171.7 
 
Cornell University Library 
 HB 171.7.S88 
 
 Story of a chicken yard. 
 
 3 1924 014 041 713 
 
STOEY OP A CHICKEU YABD - By D. K, 
 
 Published by Appeal to Reason 
 Girard, Kansas 
 
 Once upon a time there was a chicken yard which afforded ample room for 
 all the chickens that lived in it and afforded a great plenty of worms, so that 
 none went hungry who cared to scratch for a living. And the yard belonged to 
 all the chickens and each had a right to scratch where he pleased and all the 
 '^orms that he found belonged to him. So they were all as happy and as fat as 
 all good chickens ought to be. 
 
 But one day a man was disgusted with a work on "Political Economy," for 
 the book contained a lot of nonsense about the "Bights of Capital," "Eent," 
 "Profit" and "interest." So the wise man, tearing the book to pieces, threw it 
 out of the window. 
 
 The wind caught the chapter that had made the wise man so furious and 
 carried it right into the chicken yard. It fell in front of an old able-bodied 
 rooster who looked it over thinking he might find on an advertising page some 
 new kind of food.. He soon became absorbed and said to himself: 
 
 'HThat a fool I have been to scratch all my life for a living when this 
 book tells me how I can get a living for nothing and without work, for why shoulc- 
 I work when I can imake the other chickens work for me?" 
 
 Origin of Property 
 
 So he said to the chickens: Here is a large fat and juicy worm, and 
 as I am not hungry you Ccin have this worm if you will give me Just one little 
 square yard of this chicken yard and let me have it for my own. 
 
 "why, of course, you can have it, you idiot," said the others in a roar 
 of laughter at his folly. What is one little square yard of our vast domain? 
 There is plenty left for the rest of us. Give us your worm and take your square 
 yard wherever you choose." 
 
 "Well, then, I will take the spring in the corner of the yard." 
 
 "Well, you must be crazy. There are no worms in the spring." 
 
 But he held his peace until one of the chickens becoming thirsty started 
 for the spring to get a driiik. Then he cried: Here, you, keep away from that 
 spring. It is mine. 
 
 Then they all began to cackle and said they would take the water anyway. 
 But the rooster read to them out of his Political Economy," and showed them 
 they would encroach on his vested rights if they drank water without his permis- 
 sion. They argued until they were all so thirsty that they could stand it no 
 longer. Then the rooster said: 
 
 "Come, now, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll sell you a dJ^BM^faii^ ' 
 
The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014041713 
 
3. 
 
 for one more sqtiare yard of the chicken yaxd. Of ooiarse you will not miss it 
 out of your vast domain." 
 
 !Eaey were dying of thirst, so they were compelled to accept his offer, 
 -■^•ll had a good big drink and the rooster "owned" another big square yard of 
 their land. It was not many days before he owned the whole chicken yard. Then 
 he said, "HThere are you going to live now? ' 
 
 "why, in the yard," they said. 
 
 "But, this is 'my' yard. I bought it as the reward of abstinence. 
 
 "s^uff , you only abstained from eating one single worm. 
 
 The Pirst Landlord 
 
 "Ah, yes. But then 'I invested the proceeds," and by exercise of 
 'business ac-umen' I acquired possession of the whole yard, and now you cannot 
 live on my land unless you pay me rent. 
 
 "what's rent?" asked a cockerel. 
 
 "fhy, all you have to do is to give me one-half of the worms that you 
 find and then you can still live in my yeard. But as the 'rent must be paid 
 in advance' , you must give me every first wonn and then you can have the sec- 
 ond worm for yourselves, 
 
 "what nonsense. We are still going to eat all the worms that we find 
 just as we have always done. 
 
 But the old rooster showed them from his "Political Economy" how the 
 "interests of labor and capital are identical, because if they did not pay 
 rent, he would close the works and declare a shut-down and not allow them to 
 scratch in his yard at all, and so they would all starve to death. Trom this 
 time they found that they had to work Just twice as hard for a living as 
 they did before, as they h-ad to give half their worms to the rooster for rent; 
 but the rooster did not have to scratch or work at all, as he received for 
 his rent as many worms as all the rest of the chickens put together. Soon 
 his pile of worms began to grow vejry fast and no matter how many he ate, he 
 could not keep it down. He became very fat and lazy and sneered at the work- 
 ing class. So he began looking around for a way to dispose of the surplus, 
 and one day said to a pert young hen with matrimonial intentions: 
 
 "Marry me and you c an live off my pile of worms and not have to scratch 
 or work at all. 
 
 This was entirely in accordance with the hen's highest ambitions and 
 she immediately accepted the proposal. But the other chickens raised a lotid 
 to-do and said: ' It is true that you claim to have bought our yard with your 
 abstinence, but from what has the hen abstained that she gets the product of 
 our labor for nothing?" 
 
3. 
 
 "Now, see here," said the rooster. "This whole land belongs to me, 
 and I am going to do with my property as I wish. It is entirely a matter of 
 private "business, with \vhich you have nothing to do. 
 
 "But excuse us, it seems as if we had something to do with it, when 
 you get half of all the worms that we dig. We are compelled to work one-half 
 of each day for you and have only the other half to work for ourselves. 
 
 "Well, if you do not like the way the "business interests of this yard 
 are conducted, you can get out of it and get off the earth. 
 
 Lusuxy- Loving Booster 
 
 So the other chickens had to submit, and the capital of the country 
 grew larger and larger, until it "smelled to heaven. Then the chickens said: 
 You cannot eat all those worms if you live a htindred years. What is the use 
 of piling them up? 
 
 "Oh, hut," he said, "l am going to have a large retinue to help me con- 
 siime the surplus." So he told one of them to spread out his wings in front 
 of him so as to shade hiia^from the hot sunshine, and another to fan him with 
 his wings, as he was Hoo fat and lazy to do it himself. Then he had a 
 nice little hen for a manicurist to trim his claws, and a massage chicken to 
 rub him down in an effort to keep down the fat. And he told all of his retinue 
 that they could live off his pile of worms. But it was not long before the 
 iroostei' and his wife and their one little chick were complaining of the in- 
 competency of domestic help. 
 
 The rooster was coaxed by his wife to have a new palace coop with gold- 
 en roosts. The: golden roosts were not as comfortable as the wooden ones, but 
 were more swagger. 
 
 But all this time the chickens had been raising broods of their own, 
 and the yard now began to be well filled, so that it became harder to find 
 enough worms for all, especially when they had to give one-half to the old 
 rooster. So the rooster said: I see that I will have to raise your rent 
 and after this you will have to pay me three-quarters of all the worms you 
 find instead of one-half. 
 
 Then the chickens made an outcry and said: When you first made your 
 bargain with us, there were only one-tenth as many chickens in the yard as 
 there are now, and so you are getting ten times as many worms as we bargained 
 for, as we still have to give you one-half of all the wonns that we dig." 
 
 "why, of course,' said the rooster, "that is the natural increase." 
 
 , "Well, v/e cannot afford to pay any more rent, because it is much 
 harder to make a living now that when there were fewer chickens." 
 
Cause of High Hents 
 
 "That is just the reason why you must pay more. Any political economy 
 will tell you that the harder it is to raake a living, the more the living is 
 worth. You must be fools not to know that density of population makes high 
 rents. And now I want to tell you that if you do not stop grtmibling, I will 
 import a lot of other chickens from the outside. We will have foreign immi- 
 gration to keep down the price of lahor and keep up the price of rents. In 
 short, we will open the doors to the poor and oppressed of all nations and 
 they shall come to live in the land of the free and the home of the hrave with 
 us, a ref-uge from the tyranny and injustice of the iron heel of despotism. 
 
 I But the chickens were now in a very bad way, and many of them actually 
 starved to death. So the rooster said: "You must not do that. It would he 
 the height of ingratitude if you should all starve to death, for if you should 
 all die, what would become of me? Why, I might actually be compelled to ecrabh 
 for my own living, -unA my vast domain, without its teeming millions, would 
 be worthless." 
 
 "Well, then, we do not see," said they, "if the teeming millions give 
 all the value to the vast domain, why the vast domain does not belong to the 
 teeming millions." 
 
 'Veil, I certainly do despair of ever teaching you anything about po- 
 litical economy, said the rooster. 
 
 He Explains Interest 
 
 I ' How, " continued he, when you get to the verge of starvation, come to 
 [ me and I will generously lend you some of my wonns and you shall pay me interest.' 
 
 "what's interest?" they said. 
 
 "Why, just before you starve, come to me and I will lend you enough 
 worms to keep you alive, and for every ten you borrow, you shall pay me back 11. 
 
 And often the chickens were so hungry that they were in desperation, 
 compelled to borrow from the pile of wonns, but they soon discovered that it was 
 easier to go without than it was to pay back both principal and interest. 
 
 And now many of them declared that if they could not keep themselves 
 alive, it was a sin and a shame to hatch any more chickens in the world. Then 
 the old rooster read them a long lecture on Race Suicide, because if they died 
 he and his retinue would be compelled to scratch for a living. 
 
 One day after reading his "Political Econon^'', ' he beamed all over and 
 said: "The trouble is overproduction. 
 
 "overproduction, said the chickens in astonishment. "We call it under- 
 consumption. Gjhe idea of calling it overproduction when we are starving to death 
 
 He got out his Political Economy to convince them that they did not get 
 enough to eat because there were too many worms, and that the only way in which 
 they could get any worms to eat was to dispose of the surplus, so that there 
 would not be so many worms, and they could go to work and dig more worms. The 
 chickens fled, fearing some new disaster, but he explained to the few that were 
 left that what they needed was an outlet for the siirplus, and that they must 
 build up a large foreign trade, and that if they made their land the workshop 
 of the world, and sold more than they bought, and rolled up a large balance of 
 trade, they would all get rich. So now he advocated the open door and foreign 
 
5. 
 
 missions to convert the heathen, and went into the world and ■boi:ight all kinds 
 of tinsel and gew-gaws and gimcracks to hang aroimd the necks of his wife and 
 daughter. These gin-cracks were not all comf ortatle , but they tickled the 
 vanity of the fat hen and her silly daughter and made the starving chickens 
 envious sind miserable . But the pile of worms still grew. 
 
 General Prosperity 
 
 Then the old rooster said: "See how prosperous we are. See what an 
 
 enormous foreign trade we have built up. 
 
 "it may be general prosperity, but it is also private starvation, and 
 as usual, the general gets all the honors, while the private gets the knocks. 
 
 "why," said the booster, "see what a profit I have made. I now own 
 all these gim-cracks and my pile of worms is greater than ever before. lEhe 
 high-tide of prosperity will enable us to drive all the rest of the world out 
 of business and we shall have the entire market to ourselves. 
 
 "Wgll, what good will that do us?" said the chickens; "Shall we have 
 to pay less rent?" 
 
 "TUThy, of course not, stupids. Bents will advance on account of general 
 prosperity and increase in population through foreign immigration. And I want 
 you to understand that I will not have any fool talk about labor troubles and 
 arbitration from crazy agitators, who only stir up strife and array one class 
 against another. You must understand that there are no classes in this 
 country and there is nothing to arbitrate. 
 
 The First Sky Pilots 
 
 But the chickens were getting so restive that he said to some of the 
 clever ones, "Come now, you preach to the chickens and tell them that God made 
 one rich and the other poor, and you can live off my pile of worms. You tell 
 them that poverty is a blessing, that they must be content with their lot 
 and must not rebel against the will of the Most High." This quieted them for 
 a while, for they said: ' If we have a hard game here, we shall have just so 
 much better time hereafter." But it was only for a while, for their poverty 
 was awful, aad the upper classes used to say that the lower classes really liked 
 to live iit dirt and filth, but the chickens said: 
 
 "¥e have no time to plume our feathers or even to take a dust bath, 
 W» are too busy trying to get enough to eat. Give us enough to eat and you 
 ■^ill see that we will keep clean. 
 
 But the rooster said: "We will found charities, and I will give ten 
 worms every day if you will give the same, sind we will get up charitable-organ- 
 ization societies. 
 
 "oh, yes," said the uni^rateful chickens, "you take a thousand worms 
 every day and give us back ten and think you are very holy and righteous." 
 
Labor RetToked 
 
 "Uow, see here," said the rooster, "you have "been listening to the^ 
 agitators again. Let me tell you that the interest of laboring chickens will 
 not be looked after by the labor agitators, but by the Christian rooster, to 
 whom (Jod in infinite wisdom has confided the property of this country. 
 
 One day he came home from his foreign tour all in a flutter. For he^ 
 said that a duck, or a duke as he called it, had asked him for the hand of his 
 daughter in marriage. The duck had. told him that he was awfully in debt, but 
 that it would be a fine thing for his daughter to be called a duckess, as he 
 called it, and that papa rooster could pay off all the debts of the duck with 
 his immense pile of worms and in that way he could effectually dispose of the 
 surplus and be relieved from overproduction. The duck also told him that they 
 could all still live off the interest and the profits of the chicken yard. 
 The rooster said further that they were all going to live ahroad with his 
 da\:ighter and son-in-law, the duck, ajid that he bought a place which he had 
 called Skylow Castle, and that the chickens must all be very proud that their 
 country chick was going to be a duckess. 
 
 "Crlory Hallelujah," shouted the chickens, "when he is gone, we can 
 have the yard to ourselves again." But the rooster had left an agent to look 
 after his interests and the chickens found that the agent was harder than the 
 master, because the rooster had a big lot of JTotten debts of the duck to pay 
 off. flut when they all came back and the wedding day arrived, the chickens 
 kissed the feet of the booster and roosteress, and the duck and the duckess, 
 and said how proud they were that one of them was to be a duckess, ajid begged 
 her if possible, to make ducks and drakes of them, which she solemnly promised 
 to do. It was not long after that the news arrived that the rooster had so 
 swelled up that he had burst and was dead. 
 
 The Chickens Are Jubilant 
 
 "Hail, Ooliaribia," cackled the chickens. "Uow we shall surely have the 
 yard back again tot ourselves, just as we had it before." "Hot much," said 
 the argent. "He has left a will and has given the whole yard to the duck and 
 the duckess, 
 
 "But what right," said the foolish chickens , "has the dead rooster to 
 give away our land? He is dead, and can no longer have any interest in it. 
 It is "bad enough to pay rent„and interest and profit to a live rooster without 
 "being compelled to pay it to dead one. The duck and duckess have not prac- 
 ticed abstinence, nor do they even earn the wages of superintendence, and they 
 are not entitled to seven-eighths of the product of our labor. They do not 
 even live here. Why should we be compelled to give them seven-eighths of our 
 time when we are starving? 
 
 "How I want to tell you," said the a.gent,"that we are living under the 
 capitalistic system, and a man has the right to do with his own property as he 
 pleases. When we first started the capitalistic system in this yard, we were 
 the only chickens that could boast of it, but now all the other chicken yards 
 in the world have this same capitalist system, and they are one and all pro- 
 ducing a bigger pile of worms than they consume. For that reason we can no 
 
longer sell from our pile of worms, and tmless you use it to support the duck 
 eind duckess in idleness and luxury, we shall ts compelled to stop all digging 
 cf worms and shut down the works. 
 
 "Well, if we cannot dig worms, how are we to live?" cried the chickens c 
 
 "That is just it. You will all starve, so you might as well suhmit. 
 
 "Well, now, see here. We are not going to starve, nor are we going to 
 suhmit. We are going to take this chicken yard and stop paying interest and 
 profit." 
 
 Successful Rebellion 
 
 "What," shouted the agent, horrified, "would you violate the sacred 
 rights of capital? Would you trample on vested rights? Would you "break the 
 laws of rent and interest and profits? Would you treat with disrespect the 
 laws of political economy? Would you confiscate other chickens' property? 
 For shame, you are no better than Socialists." 
 
 "AU ;right," said they, "if that be Socialism, then we will all be 
 Socialists. This can be borne no longer, and we are going to have that which 
 was stolen from us. We are going to own our own yard and we are going to eat 
 all the worms that we find. 
 
 And when the agent saw that they were determined, he decamped and was 
 never seen in the yard again. And the whole yard once more belongs to all the 
 chickens, and they all have a right to scratch where they please, and all the 
 worms that each finds belong to the finder and all have enoi:igh who are willing 
 to scratch for a living. 
 
 "Well, we did not think it was so easy," said the chickens.