received about 50,000 votes, four per cent of the
total vote cast. One of the two Socialists elected was Andrea
Costa, who in his early days had been a leading Anarchist
but had broken with Anarchism and become one of the most
brilliant and active of the Socialists. Encouraged by the
success of their first electoral experiment, the Italian Social-
284 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ists formed a national Socialist party in 1885, but it made
little headway and led a very precarious existence. Police
persecutions and internal dissensions reduced it to impotence.
A fresh start was made in 1892, when the present Socialist
Party was formed. Since that time, despite numerous
factional quarrels, the movement in Italy has made steady
progress.
Different elements in the party : The new movement owed
much of the success of its inception to the work of Philip
Turati, an able lawyer and editor, who has continued to be
the leader of the moderate wing of the party, the "Reform-
ists" as they are called in Italy. Opposed to the Reformists
are the "Syndicalists," led by Arturo Labriola and others.
The Syndicalists lay their chief emphasis upon "direct
action," especially the action of the labor unions. They
regard political action as of very minor importance, not
infrequently adopting the attitude of the Anarchists in
repudiating it altogether as a game of compromise and deceit.
They expect to win by means of a general strike of the
workers rather than as a result of parliamentary action.
Between these two factions stand the Integralists, who con-
form in general to the accepted tactics and theories of Marxian
Socialism.
At the party congress of 1908, an agreement was entered
into between the Reformists and the Integralists and this
received the support of about two-thirds of the entire party
membership. At the same congress the Syndicalists defi-
nitely broke with the other factions and left the party. This
schism, the destruction of the party organizations in Messina
and Reggio by the earthquake of 1908, and a generally
falling off occasioned by the considerable increase of party
dues, led to the decrease of the party membership from
43,000 to 30,000. In the elections of 1909, however, the
party representation in parliament was increased from
twenty-five members to thirty-nine and the vote rose to
338,885.
The movement in Italy is greatly hampered by the illiter-
acy of a large part of the working class, and the fact that
only seven per cent of the population enjoys the right of
suffrage. As a result the movement is largely dominated
by middle class "intellectuals" with relatively few working-
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 285
class leaders. Probably in no other country of the world
has such a large proportion of scientists and literary men
of eminence joined the party. But in Italy as elsewhere
the voting strength comes mainly from the working class.
(6) Great Britain
Introductory: Although England was the first modern
industrial country, and the home of the great Owenite and
Chartist movements, it was relatively late in forming a
distinctively Socialist party. The International had been
organized in England and had exercised a great influence
in bringing the British trade unions together and into closer
touch with the working-class organizations of Continental
Europe. It had been especially helpful in bringing the
unions into the active agitation for the extension of the
suffrage. But the International was too completely domin-
ated by Marx and his associates ever to become recognized
as being other than a foreign movement which the insular
British mind regarded with a good deal of suspicion. When
the end came the International had been completely dis-
credited by its connection in the popular mind with the
Paris Commune, of which such terrible stories were told.
That the International really had very slight connection
with the Commune was not then generally known. For
many years after its decline and fall the unions were left
suspicious of Socialism, and the movement was confined
to a few foreigners, mostly Germans, in London.
Rise of social democracy: After the extension of the
franchise in 1867 it became increasingly evident that the
mere possession of political power did not of itself suffice to
cure the social ills which all deplored, and by 1880 all sec-
tions of radical thought in England were ripe for Socialist
agitation and organization and propaganda. The Irish Land
League had won an immense amount of popular support,
which was increased by the opposition of Mr. Gladstone's
ministry in 1880, the first year of his second term as Prime
Minister. Gladstone's Egyptian policy still further in-
tensified the breach between the radical elements of Great
Britain and the Liberal Party. Then came the influence
286 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
of Henry George, whose book, Progress and Poverty, had an
enormous circulation in all parts of Great Britain and
Ireland. Believers in George's theories formed little local
groups and in many cases went much farther than George
and became thorough-going Socialists.
The time was ripe, therefore, for the formation of a
definite Socialist body when, in March, 1881, the Democratic
Federation was formed. The moving spirit of the new
organization was Mr. Henry M. Hyndman, a graduate of
Trinity College, Cambridge, a brilliant scholar and journal-
ist, and a friend of the great Italian revolutionist, Mazzini.
Since that time Mr. Hyndman has been the acknowledged
leader of Marxian Socialism in England. It is worthy of
note that at the organization meeting of the Democratic
Federation the presiding officer was the man who presided
at the foundation of the old International, Professor E. S.
Beesly. To all the delegates assembled, Mr. Hyndman
presented copies of his little book, England for All, the first
attempt to popularize Marxian theories in English. The
Democratic Federation was from the first essentially a
Socialist body, though the only specifically Socialist proposal
in its program was the "nationalization of the land," which
was placed ninth on the list of specific reforms. This was
not borrowed from Henry George as is commonly supposed.
It had long been one of the proposals of English democratic
leaders and movements. Bronterre O'Brien, greatest of the
Chartist leaders, and the first to call himself a Social Demo-
crat, was a vigorous advocate of land nationalization. The
idea was promulgated long before O'Brien even by Thomas
Spence, as far back as 1775. In 1883 the name of the
organization was changed to Social Democratic Federation,
and a more definitely Socialist program was adopted.
Among the early members of the Federation were William
Morris, the great artist and poet; Herbert Burrows, a well-
known theosophist; E. Belfort Bax, historian and phi-
losopher; Helen Taylor, step-daughter of John Stuart Mill;
Annie Besant, the most famous woman orator in England;
Edward Aveling, a brilliant and versatile scholar, and his
wife, Eleanor, youngest daughter of Karl Marx; Edward
Carpenter, author and educator; John Burns and Tom Mann,
two of the most effective of English trade union leaders.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 287
In December, 1884, Morris, Bax, the Avelings and a
number of others withdrew from the Social Democratic
Federation and founded the Socialist League. The grounds
of the secession were mainly personal, though it developed
into an important difference of viewpoint. Morris and his
followers relied upon educational propaganda mainly and
ignored political action, while the Federation under the
leadership of Mr. Hyndman was from the very first pledged
to the task of developing a Socialist political party. The
Federation organ, Justice, and the League organ, The
Commonweal, indulged in bitter controversies. Quite
naturally, the anti-parliamentary attitude of the Socialist
League attracted the Anarchists to it, and Morris and the
others who had seceded from the Federation soon resigned
from the League. All of them except Morris returned to the
older organization, Morris himself acknowledging that in the
original controversy Mr. Hyndman had been right. While
he did not rejoin the Federation, Morris contributed to its
funds, spoke at its meetings and supported the parliamentary
candidature of Mr. Hyndman.
The growth of the Federation was very slow. It was
regarded with distrust by Frederick Engels and his imme-
diate associates, so that it did not include in its membership
all the avowed Marxists living in England. On the other
hand, it was too Marxian in the theoretical and dogmatic
sense to make a successful appeal to the British working
classes. The Federation did not understand the trade union
movement, notwithstanding the successful work among the
unions of men like Mann and Burns. The Federation tried
to act as the schoolmaster of the unions, and when its policy
was not adopted frequently attacked the union leaders.
In addition to this antagonism of the organized workers the
Federation frequently antagonized the religious elements
among the working class, especially the non-conformists,
through the outspoken attack of some of its leaders upon
Christianity.
The Independent Labor Party: But the vigorous propa-
ganda carried on by the Social Democratic Federation was
not barren of results. It laid the foundations for a new
movement. In January, 1893, a conference was held at
Bradford in fulfillment of an understanding arrived at
288 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
during the Trade Union Congress of the previous autumn.
The moving spirit in the organization of the conference was
Mr. J. Keir Hardie, a Scotch miner and labor leader who
since 1887 had been publishing a labor paper, and had
recently been elected to Parliament. At this conference
the Independent Labor Party was formed. It was from
the first frankly Socialist in aim, although its Socialism
was crude and based upon an instinctive sense of justice
rather than upon a basis of well-reasoned theory. The
new party grew rapidly, attracting many discontented mem-
bers of the Liberal Party, a large number of trade unionists
and a great many men and women members of the non-
conformist religious bodies who had been repelled by the
Federation. Many of its propagandists were lay preachers
in the Methodist and other non-conformist churches, and
they brought to the propaganda of Socialism a religious
fervor and spiritual point of view which proved very effec-
tive. It was quite common at one time for meetings of the
party to be held in churches and opened with singing and
prayer. Frederick Engels gave the new party his blessing
and joined it, though he never took any part in its propa-
ganda. Concerning the labor movement which found its
effective expression in the Independent Labor Party, Engels
wrote in 1892: "It moves now and then with an over-
cautious mistrust of the name of Socialism, while it gradually
absorbs the substance." Engels on various occasions wrote
sneeringly of the sectarianism and dogmatism of the Social
Democratic Federation. In 1895 the Independent Labor
Party participated in the general elections, but fared rather
badly, even Keir Hardie losing his seat at South- West Ham.
The labor representation committee : At the Trade Union
Congress of 1899 a committee was organized for the purpose
of bringing together the trade unions, Socialist organizations
and cooperative societies in a common effort to gain repre-
sentation in Parliament. This action was a natural develop-
ment out of the long-felt need for the unity of the working
class movement, but it was undoubtedly hastened by the
decision of the courts in the famous Taff Vale Railway Case,
which compelled the railway workers' union to pay the Taff
Vale Railway Company about $115,000 damages for the
loss sustained by the company as a result of a strike organ-
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 289
ized by the union. This decision strongly emphasized the
need for united and independent political action.
Except for a few Scottish societies, the cooperative
societies did not take up the new movement with enthusiasm,
but the Independent Labor Party, the Social Democratic
Federation and the Fabian Society joined it, and the trade
unions came in very rapidly. The Social Democratic Federa-
tion soon withdrew when it failed to persuade the committee
to adopt a definitely Socialist program.
The parliamentary election of 1900 was suddenly sprung
upon the country in the midst of the Boer War and the
Labor Representation Committee was not well prepared
either with money or suitable candidates, but the average
labor vote increased from 1,500 to 4,000, and Richard Bell,
leader of the railway workers' union, and Keir Hardie
were elected. The first real test of the strength of this
coalition came in 1906 when the Committee ran fifty can-
didates for Parliament, of whom thirty were elected.
The Labor Party: In 1906 the name of the organization
was changed to the Labor Party. This involved no other
material change, and the Labor Party is, therefore, not so
much a distinct and separate party as a union of various
working class elements for political campaign purposes in
which there are both Socialist and non-Socialist elements.
The Independent Labor Party retains its own autonomous
organization, and its own Socialist platform. While the
Labor Party adopts the nominees of the Independent Labor
Party, it also puts forward candidates who are not by any
means Socialists, some of them being Liberals of the old
school, quite opposed to Socialism. This arrangement makes
it very difficult for the outsider to understand British
Socialism.
One of the chief problems of British Socialism arises out
of this alliance with the trade unions in the Labor Party.
So long as the nominees of the Labor Party are Socialists,
or even men who are regarded as being quite near to Social-
ism, it is comparatively easy to get the rank and file of the
Socialists to support them. When, however, trade union
leaders of the old type, generally Liberals and opposed to
Socialism, are nominated, a great deal of dissatisfaction is
expressed by the Socialist rank and file. The difference has
290 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
frequently manifested itself in Parliament, the Labor Party
men voting differently according to their political persuasion.
This latter fact has done much to weaken confidence in the
permanence of the Labor Party. The Social Democratic
Party — the word Federation was changed to Party in 1907 —
is not affiliated with the Labor Party. Many of its promi-
nent members are affiliated with it, however, through their
respective trade unions, and one of the most prominent
representatives of the Labor Party in the House of Commons,
William Thorne, has for many years been one of the leaders
of the Social Democratic Party. In some cases branches of
the Social Democratic Party have joined the Labor Party.
In the elections of January, 1910, the Labor and Socialist
parties put forward seventy-eight candidates, of whom forty
were elected. In the seventy-eight constituencies in which
candidates were put forward the total Labor and Socialist
vote was 505,690. In the elections of the following December
the number of candidates put forward by the Labor and
Socialist parties was fifty-six, of whom forty-two were
elected. Of these, eight were elected directly by the Inde-
pendent Labor Party, acting alone and without alliance with
the Labor Party. Fifteen other members of the Independent
Labor Party were elected as nominees of the Labor Party.
One member of the Social Democratic Party was elected
by the Labor Party, making a total of twenty-four avowed
Socialists. Four of these belonged also to the Fabian Society.
In local elections the various Socialist bodies and the trades
unions frequently unite. The report of the International
Socialist Bureau to the Copenhagen Congress, in 1910, gave
the number of Socialist representatives upon local governing
bodies at that time as 1,126.
The Fabian Society: An important and peculiar feature
of the Socialist movement in Great Britain is the Fabian
Society, an organization formed in 1884 by a brilliant group
of middle-class men and women for the purpose of permeating
other organizations with Socialist ideas. It was not intended
to be, and never has been, a political party. Many of its
members are Liberals and in the elections of 1910 of the
eight members of the Fabian Society elected to Parliament
four were elected as Liberals. Among the early members of
the society were George Bernard Shaw, then a struggling
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 291
young author, little known outside of a small circle of
radicals; Sidney. Webb, economist and author; Beatrice
Potter, who had been secretary to Herbert Spencer, and who
later became Mrs. Sidney Webb; Mrs. Annie Besant;
Hubert Bland, a radical journalist, and Sidney Olivier, now
Governor of Jamaica.
The society has never tried to attract a large membership.
Its greatest contribution to the Socialist movement has been
in the educational field. The remarkable series of Fabian
Essays, and, later, the Fabian Tracts, have been of immense
service to the movement. The latter may be divided into
three principal groups. The first group consists of small
pamphlets which deal with Socialism in general, popular
expositions from different points of view. The second group
consists of popular studies, written by experts, dealing with
the relation of Socialism to special problems, such as the
liquor problem, poverty and old age, and so on. The third
group consists of popular expositions of the laws as they
relate to special subjects, such as public health, for example,
and statements of what may be done and how it must be
done. These "tracts" are sold by the thousand at a penny
each and have done an immense amount of good in educating
the working class leaders and fitting them to do efficient
service upon public bodies.
The Fabian Society is not a Marxian organization. It
does not accept Marx's theories. Long before the rise of
the Revisionist movement in Germany, the Fabians were
Revisionists, and it is probable that Bernstein, who resided
in London during many years and came into close associa-
tion with the Fabians, was largely influenced by the Fabian
point of view. The most important political work of the
Fabian Society has been in connection with the administra-
tion of the London County Council. In 1910 the Society
for the first time in its history put forward two parlia-
mentary candidates, neither of whom was elected, however.
The movement for Socialist unity: For some years past
there has been a constant agitation for the union of the
Socialist forces of Great Britain, and prominent Socialists
like Walter Crane, the artist, who is a member of the Social
Democratic Party, have done much to promote the move-
ment for Socialist unity. When the Independent Labor
292 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
Party was young and struggling the Social Democratic
Federation regarded it rather contemptuously, meeting all
advances of the Independent Labor Party with the declara-
tion that its attitude toward that body was one of "benev-
olent neutrality." But as the new party grew and developed
self-sufficiency, producing a literature of its own, and drawing
by far the largest number of workers to its ranks, the desire
for union with the older organization was less acutely felt.
At the end of 1911, the Social Democratic Party joined with
several small local Socialist bodies, and a few branches of the
Independent Labor Party, adopting the name, British Social-
ist Party. The new party is little more than the Social
Democratic Party under another name.
(7) The United States
The Utopian period: The free land and the political
democracy of America led to its choice as the field for nearly
all the great Utopian experiments. Altogether over four
hundred such colonies were established in the United States,
most of them in the period from 1825 to 1850. The movement
was essentially exotic, although in Albert Brisbane, America
produced one of the ablest propagandists of Fourierism,
and the New York Tribune under Horace Greeley gave a
great deal of support to the movement. The famous Brook
Farm experiment, notwithstanding the support of such
intellectual celebrities as Emerson, Ripley, Hawthorne, the
Channings, Thoreau and Margaret Fuller, was without any
great social significance. The movement as a whole was
never in any sense a political movement. Many of the
members of the Fourierist phalanxes belonged to the Free
Soil Party, and three of the members of the Wisconsin
phalanx represented that party in the State Senate, but
there was no affiliation of the movement as such to any
political party.
The Utopian movement inevitably had an effect upon the
later Socialist movement. In the first place, many of those
who came into the movement in the late sixties and early
seventies of the last century had been connected more or
less directly with the various Utopian experiments, and
brought some of their Utopianism into the new movement.
Far more important than this fact, however, was the fact
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 293
that the Utopian experiments had been so universally-
regarded as examples of Socialism in practice that it took
an unusually long time to make the American people regard
it as a political movement having nothing in common with
Communism in general and sex-communism in particular.
Fostered by Bellamy's Looking Backward, Utopian ideas
were uppermost in the minds of many American Socialists
as lately as 1897, when the newly organized "Social Democ-
racy of America" seriously contemplated the colonization
of one of the Western States, and the establishment there
of a cooperative commonwealth.
The German period: The reasons which led to the selec-
t on of the United States as the country in which to make
the greatest experiments with Fourierism, Owenism and
similar Utopian movements operated to bring hither many
of the European revolutionists who, finding it necessary to
leave Europe, found the democratic institutions of America
and the inducement of very cheap land attractive. Thus
the newer Socialism appeared in the United States almost
as early as in Europe itself. Weitling, whom we have con-
sidered as linking the Utopian and Marxian movements,
came to the United States in 1846 and started the Volks-
tribun, a weekly newspaper for the advocacy of Socialism.
The revolutionary agitation in Europe soon called him back,
however, and he participated in the uprisings of 1848,
returning almost immediately to the United States. In 1850
he established another paper, Die Republik der Arbeiter,
and in October of the same year organized a national con-
vention, which met at Philadelphia. Forty-two organiza-
tions of German workingmen were represented at the con-
vention, their aggregate membership being about 4,400.
Many of these members were exiles who had fled from
Germany after the failure of the Revolution of 1848. The
subjects discussed at the convention included labor exchange
banks, political party organization, education, propaganda,
and the general subject of communist colonies, a program
which reflects the curious mixture of old and new ideas then
prevailing.
For the next twenty-five years Socialist discussion was
confined almost entirely to German immigrants. The
German athletic associations, the Turnvereine, were always
294 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
centres of Socialist activity, and the German trade unions
generally favored Socialism and independent working class
action. In 1868 the Social Party of New York and Vicinity
conducted a campaign upon a platform resembling that of
the International in many respects, and polled a very insig-
nificant vote. The more active and aggressive members of
this party formed, immediately after the election, the
General German Workingmen's Association, which in Feb-
ruary, 1869, became a section of the International, known
as Section One of New York. Other sections were rapidly
organized, and by 1872 Marx realized that his main strength
was not in Europe, but in North America, hence the decision
to remove the headquarters of the International to New York.
The Socialist Labor Party: Following the crisis of 1873,
and the consequent business depression, small Socialist
parties were formed in New York, Chicago, and Cincinnati,
chiefly among German workingmen, and in 1876, one week
after the disbanding of the International, representatives of
these parties met in Philadelphia and organized the Working-
men's Party of the United States, with a Marxist program.
In 1877 the party name was changed to Socialist Labor
Party of North America.
The movement was still a transplanted German party.
Its members were not familiar with American conditions.
Consequently, the party failed to gain a foothold in the
American trade unions or to attract any permanent American
followers in its political campaigns. The American mind
did not readily grasp the abstract theoretical points which
the Germans were fond of discussing, and the Germans
neither understood nor cared about the special political
problems which were uppermost in the American mind.
The radical elements in the United States were too much
absorbed in the Greenback, Single Tax and Populist move-
ments to listen to discussions of surplus-value and the
materialistic conception of history.
In 1880, after the Greenback Party had come into closer
touch with the labor movement, the Socialist Labor Party
decided to support the Greenback candidates. Immediately
after the presidential election the alliance was dissolved,
the Socialists being profoundly dissatisfied with the tactics
of their Greenback allies. The only other alliance with non-
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 295
Socialists ever made by the Socialist Labor Party, if we
except a few isolated local instances, was in 1886 when the
party joined with the United Labor Party in the nomina-
tion of Henry George for mayor of New York.
Conflict with the Anarchists : The energies of the Socialist
Labor Party for the first ten years of its existence were
largely devoted to a struggle with the growing Anarchist
movement, which was likewise transplanted from Europe.
The Anarchists found a leader in John Most, an expelled
member of the German Social Democracy, who came to
the United States in 1882 after serving sixteen months in
an English prison. Most started a vigorous Anarchist cam-
paign, and found it easy to persuade many of the discouraged
German workingmen that political action was hopeless in
America. He made many converts among the Socialists
and two of the party papers went over to the Anarchists.
The party was so weakened that all except two of the party
papers were forced to suspend publication. By 1884, how-
ever, the party had begun to recover its lost strength and in
the next two years doubled the number of its local organiza-
tions. Then came the riot in Chicago and the execution of
the Anarchist leaders, an event which Socialists in common
with many non-Socialists have always regarded as judicial
murder. Anarchism in the United States never recovered
from that catastrophe, and the field was thereafter relatively
free for Socialist propaganda and growth. In 1892 the
Socialist Labor Party nominated Simon Wing for president
of the United States and Charles H. Matchett for vice-
president, the ticket polling 21,512 votes in six States. In
1896 the vote increased to 36,275, and in the Congressional
elections of 1898 the Socialist Labor Party reached its
maximum voting strength with 82,204 votes.
The Socialist Labor Party and the trade unions : Beginning
in 1881 the Socialists for several years made desperate efforts
to obtain control of the Knights of Labor, but without
success. When the American Federation of Labor was
formed in 1886 the capture of that organization was similarly
attempted. The theory of the Socialist Labor Party was
that the trade union represented a less developed form of
class consciousness than the political organization. That
the workers were organized into unions was a good thing,
296 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
a sign that they were in some degree class conscious, but
they needed to be taught the necessary shortcomings of
trade unionism, the insufficiency of their aims, and the
superiority of the Socialist method of political action. They
attempted to get the unions to endorse the candidates of
the Socialist Labor Party and even to make acceptance of
Socialist principles a condition of membership. Naturally,
the leaders of the unions, who were aiming to unite all
workers, regardless of party or creed, vigorously opposed
these attempts, with the result that bitter hostility developed
between the two wings of the working class movement.
Matters reached a climax when, in 1896, under the leader-
ship of Daniel De Leon, the Socialist Labor Party started a
rival organization to the American Federation of Labor,
called the Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance. This body
by its bitter opposition to the trade union movement made
it practically impossible for a responsible union member
to become a Socialist, and developed in the minds of the
active trade unionists a contempt for Socialism which has
not yet wholly disappeared. After a brief existence, during
which time it demonstrated the folly of attempting to base
trade unionism upon political beliefs and affiliations, the
Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance died.
The majority of the members of the Socialist Labor Party
was never in favor of these tactics. Those who opposed
them, however, were suppressed and expelled. Whole sec-
tions were either suspended for long periods or expelled by
a highly centralized executive. Lucien Sanial aptly char-
acterized this period as "a burlesque Reign of Terror."
Many of the foremost leaders in the Socialist Party of to-day
were expelled from the Socialist Labor Party for opposing
its policy toward the unions — some of them being ex-
pelled after they had voluntarily resigned in despair or
disgust.
Then came revolt. In New York the opposition to De
Leon grew and he and his supporters were ousted from office
and their successors elected. But De Leon and his associates
refused to submit to the majority and a split occurred.
There were now two parties, each claiming to be the Socialist
Labor Party, each having an official organ called The People,
and each spending most of its time denouncing the other.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 297
Never at any time has the Socialist movement been dragged
so low as it was in the United States during this period.
Formation of the Socialist Party : In the meantime a new
movement had started in the West. It was at first inclined
toward Utopianism and the colonization of some Western
States was seriously advocated. In 1898 a large part of the
membership abandoned this idea and, under the leadership
of Eugene V. Debs and Victor L. Berger, organized the Social
Democratic Party of America. The party grew rapidly
and in 1899 elected two members to the Massachusetts
Legislature, the mayors of Haverhill and Brockton in that
State, and a number of local officials in Wisconsin.
Both the factions which claimed to be the Socialist Labor
Party nominated candidates at the presidential election in
1900, but the anti-De Leon faction at once made overtures
to the Social Democratic Party, looking to the union of the
two bodies. A joint committee decided upon terms of union
and the nomination of Eugene V. Debs of the Social Demo-
cratic Party for president and Job Harriman of the Socialist
Labor Party for vice-president. This agreement was rejected
by the members of the former party by a narrow margin,
and an embarrassing situation was the result. However, a
temporary agreement was made and both bodies supported
the candidature of Debs and Harriman, the De Leon wing
of the Socialist Labor Party nominating Joseph F. Malloney
and Val. Remmel. The vote for Debs and Harriman was
97,730, more than the Socialist Labor Party had ever polled.
The vote of the Socialist Labor Party fell to 39,739. In 1901
the elements which had united in nominating Debs and
Harriman held a unity convention and established the
present Socialist Party.
Recent developments: The Socialist party more than
doubled its membership in the first three years of its existence,
and in 1904 it polled 402,321 votes. The vote was undoubt-
edly much larger than the real voting strength of the party,
a great many Democratic voters having voted the Socialist
ticket merely as a protest against the selection of a con-
servative candidate by their own party. The membership
of the party again more than doubled from 1904 to 1908,
and the party vote of 424,483 in the latter year was a more
reliable measure of its dependable voting strength. The
298 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
vote of the Socialist Labor Party in the same year fell to
13,825. In 1910 the Socialist Party elected thirty mayors,
the most important of these being the mayor of Milwaukee,
in which city the Socialists elected a majority of the city
council. The vote in the Congressional elections rose to
604,756 and Victor L. Berger was elected to the House of
Representatives, being the first Socialist to enter Congress.
The party also succeeded in electing twelve representatives
and two senators to the Wisconsin State Legislature, and
one representative each in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania,
Minnesota and North Dakota. The party membership
increased from 41,000 in 1908 to 110,000 at the end of 1911,
a gain which is in many respects more significant than the
increased vote.1
Party organization: The unit of organization in the Social-
ist Party is the "Local," composed of five or more dues-
paying members. Once a local has been formed membership
in the party is obtained only by vote of its members and the
applicant must sign a pledge declaring acceptance of the
party's program and principles and the fact that the appli-
cant has severed all connections with other political parties.
The locals are united into State organizations, which are in
turn united into a national organization. The affairs of the
national party are administered by a national committee,
composed of State representatives elected by the members
in the various states, and a national executive committee.
All the acts of these committees are subject to party refer-
endum upon the demand of a small percentage of the
members.
The financial support of the party is derived from the
monthly "dues" of its members, supplemented by voluntary
contributions. The monthly membership fee differs in
various parts of the country, but twenty-five cents per
month is the usual fee. This is automatically divided among
the national, state, and local organizations by means of a
system of dues stamps. These are issued by the national
executive committee and sold to the state committees, the
amount so derived maintaining the national organization.
'In the local elections of November, 1911, a number of Socialist
mayors were elected and Socialist representatives chosen in New York
and Rhode Island.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 299
The stamps are then sold by the state committees to the
local organizations at a profit, and by the local organiza-
tions to the members are a further profit. The national
state and local organizations are thus each assured of
financial support.
The Socialist Party and the trade unions: As we have
seen, before the rise of the present Socialist Party the trade
union movement had been largely alienated from the Social-
ist movement as a result of the tactics adopted by the Social-
ist Labor Party. The attitude of the Socialist Party toward
the unions was clearly defined by the national convention
of the party in 1908, and again in 1910 at the special con-
gress of the party:
"The Socialist Party does not seek to dictate to organized
labor in matters of internal organization and union policy.
It recognizes the necessary autonomy of the union movement
on the economic field, as it insists on maintaining its own
autonomy on the political field. It is confident that in the
school of experience organized labor will as rapidly as
possible develop the most effective forms of organization
and methods of action. ... It finds reason to hope for
closer solidarity on the economic field and for more effective
cooperation between organized labor and the Socialist Party,
the two wings of the movement for working class eman-
cipation."1
The adoption of this policy, and the consequent abandon-
ment of attempts to "capture" the American Federation of
Labor, have resulted in bringing about a much better under-
standing between the party and the trade unions. But the
Socialist Party in the United States, like most of the Euro-
pean parties, has its right and left wings, its "Revolutionists"
on the one hand and its "Opportunists" on the other. The
former element tends toward Syndicalism, and to the advo-
cacy of the general strike as a better method of class warfare
than political action. The conflict between these two
elements of the party is largely centred upon the question
of the relation of the party to the trade unions. The domi-
nant majority, following the tactics of Marx and the
German Social Democrats, seeks to obtain the friendship
1 Proceedings National Convention Socialist Party, 1908, p. 95; Pro-
ceedings National Congress, 1910, pp. 277-289.
300 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and cooperation of the American Federation of Labor and
its affiliated unions. The "revolutionary minority," on the
other hand, refuses to recognize the trade unions as forming
an equal part of the general movement of the working class,
the "other arm" of the fighting proletariat, and demands
that the party shall do its best to force the unions to give
up their present policies and change their form of organiza-
tion. The outcome of this controversy cannot at this time
be predicted.
The movement among women: The Socialist Party has
always admitted women to membership upon equal terms
with men, and many women hold prominent positions in the
party. At the convention of 1908 a National Women's
Committee was established by the party to take charge of
the special propaganda work among women.
Press, literature and education: The party press is not
owned directly by the party, as in Germany and some other
countries. The fear of placing too much power in the hands
of an official body has operated thus far to cause the defeat
of all propositions looking to the establishment of party-
owned papers. There are about two hundred Socialist
papers and magazines, a majority of them owned by cooper-
ative associations of Socialist party members, a few by State
and local organizations, the others by individuals.
The literature of the movement has shown an enormous
improvement during the ten years of the party's existence,
and in extent and importance takes rank with the literature
of almost any other country with the exception of Germany.
The works of American Socialist writers are translated into
other languages and widely read.
The party carries on an almost incredible amount of
educational work by means of travelling lecturers and the
distribution of millions of pamphlets and books each year.
"Study Courses" are furnished to the local organizations
and in this way thousands of members are induced to make
a systematic study of Socialist theory.
Allied Socialist organizations : Closely allied to the So-
cialist Party, though not directly affiliated with it, are the
Young People's Socialist Leagues and the Socialist Sunday-
schools. The former are organizations of young people
between the ages of fifteen and twenty. They combine
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 301
recreation and social features with the study of Socialism
by means of debates, lectures and reading. In general they
are patterned after the German organizations of young people
and are favored by the party. On the other hand, the Sunday-
schools, for young children, are regarded with some sus-
picion. As Mr. Hillquit said at the 1910 Congress, "The
mind of the child is too sacred to be made the object of
rough experiments, and Socialist Sunday-schools conducted
with insufficient skill or method often do more harm than
good."1 The Sunday-schools are generally carried on by
individuals or local committees. The party as a whole has
never approved them.
Among the larger schools conducted in the interest of the
Socialist movement, the Rand School of Social Science in
New York City is the most efficient and the most important.
The Intercollegiate Socialist Society is a society for the
promotion of an intelligent study of Socialism. It is not,
therefore, committed to the advocacy of Socialism. Promi-
nent non-Socialists have always been closely identified with
it. At the end of 1911 the society had "study chapters" in
thirty-eight American colleges and universities.
(8) Russia
Difficulties: The Socialist movement in Russia is carried
on under difficulties such as the Socialists of no other country
have had to face. The heroism of the men and women who
have built up a great movement under the cruellest despot-
ism of modern times has been rarely equalled and never
surpassed. From the general restrictions forbidding meet-
ings and the circulation of Socialist literature to the summary
execution and arbitrary imprisonment or exile of active
participants in the movement, every device that tyranny
could invent has been used to check and crush the Socialist
movement.
Beginning of the movement : The first approach to modern
Socialist thought appears in connection with the agitation
for the emancipation of the serfs, especially in the writings
of Alexander Herzen and Nicholas Chernyschefsky. Herzen
1 Proceedings National Congress, 1910, p. 68.
302 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
was an expatriated nobleman of wealth who published in
London a magazine called Kolokol (Bell). He died in Geneva
in 1869. Chernyschefsky was the editor of an influential
magazine who spent many years in Siberian exile and re-
turned to Russia an old man, physically and mentally
wrecked. From 1860 to 1870 Nihilism flourished in Russia.
The word "Nihilism" was first used by a famous Russian
novelist to ridicule the new school of thought with its crude
materialism and negation of all established beliefs. Nihilism
served the Socialist movement in one important respect.
It was wholly an intellectual force, and was not at all con-
nected with the Socialist movement, but it caused a great
many of the younger men and women of Russia to call the
existing order into question and fostered a thirst for positive
knowledge.
This longing for positive knowledge sent a large number
of students of both sexes forth to Switzerland and other
countries to study in the great universities. There they fell
under the influence of the teaching of such men as Herzen,
Bakunin and Peter Lavroff — the latter a disciple of Marx.
The government became alarmed at the prospect of having
its young men and women made Socialists, and in 1873
ordered all the students to return at once to Russia under
pain of exile. Many of the students refused to obey the
order, but most of them did, and in a little while the Russian
government found that it had to contend with a large num-
ber of active Socialist propagandists. During the five years,
1873-78, these propagandists were busy carrying on the
twofold work of general education and Socialist propaganda,
especially among the peasants. The government answered
with relentless persecution, and the Socialist propagandists
were executed, imprisoned or exiled to Siberia, frequently
without trial. By 1878 the young movement was checked
and its propaganda was abandoned.
The rise of terrorism : In that year General Trepoff, the
military commandant of St. Petersburg, who had been par-
ticularly brutal and inhuman, was shot by a young woman,
Vera Sassulich, as an act of revenge for his brutal treatment
of a political prisoner. Arrested and tried by jury for the
offense, the young woman was acquitted. Encouraged by
this outcome of the trial, and forbidden to use the methods
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 303
of peaceful propaganda, the more daring of the Socialists
decided to copy the example of Vera Sassulich and institute
a reign of terrorism. A small handful of idealists, they
dared challenge the power of Russian autocracy with all
its police and soldiers. For three years they carried on a
most remarkable movement of terrorism, culminating in the
assassination of Alexander II, in March, 1881, by Sophia
Perovskaia and her associates. This brought the first pe-
riod of terrorism to an end. The revolutionists had hoped
that the killing of the Czar would be the signal for a general
uprising, but they were disappointed. Russia was not ready
for such an uprising, and within a short time the revolution-
ary organization was dead.
Social democracy and organized labor: In the early
nineties, as a natural result of economic development, labor
unions appeared in the growing industrial centres. This new
movement of organized labor fulfilled in a measure the hopes
of a small group of men and women, Marxian Socialists, who
had declared during the terroristic period that the Socialist
movement would never become a real force until the eco-
nomic development of the country made the organization
of labor unions necessary. Meantime, they carried on the
work of laying the foundations for a political party. When
the labor unions appeared in considerable numbers an
impetus was given to this political movement, and the Social
Democratic Party soon had local committees in many
Russian cities, and the movement was further strengthened
by the organization of Jewish, Polish, Lettish and Armenian
Social Democrats. By the year 1900 the Social Democratic
Party, despite the fact that it was compelled to work in
secret, and was ruthlessly persecuted, had developed con-
siderable power. It was this party which led the revolu-
tionary outbreak at the end of 1905.
Revival of terrorism: But the revival of the Socialist
movement brought with it the revival of terrorism on the
part of some of the revolutionists. Various groups of revolu-
tionists who relied upon terrorism as the most effective weapon
with which to meet the cruel and repressive autocracy
appeared in various parts of the country, and in 1901 united
into the party of Socialist Revolutionists. It is this party
which has carried on the campaign of terrorism in recent
304 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
years, and most of the political assassinations are attributed
to it.
Strength of the movement: It is impossible to measure
the strength or the growth of Socialism in Russia, owing to
the fact that only secret methods of agitation and organiza-
tion are possible. The various Socialist parties have par-
ticipated in all the Duma elections since the promulgation
of the Constitution of 1905. To the First Duma, in 1906,
several members of the Social Democratic Party and the
Socialist Revolutionists were elected, despite the fact that
the two parties had officially declared a boycott of the
election and urged their members not to participate in it.
Including with these the peasant Socialists and the labor
union representatives there were over one hundred members
in the labor group of the First Duma.
In the Second Duma elections, in 1907, the Socialist
parties decided to participate, in spite of the bitter persecu-
tion which had been directed by the government against the
working class members of the first Duma. Of the 440
members of the Second Duma no less than 132 were elected
by the Socialists. Practically all of these representatives
of the Socialist movement were later imprisoned or exiled.
This Duma, like the first, lasted only a short time, when it
was dissolved by the authorities.
A new and glaringly undemocratic constitution was
promulgated for the Third Duma. The electorate was
divided into five curiae, giving one representative to every
230 of the landed nobility, one for every 1,000 of the greater
capitalists, one for every 15,000 of the smaller capitalists
and tradesmen, one for every 60,000 of the peasant class,
and one for every 125,000 of the artisan class. Furthermore,
in the case of the peasants and artisans the elections were
made indirect. The Socialist Revolutionists under the cir-
cumstances not only declined to participate in the elections,
but waged a bitter campaign against them. The Social
Democrats, on the other hand, decided to participate in the
elections, despite everything. They elected nineteen mem-
bers out of a total of 427.
These figures are only available as indicating the tre-
mendous spread of Socialist ideas in Russia: they afford no
real measure of the strength of the movement. The bulk
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 305
of the propaganda of Socialism has to be carried on by
literary agencies, and the publication or distribution of
Socialist literature of any kind being a crime in Russia, this
work involves terrible peril to those who engage in it. We
get some idea of the strength of the movement when we
consider that from 1905 to 1910 tens of thousands of Social-
ists were either imprisoned, exiled to Siberia, executed, or
compelled to flee from the country to escape from these.
Another indication of the immense strength of Russian
Socialism is the fact that in 1909 the Central Committee
of the Socialist Revolutionists alone spent $40,000 upon the
distribution of more than two million Socialist leaflets,
pamphlets and books, and that its total income was almost
$85,000.
(9) Finland
Political conditions: Finland was ceded to Russia by
Sweden in 1809, and was granted a relatively liberal constitu-
tion which gave the Finns complete autonomy in all local
affairs. During the greater part of the nineteenth century,
therefore, Finland was practically an independent State with
the Czar of Russia as its Grand Duke. Beginning with the
year 1894, under the administration of the notorious Gover-
nor-general Bobrikoff, Russia inaugurated a policy of Rus-
sianizing Finland. In 1898, in violation of his oath, the
Czar issued a decree asserting the power of the Imperial
Government over many of the internal affairs of Finland,
particularly over military affairs. The Finnish people have
resisted every attempt to destroy their liberties, and in 1901
completely frustrated the attempt of the Russian govern-
ment to destroy their militia system and establish Russian
military law.
Rise of the Socialist movement: There was no organized
Socialist movement in Finland until after the decree of 1898.
In the next year after that event a Labor Party was organ-
ized, which in 1903 changed its name to Social Democratic
Party. The new party carried on a tremendous agitation for
the extension of the suffrage and other measures of demo-
cratic reform, and in 1905, mainly as a result of that agita-
tion, a new act was passed granting full and equal suffrage
306 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
to all adult persons over twenty-four years of age, regardless
of sex, with proportional representation. This makes the
constitution of Finland the most democratic of any country
in the world.
In the elections of 1907, the first in which the Social
Democratic Party participated, the party vote was 329,946,
being 36.7 per cent of the total number of votes cast. The
number of Socialists elected was eighty out of a total of two
hundred. The Diet was dissolved by the Russian Governor-
general in 1908, in 1909, and again in 1910, and each time
the Socialists polled a larger percentage of the votes and
elected a larger proportion of the members of the Diet.
In 1910, when the present Diet was elected, the Socialists
polled forty per cent of the total vote and elected eighty-six
members, of whom ten were women.
The decree of 1909: Backed up by a subservient Duma,
the Czar issued a new decree in 1909, practically abolishing
the Finnish constitution, providing for the representation of
Finland in the Russian Duma, and reducing the Finnish
Diet to the status of a Provincial Assembly. The Finns
have with remarkable courage and heroism refused thus far
to recognize the decree or submit to it in any manner.
In addition to the parliamentary strength already noted,
the Socialists had 351 representatives in various municipal
councils in 1910. The movement in Finland is essentially
Marxian, its program being very similar to that of the
Austrian movement. The party membership in 1908 was
71,266. The party has a very powerful press and enjoys
the full confidence of the trade unions. Upon the whole, it
may be said that, in proportion to its population, Finland
has the largest and strongest of the national Socialist parties.
(10) The Scandinavian Countries
Sweden: The Swedish Social Democratic Party was
founded in 1889. For fifteen years the party devoted itself
almost entirely to agitation in behalf of universal suffrage.
The characteristic method of the Swedish Socialists has been
the general strike. In 1897 the party elected its first repre-
sentative to the Riksdag, and in 1905, after the granting of
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 307
a partial electoral reform, which did not change the class
character of the Senate, the Socialists elected thirteen mem-
bers to the Riksdag, as against four in the preceding elec-
tion. In 1909, after a further extension of the franchise,
the party polled 75,000 votes, or twenty-four per cent of
the total vote cast, and elected thirty-six members out of
a total of 165. The long and disastrous general strike of 1909
greatly weakened the party by reducing its membership and
its financial strength, but it is now rapidly improving. In
the elections of 1911 the party polled 170,299 votes and
elected 64 members to the Riksdag.
Norway : The first entrance of representatives of the Social-
ist movement into the Storthing, the Norwegian Parlia-
ment, was in 1903, when the Social Democratic Party elected
four members, including Dr. Erickson, a Lutheran clergy-
man, and Professor Berge, the only Roman Catholic in the
Parliament. The total vote cast for the candidates of the
party was about thirty thousand. The Social Democratic
Party was founded as the Labor Party in 1889.
After the separation of Norway from Sweden, the Social-
ists worked hard for a republic, but were defeated. In 1906
the Socialist vote was increased by fifty per cent and ten
members were elected to the Storthing. In 1909 the party
polled 90,500 votes out of a total of 345,000 and elected
eleven members to the Storthing out of a total of 123. The
Social Democrats had in 1910 no less than 873 representatives
in municipal councils. The party in Norway has had the
advantage of working under a very democratic constitution.
There is universal manhood suffrage above the age of
twenty-five years, and partial woman suffrage. The Social-
ist press of Norway is very influential.
Denmark: The Socialist movement in Denmark began
with the old International, and the party newspaper, the
Social Demokraten, dates from 1871, and is one of the oldest
Socialist papers now in existence. It has a circulation of
56,000. The present Social Democratic Party was estab-
lished in 1878. In 1889 it elected its first representative
to the Folkething. The party has taken an active part in
the agrarian struggles of Denmark, and has the support of
the peasant farmers and agricultural laborers.
In 1906 the party polled 77,000 votes and elected twenty-
308 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
four members to the People's Chamber — the Folkething —
and four to the Senate. In 1910 the Socialist vote was 98,721,
but the representation in both chambers of Parliament
remained the same. There are 114 members in the lower
house, all chosen by direct suffrage, and 66 in the upper
house, of whom only twenty-seven are chosen by the general
voters. The Social Democratic Party has (1911) more than
1,000 municipal and local councillors. The Danish Social
Democratic Party has the record of having polled a con-
tinuous and almost uniform increase of votes at every tri-
ennial election since 1878.
(11) Holland
Domela Nieuwenhuis : The Socialist movement in Holland
first arose in 1878, under the leadership of Domela Nieu-
wenhuis, the eloquent Lutheran minister who left his
pastorate to preach Socialism. The movement suffered the
bitterest persecution, but in 1888 Nieuwenhuis was elected
to Parliament. There his failure to make headway against
the older parties led him to despair of parliamentary action,
and in 1893 he renounced Socialism and declared himself
to be an Anarchist-Communist. The present Social Demo-
cratic Labor Party was founded in 1894 by twelve of the
most prominent Socialists in Holland, who were at once
dubbed "the Twelve Apostles" by their opponents. Among
these twelve were Pieter J. Troelstra, a lawyer, who is still
the political leader of the party, and Henry Van Kol, a civil
engineer, who is the ablest of the party's writers and speakers.
In 1897 four Socialists were elected to Parliament, and in
1901 this was increased to seven, at which number it has
stood ever since, despite the fact that the popular vote cast
for the party increased from 38,297 in 1901 to 82,494 in 1909.
The secession of Nieuwenhuis and his followers proved to
be only the beginning of a long conflict between the Social-
ists and the Anarchists. The trade union movement has long
been largely under the influence of the Anarchists, and is
opposed to parliamentary action. This has prevented any
general support of the party by the organized working
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 309
Internal dissensions: In 1905 a new source of difficulty
appeared. The reactionary clerical ministry under Dr.
Kuyper, who had suppressed the railway strike of 1903 with
unnecessary brutality, was defeated by a narrow margin,
and the seven Socialist members of the Chamber found them-
selves holding the balance of power between the new coali-
tion ministry and the deposed reactionaries, as neither of the
other groups held a parliamentary majority. Having to
make a choice between the two, the Socialists voted with the
government and sustained it. This act was bitterly con-
demned by the extreme radicals in the party as an abandon-
ment of the principle of the class struggle. As a result
there was a serious controversy which culminated in the
withdrawal of the dissatisfied elements in 1908 and the
formation of a new party, the Social Democratic Party.
Its vote in the elections of 1909 was 1,888.
(12) SWITZEBLAND
Switzerland with its democratic constitution and tradi-
tions has from the first days of the movement been a centre
of Socialist activity, especially on the part of French,
German and Russian exiles gathered at Geneva and Zurich.
The industrial development of the country, however, has
been slow and the political Socialist movement was late in
starting. Until the formation of the Social Democratic
Party in 1888, Socialist agitation had been carried on through
the radical workingmen's societies, of which the Grutliverein
was the most important. This society was started in 1838,
and until recent years practically dominated the working
class movement.
In 1901 a union was effected between the Grutliverein, the
trade unions and the Social Democratic Party. This union
has not been entirely satisfactory. It contains many non-
Socialist elements, whose influence has tended to modify
the Socialist policy. Recently, however, a very considerable
number of the non-Socialists have withdrawn. At the
general election of 1908 the party increased its vote from
70,000 to 100,000 and elected seven members to the Federal
Council.
310 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
(13) Spain
Spain is the most backward country of Western Europe.
It has never been highly developed industrially. Two-thirds
of its people are illiterate and still suffer from the domination
of a political church. In consequence, the Socialist movement
in Spain is very weak. The abuses of autocratic government
have developed one of the strongest Anarchist movements in
Europe.
The present Socialist Labor Party was organized in 1888
through the efforts of Pablo Iglesias, an able journalist and
agitator, and made steady progress until the war with the
United States in 1898. In the industrial crises which fol-
lowed the war the Socialist Labor Party and the trade unions
suffered great losses in membership. The movement revived
again after about six years, since which time it has made
very steady gains. Following the uprisings in Barcelona
in 1909, and the subsequent execution of Francisco Ferrer,
the Socialists entered into an alliance with the Republi-
cans to destroy the reactionary clerical ministry. This was
accomplished, and with the assistance of the Republicans,
Iglesias was elected to the Cortes in May, 1910, as the first
Socialist representative. A number of the Republican
representatives are also Socialists, though not nominated
by the Socialist Labor Party or regarded as representing it.
(14) Poland
Since the final dismemberment of Poland in 1794 the Polish
people have lived under what have been for them three
foreign despotisms, Russia, Prussia and Austria. Each of
these powerful nations has attempted to crush out the Polish
national spirit by force, but persecution has in fact united
the Polish people in spirit even more than they were ever
united under their own kings. Consequently the Polish
Socialist movement struggles not only for political and
economic independence, but for national independence also.
As one of their leaders has said: "The social, the political
and the national revolution are for us one and indivisible"'
1 B. A. Jedrzejowski in The Comrade, Dec, 1902.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 311
The Socialist movement is very strong in Poland, but as
in Russian Poland, which is most populous and in which
the movement is strongest, the whole party organization and
party activity is illegal, it is impossible to give a numerical
estimate of the strength of the Polish Socialist Party.
The Socialists in Galicia (Austrian Poland) have elected
six members to the Austrian Reichsrat and are represented
in the municipal councils of both Krakow and Lemberg.
Aside from the political propaganda, the Galician Socialists
initiated the university extension movement in their coun-
try, and have undertaken much of the general educational
work which is done in other countries by the government
itself.
The Polish Socialists in Germany have been subjected
to more severe persecution than other Socialists in that
country, because of the national and language complica-
tions. They have, however, built up a strong organization
and constitute an important factor in the movement.
(15) Hungary
The Socialist movement in Hungary dates from 1867, when
an association of workingmen was formed on the lines laid
down by Lassalle. Its members were hunted down as crim-
inals, exiled, shot or imprisoned, and it was not until 1890
that the movement became established. Political party
organization has always been illegal and the movement has
therefore been mainly carried on in the trade unions which
are given a legal standing. The membership in these unions
has increased rapidly and reached 130,120 in 1907, when an
industrial crisis and increased government and capitalist
persecution reduced the membership to 85,266 in 1909.
About 300 unions with a membership of about 20,000 are
in reality Socialist Party locals under the legal form of unions.
The political work of the party has been mainly directed
toward the attainment of the franchise for the working class.
It has been impossible to contest parliamentary elections,
and only in the municipalities, where the franchise is some-
what less restricted, were any Socialists elected to office
before 1910. The report of the Socialist Democratic Party
312 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
to the Congress at Copenhagen in that year showed ninety-
six representatives in fifteen communal councils.
(16) Other Countries
In nearly every country of the world we find at least the
beginnings of a Socialist movement. Under the new Repub-
lican regime in Portugal one Socialist has been elected to
parliament. In Greece ten Socialists were elected to the
National Assembly in 1910. Bulgaria and Servia both have
Socialist parties affiliated with the International Socialist
Bureau, and in the new Parliament of Turkey there are six
Socialists, five of whom are Armenians, the other being a
Bulgarian. Persia and China have been touched by the
Socialist movement, and in Japan a relatively strong Social-
ist movement has developed under the leadership of Sen
Katayama, despite bitter persecution. Katayama reported
to the International Congress in 1907 that there were 30,000
conscious Socialists in Japan. The governmental repression
was so severe in 1910 that the Japanese Socialist Party was
unable to send a representative to the Copenhagen Congress.
In South Africa and Australia there are organized Socialist
movements, but much of the strength which would otherwise
have gone to them has been absorbed by the Labor parties
in those countries. The Australian Labor Party now has a
clear majority in both houses of parliament. This makes
the work of the Australian Socialists very difficult. In con-
formity with a well-known rule, where a non-Socialist labor
party is strong the organized Socialist movement is extremely
narrow and dogmatic. In Canada the Socialist movement
is still relatively weak, except in British Columbia, where
three Socialists were elected to the Provincial Legislature in
1907. Several of the Spanish- American countries have small
Socialist parties, and in Chili and Argentina the Socialists
have gained parliamentary representation.
THE NATIONAL SOCIALIST MOVEMENTS 313
SUMMARY
1. The German Social Democracy was the earliest in origin and is
numerically the strongest of all the national Socialist parties. Its
program is Marxian, and it has always worked in harmony with the
trade unions.
2. The French Socialist Party is strong and its leaders are brilliant,
but it has suffered from internal dissensions, and from anarchism and
semi-anarchism both within and without the party.
3. The Austrian Social Democracy has the largest parliamentary
representation of any Socialist Party. It has won its fight for equal
manhood suffrage. Its greatest obstacle lies in the national dissen-
sions within the Austrian Empire.
4. The Belgian Labor Party is relatively one of the strongest of
Socialist groups. The distinctive feature of the Belgian movement is
the high development of productive and distributive cooperation.
5. The Italian Socialist Party is characterized by middle-class leader-
ship. The movement in Italy has been divided into three groups;
the "Reformists," the anti-parliamentarian "Syndicalists," and the
Marxian "Integralists."
6. The British Socialist movement is represented by the rather
narrowly Marxian, Social Democratic Party, and by the Independent
Labor Party, which is allied for political campaign purposes with the
non-Socialist Labor Party.
7. The American Socialist movement is represented by the Socialist
Labor Party and the Socialist Party. The latter party from its organi-
zation in 1900 has grown very rapidly. Its program is Marxian.
8. Socialism in Russia is outlawed, and effective political action is
impossible. The Russian Social Democratic Party tries to prepare the
way for revolution by secret organization, while the Socialist Revolu-
tionary Party prefers terrorist tactics.
9. In proportion to population Finland has the strongest of all
Socialist parties. The Finnish party has won universal suffrage re-
gardless of sex, and it leads the struggle against Russian aggression.
10. Of the other countries Socialism is strongest in Norway, Sweden,
Denmark, and Holland, and Socialist movements of varying strength
exist in nearly every country of the world.
QUESTIONS
1. Compare the Gotha and Erfurt programs of the German Social
Democracy.
2. Discuss the attitude of the German party toward the trade unions.
3. What are the chief differences in theory and tactics between
the "Impossibilists" and the " Possibilists " in France?
314 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
4. Compare the French Socialist Party with the German Social
Democracy.
5. How does the Italian Socialist movement differ from the move-
ments in the northern European countries?
6. Explain the relations between the Socialist and the Labor parties
in Great Britain.
7. What were the causes of the split in the American Socialist Labor
Party and the formation of the Socialist Party?
8. Characterize briefly the following Socialist leaders: Lassalle, Bebel,
Liebknecht, Jaures, Guesde, Adler, de Paepe, Morris, Hyndman,
Hardie.
Literature
The chief sources for the national Socialist parties are their reports
to the International Socialist Congresses. In addition the following
works will be found useful:
Bernstein, E., Ferdinand Lassalle.
Dawson, W. H., German Socialism and Ferdinand Lassalle.
Hillquit, M., Socialism in Theory and Practice, Appendix.
Hillquit, M., History of Socialism in the United States.
Hughan, Jessie W., American Socialism of the Present Day. Chap.
Ill and XV.
Hunter, R., Socialists at Work.
Kirkup, T., History of Socialism, Chap. IX.
Spargo, J., Karl Marx, His Life and Work, Chaps. XI, XII, and XIII.
Villiers, B., The Socialist Movement in England.
Webb, Sidney, Socialism in Great Britain.
PART V
POLICY AND PROGRAM
CHAPTER XXIII
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM
Marx and Engels on social reform: Marx and Engels in
the Communist Manifesto emphasized the importance of
social and political reform and sketched a practical program
for the betterment of the conditions of the wage-workers.
That it was a crude and hastily sketched program, which has
long since become antiquated to a large extent, is not here
and now a matter of importance. What is significant is the
fact that from the beginning Marx and Engels regarded
agitation for reforms as a necessary part of proletarian
activity. Eighteen years later, in the practical program
which Marx drafted for the International, we find measures
like the eight-hour work day and free, popular education
given conspicuous place.
Marx and Engels understood and set forth with remarkable
clearness and strength the need for physical, mental and
moral efficiency on the part of the workers as prerequisites
of their success. They understood and pointed out the
unfitness of the slum proletariat, whose conditions of life
necessarily fit it to be a reactionary force rather than a
progressive and revolutionary force. On the other hand,
they proclaimed the increasing misery and degradation of
the proletariat in terms which compel us to conclude that
they did not believe much could be done by the economic
and political organization of the proletariat to check that
misery and degradation. There is a terrible fatalism in the
manner in which they picture the degradation and pauper-
ization of the workers as one of the conditions essential to
comprehensive social change:
"The modern laborer . . . instead of rising with the
progress of industry, sinks deeper and deeper below the con-
ditions of existence of his own class. He becomes a pauper
and pauperism develops more rapidly than population and
317
318 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
wealth. And here it becomes evident that the bourgeoisie
is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society. ... It
is unfit to rule, because it is incompetent to assure an exis-
tence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help
letting him sink into such a state that it has to feed him,
instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live
under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no
longer compatible with society."
Thus we find in the thought of Marx and Engels, in their
mingled hopes and fears, something of the contradiction and
conflict which mark the evolution of Socialist political policy.
Practical constructive programs are not for men who believe
that, despite everything that may be done, things must go
from bad to worse; that the capitalist system must crush the
workers down and deny them the minimum necessities of
life; that at last a depth must be reached when the workers
will be forced by the instinct of self-preservation to revolt,
and so end the rule of the master class. On the other hand,
men who believe these things cannot at the same time
believe also in the triumph of the working class in any con-
flict except that of brute force, and then only as a result of
their overwhelming numbers. Nor can they recognize the
weakness and inefficiency of the most submerged class, the
slum proletariat, and maintain their hope for the fu-
ture unimpaired. For it is the essence of their belief
that the proletariat as a whole must be reduced to that
state.
Revolutionism versus opportunism : In nearly every coun-
try in which there is a considerable Socialist movement we
find two distinct and conflicting elements within the move-
ment. There is almost invariably an extreme Left wing and
an extreme Right wing, to which the terms " Revolutionary,"
and "Opportunist," or some equivalent of them, are applied.
Broadly speaking, the Socialist movement everywhere at-
tracts two distinct types of mind, the mind that is dis-
trustful of all attempts to reform existing society and sees no
hope in anything short of a complete transformation of
society, and the mind that, while equally desiring the trans-
formation of society, believes that it must be effected within
the existing order to a very large extent, by means of
the progressive improvement of conditions. Under strong
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 319
leadership those who hold these divergent views become
crystallized into factions.
While the movement in different countries varies greatly,
alike in characteristic features and historical development,
it may be said that, as a rule, violent opposition to social
reforms within the existing order is associated with the
immaturity and weakness of the organized Socialist move-
ment, and that as the movement grows stronger it becomes
of necessity the central force in promoting social and politi-
cal reforms. The truth of this generalization is admirably
illustrated in the history of the German Social Democracy
and its great leaders.
Evolution of parliamentary tactics in Germany : It is a far
cry from the negative iconoclasm of Liebknecht and his
followers in the early years of the movement to the con-
structive Socialist statesmanship of later years. In 1867
Liebknecht urged that the Socialist members should enter
parliament only to read a declaration of protest, and then
leave the house. He even denied that election to parlia-
ment offered any advantages for carrying on Socialist pro-
paganda. Against the view of Bebel and others that the
Socialist members could at least "speak through the win-
dows" of parliament to the workers throughout the country,
he scornfully urged that the workers could be better reached
outside. By 1870 he had come to realize the strategic
advantage which the "windows of parliament" gave the
Socialist propagandist and agitator, and in that year at the
Stuttgart Congress he and Bebel wrote a resolution, which
was adopted, setting forth that, while the party's representa-
tives in parliament must as far as possible work for the
interests of the working class, on the whole a negative,
critical attitude must be maintained.
The idea of using their political power directly to secure
reforms made headway very slowly. At Coburg in 1874 it
was declared that the emphasis must be placed upon propa-
ganda, and thirteen years later, at the St. Gall Congress
of the united party, a similar declaration was adopted, except
that the word "agitation" was used instead of "propaganda."
At the Halle Congress in 1890 an immense gain was regis-
tered, the Socialist representatives in the Reichstag being
instructed to press the Socialist demands and to work for
320 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
palliative reforms possible within the existing state. The
Erfurt Program, adopted in 1891, contains a series of prac-
tical proposals, or ''immediate demands," which can only
be interpreted as meaning that the Social Democracy has
definitely chosen to rest its hope upon the enlightened and
conscious effort of the proletariat, rather than upon those
tendencies in economic evolution which Marx believed to be
irresistibly making for proletarian degradation and economic
cataclysm.
The value of social reforms: In his speech at the Erfurt
Congress in support of the social reforms proposed in the
program, Liebknecht frankly declared the abandonment of
the view that Socialism flourishes best upon the misery of
the masses. Speaking in support of the new program, he
said : "Formerly people used often to say that the only means
of winning the masses to Socialism was to leave them alone
till their impoverishment was completed, and then despair
would bring them to us, but no one believes in that nonsense
any longer." Bebel also spoke in favor of the new tactics,
but seemed to base his support upon the fact that the reforms
advocated would win the votes of a large number of workers,
rather than upon an appreciation of the value of the reforms
themselves. Von Vollmar, one of the ablest of the leaders of
the Opportunist wing of the party, noted this, and urged
that the real motive of the party in advocating the social
reforms ought to be the value of the reforms as substantial
advances towards Socialism, and the fact that they would
actually improve the fighting powers of the proletariat.
In 1892, at the Berlin Congress, the annual report of the
Socialist members of the Reichstag to the party practically
affirmed Von Vollmar's view. It incorporated social reform
into the concept of social revolution. Social reform, it
declared, "serves to furnish the proletariat with a little
more of the means of battle which they require in order to
fulfil their historic mission."
Since that time there has been no disposition to return to
the old tactics of mere negative criticism. All sections of the
party recognize that if the Social Democracy is to be the
party of working-class emancipation it must fight for the
it, interests of the workers, and do all that is possible
to improve their conditions. At the Stuttgart Congress
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 321
of 1898, Von Vollmar declared that "He who raises the posi-
tion of the working people, economically, politically, intel-
lectually, increases their strength for further battles, and
places a sure foot on the way leading to the final seizure of
the powers of the State." At the Hanover Congress in the
following year a similar view was expressed by the much
more radical Clara Zetkin: "We promote these reforms,
not to win the masses, but to raise them. With slaves
breaking their chains you may make a momentary riot,
but you cannot build a new society. Our whole reform is
directed to this end, to raise the working class to a higher
economic, intellectual and moral level; and I subscribe
with both hands to the remark of Comrade Adler that we
must work with our whole might for those demands of the
present, just as if we were working for the attainment of
our great goal itself."
Social Democracy and social reform: One result of this
evolution of tactics and policy is that the Social Democracy
is universally acknowledged to be the central and most power-
ful force making for social reform in Germany to-day. Even
in the seventies, before the adoption of a constructive par-
liamentary policy by the party, the actual propaganda dealt
to a considerable extent with such practical matters as the
need of insurance against accident and old age, factory legis-
lation and the abolition of child labor. Lassalle had em-
phasized the socialization of the State, and demanded State
aid and protection for the workers. His influence upon the
practical propaganda of the time was enormous. Theorists
might talk about the disappearance of the State, but the
workingman who addressed his fellow workingmen was much
more likely to urge that the State ought to protect its useful
citizens.
When in 1884 Bismarck announced his program of social
legislation, he admitted in the Reichstag that he had taken
those features of the Socialist propaganda which he believed
to be practical, and that he hoped thus to wean the masses
from the Social Democracy. His confession was as blunt
as it could be: "Give the workingman the right to work as
long as he has health. Assure him care when he is sick,
and maintenance when he is old. If you will do that without
shrinking from the sacrifice, and do not cry out 'State Social-
322 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ism' . . . then I believe that the gentlemen of the Weyden
(Social Democratic) program will sound their bird-call in
vain; and as soon as the workingmen see that the govern-
ment is earnestly concerned for their welfare, the thronging
to them will cease."
The Social Democrats were not in the least disturbed at
the prospect of having their arch opponent "steal their
thunder" in this manner. They knew perfectly well that no
party of the ruling class could ever concede all that the
material interest of the working class demands. They knew
the workers too well to believe that any sop of concessions
made by the masters would satisfy them, and believed rather
that all such concessions would increase the appetite of the
workers and cause them to demand more and more. They
did not doubt their ability to keep the Socialist program
far in advance of any ministerial program. Bebel took
advantage of Bismarck's admissions to point out that Bis-
marck was now the acknowledged pupil of the Social Demo-
crats, that the great Chancellor had not only admitted the
existence of a grave problem which had heretofore been
declared not to exist, but had accepted the remedial policy
advocated by the Socialists. The result was certain to be
an increase of popular confidence in the wisdom and fore-
sight of the Social Democrats, he declared. That Bebel was
right has been abundantly proven by the experience of
more than a quarter of a century. In almost every country
in which there is a strong Socialist movement similar attempts
have been made to wean the masses from Socialism by
granting some of the reforms in the Socialist program, but
without any marked success.
^ The new tactics and "Marxism": The change in the tac-
tics and policy of the Social Democracy has been very com-
monly regarded as a definite departure from Marxism.
This is true if by Marxism is meant simply the theory of the
increasing misery of the proletariat. But that generalization
is not only not the whole of Marxism, it is not essential to it.
Indeed, the generalization may be regarded as having no
legitimate place in Marxian theory. It is an interjection,
inconsistent with the rest of the teachings of Marx and Engels.
have already seen, it is not consistent with the pro-
gram outlined in the Communist Manifesto, nor with the
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 323
practical program of the International. It is essentially
a false note, due to the over-emphasis of the great impelling
forces of economic evolution and the under-valuation of the
human factors. If by Marxism we mean the fundamental
thought of Marx and Engels, the thought which dominated
and guided their life-work, and the practical policies they
advocated, the change in tactics may be regarded as a return
from an incidental and foreign element in the statement of
Marxism to the fundamentals of Marxism. The utterances
of Von Vollmar and Clara Zetkin, the one a leader of the
Opportunists and the other of the Revolutionists, are quite
in harmony with the utterance of Marx himself upon the
passage of the Ten Hours' Bill in England.1
Social reform and the class struggle: The policy of pro-
moting social reform is not less revolutionary than the policy
of refusing to work for present betterment, but more so. If
by social revolution we mean a social reality, a result to be
attained through the unified efforts of the working class, the
Opportunist who unites the workers upon the basis of their
class interest, and enables them to improve their position
and equip themselves for more effective resistance and
aggression is a better Revolutionist than he who merely
denounces present conditions and holds out to the workers
the hope that, when their class has been sufficiently pauper-
ized, brutalized and dehumanized there will be a successful
revolt. To the modern Socialist, as to Marx, social revolu-
tion is not so much a method as a result. That result is the
transformation of capitalist society into Socialist society,
and will be quite as revolutionary if accomplished by a
generation of peaceful evolution as if accomplished in a week
of bloody revolt.
We recur again to the central motif of modern Socialism,
the class struggle. The social reform policy of the German
Social Democracy and all other Socialist parties is based
upon the doctrine of the class struggle and is shaped by
the actual class conflict. The workers must resist all those
forces which tend to lower their standard of living, they must
wage war against exploitation and for better conditions. So
much is involved in the class struggle itself. If the Socialist
movement is to be an expression of that struggle, it must
1 In the Inaugural Address of the International, 1864.
324 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
necessarily participate in the efforts which the workers make
to better their conditions. The class struggle as a reality,
then, forces the Socialist parties of the world to be aggressive
champions of every measure for the present betterment
of the lot of the workers.
Illustrative value of Germany's experience: The impor-
tance of this detailed account of the evolution of Socialist
tactics in Germany lies in the fact that the experience of the
German Social Democracy has been repeated by nearly
every national Socialist party. The change from the tactics
of sterile dogmatism to fruitful practical politics is both a
cause and an effect of growth. In the beginning the Socialist
movement is almost invariably characterized by dogmatism,
fanatical bitterness and sectarian intolerance. Its first
political victories are usually won in spite of these things,
often through circumstances which lead to the election of
Socialist candidates not because of their Socialism, but rather
in spite of it. But in every country it has been found that
with the election of even a single representative to an
important legislative or executive office a change of temper
and policy begins to manifest itself. The propaganda
becomes more practical and less theoretical. Wild, irrespon-
sible talk of a sudden revolution is less frequently indulged in,
and there is less disposition to sneer at social reforms. The
movement devotes more and more of its energies to the
task of bringing about the betterment of the lot of the
workers.
Brought face to face with opportunities to improve the
conditions of the working class, the Socialist Party dares not
neglect them. Even though the specific reform proposed
may be small and, of itself, relatively insignificant, the
insi motive class consciousness of the Socialist representatives
prevents them from opposing or ignoring it and indulging
themselves in denunciations of capitalism or prophecies ot
a cooperative commonwealth. In other words, election of
even a few of its representatives to office brings the Socialist
movement to a point at which it must face reality and choose
between dogmatism and life; between loyalty to a creed
and loyalty to the working class. Little groups or factions
may cling to the dogmatism and remain as narrow and
embittered sects, but the movement as a whole chooses the
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 325
opposite course. This is illustrated in the history of the
Socialist movement in England and the United States as
completely as anywhere in the world.
Far-reaching results of the policy: The results of this
broadening of Socialist policy and tactics extend far beyond
the sphere of political action. It effects also the relation of
the political Socialist movement to other phases of the
working class movement. The same reasoning which keeps
the Socialists in the early, dogmatic stages of the movement
from recognizing the value of social reforms acquired by
legislation, keeps them from recognizing the value of im-
provements brought about by the action of the trade unions
or the cooperative societies. So long as the assumption
upon which the Socialist policy is based is that the masses
must be reduced to abject pauperism before Socialism can
triumph, every attempt to prevent that pauperization will
be looked upon as retarding the social revolution. Not until
the movement frankly abandons that position and accepts
the view that every gain of the working class better fits it
for its great mission of destroying class rule, is it possible
for all phases of the organized working class movement to
work in harmony.
Socialism and cooperation: Workingmen's cooperative
societies long antedated the rise of the modern Socialist
movement in England. When the latter appeared the
cooperative movement was already more than fifty years old,
for in 1830 there were upwards of 300 cooperative societies
in the United Kingdom with a membership of more than
20,000.! While cooperation had not solved the social prob-
lem as the founders of the movement imagined, it had
greatly benefited that portion of the working class which it
had succeeded in embracing within its membership. To build
up and maintain such a movement had required courage,
self-reliance, sobriety, foresight, organizing capacity and a
high order of intelligence — all qualities essential to a suc-
cessful, militant working class movement. Had the Social-
ists of the time not been obsessed by the notion that the
cooperative societies by improving the economic conditions
of their members were so many obstacles to the coming of
Socialism via unlimited misery, the story of British Socialism
1 Holyoake, History of Cooperation, 1875, Vol. I, pp. 152-153.
326 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
might have been very different. As it was the early Social-
ists frequently went out of their way to disparage cooperation
as a conserving force, and thus set up a barrier between the
two movements which has not yet been wholly removed.
Much of the early Socialist propaganda was addressed to
the slum proletariat, upon the assumption that the poorest
and most miserable would readily respond to the Socialist
message. Of course, this proved to be quite far from the
truth. In England, as elsewhere, this element is the least
responsive to the Socialist appeal. Invariably, Socialism
makes its greatest progress among the best paid and best
organized workers. Not until the rise of the Independent
Labor Party in 1893 was any considerable progress made
among the cooperative societies.
Belgian Socialism affords a striking contrast to British
Socialism in this respect. The Belgian movement has never
been very dogmatic. From the first it has included every
phase of distinctively working class organization and aspira-
tion. It has embraced the cooperatives, the trade unions,
the friendly societies and the political movement. From
England the Belgians took the cooperative associations and
the trade unions; from Germany they took the fundamental
theories of Socialism and general party tactics; from France
they took the conception of Socialism as a great spiritual
ideal and force, "a continuation of Christianity" as Vander-
velde once described it. Thus we find that in Belgium the
conflict between the cooperatives and the political Socialist
movement has never developed to any extent, and the
Socialist movement includes the cooperative movement.
Socialism and trade unionism: The relation of the
political Socialist movement to the trade union movement
illustrates the same principle. Trade unionism antedates
the modern Socialist movement by a great many years.
As far back as 1720 the master tailors of England complained
to parliament that 7,000 journeymen had "entered into
combination to raise their wages and leave off working an
hour earlier than they used to do," and parliament responded
by enacting a law prohibiting all such combinations.1 Two
years before that, in 1718, a royal proclamation against
"lawless clubs and societies" among workmen had been
»Webb, History of Trade Unionism, p. 27.
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 327
issued.1 In the United States, even, we find aggressive local
unions of printers as early as 1786, and of shoemakers as
early as 1794.2 Long before the Communist Manifesto,
therefore, trade unionism was already well established in
England, and, to a less extent, the United States. It had
done much to improve the conditions of the workers in many
trades, as Marx himself recognized. The movement had
grown in the face of bitter persecution on the part of the
master class, the only parallel to which in modern times is
the persecution which the Socialist movement has had to
endure.
When the International was formed trade unionism in
England and the United States was a real power. In France
there were many unions which won partial legal recognition in
1864, the year in which the International was founded. In
Italy there were several unions, largely dominated by
Mazzini. Local trade unions had appeared in Germany,
though it was not until 1865 that the first national German
trade union was formed by followers of Lassalle, and therefore
closely allied with the Socialist movement from the very
beginning.
The International and the trade unions: Through the
International Marx brought about a close relation between
the trade unions and the Socialist movement of the time.
Here as always Marx subordinated dogma to the central fact
of the class struggle. The unions were fighting organizations
of workingmen, therefore they must be welcomed as a part of
the working class movement and any attempt on the part
of the Socialists to antagonize the unions was severely con-
demned. Marx himself believed that the British trade unions
were destined to become the most revolutionary Socialist
organizations in Europe. All through the life of the Inter-
national there was active cooperation between the trade
unions and the Socialists in England and America as well
as in continental Europe.
Rise of the new Socialist movement in England: Almost
a decade had passed after the death of the International
before the rise of the new Social Democratic movement in
England. As we have seen, the leading spirits of the new
1 Webb, op. cit., p. 29.
' Documentary History of American Industrial Society, Vol. V, p. 20.
328 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
movement were not workingmen, but members of the middle
class. They were dogmatists of an extreme type. In their
attitude toward the trade unions they alternated between
flattery and bitter insults. Regarding themselves as the
preachers of the only true gospel, they set forth to convince
the trade unions that their ways were wrong, to show them
that the small improvements in wages and hours of labor
which they gained from time to time were in reality not gains
but losses, since they postponed the complete emancipation
of the working class.
When they cooperated with the trade unions, as a rule
it was not because they had a common faith with the trade
unions, not because they earnestly desired to attain the
object for which the unions were striving, but because they
hoped to make converts, to win the unions to the Socialist
point of view. They wanted to "capture the trade unions' '
for Socialism. Above all, they wanted the unions to become
political organizations, auxiliaries of the party. They urged
the unions to adopt the Socialist program and even to make
acceptance of Socialist principles and the support of Socialist
candidates conditions of membership. Naturally, the
leaders of the unions resisted these attempts and resented the
general depreciation of trade unionism by the Socialists.
They were attempting to unite all the workers of a trade,
regardless of their religious or political beliefs. They had
already more than enough obstacles to overcome, and if
they had followed the counsel of the Socialists they would
have seriously divided their forces. It was inevitable,
therefore, that a conflict should develop between the new
movement with its dogmas and the old movement with its
practical problems.
The issue in America: The story of the relations of the
two movements in the United States is in many ways very
similar to that of the English conflict. From 1878 to 1893
the friendly relations which had existed between the Social-
ists and the trade unions during the period of the International
were gradually weakened. The trade union movement was
the older organization. It was indigenous, and when the
Socialist Labor Party arose was about entering upon a
period of phenomenal growth. In 1878 the first convention
of the Knights of Labor was held, and three years later the
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 329
Federation of Trade and Labor Unions, the body from which
the American Federation of Labor developed, was formed.
There were hundreds of thousands of American workingmen
organized into unions. Frequently these unions adopted
platforms or other declarations of principles which reflected
the influence of the earlier Socialist agitation and came very
near to the modern Socialist position.
On the other hand, the Socialist Labor Party was numer-
ically weak and composed mainly of foreigners, many of
them ignorant of the language of the country, and most of
them unfamiliar with its institutions and laws. Under the
circumstances, it was natural that the Socialists should
regard the trade unions as favorable fields for their propa-
ganda. It was equally natural that the trade union leaders
should resent their propaganda in so far as it consisted of
criticisms of their policies, and endeavors to commit the
unions to the support of the Socialist Labor Party. As in
England, the Socialist attitude toward the unions alternated
between flattery and bitter insults. An element developed
within the party which insisted that the unions must be
opposed, because they were so many obstacles in the path
of the Socialist movement. Sometimes this element con-
trolled the party and the attacks on the unions were very bit-
ter. At other times the party swung to the opposite extreme
of flattery. When great strikes and lockouts took place the
Socialists were always ready with help, moral and financial.
But even this friendly service was not always disinterested.
There was always the old desire to "capture the unions,"
and the leaders of the unions recognized the fact. Then, too,
the Socialists further alienated the trade unions by their
frequent association with the Anarchists.
With the formation of the Socialist Trade and Labor
Alliance in opposition to the American Federation of Labor
and the Knights of Labor, and the resolution of the national
convention of the Socialist Labor Party in 1893 condemning
the existing trade unions as hopelessly corrupt, open war
was declared between the Socialists and the trade unions.
If the capitalist class of the country had set all its brightest
retainers to invent a plan of checking the Socialist movement,
they could not have invented a better one than the Socialists
themselves had devised. One of the first acts of the seces-
330 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
sionists from the Socialist Labor Party in 1899 was the
passage of a resolution repudiating the Socialist Trade and
Labor Alliance, and proclaiming friendliness toward the
trade unions. The foundations of a peace policy were being
laid.
Policy of the Socialist Party: But even after the rise of
the new Socialist Party with its wider and saner policy,
the idea long persisted that the political Socialist movement
must act as a sort of schoolmaster to the trade union move-
ment. Not for a long time was there any sign of a recog-
nition of the trade union movement as simply another
branch of the general working class movement, an equal,
not a subordinate. Year after year in the conventions of the
American Federation of Labor, and in the local labor
councils, the Socialists struggled for the adoption of resolu-
tions indorsing the program and political policies of the
Socialist Party. Every such attempt failed and succeeded
only in reviving old and bitter quarrels or creating new ones.
The German experience : The present official policy of the
Socialist party of the United States recognized the right of
the trade unions to manage their own affairs, and treats the
trade union movement as an equal partner. This policy
accords exactly with the policy of the German Social Democ-
racy and with the ideas of Marx. It may be said to be the
first adoption of a truly Marxian policy so far as the party's
relation to the unions is concerned.
Although the first national trade union in Germany was
founded by Wilhelm Fritzsche, a Lassallean Socialist, and
was from the first dominated by Socialist ideas, other unions
sprang up at about the same time, many of which, like the
British trade unions after which they were patterned, de-
clared for strict neutrality in politics. The overwhelming
sentiment of the Lassallean Socialist movement was against
the trade union movement. It was a cardinal principle of
the Lassallean school that only the political movement could
improve the condition of the workers; that the unions were
only stumbling blocks. In 1872 this sentiment had grown
so strong that a resolution was adopted at the annual con-
gress of the Lassallean organization warning the members
against advancing the unions at the expense of the political
movement.
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 331
The Marxist attitude: In that same year the Marxist
organization adopted a radically different resolution. It
urged all the members of the organization to help the trade
unions in every possible manner, and condemned the resolu-
tion adopted by the Lassallean faction. This resolution
declared that:
"In consideration of the fact that the capitalist power
equally opposes and exploits all workingmen, no matter
whether they are conservatives, liberals, or Social Demo-
crats, this congress declares it to be the sacred duty of the
workingmen to lay aside all party strife, in order to create
the conditions for a vigorous and successful resistance on the
neutral ground of a united trades union organization, to
secure their threatened existence and to conquer for them-
selves an improvement in their class conditions.' '
In adopting this resolution the Eisenachers were following
closely the advice which Marx had given three years before.
"The trades unions should never be affiliated with or made
dependent upon any political society. ... If this happens
it means their death-blow," Marx had declared in 1869,
and then went on to argue that the improvement of their
conditions, the better education and improved physical
efficiency, which the workers obtained through the unions
would lead them to Socialism. Thus we find Marx, as ever,
basing his hope upon the improvement of the lot of the
workers, rather than upon their complete subjugation.1
Policy of the united party: In reality the Marxian Social-
ists took in 1872 a position toward trade unionism which
they logically should have taken toward social reform, but
did not until twenty years had passed away. After the union
of the two factions in 1875 the united party adopted the
Marxist policy. But it was years before the party abandoned
the attitude of schoolmaster toward the unions. Bebel
himself has confessed that at first the Social Democrats
regarded it to be the special mission of the trades unions to
serve as recruiting grounds for the party propaganda, pre-
paratory schools for Socialists. The unions were urged to
"keep politics and religion out of the unions," but at the
same time they were asked to join the Social Democratic
Party, to endorse its candidates and support it financially.
1 Gf . Karl Marx, His Life and Works, by John Spargo, p. 248.
ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
In recent years, however, the ideas of Marx have completely
prevailed in the policy of the party toward the unions. It
is now fully understood that to attempt to have the unions
endorse or join any party, Socialist or other, would create
weakening dissensions. The unions are urged to avoid
party politics, and to confine their political activities to
furthering those specific measures intimately effecting their
immediate interests upon which the workers instinctively
unite, regardless of their political beliefs. The party now
trusts to its power to win the individual union member.
The evolution of Socialist tactics, then, has in nearly
every country effected not only the attitude of the Socialist
parties toward social reforms secured by legislation, but
their attitude toward the efforts of the workers to better
their conditions through other agencies, notably the trade
unions and the cooperative societies. Nothing could well
be more fallacious than to regard these changes separately,
as so many vote-catching concessions, dictated by political
expediency. The fact is that we have to consider, not a
number of independent changes, unrelated to each other,
but a comprehensive evolution of Socialist policy away
from the accidental and non-essential, in the direction of a
more consistent application of the fundamental theories of
Marx to the actual life-problem of the working class. A
careful examination of the programs of the leading Socialist
parties of the world will show that they are based upon the
central thought of Marx, the class struggle.
Socialists and social reformers: The Socialist Labor
Party has a platform which is a compound of Lassalleanism
and the "natural rights" theory of the eighteenth century,
and contains no specific reform measures. The Socialist
Party, on the other hand, has a platform which contains
a large number of proposals aiming at the progressive im-
provement of our economic, social and political institutions
and conditions. A considerable part of the energy of the
party is devoted to the promotion of these reforms. In
these respects the Socialist Party follows the example of
all the important Socialist parties of the world. However
distasteful the term may be to some Socialists, therefore,
the Socialist Party is a party of social reform and its members
are social reformers.
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 333
It frequently happens that other social reformers, who
are not Socialists, seek the cooperation of the Socialists for
the promotion of certain reform measures, and are surprised
and disappointed when the Socialists decline to cooperate
with them, and either regard their reforms with indifference
or vigorously oppose them. In such circumstances, the
Socialists are often denounced as being narrow and intolerant,
or inconsistent and insincere. It is very easy to make such
charges, and it is perhaps natural that they should be made.
The slightest knowledge of the movement, however, is
sufficient to discredit the charges. It is inconceivable that
a great movement which is maintained by an incalculable
amount of self-sacrifice should place the principles and
ideals for which that sacrifice is made beneath mere party
or personal consideration. The sincerity of the Socialists
and the intellectual attainments of their leading exponents
warrant us assuming that there must be serious and vital
reasons for their exclusive attitude.
Reasons for such refusal: The refusal of the Socialists
to cooperate with non-Socialist reformers may be due to
(1) the fact that the specific reforms they are asked to
support are not in harmony with Socialist principles; (2)
the fact that, while consistent with the Socialist program,
and even taken from it, the specific reforms are not of them-
selves sufficiently important to justify the Socialists in
dropping the rest of their program for the time being in
order to concentrate upon them; (3) the fact that the
Socialists lack faith in those with whom they are asked to
cooperate.
A very brief consideration of these reasons will enable us
to understand the Socialist point of view. Of the reforms
which are not in accordance with Socialist principles we have
excellent illustrations in the various measures proposed for
the restriction of monopoly. It often happens that the
indictment of the great oppressive monopolies by middle-
class reformers is very similar to the indictment of the same
monopolies by the Socialists. No Socialist agitator ever
more bitterly arraigned the Steel Trust for its treatment
of its employees than some of our middle-class reformers have
done. But when the Socialist is asked to work for anti-
trust legislation he must decline, for the very obvious reason
334 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
that he believes monopoly to be an inevitable and necessary
step towards Socialism.
Of those reforms which are consistent with the Socialist
program and included in it, but are advocated also by non-
Socialists, woman's suffrage is a good illustration. Equal
suffrage is a fundamental principle of Socialism. When
limited suffrage for women is proposed, giving the vote to
women who possess certain property qualifications, the
Socialists oppose the measure, even where it is favored by
the organized woman's suffrage movement. Such a measure
is not in harmony with Socialist principles. When, as in the
United States, the demand is for the extension of the suffrage
to all women, the Socialists give the movement their hearty
support. They hold demonstrations in favor of it, appear
at legislative hearings on behalf of it, circulate petitions,
and otherwise further the movement. Not only does the
Socialist Party do these things in connection with its own
propaganda, but it gladly and earnestly cooperates with the
woman's suffrage organizations in similar activities. But
if it should be asked to drop all the rest of its program for
the time being, and to confine itself solely to agitation for
woman's suffrage, it might very properly decline to do so,
upon the ground that, important as the reform is, it is not
important enough to warrant the proposed action. This
does not mean, of course, that the Socialists must take the
position indicated under any and all circumstances. In
various countries the Socialists have at different times
concentrated all their energies upon specific issues, especially
the extension of the franchise, notably in Austria, Belgium
and Sweden. Circumstances might arise which would justify
the Socialists in concentrating all their energies upon the
extension of the suffrage to women or any other measure.
The point to be observed is that so long as they do not
regard the particular reform as being important enough to
warrant the adoption of such a policy, the Socialists are
justified in refusing to do so.
Concerning the third reason for refusing to cooperate
with non-Socialist reformers, lack of faith in those with
whom they are asked to cooperate, not much need be said.
It is a common thing for capitalist parties to put into their
platforms measures of reform, excellent in themselves, which
SOCIALISM AND SOCIAL REFORM 335
are intended to serve as bait to catch the unwary. After a
great strike among the coal miners some years ago the Demo-
cratic Party in the State of New York adopted as one of
the planks in its platform government ownership and control
of the coal mines. There were some persons who regarded
that as a reason why the Socialists ought not to oppose the
Democratic Party, but support it. They regarded the pro-
posed reform as a very important "step in the direction of
Socialism." Apart altogether from the inability of the
Socialists to believe in the good faith of the Democrats, such
a policy was impossible. It would have meant the demoral-
ization of the Socialist Party. It would have meant, also,
that the Socialists would have had to support a great many
things in which they did not believe as well as the one thing
in which they did believe.
Essentials of Socialist reform: The Socialist reform pro-
gram is distinguished from all other reform programs by
two fundamental characteristics. The first of these is the
interrelation of all the reform measures to one another.
They are not separate and distinct reforms, each one offered
as a panacea for a special social ill. They are all inter-
dependent. The social reform program of Socialism does
not consist of an aggregation of measures, separately devised
and based upon different and conflicting principles, now
collectivistic, now individualistic. Every one of its measures
is consistent with all the others, and all are based upon
one central idea. The second characteristic is that all the
measures are frankly based upon the interest of the working
class. The entire program has for its aim the strengthening
of the workers as a class, economically and politically, in
order that they may be able to establish the Socialist state.
336 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
SUMMARY
1. Socialists generally have from the first included immediate re-
forms in their programs, but there has always been a minority opposed
to reforms, and basing their hope of revolution upon the increasing
misery of the proletariat.
2. As the movement in any country becomes stronger there is an
increasing tendency to advocate reforms and an increasing recognition
of the value of parliamentary activity.
3. The attitude of Socialist parties toward trade unionism is often
characterized at first by a desire to control, and failing in this, by open
hostility. In later stages the attitude tends to be that of recognition
and desire for cooperation with the unions.
4. The aim of all Socialist reform measures is the strengthening of the
workers as a class, economically and politically.
QUESTIONS
1. Discuss the attitude of Marx and Engels toward reforms.
2. What is the distinction between Revolutionism and Opportunism?
3. What is the attitude of the extreme Revolutionist toward parlia-
mentary activity?
4. What changes have taken place in the tactics of the German
Social Democracy since the early period of its history?
5. Explain the relation of Social reform to the class struggle.
6. How does the attitude of the British Socialists toward distributive
cooperation differ from that of the Belgians?
7. What has been the attitude of the Social Democrats in England
toward the trade unions?
8. What is the difference in attitude toward trade unions between
the American Socialist and Socialist Labor Parties?
9. Under what circumstances will Socialists work with non-Socialist
reformers?
10. Why do Socialists sometimes refuse to work with such reformers?
Literature
Commons, J. R. and others (editors), Documentary History of Amer-
ican Industrial Society, Vol. V.
Ely, R. T., The Labor Movement in America.
Holyoake, G. J., History of Cooperation, Vol. I.
Hughanj Jessie W., American Socialism of the Present Day, Chap.
XI-XIV inclusive.
Kampffmeyer, Paul, Changes in the Theory and Tactics of the (German)
Social Democracy.
Marx, K., and Engels, F., The Communist Manifesto.
Spargo, John, Karl Marx, His Life and Work, Chap. X.
Webb, Sidney and Beatrice, History of Trade Unionism, Chap. I and II.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM
I
The common aim: In order that the workers "may seize
every possible advantage that may strengthen them to gain
complete control of the powers of government, and thereby
the sooner establish the cooperative commonwealth,"1 the
Socialist parties of all lands have adopted comprehensive
programs of social and political reforms. Naturally these
programs differ materially according to the conditions
existing in the different countries, but they are all charac-
terized by a general identity of aim and purpose.
Suffrage: Modern Socialism is inseparable from political
democracy. Foremost among the demands of all the Social-
ists of the world are those for the abolition of all restrictions
upon the franchise which places the working class at a dis-
advantage. Some few Socialists, like Belfort Bax, the
English Social Democrat, are opposed to woman's suffrage
and vehemently deny that it is an essential principle of
Socialism, but the contrary view is held by the vast majority
of Socialists everywhere. In Europe the battle for universal
manhood suffrage has taken a large place in the Socialist
propaganda, and the fight is not yet wholly won. In the
United States the Socialists have not been under the necessity
of establishing manhood suffrage, since that reform was
accomplished early in the history of the country. Proposals
for the extension of the franchise to women upon equal
terms with men, the abolition of poll taxes, through which
the progressive disfranchisement of a large part of the
working class in many states is being accomplished, and
other similar measures are urged in the national and state
programs of American Socialism.
1 National Platform, Socialist Party of America, 1904.
337
338 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
The initiative , referendum and recall: Direct legislation,
through the initiative and referendum, holds an important
place in the reform program of nearly every Socialist party
in the world. In England it does not appear in the program
of the Independent Labor Party, but is given a prominent
place in the program of the Social Democratic Party. On
the other hand, it is opposed by the Fabian Society, which
in this respect holds a unique position. The position of the
Fabians is set forth in a resolution presented to the Inter-
national Socialist Congress in 1896. They oppose the ini-
tiative and referendum because they believe that the masses
can never be made sufficiently familiar with the "dry details"
of legislative and administrative reforms to vote intelligently
upon them; that while theoretically democratic, direct
legislation is in practice reactionary, and urge that the fact
that leading anti-Socialists in England have advocated the
adoption of the referendum as a means of fighting Socialism
is a good reason why Socialists should oppose it. Broadly
speaking, the opposition of the Fabians to direct legislation
may be said to arise from their conception of Socialism as
a better organization of industry, rather than as the emanci-
pation of the working class. They do not accept the doctrine
of the class struggle. By Socialists generally direct legislation
is favored because it will help the working class to establish
its rule. It is not intended to supplant representative par-
liamentary government, but to supplement it. The right
to initiate legislation, to consider legislation before it becomes
law, and to recall elected representatives and officials are
fundamental principles of democracy.
Proportional representation and second ballot: In every
country we find the Socialists fighting for proportional
representation. True representative parliamentary govern-
ment is not possible where the parliament does not epitomize
the opinion of the population. In the Congress of the United
States we have approximately one representative for every
35,000 voters. But with over 600,000 votes the Socialists
elected only one representative to the Sixty-second Congress.
The Prohibition Party has participated in every national
election held during the past thirty years, polling from 130,-
000 to 270,000 votes, but has never had a single Congres-
sional representative. The injustice of this is manifest,
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 339
In Finland, Sweden and Belgium the Socialists have suc-
ceeded in bringing about proportional representation. It
should perhaps be said that no particular scheme of pro-
portional representation has been advocated by the Socialist
parties.
Closely allied to proportional representation is the second
ballot, which is advocated in the Socialist program of nearly
every country in which the principle is not already estab-
lished. Where a bare plurality of votes suffices to elect
parliamentary representatives and public officials, it fre-
quently happens that the candidates elected represent only
a minority of the voters in their respective constituencies.
Let us take the case of an election in which there are four
candidates for the legislature — a Republican, a Democrat,
a Reform candidate and a Socialist. Many persons avowedly
sympathetic to Socialism, who would vote for the Socialist
candidate if they did not regard his candidature as hopeless,
vote for that one of the other candidates whom they regard
as the more progressive of the non-Socialist candidates.
In this manner the present system of election by plurality
vote leads many voters to compromise their principles and
the vote reflects that compromise rather than the real desire
of the people. In Germany, Belgium and several other
European countries this difficulty is met by the second ballot.
Let us suppose that in our election the vote results as
follows:
Republican 1800
Democrat 1700
Socialist 1100
Reform 800
5400
With one-third of the vote the Republican is elected,
although two-thirds of the voters opposed him. Under the
second ballot the Socialist and Reform candidates would
drop out and there would be a re-ballot with the Republican
and the Democrat as candidates. In that case enough of
those who voted for the Socialist and Reform candidates
might vote for the Democrat to give him an absolute majority.
Undoubtedly the second ballot is of great advantage to the
Socialist and other radical parties in those countries where
340 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
it is established. Some English and American Socialists
have advocated preferential voting instead of the second
ballot. That is, that each voter be required to vote upon
every candidate for the office to which an election is held,
numbering each in the order of his choice, as first choice,
second choice, and so on.
Abolition of the Senate: Among the political reforms
commonly found in the programs of European Socialist
parties the payment from the public treasury of the cost of
holding elections and of salaries to parliamentary repre-
sentatives, are reforms which, like manhood suffrage, have
long since been accomplished in the United States. The
abolition of the Senate, however, is a reform which American
Socialists demand in common with the Socialists of several
countries. Thus we find the British Social Democratic
Party, the Belgian Labor Party, the French Socialist Party
and several other Socialist parties, demanding the abolition
of the Senate, or, in England, the House of Lords. In
Denmark and Belgium the Socialists have obtained repre-
sentation in the Senate, but that does not blind them to
the fact that the Senate is a body designed to give power to
the master class. In almost every country, the upper house
of parliament represents the privileged classes. The Senate
of the United States was deliberately designed to represent
wealth and social position. It was intended by the aristo-
cratic constitutional convention to "protect the minority
of the opulent against the majority."1 This purpose was
attained by providing for indirect election of Senators, long
terms of office and an equal number of Senators from each
state, regardless of population. In place of the Senate the
Socialists would have the popular optional referendum.
II
The administration of justice : Reforms in the administra-
tion of justice and in the judicial system as a whole have an
important place in the programs of international Socialism.
There are few Socialist parties which do not lay stress upon
the necessity of making the administration of justice free
1 Madison, Elliot's Debates, Vol. I, p. 450.
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 341
by abolishing all court fees and making attorneys public
officials paid by the State. However impartial the law itself
may be at its best, it is obvious that a rich man to whom
court fees are of no importance, and who can afford to engage
the most eminent counsel, has an immense advantage over
a poorer litigant. In practice, therefore, there is ample
justification for the plaint that "there is one law for the rich
and another for the poor." Wherever the Socialists have
had the power to do so they have opened free municipal
bureaus of legal advice as a step toward the establishment of
a completely free system of judicial administration.
In nearly every country, also, the Socialists demand that
all judges be popularly elected, and, like all other officials,
subject to recall. The class bias of appointive judges is
notorious, and it is not easy to see why the interpretation
of the laws of any country should be not responsive to the
people, the makers of the law in any ultimate analysis of
democracy. In many states in this country the judges are
elected by the people and the Socialists would apply the
elective principle to all judicial offices.
The judicial veto : This reform carries with it the abolition
of the judicial veto, which is neither more nor less than a
power to nullify the legislative acts of the elected parliament.
In the United States this question assumes greater importance
than anywhere else in the world and has led to the adoption
by the Socialist Party of a demand for the abolition of the
power of the Supreme Court to pass upon the constitutionality
of laws. The power to abrogate any act of Congress ought
to be vested only in the people themselves through popular
referendum and their elected representatives in Congress.
It may be said that in this demand the Socialists are return-
ing to the principles upon which the nation itself was founded.
The Constitution of the United States does not give the
Supreme Court the power to nullify legislation. It was
assumed by the court under the rule of Chief Justice Marshall,
and has become an accepted fact in our law. Thus the
Supreme Court has become the ultimate legislative authority,
reading into legislation important principles which Congress
itself specifically refuses to include in the legislation when
it is being formulated. In conformity with this Socialist
demand, the only representative of the party in the Sixty-
342 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
second Congress included in a measure providing for old
age pensions a clause expressly forbidding the Supreme Court
to pass upon its constitutionality. Another reform of
judicial procedure of far greater significance in the United
States than elsewhere is the restriction of the power to issue
injunctions in labor disputes, from which some of the worst
abuses of our judicial system have arisen.
Ill
The protection of labor: When the necessary allowances
have been made for the differences of industrial conditions
and political and social development of the countries there
is a remarkable and suggestive similarity in the practical
proposals of the Socialist parties for the protection of labor.
The class struggle involves pretty much the same needs in
monarchical Germany as in republican France; in the United
States as in Belgium or Italy. Thus we find substantially
the same demands made in various countries; all want the
legal prohibition of child labor, regulation of the hours of
labor, adequate factory inspection, freedom of trade union
combination, relief work for the unemployed, and insurance
against accident, sickness, unemployment and old age.
American Socialists want the prohibition of the employ-
ment of children under sixteen years. The Belgian Socialists
would forbid all employment to children under fourteen
and permit only half-time employment from fourteen to
eighteen. Socialists realize the enormous injury which child
labor inflicts upon the working class, and in every country
they are to be found in the vanguard of the fight against it.
They are not blind to the fact that the labor of the child
is often caused by poverty and that to forbid the employ-
ment of the child may lead to greater poverty and suffering.
They contend, however, that the remedy for poverty is not
child labor. It would be far better for the State to assume
the cost of maintaining children than to permit their young
lives to be ruthlessly exploited for profit. Fix minimum
wage rates, provide work for the unemployed or insure the
workers against it, pension the sick, the aged, the widow
and the orphan, but do not destroy the life of the child,
say the Socialists in all lands.
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 343
Most Socialist parties demand the enactment of legisla-
tion establishing eight hours as the maximum work-day,
providing for a rest period of not less than a day and a half,
thirty-six consecutive hours, in each week, forbidding the
employment of women and girls in occupations especially
injurious to females, and confining night work to the mini-
mum absolutely necessary. American Socialists make their
demand for the reduction of hours of labor more general,
and demand "shortening the work-day in keeping with the
increased productiveness of machinery." In several coun-
tries the Socialist parties demand the prohibition of the
employment of women for a given period before and after
childbirth, generally six weeks. American Socialists have
made no declaration upon this important matter, but it is
significant that the attempt to pass such a law in Massa-
chusetts in 1910 was the work of Socialists.
Agricultural laborers: It is not easy to see how a measure
like the eight-hour law is to be applied to agricultural labor
so long as agriculture retains its present form. The Social-
ists in Belgium frankly face this difficulty and limit the
application of the eight-hour work-day, and other similar
reforms, to the "industrial workers." The French Socialists,
on the other hand, in 1902 specifically applied its measures
for the regulation of the hours of labor to "labor in industry,
commerce and agriculture." Without making a definite
statement upon the point, American Socialists have largely
followed the example of the Belgians, and, by implication
at least, regarded agricultural labor as outside the scope of
some of the laws proposed for the regulation of the hours
of labor. Like the Belgians, they have formulated special
programs for farmers, including such reforms as the estab-
lishment of grain elevators and storage warehouses by the
State; separation of the Board of Agriculture from politics,
making it an elective body, the farmers themselves to be
the electors; State insurance against diseases of animals
and plants, insect pests, hail, flood, storm and fire, and State
assistance to cooperative associations of farmers for the
purchase of seed, fertilizer, implements and machinery and
for working the land and marketing produce. This is a new
development in American Socialist policy and the "Farmer's
Program" is as yet crude and ill-developed.
344 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
State insurance: In almost every industrial country
except the United States, something has been done to insure
the workers against poverty as a result of sickness, accident,
unemployment or old age. In Austria, where they have
compulsory insurance against sickness and accident, the
Socialists aim to reform the system to liberalize it, and to
extend the insurance to cover unemployment and old age.
In Germany, where they have insurance against sickness,
accident and old age, the Socialists aim to include insurance
against unemployment in the scheme, and to further democ-
ratize its administration. In the United States there is no
legislation, state or national, providing for the insurance of
the workers against sickness or accident or loss of employ-
ment, no provision for old age, except for the veterans of
the wars.
The Socialist Party demands that the enormous risks of
modern industry be borne by the nation instead of by the
individual workers and their families. The workers them-
selves are quite powerless to make adequate provision against
sickness, accident and death, to say nothing of unemploy-
ment. By immense sacrifices, through trade unions, fra-
ternal insurance societies and private insurance companies
the workers made heroic efforts to insure their families
against the worst results of prolonged illness, accident and
death. This can at best be done very inadequately, and many
of their attempts subject them to further exploitation by the
insurance companies, whose charges are notoriously exorbi-
tant. Even if these disadvantages did not exist, the Socialist
view is that the risks incidental to the production of the
national wealth would be socially borne, so far as that is
possible.
IV
Public health : In their programs and their practical work,
the Socialists of all countries have been distinguished from
all other political parties by the consistency and intelligence
with which they have recognized the social importance of
caring for the health of the people. It has been said that
every advance in the Socialist movement in Europe has
been marked by a lowering of the death-rate. The fact
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 345
that the working class furnishes most of the victims of
preventable disease has forced the Socialists to pay special
attention to the subject. Thus, in France, Germany,
Belgium and Italy, among other countries, the Socialists
have done much to prevent excessive infantile mortality by
establishing municipal creches, milk depots, and, in some
cases, by pensioning nursing mothers and thus enabling
them to remain at home with their babies. They have cared
for the health of school children by establishing open air
schools in the country or at the sea-side for sickly children;
maintaining free dental clinics; providing free meals, or
meals at cost, for children in schools; developing the system
of medical inspection in schools and so on. In several
countries the Socialists have, in the municipalities which
they control, gone far toward the practical realization of
the principle of free medical attendance, midwifery and
medicine, contained in many of the national programs.
Sanatoria and convalescent homes for the workers have been
established by many municipalities under Socialist influence.
The establishment of free medical service, making physicians
and surgeons public servants, is generally advocated by
Socialists all over the world, though it is not specifically
mentioned in the program of the Socialist Party of America,
which confines itself to the general demand of "further
measures" for the conservation of health, and the one specific
demand for the creation of a national department of public
health and hygiene.
The temperance problem: Like disease, drunkenness and
its concomitant evils affect most seriously the working class.
Socialists everywhere recognize the ravages of intemperance
and in some countries have done a great deal to stop its
progress. The Socialists in most European countries have
during the past few years waged war upon alcoholism as one
of the things tending to unfit the working class for effective
resistance to the master class and for the efficient admin-
istration of public affairs. So effective has the stand of the
Socialists upon this question been that it is commonly said
in Europe that the capitalist parties could not exist but for the
saloons. In many of the leading countries of Europe there
are Socialist temperance societies. At the seventh Inter-
national Anti-Alcoholic Congress in Paris, one of the prin-
346 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
cipal addresses was made by Emile Vandervelde, the Belgian
Socialist leader.
But there is no common legislative policy for dealing with
this problem upon which all the Socialist parties unite.
Perhaps this is due in part to the fact that it is a com-
paratively recent development of Socialist policy to deal
with it at all. In 1903, under the leadership of Victor Adler,
the congress of the Austrian party adopted a resolution
declaring that the drinking habits of the people constitute
a serious obstacle to the Socialist movement and pointing
to the improvement of economic conditions and the educa-
tion of the people concerning the injurious effects of alcohol-
ism as the most effective means of combating the evil.
It urged all its members to discourage drinking, to forbid the
sale of intoxicants in Socialist clubs, and to assist the tem-
perance societies. In 1907 at the Essen Congress, the
German party adopted a resolution on the subject of the
evils of alcoholism. The resolution pointed out the anti-
social conditions which are primarily responsible for intem-
perance among the workers, and urged the removal of these,
rather than restrictive legislation. In the same year the
Belgian party congress passed a much stronger resolution
on the subject and instituted a bureau for the purpose of
carrying on an educational campaign against intemperance.
Similar resolutions have been adopted by the party con-
gresses in several other countries, including England — by
the Independent Labor Party — and the United States. The
American resolution declares "any excessive use of liquor by
members of the working class is a serious obstacle . . .
since it impairs the vigor of the fighters in the political and
economic struggle, and we urge the members of the working
class to avoid any indulgence that might hinder the progress
of the movement for their emancipation. . . . We do not
believe that the evils of alcoholism can be cured by an
extension of the police powers of the capitalist State. Alco-
holism is a disease of which capitalism is the chief cause,
and the remedy lies rather in doing away with the under-
feeding, over-work and over-worry which result from the
wage system."
In practical politics the Socialist attitude upon the sub-
ject varies greatly in different countries. In Norway and
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 347
Sweden the Socialists support the Gothenburg system, or
some modification of it. In Finland they favor absolute
prohibition. In Belgium they demand that the manufacture
and sale of alcoholic drinks be made a State monopoly.
In England Socialists generally favor the municipalization
of the entire liquor traffic. American Socialists have taken
no definite stand. All Socialists accept the principle of local
option and probably a majority of American Socialists
believe in some form of collective ownership and manage-
ment of the entire liquor traffic.
Taxation: In all countries the Socialist parties oppose
practically all forms of indirect taxation. Thus the German
Social Democracy demands the abolition of all indirect
taxes, customs and duties on the ground that they "sacrifice
the interests of the whole community to the interests of a
favored minority;" and the Belgian Labor Party demands
"abolition of indirect taxes, especially taxes on food and
customs tariffs." The French Socialist Party, on the other
hand, while opposing taxes on food and customs duties, and
such forms of direct taxation as the taxation of small plots
of land and certain small businesses, seems to favor certain
forms of indirect taxation by empowering the State "to seek
a part of the revenue which it requires from certain monopo-
lies." Upon the positive side, all the Socialist parties advo-
cate the progressive taxation of incomes and inheritances.
In the program of the American Socialist Party the sugges-
tion is made that the taxation of inheritances should be
graduated in accordance with the nearness of kinship of the
legatee as well as in accordance with the amount. The Bel-
gian program provides that, except in case of gifts to works
of public utility, gifts of property between the living should
also be taxed upon the same basis as testamentary gifts.
The object of this provision is to prevent the evasion of the
taxes upon inheritances by the simple method of "giving"
property during the lifetime of the owner to those who
would otherwise not receive it until after his death.
The taxation of land valued for local purposes is generally
348 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
advocated by Socialist parties. This measure was advocated
in the Communist Manifesto, long before the rise of the
Henry George Single Tax school. While fundamentally
differing from the individualistic philosophy of this school,
and regarding the Single Tax as wholly inadequate when con-
sidered as a solution of our social problem, the Socialists
fully believe in absorbing by means of taxation the full
rental value of land. But even if the average wage worker
could get a factory site free he would not be able to set
up in business upon his own account with any chance of
success. He could not afford the costly equipment without
which successful competition with the great capitalists
would be impossible. To the Socialist, then, the taxation
of land values is only an item in a comprehensive program,
and not a solution of the social problem.
Collective ownership : The collective ownership and man-
agement of railroads, telegraphs, telephones, steamship lines
and all other means of social transportation; of land that is
used for the purpose of exploiting labor; of mines, quarries,
oil wells, forests and water power, and of industries which
can be so owned and managed with advantage to the com-
munity are demands which are found in every Socialist
program in the world. In some instances one item or another
in the foregoing list may be omitted, as in England, where
the telegraph service has long been nationalized, or Belgium,
where the railways have always been owned by the nation,
but otherwise the list is a fair composite of the programs of
Socialism in all the countries. The reasons for collective
ownership, the line of demarkation between social and private
property and the chief objections to collective ownership
are discussed in other chapters. The question of method
alone concerns us here: how do the Socialists propose
society shall acquire the means of production and exchange
which are to be collectively owned and administered? Do
they advocate confiscation or purchase?
Means of Socialization: It will perhaps help us to arrive
at a proper answer to these questions if we made a sharp
distinction between Socialism in the propagandist stage and
Socialism in the constructive stage. So long as they are
engaged simply in urging the general principle of collective
ownership of the means of production and exchange and its
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 349
advantages, the Socialists are justified in meeting all ques-
tions concerning the methods of obtaining possession of
capitalist industry with the answer: "Let us first decide
whether we want collective ownership; if we do we shall
devise the best method of bringing it about that we can."
When that stage has been passed, and they are called upon
to formulate plans for the realization of the principle of
collective ownership, the Socialists have to consider the
circumstances existing in each particular case. They are
not called upon to socialize all the means of production and
exchange at once, but a single branch of industry in a par-
ticular place, or a single public service. The proposal is to
municipalize this lighting plant or that telephone service,
or to nationalize the railways or a particular industry, as
the case may be.
Broadly speaking, all the methods of bringing about
collective ownership ultimately rest upon competition, con-
fiscation or compensation. That is to say, either society
must enter into competition with the capitalists and com-
pete them out of existence in much the same manner as the
large corporation crushes the small manufacturer by com-
petition, or it must take what it needs by force, without
payment, or it must purchase what it needs. Socialists
are not committed to any one of these principles, nor are
they precluded from adopting either or all of them.
The competitive method : Tired of the extortion and poor
service of a public service corporation, a gas company, for
example, the citizens of a particular municipality decide
that they want a municipally-owned and -operated lighting
plant. The Socialists, elected upon this issue, proceed to
the task of carrying out the will of the people. Either because
the price asked by the company is too high, or because they
find the plant to be antiquated and inadequate, they decide
against purchase. To confiscate the plant entirely is out
of the question, first, because the citizens would not tolerate
it, and second, because the laws of the State or the nation
forbid. The Socialist administration decides, therefore, to
erect a new plant, or perhaps to install an electric lighting
system in place of gas. The company now finds that the
profitable contracts for public lighting are taken from it,
and that the publicly owned electric service is so generally
350 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
used by the citizens that the manufacture of gas is no longer
profitable, and that the value of the plant has been destroyed
by competition. That is one method, applicable in many
instances, but quite inapplicable in others. While it might
be the best method imaginable in the case of a shoe factory,
it might not be at all a good method in the case of a water-
supply system. To build parallel railway lines, for example,
would, in most cases, be a great waste.
Confiscation: It is undoubtedly true that individual So-
cialist speakers and writers have advocated confiscation.
It would be strange if it were otherwise, if reckless, visionary
and impracticable theories and methods were not advocated
from time to time. But, here again, we must judge the move-
ment by its mass, not by its exceptions; by its sanest rather
than by its most foolish advocates. Marx and Engels
personally favored purchase rather than confiscation.
Engels wrote in 1894: "We do not at all consider the indem-
nification of the proprietors as an impossibility, whatever
may be the circumstances. How many times has not Karl
Marx expressed to me the opinion that if we could buy up
the whole crowd it would really be the cheapest way of
relieving ourselves of them."1 There is not a single Socialist
writer of recognized authority in the international movement
who does not agree that there is nothing in the theory of
modern Socialism which precludes the possibility of paying
the owners of property for whatever is taken from them.
Strangely enough, the English Fabian Society seems to be
the only important Socialist body in the world which has
declared against the principle of compensation, and even it
provides for "such relief to expropriated individuals as may
seem fit to the community."2
That Marx was right in regarding purchase as a cheaper
method than forcible confiscation can hardly be doubted
by anyone who has considered the manner in which chat-
tel slavery in this country was abolished. Leaving out of
account the loss of life, the sectional bitterness resulting
from the Civil War, and the disastrous check to the economic
development of the South, the money cost of the abolition
of slavery, including war expenses, pensions and the destruc-
1 Quoted by Vandervelde, Collectivism, p. 155.
* Basis of the Fabian Society. See Ensor, Modern Socialism, p. 359.
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 351
tion of property, far exceeded the money value of the slaves.
Everywhere in actual practice we find the Socialists moving
along the lines of least resistance, and it is safe to say that
Jules Guesde was right when he asserted in the French
Chamber of Deputies that if violent measures are ever
resorted to, the Socialists will not be responsible, that if the
decision is left to the Socialists the transformation will be
a peaceful one accompanied with a minimum of hardship
to the master class.
Liebknecht's view : Perhaps the view most generally held
is that expressed by Wilhelm Liebknecht in the following
brave and generous words:
"Even those who enjoy privileges and monopolies ought
to be made to understand that we do not propose to adopt
any sudden or violent measures against those whose position
is now sanctioned by law, and that we are resolved, in the
interests of a peaceful and harmonious evolution, to bring
about the transition from legal injustice to legal justice
with the greatest possible consideration for the individuals
who are now privileged monopolists.
"We recognize that it would be unjust to hold those who
have built up a privileged situation for themselves on the
basis of bad legislation personally responsible for that bad
legislation, and to punish them personally.
"We especially state that in our own opinion it is the duty
of the State to give an indemnity to those whose interests will be
injured by the necessary abolition of laws contrary to the
common good, in so far as this indemnity is consistent with
the interests of the nation as a whole."1
Compensation: Accepting the view that in the vast
majority of cases, the transformation of capitalist property
to social property will be peacefully accomplished, the expro-
priated owners being compensated, we are at once confronted
with a new difficulty. If bonds are issued for the purchase
of the properties as they are socialized, will not unearned
incomes continue to exist? Will not all the heavy stock-
holders simply become rich bondholders?
To these questions an affirmative answer must be given.
Temporarily, at least, these conditions would exist. Kautsky
and some other Socialist writers in Europe and America
*Cf. JaurSs, Studies in Socialism, p. 89.
352 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
have frankly faced this difficulty. They suggest (1) that
the bonds might be non-interest bearing; (2) that over and
above the amount expended by the State in redeeming
its bonds, there would be a surplus to be employed for the
extension of socialization or any other purpose decided upon
by the people; (3) that when a few of the important indus-
tries have been taken over the bondholders will find it
difficult to invest their surplus incomes profitably; (4) that
by means of a graduated income tax and an inheritance tax
all such unearned incomes could be eliminated within a
reasonable period, without inflicting injury upon any indi-
vidual. Taxation is of course a form of confiscation, but we
have long been accustomed to it, and it makes it possible
for the process of confiscation to be stretched over such a
long period of time as to make it easy and almost unnotice-
able.
Other reforms: We have briefly sketched the main out-
lines of the reform program of present-day Socialism, dealing
more particularly with those which are distinctive and char-
acteristic of the movement, rather than with those reforms
which are more commonly advocated by all liberal-minded
citizens. Socialists everywhere stand for the conservation
of natural resources; for international arbitration; for de-
centralization and a large measure of municipal autonomy;
for the complete democratization of education, making all
education from the kindergarten to the university free;
for the freedom of the press, of assemblage and religious
association; and all other reforms essential to the realiza-
tion of political and industrial democracy.
THE REFORM PROGRAM OF SOCIALISM 353
SUMMARY
1. Socialists desire to make political democracy a reality by establish-
ing universal suffrage, direct legislation and proportional representa-
tion, and by abolishing the upper houses of parliaments.
2. They demand the free administration of justice and the abolition
of the powers of the courts which protect class privilege.
3. They demand State protection for the working class by abolish-
ing child labor, restricting the working .period and establishing State
insurance
4. They desire the extension of public health legislation, and are
generally interested in the promotion of temperance.
5. They wish to substitute direct for indirect taxation, and to bring
about the collective ownership and operation of the principal means of
production and exchange. They generally favor some form of compen-
sation to the expropriated owners of industry.
QUESTIONS
1. Why do Socialists generally favor the initiative and referendum?
2. What are the advantages of proportional representation? Of
the second ballot?
3. Why do Socialists wish to abolish the Senate?
4. How does the present judicial system uphold class rule?
5. What is the Socialist argument for State insurance?
6. Compare the positions of the various Socialist parties on the sub-
ject of alcoholism.
7. Why do Socialists oppose indirect taxation?
8. What are the possible methods of obtaining possession of industry?
9. What are the advantages of the method of compensation?
Literature
Ensor, R. C. K, Modern Socialism, Chaps. XXII-XXVIII.
Hillquit, M., Socialism in Theory and Practice, Part II.
Hunter, R., Socialists at Work, Chaps. VI-VIII.
Jaures, Jean, Studies in Socialism, Chaps. VII-X.
Kautsky, K., Das Erfurter Program (tr. as The Class Struggle).
Liebknecht, W., Socialism, What it is and What it Seeks to Accom-
plish.
Snowden, Philip, Socialism and the Drink Question.
Spargo, John, Socialism (Revised Edition) Chaps. IX-X.
CHAPTER XXV
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED
The objections: A survey of the most important anti-
Socialist literature of the past twenty-five years reveals
the existence of a large body of criticism and objection.
We may conveniently classify this body of criticism and objec-
tion into two main divisions, the first consisting of philo-
sophical and technical criticisms of the theories of Social-
ism, and the second of objections and criticisms directed
against the movement and program of Socialism. The former
have been sufficiently considered in the text: we shall not
further discuss them, therefore, but confine ourselves to the
practical objections.
The most important of these objections to Socialism are:
(1) that it aims at the abolition of all forms of private prop-
erty; (2) that it is a vain attempt to make all men equal,
which is impossible; (3) that it would reduce all to a dead
level; (4) that it would unjustly reward equally the lazy
and the industrious; (5) that it involves spoliation and
confiscation; (6) that it would make the individual the slave
of the State; (7) that it aims at the destruction of the
monogamous family and its substitution by "Free Love";
(8) that it is based upon degrading selfishness and crass
materialism; (9) that it is too altruistic, too noble an ideal
for imperfect human beings to attain; (10) that it is an
attempt to do by sudden revolution what can only be done
by evolution; (11) that it is a "cut and dried scheme"; (12)
that it is a negative criticism merely and has no plan; (13)
that men cannot be made good by legislation; (14) that it
has never been tried; (15) that it has been tried and failed;
(16) that the vast increase in public ownership would lead
to a corresponding increase in corruption and graft; (17)
that it is identical with Anarchism; (18) that it would
involve an immense amount of bureaucratic government;
354
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 355
(19) that it is opposed to all forms of religion; (20) that it
would not provide an effective incentive to insure further
progress; (21) that it would destroy art; (22) that it is
against human nature.
Each of these objections is commonly found in anti-Social-
ist literature. It will be observed that some of them flatly
contradict others. Some of them, therefore, must be invalid.
Socialism may be condemned because it is based upon a
low order of selfishness, but it cannot also be logically con-
demned because it is based upon an impossible altruism.
It may be criticised because it submits no plan or scheme
for the future organization of society, but it cannot be
also condemned because it is a "cut and dried plan." Yet
it is not at all uncommon for these contradictory objections
to be made by the same persons.
Many of the objections already dealt with: The reader
who has read the preceding chapters with a reasonable amount
of care and attention will recognize the fact that a majority
of the objections have been dealt with, either directly or
by implication. In some instances, as, for example, the
objection that Socialism aims at the abolition of the mono-
gamic family, we have dealt with the matter specifically;
in other instances, as, for example, the objection that
Socialism aims to change society through a sudden revolu-
tion, the subject has been sufficiently covered by the dis-
cussion of the fundamental principle of Socialism as a theory
of social evolution. With one or two exceptions, the entire
list of objections has been dealt with to some extent, directly
or indirectly, but a few of the objections deserve a more
careful consideration. We shall confine the present dis-
cussion to these.
(1) Graft and business: The idea that graft is more
general in publicly owned and managed enterprises than in
ordinary commercial business is based upon a complete
misconception. Graft in public business is more readily
detected and more generally exposed than graft in ordinary
commercial life. There are more voluntary detectives.
The opponents of a man or political party in office are
usually anxious to discover evidence of corrupt dealing to
be used against the man or party in political campaigns.
There is far greater publicity of graft in public business than
356 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
of graft in private business, and there is danger that we
come to regard graft as practically synonymous with public
business enterprise.
It is probable that there is far less graft in public business
on an average than in private business, dollar for dollar.
In other words, in public business to the value of a million
dollars there will generally be found less graft and pecula-
tion than in private business of an equal amount. The fact
is that ordinary business life is notoriously honeycombed
with graft. The foreman in a factory grafts upon the wage-
earners under him and takes weekly "gifts" from them.
The superintendent of the factory takes bigger gifts from
those to whom he gives the orders for machinery, raw mate-
rials and other supplies for the factory. The directors of the
corporation owning the factory make contracts on behalf
of the company from which they reap extraordinary advan-
tages, or make sinecures for their relatives. The buyers
for our great mercantile houses receive "presents" and
"courtesies" and "commissions" to which the word graft
may be fairly applied. The same may be said of the
managers of the advertising departments of the railroad
companies, department stores, and other large advertisers.
Newspaper publishers and editors are bribed by large
advertising contracts. In a word, there is hardly a branch
of present-day business in which graft is not prevalent.
Let us admit that where a city owns its street railways
there will be a lot of graft in the form of petty peculations,
commissions on contracts for supplies, padding the payrolls
by creating useless jobs in order to reward political services,
and so on. When we have admitted so much, it remains
to be said that all these things take place where the street
railways are owned by capitalist corporations to an even
larger extent. Again and again managers of public service
corporations have admitted that they dared not refuse
employment to men sent to them by political bosses.
Source of graft in public business : Graft in public busi-
ness, apart from petty stealing, is almost invariably in the
interest of some private business. It is the private business
which flourishes through graft. Take the United States
postal service as an example. In addition to paying for
the transportation of mails a rate far in excess of the rate
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 357
charged to the express companies, the government pays
an annual rent for each car which far exceeds the cost of the
construction of the car, notwithstanding the fact that the
average life of a mail car is more than ten years, and the
further fact that no such rental is paid by the express
companies. The graft in the postal system about which
so much has been written is probably less than that which
might be found in any industrial corporations doing an equal
amount of business. Moreover, it has its roots in private
business. The remedy lies, not in turning the postal system
over to capitalistic enterprise, but in eliminating the private
predatory interests. The railroad graft would be wiped out
by applying the principle of collective ownership to the
railroads. Graft might then find its most important centre
in the business of supplying the railroads with coal, steel
rails, engines, and other supplies. Again the remedy would
lie in the further extension of public ownership and control
to cover these things.
Political corruption: The source of political corruption
is always private business and never public business. At
the national capital and most of the State capitals "lobbies"
are maintained to foster certain interests. What interests
are they? Always the interests of capitalistic business,
never of public business. No city treasury ever has to
provide for a legislative corruption fund, as our railroad,
express and insurance companies have always done. When
legislators are bribed it is always by those who are seeking
to make profit through the adoption of favorable legisla-
tion or through the defeat of unfavorable legislation. Mr.
Lincoln Steffens tells of $50,000 being paid for the vote of
a municipal councillor in St. Louis and of numerous other
examples of corruption, all of which were due to the efforts
of a few men to make enormous profits at the expense of the
rest of the community. Bribes may be direct — that is the
old, crude way — or they may be indirect and take the form
of large fees or salaries for nominal services, or of friendly
offers to "invest" a few hundred dollars with the assurance
of many thousands of dollars profit, and so on.
Graft and corruption, then, arise from the capitalist
exploitation of public necessities. "Socialism implies (a)
widespread public interest and criticism, fatal to graft; (6)
358 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
the overthrow of that class interest which produces graft;
(c) the end of that private business which nourishes parasiti-
cally through the medium of graft and the plunder of the
public treasuries."1
(2) Socialism and Anarchism: The Socialist movement is
the greatest organized opposing force to Anarchism in the
world. It is not an accident that in those countries where
Socialism is strongest Anarchism is weakest, and vice versa.
Both Socialism and Anarchism proceed from a criticism of
the existing social order, and there is much similarity in
their arraignment. They equally condemn the capitalist
system on account of the poverty and vice, the misery and
degradation which result from it. But at this point the
Anarchist and the Socialist part company, and assume utterly
irreconcilable positions. Socialism, as the word implies,
is based upon the fundamental idea of social interest and
responsibility, Anarchism on the opposite idea of individual
interest and responsibility. Socialism regards society as
supreme, Anarchism regards the individual as supreme.
The Anarchist regards society as merely an aggregation of
individuals, the Socialist regards society as something more,
just as a house is something more than an aggregation of
bricks and mortar. The Anarchist believes that society
cannot rightly do what the individual cannot rightly do,
and that as no individual can rightly control another indi-
vidual, society cannot rightly control the actions of any
individual. The Socialist holds that this is not the doctrine
of liberty, but of tyranny; that it places the will of a single
individual above that of all other individuals.
While the Anarchist regards law as being essentially
tyrannical, the Socialist believes that the widest liberty is
often secured through the law. Many an Anarchist has
enjoyed the privilege of free speech, for example, simply
because he was under the protection of the law. From the
point of view of the Anarchist who, after all, only carries
the principle of laissez faire to its logical conclusion, our
educational acts, factory acts, public health laws, and so on,
are all tyrannical. From the point of view of the Socialist
such manifestations of the collective will and law all widen
1 Spargo, The Socialists, Who They Are and What They Stand For,
p. 107.
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 359
the bounds of freedom, by repressing initiative upon low
planes and forcing its development upon higher planes.
The Anarchist contends that all laws are bad. The Socialist,
on the other hand, holds that law is, per se, neither good
nor bad. Laws which give the few power over the many-
are bad because they are anti-social. But laws which make
for social well-being are good and desirable. The conflict
between the two systems of thought, therefore, is fundamen-
tal and irreconcilable.
(3) Socialism and bureaucracy: When we say that Social-
ism regards the interest of society as supreme, we do not
mean that it is less concerned than Anarchism for individual
liberty. The Socialist ideal is not a huge bureaucracy,
placing all human relations under the police powers of the
State. On the contrary, the Socialist is just as solicitous
for the freedom of the individual as any Anarchist. Of
course, such a bureaucracy as many people fear might be
developed, but it would not be a necessary result of the
socialization of industry. Most modern Socialists believe
that one of the results of Socialism would be the nullification
of a vast body of laws and that the amount of control which
the government of the Socialist State would have to exercise
over the individual will be far less than we are now accus-
tomed to.
It must be remembered that a vast amount of government
is involved in the regulation of capitalistic property and
enterprise in our present social system. Experience has
shown that for the restraint of capitalistic enterprise a
tremendous amount of legislative and administrative effort
is required. No one knows just how many of our laws would
become obsolete with the socialization of industry, but it
can hardly be doubted that the body of such laws would be
very large. As it is to-day every fresh abuse of capitalism
calls forth a new installment of legislation restrictive of
personal liberty, and frequently humiliating and irritating
to a degree that is oppressive. Armies of prying officials
are engaged in the attempt to enforce these laws. Legislators
are busy grinding out new laws, judges keep busy interpreting
them and trying to enforce them. Bureaucratic government
is not a thing of the future. It is already an established fact.
We are to-day living under bureaucratic government. Every
360 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
fresh attempt to "regulate" monopolies intensifies the bu-
reaucratic character of our government. Modern capital-
ist industry could not be tolerated under any other form
of government. The Socialist view is that the socialization
of industry would inevitably do away with a large part of
the laws and the machinery for their enforcement which
make a bureaucracy of what was once a relatively simple
democratic government.
(4) Socialism and religion: One of the objections which
is most frequently urged against Socialism is its alleged
antagonism to religion. It is obvious that the collective
ownership of the means of production and exchange, which
is the practical program of Socialism, is not incompatible
with a belief in God, the immortality of the soul, the doc-
trine of the atonement or the doctrine of the immaculate
conception. The objection must, therefore, be based upon
some other ground than that of the practical program of the
Socialist movement.
The Socialists themselves declare that Socialism is not
antagonistic to religion. There is hardly a Socialist party
in the world which has not adopted some statement to the
effect that it does not in any manner concern itself with
questions of religious belief or affiliation. In the Socialist
movement of the United States there are orthodox Jews
and Christians, Catholics and Protestants, Unitarians and
Trinitarians, Methodists and Baptists, Christian Scientists
and Atheists, Spiritualists and Agnostics. Men and women
prominent in religious life hold positions of leadership in
the party. In this respect the Socialist Party does not differ
from any other political party. That many of the leaders
of the Socialist movement have been free-thinkers is no
more to be regarded as a proof that Socialism and religion
are incompatible than the fact that prominent leaders in
other parties have been free-thinkers.
The opposition to evolution: If we trace the idea that
religion and Socialism are antagonistic back to its source
we shall find that it rests upon the thought that the Marxian
theory of social evolution is incompatible with a belief in a
Supreme Being. In considering this fact we must consider
also the fact that the same idea was long held concerning
the theory of evolution itself. When Darwin and Wallace
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 361
announced their great theory it immediately became the
storm centre of the intellectual strife of the modern
world. Science and dogma entered upon a long and bitter
battle. No more bitter attacks have been made upon
Socialism in the name of religion than were made upon
the Darwinian theory. The attacks made upon Professor
Huxley and other leading Darwinians were not less bitter
and unchristian than those now made upon Socialists.
Gradually the new science made its way, and the conflict
has now to a large extent subsided. A man is no longer
refused church fellowship and communion because he
declares his belief in evolution.
The conflict which was waged over the theory of evolu-
tion ranged practically all the vigorous intellects of the time
upon one side or the other. Both sides believed that the
new theory would prove fatal to religion. Both sides believed
that dogma and religion were one and the same. Now, the
modern scientific Socialist movement arose at this time, and,
quite naturally, partook of the temper and spirit of that
science with which it felt itself to be so closely allied. It
was inevitable, therefore, that the Socialist leaders should
declare themselves to be against that religion which they,
equally with their religious opponents, believed to be opposed
to true science. Thus, the association of atheism and
Socialism may be fairly described as an outcome of the
confluence of two of the main streams of nineteenth-century
thought, social radicalism and natural science, against which
the Christian Church pitted itself. As we recede from that
period of discussion and conflict, and see the issues in a
clearer light and a truer perspective, we realize that the
Socialists in declaring that there is nothing in the Socialist
philosophy or program which is antagonistic to religious
faith, are taking the only logical position. To a man who
still believes that the world was made in six days of twenty-
four hours, and that the Great Creator specially devised all our
social institutions, any philosophy of social progress which
admits the failure of any institution or concedes the possibility
of improvement through human agencies, must seem to be
antagonistic to his religion. Happily, however, religion is
generally free from that narrow bondage. One of the most
remarkable phenomena attending the development of Social-
362 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
ism in recent years is the breaking down of the old mis-
understanding which kept so many sincere and earnest
men and women of religious faith and affiliation aloof from
the Socialist movement.
(5) The question of incentive: The fear that Socialism
would not provide an effective incentive to insure the steady
progress of mankind is based upon two fundamental assump-
tions, namely: that a Socialist society will reward all men
equally, irrespective of the quality of their service to society,
and that men will not strive to do their best unless they are
spurred on by the hope of some special reward. We have
already seen that the first of these assumptions is unwar-
ranted; that Socialism does not of necessity imply equal
rewards for unequal services. There is nothing in the
philosophy of Socialism which is incompatible with the
offering of any kind of- special reward for special social
service.
But even if we conceive the contrary to be the case, that
under Socialism every human being must receive exactly
the same income, it does not follow that men will have no
incentive to labor with zeal, to make inventions, to create
great works of art, to serve the State with diligence. It is
not true that greed is the only effective incentive to human
action, that but for the desire for gain no great service to
society would ever be performed, no inventions or discoveries
made, no masterpieces of art created. Such a view of the
motive forces of human conduct is contrary to all the evi-
dence we have. In our present society the incentive of gain
is stronger perhaps than at any time in history; success is
measured in terms of money; everything is priced. The
struggle for money is the most striking fact of life. Surely,
under these conditions, if at all, the incentive of greed must
prevail over all others. But such is not the case; there are
many men and women at work whose incentive is not
material gain.
Other incentives: First of all, there is the incentive of
joy in work. Under capitalism, this, one of the most efficient
incentives of human action, is greatly checked and weakened.
The laborer is very generally divorced from that interest
in his work which was the secret of the old craftsmanship.
Nevertheless, there are many thousands of workers whose
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 363
greatest incentive is the joy of labor, to whom the old motto
Laborare est orare has a vital meaning. Among teachers of
all ranks love of their chosen profession forms a strong
incentive and often keeps them from taking up more profit-
able work. In the medical profession, again, joy in successful
work is perhaps the most powerful of all incentives. The
doctor who is worthy of his profession will fight a subtle
and dangerous disease in a laborer's cottage with the same
energy, courage and skill as if he were in a mansion. The
combat calls forth the irresistible human passion for con-
quest, for supremacy. Even if no other human being knew
of it, the satisfaction of having won where many others fail
would alone be a recompense. When there is a genuine
freedom of choice of occupation, and economic conditions
no longer force men into wrong places, to be "square pegs
in round holes," and when the laborer is no longer oppressed
by the sense that he is being exploited in order that others
may live in idle luxury, this incentive will be greatly strength-
ened.
Closely allied to the satisfaction and joy in successful
labor is the instinct and passion for creation, for discovery
and for self-expression which we find in the inventor, the
scientist and the artist. A great inventor like Edison could
not refrain from inventing. To invent things is a passion
which dominates life. An Edison would be happy with a
modest income and freedom to experiment and invent, but
miserable with the income of a billionaire if prohibited from
inventing and experimenting. Few inventors have become
rich as a result of their inventions, most of them have died
poor. If the chance of gaining great wealth constituted the
only incentive for invention there would be few inventions,
for there are very few lines of human activity which offer
less assurance of financial reward. But men cannot help
inventing. Just as the chick must break the shell and set
itself free, so must the creative impulse in man find expression.
Lack of leisure, educational opportunities and experimental
facilities — in short, the conditions of poverty and overwork
-—kill and stultify inventive genius. Wealth cannot make
inventors, but poverty can kill them. What is true of the
inventor is true also of the scientist, the philosopher, the
artist and the poet. By making educational opportunities
364 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
and experimental facilities common and free to all, by
insuring ample leisure to each individual, Socialism would
liberate an amount of creative genius which would result in
progress in every direction.
For material reward men have done much, but they have
never done their best. All the greatest achievements of
mankind have been consummated without hope of material
reward. Has the greatest statesmanship of the world been
inspired by greed? Has it not rather been inspired by such
motives as love of country, devotion to an ideal and the
desire for approbation and honor? Has the desire for money
inspired most of the great artists and poets? Have they not
rather done their best work when inspired simply by love of
beauty, love of doing and love of the esteem of their fellow
men? Have the Newtons, the Darwins and the Spencers of
the world's history been inspired by greed? Have they not
rather been inspired by a passion for knowledge and love
of truth? When we ask ourselves these questions and others
like them we are driven to the conclusion that, even to-day,
greed is not the most powerful of human motives.
Incentive under Socialism: There is no material reward
which capitalist society can offer an inventor which Socialist
society could not offer if it were necessary to do so. Under
Socialism, however, it would be possible for society to offer
rewards infinitely more alluring than money. In all ages
symbols of honor of trifling intrinsic value have been valued
above riches. Thus the Greek athlete and the Greek poet
struggled for the crown of olive leaves as they would not
have struggled for riches. Thus, too, the British soldier
values the little iron cross given "for valor" as a priceless
possession. Such symbols are valued because they bring
honor and esteem. The Socialist State could well create
its own aristocracy of great achievement.
Collective invention: The great bed-rock inventions of
humanity were invented under tribal communism. What
inventions have been of greater value to the world than the
boat, the sail, the rudder, the lever, the wheel? But no
man knows by whom they were invented. Every invention
is in reality the assembling of many other inventions, a
collective product. The socialization and combination
which has taken place in industry has been to a very large
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 365
extent applied to the organization of invention and scientific
discovery. Our great manufacturing plants, such as the
General Electric Works at Schenectady, have their own
departments of invention, great laboratories in which salaried
inventors are continuously employed. The invention of new
industrial processes has become a business. A manufacturer
of cotton goods, for example, finds that certain fabrics do
not dye well. Formerly, under such conditions, he would either
have had to discard the fabric or experiment with various
dyeing substances until his difficulty was overcome. Now-
adays he refers his problem to a firm of experimental chem-
ists. The State, also, has gone into the business of organized
experiment and invention. Year after year inventions and
discoveries which save many millions of dollars to the
American people are made by employees of the U. S. Depart-
ment of Agriculture. If the invention is such as to warrant
its being patented, a patent is taken out in the name of the
inventor and then dedicated to the government. The in-
ventor obtains no pecuniary reward other than promotion
with a slight increase in salary, except from royalties upon
the use of the invention in foreign countries. The invention
of a safe and satisfactory stamping ink for marking inspected
carcasses that have passed the Government meat inspectors
is said to be worth nearly half a million dollars a year to the
Government, but Mr. Dorsett, the inventor, got only a
promotion with an advance in salary amounting to about
$1,000 a year. Dr. Cushman's invention of a process of
manufacturing steel wire which will not rust when exposed
to the weather is another such invention of almost incal-
culable value. But the inventor, being already in receipt
of the highest salary authorized by the law for a person
working in his department, got no financial reward whatever.
In like manner the Government employees of the Public
Health and Marine Hospital Service are constantly mak-
ing important discoveries concerning the nature, origin and
methods of combatting disease. Medical research is being
organized collectively in this manner as well as through
great organizations like the Rockefeller Institute. Thus
we have already the beginnings of a system of socialized
invention, research and discovery, which the Socialist State
may well develop.
366 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
(6) Socialism and art: Of all the objections to Socialism
perhaps the least worthy of serious consideration is the
objection that it will destroy art. It rests upon the assump-
tion that the State is to dictate to every individual what
he shall do; it will choose certain boys and girls and say:
"These are to be the sculptors and painters and composers
of to-morrow." In other words, the source of the objection
is a deep-rooted belief that Socialism must crush out all
individuality, all forms of individual initiative and expression.
As we have seen, this concept is entirely unwarranted.
It was not without abundant warrant that the great
English poet and artist, William Morris, regarded Socialism
as the only hope for the future development of art. In the
first place, an environment more unfavorable to the pro-
duction of great and worthy art than modern capitalism
creates it would be difficult to imagine. Where the great mass
of the workers must labor without joy or interest in their
work, and be for the most part mere servitors of machines,
there can be no great art, except in individual cases which
but serve to reflect the lack of art in life generally. What
is most truly wonderful and inspiring about Greek sculpture,
for example, is not the dazzling heights attained by a few
great sculptors, as, for example, by Phidias, but the wonder-
ful level attained by the ordinary workmen, as reflected,
for instance, in the wonderful funeral reliefs in the National
Museum at Athens. Art must have been an essential part
of the lives of those workmen, otherwise the work of their
hands would not have been so wonderful. In like manner,
what impresses one about the marvellous medieval cathedrals
and churches is the evidence upon every hand that in those
days art was not something apart from life, to be enjoyed
by a few, but a part of the life of every artisan.
Surely, the Socialist is justified in claiming that, just as
art cannot flourish under commercialism, it must flourish
when the means of the common life have been brought
under common control, when none are overworked to main-
tain others in idleness, when there is leisure for all and
freedom from want and the fear of want. It is worthy of
note that the Golden Age of Greek art was that period when
the slave-based communism of Athens was most highly
developed. During the period of one hundred and fifty-two
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 367
years, 490 B. C. to 338 B. C, the dramas of iEschylus,
Sophocles and Euripides and the sculptures of Phidias and
Praxiteles were produced, and the Parthenon itself was
designed by Ictinus and Calli crates. These developments
were possible only because Athens was rich and her citizens
were free from economic care and had leisure to gratify
their constantly increasing passion for beauty. Not until
the great poverty problem has been solved, and the oppor-
tunities of life are socialized will art really nourish again.
It is not without its significance that on the one hand the
great modern artists are nearly all in sympathy with the
Socialist movement, and that, on the other hand, they
have been best understood by the people. When the critics
mocked Millet, the radical workingmen understood; when
Meunier portrayed the human struggle, it was the radical
section of the working class that understood. No one who
knows the life of the working people and their aspirations
can doubt that the conditions under which they live and
labor are responsible for the repression of an infinite amount
of beauty which they would otherwise express.
(7) As to human nature: Those who urge against Social-
ism that human nature must be changed before its ideals
can be realized have usually a low idea of human nature.
They seem, moreover, to regard human nature as something
very definite, certain qualities and instincts in every human
being, unchanging from age to age. The fallacy is very
obvious. In a Fifth Avenue club men are polite and cour-
teous. That is human nature. Outside of the gates of a
great factory in times of industrial depression, men will fight
over jobs as so many hungry dogs would fight over a bone.
Under such conditions, men seem to become brutes, but
that, too, is only human nature.
So far as we can speak of human nature at all, it consists
of obedience to the fundamental instinct of self-preservation,
and adaptation to environment. The superstitious fear of
the African savage in the presence of a great calamity, and
the scientific work of the enlightened man who sets about
the task of remedying the evil wrought, both alike illustrate
human nature in different stages of development.
It is to that fundamental instinct of self-preservation that
Socialism makes its appeal. It is perhaps the deepest and
368 ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM
profoundest instinct in humanity to which the Socialist
appeals. The secret of all human progress lies in the fact
that men are forever striving to eliminate suffering and
want. Goaded by a desire to obtain more of good in return
for less labor and pain and sacrifice, mankind has progressed
thus far. It is to that desire in the vast majority that Social-
ism makes its appeal. So far from admitting that Socialism
depends upon change in human nature, the Socialist con-
tends that Socialism must come unless the fundamental
human instincts and passions which we call human nature
are changed.
SOME OBJECTIONS TO SOCIALISM CONSIDERED 369
SUMMARY
1. Private business is honeycombed with graft, and the principal
sources of graft in public business come from its relations with private
business. Socialists contend that public ownership would remove the
chief source of graft.
2. Socialism and anarchism are fundamentally opposed to each other
in both theory and tactics.
3. Socialists do not wish a huge bureaucracy. On the contrary,
they wish to abolish the bureaucracy of capitalist society.
4. Socialism is not incompatible with religion and does not concern
itself in any way with religious belief.
5. Socialism would not do away with any socially desirable incentive,
but it would add to the strength of the highest incentives which inspire
mankind.
6. Socialism appeals to the most fundamental instincts of human
nature, and Socialists contend that Socialism must win unless human
nature is changed.
QUESTIONS
1. Give the Socialist answers to objections 1-15 inclusive by refer-
ence to the preceding chapters.
2. In what forms does graft exist in private business?
3. Upon what grounds do Socialists base their belief that Socialism
will be relatively free from graft?
4. Contrast the principles of Anarchism with those of Socialism.
5. What is the attitude of Socialists towards bureaucracy?
6. What is the source of the idea that religion and Socialism are
antagonistic?
7. What are the chief incentives to human activity?
8. What is the effect of commercialism upon art?
Literature
Kelly, E., Twentieth Century Socialism, Book T, Chap. III.
Spargo, J., The Socialists, Who They Are and What They Stand For,
Chap. XVI.
Vail, C. H., Principles of Scientific Socialism, Chap. XIII.
Vandervelde, E., Collectivism, Chap. VI.
INDEX
Acts, The, 188 n.
Adler, Victor, 280, 321, 346.
Advertising, 21.
Agents, 23.
Agricultural Experiment Stations,
215.
Agricultural Stage, 92.
Agriculture, Concentration in, 11,
27, 162, 163; Department of, 365;
Labor in, 343; under Socialism,
238.
Alcoholism, 345-347.
Alexander II of Russia, 303.
Alexander VI, Pope, 244.
Alsace-Lorraine, 203.
America: class distinction in, 101;
industrial concentration in, 159-
160. See also United States.
American Federation of Labor, 295-
296, 299-300, 329.
American Steel and Wire Company,
169, 170.
American Tobacco Company, 175,
178.
American Underwriter, The, 32.
Amsterdam, International Congress
at, 8, 263, 278.
Anabaptists, 241.
Anarchism: and coercion, 218; and
Socialism, 358-359; and the fam-
ily, 243; in America, 295; in Hol-
land, 308; in France, 275; in
Spain, 310.
Ancient Society (Morgan), 71 n.
Animal Society, 66.
Anseele, Eduard, 282.
Arbitration, International, 352.
Argentina, 312.
Aristotle, 210.
Arkwright, Richard, 94.
Armenia, 312.
Art, 219, 366-367.
Athens, 187, 210, 367.
Australia, 96, 182, 261, 312.
Austria: and Poland, 310-311;
Socialism in, 264, 279-281 ; Social-
ist policies in, 344, 346.
Aveling, Edward, 286.
Aveling, Eleanor Marx, 286.
B
Babeuf, FraDCois-Noel, 191, 275.
Babylonia, 73, 93.
Bachelors' Companies, 94.
Bachofen, 249.
Bacon, Francis, 190.
Baden, 271.
Bakunin, Michael, 257, 262, 283,
302.
Ballot, The, 190, 339.
Banking, 22.
Barbarism, 71.
Barcelona, 310.
Barnave, 191.
Basiliade, The, 191.
Bax, E. Belfort, 243, 286, 287, 337.
Bazard, Armand, 256.
Bebel, August: and Bismarck,
322; Biographical, 273; and Ei-
senach Party, 267; on Monar-
chy, 8 ; and parliamentary tactics,
319-320; on the State, 213; on
the family, 243; quoted, 213.
Beesby, E. S., 286.
Belgian Labor Party, History, 281;
on abolition of the Senate, 340;
on agricultural labor, 343; on
public health, 345; on alcoholism,
346; on taxation, 347, 348.
371
372
INDEX
Belgium: Socialism in, 264, 281-
282; cooperation in, 282, 326;
proportional representation in,
339; second ballot in, 339; public
ownership in, 348.
Bell, Richard, 289.
Bellamy, Edward, 198, 293.
"Benevolent Feudalism," 66, 195.
Bernstein, Eduard, 88, 108, 158, 159,
271.
Berge, Prof., 307.
Berger, Victor L., 297, 298.
Besant, Mrs. Annie, 286, 291.
Bismarck, 203, 266, 268, 269; quot-
ed, 321-322.
Blacklist, The, 113.
Blanc, Louis, 234, 255, 260, 275.
Bland, Hubert, 291.
Blanqui, Louis Auguste, 275.
Blanquists, The, 277.
Bobrikoff, Gen., 305.
Bohemia, 280.
Bohm-Bawerk, 137.
Boissel, 191, 275.
Bonanza Farms, 27, 163.
Booth, Charles, 31.
Boston, 31.
Boycott, The, 113.
Briand, Aristide, 279.
Brisbane, Albert, 292.
British Columbia, 312.
British Socialist Party, 292.
Britons, 104.
Brook Farm, 256, 292.
Brookline, 36.
Brousse, Paul, 277.
Brussels, 257, 263.
Buecher, Karl, 91.
Bulgaria, 312.
Bureaucracy, 239, 359.
Burns, John, 286-287.
Burrows, Herbert, 286.
Canals, 215, 216, 237.
Capital, nature of, 145.
Capital (Marx), 162 n.; writing of,
258; quoted, 7, 118, 128, 144 n.f
153, 157.
Capitalism, gains under, 13; stages
of, 157.
Capitalist class, 8, 104, 107-108,
111-113.
Carey, Henry C, 124 n.
Carpenter, Edward, 286.
Cartwright, Edmund, 94, 195.
Celibacy, 241-242.
Charles I. of England, 190.
Charles II. of England, 191.
Charities and the Commons, 41 n.,
42 n.
Charity, 41, 216.
Chartism, 255, 285.
Chernyschefsky, Nicholas, 301, 302.
Child labor, in England, 95, 236;
poverty and, 37; prevention of,
39, 216; Socialist parties on, 342;
and vice, 247.
Chili, 312.
China, 312.
Christianity, 188, 202, 241-242, 243,
244.
Christian Socialist Party, 280.
Cicero, 205.
City of the Sun, The, 190.
Civilization, 72-74.
Civil War, American, 87, 97.
Clan, The, 69-70.
Clark, C. C, quoted, 170.
Class, Definition of, 102.
Class Divisions: Antiquity of,
103; character of, 8-10, 104; econ-
omists on, 105; St. Simon on,
191; Socialist ideal and, 205, 207;
and reform program, 323.
Class Struggle theory, The, 100 et
Cabet, Etienne, 191, 197, 256, 257,
275.
Cabot, John, 86.
Cambria Steel Company, 169.
Campanella, Tomasso, 190.
Canada, 312.
Class consciousness, 110.
Classes and Masses (Mallock), 102.
Clemenceau, Georges, 279.
Coats, J. & P., Company, 174.
Code de la Nature (Morelly), 191.
Coercion, 217-218.
Colchester, 181.
Collective ownership, 348, 352.
INDEX
373
Collectivism (Vandervelde), 350 n.
Columbus, 86.
Commodity, definition of, 119.
Common Sense of the Milk Question,
The (Spargo), 15 n.
Commonweal, The, 287.
Commune, the Paris, 276, 285.
Communism: Primitive, 70, 92; and
Socialism, 259; among early
Christians, 188; in Athens, 187; of
Campanella, 190; of Owen, 195;
sex, 242-244.
Communist League, 256, 260, 261.
Communist Manifesto, publication
of, 63, 258; and the Communist
League, 256; description of, 258-
259; draft of, 258; and the Inter-
national, 261; ideal of , 202; crit-
icism of, by Bernstein, 108-109;
on reform, 317; on degradation of
workers, 317-318; program in,
322; on taxation, 348; on capi*
talism, 13 n.; quoted, 100, 226,
248, 317-318.
Compensation, 348, 349, 350-351.
Competition, 19 et seq., 349-350.
Comrade, The, 310 n.
Confiscation, 348, 349-350.
Conquest of Bread, The (Kropotkin) ,
218 n.
Conservation of natural resources,
352.
Contribution to the Critique of Polit-
ical Economy, A (Marx), 258;
quoted, 77, 78.
Cooperation, 229, 231, 282, 325, 326.
Copenhagen, Congress at, 263, 290,
312.
Costa, Andrea, 283.
Courts in the United States, 113.
Crane, Walter, 291.
Credit, monopoly of, 237.
Crime, 39, 216, 218.
Crises, 25.
Crompton, Samuel, 94.
D
Da Gama, Vasco, 86.
Dangerous work, 235, 236.
Darwin, Charles, 19, 63, 258, 360.
Debs, E. V., 297.
Decentralization, 352.
De Gallifet, Gen., 278.
De Leon, Daniel, 296-297.
Democracy, 217, 221.
Democratic Federation, the, 286.
Democratic Party, the, 335.
De Molinari, 275.
Denmark, 307.
De Paepe, Cajsar, 282.
Deville, Gabriel, 276, 277.
Devine, Edward T., quoted, 41, 42.
De Vries, Hugo, 66.
Die Gleichheit, 274.
Die Heilige Familie (Marx), 77.
Die Republik der Arbeiter, 293.
Die Voraussetzungen des Sozialismus
(Bernstein), 159 n., 271.
Direct appropriation, stage of, 92.
Direct legislation, 338.
Disagreeable work, 235-236.
Disease, 32-34, 40.
Distilling Company of America,
The, 169.
Distilling and Cattle Feeding Com-
pany, The, 179.
Divorce, 244-246.
Documentary History of American
Industrial Society, 327 n.
Domestic system, the, 94, 111.
Drainage, 215.
Dreyfus case, 278.
Drysdale, Charles R., 36.
E
Economic Interpretation of History,
The (Seligman), 78 n.
Economic interpretation of history,
The, 64, 76 et seq.
Economic stages, the, 91 et seq.
Edison, Thomas A., 363.
Education, 220, 352.
Edwards, Jonathan, 209.
Egypt, 73.
Eisenach, Congress at, 267.
Eisenach Party, the, 267, 273, 331.
Elements of Political Economy (Nich-
olson), 119 n.
Elliot's Debates, 340 n.
374
INDEX
Encyclopedia of Social Reforms
(Bliss), 40 n.
Encyclopedists, the, 275.
Enqels, Frederick: biographical,
257-258; and the Communist
Manifesto, 259; and Germany,
266; and the Independent Labor
Party, 288; and Kautsky, 273;
and the Social Democratic Feder-
ation, 287; quoted, 62-63, 78, 88,
100, 213, 226, 248-250, 288, 317-
318, 350.
England: agricultural stage in, 93;
and Belgian Socialism, 326; class
struggle in, 255; death duties in,
165; factory legislation in, 195;
conditions at time of More, 189;
combination in, 174; handicraft
stage in, 93; industrial revolution
in, 94; industrial reform in, 236;
national economy in, 97; pov-
erty in, 31; shareholders in, 158;
Socialism in, 285-292; trade
unions in, 326-328. See Great
Britain.
England for All (Hyndman), 286.
Employers' associations, 112, 233.
Equality of opportunity, 207.
Erfurt, Congress at, 269.
Erfurt program, 207, 320; quoted,
269.
Erickson, Dr., 307.
Ethics, 82.
Eugenics, 241.
Evolutionary Socialism (Bernstein),
159 n., 271.
Exceptional laws, 268.
Family, The, 67, 68-69, 240-251.
Farmer, the, under Socialism, 227.
Farmers' program, 243.
Farr, William, 32.
Federal incorporation, 176.
Ferrer, Francisco, 310.
Feudalism, 93, 104, 214.
Finland, 264, 305-306, 347.
Fisher, Irving, 32.
Forbes, James, 34.
Fourier, Charles: his life and
theories, 192-195; and Owen,
197; and French Socialism, 275;
and modern Socialism, 61, 62, 63,
201, 202.
Fourierism, description of, 193-195;
decline of, 256; in the United
States, 292.
France, class struggle in, 255; and
Belgian Socialism, 326; Socialism
in, 264, 275-279; at time of St.
Simon, 191; tobacco monopoly
in, 182.
Franco-Prussian War, 267.
Frank, Dr., 271, 272.
Franklin, Benjamin, 124 n.
"Free love," 240.
Free Soil Party, 292.
Free will, 81.
Fremont, John C, 240.
French Revolution, 8, 191.
French Socialist Party, history, 276-
279; program, 340, 343, 345, 347.
Fritzsche, Wilhelm, 330.
Fabian Society, The, 289, 290-291,
330, 350.
Factory inspection, 216, 342.
Factory legislation, 195, 197, 342-
343.
Factory system, 95, 112.
Fall River, 36.
False Industry and its Antidote (Fou-
rier), 192.
Galicia, 311.
Gary, E. H., 176.
Gates, John W., quoted, 170.
General Electric Company, 365.
General German Workingmen's As-
sociation, 294.
General strike, 284, 299; in Sweden,
306.
General Workingmen's Association,
266, 267.
George, Henry, 286, 295, 348.
Genesis, 92.
Geneva, 262, 276, 309.
INDEX
375
,German Social Democracy: his-
tory , 267-274; American Social-
ist Party and, 299; and alcohol-
ism, 346 ; and emancipation of the
wage-workers, 207; as peace or-
ganization, 203; and public
health, 345; and social insurance,
344; tactics and program, 319-
324; and taxation, 347; and
trade unions, 330-332.
German Workingmen's Club, 257.
Germany: and Austria, 279-280;
and Belgian Socialism, 326; sec-
ond ballot in, 339; shareholders
in, 159; Socialism in, 264, 266-
275.
Gerry, Elbridge T., 246 n.
Ghent, cooperatives at, 282.
Giddings, F. H., quoted, 66, 67, 235.
Gladstone, W. E., 285.
Glasgow, 181.
Gotha, Congress at, 267, 268, 269.
Gotha Program, quoted, 268.
Gothenburg system, 347.
"Graft," 181, 355-358.
Great Britain: cooperation in,
325; Chartism in, 255; public
ownership in, 180, 181, 348; So-
cialism in, 285-292. See Eng-
land.
Great man theory, 76, 85.
Great plague, 189.
Greece, 47, 73, 312
Greek household, 96.
Greeley, Horace, 292.
Greenback Party, 294.
Grutliverein, 309.
Guaranties of Harmony and Freedom,
The (Weitling), 256.
Guesde, Jules, 267, 268, 269, 351.
Guilds, 93-94, 214.
Guizot, 77.
Hammurabi, Code of, 93.
Handicraft stage, 93.
Hardie, J. Keir, 288, 289.
Hargreaves, James, 86, 94.
Harriman, Job, 297.
Harrington, James, 190.
Health, public, 344-345.
Hebrew Patriarchs, 92.
Hegel, 77.
Heine, Heinrich, 257.
Henry VIII. of England, 188.
Herzen, Alexander, 301, 302.
Hillquit, Morris, 301.
History of Trade Unionism (Webb),
326 n., 327 n.
Holding company, 172.
Holland, 308, 309.
Holt, Hamilton, 204 n.
Homeric Poems, 72.
Hours of labor, 342-343.
Household economy, 96.
Howells, William Dean, 199.
Human nature, 367-368.
Hungary, 311.
Hunter, Robert, 32, 46 n.
Huysmans, Camille, 282.
Hyndman, Henry M., 286, 287.
Iglesias, Pablo, 310.
Impossibilists, 277.
Incentive, 362-365.
Income taxation, 347.
Independent Labor Party, 287-290,
338, 346.
India, 86.
Indiana, 195.
Indians, American, 70, 72.
Individualism, 53 et seq, 209, 239.
Industrial revolution, the, 94, 221.
Industrial stage, the, 95.
Industry, direction of, 233.
Infant schools, 196.
Inheritance, 45; taxes, 347.
Initiative and Referendum, 338.
Injunctions, 114, 342.
Inquiry into the Nature and Origin of
Public Wealth (Lauderdale), 136 n.
Insurance, 23; social, 216, 342-344.
Intercollegiate Socialist Society, 301.
Integralists, 284.
International Alliance, 256, 257.
International relations, 219.
International Socialist Bureau, 263,
282, 290.
376
INDEX
International Workingmen's As-
sociation: history, 261-263; in
America, 294; in Belgium, 282;
in Denmark, 307; in England,
285; in France, 275; reform pro-
gram, 317-323; and trade unions,
327; and war, 205.
Internationalism, 202.
Interstate Commerce Act, 215.
Invention, 364-365.
Ireland, 69.
Irish Land League, 285.
"Iron Law of Wages," 14, 147, 268.
Iroquois Confederacy, 70.
Irrigation, 215.
Israelites, 70, 80.
Italian Socialist Party, 283-284, 345.
Italy: public ownership in, 182;
Mazzini in, 256; Socialism in,
283-285.
J
Jahve, 80.
Japan, 182, 312.
Jaures, Jean, 8, 277, 278, 279.
Jedrzejowski, B. A., quoted, 310.
Jena, Congress at, 271 n., 274 n.
Jenks, J. W., 179.
Jesuits, in Paraguay, 190.
Jesus, 188, 192.
Jevons, W. S., 133; quoted, 135-
136; 138.
Jowett, Prof., 241.
Judges, election of, 341.
Judicial veto, 113, 341.
Jukes, the, 209.
Justice, administration of, 219-220,
340-341.
Justice (London), 287.
Juvenile movement, 274, 300-301.
Kant, Immanuel, 205.
Karl Marx, his Life and Work (Spar-
go), 331 n.
Katayama, Sen, 312.
Kautsky, Karl, 273; quoted, 147,
161, 351-352.
Kay, John, 94.
Kelly, Edmond, 238.
Kentucky, tobacco planters in, 28.
Kingdom of Heaven, the, 188.
Knights of Labor, 295, 328.
Kolokol, 302.
Kropotkin, Peter, 20, 218.
Kuyper, Dr., 309.
Labor, meaning of, 128; abstract,
128.
Labor checks, 238.
Labor Party, the, 289-290.
Labor power, 146 et seq.
Labor Problems (Adams & Sumner),
26 n.
Labor Representation Committee,
288, 289.
Labriola, Arturo, 284.
Lafargue, Paul, 277.
Lammenais, quoted, 206.
Lancashire, 98.
Land, 238.
Lasalle, Ferdinand: biographical,
266-267; and Iron Law of Wages,
14, 147; and Hungary, 311.
Lasallean Socialism, 266, 268, 320.
Lauderdale, Lord, 135.
Lavroff, Peter, 302.
Law, 22, 84.
League of the Just, 256.
Ledebour, George, 274.
L'EgalitS, 276.
Legien, Karl. 274.
Leisure and Luxury, 44 et seq.
L'HumanitS, 278.
Liberty, under Socialism, 218; of
occupation, 235.
Liebknecht, Karl, 274.
Liebknecht, Wilhelm, biographical,
273, 274; and Eisenach Party,
267; quoted, 110, 212, 319, 320,
351.
U Industrie (St. Simon), 191.
Lipton's, 158.
Lockout, the, 113.
London, founding of International
at, 261; provisioning of, 19; So-
cialist Congress at, 263; universal
exhibition at, 261 ; work of Booth
in, 32.
INDEX
377
Looking Backward (Bellamy), 198,
293.
Louis Philippe, 255, 260.
Luther, Martin, 80, 240, 273.
Luxemburg, Rosa, 274.
Luxury, social effect of, 50.
M
Mably, 275.
Madison, James, quoted, 340
Magdeburg, Congress at, 271.
Maison du Peuple, 282.
Mallock, W. H., 102; quoted, 128.
Malloney, Jos. F., 297.
Malon, Benolt, 277.
Manchester Canal, 158.
Mann, Tom, 286, 287.
Manorial Economy, 93.
Marriage, 240 et seq.
Marshall, John, 341.
Marx, Heinrich, 257.
Marx, Karl: biographical, 257-
259; and the Communist Mani-
festo, 258; and St. Simon, 62, 191;
and the International, 261, 263;
and Germany, 266; first declared
Socialist, 275; protest against
Gotha program, 268; and Lieb-
knecht, 273; influence of, 61; his
philosophical synthesis, 63; his
sociological viewpoint, 118; and
economic interpretation of history,
76-79, 88; and theory of value,
116-119; on Social Reform, 317-
318; on tactics, 322-323; on
unionism, 327-331; on means of
socialization, 350; quoted, 7, 12,
13, 76-77, 107, 118, 128, 144 n.,
157, 206, 226, 248.
Massachusetts, 297-298.
Matchett, Charles H., 295.
Materialistic conception of history,
76. See Economic Interpretation
of History.
Mayas, the, 72.
Mazzini, Guiseppe, 256, 261, 286.
Menger, Anton, 133.
Meunier, 367.
Mexican War, 86.
Mexico, Indians of, 72.
Middle class, the, 10, 108-109.
Militarism, 22, 203-205.
Mill, John Stuart, quoted, 82, 106,
124.
Millerand, Etienne, 277, 278.
Millet, Jean Francois, 367.
Milwaukee, 298.
Mir, 71.
Misery and its Causes (Devine),
quoted, 41.
Modern Socialism (Ensor), 350 n.
Molkenbuhr, Herman, 274.
Mommsen, Theodor, 203.
Money, 131, 237-238.
Monopoly, 26, 28, 118 etseq.;= price,
138.
More, Sir Thomas, 188, 198, 199.
MoreUy, 191, 212, 275.
Morgan, Lewis H., 70, 71.
Morris, William, 198, 243, 286, 287,
366.
Mosaic Law, 93.
Most, John, 295.
Municipal autonomy, 352.
Mutation theory, the, 66, 221.
N
Napoleon, 85.
National Economy, 97.
National workshops, 255.
New Atlantis (Bacon), 190.
New Harmony, 62, 195.
New Industrial World (Fourier), 192.
New International, the, 263.
New Lanark, 195, 196.
New York, State, 70; City, 81, 246,
263, 294.
New York Times, 204 n.
New York Tribune, 292.
New Zealand, 182.
News from Nowhere (Morris), 198.
Nicholson, J. S., 119.
Nieuwenhuis, Domela, 203, 308.
Nihilism, 302.
Normans, 104.
Norse Sagas, 72.
North American Review, 179 n.
Norway, 307, 346.
Nouveau Christianisme, Le (St. Si-
mon), 191.
378
INDEX
O'Brien, Bronterre, 286.
Oceana, 190.
Old age, poverty and, 38; pensions,
342, 344.
Olivier, Sidney, 291
Opportunism, 299, 318-319, 323.
Origin of Species, The, 358.
Origin of the Family, Private Prop-
erty, and the State, The (Engels),
249, 250.
Over-production, 24.
Owen, Robert, 61-62, 191, 195,
199, 259.
Owenism, 256, 285.
Panama Canal, 215, 237.
Paraguay, 190.
Parcels Post, 215.
Paris, Congress at, 263; Commune,
276, 285.
Pastoral stage, 92.
Paul, quoted, 210.
Pauperism, 34, 35, 36.
Peasants' Revolt, 189.
Pennsylvania Railroad, 162.
People, The, 296.
Perfectionists, the, 241.
Perovskaia, Sophia, 303.
Persia, 86, 312.
Peru, 72.
Petty, Sir William, quoted, 123.
Phalanx, the, 193. See Fourier.
Phelps, Edward Bunnell, 32.
Philanthropy, 56.
Plato, 187, 240, 241.
Poland, 280, 310-311.
Political corruption, 181, 357-358.
Pool, the, 172.
Populist Party, 294.
Portugal, 312.
Possibilists, 277.
Postal Savings Banks, 215.
i Hunter), 27 n., 46 n.
Poverty, 30-43.
Preferential Ballot, 340.
Present Distribution of Wealth in the
United States, The (Spahr), 165 n.,
166 n.
Price, 130 et seq.
Principles of Economics (Seligman),
134 n.
Principles of Political Economy
(Carey), 124 n.
Principles of Political Economy (J.
S. Mill), 106 n., 124 n.
Principles of Political Economy and
Taxation (Ricardo), 124.
Principles of Sociology (Giddings),
67 n.
Principles of Sociology (Spencer) , 10.
Private industry, under Socialism,
227-231.
Private property, 68, 70, 71; under
Socialism, 221, 224, 227.
Progress and Poverty (George) , 286.
Proletariat, the, 9, 109, 114.
Proportional Representation, 338-
339.
Prostitution, 40, 246-247.
Protection of workers, 318, 342.
Protestant Revolt, 80, 87, 240, 244.
Proudhon, Pierre J., 257, 262, 275.
Prussia, incomes in, 158; Lasalle
Association in, 266, 267; manu-
facturing establishments in, 159;
and Poland, 310; State Socialism
in, 182. See Germany.
Public Health, 344-345.
Public ownership, extent of, 180-
183; and "Graft," 355-358; in-
crease of, 215-216; methods of ac-
quiring, 348-352; under Social-
ism, 224, 227.
Q
Quarterly Journal of Economics, 61 n.
Radical Socialist Party, 279.
Rand School of Social Science, 301.
Recall, the, 338.
"Red" unions, 273.
Referendum, the, 338, 340.
INDEX
379
Reform Bill of 1832, 255.
Reformists, 284.
Religion, economic interpretation of
history and, 79; and marriage,
241; and prostitution, 246; ori-
gins of, 68; and Socialism, 360-
362.
Remarks and Facts Relative to the
American Paper Money (Frank-
lin), 124 n.
Remmel, Val., 297.
Remuneration of Labor, 233, 235.
Rent, 238.
Report of the United States Industrial
Commission, 169 n., 170 n.
Report on National Vitality (Fisher),
32 n., 34 n.
Republic, The, of Plato, 187, 190,
240, 241 n.
Republican Party, 240.
Restraint of Trade, 174.
Revisionism, and the Class Struggle
Theory, 108 ; and economic inter-
pretation of history, 88; Fabian
Society and, 291; in Germany,
271-272; and theory of concen-
tration, 158.
Revolution, American, 86.
Revolution of 1848, 259-260.
Revolutionism, 318-319, 323.
Ricardo, David, quoted, 123, 125,
147.
Road to Power, The (Kautsky), 147 n.
Roman Catholicism, 80, 244, 246,
307.
Roman Empire, 80.
Rousseau, Jean Jacques, 275.
Rowntree, B. S., 31.
Ruskin, John, 55.
Russia, Socialism in, 301-305; and
Finland, 305-306; and Poland,
310-311.
Ruthenians, 280.
S
Saint-Simon, biographical, 191-192;
and French Socialism, 275; and
Fourier, 192; and Socialist The-
ory, 61.
Saint-Simonism, 191-192, 256.
Sanial,"Lucien, 160, 296.
Sanitation, 216.
Sassulich, Vera, 302.
Savagery, 71.
Saxons, 104.
Saxony, 267.
Science, 219.
Scotland, clan system in, 69.
Second Ballot, the, 338-339.
Seligman, E. R. A., quoted, 134.
Senate, abolition of, 340.
Servant, the, and Society, 48-49.
Servia, 312.
Shakers, the, 241.
Shaw, G. Bernard, 290.
Sherman Anti-Trust Act, 85, 175.
Single Tax, the, 294, 348.
Slavery, beginning of, 92, 103; in
Greece, 47, 73.
Smith, Adam, 16; quoted, 105, 123.
Social Classes, 8-10, 100 et seq.
Social Democracy of America, 293,
297.
Social Democratic Federation, 286,
287, 290, 292.
Social Democratic Labor Party
(Holland), 308-309.
Social Democratic Party (Austria),
280.
Social Democratic Party (Denmark),
307.
Social Democratic Party (Finland),
305-306.
Social Democratic Party (Germany) ,
268-274. See German Social De-
mocracy.
Social Democratic Party (Great
Britain), 290, 291, 292, 338, 340.
Social Democratic Party (Holland),
308.
Social Democratic Party (Norway),
307.
Social Democratic Party (Russia),
303, 304.
Social Democratic Party (Sweden),
306-307.
Social Democratic Party (Switzer-
land), 309.
Social Demokraten, 307.
Social Evolution, 65-73, 213, 222.
Social mind, the, 67.
380
INDEX
Social Party of New York and vi-
cinity, 294.
Social Reform, 317-335.
Social Revolution, The (Kaustky),
161 n.
"Social Workshops," 255.
Socialism: and Anarchism, 358-
359; and Art, 366-367; and bu-
reaucracy, 359-360; and Com-
munism, 259; and the family,
240-251; definition of, 5; essen-
tial principle of, 224-225; and
incentive, 362-365; and human
nature, 367-368; and Karl Marx,
61; numerical strength, 4, 264;
and the principle of evolution, 65;
and religion, 360-362; scientific,
64; and State regulation, 176;
and trade unionism, 326-327.
Socialism (Mallock), 128 n.
Socialism before the French Revolu-
tion (Guthrie), 189 n.
Socialism Inevitable (Wilshire), 161
n.
Socialism, its Growth and Outcome
(Morris &Bax), 243.
Socialism, Utopian and Scientific
(Engels), 214 n.
Socialist Labor Party (Spain), 310.
Socialist Labor Party (United
States), history, 294-296; and
trade unions, 328-330; program,
332.
Socialist League, 287.
Socialist Party (France). See French
Socialist Party.
Socialist Party (British), 292.
Socialist Party (Italy), 283-284, 345.
Socialist Party (United States):
history, 297-300; and Democratic
Party, 332; Farmers' program,
343; and alcoholism, 346; and
hours of labor, 343; and the judi-
ciary 341; program, 337; and
L0 health, 345; and reform,
332; and social insurance, 344;
and taxation, 347; and trade
unions, 330.
Socialist Revolutionary Party (Rus-
. 308, 304, 305.
Socialist Sunday Schools, 300, 301.
Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance,
296, 329.
Socialists, The, Who They Are and
What They Stand For (Spargo),
358 n.
Socialization, means of, 348, 352.
Sociology, Principles of (Giddings),
67 n.
Sociology, Principles of (Spencer),
quoted, 10.
South Africa, 312.
South America, 96, 312.
South Carolina, 245.
Sozial Demokrat, 269.
Sozialistische Akademiker, 78 n.
Spahr, Charles B., 165, 166.
Spain, 310.
Spanish American War, 87, 310.
Spence, Thomas, 286.
Spencer, Herbert, 63; quoted, 10.
Standard of Life, 15.
Standard Oil Company, 168, 172,
175, 178.
State Socialism, 182.
Statute of Laborers, 189.
Steffens, Lincoln, 357.
Strike, the, 112, 113.
Students' Circles, 276.
Studies in Socialism (Jaurfes), 261,
351 n.
Stuttgart, Congress at, 263.
Sudekum, Albert, 274.
Suffrage, Equal, 334, 337.
Surplus-Value, 148, 155.
Sweden, cedes Finland, 305; pro-
portional representation in, 339;
public ownership in, 182; Social-
ism in, 306-307.
Switzerland, 182, 309.
Syndicalism, 284, 299, 308.
Taff Vale Decision, 288.
Taft, Wm. H., 176.
Taxation, 216, 347-348.
Taylor, Helen, 286.
Temperance problem, 345-347.
INDEX
381
Terrorism, 302, 303-304.
Theory of the Four Movements, The
(Fourier), 192.
Theory of Political Economy, The
(Jevons), 135 n., 136 n., 138 n.
Thome, William, 290.
Town Economy, 97.
Trade Unions: in the Class Strug-
gle, 111-112; and direction of in-
dustry, 233 ; freedom of combina-
tion, 342; and Socialism, 326-330;
in Germany, 272-273; in Eng-
land, 287-290; in Hungary, 311;
in France, 376 ; in Russia, 303 ; in
Spain, 310; in the United States,
295, 299.
Trade Unionism, History of (Webb),
326 n., 327 n.
Transitional State, the, 221.
Traveller from Altruria, A (Howells),
199.
Treatise on Domestic and Agricultural
Association (Fourier), 192.
Treatise on Taxes and Constitutions
(Petty), 123 n.
Trepoff, Gen., 302.
Tribe, the, 70.
Troelstra, Pieter J., 308.
Trust, the, 172.
Trusts of To-day (Montague), 169 n.
Turati, Philip, 284.
Turkey, 86, 312.
Tumvereine, 293.
Twentieth Century Socialism (Kelly),
238 n.
U
Unemployment, 27, 342.
United Labor Party, 295.
United States: Department of
Agriculture, 365; public owner-
ship in, 180; Socialism in, 264,
292-301, 328-330; trade unions
in, 327, 328-330; wars of, 86.
United States Steel Corporation, 169,
170, 171, 173, 176.
Utopia, The (More), 188-190, 198.
Utopian experiments, 194-195, 292-
293.
Vaillant, Eduard, 278.
Value, 116 et seq., 234.
Value, Price and Profit (Marx), 137
n., 147 n.
Vandervelde, Emile, 282, 326,
346.
Van Kol, Henry H., 308.
Veblen, Thorstein, quoted, 61.
Verestchagin, V. V., 204.
Vice, 247.
Violence, 113, 216.
Vital Statistics (Farr), 32 n.
Viviani, 279.
Volders, Jean, 282.
Volkstribun, 2, 93.
Von Vollmar, 320, 323.
Vooruit, 282.
Voyage en Icarie (Cabet), 197-198.
W
Wage Slavery, 9-10.
Wages, 14, 147-150, 234-235.
Waldeck-Rousseau, 278.
Waldenses, the, 241.
Wallace, Alfred Russell, 63, 360.
War, 203-205.
Watt, James, 195.
Wealth, advantages of, 45-46; con-
centration of, 164-166.
Wealth of Nations (Smith), 15 n.,
106 n., 123 n.
Webb, Sidney, 291.
Webb, Mrs. Sidney, 291.
Weitling, Wilhelm, 256, 258, 293.
Wells, H. G., 199.
"Whisky Trust," 169, 170, 179.
Whitney, Eli, 94.
Wing, Simon, 295.
Wisconsin, Phalanx, 292; Socialism
in, 297-298.
Wolff, Wilhelm, 257, 258.
Woman Labor, 216, 236, 343.
Woman Suffrage, 334, 337.
Woman under Socialism (Bebel),
241 n., 243.
382 INDEX
Women's Movement, American, Y
300; German, 274; Finnish, 306; (1A7 „ „ . 0-0
International, 263. 'Yellow" umons, 273.
York, 31.
Working Men's Association, 255. Young Europe Association, 256.
Workingmen's Party of the United Young Germany Society, 256.
States, 294. Young Italy, 256.
World as It Is and as It Might Be, Yucatan, Mayas of, 72.
The (Weitling), 256.
World economy, 97. Z
Wright, Carroll D., 244. Zetkin, Clara, 274, 321, 323.
Printed in the United States of America.
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