ALBERT R. MANN 
 LIBRARY 
 
 New York State Colleges 
 
 OF 
 
 Agriculture and Home Economics 
 
 Cornell University 
 
HDl311.ori9l'i™""'-'«i"-i>.rary 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013873876 
 
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THE COMPLETE WORKS 
 OF HENRY GEORGE 
 
 OUR LAND 
 
 AND 
 
 LAND POLICY 
 
 SPEECHES, LECTURES AND 
 MISCELLANEOUS WRITINGS 
 
 Garden City New York 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 191 1 
 
361776 
 
 Copyright, 1871, by 
 Hbnrt George 
 
PEEPATOKY NOTE. 
 
 This volume is made up of selections from the miscella- 
 neous written and spoken utterances of Henry George not 
 otherwise appearing iu book form. It does not purport 
 to contain all of this class of his productions. To make 
 such a publication would require several volumes like 
 this. The present volume is intended to contain only such 
 speeches, lectures, sermons, essays and other writings as 
 serve to exhibit Mr. George's varied powers of tongue and 
 pen and set forth in many of its phases his philosophy of 
 the natural order. 
 
 The most important matter in this collection is that 
 with which it opens — "Our Land and Land Policy" — given 
 to the public for the first time since its original limited 
 publication in 1871, when its author was only locally 
 known in San Francisco as a newspaper writer. It en- 
 gaged, with other work, four months in the writing, and 
 was Mr. George's first attempt to set forth the essentials 
 of his philosophy. Of it he said long afterwards : "Some- 
 thing like a thousand copies were sold, but I saw that 
 to command attention the work must be done more thor- 
 oughly." The work was done more thoroughly in "Prog- 
 ress and Poverty" eight years later. To that celebrated 
 book "Our Land and Land Policy" bears the relation of 
 acorn to oak. Mr. George towards the end of his life con- 
 templated republishing the little work, believing that it 
 might interest many whom the larger book would not at 
 
first reach. Death intervened between the plan and its 
 carrying out. Mr. George thought of making such changes 
 in "Our Land and Land Policy" as in his opinion would 
 fit it more nearly to the present times, but as his was 
 the only hand that could properly do this, it is here pre- 
 sented precisely as he published it in 1871. 
 
 Henkt George, Je. 
 
 New Yokk, December, 1900. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Our Land and Land Policy 1 
 
 the lands of the united states ... 3 
 the lands of california . . . .36 
 
 land and labour 75 
 
 the tendency of ouk present land policy . 89 
 what our land policy should be . . .98 
 
 The Study of Political Economy . . . 133 
 
 The American Republic 155 
 
 The Crime of Poverty 185 
 
 Land and Taxation 319 
 
 "Thou Shalt Not Steal" 241 
 
 To Workingmen 263 
 
 "Thy Kingdom Come" 277 
 
 Justice the Object — Taxation the Means . . 295 
 Causes of the Business Depression . . . 323 
 Peace by Standing Army 333 
 
OUR LAND AND 
 LAND POLICY 
 
THE LANDS OP THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 EXTENT OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. 
 
 ACCORDING- to the latest report of the Commissioner 
 ul\. of the General Land Ofl&ee, the public domain not yet 
 disposed of amounted on the 30th of June, 1870, to 
 1,387,732,209 acres. 
 
 These figures are truly enormous, and paraded as they 
 always are whenever land enough for a small empire is 
 asked for by some new railroad company, or it is pro- 
 posed to vote away a few million acres to encourage 
 steamship building, it is no wonder that they have a daz- 
 zling effect, and that our public lands should really seem 
 "practically inexhaustible." For this vast area is more 
 than eleven times as large as the great State of California ; 
 more than six times as large as the united area of the 
 thirteen original States ; three times as large as aU Europe 
 outside of Eussia. Thirteen hundred and eighty-seven 
 millions of acres! Room for thirteen million good-sized 
 American farms; for two hundred million such farms as 
 the peasants of France and Belgium consider themselves 
 rich to own; or for four hundred million such tracts as 
 constituted the patrimony of an ancient Roman! Yet 
 when we come to look closely at the homestead possibili- 
 
 3 
 
4 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 ties expressed by these figures, their grandeur begins to 
 melt away. In the first place, in these 1,387,733,209 acres 
 are included the lands which have been granted, but not 
 yet patented, to railroad and other corporations, which, 
 counting the grants made at the last session, amount to 
 about 200,000,000 acres in round numbers; in the next 
 place, we must deduct the 369,000,000 acres of Alaska, 
 for in all human probability it will be some hundreds if 
 not some thousands of years before that Territory will 
 be of much avail for agricultural purposes; in the third 
 place, we must deduct the water surface of all the land 
 States and Territories (exclusive of Alaska), which, tak- 
 ing as a basis the 5,000,000 acres of water surface con- 
 tained in California, cannot be less than 80,000,000 acres, 
 and probably largely exceeds that amount. Still further, 
 we mnst deduct the amount which will be given under 
 existing laws to the States yet to be erected, and which 
 has been granted, or reserved for other purposes, which in 
 the aggregate cannot fall short of 100,000,000 acres; leav- 
 ing a net area of 650,000,000 acres — ^less than half the 
 gross amount of public land as given by the Commis- 
 sioner. 
 
 When we come to consider what this land is, the mag- 
 nificence of our first conception is subject to still further 
 curtailment. For it includes that portion of the United 
 States which is of the least value for agricultural pur- 
 poses. It includes the three greatest mountain chains of the 
 continent, the dry elevated plains of the eastern slope of 
 the Eocky Mountains and the arid alkali-cursed stretches 
 of the great interior basin; and it includes, too, a great 
 deal of land in the older land States which has been 
 passed by the settler as worthless. Colorado, Wyoming, 
 Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico and Arizona, 
 though having an abundance of natural wealth of another 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 5 
 
 kind, probably contain less good land in proportion to 
 their area than any other States or Territories of the 
 Union, excepting Alaska. They contain numerous val- 
 leys which with irrigation will produce heavy crops, and 
 vast areas of good grazing lands which will make this sec- 
 tion the great stock range of the Union; but the propor- 
 tion of available agricultural land which they contain is 
 very small. 
 
 Taking everything into consideration, and remembering 
 that by the necessities of their construction the railroads 
 follow the water courses and pass through the lowest val- 
 leys, and therefore get the best land, and that it is fair 
 to presume that other grants also take the best, it is not 
 too high an estimate to assume that, out of the 650,000,000 
 acres which we have seen are left to the United States, 
 there are at least 200,000,000 acres which for agricultural 
 or even for grazing purposes are absolutely worthless, and 
 which if ever reclaimed will not be reclaimed until the 
 pressure of population upon our lands is greater than is 
 the present pressure of population upon the lands of 
 Great Britain. 
 
 And, thus, the 1,387,732,209 acres which make such 
 a showing in the Land Office Eeports come down in 
 round numbers to but 450,000,000 acres out of which 
 farms can be carved, and even of this a great proportion 
 consists of land which can be cultivated only by means 
 of irrigation, and of land which is only useful for 
 grazing. 
 
 This estimate is a high one. Mr. E. T. Peters, of the 
 Statistical Bureau, estimates the absolutely worthless land 
 at 241,000,000 acres. Senator Stewart, in a recent 
 speech, puts the land fit for homes at one third of the 
 Tjfhole — 332,000,000 acres by his figuring, as he makes 
 no deductions except for Alaska and the Texas Pacific 
 
6 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 grant. Assmning his proportion to be correct, and ad- 
 mitting that the railroads, etc., take their proportion of 
 the bad as well as of the good land, we would have, after 
 making the proper deductions, but 316,000,000 acres of 
 arable land yet left to the United States. 
 
 But taking it at 450,000,000 acres, our present popu- 
 lation is in round numbers 40,000,000, and thus our "lim- 
 itless domain," of which Congressmen talk so much when 
 about to vote a few million acres of it away, after all 
 amounts to but twelve acres per head of our present 
 population. 
 
 OUR COMING POPULATION. 
 
 But let us look at those who are coming. The amount 
 of our public land is but one factor; the number of those 
 for whose use it will be needed is the other. Our popu- 
 lation, as shown by the census of last year, is 38,307,399. 
 In 1860 it was 31,443,321, giving an increase for the 
 decade of 6,864,078, or of a fraction less than twenty-two 
 per cent. Previous to this, each decade had shown a 
 steady increase at the rate of thirty-five per cent., and 
 this may be considered the rate of our normal growth. 
 The war, with its losses and burdens, and the political, 
 financial and industrial perturbations to which it gave 
 rise, checked our growth during the last decade, but in 
 that on which we have now entered, there is little doubt 
 that the growth of the nation will resume its normal rate, 
 to go on without retardation, unless by some such disturb- 
 ing influence as that of our great Civil War, until the 
 pressure of population begins to approximate to the pres- 
 sure of population in the older countries. 
 
 Taking, then, this normal rate as the basis of our cal- 
 
UNITED STATES LAJJTOS 7 
 
 culatioiij let us see what the increase of our population 
 for the next fifty years will be: 
 
 Our population will te in An increase in that decade of 
 
 1880 51,714,989 13,407,590 
 
 1890 69,815,335 18,100,246 
 
 1900 94,250,567 24,435,332 
 
 1910 127,238,267 32,987,700 
 
 1920 ....... 171,771,610 44,533,593 
 
 This estimate is a low one. The best estimates here- 
 tofore made give us a population of from 100,000,000 to 
 115,000,000 in 1900, and from 185,000,000 to 200,000,- 
 000 in 1920, and there is little doubt that the Census of 
 1870, on which the calculation is based, does not show the 
 true numbers of our people. But it is best to be on the 
 safe side, and the figures given are sufficiently imposing. 
 In truth, it is difficult to appreciate, certainly impossible 
 to overestimate, the tremendous significance of these fig- 
 ures when applied to the matter we are considering. 
 
 By 1880, the end of the present decade, our population 
 will be thirteen millions and a half more than in 1870 — 
 that is to say, we shall have an addition to our popula- 
 tion of more than twice as many people as are now living 
 in all the States and Territories west of the Mississippi 
 (including the whole of Louisiana), an addition in ten 
 years of as many people as there were in the whole of the 
 United States in 1832. 
 
 By 1890 we shall have added to our present population 
 thirty-one and a half millions, an addition equal to the 
 present population of the whole of Great Britaiu. 
 
 By the year 1900 — twenty-nine years off — we shall have 
 an addition of fifty-six milUons of people ; that is, we shall 
 have doubled, and have increased eighteen millions beside. 
 
8 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICT 
 
 By 1910, the end of the fourth decade, our increase 
 over the population of 1870 will be eighty-nine millions, 
 and by 1920 the increase will be nearly one hundred and 
 thirty-four millions; that is to say, at the end of a half 
 century from 1870 we shall have multiplied four and a 
 half times, and the United States will then contain their 
 present population plus another population half as large 
 as the present population of the whole of Europe. 
 
 What becomes of our accustomed idea of the immensity 
 of our public domain in the light of these sober facts? 
 Does our 450,000,000 acres of available public land seem 
 "practically inexhaustible" when we turn our faces towards 
 the future, and hear in imagination, in the years that are 
 almost on us, the steady tramp of the tens of millions, 
 and of the hundreds of millions, who are coming? 
 
 Vast as this area is, it amounts to but .thirty-three acres 
 per head to the increased population which we will gain in 
 the present decade; to but fourteen acres per head to the 
 new population which we will have in twenty years ; to but 
 four acres per head to the additional population which we 
 will have by the close of the century ! 
 
 We need not carry the calculation any further. Our 
 public domain will not last so long. In fact, if we go 
 ahead, disposing of it at the rate we are now doing, it will 
 not begin to last so long, and we may even count upon 
 our ten fingers the years beyond which our public lands 
 will be hardly worth speaking of. 
 
 Between the years 1800 and 1870 our population in- 
 creased about thirty-three millions. During this increase 
 of population, besides the disposal of vast tracts of wild 
 lands held by the original States, the Government has dis- 
 posed of some 650,000,000 acres of the public domain. 
 We have now some 450,000,000 acres of available land 
 left, which, in the aggregate, is not of near as good a qual- 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 9 
 
 ity as that previously disposed of. The increase of popu- 
 lation will amount to thirty-two millions in the next twenty 
 years! Evidently, if we get rid of our remaining public 
 land at the rate which we have been getting rid of it since 
 the organisation of the General Land Office, it will be all 
 gone some time before the year 1890, and no child born 
 this year or last year, or even three years before that, can 
 possibly get himself a homestead out of Uncle Sam's farm, 
 unless he is willing to take a mountain-top or alkali patch, 
 or to emigrate to Alaska. 
 
 But the rate at which we are disposing of our public 
 lands is increasing more rapidly than the rate at which 
 our population grows. Over 200,000,000 acres have been 
 granted during the last ten years to railroads alone, while 
 bills are now pending in Congress which call for about all 
 there is left. And as our population increases, the public 
 domain becomes less and less, and the prospective value 
 of land greater and greater, so will the desire of speculators 
 to get hold of land increase, and unless there is a radical 
 change in our land policy, we may expect to see the public 
 domain passing into private hands at a constantly increas- 
 ing rate. When a thing is plenty, nobody wants it; when 
 it begins to get scarce, there is a general rush for it. 
 
 It will be said : Even if the public domain does pass into 
 private hands, there will be as much unoccupied land as 
 there otherwise would be, and let our population increase 
 as rapidly as it may, it will be a long time before there 
 can be any real scarcity of land in the United States. 
 This is very true. Before we become as populous as Prance 
 or England, we must have a population, not of one hun- 
 dred millions or two hundred millions, or even five hun- 
 dred millions ; but of one thousand millions, and even then, 
 if it is properly divided and properly cultivated, we shall 
 not have reached the limit of our land to support popula- 
 
10 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 tion. That limit is far, far off — so far in fact that we 
 need give ourselves no more trouble about it than about the 
 exhaustion of our coal measures. The danger that we 
 have to fear, is not the overcrowding, but the monopolisa- 
 tion of our land — ^not that there will not be land enough 
 to support all, but that land will be so high that the poor 
 man cannot buy it. That time is not very far distant. 
 
 THE PROSPECTIVE VALUE OF LAND. 
 
 Some years ago an Ohio Senator^ asserted that by the 
 close of the century there would not be an acre of average 
 land in the United States that woidd not be worth fifty 
 dollars in gold. 
 
 Supposing that our present land policy is to be con- 
 tinued, if he was mistaken at all, it was in setting the time 
 too far off. 
 
 Between the years 1810 and 1870, the increase in the 
 population of the United States was no greater than it will 
 be between the years 1870 and 1890. Coincident with this 
 increase of population we have seen the value of land go 
 up from nothing to from $20 to $150 per acre over a 
 much larger area than our public domain now includes of 
 good agricultural land. 
 
 And as soon as the public domain becomes nearly monop- 
 olised, land will go up with a rush. The Government, 
 with its millions of acres of public land, has been the 
 great bear in the land market. When it withdraws, the 
 bulls will have it their own way. That ther? is land to 
 be had for $3.50 per acre in Dakota lessens the value of 
 New York farms. Because there is yet cheap land to be 
 
 1 Ben "Wade. 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 11 
 
 had in some parts of the State, land in the Santa Clara 
 and Alameda valleys is not worth as much. 
 
 And in considering the prospective value of land in the 
 United States, there are two other things to be kept in 
 mind: First, that with our shiftless farming we are ex- 
 hausting our land. That is, that year by year we require 
 not only more land for an increased population, but more 
 land for the same population. And, second, that the ten- 
 dency of cheapened processes of manufacture is to increase 
 the value of land. 
 
 LAND POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 The best commentary upon our national land policy is the 
 fact, stated by Senator Stewart, that of the 447,000,000 
 acres disposed of by the Government, not 100,000,000 have 
 passed directly into the hands of cultivators. If we add 
 to this amount the lands which have been granted, but 
 not delivered, we have an aggregate of 650,000,000 acres 
 disposed of to but 100,000,000 acres directly to cultivators 
 ■ — ^that is to say, six sevenths of the land have been put into 
 the hands of people who did not want to use it themselves, 
 but to make a profit (that is, to exact a tax) from those 
 who do use it. 
 
 A generation hence our children will look with astonish- 
 ment at the recklessness with which the public domain has 
 been squandered. It will seem to them that we must have 
 been mad. For certainly our whole land policy, with here 
 and there a gleam of common sense shooting through it, 
 seems to have been dictated by the desire to get rid of 010? 
 lands as fast as possible. As the Commissioner of the 
 General Land OfEce puts it, seemingly without conscious- 
 ness of the sarcasm involved, "It has ever been the anx- 
 
12 OTJR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 ious desire of the Government to transmute its title to the 
 soil into private ownership by the most speedy processes 
 that could be devised." 
 
 In one sense our land dealings have been liberal enough. 
 The Government has made nothing to speak of from its 
 lands, for the receipts from sales have been not much more 
 than sxifficient to pay the cost of acquisition or extinguish- 
 ment of Indian title, and the expenses of surveying and of 
 the land office. But our liberality has been that of a 
 prince who gives away a dukedom to gratify a whim, or 
 lets at a nominal rent to a favoured Farmer-General the 
 collection of taxes for a province. We have been liberal, 
 very liberal, to everybody but those who have a right to our 
 liberality, and to every importunate beggar to whom we 
 would have refused money we have given land — ^that is, 
 we have given to him or to them the privilege of taxing 
 the people who alone would put this land to any use. 
 
 So far as the Indians, on the one hand, and the English 
 proprietaries of Crown grants, on the other, were con- 
 cerned, the founders of the American Eepublic were clearly 
 of the opinion that the land belongs to him who will use 
 it ; but farther than this they did not seem to inquire. In 
 the early days of the Government the sale of wild lands 
 was looked upon as a source from which abundant 
 revenue might be drawn. Sales were at first made in 
 tracts of not less than a quarter township, or nine square 
 mUes, to the highest bidder, at a minimum of $2 per acre, 
 on long credits. It was not until 1820 that the TniniTrmm 
 price was reduced to $1.25 cash, and the Government con- 
 descended to retail in tracts of 160 acres. And it was 
 not until 1841, sixty-five years after the Declaration of 
 Independence, that the right of pre-emption was given to 
 settlers upon surveyed land. In 1862 this right was ex- 
 tended to unsurveyed land. And in the same year, 1862, 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 13 
 
 the right of every citizen to land, upon the sole condition 
 of cultivating it, was first recognised by the passage of 
 the Homestead law, which gives to the settler, after five 
 years' occupancy and the payment of $22 in fees, 160 acres 
 of minimum ($1.25) or 80 acres of double-minimum 
 ($2.50) land. 
 
 Still further in the right direction did the zeal of Con- 
 gress for the newly enfranchised slaves carry it in 1866, 
 when all the public lands in the five Southern land States 
 — Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, and Arkansas 
 — were reserved for homestead entry.^ 
 
 But this growing liberality to the settler has been accom- 
 panied by a still more rapidly growing liberality to specu- 
 lators and corporations, and since the pre-emption and 
 homestead laws were passed, land monopolisation has gone 
 on at a faster rate than ever. Without dwelling on the 
 special means, such as the exercise of the treaty-making 
 power, by which large tracts of land in some of the West- 
 ern States have been given to railroad corporations and 
 individuals for a few cents per acre, let us look at the gen- 
 eral methods by which the monopolisation of Government 
 land has been and is being accomplished. 
 
 PUBLIC SALE AND PEIVATB BNTET. 
 
 The first method adopted for the disposal of public lands 
 was their sale to the highest bidder. This theory has never 
 been abandoned. After lands have been surveyed, they 
 may, at any time, be ordered to be offered at public sale. 
 This public sale is only a matter of form, purchasers at 
 
 iThis reservation has been broken through by the passage of the 
 Southern Pacific Railroad bill, which gives 5,000,000 acres to a branch 
 load in Louisiana, which would be sure to be constructed without any aid. 
 
14 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 more than the miniinuin price seldom or never appearing. 
 But the offering makes an important difference in the dis- 
 position of the lands. Before being offered at public sale 
 they are open only to pre-emption and homestead entry — 
 that is, to actual settlers, in tracts not exceeding 160 acres. 
 After being offered, they are open to private entry — ^that is, 
 they may be purchased by any one in any amount, at the 
 minimum price, $1.35 per acre. 
 
 Whether by the misrepresentations of speculators or the 
 inadvertence of the authorities, public sales, as a general 
 thing, have been ordered before the line of settlement had 
 fairly reached the land, and thus the speculator has been 
 able to keep in advance, picking out the choice lands in 
 quantities to retail at a largely advanced price, or to hold 
 back from improvement for years. 
 
 By means of cabins built on wheels or at the intersection 
 of quarter section lines, and false affidavits, a good deal of 
 land grabbing has also been done under the pre-emption 
 and homestead lavfs. More, however, in the Mississippi 
 Valley States than elsewhere. 
 
 DONATIONS OF PUBLIC LANDS. 
 
 Thus land monopolisation has gone on in the ordinary 
 course of our land dealings. But the extraordinary means 
 which have done most to hasten it, have been the donations 
 of land in immense bodies. 
 
 It is a trite saying that men are always disposed to be 
 liberal with that which is not their own — a saying which 
 has had exemplifications enough in the history of all our 
 legislative bodies. But there is a check to the appropria- 
 tion of money, in the taxation involved, which, if not felt 
 by those who vote the money away, is felt by their con- 
 
UNITED STATES LANBS 15 
 
 stituents. Not so with appropriations of land. No extra 
 taxation is caused, and the people at whose expense the 
 appropriations are made — the settlers upon the land — 
 have not yet appeared. And so Congress has always been 
 extremely liberal in giving away the public lands on all 
 pretexts, and its liberality has generally been sanctioned, 
 or at least never seriously questioned by public opinion. 
 
 The donations of land by Congress have been to indi- 
 viduals, to States, and to corporations. 
 
 THE BOUNTY LAND GEANTS. 
 
 The grants to individuals consist chiefly of bounties to 
 soldiers and sailors of the War of 1813 and the Mexican 
 War, and amount to about 73,000,000 acres, for which 
 transferable warrants were issued. Nearly all of this 
 scrip passed into the hands of speculators, not one warrant 
 in five hundred having been located by or for the original 
 holder. It has been estimated that, on an average, the 
 warrants did not yield the donees twenty-five cents per 
 acre. But taking fifty cents as a basis, we are able to 
 form an idea of the disproportion between the cost of the 
 gift to the nation and the benefit to the soldiers. Leav- 
 ing out of the calculation the few that have taken the 
 land given them, we find that the Government gave up a 
 revenue of $91,067,500, which it would have received from 
 the sale of the land at $1.25 per acre, in order to give the 
 soldiers $36,427,000, or, in other words, every dollar the 
 soldiers got cost the nation $2.50! Nor does this tell 
 the whole story. Though some of this scrip was located by 
 settlers who purchased it from brokers at an advance on the 
 price paid soldiers, most of it has been located by specula- 
 tors who, with the same capital, have been enabled to mo- 
 
le OUR LAND ANB LAND POLICY 
 
 nopolise much more land than they could otherwise have 
 monopolised, and to monopolise land even before it was 
 offered at public sale. If we estimate the advance which 
 settlers have had to pay in consequence of this speculation 
 at $3 per acre for the amount of transferred scrip, we 
 have a tax upon settlers of $145,708,000, which, added to 
 the loss of the Government, gives a total of $236,775,500, 
 given by the Government and exacted from settlers in 
 order to give the soldiers $36,427,000 ! And yet the story 
 is not told. To get at the true cost of this comparatively 
 insignificant gift, we should also have to estimate the loss 
 caused by dispersion — ^by the widening of the distance be- 
 tween producer and consumer — ^which the land specula- 
 tion, resulting from the issue of bounty warrants, has 
 caused. But here figures fail us. 
 
 GEANTS TO STATES. 
 
 The donations of land by the general Government to indi- 
 vidual States have been large. Besides special donations 
 to particular States, the general donations are 500,000 acres 
 for internal improvements, ten sections for public build- 
 ings, seventy-two sections for seminaries, two sections in 
 each township (or 1-1 8th) for common schools, and all 
 the swamp and overflowed lands, for purposes of reclama- 
 tion. These grants have been made to the States which 
 contain public land, of land within their borders. In 
 addition, all the States have been given 30,000 acres for 
 each of their Senators and Eepresentatives, for the estab- 
 lishment of agricultural colleges. 
 
 If land is to be sold, it is certainly more just that the 
 proceeds should go to the States in which it is located 
 than to the general Government, and the purposes for 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 17 
 
 which these grants have been made are of the best. Yet 
 judging from the standpoint of a right land policy, which 
 would give the settler his land at the mere cost of sur- 
 veying and book-keeping, even in theory, they are bad. 
 For why should the cost of public buildings, or even of 
 public education, be saddled upon the men who are just 
 making themselves farms, who, as a class, have the least 
 capital, and to whom their capital is of the most im- 
 portance ? 
 
 But whether right or wrong in theory, in practice, like 
 the military bounties, these grants have proved of but little 
 benefit to the States in comparison with their cost to the 
 nation and to settlers. As a general rule they have been 
 squandered by the States, and their principal effect has 
 been to aid in the monopolisation of land. How true this 
 is will be seen more clearly when we come to look at the 
 land policy of the State of California. 
 
 THE AGKICULTUEAL COLLEGE GRANT. 
 
 The Agricultural College grant was made in 1862, and 
 has since been extended as the Representatives of other 
 States have been admitted. It aggregates 9,510,000 acres, 
 and if extended to the Territories as they come in, wUl 
 take at least 11,000,000 acres. This grant differs from 
 the other State grants in this : that it is given to all States, 
 whether they contain public land or not; those in which 
 there is no public land being permitted to take their land 
 in other States which do contain it. This feature makes 
 this grant, in theory at least, the very worst of the grants, 
 for it throws upon the settlers in new and poor States the 
 burden of supporting colleges not merely for their own 
 State but for other and far richer States. 
 
18 OTJE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 For instance, the State of New York, the most popu- 
 lous and wealthy member of the Union, receives 990,000 
 acres, which must all be located in the poor far-Western 
 States. Thus to this old and rich State is given the power 
 of taxing the settlers upon nearly a million acres in far- 
 off and poor States for the maintenance of a college which 
 she is far more able to support than they are. If New 
 York has located this land well, and retains it (as I be- 
 lieve is the intention), in a very few years she will be able 
 to rent it for one fourth or even one third of the crop. 
 That is, for the support of one of her own institutions. 
 New York will be privileged to tax 50,000 people, fifteen 
 hundred or two thousand miles away, to the amount of 
 one fourth or one third of their gross earnings. And as 
 time passes, and population becomes denser, and land more 
 valuable, the number of people thus taxed will increase 
 and the tax become larger. The Cornell University, to 
 which the New York grant has been made over, is a noble 
 and beneficent institution; but wiU any one say that it is 
 just to throw the burden of its support upon the labour- 
 ing classes of far-off States? 
 
 The same thing is true of all the old and rich States 
 which are thus given the right to tax the producers of 
 new and poorer States. That most of these States have 
 sold this right to speculators at rates ranging from 37% to 
 80 cents per acre, only makes the matter worse. 
 
 But perhaps this injustice is even more evident in the 
 case of those Southern States which do contain public 
 land. The public land of Texas (of which there are some 
 80,000,000 acres left) belongs to the State; that in the 
 other Southern land States was reserved for homestead 
 entry by the Act of 1866. These States get the same 
 amount of land under this grant as the others; but none 
 of it is taken from their own lands, and their college 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 19 
 
 scrip is now being plastered over the public lands in Cali- 
 fornia and the Northwest, much of it being located here. 
 
 California gets 150,000 acres under the Act. Yet, be- 
 sides this, there have been located here up to June of last 
 year more than 750,000 acres of the land scrip of other 
 States, and large amounts have since been located or are 
 here ready for location as soon as immigration sets in. 
 This scrip brought to the States to which it was issued 
 an average of, probably, 50 cents per acre. What the giv- 
 ing of this paltry donation has cost us we know too well. 
 A great deal of the land thus located at a cost to the 
 speculator of 50 cents per acre has been sold to settlers at 
 prices ranging from $5 to $10 per acre, much of it is held 
 for higher prices than can now be obtained; and a great 
 deal of it is being rented for one fourth of the gross pro- 
 duce, the renter supplying all the labour and furnishing 
 aU the seed; while the land monopolisation, of which this 
 agricultural scrip has been one of the causes, has turned 
 back immigration from California, has made business of 
 all kinds dull, and kept idle thousands of mechanics and 
 producers who would gladly have been adding to the gen- 
 eral wealth. 
 
 Badly as California has suffered, other States have suf- 
 fered worse. Wisconsin is entitled to 210,000 acres; yet, 
 up to June, 1870, 1,111,385 acres had been located in that 
 State with agricultural scrip. Nebraska gets only 90,000 
 acres, yet the agricultural scrip locations in Nebraska up 
 to the same time were nearly a million acres. 
 
 EAILROAD GRANTS. 
 
 Some four millions of acres have been donated for the 
 construction of various wagon roads, and some four mO- 
 
20 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 lions and a half for the construction of canals; but by far 
 the largest grants have been to railroads — the amount 
 given to these companies within the last ten years aggre- 
 gating nearly one half as much as all the public lands dis- 
 posed of in other vrays since the formation of the Govern- 
 ment. This policy was not commenced until 1850, when 
 six sections per mile, or in all 3,595,053 acres, were granted 
 for the construction of the Illinois Central road. This 
 donation was made to the State, and by it assigned to the 
 company on condition of the payment to the State of 
 seven per cent, of its gross receipts in lieu of taxation. 
 This grant, which now seems so insignificant, was then 
 regarded as princely, and so it was, as it has more than 
 paid for the building and equipment of the road. The 
 example being set, other grants of course followed. In 
 1862, a long leap ahead in the rapidity of the disposal of 
 the public lands was taken in the passage of the first 
 Pacific Eailroad bill, giving directly, without the inter- 
 vention of States, to the Union, Central and Kansas com- 
 panies ten sections of land per mile (at that time the larg- 
 est amount ever granted), and $16,000 per mile in bonds. 
 In 1864 this grant was doubled, making it twenty sections 
 or 13,800 acres per mile, and at the same time the bonded 
 subsidy was trebled for the mountain districts and dou- 
 bled for the interior basin while the Government first 
 mortgage for the payment of the bonds was changed into 
 a second mortgage. 
 
 But the disposition to give away lands kept on increas- 
 ing, and the Northern and Southern Pacific getting no 
 bonds, the land grant to them was again doubled — mak- 
 ing it forty sections or 35,600 acres per mile, or, to speak 
 exactly, twenty sections in the States and forty sections 
 in the Territories. To these three Pacific roads alone 
 have been given 150,000,000 acres in round numbers — 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 21 
 
 more than is contained in all Germany, Holland and Bel- 
 gium, with their population of over fifty millions — ^more 
 land than that of any single European state except Eussia. 
 The largest single grant — and it is a grant unparalleled in 
 the history of the world — is that to the Northern Pacific, 
 which aggregates 58,000,000 acres. And besides this these 
 roads get 400 feet right of way (which in the case of the 
 Northern Pacific amounts to 100,000 acres), what land 
 they want for depots, stations, etc., and the privilege of 
 taking material from Government land, which means that 
 they may cut all the timber they wish ofE Government 
 sections, reserving that on their own. With these later 
 grants has also been inaugurated the plan of setting aside 
 a tract on each side of the grant in which the companies 
 may make up any deficiency within the original limits 
 by reason of settlement. Thus the grant to the Southern 
 Pacific withdraws from settlement a belt of land sixty 
 miles wide in California and one hundred miles wide in 
 the Territories, and that to the Northern Pacific withdraws 
 a belt one hundred and twenty miles wide from the west- 
 ern boundary of Minnesota to Puget Sound and the Co- 
 lumbia Eiver. 
 
 Since the day when Esau sold his birthright for a mess 
 of pottage we may search history in vain for any parallel 
 to such concessions. ' Munificence, we call it! Why, our 
 common use of words leaves no term in the English tongue 
 strong enough to express such reckless prodigality. Just 
 think of it! 35,600 acres of land for the building of one 
 mile of railroad — ^land enough to make 256 good-sized 
 American farms; land enough to make 4,400 such farms 
 as in Belgium support a family each in independence and 
 comfort. And this given to a corporation, not for build- 
 ing a railroad for the Government or for the people, but 
 for building a railroad for themselves; a railroad which 
 
22 OtTR LANB AND LAND POLICY 
 
 they will own as absolutely as they will own the land — a 
 railroad for the use of which both Government and people 
 must pay as much as though they had given nothing for 
 its construction. 
 
 THE VALUE OF THESE GRANTS. 
 
 If we look but a few years ahead, to the time when we 
 shall begin to feel the pressure of a population of one 
 hundred millions, the value of these enormous grants is 
 simply incalculable. But their immediate value is greatly 
 underestimated. Land was given to the first Pacific roads 
 as though it had not and never would have any value. 
 Money enough to build the roads and leave princely for- 
 tunes besides was placed in the hands of the companies, 
 and the land was thrown in as a liberal grocer might 
 throw an extra lump of sugar into the already falling 
 scale. Yet it is already apparent that by far the most 
 valuable part of these franchises are these land grants. 
 The timber which the Central Pacific gets in the Sierras 
 will of itself yield more than the cost of the whole road. 
 In addition, it has large amounts of good agricultural lands 
 in California and along the Nevada river bottoms, and 
 millions of acres of the best grazing lands in the sage- 
 brush plains of Nevada and Utah, while there are thou- 
 sands of acres of its lands which will have enormous value 
 from the coal, salt, iron, lead, copper and other minerals 
 they contain. The Union Pacific lands in the Platte Val- 
 ley have, so far as sold, yielded it an average of $5 per 
 acre; and though it gets no timber to speak of, it has 
 millions of acres which will soon be valuable for grazing, 
 and for a long distance its route passes through the great- 
 est coal and iron deposits of the continent, where much 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 23 
 
 of its 12,600 acres per mile will in time be valued at 
 thousands of dollars per acre. 
 
 Twenty years ago, when the Illinois Central received its 
 grant, its lands were worth no more than those now given 
 the Northern Pacific. Yet the lands sold by the Illinois 
 Central have averaged over $13 per acre, and those yet 
 remaining on hand are held at a still higher price. Count- 
 ing at the company's price what is held, the grant has 
 yielded over $30,000,000 — much more than the cost of the 
 road. If six sections per mile will do this in twenty years, 
 what should forty sections per mile do ? 
 
 The Directors of the Northern Pacific have themselves 
 estimated their grant to be worth $10 per acre on the com- 
 pletion of the road. I think they rather under- than 
 over-estimated it, and for an obvious reason. A true state- 
 ment of the real value of the grant would tend to dis- 
 credit the whole affair in the eyes of the cautious foreign 
 capitalists, from whom the company seeks to borrow 
 money, for they would not believe that any Government 
 could be extravagant enough to make such a donation. 
 But it must be remembered that the line of the Northern 
 Pacific passes for nearly its whole length through as fine 
 an agricultural country as that of Illinois; that its grant 
 consists, in large part, of immensely valuable timber and 
 mineral land, and that it will build up town after town, 
 one of them at least a great commercial city, on its own 
 soU. 
 
 Furthermore, for reasons before stated, the increase in 
 the value of land during the next twenty years must 
 be much greater than it has been in the last twenty years. 
 Taking these things into consideration, is it too much to 
 say that in twenty years from now the lands of the com- 
 pany will have sold for or will be worth an average of at 
 least $20 per acre? At this rate the grant amounts to 
 
24 OTJE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 over half a million dollars per mile, or in the aggregate 
 to the enormous sum of $1,160,000,000 — a sum more than 
 half the national debt. This donated absolutely to one 
 corporation. And for what? For building a road ■which 
 cannot cost more than eighty millions^, and for building it 
 for themselves! 
 
 'So keener satire upon our land-grant policy could be writ- 
 ten than that which is to be found in the published adver- 
 tisement of this Northern Pacific Company. The Directors 
 show that if they get an average of but $3 per acre for 
 their land, they can pay the whole cost of building and 
 equipping the road and have a surplus of some $20,000,000 
 left. That is to say, the Government might have built 
 the road by merely raising the average price of the lands 
 $1 per acrci and have made a profit by the operation, 
 while it would then own the road, and could give or lease 
 it to the company which would agree to charge the lowest 
 rates. As it is, the Government has raised the price to 
 settlers on one half the land $1.35 per acre; the other half 
 it has given to the company to charge settlers just what 
 it pleases; and then on this railroad which it has made 
 the settlers pay for over and over again both Government 
 and settlers must pay for transportation just as though 
 the road had been built by private means. 
 
 THE AEGUMENT FOR RAILEOAD GRANTS. 
 
 So plausible and so ably urged are the arguments for these 
 grants, such general acceptance have they gained, and so 
 seldom are they challenged (for the opposition which has 
 been made has been rather against the extravagance than 
 the theory of the grants) that it is worth while to consider 
 them with some care. 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 25 
 
 The plea for railroad land grants is about this: By 
 giving land to secure the building of railroads, we develop 
 the country without expense, or at least at the expense 
 of those who largely profit by the operation. The land 
 which we give is useless as it is ; the railroad makes it use- 
 ful and valuable. The Grovernment giving really nothing 
 of present value, does not even deprive itself of that which 
 it might receive in the future, for it is reimbursed for the 
 selling price of the land it gives by doubling the price of 
 the land it retains. The Government in fact acts like a 
 sagacious individual, who having an unsaleable estate, gives 
 half of it away to secure improvements which wiU enable 
 him to sell the other half for as much as he at first asked 
 for the whole. The settler is also the gainer, for land 
 at $3.50 per acre with a railroad is worth more to him 
 than land at $1.25 per acre without a railroad, and vast 
 stretches of territory are opened to him to which he could 
 not otherwise go for lack of means to transport his pro- 
 duce to market; while the country at large is greatly the 
 gainer by the enormous wealth which railroads always 
 create. 
 
 "Here are thousands of square miles of fertile land," 
 cries an eloquent Senator, "the haunt of the bear, the 
 buffalo and the wandering savage, but of no use whatever 
 to civilised man, for there is no railroad to furnish cheap 
 and quick communication with the rest of the world. Give 
 away a few millions of these acres for the building of a 
 railroad and all this land may be used. People wiU go 
 there to settle, farms will be tilled and towns wiU arise, 
 and these square miles, now worth nothing, will have a 
 market and a taxable value, while their productions will 
 stream across the continent, making your existing cities 
 still greater and their people stiU richer; giving freight 
 to your ships and work to your mills." 
 
26 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 All this sounds very eloquent to the land-grant man 
 who stands in the lobby waiting for the little bill to go 
 through which is to make him a mUlionaire, and really 
 convinces him that he is a benefactor of humanity, the 
 Joshua of the hardy settler and the Moses of the down- 
 trodden immigrant. And backed up, as it is, by columns 
 of figures showing the saving in railroad over wagon trans- 
 portation, the rapidity of settlement where land grants 
 have been already made, and the increase in the value of 
 real estate, it sounds very plausible to those who have not 
 anything like the reason to be as easily convinced as has 
 the land-grant man. But will it bear the test of examina- 
 tion? Let us see: 
 
 In the first place it must be observed that the considera- 
 tion for which we make these grants is purely one of time 
 — to get railroads built before they would otherwise be 
 built. No one will seriously pretend that without land 
 grants railroads would never be built; all that can be 
 claimed is that without grants they would not be built so 
 soon — that is, until the prospective business would war- 
 rant the outlay. This is what we get, or rather expect to 
 get, for we do not always get it. What do we give? We 
 give land. That is, we give the company, in addition to 
 the power of charging (practically what it pleases) for 
 the carrying it does, the unlimited power of charging the 
 people who are to settle upon one half the land for the 
 privilege of settling there. If the Government loses noth- 
 ing, it is because the settlers on one half of the land must 
 pay double price to reimburse it, while the settlers on the 
 other half must pay just what the company chooses to ask 
 them. 
 
 Now, in the course of the settlement of this land there 
 comes a time when there are enough settlers, together with 
 the prospective increase of settlers, to warrant the build- 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 27 
 
 ing of a railroad without a land grant. Admitting that 
 the settlers who come upon the land before that time are 
 gainers by the land grant in getting a railroad before they 
 otherwise would,^ it is evident that the settlers after that 
 time are losers by the amount of the additional price which 
 they must pay for their land, for they would have had a 
 railroad anyhow. 
 
 1 But as to this it must be remembered that the gain to the settler is 
 not to be measured by the increased advantage which the railroad gives 
 to the new land through which it is built, but by the difference in advan- 
 tage which that land offers over the land on which he would otherwise 
 have settled. Thus we cannot estimate the gain from the building of the 
 Northern Pacific road to the people now settling along its route in Minne- 
 sota and Dakota by the saving in the cost of transportation of the produce 
 of that land ; for had the road not been projected, they would not have 
 settled there, but would have settled in Iowa or Nebraska, where rail- 
 roads are already built ; and thus the gain they derive from the building 
 of the Northern Pacific is not to be measured by the increased advantage 
 which the railroad gives for the cultivation of the land on which they are 
 settling, but by the advantage which the railroad gives that land over 
 land in Iowa or Nebraska, on which they would otherwise have settled. 
 
 At first look, it would appear that all the people who go where - new 
 railroad is built must gain something that they could not gaiii elsewhere, 
 as otherwise they would not go there. This is doubtless true as regards 
 such gain as inures to the individual without regard to other individuals, 
 but not always true as regards such individual gain as is also a gain to 
 the community. For some part of the population which accompanies 
 the building of a raUroad through an unsettled country comes to minis- 
 ter to the needs and desires of those who build it, and is merely to be 
 regarded as an appendage of the building force, and with many of the 
 others the expectation of advantage is prospective and speculative. They 
 settle in the new country which the road is opening up, not because their 
 labour will yield them a larger return than in other places to which they 
 might go, but because they can get choice locations or a larger amount of 
 land, which population afterwards to come will make valuable. That is, 
 the gain which they expect is not from the increased productiveness of 
 their own labour, but from the appropriation of some portion of other 
 people's labour— and is not a gain to the community, though it may be a 
 
28 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 And this point where the gain of settlers ceases, and 
 the loss of settlers commences, is very much nearer the 
 beginning of settlement — that is to say, there are fewer 
 gainers and more losers, than might at first glance be 
 supposed. For if there were no land grants at all, the 
 land would be open to settlers as homesteads, or at $1.35 
 per acre, and therefore the number of actual settlers which 
 would justify the construction of a non-land-grant railroad 
 woidd be very much smaller than that which would suffice 
 to furnish a land-grant railroad with a paying business, 
 as the prospective increase during and upon the comple- 
 tion of the road would be very much greater. 
 
 So therefore, when, by giving a land grant, we get a 
 railroad to precede settlement, if the first settlers gain' 
 at all, the others lose. The gain of the first is lessened 
 by their having to pay double price for their lands; the 
 loss of the others is mitigated by no gain. So that, as 
 far as settlers are concerned, we are sacrificing the future 
 for the present ; we are taxing the many for the very ques- 
 tionable benefit of the few. And even in the case of the 
 gainers, their first advantage, in having a railroad before 
 its natural time, is offset by the subsequent retardation 
 of settlement in their neighbourhood which the land grant 
 causes. 
 
 For if the first effect of the land grant is to hasten set- 
 tlement by getting a railroad built, its second effect is to 
 retard it by enhancing the price of lands. Illinois, where 
 the first railroad land grant was made, may in a year or 
 two after have had more people, but for years back her 
 population has certainly been less because of it. For 
 nearly half a million acres — one fifth of this grant — re- 
 mained unoccupied in 1870, the company holding it at an 
 average price of $13 per acre. If this land could have 
 been had for $1.25 per acre, it would have been occupied 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 29 
 
 years ago. This is the case wherever land grants have 
 been made, and long before the Territories, in which we 
 are now giving away 25,000 acres per mile for the building 
 of railroads, are one tenth settled, we will be asked to 
 give away like amounts of other unappropriated territory 
 (if there is any by that time left) in order to furnish 
 "cheap homes to the settlers !" 
 
 Considering all the people who are to come upon our 
 now unoccupied lands, weighing the near future with the 
 present, is it not evident that the policy of land grants 
 is a most ruinous one even in theory — even when we get 
 by it that which we bargain to get? Let us see how it 
 affects the community at large in the present. 
 
 Where a land grant is necessary to induce the building 
 of a road, it is because the enterprise itself wiU. not pay — 
 that is to say, at least, that it will not yield as large a 
 return for the investment as the same amount of capital 
 would yield if invested somewhere else. The land grant 
 is a subsidy which we give to the investors to make up 
 this loss. 
 
 Is it not too plain for argument, that where capital is 
 invested in a less remunerative enterprise than it other- 
 wise would be, there is a loss to the whole community? 
 Whether that loss is made up to the individuals by a sub- 
 sidy or not, only affects the distribution of the loss among 
 individuals — the loss to the community, which includes all 
 its individuals, is the same. 
 
 But it will be said: Though this may be true so far as 
 the direct returns of the railroad are concerned, there are 
 other advantages from railroad building besides the re- 
 ceipts from fares and freights. The owners of the land 
 through which the road passes, the producer and the con- 
 sumer of the freight which it carries, and the passenger 
 who rides upon it, are all benefited to an amount far ex- 
 
30 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 ceeding the sums paid as fares and freight. When we 
 give a land grant, we merely give the railroad company 
 a share in these diffused profits, which will make up to it 
 the loss which would accrue were it confined to its legiti- 
 mate share. Thus: Here is a railroad, the business of 
 which would not pay for building it for five years yet. 
 The loss to the unsubsidised company which would build 
 it now and run it for five years would be $10,000,000. 
 But the gain to landowners and others woidd be $100,000,- 
 000. Now, if by a land grant or otherwise, we secure to 
 the railroad company a share of this collateral gain, 
 amounting to $20,000,000, the railroad company will make 
 a profit of $10,000,000, instead of a loss of $10,000,000, 
 by building the road, and others would make a profit of 
 $80,000,000. 
 
 But it must be remembered that every productive enter- 
 prise, besides its return to those who undertake it, yields 
 collateral advantages to others. It is the law of the uni- 
 verse — each for all, and all for each. If a man only plant 
 a fruit tree, Ms gain is that he gathers its fruit in its time 
 and its season. But in addition to his gain, there is a 
 gain to the whole community in the increased supply of 
 fruit, and in the beneficial effect of the tree upon the cli- 
 mate. If he build a factory, besides his own profit 
 he furnishes others with employment and with profit; he 
 adds to the value of surrounding property. And if he 
 build a railroad, whether it be here or there, there are 
 diffused benefits, besides the direct benefit to himself from 
 its receipts. 
 
 Now, as a general rule, is it not safe to assume that 
 the direct profits of any enterprise are the test of its 
 diffused profits? For instance: It will pay to put up an 
 ice-making machine rather in New Orleans than in Ban- 
 gor. Why? Because more people in New Orleans need 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 31 
 
 ice, and they need it more than those in Bangor. The 
 individual profit will be greater, because the general profit 
 win be greater. It will pay capitalists better to build 
 a railroad between San Francisco and Santa Cruz than 
 it will to build a like railroad in Washington Territory. 
 Why? Because there are more people who will ride, and 
 more freight to be carried, on the one than on the other. 
 And as the diffused benefit of a railroad can only inure 
 from the carrying of passengers and freight, is it not evi- 
 dent that the diffused benefit is greater in the one case 
 than in the other, Just in proportion as the direct benefit 
 is greater? 
 
 In the second place, in any particular case in which we 
 have to offer a subsidy to get a railroad built, the ques- 
 tion is not, shall we have this railroad or nothing? — but, 
 shall we have this road in preference to something else ? — 
 for the investment of capital in one enterprise prevents 
 its investment in another. No legislative act, no issue 
 of bonds, no grant of lands, can create capital. Capital, 
 so to speak, is stored-up labour, and only labour can create 
 it. The available capital of the United States at any 
 given time is but a given quantity. It may be invested 
 here or it may be invested there, but it is only here or 
 there that it can be invested. Nor is there any illimitable 
 supply abroad to borrow from. The amount of foreign 
 capital seeking investment in the United States is about 
 so much each year; and if by increasing our offers we get 
 any more, we must pay more, not merely for the increased 
 amount which we get, but for all which we get. 
 
 To recur, now, to our former example: Here is a rail- 
 road through an unsettled eoimtry, which to build now 
 would, relying upon its direct receipts, entail a loss of 
 $10,000,000, the diffused benefits of which may be esti- 
 mated at $100,000,000. Here is another railroad which 
 
32 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 it would take the same capital to buUd, which, in the same 
 time, would yield a direct profit of $5,000,000, and the dif- 
 fused benefits of which it is fair to presume might be 
 expressed by $300,000,000. Now if we offer to the build- 
 ers of the first road a land grant which will enable them 
 to obtain one fifth of the diffused benefits of the road, we 
 could induce them to build that road rather than the 
 other, for they would make twice as much by doing so. 
 But what would be the net result to the community? 
 Clearly a loss of $215,000,000. That is to say: By offer- 
 ing a land grant we could induce capitalists to build a 
 road in Washington Territory, rather than between San 
 Francisco and Santa Cruz. But if we did do so, the peo- 
 ple between San Francisco and Santa Cruz would lose far 
 more than the capitalists and the Washington Territory 
 settlers would gain; the people of the Pacific Coast, as a 
 whole, and the United States, as a whole, would be poorer 
 than if we had left capital free to seek the investments 
 which would of themselves return to it the largest profits. 
 
 The comparison between an individual and the nation 
 is fallacious. The one is a part, the other is the whole. 
 The individual lives but a few years, the lifetime of the 
 nation is counted by centuries. It may profit an indi- 
 vidual to induce people to settle or capital to be invested 
 in certain places; the nation can only profit by having its 
 population and its capital so located and invested that the 
 largest returns will be realised. It may profit an indi- 
 vidual to sacrifice the near future to the present, but it 
 cannot profit a nation. 
 
 As concerns the statistics by which the benefits of land- 
 grant railroads are attempted to be shown, it must be re- 
 membered, first, that the population of the United States 
 is growing at the rate of a million per year, and next, 
 that increase in the value of land is not increase in wealth. 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 33 
 
 That whatever population railroads have brought to new- 
 States and Territories is dispersion, not increase, is proven 
 by the fact that the population of the United States is not 
 increasing faster than it did before railroad building com- 
 menced, while the slightest consideration of economic laws 
 shows that whatever gain has resulted from their building 
 is at the expense of a greater gain which would have 
 resulted from the investment of the same capital where it 
 was more needed — in fact, that there is no gain, but a 
 loss. We have been supposing that land grants secure the 
 consideration for which they are given — ^the building of 
 roads before they would otherwise be built ; but this is far 
 from being always the case. With the exception, per- 
 haps, of the little Stockton and Copperopolis road, the 
 California grants have not hastened the building of rail- 
 roads, but have actually retarded it, by retarding settle- 
 ment. The fact is, that in nearly all cases these land 
 grants are made to men who do not propose, and who 
 have not the means, to build the road. They keep them 
 (procuring extensions of time, when necessary ^) until 
 they can sell out to others who wish to build, and who, on 
 their part, generally delay until they can see a profit in 
 the regular business. 
 
 To sum up: When we give a land grant for the build- 
 ing of a railroad, we either get a railroad built before it 
 would be built by private enterprise, or we do not. 
 
 If we do not, our land is given for nothing; if we do, 
 capital is diverted from more to less productive invest- 
 ments, and we are the poorer for the operation. 
 
 In either case the land grant tends to disperse popula- 
 tion; in either case it causes the monopolisation of land; 
 
 1 Congress, in 1870, actually passed a bill extending the time for the 
 completion of the first twenty miles of Western road to which a land 
 grant was made in 1853, 
 
34: OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 in either ease it makes the many poorer, and a few the 
 richer. 
 
 I have devoted this much space to answering directly 
 the argument for railroad land grants, because they are 
 constantly urged, and are seldom squarely met, and be- 
 cause so long as we admit that we may profit by thus 
 granting away land in "reasonable amounts," we shall 
 certainly find our lands going in "unreasonable amounts." 
 But surely it requires no argument to show that this thing 
 of giving away from twelve to twenty-five thousand acres 
 per mile of road in order to get people to build a rail- 
 road for themselves, is a wicked extravagance for which 
 no satisfactory excuse can be made. This land, now so 
 worthless that we give it away by the million acres with- 
 out a thought, is only worthless because the people who are 
 to cultivate it have not yet arrived. They are coming fast 
 — we have seen how fast. While there is plenty of uncul- 
 tivated land in the older States, we are giving away the 
 land in the Territories under the plea of hastening settle- 
 ment, and when the time comes that these lands are really 
 needed for cultivation, they will all be monopolised, and 
 the settler, go where he will, must pay largely for the 
 privilege of cultivating soil which since the dawn of cre- 
 ation has been waiting his coming. We need not trouble 
 ourselves about railroads; settlement will go on without 
 them — as it went on in Ohio and Indiana, as it has gone 
 on since our Aryan forefathers left the Asiatic cradle of 
 the race on their long westward journey. Without any 
 giving away of the land, railroads, with every other appli- 
 ance of civilisation, will come in their own good time. Of 
 aU people, the American people need no paternal Govern- 
 ment to direct their enterprise. All they ask is fair play, 
 as between man and man; all the best Government can 
 do for them is to preserve order and administer justice. 
 
UNITED STATES LANDS 35 
 
 There may be cases in which political or other non- 
 economic reasons may make the giving of a subsidy for 
 the building of a road advisable. In such cases, a money 
 subsidy is the best, a land subsidy the worst. But if the 
 policy of selling our lands is continued, and it is desirable 
 to make the payment of the subsidy contingent upon the 
 sale of the land, then the proceeds of the land, not the 
 land itself, should be granted. 
 
 There is one argument for railroad land grants which 
 I have neglected to notice. Senator Stewart pleads that 
 these grants have kept the land from passing into the 
 hands of speculators, who would have taken more than the 
 railroad companies, and have treated the settlers less lib- 
 erally than the companies. Perhaps he is right; there is 
 certainly some truth in his plea. But if he is right, what 
 does that prove? Not the goodness of railroad grants; 
 but the badness of the laws which allow speculation in 
 the public lands. 
 
II. 
 
 THE LANDS OP CALIFOENIA. 
 
 HOW FAE LAND MONOPOLISATION HAS ALREADY GONE. 
 
 In all the new States of the Union land monopolisation 
 has gone on at an alarming rate, but in none of them so 
 fast as in California, and in none of them, perhaps, are 
 its evil effects so manifest. 
 
 California is the greatest land State in the Union, both 
 in extent (for Texas owns her own land) and in the 
 amount of land still credited to the Government in De- 
 partment reports. With an area of 188,981 square miles, 
 or, in round numbers, 121,000,000 acres, she has a popula- 
 tion of less than 600,000 — that is to say, with an area 
 twenty-four times as large as Massachusetts, she has a 
 population not half as great. Of this population not one 
 third is engaged in agriculture, and the amount of land 
 under cultivation does not exceed 3,500,000 acres. Surely 
 land should here be cheap, and the immigrant should come 
 with the certainty of getting a homestead at Government 
 price ! But this is not so. Of the 100,000,000 acres of 
 public land which, according to the last report of the 
 Department, yet remain in California (which of course 
 includes all the mountains and sterile plains), some 30,- 
 
 36 
 
LANDS OF CALIFORNIA 37 
 
 000,000 acres are withheld from settlement by railroad 
 reservations, and millions, of acres more are held under 
 unsettled Mexican grants, or by individuals under the pos- 
 sessory laws of the State, without color of title. Though 
 here or there, if he knew where to find it, there may be a 
 little piece of Government land left, the notorious fact is 
 that the immigrant coming to the State to-day must, as 
 a general thing, pay their price to the middlemen before 
 he can begin to cultivate the soil. Although the popula- 
 tion of California, all told — miners, city residents. China- 
 men and Diggers — does not amount to three to the square 
 mile; although the arable land of the State has hardly 
 been scratched (and with all her mountains and dry plains 
 California has an arable surface greater than the entire 
 area of Ohio), it is already so far monopolised that a 
 large part of the farming is done by renters, or by men 
 who cultivate their thousands of acres in a single field. 
 For the land of California is already to a great extent 
 monopolised by a few individuals, who hold thousands and 
 hundreds of thousands of acres apiece. Across many of 
 these vast estates a strong horse cannot gallop in a day, 
 and one may travel for miles and miles over fertile ground 
 where no plough has ever struck, but which is all owned, 
 and on which no settler can come to make himself a home, 
 unless he pay such tribute as the lord of the domain chooses 
 to exact. 
 
 Nor is there any State in the Union in which settlers 
 in good faith have been so persecuted, so robbed, as in 
 California. Men have grown rich, and men still make a 
 regular business of blackmailing settlers upon public land, 
 or of appropriating their homes, and this by the power of 
 the law and in the name of Justice. Land grabbers have 
 had it pretty much their own way in California — ^they 
 have moulded the policy of the general Government; have 
 
38 OUB LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 dictated the legislation of the State; have nin the land 
 offices and used the courts. 
 
 Let us look briefly at the modes by which this land mo- 
 nopolisation has been carried on. 
 
 THE MEXICAN GRANTS. 
 
 California has had one curse which the other States 
 have not had ^ — the Mexican grants. The Mexican land 
 policy was a good one for a sparsely settled pastoral coun- 
 try, such as California before the American occupation. 
 To every citizen who would settle on it, a town lot was 
 given; to every citizen who wanted it, a cattle range was 
 granted. By the terms of the cession of California to 
 the United States it was provided that these rights should 
 be recognised. 
 
 It would have been better, far better, if the American 
 Government had agreed to permit these grant-holders to 
 retain a certain definite amount of land around their im- 
 provements, and compounded for the rest of the grants 
 called for by the payment of a certain sum per acre, turn- 
 ing it into the public domain. This would have been best, 
 not only for the future population of California, but for 
 the grant-holders themselves as the event has proved. 
 
 Or, if means had been taken for a summary and definite 
 settlement of these claims, the evils entailed by them would 
 have been infinitesimal compared with what have residted. 
 For it is not the extent of the grants (and all told the 
 bona fide ones call for probably nine or ten million acres 
 of the best land of California) which has wrought the 
 mischief, so much as their unsettled condition — ^not the 
 treaty with Mexico, but our own subsequent policy. 
 
 1 The Territory of New Mexico is afflicted in the same way. 
 
LANDS OF CALIFOBNIA 39 
 
 It is difficult in a brief space to give anything like an 
 adequate idea of the villainies for which these grants have 
 been made the cover. If the history of the Mexican grants 
 of California is ever written, it will be a history of greed, 
 of perjury, of corruption, of spoliation and high-handed / 
 robbery, for which it wUl be difficult to find a parallel. I 
 
 The Mexican grants were vague, running merely for 
 so many leagues within certain natural boundaries, or be- 
 tween other grants, though they were generally marked 
 out in rough fashion. It is this indefiniteness which has 
 given such an opportunity for rascality, and has made 
 them such a curse to California, and which, at the same 
 time, has prevented in nearly all cases their original owners 
 from reaping from them any commensurate benefit. Be- 
 tween the Commission which first passed upon the validity 
 of the grants and final patent, a thousand places were 
 found where the grant could be tied up, and where, indeed, 
 after twenty-three years of litigation the majority of them 
 still rest. Ignorant of the language, of the customs, of 
 the laws of the new rulers of their country, without the 
 slightest idea of technical subtleties and legal delays, mere 
 children as to business — the native grant-holders were com- 
 pletely at the mercy of shrewd lawyers and sharp specu- 
 lators, and at a very early day nearly all the grants passed 
 into other hands. 
 
 HOW THE GRANTS FLOAT. 
 
 As soon as settlers began to cultivate farms and make 
 improvements, the grants began to float. The grant-hold- 
 ers watched the farmers coming into their neighbourhood, 
 much as a robber chief of the Middle Ages might have 
 watched a rich Jew taking up his abode within striking 
 distance of his castle. The settler may have been abso- 
 
40 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 lutely certain that he was on Government land, and may 
 even have been so assured by the grant-holder himself; 
 but so soon as he had built his house and fenced his land 
 and planted his orchard, he would wake up some morn- 
 ing to find that the grant had been floated upon him, and 
 that his land and improvements were claimed by some 
 land shark who had gouged a native Californian out of 
 his claim to a cattle-run, or wanting an opportunity to 
 do this, had set up a fraudulent grant, supported by 
 forged papers and suborned witnesses. Then he must 
 either pay the blackmailer's price, abandon the restdts of 
 his hard labour, or fight the claim before surveyor-gen- 
 eral, courts, commissioner, secretary, and Congress itself, 
 while his own property, parcelled out into contingent fees, 
 furnished the means for carrying the case from one tri- 
 bunal to another, for buying witnesses and bribing corrupt 
 officials. And then, frequently, after one set of settlers 
 had been thus robbed, new testimony would be discovered, 
 a new survey would be ordered, and the grant woidd 
 stretch out in another direction over another body of set- 
 tlers, who would then sufEer in the same way, while in 
 many cases, as soon as one grant had been bought ofE or 
 beaten away, another grant would come, and there are 
 pieces of land in California for which four or five differ- 
 ent titles have been purchased. 
 
 The ruling of the courts has been, that so long as the 
 grants had not been finally located, their owners might 
 hold possession within their exterior boundaries and eject 
 settlers. Thus, if a grant is for one league, within cer- 
 tain natural boundaries which include fifty, the claimant 
 can put settlers off any part of the fifty leagues. 
 
 Whenever any valuable mine or spring is discovered in the 
 neighbourhood of any of these grants, then the grant jumps. 
 If they prove worthless, then it floats back again. Thus 
 
LANDS OP CALIFORNIA 41 
 
 the celebrated Mariposa claim, after two or three locations 
 in the valley, was finally carried up into the mountains, 
 where it had as much business as it would have had in 
 Massachusetts or Ohio, and stretched out into the shape 
 of a boot to cover a rich mining district. Among the 
 property given to John Charles Fremont and his partners, 
 by this location, was the Ophir mine and mill, upon which 
 an English company had spent over $100,000, after assur- 
 ances from the Mariposa people that the mine was outside 
 their claim. In the southern half of California, where 
 these grants run, there has been hardly a valuable spring 
 or mine discovered that was not pounced upon by a grant. 
 One of the latest instances was the attempt to float the 
 Cuyamaca grant over the new San Diego mining district, 
 and to include some sixty-five mines — one of them, the Pio- 
 neer, on which $200,000 has been expended. Another was 
 the attempt to float a grant over the noted Geyser Springs, 
 in Sonoma county. In both these cases the attempt was 
 defeated. General Hardenburgh refusing to approve the 
 surveys. In the latter case, however, it was dog eat dog, 
 the great scrip locator, W. S. Chapman, having plastered 
 a Sioux warrant over the wonderful springs. He has 
 since obtained a patent, though I understand that some- 
 body else laid a school-land warrant on the springs before 
 Chapman. 
 
 HOW THE GRANTS ARE STRETCHED OUT. 
 
 Hardly any attention seems to have been paid to the 
 amount of land granted by the Mexican authorities. 
 Though, under the colonisation laws, eleven leagues (a 
 Mexican league contains 4,438 acres) constituted the larg- 
 est amount that could be granted, many of these grants 
 have been confirmed and patented for much more (in 
 
42 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 the teeth of a decision of the United States Supreme 
 Court), and under others yet unsettled, much larger 
 amounts are still held. Grants for one league have been 
 confirmed for eleven. Claims rejected by the Commis- 
 sion have been confirmed by the District Courts, and claims 
 rejected by other decisions of the Supreme Court have been 
 got through by the connivance of law officers of the Gov- 
 ernment who would suffer the time for appeal to lapse or 
 take it so that it would be thrown out on a technicality. 
 As for the surveys they might almost as well have been 
 made by the grant-holders themselves, and seem, as a gen- 
 eral thing, to have run about as the grant-holders wished. 
 The grants have been extended here, contracted there, 
 made to assume all sorts of fantastic shapes, for the pur- 
 pose of covering the improvements of settlers and taking 
 in the best land. There is one of them that on the map 
 looks for all the world like a tarantula — a fit emblem of 
 the whole class. In numbers of cases, the names of which 
 might be recited, grants of four leagues have been stretched 
 in the survey to eight; grants of two leagues to six; grants 
 of five to ten; and in one case it has been attempted to 
 stretch one league to forty. In one ease, the Saucal Ee- 
 dondo, where a two-league grant had been confirmed to 
 five, and a survey of 33,190 acres made, a new survey was 
 ordered by a clerk of the surveyor-general, and a survey 
 taking in 25,000 acres more of United States land covered 
 by settlers was made and fixed up in the office; and it was 
 not until after some years of litigation before the Depart- 
 ment that this fact was discovered. In some cases specula- 
 tors who were "on the inside" would buy from a Spanish 
 grantee the use of the name of his claim, and get a new 
 survey which would take in for them thousands of acres 
 more. The original claimant of Eancho la Laguna asked 
 for three leagues, or 13,314 acres; the survey was made 
 
LANDS OF CALIFORNIA 43 
 
 and confirmed for 18,000. Afterwards it was set aside, 
 on the pretence that the Santa Barbara paper, in which 
 the advertisement of survey had been published, was 
 printed for part of the time in San Francisco, and a sur- 
 vey taking in 48,703 acres made, which, after being re- 
 jected by Commissioner Edwards, was patented by Com- 
 missioner Wilson. The Eancho Guadaloupe, a grant of 
 21,520 acres, was surveyed for 32,408 acres in 1860, the 
 survey approved, a patent issued, and the ranch sold. 
 Now the new owner, supported by an affidavit from the 
 surveyor that objection was made to the 32,000 acre survey 
 in 1860 by the two Mexican owners (one of whom died 
 in 1858), is trying to get a new survey confirmed which 
 takes in 11,000 acres more. The survey of Los Nogales 
 was made in 1861, under a decree for one league and no 
 more, and now an application for a new survey which will 
 include 11,000 acres more is being pushed. The land is 
 covered by settlers. 
 
 THE BIG GRAPE-VINE EANCHO. 
 
 Perhaps the most daring attempt to grab lands and rob 
 settlers under pretence of a Mexican grant — so daring that 
 it has almost a touch of the comic — is the case of Los 
 Prietos y Najalayegua, which was shown up first in a little 
 pamphlet by James P. Stuart, of San Francisco, and after- 
 wards in Congress by Mr. Julian, to whom the settlers of 
 California are indebted for many signal services. In 
 Santa Barbara county there is living an old Mexican, 
 named Jose Dominguez, on whose little ranch grows an 
 immense grape-vine. In the old times Dominguez had 
 petitioned for another tract of land of about a league and 
 a half, but he neglected to comply with the conditions, and 
 
4:4 OUB LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 sold it for the sum of one dollar. In fact he seems to 
 have sold it twice. Finally the claim passed into the hands 
 of Thomas A. Scott, the Pennsylvania railroad king, and 
 Edward J. Pringle, of San Francisco. It had never heen 
 presented to the United States Commission, and was con- 
 sequently barred. But in 1866 a bill confirming the grant, 
 and accompanied by a memorial purporting to be from 
 Dominguez, but which Dominguez swears he never saw, 
 was introduced by Mr. Conness, and slipped quietly 
 through, under pretence of giving the old man, with his 
 sixty children and grandchildren, the big grape-viae which 
 his mother had planted. 
 
 The biU was assisted in the House by the reading of a 
 letter from Mr. Levi Parsons, in which a visit to the Mexi- 
 can Patriarch and his great grape-vine, the only support 
 of a greater family, was most touchingly described, and 
 the intervention of Congress asked as a matter of Justice 
 and humanity. Then came the survey; and the specula- 
 tors, emboldened by their success with Congress, went in for 
 a big grab, taking in the modest amount of 208,743 acres ^ 
 — a pretty good dollar's worth of land, considering that it 
 included many valuable farms and vineyards. They asked 
 too much, for an outcry was made and a resurvey was 
 ordered, which is now pending. 
 
 BOGUS GRANTS. 
 
 The real grants have been bad enough, the bogus grants 
 have been worse. Their manufacture commenced early — 
 the signatures of living ex-Mexican officials being some- 
 
 1 The survey was not strictly official, though made by a United States 
 Deputy, he having reported that the calls were uncertain, and the grantees 
 asking a survey according to their views, 
 
LANDS OF CAIilPOENIA - 45 
 
 times procured. • Of this class was the famous Limantour 
 claim to a great portion of San Francisco. It was finally 
 defeated, but not until a large amount had been paid to 
 its holders, and enormous expenses incurred in fighting it. 
 Many of these claims have been pressed to final patent, 
 and settlers driven from their homes by sheriff's posses 
 or the bayonets of the United States troops. Others have 
 only been used for purposes of blackmail, the owners of 
 threatened property being compelled to remove the shadow 
 from their title when obliged to borrow or to sell, and find- 
 ing it cheaper to pay the sums asked than to incur the 
 expense of long and tedious litigation, many steps in which 
 had to be taken in Washington. 
 
 Thanks to the possessory law of the State, as interpreted 
 by State courts, where the holders of a bogus claim secure 
 possession they have been all right as long as they could 
 delay final action. After the action of the District Court 
 five years are allowed for appeal to the Supreme Court, 
 and then a smart attorney can easily keep the case hang- 
 ing from year to year. In one case where a modest de- 
 mand for some forty leagues was rejected, because in 
 forging the Mexican seal on the grant, the head of the 
 cactus-mounted eagle had been carelessly put where his 
 tail ought to be, the appeal has been kept at the foot of 
 the docket for years, while the claimants are enjoying the 
 land just as fully as if they had paid the Government for 
 it, and are actually selling it to settlers, who know the 
 claim to be fraudulent, at from $3 to $10 per acre. If the 
 Supreme Court ever does reach the case, the appeal wiU 
 be dismissed. A new motion will then be made, and 
 finally, when all the law's delays are exhausted, the set- 
 tlers will have to pay the Government $1.25 per acre for 
 the land. Meantime they can get it only by paying his 
 price to the holder of this notoriously fraudulent claim. 
 
46 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 It has at all times been within the power of Congress 
 to end this uncertainty as to land titles, and settle these 
 Mexican claims. There has been a great deal of legisla- 
 tion on the subject, but somehow or other it has always 
 turned out for the benefit of the land grabbers. Modes of 
 procedure have been changed ; cases have been thrown from 
 the courts into the land ofSces; from the land oflSces 
 back to the courts, and then from the courts back to the 
 land offices again. Always some excuse for delay; al- 
 ways some loophole in the law, through which the land 
 grabber coiild easily pass, but in which the settler would 
 be crushed. The majority of these Mexican grants are 
 yet unsettled. Their owners do not want them settled 
 so long as they can hold thousands of acres more than they 
 have a shadow of claim to, and delay as much as possible. 
 These are eases where the last step to secure patent can 
 be taken at any time, by the making of a motion or the 
 payment of a fee ; but which are suffered to remain in that 
 condition, while in the meantime the claim holders are 
 selling quitclaim deeds to settlers, for land which their 
 patents would show they do not own. 
 
 THE PUEBLO OP SAN FRANCISCO. 
 
 Foe the injuries which these Mexican grants have done to 
 California, the Mexican land policy is not responsible. 
 That merely furnished the pretext under cover of which 
 our policy has fostered land monopolisation. What of the 
 Mexican policy was bad under our different conditions, we 
 have made infinitely worse; what would still have been 
 good, we have discarded. The same colonisation laws 
 under which these great grants were made gave four square 
 leagues to each town in which to provide homes for its 
 
LANDS OP CALIFOENIA 47 
 
 inhabitants, the only conditions being good character and 
 occupancy. The American city of San Francisco, as the 
 successor of the Mexican pueblo, came into a heritage such 
 as no great city of modern times has enjoyed — land enough 
 for a city as large as London, dedicated to the purpose of 
 providing every family with a free homestead. Here was 
 an opportunity to build up a great city, in which tenement 
 houses and blind alleys would be unknown ; in which there 
 would be less poverty, sufEering, crime and social and 
 political corruption than in any city of our time, of equal 
 numbers. This magnificent opportunity has been thrown 
 away, and with the exception of a great sand bank, the worst 
 that could be found, reserved for a part, and a few squares 
 reserved for public buUdings, the heritage of all the people 
 of San Francisco has been divided among a few hundred. 
 Of the successive steps, culminating in the United States 
 law of 1866, by which this was accomplished, of the battles 
 of land grabbers to take and to keep, and of the municipal 
 corruption engendered, it is not worth while here to speak. 
 The deed is done. We have made a few millionaires, and 
 now the citizen of San Francisco who needs a home must 
 pay a large sum for permission to build it on land dedi- 
 cated to its use ere the American flag had been raised in 
 California. 
 
 THE KAILEOAD GRANTS OF CALIFOEHriA. 
 
 The grants made to railroads of public lands in the State 
 of California are: The grant to the Western Pacific and 
 Central Pacific, of ten alternate sections on each side per 
 mile (12,800 acres), made to half that amount in 1862, 
 and doubled in 1864; the grants to the Southern Pacific 
 and to the California and Oregon, of ten alternate sec- 
 tions on each side, with ten miles on each side in which 
 
48 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 to make up deficiencies, made in 1866; the grant to the 
 Stockton and Copperopolis, of five alternate sections on 
 each side, with twenty miles on each side in which to make 
 up deficiencies, made in 1867; the grants to the Texas 
 Pacific ^ and to the connecting hranch of the Southern 
 Pacific, of ten alternate sections on each side, with ten 
 miles for deficiencies, made in 1871. A grant was also 
 made in 1866 to the Sacramento and Placerville road, but 
 the idea of building the road was abandoned, and the 
 grant has lapsed. 
 
 Upon the map of California (see frontispiece) the reser- 
 vations for these grants are marked in red. This marking 
 does not show the exact limits of the reservations, as they 
 follow the rectilinear section lines, which it is, of course, 
 impossible to show on so small a scale — nor are the routes 
 of the roads precisely drawn. But it gives a perfectly cor- 
 rect idea of the extent and general course of these reserva- 
 tions. The exhibit is absolutely startling — a commentary 
 on the railroad land-grant policy of Congress to the force 
 of which no words can add. Observe the proportion which ■ 
 these reservations bear to the total area of the State, and 
 observe at the same time the topography of California — 
 how the railroad reservations cover nearly all the great 
 central valleys, and leave but the mountains, and you may 
 get an idea of how these reservations are cursing the State. 
 
 It is true that the companies do not get all of the land 
 included in these reservations, nor even half of it; but 
 for the present, at least, so far as the greater part of it 
 is concerned, they might as well get it all. Pre-emption 
 or homestead settlers may still go upon the even sections, 
 but the trouble is to find them. The greater part of this 
 
 1 Between the line of the road and the Mexican boundary this 
 company gets all the public land. 
 
LANDS OP CALIPOKNIA 49 
 
 land is unsurveyed, or having been once surveyed, the 
 vaqueros, who share in the prejudices of their employers 
 against settlers, have pulled up the stakes, and the settler 
 cannot tell whether he gets on Grovernment or on railroad 
 land. If on Government land, he is all right, and can 
 get 80 acres for $23, as a homestead; or 160 acres for 
 $400 by pre-emption. But it is an even chance that he is 
 on railroad land, and if so, he is at the mercy of a cor- 
 poration which will make with him no terms, in advance. 
 Settlers will not take such chances. 
 
 These railroad grants have worked nothing but evil to 
 California. Though given under pretext of aiding settle- 
 ment, they have really retarded it. Of all the roads ever 
 subsidised in the United States, the Central Pacific is the 
 one to which the giving of a subsidy is the most defensible. 
 But so large was the subsidy, in money and bonds, that 
 the road could have been built, and would have been built, 
 just as soon without the land grant. The Western Pacific 
 land grant became the property of a single individual, 
 who did nothing towards building the road — the company 
 that did build the road (the Central) buying the fran- 
 chise minus the land grant. The Southern Pacific land 
 grant has actually postponed the building of a road south- 
 ward through California, and had the grant never been 
 made, it is certain that an unsubsidised road would already 
 have been running farther into Southern California than 
 the land-grant road yet does. Of the California and Ore- 
 gon land grant, the same thing may be said. The Stock- 
 ton and Copperopolis grant was made in 1867, but the 
 building of the road has only been commenced this year. 
 And it is exceedingly probable that had this land been 
 open to settlers, the business, actual and prospective, would 
 by this time have offered sufficient inducements for the 
 building of the road. 
 
60 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 AE these land grants, witli the exception perhaps of that 
 from the Eastern boundary to San Diego, and with the 
 exception of the Western Pacific grant, are owned by a 
 single firm, who also own all the railroads in California, 
 having bought what they did not build. 
 
 It is generally argued when land grants are made, that 
 it is to the interest of the companies to sell their lands 
 cheaply, because settlement will bring them business. But 
 the land-grant companies of California seem in no hurry 
 to sell their lands, preferring to wait for the greater 
 promise of the future. Neither the Southern Pacific nor 
 the California and Oregon will make any terms with set- 
 tlers until their lands are surveyed and listed over to them. 
 It is, of course, to their interest to have the Government 
 sections settled first, and to reserve their own land for 
 higher prices after the Government land is gone. The 
 Central Pacific adyertises to sell good farming land for 
 $2.50 per acre; but when one goes to buy good farming 
 land for that price, he finds that it has been sold to the 
 Sacramento Land Company, a convenient corporation, 
 which stands to the company in its land business just as 
 the Contract and Finance Company did in the building 
 of the road. 
 
 PRIVATE ENTRY AND SCRIP LOCATION'S. 
 
 Large bodies of the public lands of California were ofEered 
 at public sale long before there was any demand for them. 
 When the failure of placer mining directed industry to- 
 wards agriculture, and the beginnings of the railroad sys- 
 tem led to hopes of a large immigration, these lands were 
 gobbled up by a few large speculators, by the hundred 
 thousand acres. The larger part of the available portion 
 
LANDS OF CALIFORNIA 51 
 
 of the great San Joaquin Valley went in this way, and the 
 process has gone on from Siskiyou on the north to San 
 Diego on the south. 
 
 According to common report, the speculators have re- 
 ceived every facility in the land offices. While the poor 
 settler who wanted a farm would have to trudge off to 
 look at the land himself, the speculator or his agent had 
 all the information which could be furnished. Land, which 
 had never been sold or applied for, would be marked on 
 the maps as taken, in order to keep it from settlers and 
 reserve it for speculators; and in some cases, it is even 
 said that settlers selecting land and going to the Land 
 Office to apply for it, would be put off for a few minutes 
 while the land they wanted would be taken up in behalf 
 of the speculator, and then they would be referred to him, 
 if they desired to purchase. 
 
 A great deal of this land has been located with the Agri- 
 cultural College scrip of Eastern States, bought by the 
 speculators at an average of about fifty cents per acre, 
 in greenbacks, when greenbacks were low, and sold or held 
 at prices varying from $4 to $20 per acre, in gold. Whole 
 townships have been taken up at once in this way; but 
 the law was amended in 1867, so that only three sections 
 in the same township can now be located with this scrip. 
 The Agricultural scrip of California has been sold at 
 about $5 per acre, having special privileges. 
 
 The Act of last year, making this California scrip locat- 
 able on unsurveyed land, within railroad reservations, etc., 
 is a good sample of the recklessness of Congressional leg- 
 islation on land matters. It is so loosely drawn that by 
 the purchase of forty acres a speculator can tie up a whole 
 township. The Land Agent of the University has only 
 to give notice to the United States Eegister that he has 
 an application for land (without specifying amount or 
 
52 OTJR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 locality) in a certain township, and the Eegister must hold 
 the plats of survey for sixty days after their return. 
 Should a pre-emptor go on before this time, there is noth- 
 ing to prevent the speculator from swooping down upon 
 him and asserting that his farm is the particular piece of 
 ground he wanted. Happily, nearly all this scrip will be 
 used for locating timber land, for which the scrip of other 
 States is not available, as it can only be located on sur- 
 veyed land, and the surveyed timber land has long since 
 been taken up. 
 
 Besides the Agricultural scrip, a large amount of Half 
 Breed scrip has been located by speculators. This scrip 
 was issued to Indians in lieu of their lands, and was 
 made by law locatable only by the Indians themselves, 
 and though the speculators pretended to locate as the at- 
 torneys of the Indians, ^he location was illegal. How- 
 ever, it was made, and patents have been issued. 
 
 In this way millions of acres in California have been 
 monopolised by a handful of men. The chief of these 
 speculators now holds some 350,000 acres, while thousands 
 and thousands of acres which he located with scrip or paid 
 $1.35 per acre for, have been sold to settlers at rates vary- 
 ing from $5 to $20 per acre, the settlers paying cash 
 enough to clear him and leave a balance, and then giving 
 a mortgage for and paying interest on the remainder; 
 and a large quantity of his land is rented — cultivators 
 furnishing everything and paying the landlord one fourth 
 of their crop. 
 
 And as has been the case in all the methods of land 
 monopolisation in California, these scrip locations have 
 been used not only to grab unoccupied lands, but to rob 
 actual settlers of their improved farms. In one instance 
 a large scrip speculator got a tool of his appointed to 
 make the survey of a tract of land in one of the southern 
 
LANDS OF CALIPOENIA 53 
 
 counties which had been long occupied by actual settlers. 
 This deputy surveyor persuaded the settlers that it would 
 be cheaper for them to get a State title to their lands than 
 to file pre-emption claims, and they accordingly proceeded 
 to do this. But as the clock struck nine, and the doors 
 of the Land Office in San Francisco were thrown open on 
 the morning the plats were filed, another agent of the 
 speculator entered with an armful of scrip which he pro- 
 ceeded to plaster over the settlers' farms. 
 
 MANAGEMENT OF THE CALIFORNIA STATE LANDS. 
 
 We have seen what Federal legislation has done to inflict 
 the curse of land monopoly upon California. Let us now 
 see what has been done by the State herself. We shall 
 find that reckless as have been the dealings of the general 
 Government with our lands, the dealings of the State have 
 been even worse. 
 
 And here let it be remarked that for most of these wrong 
 acts of the Federal Government, the people of California 
 are themselves largely responsible. For the public mani- 
 festation of a strong sentiment here could not have failed 
 to exert great influence upon Congress. But, for instance, 
 instead of objecting to railroad grants, we have, for the 
 most part, hailed them as an evidence of Congressional 
 liberality; and when the Southern Pacific had once for- 
 feited its grant, the California Legislature asked Congress 
 to give it back without suggesting a single restriction on 
 the sale or management of the lands. In 1870, a bill 
 actually passed the House reserving the public lands of 
 California for homestead entry, as the lands of the South- 
 ern States had been reserved, but it went over in the Sen- 
 ate on the objection of Senator Nye, of Nevada. There is 
 
54 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 little doubt that the manifestation of a strong desire on 
 our part would, at any time, secure the passage of such 
 a bill. 
 
 The specific grants made to California, in common with 
 other land States, which have been before enumerated, 
 amount to an aggregate of 7,421,804 acres — an area al- 
 most as large as that of Massachusetts and Connecticut 
 combined. Besides these grants, all the swamp lands are 
 given to the State for purposes of reclamation, of which 
 3,381,691 acres have already been sold — about all there is. 
 
 These large donations have proved an evil rather than 
 a benefit to the people of California; for in disposing of 
 them, the State has given even greater facilities for mo- 
 nopoly than has the Federal Government, and the prac- 
 tical effect of the creation of two sources of title to public 
 land has been to harass settlers and to give opportunity 
 for a great deal of robbery and rascality. 
 
 The land policy of the State of California must be 
 traced through some thirty-five or forty Acts, in whose 
 changes and technicalities the non-expert will soon be- 
 come bewildered. It is only necessary here to give its 
 salient features. 
 
 It must be understood in the first place that the only 
 grant of specific pieces of land is that of the 16th and 
 36th sections of each township. When these are occupied 
 or otherwise disposed of, other sections are given in lieu 
 of them. These lieu lands, as well as the lands granted 
 in specific amounts, the State has had the privilege of 
 taking from any unappropriated Government land, the 
 ownership of the swamp lands being decided by the nature 
 of the land itself. With this large floating grant, as it 
 may be termed, the general policy of the State has been, 
 not to select the lands and then to sell them, but in effect 
 to sell to individuals its right of selection. 
 
LANDS OF CALIFOKNLA. 56 
 
 Now, under the general laws of the United States, until 
 land is offered at public sale, there is no way of getting 
 title to it save by actual settlement, and then in tracts 
 of not over 160 acres to each individual. And though 
 since 1863 the pre-emption right has applied to unsur- 
 veyed lands, yet until land is surveyed and the plats filed, 
 the settler can make no record of his pre-emption. 
 
 To this land thus reserved by the general laws for the 
 small farms of actual settlers, the State grants gave an 
 opportunity of obtaining title without regard to settle- 
 ment or amount — an opportunity which speculators have 
 well improved. In defiance of the laws of the United 
 States, and. even of the Act admitting California into the 
 Union, the State at first sold even unsurveyed land, a 
 policy which continued until the courts declared it illegal 
 in 1863. In 1852, to dispose of the 500,000 acre grant 
 (which the Constitution of the State gave to the School 
 Fund), warrants were issued purchasable at $3 per acre in 
 depreciated scrip, and locatable on any unoccupied Gov- 
 ernment land, surveyed or unsurveyed. These warrants, 
 however, were not saleable to any one person in amounts 
 of more than 640 acres, and the buyer had to make affi- 
 davit that he intended to make permanent settlement on 
 the land. But as the warrants were assignable, and afB- 
 davits cheap, these restrictions were of but little avail. 
 Passing for the most part into the hands of speculators, 
 the warrants enabled them to forestall the settler and even 
 in many eases to take his farm from him; for though by 
 the terms of the law the warrants could only be laid on 
 unoccupied land, yet when once laid, they were prima facie 
 evidence of title, and the difficulty could be got over only 
 by collusion with county officers and false affidavits. These 
 school-land warrants have been a terror to the California 
 settler, and many a man who has made himself a home. 
 
66 OTJE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 relying upon the general laws of the Federal Government, 
 has seen the results of his years of toil and privation pass 
 into the hands of some soulless cormorant, who, without 
 his knowledge, had plastered over his farm with school- 
 land warrants. The law under which the warrants were 
 issued was repealed in 1858, and the policy adopted of 
 settling the State title to applicants for land, in amounts 
 not to exceed 320 acres to each individual, at the rate 
 of $1.25 per acre, payable either in cash, or twenty per- 
 cent, in cash, and the balance on credit with interest at 
 ten per cent. The 16th and 36th sections, or the lands 
 in lieu of them, were at first given to the respective town- 
 ships, to be sold for the benefit of the Township School 
 Fund; but were afterwards made saleable as other lands 
 for the benefit of the General Fund. 
 
 The swamp lands were from the first made saleable in 
 tracts not exceeding 320 acres to each person, for $1 per 
 acre, cash or credit, the proceeds to be applied to the 
 reclamation of the land, under regulations varied by differ- 
 ent laws, from time to time. This was virtually giving 
 them away — the true policy; but the trouble is that for 
 the most part they have been given to a few men. 
 
 TJp to 1868, the State had always, in words at least, 
 recognised the principle that one man should not be per- 
 mitted to take more than a certain amount of land; but 
 by the Act of March 28th, of that year, which repealed 
 all previous laws, and is still, with some trifiing amend- 
 ments, the land law of the State, all restrictions of amount, 
 except as to the 16th and 36th sections proper, were swept 
 away; and with reference to those lands, the form of affi- 
 davit was so changed that the applicant was not required 
 to swear that he wanted the land for settlement, or wanted 
 it for himself. This Act has some good features ; but from 
 enacting clause to repealing section, its central idea seems 
 
LANDS OP CALIFOENIA 57 
 
 to be the making easy of land monopolisation, and the 
 favouring of speculators at the expense of settlers. In 
 addition to sweeping away the restrictions as to amount 
 and to use, it provided that the settlers upon the 16th 
 and 36th sections should only be protected in their occu- 
 pancy for six months after the passage of the Act, after 
 which the protection should only be for sixty days; and 
 changed the affidavit previously required, from a denial 
 of other settlement to a denial of valid adverse claim. 
 Under this provision a regular business has been driven 
 in robbing settlers of their homes. Unless a new law 
 is very generally discussed in the newspapers (and land 
 laws seldom are) it takes a long time for the people 
 to become acquainted with it; and there were many set- 
 tlers on State land who knew nothing of the limitation 
 until they received notification that somebody else had 
 possession of a clear title to their farms. Did space per- 
 mit, numbers of cases of this kind of robbery might be 
 cited — some of them of widows and orphans, whose all 
 was ruthlessly taken from them; but I will confine myself 
 to one case of recent occurrence, where the looked-for 
 plunder is unusually large. 
 
 The town of Amador, and the very valuable Keystone 
 Mine, are situated on the east half of a 36th section. The 
 survey which developed this fact was only made in the 
 early part of the present year. The Deputy Surveyor, 
 who was evidently in the plot, returned to the United 
 States Land Office the plat of the township, with the mine 
 and the town marked in the west half. Application was 
 at the same time made to the State Surveyor-General, in 
 the name of Henry Casey, for the east half. In regular 
 course, the Surveyor-General sent the application to the 
 United States Land Office, whence it was returned, with 
 a certificate that the land was free; whereupon, the Sur- 
 
58 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 veyor-General approved the application, and twenty-five 
 cents per acre was paid the State. And thus for $80 cash, 
 and $32 per annum interest, a little knot of speculators 
 have secured title to the Keystone Mine, worth at least a 
 million dollars, and the whole town of Amador, besides. 
 
 And as further evidence of the recklessness of Califor- 
 nia land legislation, and of the lengths to which the land 
 grabbers are prepared to go, two facts may be cited: The 
 last Legislature, instead of repealing or removing the ob- 
 jectionable features from this Green law, actually passed a 
 special bill legalising all applications for State lands, even 
 where the affidavits by which they were supported did not 
 conform to the requirements of the law, either in form or 
 in substance. After this had been passed, on the last day 
 of the session a bill was got through and was signed by 
 the Governor, designed to restrict applicants for lieu lands 
 to 320 acres. But after the Legislature had adjourned, 
 when the Act came to be copied in the Secretary of 
 State's office, lo, and behold! it was discovered that the 
 engrossed and signed copy did not contain this provision. 
 
 Yet, to understand fully what a premium the State has 
 offered for the monopolisation of her school lands, there 
 is another thing to be explained. To purchase land of 
 the State, an application must be filed in the State Land 
 Office, describing the land by range, township and section, 
 and stating under what grant the title is asked. This 
 application must be accompanied by a fee of five dollars. 
 The Surveyor-General then issues a certificate to the appli- 
 cant, and sends the application to the United States Land 
 Office, for certification that the land is free, before he 
 approves the application and demands payment for the 
 land. If there be no record in his office of pre-emption, 
 homestead or other occupation, the United States Eegister 
 thereupon marks the land off on his map, but he does not 
 
LANDS OF CAIilFORNLA. 59 
 
 certify to the State Surveyor-General until he gets his fee. 
 The State Surveyor-General has no appropriation to pay 
 the fee, although the present incumbent asked for one in 
 his first report; and so the payment of the fee and the 
 return of the United States certificate depend upon the 
 applicant, whose interest it is, of course, not to get it 
 until he wishes to pay for his land. And thus, by the 
 payment of five dollars, a whole section of United States 
 land can be shut up from the settler. There are 1,244,696 
 acres monopolised in California to-day in this way. For 
 thousands and thousands of the acres which are offered for 
 sale on California and Montgomery streets there is no 
 other title than the payment of this five dollars. When 
 the immigrant buys of the speculator for two, five, ten or 
 twenty dollars an acre, as the case may be, then the sipecu- 
 lator goes to the United States Land Office, pays the 
 Eegister's fee, gets his certificate and the State Surveyor- 
 General's approval, and pays the State $1.25 per acre; or, 
 if with the immigrant he has made a bargain of that kind, 
 he pays twenty-five cents per acre, and leaves his pur- 
 chaser to pay the dollar at some future time, with interest 
 at ten per cent. 
 
 SWAMP LAND GRABBING. 
 
 And as the speculator has had a far better opportunity in 
 dealing with the State than with the United States, there 
 has been every inducement to get as much land as possible 
 under the jurisdiction of the State, by declaring it swamp 
 land. The certificate of United States ofiiceTs as to the 
 character of the land has not been waited for; but the 
 State has sold to every purchaser who would get the County 
 Surveyor to segregate the land he wanted, and procure a 
 couple of affidavits as to its swampy character. Probably 
 
60 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 one half of the land sold (or rather given, as the money 
 is returned) by the State as swamp, is not swamp at all, 
 but good dry land, that has been sworn to as swamp, in 
 order to take it out of the control of the pre-emption 
 laws of the United States. The State has been made the 
 catspaw of speculators, and her name used as the cover 
 under which the richest lands in California might be mo- 
 nopolised and settlers robbed. The seizure of these lands' 
 of the State (or rather by speculators in the name of the 
 State) is for the most part entirely illegal; but by the 
 Act of 1866, previous seizures were confirmed, and the land 
 grabbers of California, though Mr. Julian occasionally 
 makes them some trouble, have powerful friends in Wash- 
 ington, and unless energetic remonstrance is made, gen- 
 erally get what they ask. This swamp land grant has not 
 yielded a cent to the State, but it has enabled speculators 
 to monopolise hundreds of thousands of acres of the most 
 valuable lands in California, and, of course, to rob settlers. 
 For the settler, though he has a right under United States 
 laws, can get no record nor evidence of title until his land 
 is surveyed and the plats filed. In the meantime, if the 
 speculator comes along and can get a couple of affidavits 
 as to the swampy character of the settler's farm, he has 
 been able to buy the title of the State. Lands thousands 
 of feet above the level of the sea have been purchased as 
 swamp; lands over which a heavily loaded wagon can be 
 driven in the month of May; and even lands which can- 
 not be cultivated without irrigation. 
 
 Sierra Valley is in Plumas county, in the very heart 
 of the mountains. Standing on its edge, you may at your 
 option toss a biscuit into a stream which finally sinks in 
 the great Ifevada Basin, or into the waters which join the 
 Pacific. When the snow melts in the early spring, the 
 mountain streams which run through the valley overflow 
 
LANDS OF CALIPOENIA 61 
 
 and spread over a portion of the land; but after a freshet 
 has passed, water has to be turned in through irrigating 
 ditches to enable the lands to produce their most valuable 
 crop, hay. The valley is filled with pre-emption and home- 
 stead settlers, who, besides their own homes and improve- 
 ments, have built two churches and seven schoolhouses. 
 Many of their farms are worth $30 per acre. The swamp 
 land robbers cast their eyes on this pretty little valley and 
 its thrifty settlement, and the first thing the settlers knew 
 their farms had been bought of the State as swamp lands, 
 and the United States was asked to list them over. En- 
 ergetic remonstrance was made, and the matter was re- 
 ferred by the Department to the United States Surveyor- 
 General to take testimony. His investigation has just 
 been concluded, and the attempted grab has probably 
 failed. But in hundreds of cases, similar ones on a smaller 
 scale have succeeded. 
 
 Another recent attempt has been made to get hold of 
 46,000 acres adjoining Sacramento. This land was for- 
 merly overshadowed by the rejected Sutter grant, and for 
 some time has been all pre-empted. Something like a 
 year ago it was surveyed and the plats returned to the 
 United States Land Office, with this land marked as 
 swamp; applications being at the same time made to the 
 State for the land. The ex-Surveyor-General, Sherman 
 Day, signed the plats, and the land had actually been listed 
 over by the Department, when a protest was made and for- 
 warded to Washington, accompanied by his own personal 
 testimony, by the new Surveyor- General, Hardenburgh, 
 who, having been long a resident of Sacramento, knew the 
 character of the land. This forced the suspension of the 
 lists, very much, it seems, to the indignation of the Acting 
 Commissioner of the General Land Office, W. W. Curtis, 
 who wrote a letter to the Surveyor-General, which has 
 
62 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 been published in the newspapers (which is a curiosity 
 of official impudence), and which betrays a very suspi- 
 cious anger with what the Acting Commissioner seems to 
 consider the interference of the Surveyor-General. 
 
 Mr. Julian, in his speech entitled "Swamp Land Swin- 
 dles," has detailed how a party of speculators, one of whom 
 was ex-State Surveyor- General Houghton, and another the 
 son of the then United States Surveyor- General Upson, 
 got hold of sixteen thousand acres in Colusa (as to the 
 dry character of which he gives affidavits), under the 
 swamp-land laws, by having the survey of two townships 
 made and approved in a few days, just before the map 
 of the California and Oregon Eailroad Company was filed. 
 These swamp-land speculators are in many cases attempt- 
 ing to shelter themselves behind the growing feeling 
 against railroad grants ; but bad as the railroad grants are, 
 the operations of these speculators are worse. The rail- 
 road companies can only take half the lands; the specu- 
 lators take it all. The railroad companies cannot easily 
 disturb previous settlers ; but the speculators take the set- 
 tler's home from under his feet. 
 
 WHO HAVE OUK LANDS. 
 
 The State Surveyor-General ought to give in his next 
 report (and if he does not the Legislature ought to call 
 for it) a list of the amounts of State lands taken in large 
 quantities by single individuals (with their names) under 
 the Act of 1868. Such a list would go far to open the 
 eyes of the people of California to the extent their State 
 Government has been used to foster the land monopoly of 
 which they are beginning to complain. Yet such a list 
 would not fuUy show what has been done, as a great deal 
 
LANDS OF CALIFORNIA 63 
 
 of land has been taken by means of dummies. Of the 
 16th and 36th sections proper, to which even now one 
 individual cannot apply for more than 330 acres, one 
 speculator has secured 8000 acres in Colusa county alone. 
 Among those who have secured the largest amount from 
 the State, either in their own names or as attorneys for 
 others, are W. S. Chapman, George W. Eoberts, ex-Sur- 
 veyor-General Houghton, John MuUan, Will S. Green, H. 
 C. Logan, George H. Thompson, B. F. Maulden, I. IST. 
 Chapman, Leander Eansom, N. N. Clay, E. H. Miller and 
 James W. Shanklin. The larger amounts secured by sin- 
 gle individuals range from 20,000 acres to over 100,000. 
 
 WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN DONE. 
 
 The true course in regard to State lands is that urged 
 upon the Legislature by the present Surveyor-General in 
 his first annual report — to issue title only to the actual 
 settler who has resided on the land three years, and who 
 has shown his intention to make it his home by placing 
 upon it at least $500 worth of improvements.^ Had this 
 course been adopted from the start, California would to- 
 day have had thousands more of people and millions more 
 of property. Had it even been adopted when urged by 
 General Bost, over half a million acres of land would have 
 
 1 In his biennial message to the same Legislature (the last) Governor 
 Haight speaks in the same strain. He says : "Our land system seems to 
 be mainly framed to facilitate the acquisition of large bodies of land by 
 capitalists and corporations, either as donations or at nominal prices. It 
 is to be regretted that the land granted by Congress to railroad corpora- 
 tions had not been subject to continued pre-emption by settlers, giving to 
 the corporation the proceeds at some fixed price, and it would have been 
 much better for the State and country if the public lands had never been 
 disposed of except to actual settlers under the pre-emption law." 
 
64 OTJE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 been saved to settlers — that is to say, four thousand fami- 
 lies might have found homesteads in California at nominal 
 rates — at rates so much lower than that vrhich they must 
 now pay that the difference would more than have sufficed 
 for all the expenses of their transportation from the East. 
 To amend our policy in regard to sales of State land 
 now, is a good deal like locking the stable door after the 
 horse is stolen. Still it should be done. Our swamp 
 lands are all gone, and the most available of the school 
 lands have gone also. Yet there may be a million acres 
 of good land left. These we cannot guard with too jeal- 
 ous care. 
 
 THE POSSESSORY LAW. 
 
 But the catalogue of what the State of California has done 
 towards the monopolisation of her land does not end with 
 a recital of her acts as trustee of the land donated her 
 by the general Government. Besides giving these lands 
 for the most part to monopolists, she has, by her legisla- 
 tion, made possible the monopolisation of other vast bodies 
 of the public lands. Under her possessory laws before 
 alluded to, millions of acres are shut out from settlement, 
 without their holders having the least shadow of title. 
 It is Government land, but unsurveyed. The only way 
 of getting title to it is to go upon it and live; but the 
 laws of California say that no one can go upon it until 
 he has a better title than the holder — ^that of possession. 
 Tracts of from two to ten thousand acres thus held are 
 common, and in one case at least (in Lake county) a 
 single firm has 28,000 acres of Government land, open 
 by the laws of the United States to pre-emption settlers, 
 enclosed by a board fence, and held under the State laws. 
 It is these laws that enable the Mexican grant owners to 
 
LANDS OF CALIFORNIA 66 
 
 hold all the land they can possibly shadow with their 
 claims, and that offer them a premium to delay the adjust- 
 ment of their titles, in order that they may continue to 
 hold, and in many cases, to sell, far more than their grants 
 caU for. 
 
 HOW A LAEGE QUANTITY OP PUBLIC LAND MAT 
 BE FREED. 
 
 A LAEGE appropriation for the survey of the public lands 
 in California, managed by a Surveyor-General who really 
 wished to do his duty,^ would open to settlers millions of 
 acres from which they are now excluded by railroad reser- 
 vations or the monopolisation of individuals. If our Rep- 
 resentatives in Congress desire to really benefit their State, 
 they will neglect the works at Mare Island, the erection 
 of public buildings in San Francisco, and the appropria- 
 tions for useless fortifications, until they can get this. 
 And one of the first acts of the next Legislature should 
 be to limit the possessory law to 160 acres, which would 
 be a quick method of breaking up possessory monopolisa- 
 tions. In the meantime there is a remedy, though a slower 
 and more cumbrous one. At the last session of Congress 
 an Act was passed (introduced by Mr. Sargent) authoris- 
 ing the credit to settlers, on payments for their lands, of 
 money advanced for surveying them. Here is a means 
 by which, with combined effort, a large amount of public 
 land may be freed. Let a number of settlers, sufficient 
 to bear the expense, go upon one of these large possessory 
 claims. If ejected, let them deposit the money for a sur- 
 vey with the United States Surveyor-General, and the 
 moment the lines are run and the plats are filed they have 
 a sure title to the land. 
 
 1 And we seem to have secured one in the present Surveyor-GeneraL 
 
66 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 MORE MONOPOLISATION THREATENED — FOOD AND WATER. 
 
 There is little doubt that one of the greatest attempts 
 at monopolisation yet made in California would have fol- 
 lowed the passage of Sargent's bill for the sale of the 
 Pacific Coast timber lands, which was rushed through the 
 House at the last session, but was passed over by the Sen- 
 ate, and which has been re-introduced. These timber 
 lands are of incalculable value, for from them must come 
 the timber supply, not of the Pacific States alone, but of 
 ,the whole Interior Basin, and nearly all the Southern 
 Coast. The present value of these lands when they can 
 be got at, may be judged by the fact that there are single 
 trees upon the railroad lands which yield at present prices 
 over $500 worth of lumber. Under this bill, these lands 
 would have been saleable at $2.50 per acre. The limita- 
 tion of each purchaser to 640 acres would of course amount 
 to nothing, and within a short time after the passage of 
 the bill, the available timber lands would have passed into 
 the hands of a small ring of large capitalists, who would 
 then have put the price of lumber at what figure they 
 pleased. The amount of capital required to do this would 
 be by no means large when compared with the returns, 
 which would be enormous, for though some estimates of 
 the timber lands of California go as high as 30,000,000 
 acres, the means of transportation as yet make but a small 
 portion of this available. And it would be only necessary 
 to buy the land as it is opened, to virtually control the 
 whole of it. There is, however, a good deal to be said 
 in favour of the sale of these lands, and some legislation 
 is needed, as there is a great deal of land of no use but 
 for its timber, but upon which individuals cannot cut, 
 except as trespassers, while the railroad company in the 
 
LANDS OF CALIPOENIA 67 
 
 Sierras, having been given the privilege of taking timber 
 off Government land for construction, has a monopoly 
 there, and is clearing Government land in preference to 
 its own. If waste could be prevented, it would perhaps 
 be best to leave the timber free to all who chose to cut, 
 on the principle that all the gifts of nature, whenever pos- 
 sible, should be free. This is problematical, perhaps im- 
 possible. If so, the plan proposed by Honourable Will S. 
 Green, of Colusa, seems to be the best of those yet brought 
 forward; that is, to sell the lands only to the builders of 
 saw-mills, in amounts proportioned to the capacity of the 
 miU. At all events, almost anything would be better than 
 the creation of such a monstrous monopoly as would at 
 once have sprung up under the Sargent bill — a monopoly 
 which would have taxed the people of California millions 
 annually, and wordd have raised the price of timber on 
 the whole coast. 
 
 It is not only the land and the timber, but even the 
 water of California that is threatened with monopoly, as 
 by virtue of laws designed to encourage the construction 
 of mining and irrigation ditches, the mountain streams 
 and natural reservoirs are being made private property, 
 and already we are told that all the water of a large section 
 of the State is the property of a corporation of San Fran- 
 cisco capitalists. 
 
 THE EFFECT OF LAND MONOPOLISATION IN CALIFORNIA. 
 
 It is not we, of this generation, but our children of the 
 next, who will fully realise the evils of the land monopo- 
 lisation which we have permitted and encouraged; for 
 those evils do not begin to fully show themselves until 
 population becomes dense. 
 
68 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 I 
 But already, while our great State, with an area larger 
 than that of France or Spain or Turkey — ^with an area 
 equal to that of all of Great Britain, Holland, Belgium, 
 Denmark and Greece combined — does not contain the 
 population of a third-class modern city; already, ere we 
 have commenced to manure our lands or to more than 
 prospect the treasures of our hills, the evils of land mo- 
 nopolisation are showing themselves in such unmistakable 
 signs that he who runs may read. This is the blight that 
 has fallen upon California, stunting her growth and mock- 
 ing her golden promise, offsetting to the immigrant the 
 richness of her soil and the beneficence of her climate. 
 
 It has already impressed its mark upon the character 
 of our agriculture — more shiftless, perhaps, than that of 
 any . State in the Union where slavery has not reigned. 
 For California is not a country of farms, but a country of 
 plantations and estates. Agriculture is a speculation. 
 The farm-houses, as a class, are unpainted frame shanties, 
 without garden or flower or tree. The farmer raises wheat ; 
 he buys his meat, his flour, his butter, his vegetables, and, 
 frequently, even his eggs. He has too much land to spare 
 time for such little things, or for beautifying his home, 
 or he is merely a renter, or an occupant of land menaced 
 by some adverse title, and his interest is but to get for 
 this season the greatest crop that can be made to grow with 
 the least labour. He hires labour for his planting and his 
 reaping, and his hands shift for themselves at other sea- 
 sons of the year. His plough he leaves standing in the 
 furrow, when the year's ploughing is done; his mustangs 
 he turns upon the hills, to be lassoed when again needed. 
 He buys on credit at the nearest store, and when his crop 
 is gathered must sell it to the Grain King's agent, at the 
 Grain King's prices. 
 And there is another type of California farmer. He 
 
LANDS OP CALIFOENIA 69 
 
 boards at the San Francisco hotels, and drives a spanking 
 team over the ClifE House road; or, perhaps, he spends 
 his time in the gayer capitals of the Bast or Europe. His 
 land is rented for one third or one fourth of the crop, or 
 is covered by scraggy cattle, which need to look after them 
 only a few half-civilised vaqueros; or his great wheat 
 fields, of from ten to twenty thousand acres, are ploughed 
 and sown and reaped by contract. And over our Ul-kept, 
 shadeless, dusty roads, where a house is an unwonted land- 
 mark, and which run frequently for miles through the 
 same man's land, plod the tramps, with blankets on back 
 — the labourers of the California farmer — ^looking for 
 work, in its seasons, or toiling back to the city when the 
 ploughing is ended or the wheat crop is gathered. I do 
 not say that this picture is a universal one, but it is a 
 characteristic one.^ 
 
 It is not only in agriculture, but in all other avocations, 
 and in all the manifestations of social life, that the effect 
 of land monopoly may be seen — in the knotting up of 
 business into the control of little rings, in the concentra- 
 tion of capital into a few hands, in the reduction of wages 
 in the mechanical trades, in the gradual decadence of 
 that independent personal habit both of thought and action 
 which gave to California life its greatest charm, in the 
 palpable differentiation of our people into the classes of 
 rich and poor. Of the "general stagnation" of which we 
 
 1 An old Califomian, a gentleman of high intelligence, who has recently 
 travelled extensively through the State upon official business, which com- 
 pelled him to pay particular attention to the material condition of the 
 people, writes: "The whole country is poverty-stricken; the farmers 
 shiftless, and crazy on wheat. I have seen farms cropped for eighteen 
 years with wheat, and not a vine, tree, shrub or flower on the place. The 
 roads are too wide, and are unworked, and a nest for noxious weeds. The 
 effect of going through California is to make you wish to leave it. if you 
 are poor and want to farm." 
 
70 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 of California have been so long complaining, this is the 
 most efficient cause. Had the unused land of California 
 been free, at Government terms, to those who would cul- 
 tivate it, instead of this "general stagnation" of the past 
 two years, we should have seen a growth unexampled in 
 the history of even the American States. For with all 
 our hyperbole, it is almost impossible to overestimate the 
 advantages with which nature has so lavishly endowed 
 this Empire State of ours. "God's Country," the return- 
 ing prospectors used to call it, and the strong expression 
 loses half of its irreverence as, coming over sage-brush 
 plains, from the still frost-bound East, the traveller winds, 
 in the early spring, down the slope of the Sierras, through 
 interminable ranks of evergreen giants, past laughing riUs 
 and banks of wild flowers, and sees under their cloudless 
 sky the vast fertUe valleys stretching out to the dark blue 
 Coast Eange in the distance. But while nature has done 
 her best to invite newcomers, our land policy has done 
 its best to repel them. We have said to the immigrant: 
 "It is a fair country which God has made between the 
 Sierras and the sea, but before you settle in it and begin 
 to reap His bounty, you must pay a forestaller roundly for 
 his permission." And the immigrant having far to come 
 and but scanty capital, has as a general thing stayed away. 
 
 THE LANDED ARISTOCRACY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Though California is a young State ; though she is a poor 
 State, and though a few years ago she was a State in which 
 there was less class distinction than in any State in the 
 Union, she can already boast of an aristocracy based on 
 the surest foundation — that of landownership. 
 
 I have been at some trouble to secure a list of the 
 
LANDS OP CALIFOENIA 71 
 
 large landowners of California, but find exact and reliable 
 information on that point difficult to obtain. The prop- 
 erty of most of the largest landowners is scattered through 
 various counties of the State, and a comparison of the 
 books of the various assessors would be the only means of 
 forming even an approximate list. These returns, however, 
 are far from reliable. It has not been the custom to list 
 land held by mere possessory title, and the practice of 
 most of the assessors has been to favour large landholders. 
 The Board of Equalisation have ferreted out many inter- 
 esting facts in this regard, which will probably be set 
 forth in their coming report. Some remarkable discrep- 
 ancies, of which the proportion is frequently as one to 
 ten, are shown between the assessors' lists and the in- 
 ventories of deceased landowners. In San Luis Obispo, 
 one of the largest landowners and land speculators in the 
 State returns to the assessor a total of 4366 acres. Eef- 
 erence to the United States Land Offices shows that he 
 holds in that county, of United States land, 43,266 
 acres. 
 
 The largest landowners in California are probably the 
 members of the great Central-Southern Pacific Railroad 
 Corporation. Were the company land divided, it would 
 give them something like two million acres apiece ; and in 
 addition to their company land, most of the individual 
 members own considerable tracts in their own name. 
 
 McLaughlin, who got the Western Pacific land grant, 
 has some three or four hundred thousand acres. Outside 
 of these railroad grants, the largest single holder is, prob- 
 ably, Wm. S. Chapman, of San Francisco, the "pioneer" 
 scrip speculator, who has some 350,000 acres; though ex- 
 State Surveyor-General Houghton is said by some to 
 own still more. Ex-United States Surveyor-General Beals 
 has s6me 300,000 acres. Across his estate one may ride 
 
72 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 for seventy-five miles. Miller & Lux, San Francisco 
 wholesale butchers, have 450,000. Around one of their 
 patches of ground there are 160 miles of fence. An- 
 other San Francisco firm, Bixby, Flint & Co., have between 
 150,000 and 200,000 acres. George W. Eoberts & Co. own 
 some 130,000 acres of swamp land. Isaac Friedlander, 
 San Francisco grain merchant, has about 100,000 acres. 
 Throckmorton, of Mendocino, some 146,000; the Murphy 
 family of Santa Clara, about 150,000 j John Foster of Los 
 Angeles, 130,000; Thomas Fowler, of Fresno, Tulare and 
 Kern, about 300,000. Abel Stearns, of Los Angeles, had 
 some 200,000 acres, but has sold a good deal. A firm in 
 Santa Barbara advertises for sale 300,000 acres, owned by 
 Philadelphia capitalists. 
 
 As for the poorer members of our California peerage — 
 the Marquises, Counts, Viscounts, Lords and Barons — ^who 
 hold but from 80,000 to 30,000 acres, they are so numer- 
 ous, that, though I have a long list, I am afraid to name 
 them for fear of making invidious distinctions, while the 
 simple country squires, who hold but from five to twenty 
 thousand acres, are more numerous still. 
 
 These men are the lords of California — ^lords as truly 
 as ever were ribboned Dukes or belted Barons in any~ 
 country under the sun. We have discarded the titles of 
 an earlier age; but we have preserved the substance, and, 
 though instead of "your grace," or "my lord," we may 
 style them simply "Mr.," the difference is only in a name. 
 They are our Land Lords just as truly. If they do not 
 exert the same influence and wield the same power, and 
 enjoy the same wealth, it is merely because our population 
 is but six hundred thousand, and their tenantry have not 
 yet arrived. Of the millions of acres of our virgin soil 
 which their vast domains enclose, they are absolute mas- 
 ters, and upon it no human creature can come, save by 
 
LANDS OP CALIFOENIA 73 
 
 their permission and upon their terms.^ From the zenith 
 above, to the centre of the earth below (so our laws run), 
 the universe is theirs. 
 
 It must not be imagined that these large landholders 
 are merely speculators — ^that they have got hold of land 
 for the purpose of quickly selling it again. On the con- 
 trary, as a class, they have a far better appreciation of the 
 future value of land and the power which its ownership 
 gives, than have the people at large who have thought- 
 lessly permitted this monopolisation to go on. Many of 
 the largest landholders do not desire to sell, and will not 
 sell for anything like current prices; but on the contrary 
 are continually adding to their domains. Among these, 
 is one Irish family, who have seen at home what the own- 
 ership of the soil of a country means. They rent their 
 land ; they will not sell it ; and this is true of many others. 
 Sometimes this indisposition to sell is merely the result 
 of considerations of present interest. As for instance: 
 An agent of a society of settlers recently went to a large 
 landholder in a southern county, and offered him a good 
 price for enough land to provide about two hundred people 
 with small farms. The landholder refused the offer, and 
 the agent proceeded to call his attention to the increase 
 in the value of his remaining land which this settlement 
 would cause. "It may be," said the landholder, "but I 
 should lose money. If you bring two hundred settlers 
 here, they wUl begin agitating for a repeal of the fence 
 law, and wiU soon compel it by their votes. Then I will 
 be obliged to spend two or three hundred thousand dollars 
 to fence in the rest of my ranch, and as fences do not 
 fatten cattle, it will be worth no more to me than now." 
 
 1 They are coining. According to Government statisticians, California 
 will, in 1890, contain a population of 3,500,000- 
 
74 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 Let me not be understood as reproaching the men who 
 have honestly acquired large tracts of land. As the world 
 goes, they are not to be blamed. If the people put sad- 
 dles on their backs, they must expect somebody to jump 
 astride to ride. If we must have an aristocracy, I would 
 prefer that my children should be members of it, rather 
 than of the common herd. While as for the men who 
 have resorted to dishonest means, the probabilities are 
 that most of them enjoy more of the respect of their fel- 
 lows, and its fruits, than if they had been honest and got 
 less land. 
 
 The division of our land into these vast estates derives 
 additional significance from the threatening wave of Asi- 
 atic immigration whose first ripples are already breaking 
 upon our shores. What the barbarians enslaved by for- 
 eign wars were to the great landlords of ancient Italy, 
 what the blacks of the African coast were to the great 
 landlords of the Southern States, the Chinese coolies may 
 be, in fact are already beginning to be, to the great land- 
 lords of our Pacific slope. 
 
III. 
 
 LAND AND LABOUE. 
 
 WHAT LAND IS. 
 
 Land, for our purpose, may be defined as that part of 
 the globe's surface habitable by man — not merely his habi- 
 tation, but the storehouse upon which he must draw for 
 all his needs, and the material to which his labour must 
 be applied for the supply of all his desires, for even the 
 products of the sea cannot be taken, or any of the forces 
 of nature utilised without the aid of land or its products. 
 On the land we are born, from it we live, to it we return 
 again — children of the soil as truly as is the blade of grass 
 or the flower of the field. 
 
 OF THE VALUE OF LAND. 
 
 Though land is the basis of all that we have, yet neither 
 land nor its natural products constitute wealth. Wealth 
 is the product — or to speak more precisely, the equiva- 
 lent of labour. That which may be had without labour 
 has no value, for the value of any object is measured by 
 the labour for which it will exchange.^ And when in 
 
 1 1 use the word value throughout in the sense in which it is used by 
 
 the writers on political economy — that of exchangeable power, not of 
 
 utility. 
 
 75 
 
76 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 speaking of "natural wealth," we mean anything else than 
 the general possibilities which nature offers to labour, we 
 mean such peculiar natural advantages as will yield to 
 labour a larger return than the ordinary, and which are 
 thus equivalent to the amount of labour dispensed with — 
 that is, such natural objects or advantages as are scarce 
 as well as desirable. If I find a diamond, I may not have 
 expended much labour, but I am rich because I have some- 
 thing which it usually takes an immense amount of labour 
 to obtain. If I own a coal mine which is valuable, it is 
 because other people have not coal mines, and cannot ob- 
 tain fuel with as little expenditure of labour as I can, and 
 will therefore give me the equivalent of more labour for 
 my coal than I have to bestow to get it. If diamonds 
 were as plenty as pebbles, they would be worth by the cart- 
 load just the cost of loading and hauling. If coal could 
 everywhere be had by digging a hole in the ground, the 
 possession of a coal mine would make nobody rich. 
 
 And so it is with land. It is only valuable as it is 
 scarce. Land (of the average quality) is not naturally 
 scarce, but abundant, and it may be doubted whether there 
 is any country, even the most populous, where the soil 
 could not easily support in comfort all the people, though 
 the law of diminishing return, as laid down by the Eng- 
 lish economists, is doubtless true. But the density of 
 population permits other economies which go far to make 
 up for, and which, probably, in a right social state would 
 fuUy make up for, any increase in the amount of labour 
 necessarily devoted to agricultural production. 
 
 But land is a fixed quantity, which man can neither in- 
 crease nor diminish, and is therefore very easily made arti- 
 ficially scarce by monopolisation. And artificial scarcity 
 arising from unequal division produces the same effect as 
 real scarcity in giving land a value. There is no scarcity 
 
LAND AND LABOUR 77 
 
 of building lots in San Francisco, for there is room yet 
 within the settled limits for ten thousand more houses. 
 But if I want to put up a house I must pay for the privi- 
 lege, just as if there were more people wanting to put up 
 houses than there is room to put them up on. 
 
 And the value of land is the power which its owner- 
 ship gives of appropriating the labour of those who have 
 it not; and in proportion as those who own are few, and 
 those who do not own are many, so does this power which 
 is expressed by the selling price of land increase. We 
 speak of railroads raising the value of land by reducing 
 the time and cost of transportation. But if we analyse 
 the operation by imagining the construction of a railroad 
 through a country in which there are few settlers and 
 land can be had for the taking, we will see that the direct 
 effect of the railroad or other improvement which in- 
 creases the value of the product of land is to increase the 
 value of labour — or to speak more precisely, of the value 
 of labour and capital, in the relative proportions deter- 
 mined by the circumstances which fix the shares of each — 
 and that it is only when the land is so far monopolised as 
 to enable the landowners to appropriate to themselves this 
 benefit that the value of land is increased. ISTo matter how 
 few people there might be, if the land were all in private 
 hands the owners might appropriate to themselves the 
 whole benefit. This is the result in a country like Eng- 
 land, but in a new country, those owners having more 
 land than they can work or desire to work, will, in selling 
 or renting their lands, yield some of the new advantage 
 in order to induce people to take their surplus land. It 
 will be said: If the value of land is the power which its 
 ownership gives of appropriating the labour of others, so 
 is the value of everything else, from a twenty-dollar piece 
 to a keg of nails. But in this is the distinction: The 
 
78 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 twenty-dollar piece or the keg of nails are themselves the 
 result of labour, and when given for labour the transac- 
 tion is an exchange. Land is not the result of labour, 
 but is the creation of God, and when labour must be 
 given for it the transaction is an appropriation. In the 
 one case labour is given for labour; in the other, labour 
 is given for something that existed before labour was. 
 
 OF THE VALUE OP LAND AND THE COMMON VTEALTH. 
 
 And thus we see that the value of land, being intrinsically 
 merely the power which its ownership gives to appropriate 
 the fruits of labour, is not an element of the wealth of a 
 community. This principle is as self-evident as that two 
 and two make four, yet we seem to have lost sight of it 
 altogether. All over the country the increase in the value 
 of land is cited as an increase of wealth. Year after year 
 we add up the increased price which land will bring, and 
 exclaim, Behold how rapidly the United States is growing 
 rich ! Yet we might with equal propriety count the debts 
 which men owe each other, in estimating the assets of a 
 community. The increased price of his land may be in- 
 creased wealth to the owner, because it enables him to 
 obtain a larger share in the distribution of its products, 
 but it is not increased wealth to the community, because 
 the shares of other people are at the same time cut down. 
 The wealth of a community depends upon the product of 
 the community. But the productive powers of land are 
 precisely the same whether its price is low or high. In 
 other words, the price of land indicates the distribution of 
 wealth, not the production. The manner of distribution 
 certainly reacts on production, and so the price of land 
 indirectly and gradually affects the wealth of the com- 
 
LAND AND LABOUR 79 
 
 munity; but this effect is the reverse of what seems gen- 
 erally imagined. High prices for land tend to decrease 
 instead of adding to the wealth of a community. For high 
 priced land means luxury on the one side, and low wages 
 on the other. Luxury means waste, and low wages mean 
 unintelligent and inefficient labour. 
 
 OF THE VALUE OF LAISTD AND THE VALUE OP LABOUR. 
 
 The value of land and of labour must bear to each other 
 an inverse ratio. These two are the "terms" of produc- 
 tion, and while production remains the same, to give more 
 to the one is to give less to the other. The value of land 
 is the power which its ownership gives to appropriate the 
 product of labour, and, as a sequence, where rents (the 
 share of the landowner) are high, wages (the share of the 
 labourer) are low. And thus we see it aU. over the world, 
 in the countries where land is high, wages are low, and 
 where land is low, wages are high. In a new country the 
 value of labour is at first at its maximum, the value of 
 land at its minimum. As population grows and land be- 
 comes monopolised and increases in value, the value of 
 labour steadily decreases. And the higher land and the 
 lower wages, the stronger the tendency towards still lower 
 wages, until this tendency is met by the very necessities 
 of existence. For the higher land and the lower wages, 
 the more difficult is it for the man who starts with noth- 
 ing but his labour to become his own employer, and the 
 more he is at the mercy of the landowner and the capitalist. 
 
 OE SPECULATION IN LAND. 
 
 The old prejudice against speculators in food and other 
 articles of necessity is passing away, for more exact habits 
 
80 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 of thought have shown that where speculators do not con- 
 trol all the sources and means of production (which is 
 impossible as to most things in this age of the world ^), 
 and speculation does not become monopoly, instead of caus- 
 ing scarcity, it tends to alleviate it; and this, on the one 
 side, by giving notice of the impending scarcity, and thus 
 inducing economy, and on the other by stimulating pro- 
 duction. 
 
 But land not being a thing of human production, specu- 
 lation in land cannot have this result. A country may 
 export people, but it cannot import land. Whatever be 
 the price put upon it, the number of acres in any given 
 place is just so many, with just such capabilities. And 
 though high prices for land may lessen the demand by 
 driving people farther away, this is not economy, but 
 waste, as the labour of a diffused population cannot be so 
 productive as that of a more concentrated population, com- 
 bined action cannot be so effective and economical, and 
 exchanges must be much more difficult and at a greater 
 cost. It is sometimes said (and the English landlords 
 piously believe that in raising their rents to the highest 
 figure they are doing their best for their fellow-men) that 
 the increase in the price of land leads to increased thor- 
 oughness of cultivation, yet how can that be when the in- 
 crease in the price of land must take from the means of 
 the cultivator, either by reducing his capital when he buys, 
 or by reducing his earnings when he rents ? ^ That the 
 
 1 Possible as to some things. The Rothschilds and the Bank of Cali- 
 fornia control the quicksilver production of the world, and sell quicksilver 
 in China cheaper than in California, where it is produced, 
 
 2 It may he said (and it is probably to some extent true in new coun- 
 tries), that where land is low a man will buy as much as he can ; where 
 land is higher, and he must take less for the same money, he will cul- 
 tivate it better. But if a man takes more than he can well use, this in 
 
LAND AND LABOUR 81 
 
 two things go together is undoubtedly true; but it seems 
 to me that the increased thoroughness of cultivation is 
 due to the increased pressure of population — ^to higher 
 prices for produce and lower prices for labour rather 
 than directly to the increased price of land. 
 
 There is another attribute in which land differs from 
 things of human production. It is imperishable. The 
 speculator in grain must seU quickly, not merely because 
 he knows another crop will soon come in, but because his 
 grain will spoU by keeping; the speculator in a manufac- 
 tured article must also sell quickly, not merely because 
 the mills are at work, but because the articles in which 
 he is speculating will spoil or go out of fashion. Not so 
 with land. The speculator in land can wait ; his land will 
 still be there as good as ever. If he dies before he reaps 
 the beneiit, the land will be there for his children. 
 
 Thus land, being a thing of limited quantity, of imper- 
 ishable nature and of unchanging demand, is a thing in 
 which there are more inducements for speculation than 
 in anything else. And being, not the result of human 
 labour, but the field for human labour, the increased price 
 caused by speculation is a tax for which there can be no 
 beneficial return. Speculation in land is, in fact, but a 
 shutting out from the land of those who want to use it, 
 until they agree to pay the price demanded — ^the land 
 speculator is a true "dog in the manger." He does not 
 want to use the land himself, but he finds his profit in 
 preventing other people from using it. The speculator 
 
 itself is speculation, and another remedy should be looked for than the 
 increase of speculation. Whereas, if by high prices a man is driven to 
 bestow the same labour on a smaller piece of ground than he would with 
 greater profit expend on a larger piece — the increased thoroughness of 
 cultivation reduces production instead of increasing it— is an evil, not a 
 benefit. 
 
82 OTJE LAND AKD LAND POLICY 
 
 knows that more people are coining, and that they must 
 have land, and he gets hold of the land which they wiH 
 want to use, in order that he may force them to pay him 
 a price for which he gives them no return — that is, that he 
 may appropriate a portion of their labour. Our emigrat- 
 ing race may be likened to a caravan crossing the desert, 
 and the land speculator to one of their number who rides 
 a little in advance, taking possession of the springs as 
 they are reached and exacting a price from his comrades 
 for the water which nature furnishes without price. 
 
 OF PROSPECTIVE VALUE AS AFFECTIITG THE PRESENT 
 VALUE OP LAND. 
 
 According to the doctrine of rent advanced by Ricardo 
 and Malthus,^ and generally accepted by the best authori- 
 ties on political economy, the value of land should be de- 
 termined by the advantages which it possesses over the 
 least advantageous land in use. This would be true, 
 though subject to the modifications arising from custom 
 and the inertia of population, were it not for the influ- 
 ence which prospective value exercises upon present value. 
 Where speculation in land is permitted — more so, where 
 it is encouraged, as it is with us — ^the prospective value 
 of land (the incentive to speculation) must exercise a 
 very great influence upon the present value of land, and 
 the value of land be determined, not by its actual advan- 
 tages over the poorest land in use, but by its advantages, 
 prospective as well as actual, over land which offers just 
 sufficient prospective advantage to make its possession de- 
 
 1 Henry George made no real study of the authorities on political econ- 
 omy until the "Progress and Poverty" period, — H. 6., Jr. 
 
LAND AND LABOUR 83 
 
 sirable. The prices of land in the United States to-day 
 are not warranted by our present population, but are sus- 
 tained by speculation founded upon the certainty of the 
 greater population which is coming. Every promise, every 
 hiope, is discounted by land speculation. And land being 
 indestructible and costing less to keep than anything else 
 (for the taxes on unimproved land are generally lighter 
 than on anything else), and being limited in amount (so 
 that no increase in price brings about increase in supply), 
 these anticipations form a firm basis for price. Land has 
 no intrinsic value. It is not like a keg of nails, which costs 
 about so much to produce, and the price of which cannot, 
 therefore, go much above or fall much below that point. 
 It is worth just what can be had for it. If a man must 
 have land where speculative prices rule, he must pay the 
 price asked, and the price he pays is the gauge by which 
 all the surrounding holders measure the value and assess 
 the price of their lands. One rise encourages another 
 rise, and the course of prices is up and up, so long as 
 there is expectation of future demand. And whenever a 
 temporary panic comes, the land prices recover as quickly 
 as it is natural for hope to reassert itself in the human 
 breast. A great singer buys a lot in a little Illinois town 
 and real estate advances fifty per cent.; a train of cars 
 comes to Oakland, and for miles around land cannot be 
 bought for less than a thousand dollars an acre ; a few men 
 in San Francisco say to each other that the city is sure 
 to be the second on the continent, and straightway the 
 hill-tops for long distances are being bought and sold at 
 rates which would be exorbitant if San Francisco really 
 contained a million people, and he who wants a piece of 
 land to use must pay the speculative price. We are thus 
 compelled to pay in the present, prices based on what 
 people will be compelled to pay in the future. 
 
84 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 OF SPECULATION IN LAND, AND THE SUPPLY OF CAPITAL, 
 
 We frequently hear it said : "Times are hard because land 
 speculation has locked up so much capital." Now it is 
 evident that no amount of buying and selling in a com- 
 munity can lock up capital, and the direct efEect of a 
 rise in land values, is to alter the distribution of wealth, 
 not to affect its amount. But to some extent the same 
 effect is produced as would be by the locking up of capital. 
 When a rise in land values takes place, certain men find 
 themselves much richer, without any addition to the capi- 
 tal of the community having been made. Some of these 
 will employ part of their new wealth in unproductive uses 
 — ^in building finer houses, buying diamonds for their 
 wives, or travelling in the East, or in Europe. This re- 
 duces the supply of productive capital. At the same time 
 the profits of land speculation, and the new security which 
 the rise in values gives, will increase the number of bor- 
 rowers, and competition between them will have a ten- 
 dency to keep up rates of interest. But a fall in land 
 prices does not at once increase the available supply of 
 capital, as capitalists are made timid, and there is a ten- 
 dency to hoard rather than lend. 
 
 OF THE NECESSARY VALUE OP LAND. 
 
 Where the monopolisation of land is not permitted, where 
 a man can only take land which he wants to use, unused 
 land can have no value — at least, none above the price 
 fixed by the State for the privilege of occupying it. But 
 as land becomes occupied, most of it would acquire a value 
 — either from the possession of natural advantages supe- 
 
LAND AND LABOUR 85 
 
 rior to that still unoccupied, or from its more central posi- 
 tion as respects population. This we may call the neces- 
 sary or real value of land, in contradistinction to the un- 
 necessary or fictitious value of land which results from 
 monopolisation. To illustrate : If, on the outskirts of San 
 Francisco, any one who wished to build a house might 
 take a lot from the unused ground, outside land would 
 be worth nothing, but Montgomery or Kearney street prop- 
 erty woxdd stUl be very valuable, as, being in the heart 
 of the city, it is more convenient for residences or more 
 useful for business purposes. The difference, however, 
 between this necessary value of the land of the United 
 States and the aggregate value at which it is held must 
 be most enormous, and the difference represents the un- 
 necessary tax which land monopolisation levies upon 
 labour. 
 
 OF PROPERTY IN LAND. 
 
 The right of every human being to himself is the foun- 
 dation of the right of property. That which a man pro- 
 duces is rightfidly his own, to keep, to sell, to give, or 
 to bequeath, and upon this sure title alone can ownership 
 of anything rightfully rest. But man has also another 
 right, declared by the fact of his existence — the right to 
 the use of so much of the free gifts of nature as may 
 be necessary to supply all the wants of that existence, and 
 as he may use without interfering with the equal rights 
 of any one else, and to this he has a title as against aU 
 the world. 
 
 This right is natural; it cannot be alienated. It is the 
 free gift of his Creator to every man that comes into the 
 ■^orld — a right as sacred, as indefeasible as his right to 
 life itself. 
 
86 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 Land being the creation of God and the natural habi- 
 tation of man, the repervoir from which man must draw 
 the means of maintaining his life and satisfying his wants ; 
 the material to which it was pre-ordained that his labour 
 should be applied, it follows that every man born into 
 this world has a natural right to as much land as is 
 necessary for his own uses, and that no man has a right 
 to any more. To deny this is to deny the right of man 
 to himself, to assert the atrocious doctrine that the Al- 
 mighty has created some men to be the slaves of others. 
 
 For, to permit one man to monopolise the land from 
 which the support of others is to be drawn, is to permit 
 him to appropriate their labour, and, in so far as he is 
 permitted to do this, to appropriate them. It is to insti- 
 tute slavery. 
 
 For whether a man owns the bodies of his fellow beings, 
 or owns only the land from which they must obtain a 
 subsistence, makes but little difference to him or to them. 
 In the one case it is slavery just as much as the other. 
 And of the two forms of slavery, that which pretends to 
 the ownership of flesh and blood seems to me, on the 
 whole, far the more preferable. For in England, where 
 the monopolisation of land has reached a point which 
 gives to the mere labourer a share of the product of his 
 labour just sufficient to maintain his existence, the land- 
 owner gets from the labourer all that any master can get 
 from his slave, while he is not affected by the selfish 
 interest which prompts the master to look out for the well- 
 being of his slave, and is not influenced by those warmer 
 feelings which any ordinarily well-disposed man feels to- 
 wards any living thing of which he claims the ownership, 
 be it even a dog. For in free, rich England of the Nine- 
 teenth Century — England, whose boast it is that no slave 
 can breathe her air — England, that has spent millions of 
 
LAND ANB LABOUB 87 
 
 pounds for the abolition of slavery in far-off lands, and 
 that sends abroad annually hundreds of thousands of 
 pounds for the conversion of the heathen — the condition 
 of the agricultural labourer is to-day harder, more hope- 
 less and more brutalising than that of the average slave 
 under any system of slavery which has prevailed in mod- 
 ern times. And, going even further, I do not believe that 
 the cold-blooded horrors brought to light by the various 
 Parliamentary Commissions vi^hich have investigated the 
 condition of the labouring poor of England, can be matched 
 even by the records of ancient slavery, under which sys- 
 tem slaves were sometimes fed to fishes, or tortured for 
 sport, or even by the annals of Spanish conquests in the 
 New World. Certain it is that the condition of the slaves 
 upon our Southern plantations was not half so bad as 
 that of the land monopoly slaves of England. Legrees 
 there may have been in plenty, but I have yet to hear of 
 the Legree who worked children to physical and moral 
 death in his fields, or ground them, body and' soul, in 
 his mills. 
 
 There is in nature no such thing as a fee simple in 
 land. The Almighty, who created the earth for man and 
 man for the earth, has entailed it upon all the genera- 
 tions of the children of men by a decree written upon the 
 constitution of all things — a decree which no human action 
 can bar and no prescription determine. Let the parch- 
 ments be ever so many, or possession ever so long, in the 
 Courts of Natural Justice there can be but one title to 
 land recognised — the using of it to satisfy reasonable 
 wants. 
 
 Now, from this, it by no means follows that there should 
 be no such thing as property in land, but merely that 
 there should be no monopolisation — no standing between 
 the man who is willing to work and the field which nature 
 
88 OUB LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 offers for his labour. For while it is true that the land 
 of a country is a free gift of the Creator to all the people 
 of that country, to the enjoyment of which each has an 
 equal natural right, it is also true that the recognition 
 of private ownership in land is necessary to its proper use 
 — ^is, in fact, a condition of civilisation. When the mUlen- 
 nium comes, and the old savage, selfish instincts have died 
 out in men, land may perhaps be held in common; but 
 not till then. In our present state, at least, the "magic 
 of property which turns even sand into gold" must be 
 applied to our lands if we would reap the largest benefits 
 they are capable of yielding — must be retained if we would 
 keep from relapsing into barbarism. 
 
 And a full appreciation of the value of landownership 
 tends to the same practical conclusion as the considera- 
 tions I have been presenting. If the worker upon land is 
 a better worker and a better man because he owns the 
 land, it should be our effort to make this stimulus felt 
 by all — to make, as far as possible, all land-users also 
 landowners. 
 
 Nor is there any difficulty in combining a full recogni- 
 tion of private property in land with a recognition of the 
 right of all to the benefits conferred by the Creator, as 
 I will hereafter attempt to show. 
 
 We are not called upon to guarantee to all men equal 
 conditions, and could not if we would, any more than we 
 coidd guarantee to them equal intelligence, equal indus- 
 try or equal prudence; but we are called upon to give to 
 all men an equal chance. If we do not, our republicanism 
 is a snare and a delusion, our clatter about the rights of 
 man the veriest buncombe in which a people ever indulged. 
 
IV. 
 
 THE TENDENCY OP OUE PEESENT LAND 
 POLICY. 
 
 WHAT OUE LAND POLICY IS. 
 
 Is our land policy calculated to give to all men an equal 
 chance? We have seen what it is — ^how we are enabling 
 speculators to rob settlers; how we are by every means 
 enhancing the tax which the many must pay to the few; 
 how we are making away with the heritage of our children, 
 and putting in immense bodies into the hands of a few 
 individuals the soil from which the coming millions of 
 our people must draw their support. If we continue this 
 policy a few years, the public domain will all be gone; 
 the homestead law and the pre-emption law will remain 
 upon the statute books but to remind the poor man of the 
 good time past, and we shall find ourselves embarrassed 
 by all the difficulties which beset the statesmen of Europe 
 — ^the social disease of England; the seething discontent 
 of Prance. 
 
 Was there ever national blunder so great — ever national 
 crime so tremendous as ours in dealing with our land? 
 It is not in the heat and flush of conquest that we are 
 thus doing what has been done in every country under the 
 sun where a ruling class has been built up and the masses 
 
90 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 condemned to hopeless toil; it is not in ignorance of true 
 political principles and in the conscientious belief that 
 the God-appointed order of things is that the many should 
 serve the few. We are monopolising our land deliber- 
 ately — our land, not the land of a conquered nation, and 
 we are doing it while prating of the equal rights of the 
 citizen and of the brotherhood of men. 
 
 THE VALUE OF OUR PUBLIC DOMAIN. 
 
 This public domain that we are getting rid of as recklessly 
 as though we esteemed its possession a curse, can never 
 be replaced, nor are there other limitless bodies of land 
 which we may subdue. Of the whole continent, we now 
 occupy nearly the whole of the zone in which all the 
 real progressive life of the world has been lived. North 
 of us are the cold high latitudes, south of us the tropical 
 heats. The table-lands of Mexico and the valleys of the 
 Saskatchewan and Eed rivers, which comprise almost all 
 of the temperate portions of the continent yet unoccupied 
 by our race, are of very small extent when compared with 
 the vast country we have already overrun, and when our 
 emigration is compelled to set upon them will be filled as 
 we now populate a new State. 
 
 It is not pleasant to think of the time when the public 
 domain will all be gone. "This will be a great country," 
 we say, "when it is all fenced in." Great it will be — 
 great it must be, in arts and arms, in population and in 
 wealth. But will it be as great in all that constitutes 
 true greatness? Will it be such a good country for the 
 poor man? Will there be such an average of comfort and 
 independence and virtue among the masses? And which 
 to me is the important fact — that I am one of a nation 
 
PRESENT LAND POLICY 91 
 
 of so many more millions, or that I can buy my chil- 
 dren shoes when they need them ? "The greatest glory of 
 America," says Carlyle, "is that there every bootblack may 
 have a turkey in his pot." We shall be credited with no 
 such glory when the country is all "fenced in" as we are 
 now rapidly fencing it. 
 
 From this public domain of ours have sprung and still 
 spring subtle influences which strengthen our national 
 character and tinge all our thought. This vast back- 
 ground of unfenced land has given a consciousness of 
 freedom even to the dweller in crowded cities, and has 
 been a well-spring of hope even to those who never thought 
 of taking refuge upon it. The child of the people as he 
 grows to manhood in Europe finds every seat at the ban- 
 quet of life marked "taken," and must struggle with his 
 fellows for the crumbs that fall, without one chance in a 
 thousand of forcing or sneaking his way to a seat. In 
 America, whatever be his condition, there is always more 
 or less clearly and vividly the consciousness that the pub- 
 lie domain is behind him; that there is a new country 
 where all the places are not yet taken, where opportu- 
 nities are still open; and the knowledge of this fact, act- 
 ing and reacting, penetrates our whole national life, 
 giving to it generosity and independence, elasticity and 
 ambition. ' 
 
 Why should we seek so diligently to get rid of this 
 public domain as if for the mere pleasure of getting rid 
 of it ? What have the buffaloes done to us that we should 
 sacrifice the heritage of our children to see the last of 
 them extirpated before we die? Are the operatives of 
 New England, the farmers of Ohio, the mechanics of San 
 Francisco better off for the progress of this thing which 
 we call national development — ^this scattering of a thou- 
 sand people over the land which would suffice for a mil- 
 
92 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 lion; this fencing in for a dozen of the soil to which tens 
 of millions must before long look for subsistence? 
 
 All that we are proud of in the American character, all 
 that makes our condition and institutions better than 
 those of the older countries, we may trace to the fact 
 that land has been cheap in the United States; and yet 
 we are doing our utmost to make it dear, and actually 
 seem pleased to see it become dear, looking upon the lien 
 which the few are taking upon the labour of the many as 
 an actual increase in the wealth of all. 
 
 NO TENDENCY TO EQUALISATION, 
 
 IfoE can we flatter ourselTes that the inequality in con- 
 dition which we are creating will right itself by easy and 
 peaceful means. It is not merely present inequality which 
 we are creating, but a tendency to fiirther inequality. 
 When we allow one man to take the land which should 
 belong to a hundred, and give to a corporation the soil 
 from which a million must shortly draw their subsistence, 
 we are not only giving in the present wealth to the few 
 by taking it from the many, but we are putting it in the 
 power of the few to levy a constant and an increasing tax 
 upon the many, and we are increasing the tendency to 
 the concentration of wealth not merely upon the land 
 which is thus monopolised, but all over the United 
 States. 
 
 Even if the large bodies of land which we are giving 
 away for nothing, or selling to speculators for a nominal 
 price, are subdivided and sold for small farms, the mis- 
 chief we have done is not at an end. The capital of the 
 settlers has been taken from them, and put in large masses 
 into the hands of the speculators or railroad kings. The 
 
PRESENT LAND POLICY 93 
 
 many are thereafter the poorer; the few thereafter the 
 richer. We have concentrated wealth; that is, we have 
 concentrated the power of getting wealth. We have set in 
 operation the law of attraction — the law that "unto him 
 that hath shall it he given," and never in any age of the 
 world has this law worked so powerfully as now. 
 
 It must not be thought that because we have no laws 
 of entail and primogeniture the vast estates which we are 
 creating will in time break up of themselves. There were 
 no laws of entail and primogeniture in ancient Eome 
 where the monopolisation of land and the concentration 
 of wealth went so far that the empire, and even civilisa- 
 tion itself, perished of the social diseases engendered. It 
 is not the laws of entail and primogeniture that have pro- 
 duced the concentration of wealth in England which makes 
 the richest country in the world the abode of the most 
 hopeless poverty. In spite of entail and primogeniture, 
 wealth is constantly changing from hand to hand, but al- 
 ways in large masses. The richest families of a few cen- 
 turies back are extinct, the blood of the noblest of a com- 
 paratively recent time ilows in the veins of people who 
 live in garrets and toil in kitchens. And the same causes 
 which have reduced the 374,000 landholders of England 
 in the middle of the last century to 30,000 now are work- 
 ing in this country as powerfully as they are working 
 there. Wealth is concentrating in a few hands as rapidly 
 in New York as in London; the condition of the labouring 
 classes of New England is steadily approximating to that 
 of Old England. 
 
 Nor, if we are to have a very rich class and a very poor 
 class, is there any particular advantage in the fact that 
 one is constantly being recruited from the other, though 
 there are people who seem to think that the fact that 
 most of our millionaires were poor boys is a sufficient an- 
 
94 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 swer to anything that may be said of the evils of a con- 
 centration of wealth. As wealth concentrates, the chance 
 for any particular individual to escape from one class to 
 another becomes less and less, until practically worth noth- 
 ing, while there is nothing in human nature to cause us 
 to believe, and nothing in history to show that members 
 of a privileged class are less grasping because they once 
 belonged to an unprivileged class. Nor, after wealth has 
 become concentrated, is there any tendency in this chang- 
 ing of the individuals who hold it to diffuse it again. 
 The social structure is like the flame of a gas-burner, 
 which retains its form though the particles which com- 
 pose it are constantly changing. 
 
 THE TENDENCY TO CONCBNTKATION. 
 
 There is no tendency yet to the breaking up of large 
 landholdings in the United States; but the reverse is 
 rather the case. The railroad lands are not being sold 
 anything like as fast as they are being granted, and large 
 private estates are increasing instead of diminishing. It 
 is true that tracts bought for speculation are frequently 
 cut up and sold, but it will generally be found that others 
 are at the same time secured farther ahead, though not 
 always by the same parties. And as wealth concentrates, 
 population becomes denser, and the advantages of land- 
 ownership greater, the tendency on the part of the rich 
 to invest in land increases, and the same cause which has 
 so largely reduced the number of landowners in Great 
 Britain is put in operation. Already the custom of rent- 
 ing land is unmistakably gaining ground, and the con- 
 centration of landownership seems to be going on in our 
 older States almost as fast as the monopolisation of new 
 
PRESENT LAND POLICY 95 
 
 and goes on in the younger ones.^ And at last the steam 
 jlough and the steam wagon have appeared — to develop, 
 perhaps, in agriculture the same tendencies to concen- 
 tration which the power loom and the triphammer have 
 developed in manufacturing. 
 
 We are not only putting large bodies of our new lands 
 in the hands of the few; but we are doing our best to 
 keep them there, and to cause the absorption of small 
 farms into large estates. The whole pressure of our reve- 
 nue system, National and State, tends to the concentra- 
 tion of wealth and the monopolisation of land. A hun- 
 
 1 "Our farms in older States instead of being divided and subdivided 
 as they ought to be, are growing larger and more unwieldy. The ten- 
 dency of the times is unquestionably towards immense estates, each with 
 a manorial mansion in the center and a dependent tenantry crouching in 
 the shadow." — North American Review, 1859. 
 
 "A non-resident proprietary like that of Ireland is getting to be the 
 characteristic of large farming districts in New England, adding yearly to 
 the nominal value of leasehold farms, advancing yearly the rent de- 
 manded, and steadily degrading the character of the tenantry, until, in 
 the place of the boasted intelligence of rural New England, a competent 
 authority can to-day write : ' The general educational condition of the 
 farm laborer is very low, even below that of the factory operative ; a large 
 percentage of them can neither read nor write.'" — New York World, 
 May, 1871, in an article on the returns for New England of the Censvs 
 0/1870. 
 
 "The part of the report [Massachusetts Bureau of Labor Statistics], 
 however, which of all is, in our opinion, the most remarkable, is that 
 relating to agriculture in Massachusetts. It may be summed up in two 
 words : rapid decay. Increased nominal value of land, higher rents, 
 fewer farms occupied by owners ; diminished product, general decline of 
 prosperity, lower wages ; a more ignorant population, increasing number 
 of women employed at hard outdoor labor (surest sign of a declining civ- 
 ilization), and steady deterioration in the style of farming — these are the 
 conditions described by a cumulative mass of evidence that is perfectly 
 irresistible, and that is unfortunately only too strongly confirmed by such 
 details of census statistics as have been so far made public."— JVeio Tort 
 Nation, June, 1871. 
 
96 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 dred thousand dollars in the hands of one man pays but 
 a slight proportion of the taxes which are paid by the 
 same simi in the hands of fifty; a hundred thousand acres 
 owned by a single landholder are assessed but for a frac- 
 tion of the amount assessed upon the himdred thousand 
 acres of six hundred farms. Especially is this true of 
 the State of California, where the large landholders are 
 frequently assessed at the rate of one dollar per acre on 
 land for which they are charging settlers twenty or thirty, 
 and where the small farmer sometimes pays taxes at a 
 rate one hundredfold greater than his neighbour of the 
 eleven league ranch. Our whole policy is of a piece — 
 everything is tending with irresistible force to make us a 
 nation of landlords and tenants — of great capitalists and 
 their poverty-stricken employes. 
 
 The life of all the older nations shows the bitterness 
 of the curse of land monopolisation; we cannot turn a 
 page of their history without finding the blood stains and 
 the tear marks it has left. But never since commerce and 
 manufactures grew up, and men began to engage largely 
 in other occupations than those connected directly with 
 the soil, has it been so important to prevent land monopo- 
 lisation as now. The tendency of all the improved means 
 and forms of production and exchange — of the greater 
 and greater subdivision of labour, of the enslavement of 
 steam, of the utilisation of electricity, of the ten thou- 
 sand great labour-saving appliances which modern inven- 
 tion has brought forth, is strongly and more strongly to 
 extend the dominion of capital and to make of labour its 
 abject slave. Once to set up in the business of making 
 cloth required only the purchase of a hand loom and a 
 little yarn, the means for which any journeyman could 
 soon save from his earnings; now it requires a great fac- 
 tory, costly machinery, large stocks and credits, and to 
 
PEESENT LAKD POLICY 97 
 
 go into business on his own account one must be a mil- 
 lionaire. So it is in all branclies of manufacture ; so, too, 
 it is in trade. Concentration is the law of the time. The 
 great city is swallowing up the little towns ; the great mer- 
 chant is driving his poorer rivals out of business; a thou- 
 sand little dealers become the clerks and shopmen of the 
 proprietor of the marble-fronted palace; a thousand mas- 
 ter workmen, the employes of one rich manufacturer, and 
 the gigantic corporations, the alarming product of the 
 new social forces which Watt and Stephenson introduced 
 to the world, are themselves being welded into still more 
 titanic corporations. From present appearances, ten years 
 from now we shall have but three, possibly but one railroad 
 company in the United States, yet our young men remem- 
 ber the time when these giants were such feeble infants 
 that we deemed it charity to shelter them from the cold, 
 and feed them, as it were, with a spoon. In the new con- 
 dition of things what chance will there be for a poor man 
 if our land also is monopolised ? 
 
 Of the political tendency of our land policy, it is hardly 
 necessary to speak. To say that the land of a country 
 shall be owned by a small class, is to say that that class 
 shall rule it; to say — which is the same thing — that the 
 people of a country shall consist of the very rich and the 
 very poor, is to say that republicanism is impossible. Its 
 forms may be preserved; but the real government which 
 clothes itself with these forms, as if in mockery, will be 
 many degrees worse than an avowed and intelligent des- 
 potism. 
 
WHAT OUE LAND POLICY SHOULD BE. 
 
 HOW WE SHOULD DISPOSE OF OUE NEW LAND. 
 
 When we reflect what land is; when we consider the rela- 
 tions between it and labour; when we remember that to 
 own the land upon which a man must gain his subsist- 
 ence is to all intents and purposes to own the man himself, 
 we cannot remain in doubt as to what should be our policy 
 in disposing of our public lands. 
 
 We have no right to dispose of them except to actual 
 settlers — to the men who really want to use them; no 
 right to sell them to speculators, to give them to railroad 
 companies or to grant them for agrieiiltural colleges; no 
 more right to do so than we have to sell or to grant the 
 labour of the people who must some day live upon 
 them. 
 
 And to actual settlers we should give them. Give, not 
 sell. Tor we have no right to step between the man who 
 wants to use land and land which is as yet unused, and 
 to demand of him a price for our permission to avail him- 
 self of his Creator's bounty. The cost of surveying and 
 the cost of administering the Land Office may be proper 
 charges ; but even these it were juster and wiser to charge 
 as general expenses, to be borne by the surplus wealth of 
 
 98 
 
TBTJE LAND POLICY . 99 
 
 the country, by the property which settlement will make 
 more valuable. We can better afford to bear the neces- 
 sary expenses of the Land OflBce than we can the expense 
 of keeping useless men-of-war at sea or idle troops in 
 garrison posts. When we can give a few rich bankers 
 twenty or thirty millions a year we can afford to pay a 
 few millions in order to make our public lands perfectly 
 free. Let the settler keep all of his little capital ; it is his 
 seed wheat. When he has gathered his crop, then we may 
 take our toll, with usury if need be. 
 
 And we should give but in limited quantities. For 
 while every man has a right to as much land as he can 
 properly use, no man has a right to any more, and when 
 others do or will want it, cannot take any more without 
 infringing on their rights. One hundred and sixty acres 
 is too much to give one person ; it is more than he can cul- 
 tivate; and our great object should be to give every one 
 an opportunity of employing his own labour, and to give 
 no opportunity to any one to appropriate the labour of 
 others. We cannot afford to give so much in view of the 
 extent of the public domain and the demand for homes 
 yet to be made upon it. While we are calling upon all 
 the world to come in and take our land, let us save a little 
 for our own children. Nor can we afford to give so 
 much in view of the economic loss consequent upon the 
 dispersion of population. Four families to the square 
 mile are not enough to secure the greatest return to labour 
 and the least waste in exchanges. Eighty acres is quite 
 enough for any one, and I am inclined to think forty acres 
 still nearer the proper amount. 
 
 There should be but this one way of disposing of the 
 agricultural lands. Kone at all should be given to the 
 States, except such as was actually needed for sites of 
 public buildings; none at all for school funds or agricul- 
 
100 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 tural colleges. The earnings of a self-employing, inde- 
 pendent people, upon which the State may at any time 
 draw, constitute the best school fund; to diffuse wealth so 
 that the masses may enjoy the luxury of learning is the 
 best way to provide for colleges. 
 
 SOME OBJECTIONS. 
 
 It will be said: If the public land is to be morselled out 
 in this way, what is to be done for stock ranches and 
 sheep farms? There wiU be the unused land, the public 
 commons. Let the large herds and flocks keep upon that, 
 moving farther along as it is needed for settlement. But 
 there would be plenty of stock kept on eighty-acre or even 
 forty-acre farms. In Belgium each six-acre farmer has 
 his cow or two of the best breed, and kept in the best 
 condition. 
 
 And it may be said: There is some land which requires 
 extensive work for its reclamation. Capital cannot be 
 induced to undertake this work if the land be given away 
 in small pieces. But if capital cannot, labour can. The 
 most difficult reclamation in the world — ^that of turning 
 the shifting sands of the French sea-coast into gardens 
 has been done by ten- and twelve-acre farmers. Observe 
 that it is proposed to give the lands only to actual settlers. 
 Is there any of our land which requires for its reclama- 
 tion greater capital than that involved in the labour of 
 sixteen men to the square mile, working to make them- 
 selves homes? The cost of reclaiming the swamp lands 
 of California, which has been made an excuse for giving 
 them away by the hundred thousand acres, does not in 
 most cases equal the cost of the fencing required on the 
 uplands. Let men be sure that they are working for them- 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 101 
 
 selves, give them a little stake in the general prosperity, 
 and labour will combine intelligently and economically, 
 enough. 
 
 HOW SETTLEMENT WOULD GO ON. 
 
 Under such a policy as this, settlement would go on regu- 
 larly and thoroughly. Population would not in the same 
 time spread over as much ground as imder the present 
 policy; but what it did spread over would be well settled 
 and well cultivated. There would be no necessity for 
 building costly railroads to connect settlers with a mar- 
 ket. The market would accompany settlement. No one 
 would go out into the wilderness, to brave all the hardships 
 and discomforts of the solitary frontier life; but with the 
 foremost line of settlement would go church and school- 
 house and lecture-room. The ill-paid, overworked me- 
 chanic of the city could find a home on the soil, where 
 he would not have to abandon all the comforts of civili- 
 sation, but where there would be society enough to make 
 life attractive, and where the wants of his neighbours 
 would give a market for his surplus labour until his land 
 began to produce ; and to tell those who complain of want 
 of employment and low wages to make for themselves 
 homes on the public domain would then be no idle taunt. 
 Consider, too, the general gain from this mode of set- 
 tlement. How much of our labour is now given to trans- 
 portation, and wasted in various ways, because of the scat- 
 tering of our population which land grabbing has caused? 
 
 SOMETHING STILL MORE RADICAL NEEDED. 
 
 But still the adoption of such a policy would afEect only 
 the land that is left us. It would be preventive, not reme- 
 
102 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 dial. It would still leave the great belts granted to rail- 
 roads, the vast estates such as those with which California 
 is cursed, and the large bodies of land which everywhere 
 have been made the subject of speculation. It would 
 leave, moreover, still in full force, the tendency which is 
 concentrating the ownership of the land in a few hands 
 in the older settled States. And further than this, I 
 hardly think, agitate as we may, that we can secure the 
 adoption of such a preventive policy until we can do some- 
 thing to make the monopolisation of land unprofitable. 
 
 What we want, therefore, is something which shall de- 
 stroy the tendency to the aggregation of land, which shall 
 break up present monopolisation, and which shall prevent 
 (by doing away with the temptation) future monopolisa- 
 tion. And as arbitrary and restrictive laws are always 
 difficult to enforce, we want a measure which shall be 
 equal, uniform and constant in its operation; a measure 
 which will not restrict enterprise, which will not curtail 
 production, and which will not ofEend the natural sense 
 of justice. 
 
 When our 40,000,000 of people have to raise $800,000,- 
 000 per year for public purposes '■ we cannot have any diffi- 
 culty in discovering such a remedy, in the adjustment of 
 taxation. 
 
 A LESSON FROM THE PAST. 
 
 Let us turn for a moment from the glare of the Nine- 
 teenth Century to the darkness of mediaeval times. The 
 spirit of the Feudal System dealt far more wisely with 
 the land than the system which has succeeded it, and rude 
 outcome of a barbarous age though it was, we may, remem- 
 
 1 Estimate of Commissioner Wells. 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 103 
 
 bering the difference of times and conditions, go back to 
 it for many valuable lessons. The Feudal System an- 
 nexed duties to privileges. In theory, at least, protection 
 was the corollary of allegiance, and honour brought with 
 it the obligation to a good life and noble deeds, while the 
 ownership of land involved the necessity of bearing the 
 public expenses. One portion of the land, allotted to the 
 Crown, defrayed the expenses of the State; out of the 
 profits of another portion, allotted to the military tenants, 
 the army was provided and maintained; the profits of a 
 third portion, given to religious uses, supported the Church 
 and relieved the sick, the indigent and the wayworn, while 
 there was a fourth portion, the commons, of which no 
 man was master, but which was free to all the people. 
 The great debt, the grinding taxation, which now falls 
 on the labouring classes of England, are but the results of 
 a departure from this system. Before Henry VIII. sup- 
 pressed the monasteries and enclosed the commons there 
 were no poor laws in England and no need for any; until 
 the Crown lands were got rid of there was no necessity 
 for taxation for the support of the Government; until the 
 military tenants shirked the condition on which they had 
 been originally permitted to reap the profits of landowner- 
 ship, England could at any time put an army in the field 
 without borrowing and without taxation; and a recent 
 English writer has estimated that had the feudal tenures 
 been continued, England would have now had at her com- 
 mand a completely appointed army of six hundred thou- 
 sand men, without the cost of a penny to the public trea- 
 sury or to the labouring classes. Had this system been con- 
 tinued the vast war expenses of England would have come 
 from the surplus wealth of those who make war; the ex- 
 penses of government would have borne upon the classes 
 who direct the Government; and the deep gangrene of 
 
104 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 pauperism, which perplexes the statesman and hafiBes the 
 philanthropist, would have had no existence. England 
 would have been stronger, richer, happier. Why should 
 we not go back to the old system, and charge the expenses 
 of government upon our lands? 
 
 If we do, ,we shall go far towards breaking up land mo- 
 nopoly and all its evils, and towards counteracting the 
 causes now so rapidly concentrating wealth in a few hands. 
 We shall raise our revenues by the most just and the most 
 simple means, and with the least possible burden upon 
 production. 
 
 TAXATION' OF LAND FALLS ONLY OJST ITS OWNER. 
 
 There is one peculiarity in a land tax. With a few tri- 
 fling exceptions of no practical importance it is the only 
 tax which must be paid by the holder of the thing taxed. 
 If we impose a tax upon money loaned, the lender will 
 charge it to the borrower, and the borrower must pay it, 
 otherwise the money will be sent out of the country for 
 investment, and if the borrower uses it in his business 
 he, in his turn, must charge it to his customers or his 
 business becomes unprofitable. If we impose a tax upon 
 buildings, those who use them must pay it, as otherwise 
 the erection of buildings becomes unprofitable, and will 
 cease until rents become high enough to pay the regular 
 profit on the cost of building and the tax besides. But 
 not so with land. Land is not an article of production. 
 Its quantity is fixed. No matter how little you tax it there 
 will be no more of it; no matter how much you tax it 
 there will be no less. It can neither be removed nor made 
 scarce by cessation of production. There is no possible 
 way in which owners of laud can shift the tax upon the 
 
TBUE LAND POLICY 105 
 
 user. And so while the effect of taxation upon all other 
 things is to increase their value, and thus to make the 
 consumer pay the tax — the effect of a tax upon land is 
 to reduce its value — that is, its selling price, as it reduces 
 the profit of its ownership without reducing its supply. 
 It will not, however, reduce its renting price. The same 
 amount of rent will be paid; but a portion of it will now 
 go to the State instead of to the landlord. And were we 
 to impose upon land a tax equal to the whole annual profit 
 • of its ownership, land would be worth nothing and might 
 in many eases be abandoned by its owners. But the users 
 would still have to pay as much as before — ^paying in 
 taxes what they formerly paid as rent. And reversely, if 
 we were to reduce or take off the taxes on land, the owner, 
 not the user, would get the benefit. Eents would be no 
 higher, but would leave more profit, and the value of land 
 would be more. 
 
 LAND TAXATION THE BEST TAXATION. 
 
 The best tax is that which comes nearest to filling the 
 three following conditions: 
 
 That it bear as lightly as possible upon production. 
 
 That it can be easily and cheaply collected, and cost 
 the people as little as possible in addition to what it yields 
 the Government. 
 
 That it bear equally — that is, according to the ability 
 to pay. 
 
 The tax upon land better fulfils these conditions than 
 any tax it is possible to impose. 
 
 1. — As we have seen, it does not bear at all upon produc- 
 tion — it adds nothing to prices, and does not affect the 
 cost of living. 
 
106 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 2. — ^As it does not add to prices, it costs the people noth- 
 ing in addition to what it yields the Government; while 
 as land cannot be hid and cannot be moved, it can be col- 
 lected with more ease and certainty, and with less expense 
 than any other tax. 
 
 3. — A tax upon the value of land is the most equal of 
 all taxes, not that it is paid by all in equal amounts, or 
 even in equal amounts upon equal means, but because the 
 value of land is something which belongs to all, and in 
 taxing land values we are merely taking for the use of the 
 community something which belongs to the community, 
 which by the necessities of our social organisation we are 
 obliged to permit individuals to hold. 
 
 Of course, in speaking of the value of land, I mean the 
 value of the land itself, not the value of any improvement 
 which has been made upon it — I mean what I believe is 
 sometimes called in England the unearned value of land. 
 
 Prom its very nature it must be apparent that property 
 in land differs essentially from other property, and if the 
 principles I have endeavoured to state in the third section 
 of this paper are correct, it must be evident that it is 
 not unjust to impose taxes upon land values which are not 
 imposed on other property. But as the proposition may 
 be somewhat startling, it may be worth while to dwell a 
 little on this point. 
 
 OF THE JUSTICE OF TAXING LAND. 
 
 Here is a lot in the central part of San Francisco, which, 
 irrespective of the building upon it, is worth $100,000. 
 What gives that value? Not what its owner has done,^ 
 
 1 Though he may have done some part, as in grading, etc 
 
TEUE LAND POLICY 107 
 
 but the fact that 150,000 people have settled around it. 
 This lot yields its owner $10,000 annually. Where does 
 this $10,000 come from? Evidently from the earnings 
 of the workers of the community, for it can come from no- 
 where else. 
 
 Here is a lot on the outskirts. It is in the same condi- 
 tion in which nature left it. Intrinsically it is worth 
 no more than when there were but a hundred people at 
 Yerba Buena Cove. Then it was worth nothing. Now 
 that there are 150,000 people here and more coming, it is 
 worth $3000. That is, its owner can command $3000 
 worth of the labour or of the wealth of the community. 
 What does he give for this ? Nothing ; the land was there 
 before he was. 
 
 Suppose a community like that of San Francisco, in 
 which land, though in individual hands as now, has no 
 value. Suppose, then, that all at once the land was given 
 a value of, say, $150,000,000, which is about the present 
 value of land in San Francisco. What would be the efEect ? 
 That a tax, of which $150,000,000 is the capitalised value, 
 would be levied upon the whole community for the benefit 
 of a portion. There would be no more in the community 
 than before, and no greater means of producing wealth. 
 But of that wealth, beyond the share which they formerly 
 had, the landowners would now command $150,000,000. 
 That is, there would be $150,000,000 less for other people 
 who were not landholders. 
 
 And does not this consideration of the nature and efEect 
 of land values go far to explain the puzzling fact that not- 
 withstanding all the economies in production and distri- 
 bution which a dense population admits, just as a com- 
 munity increases in population and wealth, so does the 
 reward of the labourer decrease and poverty deepen? 
 
 One hundred men settle in a new place. Land has at 
 
108 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 first little or no value. The net result of their labour is 
 divided pretty equally between them. Each one gets pretty 
 nearly the full value of his contribution to the general 
 stock. The community becomes 100,000. Land has be- 
 come valuable, its value perhaps aggregating as much as 
 the value of all other property. The production of the 
 conmiunity may now be more per capita for each indi- 
 vidual who works, but before the division is made, one 
 half of the product must go to the landholders. How 
 then can the labourer get so much as he could in the small 
 community ? 
 
 Now in this view of the matter — considering land values 
 as an indication of the appropriation (though doubtless 
 the necessary appropriation) of the wealth of all; consid- 
 ering land rentals as a tax upon the labour of the com- 
 munity, is not a tax upon land values the most just and 
 the most equal tax that can be levied? Should we not 
 take that which rightfully belongs to the whole before we 
 take that which rightfully belongs to the individual? 
 Should we not tax this tax upon labour before we tax 
 productive labour itself? 
 
 That the value of our land, even the "necessary value" 
 which it would have when stripped of speculative value, 
 would easily bear the whole burden of taxation, there 
 can be no doubt. The statistics are too confused and 
 too unreliable to enable us to judge accurately of the value 
 of land as compared with the value of other property; 
 but we have high authority for the belief that the value 
 of our land is equal to the value of all other property, 
 including the improvements upon it. The New York 
 Commissioners for the Eevision of the Eevenue Laws — 
 David A. Wells, Edwin Dodge and George W. Cuyler, the 
 first named of whom, as United States Special Commis- 
 sioner of the Eevenue, has had better opportunities for 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 109 
 
 studying all matters connected with taxation than any 
 other man in the United States — say in their report, ren- 
 dered this year : "A careful consideration and study of the 
 nature and classification of property inclines the Com- 
 missioners to indorse the correctness of an opinion which 
 appears to have been originally proposed by a financial 
 writer of New York [George Opdyke] as far back as 1851, 
 viz. : 'That universally the marJcet value of the aggregate 
 of land and that of the aggregate of productive capital are 
 equal' " ^ 
 
 And it may be here remarked that these New York Com- 
 missioners in their elaborate report recommend the total 
 abolition of the tax on personal property on the ground 
 
 1 By "productive capital " Opdyke means all property other than land. 
 In his Treatise on Political Economy he says : "The statistics presented 
 by assessments of property for the purposes of taxation invariably exhibit 
 the estimated value of land and its meliorations under the head of ' real 
 estate,' and the estimated value of all other productive capital under the 
 head of ' personal estate. ' Thus divided, we may readily infer that the 
 value of real estate greatly exceeds that of personal estate, and so these 
 statistics invariably indicate. But if we take the estimate for any given 
 village, town or city, and from the gross value of the real estate deduct 
 the value of the buildings, and add to it the personal estate, we shall 
 then find them equal, provided the assessment has been correctly made, 
 which, by the way, very rarely occurs. " 
 
 After citing examples from New York and Cincinnati, he goes on to 
 say: "It is thus of all other cities, towns and villages throughout the 
 civilized world ; and it is thus in all agricultural districts, but in these 
 the land and its meliorations are so much more intimately blended that 
 we cannot perceive the facts so readily. The truth is, the market value 
 of land is merely the reflection of the value of the productive capital 
 placed upon it and its immediate vicinity. It has no real value of its 
 own; it costs nothing to produce ; but since the laws have endowed it 
 with the vital principle of wealth by subjecting it to individual owner- 
 ship, it can no longer be obtained without giving in exchange for it an 
 equivalent portion of the capital present and designed to concur with it 
 in the production of wealth, " 
 
110 OUE LAND AHD LAND POLICY 
 
 (which has been proved in every State in the Union, 
 and, in fact, by every nation of ancient or modern times) 
 that it is utterly impossible to collect it with any degree 
 of fulness and anything like fairness, and that the at- 
 tempt to do so results in injury both to the material and 
 the moral interests of the community. They propose in- 
 stead of the tax on personal property, to tax every indi- 
 vidual on an amount three times as great as the aimual 
 rental of the house or place of business he occupies, and 
 present a strong array of reasons to show that this would 
 be a much more equitable and productive mode of taxa- 
 tion. Better still, for the reasons I have given, to abandon 
 the attempt to tax personal property or anything in lieu 
 of it, and to put the bulk of taxation entirely on land 
 values. 
 
 Nevertheless, after all that can be said, it must be con- 
 fessed that there would be some slight injustice in doing 
 so. I had ten thousand dollars, let us say, which I might 
 have put out at high interest, or invested in my business. 
 Supposing the existing policy would be continued, I bought 
 land with it, calculating that in a few years, when popu- 
 lation became greater, people would be glad to buy it of 
 me for a much higher price, or give me one fourth of the 
 crop for the privilege of cultivating it. You now im- 
 pose taxation, which will lower the value of my land. If 
 you do this, you make my speculation less profitable than 
 others I might have gone into, and thus do me injustice, 
 for you gave me no notice. 
 
 This is true, and it is this consideration which makes 
 men like John Stuart Mill shrink from the practical ap- 
 plication of deductions from their own doctrines, and pro- 
 pose that in resuming their ownership of the land of Eng- 
 land, the people of England shall pay its present proprie- 
 tors not only its actual value, but also the present value 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 111 
 
 of its prospective increase in value. But if we once do a 
 public wrong, we can never right it without doing some- 
 body injustice. England sought to right the wrong of 
 slavery without injustice to the slaveholders who had in- 
 vested their capital in human flesh and blood. She suc- 
 ceeded by making them pecuniary compensation; but in 
 doing this she did a worse injustice to her own white 
 slaves on whom the burden of the payment has been im- 
 posed. And by shrinking from doing this slight injustice 
 which would affect but very few people in the community, 
 and those most able to stand it, we continue a ten thou- 
 sandfold greater injustice ; and the longer we delay action, 
 the greater will be the injustice which we must do. 
 
 OF SOME EXEMPTIONS, AND SOME ADDITIONS. 
 
 Foe the purpose of making it still more sure that taxation 
 should not bear heavily upon any one; for the purpose 
 of still further counteracting the tendency to the con- 
 centration of wealth, and for the purpose of securing as 
 far as possible to every citizen an interest in the soU, 
 there should be a uniform exemption to a small amount 
 made to each landholder — perhaps a smaller amount in 
 the cities, where land is only used for residences and busi- 
 ness purposes, than in the country, where labour is di- 
 rectly applied to the land. Those whose land did not ex- 
 ceed in value this minimum would have no taxes to pay; 
 those whose land did, would pay upon the surplus. This 
 would reverse the present effect of our revenue system, 
 and tend to make the holding of land in large bodies less 
 profitable than the holding of it in small bodies. 
 
 And while, perhaps, it might not be wise to attempt to 
 limit the accumulations of any individual during his life- 
 
112 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY ' 
 
 time, or at any rate it is not yet necessary to try the ex- 
 periment, there should be a yery heavy duty, amounting to 
 a considerable part of the whole, levied upon the estates 
 of deceased persons, and in the case of intestates the 
 whole should escheat to the State, where there were no 
 heirs of the first or second degree. 
 
 There is still another source from which a large reve- 
 nue might be harmlessly drawn — license taxes upon such 
 businesses as it is public policy to restrict and discourage, 
 such as liquor selling, the keeping of gambling houses 
 (where this cannot be prevented), etc. All other taxes 
 of whatever kind or nature, whether National, State, 
 County, or Municipal, might then be swept away. 
 
 THE EFFECTS OF SUCH A CHANGE. 
 
 CoNSiDEE the effects of the adoption of such a system : 
 
 The mere holder of land would be called on to pay just 
 as much taxes as the user of land. The owner of a vacant 
 city lot would have to pay as much for the privilege of 
 keeping other people off it till he wanted to use it, as his 
 neighbour who has a fine house upon his lot, and is either 
 using or deriving rent from it. The monopoliser of agri- 
 cultural land would be taxed as much as though his land 
 were covered with improvements, with crops and with stock. 
 Land prices would fall; land speculation would receive 
 its death-blow; land monopolisation would no longer pay. 
 Millions and millions of acres from which settlers are now 
 shut out would be abandoned by their present owners, or 
 sold to settlers on nominal terms. It is only in rare cases 
 that it would pay any one to get land before he wanted 
 to use it, so that those who really wanted to use land 
 would find it easy to get. 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 113 
 
 The whole weight of taxation would be lifted from pro- 
 ductive industry. The million dollar manufactory, and 
 the needle of the seamstress, the mechanic's cottage, and 
 the grand hotel, the farmer's plough, and the ocean steam- 
 ship, would be alike untaxed. All would be free to buy 
 or sell, to make or save, unannoyed by the tax-gatherer. 
 
 Imagine this country with all taxes removed from pro- 
 duction and exchange! How demand would spring up; 
 how trade would increase ; what a powerful stimulus would 
 be applied to every branch of industry; what an enormous 
 development of wealth would take place. Imagine this 
 country free of taxation, with its unused land free to 
 those who would use it ! Would there be many industrious 
 . men walking our streets, or tramping over our roads in 
 the vain search for employment? Would we hear much 
 of stagnation in business, and of "over production" of 
 the things that millions of us want? Consider the enor- 
 mous gain which would result from leaving capital and 
 labour, untrammelled by tax or restriction, to seek the 
 most remunerative fields; the enormous saving which 
 would result from the settling of people near each other, 
 as they would settle, if any one could get enough unused 
 land for his needs, and it would pay nobody to get any 
 more. 
 
 Consider the effects of this policy on the distribution of 
 wealth — directly, by reversing the effect of taxation — 
 which is now to make the poor poorer, and the rich richer ; 
 indirectly, by freeing and cheapening land, and thus put- 
 ting labour in a position to make better terms with capital. 
 And consider how equalisation in the distribution of wealth 
 would react on production — how it would lessen the great 
 army of involuntary idlers; how it would increase the 
 vigour and industry and skill of workers; for poorly re- 
 warded labour is poor labour all the world over, and the 
 
114 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 greater its reward, the greater the efBcieney of labour. 
 Consider, too, the moral effects: Sharp alternations of 
 wealth and poverty breed vice and crime, as surely as they 
 breed misery. Personal independence is the foundation 
 of all the virtues. Deep poverty brutalises men. Where 
 it exists, the preacher wiU preach in vain; and the philan- 
 thropist will toil in vain; they are dumping their good 
 words and good deeds into such a Slough of Despond as 
 Pilgrim saw. 
 
 VFHO WOULD GAIN AND V7H0 WOULD LOSE. 
 
 That the policy proposed would be to the advantage of 
 aU who do not hold land is clear enough. But it must 
 not be imagined that all who hold land would lose. On 
 the contrary, the large majority of landholders would be 
 gainers. Whether a landholder would gain or lose, would 
 depend upon whether his interest as a landholder, which 
 would be adversely affected, was greater or less than his 
 other interests, which would be beneficially affected. The 
 man who owns a house and lot of equal value would have 
 less taxes to pay if taxation were taken off of buUdings 
 and put on land, as the aggregate value of land is greater 
 than that of buildings. His homestead would seU for less 
 than before, but the money it sold for would buy just as 
 good a house and lot as before; so that, if his intention 
 is to always keep a homestead, he would not lose any- 
 thing by the shrinkage in its value; or even if it was not, 
 he would not have to keep it long before his gain on taxes 
 would make up for the loss in value. While, if he was 
 a mechanic, engaged in or connected with any of " the 
 building trades, he would gain in more constant work and 
 better wages by the stimulus which the exemption of im- 
 
TRUE LAKD POLICY 115 
 
 provements from taxation, and the reduction in the value 
 of land would give to building. Or if he kept a store, or 
 was engaged in any business or profession, he would gain 
 by the quickened growth and increased activity of the 
 community. 
 
 And if taxes were removed from everything but land 
 (with the exceptions and exemptions I have before indi- 
 cated) the gain would be largely greater. Let the farmer, 
 the mechanic, the manufacturer, or the business man, who 
 is also a landowner, calculate how much he pays of the 
 taxes which enter into the cost of everything he buys, or 
 in any way uses, and how much he loses by the restrictive 
 effect which those taxes have upon all industry and busi- 
 ness. Then let him set against this amount, which he 
 now pays and loses, the additional amount which he would 
 pay as taxes on land, or which he would lose by the re- 
 duction of its value, were all taxes placed upon land. 
 Did they make this calculation, three out of every four 
 of those who own land would see they would be gainers. 
 For as yet the class whose other interests are subordinate 
 to their interest in the high value of land is really small. 
 And it must be remembered that were our whole revenue 
 raised by a direct land tax, the amount taken from the peo- 
 ple in order to give the same amount to the Government 
 would be very much smaller than now, and that there would 
 be a positive increase in wealth, a large share of which 
 would go to the landowners who would have additional 
 taxes to pay. 
 
 VFHAT CAN BE DONE AT ONCE. 
 
 The more the matter is considered, the more, I think, it 
 will appear that all our taxation, or at least the largest part 
 of it, should be placed upon land values. By doing so 
 
116 OUB LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 we would substitute the best possible revenue system for 
 our present cumbrous, unjust, wasteful and oppressive 
 modes of taxation; we would, without resort to special 
 and arbitrary laws, prevent and break up land monopolisa- 
 tion, and we would, at the same time, and in the same 
 simple, just way, do a great deal to counteract the alarm- 
 ing tendency to the concentration of wealth in a few 
 hands, which is now so apparent. 
 
 Nevertheless, the application of this remedy is not yet 
 practicable. We are so used to look upon land as upon 
 other property, so accustomed to consider its enhancement 
 in value as a public gain, that it will take some time to 
 educate public opinion up to the proper point to permit 
 this; and even then there will be constitutional difBeulties 
 to be removed. 
 
 But in the meantime, we can do something to check the 
 progress of land monopolisation, and even to break it up. 
 So far as the General Government is concerned, we can 
 insist that no more land grants be made on any pretext 
 or for any purpose ; but that all of the public domain stiU 
 left to us shall be reserved for the small farms of actual 
 settlers. We can go further, and demand that something 
 be done to open to settlers the great belts which have 
 been already handed over to railroad corporations. These 
 grants, in the first place, outraged natural justice, and 
 Congress had no more right to make them than Catherine 
 of Kussia had to give away her subjects to her para- 
 mours and courtiers, or than the Pope had to divide the 
 Southern Hemisphere between the Spanish and the Portu- 
 guese. We should be perfectly justified in taking this 
 land back, throwing it open to settlers upon Government 
 terms, and paying the companies the Government price. 
 Such an operation would largely increase our debt, but 
 the money would be well expended. If this cannot be 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 117 
 
 done, the land can at least be immediately surveyed, so 
 that settlers can find the Government sections, and the 
 right of the Companies to land reserved for them be de- 
 clared subject to State taxation. 
 
 In this monopoly-cursed State of ours, we may at once 
 do a great deal to free our land. By restricting posses- 
 sory rights to the maximum amount allowed by the Gen- 
 eral Government to pre-emptors, and by demanding pay- 
 ment for the large tracts now held by speculators under 
 five-dollar certificates, or the payment of twenty per cent, 
 of the purchase money, the Legislature couldj in the first 
 week of its session, throw open to settlers some millions 
 of acres now monopolised.* And millions of acres more 
 would be forced into market if its holders were only com- 
 pelled to pay upon their land the same rate of taxation 
 levied upon other property. The Board of Equalisation 
 created by the last Legislature is endeavouring to secure 
 the proper assessment of these large tracts; but the law 
 under which it works is defective, and the Constitutional 
 requirement of the election of County Assessors is very 
 much in the way of a thorough reform, perhaps makes 
 it impossible. But as under our Constitution, as inter- 
 preted by the Supreme Court, all property must be taxed 
 equally, we can do no more than this to break up large 
 estates until the Constitution is amended. 
 
 THE NECESSITY OP A RADICAL REMEDY. 
 
 There are many who will think that if we do these things, 
 or even if we merely do something to check the grosser 
 
 1 Under the decisions of the Department, land within the exterior limits 
 of Spanish grants, and included in railroad reservations, does not go to 
 the Railroad Company when the grant is confined to its real limits, or is 
 rejected, but becomes open to settlement. 
 
118 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 abuses in the disposition of our new land, we shall have 
 done all that is necessary. I wish to call the attention of 
 those who thus think to a certain class of facts: 
 
 There is a problem which must present itself to every 
 mind which dwells upon the industrial history of the pres- 
 ent century; a problem into which all our great social, 
 industrial, and even political questions run — ^which already 
 perplexes us in the United States; which presses with still 
 greater force in the older countries of Europe; which, in 
 fact, menaces the whole civilised world, and seems like a 
 very riddle of the Sphinx, which fate demands of modern 
 civilisation, and which not to answer is to be destroyed — 
 the problem of the proper distribution of wealth. 
 
 How is it that the increase of productive power and 
 the accumulation of wealth seem to bring no benefit, no 
 relief to the working classes; that the condition of the 
 labourer is better in the new and poor country than in 
 the old and rich country; that in a country like Great 
 Britain, whose productive power has been so enormously 
 increased, whose surplus wealth is lent to all the world, 
 and whose surplus productions are sent to every market, 
 pauperism is increasing in England, while one third of 
 the families of Scotland live in a single room each, and 
 one third more in two rooms each ? ^ How is it, though 
 within the century steam machinery has added to the 
 productive force of Great Britain a power greater than 
 that of the manual labour of the whole human race, that 
 the toil of mere infants is cruelly extorted — ^that cultiva- 
 tion in the richest districts is largely carried on by gangs 
 of women and children, in which mere babies are worked 
 under the lash; that little girls are to be found wielding 
 sledge hammers, and little boys toiling night and day in 
 
 1 Census of 1861. See Journal of Statistical Society, vol. 32. 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 119 
 
 the fearful heat of glass furnaces, or working to the ex- 
 treme limit of human endurance in fetid garrets and damp 
 cellars, at the most monotonous employments — children 
 who work so early and work so hard that they know noth- 
 ing of God, have never heard of the Bible, call a violet a 
 pretty bird, and when shown a cow in a picture, think it 
 must be a lion ; ^ children whose natural protectors have 
 been changed by brutalising poverty and the want that 
 knows no law, into the most cruel of taskmasters? 
 
 Why is it that in the older parts of the United States 
 we are rapidly approximating to the same state of things ? 
 Why is it that, with all our labour-saving machinery, all 
 the new methods of increasing production which our fer- 
 tile genius is constantly discovering — ^with all our rail- 
 roads, and steamships, and power looms, and sewing ma- 
 chines, our mechanics cannot secure a reduction of two 
 hours in their daily toil; that the general condition of the 
 working classes is becoming worse instead of better; and 
 the employment of women and children at hard labour 
 is extending ; that though wealth is accumulating, and lux- 
 ury increasing, it is becoming harder and harder for the 
 poor man to live? 
 
 A very Sodom's apple seems this "progress" of ours to 
 the classes that have the most need to progress. We have 
 been "developing the country" fast enough. We have 
 been building railroads, and peopling the wilderness, and 
 extending our cities. But what is the gain? We count 
 up more millions of people, and more hundreds of millions 
 of taxable property; our great cities are larger, our mil- 
 lionaires are more numerous, and their wealth is more 
 enormous; but are the masses of the people any better 
 off ? Is it not so notoriously true that we accept the state- 
 
 1 Keport Children's Employment Commission. 
 
120 OUE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 ment without question, that just as population increases 
 and wealth augments — just in proportion as we near the 
 goal for which we strive so hard, poverty extends and 
 deepens, and it becomes harder and harder for a poor man 
 to make a living? 
 
 That the startling change for the worse that has come 
 over the condition of the masses of the United States in 
 the last ten years is attributable in some part to the 
 destruction caused by the war, and in much greater part 
 to stupid, reckless, wicked legislation, there can be no 
 doubt. The whole economic policy of the General Gov- 
 ernment — the management of the debt and of the cur- 
 rency, the imposition of a tarifE which is oppressing aU 
 our industry, and actually killing many branches of it, the 
 immense donations to corporations — ^has tended with irre- 
 sistible force, as though devised for the purpose, to make 
 a few the richer and the many the poorer; to swell the 
 gains of a few rich capitalists, and make hundreds of 
 thousands of willing workmen stand with idle hands. 
 
 But beneath and beyond these special causes, we may 
 see, as could be seen before the war had given the money 
 power an opportunity and excuse for wresting the ma- 
 chinery of Government to its own selfish ends, the work- 
 ing of some general tendency, observable all over the world, 
 and most obvious in the countries which have made the 
 greatest advances in productive power and in wealth. 
 
 What is the cause or the causes of this tendency? If 
 we say, as many of the economists say, that it is over- 
 population in England — ^that the working classes get mar- 
 ried too early and have too many children — ^what is it in 
 the United States ? If we say that in the United States it 
 is solely due to special conditions, what is it in Australia 
 and other countries of widely differing circumstances ? 
 
 ITow, although there are undoubtedly other general 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 121 
 
 causes, such as the tendency of modem processes to require 
 greater capital and rarer administrative ability, to offer 
 greater facilities for combination, and give more and 
 more advantage to him who can work on a large scale; 
 yet if the principles previously stated are correct, are we 
 not led irresistibly to the conclusion that the main cause 
 of this general tendency to the unequal division of wealth 
 lies in the pursuance of a wrong policy in regard to land 
 — in permitting a few to take and to keep that which 
 belongs to all; in treating the power of appropriating 
 labour as though it were in itself labour-produced wealth? 
 Is not this mistake sufiBcient of itself to explain most of 
 the perplexing phenomena to which I have alluded? 
 
 When land becomes fidly monopolised as it is in Eng- 
 land and Ireland — when the competition between land- 
 users becomes greater than the competition between land- 
 owners, whatever increase of wealth there is must go to 
 the landowner or to the capitalist; the labourer gets noth- 
 ing but a subsistence. Amid lowing herds he never tastes 
 meat; raising bounteous crops of the finest wheat, he lives 
 on rye or potatoes; and where steam has multiplied by 
 hundreds and by thousands manufacturing power, he is 
 clad in rags, and sends his children to work whUe they 
 are yet infants. No matter what be the increase in the 
 fertility of the soil, no matter what the increase in pro- 
 duct which beneficent inventions cause, no matter even 
 if good laws succeed bad laws, as when free trade suc- 
 ceeds protection, as has been the ease in Great Britain, all 
 the advantage goes to the landowner; none to the landless 
 labourer, for the ownership of the land gives the power 
 of taking all that labour upon it will produce, except 
 enough to keep the labourer in condition to work, and 
 anything more that is given is charity. And so increase 
 in productive power is greater wealth to the landowner — 
 
122 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 more splendour in his drawing rooms, more horses in his 
 stables and hounds in his kennels, finer yachts, and pic- 
 tures and books — more command of everything that makes 
 life desirable; but to the labourer it is not an additional 
 crust. 
 
 And where land monopolisation has not gone so far, 
 steadily with the increase of wealth goes on the increase 
 of land values. Every successive increase represents so 
 much which those who do not produce may take from the 
 results of production, measures a new tax upon the whole 
 community for the benefit of a portion. Every succes- 
 sive increase indicates no addition to wealth, but a 
 greater difference in the division of wealth, making one 
 class the richer, the other the poorer, and tending still 
 further to increase the inequality in the distribution of 
 wealth — on the one side, by making the aggregations of 
 capital larger and its power thus greater, and on the other, 
 by increasing the number of those who cannot buy land 
 for themselves, but must labour for or pay rent to others, 
 and while thus swelling the number of those who must 
 make terms with capital for permission to work, at the 
 same time reducing their ability to make fair terms in 
 the bargain. 
 
 Need we go any further to find the root of the difficulty ? 
 to ^ discover the point at which we must commence the 
 reform which will make other reforms possible? And 
 while, on the one hand, the recognition of the main cause 
 of the inequality in the distribution of wealth, which is 
 becoming a disease of our civilisation, condemns the wild 
 dreams of impracticable socialisms, and the impossible 
 theories of governmental interference to restrict accumu- 
 lation and competition and to limit the productive power 
 of capital, by discovering a just and an easy remedy; on 
 the other hand, the spread of such theories should ad- 
 
TEUE LAND POLICY 123 
 
 monisii those who consider the remedy of a common-sense 
 policy in regard to land as too radical, of the necessity 
 of making some attempt at reform. This great problem 
 of the more equal distribution of wealth must in some way 
 be solved, if our civilisation, like those that went before 
 it, is not to breed seeds of its own destruction. In one 
 way or another the attempt must be made — ^if not in 
 one way, then in another. The spread of education, the 
 growth of democratic sentiment, the weakening of the in- 
 fluences which lead men to accept the existing condition 
 of things as divinely appointed, insure that, and the gen- 
 eral uneasiness of labour, the growth of trade-unionism, 
 the spread of such societies as the International prove it! 
 The terrible struggle of the Paris commune was but such 
 an attempt.^ And in the light of burning Paris we may 
 see how it may be that this very civilisation of ours, this 
 second Tower of Babel, which some deem reaches so far 
 towards heaven that we can plainly see there is no God 
 there, may yet crumble and perish. How prophetic, in 
 view of those recent events, seem the words of Macaulay, 
 when, alluding to Gibbon's argument that modem civili- 
 sation could' not be overturned as was the ancient, he 
 
 1 And this French struggle also shows the conservative influence of the 
 diffusion of landed property. The Radicals of Paris were beaten by the 
 small proprietors of the provinces. Had the lands of France been in the 
 hands of a few, as the first revolution found it, the raising of the red flag 
 on the HStel de Ville would have been the signal for a Jacquerie in every 
 part of the country. So conscious are the extreme reds of the conservative 
 influence of property in land that they have for a long time condemned as 
 a fatal mistake the law of the first Republic which provided for the equal 
 distribution of land among heirs, not because it has not improved the 
 condition of the peasantry, but because the improvement in their con- 
 dition and the interest which their possession of land gives them in the 
 maintenance of order dispose them to oppose the violent remedies which 
 the workmen of the cities think necessary. 
 
124 OUK LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 declared that in the very heart of our great cities, in the 
 shadow of palaces, libraries and colleges, poverty and igno- 
 rance might produce a race of Huns fiercer than any who 
 followed Attila, and of Vandals more destructive than 
 those led by Genseric. 
 
 THE PAST AND THE FUTUKE OP THE NATION. 
 
 Five years must yet pass before we can celebrate the hun- 
 dredth anniversary of the Eepublic. A century ago, as 
 the result of nearly two hundred years of colonisation, 
 the scarce three million people of the thirteen colonies 
 but fringed the Atlantic seaboard with their settlements. 
 Pittsburg was to them the Par West, and the Mississippi 
 as little known as is now the great river that through a 
 thousand miles of Arctic solitudes rolls sluggishly to its 
 mouth in our newly acquired Northern possessions. 
 
 Looking back over the history of the great nations from 
 whom we derive our blood, our language and our institu- 
 tions, and a hundred years seems but a small span. A 
 hundred years after the foundation of the city, and Eome 
 had scarce begun her conquering mission ; a hundred years 
 after the Norman Invasion, and the England of the first 
 Plantagenet difEered but little from the England of the 
 Bastard. 
 
 How wondrous seems our growth when compared with 
 the past! So wondrous, so unprecedented, that when the 
 slow lapse of years shall have shortened the perspective, and 
 when, in obedience to altered conditions, the rate of in- 
 crease shall have slackened, it will seem as though in our 
 time the very soil of America must have bred men. 
 
 We have subdued a continent in a shorter time than 
 many a palace and cathedral of the Old World was a-build- 
 
TKUE LAND POLICY 125 
 
 ing ; in less than a century we have sprung to a first rank 
 among the nations; our population is increasing in a 
 steady ratio; and we are carrying westward the centre of 
 power and wealth, of luxury, learning and refinement, 
 with more rapidity than it ever moved before. 
 
 We look with wonder upon the past. When we turn 
 to the future, imagination fails, for sober reason with her 
 cold deductions goes far beyond the highest flights that 
 fancy can dare, and we turn dazzled and almost awe- 
 struck from the picture that is mirrored. Judging from 
 the past, in all human probability there will be on this 
 continent, a century from now, four or five, perhaps five 
 or six, hundred million English-speaking people, stretch- 
 ing from the isothermal line which marks the northern 
 limit of the culture of wheat, to the southern limit of the 
 semi-tropical clime — four or five hundred million people, 
 with the railroad, the telegraph, and all the arts and ap- 
 pliances that we now have, and with all the undreamed-of 
 inventions which another century such as the past will 
 develop. Beside the great cities of such a people, the 
 Paris of to-day will be a village, the London, a provin- 
 cial town, and to the political power which wiU grow up, 
 if these people remain under one government, the great 
 nations of Europe will occupy such relative positions as 
 the South American States now hold to the great Eepublic 
 of the North. 
 
 Yet we should never forget that we have no exemption 
 from the difficulties and dangers which have beset other 
 peoples, though they may come to us in somwhat differ- 
 ent guise. The very rapidity of our growth should ad- 
 monish us that though we are still in our youth, our 
 conditions are fast changing; the very possibilities of our 
 future warn us that this is the appointed theatre upon 
 which the questions that perplex the world must be worked 
 
126 OUR LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 out, or fought out. What good, or what evil, we of this 
 generation do, will appear in the next on an enormously 
 magnified scale. The blunders that we are carelessly 
 making, saying "these things will right themselves in 
 time," will indeed right themselves; but how? How was 
 the wrong of slavery righted in the United States? The 
 whole history of mankind, with its story of fire and sword, 
 of suffering and destruction, is but one continued example 
 of how national blunders and crimes work themselves out. 
 On the smaller scale of individual life and actions, the 
 workings of Divine justice are sometimes never seen; but 
 sure, though not always swift, is the Nemesis that with 
 tireless feet follows every wrong-doing of a people. 
 
 The American people have had a better chance and a 
 fairer field than any nation that has gone before. Com- 
 ing to a new world with all the experiences of the old; 
 possessed of all the knowledge and the arts of the most 
 advanced of the families of men, the temperate zone of 
 an immense continent lay before them, where, unembar- 
 rassed by previous mistakes, they might work out the 
 problem of human happiness by the light of the history 
 of two thousand years. Yet nobly and well as our fathers 
 reared the edifice of civil and religious liberty, true ideas 
 as to the treatment of land, the very foundation of all 
 other institutions, seem never to have entered their minds. 
 In a new country where nothing was so abundant as 
 land, and where there was nothing to suggest its monopo- 
 lisation, the men who gave direction to our thought and 
 shaped our polity shook ofE the idea of the divine right of 
 kings without shaking off that of the divine right of 
 landowners. They promulgated the grand truth that all 
 men are born with equal rights to life, liberty, and the 
 pursuit of happiness, without promulgating the doctrines 
 in respect to land which alone could maintain, those rights 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 127 
 
 as a living reality; they instituted a form of government 
 based on the theory of the independence and virtue of 
 the masses of the people without imposing those restric- 
 tions upon land monopolisation which alone can keep the 
 masses virtuous and independent. They laid the founda- 
 tions for a glorious house ; but they laid them in the sand. 
 
 Already we can see that the rains will come, the winds 
 will blow. We see it in the increase of the renting sys- 
 tem in agriculture; in the massing of men in the employ 
 of great manufacturers; in the necessity under which 
 thousands of our citizens lie of voting, and even of speak- 
 ing on political matters, as their employers dictate ; ^ in 
 the marked differentiation of our people in older sections 
 into the rich and the poor ; in the evolution of "dangerous 
 classes" in our large cities; in the growth of enormous 
 individual fortunes; in the springing up of corporations 
 which dwarf the States, and fairly grapple the General 
 Government; in the increase of political corruption; in 
 the ease with which a few great rings wrest the whole 
 power of the nation to their aggrandisement. 
 
 Go to New York, the greatest of our American cities, 
 the type of what many of them must soon be, the best 
 example of the condition to which the whole country is 
 tending — New York, where men build marble stables for 
 their horses, and an army of women crowd the streets at 
 night to sell their souls for the necessities which unre- 
 mitting toil, such as no human being ought to endure, will 
 not give them — ^where a hundred thousand men who ought 
 to be at work are looking for employment, and a hundred 
 thousand children who ought to be at school are at work. 
 Notice the great blocks of warehouses, the gorgeousness 
 of Broadway, the costly palaces which line the avenues. 
 
 1 See Reports Massachusetts Bureau Labour Statistics. 
 
128 OXJE LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 Notice, too, the miles of brothels which flank them, the 
 tenement houses, where poverty festers and vice breeds, 
 and the man from the free open West turns sick at heart; 
 notice in the depth of winter the barefooted, ragged chil- 
 dren in the press of the liveried equipages, and you will 
 understand how it is that republican government has 
 broken down in New York; how it is that republican gov- 
 ernment is impossible there; and how it is that the cru- 
 cial test of our institutions is yet to come. If you say 
 that New York is a great seaport, with different condi- 
 tions from the rest of the country, go to the manufactur- 
 ing towns, to the other cities, and see the same character- 
 istics developing just in proportion to their population 
 and wealth. 
 
 And while we may see all this, we are doing our utmost 
 to make land dear, giving away the public domain in 
 tracts of millions of acres, drawing great belts across it 
 upon which the settler cannot enter; offering a premium 
 by our taxation for the concentration of landownership, 
 and pressing with the whole weight of our revenue system 
 in favour of the concentration of wealth. 
 
 HOW A GKBAT PEOPLE PERISHED. 
 
 Ik all the history of the past there is but one nation with 
 which the great nation now growing up on this continent 
 can be compared; but one people which has occupied the 
 position and exerted the influence which, for good or 
 evil, the American people must occupy and exert — a na- 
 tion which has left a deeper impress upon the life of the 
 race than any other nation that ever existed; whose sway 
 was co-extensive with the known world; whose heroes and 
 poets, and sages and orators, are still familiar names to 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 129 
 
 US ; whose literature and art still furnisli us models ; whose 
 language has enriched every modern tongue, and though 
 long dead, is still the language of science and of religion, 
 and whose jurisprudence is the great mine from which 
 our modern systems are wrought. That a nation so pow- 
 erful in arms, so advanced in the arts, should perish as 
 Eome perished ; that a eifilisation so widely difEused should 
 be buried as was the Eoman civilisation, is the greatest 
 marvel which history presents. To the Roman citizen of 
 the time of Augustus or the Antonines, it would have ap- 
 peared as incredible, as utterly impossible that Eome could 
 be overwhelmed by barbarians, as to the American citizen 
 of to-day it would appear impossible that the great Ameri- 
 can Eepublic could be conquered by the Apaches, or the 
 Chinooks, our arts forgotten, and our civilisation lost. 
 
 How did this once incredible thiag happen? What 
 were the hidden causes that sapped the strength and ate 
 out the heart of this world-conquering power, so that it 
 crumbled to pieces before the shock of barbarian hordes? 
 A Eoman historian himself has told us. "Great estates 
 ruined Italy !" In the land policy of Eome may be traced 
 the secret of her rise, the cause of her fall. 
 
 "To every citizen as much land as he himself may use; 
 he is an enemy of the State who desires any more," was 
 the spirit of the land policy which enabled Eome to as- 
 similate so quickly the peoples that she conquered; that 
 gave her a body of citizens whose arms were a bulwark 
 against every assault, and who carried her standards in 
 triumph in every direction. At first a single acre consti- 
 tuted the patrimony of a Eoman; afterwards the amount 
 was increased to three acres and a half. These were the 
 heroic days of the Eepublic, when every citizen seemed 
 animated by a public spirit and a public virtue which made 
 the Eoman name as famous as it made the Eoman arms 
 
130 OUB LAND AND LAND POLICY 
 
 invincible; when Cincinnatus left his two-acre farm to 
 become Dictator, and after the danger was over and the 
 State was safe, returned to his plough; when Regulus, at 
 the head of a conquering army in Africa, asked to be re- 
 lieved, because his single slave had died, and there was 
 no one to cultivate his little farm for his family. 
 
 But, as wealth poured in from foreign conquests, and 
 the lust for riches grew, the old policy was set aside. The 
 Senate granted away the public domain in large tracts, 
 just as our Senate is doing now ; and the fusion of the little 
 farms into large estates by purchase, by force and by 
 fraud went on, until whole provinces were owned by two 
 or three proprietors, and chained slaves had taken the 
 place of the sturdy peasantry of Italy. The small farmers 
 who had given her strength to Eome were driven to the 
 cities, to swell the ranks of the proletarians, and become 
 clients of the great families, or abroad to perish in the 
 wars. There came to be but two classes — ^the enormously 
 rich and their dependents and slaves; society thus con- 
 stituted bred its destroying monsters ; the old virtues van- 
 ished, population declined, art sank, the old conquering 
 race actually died out, and Rome perished, as a modern 
 historian puts it, from the very failure of the crop of men. 
 
 Centuries ago this happened, but the laws of the uni- 
 verse are to-day what they were then. 
 
 I have endeavoured in this paper to group together some 
 facts which show with what rapidity, and by what methods, 
 the monopolisation of our land is going on; to answer 
 some arguments which are advanced in its excuse ; to state 
 some principles which prove the matter to be of the deep- 
 est interest to all of us, whether we live directly by the 
 soil or not; and to suggest some remedies. 
 
TRUE LAND POLICY 131 
 
 That land monopolisation when it reaches the point to 
 which it has been carried in England and Ireland is pro- 
 ductive of great evils we shall probably all agree. But 
 popular opinion, even in so far as any attention has been 
 paid to the subject, seems to regard the danger with us 
 as remote. There are few who understand how rapidly 
 our land is becoming monopolised; there are fewer still 
 who seem to appreciate the evils which land monopolisa- 
 tion is already inflicting upon us, or the nearness of the 
 greater evils which it threatens. 
 
 And so as to the remedy. There are many who will 
 concede that the reckless grants of public land should 
 cease, and even that the public domain should be reserved 
 for actual settlers, but who will be startled by the propo- 
 sition to put the bulk of taxation on land exclusively. 
 But the matter will bear thinking of. It is impossible to 
 overestimate the importance of this land question. The 
 longer it is considered, the broader does it seem to be and 
 the deeper does it seem to go. It imperatively demands 
 far more attention than it has received; it is worthy of 
 all the attention that can be given to it. 
 
 To properly treat so large a subject in so brief a space 
 is a most difficult matter. I have merely outlined it; 
 but if I have done something towards calling attention to 
 the recklessness of our present land policy, and towards 
 suggesting earnest thought as to what that policy should 
 be, I have accomplished all I proposed. 
 
 Henet Geoege. 
 San Fkancisoo, July 27, 1871. 
 
THE STUDY OF 
 POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
THE STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. 
 
 [A lecture delivered before the students of the University of Cali- 
 fornia, March 9, 1877, and published in "The Popular Science Monthly," 
 March, 1880.] 
 
 I TAKE it that these lectures are intended to be more 
 suggestive than didactic, and in what I shall have to 
 say to you my object will be merely to induce you to think 
 for yourselves. I shall not attempt to outline the laws of 
 political economy, nor even, where my own views are 
 strong and definite, to touch upon unsettled questions. 
 But I want to show you, if I can, the simplicity and cer- 
 tainty of a science too generally regarded as complex and 
 indeterminate, to point out the ease with which it may 
 be studied, and to suggest reasons which make that study 
 worthy of your attention. 
 
 Of the importance of the questions with which political 
 economy deals it is hardly necessary to speak. The sci- 
 ence which investigates the laws of the production and 
 distribution of wealth concerns itself with matters which 
 among us occupy more than nine tenths of human effort, 
 and perhaps nine tenths of human thought. In its prov- 
 ince are included all that relates to the wages of labour 
 and the earnings of capital; all regulations of trade; all 
 questions of currency and finance ; all taxes and public dis- 
 bursements — in short, everything that can in any way 
 affect the amount of wealth which a community can secure, 
 
 135 
 
136 STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 or the proportion in which that wealth will be distributed 
 between individuals. Though not the science of govern- 
 ment, it is essential to the science of government. Though 
 it takes direct cognisance only of what are termed the 
 selfish instincts, yet in doing so it includes the basis of all 
 higher qualities. The laws which it aims to discover are 
 the laws by virtue of which states wax rich and populous, 
 or grow weak and decay ; the laws upon which depend the 
 comfort, happiness, and opportunities of our individual 
 lives. And as the development of the nobler part of hu- 
 man nature is powerfully modified by material conditions, 
 if it does not absolutely depend upon them, the laws 
 sought for by political economy are the laws which at last 
 control the mental and moral as well as the physical states 
 of humanity. 
 
 Clearly, this is the science which of all sciences is of 
 the first importance to us. Useful and sublime as are the 
 sciences which open to us the vistas of Nature — which read 
 for us the story of the deep past, or search out the laws 
 of our physical or mental organisation — what is their 
 practical importance as compared with the science which 
 deals with the conditions that alone make the cultivation 
 of the others possible? Compare on this ground of prac- 
 tical utility the science of political economy with all others, 
 and its pre-eminence almost suggests the reply of the 
 Greek: "No, I cannot play the fiddle; but I can tell you 
 how to make of a little village a great and glorious city !" 
 
 How is it, then, it will naturally be asked, that a sci- 
 ence so important is so little regarded? Our laws per- 
 sistently violate its first and plainest principles, and that 
 the ignorance thus exemplified is not confined to what are 
 called the uneducated classes is shown by the debates in 
 our legislative bodies, the decisions of our courts, the 
 speeches of our party leaders, and the editorials of our 
 
UNIVERSITY LECTURE 137 
 
 newspapers. A century has elapsed since Adam Smith 
 published his "Wealth of Nations," and sixty years since 
 Eicardo enunciated his theory of rent. Yet not only has 
 political economy received no substantial improvement 
 since Eicardo, but, while thousands of new discoveries 
 in other branches of human knowledge have been eagerly 
 seized and generally utilised, and the most revolutionary 
 conclusions of other sciences become part of the accepted 
 data of thought, the truths taught by political economy 
 seem to have made little real impression, and it is even 
 now a matter of debate whether there is, or can be, such 
 a science at all. 
 
 This cannot be on account of the paucity of politico- 
 economic literature. Enough books have been written on 
 the subject within the last hundred years to fill a large 
 library, while all of our great institutions of learning 
 have some sort of a chair of political economy, and mat- 
 ters of intense public interest in which the principles of 
 the science are directly involved are constantly being dis- 
 cussed. 
 
 It seems to me that the reasons why political economy is 
 so little regarded are referable partly to the nature of 
 the science itself and partly to the manner in which it 
 has been cultivated. 
 
 In the first place, the very importance of the subjects 
 with which political economy deals raises obstacles in its 
 way. The discoveries of other sciences may challenge per- 
 nicious ideas, but the conclusions of political economy in- 
 volve pecuniary interests, and thus thrill directly the sen- 
 sitive pocket-nerve. For, as no social adjustment can exist 
 without interesting a larger or smaller class in its main- 
 tenance, political economy at every point is apt to come 
 in contact with some interest or other which regards it 
 as the silversmiths of Ephesus did those who taught the 
 
138 STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 uselessness of presenting shrines to Diana. Macatilay has 
 well said that, if any large pecuniary interest were con- 
 cerned in denying the attraction of gravitation, that most 
 obvious of physical facts would not lack disputers. This 
 is just the difficulty that has beset and still besets the 
 progress of political economy. The man who is, or who 
 imagines that he is, interested in the maintenance of a 
 protective tariff, may accept all your professors choose to 
 tell him about the composition of the sun or the evolution 
 of species, but, no matter how clearly you demonstrate the 
 wasteful inutility of hampering commerce, he will not be 
 convinced. And so, to the man who expects to make 
 money out of a railroad-subsidy, you will in vain try to 
 prove that such devices to change the natural direction of 
 labour and capital must cause more loss than gain. What, 
 then, mast be the opposition which inevitably meets a sci- 
 ence that deals with tariffs and subsidies, vrith banking 
 interests and bonded debts, with trades-unions and com- 
 binations of capital, with taxes and licenses and land- 
 tenures ! It is not ignorance alone that offers opposition, 
 but ignorance backed by interest, and made fierce by 
 passions. 
 
 Now, while the interests thus aroused furnish the in- 
 centive, the complexity of the phenomena with which polit- 
 ical economy deals makes it comparatively easy to palm off 
 on the unreasoning all sorts of absurdities as political 
 economy. And, when all kinds of diverse opinions are 
 thus promulgated under that name, it is but natural that 
 the great number of people who depend on others to save 
 themselves the trouble of thinking should look upon polit- 
 ical economy as a field wherein any one may find what 
 he pleases. But what is far worse than any amount of 
 pretentious quackery is that the science even as taught 
 by the masters is in large measure disjointed and indeter- 
 
UNIVEESITY LECTURE 139 
 
 minate. As laid down in the best text-books, political 
 economy is like a shapely statue but half hewn from the 
 rock — like a landscape, part of which stands out clear and 
 distinct, but over the rest of which the mists still roll. 
 This is a subject into which, in a lecture like this, I can- 
 not enter; but, that it is so, you may see for yourselves 
 in the failure of political economy to give any clear and 
 consistent answer to most important practical questions — 
 such as the industrial depressions which are so marked a 
 feature of modern times, and in confusions of thought 
 which wil? be obvious to you if you carefully examine even 
 the best treatises. Strength and subtilty have been 
 wasted in intellectual hair-splitting and super-refinements, 
 in verbal discussions and disputes, while the great high- 
 roads have remained unexplored. And thus has been 
 given to a simple and attractive science an air of repellent 
 abstruseness and uncertainty. 
 
 And springing, as it seems to me, from the same funda- 
 mental cause, there has arisen an idea of political economy 
 which has arrayed against it the feelings and prejudices 
 of those who have most to gain by its cultivation. The 
 name of political economy has been constantly invoked 
 against every effort of the working classes to increase their 
 wages or decrease their hours of labour. The impious 
 doctrine always preached by oppressors to oppressed — ^the 
 blasphemous dogma that the Creator has condemned one 
 portion of his creatures to lives of toil and want, while 
 he has intended another portion to enjoy "aU the fruits 
 of the earth and the fullness thereof" — ^has been preached 
 to the working classes in the name of political economy, 
 just as the "cursed-be-Ham" clergymen used to preach 
 the divine sanction of slavery in the name of Christianity. 
 In so far as the real turning questions of the day are 
 concerned, political economy seems to be considered by 
 
140 STUDY OP POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 most of its professors as a scientific justification of all 
 that is, and by the convenient formula of supply and de- 
 mand they seem to mean some method which Providence 
 has of fixing the rate of wages so that it can never by any 
 action of the employed be increased. Nor is it merely 
 ignorant pretenders who thus degrade the name and terms 
 of political economy. This character has been so firmly 
 stamped upon the science itself as currently held and 
 taught that not even men like John Stuart Mill have been 
 able to emancipate themselves. Even the intellectually 
 courageous have shrunk from laying stress upon principles 
 which might threaten great vested interests; while others, 
 less scrupulous, have exercised their ingenuity in elimi- 
 nating from the science everything which could offend 
 those interests. Take the best and most extensively circu- 
 lated text-books. While they insist upon freedom for 
 capital, while they justify on the ground of utility the sel- 
 fish greed that seeks to pile fortune on fortune, and the 
 niggard spirit that steels the heart to the wail of distress, 
 what sign of substantial promise do they hold out to the 
 workingman save that he should refrain from rearing 
 children ? 
 
 What can we expect when hands that should offer bread 
 thus hold out a stone? Is it in human nature that the 
 masses of men, vaguely but keenly conscious of the injus- 
 tice of existing social conditions, feeling that they are 
 somehow cramped and hurt, without knowing what cramps 
 and hurts them, should welcome truth in this partial form; 
 that they should take to a science which, as it is presented 
 to them, seems but to justify injustice, to canonise selfish- 
 ness by throwing around it the halo of utility, and to pre- 
 sent Herod rather than Vincent de Paul as the typical 
 benefactor of humanity? Is it to be wondered at that 
 they should turn in their ignorance to the absurdities of 
 
TJNIVEKSITT LECTUKE 141 
 
 protection and the crazy theories generally designated by 
 the name of socialism? 
 
 I have lingered to inquire why political economy has in 
 popular apprehension acquired the character of indefinite- 
 ness, abstruseness, and selfishness, merely that I may be 
 the better able to convince you that none of these quali- 
 ties properly belong to it. I want to draw you to its 
 study by showing you how clear and simple and beneficent 
 a science it is, or rather should be. 
 
 Although political economy deals with various and com- 
 plicated phenomena, yet they are phenomena which may 
 be resolved into simple elements, and which are but the 
 manifestations of familiar principles. The premises from 
 which it makes its deductions are truths of which we are 
 all conscious and upon which in every-day life we con- 
 stantly base our reasoning and our actions. Its processes, 
 which consist chiefly in analysis, have a like certainty, al- 
 though, as with all the causes of which it takes cognisance 
 are at all times acting other causes, it can never predict 
 exact results but only tendencies. 
 
 And, although in the study of political economy we can- 
 not use that potent method of experiment by artificially 
 produced conditions which is so valuable in the physical 
 sciences, yet, not only may we find, in the diversity of 
 human society, experiments already worked out for us, but 
 there is at our command a method analogous to that of the 
 chemist, in what may be called mental experiment. You 
 may separate, combine, or eliminate conditions in your own 
 imagination, and test in this way the working of known 
 principles. This, it seems to me, is the great tool of politi- 
 cal economy. It is a method with which you must be fa- 
 miliar and doubtless use every day, though you may never 
 have analysed the process. Let me illustrate what I mean 
 by something which has no reference to political economy. 
 
142 STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 When I was a boy I went down to the wharf with an- 
 other boy to see the first iron steamship which had ever 
 crossed the ocean to our port. Now, hearing of an iron 
 steamship seemed to us then a good deal like hearing of a 
 leaden kite or a wooden cooking-stove. But, we had not 
 been long aboard of her, before my comrade said in a tone 
 of contemptuous disgust: "Pooh! I see how it is. She's 
 all lined with wood ; that's the reason she floats." I could 
 not controvert him for the moment, but I was not satis- 
 fied, and, sitting down on the wharf when he left me, I set 
 to work trying mental experiments. If it was the wood 
 inside of her that made her float, then the more wood the 
 higher she would float; and, mentally, I loaded her up 
 with wood. But, as I was familiar with the process of 
 making boats out of blocks of wood, I at once saw that, 
 instead of floating higher, she would sink deeper. Then, 
 I mentally took all the wood out of her, as we dug out our 
 wooden boats, and saw that thus lightened she would float 
 higher still. Then, in imagination, I jammed a hole in her, 
 and saw that the water would run in and she would sink, 
 as did our wooden boats when ballasted with leaden keels. 
 And, thus I saw, as clearly as though I could have actually 
 made these experiments with the steamer, that it was not 
 the wooden lining that made her float, but her hollowness, 
 or, as I would now phrase it, her displacement of water. 
 
 Now, just such mental operations as these you doubt- 
 less perform every day, and in doing so you employ the 
 method of imaginative experiment, which is so useful in 
 the investigations of political economy. You can, in this 
 way, turn around in your mind a proposition or phenome- 
 non and look on all sides of it, can isolate, analyse, recom- 
 bine, or subject it to the action of a mental magnifying 
 glass which will reveal incongruities as a reductio ad absur- 
 dum. Let me again illustrate: 
 
UNIVEE8ITY LECTUEE 143 
 
 Before I had ever read a line of political economy, I 
 happened once to hear a long and well-put argument in 
 favour of a protective tariff. Up to that time I had sup- 
 posed that "protection to domestic industry" was a good 
 thing; not that I had ever thought out the matter, but 
 that I had accepted this conclusion because I had heard 
 many men whom I believed wiser than I say so. But 
 this particular speaker had, so far as one of his audience 
 was concerned, overshot his mark. His arguments set me 
 thinking, just as when a boy my companion's solution of 
 the iron-ship mystery had set me thinking. I said to 
 myself: The effect of a tariff is to increase the cost of 
 bringing goods from abroad. Now, if this benefits a coun- 
 try, then all difficulties, dangers, and impediments which 
 increase the cost of bringing goods from abroad are like- 
 wise beneficial. If this theory be correct, then the city 
 which is the hardest to get at has the most advantageous 
 situation: pirates and shipwrecks contribute to national 
 prosperity by raising the price of freight and the cost of 
 insurance; and improvements in navigation, in railroads 
 and steamships, are injurious. Manifestly this is absurd. 
 
 And then I looked further. The speaker had dwelt on 
 the folly of a great country like the United States export- 
 ing raw material and importing manufactured goods which 
 might as well be made at home, and I asked myself. What 
 is the motive which causes a people to export raw material 
 and import manufactured goods ? I found that it could be 
 attributed to nothing else than the fact that they could in 
 this way get the goods cheaper, that is, with less labour. 
 I looked to transactions between individuals for parallels 
 to this trade between nations, and found them in plenty — 
 the farmer selling his wheat and buying flour ; the grazier 
 sending his wool to a market and bringing back cloth and 
 blankets; the tanner buying back leather in shoes, instead 
 
144 STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 of makiBg them himself. I saw, when I came to analyse 
 them, that these exchanges hetween nations were precisely 
 the same thing as exchanges between individuals; that 
 they were, in fact, nothing but exchanges between indi- 
 viduals of different nations; that they were all prompted 
 by the desire and led to the result of getting the greatest 
 return for the least expenditure of labour; that the social 
 condition in which such exchanges did not take place was 
 the naked barbarism of the Terra del Fuegians; that just 
 in proportion to the division of labour and the increase 
 of trade were the increase of wealth and the progress of 
 civilisation. And so, following up, turning, analysing, 
 and testing all the protectionist arguments, I came to con- 
 clusions which I have ever since retained. 
 
 Now, just such mental operations as this are all that is 
 required in the study of political economy. Nothing more 
 is needed (but this is needed) than the habit of careful 
 thought — the making sure of every step without jumping 
 to conclusions. This habit of jumping to conclusions — 
 of considering essentially different things as the same be- 
 cause of some superficial resemblance — is the source of the 
 manifold and mischievous errors which political economy 
 has to combat. 
 
 But I can probably, by a few examples, show you what I 
 mean more easily than in any other way. Were I to put 
 to you the child's question, "Which is heavier, a pound of 
 lead or a pound of feathers?" you would doubtless be 
 offended; and were I seriously to ask you. Which is the 
 most valuable, a dollar's worth of gold or a dollar's worth 
 of anything else? you might also feel that I had insulted 
 your intelligence. Yet the belief that a dollar's worth of 
 gold is more valuable than a dollar's worth of anything 
 else is widespread and persistent. It has molded the 
 policy of great nations, dictated treaties, marched armies. 
 
UNIVERSITY LECTURE 145 
 
 launched fleets, fought battles, constructed and enforced 
 elaborate and vexatious systems of taxation, and sent men 
 by thousands to jail and to the gallows. Certainly a large 
 portion, probably a large majority, of the people of the 
 United States — including many college graduates, mem- 
 bers of what are styled the learned professions, senators, 
 representatives, authors, and editors — seem to-day utterly 
 unable to get it fully through their heads that a dollar's 
 worth of anything else is as valuable as a dollar's worth 
 of the precious metals, and are constantly reasoning, argu- 
 ing, and legislating on the assumption that the community 
 which exchanges gold for goods is suffering a loss, and 
 that it is the part of wisdom, by preventing such exchange, 
 to "keep money in the country." On this absurd assump- 
 tion the revenue system of the United States is based to- 
 day, and, if you will notice, you wUl find it cropping out 
 of current discussions in all sorts of forms. Even here, 
 where the precious metals form one of our staples, and for 
 a long time constituted our only staple, you may see the 
 power of the same notion. The anti-cooly clubs complain 
 of the "drain of money to China," but never think of com- 
 plaining of the drain of flour, wheat, quicksilver, or 
 shrimps. And the leading journals of San Francisco, who 
 hold themselves on an immeasurably higher intellectual 
 level than the anti-cooly clubs, never, I think, let a week 
 pass without congratulating their readers that we have 
 ceased to import this or that article, and are thereby keep- 
 ing so much money that we used to send abroad, or lament- 
 ing that we still send money away to pay for this or that 
 which might be made here. Yet that we send away wine 
 or wool, fruit or honey, is never thought of as a matter 
 of lament, but quite the contrary. What is all this but 
 the assumption that a dollar's worth of gold is worth more 
 than a dollar's worth of anything else ? 
 
146 STUDY OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 This fallacy is transparently absurd when we come to 
 reduce it to a general proposition. But, nevertheless, the 
 habit of jumping at conclusions, of which I have spoken, 
 makes it seem very natural to people who do not stop to 
 think. Money is our standard, or measure of values, in 
 which we express all other yalues. When we speak of 
 gaining wealth, we speak of "making money"; when we 
 speak of losing wealth, we speak of "losing money" ; when 
 we speak of a rich man, we speak of him as possessed of 
 much money, though as a matter of fact he may, and 
 probably has, very little actual money. Then, again, as 
 money is the common medium of exchange, in the process 
 of getting things we want for things we are willing to 
 dispose of, we generally first exchange the latter for money 
 and then exchange the money for the things we want. 
 And, as the number of people who want things of all sorts 
 must manifestly be greater than the number of people 
 who want the particular thing, whatever it may be that 
 we have to exchange, any difficulty there may be in mak- 
 ing our exchange will generally attend the first part of it; 
 for, in exchanging anything for money, I must find some 
 one who wants my particular thing, while in exchanging 
 money for a commodity, any one who wants any commodity 
 or service will be willing to take my money. Now, this 
 habit of estimating wealth in money, and of speaking of 
 gain or loss of wealth as gain or loss of money, and this 
 habit of associating difficulties of exchange in individual 
 cases with the difficulty of obtaining money, constantly 
 lead people who do not think clearly to jump at the con- 
 clusion that money is more valuable than anything else. 
 Yet the slightest consideration would show them that 
 wealth never consists, but in very, small part, of money; 
 that the difficulty in individual exchanges has no refer- 
 ence to the relative value of money, and is eliminated 
 
UNIVERSITY LECTUEE 147 
 
 when the exchanges of large munbers of individuals are 
 concentrated or considered, and, in short, a dollar in 
 money is worth no more than a dollar's worth of wheat 
 or cloth; and that, instead of the exchange of money for 
 other commodities being proof of a disadvantageous bar- 
 gain, it is proof of an advantageous bargain, for, if we did 
 not want the goods more than the money, we would not 
 make the exchange. 
 
 Or, to take another example: In connection with the 
 discussion of Chinese immigration, you have, doubtless, 
 over and over again heard it contended that cheap labour, 
 which would reduce the cost of production, is precisely 
 equivalent to labour-saving machinery, and, as machinery 
 operates to increase wealth, so would cheap labour. This 
 conclusion is jumped at from the fact that cheap labour 
 and labour-saving machinery similarly reduce the cost of 
 production to the manufacturer. But, if, instead of jump- 
 ing at this conclusion, we analyse the manner in which 
 the reduction of cost is produced in each case, we shall 
 see the fallacy. Labour-saving machinery reduces cost by 
 increasing the productive power of labour; a reduction of 
 wages reduces cost by reducing the share of the product 
 which falls to the labourer. To the employer the effect 
 may be the same; but, to the community, which includes 
 both employers and employed, the effect is very different. 
 In the one case there is increase in the general wealth; 
 in the other there is merely a change in distribution — 
 whatever one class gains another class necessarily losing. 
 Hence the effect of cheap labour is necessarily very differ- 
 ent from that of improved machinery. 
 
 And precisely similar to this fallacy is that which seems 
 so natural to men of another class — ^that because the in- 
 troduction of cheaper labour in any community does, in 
 the present organisation of society, tend to reduce the 
 
148 STUDY OF POLITICAIi ECONOMY 
 
 general level of wages, so does the importation of cheap 
 goods. This, also — but I must leave you to analyse it for 
 yourselves — springs from a confusion of thought which 
 does not distinguish between the whole and the parts, 
 between the distribution of wealth and the production of 
 wealth. 
 
 Did time permit, I might go on, showing you by in- 
 stance after instance how transparently fallacious are 
 many current opinions — some, even, more widely held than 
 any of which I have spoken — ^when tried by the simple 
 tests which it is the province of political economy to apply. 
 But my object is not to lead you to conclusions. All I 
 wish to impress upon you is the real simplicity of what is 
 generally deemed an abstruse science, and the exceeding 
 ease with which it may be pursued. For the study of 
 political economy you need no special knowledge, no ex- 
 tensive library, no costly laboratory. You do not even 
 need text-books nor teachers, if you will but think for 
 yourselves. All that you need is care in reducing complex 
 phenomena to their elements, in distinguishing the essen- 
 tial from the accidental, and in applying the simple laws 
 of human action with which you are familiar. Take no- 
 body's opinion for granted; "try all things: hold fast that 
 which is good." In this way, the opinions of others will 
 help you by their suggestions, elucidations, and correc- 
 tions; otherwise they will be to you but as words to a 
 parrot. 
 
 If there were nothing more to be urged in favour of 
 the study of political economy than the mental exercise 
 it will give, it would still be worth your profoundest atten- 
 tion. The study which will teach men to think for them- 
 selves is the study of all studies most needed. Education 
 is not the learning of facts; it is the development and 
 training of mental powers. All this array of professors. 
 
UNIVERSITY LECTURE 149 
 
 all this paraphernalia of learning, cannot educate a man. 
 They can but help him to educate himself. Here you may 
 obtain the tools; but they will be useful only to him who 
 can use them. A monkey with a microscope, a mule pack- 
 ing a library, are fit emblems of the men — and, imfortu- 
 nately, they are plenty — who pass through the whole edu- 
 cational machinery, and come out but learned fools, 
 crammed with knowledge which they cannot use — all the 
 more pitiable, all the more contemptible, all the more in 
 the way of real progress, because they pass, with them- 
 selves and others, as educated men. 
 
 But, while it seems to me that nothing can be more 
 conducive to vigorous mental habits and intellectual self- 
 reliance than the study which trains us to apply the analy- 
 sis of thought to the every-day affairs of life, and to see in 
 constantly changing phenomena the evidence of unchang- 
 ing law; which leads us to distinguish the real from the 
 apparent, and to mark, beneath the seething eddies of in- 
 terest, passion, and prejudice, the great currents of our 
 times — it is not on such incentives that I wish to dwell. 
 There are motives as much higher than the thirst for 
 knowledge, as that noble passion is higher than the lust 
 for power or the greed of gold. 
 
 In its calculations the science of wealth takes little note 
 of, nay, it often carefully excludes, the potent force of 
 sympathy, and of those passions which lead men to toil, 
 to struggle, even to die for the good of others. And yet 
 it is these higher passions, these nobler impulses, that 
 urge most strenuously to its study. The promise of po- 
 litical economy is not so much what it may do for you, as 
 what it may enable you to do for others. 
 
 I trust you have felt the promptings of that highest 
 of ambitions — the desire to be useful in your day and gen- 
 eration; the hope that in something, even though little. 
 
160 STUDY OP POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 those who come after may be wiser, better, and happier 
 that you have lived. Or, if you have never felt this, I 
 trust the feeling is only latent, ready to spring forth when 
 you see the need. 
 
 Gentlemen, if you but look, you will see the need ! You 
 are of the favoured few, for the fact that you are here, 
 students in a university of this character, bespeaks for 
 you the happy accidents that fall only to the lot of the 
 few, and you cannot yet realise, as you may by-and-by 
 realise, how the hard struggle which is the lot of so many 
 may cramp and bind and distort — how it may dull the 
 noblest faculties and chill the warmest impulses, and grind 
 out of men the joy and poetry of life; how it may turn 
 into the lepers of society those who should be its adorn- 
 ment, and transmute into vermin to prey upon it and 
 into wild beasts to fly at its throat, the brain and muscle 
 that should go to its enrichment ! These things may never 
 yet have forced themselves on your attention; but still, if 
 you wUl think of it, you cannot fail to see enough want 
 and wretchedness, even in our own country to-day, to move 
 you to sadness and pity, to nerve you to high resolve; to 
 arouse in you the sympathy that dares, and the indigna- 
 tion that burns to overthrow a wrong. 
 
 And seeing these things, would you fain do something 
 to relieve distress, to eradicate ignorance, to extirpate vice ? 
 You must turn to political economy to know their causes, 
 that you may lay the axe to the root of the evil tree. Else 
 all your efforts will be in vain. Philanthropy, unguided 
 by an intelligent apprehension of causes, may palliate or 
 it may intensify, but it cannot cure. If charity could 
 eradicate want, if preaching could make men moral, if 
 printing books and building schools could destroy igno- 
 rance, none of these things would be knovm to-day. 
 
 And there is the greater need that you make yourselves 
 
UNIVBESITT LECTURE 151 
 
 I 
 acquainted with the principles of political economy from 
 
 the fact that, in the immediate future, questions which 
 come within its province must assume a greater and greater 
 importance. To act intelligently in the struggle in which 
 you must take part — for positively or negatively each of 
 you must carry his weight — ^you must know something of 
 this science. And this, I think, is clear to whoever con- 
 siders the forces that are mustering — that the struggle to 
 come will be fiercer and more momentous than the strug- 
 gles that are past. 
 
 There is a comfortable belief prevalent among us that 
 we have at last struck the trade-winds of time, and that 
 by virtue of what we call progress all these evils will cure 
 themselves. Do not accept this doctrine without exami- 
 nation. The history of the past does not countenance it, 
 the signs of the present do not warrant it. Gentlemen, 
 look at the tendencies of our time, and see if the earnest 
 work of intelligent men be not needed. 
 
 Look even here. Can the thoughtful man view the de- 
 velopment of our State with unmixed satisfaction? Do 
 we not know that, under present conditions, just as that 
 city over the bay grows in wealth and population, so will 
 poverty deepen and vice increase ; that just as the liveried 
 carriages become more plentiful, so do the beggars; that 
 just as the pleasant villas of wealth dot these slopes, so 
 will rise up the noisome tenement house in the city slums. 
 I have watched the growth of San Francisco with joy and 
 pride, and my imagination still dwells with delight upon 
 the image of the great city of the future, the queen of all 
 the vast Pacific — perhaps the greatest city of the world. 
 Yet what is the gain? San Francisco of to-day, with her 
 three hundred thousand people, is, for the classes who de- 
 pend upon their labour, not so good a place as the San 
 Francisco of sixty thousand ; and when her three hundred 
 
152 STUDY OP POLITICAL ECONOMY 
 
 thousand rises to a million, San Francisco, if present ten- 
 dencies are unchanged, must present the same sickening 
 sights which in the streets of New York shock the man 
 from the open West. 
 
 This is the dark side of our boasted progress, the Neme- 
 sis that seems to follow with untiring tread. Where 
 wealth most abounds, there poverty is deepest; where lux- 
 ury is most profuse, the gauntest want jostles it. In 
 cities which are the storehouses of nations, starvation an- 
 nually claims its victims. Where the costliest churches 
 rear the tallest spires towards heaven, there is needed a 
 standing army of policemen; as we build new schools, we 
 buUd new prisons; where the heaviest contributions are 
 raised to send missionaries to the ends of the earth to 
 preach the glad tidings of peace and good-will, there may 
 be seen squalor and vice that would affright a heathen. 
 In mills where the giant power of steam drives machinery 
 that multiplies by hundreds and thousands the productive 
 forces of man, there are working little children who ought 
 to be at play or at school; where the mechanism of ex- 
 change has been perfected to the utmost, there thousands 
 of men are vainly trying to exchange their labour for the 
 necessaries of life! 
 
 Whence this dark shadow that thus attends that which 
 we are used to call "material progress," that which our 
 current philosophy teaches us to hope for and to work for ? 
 Here is the question of all questions for us. We must 
 answer it or be destroyed, as preceding civilisations have 
 been destroyed. For no chain is stronger than its weakest 
 link, and our glorious statue with its head of gold and its 
 shoulders of brass has as yet but feet of clay ! 
 
 Political economy alone can give the answer. And, if 
 you trace out, in the way I have tried to outline, the laws 
 of the production and exchange of wealth, you will see the 
 
UNIVERSITY LECTURE 153 
 
 causes of social weakness and disease in enactments which 
 selfishness has imposed on ignorance, and in maladjust- 
 ments entirely within our own control. 
 
 And you will see the remedies. Not in wild dreams of 
 red destruction nor weak projects for putting men in lead- 
 ing-strings to a brainless abstraction called the state, but 
 in simple measures sanctioned by justice. You will see 
 in light the great remedy, in freedom the great solvent. 
 You will see that the true law of social life is the law of 
 love, the law of liberty, the law of each for all and all for 
 each; that the golden rule of morals is also the golden 
 rule of the science of wealth; that the highest expressions 
 of religious truth include the widest generalisations of 
 political economy. 
 
 There will grow on you, as no moralising could teach, 
 a deepening realisation of the brotherhood of man; there 
 wiU come to you a firmer and firmer conviction of the 
 fatherhood of God. If you have ever thoughtlessly ac- 
 cepted that worse than atheistic theory that want and 
 wretchedness and brutalising toil are ordered by the Crea- 
 tor, or, revolting from this idea, if you have ever felt 
 that the only thing apparent in the ordering of the world 
 was a blind and merciless fate careless of man's aspira- 
 tions and heedless of his sufferings, these thoughts will 
 pass from you as you see how much of all that is bad and 
 all that is perplexing in our social conditions grows simply 
 from our ignorance of law — as you come to realise how 
 much better and happier men might make the life of man. 
 
THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC: 
 ITS DANGERS AND POSSIBILITIES. 
 
THE AMEEICAN- EEPUBLIC: ITS DANGEES 
 AND POSSIBILITIES. 
 
 [An oiation delivered in the California Theatre, San Francisco, on the 
 celehration of the 4th of July, 1877.] 
 
 Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 
 
 IT is under circumstances that inspire gratitude and 
 renew patriotism that we celebrate the completion by 
 the American Eepublie of the first year of her second cen- 
 tury. How much that year has held of the possibilities 
 of dire calamity it may be too soon to speak.^ But for 
 the deliverance let us give thanks. Through the web 
 woven by passion and prejudice has run the woof of a 
 beneficent purpose. Through clash of plans and conflict 
 of parties; through gateways hung with cloud and by 
 paths we knew not of, have we come to this good estate! 
 As, when the long struggle was over, the men of the 
 Eevolution turned to pour forth their thanks to Him in 
 whose hands are the nations, so let us turn to-day. Last 
 year was the Centennial; but this year, if we read the 
 times aright, marks the era, and with 1877 will the his- 
 torian, in future ages, close the grand division of our 
 history that records the long, sad strife of which slavery 
 was the cause. Most gracious of our national anniver- 
 saries is that we keep. Never before has the great Decla- 
 
 1 Hayes-Tilden I^residential contest 
 157 
 
158 THE AMERICAN EEPUBLIC 
 
 ration rung through the land as to-day. For the first 
 time have its words neither fallen on the ears of a slave 
 nor been flung back by a bayonet-guarded State House ! 
 
 For year after year, while they who won our indepen- 
 dence faded away; for year after year, while their sons 
 grew old, and in their turn taught us to light the altar 
 fires of the Eepublic, at every recurring anniversary of 
 the nation's birth, the unexpressed thought of an inherited 
 curse that was sowing the land with dragon's teeth, 
 checked the pride and gave to the rejoicings of the thought- 
 ful a sombre background, and between thunder of gun and 
 voice of trumpet, the black shadow of a great wrong 
 mocked in silence the burning words that protested to the 
 world the inalienable rights of man. To this there came 
 an end. In the deadly close of civil war, when all fierce 
 and wicked passions were loosed, while the earth shook 
 with the tread of fratricidal armies, and the heavens were 
 red with the blaze of burning homes, amid the groans of 
 dying men and the cry of stricken women, the great curse 
 passed away. But still the shadow. Could we boast a 
 Union in which State Governments were maintained by 
 extra-State force, or glory in a republic whose forms were 
 mocked in virtual provinces ? 
 
 But all this is of the past. The long strife is over. 
 The cancer has been cut out. And may we not also say 
 to-day that the wound of the knife has healed? To-day 
 we celebrate the nation's birth, more truly one people than 
 for years and years. Again in soul as in form, the many 
 are one. Over palmetto as over pine floats the flag that 
 typifies the glory of our common past, the promise of our 
 common future — the flag that rose above the blood-stained 
 snow at Valley Forge, that crossed with Washington the 
 icy Delaware — the flag that Marion bore, that Paul Jones 
 nailed to the mast, that Lafayette saluted I Over our un- 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ORATION 159 
 
 divided heritage of a continent it floats to-day, with the 
 free will of a united people — ^under its folds no slave, and 
 in its blue no star save that of a free and sovereign State. 
 And, as in city and town and hamlet, to-day, has been read 
 once more the declaration of a nation's birth, again, I be- 
 lieve me, in the hearts of their people, has Adams signed 
 with Jefferson and Eutledge with Livingston, pledging 
 to the Republic one and indivisible, life and fortune and 
 sacred honour ! 
 
 Beside me on this platform, around me in this audience, 
 sit men who have borne arms against each other in civil 
 strife, again united under the folds of that flag. Men of 
 the South and men of the North, do I not speak what is in 
 your hearts, do I not give voice to your hope and your 
 trust, when I say that the Union is again restored in spirit 
 as in form — not a union of conquerors and conquered, but 
 the union of a people — one in soul as one in blood; one in 
 destiny as one in heritage! 
 
 Let our dead strifes bury their dead, while we cherish 
 the feeling that makes us one. Let us spare no myrrh nor 
 frankincense nor costly spices as we feed the sacred fire. 
 It is not a vain thing these flags, these decorations, these 
 mUes of marching men. Stronger than armies, more po- 
 tent than treasure is the sentiment of nationality they 
 typify and inculcate! 
 
 Yet to more than the sentiment of nationality is this 
 day sacred. It marks more than the birth of a nation — 
 it marks a step in the progress of the race. More than 
 national independence, more than national union, speaks 
 out in that grand document to which we have just lis- 
 tened; it is the declaration of the fundamental principle 
 of liberty — of a truth that has in it power to renovate the 
 world. 
 
 It is meet that on this day the flags of aU nations should 
 
160 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 mingle above our processions and wreathe our halls. For 
 this is the festival of her to whom under aU skies eyes 
 have turned and hands been lifted — of her who has had in 
 all lands her lovers and her martyrs — of her who shall 
 yet unite the nations and bid the war drums cease ! It is 
 the festival of Liberty! 
 
 And in keeping this day to Liberty, we honour aU her 
 sacred days — ^those glorious days on which she has stepped 
 forward, those sad days on which she has been stricken 
 down by open foes, or fallen wounded in the house of her 
 friends. Far back stretches the lineage of the Eepublic 
 at whose birth Liberty was invoked — from every land have 
 been gathered the gleams of light that unite in her beacon 
 fire. It is kindled of the progress of mankind ; it witnesses 
 to heaven the aspirations of the ages; it shall light the 
 nations to yet nobler heights! 
 
 Let us keep this day as the day sacred to Union and to 
 Liberty should be kept. Let us draw closer the cords of 
 our common brotherhood and renew our fathers' vows. 
 Let it be honoured as John Adams predicted it would be 
 honoured — ^with clangour of bells and roar of guns, with 
 music and processions and assemblages of the people, with 
 every mark of respect and rejoicing — ^that its memories of 
 glory may entwine themselves with the earliest recollec- 
 tions of our children, that even the thoughtless may catch 
 something of its inspiration ! 
 
 Yet it is not enough that with all the marks of vener- 
 ation we keep these holidays. It is possible to cherish the 
 form and lose the spirit. 
 
 Ko matter how bright the lights behind, their usefulness 
 is but to illumine the path before. Whatever be the causes 
 of that enormous difference — almost a difference in kind — 
 between the stationary and the progressive races, here is 
 
FOTTETH OP JULY ORATION 161 
 
 its unfailing indication — ^the one look to the past, the other 
 to the future. The moment we believe that all wisdom 
 was concentrated in our ancestors, that moment the petri- 
 faction of China is upon us. For life is growth, and 
 growth is change, and political progress consists in getting 
 rid of institutions we have outgrown. Aristocracy, feu- 
 dality, monarchy, slavery — all the things against which 
 human progress has been a slow and painful struggle — 
 were, doubtless, in their times relatively if not absolutely 
 beneficial, as have been in later times things we may 
 have to cast away. The maxim commended to us by him 
 who must ever remain the greatest citizen of the Eepublic 
 — "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty," embodies a 
 truth which goes to the very core of philosophy, which 
 must everywhere and at all times be true. Ever and ever 
 we sail an unknown sea. Old shapes of menace fade but 
 to give place to others. Even new rocks lurk ; ever in new 
 guise the syrens sing ! 
 
 As through the million-voiced plaudits of to-day we hear 
 again the words that when first spoken were ominous of 
 cord and gibbet, and amid a nation's rejoicing our pulses 
 quicken as imagination pictures the bridge of Lexington, 
 the slender earthworks of Bunker Hill, the charge of 
 tattered Continentals, or the swift night-ride of Marion's 
 men, let us not think that our own times are common- 
 place, and make no call for the patriotism that, as it wells 
 up in our hearts, we feel would have been strong to dare 
 and do had we lived then. 
 
 How momentous our own times may be the future alone 
 can tell. We are yet laying the foundations of empire, 
 while stronger run the currents of change and mightier 
 are the forces that marshal and meet. 
 
 Let us turn to the past, not in the belief that the great 
 men of the past conquered for us a heritage that we have 
 
162 THE AMERICAN EEPUBLIC 
 
 but to enjoy, but that we may catch their heroic spirit to 
 guide and nerve us in the exigencies of the present; that 
 we may pass it on to our children, to carry them through 
 the dangers of the future. 
 
 ' Now, as a hundred years ago, the Eepublic has need of 
 that spirit — of the noble sensitiveness that is jealous for 
 Freedom; of the generous indignation that weighs our 
 consideration of expediency against the sacrifice of one 
 iota of popular right; of the quick sympathy that made 
 an attack on the liberties of one colony felt in all; of the 
 patient patriotism that worked and waited, never flagging, 
 never tiring, seeking not recognition nor applause, looking 
 only to the ultimate end and to the common good; of the 
 devotion to a high ideal which led men to risk for it all 
 things sweet and all things dear! 
 
 We shall best honour the men of the Eevolution by in- 
 voking the spirit that animated them; we shaU best per- 
 petuate their memories by looking in the face whatever 
 threatens the perpetuity of their^work. Whether a cen- 
 tury hence they shall be regarded as visionaries or as men 
 who gave a new life to mankind, depends upon us. 
 
 For let us not disguise it — ^republican government is yet 
 but an experiment. That it has worked well so far, de- 
 termines nothing. That republican institutions would 
 work well under the social conditions of the youth of the 
 Eepublic — cheap land, high wages and little distinction 
 between rich and poor — ^there was never any doubt, for 
 they were working well before. Our Eevolution was not 
 a revolution in the full sense of the term, as was that 
 great outburst of the spirit of freedom that followed it in 
 France. The colonies but separated from Great Britain, 
 and became an independent nation without essential 
 change in the institutions under which they had grown up. 
 The doubt about republican institutions is as to whether 
 
rOURTH OF JULY ORATION 163 
 
 .they will work when population becomes dense, wages low, 
 and a great gulf separates rich and poor. 
 
 Can we speak of it as a doubt? Nothing in political 
 philosophy can be clearer than that under such conditions 
 republican government must break down. 
 
 This is not to say that these forms must be abandoned. 
 We might and probably would go on holding our elections 
 for years and years after our government had become es- 
 sentially despotic. It was centuries after Csesar ere the 
 absolute master of the Eoman world pretended to rule 
 other than by authority of a Senate that trembled before 
 him. It was not till the thirteenth century that English 
 kings dropped the formal claim of what was once the 
 essence of their title — ^the choice of the people; and to 
 this day the coronation ceremonies of European monarchs 
 retain traces of the free election of their leader by equal 
 warriors. 
 
 But forms are nothing when substance has gone. And 
 our forms are those from which the substance may most 
 easily go. Extremes meet, and a republican government, 
 based on universal suffrage and theoretical equality, is of 
 all governments that which may most easily become a 
 despotism of the worst kind. For there, despotism ad- 
 vances in the name of the people. The single source of 
 power once secured, everything is secured. There is no 
 unfranchised class to whom appeal may be made ; no privi- 
 leged orders, who in defending their own rights may de- 
 fend those of all. No bulwark remains to stay the flood, 
 no eminence to rise above it. 
 
 And where there is universal suffrage, just as the dis- 
 parity of condition increases, so does it become easy to seize 
 the source of power, for the greater is the proportion of 
 power in the hands of those who feel no direct interest in 
 
164 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 the conduct of the govermneiit, nay, who, made bitter by 
 hardships, may even look upon profligate government with 
 the sort of satisfaction we may imagine the proletarians 
 and slaves of Eome to have felt as they saw a Caligula or 
 Nero raging among the rich patricians. 
 
 Given a community with republican institutions, in 
 which one class is too rich to be shorn of their luxuries, no 
 matter how public affairs are administered, and another 
 so poor that any little share of the public plunder, even 
 though it be but a few dollars on election day, will seem 
 more than any abstract consideration, and power must pass 
 into the hands of jobbers who wUl sell it, as the prastorian 
 legions sold the Koman purple, while the people will be 
 forced to reimburse the purchase money with costs and 
 profits. If to the pecuniary temptation involved in the 
 ordinary conduct of government are added those that come 
 from the granting of subsidies, the disposition of public 
 lands and the regulation of prices by means of a protec- 
 tive tariff, the process will be the swifter. 
 
 Even the accidents of hereditary succession or of selec- 
 tion by lot (the plan of some of the ancient republics) 
 may sometimes place the wise and just in power, but in a 
 corrupt republic the tendency is always to give power to 
 the worst. Honesty and patriotism are weighted and un- 
 serupulousness commands success. The best gravitate to 
 the bottom, the worst float to the top; and the vile can 
 only be ousted by the viler. And as a corrupt government 
 always tends to make the rich richer and the poor poorer, 
 the fundamental cause of corruption is steadily aggra- 
 vated, while as national character must gradually assimi- 
 late to the qualities that command power and consequently 
 respect, that demoralisation of opinion goes on which in 
 the long panorama of history we may see over and over 
 again, transmuting races of freemen into races of slaves. 
 
rOUETH OP JULY ORATION 165 
 
 As in England, in the last century, where Parliament 
 was but a close corporation of the aristocracy, a corrupt 
 oligarchy, where it is clearly fenced off from the masses, 
 may exist without much effect on national character; be- 
 cause, in that case, power is associated in the popular 
 mind with other things than corruption; but where there 
 are no hereditary distinctions, and men are habitually seen 
 to raise themselves by corrupt qualities from the lowest 
 places to wealth and power, tolerance of these qualities 
 finally becomes admiration. A corrupt democratic govern- 
 ment must finally corrupt the people, and when a people 
 become corrupt, there is no resurrection. The life has 
 gone, only the carcass remains; and it is left but for the 
 ploughshares of fate to bury it out of sight. 
 
 Secure in her strength and position from external dan- 
 gers, with the cause gone that threatened her unity, the 
 Eepublic begins to count the years of her second century 
 with a future, to all outward seeming, secure. But may 
 we not see already closing round her the insidious perils 
 from which, since her birth, destruction has been predicted ? 
 Clearly, to him who will look, are we passing from the 
 conditions under which republican government is easy, 
 into those under which it becomes endangered, if not dan- 
 gerous. While the possessor of a single million is ceasing 
 to be noticeable in the throng of millionaires, and larger 
 private fortunes are mounting towards hundreds of mil- 
 lions, we are all over the country becoming familiar with 
 widespread poverty in its hardest aspects — not the pov- 
 erty that nourishes the rugged virtues, but poverty of the 
 kind that dispirits and embrutes. 
 
 And as we see the gulf widening between rich and poor, 
 may we not as plainly see the symptoms of political deteri- 
 oration that in a republican government must always ac- 
 
166 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 company it? Social distinctions are sharpest in our great 
 cities, and in our great cities is not republican government 
 becoming a reproach ? May we not see in these cities that 
 the worst social influences are become the most potent 
 political factors; that corrupt riags notoriously rule; that 
 offices are virtually purchased — and, most ominous of all, 
 may we not plainly see the growth of a sentiment that 
 looks on all this as natural, if not perfectly legitimate; 
 that either doubts the existence of an honest man in pub- 
 lic place, or thinks of him as a fool too weak to seize his 
 opportunity? Has not the primary system, which is sim- 
 ply republicanism applied to party management, already 
 broken down in our great cities, and are not parties in 
 their despair already calling for what in general govern- 
 ment would be oligarchies and dictatorships? 
 
 We talk about the problem of municipal government! 
 It is not the problem of municipal government that we 
 have to solve, but the problem of republican government. 
 These great cities are but the type of our development. 
 They are growing not merely with the growth of the coun- 
 try, but faster than the growth of the country. There are 
 children here to-day who in all human probability will see 
 San Francisco a city as large as London, and wiU count 
 through the country New Yorks by the score ! 
 
 FeUow-citizens, the wind does not blow north or south 
 because the weather-cocks turn that way. The complaints 
 of political demoralisation that come from every quarter 
 are not because bad men have been elected to office or 
 corrupt men have taken to engineering parties. If bad 
 men are elected to office, if corrupt men rule parties, is 
 it not because the conditions are such as to give them the 
 advantage over good and pure men? Fellow-citizens, it 
 is not the glamour of success that makes the men whose 
 work we celebrate to-day loom up through the mists of a 
 
FOURTH OF JULY OBATION 167 
 
 century like giants. They were giants — some of them so 
 great, that with all our eulogies we do not yet appreciate 
 them, and their full fame must wait for yet another cen- 
 tury. But the reason why such intellectual greatness gath- 
 ered around the cradle of the Eepublic and guided her 
 early steps, was not that men were greater in that day, 
 but that the people chose their best. You will hardly find 
 a man of that time, of high character and talent, who was 
 not in some way in the public service. This certainly can- 
 not be said now. And it is because power is concentrating, 
 as it must concentrate as our institutions deteriorate. If 
 one of those men were to come back to-day and were 
 spoken of for high position — say for the United Stalles 
 Senate — ^instead of JefEerson's three questions, the know- 
 ing ones would ask: "Has he money to make the fight?" 
 "Are the corporations for him?" "Can he put up the 
 primaries?" No less a man than Benjamin Franklin — a 
 man whose fame as a statesman and philosopher is yet 
 growing — a man whom the French Academy, the most 
 splendid intellectual assemblage in Europe, applauded as 
 the modern Solon — represented the city of Philadelphia in 
 the provincial Assembly for ten years, until, as their best 
 man, he was sent to defend the colony in London. Are 
 there not to-day cities in the land which even a Benjamin 
 Franklin could not represent in a State Assembly unless 
 he put around his neck the collar of a corporation or took 
 his orders from a local ring ? 
 
 You will think of many things in this connection to 
 which it is not necessary for me to allude. We all see 
 them. Though we may not speak it openly, the general 
 faith in republican institutions is narrowing and weak- 
 ening — it is no longer that defiant, jubilant, boastful belief 
 in republicanism as the source of all national blessings and 
 the cure for all human woes that it once was. We begin 
 
168 THE AMEEICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 to realise that corruption may cost as much as a royal 
 familyj and that the vaunted ballot, under certain condi- 
 tions, may bring forth ruling classes of the worst kind, 
 while we already see developing around us social evils that 
 we once associated only with effete monarchies. Can we 
 talk so proudly of welcoming the oppressed of all nations 
 when thousands vainly seek for work at the lowest wages? 
 Can we expect him, who must sup on charity, to rejoice 
 that he cannot be taxed without being represented; or 
 congratulate him who seeks shelter in a station-house that, 
 as a citizen of the Kepublic, he is the peer of the monarchs 
 of earth? 
 
 Is there any tendency to improvement? 
 
 Fellow-citizens, we have hitherto had an advantage over 
 older nations which we can hardly overestimate. It has 
 been our public domain, our background of unfeneed 
 land, that made our social conditions better than those of 
 Europe; that relieved the labour market and maintained 
 wages ; that kept open a door of escape from the increasing 
 pressure in older sections, and acting and reacting in many 
 ways on our national character, gave it freedom and inde- 
 pendence, elasticity and hope. 
 
 But with a folly for which coming generations may curse 
 us, we have wasted it away. Worse than the Norman con- 
 queror, we have repeated the sin of the sin-swollen Henry 
 VIII. ; and already we hear in the "tramp" of the sturdy 
 vagrant of the sixteenth century, the predecessor of the 
 English pauper of this. We have done to the future the 
 unutterable wrong that English rule and English law did 
 to Ireland, and already we begin to hear of rack-rents and 
 evictions. We have repeated the crime that filled Italy 
 with a servile population in place of the hardy farmers 
 who had carried her eagles to victory after victory — ^the 
 
FOUETH OP JULY ORATION 169 
 
 crime that ate out the heart of the Mistress of the World, 
 and buried the glories of ancient civilisation in the dark- 
 ness of medisBval night. Instead of guarding the public 
 domain as the most precious of our heritages; instead of 
 preserving it for our poorer classes of to-day and for the 
 uncounted millions who must follow us, we have made it 
 the reward of corruption, greed, fraud and perjury. Go 
 out in this fair land to-day and you may see great estates 
 tilled by Chinamen, while citizens of the Republic carry 
 their blankets through dusty roads begging for work; you 
 may ride for miles and miles through fertile land and see 
 no sign of human life save the ghastly chimney of an 
 evicted settler or the miserable shanty of a poverty-stricken 
 renter. Cross the bay, and you will see the loveliest piece 
 of mountain scenery around this great city, though desti- 
 tute of habitation, walled in with a high board fence, that 
 none but the owner of 30,000 acres of land may look upon 
 its beauties. Pass over these broad acres which lie as they 
 lay ere man was born on this earth, and under penalty of 
 fine and imprisonment you must confine yourself to the 
 road, purchased of him with poll taxes of four dollars a 
 head wrung from men packing their blankets in search 
 of work at a dollar a day. 
 
 Fellow-citizens, the public domain fit for homes is al- 
 most gone, and at the rate we are parting with the rest, 
 it is certain that by the time children now in our public 
 schools come of age, the pre-emption law and the home- 
 stead law will remain on our statute books only to remind 
 them of their squandered birthright. Then the influences 
 that are at work to concentrate wealth in the hands of the 
 few, and make dependence the lot of the many, will have 
 free play. 
 
 How potent are these influences! Though in form 
 everything seems tending to republican equality, a new 
 
170 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 power has entered the world that, under present social ad- 
 justments, is working with irresistible force to subject the 
 many to the few. The tendency of all modern machinery 
 is to give capital an overpowering advantage and make 
 labour helpless. Our boys cannot learn trades, because 
 there are few to learn. The journeyman who, with his 
 kit of tools, could make a living anywhere, is being re- 
 placed by the operative who performs but one part of a 
 process, and must work with tools he can never hope to own, 
 and who consequently must take but a bare living, while 
 all the enormous increase of wealth which results from 
 the economy of production must go to increase great for- 
 tunes. The undercurrents of the times seem to sweep us 
 back again to the old conditions from which we dreamed 
 we had escaped. The development of the artisan and com- 
 mercial classes gradually broke down feudalism after it 
 had become so complete that men thought of heaven as 
 organised on a feudal basis, and ranked the first and sec- 
 ond persons of the Trinity as Suzerain and Tenant-in- 
 Chief . But now the development of manufacture and ex- 
 change has reached a point which threatens to compel every 
 worker to seek a master, as the insecurity which followed 
 the final break up of the Eoman Empire compelled every 
 freeman to seek a lord. Nothing seems exempt from this 
 tendency. Even errands are run by a corporation, and 
 one company carries carpet-sacks, while another drives the 
 hack. It is the old guilds of the middle ages over again, 
 only that instead of all being equal, one is master and the 
 others serve. And where one is master and the others 
 serve, the one will control the others, even in such matters 
 as votes. 
 
 In our constitution is a clause prohibiting the granting 
 of titles of nobility. In the light of the present it seems 
 a good deal like the device of the man who, leaving a big 
 
FOUETH OF JULY ORATION 171 
 
 hole for the cat, sought to keep the kitten out hy blocking 
 up the little hole. Could titles add anything to the power 
 of the aristocracy that is here growing up? Six hundred 
 liveried retainers followed the great Earl of Warwick to 
 Parliament J but in this young State there is already a 
 simple citizen who could discharge any one of thousands 
 of men from their employment, who controls 3200 miles of 
 railroad and telegraph, and millions of acres of land, and 
 has the power of levying toll on traffic and travel over an 
 area twice that of the original thirteen States. Warwick 
 was a king-maker. Would it add to the real power of our 
 simple citizen were we to dub him an earl? 
 
 Look at the social conditions which are growing up here 
 in California. Land monopolised; water monopolised; a 
 race of cheap workers crowding in, whose effect upon our 
 own labouring classes is precisely that of slavery; all the 
 avenues of trade and travel under one control, all wealth 
 and power tending more and more to concentrate in a few 
 hands. What sort of a republic will this be in a few years 
 longer if these things go on? The idea would be ridicu- 
 lous, were it not too sad. 
 
 Fellow-citizens, I am talking of things not men. Most 
 irrational would be any enmity towards individuals. How 
 few are there of us who under similar circumstances would 
 not do just what those we speak of as monopolists have 
 done. To put a saddle on our back is to invite the booted 
 and spurred to ride. It is not men who are to blame but 
 the system. And who is to blame for the system, but the 
 whole people ? If the lion will suffer his teeth to be puUed 
 and his claws to be pared, he must expect every cur to 
 tease him. 
 
 But, fellow-citizens, while it is true that a republican 
 government worth the name cannot exist under the social 
 
172 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 conditions into which we are passing, it is also true that 
 under a really republican government such conditions 
 could not be. 
 
 I do not mean to say we have not had enough govern- 
 ment; I mean to say that we have had too much. It is a 
 truth that cannot be too clearly kept in mind that the 
 best government is that which governs least, and that the 
 more a republican government undertakes to do, the less 
 republican it becomes. Unhealthy social conditions are 
 but the result of interferences with natural rights. 
 
 There is nothing in the condition of things (it were a 
 libel on the Creator to say so) which condemns one class 
 to toil and want while another lives in wasteful luxury. 
 There is enough and to spare for us all. But if one is 
 permitted to ignore the rights of others by taking more 
 than his share, the others must get less; a difference is 
 created which constantly tends to become greater, and a 
 greedy scramble ensues in which more is wasted than 
 is used. 
 
 If you will trace out the laws of the production of 
 wealth and see how enormous are the forces now wasted, if 
 you wiU follow the laws of its distribution, and see how, 
 by human laws, one set of men are enabled to appropriate 
 a greater or less part of the earnings of the others; if 
 you wiU think how this robbery of labour degrades the 
 labourer and makes him unable to drive a fair bargain, 
 and how it diminishes production, you wiU begin to see 
 that there is no necessity for poverty, and that the grow- 
 ing disparity of social conditions proceeds from laws which 
 deny the equal rights of men. 
 
 FeUow-citizens, we have just listened again to the Dec- 
 laration, not merely of national independence, but of the 
 rights of man. 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ORATION 173 
 
 Great was Magna Charta — a beacon of light through 
 centuries of darkness, a bulwark of the oppressed through 
 ages of wrong, a firm rock for Liberty's feet, as she still 
 strove onward ! 
 
 But all charters and bills of right, all muniments and 
 titles of Liberty, are included in that simple statement of 
 self-evident truth that is the heart and soul of the Decla- 
 ration: "That all men are created equal; that they are 
 endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; 
 that among them are life, liberty and the pursuit of hap- 
 piness." 
 
 In these simple words breathes not only the spirit of 
 Magna Charta, but the spirit which seeks its inspiration 
 in the eternal facts of nature — through them speak not 
 only Stephen Langton and John Hampton, but Wat Tyler 
 and the Mad Priest of Kent. 
 
 The assertion of the equal rights of all men to life, lib- 
 erty and the pursuit of happiness is the assertion of the 
 right of each to the fullest, freest exercise of all his facul- 
 ties, limited only by the equal right of every other. It in- 
 cludes freedom of person and security of earnings, free- 
 dom of trade and capital, freedom of conscience and speech 
 and the press. It is the declaration of the same equal 
 rights of all human beings to the enjoyment of the bounty 
 of the Creator — ^to light and to air, to water and to land. 
 It asserts these rights as inalienable — as the direct grant 
 of the Creator to each human being, of which he can be 
 rightfully deprived neither by kings nor congresses, nei- 
 ther by parchments nor prescriptions — neither by the com- 
 pacts of past generations nor by majority votes. 
 
 This simple yet all-embracing statement bears the stamp 
 royal of primary truth — it includes all partial truths and 
 co-ordinates with all other truths. This perfect liberty, 
 which, by giving each his rights, secures the rights of all 
 
174 THE AMEBICAN BEPUBLIC 
 
 ^~is order, for violence is the infringement of right; it is 
 justice, for injustice is the denial of right; it is equality, 
 for one cannot have more than his right, without another 
 having less. It is reverence towards God, for irreverence 
 is the denial of His order; it is love towards man, for it 
 accords to others all that we ask for ourselves. It is the 
 message that the angels sang over Bethlehem in Judea — ^it 
 is the political expression of the Golden Eule ! 
 
 Like all men who build on truth, the men of the Eevo- 
 lution buUded better than they knew. The Declaration of 
 Independence was ahead of their time ; it is in advance of 
 our time; it means more than perhaps even he saw whose 
 pen traced it — man of the future that he was and still is ! 
 But it has in it the generative power of truth; it has 
 grown and still must grow. 
 
 They tore from the draft of the Declaration the page in 
 which Jefferson branded the execrable crime of slavery. 
 But in vain ! In those all-embracing words that page was 
 still there, and though it has taken a century, they are, in 
 this respect, vindicated at last, and human flesh and blood 
 can no longer be bought and sold. 
 
 It is for us to vindicate them further. Slavery is not 
 dead, though its grossest form be gone. What is the dif- 
 ference, whether my body is legally held by another, or 
 whether he legally holds that by which alone I can live. 
 Hunger is as cruel as the lash. The essence of slavery 
 consists in taking from a man all the fruits of his labour 
 except a bare living, and of how many thousands mis- 
 called free is this the lot? Where wealth most abounds 
 there are classes with whom the average plantation negro 
 would have lost in comfort by exchanging. English vil- 
 leins of the fourteenth century were better off than Eng- 
 lish agricultural labourers of the nineteenth. There is 
 
FOURTH OP JULY OEATION 175 
 
 slavery and slavery ! "The widow," says Carlyle, "is gath- 
 ering nettles for her children's dinner; a perfumed seig- 
 neur, delicately lounging in the CEil de Bceuf, has an 
 alchemy whereby he will extract from her the third nettle, 
 and call it rent !" 
 
 Fellow-citizens, let us not be deluded by names. What 
 is the use of a republic if labour must stand with its hat 
 off begging for leave to work, if "tramps" must throng the 
 highways and children grow up in squalid tenement 
 houses? Political institutions are but means to an end — 
 the freedom and happiness of the individual; and just so 
 far as they fail in that, call them what you will, they are 
 condemned. 
 
 Our conditions are changing. The laws which impel 
 nations to seek a larger measure of liberty, or else take 
 from them what they have, are working silently but with 
 irresistible force. If we would perpetuate the Eepublic, 
 we must come up to the spirit of the Declaration, and 
 fully recognise the equal rights of all men. We must free 
 labour from its burdens and trade from its fetters; we 
 must cease to make government an excuse for enriching 
 the few at the expense of the many, and confine it to neces- 
 sary functions. We must cease to permit the monopolisa- 
 tion of land and water by non-users, and apply the just 
 rule, "No seat reserved unless occupied." We must cease 
 the cruel wrong which, by first denying their natural 
 rights, reduces labourers to the wages of competition, and 
 then, under pretence of asserting the rights of another 
 race, compels them to a competition that will not merely 
 force them to a standard of comfort unworthy the citizen 
 of a free republic, but ultimately deprives them of their 
 equal right to live. 
 
 Here is the test: whatever conduces to their equal and 
 inalienable rights to men is good — let us preserve it. 
 
176 THE AMERICAN EEPtJjBLIC 
 
 Whatever denies or interferes with those equal rights is 
 bad — ^let us sweep it away. If we thus make our institu- 
 tions consistent with their theory, all difficulties must van- 
 ish. We will not merely have a republic, but social con- 
 ditions consistent with a republic. If we will not do this, 
 we surrender the Eepublic, either to be torn by the volcanic 
 forces that already shake the ground beneath the standing 
 armies of Europe, or to rot by slow degrees; and in its 
 turn undergo the fate of all its predecessors. 
 
 Liberty is not a new invention that, once secured, can 
 never be lost. Freedom is the natural state of man. 
 "Who is your lord?" shouted the envoys of Charles the 
 Simple to the Northmen who had penetrated into the heart 
 of France. "We have no lord; we are all free men!" was 
 their answer; and so in their time of vigour would have 
 answered every people that ever made a figure in the 
 world. But at some point in the development of every 
 people freedom has been lost, because as fresh gains were 
 made, or new forces developed, they were turned to the 
 advantage of a few. 
 
 Wealth in itself is a good, not an evil; but wealth con- 
 centrated in the hands of a few, corrupts on one side, and 
 degrades on the other. No chain is stronger than its 
 weakest link, and the ultimate condition of any people 
 must be the condition of its lowest class. If the low are 
 not brought up, the high must, be brought down. In the 
 long run, no nation can be freer than its most oppressed, 
 richer than its poorest, wiser than its most ignorant. This 
 is the fiat of the eternal justice that rules the world. It 
 stands forth on every page of history. It is what the 
 Sphinx says to us as she sitteth in desert sand, while the 
 winged bulls of Nineveh bear her witness ! It is written in 
 the undecipherable hieroglyphics of Yucatan; in the brick 
 mounds of Babylon; in the prostrate columns of Persiopo- 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ORATION 177 
 
 lis; in the salt-sown plain of Carthage. It speaks to us 
 from the shattered relics of Grecian art; from the mighty 
 ruins of the Coliseum ! Down through the centuries comes 
 a warning voice from- the great Eepublic of the ancient 
 world to the great Eepublic of the new. In three Latin 
 words Pliny sums up the genesis of the causes that ate 
 out the heart of the mightiest power that the world ever 
 saw, and overwhelmed a widegspread civilisation: "Great 
 estates ruined Italy!" 
 
 Let us heed the warning by laying the foundations of 
 the Eepublic upon the work of the equal, inalienable rights 
 of all. So shall dangers disappear, and forces that now 
 threaten turn to work our bidding; so shall wealth in- 
 crease, and knowledge grow, and vice, and crime and mis- 
 ery vanish away. 
 
 They who look upon Liberty as having accomplished her 
 mission, when she has abolished hereditary privileges and 
 given men the ballot, who think of her as having no fur- 
 ther relations to the every-day affairs of life, have not 
 seen her real grandeur — to them the poets who have sung 
 of her must seem rhapsodists, and her martyrs fools ! As 
 the sun is the lord of life, as well as of light ; as his beams 
 not merely pierce the clouds, but support all growth, sup- 
 ply all motion, and call forth from what would otherwise 
 be a cold and inert mass, all the infinite diversities of 
 being and beauty, so is liberty to mankind. It is not for 
 an abstraction that men have toiled and died ; that in every 
 age the witnesses of liberty have stood forth, and the 
 martyrs of liberty have suffered. It was for more than 
 this that matrons handed the Queen Anne musket from its 
 rest, and that maids bid their lovers go to death ! 
 
 We speak of liberty as one thing, and of virtue, wealth, 
 knowledge, invention, national strength and national inde- 
 
178 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 pendence as other things. But, of all these. Liberty is 
 the source, the mother, the necessary condition. She is to 
 virtue what light is to colour, to wealth what sunshine is 
 to grain; to knowledge what eyes are to the sight. She is 
 the genius of invention, the brawn of national strength, 
 the spirit of national independence ! Where Liberty rises, 
 there virtue grows, wealth increases, knowledge expands, 
 invention multiplies human powers, and in strength and 
 spirit the freer nation rises among her neighbours as Saul 
 amid his brethren — ^taller and fairer. Where Liberty 
 sinks, there virtue fades, wealth diminishes, knowledge is 
 forgotten, invention ceases, and empires once mighty in 
 arms and arts become a helpless prey to freer barbarians ! 
 
 Only in broken gleams and partial light has the sun of 
 Liberty yet beamed among men, yet all progress hath she 
 called forth. 
 
 Liberty came to a race of slaves crouching under Egyp- 
 tian whips, and led them forth from the House of Bondage. 
 She hardened them in the desert and made of them a race 
 of conquerors. The free spirit of the Mosaic law took 
 their thinkers up to heights where they beheld the unity 
 of God, and inspired their poets with strains that yet 
 phrase the highest exaltations of thought. Liberty 
 dawned on the Phenician coast, and ships passed the Pil- 
 lars of Hercules to plough the unknown sea. She broke 
 in partial light on Greece, and marble grew to shapes of 
 ideal beauty, words became the instruments of subtlest 
 thought, and against the scanty militia of free cities the 
 countless hosts of the Great King broke like surges against 
 a rock. She cast her beams on the four-acre farms of 
 Italian husbandmen, and born of her strength a power 
 came forth that conquered the world! She glinted from 
 shields of German warriors, and Augustus wept his legions. 
 Out of the night that followed her eclipse, her slanting 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ORATION 179 
 
 rays fell again on free cities, and a lost learning revived, 
 modern civilisation began, a new world was unveiled; and 
 as Liberty grew so grew art, wealth, power, knowledge 
 and refinement. In the history of every nation we may 
 read the same truth. It was the strength born of Magna 
 Charta that won Crecy and Agineourt. It was the revival 
 of Liberty from the despotism of the Tudors that glorified 
 the Elizabethan age. It was the spirit that brought a 
 crowned tyrant to the block that planted here the seed of 
 a mighty tree. It was the energy of ancient freedom that, 
 the moment it had gained unity, made Spain the might- 
 iest power of the world, only to fall to the lowest depth 
 of weakness when tyranny succeeded liberty. See, in 
 France, all intellectual vigour dying under the tyranny of 
 the seventeenth century to revive in splendour as Liberty 
 awoke in the eighteenth, and on the enfranchisement of 
 the French peasants in the great revolution, basing the 
 wonderful strength that has in our time laughed at dis- 
 aster. 
 
 What Liberty shall do for the nation that fully accepts 
 and loyally cherishes her, the wondrous inventions, which 
 are the marked features of this century, give us but a hint. 
 Just as the condition of the working classes is improved, 
 do we gain in productive power. Wherever labour is best 
 paid and has most leisure, comfort, and refinement, there 
 invention is most active and most generally utilised. 
 Short-sighted are they who think the reduction of working 
 hours would reduce the production of wealth. Human 
 muscles are one of the tiniest of forces ; but for the human 
 mind the resistless powers of nature work. To enfran- 
 chise labour, to give it leisure and comfort and indepen- 
 dence, is to substitute in production mind for muscle. 
 When this is fully done, the power that we now exert over 
 matter will be as nothing to that we shall have. 
 
180 THE AMEKICAN EEPUBLIO 
 
 It has been said that, from the very increase of our 
 numbers, the American Union must in time necessarily 
 break up. I do not believe it. Even now, while the 
 memories of a civil war are fresh, I do not think any part 
 of our people regret that this continent is not bisected by 
 an imaginary line, separating two jealous nations, two 
 great standing armies. If we respect the equal rights of 
 all, if we reduce the operation of our national Government 
 to the purposes for which it is alone fitted, the preserva- 
 tion of the common peace, the maintenance of the common 
 security and the promotion of the common convenience, 
 there can be no sectional interest adverse to unity, and 
 the blessings of the bond that makes us a nation must be- 
 come more apparent as years roll on. 
 
 So far from this Union necessarily falling to pieces from 
 its own weight, it may, if we but hold fast to justice, not 
 merely embrace a continent, but prove in the future capa- 
 ble of a wider extension than we have yet dreamed. 
 
 The crazy king, the brutal ministers, the rotten Parlia- 
 ment, the combination of tyranny, folly, corruption and 
 arrogance that sundered the Anglo-Saxon race, is gone, 
 but stronger and stronger grows the influence of the death- 
 less minds that make our common language classic. The 
 republic of Anglo-Saxon literature extends wherever the 
 tongue of Shakespeare is spoken. The great actors who 
 from time to time walk this stage, find their audiences 
 over half the globe ; it is to one people that our poets sing ; 
 it is one mind that responds to the thought of our think- 
 ers. The old bitternesses are passing away. With us the 
 hatreds, born of two wars, are beginning to soften and die 
 out, while Englishmen, who this year honour us in hon- 
 ouring the citizen whom we have twice deemed worthy of 
 our foremost place, are beginning to look upon our Kevo- 
 lution as the vindication of their own liberties. 
 
FOURTH OF JULY ORATION 181 
 
 A hundred years have passed since the fast friend of 
 American liberty — the great Earl Chatham — rose to make 
 his last appeal for the preservation, on the basis of justice, 
 of that English-speaking empire, in which he saw the 
 grandest possibility of the future. Is it too soon to hope 
 that the future may hold the realisation of his vision in a 
 nobler form than even he imagined, and that it may be 
 the mission of this Eepublic to imite all the nations of 
 English speech, whether they grow beneath the Northern 
 Star or Southern Cross, in a league which, by insuring 
 justice, promoting peace, and liberating commerce, will be 
 the forerunner of a world-wide federation that will make 
 war the possibility of a past age, and turn to works of use- 
 fulness the enormous forces now dedicated to destruction. 
 
 And she to whom on this day our hearts turn, our an- 
 cient ally, our generous friend — ^thank God we can say, our 
 sister Eepublic of France ! It was not alone the cold cal- 
 culations of kingcraft that when our need was direst, 
 helped us with money and supplies, with armies and fleets. 
 The grand idea of the equal rights of man was stirring in 
 France, her pulses were throbbing with the new life that 
 was soon to shake the thrones of Europe as with an earth- 
 quake, and French sympathy went out where Liberty made 
 her stand. "They are a generous people," wrote Franklin, 
 "they do not like to hear of advantages in return for their 
 aid. They desire the glory of helping us." France has 
 that glory, and more. Let her column Vendome fall, and 
 the memory of the butchers of mankind fade away; the 
 great things that France has done for freedom will make 
 her honoured of the nations, while, with increasing and 
 increasing meaning, rings through the ages the cry with 
 which she turned to the thunder-burst of Valmy: "Live 
 the people !" 
 
182 THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 
 
 t 
 Beset by difBeulties from which we are happily exempt 
 
 — on. the one side those who dream of bringing back the 
 middle ages, on the other the red spectre ; compelled, or in 
 fancy compelled, by the legacy of old hates to maintain 
 that nightmare of prosperity and deadly foe of freedom, a 
 large standing army — France has yet steadily made prog- 
 ress. Italy is one; the great Germanic race at last have 
 unity ; as out of a trance, life stirs in Spain ; Kussia moves 
 as she marches. May it not be France's to again show 
 Europe the way? 
 
 Fellow-citizens: If I have sought rather to appeal to 
 thought than to flatter vanity, it is not that I do not see 
 the greatness and feel the love of my country. Drawing 
 my first breath almost within the shadow of Independence 
 Hall, the cherished traditions of the Eepublic entwine 
 themselves with my earliest recollections, and her flag sym- 
 bolises to me all that I hold dear on earth. But for the 
 very love I bear her, for the very memories I cherish, I 
 would not dare come before you on this day and ignore the 
 dangers I see in her path. 
 
 If I have not dwelt on her material greatness or pic- 
 tured her future growth, it is because there rises before me 
 a hi^er ideal of what this Eepublic may be than can be 
 expressed in material symbols — an ideal so glorious that, 
 beside it, all that we now pride ourselves on seems mean 
 and pitiful. That ideal is not satisfied with a republic 
 where, with all the enormous gains in productive power, 
 labour is ground down to a bare living and must think the 
 chance to work a favour; it is not satisfied with a republic 
 where prisons are crowded and almshouses are built and 
 families are housed in tiers. It is not satisfied with a 
 republic where one tenant for a day can warn his co- 
 tenants off more of the surface of this rilling sphere 
 
FOUETH OP JULY OEATION 183 
 
 than lie is using or can use, or compel them to pay him 
 for the bounty of their common Creator; it is not satis- 
 fied with a republic where the fear of poverty on the one 
 hand and the sight of great wealth on the other makes 
 the lives of so many such a pitiful straining, keeps eyes 
 to the ground that might be turned to the stars, and sub- 
 stitutes the worship of the Golden Calf for that of the 
 Living God ! 
 
 It hopes for a republic where all shall have plenty, where 
 each may sit under his vine and fig tree, with none to vex 
 him or make him afraid; where with want shall gradually 
 disappear vice and crime; where men shall cease to spend 
 their lives in a struggle to live, or in heaping up things 
 they cannot take away; where talent shall be greater than 
 wealth and character greater than talent, and where each 
 may find free scope to develop body, mind and soul. 
 
 Is this the dream of dreamers? One brought to the 
 world the message that it might be reality. But they cru- 
 cified him between two thieves. 
 
 Not till it accepts that message can the world have 
 peace. Look over the history of the past. What is it but 
 a record of the woes inflicted by man on man, of wrong 
 producing wrong, and crime fresh crime? It must be so 
 till justice is acknowledged and liberty is law. 
 
 Some things have we done, but not all. In the words 
 with which an eminent Frenchman closes the history of 
 that great revolution that followed ours: "Liberty is not 
 yet here; but she will come!" 
 
 Fellow-citizens, let us follow the star that rose above 
 the cradle of the Eepublic ; let us try our laws by the test 
 of the Declaration. Let us show to the nations our faith 
 in Liberty, nor fear she will lead us astray. 
 
 Who is Liberty that we should doubt her; that we 
 
184 THE AMERICAN EEPUBLIC 
 
 should set bounds to her, and say, "Thus far shall thou 
 come and no further !" Is she not peace ? is she not pros- 
 perity? is she not progress? nay, is she not the goal to- 
 wards which all progress strives ? 
 
 Not here ; but yet she cometh ! Saints have seen her in 
 their visions; seers have seen her in their trance.. To 
 heroes has she spoken, and their hearts were strong; to 
 martyrs and the flames were cool ! 
 
 She is not here, but yet she cometh. Lo! her feet are 
 on the mountains — the call of her clarions ring on every 
 breeze; the banners of her dawning fret the sky! Who 
 will hear her as she calleth; who will bid her come and 
 welcome ? Who will turn to her ? who will speak for her ? 
 who will stand for her while she yet hath need ? 
 
THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
THE CEIMB OP POVEETY. 
 
 [An address delivered in the Opera House, Burlington, Iowa, April 1, 
 1885, under the auspices of Burlington Assembly, No. 3135, Knights of 
 Labour, which afterwards distributed fifty thousand copies in tract form.] 
 
 Ladles and Gentlemen: 
 
 IPEOPOSE to talk to you to-night of the Crime of 
 Poverty. I cannot, in a short time, hope to convince 
 you of much; but the thing of things I should like to 
 show you is that poverty is a crime. I do not mean that 
 it is a crime to be poor. Murder is a crime; but it is 
 not a crime to be murdered; and a man who is in pov- 
 erty, I look upon, not as a criminal in himself, so much 
 as the victim of a crime for which others, as well perhaps 
 as himself, are responsible. That poverty is a curse, the 
 bitterest of curses, we all know. Carlyle was right when 
 he said that the hell of which Englishmen are most afraid 
 is the hell of poverty; and this is true, not of Englishmen 
 alone, but of people all over the civilised world, no matter 
 what their nationality. It is to escape this hell that we 
 strive and strain and struggle; and work on oftentimes in 
 blind habit long after the necessity for work is gone. 
 
 The curse born of poverty is not confined to the poor 
 alone; it runs through all classes, even to the very rich. 
 They, too, sufEer; they must suffer; for there cannot be 
 suffering in a community from which any class can totally 
 escape. The vice, the crime, the ignorance, the meanness 
 
 187 
 
188 THE CEIME OF POVERTY 
 
 born of poverty, poison, so to speak, the very air which 
 rich and poor alike must breathe. 
 
 Poverty is the mother of ignorance, the breeder of crime. 
 I walked down one of your streets this morning, and I 
 saw three men going along with their hands chained to- 
 gether. I knew for certain that those men were not rich 
 men ; and, although I do not know the offence for which they 
 were carried in chains through your streets, this I think 
 I c^ safely say, that, if you trace it up you will find it in 
 some way to spring from poverty. Nine tenths of human 
 misery, I think you will find, if you look, to be due to 
 poverty. If a man chooses to be poor, he commits no 
 crime in being poor, provided his poverty hurts no one 
 but himself. If a man has others dependent upon him; 
 if there are a wife and children whom it is his duty to 
 support, then, if he voluntarily chooses poverty, it is a 
 crime — aye, and I think that, in most cases, the men who 
 have no one to support but themselves are men that are 
 shirking their duty. A woman comes into the world for 
 every man; and for every man who lives a single life, car- 
 ing only for himself, there is some woman who is deprived 
 of her natural supporter. But while a man who chooses 
 to be poor cannot be charged with crime, it is certainly a 
 crime to force poverty on others. And it seems to me 
 clear that the great majority of those who suffer from 
 poverty are poor not from their own particular faults, but 
 because of conditions imposed by society at large. There- 
 fore I hold that poverty is a crime — not an individual 
 crime, but a social crime, a crime for which we all, poor 
 as well as rich, are responsible. 
 
 Two or three weeks ago I went one Sunday evening to 
 the church of a famous Brooklyn preacher. Mr. Sankey 
 was singing and something like a revival was going on 
 there. The clergyman told some anecdotes connected with 
 
KNiaHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 189 
 
 the revival, and recounted some of the reasons why men 
 failed to become Christians. One case he mentioned 
 struck me. He said that he had noticed on the outskirts 
 of the congregation, night after night, a man who lis- 
 tened intently and who gradually moved forward. One 
 night, the clergj'man said, he went to him, saying: "My 
 brother, are you not ready to become a Christian?" The 
 man said, no, he was not. He said it, not in a defiant 
 tone, but in a sorrowful tone; the clergyman asked him 
 why, whether he did not believe in the truths he had been 
 hearing ? Yes, he believed them all. Why, then, wouldn't 
 he become a Christian? "Well," he said, "I can't join the 
 church without giving up my business ; and it is necessary 
 for the support of my wife and children. If I give that 
 up, I don't know how in the world I can get along. I had 
 a hard time before I found my present business, and I 
 cannot afford to give it up. Yet I can't become a Chris- 
 tian without giving it up." The clergyman asked, "are 
 you a rum-seller?" N"o, he was not a rum-seller. Well, 
 the clergyman said, he didn't know what in the world the 
 man could be; it seemed to him that a rum-seller was the 
 only man who does a business that woidd prevent his be- 
 coming a Christian; and he finally said: "What is your 
 business ?" The man said, "I sell soap." "Soap !" ex- 
 claimed the clergyman, "yo\i sell soap ? How in the world 
 does that prevent your becoming a Christian?" "Well," 
 the man said, "it is this way; the soap I sell is one of 
 these patent soaps that are extensively advertised as en- 
 abling you to clean clothes very quickly, as containing no 
 deleterious compound whatever. Every cake of the soap 
 that I sell is wrapped in a paper on which is printed a 
 statement that it contains no injurious chemicals, whereas 
 the truth of the matter is that it does, and that though it 
 will take the dirt out of clothes pretty quickly, it will, in a 
 
190 THE CRIME OP POVERTY 
 
 little vhikj rot them completely. I have to make my 
 living in this way; and I cannot feel that I can become 
 a Christian if I sell that soap." The minister went on, 
 describing how he laboured unsuccessfully with that man, 
 and finally wound up by saying : "He stuck to his soap and 
 lost his soul." 
 
 But, if that man lost his soul, was it his fault alone? 
 Whose fault is it that social conditions are such that men 
 have to make; that terrible choice between what conscience 
 tells them is right, and the necessity of earning a living? 
 I hold that it is the fault of society; that it is the faidt 
 of us all. Pestilence is a curse. The man who would 
 bring cholera to this country, or the man who, having the 
 power to prevent its coming here, would make no effort to 
 do so, would be guilty of a crime. Poverty is worse than 
 cholera; poverty kills more people than pestilence, even in 
 the best of times. Look at the death statistics of our 
 cities; see where the deaths come quickest; see where it 
 is that the little children die like flies — it is in the poorer 
 quarters. And the man who looks with careless eyes upon 
 the ravages of this pestilence, the man who does not set 
 himself to stay and eradicate it, he, I say, is guilty of a 
 crime. 
 
 If poverty is appointed by the power which is above us 
 all, then it is no crime; but if poverty is unnecessary, 
 then it is a crime for which society is responsible and for 
 which society must suffer. 
 
 I hold, and I think no one who looks at the facts can 
 faU to see, that poverty is utterly unnecessary. It is not 
 by the decree of the Almighty, but it is because of our 
 own injustice, our own selfishness, our own ignorance, that 
 this scourge, worse than any pestilence, ravages our civili- 
 sation, bringing want and suffering and degradation, de- 
 stroying souls as well as bodies. Look over the world, in 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUE SPEECH 191 
 
 this heyday of nineteenth century civilisation. In every 
 civilised country under the sun you will find men and 
 women whose condition is worse than that of the savage: 
 men and women and little children with whom the veriest 
 savage could not afford to exchange. Even in this new 
 city of yours with virgin soil around you, you have had 
 this winter to institute a relief society. Your roads have 
 been filled with tramps, fifteen, I am told, at one time 
 taking shelter in a round-house here. As here, so every- 
 where; and poverty is deepest where wealth most abounds. 
 
 What more unnatural than this? There is nothing in 
 nature like this poverty which to-day curses us. We see 
 rapine in nature; we see one species destroying another; 
 but as a general thing animals do not feed on their own 
 kind; and, wherever we see one kind enjoying plenty, all 
 creatures of that kind share it. No man, I think, ever 
 saw a herd of buffalo, of which a few were- fat and the 
 great majority lean. No man ever saw a flock of birds, 
 of which two or three were swimming in grease and the 
 others all skin and bone. Nor in savage life is there any- 
 thing like the poverty that festers in our civilisation. 
 
 In a rude state of society there are seasons of want, sea- 
 sons when people starve; but they are seasons when the 
 earth has refused to yield her increase, when the rain has 
 not fallen from the heavens, or when the land has been 
 swept by some foe — not when there is plenty. And yet 
 the peculiar characteristic of this modern poverty of ours 
 is that it is deepest where wealth most abounds. 
 
 Why, to-day, while over the civilised world there is so 
 much distress, so much want, what is the cry that goes up ? 
 What is the current explanation of the hard times? Over- 
 production ! There are so many clothes that men must go 
 ragged, so much coal that in the bitter winters people 
 have to shiver, such over-filled granaries that people acta- 
 
192 THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
 ally die by starvation! Want due to over-production! 
 Was a greater absurdity ever uttered? How can there be 
 over-production till all have enough? It is not over-pro- 
 duction; it is unjust distribution. 
 
 Poverty necessary ! Why, think of the enormous povrers 
 that are latent in the human brain ! Think how invention 
 enables us to do with the power of one man what not long 
 ago could not be done by the power of a thousand. Think 
 that in England alone the steam machinery in operation 
 is said to exert a productive force greater than the physical 
 force of the population of the world, were they all adults. - 
 And yet we have only begun to invent and discover. We 
 have not yet utilised all that has already been invented 
 and discovered. And look at the powers of the earth. 
 They have hardly been touched. In every direction as we 
 look new resources seem to open. Man's ability to pro- 
 duce wealth seems almost infinite — we can set no bounds 
 to it. Look at the power that is flowing by your city in 
 the current of the Mississippi that might be set at work 
 for you. So in every direction energy that we might 
 utUise goes to waste; resources that we might draw upon 
 are untouched. Yet men are delving and straining to 
 satisfy mere animal wants; women are working, working, 
 workinf their lives away, and too frequently turning in 
 despair from that hard struggle to cast away all that 
 makes the charm of woman. 
 
 If the animals can reason what must they think of us? 
 Look at one of those great ocean steamers ploughing her 
 way across the Atlantic, against wind, against wave, abso- 
 lutely setting at defiance the utmost power of the elements. 
 If the gulls that hover over her were thinking beings could 
 they imagine that the animal that could create such a 
 structure as that could actually want for enough to eat? 
 Yet, so it is. How many even of those of us who find life 
 
KOTGHTS OP LABOUE SPEECH 193 
 
 easiest are there who really live a rational life ? Think of 
 it, you who believe that there is only one life for man — 
 what a fool at the very best is a man to pass his life in 
 this struggle to merely live? And you who believe, as I 
 believe, that this is not the last of man, that this is a life 
 that opens but another life, think how nine tenths, aye, 
 I do not know but ninety-nine-hundredths of all our vital 
 powers are spent in a mere eSort to get a living; or to 
 heap together that which we cannot by any possibility take 
 away. Take the life of the average workingman. Is that 
 the life for which the human brain was intended and the 
 human heart was made? Look at the factories scattered 
 through our country. They are little better than peni- 
 tentiaries. 
 
 I read in the N'ew York papers a while ago that the girls 
 at the Yonkers factories had struck. The papers said 
 that the girls did not seem to know why they had struck, 
 and intimated that it must be just for the fun of strik- 
 ing. Then came out the girls' side of the story and it 
 appeared that they had struck against the rules in force. 
 They were fined if they spoke to one another, and they 
 were fined still more heavily if they laughed. There was 
 a heavy fine for being a minute late. I visited a lady in 
 Philadelphia who had been a forewoman in various fac- 
 tories, and I asked her, "Is it possible that such rules are 
 enforced?" She said it was so in Philadelphia. There is 
 a fine for speaking to your next neighbour, a fine for 
 laughing ; and she told me that the girls in one place where 
 she was employed were fined ten cents a minute for being 
 late, though many of them had to come for miles in winter 
 storms. She told me of one poor girl who really worked 
 hard one week and made $3.50; but the fines against her 
 were $5.25. That seems ridiculous; it is ridiculous, but 
 it is pathetic and it is shameful. 
 
194 THE CRIME OP POVEKTT 
 
 But take the eases of those even who are comparatively 
 independent and well off. Here is a man working hour 
 after hour, day after day, week after week, in doing one 
 thing over and over again, and for what? Just to live. 
 He is working ten hours a day in order that he may sleep 
 eight and may have two or three hours for himself when 
 he is tired out and all his faculties are exhausted. That 
 is not a reasonable life; that is not a life for a being 
 possessed of the powers that are in man, and I think every 
 man must have felt it for himself. I know that when I 
 first went to my trade I thought to myself that it was in- 
 credible that a man was created to work aU day long -just 
 to live. I used to read the "Scientific American," and as 
 invention after invention was heralded in that paper I 
 used to think to myself that when I became a man it would 
 not be necessary to work so hard. But on the contrary, 
 the struggle for existence has become more and more in- 
 tense. People who want to prove the contrary get up 
 masses of statistics to show that the condition of the work- 
 ing classes is improving. Improvement that you have to 
 take a statistical microscope to discover does not amount 
 to anything. But there is not improvement. 
 
 Improvement! Why, according to the last report of 
 the Michigan Bureau of Labour Statistics, as I read yester- 
 day in a Detroit paper, taking all the trades, including 
 some of the very high priced ones, where the wages are 
 from $6 to $7 a day, the average earnings amount to $1.77, 
 and, taking out waste time, to $1.40. Now, when you 
 consider how a man can live and bring up a family on 
 $1.40 a day, even in Michigan, I do not think you will 
 conclude that the condition of the working classes can 
 have very much improved. 
 
 Here is a broad general fact that is asserted by all who 
 have investigated the question, by such men as Hallam, 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 195 
 
 the historian, and Professor Thorold Rogers, who has made 
 a study of the history of prices as they were five centuries 
 ago. When all the productive arts were in the most primi- 
 tive state, when the most prolific of our modern vegetables 
 had not been introduced, when the breeds of cattle were 
 small and poor, when there were hardly any roads and 
 transportation was exceedingly difficult, when all manu- 
 facturing was done by hand — in that rude time the condi- 
 tion of the labourers of Bilgland was far better than it is 
 to-day. In those rude times no man need fear want save 
 when actual famine came, and owing to the difficulties of 
 transportation the plenty of one district could not relieve 
 the scarcitj- of another. Save in such times, no man need 
 fear want. Pauperism, such as exists in modern times, 
 was absolutely unknown. Everyone, save the physically 
 disabled, could make a living, and the poorest lived in 
 rude plenty. But perhaps the most astonishing fact 
 brought to light by this investigation is that at that time, 
 under those conditions in those "dark ages," as we call 
 them, the working day was only eight hours. While with 
 all our modern inventions and improvements, our working 
 classes have been agitating and struggling in vain to get 
 the working day reduced to eight hours. 
 
 Do these facts show improvement? Why, in the rudest 
 state of society in the most primitive state of the arts 
 the labour of the natural bread-winner will suffice to pro- 
 vide a living for himself and for those who are dependent 
 upon him. Amid all our inventions there are large bodies 
 of men who cannot do this. What is the most astonishing 
 thing in our civilisation ? Why, the most astonishing thing 
 to those Sioux chiefs who were recently brought from the 
 Far West and taken through our manufacturing cities in 
 the East, was not the marvelous inventions that enabled 
 machinery to act almost as if it had intellect ; it was not the 
 
196 THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
 growth of our cities; it was not the speed with which 
 the railway car whirled along; it was not the telegraph or 
 the telephone that most astonished them ; but the fact that 
 amid this marvelous development of productive power they 
 found little children at work. And astonishing that ought 
 to be to us ; a most astounding thing ! 
 
 Talk about improvement in the condition of the work- 
 ing classes, when the facts are that a larger and larger 
 proportion of women and children are forced to toil. Why, 
 I am told that, even here in your own city, there are chil- 
 dren of thirteen and fourteen working in factories. In 
 Detroit, according to the report of the Michigan Bureau of 
 Labour Statistics, one half of the children of school age 
 do not go to school. In New Jersey, the report made to 
 the legislature discloses an amount of misery and igno- 
 rance that is appalling. Children are growing up there, 
 compelled to monotonous toil when they ought to be at 
 play, children who do not know how to play ; children who 
 have been so long accustomed to work that they have be- 
 come used to it; children growing up in such ignorance 
 that they do not know what country New Jersey is in, 
 that they never heard of George Washington, that some 
 of them think Europe is in ISTew York. Such facts are 
 appalling; they mean that the very foundations of the 
 Eepublie are being sapped. The dangerous man is not the 
 man who tries to excite discontent; the dangerous man is 
 the man who says that all is as it ought to be. Such a 
 state of things cannot continue; such tendencies as we 
 see at work here cannot go on without bringing at last an 
 overwhelming crash. 
 
 I say that all this poverty and the ignorance that flows 
 from it is unnecessary; I say that there is no natural rea- 
 son why we should not all be rich, in the sense, not of 
 having more than each other, but in the sense of all hav- 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 197 
 
 ing enough to completely satisfy all physical wants; of aU 
 having enough to get such an easy living that we could 
 develop the hotter part of humanity. There is no reason 
 why wealth should not be so abundant, that no one should 
 think of such a thing as little children at work, or a 
 woman compelled to a toil that nature never intended her 
 to perform; wealth so abundant that there would be no 
 cause for that harassing fear that sometimes paralyses 
 even those who are not considered "the poor," the fear that 
 every man of us has probably felt, that if sickness should 
 smite him, or if he should be taken away, those whom he 
 loves better than his life would become charges upon char- 
 ity. "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow ; they 
 toil not, neither do they spin." I believe that in a really 
 Christian community, in a society that honoured not with 
 the lips but with the act, the doctrines of Jesus, no one 
 would have occasion to worry about physical needs any 
 more than do the lilies of the field. There is enough and 
 to spare. The trouble is that, in this mad struggle, we 
 trample in the mire what has been provided in sufficiency 
 for us all; trample it in the mire while we tear and rend 
 each other. 
 
 There is a cause for this poverty; and, if you trace it 
 down, you will find its root in a primary injustice. Look 
 over the world to-day — poverty everywhere. The cause 
 must be a common one. You cannot attribute it to the 
 tariff, or to the form of government, or to this thing or to 
 that in which nations differ; because, as deep poverty is 
 common to them all the cause that produces it must be a 
 common cause. What is that common cause? There is 
 one sufficient cause that is common to all nations; and 
 that is the appropriation as the property of some of that 
 natural element on which and from which all must live. 
 
 Take that fact I have spoken of, that appalling fact 
 
198 THE CRIME OP POVERTY 
 
 that, even now, it is harder to live than it was in the 
 ages dark and rude five centuries ago — how do you ex- 
 plain it? There is no difSculty in finding the cause. 
 Whoever reads the history of England, or the history of 
 any other civilised nation (but I speak of the history of 
 England because that is the history with which we are 
 best acquainted) wiU see the reason. For century after 
 century a parliament composed of aristocrats and em- 
 ployers passed laws endeavouring to reduce wages, but in 
 vain. Men could not be crowded down to wages that gave 
 a mere living because the bounty of nature was not wholly 
 shut up from them; because some remains of the recogni- 
 tion of the truth that all men have equal rights on the 
 earth still existed; because the land of that country, that 
 which was held in private possession, was only held on a 
 tenure derived from the nation, and for a rent payable 
 back to the nation. The church lands supported the ex- 
 penses of public worship, of the maintenance of seminaries 
 and the care of the poor; the crown lands defrayed the 
 expenses of the civil list; and from a third portion of the 
 lands, those held under the military tenures, the army 
 was provided for. There was no national debt in Eng- 
 land at that time. They carried on wars for hundreds of 
 years, but at the charge of the landowners. And more 
 important still, there remained everywhere, and you can 
 see in every old English town their traces to this day, the 
 common lands to which any of the neighbourhood was 
 free. It was as those lands were inclosed; it was as the 
 commons were gradually monopolised, as the ehu.rch lands 
 were made the prey of greedy courtiers, as the crown lands 
 were given away as absolute property to the favourites of 
 the king, as the military tenants shirked their rents and 
 laid the expenses they had agreed to defray, upon the na- 
 tion, in taxation that bore upon industry and upon thrift 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 199 
 
 — it was then that poverty began to deepen, and the tramp 
 appeared in England; just as to-day he is appearing in 
 our new States. 
 
 Now, think of it — is not land monopolisation a suffi- 
 cient reason for poverty? What is man? In the first 
 place, he is an animal, a land animal who cannot live with- 
 out land. All that man produces comes from land; aU 
 productive labour, in the final analysis, consists in work- 
 ing up land; or materials drawn from land, into such 
 forms as fit them for the satisfaction of human wants and 
 desires. Why, man's very body is drawn from the land. 
 Children of the soil, we come from the land, and to the 
 land we must return. Take away from man all that be- 
 longs to the land, and what have you but a disembodied 
 spirit? Therefore he who holds the land on which and 
 from which another man must live, is that man's master; 
 and the man is his slave. The man who holds the land 
 on which I must live can command me to life or to death 
 Just as absolutely as though I were his chattel. Talk 
 about abolishing slavery — we have not abolished slavery; 
 we have only abolished one rude form of it, chattel slavery. 
 There is a deeper and a more insidious form, a more 
 cursed form yet before us to abolish, in this industrial 
 slavery that makes a man a virtual slave, while taunting 
 him and mocking him with the name of freedom. Pov- 
 erty ! want ! they will sting as much as the lash. Slavery ! 
 God knows there are horrors enough in slavery; but there 
 are deeper horrors in our civilised society to-day. Bad as 
 chattel slavery was, it did not drive slave mothers to kill 
 their children, yet you may read in official reports that the 
 system of child insurance which has taken root so strongly 
 in England, and which is now spreading over our Eastern 
 States, has perceptibly and largely increased the rate of 
 child mortality ! — ^What does tljat mean ? 
 
200 THE CRIME OP POVERTY 
 
 Kobinson Crusoe, as you know, when he rescued Friday 
 from the cannibals, made him his slave. Friday had to 
 •serve Crusoe. But, supposing Crusoe had said, "0 man 
 and brother, I am very glad to see you, and I welcome 
 you to this island, and you shall be a free and independent 
 citizen, with just as much to say as I have — except that 
 this island is mine, and of course, as I can do as I please 
 with my own property, you must not use it save upon my 
 terms." Friday would have been just as much Crusoe's 
 slave as though he had called him one. Friday was not 
 a fish, he could not swim off through the sea; he was not 
 a bird, and could not fly off through the air ; if he lived at 
 all, he had to live on that island. And if that island was 
 Crusoe's, Crusoe was his master through life to death. 
 
 A friend of mine, who believes as I do upon this ques- 
 tion, was talking a while ago with another friend of mine 
 who is a greenbacker, but who had not paid much atten- 
 tion to the land question. Our greenback friend said, 
 "Yes, yes, the land question is an important question; oh, 
 I admit the land question is a very important question; 
 but then there are other important questions. There is 
 this question and that question, and the other question; 
 and there is the money question. The money question is a 
 very important question; it is a more important question 
 than the land question. You give me all the money, and 
 you can take all the land." My friend said, "Well, sup- 
 pose you had all the money in the world and I had all 
 the land in the world. What would you do if I were to 
 give you notice to quit?" 
 
 Do you know that I do not think that the average man 
 realises what land is? I know a little girl who has been 
 going to school for some time, studying geography, and 
 all that sort of thing ; and qne day she said to me : "Here 
 is something about the surface of the earth. I wonder 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 201 
 
 what the surface of the earth looks like ?" "Well," I said, 
 "look out into the yard there. That is the surface of the 
 earth." She said, "That the surface of the earth? Our 
 yard the surface of the earth? Why, I never thought of 
 it !" That is very much the case not only with grown men, 
 hut with such wise beings as newspaper editors. They 
 seem to think, when you talk of land, that you always refer 
 to farms; to think that the land question is a question 
 that relates entirely to farmers, as though land had no 
 other use than growing crops. N^ow, I should like to know 
 how a man could even edit a newspaper without having 
 the use of some land. He might swing himself by straps 
 and go up in a balloon, but he could not even then get 
 along without land. What supports the balloon in the 
 air ? Land ; the surface of the earth. Let the earth drop, 
 and what would become of the balloon ? The air that sup- 
 ports the balloon is supported in turn by land. So it is 
 with everything else men can do. Whether a man is work- 
 ing away three thousand feet under the surface of the 
 earth, or whether he is working up in the top of one of 
 those immense buildings that they have in New York; 
 whether he is ploughing the soil or sailing across the 
 ocean, he is still using land. 
 
 Land ! Why, in owning a piece of ground, what do you 
 own? The lavryers will tell you that you own from the 
 centre of the earth right up to heaven; and, so far as all 
 human purposes go, you do. In New York they are 
 building houses thirteen and fourteen stories high. What 
 are men, living in those upper stories, paying for ? There 
 is a friend of mine who has an office in one of them, and 
 he estimates that he pays by the cubic foot for air. Well, 
 the man who owns the surface of the land has the renting 
 of the air up there, and would have if the buildings were 
 carried up for miles. 
 
202 THE CBIMB OP POVERTY 
 
 This land question is the bottom question. Man is a 
 land animal. Suppose you want to build a house; can 
 you build it without a place to put it? What is it built 
 of? Stone, or mortar, or wood, or iron — ^they all come 
 from the earth. Think of any article of wealth you choose, 
 any of those things which men struggle for, where do 
 they come from? From the land. It is the bottom ques- 
 tion. The land question is simply the labour question; 
 and when some men own that element from which all 
 wealth must be drawn, and upon which all must live, 
 then they have the power of living without work, and, 
 therefore, those who do work get less of the products of 
 work. 
 
 Did you ever think of the utter absurdity and strange- 
 ness of the fact that, all over the civilised world, the work- 
 ing classes are the poor classes? Go into any city in the 
 world, and get into a cab and ask the man to drive you 
 where the working people live. He won't take you to 
 where the fine houses are. He wiU take you, on the con- 
 trary, into the squalid quarters, the poorer quarters. Did 
 you ever think how curious that is ? Think for a moment 
 how it would strike a rational being who had never been 
 on the earth before, if such an intelligence could come 
 down, and you were to explain to him how we live on 
 earth, how houses and food . and clothing, and all the 
 many things we need were all produced by work, would 
 he not think that the working people would be the people 
 who lived in the finest houses and had most of everything 
 that work produces? Yet, whether you took him to Lon- 
 don or Paris or l^ew York, or even to Burlington, he 
 would find that those called the working people were the 
 people who live in the poorest houses. 
 
 All this is strange — just think of it. We naturally de- 
 spise poverty; and it is reasonable that we should. I do 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 203 
 
 not say — I distinctly repudiate it — that the people who 
 are poor are poor always from their own fault, or even in 
 most cases; but it ought to be so. If any good man or 
 woman could create a world, it would be a sort of a world 
 in which no onr would be poor unless he was lazy or 
 vicious. But that is just precisely the kind of a world 
 this is; that is just precisely the kind of a world the Cre- 
 ator has made. Nature gives to labour, and to labour 
 alone; there must be human work before any article of 
 wealth can be produced ; and in the natural state of things 
 the man who toiled honestly and well would be the rich 
 man, and he who did not work would be poor. We have 
 so reversed the order of nature that we are accustomed 
 to think of the workingman as a poor man. 
 
 And if you trace it out I believe you wUl see that the 
 primary cause of this is that we compel those who work 
 to pay others for permission to do so. You may buy a 
 coat, a horse, a house; there you are paying the seller for 
 labour exerted, for something that he has produced, or 
 that he has got from the man who did produce it; but 
 when you pay a man for land, what are you paying him 
 for? You are paying for something that no man has 
 produced ; you pay him for something that was here before 
 man was, or for a value that was created, not by him indi- 
 vidually, but by the community of which you are a part. 
 What is the reason that the land here, where we stand to- 
 night, is worth more than it was twenty-five years ago? 
 What is the reason that land in the centre of New York, 
 that once could be boTight by the mile for a jug of whiskey, 
 is now worth so much that, though you were to cover it 
 with gold, you would not have its value ? Is it not because 
 of the increase of population? Take away that popula- 
 tion, and where would the value of the land be? Look at 
 it in any way you please. 
 
204 THE CRIME OP POVEETT 
 
 We talk about over-production. How can there be such 
 a thing as over-production while people want? All these 
 things that are said to be over-produced are desired by 
 many people. Why do they not get them ? They do not get 
 them because they have not the means to buy them; not 
 that they do not want them. Why have not they the means 
 to buy them? They earn too little. When the great 
 masses of men have to work for an average of $1.40 a day, 
 it is no wonder that great quantities of goods cannot 
 be sold. 
 
 Now why is it that men have to work for such low 
 wages? Because if they were to demand higher wages 
 there are plenty of unemployed men ready to step into 
 their places. It is this mass of unemployed men who 
 compel that fierce competition that drives wages down to 
 the point of bare subsistence. Why is it that there are 
 men who cannot get employment? Did you ever think 
 what a strange thing it is that men cannot find employ- 
 ment? Adam had no difficulty in finding employment; 
 neither had Kobinson Crusoe; the finding of employment 
 was the last thing that troubled them. 
 
 If men cannot find an employer, why cannot they em- 
 ploy themselves? Simply because they are shut out from 
 the element on which human labour can alone be exerted. 
 Men are compelled to compete with each other for the 
 wages of an employer, because they have been robbed of 
 the natural opportunities of employing themselves ; because 
 they cannot find a piece of God's world on which to work 
 without paying some other human creature for the privi- 
 lege. 
 
 I do not mean to say that even after you had set right 
 this fundamental injustice, there would not be many things 
 to do; but this I do mean to say, that our treatment of 
 land lies at the bottom of aU social questions. This I do 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUE SPEECH 205 
 
 mean to say, that, do what you please, reform as you may, 
 you never can get rid of wide-spread poverty so long as the 
 element on which and from which all men must live is 
 made the private property of some men. It is utterly im- 
 possible. Eeform government — ^get taxes down to the 
 minimum — build railroads; institute co-operative stores; 
 divide profits, if you choose, between employers and em- 
 ployed — and what will be the result? The result wiU be 
 that the land will increase in value — ^that will be the re- 
 sult — ^that and nothing else. Experience shows this. Do 
 not all improvements simply increase the value of land — 
 the price that some must pay others for the privilege of 
 living ? 
 
 Consider the matter, I say it with all reverence, and I 
 merely say it because I wish to impress a truth upon your 
 minds — it is utterly impossible, so long as His laws are 
 what they are, that God himself could relieve poverty — 
 utterly impossible. Think of it and you will see. Men 
 pray to the Almighty to relieve poverty. But poverty 
 comes not from God's laws — it is blasphemy of the worst 
 kind to say that; it comes from man's injustice to his 
 fellows. Supposing the Almighty were to hear the prayer, 
 how could He carry out the request so long as His laws 
 are what they are? Consider — the Almighty gives us 
 nothing of the things that constitute wealth; He merely 
 gives us the raw material, which must be utilised by man 
 to produce wealth. Does He not give us enough of that 
 now? How could He relieve poverty even if He were to 
 give us more? Supposing in answer to these prayers He 
 were to increase the power of the sun ; or the virtue of the 
 soil? Supposing He were to make plants more prolific, 
 or animals to produce after their kind more abundantly? 
 Who would get the benefit of it? Take a country where 
 land is completely monopolised, as it is in most of the 
 
206 THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
 civilised countries — who would get the benefit of it ? Sim- 
 ply the landowners. And even if God in answer to prayer 
 were to send down out of the heavens those things that men 
 require, who would get the benefit ? 
 
 In the Old Testament we are told that when the Israelites 
 journeyed through the desert, they were hungered, and 
 that God sent manna down out of the heavens. There 
 was enough for all of them, and they aU took it and were 
 relieved. But supposing that desert had been held as pri- 
 vate property, as the soil of Great Britain is held, as the 
 soil even of our new States is being held; suppose that 
 one of the Israelites had a square mile, and another one 
 had twenty square miles, and another one had a hundred 
 square miles, and the great majority of the Israelites did 
 not have enough to set the soles of their feet upon, which 
 they could call their own — ^what would become of the 
 manna? What good would it have done to the major- 
 ity? Not a whit. Though God had sent down manna 
 enough for all, that manna would have been the prop- 
 erty of the landholders; they would have employed some 
 of the others perhaps, to gather it up into heaps for them, 
 and would have sold it to their hungry brethren. Con- 
 sider it; this purchase and sale of manna might have gone 
 on until the majority of Israelites had given all they had, 
 even to the clothes off their backs. What then? Then 
 they would not have had anything left to buy manna with, 
 and the consequences would have been that while they 
 went hungry the manna would have lain in great heaps, 
 and the landowners would have been complaining of the 
 over-production of manna. There would have been a great 
 harvest of manna and hungry people, just precisely the 
 phenomenon that we see to-day. 
 
 I cannot go over all the points I would like to try, but 
 I wish to call your attention to the utter absurdity of pri- 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 207 
 
 vate property in land! Why, consider.it, the idea of a 
 man's selling the earth — the earth, our common mother. 
 A man selling that which no man produced — a man pass- 
 ing title from one generation to another. Why, it is the 
 most absurd thing in the world. Why, did you ever think 
 of it? ^Vhat right has a dead man to land? For whom 
 was this earth created ? It was created for the living, cer- 
 tainly, not for the dead. Well, now we treat it as though 
 it was created for the dead. Where do our land titles 
 come from ? They come from men who for the most part 
 are past and gone. Here in this new country you get a 
 little nearer the original source; but go to the Eastern 
 States and go back over the Atlantic. There you may 
 clearly see the power that comes from landownership. 
 
 As I say, the man that owns the land is the master of 
 those who must live on it. Here is a modern instance: 
 you who are familiar with the history of the Scottish 
 Church know that in the forties there was a disruption in 
 the church. You who have read Hugh Miller's work on 
 "The Cruise of the Betsey" know something about it ; how 
 a great body, led by Dr. Chalmers, came out from the 
 Established Church and said they would set up a Free 
 Church. In the Established Church were a great many 
 of the landowners. Some of them, like the Duke of Buc- 
 eleugh, owning miles and miles of land on which no com- 
 mon Scotsman had a right to put his foot, save by the 
 Duke of Buceleugh's permission. These landowners re- 
 fused not only to allow these Free Churchmen to have 
 ground upon which to erect a church, but they wotdd not 
 let them stand on their land and worship God. You who 
 have read "The Cruise of the Betsey" know that it is the 
 story of a clergyman who was obliged to make his home 
 in a boat on that wild sea because he was not allowed 
 to have land enough to live on. In many places the people 
 
208 THE CRIME OP POVEETY 
 
 had to take the sacrament with the tide coming to their 
 knees — many a man lost his life worshipping on the roads 
 in rain and snow. They were not permitted to go on 
 Mr. Landlord's land and worship God, and had to take 
 to the roads. The Duke of Bueeleugh stood out for seven 
 years compelling people to worship in the roads, until 
 finally relenting a little, he allowed them to worship God 
 in a gravel pit; whereupon they passed a resolution of 
 thanks to His Grace. 
 
 But that is not what I wanted to tell you. The thing 
 that struck me was this significant fact: As soon as the 
 disruption occurred, the Free Church, composed of a great 
 many able men, at once sent a delegation to the land- 
 lords to ask permission for Scotsmen to worship God in 
 Scotland and in their own way. This delegation set out 
 for London — ^they had to go to London, England, to get 
 permission for Scotsmen to worship God in Scotland, and 
 in their own native home! 
 
 But that is not the most absurd thing. In one place where 
 they were refused land upon which to stand and worship 
 God, the late landowner had died and his estate was in the 
 hands of the trustees, and the answer of the trustees was, 
 that so far as they were concerned they would exceedingly 
 like to allow them to have a place to put up a church to 
 worship God, but they could not conscientiously do it 
 because they knew that such a course would be very dis- 
 pleasing to the late Mr. Monaltie! Now this dead man 
 had gone to heaven, let us hope; at any rate he had gone 
 away from this world, but lest it might displease him men 
 yet living could not worship God. Is it possible for ab- 
 surdity to go any further ? 
 
 You may say that those Scotch people are very absurd 
 people, but they are not a whit more so than we are. I 
 read only a little while ago of some Long Island fisher- 
 
KNIGHTS OP LABOUR SPEECH 209 
 
 men who had been paying as rent for the privilege of fish- 
 ing there, a certain part of the catch. They paid it be- 
 cause they believed that James II., a dead man centuries 
 ago, a man vrho never put his foot in America, a king who 
 was kicked ofE the English throne, had said they had to 
 pay it, and they got up a committee, went to the county 
 town and searched the records. They could not find any- 
 thing in the records to show that James II. had ever or- 
 dered that they should give any of their fish to anybody, 
 and so they refused to pay any longer. But if they had 
 found that James II. had really said they should they 
 would have gone on paying. Can anything be more 
 absurd ? 
 
 There is a square in New York — Stuyvesant Square — 
 that is locked up at six o'clock every evening, even on the 
 long summer evenings. Why is it locked up? Why are 
 the children not allowed to play there? Why because old 
 Mr. Stuyvesant, dead and gone I don't know how many 
 years ago, so willed it. Now can anything be more 
 absurd ? ^ 
 
 Yet that is not any more absurd than our land titles. 
 From whom do they come? Dead man after dead man. 
 Suppose you get on the cars here going to Council Bluffs 
 or Chicago. You find a passenger with his baggage strewn 
 over the seats. You say : "Will you give me a seat, if you 
 please, sir?" He replies: "No; I bought this seat." 
 "Bought this seat? From whom did you buy it?" "I 
 bought it from the man who got out at the last station." 
 That is the way we manage this earth of ours. 
 
 Is it not a self-evident truth, as Thomas Jefferson said, 
 that "the land belongs in usufruct to the living," and 
 
 1 After a popular agitation, the park authorities since decided to leave 
 the gates open later than six o'clock. 
 
210 THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
 that they who have died have left it, and have no power to 
 say how it shall be disposed of? Title to land! Where 
 can a man get any title which makes the earth his prop- 
 erty? There is a sacred right to property — sacred be- 
 cause ordained by the laws of nature, that is to say, by 
 the laws of God, and necessary to social order and civili- 
 sation. That is the right of property in things pro- 
 duced by labour; it rests on the right of a man to him- 
 self. That which a man produces, that is his against all 
 the world, to give or to keep, to lend, to sell or to be- 
 queath; but how can he get such a right to land when 
 it was here before he came? Individual claims to land 
 rest only on appropriation. I read in a recent number 
 of the "Nineteenth Century," possibly some of you may 
 have read it, an article by an ex-prime minister of Aus- 
 tralia in which there was a little story that attracted my 
 attention. It was of a man named Galahard, who in the 
 early days got up to the top of a high hill in one of the 
 finest parts of western Australia. He got up there, looked 
 all around, and made this proclamation: "All the land 
 that is in my sight from the top of this hill I claim for 
 myself; and all the land that is out of sight I claim for 
 my son John." 
 
 That story is of universal application. Land titles 
 everywhere come from just such appropriations. Now, 
 under certain circumstances, appropriation can give a 
 right. You invite a company of gentlemen to dinner and 
 you say to them: "Be seated, gentlemen," and I get into 
 this chair. Well, that seat for the time being is mine by 
 the right of appropriation. It would be very ungentle- 
 manly, it would be very wrong for any one of the other 
 guests to come up and say : "Get out of that chair ; I want 
 to sit there !" But that right of possession, which is good 
 so far as the chair is concerned, for the time, does not 
 
KNIGHTS OP LABOUR SPEECH 211 
 
 give me a right to appropriate all there is on the table 
 before me. Grant that a man has a right to appropriate 
 such natural elements as he can use, has he any right to 
 appropriate more than he can use? Has a guest in such 
 a case as I have supposed a right to appropriate more 
 than he needs and make other people stand up? That is 
 what is done. 
 
 Why, look all .over this country — ^look at this town or 
 any other town. If men only took what they wanted to 
 use we should all have enough; but they take what they 
 do not want to use at all. Here are a lot of Englishmen 
 coming over here and getting titles to our land in vast 
 tracts; what do they want with our land? They do not 
 want it at all; it is not the land they want; they have 
 no use for American land. What they want is the income 
 that they know they can in a little while get from it. 
 Where does that income come from? It comes from 
 labour, from the labour of American citizens. What we 
 are selling to these people is our children, not land. 
 
 Poverty! Can there be any doubt of its cause? Go 
 into the old countries — go into western Ireland, into the 
 highlands of Scotland — these are purely primitive commu- 
 nities. There you will find people as poor as poor can 
 })e — ^living year after year on oatmeal or on potatoes, and 
 often going hungry. I could tell you many a pathetic 
 story. Speaking to a Scottish physician who was telling 
 me how this diet was inducing among these people a dis- 
 ease similar to that which from the same cause is ravag- 
 ing Italy (the Pellagra), I said to him: "There is plenty 
 of fish; why don't they catch fish? There is plenty of 
 game; I know the laws are against it, but Cannot they 
 take it on the sly?" "That," he said, "never enters their 
 heads. Why, if a man was even suspected of having a 
 taste for trout or grouse he would have to leave at once." 
 
212 THE CRIME OF POVERTY 
 
 There is no difficulty in discovering what makes those 
 people poor. They have no right to anything that nature 
 gives them. All they can make above a living they must 
 pay to the landlord. They not oiily have to pay for the 
 land that they use, but they have to pay for the seaweed 
 that comes ashore and for the turf they dig from the 
 bogs. They dare not improve, for any improvements they 
 make are made an excuse for putting up the rent. These 
 people who work hard live in hovels, and the landlords, 
 who do not work at all — oh ! they live in luxury in London 
 or Paris. If they have hunting boxes there, why they are 
 magnificent castles as compared with the hovels in which 
 the men live who do the work. Is there any question as 
 to the cause of poverty there? 
 
 IvTow go into the cities and what do you see ! Why, you 
 see even a lower depth of poverty; aye, if I would point 
 out the worst of the evils of land monopoly I would not 
 take you to Connemara; I would not take you to Skye or 
 Kintire — I would take you to Dublin or Glasgow or Lon- 
 don. There is something worse than physical deprivation, 
 something worse than starvation; and that is the degrada- 
 tion of the mind, the death of the soul. That is what you 
 will find in those cities. 
 
 Now, what is the cause of that? Why, it is plainly to 
 be seen; the people driven off the land in the country are 
 driven into the slums of the cities. For every man that 
 is driven off the land the demand for the produce of the 
 workmen of the cities is lessened; and the man himself 
 with his wife and children, is forced among those work- 
 men to compete upon any terms for a bare living and force 
 wages down. Get work he must or starve — get work he 
 must or do that which those people, so long as they main- 
 tain their manly feelings, dread more than death, go to 
 the alms-houses. That is the reason, here as in Great 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 213 
 
 Britain, that the cities are overcrowded. Open the land 
 that is locked up, that is held by dogs in the manger, who 
 will not use it themselves and will not allow anybody else 
 to use it, and you would see no more of tramps and hear 
 no more of over-production. 
 
 The utter absurdity of this thing of private property in 
 land ! I defy any one to show me any good from it, look 
 where you please. Go out in the new lands, where my 
 attention was first called to it, or go to the heart of the 
 capital of the world — London. Everywhere, when your 
 eyes are once opened, you will see its inequality and you 
 will see its absurdity. You do not have to go farther than 
 Burlington. You have here a most beautiful site for a 
 city, but the city itself as compared with what it might 
 be is a miserable, straggling town. A gentleman showed 
 me to-day a big hole alongside one of your streets. The 
 place has been filled up all around it and this hole is left. 
 It is neither pretty nor useful. Why does that hole stay 
 there? Well, it stays there because somebody claims it as 
 his private property. There is a man, this gentleman told 
 me, who wished to grade another lot and wanted some- 
 where to put the dirt he took off it, and he offered to buy 
 this hole so that he might fill it up. Now it would have 
 been a good thing for Burlington to have it filled up, a 
 good thing for you all — your town would look better, and 
 you yourself would be in no danger of tumbling into it 
 some dark night. Why, my friend pointed out to me 
 another similar hole in which water had collected and told 
 me that two children had been drowned there. And he 
 likewise told me that a drunken man some years ago had 
 fallen into such a hole and had brought suit against the 
 city which cost you taxpayers some $11,000. Clearly it 
 is to the interest of you all to have that particular hole I 
 am talking of filled up. The man who wanted to fill it 
 
214 THE CRIME OP POVERTY 
 
 up offered the hole owner $300. But the hole owner re- 
 fused the offer and declared that he would hold out until 
 he could get $1000; and in the metinwhile that unsightly 
 and dangerous hole must remain. This is but an illus- 
 tration of private property in land. 
 
 You may see the same thing all over this country. See 
 how injuriously in the agricultural districts this thing of 
 private property in land affects the roads and the distances 
 between the people. A man does not take what land he 
 wants, what he can use, but he takes all he can get, and 
 the consequence is that his next neighbour has to go fur- 
 ther along, people are separated from each other further 
 than they ought to be, to the increased diflSeulty of pro- 
 duction, to the loss of neighbourhood and companionship. 
 They have more roads to maintain than they can decently 
 maintain; they must do more work to get the same result, 
 and life is in every way harder and drearier. 
 
 When, you come to the cities it is just the other way. 
 In the country the people are too much scattered; in the 
 great cities they are too crowded. Go to a city like N"ew 
 York and there they are jammed together like sardines 
 in a box, living family upon family, one above the other. 
 It is an unnatural and unwholesome life. How can you 
 have anything like a home in a tenement room, or two or 
 three rooms? How can children be brought up healthily 
 with no place to play ? Two or three weeks ago I read of 
 a Few York judge who fined two little boys five dollars 
 for playing hop-scotch on the street — where else could 
 they play ? Private property in land had robbed them of 
 all place to play. Even a temperance man, who had in- 
 vestigated the subject, said that in his opinion the gin 
 palaces of London were a positive good in this, that they 
 enabled the people whose abodes were dark and squalid 
 rooms to see a little brightness and thus prevent them from 
 going wholly mad. 
 
KNIGHTS OF LABOUR SPEECH 215 
 
 What is the reason for this overcrowding of cities? 
 There is no natural reason. Take New York, one half its 
 area is not built upon. Why, then, must people crowd 
 together as they do there? Simply because of private 
 ownership of Idnd. There is plenty of room to build 
 houses and plenty of people who want to build houses, but 
 before anybody can build a house a blackmail price must 
 be paid to some dog in the manger. It costs in many 
 cases more to get vacant ground upon which to build a 
 house than it does to build the house. And then what 
 happens to the man who pays this blackmail and buUds a 
 house? Down comes the tax-gatherer and fines him for 
 building the house. 
 
 It is so all over the United States — the men who im- 
 prove, the men who turn the prairie into farms and the 
 desert into gardens, the men who beautify your cities, are 
 taxed and fined for having done these things. Now, noth- 
 ing is clearer than that the people of New York want 
 more houses; and I think that even here in Burlington 
 you could get along with more houses. Why, then, should 
 you fine a man who builds one ? Look all over this coun- 
 try — ^the bulk of the taxation rests upon the improver ; the 
 man who puts up a building, or establishes a factory, or 
 cultivates a farm, he is taxed for it; and not merely taxed 
 for it, but I think in nine cases out of ten the land which 
 he uses, the bare land, is taxed more than the adjoining 
 lot or the adjoining 160 acres that some speculator is 
 holding as a mere dog in the manger, not using it himself 
 and not allowing anybody else to use it. 
 
 I am talking too long; but let me in a few words point 
 out the way of getting rid of land monopoly, securing the 
 right of all to the elements which are necessary for life. 
 We could not divide the land. In a rude state of society, 
 as among the ancient Hebrews, giving each family its lot 
 
216 THE CRIME OP POVERTY 
 
 and making it inalienable we might secure something like 
 equality. But in a complex civilisation that ■will not suf- 
 fice. It is not, however, necessary to divide up the land. 
 All that is necessary is to divide up the income that comes 
 from the land. In that way we can secure absolute equal- 
 ity; nor could the adoption of this principle involve any 
 rude shock or violent change. It can be brought about 
 gradually and easily by abolishing taxes that now rest 
 upon capital, labour and improvements, and raising all our 
 public revenues by the taxation of land values; and the 
 longer you think of it the clearer you will see that in 
 every possible way will it be a benefit. 
 
 Now, supposing we should abolish all other taxes direct 
 and indirect, substituting for them a tax upon land values, 
 what would be the effect? In the first place it would be 
 to kiU speculative values. It would be to remove from 
 the newer parts of the country the bulk of the taxation 
 and put it on the richer parts. It would be to exempt 
 the pioneer from taxation and make the larger cities pay 
 more of it. It would be to relieve energy and enterprise, 
 capital and labour, from all those burdens that now bear 
 upon them. What a start that would give to production ! 
 In the second place we could, from the value of the land, 
 not merely pay all the present expenses of the government, 
 but we could do infinitely more. In the city of San 
 Francisco James Lick left a few blocks of ground to be 
 used for public purposes there, and the rent amounts to so 
 much, that out of it will be built the largest telescope in 
 the world, large public baths and other public buildings, 
 and various costly works. If, instead of these few blocks, 
 the whole value of the land upon which the city is built 
 had accrued to San Francisco what could she not do ? 
 
 So in this little town, where land values are very low 
 as compared with such cities as Chicago and San Fran- 
 
KNIGHTS OP LABOUR SPEECH 217 
 
 ciseo, you coiild do many things for mutual benefit and 
 public improvement did you appropriate to public pur- 
 poses the land values that now go to individuals. You 
 could have a great free library; you could have an art 
 gallery; you could get yourselves a public park, a mag- 
 nificent public park, too. You have here one of the finest 
 natural sites for a beautiful town I know of, and I have 
 travelled much. You might make on this site a city that 
 it would be a pleasure to live in. You will not as you 
 go now — oh, no ! Why, the very fact that you have a 
 magnificent view here will cause somebody to hold on all 
 the more tightly to the land that commands this view 
 and charge higher prices for it. The State of New York 
 wants to buy a strip of land so as to enable the people to 
 see Niagara, but what a price she must pay for it ! Look 
 at all the great cities; in Philadelphia, for instance, in 
 order to build their great city hall they had to block up 
 the only two wide streets they had in the city. Every- 
 where you go you may see how private property in land 
 prevents public as weU as private improvement. 
 
 But I have not time to enter into further details. I 
 can only ask you to think upon this thing, and the more 
 you will see its desirability. As an English friend of 
 mine puts it: "No taxes and a pension for everybody;" 
 and why should it not be? To take land values for pub- 
 lic purposes is not really to impose a tax, but to take for 
 public purposes a value created by the community. And 
 out of the fund which would thus accrue from the com- 
 mon property, we might, without degradation to anybody, 
 provide enough to actually secure from want all who were 
 deprived of their natural protectors or met with accident, 
 or any man who should grow so old that he could not work. 
 All prating that is heard from some quarters about its 
 hurting the common people to give them what they do not 
 
218 THE CEIME OF POVEETY 
 
 work for is humbug. The truth is, that anything that 
 injures self-respect, degrades, does harm; but if you give 
 it as a right, as something to which every citizen is en- 
 titled to, it does not degrade. Charity schools do degrade 
 children that are sent to them, but public schools do not. 
 But aU such benefits as these, while great, would be inci- 
 dental. The great thing would be that the reform I pro- 
 pose would tend to open opportunities to labour and enable 
 men to provide employment for themselves. That is the 
 great advantage. We should gain the enormous produc- 
 tive power that is going to waste all over the country, the 
 power of idle hands that would gladly be at work. And 
 that removed, then you would see wages begin to mount. 
 It is not that everyone would turn farmer, or everyone 
 would build himself a house if he had an opportunity for 
 doing so, but so many could and would, as to relieve the 
 pressure on the labour market and provide employment 
 for all others. And as wages mounted to the higher levels, 
 then you would see the productive power increased. The 
 country where wages are high is the country of greatest 
 productive powers. Where wages are highest, there wiU 
 invention be most active; there wiU labour be most intelli- 
 gent; there will be the greatest yield for the expenditure 
 of exertion. The more you think of it the more clearly 
 you will see that what I say is true. I cannot hope to 
 convince you in an hour or two, but I shall be content 
 if I shall put you upon inquiry. Think for yourselves; 
 ask yourselves whether this wide-spread fact of poverty is 
 not a crime, and a crime for which every one of us, man 
 and woman, who does not do what he or she can do to 
 call attention to it and do away with it, is responsible. 
 
LAND AND TAXATION: A CONVER 
 SATION BETWEEN DAVID DUDLEY 
 FIELD AND HENRY GEORGE 
 
LAND AND TAXATION: A CONVEESATION 
 
 BETWEEN DAVID DUDLEY FIELD 
 
 AND HENRY GEOEGE. 
 
 [Published in the "North American Review," July, 1885, and circu- 
 lated in tract form in the United States, Canada and Great Britain.] 
 
 Mr. David Dudley Field. Will you explain to me how 
 you expect to develop, in practice, your theory of the con- 
 fiscation of land to the use of the State ? 
 
 Mr. Henet Gbokge. By abolishing all other taxes and 
 concentrating taxation upon land values. 
 
 F. Then suppose A to be the proprietor of a thousand 
 acres of land on the Hudson, chiefly farming land, but at 
 the same time having on it houses, barns, cattle, horses, 
 carriages, furniture ; how is he to be dealt with under your 
 theory ? 
 
 G. He would be taxed upon the value of his land, and 
 not upon the value of his improvements and stock. 
 
 F. Whether the value of his land has been increased by 
 his cultivation or not ? 
 
 G. The value of land is not really increased by cultiva- 
 tion. The value that cultivation adds is a value of im- 
 provement, which I would exempt. I would tax the land 
 at its present value, excluding improvements; so that such 
 a proprietor would have no more taxes to pay than the 
 
 221 
 
222 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 proprietors of one thousand acres of land, equal in capa- 
 bilities, situation, etc., that remained in a state of nature. 
 
 P. But suppose the proprietor of such land to have let 
 it lie waste for many years while the farmer that I speak 
 of has devoted his time and money to increasing the value 
 of his thousand acres, would you tax them exactly alike? 
 
 Gr. Exactly. 
 
 F. Let us suppose B, an adjoining proprietor, has land 
 that has never yielded a blade of grass, or any other 
 product than weeds; and that A, a farmer, took his in 
 the same condition when he purchased, and by his own 
 thrift and expenditure has ^improved his land, so that now, 
 without buildings, furniture, or stock, it is worth five 
 times as much as B's thousand acres; B is taxed at the 
 rate of a dime an acre; would you tax A at the rate of a 
 dime an acre? 
 
 G. I would certainly tax him no more than B, for by 
 the additional value that A has created he has added that 
 much to the common stock of wealth, and he ought to 
 profit by it. The effect of our present system, which taxes 
 a man for values created by his labour and capital, is to 
 put a fine upon industry, and repress improvement. The 
 more houses, the more crops, the more buildings in the 
 country, the better for us all, and we are doing ourselves 
 an injury by imposing taxes upon the production of such 
 things. 
 
 F. How are you to ascertain the value of land considered 
 as waste land? 
 
 G. By its selling price. The value of land is more 
 easily and certainly ascertained than any other value. 
 Land lies out of doors, everybody can see it, and in every 
 neighbourhood a close idea of its value can be had. 
 
CONVEESATION WITH FIELD 223 
 
 F. Take the case of the owner of a thousand acres in 
 the Adirondack wilderness that have been denuded of 
 treeSj and an adjoining thousand acres that have a fine 
 growth of timber. How would you value them? 
 
 G. Natural timber is a part of the land; when it has 
 value it adds to the value of the land. 
 
 F. The land denuded of timber would then be taxed 
 less than land that has timber? 
 
 G. On general principles it would, where the value of 
 the land was therefore lessened. But where, as in the 
 Adirondacks, public policy forbids anything that would 
 hasten the cutting of timber, natural timber might be con- 
 sidered an improvement, like planted timber, which should 
 not add to taxable value. 
 
 F. Then suppose a man to have a thousand acres of 
 wild timber land, and to have cut off the timber, and 
 planted the land, and set up buildings, and generally im- 
 proved it, would you tax him less than the man that has 
 retained his land with the timber still on it? 
 
 G. I would tax the value of his land irrespective of the 
 improvements made by him, whether they consisted in 
 clearing, in ploughing, or in building. In other words, I 
 would tax that value which is created by the growth of 
 the community, not that created by individual effort. 
 Land has no value on account of improvements made upon 
 it, or on account of its natural capabilities. It is as 
 population increases, and society develops, that land values 
 appear, and they rise in proportion to the growth of popu- 
 lation and social development. For instance, the value of 
 the land upon which this building stands is now enor- 
 mously greater than it was years ago, not because of what 
 its owner has done, but because of the growth of New York. 
 
224 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 F. I am not speaking of New York City in particular; 
 I am speaking of land generally. 
 
 G. The same principle is generally true. Where a set- 
 tler takes up a quarter section on a western prairie, and 
 improves it, his land has no value so long as other land 
 of the same quality can be had for nothing. The value 
 he creates is merely the value of improvement. But when 
 population comes, then arises a value that attaches to the 
 land itself. That is the value I would tax. 
 
 F. Suppose the condition of the surrounding commu- 
 nity in the West remained the same ; two men go together 
 and purchase two pieces of land of a thousand acres each; 
 one leaves his with a valuable growth of timber, the other 
 cuts off the timber, cultivates the land, and' makes a well 
 ordered farm. Would you tax the man that has left the 
 timber upon his land more than you would tax the other 
 man, provided that the surrounding country remaiaed the 
 same? 
 
 G. I would tax them both upon the value of the land 
 at the time of taxation. At first, I take it, the clearing 
 of the land would be a valuable improvement. On this, 
 as on the value of his other improvements, I would not 
 have the settler taxed. Thus taxation upon the two would 
 be the same. In course of time the growth of population 
 might give value to the uncut timber, which, being in- 
 eluded in the value of land, would make the taxation upon 
 the man that had left his land in a state of nature heavier 
 than upon the man that had converted his land into a 
 farm. 
 
 F. A man that goes into the western country and takes 
 up land, paying the government price, and does nothing 
 to the land; how is he to be taxed? 
 
CONVERSATION WITH FIELD 225 
 
 G. As heavily as the man that has taken a like amount 
 of land and improved it. Our present system is unjust 
 and injurious in taxing the improver and letting the mere 
 proprietor go. Settlers take up land, clear it, build houses, 
 and cultivate crops, and for thus adding to the general 
 wealth are immediately punished by taxation upon their 
 improvements. This taxation is escaped by the man that 
 lets his land lie idle, and, in addition to that, he is gen- 
 erally taxed less upon the value of his land than are those 
 who have made their land valuable. All over the country, 
 land in use is taxed more heavily than unused land. This 
 is wrong. The man that holds land and neglects to im- 
 prove it keeps away somebody that would, and he ought 
 to pay as much for the opportunity he wastes as the man 
 that improves a like opportunity. 
 
 P. Then you would tax the farmer whose farm is worth 
 $1000 as heavily as you would tax the adjoining proprietor, 
 who, with the same quantity of land, has added improve- 
 ments worth $100,000 ; is that your idea ? 
 
 G. It is. The improvements made by the capitalist 
 would do no harm to the farmer, and would benefit the 
 whole community, and I would do nothing to discourage 
 them. 
 
 F. In whom would you have the title to land vested — in 
 the State, or in the individuals, as now? 
 
 G. I would leave the land titles as at present. 
 
 P. Your theory does not touch the title to land, nor the 
 mode of transferring the title, nor the enjoyment of it; 
 but it is a theory confined altogether to the taxing of it? 
 
 G. In form. Its effect, however, if carried as far as I 
 would like to carry it, would be to make the community 
 
226 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 the real owner of land, and the various nominal owners 
 virtually tenants, paying ground rent in, the shape of taxes. 
 
 F. Before we go to the method by which you would 
 effect that result, let me ask you this question: A, a large 
 landlord in New York, owns a hundred houses, each worth 
 say $25,000 (scattered in different parts of the city) ; at 
 what rate of valuation would you tax him? 
 
 G. On his houses, nothing. I would tax him on the 
 value of the lots. 
 
 F. As vacant lots? 
 
 G. As if each particular lot were vacant, surrounding 
 improvements remaining the same. 
 
 F. If you would have titles as now, then A, who owns a 
 ten thousand dollar house and lot in the city, would still 
 continue to be the owner, as he is at present ? 
 
 G. He would still continue to be the owner, but as taxes 
 were increased upon land values he would, while still con- 
 tinuing to enjoy the full ownership of the house, derive 
 less and less of the pecuniary benefits of the ownership of 
 the lot, which would go in larger and larger proportions 
 to the State, until, if the taxation of land values were 
 carried to the point of appropriating them entirely the 
 State would derive all those benefits, and, though nomi- 
 nally still the owner, he would become in reality a tenant 
 with assured possession, so long as he continued to pay 
 the tax, which might then become in form, as it would be 
 in essence, a ground rent. 
 
 F. Now, suppose A to be the owner of a city lot and 
 building, valued at $500,000; who woidd give a deed to 
 ittoB? 
 
 G. A would give the deed. 
 
CONVERSATION WITH FIELD 227 
 
 F. Then supposing A to own twenty lots, with twenty 
 buildings on them, the lots being, as vacant lots, worth 
 each $1000, and the buildings being worth $49,000 each; 
 and B to own twenty lots of the same value, as vacant lots, 
 without any buildings ; would you tax A and B alike ? 
 
 G. I would. 
 
 F. Suppose that B, to buy the twenty lots, had borrowed 
 the price and mortgaged them for it; would you have the 
 tax in that case apportioned? 
 
 G. I would hold the land for it. In cases in which it 
 became necessary to consider the relations of mc.tgagee 
 and mortgager, I would treat them as joint owners. 
 
 F. If A, the owner of a city lot with a house upon it, 
 should sell it to B, do you suppose that the price would be 
 graduated by the value of the improvements alone ? 
 
 G. When the tax upon the land had reached the point 
 of taking the full annual value, it would. 
 
 F. To illustrate: Suppose A has a city lot, which, as a 
 vacant lot, is worth annually $10,000, and there is a build- 
 ing upon it worth $100,000, and he sells them to B; you 
 think the price would be graduated according to the value 
 of the building; that is to say, $100,000, after the taxa- 
 tion had reached the annual value of $10,000? 
 
 G. Precisely. 
 
 F. To what purpose do you contemplate that the money 
 raised by your scheme of taxation should be applied? 
 
 G. To the ordinary expenses of government, and such 
 purposes as the supplying of water, of light, of power, the 
 running of railways, the maintenance of public parks, 
 libraries, colleges, and kindred institutions, and such other 
 beneficial objects as may from time to time suggest them- 
 
228 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 selves; to the care of the sick and needy, the support of 
 widows and orphans, and, I am inclined to think, to the 
 payment of a fixed sum to every citizen when he came to 
 a certain age. 
 
 F. Do you contemplate that money raised by taxation 
 should be expended for the support of the citizen? 
 
 G. I see no reason why it should not be. 
 
 P. Would you have him fed and clothed at the public 
 expense ? 
 
 G. Not necessarily; but I think a payment might well 
 be maa». to the citizen when he came to the age at which 
 active powers decline that would enable him to feed and 
 clothe himself for the remainder of his life. 
 
 P. Let us come to practical results. The rate of taxa- 
 tion now in the city of Few York, we will suppose, is 2.30 
 upon the assessed value. The assessed value is understood 
 to be about sixty per cent, of the real value of property. 
 Land assessed at $60,000 is really worth $100,000, and 
 being assessed at 3.30 when valued at $60,000, should be 
 assessed at about 1.40 on the real value; you would in- 
 crease that amount indefinitely, if I understand you, up 
 to the annual rental value of the land? 
 
 G. I would. 
 
 P. Which we wiU suppose to be five per cent. ; is that it ? 
 
 G. Let us suppose so. 
 
 P. Then your scheme contemplates the raising of five 
 per cent, on the true value of all real estate as vacant land, 
 to be used for the purposes you have mentioned. Have 
 you thought of the increase in the army of office-holders 
 that would be required for the collection and disburse- 
 ment of this enormous sum of money? 
 
CONTERSATION WITH FIELD 229 
 
 G. I have. 
 
 F. What do you say to that ? 
 
 G. That as to collection, it would greatly reduce the 
 present army of oifice-holders. A tax upon land values can 
 be levied and collected with a much smaller force than is 
 now required for our multiplicity of taxes; and I am in- 
 clined to think, that, directly and indirectly, the plan I 
 propose would permit the dismissal of three fifths of the 
 officials needed for the present purposes of government. 
 This simplification of government would do very much to 
 purify our politics; and I rely largely upon the improve- 
 ment that the change I contemplate would make in social 
 life, by lessening the intensity of the struggle for wealth, to 
 permit the growth of such habits of thought and conduct as 
 would enable us to get for the management of public af- 
 fairs as much intelligence and as strict integrity as can now 
 be obtained for the management of great private affairs. 
 
 F. Supposing it to be true that you would reduce the 
 expense of collection, would you not, for the disbursement 
 of these vast funds, require a much larger number of 
 efficient men than are now required? 
 
 G. Not necessarily. But, whether this be so or not, 
 the full scheme I propose can only be attained gradually. 
 Until, at least, the total amount needed for what are now 
 considered purely governmental purposes were obtained by 
 taxation on land values, there would be a large reduction 
 of office-holders, and no increase. 
 
 F. How do you propose to divide the taxation between 
 the State and the municipalities? 
 
 G. As taxes are now divided. As to questions that 
 might arise, there wiU be time enough to determine them 
 when the principle has been accepted. 
 
230 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 F. Tour theory contemplates the raising of nearly four 
 times as much revenue in the State of New York as is now 
 raised ; how many office-holders would it require to disburse 
 this enormous sum of money among the various objects 
 that you have mentioned? 
 
 G. My theory does not require that it should be dis- 
 bursed among the objects I have mentioned, but simply 
 that it should be used for public benefit. 
 
 F. Do you not think that the present rate of taxation is 
 more than sufficient for aU purposes of government? 
 
 G. Under the state of society that I believe would ensue, 
 it would be much more than sufficient for present purposes 
 of government. We should need far less for expenses of 
 revenue collection, police, penitentiaries, courts, alms- 
 houses, etc. 
 
 F. Then, to bring the matter down to a point, you pro- 
 pose for the present no change whatever in anything, ex- 
 cept that the amount now raised by all methods of taxation 
 should be imposed upon real estate considered as vacant? 
 
 G. For a beginning, yes. 
 
 F. Well, what do you contemplate as the ending of such 
 a scheme? 
 
 G. The taking of the full annual value of land for the 
 benefit of the whole people. I hold that land belongs 
 equally to all, that land values arise from the presence of 
 all, and should be shared among all. 
 
 F. And this result you propose to bring about by a tax 
 upon land values, leaving the title, the privilege of sale, 
 of rent, of testament, the same as at present? 
 
 G. Yes. 
 
CONVERSATION WITH FIELD 231 
 
 F. Your theory appears to be impracticable. I think 
 that the raising of such an enormous sum of money, plac- 
 ing it in the coffers of the State, to be disbursed by the 
 State in the manner you contemplate, would tend to the 
 corruption of the government beyond all former precedent. 
 The end you contemplate — of bettering the condition of 
 the people — is a worthy one. I believe that we — ^you and 
 I — who are well to do in the world, and others in our 
 condition, do neglect and have neglected our duty to those 
 in a less fortunate condition, and that it is our highest 
 duty to endeavour to relieve, so far as we can, the burdens 
 of those who are now suffering from poverty and want. 
 Therefore, far from deriding or scouting your theory, I 
 examine it with respect and attention, desirous of getting 
 from it whatever I can that may be good, while rejecting 
 what I conceive to be erroneous. Taken altogether, as 
 you have explained it, I do not see that it is a practicable 
 scheme. 
 
 G. But your objections to it as impracticable only arise 
 at the point, yet a long distance off, at which the revenues 
 raised from land values would be greater than those now 
 raised. Is there anything impracticable in substituting 
 for the present corrupt, demoralising, and repressive 
 methods of taxation a single tax upon land values? 
 
 F. I think it possible to concentrate all taxation upon 
 land, if that should be thought the best method. Many 
 economists are of opinion that taxes should be raised from 
 land alone, conceiving that rent is really paid by every 
 consumer, but they include in land everything placed upon 
 it out of which rent comes. 
 
 G. Then we could go together for a long while; and 
 when the point was reached at which we would differ, we 
 might be able to see that a purer government than any we 
 
232 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 have yet had might be possible. Certainly here is the gist 
 of the whole problem. If men are too selfish, too corrupt, 
 to co-operate for mutual benefit, there must always be 
 poverty and sufEering. 
 
 F. My theory of government is that its chief function 
 is to keep the peace between individuals and allow each 
 to develop his own nature for his own happiness. I would 
 never raise a dollar from the people except for necessary 
 purposes of government. I believe that the demoralisation 
 of our politics comes from the notion that public ofiBces are 
 spoils for partisans. A large class of men has grown up 
 among us whose living is obtained from the State — that is 
 to say, out of the people. We must get rid of those men, 
 and instead of creating offices we must lessen their number. 
 
 G. I agree with you as to government in its repressive 
 feature; and in no way could we so lessen the number of 
 ofBce-holders and take the temptation of private profit out 
 of public affairs as by raising all public revenues by the 
 tax upon land values, which, easily assessed and collected, 
 does not offer opportunities for evasion or add to prices. 
 Though in form a tax, this would be in reality a rent; 
 not a taking from the people, but a collecting of their 
 legitimate revenues. The first and most important func- 
 tion of government is to secure the full and equal liberty 
 of individuals; but the growing complexity of civilised 
 life and the growth of great corporations and combina- 
 tions, before which the individual is powerless, convince 
 me that government must undertake more than to keep 
 the peace between man and man — must carry on, when it 
 cannot regulate, businesses that involve monopoly, and in 
 larger and larger degree assume co-operative functions. 
 If I could see any other means of doing away with the 
 injustice involved in growing monopolies, of which the 
 
CONVEESATION WITH FIELD 233 
 
 railroad is a type, than by extension of governmental func- 
 tions, I should not favour that; for all my earlier thought 
 was in the direction you have indicated — the position occu- 
 pied by the democratic party of the last generation. But 
 I see none. Ilowever, if it vp^ere to appear that further 
 extension of the functions of government would involve 
 demoralisation, then the surplus revenue might be divided 
 per capita. But it seems to me that there must be in 
 human nature the possibility of a reasonably pure govern- 
 ment, when the ends of that government are felt by all to 
 be the promotion of the general good. 
 
 F. I do not believe in spoliation, and I conceive that 
 that woxdd be spoliation which would take from one man 
 his property and give it to another. The scheme of the 
 communists, as I understand it, appears to me to be not 
 only unsound, but destructive of society. I do not mean 
 to intimate that you are one of the communists; on the 
 contrary, I do not believe you are. 
 
 G. As to the sacredness of property, I thoroughly agree 
 with you. As you say in your recent article on industrial 
 co-operation in the "Forth American Eeview," "To take 
 from one against his will that which he owns and give it 
 to another, would be a violation of that instinct of justice 
 which God has implanted in the heart of every hxmian 
 being ; a violation, in short, of the supreme law of the Most 
 High"; and my objection to the present system is that it 
 does this. I hold that that which a man produces is right- 
 fully his, and his alone; that it should not be taken from 
 him for any purpose, even for public uses, so long as there 
 is any public property that might be employed for that 
 purpose; and therefore I would exempt from taxation 
 everything in the nature of capital, personal property, or 
 improvements — in short, that property which is the result 
 
234 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 of man's exertion. But I hold that land is not the right- 
 ful property of any individual. As you say again, "No 
 one can have private property in privilege," and if the 
 land belongs, as I hold it does belong, to all the people, the 
 holding of any part of it is a privilege for which the indi- 
 vidual holder should compensate the general owner accord- 
 ing to the pecuniary value of the privilege. To exact this 
 would not be to despoil any one of his rightful property, but 
 to put an end to spoliation that now goes on. Your article 
 in the "Eeview" shows that you see the same difficulties 
 I see, and would seek the same end — ^the amelioration of 
 the condition of labour, and the formation of society upon 
 a basis of justice. Does it not seem to you that some- 
 thing more is required than any such scheme of co-opera- 
 tion as that which you propose, which at best could be only 
 very limited in its application, and which is necessarily 
 artificial in its nature? 
 
 F. Undoubtedly. The hints that I have given in the 
 article to which you refer, would affect a certain number of 
 persons, not by any means the whole body politic. I con- 
 ceive that a great deal more is necessary. There should 
 be more sympathy, more mutual help. I think, as I have 
 said, that we are greatly wanting in our duty to all the 
 people around us, and I would do everything in my power 
 to aid them and their children. I do not think that we 
 have arrived at the true conception of our duty — of the 
 duty of every American citizen to all other American 
 citizens. 
 
 G. I think you are right in that; but does it not seem 
 as though it were out of the power of mere sympathy, mere 
 charity, to accomplish any real good? Is it not evident 
 that there is at the bottom of all social evils an injustice, 
 and until that injustice is replaced by justice, charity and 
 
CONVERSATION WITH FIELD 235 
 
 sympathy will do their best in vain? The fact that there 
 are among us strong, willing men unable to find work by 
 which to get an honest living for their families is a most 
 portentous one. It speaks to us of an injustice that, if 
 not remedied, must wreck society. It springs, I believe, 
 from the fact that, while we secure to the citizen equal 
 political rights, we do not secure to him that natural right 
 more important still, the equal right to the land on which 
 and from which he must live. To me it seems clear, as 
 our Declaration of Independence asserts, that all men are 
 endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, 
 and that the first of these rights — ^that which, in fact, in- 
 volves all the rest, that without which none of the others 
 can be exercised — is the equal right to land. Here are 
 children coming into life to-day in New York; are they 
 not endowed with the right to more than struggle along 
 as they best can in a country where they can neither eat, 
 sleep, work, nor lie down without buying the privilege 
 from some of certain human creatures like themselves, who 
 claim to own, as their private property, this part of the 
 physical universe, from the earth's centre to the zenith? 
 
 F. I was not speaking of charity, but of sympathy lead- 
 ing to help — ^helping one to help himself — that is the help 
 I mean, and not the charity that humbles him. 
 
 G. Then I cordially agree with you, and I look upon 
 such sympathy as the most powerful agency for social im- 
 provement. But sympathy is little better than mockery 
 until it is willing to do justice, and justice requires that 
 all men shall be placed upon an equality so far as natural 
 opportunities are concerned. 
 
 F. How would you secure that equality ? Take the case 
 of a child born to-day in a tenement house, in one of those 
 rooms that are said to be occupied by several families, and 
 
236 LAND ANB TAXATION 
 
 another child born at the same time in one of the most 
 comfortable homes in our city. The parents of the first 
 child are wasteful, intemperate, filthy: the parents of the 
 second are thrifty, temperate, cleanly; how would you 
 secure equality in opportunities of the first child with the 
 second ? 
 
 G. Equality in all opportunities could not be secured; 
 virtuous parents are always an advantage, vicious parents 
 a disadvantage ; but equality of natural opportunities could 
 be secured in the way I have proposed. And in a civili- 
 sation where the equal rights of all to the bounty of their 
 Creator were recognised, I do not believe there would be 
 any tenement houses, and very few, if any, parents such as 
 those of whom you speak. The vice and crime and degra- 
 dation that so fester in our great cities are the effects, 
 rather than the causes, of poverty. 
 
 F. The principle announced in the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence to which you have referred, is one of the cardinal 
 principles of the American government — ^the unalienable 
 right of all men to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of hap- 
 piness." That, however, does not mean that aU men are 
 equal in opportunities or in positions. A child bom to- 
 day is entitled to the labours of its parents, or rather to 
 the products of their labour, just as much as they are en- 
 titled to it until he is able to take care of himself. One of 
 the incentives to labour is to provide for the children of the 
 labourer. The aim of our American civilisation ought to 
 be to furnish, so far as can be done rightfully, to every 
 child born into the world, an equal opportunity with every 
 other child, to work out his own good. This, however, is 
 the theoretical proposition. It is impossible in practice 
 to give to every child the same opportunity; what we 
 should aim at is, to approximate to that state of things: 
 
CONVERSATION WITH FIELD 237 
 
 that is the work of the philanthropist and Christian. In 
 short, my belief is that the truest statement of political 
 ethics and political economy is to be found in the doc- 
 trines of the Christian religion. 
 
 G. In that I thoroughly agree with you. But Chris- 
 tianity that does not assert the natural rights of man, that 
 has no protest when the earth, which it declares was cre- 
 ated by the Almighty as a dwelling-place for all his chil- 
 dren, is made the exclusive property of some of them, 
 while others are denied their birthright — seems to me a 
 travesty. A Christian has something to do as a citizen 
 and lawmaker. We must rest our social adjustments upon 
 Christian principles if we would have a really Christian 
 society. But to return to the Declaration of Indepen- 
 dence; the equal right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
 happiness, does it not necessarily involve the equal right to 
 land, without which neither life, liberty, nor the freedom 
 to pursue happiness is possible? 
 
 P. You do not propose to give to every child a piece of 
 land ; you only propose to secure its right, if I understand 
 you, by taxing land as vacant land in the mode you 
 propose. 
 
 G. That is all, but it is enough. In the complex civili- 
 sation we have now attained it would be impossible to se- 
 cure equality by giving to each a separate piece of land, 
 or to maintain that equality, even if once secured; but by 
 treating all land as the property of the whole people, we 
 would make the whole people the landlords, and the indi- 
 vidual users the tenants of all, thus securing to each his 
 equal right. 
 
 P. In how long a time, if you were to have such legisla- 
 tion as you would wish, do you think we should arrive at 
 the condition that you have mentioned? 
 
238 LAND AND TAXATION 
 
 G. I think immediately a substantial equality would be 
 arrived at, such an equality as would do away with the 
 spectacle of a man unable to find work, and would secure 
 to all a good and easy living, with a mere modicum of the 
 hard labour and worriment now undergone by most of us. 
 The great benefit would not be in the appropriation to 
 public use of the unearned revenues now going to indi- 
 viduals, but in the opening of opportunities to labour, and 
 the stimulus that would be given to improvement and 
 production by the throwing open of unused land and the 
 removal of taxation that now weighs down productive 
 powers. And with the land made the property of the whole 
 people, all social progress would be a progress towards 
 equality. While other values tend to decline as civilisa- 
 tion progresses, the value of land steadily advances. Such 
 a great fact bespeaks some creative intent; and what that 
 intent may be, it seems to me we can see when we reflect 
 that if this value — a value created not by the individual, 
 but by the whole community — were appropriated to the 
 common benefit, the progress of society would constantly 
 tend to make less important the difference between the 
 strong and the weak, and thus, instead of those monstrous 
 extremes towards which civilisation is now hastening, 
 bring about conditions of greater and greater equality. 
 
 F. As a conclusion of the whole matter, if I understand 
 this explanation of your scheme, it is this, that the State 
 should tax the soil, and the soil only; that in doing so it 
 should consider the soil as it came from the hands of the 
 Creator, without anything that man has put upon it; that 
 aU other property — in short, everything that man has 
 made — is to be acquired, enjoyed, and transmitted as at 
 present; that the rate of annual taxation should equal the 
 rate of annual rental, and that^the proceeds of the tax 
 
CONVEESATION WITH FIELD 239 
 
 should be applied, not only to purposes of government, 
 but to any other purpose that the legislature from time 
 to time may think desirable, even to dividing them among 
 the people at so much a head. 
 
 Gr. That is substantially correct. 
 
 P. I am glad to hear your explanation, though I do not 
 agree with you, except as I have expressed myself. 
 
"THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
"THOTJ SHALT NOT STEAL." 
 
 [An address at the second public meeting of the Anti- Poverty Society, 
 in the Academy of Music, New York, Sunday evening. May 8, 1887.] 
 
 DE. McGLYFJSr in Chiekering HaU last Sunday night 
 said it was an historic occasion. He was right. That 
 a priest of Christ, standing on Sunday night on a public 
 platform and addressing a great audience — an audience 
 embracing men and women of all creeds and "beliefs — 
 should proclaim a crusade for the abolition of poverty, and 
 call on men to join together and work together to 
 bring the kingdom of God on earth, did mark a most im- 
 portant event. Great social transformations, said Maz- 
 zini, never have been and never will be other than the 
 application of great religious movements. The day on 
 which democracy shall elevate itself to the position of a 
 religious party, that day will its victory begin. And the 
 deep significance of the meeting last Sunday night, the 
 meaning of this Anti-Poverty Society that we have joined 
 together to inaugurate, is the bringing into the struggle 
 of democracy the religious sentiment, the sentiment alone 
 of aU sentiments powerful enough to regenerate the world. 
 The comments made on that meeting and on the insti- 
 tution of this society are suggestive. We are told, in the 
 first place by the newspapers, that you cannot abolish 
 poverty because there is not wealth enough to go around. 
 We are told that if all the wealth of the United States 
 
 243 
 
244 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 were divided up there would only be some eight hundred 
 dollars apiece. Well, if that is the case, all the more mon- 
 strous then is the injustice Which to-day gives single men 
 millions and tens of millions, and even hundreds of mil- 
 lions. If there really is so little, then the more injustice 
 in these great fortunes. But we do not propose to abolish 
 poverty by dividing up what wealth there is, so much as 
 by creating more wealth. We propose to abolish poverty 
 by setting at work that vast army of men, estimated last 
 year to amount in this country alone to one million, that 
 vast army of men only anxious to create wealth, but who 
 are now, by a system which permits dogs in the manger to 
 monopolise God's bounty, deprived of the opportunity to 
 toil. 
 
 Then again, they tell us, you cannot abolish poverty 
 because poverty always has existed. Well, if poverty al- 
 ways has existed, all the more need for our moving for its 
 abolition. It has existed long enough. We ought to be 
 tired of it; let us get rid of it. 
 
 But I deny that poverty — such poverty as we see on 
 earth to-day — always haS existed. Never before in the 
 history of the world was there such an abundance of 
 wealth, such power of producing wealth. So marked is 
 this that the very people who tell us that we cannot abol- 
 ish poverty, attribute it in almost the next breath to over- 
 production. They virtually tell us it is because mankind 
 produces so much wealth that so many are poor ; that it is 
 because there is so much of the things that satisfy human 
 desires already produced, that men cannot find work, and 
 that women must stint and strain. Poverty attributed to 
 over-production; poverty in the midst of wealth; poverty 
 in the midst of enlightenment; poverty when steam and 
 electricity and a thousand labour-saving inventions have 
 been called to the aid of man, never existed in the world 
 
ANTI-POVERTY ADDRESS 245 
 
 before. There is manifestly no good reason for its ex- 
 istence, and it is time that we should do something to 
 abolish it. 
 
 There are not charitable institutions enough to supply the 
 demands for charity; that seems incapable of being sup- 
 plied. But there are enough, at least, to show every thinking 
 woman and every thinking man that it is utterly impossible 
 to eradicate poverty by charity, to show everyone who will 
 trace to its root the cause of the disease that what is needed 
 is not charity, but justice — the conforming of human insti- 
 tutions to the eternal laws of right. But when we propose 
 this, when we say that poverty exists because of the viola- 
 tion of God's laws, we are taunted with pretending to 
 know more than men ought to know about the designs of 
 Omnipotence. They have set up for themselves a God who 
 rather likes poverty, since it affords the rich a chance to 
 show their goodness and benevolence; and they point to 
 the existence of poverty as a proof that God wills it. Our 
 reply is that poverty exists not because of God's will, but 
 because of man's disobedience. We say that we do know 
 that it is God's will that there should be no poverty on 
 earth, and that we know it as we may know any other 
 natural fact. The laws of this universe are the laws of 
 God, the social laws as well as the physical laws, and He, 
 the Creator of all, has given us room for all, work for all, 
 plenty for all. If to-day people are in places so crowded 
 that it seems as though there were too many people in the 
 world; if to-day thousands of men who would gladly be at 
 work do not find the opportunity to go to work; if to-day 
 the competition for employment crowds wages down to 
 starvation rates; if to-day, amid abounding wealth, there 
 are in the centres of our civilisation human beings who 
 are worse off than savages in any normal times, it is not 
 because the Creator has been niggardly; it is simply be- 
 
246 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 cause of our own injustice — simply because we have not 
 carried the idea of doing to others as we would have them 
 do unto us into the making of our statutes. 
 
 This Anti-Poverty Society has no patent remedy for 
 poverty. We propose no new thing. What we propose 
 is simply to do justice. The principle that we propose to 
 carry into our laws is neither more nor less than the prin- 
 ciple of the golden rule. We propose to abolish poverty 
 by the sovereign remedy of doing to others as we would 
 have others do to us; by giving to all their just rights. 
 And we propose to begin by assuring to every child of God 
 who, in our country, comes into this world, his full and 
 equal share of the common heritage. 
 
 Crowded! Is it any wonder that men are crowded to- 
 gether as they are in this city, when we see men taking 
 up far more land than they can by any possibility use, 
 and holding it for enormous prices? 'Why, what would 
 have happened if, when these doors were opened, the first 
 people who came iu had claimed all the seats around them, 
 and demanded a price of others who afterward came in by 
 the same equal right? Yet that is precisely the way we 
 are treating this continent. That is the reason why people 
 are huddled together in tenement houses; that is the rea- 
 son why work is difficult to get; the reason that there 
 seems, even in good times, a surplus of labour, and that 
 in those times that we call bad, the times of industrial de- 
 pression, there are all over the country thousands and hun- 
 dreds of thousands of men tramping from place to place, 
 unable to find employment. 
 
 Not work enough! Why, what is work? Productive 
 work is simply the application of human labour to land; 
 it is simply the transforming into shapes adapted to gratify 
 human desires, the raw material that the Creator has 
 placed here. Is there not opportunity enough for work in 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDRESS 247 
 
 this country? Supposing that, when thousands of men 
 are unemployed and there are hard times everywhere, we 
 could send a committee up to the high court of heaven to 
 represent the misery and the poverty of the people here, con- 
 sequent on their not being able to find employment. What 
 answer would we get? "Are your lands all in use? Are 
 your mines all worked out? Are there no natural oppor- 
 tunities for the employment of labour?" What could we 
 ask the Creator to furnish us with that is not already 
 here in abundance? He has given us the globe, amply 
 stocked with raw material for our needs. He has given 
 us the power of working up this raw material. If there 
 seems scarcity, if there is want, if there are men who can- 
 not find employment, if there are people starving in the 
 midst of plenty, is it not simply because what the Creator 
 intended for all has been made the property of the few? 
 In moving against this giant wrong, which denies to 
 labour access to the natural opportunities for the employ- 
 ment of labour, we move against the cause of poverty. We 
 propose to abolish it, to tear it up by the roots, to open 
 free and abundant employment for every man. We pro- 
 pose to disturb no just right of property. As Dr. McGlynn 
 said last Sunday night, we are defenders and upholders of 
 the sacred right of property — ^that right of property which 
 justly attaches to everything that is produced by labour; 
 that right which gives to everyone a just right of property 
 in what he has produced — that makes it his to give, to sell, 
 to bequeath, to do whatever he pleases with, so long as in 
 using it he does not injure anyone else. That right of 
 property we insist upon, that we would uphold against all 
 the world. To a house, a coat, a book — anything pro- 
 duced by labour — ^there is a clear individual title, which 
 goes back to the man who made it. That is the founda- 
 tion of the just, the sacred right of property. It rests 
 
248 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 on the right of the individual to the use of his own 
 powers, on his right to profit by the exertion of his own 
 labour; but who can carry the right of property in land 
 that far? Who can claim a title of absolute ownership 
 in land coming from the man who made it? And until 
 the man who claims the exclusive ownership of a piece of 
 this planet can show a title originating with the Maker 
 of this planet; until he can produce a decree from the 
 Creator declaring that this city lot or that great tract of 
 agricultural land, or that coal mine, or that gas-weU, was 
 made for him — ^until then we have a right to hold that 
 land was intended for all of us. 
 
 Ifatural religion and revealed religion alike tell us that 
 God is no respecter of persons; that He did not make this 
 planet for a few individuals; that He did not give it to 
 one generation in preference to other generations, but that 
 He made it for the use during their lives of all the people 
 that His providence brings into the world. If this be 
 true, the child that is born to-night in the humblest tene- 
 ment in the most squalid quarter of New York, comes into 
 life seized with as good a title to the land of this city as 
 any Astor or Ehinelander. 
 
 How do we know that the Almighty is against poverty? 
 That it is not in accordance with His decree that poverty 
 exists? We know it because we know this, that the Al- 
 mighty has declared, "Thou shalt not steal." And we 
 know for a truth that the poverty that exists to-day in 
 the midst of abounding wealth is the result of a system 
 that legalises theft. 
 
 The women who by the thousands are bending over their 
 needles or sewing-machines, thirteen, fourteen, sixteen 
 hours a day; these widows straining and striving to bring 
 up the little ones deprived of their natural bread-winner; 
 the children that are growing up in squalor and wretched- 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDRESS 249 
 
 ness, underclothed, underfed, undereducated even, in this 
 city without any place to play — growing up under condi- 
 tions in which only a miracle can keep them pure — ^under 
 conditions which condemn them in advance to the peni- 
 tentiary or the brothel — they suffer, they die, because we 
 permit them to be robbed, robbed of their birthright, 
 robbed by a system which disinherits the vast majority 
 of the children that come into the world. There is enough 
 and to spare for them. Had they the equal rights in the es- 
 tate which their Creator has given them, there would be 
 no young girls forced to unwomanly toil to eke out a mere 
 existence, no widows finding it such a bitter, bitter strug- 
 gle to put bread in the mouths of their little children; no 
 such misery and squalor as we may see here in the great- 
 est of American cities, misery and squalor that are deepest 
 in the largest and richest centres of our civilisation to-day. 
 
 These things are the results of legalised theft, the fruits 
 of a denial of that commandment that says, "Thou shalt 
 not steal." How is this great commandment interpreted 
 to-day, even by the men who pretend to preach the gos- 
 pel ? "Thou shalt not steal." Well, according to them, it 
 means: "Thou shalt not get into the penitentiary." Not 
 much more than that with any of them. You may steal, 
 provided you steal enough, and you do not get caught, and 
 you may have a front seat in the churches. Do not steal 
 a few dollars — that may be dangerous; but if you steal 
 millions and get away with it, you become one of our first 
 citizens. 
 
 "Thou shalt not steal"; that is the law of God. What 
 does it mean? Well, it does not merely mean that you 
 shall not pick pockets ! It does not merely mean that you 
 shall not commit burglary or highway robbery ! There are 
 other forms of stealing which it prohibits as well. It cer- 
 tainly means (if it has any meaning) that we shall not 
 
250 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 take that to which we are not entitled, to the detriment 
 of others. 
 
 'Now, here is a desert. Here is a caravan going along 
 over the desert. Here are a gang of robbers. They say, 
 "Look! There is a rich caravan; let us go and rob it, 
 kill the men if necessary, take their goods from them, their 
 camels and horses, and walk off." But one of the robbers 
 says, "Oh, no; that is dangerous; besides, that would be 
 stealing ! Let us, instead of doing that, go ahead to where 
 there is a spring, the only spring at which this caravan 
 can get water in this desert. Let us put a wall around 
 it and call it ours, and when they come up we won't let 
 them have any water until they have given us all the 
 goods they have." That would be more gentlemanly, more 
 polite and more respectable; but would it not be theft all 
 the same? 
 
 And is it not theft of the same kind when men go ahead 
 in advance of population and get land they have no use 
 whatever for, and then, as people come into the world and 
 population increases, will not let this increasing popula- 
 tion use the land until they pay an exorbitant price ? That 
 is the sort of theft on which our first families are founded. 
 Do that under the false code of morality which exists here 
 to-day and people will praise your forethought and your 
 enterprise, and will say you have made money because you 
 are a very superior man, and that anybody can make 
 money if he will only work and be industrious! But is 
 it not as clearly a violation of the command, "Thou shalt 
 not steal," as taking the money out of a man's pocket ? 
 
 "Thou shalt not steal." That means, of course, that 
 we ourselves must not steal. But does it not also mean 
 that we must not suffer anybody else to steal if we can 
 help it? "Thou shalt not steal." Does it not also mean, 
 "Thou shalt not suffer thyself or anybody else to be stolen 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDRESS 251 
 
 from ?" If it does, then we, all of us, rich and poor alike, 
 are responsible for this social crime that produces pov- 
 erty. Not merely the men who monopolise land — they 
 are not to blame above any one else, but we who permit 
 them to monopolise land are also parties to the theft. 
 The Christianity that ignores this social responsibility 
 has really forgotten the teachings of Christ. Where He 
 in the gospels speaks of the judgment, the question which 
 is put to men is never, "Did you praise me?" "Did you 
 pray to me?" "Did you believe this or did you believe 
 that?" It is only this: "What did you do to relieve dis- 
 tress ; to abolish poverty ?" To those who are condemned, 
 the judge is represehted as saying: "I was ahungered and 
 ye gave me not meat, I was athirst and ye gave me not 
 drink, I was sick and in prison and ye visited me not." 
 Then they say, "Lord, Lord, when did we fail to do these 
 things to you?" The answer is, "Inasmuch as ye failed 
 to do it to the least of these, so also did you fail to do it 
 unto me; depart into the place prepared for the devil and 
 his angels." On the other hand, what is said to the 
 blessed is, "I was ahungered and ye gave me meat, I was 
 thirsty and ye gave me drink, I was naked and ye clothed 
 me, I was sick and in prison and ye visited me." And 
 when they say, "Lord, Lord, when did we do these things 
 to thee ?" the answer is, "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto 
 the least of these ye have done it unto me." 
 
 Here is the essential spirit of Christianity. The essence 
 of its teaching is not, "Provide for your own body and 
 save your own soul !" but, "Do what you can to make this 
 a better world for all !" It was a protest against the doe- 
 trine of "each for himself and devil take the hindermost !" 
 It was the proclamation of a common fatherhood of God 
 and a common brotherhood of men. This was why the rich 
 and the powerful, the high priests and the rulers, persecuted 
 
252 "THOU SHAIiT NOT STEAL" 
 
 Christianity with fire and sword. It was not what in so 
 many of our churches to-day is called religion that pagan 
 Eome sought to tear out — it was what in too many of the 
 churches of to-day is called "socialism and communism," 
 the doctrine of the equality of human rights ! 
 
 Now imagine when we men and women of to-day go 
 before that awful bar that there we should behold the 
 spirits of those who in our time under this accursed social 
 system were driven into crime, of those who were starved 
 in body and mind, of those little children that in this city 
 of Few York are being sent out of the world by thousands 
 when they have scarcely entered it — because they did not 
 get food enough, nor air enough, nor light enough, because 
 they are crowded together in these tenement districts under 
 conditions in which all diseases rage and destroy. Sup- 
 posing we are confronted with those souls, what will it 
 avail us to say that we individually were not responsible 
 for their earthly conditions? What, in the spirit of the 
 parable of Matthew, would be the reply from the Judg- 
 ment seat? Would it not be, "I provided for them all. 
 The earth that I made was broad enough to give them 
 room. The materials that are placed in it were abundant 
 enough for all their needs. Did you or did you not lift 
 up your voice against the wrong that robbed them of their 
 fair share in what I provided for all?" 
 
 "Thou shalt not steal!" It is theft, it is robbery that 
 is producing poverty and disease and vice and crime among 
 us. It is by virtue of laws that we uphold; and he who 
 does not raise his voice against that crime, he is an ac- 
 cessory. The standard has now been raised, the cross of 
 the new crusade at last is lifted. Some of us, aye, many 
 of us, have sworn in our hearts that we will never rest so 
 long as we have life and strength until we expose and 
 abolish that wrong. We have declared war upon it. Those 
 
ANTI-POVERTY ADDRESS 253 
 
 who are not with us, let us count them against us. For 
 us there will be no faltering, no compromise, no turning 
 back until the end. 
 
 There is no need for poverty in this world, and in our 
 civilisation. There is a provision made by the laws of 
 the Creator which would secure to the helpless aU that they 
 require, which would give enough and more than enough 
 for all social purposes. These little children that are 
 dying in our crowded districts for want of room and fresh 
 air, they are the disinherited heirs of a great estate. 
 
 Did you ever consider the full meaning of the signifi- 
 cant fact that as progress goes on, as population increases 
 and civilisation develops, the one thing that ever increases 
 in value is land? Speculators all over the country appre- 
 ciate that. Wherever there is a chance for population com- 
 ing; wherever railroads meet or a great city seems des- 
 tined to grow; wherever some new evidence of the bounty 
 of the Creator is discovered, in a rich coal or iron mine, 
 or an oU well, or a gas deposit, there the speculator jumps 
 in, land rises in value and a great boom takes place, and 
 men find themselves enormously rich without ever having 
 done a single thing to produce wealth. 
 
 Now, it is by virtue of a natural law that land steadily 
 increases in value, that population adds to it, that inven- 
 tion adds to it; that the discovery of every fresh evidence 
 of the Creator's goodness in the stores that He has im- 
 planted in the earth for our use adds to the value of land, 
 not to the value of anything else. This natural fact is by 
 virtue of a natural law — a law that is as much a law of the 
 Creator as the law of gravitation. What is the intent of 
 this law? Is there not in it a provision for social needs? 
 That land values grow greater and greater as the com- " 
 munity grows and common needs increase, is there not a 
 manifest provision for social needs — a fund belongiag to 
 
254 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 society as a whole, with which we may take care of the 
 widow and the orphan and those who fall by the wayside — 
 with which we may provide for public education, meet 
 public expenses, and do all the things that an advancing 
 civilisation makes more and more necessary for society to 
 do on behalf of its members ? 
 
 To-day the value of the land in New York City is over 
 a hundred millions annually. Who has created that value ? 
 Is it because a few landowners are here that that land is 
 worth a hundred millions a year? Is it not because the 
 whole population of New York is here ? Is it not because 
 this great city is the centre of exchanges for a large por- 
 tion of the continent ? Does not every child that is born, 
 everyone that comes to settle in New York, does he not 
 add to the value of this land? Ought he not, therefore, 
 to get some portion of the benefit ? And is he not wronged 
 when, instead of being used for that purpose, certain fa- 
 voured individuals are allowed to appropriate it? 
 
 We might take this vast fund for common needs, we 
 might with it make a city here such as the world has never 
 seen before — a city spacious, clean, wholesome, beautiful 
 — a city that should be full of parks; a city without tene- 
 ment houses; a city that should own its own means of 
 communication, railways that should carry people thirty or 
 forty miles from the city hall in a half hour, and that 
 could be run free, just as are the elevators in our large 
 buildings ; a city with great museums, and public libraries, 
 and gymnasiums, and public halls, paid for out of this 
 common fund, and not from the donations of rich citizens. 
 We could out of this vast fund provide as a matter 
 of right for the widow and the orphan, and assure to 
 every citizen of this great city that if he happened to 
 die his wife and his children should not come to want, 
 should not be degraded with charity, but as a matter 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDEESS 255 
 
 of right, as citizens of a rich comnnmity, as coheirs 
 to a vast estate, should have enough to live on. And 
 we could do all this, not merely without imposing any 
 tax upon production; not merely without interfering 
 with the just rights of property, but while at the same time 
 securing far better than they are now the rights of prop- 
 erty and abolishing the taxes that now weigh on produc- 
 tion. We have but to throw off our taxes upon things of 
 human production; to cease to fine a man that puts up a 
 house or makes anything that adds to the wealth of the 
 community; to cease collecting taxes from people who 
 bring goods from abroad or make goods at home, and put 
 all our taxes upon the value of land — ^to collect that enor- 
 mous revenue due to the growth of the community for the 
 benefit of the community that produced it. 
 
 Dr. Nulty, Bishop of Meath, has said in a letter ad- 
 dressed to the clergy and laity of his diocese that it is this 
 provision of the Creator, the provision by which the value 
 of land increases as the community grows, that seems to 
 him the most beautiful of all the social adjustments; and 
 it is to me that which most clearly shows the beneficence 
 as well as the intelligence of the creative mind; for here 
 is a provision by virtue of which the advance of civilisa- 
 tion would, under the law of equal justice, be an advance 
 towards equality, instead, as it now is, an advance towards 
 a more and more monstrous inequality. The same good 
 Catholic bishop in the same letter says: "Now, therefore, 
 the land of every country is the common property of the 
 people of that country, because its real owner, the Cre- 
 ator, who made it, hath given it as a voluntary gift unto 
 them. 'The earth has He given to the children of men.' 
 And as every human being is a creature and a child of 
 God, and as all His creatures are equal in His sight, any 
 settlement of the land of this or any other country that 
 
256 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 would exclude the humblest from his equal share in the 
 common heritage is not only an injury and a wrong done 
 to that man, but an impious violation of the benevolent 
 intention of his Creator." And then Bishop Nulty goes 
 on to show that the way to secure equal rights to land is 
 not by cutting land up into equal pieces, but by taking for 
 public use the values attaching to land. That is the 
 method this society proposes. I wish we could get that 
 through the heads of the editors of this city. We do not 
 propose to divide up land. What we propose to do is to 
 divide up the rent that comes from land; and that is a 
 very easy thing. 
 
 We need not disturb anybody in possession, we need not 
 interfere with anybody's building or anybody's improve- 
 ment. We only need to remit taxes on all improvements, 
 on all forms of wealth, and put the tax on the value of the 
 land, exclusive of the improvements, so that the dog in 
 the manger who is holding a piece of vacant land will 
 have to pay the same for it as though there was a build- 
 ing upon it. In that way we would treat the whole land 
 of such a community as this as the common estate of the 
 whole people of the community. And as the Sailors' Snug 
 Harbour, for instance, out of the revenues of comparatively 
 a little piece of land in New York can maintain that fine 
 establishment on Staten Island, keeping in comfort a num- 
 ber of old seamen, so we might make a greater Snug Har- 
 bour of the whole of New York. 
 
 The people of New York could manage their estate Just 
 as well as any corporation, or any private family, for that 
 matter. But for the people of New York to resume their 
 estate and to treat it as their own, it is n6t necessary for 
 them to go to any bother of management. It is not neces- 
 sary for them to say to any landholder, this particular 
 piece of land is ours, and no longer yours. We can leave 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDRESS 257 
 
 land titles just as they are. We can leave the owners of 
 the land to call themselves its owners; all we want is the 
 annual value of the land. Not, mark you, that value 
 which the owner has created, that value which has heen 
 given to it by improvements, but simply that value which 
 is given to the bare land by the fact that we are all here 
 — that has attached to the land because of the growth of 
 this great community. And, when we take that, then all 
 inducement to monopolise the land will be gone; then 
 these very worthy gentlemen who are holding one half of 
 the area of this city idle and vacant will find the taxes upon 
 them so high that they either will have to go to work 
 and build houses or sell the land, or, if they cannot sell it, 
 give it away to somebody who will build houses. 
 
 And so all over the country. Go into Pennsylvania 
 and there you will see great stretches of land, containing 
 enormous deposits of the finest coal held by corporations 
 and individuals who are working but little part of it. On 
 these great estates the common American citizens, who 
 mine the coal, are not allowed even to rent a piece of land, 
 let alone buy it. They can only live in company houses; 
 and they are permitted to stay in them only on condition 
 (and they have to sign a paper to that effect) that they 
 can be evicted at any time on five days' notice. The com- 
 panies combine, and make coal artificially dear here and 
 make employment artificially scarce in Pennsylvania. 
 Now, why should not those miners, who work on it half 
 the time, why shouldn't they dig down in the earth and 
 get up coal for themselves ? Who made that coal ? There 
 is only one answer — God made that coal. Whom did he 
 make it for? Any child or any fool would say that God 
 made it for the people that would be one day called into 
 being on this earth. But the laws of Pennsylvania, like 
 the laws of New York, say God made it for this corpora- 
 
258 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 tion and "that individual; and thus a few men are per- 
 mitted to deprive miners of work and make coal artifi- 
 cially dear. 
 
 A few weeks ago, when I was travelling in Illinois, a 
 young feUow got in the car at one of the mining towns, 
 and I entered into conversation with him. He said he was 
 going to another place to try and get work. He told me 
 of the condition of the miners, that they could scarcely 
 make a living, getting very small wages and only working 
 about half the time. I said to him, "There is plenty of 
 coal in the ground; why don't you employ yourselves in 
 digging coal." He replied, "We did get up a co-operative 
 company, and we went to see the owner of the land to 
 ask what he would let us sink a shaft and get out some 
 coal for. He wanted $7500 a year. We could not raise 
 that much." Tax land up to its full value and how long 
 can such dogs-in-the-manger afEord to hold that coal land 
 away from these men? And when any man who wants 
 work can go and employ himself, then there will be no 
 million or no thousand unemployed men in aU the United 
 States. 
 
 The relation of employer and employed is a relation of 
 convenience. It is not one imposed by the natural order. 
 Men are brought into the world with the power to employ 
 themselves, and they can employ themselves wherever the 
 natural opportunities for emplojTnent are not shut up 
 from them. No man has a natural right to demand em- 
 ployment of another, but each man has a natural right, an 
 inalienable right, a right given by his Creator, to demand 
 opportimity to employ himself. And whenever that right 
 is acknowledged, whenever the men who want to go to 
 work can find natural opportunities to work upon, then 
 there wiU be as much competition among employers who 
 are anxious to get men to work for them as there will be 
 
ANTI-POVEETY ADDEESS 259 
 
 among men who are anxious to get work. Wages will rise 
 in every vocation to the true rate of wages, the full, honest 
 earnings of labour. That done, with this ever-increasing 
 social fund to draw upon, poverty will be abolished, and 
 in a little while will come to be looked upon as we are now 
 beginning to look upon slavery — as the relic of a darker 
 and more ignorant age. 
 
 I remember — this man here remembers (turning to Mr. 
 James Eedpath) even better than I, for he was one of the 
 men who brought the atrocities of human slavery home to 
 the heart and conscience of the North — I well remember, 
 as he well knows, and all the older men and women in 
 this audience will remember, how property in human flesh 
 and blood was defended just as private property in land 
 is now defended; how the same charges were hurled upon 
 the men who protested against human slavery as are now 
 made against the men who are intending to abolish indus- 
 trial slavery. We remember how the dignitaries of the 
 churches, and the opinion of the rich members of the 
 churches branded as a disturber, almost as a reviler of 
 religion, any priest or any minister who dared to get up 
 and assert God's truth — that there never was and there 
 never could be rightful property in human flesh and 
 blood. 
 
 So it is now said that men who protest against this sys- 
 tem, which is simply another form of slavery, are men who 
 propose robbery. Thus the commandment, "Thou shalt 
 not steal," they have made, "Thou shalt not object to 
 stealing." When we propose to resume our own again, 
 when we propose to secure its natural right to every child 
 that comes into being, such people talk of us advocating 
 confiscation — charge us with being deniers of the rights 
 of property. The real truth is that we wish to assert the 
 just rights of property, that we wish to prevent theft. 
 
260 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 Chattel slavery was incarnate theft of the worst kind. 
 That system, which made property of human heings, which 
 allowed one man to sell another, which allowed one man to 
 take away the proceeds of another's toil, which permitted 
 the tearing of the child from the mother, and which per- 
 mitted the so-called owner to hunt with blood-hounds the 
 man who escaped from his tyranny — ^that form of slavery 
 is abolished. 
 
 So far as that goes the command, "Thou shalt not 
 steal," has been vindicated. But there is another form 
 of slavery. 
 
 We are selling land now in large quantities to certain 
 English lords and capitalists who are coming over here 
 and buying greater estates than the greatest in Great 
 Britain or Ireland; we are selling them land, they are 
 buying land. Did it ever occur to you that they do not 
 want that land? They have no use whatever for Ameri- 
 can land; they do not propose to come over here and live 
 on it. They cannot carry it over there where they do 
 live. It is not the land that they want. What they want 
 is the income from it. They are buying it not that they 
 themselves want to use it, but because by-and-by, as popu- 
 lation increases, numbers of American citizens will want 
 to use it, and then they can say to these American citi- 
 zens, "You can use this land provided you pay us one half 
 of all you make upon it." What we are selling those 
 foreign lords and capitalists is not really land ; we are sell- 
 ing them the labour of American citizens; we are sell- 
 ing them the privilege of taking, without giving any return 
 for it, the proceeds of the toil of our children. 
 
 So here in New York you will read in the papers every 
 day that the price of land is going up. John Jones or 
 Eobert Brown has made a hundred thousand dollars within 
 a year in the increase in the value of land in New York. 
 
AHTI-POVEETY ADDRESS 261 
 
 What does that mean ? It means he has the power of get- 
 ting so many more coats, so many more cigars, so much 
 more wine, dry-goods, horses and carriages, houses or food. 
 He has gained the power of taking for his own so much 
 more of these products of human labour. But what has he 
 done? He has not done anything. He may have been 
 off in Europe or out West, or he may have been sitting 
 at home taking it easy. If he has done nothing to get 
 this increased income, where does it come from? The 
 things I speak of are all products of human labour — 
 some one has to work for them. When the man who 
 does no work can get them, necessarily the men who do 
 work to produce them must have less than they ought 
 to have. 
 
 This is the system that the Anti-Poverty Society has 
 banded together to war against, and it invites you to come 
 and swell its ranks. It is the noblest cause in which any 
 human being can possibly engage. What, after all, is 
 there in life as compared with a struggle like this? One 
 thing and only one thing is absolutely certain for every 
 man and woman in this hall, as it is to all else of human 
 kind — ^that is death. What will it profit us in a few years 
 how much we have left? Is not the noblest and the best 
 use we can make of life to do something to make better 
 and happier the condition of those who come after us — 
 by warring against injustice, by the enlightenment of pub- 
 lie opinion, by the doing all that we possibly can do to 
 break up the accursed system that degrades and embitters 
 the lot of so many? 
 
 We have a long fight and a hard fight before us. Pos- 
 sibly, probably, for many of us, we may never see it come 
 to success. But what of that? It is a privilege to be 
 engaged in such a struggle. This we inay know, that it 
 is but a part of that great, world-wide, long-continued 
 
262 "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL" 
 
 struggle in which the just and the good of every age have 
 been engaged; and that we, in taking part in it, are doing 
 something in our humble way to bring on earth the king- 
 dom of Grod, to make the conditions of life for those who 
 come afterward, those which we trust will prevail in 
 heaven. 
 
TO WORKINGMEN 
 
TO WOEKINGMEN. 
 
 [Article in "Belford's Magazine,'' New York, June, 1888, and repub- 
 lished in "The Standard," New York, June 16, 1888.] 
 
 I AM one of those who believe that it is possible for 
 ■workingmen to raise wages by an intelligent use of their 
 votes ; that this is the only way in which wages can be gen- 
 erally and permanently raised — the only way labour can 
 obtain that share of wealth which is Justly its due. And 
 I am one of those who believe that this is the supreme 
 object that workingmen should seek in politics. In seek- 
 ing to raise wages, to improve the conditions of labour, 
 we are seeking, not the good of a class, but the good of 
 the whole. The number of those who can live on the 
 labour of others is and can be but small as compared with 
 the number who must labour to live. And where labour 
 yields the largest results to the labourer, where the produc- 
 tion of wealth is greatest and its distribution most equi- 
 table, where the man who has nothing but his labour is 
 surest of making the most comfortable living and best 
 provide for those whom nature has made dependent upon 
 him, there, I believe, will be the best conditions of life for 
 all — there will the general standard of intelligence and 
 virtue be highest, and there will all that makes a nation 
 truly great and strong and glorious most abound. 
 
 Believing this, I am glad that the presidential campaign 
 this year is to turn, not upon sectional issues or matters 
 
 265 
 
266 TO WOEKINGMEN 
 
 of party or personal character, but upon a great question 
 of national policy — ^the question of protection or free 
 trade; and that this is to be discussed, as it is most impor- 
 tant that it should be discussed, in its relation to wages. 
 What is thus entering our politics is more than a question 
 of higher or lower duties, or no duties at all — it is the 
 most important of all questions, the great labour question. 
 And what is really involved in the decision that will be 
 asked of you as to whether protection bv free trade is best 
 for the interests of labour, is whether the emancipation of 
 labour is to be sought by imposing restrictions or by se- 
 curing freedom. Until the men who would raise wages 
 and emancipate labour settle that for themselves, they can- 
 not unite to carry out any large measure. 
 
 In the coming campaign the most frantic appeals will 
 be made to workingmen to vote for protecdon. You will 
 be told that "protection" means "protection to American 
 labour"; that that is what it was instituted for, and that 
 is why it is maintained; that it is protection that makes 
 this country so prosperous and your wages so high, and 
 that if it is abolished, or even interfered with, mills must 
 close, mines shut do^vn, and poor labour stand idle and 
 starve until American workmen are forced to work for the 
 lowest wages that are paid in Europe. 
 
 Don't accept what any one tells you — ^least of aU what 
 is told you by and on behalf of those who have an enor- 
 mous pecuniary interest in maintaining what is styled 
 "protection." Hear what they say, but make up your 
 minds for yourselves. There is nothing in the tariff ques- 
 tion that cannot readily be mastered by any one of ordi- 
 nary intelligence, and the great qiiestion whether what is 
 called "protection" • does or does not benefit the labourer 
 can be settled for himself by any one who will ask himself 
 what protection really is, and how it benefits labour. 
 
AGAINST PROTECTIONISM 267 
 
 Kow what is "protection"? It is a system of taxes 
 levied on imports for the purpose of increasing the price 
 of certain commodities in our own country so that the 
 home producers of such commodities can get higher prices 
 for what they sell to their own fellow-countrymen. 
 
 This is aU there is to "protection." Protection can't 
 enable any American producer to get higher prices for 
 what he sells to people of other countries, and no duty 
 is protective unless it so increases prices as to enable some- 
 one to get more from his fellow-citizens than he could 
 without protection. How "protection" may thus benefit 
 some people is perfectly clear. But how can it benefit the 
 whole people? That it may increase the profits of the 
 manufacturer, or the income of the owner of timber or 
 mineral land, is plain. But how can it increase wages? 
 "Protection" raises the price of commodities. That may 
 be to the advantage of those who buy labour and seU com- 
 modities. But how can it be to the advantage of those 
 who sell labour and buy commodities? 
 
 I^Tever mind the confused and confusing claims that are 
 put forth for protection until you can see how it can do 
 what is claimed for it. 
 
 Ask yourselves what protection is and how it operates, 
 and you will see that the only way it can benefit any one, or 
 by "encouraging" him give him power to encourage or 
 benefit any one else, is by enabling him to get from his 
 fellow-citizens more than he could otherwise get. This is 
 the essence of protection; and if it has any stimulating or 
 beneficial effect it must be through this. The protective 
 effect of any protective duty is precisely that of a subsidy 
 paid by the government to some people out of taxes levied 
 on the whole people. The only difference is, that in what 
 is called the subsidy system the government tax-gatherers 
 would collect the tax from the whole people and pay it over 
 
268 TO WOEKINGMEN 
 
 to some people, while in what is called the protective sys- 
 tem the govenunent tax-gatherers collect a tax on foreign 
 goods so as to "protect" the favoured people, while they 
 for themselves collect taxes on their fellow-citizens in in- 
 creased prices. 
 
 Now if workmen get any benefit from what is thus 
 called protection, it can only be through the protected em- 
 ployers and by their favour. The protective system gives 
 nothing whatever to labour. It gives only to the employ- 
 ers of labour, and only to some of them. And these some 
 are necessarily comparatively few. It is utterly impos- 
 sible that any protective tariff can "protect" the largest 
 industries of any country, for a duty can only have a pro- 
 tective effect when levied upon goods some of which are 
 produced in the country and some of which are imported 
 or would be imported if it were not for the duty. Import 
 duties cannot be levied upon things of which we produce 
 enough for ourselves and consequently do not import, or 
 of which we produce more than enough for ourselves and 
 consequently export; and if levied upon things we do not 
 produce and must import or go without, they can have no 
 protective effect. In every country, therefore, the pro- 
 tected industries can only be those in which but a small 
 part of the labour of that country is employed. In this 
 country, out of over seventeen millions of labourers of 
 one sort or another, those employed in the protected indus- 
 tries do not amount to more than 900,000, and these in- 
 dustries, it is to be observed, are those in which large 
 capital is required and in which it is impossible for the 
 mere labourer to employ himself. 
 
 Now, would it be possible by levying a general tax (espe- 
 cially a tax which, like all protective taxes, bears on the 
 poor far more heavily than on the rich, on the labourer 
 far more heavily than on the capitalist), and paying out 
 
AGAINST PROTECTIONISM 269 
 
 the proceeds directly to the labourers engaged in certain 
 industries, to raise wages, or even to raise wages in those 
 industries ? Everyone who thinks a moment will say no ! 
 If we were to levy such a tax and pay out the proceeds 
 directly to glass workers or iron-ore miners or the hands 
 in cotton or woollen factories, in addition to what they 
 get from their employers, the consequence would simply be 
 that labour would be attracted from the unsubsidised to 
 the subsidised employments, and wages would go down to 
 a point that would give the subsidised labourers no more 
 than they got without the subsidy ! 
 
 But if such a plan of raising wages is utterly hopeless, 
 what should we say of a plan to raise wages by levying a 
 tax upon aU labourers and giving the proceeds, not to all 
 labourers, or even to some labourers, but only to some em- 
 ployers? This is the plan of protection. If protection 
 can increase or maintain wages, it must be in this way. 
 What protective duties actually do is to increase the profits 
 of certain employers — ^to allow them to collect a tax from 
 their fellow-citizens without any stipulation as to how they 
 shall spend it. To suppose that wages can be increased 
 in this way is to suppose, in the first place, that these pro- 
 tected employers voluntarily give up their increased profits 
 to their workmen, and to suppose, in the second place, that 
 the increase of wages which the benevolence of the pro- 
 tected employers thus causes in industries which at the 
 best employ not more than 1,500,000 people can raise 
 wages in occupations that employ 30,000,000 people ! 
 
 Observe also that the first step in this precious scheme 
 of plunder which is called protection to American labour 
 is really to reduce wages. Wages do not really consist of 
 money. Money is the mere fiux and counter of exchanges. 
 What the man who works for wages really works for are 
 commodities and services for which he pays with the money 
 
270 TO WOERINaMEN 
 
 he receives in wages. Necessarily, therefore, to increase 
 the price of the commodities he buys with his money- 
 wages is to decrease his real wages. For instance, a good 
 many of the highly protected American labourers in the 
 state of Pennsylvania (as in some other States) are com- 
 pelled by their benevolent protectionist employers to make 
 their purchases in what the highly protected American 
 labourers call "pluck-me stores." In fact, it is through 
 these pluck-me stores that these highly protected Ameri- 
 can workingmen get their wages, as the pluck-me bill is 
 deducted before any money is turned over to them on pay 
 days; and many of them being kept constantly in debt, 
 hardly see a dollar from one year's end to another. N'ow, 
 it is evident that if one of these employers adds a dollar 
 to the prices his men have to pay for the goods they must 
 buy in his "pluck-me," he just as effectually cuts down their 
 real earnings as though he reduced their wages by a dollar. 
 And so it is evident that the protective taxes which we 
 impose for the purpose of increasing the prices of com- 
 modities must in the same way operate to reduce the real 
 wages of labour. Therefore the protective scheme for 
 raising wages fully stated is simply this : Wages generally 
 are in the first place reduced by taxes which _ increase the 
 price of certain commodities, in order (1) that a com- 
 paratively few employers who profit by this increase in 
 the price of what they have to sell may voluntarily increase 
 the wages of their employees, and (3) that this benevolent 
 raising of wages in some occupations may cause the rais- 
 ing of wages in all occupations ! 
 
 Is it not time that American workingmen were done 
 with such a preposterous scheme as this? There is one 
 sense, and one sense alone, in which protection may raise 
 wages. When real wages are low enough, it .may to some 
 extent raise nominal wages. If the protected Pennsyl- 
 
AGAINST PROTECTIONISM 271 
 
 vania employer were to keep on raising the prices in his 
 workmen's "protected home market," the pluek-me store, 
 he would come to a point where their nominal wages would 
 not enable them to get enough food and clothing to sup- 
 port life, and where, consequently, he would be forced to 
 increase their nominal wages in order to prevent their re- 
 moval or starvation. In this way protection, like a depre- 
 ciation of currency, may sometimes increase nominal 
 wages. But it can never increase real wages. Whomso- 
 ever protection may benefit — and analysis will show that 
 it cannot even benefit the employing capitalists whom it 
 assumes to benefit, unless they are also protected from 
 home competition by some sort of a monopoly — ^it cannot 
 benefit the labourer. It is to the labourer a delusion and 
 a fraud — a scheme of barefaced plunder that adds insult 
 to injury; that first robs him, and then tells him to get 
 down on his knees and thank his robber ! 
 
 The impudent pretence that what is called protection is 
 protection to labour is peculiar to the United States, and is 
 an afterthought here. When this utterly un-American 
 system of robbing the many for the benefit of the few was 
 introduced into this country, it was not pretended that it 
 was to protect labour or to compensate for high wages. It 
 was asked for the protection of capital — to give capitalists 
 a bonus — so that here, where interest was high, they could 
 engage in the same sort of manufacturing businesses as in 
 Europe, where interest was low. It was asked for the 
 "protection of infant industries" — ^to give them artificial 
 support for a few years, when, it was then claimed, they 
 could stand alone without any more protection. 
 
 But men who once secure the enactment of laws to 
 enable them to take the earnings of others never want an 
 excuse for demanding the continuance of the privilege. 
 Now that United States three per cent, bonds are at a 
 
272 TO WORKINGMEN 
 
 premium, it would be preposterous to talk of protecting 
 American capital against the cheaper capital of Europe, 
 and now that the great protected industries have become 
 very industrial giants, it would be only ridiculous to talk 
 of protecting "infant industiries." So we are now told 
 that protection is "protection for labour," and is made 
 necessary by our higher wages. In fact, we are now told 
 that it is because of protection that wages are so high and 
 the country so prosperous. 
 
 The pretence is as hollow and insulting as the pretence 
 of the slave-owners that slavery was for the protection of 
 the slave. Special privilege needs protection, and monop- 
 oly needs protection, and all legalised systems of robbery 
 that enable men who do no labour to grow rich by appro- 
 priating the earnings of those who do labour, need pro- 
 tection. But what is labour, that it should need protec- 
 tion ? What is labour, that votes should have to be bought 
 and coerced, and lobbyists maintained, and congressmen 
 interested, and newspapers subsidised, and our coasts and 
 borders lined with seizors and searchers and spies and 
 informers and tax-gatherers, to keep it from falling to 
 pauperism ? Is not labour the producer of all wealth ? Is 
 it not labour that feeds all, clothes aU, shelters all, and 
 pays for all? Is not labour the one thing that can take 
 care of itself ; that requires but access to the raw materials 
 of nature to bring forth all that man's needs require? 
 What benevolent capitalist drew a tariff wall around Adam 
 to enable him to get a living and bring up a family? 
 Whatever else may need protection, labour needs no pro- 
 tection. What labour needs is freedom ! Not the keeping 
 up of restrictions and the perpetuation of monopolies, but 
 the tearing of them down. 
 
 Who are these benevolent individuals, so anxious to pro- 
 tect the poor, helpless workingman, so fearful lest Ameri- 
 
AGAINST PROTECTIONISM 273 
 
 can. labour may fall to the level of "the pauper labour of 
 Europe"? The coal barons and the factory lords, the 
 iron and steel combinations, the lumber ring, and the thou- 
 sand trusts that, having secured the imposition of duties 
 to keep out foreign productions, band themselves together 
 to limit home production and to screw down the wages of 
 their workmen. And are not these men who are so anx- 
 ious, as they say, to protect you from the competition of 
 "foreign pauper labour" the very men who are most ready 
 to avail themselves of foreign labour? 
 
 Do you know of any protected employer, no matter how 
 many millions he may have made out of the tariff, who 
 pays any higher wages to labour than he has to ? Is it not 
 true that in all the protected industries wages are, if any- 
 thing, lower than in the unprotected industries? Is it 
 not true that in all the protected industries workmen have 
 been compelled to band themselves together to protect 
 themselves; and that these protected industries are the in- 
 dustries notable above all others for their strikes and 
 lock-outs — ^the bitter and oft-times disastrous industrial 
 wars that labour is compelled to wage to prevent being 
 crowded to starvation rates? Are these the men whose 
 protection you need ? 
 
 It is impossible for me in a brief article like this to go 
 over all the claims and expose all the fallacies of protec- 
 tion. That I have already done, in anticipation of the 
 coming before the people of this question, in a little book 
 entitled "Protection or Free Trade?" in which I have 
 shown the full relations of the tariff question to the labour 
 question. All I want here to do is to urge every Ameri- 
 can workingman to think over the matter for himself, and 
 to decide whether what is called "protection" is or is not 
 in the interests of the men who earn their daily bread by 
 their daily labour. 
 
274 TO WOKKINGMEN 
 
 For if, as protectionists tell us, our country is so pros- 
 perous and wages are so high because of the protection 
 we already have, then we certainly ought to bend aU our 
 efforts to get more protection. However prosperous this 
 country may be when viewed through the rose-coloured 
 spectacles of the millionaire, and however high wages may 
 be from the standpoint of those who think that the natural 
 wages of labour are only enough to keep soul and body 
 together, there will be no dispute among workingmen that 
 this country is not prosperous enough and wages not high 
 enough. Whoever may be satisfied with things as they 
 are, the great mass of American citizens who work for a 
 living are not satisfied and ought not to be satisfied. Mon- 
 strous fortunes are rolling up here faster than they ever did 
 in the world before; but the great body of the American 
 people get but a poor hand-to-mouth living, and find year 
 after year passing without anjiihing laid by for a rainy 
 day. Our rich men astonish the rich men of Europe by 
 their lavish expenditure, and the daughters of our million- 
 aires are sought in marriage by European aristocrats of 
 the bluest blood; but the tramp is known from the At- 
 lantic to the Pacific ; the proportion of our people who are 
 maintained by charity, the proportion who are confined 
 in prisons and lunatic asylums, the proportion of our 
 women and children who must go to work, is steadily in- 
 creasing. And the proportion of men who, starting with 
 nothing but their ability to labour, can become their own 
 employers, or can hope out of the earnings of their labour 
 to maintain a family and put by a competence for old age, 
 is steadily diminishing. "Statisticians" may pile up fig- 
 ures to prove to the American workingman how much 
 better off he is than he used to be, and the editors of 
 protection papers may picture the poverty of European 
 workingmen in the darkest colours to show him how proud 
 
AGAINST PBOTECTIONISM 275 
 
 and happy and contented he ought to be. But the labour 
 organisations, the strikes, the bitter unrest with which the 
 whole industrial mass is seething, show that he is not con- 
 tented. If protection gives prosperity, if protection raises 
 wages, then in heaven's name let us demand more protec- 
 tion, even though we utterly destroy all foreign commerce, 
 put a line of custom-houses between every State, and shut 
 in our rich men so that they cannot go to Europe and 
 spend their money on foreign paupers, as Mr. Blaine is 
 doing. But if it does not — then let us sweep away what 
 protection we have. Let us raise the banner of equal 
 rights, and try the way of freedom ! 
 
 It is not protection that has made wages higher here 
 than in Europe. If protection could make wages high, 
 why has it not made wages high in Germany and Italy and 
 Spain and Mexico? Why did it not make wages high in 
 England when it was in full force there? Wages were 
 higher in the United States than in Europe before we had 
 any protection; and if they have on the whole remained 
 higher, it is in spite of protection. Our higher wages are 
 because of our cheaper land — ^because labour can more 
 readily obtain access to the natural materials and oppor- 
 tunities of labour. The secret of our prosperity, of our 
 rapid growth, of our better conditions of labour, is simply 
 that we have had the temperate zone of a vast and virgin 
 continent to overrun, and that it has taken a long while 
 for monopoly to fence it in. As it is gradually fenced 
 in, as the tribute that labour must pay to monopoly for the 
 use of land becomes higher and higher, so must our social 
 conditions, tariff or no tarifE, approximate to the social 
 conditions of Europe. 
 
 To give labour full freedom; to make wages what they 
 ought to be, the full earnings of labour; to secure work 
 for all, and leisure for all, and abundance for aU; to 
 
276 TO WOEKINGMEN 
 
 enable all to enjoy the advantages and blessings of an ad- 
 vancing civilisation — we must break down all monopolies 
 and destroy all special privileges. 
 
 The rejection of protection and the abolition of the 
 tarifE will not of itself accomplish this, but it will be a 
 long step towards it — a step that must necessarily be taken 
 if labour is to be emancipated and industrial slavery abol- 
 ished. Until the workingmen of the United States get 
 over the degrading superstition of protection they must 
 be divided and helpless. But when they once realise the 
 true dignity of labour, once see that the good of all can 
 only be gained by securing the equal rights of each, then 
 they can unite, and then they will be irresistible. 
 
 And this is the question that you will be asked this year 
 to answer by your votes. Are you for restriction or are 
 you for freedom? Are you in favour of taxing the whole 
 people for the benefit of a few capitalists, in the hope that 
 they will give to their workmen some of the crumbs? or 
 are you against all special privileges and in favour of 
 equal rights to all? 
 
 To the man who thinks the matter over there can be 
 no question as to what answer best accords with the in- 
 terests of workingmen. It is possible for the few to be- 
 come rich by taxing the many. But it is not possible for 
 the many to become rich by taxing themselves to put the 
 proceeds in the hands of the few. 
 
 Labour cannot be hurt by freedom. The only thing 
 that can be hurt by freedom is monopoly. And monopoly 
 means the robbery of labour. What labour needs is free- 
 dom, not protection; justice, not charity; equal rights for 
 all, not special privileges for some. 
 
"THY KINGDOM COME." 
 
"THY KINGDOM COME." 
 
 [A sermon delivered in the City Hall, Glasgow, Scotland, Sunday, 
 April 28, 1889, under the auspices of the Henry George Institute, and 
 afterwards circulated extensively ia tract form by the Scottish Land Res- 
 toration League.] 
 
 WE have just joined in the most solemn, the most 
 sacred, the most catholic of all prayers: "Our 
 Father which art in Heaven!" To all of us who have 
 learned it in our infancy, it oft calls iip the sweetest and 
 most tender emotions. Sometimes with feeling, sometimes 
 as a matter of course, how often have we repeated it ! For 
 centuries, daily, hourly, has that prayer gone up. "Thy 
 kingdom come!" Has it come? Let this Christian city 
 of Glasgow answer — Glasgow, that was to "Flourish by the 
 preaching of the Word." "Thy kingdom come!" Day 
 after day, Sunday after Sunday, week after week, century 
 after century, has that prayer gone up ; and to-day, in this 
 so-called Christian city of Glasgow, 135,000 human beings 
 — so your medical officer says — 135,000 children of God 
 are living whole families in a single room. "Thy king' 
 dom come!" We have been praying for it and praying 
 for it, yet it has not come. So long has it tarried that 
 many think it never will come. Here is the vital point in 
 which what we are accustomed to call the Christianity of 
 the present day differs so much from that Christianity 
 which overran the ancient world — that Christianity which, 
 
 279 
 
280 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 beneath a rotten old civilisation, planted the seeds of a 
 newer and a higher. We have become accustomed to think 
 that God's kingdom is not intended for this world; that, 
 virtually, this is the devil's world, and that God's kingdom 
 is in some other sphere, to which He is to take good 
 people when they die — as good Americans are said when 
 they die to go to Paris. If that be so, what is the use 
 of praying for the coming of the kingdom? Is God — the 
 Christian's God, the Almighty, the loving Father of whom 
 Christ told — is He such a monster as a god of that kind 
 would be ; a god who looks on this world, sees its sufferings 
 and its miseries, sees high faculties aborted, lives stunted, 
 innocence turned to vice and criine, and heart-strings 
 strained and broken, yet, having it in his power, will not 
 bring that kingdom of peace, and love, and plenty, and 
 happiness? Is God, indeed, a self-wUled despot, whom 
 we must coax to do the good He might ? 
 
 But, think of it. The Almighty — and I say it with rev- 
 erence — the Almighty could not bring that kingdom of 
 Himself. For, what is the kingdom of God; the kingdom 
 that Christ taught us to pray for ? Is it not in the doing 
 of God's will, not by automata, not by animals who are 
 compelled, but by intelligent beings made in His image; 
 intelligent beings clothed with free will, intelligent beings 
 knowing good from evil. Swedenborg never said a deeper 
 nor a truer thing, nor a thing more compatible with the 
 philosophy of Christianity, than when he said God had 
 never put any one into hell; that the devils went to heU 
 because they would rather go to hell than go to heaven. 
 The spirits of evil would be unhappy in a place where 
 the spirit of good reigned : wedded to injustice, and loving 
 injustice, they would be miserable where justice was the 
 law. And, correlatively, God could not put intelligent 
 beings having free will into conditions where they must 
 
SERMON m GLASGOW 281 
 
 do right without destroying that free will. Nay! Nay! 
 "Thy kingdom come!" — when Christ taught that prayer 
 He meant, not merely that men must idly phrase these 
 words, but that for the coming of that kingdom they must 
 work as well as pray ! 
 
 Prayer! Consider what prayer is. How true is the 
 old fable ! The wagoner, whose wagon was stuck in the 
 rut, knelt down and prayed to Jove to get it out. He 
 might have prayed till the crack of doom, and the wagon 
 would have stood there. This world — God's world — is not 
 that kind of a world in which the repeating of words will 
 get wagons out of mire or poverty out of slums. He who 
 would pray with effect must work ! 
 
 "Our Father which art in Heaven." Not a despot, 
 ruling by his arbitrary fiats, but a father, a loving father, 
 our father; a father for us all — that was Christ's mes- 
 sage. He is our Father and we are His children. But 
 there are men, who, looking around on the suffering and 
 injustice with which, even in so-called Christian countries, 
 human life is full, say there is no Father in heaven, there 
 can be no God, or He would not permit this. How super- 
 ficial is that thought! What would we as fathers do for 
 our children ? Is there any man, who, having a knowledge 
 of the world and the laws of human life, would so sur- 
 round his boy with safeguards that he could do no evil 
 and could suffer no pain? What could he make by that 
 course of education? A pampered animal, not a self- 
 reliant man! We are, indeed, His children. Yet let one 
 of God's children fall into the water, and if he has not 
 learned to swim he will drown. And if he is a good dis- 
 tance from land and near no boat or anything on which 
 he may get, he will drown anyhow, whether he can swim. 
 or not. God the Creator might have made men so that they 
 could swim like the fishes, but how could He have made 
 
282 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 them so that they could swim like the fishes and yet have 
 adapted this wonderful frame of ours to aU the purposes 
 which the intelligence that is lodged within it requires to 
 use it for? God can make a fish; He can make a bird; 
 but could He, His laws being what they are, make an 
 animal that might at once swim as well as a fish and fly 
 as well as a bird? That the intelligence which we must 
 recognise behind nature is almighty does not mean that it 
 can contradict itself and stultify its own laws. 'No; we 
 are the children of God. What God is, who shall say? 
 But every man is conscious of this, that behind what he 
 sees there must have been a Power to bring that forth; 
 that behind what he knows there is an intelligence far 
 greater than that which is lodged in the human mind, but 
 which human intelligence does in some infinitely less de- 
 gree resemble. 
 
 Yes; we are His children. We ia some sort have that 
 power of adapting things which we know must have been 
 exerted to bring this universe into being. Consider those 
 great ships for which this port of Glasgow is famous aU 
 over the world ; consider one of those great ocean steamers, 
 such as the Umhria, or the Etruria, or the City of New 
 YorTc, or the Oity of Paris. There, in the ocean which 
 such ships cleave, are the porpoises, there are the whales, 
 there are the dolphins, there are all manner of fish. They 
 are to-day just as they were when Caesar crossed to this 
 island, just as they were before the first ancient Briton 
 launched his leather-covered boat. Man to-day can swim 
 no better than man could swim" then, but consider how 
 by his intelligence he has advanced higher and higher, 
 how his power of making things has developed, until now 
 he crosses the great ocean quicker than any fish. Consider 
 one of those great steamers forcing her way across the 
 Atlantic Ocean, four hundred miles a day, against a living 
 
SEEMON IN GLASGOW 283 
 
 gale. Is she not in some sort a product of a godlike 
 power — a machine in some sort like the very fishes that 
 swim underneath? Here is the distinguishing thing be- 
 tween man and the animals; here is the broad and im- 
 passable gulf. Man among all the animals is the only 
 maker. Man among all the animals is the only one that 
 possesses that godlike power of adapting means to ends. 
 And is it possible that man possesses the power of so 
 adapting means to ends that he can cross the Atlantic in 
 six days, and yet does not possess the power of abolishing 
 the conditions that crowd thousands of families into one 
 room? When we consider the achievements of man and 
 then look upon the misery that exists to-day in the very 
 centres of wealth, upon the ignorance, the weakness, the 
 injustice, that characterise our highest civilisation, we may 
 know of a surety that it is not the fault of God; it is the 
 fault of man. May we not know that in that very power 
 God has given to His children here, in that power of ris- 
 ing higher, there is involved — and necessarily involved — 
 the power of falling lower? 
 
 "Our Father!" "Owr Father!" Whose? ISTot m?/ Fa- 
 ther — that is not the prayer. "Our Father" — not the 
 father of any sect, of any class, biit the Father of all men. 
 The AU-Father, the equal Father, the loving Father. He 
 it is we ask to bring the kingdom. Aye, we ask it with our 
 lips! We call him "Our Father," the All, the Universal 
 Father, when we kneel down to pray to Him. But that 
 He is the AU-Father — ^that He is all men's Father — we 
 deny by our institutions. The All-Father who made the 
 world, the AU-Father who created man in His image, and 
 put him upon the earth to draw his subsistence from its 
 bosom; to find in the earth aU the materials that satisfy 
 his wants, waiting only to be worked up by his labour! 
 If He is the AU-Father, then are not aU human beings, 
 
284 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 all children of the Creator, equally entitled to the use of 
 His bounty? And, yet, our laws say that this God's 
 earth is not here for the use of all His children, but only 
 for the use of a privileged few! There was a little dia- 
 logue published in the United States, in the West, some 
 time ago. Possibly you may have seen it. It is between 
 a boy and his father, when visiting a brick-yard. The 
 boy looks at the men making bricks, and he asks who those 
 dirty men are, why they are making up the clay, and what 
 they are doing it for. He learns, and then he asks about 
 the owner of the brick-yard. "He does not make any 
 bricks; he gets his income from letting the other men 
 make bricks." Then the boy asks about what title there 
 is to the bricks, and is told that it comes from the men 
 having made them. Then he wants to know how the man 
 who owns the brick-yard gets his title to the brick-yard — 
 whether he made it ? "No, he did not make it," the father 
 replies, "God made it." The boy asks, "Did God make it 
 for him?" Whereat his father tells him that he must 
 not ask questions such as that, but that anyhow it is all 
 right, and it is all in accordance with God's law. Then 
 the boy, who of course was a Sunday-school boy, and had 
 been to church, goes off mumbling to himself that God so 
 loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son to 
 die for all men; but that He so loved the owner of this 
 brick-yard that he gave him not merely his only begotten 
 Son but the brick-yard too. 
 
 This has a blasphemous sound. But I do not refer to it 
 lightly. I do not like to speak lightly of sacred subjects. 
 Yet it is well sometimes that we should be fairly shocked 
 into thinking. Think of what Christianity teaches us; 
 think of the life and death of Him who came to die for 
 men! Think of His teachings, that we are all the equal 
 children of an Almighty Father, who is no respecter of 
 
SERMON IN GLASGOW 285 
 
 persons, and then think of this legalised injustice — this 
 denial of the most important, most fundamental rights of 
 the children of God, which so many of the very men who 
 teach Christianity uphold; nay, which they blasphemously 
 assert is the design and the intent of the Creator himself. 
 Better to me, higher to me, is the atheist, who says there 
 is no God, than the professed Christian, who, prating of 
 the goodness and the Fatherhood of God, tells us in words 
 as some do, or tells us indirectly as others do, that mil- 
 lions and millions of human creatures — [at this point a 
 child was heard crying] — don't take the little thing out — 
 that millions and millions of human beings, like that little 
 baby, are being brought into the world daily by the crea- 
 tive fiat, and no place in this world provided for them. 
 Aye! tells us that, by the laws of God, the poor are cre- 
 ated in order that the rich may have the unctuous satis- 
 faction of dealing out charity to them — tells us that a 
 state of things like that which exists in this city of Glas- 
 gow, as in other great cities on both sides of the Atlantic, 
 where little children are dying every day, dying by hun- 
 dreds of thousands, because, having come into this world 
 — those children of God, with His fiat, by His decree — 
 they find that there is not space on the earth suflBeient for 
 them to live; and are driven out of God's world because 
 they cannot get room enough, cannot get air enough, can- 
 not get sustenance enough. I believe in no such god. 
 If I did, though I might bend before him in fear, I would 
 hate him in my heart. Not room enough for the little 
 children here! Look around any country in the civilised 
 world ; is there not room enough and to spare ? Not food 
 enough? Look at the unemployed labour, look at the idle 
 acres, look through every country and see natural oppor- 
 tunities going to waste. Aye ! that Christianity that puts 
 on the Creator the evil, the injustice, the suffering, the 
 
286 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 degradation that are due to man's injustice, is worse, far 
 worse, than atheism. That is the blasphemy, and if 
 there be a sin against the Holy Ghost, that is the unpar- 
 donable sin! 
 
 Why, consider — "Give us this day our daily bread." I 
 stopped in a hotel last week — a hydropathic establishment. 
 A hundred or more guests sat down to table together. 
 Before they ate anything, a man stood up, and, thanking 
 God, asked Him to make us all grateful for His bounty. 
 So at every meal-time such an acknowledgment is made 
 over well-filled boards. What do men mean by 'it? Is it 
 mockery, or what? 
 
 If Adam, when he got out of Eden, had sat down and 
 commenced to pray, he might have prayed till this time 
 without getting anything to eat unless he went to work for 
 it. Yet food is God's bounty. He does not bring meat 
 all cooked, nor vegetables all prepared, nor lay the plates, 
 nor spread the cloth. What He gives are the opportuni- 
 ties of producing these things — of bringing them forth 
 by labour. His mandate is — it is written in the Holy 
 Word, it is graven on every fact in nature — that by labour 
 we shall bring forth these things. Nature gives to labour 
 and to nothing else. What God gives are the natural ele- 
 ments that are indispensable to labour. He gives them, 
 not to one, not to some, not to one generation, but to all. 
 They are His gifts. His bounty to the whole human race. 
 And yet in all our civilised countries what do we see? 
 That a few men have appropriated these bounties, claim- 
 ing them as theirs alone, while the great majority have no 
 legal right to apply their labour to the reservoirs of nature 
 and draw from the Creator's bounty. And thus it comes 
 that all over the civilised world that class that is called 
 peculiarly the "labouring class" is the poor class, and 
 that men who do no labour, who pride themselves on neyet 
 
SERMON m GLASGOW 287 
 
 having done honest labour and on being descended from 
 fathers and grandfathers who never did a stroke of honest 
 labour in their lives, revel in a superabundance of all the 
 things that labour brings forth. 
 
 Mr. Abner Thomas, of ISTew York, a strict orthodox 
 Presbyterian — and the son of that Dr. Thomas, famous in 
 America if not here, the pastor of a Presbyterian church 
 in Philadelphia, and the author of a commentary on the 
 Bible that is still a standard work — wrote a little while 
 ago an allegory, called "A Dream." Dozing off in his 
 chair, he imagined that he was ferried over the Eiver of 
 Death, and, taking the straight and narrow way, came at 
 last within sight of the Golden City. A fine-looking old- 
 gentleman angel opened the wicket, inquired his name, 
 and let him in; warning him, at the same time, that it 
 would be better if he chose his company in heaven, and 
 did not associate with disreputable angels. 
 
 "What !" said the new-comer, "is not this heaven ?" 
 
 "Yes," said the warden, "but there are a lot of tramp 
 angels here now." 
 
 "How can that be?" said Mr. Thomas, in his dream. 
 "I thought everybody had plenty in heaven." 
 
 "It used to be that way some time ago," said the war- 
 den ; "and if you wanted to get your harp polished or your 
 wings combed, you had to do it yourself. But matters 
 have changed since we adopted the same kind of property 
 regulations in heaven as you have in civilised countries on 
 earth, and we find it a great improvement, at least for 
 the better class." 
 
 Then the warden told the new-comer that he had better 
 decide where he was going to board. 
 
 "I don't want to board anywhere," said Thomas; "I 
 would much rather go over to that beautiful green knoll 
 and lie down." 
 
288 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 "I would not advise you to do so," said the warden ; "the 
 angel who owns that knoll does not like to encourage tres- 
 passing. Some centuries ago, as I told you, we intro- 
 duced the system of private property in the soil of heaven. 
 So we divided the land up. It is all private property 
 now." 
 
 "I hope I was considered in that division ?" said Thomas. 
 
 "No," said the warden, "you were not; but if you go to 
 work, and are saving, you can easily earn enough in a 
 couple of centuries to buy yourself a nice piece. You get 
 a pair of wings free as you come in, and you will have 
 no diflSculty in hypothecating them for a few days' board 
 until you find work. But I woidd advise you to be quick 
 about it, as our population is constantly increasing, and 
 there is a great surplus of labour. Tramp angels are, in 
 fact, becoming quite a nuisance." 
 
 "What shall I go to work at ?" said Thomas. 
 
 "Our principal industries," responded the warden, "are 
 the making of harps and crowns and the growing of flow- 
 ers; but there are many opportunities for employment in 
 personal service." 
 
 "I love flowers," said Thomas, "and I will go to work 
 growing them. There is a beautiful piece of land over 
 there that nobody seems to be using. I will go to work 
 on that." 
 
 "You can't do that," said the warden. "That property 
 belongs to one of our most far-sighted angels, who has got 
 very rich by the advance of land values, and who is holding 
 that piece for a rise. You will have to buy it or feu it 
 before you can work on it, and you can't do that yet." 
 
 And so the story goes on to describe how the roads of 
 heaven, the streets of the 'New Jerusalem, were filled with 
 disconsolate tramp angels, who had pawned their wings, 
 and were outcasts in heaven itself. 
 
SEKMON IN GLASGOW 289 
 
 You laugh, and it is ridiculous. But there is a moral 
 in it that is worth serious thought. Is not the ridiculous- 
 ness in our imagining the application to God's heaven of 
 the same rules of division that we apply to God's earth, 
 even while we pray that His will may be done on earth 
 as it is done in heaven ? 
 
 Eeally, if you come to think of it, it is impossible to 
 imagine heaven treated as we treat this earth, without 
 seeing that, no matter how salubrious were its air, no 
 matter how bright the light that filled it, no matter how 
 magnificent its vegetable growth, there would be poverty, 
 and suffering, and a division of classes in heaven itself, 
 if heaven were parcelled out as we have parcelled out the 
 earth. And, conversely, if men in this life were to act 
 towards each other as we must suppose the inhabitants of 
 heaven to do, would not this earth be a very heaven ? "Thy 
 kingdom come." No one can think of the kingdom for 
 which the prayer asks without feeling that it must be a 
 kingdom of justice and equality — not necessarily of equal- 
 ity in condition, but of equality in opportunity. And no 
 one can think of it without seeing that a very kingdom 
 of God might be brought on this earth if men would but 
 seek to do justice — if men would but acknowledge the 
 essential principle of Christianity, that of doing to others 
 as we would have others do to us, and of recognising that 
 we are all here equally the children of the one Father, 
 equally entitled to share His bounty, equally entitled to 
 live our lives and develop our faculties, and to apply our 
 labour to the raw material that He has provided. Aye! 
 and when a man sees that, then there arises that hope of 
 the coming of the kingdom that carried the Gospel through 
 the streets of Eome, that carried it into pagan lands, that 
 made it, against the most ferocious persecution, the domi- 
 nant religion of the world. Early Christianity did not 
 
290 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 mean, in its prayer for the coming of Christ's kingdom, 
 a kingdom in heaven, but a kingdom on earth. If Christ 
 had simply preached of the other world, the high priests 
 and the Pharisees would not have persecuted Him, the 
 Eoman soldiery would not have nailed His hands to the 
 cross. Why was Christianity persecuted? Why were its 
 first professors thrown to wild beasts, burned to light a 
 tyrant's gardens, hounded, tortured, put to death, by all 
 the cruel devices that a devilish ingenuity could suggest? 
 Not that it was a new religion, referring only to the 
 future. Eome was tolerant of all religions. It was the 
 boast of Eome that aU gods were sheltered in her Pan- 
 theon; it was the boast of Eome that she made no inter- 
 ference with the religions of peoples she conquered. What 
 was persecuted was a great movement for social reform — 
 the Gospel of Justice — ^heard by common fishermen with 
 gladness, carried by labourers and slaves into the Imperial 
 City. The Christian revelation was the doctrine of human 
 equality, of the fatherhood of God, of the brotherhood of 
 man. It struck at the very basis of that monstrous tyr- 
 anny that then oppressed the civilised world; it struck at 
 the fetters of the captive, at the bonds of the slave, at 
 that monstrous injustice which allowed a class to revel 
 on the proceeds of labour, while those who did the labour 
 fared scantily. That is the reason why early Christianity 
 was persecuted. And when they could no longer hold it 
 down, then the privileged classes adopted and perverted the 
 new faith, and it became, in its very triumph, not the 
 pure Christianity of the early days, but a Christianity that, 
 to a very great extent, was the servitor of the privileged 
 classes. And, instead of preaching the essential father- 
 hood of God, the essential brotherhood of man, its high 
 priests engrafted on the pure truths of the Gospel the 
 blasphemous doctrine that the All-Father is a respecter of 
 
SERMON IN GLASGOW 291 
 
 persons, and that by His will and on His mandate is 
 founded that monstrous injustice which condemns the 
 great mass of humanity to unrequited hard toil! There 
 has. been no failure of Christianity. The failure has been 
 in the sort of Christianity that has been preached. 
 
 Nothing is clearer than that if we are all children of the 
 universal Father, we are all entitled to the use of His 
 bounty. No one dare deny that proposition. But the 
 men who set their faces against its carrying out say, virtu- 
 ally: "Oh, yes! that is true; but it is impracticable to 
 carry it into effect !" Just think of what this means : 
 This is God's world, aiid yet such men say that it is a 
 world in which God's justice, God's will, cannot be car- 
 ried into effect. What a monstrous absurdity, what a 
 monstrous blasphemy ! If the loving God does reign, if 
 His laws are the laws not merely of the physical but of the 
 moral universe, there must be a way of carrying His will 
 into effect, there must be a way of doing equal justice to 
 all His creatures. 
 
 And so there is. The men who deny that there is any 
 practical way of carrying into effect the perception that 
 all human beings are equally children of the Creator, shut 
 their eyes to the plain and obvious way. It is of course 
 impossible in a civilisation like this of ours to divide land 
 up into equal pieces. Such a system might have done in 
 a primitive state of society, among a people such as that 
 for whom the Mosaic code was framed. It would not do 
 in this state of society. We have progressed in civilisation 
 beyond such rude devices, but we have not, nor can we, pro- 
 gress beyond God's providence. There is a way of securing 
 the equal rights of all, not by dividing land up into equal 
 pieces, but by taking for the use of all that value which 
 attaches to land, not as the result of individual labour 
 upon it, but as the result of the increase of population. 
 
292 THY KINGDOM COME 
 
 and the improvement of society. In that way everyone 
 would be equally interested in the land of his native coun- 
 try. If he used a more valuable piece than his neighbour 
 he would pay a heavier tax. If he made no direct use 
 of any land he would still be an equal sharer in the reve- 
 nue. Here is the simple way. Aye ! and it is a way that 
 impresses the man who really sees its beauty with a more 
 vivid idea of the beneficence of the providence of the 
 All-Father than it seems to me anything else. One can- 
 not look, it seems to me, through nature; whether he look 
 at the stars through a telescope, or have the microscope 
 reveal to him those worlds that we find in drops of water, 
 whether he consider the human frame, the adjustments of 
 the animal kingdom, or of any department of physical 
 nature, he must see that there has been a contriver and 
 adjuster, that there has been an intent. So strong is that 
 feeling, so natural is it to our minds, that even men who 
 deny the creative intelligence are forced, in spite of them- 
 selves, to talk of intent. The claws of one animal were 
 intended, we say, to climb with; the fins of another to 
 propel it through the water. Yet, while in looking through 
 the laws of physical nature, we find intelligence, we do not 
 so clearly find beneficence. But in the great social fact 
 that as population increases, and improvements are made, 
 and men progress in civilisation, the one thing that rises 
 everywhere in value is land, we may see a proof of the 
 beneficence of the Creator. 
 
 Why, consider what it means ! It means that the social 
 laws are adapted to progressive man ! In a rude state of 
 society where there is no need for common expenditure, 
 there is no value attaching to land. The only value which 
 attaches there is to things produced by labour. But as 
 civilisation goes on, as a division of labour takes place, as 
 men come into centres, so do the common wants increase 
 
SERMON IN GLASGOW 293 
 
 and so does the necessity for public revenue arise. And 
 BO in that value which attaches to land, not by reason of 
 anything the individual does, but by reason of the growth 
 of the community, is a provision, intended — we may safely 
 say intended — to meet that social want. Just as society 
 grows, so do the common needs grow, and so grows this 
 value attaching to land — the provided fund from which 
 they can be supplied. Here is a value that may be taken, 
 without impairing the right of property, without taking 
 anything from the producer, without lessening the natu- 
 ral rewards of industry and thrift. Nay, here is a value 
 that must be taken if we would prevent the most mon- 
 strous of all monopolies. What does all this mean? It 
 means that in the creative plan, the natural advance in 
 civilisation is an advance to a greater and greater equality 
 instead of to a more and more monstrous inequality. 
 
 "Thy kingdom come!" It may be that we shall never 
 see it. But to the man who realises that it may come, to 
 the man who realises that it is given to him to work for 
 the coming of God's kingdom on earth, there is for him, 
 though he never see that kingdom here, an exceeding great 
 reward — the reward of feeling that he, little and insig- 
 nificant though he may be, is doing something to help the 
 coming of that kingdom, doing something on the side of 
 that good power that shows all through the universe, doing 
 something to tear this world from the devil's grasp, and 
 make it the kingdom of righteousness. Aye, and though it 
 should never come, yet those who struggle for it know in 
 the depths of their hearts that it must exist somewhere — 
 they know that somewhere, some time, those who strive 
 their best for the coming of the kingdom, will be welcomed 
 into the kingdom, and that to them, even to them, some 
 time, somewhere, the King shall say : "Well done, thou good 
 and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 
 
JUSTICE THE OBJECT— TAXATION 
 
 THE MEANS 
 
JUSTICE THE OBJECT— TAXATION 
 THE MEANS. 
 
 [Address in Metropolitan Hall, San Francisco, February 4, 1890, on 
 the way to the Australian lecture tour. ] 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen, Friends and Fellow -Citizens: 
 
 AS I rise on this stage the past comes back to me. 
 .IJL Twelve years ago — it seems so far and yet so near — 
 twelve years ago, when I was halt of speech, when to face 
 an audience, it seemed to me, required as much courage 
 as it would to face a battery — I stood on this platform to 
 speak my first word in the cause for which I stand now. 
 I stood on this platform to see, instead of the audience 
 that greets me to-night, a beggarly array of empty benches. 
 It is a long time. Many times, in this country and in the 
 dear old world, I have stood before far greater audiences 
 than this ; I have been greeted by thousands who never saw 
 me before, as they would greet a friend long known and 
 well loved ; but I don't think it ever gave me such pleasure 
 to stand before an audience as it does here to-night. 
 
 For years and years I have been promising myself to 
 come back to San Francisco. I have crossed the Atlantic 
 five times before I could fulfil that desire. I am here 
 now to go in a few days to the antipodes; perhaps I may 
 never return — ^who knows? If I live I shall try to. But 
 San Francisco, though I never again can be a citizen of 
 
 297 
 
298 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 California — ^though my path in life seems away so far 
 that California seems but a ridge on the horizon — ^my heart 
 has always turned, and always will turn, to the home of 
 my youth, to the city in which I grew up, to the city 
 in which I have found so many warm friends — to the 
 country in which I married, and in which my children 
 were born. Always it will seem to me home; and it is 
 sweet to the man long absent to be welcomed home. 
 
 Aye, and you men, old friends tried and true — ^you men 
 who rallied in the early times to our movement, when we 
 could count each other almost upon one's fingers — I come 
 back to you to say that at last our triumph is but a matter 
 of time; to say that never in the history of thought has 
 a movement come forward so fast and so well. 
 
 Ten years ago, when I left, I was anything but hopeful ; 
 ten years ago I would not have dared to say that in any 
 time to which I might live, we should see the beginning of 
 this great struggle. Nor have I cared. My part (and I 
 think I can speak for every man who is enlisted in this 
 movement) — my part has never been to predict results. 
 Our feeling is the feeling of the great stoic emperor, "that 
 is the business of Jupiter; not ours." Ours to do the 
 work as we may; ours to plant the seed which is to give 
 the results. But now, so well forward is this cause, so 
 many strong advocates has it in every land, so far has it 
 won its way, that now it makes no difference who lives or 
 who dies, who goes forward or who hangs back. Now the 
 currents of the time are setting in our favour. At last — 
 at last we can say with certainty that it will only be a little 
 while before all over the English speaking world, and 
 then, not long after, over the rest of the civilised world, 
 the great truth will be acknowledged that no human child 
 comes into this world without coming into his equal right 
 to all. 
 
TAXA.TION THE MEANS 299 
 
 I am talking to-night to my friends; I am talking to- 
 night to those who are as earnest and well informed in 
 this cause as I am; but I am also probably talking to 
 many who have but vague ideas concerning it. ' Let me, 
 since I am in San Francisco, speak of the genesis of my 
 own thought. I came out here at an early age, and knew 
 nothing whatever of political economy. I had never 
 thought upon any social problem. The first time I ever 
 recollect talking on such a subject was one day, when I 
 was about eighteen, after I had first come to this country, 
 sitting on the deck of a topsail schooner with a lot of 
 miners on the way to the Frazer Eiver; and we got talk- 
 ing about the Chinese, and I ventured to say — ^ventured 
 to ask what harm the Chinese were doing here, if, as these 
 miners said, they were only working the cheap diggings? 
 And one old miner turned to me, and said, "No harm 
 now; but it will not be always that wages are as high as 
 they are to-day in California. As the country grows, as 
 people come in, wages will go down, and some day or other 
 white men will be glad to get these diggings that the 
 Chinamen are now working." And I well remember how 
 it impressed me, the idea that as the country grew in all 
 that we are hoping that it might grow, the condition of 
 those who had to work for their living must grow, not 
 better, but worse. 
 
 And I remember, after having come down from the 
 country, sitting one Christmas eve in the gallery of the old 
 American Theatre, among the gods, when a new drop cur- 
 tain fell, and we all sprang to our feet, for on that curtain 
 was painted what was then a dream of the far future, the 
 overland train coming into San Francisco; and after we 
 had shouted ourselves hoarse, I began to think what good 
 is it going to be to men like me? those who have nothing 
 but their labour? I saw that thought grow and grow; 
 
300 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 we were all — aU of us, rioh and poor — ^hoping for the 
 development of California, proud of her future greatness, 
 looking forward to the time when San Francisco was to 
 be one of the great capitals of the world ; looking forward 
 to the time when this great empire of the West was to 
 count her population by millions, and underneath it all 
 came to me what that miner told. What about the masses 
 of the people? 
 
 When, after growing up here, I went across the conti- 
 nent, before the continental railway was completed, and in 
 the streets of New York for the first time realised the 
 contrasts of wealth and want that are to be found in a 
 great city; saw those sights that, to the man who comes 
 from the West, affright and appal, the problem grew upon 
 me. I said to myself there must be some reason for this; 
 there must be some remedy for this, and I wiU not rest 
 until I have found the one and discovered the other. At 
 last it came clear as the stars of a bright midnight. I saw 
 what was the cause ; I saw what was the cure. I saw noth- 
 ing that was new. Truth is never new. 
 
 When I lectured for the first time in Oxford, a pro- 
 fessor of political economy in that great university met 
 and opposed me, and he said, "I have read Mr. George's 
 book from one end to the other; what I have to say is 
 this : there is nothing in it both new and true ; what is 
 true is not new, and what is new is not true." I an- 
 swered him: "I accept your statement. It is a correct 
 criticism ; social truth never is, never can be new ; and the 
 truth for which we stand is an old truth; a truth seen by 
 men everywhere, recognised by the first perceptions of aU 
 men; only overclouded, only obscured in our modern times 
 by force and fraud." 
 
 So it is. I notice that one of our papers gives to me the 
 character of an apostle and speaks of my comrades as my 
 
TAXA.TION THE MEANS 301 
 
 disciples. It is not so. I have done no more to any man 
 than point out God's stars. They were there for him to 
 see. Millions and millions of years have seen them pre- 
 cisely as I sBiVr them ; every man may see them who will look. 
 When I first went to Ireland I got a note from the most 
 venerable of the Irish bishops, Dr. Dougan, bishop of 
 Waterford, asking me to come and have a private talk with 
 him. I went, and the old man — ^white haired, ruddy 
 cheeked, like Willegis, Wagner's son — the man who under 
 the mitre of the bishop still keeps the fresh true heart of 
 the Irish peasant — commenced, with the privilege of age, 
 catechising me. He said: "What is this new doctrine 
 that your name is associated with? You say that all men 
 have equal rights to land; but all men can't use land; how 
 do you propose to divide up ?" And then he went on from 
 one question to another, bringing all the arguments, all 
 the objections that spring up in the minds of men, just as 
 they probably sprung up in the minds of many who are 
 here — just as they spring up in the mind of any man — 
 all the objections that are so current ; and I answered them 
 all. Finally rising, without saying anything, the old man 
 stretched out his hand. "God bless you, my son; I have 
 asked you to come here and answer my questions, because 
 I wanted to see if you could defend your faith. Go on; 
 go on. What you say to me is nothing new; it is the 
 old truth that through persecution and against force, 
 though trodden down, our people have always held. What 
 you say is not new to me. When a little boy, sitting by 
 the peat fire in the west of Ireland, I have heard the same 
 truths from the lips of men who could not speak a word 
 of English. Go on; the time has come; I, an old man, 
 tell you that there is no earthly power that can stop this 
 movement." And the years have shown that the venerable 
 bishop was right. 
 
302 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 What is the cause of this dark shadow that seems to 
 accompany modern civilisation — of this existence of bitter 
 want in the very centres of life — of the failure of all our 
 modem advances — of all the wonderful discoveries and 
 inventions that have made this wonderful nineteenth cen- 
 tury, now drawing to a close, so prominent among all 
 the centuries? What is the reason, that as we add to 
 productive power — ^that is, invention after invention — 
 multiplying by the hundredfold and the thousandfold the 
 power of human hands to supply human wants; that 
 aU over the civilised world, and especially in this great 
 country, pauperism is increasing, and insanity is in- 
 creasing, and criminality is increasing; that marriages are 
 decreasing; that the struggle for existence seems not less, 
 but more and more intense — ^what is the reason? There 
 must be but one of two answers. Either it is in accord- 
 ance with the will of God, either it is the result of natural 
 law, or it is because of our ignorance_ and selfishness of 
 our faith that we evade the natural law. We single taxers 
 point to the one sufficient cause. Wherever these phe- 
 nomena are to be seen the natural element on which and 
 from which all men must live, if they are to live at all, is 
 the property, not of the whole people, but of the few. We 
 point to the adequate cure; the restoration to all men of 
 their natural rights in the soil — ^the assurance to every 
 child, as it comes into the world, of the enjoyment of 
 its natural heritage — ^the right to live, the right to work, 
 the right to enjoy the fruits of its work; rights necessarily 
 conditioned upon the equal right to that element which is 
 the basis of production; that element which is indispen- 
 sable to human life; that element which is the standing 
 place, the storehouse, the reservoir of men; that element 
 from which all that is physical in man is drawn. For 
 our bodies, themselves, they come from the land, and to 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 303 
 
 the land they return again; we, ourselves, are as much 
 children of the soil as are the flowers or the trees. 
 
 We call ourselves to-day single-tax men. It is only 
 recently, within a few years, that we have adopted that 
 title. It is not a new title ; over a hundred years ago there 
 arose in France a school of philosophers and patriots — 
 Quesnay, Turgot, Condorcet, Dupont — ^the most Ulustrious 
 men of their time, who advocated, as the cure for all so- 
 cial Uls, the impot unique, the single tax. 
 
 We here, on this western continent, as the nineteenth 
 century draws to a close, have revived the same name, and 
 we find enormous advantages in it. 
 
 We used to be confronted constantly by the question: 
 '^eU, after you have divided the land up, how do you 
 propose to keep it divided?" We don't meet that ques- 
 tion now. The single tax has, at least, this great merit: 
 it suggests our method; it shows the way we would travel 
 — the simple way of abolishing all taxes, save one tax upon 
 land values. 
 
 Now mark, one tax upon land values. We do not pro- 
 pose a tax upon land, as people who misapprehend us con- 
 stantly say. We do not propose a tax upon land; we pro- 
 pose a tax upon land values, or what in the terminology 
 of political economy is termed rent; that is to say, the 
 value which attaches to land irrespective of any improve- 
 ments in or on it; that value which attaches to land, not 
 by reason of anything that the user or improver of land 
 does — ^not by reason of any individual exertion of labour, 
 but by reason of the growth and improvement of the com- 
 munity. A tax that will take up what John Stuart Mill 
 called the unearned increment; that is to say, that incre- 
 ment of wealth which comes to the owner of land, not as a 
 user; that comes whether he be a resident or an absentee; 
 whether he be engaged in the active business of life; 
 
304 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 whether he be an idiot and whether he be a child; that 
 growth of value that we have seen in our own times so 
 astonishingly great in this city; that has made sand lotSj 
 lying in the same condition that they were thousands of 
 years ago, worth enormous sums, without any one putting 
 any exertion of labour or any expenditure of capital upon 
 them. Now, the distinction between a tax on land and a 
 tax on land values may at first seem an idle one, but it is 
 a most important one. A tax on land — that is to say, a 
 tax upon all land — would ultimately become a condition 
 to the use of land ; would therefore fall upon labour, would 
 increase prices, and be borne by the general community. 
 But a tax on land values cannot fall on all land, because 
 all land is not of value; it can only fall on valuable land, 
 and on valuable land in proportion to its value; therefore, 
 it can no more become a tax on labour than can a tax upon 
 income or a tax upon the value of special privileges of any 
 kind. It can merely take from the individual, not the 
 earnings of the individual, but that premium which, as 
 society grows and improves, attaches to the use of land of 
 superior quality. 
 
 Now see, take it in its lowest aspect — ^take it as a mere 
 fiscal change, and see how in accord with every dictate of 
 expediency, with every principle of justice, is the single 
 tax. We have invented and invented, improved and im- 
 proved, yet the great fact is, that to-day we have not wealth 
 enough. There are in the United States some few men 
 richer than it is wholesome for men to be. But the great 
 masses of our people are not rich as civilised Americans at 
 the close of the nineteenth century ought to be. The 
 great mass of our people only manage by hard work to live. 
 The great mass of our people don't get the comforts, the 
 refinements, the luxuries that in the present age of the 
 world everyone ought to have. All over this country there 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 305 
 
 is a fierce struggle for existence. Only as I came to the 
 door of this building, a beggar stopped me on the street — 
 a young man; he said he could not find -work. I don't 
 know, perhaps he lied. I do know that when a man once 
 commences upon that course there is rapid demorali- 
 sation. I do know that indiscriminate charity is apt to 
 injure far more than it can help; yet I gave him some- 
 thing, for I did not know but that his story might be true. 
 This is the shore of the Pacific. This is the Golden 
 Gate. The westward march of our race is terminated by 
 the ocean, which has the ancient East on its further shore ; 
 no further can we go. And yet here, in this new country, 
 in this golden State, there are men ready to work, anxious 
 to work, and yet who, for longer or shorter periods, can- 
 not get the opportunity to work. The further east you 
 go, the worse it grows. To the man from San Francisco, 
 who has never realised it before, there are sights in New 
 York that are appalling. Cross the ocean to the greater 
 city — ^the metropolis of the civilised world — and there pov- 
 erty is deeper and darker yet. What is the reason? If 
 there were more wealth wanted, why don't they get more? 
 We cannot cure this evil of poverty by dividing up wealth, 
 monstrous as are some of the fortunes that have arisen; 
 and fortunes are concentrating in this country faster than 
 ever before in the history of the world. But divide them 
 and still there would not be enough. But if men want 
 more wealth, why don't they get more wealth? If we, as 
 people, want more wealth (and certainly ninety-nine out 
 of every hundred Americans do want more wealth), why 
 are some suffering for the opportunities of employment? 
 Others are at work without making a living. But ninety- 
 nine out of a hundred have some legitimate desire that 
 they would like to gratify. Well, in the first place, if we 
 want more wealth — if we call that country prosperous 
 
306 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 which is increasing in wealth — ^is it not a piece of stupidity 
 that we should tax men for producing wealth? 
 
 Yet that is what we are doing to-day. Bring almost 
 any article of wealth to this country from a foreign coun- 
 try, and you are confronted at once with a tax. Is it not 
 from a common-sense standpoint a stupid thing, if we 
 want more wealth — if the prosperous country is the coun- 
 try that increases in wealth, why in Heaven's name should 
 we put up a barrier against the men who want to bring 
 wealth into this coimtry? We want more dry-goods (if 
 you don't know, your wives surely wHl teU you) . We want 
 more clothing; more sugar; more of aU sorts of the good 
 things that are called "goods"; and yet by this system of 
 taxation we virtually put up a high fence around the coun- 
 try to keep out these very things. We tax that convenient 
 man who brings any goods into the country. 
 
 If wealth be a good thing; if the couijtry be a pros- 
 perous country — ^that is, increasing in wealth — ^well, surely, 
 if we propose to restrict trade at all, the wise thing would 
 be to put the taxes on the men who are taking goods out 
 of the country, not upon those who are bringing goods 
 into the country. We single-tax men would sweep away 
 all these barriers. We would try to keep out small-pox 
 and cholera and vermin and plagues. But we would wel- 
 come all the goods that anybody wanted to send us, that 
 anybody wanted to bring home. We say it is stupid, if 
 we want more wealth, to prevent people from bringing 
 wealth to the country. We say, also, that it is just as 
 stupid to tax the men who produce wealth within the 
 country. 
 
 Here we say we want more manufactures. The Ameri- 
 can people submit to enormous taxes for the purpose of 
 building up factories; yet when a man builds a factory, 
 what do we do ? "Why, we come down and tax him for it. 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 307 
 
 We certainly want more houses. There are a few people 
 who have bigger houses than any one reasonable family 
 can occupy; but the great mass of the American people 
 are underhoused. There, in the city of Kew York, the 
 plight to which all American cities are tending, you will 
 find that sixty-five per cent, of the population are living 
 two families or more to the single floor. Yet let a man 
 put up a house in any part of the United States, and 
 down comes the tax-gatherer to demand a fine for having 
 put up a house. 
 
 We say that industry is a good thing, and that thrift is 
 a good thing; and there are some people who say that if 
 a man be industrious, and if a man be thrifty, he can 
 easily accumulate wealth. Whether that be true or not, 
 industry is certainly a good thing, and thrift is certainly 
 a good thing. But what do we do if a man be industrious ? 
 If he produces wealth enough and by thrift accumulates 
 wealth at all, down comes the tax-gatherer to demand a 
 part of it. We say that that is stupid ; that we ought not 
 by our taxes to repress the production of wealth ; that when 
 a farmer reclaims a strip of the desert and turns it into 
 an orchard and a vineyard, or on the prairie produces crops 
 and feeds fine cattle, that, so far from being taxed and 
 fined for having done these things, we ought to be glad 
 that he has done it; that we ought to welcome all en- 
 ergy; that no man can produce wealth for himself with- 
 out augmenting the general stock, without making the 
 whole country richer. 
 
 We impose some taxes for the purpose of getting rid of 
 things, for the purpose of having fewer of the things that 
 we tax. In most of our counties and States when dogs 
 become too numerous, there is imposed a dog tax to get 
 rid of dogs. Well, we impose a dog tax to get rid of dogs, 
 and why should we impose a house tax unless we want 
 
308 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 to get rid of houses? Why should we impose a farm tai 
 unless we want fewer farms? Why should we tax any 
 man for having exerted industry or energy in the pro- 
 duction of wealth? Tax houses and there will certainly 
 be fewer houses. 
 
 If you go east to the city of Brooklyn, you may see that 
 demonstrated to the eye. What first surprised me in the 
 city of churches was to see long rows of buildings, of 
 brown-stone houses, two stories in front and three stories 
 behind; or three stories in front and four stories behind; 
 and I thought for a moment what foolish idea ever entered 
 the brains of those men, to have left out half an upper 
 story in that way? I found out by inquiring that it was 
 aU on account of the tax. In the city of Brooklyn, the 
 assessor is only supposed to look in front, and so by mak- 
 ing the house in that way, you can get a three-story build- 
 ing behind with only a two-story front. 
 
 So in England, in the old houses, there you may see' the 
 result of the window tax. The window tax is in force 
 in France to-day, and in France there are two hundred 
 thousand houses, according to the census, that have no 
 window at all in order to escape the tax. 
 
 So if you tax ships there will be fewer ships. What 
 old San Franciscan cannot remember the day when in 
 this harbour might be seen the graceful forms and lofty 
 spars of so many American ships, the fleetest and best in 
 the world? I well remember the day that no American, 
 who crossed to Europe, thought of crossing on any other 
 than an American ship. To-day, if you wish to cross the 
 Atlantic, you must cross on a British steamer, unless you 
 choose to cross on a German or French steamer. On the 
 high seas of the world the American ship is becoming al- 
 most as rare as a Chinese junk. Why? Simply because 
 we have taxed our ships out of existence. There is the 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 309 
 
 proof. Tax buildings, and you will have fewer or poorer 
 buildings; tax farms, and you will have fewer farms and 
 more wilderness; tax ships, there will be fewer and poorer 
 ships; and tax capital, and there will be less capital; but 
 you may tax land values all you please and there will not 
 be a square inch the less land. Tax land values all you 
 please up to the point of taking the full annual value — 
 up to the point of making mere ownership in land utterly 
 unprofitable, so that no one will want merely to own land 
 — what will be the result? Simply that land will be the 
 easier had by the user. Simply that the land will be- 
 come valueless to the mere speculator — to the dog in the 
 manger, who wants merely to hold and not to use ; to the 
 forestaller, who wants merely to reap where others have 
 sown, to gather to himself the products of labour, without 
 doing labour. Tax land values, and you leave to produc- 
 tion its full rewards, and you open to producers natural 
 opportunities. 
 
 Take it from any aspect you please, take it on its polit- 
 ical side (and surely that is a side that we ought to 
 consider clearly and plainly), while we boast of our demo- 
 cratic republicanism, democratic republicanism is passing 
 away. I need not say that to you, men of San Francisco 
 — San Francisco ruled by a boss; to you men of Cali- 
 fornia, where you send to the Senate the citizen who domi- 
 nates the State as no duke could rule. Look at the corrup- 
 tion that is tearing the heart out of our institutions ; where 
 does it come from ? Whence this demoralisation ? Largely 
 from our system of taxation. What does our present sys- 
 tem of taxation do ? Why, it is a tax upon conscience ; a 
 tax upon truth; a tax upon respect to law; it offers a 
 premium for lying and perjury and evasion; it fosters 
 and stimulates bribery and corruption. 
 
 Go over to Europe ; travel around for a while among the 
 
310 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 effete monarchies of the old world, and what you see will 
 make you appreciate democracy; then come home. At 
 length you take a pilot. There is the low-lying land upon 
 the horizon — the land of the free and the home of the 
 brave — and if you are entering the port of Kew York, 
 as most Americans do, finally you will see that great statue, 
 presented by a citizen of the French republic — ^the statue 
 of Liberty holding aloft a light that talks to the world. 
 Just as you get to see that statue clearly, Liberty enlight- 
 ening the world, you will be called down by a custom-house 
 oflBcer to form in line, men and women, and to call on 
 God Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, to bear witness 
 that you have nothing dutiable in your trunks or in your 
 carpet sacks, or rolled up in your shawl straps; and you 
 take that oath; the United States of America compels 
 you to. But the United States of America don't leave you 
 there; the very next thing, another official steps up to de- 
 mand your keys and to open your box or package and to 
 look through it for things dutiable, unless, as may be, his 
 eyes are stopped by a greenback. Well, now, everyone 
 who has made that visit does know that most passengers 
 have things dutiable; and I notice that the protectionists 
 have them fully as often as the free traders. I have never 
 yet seen a consistent protectionist. There may be pro- 
 tectionists who would not smuggle when they get a chance ; 
 but I think they must be very, very few. Go right 
 through that daily stream — from the very institution of 
 laws — down to the very lobby that gathers at Washington 
 when it is proposed to repeal a tax, bullying, bragging, 
 stealing to keep that particular tax on the American peo- 
 ple, so patriotic are they; very much interested in protect- 
 ing the poor workingman. 
 
 See the private interests that are enlisted in merely the 
 petty evasions of law that go on by passengers; but the 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 311 
 
 gigantic smuggling, the under-valuation frauds of all 
 kinds; the private interests that are enlisted in class; that 
 enter the primaries ; that surround our national legislature 
 with lobbyists that in every presidential election put their 
 millions into the corruption fund. Does not the whole 
 system reek with fraud and corruption? Is it not a dis- 
 crimination against honesty, against conscience, a pre- 
 mium on evasion and fraud? Come into our States and 
 look at their taxes, or look, if you please, by the way, on 
 the internal revenue. You remember how, when it was 
 proposed to abolish that stamp tax on matches, that was 
 in force during the war, how the match combination fought 
 hard and fought long against the repeal of that tax. You 
 remember how the whiskey ring spent its money to pre- 
 vent the reduction of the whiskey tax; how to-day it 
 stands ready to spend money to keep up the present tax. 
 Go then into our States; take our system of direct taxa- 
 tion; what do you find? We pretend to tax all property; 
 many of our taxes are especially framed to get at rich 
 men; what is the result? Why, all over the United States 
 the very rich men simply walk from under those taxes. 
 AU over the United States the attempt to tax men upon 
 their wealth is a farce and a fraud. If there were no 
 other reason, this would be a sufficient reason why all such 
 taxes should be abolished. In their very nature they per- 
 mit evasion, law breaking, perjury, bribery and corrup- 
 tion ; but the tax on land values, it has at least this advan- 
 tage: land cannot be hid; it cannot be carried off; it 
 always remains, so to speak, out of doors. If you don't 
 see the land you know that it is there; and of aU values 
 the value which attaches to land is the most definite, the 
 most easily ascertained. Why, I may go into San Fran- 
 cisco, into Denver, into New York, into Boston, into any 
 city where I am totally unacquainted, and if one offers 
 
312 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 to sell me a lot, I can go to any real-estate dealer and say: 
 "Here is a lot of such a frontage and such a depth, and 
 on such a street; what is it worth?" He will tell me 
 closely. How can he tell me the value of the house that 
 is upon it? Kot without a close examination; stUl less, 
 how can any one tell me, without the examination of ex- 
 perts, what is the value of the things contained in that 
 house, if it be a large and fine house; and still less, how 
 can any one tell me the value of the various things that 
 the man who lives in that house may own. But land — 
 there it is. You can put up a simple little sign on every 
 lot, or upon every piece of agricultural land, saying that 
 this tract is of such a frontage and of such a depth, hav- 
 ing such an area, and it belongs to such a person, and is 
 assessed at so much, and you have published information 
 checking the assessment; you have the assessment on a 
 value that can be ascertained more definitely, more cer- 
 tainly than any other value; substitute that tax for all 
 the many taxes that we now impose. See the gain in 
 morals; see the gain in economy! With what a horde of 
 tax-gathering and tax-assessing officials could we dispense;' 
 what swearing and examination and nosing around to find 
 out what men have or what they are worth ! 
 
 Now take the matter of justice. We single-tax men are 
 not deniers of the rights of property; but, on the contrary, 
 we are the upholders and defenders of the rights of prop- . 
 erty. We say that the great French convention was right 
 when it asserted the sacred right of property; that there 
 is a right of property, that comes from no human law, 
 which antedates all human enactments; that is a clear 
 genesis; that which a man produces, that which by his 
 exertion he brings from the reservoir of nature and adapts 
 to forms suited to gratify the wants of man — ^that is his; 
 his as against all the world. If I by my labour catch a 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 313 
 
 fish, that fish is and ought to be mine; if I make a ma- 
 chine, that machine belongs to me ; that is the sacred right 
 of property. There is a clear title from the producer, 
 resting upon the right of the individual to himself, to 
 the use of his own powers, to the enjoyment of the results 
 of his exertion; the right that he may give, that he may 
 sell, that he may bequeath. 
 
 What do we do when we tax a building? When a man 
 puts up a building by his own exertion, or it comes to him 
 through the transfer of the right that others have to 
 their exertion down comes the community and says, vir- 
 tually, you must give us a portion of that building. For 
 where a man honestly earns and accumulates wealth, down 
 come the tax-gatherers and demand every year a portion 
 of those earnings. Now, is it not as much an impairment 
 of the right of property to take a lamb as to take a sheep ? 
 To take five per cent, or twenty per cent., as to take a 
 hundred per cent.? We should leave the whole of the 
 value produced by individual exertion to the individual. 
 We should respect the rights of property not to any lim- 
 ited extent, but fully. We should leave to him who pro- 
 duces wealth, to him to whom the title of the producer 
 passed, all that wealth. No matter what be its form, it 
 belongs to the individual. We should take for the uses 
 of the community the value of land for the same reason. 
 It belongs to the community because the growth of the 
 community produces it. 
 
 What is the reason that land in San Francisco to-day 
 is worth so much more than it was in 1860 or 1850 ? Why 
 is it that barren sand, then worth nothing, has now be- 
 come so enormously valuable? On account of what the 
 owners have done? No. It is because of the growth of 
 the whole people. It is because San Francisco is a larger 
 city; it is because you all are here. Every child that is 
 
314 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 born ; every family that comes and settles ; every man that 
 does anything to improve the city, adds to the value of 
 land. It is a value that springs from the growth of the 
 community. Therefore, for the very same reason of jus- 
 tice, the very same respect for the rights of property which 
 induces us to leave to the individual all that individual 
 effort produces, we should take for the community that 
 value which arises by the growth and improvement of the 
 community. 
 
 What would be the direct result? Take this city, this 
 State or the whole country; abolish all taxes on the pro- 
 duction of wealth; let every man be free to plough, to 
 sow, to build, in any way add to the common stock with- 
 out being fined one penny. Say to every man who would 
 improve, who would in any way add to the production of 
 wealth: Go ahead, go ahead; produce, accumulate all you 
 please; add to the common stock in any way you choose; 
 you shall have it all; we shall not fine or tax you one 
 penny. What would be the result of abolishing all these 
 taxes that now depress industry; that now fall on labour; 
 that now lessen the profits of those who are adding to the 
 general wealth? Evidently to stimulate production; to 
 increase wealth; to bring new life into every vocation of 
 industry. And mark the results. 
 
 On the other side what would be the effect when abolish- 
 ing all these taxes that now fall on labour or the products 
 of labour, if we were to resort for public revenue to a 
 tax upon land values; a tax that would fall on the owner 
 of a vacant lot Just as heavily as upon the man who has 
 improved a lot by putting up a house; that would fall on 
 the speculator who is holding 160 acres of agricultural 
 land idle, waiting for a tenant or a purchaser, as heavily 
 as it would fall upon the farmer who had made the 160 
 acres bloom? Why, the result would be everywhere that 
 
TAXA.TION THE MEANS 315 
 
 the dog in the manger would be checked; for the result 
 everywhere would be that the men who are holding natural 
 opportunities, not for use but simply for profit, by de- 
 manding a price of those who must use them, would have 
 either to use their land or give way to somebody who 
 would. 
 
 Everywhere from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the 
 lakes to the gulf, opportunities would be opened to labour ; 
 there would come into the labour market that demand for 
 the products of labour that never can be satisfied — ^the de- 
 mands of labour itself. We should cease to hear of the 
 labour question. The notion of a man ready to work, 
 anxious to work, and yet not able to find work, would be 
 forgotten, would be a story of the misty past. 
 
 Why, look at it here to-day, in this new country, where 
 there are as yet only sixty-five millions of us scattered over 
 a territory that in the present stage of the arts is suffi- 
 cient to support in comfort a thousand millions; yet we 
 are actually thinking and talking as if there were too 
 many people in the country. We want more wealth. Why 
 don't we get it ? Is any factor of production short ? What 
 are the factors of production? Labour, capital and land; 
 but to put them in the order of their importance: land, 
 labour, capital. We want more wealth; what is the result ? 
 Is it in labour; is there not enough labour? Ko. Prom 
 all parts of the United States we hear of what seems like 
 a surplus of labour. We have actually got to thinking 
 that the man who gives another employment is giving 
 him a boon. Is there any scarcity of capital? Why, so 
 abundant is capital to-day that United States bonds, 
 bought at the current rate, wiU only yield a fraction over 
 two per cent, per annum. So abundant is capital that there 
 can be no doubt that a government loan could be floated 
 to-day at two per cent., and little doubt but that it would 
 
316 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 soon command a premium. So abundant is capital that 
 all over the country it is pressing for remunerative em- 
 ployment. If the limitation is not in labour and not in 
 capital, it must be in land. 
 
 But there is no scarcity of land from the Atlantic to 
 the Pacific, for there you will find unused or only half- 
 used land. Aye, even where population is densest. Have 
 you not land enough in San Francisco ? Go to that great 
 city of New York, where people are crowded together so 
 closely, the great majority of them, that physical health 
 and moral health are in many cases alike impossible; 
 where, in spite of the fact that the rich men of the whole 
 country gravitate there, only four per cent, of the fami- 
 lies live in separate houses of their own, and sixty-five 
 per cent, of the families are crowded two or more to the 
 single floor — crowded together layer on layer, in many 
 places, like sardines in a box. Yet, why are there not 
 more houses there ? liot because there is not enough capi- 
 tal to build more houses, and yet not because there is not 
 land enough on which to build more houses. To-day one 
 half of the area of New York City is unbuilt upon — is ab- 
 solutely unused. When there is such a pressure, why don't 
 people go to these vacant lots and build there? Because, 
 though unused, the land is owned; because, speculating 
 upon the future growth of the city, the owners of those 
 vacant lots demand thousands of dollars before they will 
 permit any one to put a house upon them. 
 
 What you see in New York, you may see everywhere. 
 Come into the coal fields of Pennsylvania; there you will 
 frequently find thousands and thousands of miners unable 
 to work, either locked out by their emploj'ers, or striking 
 as a last resource against their pitiful wages being cut 
 down a little more. 
 
 Why should there be such a struggle ? Why don't these 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 317 
 
 men go to work and take coal for themselves? N'ot be- 
 cause there is not coal land enough in those mining dis- 
 tricts. The parts that are worked are small as compared 
 to her whole coal deposits. The land is not all used, but 
 it is all owned, and before the men who would like to go 
 to work can get the opportunity to work the raw material, 
 they must pay thousands of dollars per acre for land that 
 is only nominally taxed to its owner. 
 
 Go west, find people filing along, crowding around every 
 Indian reservation that is about to be opened; travelling 
 through unused and half-used land in order to get an 
 opportunity to settle — ^like men swimming a river in order 
 to get a drink. Come to this State, ride through your 
 great valleys, see those vast expanses, only dotted here 
 and there by a house, without a tree; those great ranches, 
 cultivated as they are cultivated by blanket men, who have 
 a little work in ploughing time, and some more work in 
 reaping time, and who then, after being fed almost like 
 animals, and sheltered worse than valuable animals are 
 sheltered, are enforced to tramp through the State. It is 
 the artificial scarcity of natural opportunities. 
 
 Is there any wonder that under this treatment of the 
 land all over the civilised world there should be want and 
 destitution? Aye, and suffering — degradation worse in 
 many cases than anything known among savages, among 
 the great masses of the people ? 
 
 How could it be otherwise in a world like this world, 
 tenanted by land animals, such as men are? How could 
 the Creator, so long as our laws are what they are — ^how 
 could He Himself relieve it? Suppose that in answer to 
 the prayers that ascend for the relief of poverty, the 
 Almighty were to rain down wealth from heaven or cause 
 it to spout up from the bowels of the earth, who, under our 
 system, would own it ? The landowner. There would be 
 
318 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 no benefit to labour. Consider, conceive any kind of a 
 world your imagination will permit. Conceive of heaven 
 itself, which, from the very necessities of our minds, we 
 cannot otherwise think of than as having an expansion of 
 space — ^what would be the result in heaven itself, if the 
 people who should first get to heaven were to parcel it out 
 in big tracts among themselves? Oh, the wickedness of 
 it; oh, the blasphemy of it! Worse than atheists are 
 those so-called Christians, who by implication, if not by 
 direct statement, attribute to the God they call on us to 
 worship, the God that they say with their lips is all love 
 and mercy, this bitter suffering which to-day exists in the 
 very centres of our civilisation. Good heavens ! When I 
 was last in London, the first morning that I spent there, 
 I rose early and walked out, as I always like to walk when 
 I go to London, through streets whose names I do not 
 know; I came to a sign — a great big brass plate, "Office 
 of the Missionary Society for Central Africa." I walked 
 half a block, and right by the side of the Horse Guards, 
 where you may see the pomp and glare of the colour 
 mounting, there went a man and a woman and two little 
 children that seemed the very embodiment of hard and 
 hopeless despair. 
 
 A while ago I was in Edinburgh, the modern Athens, 
 the glorious capital (for such it is in some parts) — ^the 
 glorious capital of Scotland; aye, and I went into those 
 tall houses, monstrous they seemed, those relics of the old 
 time, and there, right in the shadow, in the centre of such 
 intellectual activity, such wealth, such patriotism, such 
 public spirit, were sights that would appal the veriest sav- 
 age. I saw there the hardest thing a man can look at. 
 They took me to an institution where little children are 
 taken in and cared for, whose mothers are at work, and 
 here I saw the bitterest of all sights — ^little children 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 319 
 
 shrunken and sickly from want of food; and the superin- 
 tendent told me a story. He pointed out a little girl, and 
 said that little thing was brought in there almost starving, 
 and when they set food before her, before she touched it 
 or tasted it, she folded her hands and raised her eyes, and 
 thanked her heavenly Father for His bounty. Good God ! 
 Men and women, think of the blasphemy of it! To say 
 that the bounty of that little child's heavenly Father was 
 conceded so. No, no, no. He has given enough and to 
 spare for all that His providence brings into this world. 
 It is the injustice that disinherits God's children; it is 
 the wrong that takes from those children their heritage, 
 not the Almighty. 
 
 Aye, years ago, I said on this platform that the seed 
 had been set. Now the grand truth is beginning to ap- 
 pear. From one end of Great Britain to the other, all 
 through this country, into the antipodes to which I am 
 going — ^wherever our English tongue is spoken — aye, and 
 beyond, on the continent of Europe — the truths for which 
 we stand are making their way. The giant Want is 
 doomed. But I tell you, and I call upon my comrades to 
 bear me witness, whether there is not a reward in this 
 belief, in this work, which is utterly independent of results. 
 
 In London, on one of my visits, a clergyman of the 
 Established Church asked a private interview with me. 
 He said: "I want to talk with you frankly. Something 
 I have seen of your sayings has made me think that you 
 could give me an answer. Let me tell you my story. I 
 was educated for the church; graduated at one of the uni- 
 versities; took orders; was sent to a foreign country as a 
 missionary. After a while I became a chaplain in the 
 navy; finally, a few years since, I took a curacy in Lon- 
 don, and settled here. I have been, up till recently, a be- 
 lieving Christian. I have believed the Bible to be the 
 
320 JUSTICE THE OBJECT 
 
 word of God, and I have rested implicitly on its promises ; 
 and one promise I have often thought of: 'Once I was 
 young, and now I am old, yet never have I seen the right- 
 eous forsaken, nor his seed begging their bread.' I be- 
 lieved that till I came to my own country. I believed that 
 until I undertook the ministerial work in London. I be- 
 lieved it was true. Now I know it is not true; I have 
 seen the righteous forsaken and his seed begging their 
 bread." He said: "My faith is gone; and I am holding 
 on here, but I feel like a hypocrite. I want to ask you 
 how it seems to you." And I told him in my poor way, as 
 I have been trying to tell you to-night, how it is, simply 
 because of our violation of natural justice; how it is, 
 simply because we will not take the appointed way. 
 
 Aye, in our own hearts we all know. To the man who 
 appreciates this truth, to the man who enters this work, 
 it makes little difference — ^this thing of results. This at 
 least he knows, that it is not because of the power that 
 created this world and brought men upon it that these 
 dark shades exist in our civilisation to-day; that it is not 
 because of the niggardliness of the Creator. 
 
 And there arises in me a feeling of what the world might 
 be. The prayer that the Master taught His disciples: 
 "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is 
 in heaven," was no mere form of words. It is given to 
 men to struggle for the kingdom of justice and righteous- 
 ness. It is given to men to work and to hope for and to 
 bring on that day of which the prophets have told and 
 the seers have dreamed; that day in which involuntary 
 poverty shall be utterly abolished ; that day in which there 
 shall be work for all, leisure for all, abundance for all; 
 that day in which even the humblest shall have his share, 
 not merely of the necessities and comforts, but of the rea- 
 sonable luxuries of life; that day in which every child bom 
 
TAXATION THE MEANS 321 
 
 among us may hope to develop all that is highest and 
 noblest in its nature; that day in which in the midst of 
 abundance the fear of want shall be gone. This greed 
 for wealth that leads men to turn their backs upon every- 
 thing that is just and true, and to trample upon their fel- 
 lows lest they be trampled upon; to search and to strive, 
 and to strain every faculty of their natures to accumulate 
 what they cannot take away, will be gone, and in that day 
 the higher qualities of man shall have their opportunity 
 and claim their reward. 
 
 We eaimot change human nature; we are not so foolish 
 as to dream that human nature can be changed. What we 
 mean to do is to give the good in human nature its oppor- 
 tunity to develop. 
 
 Try our remedy by any test. The test of justice, the 
 test of expediency. Try it by any dictum of political 
 economy; by any maxim of good morals, by any maxim 
 of good government. It will stand every test. What I 
 ask you to do is not to take what I or any other man may 
 say, but to think for yourselves. 
 
CAUSES OF THE BUSINESS 
 DEPRESSION 
 
CAUSES OF THE BUSINESS DEPEESSION. 
 
 [A contribution to "Once a Week," New York, March 6, 1894.] 
 
 I AM asked by "Once a Week" to state what, in my 
 opinion, are the causes of the existing business de- 
 pression. It should be possible to do more. For the 
 method that has fixed with certainty the causes of natural 
 phenomena once left to varying opinion or wUd fancy, 
 ought to enable us to bring into the region of ascertained 
 fact the causes of social phenomena so clearly marked and 
 so entirely within observation. 
 
 To ascertain the cause of failure or abnormal action in 
 that complex machine, the human body, the first effort of 
 the surgeon is to locate the difficulty. So the first step 
 towards determining the causes of business depression is 
 to see what business depression really is. 
 
 By business depression we mean a lessening in rapidity 
 and volume of the exchanges by which, in our highly spe- 
 cialised industrial system, commodities pass into the hands 
 of consumers. This lessening of exchanges which, from 
 the side of the merchant or manufacturer, we call busi- 
 ness depression, is evidently not due to any scarcity of the 
 things that merchants or manufacturers have to exchange. 
 Prom that point of view there seems, indeed, a plethora of 
 such things. Nor is it due to any lessening in the desire 
 of consumers for them. On the contrary, seasons of busi- 
 ness depression are seasons of bitter want on the part of 
 
 325 
 
326 BUSINESS DEPRESSION 
 
 large numbers — of want so intense and general that char- 
 ity is called on to prevent actual starvation from need of 
 things that manufacturers and merchants have to sell. 
 
 It may seem, on first view, as if this lessening of ex- 
 changes came from some impediment in the machinery of 
 exchange. Since tariffs have for their object the checking 
 of certain exchanges, there is a superficial plausibility in 
 looking to them for the cause. While, as money is the 
 common measure of value and a common medium of ex- 
 change, in terms of which most exchanges are made, it is, 
 perhaps, even more plausible to look to monetary regu- 
 lations. But however important any tariff question or 
 any money question may be, neither has sufiicient impor- 
 tance to account for the phenomena. Protection carried 
 to its furthest could only shut us off from the advantage 
 of exchanging what we produce for what other countries 
 produce; free trade carried to its furthest could only give 
 us with the rest of the world that freedom of exchange 
 that we already enjoy between our several States; while 
 money, important as may be its ofifiee as a measure and 
 flux of exchanges, is stUl but a mere counter. Seasons of 
 business depression come and go without change in tariffs 
 and monetary regulations, and exist in different countries 
 under widely varying tariffs and monetary systems. The 
 real cause must lie deeper. 
 
 That it does lie deeper is directly evident. The les- 
 sening of the exchanges by which commodities pass into 
 the hands of consumers is clearly due, not so much to 
 increased difficulty in transferring these commodities as 
 to decreased ability to pay for them. Every busi- 
 ness man sees that business depression comes from lack 
 of purchasing power on the part of would-be consum- 
 ers, or, as our colloquial phrase is, from their lack of 
 money. But money is only an intermediary, perform- 
 
CATTSES AND CTJEE 327 
 
 ing in exchanges the same ofBce that poker-chips do in a 
 game. In the last analysis it is a labour certificate. The 
 great mass of consiuners obtain money by exchanging their 
 labour, or the proceeds of their labour, for money, and with 
 it purchasing commodities. Thus what they really pay 
 for commodities with is labour. It is not merely true in 
 the sense he meant it that, as Adam Smith says, "Labour 
 was the first price, the original purchase money that was 
 paid for all things." It is the final price that is paid for 
 aU things. 
 
 The lessening of "effective demand," which is the proxi- 
 mate cause of business depression, means, therefore, a 
 lessening of the ability to convert labour into exchange- 
 able forms — ^means what we call scarcity of employment. 
 These two phrases are, in fact, but different names for 
 different aspects of one thing. What from the side of the 
 business man is "business depression," is, from the side 
 of the workman, "scarcity of employment." The one al- 
 ways comes with the other and passes away with the other. 
 They act on each other, and again react, as when the mer- 
 chant or manufacturer discharges his employees on ac- 
 count of business depression, and thus adds to scarcity of 
 employment. But in the primary causal relation scarcity 
 of employment comes first. That is to say, scarcity of 
 employment does not come from business depression, as 
 is sometimes assumed, hut business depression comes from 
 the scarcity of employment. For it is the effective de- 
 mand for consumption that determines the extent and di- 
 rection in which labour will be expended in producing 
 commodities — not the supply of commodities that deter- 
 mines the demand. 
 
 What is employment? It is the expenditure of exer- 
 tion in the production of commodities or satisfactions. It 
 is what, in a phrase having clearer connotations, we term 
 
328 BUSINESS DEPRESSION 
 
 work. For the term employment is, for economic use, 
 somewhat confused hy our habitual distinction between 
 employers and employees. This distinction only arises 
 from the division of labour, and disappears when we con- 
 sider first principles. I employ a man to black my boots. 
 He expends his labour to give me the satisfaction of pol- 
 ished boots. What is the five cents I give him in return? 
 It is a counter or chip through which he may obtain at will 
 the expenditure of labour to that equivalent in any of 
 various forms— food, shelter, newspapers, a street-car ride, 
 and so on. In final analysis the transaction is the same 
 as if I had employed him to black my boots and he had 
 employed me to render to him some of these other services ; 
 or as if I had blacked my own boots and he had performed 
 these other services for himself. Even in a narrow view 
 there are only three ways by which men can live — ^by work, 
 by beggary and by theft; for the man who obtains work 
 without giving work is, economically, only a beggar or a 
 thief. But on a larger view these three come down to 
 one, for beggars and thieves can only live on workers. It 
 is human labour that supplies aU the wants of human 
 life — as truly now, in all the complexities of modern civil- 
 isation, as in the beginning, when the first man and first 
 woman were the only human beings on the globe. 
 
 Now, employment, or work, is the expenditure of labour 
 in the production of commodities or satisfactions. But 
 on what? Manifestly on land, for land is to man the 
 whole physical universe. Take any country as a whole, 
 or the world as a whole. On what and from what does its 
 whole population live ? Despite our millions and our com- 
 plex civilisation, our extensions of exchanges and our in- 
 ventions of machines, are we not all living as the first man 
 did and the last man must, by the application of labour 
 to land? Try a mental experiment: Picture, in imagina- 
 
CAUSES AND CUBE 329 
 
 tioiij the farmer at the plough, the miner in the ore vein, 
 the railroad train on its rushing way, the steamer cross- 
 ing the ocean, the great factory with its whirring wheels 
 and thousand operatives, builders erecting a house, line- 
 men stringing a telegraph wire, a salesman selling goods, 
 a bookkeeper casting up accounts, a bootblack polishing 
 the boots of a customer. Make any such picture in ima- 
 gination, and then by mental exclusion withdraw from it, 
 item by item, all that belongs to land. What will be left ? 
 Land is the source of all employment, the natural ele- 
 ment indispensable to all work. Land and labour — ^these 
 are the two primary factors that, by their union, produce 
 all wealth and bring about all material satisfactions. 
 Given labour — that is to say, the ability to work and the 
 willingness to work — and there never has and never can 
 be any scarcity of employment so long as labour can obtain 
 access to land. Were Adam and Eve bothered by "scar- 
 city of employment"? Did the first settlers in this coun- 
 try or the men who afterwards settled those parts of the 
 country where land was still easily had know anything of 
 it? That the monopoly of land — the exclusion of labour 
 from land by the high price demanded for it — ^is the cause 
 of scarcity of employment and business depressions is as 
 clear as the sun at noonday. Wherever you may be that 
 scarcity of employment is felt — whether in city or village, 
 or mining district or agricultural section — how far wUl 
 you have to go to find land that labour is anxious to use 
 (for land has no value until labour will pay a price for 
 the privilege of using it), but from which labour is de- 
 barred by the high price demanded by some non-user ? In 
 the very heart of New York City, two minutes' walk from 
 Union Square will bring you to three vacant lots. For 
 permission to use the smallest and least valuable of these 
 a rental of $40,000 a year has been offered and refused. 
 
330 BUSINESS DEPRESSION 
 
 This is but an example of what may everywhere be seen, 
 from the heart of the metropolis to the Cherokee Strip. 
 Where labour is shut out from land it wastes. Desire 
 may remain, but "effective demand" is gone. Is there 
 any mystery in the cause of business depression ? Let the 
 whole earth be treated as these lots are treated, and who 
 of its teeming millions coidd find employment? 
 
 At the close of the last great depression I made "An 
 Examination of the Cause of Industrial Depression" in a 
 book better known by its main title, "Progress and Pov- 
 erty," to which I woidd refer the reader who would see 
 the genesis and course of business depressions fully ex- 
 plained. But their cause is clear. Idle acres mean idle 
 hands, and idle hands mean a lessening of purchasing 
 power on the part of the great body of consumers that 
 must bring depression to all business. Every great period 
 of land speculation that has taken place in our history 
 has been followed by a period of business depression, and 
 it always must be so. Socialists, Popidists and charity- 
 mongers — the people who would apply little remedies for 
 a great evil — are all "barking up the wrong tree." The 
 upas of our civilisation is our treatment of land. It is 
 that which is converting even the march of invention into 
 a blight. 
 
 Charity and the giving of "charity work" may do a 
 little to alleviate suffering, but they cannot cure business 
 depression. For they merely transfer existing purchasing 
 power. They do not increase the sum of "effective de- 
 mand." There is but one cure for recurring business de- 
 pression. There is no other. That is the single tax — ^the 
 abolition of all taxes on the employment and products of 
 labour and the taking of economic or ground rent for the 
 use of the community by taxes levied on the value of land, 
 irrespective of improvement. For that would make land 
 
CAUSES AND CURE 331 
 
 speculation unprofitable, land monopoly impossible, and 
 so open to the possessors of the power to labour the ability 
 of converting it by exertion into wealth or purchasing 
 power that the very idea of a man able to work, and yet 
 suffering from want of the things that work produces, 
 would seem as preposterous on earth as it must seem in 
 heaven. 
 
PEACE BY STANDINa ARMY 
 
PEACE BY STANDING AEMY. 
 
 [Speech at the labour meeting, Cooper Union, New York, July 12, 
 1894, called to protest against President Cleyeland's sending Federal 
 troops to Chicago during the great railroad strike. Contrary to the rule 
 of omission followed in the preceding addresses, the interruptions of the 
 audience are here inserted, as being needed to show the full nature of the 
 •] 
 
 Mr. Chairman and Fellow-Citizens: 
 
 I COME here to-night, at considerable personal incon- 
 venience, to discharge what I believe to be a duty. I 
 come here to talk to you, as I have always talked, frankly 
 and plainly. In some things I do not agree with the men 
 who have invited me to come here. In some things I prob- 
 ably differ from the majority of this audience. I do not 
 believe in strikes. (Hisses and faint cheers.) I am not 
 disposed to denounce George M. Pullman. (Prolonged 
 hisses and groans.) I come here as a citizen, as a Demo- 
 crat — (Slight applause, followed by hisses and groans, con- 
 tinuing for several minutes) 
 
 — I come as a Democrat who, from his great tariff mes- 
 sage in 1887, has earnestly and with all his strength and 
 ability supported Grover Cleveland (more hisses and 
 groans), to protest against his action. (Great cheers.) 
 
 I come here to say what no daily paper in New York 
 City has dared to say — ^that the action of Grover Cleveland 
 (hisses and cries of "Order!") in throwing the standing 
 
 335 
 
336 PEACE BY STANDINa AEMT 
 
 army, without call from local authority, into the struggle 
 between the railroads and their workmen, was in viola- 
 tion of the fundamental principles of our Government, 
 and dangerous to the Eepublic. Governor Altgeld (loud 
 cheering) has spoken the true Democratic doctrine. (Re- 
 newed hisses.) You men who are hissing the name of 
 Democracy know no more about that doctrine than do the 
 so-called Democrats who rule and rob this city. The De- 
 mocracy that I am talking about, the Democracy to which 
 I belong and as a representative of which I stand here, is 
 not that Democracy ; it is the Democracy of Thomas Jeffer- 
 son ! It is not, the false Democracy of to-day, but it is the 
 true Democracy; the Democracy that believes in equal 
 rights to all and special privilege to none ; the Democracy 
 that would crush monopolies under its foot. (Cheers.) It 
 is not the Democracy which now rules, but the Democracy 
 that I trust soon wiU. (Long cheers.) 
 
 I am not a lawyer. I have had no time to make a 
 special study of the matter from a legal standpoint. I 
 cannot say how far, if at aU, the President has violated 
 the written law of the land. But this I do say positively : 
 he has violated that law more important than the written 
 law; he has violated the fundamental principles of our 
 poliiy. (Cheers.) 
 
 The doctrine that the Federal power should be slow to 
 interfere in that in which it is not directly concerned is 
 a foundation stone of our Eepublic. Governor Altgeld and 
 Governor Waite are right. (Cheers.) If the standing 
 army is to be sent into the States of this nation as it has 
 been sent into ihe State of Illinois and other States, if 
 the Federal Executive of its own motion is to undertake 
 to keep the peace between citizens throughout the land, 
 what shall the end be? We shall need a standing army 
 of hundreds of thousands of men. The moment this prin- 
 
CHICAGO RAILROAD STRIKE 337 
 
 ciple is acknowledged, there is an end to local self-govern- 
 ment, the Eepuhlic dies, and in all but name and heredi- 
 tary succession the Empire has come. It is the lesson of 
 the history of the world — ^peaoe kept by a standing army 
 is incompatible with a true republic. (Loud cheering.) 
 
 This is a time for every sober man who loves his coun- 
 try and wishes to see it exist in peace and plenty to redeem 
 its promise and fulfil its high destiny, to enter his pro- 
 test against this Presidential action, temperately, firmly, 
 unequivocally. (Cheers.) 
 
 But it is said that the President's action has been to 
 maintain law and order. Let that be granted. Does the 
 end always justify the means? I yield to nobody in my 
 respect for law and order and my hatred of disorder, but 
 there is something more important even than law and order, 
 and that is the principle of liberty. I yield to nobody in 
 my respect for the rights of property, yet I would rather 
 see every locomotive in this land ditched, every car and 
 every depot burned and every rail torn up, than to have 
 them preserved by means of a Federal standing army. 
 That is the order that reigned in Warsaw. (Long ap- 
 plause.) That is the order in the keeping of which every 
 democratic republic before ours has fallen. I love the 
 American Eepublie better than I love such order. (Long 
 cheering.) 
 
 What is the pretence that is made a justification for the 
 action of the President? It is that the running of the 
 mail trains of the United States has been interfered with. 
 Debs has been indicted and arrested, charged with con- 
 spiracy to interfere with the mails of the United States. 
 (Groans and hisses.) Is that charge a true or a fair one? 
 (Shouts of "No !") I do not believe that there is an hon- 
 est man to-day who will say that he believes in his heart 
 that there is any basis for this charge. Debs from the 
 
338 PEACE BY STANDING ARMT 
 
 first declared that he and those who were following him 
 were anxious to carry the mail trains of the United States. 
 
 But the railroads used the United States mail as a tool 
 to crush lahour organisation. (Cheers.) The railroads 
 were the real conspirators so far as conspiracy to interfere 
 with the transportation of the mails is concerned. (Loud 
 cheers.) They did not carry nor attempt to carry the 
 mails on the regular mail trains as usual. If they had, 
 Debs and his men would have seen to it that the mail cars 
 went through. What they did do was to change the posi- 
 tion of the mail cars, and to scatter the mails among all 
 their trains, and demand then that all trains should be run 
 through because there was mail matter on them. (Cries 
 of "Shame !" and long hissing.) 
 
 The conspiracy was by the millionaire monopolists. 
 They deliberately conspired to use the mails so as to call 
 upon the Federal Government to send its troops to crush 
 down their employees. (Cries of "That is right!") 
 
 Look at California, where this struggle has been fiercest. 
 I know something of that State. Citizen of New York 
 as I now am, yet the greater part of my life has been 
 spent in California. The people of that State are an 
 orderly and law-abiding people. Do you suppose that they 
 would look easily upon any movement that contemplated 
 an interference with the mail service, which means so 
 much to them? I know that they would not. I have not 
 been in California for years, yet to-night I would stake 
 my life that the great majority of the people of that 
 State are in S3rmpathy vnth the employees as against the 
 railroad monopolies. Can there be stronger proof that if 
 law is on one side, justice and liberty are on the other 
 side? When a law-loving people sympathise with viola- 
 tions of law, there must be injustice behind the law. 
 (Applause.) 
 
CHICAGO EAILEOAD STRIKE 339 
 
 The masses of California hate the railroad power, and 
 there is reason why they should. It has been the railroad 
 power that has utterly demoralised California politics and 
 debauched its public service. It is the railroad power that 
 has given the control of that great State into the hands of 
 a few raUroad magnates — such a control as no prince ever 
 exercised over his principality. 
 
 I stood by when the iirst spadeful of earth was turned 
 in Sacramento for the Pacific roads. The men who were 
 then back of that enterprise were but moderately wealthy 
 men — ^the richest of them worth perhaps $100,000. To- 
 day those men, or those who have succeeded them, are 
 multi-millionaires. How did they get their great for- 
 tunes? Not as C. P. Huntington says in a newspaper 
 paragraph this evening — by industry and frugality. 
 (Laughter.) They got those fortunes by robbery — ^by rob- 
 bery that is worse than highway robbery because it has 
 been coupled with the bribery of those whom the people 
 elected to serve them in high office, even on the benches 
 of their courts. (Cheers.) 
 
 These men have used what they got in trust from the 
 Nation and the State, to corrupt the Government of Na- 
 tion and State. They have bought their way from pri- 
 mary elections to the United States Senate; they have 
 made the managers of both parties their henchmen, put 
 their friends on the bench, controlled newspapers, and 
 kept lawyers under fee to take no case against them; they 
 have throttled enterprise and held the State in a bond of 
 iron. Over and over the people of California have re- 
 belled at the ballot only to find after election was over that 
 the railroad was still in control. (Cheering.) 
 
 What is true of California is true of other Western 
 States, and true in large degree all over the country. And 
 this great corrupt power, not content with legislative 
 
340 PEACE BY STANDING ARMY 
 
 coB.trol, has been looking forward to the use of the Fed- 
 eral courts and of the standing army. We have been 
 building ships of war that are of no use unless for the 
 purpose of furnishing some pleasant gentlemen with plea- 
 sure trips and of furnishing the Carnegies with money. 
 (Cheers and laughter.) We now have a standing army 
 of 25,000 men, and there are demands that it shall be in- 
 creased to 50,000 men. In the days when our Govern- 
 ment was weaker, when we had hostile savages on our fron- 
 tier lines, and had real fighting to do, we had an army of 
 only 10,000 men and a navy in proportion. 
 
 What is the reason that we are building ships of war 
 and increasing the size of our army? It is because the 
 millionaire monopolists are becoming afraid of a poverty- 
 stricken people which their oppressive trusts and combi- 
 nations are creating. It is because great wealth, unjustly 
 acquired, always wants the security of standing armies 
 and navies. (Long cheering.) 
 
 I want to speak with the utmost respect of Mr. Cleve- 
 land. (Prolonged hissing and groaning.) No man has 
 been given such high honour from the American people. 
 They made him President once, and then after a four 
 years lapse showed their confidence in him by making him 
 President again, a compliment never paid to any man be- 
 fore. He has received higher honour from the American 
 people than even did George Washington, Thomas Jeffer- 
 son, Abraham Lincoln or Ulysses S. Grant. 
 
 (A voice, "Why did you support him?") 
 
 Why I supported him — why against politicians and pow- 
 ers he was elected — was because I believed, and the people 
 believed, he had sounded the key-note against monopoly. 
 I am slow to attribute to Mr. Cleveland anything but the 
 best motives, but the facts are plain. Kot only has he 
 left undone that which he had asked the warrant and re- 
 
CHICAGO EAILEOAD STEIKE 341 
 
 eeived the command of the people to do, but from the 
 very first, I am sorry to say, he seems to have taken the 
 side, wantonly taken the side, of those very monstrous 
 monopolies that have oppressed the people and which they 
 believed he would begin to break down. (Loud cheering.) 
 
 It is at least the fact that his Federal nppointments in. 
 California have been such as the railroad magnates them- 
 selves would have dictated had they been allowed to dic- 
 tate, and I am not so sure that they were not. To the 
 most important Federal ofiiee in California Mr. Cleveland 
 appointed a man who was denounced at a Democratic State 
 Convention as a traitor to his party because he had sold 
 out to the railroad companies. Mr. Cleveland did this in 
 spite of the fact that these things were formally presented 
 to him by representative men of California. (Hisses.) 
 And his other California appointments, so far as I have 
 learned, are of the same character. 
 
 With Democratic lawyers of national reputation to 
 choose from, one of Mr. Cleveland's first steps was to take 
 as his Attorney-General a corporation attorney, a man 
 whom I, and I think most of you, never had heard of. I 
 refer to Mr. Olney. (Groans.) 
 
 It is from such capturing by great corporate interests of 
 the legal machinery and law courts of the Federal Govern- 
 ment that we get injunctions that look to the punishing 
 of a man for not going to work when he did not choose 
 to go to work, and I fear it is from the same power that 
 the order comes which sends the standing army into States 
 where the State authority has not asked for it, and even 
 protests against its presence. (Groans.) 
 
 You have heard of the Senate sugar investigation, an 
 investigation designed to do anything except to find out 
 facts. (Laughter.) When in Washington, before that in- 
 vestigation was ordered, or the newspaper charges which 
 
342 PEACE BY STANDING ARMY 
 
 compelled it had been made, I was told by reliable author- 
 ity that a Democratic United States senator, who has been 
 once, and if I mistake not, twice, Chairman of the National 
 Democratic Executive Committee and consequently in a 
 position to know, was declaring that the Sugar Trust in- 
 terests must be taken care of in the tariff revision because 
 it had contributed $300,000 to Mr. Cleveland's election. 
 Whether the railroads made any such contributions I do 
 not know. (Laughter and cries of "Certainly they did !" 
 "Sure!" and "You bet!") 
 
 I said in beginning that I came here to say what our 
 >daily papers in New York dared not say. That is true as 
 far as my knowledge goes. But it has only been true since 
 last Saturday. On last Friday, the 6th, the greatest of 
 our Democratic papers, the "New York World," came out 
 in a long and ringing article denouncing the use by Presi- 
 dent Cleveland of the standing army. On Saturday it ate 
 its words of the day before and applauded the President, 
 and has continued to do so ever since. What brought 
 about such a change? If telegrams could be dragged out 
 as the telegrams of the strike managers have been, we 
 might find out; but it certainly was not a change of heart, 
 a change of conviction. It is ominous to find the entire 
 press applauding action which violates so grossly Ameri- 
 can principles and American tradition; but it is even 
 more ominous still, it seems to me, to see the ease with 
 which a power that has bent courts and executive to its 
 will can between sunrise and sunset wheel around a great 
 paper — a paper that in so many things has stood as the 
 exponent of true Democratic principles. (Great applause.) 
 
 But I must stop. (Cries of "No, no; go on!" from all 
 parts of the hall.) I would, indeed, like to go on, but 
 I have exceeded my time, and others are to follow. Still, 
 something yet I must say, but I must be brief. The pur- 
 
CHICAGO EAILEOAD STRIKE 343 
 
 pose of this meeting is not only to express opinion on the 
 action of the President, but to consider the industrial 
 situation. 
 
 Well, what are we going to do about it? (Cries of "Im- 
 peach Cleveland !" "We have the ballot I" "Let us have 
 political action!") 
 
 There is no royal road to relief. It cannot be found in 
 electing this man or that man, or in merely changing from 
 this party to that party. Political action amounts to noth- 
 ing unless it is the expression of thought, not impulse. 
 This is a time which calls for our best and most sober 
 thought. Consider what is proposed. On the one side 
 there are calls for a general strike. Can anything be ac- 
 complished by a general strike? A strike unaccompanied 
 by violence is simply a test of endurance — a trial of who 
 can live longest when the exertion of labour is stopped. 
 Now, as a matter of fact, who can live longest when the 
 earnings of labour are stopped — the men who have wealth 
 ■ in store or the men who are dependent on their daily earn- 
 ings for their daUy bread? the rich man or the poor man? 
 (Applause, and cries of "The rich!") Yes; the rich man 
 every time. (Continued applause.) 
 
 Again, we are told that arbitration is the sovereign 
 remedy — that we must have compulsory arbitration. This 
 is as idle and more dangerous than the cry we used to hear 
 for bureaus of labour statistics. Compulsory arbitration! 
 That must mean, if it means anything, that behind the 
 arbitrators there must be power to enforce their decree. 
 Have you considered what compulsory arbitration means? 
 Arbitrators must be appointed. In the long run who will 
 get the arbitrators, the rich men or the poor men? (Cries 
 of "The rich!" "The rich every time!") Yes; judging 
 from experience, the rich. Are you willing, then, to submit 
 your wrongs to arbitration? (Cries of "No!") To call 
 
344 PEACE BY STANDING ARMT 
 
 far the establishment of courts which^ if they amount to 
 anything at all, are to have power to compel you to work 
 when you do not want to work? ("No, no!" and ap- 
 plause.) 
 
 Then there is a third proposition. The "Morning Jour- 
 nal" of this city is the proposer. It concedes and declares 
 the impolicy and weakness of strikes. It proposes instead 
 of striking that the men in sympathy with the Pullman 
 strikers should keep at work, save their money, and raise 
 a fund which shouJid enable every Pullman striker to 
 leave Pidlman !, Well, supposing you did. Where are you 
 to take them? (Laughter.) Is there a city, a town, a 
 hamlet in this coxintry where their trades are carried, on, 
 that there are not to-day three idle men in those trades 
 for one at work? (Applause.) Suppose you did raise 
 money to take these Pullman strikers out of Pullman, 
 could anything better please Mr. Pullman? Poor as are 
 the wages he pays, would he have any difficulty in filling 
 his works were the strikers, removed? (Applause.) 
 
 I speak of this proposition because it brings us to the 
 heart of the labour question. Strikes, labour troubles, 
 low wages, all the bitter injustice which the masses are 
 feeling, come at bottom from the fact that there are more 
 men seeking work than can find opportunities to work. 
 (Applause and cries of "That is it!") Yet the country 
 abounds in opportunities. Its natural resources are so 
 great as to seem without limit. The trouble is that the 
 natural resources have been monopolised. (Much ap- 
 plause.) 
 
 Let me tell you what I have told you many times before. 
 It is something I must teU you, or I should be dishonest. 
 This whole great organised labour movement is on a wrong 
 line — a line on which, no large and permanent success can 
 possibly be won. Trades-unions, ivith their necessary 
 
CHICAGO EAIIiEOAD STRIKE 345 
 
 weapon, the strike, have accomplished something and may 
 accomplish something, but it is very little and at great 
 cost. The necessary endeavour of the strike to induce 
 or compel others to stop work is in its nature war, and 
 furthermore it is war that must necessarily deny a funda- 
 mental principle of personal liberty — ^the right of every 
 man to work when, where, for whom and for what he 
 pleases. Those who denounce labour organisations and 
 their works use this moral principle against you. Stated 
 alone, it is their strength and your weakness. ("That is 
 true!") 
 
 But above the wrongs which strikes involve, there is a 
 deeper, wider wrong, which must be recognised and as- 
 serted if the labour movement is to obtain the moral 
 strength that is its due. It is the great denial of liberty 
 to work which provokes these small denials of liberty to 
 work. It is the shutting up by monopolisation of the natu- 
 ral, God-given opportunities for work that compels men 
 to struggle and fight for the opportunity to work, as 
 though the very chance of employment were a prize and a 
 boon. ( Applause. ) 
 
 The key to the labour question is the land question. 
 The giant of monopolies is the monopoly of the land. 
 That which no man made, that which the Almighty Father 
 gives us, that which must be used in aU production, that 
 which is the first material essential of life itself, must be 
 made free to aU. In the single tax alone can labour find 
 relief. (Great and long continued applause.)