BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1691 Date Due M/yf 2 2 Nov 18^? MAR 11 r ^l 4)iGi^-ffl^s-M V. Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022602415 Cornell University Library HX 86.H65 Socialism in theory and practice / 3 1924 022 602 415 SOCIALISM IN THEORY AND PRACTICE THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO ATLANTA ■ SAN FRANCISCO MACMILLAN & CO., Limited LONDON • BOMBAY * CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. TORONTO SOCIALISM IN THEORY AND PRACTICE BY MORRIS HILLQUIT AUTHOR OF "HISTORY OF SOCIALISM IN THE UNITED STATES" Neto gorfe THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1909 .^Ok,N|il.(.: Ail rishts reserved Copyright, 1909, Bv THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped. Published February, igog. . J. S. Gushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co. ,'") Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. PREFACE The socialist movement has grown immensely within the last decade, and its growth still continues unabated in all civilized countries of the world. What is the secret of that growth ; what are the aims and methods of the movement; and what does it portend for the future of the human race ? These are questions which persons of intellect can ignore no longer, and they are questions which cannot be answered without much thought and study. In this book I have endeavored to present to the public a brief summary of the socialist philosophy in its bearing on the most important social institutions and problems of our time, and a condensed account of the history, methods, and achievements of the socialist movement of the world. Socialism is a criticism of modern social conditions, a theory of social progress, an ideal of social organiza- tion, and a practical movement of the masses. To be fully understood it must be studied in all of these phases, and the fact that this book is probably the first attempt to accomplish that task, inadequate as that attempt may be, is sufficient justification for its publication. Grateful acknowledgment is hereby made for many valuable suggestions which I have received from Mr. W. J. Ghent, who has carefully read the proofs, and from Mr. Rufus W. Weeks, who has read the manuscript. MORRIS HILLQUIT. New York, January lo, 1909. CONTENTS PART I THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT CHAPTER I Introduction CHAPTER n Socialism and Individualism The System of Individualism . . . . ^ . . .12 The Individual and Society 18 Individualism in Industry 24 The Individual under Socialism 29 CHAPTER III Socialism and Ethics The Essence and Scope of Ethics 36 The Evolution of the Moral Sense 46 Class Ethics . . -52 The Ethical Ideal and Socialist Morality . . . ' . 58 CHAPTER IV Socialism and Law The Law 66 The Feudal System of Law 72 The Modern System of Law 78 Social Legislation and Socialist Jurisprudence ... 84 vii VIU CONTENTS CHAPTER V * Socialism and the State PAGE Nature and Evolution of the State 89 The Transitional State 100 The Spcialist State 105 Production and Distribution of Wealth under Socialism . .111 Incentive under Socialism 119 The Political Structure of the Socialist State . . . -131 CHAPTER VI Socialism and Politics Politics, Representative Government and Political Parties Classes and Class Struggles in Modern Society The Class Struggles in Politics The Socialist Party in Politics Electoral Tactics of the Socialist Party . Parliamentary Tactics of the Socialist Party Political Achievements of Socialism 144 153 161 168 174 181 190 PART II SOCIALISM AND REFORM CHAPTER I Introduction — Socialists and Social Reformers 307 CHAPTER II The Industrial Reform Movements Industrial Reform 214 Factory Reform 211: Shorter Workday 218 Child Labor _ 224 Woman Labor 2-j The Trade Union Movement 236 Cooperative Societies of Workingmen 242 CONTENTS IX CHAPTER III f FAGB Workingmen's Insurance 254 CHAPTER IV The Political Reform Movements Political Reform 269 Universal Suffrage 272 Proportional Representation 274 Referendum, Initiative and Right of Recall .... 277 Socialism and Woman Suffrage 281 CHAPTER V Administrative Reforms Government Ownership 284 Tax Reforms 288 The Single Tax 291 Abolition of Standing Armies 296 CHAPTER VI Social Reform Crime and Vice 303 Intemperance ' . • • 309 The Housing of the Poor 314 APPENDIX Historical Sketch of the Socialist Movement Early History 320 Germany 33S France 337 Russia 340 Austria 34S England 346 Italy 348 Belgium and Holland 349 The Scandinavian Countries 35° United States 35' The New International 354 Index 357 PART I THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION The history of our civilization presents one unbroken chain of social changes. The interval between the primi- tive tribe of cave-dwellers and modem industrial society is filled with a variety of intermediate social types. Each of these types constitutes a separate phase of civilization. Within the same civilization each type is superior to the one preceding it, and inferior to the one succeeding it. Each phase of civiUzation is evolved from the preceding phase and gives birth to the succeeding phase. Each phase of civilization passes through the stages of formation, bloom, and decay. The present phase of our civilization forms no excep- tion to this immutable rule of social development. . We have reached a state vastly superior to all conditions of the past. Men in modem society on the whole enjoy more individual freedom and security, more physical comforts and intellectual and aesthetic pleasures than did the sav- ages and members of societies based on slavery or serf- dom. But we have not reached perfection. We never shall reach perfection. A state of perfection in society would imply the arrest of all human endeavors and progress, the 3 4 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT death of eivilization. It is improvement, not perfection, for which we are striving, and our contemporary social organization is capable of improvement just as all societies of the past were. Our social order of to-day did not spring into existence suddenly and full-fledged. It developed gradually from preceding social conditions, and it is still in process of evolution. It has had its period of formation, and the socialists contend that it has passed its period of bloom. It has entered on the stage of decay and must be followed by a new phase of civilization of a more advanced type. The all-important factor in modern society is industry. In former ages industry — that is, production of goods for exchange — played a rather subordinate part in the lives of the nations. Agriculture was the basis of the com- munity. But recent times, and particularly the last century, have witnessed a stupendous industrial growth. The modest workshop of former ages has been superseded by the huge modem factory; the simple, almost primitive tool of the old-time mechanic has developed into the gigantic machine of to-day; and the power of steam and electricity has increased the productivity of labor a hundred fold. New objects of use have been invented, new needs have been created, while the railroads, steamships and other im- proved means of communication and distribution have imited the entire civilized world into one international market. This industrial revolution has brought in its wake a radical change of social institutions. It has created new classes of society. The privileged type of former ages, the landowning and titled nobleman, the courtier and INTRODUCTION 5 warrior, has been relegated to the background, and in his place has arisen the captain of industry — the modem capitalist. With the ancient aristocracy have also disappeared the ancient types of the dependent class, the slave and the serf, and their place has been taken by the modem wage worker. ' In the earlier stages of its career the capitalist class was revolutionary and useful. It abolished absolute monarch- ies and introduced modem representative government, it rooted out old prejudices and beliefs, it tore down the arti- ficial barriers between nations, it gave to the world the most marvelous inventions, and ushered in a distinctly superior system of society. But these achievements belong largely to the pioneer days of capitalism, to the period when the modem indus- tries were in process of formation. To-day our prin- cipal industries are fully organized. They have largely been reduced to mere routine and their progress depends but little on individual initiative. The typical capitalist of to-day has long ceased to be the manager of the industries. He is "engaged" in what- ever industry the vicissitudes of the stock market and the tricks of stock jobbery may thrust upon him. It may happen to be a railway system or a gas plant, a mine or a steel foundry, a rubber factory or water works, or all of them in turn. He need not know, and as a rule he does not know, the intimate workings of the industry he controls. The actual work of management and operation is done by hired labor, whether such labor be that of the high-priced superintendent or that of a common laborer employed at starvation wages. There is hardly a capitalist to-day 6 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT whose existence is necessary to the continuance of any essential industry. The days of the actual usefulness of the capitalist class in the social economy of the nation are rapidly passing. And like so many other classes in history under similar conditions, the capitalists have become reactionary, and the regime developed by them has be-y ( come irrational, imjust and oppressive. 'i^^d! In the merciless war of competition the big capitalist enterprises are gradually extinguishing the smaller inde- pendent concerns. Our "national" wealth and principal industries concentrate in the hands of ever fewer combines. Trusts and monopolies are becoming the modern form of industrial organization. A new capitalist type is thus de- veloped, the type of the trust magnate and multi-million- aire. But the large masses of the people share but little in the benefits of this unprecedented growth of wealth. While a certain portion of the working class, the trained or skilled laborers, probably enjoy to-day larger material comforts than did their ancestors in the past, the increase of their comforts does not keep pace with the increase of the general productivity and wealth. The condition of this favored class of the working population is one of absolute improvement but of relative deterioration. And side by side with the more fortunate strata of the working class there are the large masses of laborers whose conditions of life have greatly deteriorated, absolutely as well as relatively. Millions of workingmen maintain themselves with difficulty above the bare margin of starvation, while large masses of the population, rendered "superfluous" by the invention of improved machinery, are driven to ..vag abo ndage arid forced into the paths of vice and~ crime. INTRODUCTION 7 The boundless luxuries of the few find their logical coun- terpart in the dire misery of the many. In the mad capitalist race for profits, morals are useless and cumbersome ballast. The earlier merchant and manufacturer had some sense of commercial probity. The modem trust magnate has none. To him all means are fair so long as they satisfy his greed. His ideal is to in- crease his power, to get possession of all the sources of wealth of his country, to own his fellow-men, body and soul. To reach this aim he corrupts legislatures, buys courts of justice, bribes public officials and pollutes the public press. The "interests of industry " — his interests — shape the entire life of modern nations. They influence our laws, dominate our politics, direct our public opinion, determine our internal and external policy, and decide upon war and peace between nations. The trust magnate is a more dangerous potentate than any political despot. And these conmtions are not mere accidental abuses; they are the necessary results of our industrial institutions. Even the beneficiaries of these institutions are without power to change them. The capitalists are driven into the fatal course by the inexorable laws of industrial de- velopment. We may well foresee a time, if the present order lasts long enough, when practically all of our most important industries will have become trusts, when the entire wealth of the nations and all the powers of govern- ment will be in the hands of a small number of monopolists, and when the people will depend upon them absolutely for their physical, intellectual and moral existence. Such conditions are not unparalleled in history. The 8 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT Roman Empire found itself in such a situation in the fourth and fifth centuries of our era, and Roman civiliza- tion succumbed. France faced a similar crisis thirteen hundred years later, but the French nation suppressed the dangerous order and built a better and more vigorous society on its ruins. Will the modern nation share the fate of Rome, or fol- low the example of France? The answer to this momentous question is contained in the question itself. Rome perished for the lack of a class to save it. The slaves were beyond the pale of Roman society, and the proletarians of the capital and the provinces were too ignorant, demoralized and feeble to combat the greedy and profligate patricians. The degenerate Roman popiilation fell an easy prey to the advancing barbarian hordes. In France, on the other hand, the haughty and parasitic nobility was confronted by the men of science, industry, commerce and labor, the vigorous and intelligent "third estate." The "third estate" saved France, even though the salvation was accomplished at the cost of a revolution. Modern society has developed a new " third estate, " — the industrial working class. The working class to-day is the principal social power operating against the formation of a capitalist oligarchy. And it is a power to be reckoned with. The modern workingmen are not the helots of ancient Greece, nor the proletarians of ancient Rome, nor the serfs of mediaeval ages. They are more intelligent and better organized than any dependent class in the past : their conditions of existence and instinct of self-preserva- tion naturally array them against the present system of exploitation of labor, and force them into active resistance INTRODUCTION g against it. As capitalism grows more acute and menac- ing, the cohorts of labor become more unified, powerful and aggressive, and more fully able and determined to carry their struggles to victory. Only half a century ago the labor movement was barely in its inception, weak in numbers, inefficient in organiza- tion and uncertain in its aims. To-day the working- men are organized in legions of powerful trade imions, trained and drilled in the everyday battles for the advance- ment of their conditions of life. In a large number of countries they have created immense cooperative estab- lishments successfully competing with the capitalist enter- prises in the same industries. In all civilized countries of the world they have developed a socialist movement, so uniform in its aims and methods, so persistent in its struggles, so inspiring in its propaganda and so irresistible in its spread, that with perhaps the single exception of early Christianity the movement stands unparalleled in the annals of written history. The trade unions fight the immediate and particular battles of the workers in the factories, mills, mines and shops, and educate their members to a sense of their economic rights. The cooperative labor enterprises train their members in the collective operation and democratic management of industries. The socialist parties emphasize the general and ultimate interests of the entire working class, and train their members in political action and in the administration of the affairs of government and state. Marching over different routes, operating with different methods and conscious or unconscious of the effects of their own activity, all these forms of the labor movement 10 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT make for one inevitable goal : the building up of a new and regenerated society. And the workingmen are not alone in this movement. They receive large and ever larger accretions from all other classes — from the small business men displaced by the trust, the professionals reduced to the state of "intellectual proletarians"; the farmers, exploited less directly but not less effectively by trustified capital, and even from the ranks of the capitalist class itself. The number of men of the "better classes" who embrace the cause of the people from motives of enlightened self- interest or from purely ethical motives grows as the evils of the decaying capitalist system become more apparent. These " desertions " from the ranks of the dominant classes into the camp of the subjugated class, are an infallible sign the approaching collapse of the rule of the former. 'The economic development which has thus furnished the conditions for a radical transformation of society and produced the forces to accomplish it, is also building up the basis of that transformation. The great modern trust organizes industry on a national scale; it regulates the production and distribution of commodities, and brings all workers of the coimtry under one administration. A trustified industry is in its essence a nationalized industry. It would be just as easy to-day for a governmental agency to run such an industry as it is for the individual trust magnates or their agents. And it would be much more just. Our highly effective system of industry is the achievement of many generations, the heritage of all mankind ; our marvelous tools of pro- duction and distribution are the fruit of the collective industry and intellect of the laboring population ; they are INTRODUCTION 1 1 operated collectively by the whole working class, and they are indispensable to the life of the entire nation. In equity and justice the capitalist has no better title to the modern social tools than the slaveholder had to his chattel slaves. Socialism advocates the transfer of ownership in the social tools of production — the land, factories, machinery^ railroads, mines, etc. — from the individual capitalists to the people, to be operated for the benefit of all. This program has been denounced as confiscatory and revolutionary, but it is no more so than was the abolition of chattel slavery. It has been ridiculed as Utopian and fantastic, but it is no more so than the demands of the eighteenth century capitalist for the abolition of the privi- leges of birth were to his contemporaries. Our social progress is a movement towards perfect democracy. The successive stages of our civilization mark the disappearance of one class privilege after another. Why should mankind halt in reverence and awe before the privilege of wealthPR When an heir to millions is bom to-day, he has thd^Same exceptional position in society and the same power over thousands of his fellow-men that the newborn duke or marquis had in times past; and the justice and logic of the situation are the same in both cases. ')A true democracy is one in which all babes are born alike, \ and all human beings enjoy the same rights and oppor tunities. // CHAPTER II SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM The System of Individualism Socialism and individualism are the two main contend- ing principles underlying all modern social theories and movements. Both ideas are, comparatively speaking, new in the history of human thought, and the socials philosophy based on individualism is the older of the twojji Some writers discern the origin of the idea of individualism in the movement of the Reformation, and its first practical application in the demand for liberty of the conscience, i.e., the religious self-determination of the individual. The idea of religious liberty according to the noted Russian scholar, Peter Struve, led to the broader conception of the liberty of the individual, and the latter to the theory of political self-government of the nations. "In connection with the idea of the self-determination of the individual," he observes, "the idea of the self- government of society originates in the same surround- ings and under the same conditions and becomes a mov- ing force. In the study of the events and ideas of the English revolution of the seventeenth century, nothing is more striking than the fact that that wonderful period produced, as with one blow and in quite finished form, the idea of individual liberty, liberalism, as well as the idea of political self-government, democracy." ^ The theory is no doubt historically true, but it utterly • "Individualism i Socialism," Polyarnaya Zvesda, No. ii. 12 SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 1 3 fails to account for the causes of the phenomenon. The religious movement of the Reformation was one of the manifestations of the struggle for individualism, but not its cause. The Reformation and the nascent idea of indi- vidualism involved in it were but the symptoms and results of a deeper and more material process — the birth of the iB^ern social and industrial system, opj^e modern philosophy of individualism came into life '■ks k reaction against the excessive centralization of the feudal state and church, and as a protest against the un- checked powers of the crown, nobility and clergy over the population, and especially over the growing class of in- dustrials. "Individual Liberty" was the battle cry with which the young bourgeoisie (the industrial and trading class) entered the arena of political struggle. That battle cry meant for it freedom of competition — Industrial Liberty ; the right to use the powers of the state for the advancement of manufacture and commerce — Political Liberty ; the freedom from interference by the church with the political and industrial management of the people — Religious Liberty ; and above dl it meant the freedom and sacredness of private propCTta "What they (the liberal bourgeois) meant by the ff^^m of the individual," says Mr. E. Belfort Bax, "was, first and foremost, the liberty of private property as such, to be controlled in its operation by naught else than the will of the individual possessing it. What was cared for was not so much the liberty of the individual as the liberty of private property. The liberty of the individual as such was secondary. It was as the possessor and controller of property that it was specially desired to assure his liberty." ' ' " Socialism and Individualism," London, Personal Rights Series, p. 10. 14 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT The idea of individual liberty thus conceived animates all phases of the struggle of the bourgeoisie against feudal society. It is at the bottom of Rousseau's "Social Con- tract" and the social philosophy of the Encyclopedists; it asserts itself in the principle of non-interference pro- claimed by Adam Smith and the founders of classical political economy; and it is the true meaning of th^ ra^., tionalistic criticisms of Voltaire and his followers. ^d- Individual liberty with or without other verbal adorn- ments was the motto that inspired the battles of the English middle classes under Cromwell towards the end of the seventeenth century, and those of the French " third estate " and the American colonists a century later. "All men are born and continue free," * and "All men are endowed by their Creator with the ' inalienable right ' of liberty," ^ were the maxims adopted as the foundation of all political constitutions by the victorious bourgeoisie otall countries. The battles fought by the pre-Revolutionary bourgeoisie in the name of Individual Liberty have given to civiliza- tion a few great acquisitions. They have to a large extent emancipated man in the purely individual sphere of his life, and rendered into his own keeping his beliefs, views and tastes, his individual mind and soul. The freedom of press, speech, conscience and person are such acquisi- tions, and they are of everlasting benefit to mankind. But the historical watchword had an altogether different fate in the field of politics and industry. In the revolutionary period of the career of our ruling classes "Individual Liberty" in those fields stood princi- • French Declaration of the Rights of Man. ' American Declaration of Independence. SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 15 pally for freedom from arbitrary political, industrial and social restraint, but, with the fall of feudalism and the removal of feudal restraints, the phrase lost its original significance. The manufacturing and trading classes, as the struggling and subjected bourgeois of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, appealed to the sacred right of individual freedom as a means to deliver them from the oppression of the ruling classes of their time ; but the pos- sessing classes of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, themselves in power and confronting a new dependent class, the class of wage workers, invoke the old god of their fathers only in order to strengthen their own rule. The "Individual Liberty" of the modern capitalist has come very largely to stand for the right to deal with his employees as he pleases, the unrestricted right to exploit men, women and children of the working class, and to be free from the interference of the state in his process of exploitation. An economic order based entirely on the principles of "laissez- faire," and a political organization of the type characterized by Huxley as "Administrative Nihilism" are the ideals of the modem priests of the god "Individual Liberty." In the hands of the capitalist individual liberty has de- generated into individual license, its philosophy is that of shortsighted egoism. I The most consistent and logical representative of that philosophy is probably Max Stirner, whose work, "The Ego and His Own," has only recently, more than sixty years after its first appearance, been placed before the English-reading bourgeois to be acclaimed by them with unbounded delight. The views of that philoso- pher of individualism may be summed up in the follow- ing two brief quotations from the work mentioned : — "Away then with every concern that is not altogether 1 6 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT my concern! You think at least 'the good cause' must be my concern. What's good and what's bad ! Why, I myself am my concern, and I am neither good nor bad. Neither has meaning for me. "The divine is God's concern; the human man's. My concern is neither the divine nor the human, not the true, good, just, free, etc., but solely what is mine, and it is not a general one, but is unique, as I am imique. "Nothing is more to me than myself." * And again: — "Every state is a despotism, be the despot one or (as one is likely to imagine about a republic), if all be the lords, 7.fei despotize one over the other." ^ And in this extreme view of individual freedom the liberal , capitalists find themselves entirely in accord with the radical anarchists. Both would rob society of all its social functions. Both base their philosophy on individual competition and the brutal struggle for existence rather than on the principle of human cooperation, both make an idol of individual liberty, both suffer from a morbid exag- geration of the Ego, and both sanction all means to attain the end of individual happiness. The only difference between the conservative and patri- otic capitalist and the violent anarchist is that the former represents the "individualism" of the rich, and the latter ^hat of the poor. <^ The philosophy of individualism supplies a moral and V pseudo-scientific sanction for the economic struggle be- tween man and man, and appeals to the different classes of the population favorably or unfavorably according to their ' Max Stirner, "The Ego and His Own," New York, 1907, p. 6. ' Ibid., p. 256. SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 17 chances and position in that struggle. The ruling classes with their overwhelming economic powers are best equipped for the uneven struggle of existence; they are boimd to prevail in it and to reap all the advantages of the victory if not interfered with — they are, therefore, naturally inclined to individualism. The dependent and non-possessing classes, on the other hand, are powerless in the individual struggle for existence under prevailing conditions. They stand in need of social protection against the abuses of the dominant class, and thus their strength lies in concerted action and cooperation. To the intelligent workingmen, individualism is as repel- lent as it is hostile to their interests — they naturally lean towards the opposite philosophy. Socialism is the mani-, festation of the working class revolt against the excessive \ individualism of the capitalists, just as individualism \ appeared originally as the expression of the revolt of ; the bourgeoisie against the excessive centralization of the ancient regime. The frequent and heated modem discussions on the merits and demerits of the "systems" of individualism and socialism are, therefore, at bottom only the theoretical and somewhat veiled expression of the practical strug between the ruling and dependent classes of our timg In the words of Sidney Ball, "Socialism and Indi-* ism, when contrasted, have an economic connotation," * but in ordinary discussion they assume, as a rule, the guise of purely abstract political or philosophical issues. These issues between the "individualists" and the socialists are many in number and multiform in character, ' "Socialism and Individualism," in Economic Review, Vol. VII, p. 49°- 1 8 THE SOaALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT but for the convenience of treatment they may all be grouped under the following three main heads : — 1. The Relations of the Individual to Society. 2. The Mutual Relations of Individuals in Production. 3. The Fate of Individual Liberty under a System of Socialism. We shall consider the points presented by each of these three subjects separately. The Individual and Society At the bottom of the individualist philosophy in politics lies the conception that organized society is a mere aggre- gation of individuals freely and deliberately associating for certain common purposes — a sort of business part- nership which may be formed, shaped and dissolved by the contracting parties at will. In this view of our social organization every member of modern society is an inde- pendent party to the "social contract" who has entered into contractual relations with society in order to gain some individual advantages and who may cancel these relations if the sacrifices imposed on him should exceed such advantages. The logical result of these views is an attitude of jealousy and suspicion towards organized society or the "state,"* an apprehension that the latter may strive to exact from the individual more than he has bargained to give, that it may "exceed the sphere of its legitimate functions."/ ' For the purposes o£ the present discussion the terms are here em- ployed interchangeably. ' M. Yves Guyot, the leading apostle of individualism in France, would limit the activities of the state to the following functions: — "i. To guarantee exterior and interior security. SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 19 This somewhat crude social philosophy found its clearest expression in the French pre-Revolutionary "literature of enlightenment"; it was the key to the social theories of the English Utilitarian school of Locke, Bentham and Mill, and it held practically undisputed sway of the Mman mind until about the middle of the last century/I The doctrine is most naively asserted in the Massachusetts Bill of Rights, in the following language: "The body politic is formed by a voluntary association of individuals ; it is a social compact by which the whole people covenants with each citizen and each citizen with the whole people, that all shall be governed by certain laws for the common r^But the discoveries in the domain of organic evolution 'and the growing recognition of the laws which are oper- ating to shape individual life everywhere, finally caused the students of social life and phenomena to subject their views to a critical examination. Conditions of social existence, past and present, were carefully investigated and collated, and laws of social development were gradu- ally established. In the light of the newly acquired knowledge the & priori social theories of the early thinkers had to be abandoned one by one, and to-day it is quite generally accepted that organized society is not an arbitrary invention, but the result of a definite and logical process of historical de-j velopment. -^^ It is probable that men never were purely individual "2. To secure to each individual the freedom to dispose of his per- son and the freedom of the environment in vphich he must act. "3. Not to intervene in contracts except to enforce their performance." "Le Socialisme ^ L'Individualisme," Journal des Economisies, June, 1898. 20 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT beings, but that they evolved from gregarious or social ancestors in the kingdom of animal life. "As far as we can go back in the palseo-ethnology of mankind," observes Kropotkin, "we find men living in societies — in tribes similar to those of the higher mammals." And further: "The earliest traces of man, dating from the glacial or the early post-glacial period, afford unmistakable proofs of man having lived even then in societies. Isolated finds of stone implements, even from the old stone age, are very rare; on the contrary, wherever one flint implement is discovered, others are sure to be foimd, in most cases in very large quantities. At a time when men were dwelling in caves, or under occasionally protruding rocks, in com- pany with mammals now extinct, and hardly succeeded in making the roughest sorts of flint hatchets, they already knew the advantages of life in societies." ' The entire history of man's progress has been one of increasing growth and importance of his social organiza- tion. According to Lewis H. Morgan,^ whose studies of social development are among the most complete and reliable contributions to modern sociology, the first definite form of social organization is the primitive family or Gens, which still prevails among certain savages. This is a rather loose form of organization, consisting of a body of human beings descended from a common ancestor. The next step in social development is the Association of Several Gentes or Phratry, which is followed by the closer and more complex organization of the Tribe, a union of many gentes speaking a common dialect and occupying a common territory. From the Tribe to the ' P. Kropotkin, "Mutual Aid a Factor of Evolution," London, 1902, PP- 79> 80. 2 "Ancient Society." SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 21 Confederacy of Tribes, which is formed for mutual defense, and gradually and naturally develops into the Nation, there is but one step. This in brief is the history of social growth in ancient society. With the development of property in goods and land, the social organization gradually transformed itself into a political society based on territorial relations. The Township, the Coimty and the National Domain or State, ^re the successive steps of that development. 1 1 Thus mankind has imperceptibly evolved from an aggre- « Ration of loosely connected social units to the present state of society, in which the entire globe is divided politically into a very small number of governments compactly and closely organized. The process took countless ages for its accomplishment and was in all its phases determined by the instinctive needs of mankind. The successive types of social organization, ever stronger and more compact, were evolved in the in- cessant struggle for existence as efficient weapons in that struggle. "The state," says Professor Ward, "is a natural product, as much as an animal or plant, or as man him- self." f Whatever progress has been made by mankind in its long career has been made through its social organiza- tions. There is no civilization and there is no liberty out- side of organized society, and in this sense the individual man is the child and creature of the state and tied to it/ » with every fiber of his existence.** / / ' Lester F. Ward, "Pure Sociology," New York, 1903, p. 549. * "There never was and there never can be any liberty upon this earth among human beings outside of state organization. . . . Liberty is as truly a creation of the state as is government." — Professor J. W. Burgess, "Political Science and Constitutional Law," Boston, 1890, p. 88. 22 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT The historical and uniform course of the evolution of the state and its overwhelming importance as a factor in human civilization have led the school of thinkers of which Auguste Comte, Saint-Simon and Hegel are the typical representatives, to the opposite extreme — the conception of the state as an organism. The "historical" or "organic" school sees in the abstract phenomenon of the state a concrete and independent being with a life, interests and natural history of its own. To these thinkers human so- ciety is a social organism very much like the biological organism. The social institutions are so many of its organs performing certain vital functions required for the life and well-being of the organism itself, while the indi- vidual members of society are but its cells. Mr. M. J. Novicov,' probably the most ingenious exponent of the "organic" school of sociology, carries the parallelism be- tween the social organism and the biological organism to the point of practical identity, and Mr. Benjamin Kidd, criticising the utilitarian motto, "The greatest happiness of the greatest number," says: "The greatest good which the evolutionary forces operating in society are working out, is the good of the social organism as a whole. The greatest number in this sense is comprised of the members of generations yet unborn or unthought of, to whose in- terests the existing individuals are absolutely indifferent. And, in the process of social evolution which the race is undergoing, it is these latter interests which are always in the ascendant." ^ In short, the state is the end, the citizen is only the ' "Conscience et Volontg Sociales," Paris, 1897; "La Th^orie Or- ganique des Socials," in Annates de L'lnstitut International de Sociolo- gie. Vol. V. J "Social Evolution," p. 312. SOaALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 23 means. It is the old parable of the shrewd Mucius Sce- vola presenting itself before us in the fashionable garb of modern science. And here again the two extremes meet. The extreme individualist deprecates all attempts on the part of the state to regulate the affairs of the citizens, on the plea that the state should not interfere with the liberty of the in- dividual; the extreme sociocrat discountenances all at- tempts on the part of the citizens to model the state in their interests, on the ground that the individual cannot shape the life of the social organism. One bases his objections on the ground of expediency, the other on scientific neces- sity ; but the practical results are the same in both cases — the separation of the state and the individual. Although the ultra "organic" theory of the state has found some adherents among socialist writers,* contem- porary socialism has, on the whole, as little sympathy with the extreme sociocratic view as it has with that of the extreme individualist. It is always dangerous to engraft a ready-made principle of any branch of scientific research on an entirely dif- ferent branch, notwithstanding apparent analogies between the two, and the fallacy of that method is probably best illustrated by the introduction of purely biological laws into the domain of sociology. The social organization of men is a phenomenon vastly different from the biological organism. In the case of the latter it is the organism as such which is endowed with sensation, reflection and life — the individual cell has no conscious life of its own, and serves only to support the existence of the organism. In ' For example, the well-known Marxian scholar, F. v. d. Goes, in "Organische Ontwikkeling der Maatschappij," Amsterdam, 1894. 24 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT the case of the "social organism," on the other hand, it is the individual members of it who are endowed with conscious life, and it is the so-called organism that serves Jto support their individual existences. ^ ^ The state is not the voluntary and arbitrary creation of ( I man, but it is just as little a factor imposed on man by some power outside of him. The state is a product of logical historical development, but that only as an accom- paniment of the logical historical development of man. The individual cannot dissociate himself from society, nor can society have any existence outside of the individuals composing it. The state represents the collective mind and attainments of all past generations, but also the col- lective intellect, will and powers of its present living, feeling and thinking members. The state has the power to regulate the conduct of its individual citizens, but its citizens have the power to determine the scope and nature of such regulations, and the higher mankind ascends in the scale of intellectual development, the more effective is its direction of the fimctions of the state. Man to-day is in a position to employ the state not merely for the good of the abstract "social organism as a whole," nor yet merely for the good of remote generations to come, but for his own present concrete good. This is the view from which all socialist political ac- tivity proceeds, and this view is steadily gaining practical recognition in all spheres of society, as is eloquently attested by the ever greater extensions of the social functions of the! modem state. ^x Individualism in Industry If the tendency of political development of mankind has, on the whole, been in the direction of socialization, SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM' 2$ the same tendency asserts itself even more strongly in the process of industrial development. Individualism in production is a mark of economic immaturity. The primitive man, without experience, tools, weapons or arts, living in trees or in caves, and subsisting on the wild fruit of the tropical forest, may to a large extent be economically independent of his fellow-man in the neigh- boring tree. But the succeeding fishing, hunting, agri- cultural and pastoral occupations already presuppose the existence of certain uniform tools, a certain common ex- perience, common methods of work, and even the possi- bility of occasional exchanges of products. But these early institutions are, on the whole, too un- certain and unexplored to enable us to build any sober conclusions upon them. To ascertain the real tendency of industrial development, we must take a more recent and better-known period, — a period, besides, which has imcov- ered the laws of industrial evolution more clearly than the entire history before it, — the period of the last century. And if there is any doubt in our minds as to the tendency of oiu: industrial life, the examination of this period will rapidly dispel it. In the beginning of the nineteenth century, the produc- tion and distribution of goods was in the main operated on an individualist basis. The artisan worked as an indi- vidual either at his home or in his shop, generally alone and sometimes with the aid of a helper or apprentice. His simple tool was owned and operated by him individually. His product was in most cases due entirely to his indi- vidual labor and skill, and was rightly and properly his individual possession. 26 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT But with the development of the simple tool into a variety of huge, steam-propelled machines, specialized for the mass production of minute parts of commodities, the little workshop grew into the enormous modern factory in which hundreds and thousands of men are brought together from all parts of the country, organized into a complex hierarchy of labor, each one doing one small thing, each working into the hands of the other, all of them collectively producing one article which may have to go through numerous similar operations in other immense and complex factories before it turns into a commodity for direct consumption. The modern machine is a social tool, the modern factory is a social workshop, the modern workingman is a social servant, and the modem goods are social products. Let us take the most simple articles of use : the coat we wear, the chair we sit on, the bed we sleep in, and ask our- selves. Who produced these articles? To answer that question we shall have to consider the unknown thousands who contributed to the work of their immediate design and manufacture, to the production and transportation of the material contained in them, to the work of constructing , the wonderful machinery employed at the countless steps of the process, and to the work of operating the machinery of transportation, etc. In modern production the indi- vidual laborer is practically obliterated ; what is before us is a world-wide community of socially organized labor of all gradations, from the highest and most skillful to the lowest and most common, working together collectively for the needs of our race. And it is this collective labor of our times that sustains modern comforts and modern civilization. Were it pos- SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 27 sible for us to return to the regime of absolute individ- ualism in production, to prepare our own food, make our own clothing, build our own dwellings, without taking advantage of the material prepared by others, without accepting the cooperation of our fellow-men, we should relapse into a state of savagery in less than a generation. While the feature of individualism has been almost eliminated from the field of production by the last century, it has, during that period, shown much greater vitality in the sphere of management of our industries. ,- - 'The management of our industries by individual capi- ttalists for their own private benefit and in rivalry with each other — industrial competition — has for decades been the favorite topic of controversy between the ad- herents of the individualist philosophy and the partisans of the socialist school of political economy. To the sturdy individualist the competitive system of industry is the source of all blessings of civilization : he never tires of extolling the merits of that system as an incentive to in- dustrial enterprise, inventiveness and efficiency, as a char- acter builder and lever of all social and individual progress. The socialist, on the other hand, points a warning finger to the evils of competition: the anarchy in management and waste in production which the system entails, and the tremendous social, economic and ethical losses which it imposes on the producers, the consumers and the com- munity at largeJf But while the discussion on the merits and demerits of competition is assuming ever more intense forms, the mute ' A most notable contribution to that phase of the discussion is the recent work of Mr. Sidney A. Reeve, "The Cost of Competition," McCIure, Phillips & Co., 1906. 28 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT forces of economic evolution, unconcerned by theories and abstractions, are rapidly working towards a practical solution of the problem. The individual capitalist stead- ily yields his place in the industrial world to the corpora- tion and the trust, and the latter combine and consolidate the independent managements of numerous individual concerns imder one corporate direction, and reorganize the management of industries, frequently on a national and even international scale. The irresistible growth of trusts and monopolies is the central fact of all recent economic development, and it sounds the death knell of individual competition. The only sphere of our industrial life in which the prin- ciple of individualism has survived in all its pristine vigor, is that of the appropriation or distribution of the products. Although the instruments of production have become social in their character and use, and indispensable to the entire working community, they are still owned and con- trolled by the individual capitalists. Although the pro- duction of goods is a collective process, and its management and direction are fast becoming so, it is still conducted principally for the benefit of the individual captains of industry. Although all useful members of the community collectively contribute to the so-called national wealth, only a comparatively small number of individuals share in it. In short, although the production of wealth is prac- tically socialistic, its distribution is entirely individualistic. And this contradiction between the modern methods of production and distribution is the only real issue be- tween the individualist and the socialist in the domain of economic discussion. The beneficiaries of the present system of wealth dis- SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 29 tribution have a very obvious material interest in main- taining it, and there never was a ruling class that did not have the abundant support of scientific and ethical theories to justify it in the continued enjoyment of its privileges. In the present case this function is being performed by the school of "individualistic" philosophers and moralizers. The socialists, on the other hand, consider the present system of individual appropriation of social wealth as an anachromsm, a survival of a past economic order, and a disturbing factor in the process of social, economic and ethical progress. The main object of socialism is to adjust the principles of wealth distribution to those of production — to make the one as social and general in function and effect as the other already is. The Individual under Socialism The commonest of all objections to the socialist ideal is that a state of socialism would, endanger individual liberty. From such unimaginative novelists as Eugen Richter' and David M. Parry,' whose conceptions of the socialist commonwealth are those of the modern factory regulations extended to the scope of a national order, up to the thinker of the keenness of mind and universality of knowledge of Herbert Spencer who asserts that "all socialism implies slavery,"' all bourgeois philosophers seem to take it for granted that mankind is to-day enjoy- ing a large measure of individual freedom and that social- ism would greatly curtail if not entirely suppress it. ' " Sozialdemokratische Zukunftsbilder." ' "The Scarlet Empire," Indianapolis, 1906. ' "The Coming Slavery." 30 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT The socialists deny both assertions with equal emphasis. Under our present system of economic dependence and struggles, individual liberty is but a fiction. The very small "leisure class," i.e., the class of persons enjoying a workless and ample income and entirely removed from active participation in the industrial, professional, com- mercial and financial strife, no doubt enjoy considerable individual liberty, but for all other strata of modern society that liberty does not exist. The workingmen, the largest class of the population, are anything but free : their work and their pleasures, their dress and their dwellings, their mode of life and their 1 » habits, are forced on them by their economic condition. / "Not as an exception, but universally," says Mr. H.'D'. Lloyd,' "labor is doing what it does not want to do, and not getting what it wants or needs. Laborers want to work eight hours a day; they must work ten, fourteen, eighteen. . . . They want to send their children to school ; they must send them to the factory. They want their wives to keep house for them; but they too must throw some shuttle or guide some wheel. They must work when they are sick; they must stop work at another's will ; they must work life out to keep life in. The people have to ask for work, and then do not get it. They have to take less than a fair share of the product ; they have to risk life, limb or health — their own, their wives', their children's — for others' selfishness or whim." I^Nor is the workingman alone deprived of individual j\ liberty under present conditions. The toiling farmer bur- dened by mortgages and oppressed by the railroad com- ' Quoted in Richard T. Ely's "Socialism and Social Reform," pp. 209, 210. SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM « 31 panics, the professional man dependent on private and unregulated calls for his services, and the small business man struggling against odds to maintain his "independ- ence," they are all tied to a routine of life and action not voluntarily chosen, but inexorably imposed on them by the economic exigencies of their business pursuits and callings. And even the "powerful" and wealthy, the heads of the modern industrial structure, are anything but free: their wealth as live, active, investment-seeking capital, dominates them and suppresses their individual volition ; they are the slaves of their wealth rather than its masters. All these purely economic checks on individual liberty must of necessity be greatly palliated, if not entirely re- moved, in a socialist community, for the system of socialism implies primarily a state of greater economic security and industrial equality. "But," it is asked, "assuming that socialism would remove some of the elements operating to-day against the full exercise of the freedom of the individual, would it not create new and more formidable restraints upon liberty? Under the present regime the individual has some say in the choice of his occupation and the mode of exercising his trade or calling; under socialism, on the other hand, the state would be the sole employer, and would determine for every citizen what, where and how he should work; would not the citizen thus become the ■ slave of the state?" This argument, so frequently urged against socialism, contains two fundamental errors: it assumes that a so- cialist state may be a power independent of and opposed to the body of individuals composing it, and that in a sys- 32 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT tem of socialism, all industries must be concentrated in and controlled by the national government or " state," The basic principle of every socialist community must be its democratic administration: the socialist state will assume such concrete form, powers and functions as the majority of citizens, unbiased by conflicting class interests, will freely choose to confer on it, and it is not at all reason- able to suppose that these citizens will deliberately encase themselves in an iron cage of rigid laws and rules of their own making. Much more likely the men who will have the framing of the political and industrial system of a socialist common- wealth, will take ample care of their own individual free- dom. Nor is there any reason to suppose that under socialism "the state" would be the sole employer. Socialism im- plies the collective ownership of the social tools of produc- tion, and the collective management of industries based upon the use of social tools. Does that necessarily imply state ownership and management? By no means. Certain industries are even to-day organized on a national scale, and may be best managed or controlled as state functions; others come more appropriately within the scope of the municipal administration, others still may be most efficiently managed by voluntary cooperative asso- ciations with or without state control, while a variety of industries of an individual nature, such as the various arts and Ofafts, must of necessity remain purely individual pursuiteJ|The phantom of the "despotic state" has taken such asffong hold of the minds of our social philosophers trained in the individualistic school of thought, that even writers like Professor Richard T. Ely, of whose candor SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 33 and analytical powers there can be no doubt, and who is by no means unsympathetic to socialism, is not quite free from the fear of it. "Even," says Professor Ely, "if the func- tions of government should be reduced to the lowest forms compatible with socialism, those in whose hands were centered political and economic control would have tre- mendous power, however they might be selected or ap- pointed. Nor can we forget the possibilities of combina- tions between different parties for certain purposes. It would, under socialism, be quite possible for two or three parties to act together as sometimes they do now. The frequent assertion that the Democratic and Republican parties have acted together in New York City to control the civil service, seems to be well founded ; and it is quite conceivable that two or three parties might act together to promote the interests favorable to a few leaders, and to keep down, if not persecute, obnoxious persons."* In voicing these apprehensions Professor Ely uncon- sciously transfers present conditions into an order of things in which the very causes of such conditions are altogether lacking. Political parties are the creatures and tools of class interests, and "the interests favorable to a few leaders" which he mentions, are the economic interests of the class or grpup of men represented in politics by those leaders. Modern party politics is, as we shall attempt to show in a later chapter, a manifestation of the capital- ist mode'of production and of the economic struggle of the classes, and must disappear with the abolition of the present economic order. Under socialism there can be no party politics, in the present sense, and whatever abuses may develop in the ' Richard T. Ely, "Socialism and Social Reform," pp. 212, 213. D 34 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT administration of the state or the industries, can be only casual, based on inexperience or error of judgment of the community or on personal incompetence, malice or am- bition of the responsible officers, and in either case they can be more readily remedied than in a state in which such abuses have their roots in the very foundation of the in- dustrial organization of society. On a par with the assertion that socialism would be fatal to individual liberty is the kindred claim that socialism would destroy the individuality of man. The " dead level of intellectual equality and homogeneity" under socialism is a specter almost as terrifying to the good "individualist" as the phantom of socialist slavery. And it is fully as unreal. For if any industrial system tends to destroy the individuality of men, it is not the proposed system of socialism, but our present economic order. The aggre- gation of millions of workingmen in the modern industrial centers, employed under similar conditions, tied everlast- ingly to the same monotonous machine work, dwelling in the same uniform tenements and leading the same stereo- typed bleak existence, tends to turn them into one imdis- tinguishable, homogeneous mass, dressing, talking, looking and thinking substantially alike. The men of our active upper classes, all engaged in the same all-absorbing pursuit of wealth by the same methods and under the same con- ditions, and our leisure classes sorely tried by the rigid rules of conventional etiquette, and tied to a blas^ life of uniform and tiring social functions, fashionable sports and pre- scribed recreations, develop a different but not less homo- geneous nor more attractive type.} This natural uniform- ity of type within the different socisil classes is accompanied by a sort of artificial uniformity produced by the present SOCIALISM AND INDIVIDUALISM 35 economic conditions operating in a more indirect manner. " One has only to look on whilst the sons of the nouveaux riches spend their money," remarks Mr. Macdonald, "or whilst the crowds which our industrial quarters have dis- gorged enjoy themselves, to appreciate the meaningless monotony of our pleasure. From our furniture, made by the thousand pieces by machine, to our religion, stereo- typed in set formulae and piursued by clockwork methods, individuality is an exceptional characteristic." ' "Our standard of decency in expenditure," observes Professor Veblen, "as in other ends of emulation, is set by the usage of those next above us in reputability; imtil, in this way, especially in any community where class distinc- tions are somewhat vague, all canons of respectability and decency, and all standards of consumption, are traced back by insensible gradations to the usages and habits of thought of the highest social and pecuniary class — the wealthy leisure class." ^ And Mr. Vail expresses the same idea when he says: "The tendency toward uniformity is due to the lack of equality in economic conditions. The inferior classes strive to imitate the superior classes in order to avoid an apparent social inferiority. The result is, society is con- tinually run in the same groove. On the other hand, any system which would tend to decrease economic inequality would tend to kill imitation. Just in proportion as men become equal, they cease to gain by imitating each other. It is always among equals that we find true independence."* • J. Ramsay Macdonald, "Socialism and Society," London, 1905, p. 7. 2 Thorstein Veblen, "The Theory of the Leisure Class," New Yoric, 1905, p. 104. ' Charles H. Vail, "Principles of Scientific Socialism," p. 227. CHAPTER III SOCIALISM AND ETHICS The Essence and Scope of Ethics The branch of social philosophy known as Ethics pre- sents itself to us in a dual aspect. Theoretical or scien- tific ethics aims to ascertain the principles and true mean- ing of "right and wrong" in human conduct. Practical or applied ethics seeks to draw concrete conclusions from the knowledge so gained, and to base on it a code of " right " conduct for the practical guidance of mankind. Scien- tific ethics takes cognizance of actions and relations as they are, while practical ethics considers them as they ought to be. And it is largely on account of this dual character of ethics that the standard definitions of the term present such a striking divergence. Some of the writers on the subject have attempted to cover both aspects of ethics in one definition, while others either give separate defini- tions for each, or emphasize only one side, entirely ignoring the other.* But whether ethics be considered as a science or as an ' The following are among the better-known definitions of ethics, both as a science and an art : — Professor John Dewey in the Encyclopedia Americana: "Ethics is that branch of human conduct which is concerned with ihe formation and «J« of judgments of right and wrong, and with the intellectual, emotional, and executive or overt phenomena which are associated with such judg- ments, either as antecedents or consequents." Francis L. Fatton in Syllabus of Ethics: "Ethics is the science that offers a rational explanation of Rightness and Oughtness; and that deals 36 SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 57 art, all authorities agree that in either case it is concerned with "right" or "good" human conduct. That is, how- ever, as far as the agreement goes. The more fundamental problems of the kind of human conduct properly coming within the sphere of ethics, and of the adoption of a uni- versally valid standard of "right and wrong" or "good and bad" in- such conduct, is still the subject of much discussion. It is pretty generally agreed that the conduct of which ethics takes cognizance is not the conduct of associated human beings acting as such (for that properly belongs to with the Life of free personal beings under these conceptions, considering it as related to an Ideal or norm of Excellence, conformity to which is obligatory." Harold Hqffding in Eihik: "A scientific system of Ethics endeavors to discover in accordance with what principles we direct our life, and to secure for these, when ascertained, greater clearness and inner harmony." Ethics is considered as a critical science only, in the following defini- tions: — Herbert Spencer in Data of Ethics: "Morality is the science of right conduct, and has for its object to determine how and why certain modes of conduct are detrimental, and certain other modes beneficial." New International Encyclopedia: "Ethics is the voluntary conduct of a self-conscious person, in so far as that action is amenable to a standard of obligation imposed on him by social influence or by a supreme plan of life that draws its material from society." The following definitions deal with ethics as a constructive art: — Henry Sidgwick in The Methods of Ethics: "By 'methods of ethics' is meant any rational procedure by which we determine what individual human beings 'ought' or what it is 'right' for them to do, or to seek to realize by voluntary action." Jeremy Bentham: "Ethics is the art of directing men's action to the production of the greatest possible quantity of happiness." American Encyclopedia: "Ethics is the principle which prescribes what ought to take place in human conduct." Webster's Dictionary: "Ethics is a system of rules for regulating the actions and manners of men in society." 38 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT the domain of politics), but the conduct of the individual. -I At the same time, however, it is not all individual human conduct that falls within the sphere of ethics. " Conduct" has been aptly defined by Herbert Spencer as "acts ad- justed to ends," ' and it is very obvious that within the scope of his biological functions and even in his intellectual life and social relations man performs daily numerous acts fully adjusted to ends which have no ethical implications. To be ethical or unethical, human actions must have some bearing on beings other than the actor himself; they must be tested by their social effects. A number of authorities extend the operation of ethics to conduct towards one's self and one's fellow-men; philosophers of the theological school include conduct towards God within the purview of ethics, while the thinkers of the evolutionary biological school, with Spencer at the head, classify ethical conduct as conduct towards self, offspring and race. But on closer examination, it will be found that the addition of all factors other than the purely social factor, is meaningless or con- - fusing. Ethics remains indifferent to the conduct of the individual towards himself, so long as that conduct does not directly or indirectly affect the well-being of his fellow- men or of the human race. When an individual wastes his physical or mental resources in a manner calculated to cripple his own life without, however, involving the well- being of other individuals, we call his conduct improvident or unwise, and only when he abuses his own body in a manner likely to injure his offspring or to enfeeble or degenerate the race, do we call him immoral. Similarly, we consider an individual immoral if he is in the habit of transgressing those religious precepts which happen to be ' "Data of Ethics," New York, 1893, p. 3. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 39 in accord with the generally accepted secular notions of "right" or "good" in social conduct, but if he neglects to comply with certain prescribed religious observances which have no bearing on the well-being of his fellow-men, we merely call him irreligious. And finally the conduct of the individual towards his offspring is no more than a special phase of his conduct towards his fellow-men or his race. Without fear of serious contradiction we may, therefore, define ethics as the science or art of "right" individual conduct of men towards their fellow-men. A much greater uncertainty and divergence of views con- front us when we attempt to discover the meaning of the term "right" as applied to human conduct in the various philosophical systems of ethics. As a matter of fact, there is no code of morality universally recognized and conformed to by all mankind at all times. Human actions which are condemned as atrocious by some races under some circumstances, are sanctioned and even praised by other races and imder other circumstances. Under normal conditions civilized men consider the act of deliberate murder as the most revolting and heinous of crimes, but in war the same act is glorified by them as one of greatest virtue, while among the food-lacking tribes of cannibals, it is considered as an indifferent act of common- place household economy. Other offenses against the person, and still more so offenses against property, have received even more varying estimates at different periods of human history and from different portions of the human race, while the astounding changes of the social standards of sex morality with time and place, are familiar to every student of sociology and reader of descriptive travel. 40 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT And still the fundamental precepts of morality are by no means an arbitrary figment of the human brain. For the epoch and place in which they prevail they have universal validity, and even their modifications from time to time and variations from place to place will always be found to have legitimate reasons and realistic roots in the conditions of such times and places. If there are no absolute standards of right and wrong, there certainly must be relative standards of right and wrong at every given time and place, and these relative standards, further- more, must have some common principle determining their formation. What are those standards, and what is that principle? These are the main questions which exercised the minds of the early founders of the science of ethics and which still constitute the brunt of discussions of the modern moral philosophers. And it is largely the difference in the answers to these questions which separates the numerous existing ethical systems from each other. The theological school of thinkers, of which St. Augus- tine, the mediaeval monk Ambrose and especially Thomas^ Aquinas are the classical exponents, and which still has numerous and vigorous adherents, assumes that there is a universal and supreme standard of right and wrong. That standard is the divine command which has been given to all mankind and is expressed in the holy scriptures. In particular instances that command is to be ascertained by revelation or by interpretation and application of the general rules obtained from texts of scripture and by analogical inferences from scriptural examples. Any departure from that command as so interpreted by in- dividuals or whole races is merely evidence of apostasy. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 41 In this theory ethics is practically synonymous with theology. Closely cognate with the theological system of ethics, but considerably secularized, is the doctrine of Natural Laws first developed into a comprehensive system by Hugo Grotius and followed by many modern writers, principally in England. That school, like the theological school, recognizes an absolute and universal standard of right and wrong in human conduct, but in distinction to the theological school it bases that standard not on a divine command but on "the essential nature of man." Accord- ing to Grotius and his followers there are implanted in the human being certain notions of right and wrong which form a part of his very existence and which are as unalter- able and true as the truths of mathematics. The test and the proof of such truths is their universal acceptance by human societies. In conformity with this conception the writers of that school have evolved a code of ethics based entirely on the fundamental notions of morality prevailing among the civilized nations of their times. Barely distinguishable from the juridical school of Natural Laws is the philosophical school of Intuitionalism. This school, which may claim Socrates and Plato for its . founders, has in more recent times had many brilliant ex- ponents and defenders in the field of philosophic thought, chief among them being Kant and Whewell. According to the intuitional doctrine the sense of duty is innate in every normal human being and its commands and prin- ciples are known to them by intuition and without the aid of any process of reasoning or demonstration. This doc- trine is developed with the greatest elaborateness by Kant, who distinguishes between the world of " phenomena," or 42 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT objects as they appear to us through our limited senses and powers of perception, and the world of "noiimena," the real world of objects as they exist regardless of our per- ception of them (Die Dinge an sich). The sense of duty is one of such "noumena." It manifests itself to us in a greater or smaller degree according to the development of our powers of perception, but it has an absolute and real existence outside of our perceptions. To all these systems of ethics which may be collectively designated as Idealistic, are opposed the so-called Rational- istic systems, which seek to evolve standards of right and wrong from reason and experience rather than from reve- lation or intuition. The earliest of such schools is the Hedonistic or Epi- curean, which considers individual happiness as the end of life and all conduct conducive to that end as good and right. This theory is not grossly materialistic, since it recognizes the intellectual and aesthetic pleasures as the ones conducive to greater and more lasting happmess. Like the school of Intuitionalism the school of Hedonism dates back to Greek antiquity. The philosophers Aris- tippus and Epicurus were among its first exponents. The theory was revived by Hobbes and considerably modified and extended by him and his followers. The more recent writers of this school frequendy substitute the more definite standard of pleasure and pain for the old hedonistic test of happiness and imhappiness, and several of them see the true application of the principle of hedonism not in the happiness of the individual, but in universal or social happiness. Hedonism in one form or another was the favorite doctrine of the rationalistic philosophers of pre- Revolutionary France — Lamettrie, Helvetius and others. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 43 The notion of the "social contract," which appeared together with the victory of the European industrials and the establishment of constitutional government, logically led to the formation of the Utilitarian school of ethics. The adherents of the "social contract" theory, as stated in a previous chapter, assume that organized society was formed by its individual members for their mutual benefit and protection, and that it is deliberately maintained by them for that purpose. Since, however, the rules or acts of organized society cannot always benefit all of its members alike, each individual member must occasionally sacri- fice some right to his fellow-men, upon the theory that in the long run the advantages derived by him from society would outweigh the disadvantages suffered. This is the "rational" sanction for the majority rule in all popular government, and Bentham only translated the political doctrine into ethical terms, when he asserted that "right" conduct is such as results in the greatest good to the great- est number. The Utilitarian school, in the language of Sidgwick, "holds that all rules of conduct which men prescribe to one another as moral rules, are really — though in part un- consciously — prescribed as means to the general happi- ness of mankind." ' The chief exponents of this school are Paley, Bentham and the Mills, father and son, although Kant's ethical injunction, "Act only on such a maxim as may also be a universal law," may also be considered essentially utilitarian, inconsistent as it is with the in- tuitional theory of the famous philosopher. Finally, the school of social thought which goes to • Henry Sidgwick, "The Methods of Ethics," 5th Edition, London, 1893, p. 8. 44 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT biology for the discovery of rules of human conduct, has introduced another and more realistic standard of right and wrong in human conduct. According to Darwinian conceptions the strongest motives in all organic life are the instincts of self-preservation and preservation of the species. Applied to men in a social state that theory means that the main concern of human beings is the pres- ervation of life, and that such conduct of the individual will be regarded as good or right as tends to preserve and enhance the life of his fellow-men, while conduct which tends to curtail or impair such life will be considered bad or wrong. "Goodness," says Herbert Spencer, "standing by itself, suggests, above all other things, the conduct of one who aids the sick in re-acquiring normal vitality, assists the unfortunate to recover the means of maintaining them- selves, defends those who are threatened with harm in person, property, or reputation, and aids whatever promises to improve the living of all his fellows. Contrariwise, badness brings to mind, as its leading correlative, the con- duct of the one who, in caring for his own life, damages the lives of others by injuring their bodies, destroying their possessions, defrauding them, calunmiating them." ' And Lester F. Ward tersely expresses the same thought in the following language: "'Duty' is simply conduct favorable to race safety. Virtue is an attribute of life and character consistent with the preservation and continuance of man on earth. Vice is the reverse of this, and is felt as an attack upon the race." ^ These, then, are the main theories of right and wrong, as conceived by the contending systems of ethical thought. ' "Data of Ethics," pp. 24, 25. ' "Pure Sociology," p. 420. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 45 But this branch of the subject does not by any means exhaust the field of ethical inquiry. For assuming that a true standard of right conduct is discovered, there still remains the more important question as to the motives which impel or ought to impel human beings to conform to that standard. The mere fact that we recognize a certain mode of action as right and another as wrong does not imply that we will in all cases follow the one and shun the other. What, then, is the factor that makes or ought to make us choose good conduct in preference to bad conduct ? To that question the different schools make different replies according to their conceptions of the nature of the moral obligation. The theological school holds out the promise of reward in a life beyond the grave. The in- tuitional school declares that no reward is required, since the individual is impelled to obey the moral impulse iimate in him, the irresistible command of nature, or, as Kant terms it, the Categorical Imperative. "Thou must dways fulfill thy destiny," decrees the celebrated German philoso- pher Fichte, and the biological school of ethics practically makes the same reply except that it substitutes the instinct of preservation of the species for the intuitive moral sense. The most contradictory and, therefore, the least satis- factory explanations of the ethical motives of men are those offered by the schools which pride themselves with being founded on pure reason, — those of hedonism and utili- tarianism. Recognizing that mere individual self-interest is en- tirely inadequate to account for the acts of altruism which chiefly constitute high moral conduct, the hedonists early resorted to the theory of "intelligent egoism" as distinct from that of shortsighted selfishness. The well-developed 46 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT human being, they argue, is so constituted that he ex- periences greater pleasure in serving his fellow-men than in gratifying his own narrow desires. In promoting the well- being of his fellows he, therefore, primarily procures a pleasurable emotion for himself and only incidentally rend- ers a service to his neighbor. But this argument carries its own destruction, for it makes the basis of right human conduct not the self-interest of the actor, but his inner consciousness or instinct of duty to his fellow-men, the performance of which causes him pleasure. Neither the hedonistic theory nor the utilitarian conception, which represents man in organized society as engaged in constant cold-blooded bargaining with his fellow-men for advantages, can account for such acts as the voluntary sacrifice of one's life in the service of society. And on the other hand the idealistic theories of ethics do not even attempt to explain motives of human conduct, but virtually abandon the subject as beyond their ken. Within this charmed circle of contradictions the philoso- phy of ethics oscillated during almost the entire intellectual period of the human race, and little, if any, substantial progress was made in twenty-five centuries of the career of that important branch of thought. It was only when the discussion was removed from the domain of metaphysical speculation to the field of positive science, that ethics ac- quired a realistic basis. This great work was primarily accomplished by Charles Darwin and his disciples. The Evolution of the Moral Sense The main features of the Darwinian theory of organic evolution are, as is generally known, the doctrine of the struggle for existence and the resulting natural selection SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 47 through the survival of the fittest, the development of useful organs and hereditary transmission. In a state of nature each individual is engaged in con- stant struggle with individuals of its own or different species and with surrounding nature. In this universal struggle the individuals least equipped for the fight and least adapted to their surroundings, perish, while those who happen to possess organs or features of particular advantage in the struggle, survive, and by the frequent application of such useful organs and features, develop them ever more and transmit them to their offspring in a higher degree of development. Thus results a constant pro- cess of increasing adaptation to surroundings and a breed of more highly and efficiently organized individuals. The struggle for existence is a purely individual struggle in the lowest forms of life, and the struggle between individuals of the same species predominates in those forms. But in the ascending scale of organic existence the struggle be- tween individuals of the same species gradually abates and is superseded by the collective struggles of such individuals against hostile kinds and the adverse forces of nature around them. Social organizations thus arise among animals, including the progenitors of primitive men, and these organizations prove a powerful weapon in the struggle for existence against hostile groups or species. The more compact and harmonious the organization, the greater its efficiency as a weapon in the struggle for existence. Hence- forward the process of evolution is one of growing soli- darity and cohesion among the individuals of the same group or species as against their common enemies, and this instinct of solidarity and cohesion is the first germ of the sense of social duty or moral consciousness. 48 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT "The feeling of pleasure from society," says Darwin, "is probably an extension of the parental or filial affec- tions, since the social instinct seems to be developed by the young remaining for a long time with their parents ; and this extension may be attributed in part to habit, but chiefly to natural selection. With those animals which were benefited by living in close association, the individuals which took the greatest pleasure in society would best escape various dangers, whilst those that cared least for their comrades, and lived solitary, would perish in greater numbers. With respect to the origin of the paternal and filial affections, which apparently lie at the base of the social instincts, we know not the steps by which they have been gained ; but we may infer that it has been to a large extent through natural selection." * And again : "When two tribes of primeval men, living in the same country, came into competition (other circum- stances being equal) if the one tribe included a greater number of courageous, sympathetic and faithful members, who were always ready to warn each other of danger, to aid and defend each other, this tribe would succeed better and conquer the other. . . . Selfish and contentious people will not cohere, and without coherence nothing can be effected. A tribe rich in the above qualities would spread and be victorious over other tribes; but in the course of time it would, judging from all past history, be in its turn overcome by some other tribe still more highly endowed. Thus the social and' moral qualities would tend to slowly advance and be diffused throughout the world." ^ » "The Descent of Man," Collier Edition, New York, 1901, pp. 144, 145- 2 Ibid., pp. 175, 176. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 49 These mental and moral qualities once generated will on the whole grow in the course of evolution. The higher a tribe of men stands in the scale of civilization, the less will its members depend on their purely physical powers and the greater will be the importance of their mental and moral qualities. "In proportion as physical characteristics become less important," says Alfred Russel Wallace, who shares with Darwin the merit of the discovery of the theory of natural selection, "mental and moral qualities will have an in- creasing influence on the well-being of the race." * Thus the moral sense is a product of the process of evolution of man, gained in his early struggle for existence, precisely in the same maimer as his intellectual qualities. It is a property of man in a state of society just as much as any of his physical organs, or as Mr. Bax puts it, "the ethi- cal sentiment is the correlate in the ideal sphere, of the fact of social existence itself in the material sphere. The one is as necessarily implied in the other as the man is implied in his shadow." ^ This conception of the nature of morality and its origin and development in the human being overthrows all earlier theories of ethics, but at the same time it reconciles all elements of truth that are contained in them. The primitive men did not deliberately form their first social organizations on the strength of such considerations as are contained in Rousseau's " Social Contract." They did not bargain for advantages or pleasures to be bestowed on them by society. They were forced into organization by the superior powers of struggle. They probably first • In "Contributions to Natural Selection." ' E. Belfort Bax, "The Ethics of Socialism," p. 4. £ 50 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT herded themselves together blindly, unreasoningly. But the instinct which impelled them to form such organiza- tions was the instinct of self-preservation, the inarticulate and unexpressed conviction that in organization lay their greater safety and protection, and that by their own de- votion to the social aggregation they would help to strengthen the weapon upon the efficiency of which their lives largely depended. The primitive men or their pro- genitors were in that sense imconscious hedonistic and utilitarian philosophers. But the moral sense once evolved, in the course of time became a permanent trait of the human being, an innate or intuitive feeling, and in this sense the Idealistic theories of ethics have a certain degree of reason and justification. "The social instinct," says Ernst Haeckel, "is always a physical habit, which was originally acquired, but which, becoming in the course of time hereditary, appears at last innate." ^ The conclusion of the foremost Darwinian scholar in Germany thus largely coincides with those of the foremost German philosopher of Intuitionalism, Immanuel Kant. The moral sense once acquired is, like all other properties of the human being, subject to growth. The rudimentary moral instinct of the primitive man must have imdergone countless phases of development before it evolved into the lofty conceptions of the contemporary moral philosopher. But it would be a mistake to consider that growth as a continuous, automatic and regular process. The moral sentiment in mankind does not grow in the same sense as a plant or other physical organism grows, i.e., by steadily ' Quoted by C. M. Williams, "A Review of the Systems of Ethics," etc., New York, 1893. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 5t increasing in dimension with the lapse of time. Different races, though perhaps of the same age, exhibit different moral perceptions in kind and degree, and even within the same society and age different individuals present the most divergent degrees of the moral sentiment. The growth of the moral sense, like the growth of the intellect, depends upon a multiplicity of ex- ternal conditions which shape its contents and further or arrest its progress. What is the nature of these con- ditions ? The theory of natural selection traces the origin and reveals the quality of the moral sense in man, but it fails to account for the mode and laws of its further de- velopment. In fact the founders of the modern school of biological evolution distinctly disclaim the effective- ness of that factor as applied to a more advanced state of human society. "With civilized nations," declares Darwin, "as far as an advanced standard of morality and an increased number of fairly good men are concerned, natural selection ap- parently effects but little; though the fundamental social instincts were originally thus gained," ' (and Mr. Wallace is still more emphatic in this view of the limited scope of operation of the principle of natural selection. What, then, are the factors determining the degree and direction of moral development? The answer to that momentous question will be found in the philosophy of the school of Karl Marx, who alone consistently introduced the spirit of Darwinism into the study of social phenomena by substituting the economic interpretation of history and the resulting doctrine of the class struggle in the more modern stages of social develop- 1 "The Descent of Man," p. 185. 52 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT ment for the instinct of self-preservation and the resulting doctrine of the struggle for existence in its lower stages. Class Ethics The prime concern of men in a state of society is the production of the means for the sustenance of the mem- bers of that society. A community engaged chiefly in himting, pastoral, agricultural or manufacturing pursuits and largely depending on the success of such pursuits for its existence, will in all cases arrange its organization and regulate its functions primarily with a view of enhancing the efficiency of that particular mode of securing the ma- terial life of its members. This object determines all economic and political forms of society, and in the last analysis it also dominates all social motives and notions. "In the social production which men carry on," says Marx, "they enter into definite relations that are indis- pensable and independent of their will; these relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development of their material powers of production. The 'sum total of these relations of production constitute the economic structure of society — the real foundation, on which rise legal and political superstructtires and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of pro- duction in material life determines the general character of the social, political and spiritual processes of life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their ex- istence, but, on the contrary, their social existence deter- mines their consciousness." ' Morality, which has been defined by Professor Ward as ' Karl Marx, "A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy," English Translation, New York, 1904, p. 11. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 53 conduct conducive to "race safety," and by Mr. Stephen as conduct conducive to the "health of society,"' and which in the earlier stages of social evolution stands principally for courage and loyalty in combat, in a more advanced society comes to a large extent to signify conduct favoring the economic efi&ciency and prosperity of the nation. The glaring differences which confront us in the codes of ethics of different communities, or within the same com- munities at different times, mostly reflect the differences or changes of the economic conditions of such communi- ties, the manner of maintaining the lives of their members. A savage tribe suffering from a scarcity of food may have its own rudimentary code of ethics, but such a code will not extend its ban to the practices of devouring its captives in war or slaying its aged and feeble members. When, however, the same tribe develops to the point of using tools and implements and learns to produce food in greater abundance, the practices of man-eating and of killing its own members become immoral. A nation like the ancient Spartans, whose subsistence largely depends on success in war, may have a very definite and strict code of ethics, but the virtues recognized by that code will be principally those of military worth, physical strength, courage and quick-wittedness, whereas honesty will be considered -a matter of moral indifference, and the practice of killing feeble children, even a moral duty. Conversely, peaceful, pastoral and agricultural communities will rate honesty and industry as the highest virtues, and show but little regard for courage and daring. ' Leslie Stephen, "The Science of Ethics," 2d Edition, New York, 1907. 54 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT Thus each community primarily formulates in its code of ethics the material or economic welfare of its members, while within each community the standard of individual morality is the degree to which each member advances or impairs the material interests of his fellow-members. In the earlier types of social organization in which the material interests of all members were practically identical and in which the individual member necessarily benefited from every advantage accruing to the totality of members, and vice versa, there could be no conflict between the interests of the individual and those of society. The material welfare of the community was easily, we may say instinctively, ascertainable and readily conformed to. The system of morality, such as it was, was perfect. But in modern communities the relations of the indi- viduals to society and to each other are by no means so simple and harmonious. The division of labor or special- ization of functions which has marked the social progress of man, together with the accumulation of property made possible by the ever growing productivity of human labor, have split up all more modem societies into different groups of members, with distinct economic interests. Society or "the nation" no longer represents a homogene- ous aggregation of individuals with uniform and harmonious material interests, and the standard of individual morality as conduct favoring the safety, health or economic interests of the " nation " loses much of its force. For in the modern class state conduct which is beneficial to certain groups or classes of society is very often detrimental to other groups or classes, and especially within the most vital sphere of economic activity it is almost impossible to conceive of any action which would be beneficial to all society alike. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 55 The individual who invents a labor-saving device may be said in the abstract to be benefiting mankind at large, but as society is constituted to-day, his invention also re- sults in depriving large numbers of workingmen of a chance to earn their living. The legislator who forces the intro- duction of safety appliances in dangerous works benefits a certain class of workers but at the same time he injures the material interests of a number of employers. What, then, is the true standard of morality applicable to modern society? We have mentioned that modern society consists of various interest groups or classes. These classes are formed by the economic relations of men and are friendly, indifferent or hostile to each other according to the nature of such relations. But between all these divergent social classes we may draw one sharp line of demarcation, the line that separates the possessing from the non-possessing, the dominant from the dependent classes. And while the material interests of the several possessing classes between themselves may be conflicting at different points of contact, they are as a rule fairly harmonious as regards their common relations to the dependent classes. And whenever the interests of these dominant classes come in conflict with those of the dependent classes, the former have always understood it to represent their special in- terests as the interests of society. This attitude is made all the easier for the ruling classes because their interests al- ways coincide with the maintenance of the existing order and relations, and are, therefore, conservative, while the interests of the dependent classes lie in the direction of a change of such conditions and are, therefore, revolutionary. Moral conduct, as ordinarily interpreted, is conduct 56 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT tending to conserve the existing order. In the modern class state such conduct is, therefore, conduct conducive to the perpetuation of the advantages of the ruling classes. "Ethics," says Mr. La Monte rather forcibly, "simply registers the decrees by which the ruling class stamps with approval or brands with censtjre human conduct solely with reference to the effect of that conduct on the welfare of their class. This does not mean that any ruling class has ever had the wit to devise ab initio a code of ethics perfectly adapted to further thqir interests. Far from it. The process has seldom, if ever, been a conscious one. By a process akin to natural selection in the organic world, the ruling class learns by experience what conduct is helpful and what hurtful to it, and blesses in the one case and damns in the other. And as the ruling class has always controlled all the avenues by which ideas reach the so-called lower classes, they have heretofore been able to impose upon the subject classes just those morals which were best adapted to prolong their subjection." * It is only on the theory of the class character of modern ethics that the curious inconsistencies in our moral con- ceptions can be accounted for. The strong man who should deliberately injure a weak child outside of his busi- ness pursuits, would be considered by his fellow-men as an individual of a low moral character, but the powerful and wealthy mill owner who daily undermines the health and saps the life of hundreds of inoffensive children- of tender age in the "legitimate" pursuit of his business, i.e., in the process of profit making, is regarded by us as a perfectly moral being. He may be the superintendent of a Sunday ' Robert Rives La Monte, "Socialism: Positive and Negative," Chicago, 1907, pp. 60, 61. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 57 school, an honored member of an Ethical Culture Society, or may be sincerely interested in the missionary task of improving the moral conditions of some South African tribe of savages. Similarly the owners of the factories, mines and rail- roads, who suffer or cause large numbers of their fellow- men to lose their lives on account of insufficient safety appliances in their works, and the dealers in food stuffs, who poison their fellow-men by adulterated food, meet with no particular opprobrium on the part of society, while they would have been condemned as immoral wretches if they had been guilty of similar conduct outside of their business pursuits, and not for the sake of profits. The socialists of the Marxian school do not agree with thinkers of the type of Mandeville,' who considers moral- ity purely artificial 'and a device of the "politicians" to strengthen their rule on their fellow-men. They fully recognize that the moral sentiment is implanted in the normal human being and capable of very high development even under adverse conditions. Instances of men and women rising above their class interests and sacrificing their material welfare, sometimes even their lives, in the service of their fellow-men, are of frequent, almost daily occurrence, and cannot be accounted for on any economic or materialistic theory. The socialists also recognize that outside of the economic sphere of human activity, there is a'large field of human interest, in which the indi- viduals of all classes meet on common ground, and in which the moral conceptions correspond to the actual welfare of all mankind. But they maintain that as a rule ' The author of a book entitled "The Fable of the Bees, or Private Vices Public Benefits," published in 1724. 58 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT the ethical conceptions dominating the "business" inter- ests of modern nations, and the various social activities and organs subservient to these interests, such as politics, the agencies molding public opinion, etc., are concep- tions favoring the interests of the dominant classes only. They are the ethics of the ruling classes falsely parading as general social ethics. The Ethical Ideal and Socialist Morality When we speak of a certain degree of development of the moral faculty and when we distinguish a rudimentary form of morality from a highly evolved form, we must necessarily have in mind a standard of comparison. Such a standard of comparison is the ethical ideal, which to us represents the limit of all moral conduct and by the ap- proach to which we judge a concrete code of morals to be high or low. An ethical ideal — Absolute Ethics, Spencer terms it — does not imply a belief in a code of morality good for all times and places and independent of all existing physical conditions. It merely represents our view of the last phase of moral evolution in civilized society, based upon our observation of the course of such evolution in the past. Such an ideal is as useful for the purposes of practical ethics as general and abstract laws of pure science are useful for the study of concrete phenomena. Most of the modern writers on the subject have, there- fore, outlined ideal standards of ethics, and most of these outlines agree in their fundamental characteristics. According to Spencer's definition ethical conduct is such as is conducive to the welfare of self, offspring and SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 59 race, and the best, i.e., most normal conduct is that which fulfills all the three conditions simultaneously and most efficiently. Such conduct, however, can only be attained in a state of society in which the interests of the individual and those of society are entirely identical, and in which "general happiness is to be achieved mainly through the adequate pursuit of their own happiness by individuals, while reciprocally, the happiness of the individual is to be achieved in part by the pursuit of the general happiness." ^ Whether we agree in all parts with this definition or whether we confine the scope of ethics to conduct towards society or one's fellow-men, does not alter the validity of the conclusion. The relations of the individual and society are those of mutual service, and the progress of morality consists in the growth of these relations, or in the words of Huxley, "in the gradual strengthening of the social bond." ^ The limit of moral evolution can thus be reached only in a state of society free from material and other antago- nisms between the individuals among themselves and be- tween the individual and society. In such society the question of right and wrong is entirely obviated, since no normal conduct of the individual can hurt society, and all acts of society must benefit the individual. Organic morality takes the place of ethics. Such an ideal state of organic morality may be unattain- able in its absolute purity, but the trend of evolution is in its general direction. All factors which impede the path to its approximate realization are anti-ethical or immoral ; ' Herbert Spencer, "Social Statics." ' Thomas H. Huxley, "Evolution and Ethics," New York, 1896, P- 35- 60 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT contrariwise, all factors or movements which tend in its direction are ethical. In modern society the checks to the realization of ideal morality are numerous. As indicated in the previous chapter, the existence of social classes and the resulting class struggles are the chief impediments to a true social morality. But the direct action of the struggle between antagonistic classes in the same society does not by any means exhaust the evil. Some of the indirect effects of the class state based on individual production are even more disastrous to the progress of true morality than its direct operations. And chief among such effects are the two most anti-social institutions — competition and war. "The competitive struggle," says Kautsky, "affects the social instincts of the individuals in the same society most distinctively. For in this struggle each individual maintains himself best the less he permits himself to be influenced by social considerations and the more he is guided by his own interests. For the member of the capi- talist society based on individual competitive production, it is, therefore, quite natural to consider egoism as the only legitimate instinct in man, and to regard the social in- stincts as refined forms of egoism or as an invention of the priests to fasten their rule on men or as a supernatural mystery." ' Wars are regarded by Herbert Spencer as the chief ob- stacle to the progress of moral development, and in his " Data of Ethics," as well as in his later work, " The Deduc- tions of Ethics," the theory occurs again and again that a "state of war" is incompatible with an ideal morality, and ' Karl Kautsky, "Ethik und Materialistische Geschichtsauffassung," Stuttgart, 1906, pp. 105, 106. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 6 1 that the latter is only attainable in perfectly peaceful socie- ties, Spencer does not take cognizance of the class struggle and of the economic interpretation of history. To him " a state of war" and "a state of peace" are merely phases of moral development in human society. But as a matter of fact wars depend but little on the degree of civilization attained by the community. The most advanced states are frequently also the most warlike states. Wars in mod- ern times are most often caused by economic motives. They are usually the results of the competitive struggles of the capitalist classes of the belligerent nations for the markets of the world, the logical counterparts of competi- tion in the national markets. To the industrial individualism which is the leading feature of modern society corresponds a gross egoism in all spheres of our material existence which sets individual against individual and throttles all nobler social instincts in man. Employer and employee, producer and consumer, buyer and seller, landlord and tenant, lender and borrower, are always arrayed against each other, constantly and necessarily meeting in a spirit of antagonism of interests, incessantly engaged in conscious or unconscious economic struggle with each other. And all these forms of economic struggle are but single phases of the broader and deeper class struggle which is the dominant factor in modern in- dustrial life and largely determines all current moral con- ceptions. But the class struggle is not an unmitigated evil. Just as the struggle for existence among individuals in the lower forms of human existence led to the improvement of the race and eventually matured the conditions of its own destruction, just so the class struggles in advanced societies 62 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT have often been the mstruments for the improvement of the social type and will eventually lead to the abolition of all classes and class struggles. The struggles between the bourgeoisie, the progenitors of the modern capitalist class, and the ruling class of land- owners, have yielded many valuable acquisitions to modern civilization, and have resulted in the establishment of mod- ern society, which with all its faults and imperfections is vastly superior to the feudal order which it displaced. The struggles of the dependent classes against the ruling classes in modern society have already produced the rudiments of a nobler social morality, and are rapidly preparing the ground for a still higher order of civilization. The modern working class is gradually but rapidly emancipating itself from the special morality of the ruling classes. In their common struggles against the oppression of the capitalist class the workers are natiirally led to the recognition of the value of compact organization and solidary, harmonious action. Within their own ranks they have no motive for struggle or competition; their interests are in the opposite direction. And as the struggles of their class against the rule of capitalism become more general and concrete, more conscious and effective, there grows in them a sentiment of class loyalty, class solidarity and class consciousness which is the basis of a new and distinct code of ethics. The modern labor movement is maturing its own standards of right and wrong conduct, its own social ideals and morality. Good or bad conduct has largely come to mean to them conduct conducive to the welfare and success of their class in its struggles for emancipation. They admire the true, militant and de- voted "labor leader," the hero in their struggles against SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 63 the employing class. They detest the " scab," the deserter from their ranks in these struggles. The two historical slogans given to the modern socialist and labor movement by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, "The emancipation of the workingmen can only be ac- complished by the workingmen themselves," and "Work- ingmen of all coimtries unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains, you have a world to gain ! " — may truly be said to be the main precepts of the new morality of the working class. They inspire the "lower" classes with the consciousness of a great social mission to be performed by them in modern society ; they foster the virtues of com- radeship and self-reliance in their ranks, and develop the qualities of fidelity and devotion to their common cause. This new morality is by no means ideal social morality. It is the ethics of struggle, class ethics as yet. But just because it is the ethics of a subjugated class engaged in the struggle for its emancipation, it is superior to the prevailing ethics of the class bent upon maintaining acquired privi- leges. The workingmen cannot abolish the capitalist class rule without abolishing all class rule; they cannot emancipate themselves without emancipating all mankind. Behind the socialist theory of the existing class Struggle lies the conception of a classless, harmonious society; behind the conception of the international solidarity of the working class lies the ideal of the world-wide solidarity of the human race. The ideals of the modem socialist and labor movement thus generally coincide with the scientific conceptions of absolute morality. * Of course, in both cases we are dealing with ideals, and ideals only. We must recognize that the realities of life always fall short of social ideals. Socialism does not 64 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT imply a state of absolute and universal harmony. The human mind cannot conceive to-day a state of society free from all antagonism and frictions caused by differences in temperament, views and even temporary material interests. There will probably always be some individual infractions of the accepted canons of social morality, but there will be no universal economic motive for such infractions, and they will necessarily become less flagrant in character and less frequent in number, they will cease to be the rule in human conduct, and will become the exception. "The conflict of the individual with society," says Charles Kendall Franklin, " is of two kinds. On the one hand, it is carried on by specialized individuals whose function is to develop and perfect society by developing the moral and social senses; on the other, the conflict is between society and the rank individualist who will not be subdued by society, who persists in expending his energies in as wasteful a manner as he sees fit so it benefits himself. Civilization is full of suc^h people to-day. They are powerful individuals, they head corporations, they compose the professions, they constitute the classes. They believe in society for their own benefit and hoot at the socialization of the race as the rankest nonsense. . . . Their worst representative is the degenerate and criminal ; individuals who cannot adapt themselves at all to the development of society to-day." ' Of the two kinds of anti-social individuals so charac- terized by Franklin, the "specialized" individual and the pathological criminal, the men physically and morallY| constituted above or below their fellow-men, may survive forever ui larger or smaller numbers, but the "rank indi- ' "The Socialization of Humanity," Chicago, 1904, p. 210. SOCIALISM AND ETHICS 6$ vidualist" who preys upon his fellow-men and tramples on social solidarity, mainly from motives of material gain, can find but little room in a society based on cooperative production and common social enjoyment. With the change of his economic interests and motives man will necessarily change his conduct. "The ethics of socialism," observes Bax on this point, "seeks not the ideal society through the ideal individual, but conversely the ideal individual through the ideal society. It finds in an adequate, a free and harmonious social life, at once the primary condition and the end and completion of individuality." * ' "The Ethics of Socialism," p. 19. CHAPTER IV SOCIALISM AND LAW The Law In our occasional contact with the law we are but too apt to concentrate our attention on the concrete legal enactments and rules of procedure, and to lose sight of the body of the law as a dynamic system. Here we will not concern ourselves with the anatomy of the law, but rather with its physiology, and will consider the law as a social force in its relation to the general pro- cess of social development. Under the designation "Law" in the broadest sense of the term, we understand the entire body of legislative enactments, rules and regulations which prescribe the relations of man to man, man to state, state to man and state to state. The law thus defined is not fixed or universal : it varies with the different types of civilization past and present. There is a radical difference between the laws of the ancient Greek communities, mediaeval European society, . and the modem civilized states, and there is as radical a difference between the systems of law prevalent in the^ semi-barbaric countries of South Africa, the empire of China and the democracy of the United States. Nor are the laws of any given country immutable. In 66 SOCIALISM AND LAW 6/ fact, nothing is more changeable than the system of na- tional laws in the modem countries. Every year volumes of new laws and ordinances are issued from the halls of Congress or parliaments, the inferior legislative chambers and the councils of thousands of municipalities; every year innumerable old laws are repealed or amended, and innumerable new laws are enacted. The thing that is legal to-day may be branded as a crime to-morrow, new rights may be conferred on or taken from us, and new duties may be imposed on us by every legislative session, and especially in the Anglo-Saxon countries new laws may grow out overnight by the process of judicial "construc- tion." But these changes in the law are by no means arbitrary. Individual measures may at times be needless and illogical, but in the long run all changes in a given system of law mark a development in a certain definite direction. A system of jurisprudence is just as much subject to the laws of evolution as any other social institution. The primitive man has but little use or occasion for laws. But the higher the plane of human civilization, the closer the interrelation of men, the greater becomes the need of definite rules of conduct of the members of such organization in all matters pertaining to the common wel- fare. Those of such rules that are more vital to the main- tenance of the social fabric are as a rule enacted into formal laws, while those of less direct and important bearing are left within the domain of ethics. "Normally," says Mr. Sidgwick, "in a well-organized society the most important and indispensable rules of social behavior will be legally enforced, and the less important left to be maintained by Positive Morality. . . . Law will constitute, as it were. 68 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT the skeleton of social order, clothed by the flesh and blood of Morality." ' Law and ethics have thus a common origin, and while by no means identical in all respects, they present a great similarity in many aspects. Law, like ethics, springs from the economic and social conditions of the nations, and from its very origin it must be adapted to and change with those conditions. A tribe, race or nation will in each period establish such rules or laws as will be most conducive to the successful pursuit of its mode of subsistence, and as each of the succeeding economic and social orders gradually grow out of the preceding systems, new laws are created to meet the changed situation. The feudal system gave us the Law of Real Property, the development of national and inter- national commerce led to the. Law of Negotiable Instru- ments, the rise of the factory inscribed the Labor Laws in our statute book, and practically in our own times the introduction of railroads, telegraphs and telephones added new and important branches to our body of law, while the more recent economic categories of corporations and trusts still keep our legislative mills busy. " The evolution which led men to an orderly social life did not consist in the dia- lectic self -development of juridic ideas," says Arnold Lindwurm, "but in the economic development brought about by social necessity." ^ The law of each civilization, again like its ethics, not only reflects the economic and social conditions of the times, but is primarily designed to safeguard and maintain those conditions. That is why we find such a variance ' "The Methods of Ethics," p. 19. '"Das Eigenthumsrecht und die Menschheits — Idee im Staate," Leipsic, 1878, p. 139. SOCIALISM AND LAW 69 in the criminal law of different states in its estimate of the gravity of certain crimes. "Every state," says Dr. Ru- dolph von Ihering, "pimishes those crimes most severely which threaten its own peculiar condition of existence, while it allows a moderation to prevail in regard to other crimes which, not unfrequently, presents a very striking contrast to its severity as against the former. A theocracy brands blasphemy and idolatry as crimes deserving of death, while it looks on a boimdary violation as a mere misdemeanor (Mosaic Law). The agricultural state, on the other hand, visits the latter with the severest punish- ment, while it lets the blasphemer go with the lightest punishment (Old Roman Law). The commercial state punishes most severely the uttering of false coin; the military state, insubordination and breach of official duty; the absolute state, high treason ; the republic, the striving after regal power; and they all manifest a severity in these points which contrasts greatly with the manner in which they punish other crimes. In short, the reaction of the feeling of legal right, both of states and individuals, is most violent when they feel themselves threatened in the conditions of existence peculiar to them." ^ The statement that the law is always designed to safe- guard the existing economic conditions of society must, however, again as in the case of ethics, be qualified by the further statement that the law of each period is primarily designed to safeguard and protect the interests of the dominant classes within such society. The legal systems of antiquity, the Greek and Roman Law, made no attempt to disguise that fact. The subject class, the class of slaves, frequently the overwhelming » "Struggle for Law," English Translation, Chicago, 1879, pp. 45, 46. 70, THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT majority of the population, was placed beyond the pale of the law. The slave was excluded from the protection of the law and left to the arbitrary treatment of his master. The institution of serfdom, which lasted throughout the Middle Ages and in some instances survived into the nine- teenth century, presents a similar state of affairo. Prior to the great French Revolution, the nobility and clergy openly enjoyed special legal privileges from which the common people were excluded, and while the form of legal class favoritism has been abolished in most of the enlightened contemporary states, our laws on the whole still favor the ruling classes. Since the law is the expression of social and economic conditions in motion, every improvement in those condi- tions leads to a corresponding improvement in the system of law. The course of political and economic improve- ment which on the whole marks our social progress, reflects itself in the ever-growing tendency towards equity and justice in law. Compared with the iniquitous laws of mediaeval ages, our laws to-day are exceedingly humane, and generally speaking, every succeeding phase of a legal system is superior to the preceding phase. This applies to all domains of the law — private, public and inter- national. But legal progress does not run parallel with social and economic advance. As a rule the law lags somewhat behind existing conditions. New factors in our industrial life from time to time create new social conditions, and produce new conceptions of social rights and obligations. These remain abstract and debatable theories until such time as they have been incorporated in the statute books, and a penalty has been attached to their violation. Then, SOCIALISM AND LAW ^I and then only, they are transferred from the domain of ethics to that of law. But the recognition of these rights, as a rule, does not occur automatically. Moral rights do not ripen into laws by a process of natural growth, nor are acquired laws self- executing. ' Reforms in law and legal redress are conquered in- struggle, and, in most cases, in hard, obstinate struggle. The effort to effect equitable legal reform or secure such redress, the "struggle for law," as Dr. von Ihering terms it, assumes different forms in the different provinces of the law. In the domain of private law such efforts find daily application in litigation; in the domain of public law, these efforts are expressed in politics, and their realiza- tion is sometimes effected by revolutions; in international law the struggle is expressed in the diplomatic dealings of the nations, and sometimes culminates in war. "All social classes," says the eminent Italian jurist Alfredo Tprtori, " are impelled to make such laws, to establish such insti- tutions and to sanction such customs and beliefs as accord with their direct or indirect interests. Hence the perpet- ual movement which drives men and groups to change ex- isting laws and to adapt them to new social interests." * And this struggle for right and law is the key to all social progress. The man who suffers personal wrong without protest or opposition, the "peaceful" member of the com- munity, is a demoralizing factor in our social fabric; the class that does not struggle for civic and industrial rights will eventually lapse into slavery; and the nation that passively countenances encroachments upon its rights and territory is doomed to dismemberment and national bankruptcy. ' "Socialisme et droit priv^," in Le Devenir Social, 1896, p. 251. 72 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT It is the man who defends his rights, the class that battles for political and industrial advancement, and the nation that holds its own against the entire world; it is the "litigious" person, the "revolutionary" class and the "vigilant" nation that keep the world from stagnation and force it onward on the path of progress. . Conservatism and meekness and the pietistic veneration for the laws and customs of our forefathers, are not civic virtues, but vicious manifestations of mental indolence and political reaction. The progress of mankind lies in the future, not in the past. Let us test the truth of these general observations by a comparison of three systems of law corresponding to three phases of human civilization ; the feudal system, immedi- ately preceding our own, the modem or capitalistic system and the proposed system of socialism. The Feudal System of Law The system of feudalism was evolved in the period of turbulence into which Europe was thrown by the migra- tion of nations, and represented the first attempt to reduce the general social chaos and confusion of that period to some social order. The system was based on landownership and agriculture, both of which were rendered highly precarious by inces- sant wars and pillage, and naturally produced all the complex features of the social, political and legal organiza- tion of feudal society. The tiller of the soil in the early stages of feudal civiliza- tion was in constant danger of having his fields devastated and crops destroyed by the incursion of hostile hordes of marauders, and the protection from this ever present SOCIALISM AND LAW 73 danger was a necessary part of his agricultural pursuits. The man with the sword was as indispensable to the culti- vation of the land as the man with the plow, and the first division of labor in feudal society is formed on these lines. The warrior is a public fimctionary in the early feudal commimity ; he protects the tillers of the soil from molesta- tion in the pursuit of their daily occupations, and in return he receives from them his necessary means of subsistence in the shape of a portion of their crops. The warrior lives among the other members of the community; he is part of them, but his dwellmg house is the largest in the settlement, and is fortified, so as to offer a refuge to the villagers and their property and cattle in case of attack. In the further progress of feudal civilization the social relations become more permanent and fixed. The division of social functions develops into class differences. The warrior through long years of use and a process of heredi- tary transmission of social functions arrogates to himself the power over his fellow-men which the monopoly of arms •places in his hands: the settlement becomes the feudal Manor, and the fortified manor house, the Castle; the warrior turns into the Noble, the worker into the Villein, and the voluntary compensation for military services grows into a fixed annual tribute — the Tithe and compulsory military service. Land was now the principal wealth and source of power in feudal society, and pillage and robbery the accepted means of its acquisition. War became the industrial pursuit of the noble. Conquering a strange community, the victorious leader frequently reduced its inhabitants to the state of serfdom, appropriated their land, and endowed his retainers with 74 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT portions of it. But just as frequently the noble " protector" would rob his own subjects of large parcels of the commu- nal land. The class of the nobles thus became a land- owning class, and brute force was the origin of its title. The greed for land and the necessity of defending their possessions engendered an ever increasing strife among the nobles and led to military offensive and defensive alliances between them which made up the graduated and complex political structure of mediaeval society. At this stage of development, which we may consider the period of bloom of feudal civilization, the social rela- tions, notwithstanding their rough appearances, are still not altogether based on force. The social order, strange as it may seem, still rests very largely on the principle of mutual service between the classes. "The feudal lord," says Laf argue, "only holds his land and possesses a claim on the labor and harvests of his tenants and vassals on condition of doing suit and service to his superiors and lending aid to his dependants. On accepting the oath of fealty and homage the lord engaged to protect his vassal against all and sundry by all the means at his command; in return for which support the vassal was bound to render military and personal service and make certain payments to his lord. The latter in his turn, for the sake of protection, commended himself to a more puissant feudal lord, who himself stood in the relation of vassalage to a suzerain, to the king or emperor. All the members of the feudal hierarchy, from the serf upwards to the king or emperor, were bound by the ties of reciprocal duties." ^ ' Paul Lafargue, "The Evolution of Property," English Translation, London, 1894, p. 79. SOCIALISM AND LAW 75 Under the existing conditions of the times the class of nobility was, therefore, on the whole a socially useful class. But in the succeeding centuries, the onward march of civilization gradually but radically changed the social conditions of Europe. The logical trend of feudal de- velopment led to ever vaster and more powerful alliances based on a hierarchy of power and duties, to political con- centration and ultimately to the formation of monarchical states. The natural effect of this course of development was to limit strife and warfare, and a number of other causes served to accelerate that process. The introduc- tion of gunpowder was a death blow to knight errantry, and the humanizing influences of a more enlightened civilization, ushered in by the period of the Renaissance as well as the rise of commerce and industry, destroyed the very foundation upon which the feudal order was built. Feudal society was broken up, and the dominant class which it had produced was deprived of all its useful social functions. But not of its power. The nobility ceased to render service to the community, but it did not discard the habit of levying tribute upon it. As landowners, courtiers, magistrates and high dignitaries of church and state, the noblemen retained themselves in power for centuries after the passing of feudal society. But in the course of those centuries, a new and formi- dable rival for power was slowly developing in the bosom of society — the class of commercial and industrial burgh- ers — the bourgeoisie. Manufacture, which in the earlier stages of feudalism was a very subordinate occupation confined to the village, and exercised by its followers as a sort of public service in 76 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT return for a scant living, received an ever larger extension as society became more settled. The development of village markets and the rise of towns encouraged inde- pendent production of commodities and stimulated trade, which, with the discovery of the sea route to India and the discovery of America, received a new and larger impulse. The merchants' and manufacturers' guilds soon became a power in the state, and the town, a growing factor in the political life of the nation. Henceforward, the history of Europe is the history of the struggle between these two classes for political su- premacy. The titled descendants of the robber barons of every country unite in the effort to maintain their in- herited social, political and economic ascendency, and to stem the threatening tide of the rising power of the churl- ish newcomers, and in these efforts they are as a rule supported by the Catholic clergy, whose social and eco- nomic position is very similar to their own. On the other hand, the rising bourgeoisie strives everywhere for free- dom from the fetters of the feudal order, which impede its movement for the establishment of a free competitive international market of commerce and manufacture. The struggle results imiformly in the victory of the young and vigorous bourgeoisie over the enfeebled nobility. The last act in this historical drama is the general Euro- pean Revolution which formally esta*blishes the rule of the industrial bourgeoisie in all countries of Europe, whether such revolution is accomplished with little bloodshed, as in Great Britain in the seventeenth century, or by spectacular acts and carnage, as in France at the end of the eighteenth century, or by a slow and almost imperceptible process, as in Germany towards the middle of the last century. SOCIALISM AND LAW "JJ Such, in brief, is the career of the feudal system, and that career with all its phases of development and strug- gles is faithfully portrayed in the laws of the period. The formative stages of the feudal order are not con- ducive to the development of any general system of juris- prudence. Society is split into iimumerable separate and very loosely connected commimities, in each of which the arbitrary will of the feudal lord is the supreme law. The system of law of that period has been aptly described by Stubbs as " a graduated system of jtirisprudence based on land tenure, in which every lord taxed and commanded the class next below him; in which abject slavery formed the lowest and irresponsible tyranny the highest grade; in which private war, private coinage, private prisons, took the place of the imperial institutions of the govern- ment." ' The legal doctrine that the sovereign can do no wrong and the more modem doctrine of the immunity of the state from legal process, are directly traceable to that period of jurisprudence. The succeeding phase of feudalism, with its hierarchic order of vassalage and the graduated system of reciprocal rights and duties, finds its expression in the law of prop- erty and inheritance. Land, practically the sole means of existence and the source of all social power, is not considered private property. The feudal lord holds his land and enjoys the right to its income as a sort of trustee for his dependants ; his title to the land is not one in fee simple, or absolute ownership, but is subject to the superior rights of his immediate lord as well as to the numerous rights and easements of his subjects. The absolute legal title to all the land vests in the king as the representative > "Constitutional History," pp. 255, 256. 78 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT of the nation, a theory which has left very distinct traces in the present-day legal doctrine of the right of Eminent Domain. The feudal lord is the military officer in command of the fief or manor, and that office upon his death descends to his oldest son, together with the duties of protection which it entails. His landownership is merely an inci- dent of office and, therefore, descends to his oldest son as his successor in office. The entailed estates, the law of intestacy and primogeniture are the juridical expression of the social order of that epoch of feudal bloom. The period of dissolution of feudal society with its accompanying struggles between the landowning noble class and the industrial class are written in large letters in the legal evolution of that period of social transition. The downfall of feudalism and the triumph of the bour- geoisie are signalized by the removal of restrictions upon the alienation of land and freedom of trading, the intro- duction of the testament, the abolition of guilds and guild laws, and the eradication of all legal privileges of nobility and clergy. The Modern System of Law The basis of modern society differs from that of the feudal system in every essential. Under feudalism, as we have seen, the principal pursuit is agriculture and the principal form of wealth is landownership. The ownership of land is the basis of all social relations and political rights. It creates the hierarchy of rank, the feeling of ter- ritorial solidarity, the sense of communal interest, and the spirit of conservatism which are characteristic of that phase of civilization. SOCIALISM AND LAW 79 Contemporary society, on the other hand, rests mainly on manufacture and trading. The wealth of modern nations is represented principally by movable objects and commodities, or personal property, and all our social re- lations are based on the ownership of such property. The right to produce, consume and dispose of all com- modities at will, is a necessary incident of their full en- joyment, hence the absolute ownership of all property, the freedom of its production and its unrestricted use, are the pillars upon which all modem law rests. Private Property and its logical corollaries. Competitive Industry and Individual Liberty, are the new Trinity which the rule of the bourgeoisie has established in modem civilization. These three guiding principles find their most eloquent and finished expression in the American Declaration of Independence and the French Declaration of Human Rights, the two instruments framed spon- taneously and in their entirety as the expression of violent political revolutions; they animate the unwritten con- stitution of England and the written constitutions of all other parliamentary countries. Private property is also the foundation of all modem legislation, for all modern systems of law are principally designed for its protection. " In a general way," says the well-known criminologist, Zerboglio, "it may be considered as an established fact that the foundation and objects of criminal law are the preservation and the defense of that class which has constituted the modem system of jurisprudence for the purpose of safeguarding its economic power."* ' A. Zerboglio, "Lutte de classe dans la legislation," in Le Devenir Social, 1896, p. 142. 80 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT "Offenses against property" are acts committed in an endeavor to acquire property by means not sanctioned by law, — crimes committed for gain. But the direct offenses against property are not the only crimes committed from motives of gain. The overwhelming majority of crimes against the person, from murder in the first degree to simple assault, ate most frequently committed with the object of material advantages: if they are not crimes against property they may be fitly designated as crimes for property. And what our criminal laws conceal and disguise to some extent, our civil laws reveal with the utmost frank- ness; the civil codes of every modern nation are chiefly a compilation of rules governing the regulation of disputes over property rights and regulating relations of property owners between themselves. "If we examine any ground of civil action," remarks Mr. Bax, "we shall find it almost always turns directly or indirectly on a question of property; that is, on what individual shall possess certain wealth — the chances be- ing invariably on the side of the wealthy litigant." ' Except for its protection of private property and the principle of free competition as instanced by the anti-trust and anti-monopoly legislation, the general policy of our modem law is one of non-interference. The famous watchword, " Laissez-faire," applies to bourgeois laws as well as to bourgeois economics. This policy is based on the assumption of equality of all citizens and their ability to adjust their own relations without the interference of the state. And in the period » Ernest Belfort Bax, "The Religion of Socialism," London, igoi, p. 147- SOCIALISM AND LAW 8 1 of inception of the present social order this assumption was not entirely unwarranted. When manufacture was in its infancy, and was carried on by primitive methods and with the aid of simple and inexpensive tools, the in- dustrial field was practically free to all artisans. There were no fixed lines between "capitalists" and "wage workers" as distinct and permanent classes: employer and employee met on terms of some equality ; their rela- tions were largely created by voluntary and reciprocal contract. But with the development of the complex and expensive modem instruments of production, these instru- ments passed into the hands of the possessing classes, who thus acquired a monopoly of the modem industrial pro- cess, while the non-possessing classes were reduced to the status of wage workers. The assumed equality of all men thus became a mere fiction, at least as far as the economic relations of the citizens are concerned, and all social legislation based on that assumption henceforward had the effect of sanc- tioning the power of the strong to exploit the weak. In a society of economic equals the law might properly abstain from interfering with the industrial relations of the citi- zens, but in a society in which economic supremacy places one class of citizens in an artificial position of advantage over their fellow-citizens, the office of just legislation should be to protect the weak against the abuses of the strong. The failure of modem law to afford such pro- tection to the workingmen in itself shows partiality in the interests of the ruling classes. "Upon this point," observes Loria, "a comparison between modem and mediaeval law is enlightening. Dioring the Middle Ages, when capital was weak and 82 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT labor acquired its strength from the existence of free land, the law came to the assistance of capital by regulating the labor contract in a manner hostile to the laborer's interest. In our times, on the contrary, when capital is strong and labor is deprived of its liberty of action, the law amply fulfills its office of guardian of property by abstaining from regulating the wage contract at all, and leaving it to the dictation of capital." ' A striking instance of this rule is to be found in the enactment and repeal of the famous English "Statute of Laborers." The epidemic of the "black death" in the middle of the fourteenth century had vastly decreased the supply of labor, and wages were going up rapidly. Parliament passed a law making work compulsory on all propertyless persons below the age of sixty years at wages that had been customary in the year 1347, i.e., before the plague, and this law with a number of successive amendments and variations remained in force until the beginning of the nineteenth century, when the develop- ment of machinery and the modem processes of produc- tion had created a superfluity of labor and a ruinous com- petition among the workers themselves. The laws fixing the rate of wages then became useless and embarrassing to the employing classes, and were speedily repealed. But the wage contract is not the only instance of the disadvantage of the workingmen under the law arising from the principle of non-interference. Another and per- haps more conspicuous illustration of the iniquitous effect of that principle is to be found in the employers' liability laws of modern nations, particularly the nations whose ' Achille Loria, "The Economic Foundations of Society," English Translation, p. 104. SOCIALISM AND LAW 83 systems of jurisprudence are based on the Anglo-Saxon common law. The doctrine of the assumption by the workingman of the "obvious risks of employment," and his inability to recover damages for injuries where such injuries were caused in whole or in part by his " contribu- tory negligence" or by the negligence of a "fellow-ser- vant," have for their theoretical basis the fiction that the modem workingman of his own free choice determines how, where and with whom he shall work. The practical effect of these doctrines is that in most cases the work- ingman remains without remedy against his employer. The fictitious "equality of all citizens before the law" furthermore favors the possessing classes as against the classes of non-possessors in matters of modem legal pro- cedure at least as much as in matters of substantial law. The fact that the practice of law is a business pursuit of the private practitioner coupled with the complicated, tech- nical and expensive nature of litigation, frequently puts justice beyond the reach of the poor. "The law," ex- claims the eminent Italian jurist ahready quoted, "is a monopoly of wealth, and in the temple of Themis there is no place reserved for the laborer." * Nor is the character of modem law as the guardian of the possessing classes and the whip of the poor, evidenced by its passive attitude alone. The rigid prohibitions against labor combinations in the various modern coun- tries, the strict penalties for all labor interferences with the "rights" of the employing class, and the severe treat- ment by the courts of aU "transgressions" of workingmen in their struggles against their employers, furnish eloquent proof of the law's positive partiality for the ruling 'classes. ' Loria, "Economic Foundations of Society," p. 114. 84 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY .AND MOVEMENT Social Legislation and Socialist Jurisprudence As the feudal regime at a certain stage of its develop- ment became burdensome on the class of the "bourgeoisie" and caused them to revolt against that regime, so has the modem industrial order become burdensome upon the working classes, and the latter already show symptoms of revolt against it. The mpre advanced workingmen of all countries begin to regard the economic dependence of their class and the privileged position of the employing classes as a social injustice. They feel that the part of the toilers in the process of production entitles, them to a larger share of the national product, and that they are despoiled and deprived of their just due by the classes in power. They demand an ever greater consideration and protection for labor, and an ever larger curtailment of the privileges of wealth. These demands of the workingmen assume for them the form of social or ethical rights, and their struggles are struggles to realize their rights as laws. The character of the legislation which the working class thus advocates and strives for, is diametrically opposed to all the funda- mental principles of modern or bourgeois law. It is based on the right of persons instead of property rights, and on social regulation, control and protection, instead of the principles of free competition and non-interference. And as the working-class movement grows in strength, intelli- gence and determination, the ruling classes are forced to make concessions to it, either by way of granting or fore- stalling its demands. This is the secret of the recent reaction against the sacred "laissez-faire" principle 9f modern law, and the SOCIALISM AND LAW 85 source of all "social legislation" of the last few decades. In Germany, social legislation was inaugurated at a time when the socialist movement had demonstrated that it was strong enough to withstand the assault of the anti- socialist laws. The motive of the government in intro- ducing such legislation was revealed by the Iron Chan- cellor with his characteristic frankness in the following speech, delivered in the Imperial Diet in 1881: — "That the state should take better care of its needy members than heretofore is not only a dictate of humane- ness and Christianity, but also a necessity of conservative politics which should aim to cultivate in the non-possessing classes of the population, who are at the same time the most numerous and least instructed, the view that the state is not only a necessary but also a beneficent institution. To this end they must be led by means of direct advantages, derived through legislative enactment, to consider the state not as an institution created solely for the protection of the possessing classes, but as one serving their own needs and interests. The objection that such legislation would introduce a socialistic element must not deter us from our course." In France the first social legislation was introduced by Napoleon III as a measure intended to combat the grow- ing influence of the International Workingmen's Associa- tion. In England, in the United States and in all other modem countries, the beginnings of systematic "factory legislation" coincide, broadly speaking, with the begin- nings of the organized labor movement, and its extension keeps pace with the growth of the labor movement. The current of social legislation takes two distinct directions, one being designed to protect the workmen, and 86 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT the other to regulate and limit the power of industrial capitalism. To the former class belong the laws pro- viding for workingmen's insurance in case of sickness and disability, the old-age pension laws, and the large body of laws popularly known as Factory Legislation, i. e., laws limiting the hours of labor of women and chil- dren, and of men in certain lines of employment, estab- lishing rules for the health and safety of the operatives in mines, mills, factories and other works, extending the liability of employers for injuries sustained by their work- men, regulating the payment of wages, and similar meas- ures affecting the duties of employer to employed. In the second class of legislation must be counted all laws which attempt to check the excessive accumulation of wealth in the hands of private individuals, such as the income and inheritance tax laws, and laws having for their object the control and regulation of certain industries, such as railroading, banking, insurance, etc. The net result of all such social legislation is as yet insignificant. On the whole it has had no great efifect in improving the condition of the poor or limiting the power of the wealthy. But the importance of this line of legislation lies not in its positive achievements as much as in its symptomatic significance. The "social" laws of the last few decades mark a growing change in the popular conception of the office of legislation — the approach of a new legal system expressive of a new social era. For the forces that gave birth to the weak rudiments of social legislation are still at wdfk, steadily gaining in extent and intensity. The struggles of the organized workingmen of all countries for a fair distribution of the national wealth and for equitable social relations among SOCIALISM AND LAW 87 all men are finding ever stronger support among all classes of the population, and are bound to continue. The logical end of all legal reforms accompanying these strug- gles is the substitution of a system of law based on the principle of socialism for the present individualistic system. And while it would be folly to attempt at this time a comprehensive outline of a socialist system of law, we have sufficient concrete data in the present tendencies of social development to enable us to indicate the funda- mental principles and general aspect of that proposed system of jurisprudence. <• A socialist society is one based on the system of public or collective ownership of the material instruments of pro- duction, democratic administration of the industries, and cooperative labor; and the guiding principle of such so- ciety must be the recognition of the right of existence and enjoyment inherent in every human being. The function of law imder socialism will of necessity be to insure the stability of these principles and institu- tions, just as it has been its function at all earlier periods of human civilization to insure the stability of the institu- tions of such periods. But in a socialist society the func- tion of law will be largely simplified by the disappearance of class distinctions. In a society of industrial equals, in which the material interests of all citizens are identical, and the interests of every citizen accord with those of the state, the motives for all crimes against property and for many crimes against the ^rson are removed, and with their removal disappears the necessity of legislating against such crimes, while the abolition of private competitive industry and trading must have the effect of eradicating 88 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT from our statute books the major part of all our civil and commercial laws. In direct opposition to the modem system of law, which deals largely with the reciprocal relations and private conduct of individual citizens, and pays but scant atten- tion to the industrial life of the nation, a socialist system of jurisprudence must of necessity occupy itself primarily with the regulation of the social processes of wealth pro- duction and distribution, and limit its interference with the private life and conduct of the citizen to a minimum. 1 CHAPTER V SOCIALISM AND THE STATE J Nature and Evolution of the State One of the most interesting theoretical discussions that ever occupied a modem political parliament was that con- ducted in the German Diet on the occasion of its delibera- tions on the proposed budget of 1893. ^^ ^^^ towards the close of the session; the dissolution of the Diet was imminent, and the Social Democracy, which in the pre- vious elections had polled close to one and a half million votes, loomed up large as a menacing factor in the com- ing elections. By common accord the subject under im- mediate consideration was suspended, the debate of the Diet was made the pretext for an electoral campaign and the sole topic of discussion was the proposed Socialist State. It was a battle royal which lasted three consecu- tive days. The most eloquent speakers of all anti-socialist parliamentary parties in Germany took part in the debate, mercilessly criticising the socialist aims and ideals, and demolishing the structure of the proposed socialist state as they conceived it. When the turn came to the brilliant socialist leader, August Bebel, he rather nonplussed his colleagues in the Diet by the somewhat startling declaration that the phrase "Socialist State" was in itself an absurdity, and that a "state" could not possibly exist under a socialist order. 89 90 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT The same idea is expressed by Bebel more explicitly in his "Woman," where, in discussing the feflFects of the proposed economic reforms of socialism on the political organization of society, he says : — "The state organization as such gradually loses its foundation. The state is the organization of force for the maintenance of existing relations- of property and social rule. But as the relations of master and servant disappear with the abolition of the present system of property, the political expression of the relationship ceases to have any meaning. The state expires with the expira- tion of the ruling class, just as religion expires when the belief in supernatural beings or supernatural reasoning ceases to exist. Words must represent ideas; if they lose their substance, they no longer correspond to any- thmg." ' This conception of the state is by no means peculiar to Bebel. It has been expressed by many socialist think- ers of prominence before and after him, and its source is to be found in the following passage from the writings of Frederick Engels, one of the ' theoretical founders of modern socialism : — " By reducing the ever greater majority of the population to the rank of proletarians, the capitalist mode of pro- duction creates the power which is compelled to bring about this social transformation under penalty of its own destruction. By forcing the conversion of the large socialized means of production into state ownership, it points itself the way towards the accomplishment of that transformation. The wage workers seize the powers of ' August Bebel, "Woman in the Past, Present and Future," San Francisco, 1897, p. 128. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 9 1 the state and provisionally turn the means of production over to the state. But with this act they abolish their own existence as proletarians, and with this act they also abolish all class diflferences and class antagonisms and the state as a state. Heretofore society was based on class antagonisms and needed a ' state,' i.e., an organi- zation of the exploiting classes for the preservation of the existing methods of production, and more particularly for the purpose of forcibly maintaining the exploited classes in the condition of dependence inherent in such methods of production (slavery, serfdom, wage labor). The state was the official representative of the whole society; it was its- union in a visible body, but only inasmuch as it was the state of that class which represented to it the entire society: in antiquity, the state of the slave-owning citizens; in the Middle Ages, that of the feudal nobihty; in our times, that of the bourgeoisie. By actually becoming the representative of the whole society, the state becomes superfluous. As soon as there is no longer any class in society to be held in subjection, as soon as the class rule and the struggle for existence based on the modern an- archy in production are removed, and with them also the resultant struggles and excesses, there is nothing more to repress, nothing requiring a special repressing power, a state. The first act in which the state appears as the representative of entire society — the seizure of the instruments of production in the name of society — is at the same time its last independent act as a state. The interference of the state with, social relations becomes superfluous in one field after the other, and the state, as it were, falls asleep. The government of persons is replaced by the administration of things and the regula- 92 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT tion of the process of production. The state is not ' abol- ished,' it dies off. The phrase of the 'socialist state' may thus be judged for its value as a slogan in the tem- porary propaganda of socialism, and for its scientific inefficiency." ^ It will be noticed that the socialist writers quoted see in the state a social institution different and apart from organized society as such. This is by no means the prevalent conception, and in fact there seems to be no fixed and generally accepted definition of the term in the popular or scientific literature of the subject. Few ex- pressions are used so vaguely and loosely as the term "state." A large number of authoritative sociological writers and lexicographers by implication consider the state as a term synonymous with organized society, and expressly define it in that sense.^ The fault of all such definitions is, that they do not • Frederick Engels, "Herrn Eugen Diihring's Umwalzung der Wis- senschaften," 3d Edition, Stuttgart, 1894. ' "The whole body of the people united under one government, what- ever may be the form of the government." — Webster's Dictionary. "The state (xiXis) is an association of human beings — and the highest form of human association." — Aristotle. "The state (respublica) is the creature of the people, the people united by a common sense of right and by a community of interest." — Cicero. "The state is organized mankind," — Johann K. Bluntcshli in "Lehre vom modernen Staat." "The state is an assemblage of persons united under the same gov- ernment." — Turcot. "The state is the people living within certain geographical limits. It represents a body of people having, in general, like sentiments, feelings and aims, to carry out which they originate some organic law which pro- vides for ministers or officers, and they constitute the government, which is but the agent of the people in executing the laws they have ordained." — Carroll D. Wright in "Outline of Practical Sociology," New York, 1899, pp. 88, 89. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 93 define. All human society in a state of civilization is or- ganized, and the term "organized society" applies with equal force to the collectivity of contemporary mankind as to each separate nation or community. The " state " has a more limited and definite significance, and is more properly defined as a body of people united under one political government.' That the distinction is not a mere scholastic quibble, but a very material and weighty dif- ferentiation, becomes apparent as soon as we attempt to analyze it. Every political government is not only well defined territorially, but it also has certain other fixed and essential attributes: it must be based on a constitu- tion or on the will of an individual sovereign ; it must be supported by laws that can be enforced ; it must have the machinery to enforce such laws and the power to raise revenue for the maintenance of such machinery; it must also be represented by a person or class of persons invested ' "A political community organized under a distinct government, recognized and conformed to by the people as supreme." — Standard Dictionary. "When a number of persons are supposed to be in the habit of paying obedience to a person, or an assemblage of persons of a known and certain description, such persons altogether are said to be in a state of political society." — J. Bentham in "A Fragment of Government." "The supreme will of a state, in whatever mode of sovereignty mani- fested, expresses itself and achieves its ends in various ways, but chiefly through Government, which may be defined as the requisition, direction and organization of obedience." — Franklin H. Giddings in "Read- ings in Descriptive and Historical Sociology." "The state is an aggregation of individuals living in the same terri- tory under the government of one supreme power." — Anton Menger in "Neue Staatslehre." "The state is sovereign, i.e., it has the original, absolute, unlimited power over the individual subject and over all associations of subjects." — J. W. Burgess in "Political Science and Constitutional Law," New York, 1900, p. 4. 94 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT with the powers of government. In short, the element of repression and coercion is essential to the existence of every state. "When the political community is regarded as ' society, ' " says Mr. Ball, "it is looked at as a number of individuals or classes or professions — as an aggregate of vmits. When we speak of the 'state,' we understand a single per- sonality, as it were, representing all these interests and endowed with force which it can exercise against any one of them. In other words 'the state' cannot be reduced to ' society ' or to ' government,' which is only one of its func- tions, but is society organized and having force." ' The keen French economist Leroy-Beaulieu observes : "The concrete state, as we see it at work in all countries, manifests, as an organism, two essential characteristics, which it always possesses, and which, moreover, it is alone in possessing ; the power of imposing by methods of con- straint upon all the inhabitants of a territory the observ- ance of certain injunctions known by the name of laws or administrative regulations, and the power of raising, also by methods of constraint, from the inhabitants of that territory large sums of money of which it has the free dis- posal. The organism of the st^te is, therefore, essentially coercive; the constraint it exercises takes two forms, the one of laws, the other of taxes." ^ Charles Benoist in his "Politique"' states the same proposition more tersely in affirming that the state may be recognized by two signs; it makes laws and levies taxes. » Sidney Ball, " The Moral Aspect of Socialism" in "Socialism and Individualism," Fabian Socialist Series, No. 3, London, 1908, pp. 75, 76. ' Paul Leroy-Beaulieu, "The Modern State," English Translation, London, 1891, p. 67. ' Quoted by Gabriel Deville, "The State and Socialism." SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 95 If we enlarge the definition somewhat, and say, The state makes and enforces laws and levies taxes, we have men- tioned the most uniform and indispensable fimctions of every state. But the enumeration of these functions alone is quite sufficient to convict the state as a product of class strug- gles. Law as distinguished from mere custom, law in the sense of a positive command of the state enforceable by a penalty, has its inception in an order of things in which it is already in the interest of one part of the population to act in a manner prejudicial to their fellow-men, and in which it becomes necessary for the latter to restrain the former by force. Such an order of things, however, is only possible in a class society. Primitive society is a society of economic equals. The community produces principally articles of immediate cftftsumption, and that in quantities barely sufficient for the needs of its members. There is no opportunity for the accumulation of private wealth, there are no rich and no poor, and no social classes of any kind. There is neither motive nor chance for any man to covet the property or to trespass upon the "rights" of his neighbor, and there is no occasion to repress such desires by force. The primitive social organizations, the gentes and phratries, have no laws and no instruments to enforce laws. Courts, judges, constables, prisons and police are entirely unknown to them; they levy no taxes or compulsory tribute on their members ; they are entirely free from the element of coercion — they are not states. It is only when the productivity of human labor has in- creased to a degree beyond that required for the satis- faction of his indispensable personal needs, when man has become a possible object of exploitation, and when the first 96 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT form of such exploitation has been introduced in the in- stitution of slavery, it is only then that repressive laws and organized social force become necessary. The state thus appears in the social development of mankind simultaneously with the institutions of private property and slavery and as their necessary concomitant. In its original form, it was frankly and without disguise the organization of the slave-owning class for the purpose of maintaining their authority over their slaves. The slaves themselves, as stated in the preceding chapter, were not members of the state, and there was no pretense that the state was "the body of the whole people." "The ancient state," says David G. Ritchie, "existed for the citizen and not for the imenfranchised multitudes, who were mere means to the state's existence and no part of the state itself. The Greek state existed for the few; the modern state professes to exist for all — and may do so soijae day in reality." ' With the gradual change of economic conditions and social relations, the state has steadily modified its outward garb, but its true functions and inner mechanism have largely remained unchanged. The state has at all times been the instrument of the possessing classes; its chief function has always been to maintain the existing order, i.e., the supremacy of the ruling classes and the dependence of the non-possessing classes, and even to-day it is the privi- lege of the classes in power "to make laws and to levy taxes," while it is the duty of the poor to obey the laws and to pay the taxes. The socialist definition of the state as an organization of the ruling classes for the maintenance of the exploited ' "The Principle of State Interference," London, 1902, p. 101. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 97 classes in a condition of dependence, is thus entirely cor- rect in substance. But in connection with this definition another factor must be considered. The ruling classes of every period are created by the prevalent economic conditions of that period and they change with the change in these conditions. The slave-owning class was superseded in history by the class of feudal landlords, and the latter by the modern bourgeoisie, and with the accession of every new class of rulers the character and constitution of the state assumed a different aspect. These changes are rarely distinguish- able by definite lines of demarcation. As a rule they take place gradually and are accompanied by protracted and obstinate struggles between the declining and rising classes, and it is not always easy to determine which of the two contending classes is the ruling class. In such periods of transition the state reflects the indefinite character of the social and economic conditions, and while in the main it always serves the interests of the class temporarily in power, it frequently makes important concessions to the rebellious classes. Thus the state of the fourteenth century was a feudal state, pure and simple, without any admixture of foreign elements ; but the state of the seventeenth century, while still feudal in its main characteristics, already pre- sented many elements of bourgeois power. And similarly, the state of a century and even half a century ago was an unalloyed bourgeois state, while the present-day state already shows deep inroads made in its . substance and functions by the rising class of wage workers. " Under the pressure of the socialist and labor movement in all civilized countries, the state has acquired a new sig- nificance as an instrument of social and economic reform. 98 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT Such reforms have already demonstrated the ability of the state to curb the industrial autocracy of the ruling classes and to protect the workers from excessive exploi- tation by their employers. The modern state, originally the tool in the hands of the capitalist class for the exploitation of the workers, is grad- ually coming to be recognized by the latter as a most potent instrument for the modification and ultimate aboli- tion of the capitalist class rule. In the general scheme of socialism, the state has, therefore, the very important mission of paving the way for the transition from present conditions to socialism. The state in that r61e is gener- ally styled in the literature of socialism the "period of transition, " or the " transitional state." Beyond it lies the pure socialist order. Does that order still admit of the existence of a state, or must the state, as the product of class divisions in so- ciety, fall with the disappearance of those class divisions as asserted by Engels and his followers ? At the first glance the proposition seems almost axio- matic — with the removal of the cause, the effect must fail. But on closer analysis the question seems by no means free from doubt. A social institution may be called into life by certain conditions and for certain purposes, but may gradually adapt itself to new and entirely different con- ditions and purposes. In fact, the history of our civiliza- tion is replete with instances of social, political, religious and legal institutions which have long survived their origi- nal creating causes, and in an altered form have shown great vitality under new conditions. The modern state exhibits many features that seem to indicate just such adaptability and vitality. The state, which came into being SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 99 solely as an instrument of class repression, has gradually, and especially within the last centuries, assumed other important social functions, functions in which it largely represents society as a whole, and not any particular class of it. Instances of such functions of the modern state may be foxmd in the system of public education, sanitary and health regulations, and in the institutions of police and criminal justice to the extent to which they secure the per- sonal safety and security of all citizens. It is true, as Menger ' observes, that these functions con- stitute but a very small part of the activity of the state, and are as a rule relegated to its subordinate organs, such as municipalities, etc. ; but it is equally true that these gen- erally useful functions are claiming and receiving ever greater attention from the state, and that under a system of socialism they are certain to receive an immense ex- tension. If we realize that the socialist commonwealth must of necessity be charged with the direction, regulation or control of at least its principal industries, and with the care of its old and decrepit, sick, invalid and orphaned mem- bers, we shall readily see that the socialist organization will have to be something more than a mere "administration of things," — it will in all likelihood be a quite definitely organized society. But, it may be objected, a socialist society will be free from the element of coercion; hence it will not be a state in the true sense of the term. Let us consider this objection. For the purposes of public works, health, safety and relief, the socialist commonwealth will need vast material * Anton Menger, "Neue Staatslehre," 2d Edition, Jena, 1904, p. 20, 100 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT resources, probably more than the modern state, and these resources, in whatever form and under whatever designa- tion, can come only from the wealth-producing members of the commonwealth — thus there must be a direct or indirect tax on the labor or income of the citizen. The collection of this tax, the direction of the industries and the regulation of the relations between the citizens, will require some laws and some rules or instruments for their enforcement; hence even the element of coercion cannot be entirely absent in a socialist society, at least not as far as the human mind can at present conceive. The socialist society as conceived by modern socialists differs, of course, very radically from the modern state in form and substance. It is not a class state, it does not serve any part of the population and does not rule any other part of the popu- lation; it represents the interests of the entire community, and it is for the benefit of the entire community that it levies taxes and makes and enforces laws. It is not the slaveholding state, nor the feudal state, nor the state of the bourgeoisie, — it is a socialist state, but a state neverthe- less, and since little or nothing can be gained by inventing a new term, we shall hereafter designate the proposed or- ganized socialist society as the Socialist State. The Transitional State Modern socialists recognize that social institutions are not the results of arbitrary choice, but of historical growth. When the ever working forces of industrial evolution have created new economic interests and social relations, the political forms of society must be modified to meet these changes, and when these new interests and relations become SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 10 1 incompatible with the very basis of the existing social system, that system is bound to give way to a more ade- quate order. The socialists contend that the present system of individual ownership in the large and social means of production, and the system of industrial com- petition based on such individual ownership, have become or are fast becoming incompatible with the interests of an ever growing majority of the population and with the prog- ress of industry itself. They perceive a tendency in the modern industrial development towards the collective ownership of these means of production and the socializa- tion of industries; they see the public necessity of such transformation, and advocate and demand its accomplish- ment. That is the whole of the socialist program, and it is certainly wide enough. The transformation of the means of production from private to public ownership is by no means a simple task. It is not reasonable to suppose that the possessing classes, the owners of the land, the mines, railroads and factories, the financiers and capitalists of all descriptions, will some fine day voluntarily surrender all their privileges and possessions to the people, nor is it likely that the transformation will be accomplished by one single and simple decree of the victorious proletariat all over the civilized world. More likely the process of trans- formation will be complicated and diversified, and will be marked by a series of economic and social reforms and legislative measures tending to divest the ruling classes of their monopolies, privileges and advantages, step by step, until they are practically shorn of the power to ex- ploit their fellow-men ; i.e., until all the important means of production have passed into collective ownership and 102 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT all the principal industries are reorganized on the basis of socialist cooperation. The proposed measures that are expected to effect this eventual transformation con- stitute the "immediate" or "transitional" demands of so- cialism, and are part of the general socialist program, each socialist party emphasizing those points which are of more immediate importance in view of the social and political conditions of its own country at any given time. The measures thus most generally advocated by the socialists are: universal suffrage and equal political rights for men and women; the initiative, referendum, proportional representation in legislative bodies, and the right of recall of representatives by their constituents; greater autonomy for the municipalities and limitation of the powers and functions of the central government; the abolition of standing armies; progressive reduction of the hours of labor and increase of wages; state employment of the imemployed; state insurance of workingmen in case of accidents and sickness; old age pensions for work- ingmen; state provisions for all orphans and invalids; abolition of all indirect taxes; a progressive tax on prop- erty, income and inheritance; municipal ownership of all municipal utilities; state or national ownership of all mines, means of transportation and communication, and of all industries controlled by monopolies, trusts and combines, and the gradual assumption by the munici- pality or state of all other industries as soon as they reach a stage where they become susceptible of socialization. The socialists, of course, do not anticipate that these measures will in all cases be adopted in their logical order and in the pristine purity of their original conception ac- cording to program, nor that they will be realized in all SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 103 countries with absolute iiniformity. More likely the course of the social transformation will be different in the different countries, slow and methodic in some, rapid and tempestuous in others, according to the historic condi- tions, the temperament of the people and the respective strength and intelligence of the ruling classes and the prol- etariat in each case. In the more democratic countries, especially those in which the socialist and labor movements constitute important political' and social factors, the neces- sary transitional reforms, or at least a large part of them, may be gradually conquered through the direct control by the proletariat of important organs of the state, such as municipalities or legislatures, or through the indirect influence of the growing labor movement. In other countries the conquest of the public powers by the working class may be accomplished by a violent insiirrection. The wage workers may, in the words of Engels, "seize the powers of the state" and establish a temporary "dictator- ship of the proletariat." Thus the transition from the system of feudalism to the present order was accomplished radically but peacefully in England, slowly and incom- pletely in Germany, rapidly and violently in France. But violence is but an accident of the social revolution ; it is by no means its necessary accompaniment, and it has no place in the socialist program. And similarly silent is the socialist program on the question whether the gradual expropriation of the possess- ing classes will be accomplished by a process of confisca- tion or by the method of compensation. The greater number of socialist writers incline towards the latter assumption, but in that they merely express their individ- ual present preferences. Social development, and espe- 104 THE SOCLA.LIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT cially social revolutions, are not in the habit of consulting cut and dried theories evolved by philosophers of past generations, and social justice is more frequently a ques- tion of social expediency and class power. The French clergy was not compensated for the lands taken from it by the bourgeois revolution, and the Russian noblemen and American slave owners were not compensated upon the emancipation of their serfs and chattel slaves. It is not unlikely that in countries in which the social transfor- mation will be accomplished peacefully, the state will com- pensate the expropriated proprietors, while every violent revolution will be followed by confiscation. The socialists are not much concerned about this issue. Their aim is the establishment of a state in which exploitation of man by man shall become impossible, and when private wealth has been robbed of the character of employing and ex- ploiting capital, its possession by a number of individuals ceases to be a menacing factor in a socialist state. The "transitional state" thus conceived cannot be bounded by fixed lines of demarcation either in its incep- tion or its termination. As every other period of historical development, it is bound to overlap at both ends. A number of municipalities and states are already wholly or partly under socialist control. Many of the "transi- tional" reforms of socialism, political and social, have al- ready been realized to some extent in the countries of Eu- rope, America and Australia, and the conceded tendency of all modern legislation is toward the extension of such reforms. In this sense it may well be said that we are in the midst, or at any rate at the beginning, of the socialist " transitional state," although it would be impossible for us to say just when we entered it. And similarly difficult is SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 05 it to fix the line between the so-called transitional state and the socialist state proper. Theoretically, the reign of pure socialism begins after the entire socialist program has been materialized and society has been reorganized entirely on the basis of cooperative production. But in reality, social ideals are rarely realized in perfect form, and just as the period of feudalism has left remnants of its institutions in a later order, and in some cases down to the present day, so, in all likelihood, many features of our present individualist order will long survive in a state, substantially and preponderatingly socialistic. The Socialist State The transition from the present order of individual wealth and competitive industry to a system of collective ownership and cooperative production, by whatever means and in whatever manner accomplished, is boimd to be accompanied by very thoroughgoing changes in all rela- tions of men, and by a decided remodeling of the entire social and political structure of society. These proposed changes, with the probable constitution, construction and workings of the "socialist state," have always offered an exceptionally fertile field for speculation. The modern socialist movement made its first appear- ance towards the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, and its philosophy was largely influenced by the general ideological conceptions of that time. The first apostles of the new creed believed with their contemporaries that political and social institutions could be arbitrarily devised, tried, chosen, cast away, and "substituted by others. They regarded the evils and shortcomings of modern society as flaws in the social struc- I06 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT ture, due to the carelessness of the "founders" of that society, and saw the remedy for these evils in the simple expedient of constructing a new society on a more rational and equitable plan. The early socialist literature is, therefore, replete with detailed and minute descriptions of proposed social organizations wherein universal brother- hood is the rule, bliss and prosperity are the heritage of all, and justice reigns supreme. And as the authors of these social Utopias were not bound by material impedi- ments and freely drew upon their fertile imaginations, their schemes are more or less realistic or fantastic according to their individual temperaments and bent of mind. The most noteworthy representatives of this early school of socialism are Morelly, Gabriel Mably, Charles Fourier, Etienne Cabet, Robert Owen and Wilhelm Weitling. But the detailed painting of the society of the future or the "socialist state" is by no means confined to the pioneers of modern socialist thought. The temptation to evolve a ready and complete scheme of a new social order, based on socialism, for the purpose of proving or refuting the "feasibility" of the socialist ideal is so great, that socialists and anti-socialists alike still very frequently resort to that expedient. Conspicuous instances of such society builders on the socialist side are Edward Bellamy ("Looking Backward"), William Morris ("News from Nowhere") and Laurence Gronlund ("Cooperative Com- monwealth"); while the opposite side is ably represented by the merciless destroyers of the "socialist state" of the types of Eugen Richter (" Sozialdemokratische Zukunfts- bilder"), William Graham ("Socialism Old and New"), Victor Cathrein ("Socialism: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Application"), and those latest valiant con- SOCIALISM AND THE STATE lo/ querors of the Socialist Dragon, David M. Parry ("The Scarlet Empire") and W. H. Mallock. Nor can it be said that the drawing of such detailed descriptions of imaginary forms and workings of a socialist society is altogether a waste of time; such pictures are not without usefulness as food for reflection and interesting speculation, and some of them no doubt contain sparks of true genius which may perhaps even find practical application in times to come. But all such descriptions are nevertheless mere guesses for which none but their authors are responsible; they are not part of the generally accepted socialist pro- gram or philosophy. "Never," said the veteran leader of the German Social Democracy, Wilhelm Liebknecht, on the occasion of the debate in the Diet already alluded to, "never has our party told the workingmen about a 'state of the future,' never in any way other than as a mere utopia. If anybody says : I pictiore to myself society after our program has been realized, after wage labor has been abolished and the ex- ploitation of men has ceased, in such or such a manner, well and good ; ideas are free, and everybody may conceive the socialist state as he pleases. Whoever believes in it, may do so, whoever does not, need not. These pictures are but dreams, and social democracy has never under- stood them otherwise." And it is difficult to see how any forecast of future con- ditions could be much more than a dream. If we look back from the pinnacles of the twentieth century to con- ditions of the early part of the nineteenth century, we shall be astounded at the unprecedented radical revolution accomplished within the last hundred years in all domains of our social, political and industriallife. The old pur- I08 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT suits, habits and views of our fathers have been mercilessly cast aside. New fields of endeavor have been explored, new truths discovered, new relations established, new worlds created. The globe has a vastly different aspect from that of a hundred years ago, and the nations that people it are vastly different beings. The modern man differs in all his habits and mode of life from his forefathers of but a few generations ago. It will not be seriously contended that these present con- ditions could have been more or less accurately forecast and divined at the beginning of the present regime even by the most sagacious and best-informed social philosopher. For even if such a philosopher could reckon with the prob- able development of the forces then existing, he could cer- tainly not take into account the tremendous effect of the new discoveries and inventions since made, the applica- tion of steam and electricity in the industrial processes, the introduction of the railroads, steamships, telegraphs, telephones, and the countless modern machines and con- trivances which have served to revolutionize our entire system of production and communication and with it all our habits of life and thought. To the placid and rational philosopher of the beginning of the nineteenth century, an account of our present civilization would have been a much wilder and more incredible dream than the most fantastic socialist utopia seems to-day to our wise bourgeois philosopher. And still the task of the man who might have assumed a century ago to forecast present conditions would have been mere child's play in comparison with that of the dreamer who undertakes to-day to describe the details of the life and organization of the "socialist state." SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 09 The forces of industrial development have by no means reached their zenith, they are still naultiplying and multi- plying in an ever accelerating ratio. The wider the basis of existing industrial forces, the greater the rate of economic progress ; this is the simple working of the theory of geo- metrical progression as daily demonstrated in our indus- trial life. The last fifty years have witnessed more indus- trial progress than the three centuries preceding them, and the coming fifty years will perhaps eclipse the last five hundred years. The task of the would-be socialist forecaster is besides greatly complicated by another element. The develop- ments of the last century, immense and radical as they have been, have not very materially affected the basic principles of modern industrial organization. But the industrial development of the future, as conceived by socialists, will consist not only in the natural increase and multiplication of the productive forces, but also in a radical reorganiza- tion of the methods of production and distribution, and the resultant changes must thus of necessity be more thorough- going and less calculable. And finally, all speculation on the nature and aspect of the socialist state suffers from another inherent weakness. They tacitly assume that the "socialist state" is a fixed and defijiite phase of social development, whereas in fact it is anything but that. Socialism stands for an order o(f society in which private ownership in the means of produc- tion has substantially given way to a system of collective ownership. Such an order of things may quite conceiv- ably be established in some of the most progressive coim- tries in a short time, say within twenty-five years — our era is one of rapid developments. Such a country would in no THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT that case quite properly claim the designation of a "so- cialist state." But with the establishment of socialism, the general progress of that coimtry would not halt, and the succeeding centuries would continue to change its institutions, life and customs. The socialist state in its maturity will be an entirely different organization from the socialist state in its infancy, and similarly the socialist organization of one country may be radically different from that of the other, and still the social prophet must have in mind a fixed and imiform "socialist state." Modern socialists indulge but little in fantastic fore- casts of the future order of things; they fully realize the general futility of such speculations for the practical purposes of the socialist movement. The socialist criticism is directed against existing evils, the socialist program is a program of immediate relief, and the socialist demands are made on the present state. The socialists are concerned only with the immediate effects of their proposed measures on the welfare of the present population, and if they venture at all to inquire into the future, they limit their inquiries entirely to such immediate effects, to conditions "on the day after the revolution." Such inquiries are very useful as serving to illustrate the constructive sides of the socialist philosophy. Much valuable work on such lines has recently been done by Karl Kautsky ("The Social Revolution," Second Part), and Anton Menger ("Neue Staatslehre"), and very cred- itable attempts in the same direction have also been made by Annie Besant and G. Bernard Shaw (in the "Fabian Essays"), Oswald Koehler ("Der Sozialdemokratische Staat"), B. Malon (in "Precis de Socialisme"), and the American writer, John Spargo ("Socialism"). And as the socialist movement gains in power and the socialist SOCIALISM AND THE STATE III ideal becomes more realistic, the socialist thinkers are boimd to bestow greater and more serious attention to the elaboration of that feature of their philosophy. The great distinction between the works of these con- temporary socialist writers and their Utopian precursors is, that while the latter based their speculations on an entirely arbitrary conception of an ideal state, the former take for their starting point the present actual state. They realize that the so-called " socialist state, " as far as we can conceive it to-day, is nothing but the present state with such modifications as the realization of the proposed so- cialist reforms naturally and necessarily imply, and their forecast is but an analysis of such probable changes. But with all this candor and caution it is still impossible to arrive at scientific and indisputable conclusions as to con- ditions of even the immediate future. The conclusions of each author are bound to contain some element of spec- ulation and to reflect to a large extent his individual views and inclinations. It is in that spirit and with that under- standing that the following chapters are offered. Production and Distribution of Wealth Under Socialism ** The organization of wealth production under socialism offers but little difficulty. The prevalent methods of pro- duction, as indicated in a previous chapter, have already become largely social in many important industries. In the modern corporations, trusts and other combines, the capitalists have created industrial organizations very much akin to the socialist ideal, and have demonstrated the feasibihty and advantages of cooperative and planful production on a large scale. By the simple process of 112 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT combining the greater number of plants in a given industry under one head, discarding the less efficient of them and strengthening the more important, the trusts have largely eliminated the element of waste in production; and by consolidating the management and supervision of the work, and perfecting the specialization and division of labor, they have vastly increased the productivity of the latter. The state, with its larger powers and resources, will be able to increase the advantages of trustified production very considerably^^ , '' But a socialist regime, once having assumed the admin- istration of the trusts, will be bound to change the nature and to extend the benefits of these institutions still further. The modem trusts, while social in their methods of work, are not public, but private institutions, and are operated entirely for the benefit of their individual owners. It is not in the interests of the individual trust magnates to extend production beyond the limits of the present de- mand; the general purchasing power of the consumers remaining unchanged, such an increased output could only result in a decline of prices. The policy of the trusts is, therefore, on the whole, to limit production. A social- ist administration, on the other hand, has a vital interest in extending production in order to enhance the national wealth and to provide employment for a larger number of its members. Since it is not producing for profit, the effect of an increased output on the price of the commodity will not enter in its calculations, and since the purchasing power of the population will be increased in proportion to the growth of productivity, there will be no danger of an industrial crisis. The members of a socialist state, furthermore, will be SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 113 interested in siich trustified industries not only as con- sumers, but also as employees, and hence they will naturally introduce such reforms in the management of these indus- tries as will benefit them in the latter capacity. Under capitalism the greater productivity of labor in trustified industries is accompanied by loss of work for large portions of former employees. Under socialism it will necessarily lead to a progressive diminution of their hours of labor. Under capitalism the profits of the trust magnates are the sole aim and motive o"f production, and the safety and wel- fare of their employees are of but secondary importance. Under socialism production will be carried on principally for the benefit of the producers themselves, and it is rea- sonable to expect that every known device will be applied to make industry safe, pleasant and attractive. \ The modem trusts, thus transformed into cooperative enterprises on a large scale, will in all likelihood become the starting point of the socialist system of industrial organization, and the system will be extended from one industry to the other as fast as the conditions will permit. But this will probably not be, at least for a long time to come, the exclusive form of industrial organization. There are certain industries dependent on purely personal skill, such as the various arts and crafts, that from their very nature are not susceptible of socialization, and other indus- tries, such as small farming, that will, at least for many years to come, not be proper objects for socialization. These may continue to exist in a socialist society as individual enterprises side by side with the larger cooperative works. On the whole, however, it is safe to assume that by far the greater and most important part of wealth production will be conducted by cooperative establishments. In the 114 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT countries of the most advanced industrial development, the large plants employ even to-day the greater part of the wage-working population, and there are but few important industries that are not ripe for concentration and consolidation. And since the large cooperative establishments, with their natural economies and advan- tages, will hold out greater attractions to the workers than the majority of the small individual enterprises, there will probably be but few who will choose to remain outside of the prevalent industrial organization. The rational organization of labor, the elimination of duplicate plants, of the "middlemen" in industry and commerce and of other waste entailed in a system of com- petition, the disappearance of all workless "incomes" and of all the purely parasitic types who are to-day maintained and supported by the competitive system or maintained for the special interests and comforts of the ruling and leisure classes, — all these changes necessarily involved in a system of socialism, will increase the productive forces of society and augment the national wealth immensely. How will that wealth be distributed ? With this ques- tion we have approached what is considered as the cru- cial point of socialism by the opponents of that philoso- phy. The impracticability or impossibility of the "social- ist scheme of wealth distribution" is the burden of most of the "scientific" refutations of the socialist theory, and curiously enough most of these criticisms are based on a careless reading of the great theoretician of modern socialism, Karl Marx. In common with Smith, Ricardo and other representa- tives of the classical school of political economy, Marx holds that the value of a commodity is determined by the SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 115 labor time expended in its production, the labor time in question being defined as "the labor time socially neces- sary to produce an article under the normal conditions of production with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at that time." ' This simple statement of fact has been almost uniformly interpreted by the astute critics of Marx as the socialist "plan of distribution," and many valuable reams of paper have been consumed in ingenious objections to that plan.^ In fact, however, Marx occupied himself just as little with the distribution of wealth in a future socialist state of society as Darwin occupied himself with the ultimate physical type of man. As a true man of science, he limited his researches to the past developments and existing facts and tendencies. In formulating the labor theory of value, Marx simply stated a fact, a law applicable to the present system of producing wealth — nothing else. "Marx," says Frederick Engels, his foremost inter- preter, "deals only with the determination of the value of commodities, that is to say, with the value of articles which are produced in a society consisting of private producers, by each private producer for his indi- vidual accoimt and for the purpose of exchange. This value in its definite historic meaning is created and meas- ured by human labor embodied in the separate com- modities. ... It is this simple fact, daily enacted before our own eyes in the modern capitalist society, which Marx states. . . . Whatever other values may be mentioned, • Karl Mane, "Capital," English Edition, Vol. I, p. 11. ' See William Graham, "Socialism New and Old"; Victor Cathrein, "Socialism: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Application"; Schaeffle, "Quintessence of Socialism." Il6 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT this much is certain, that Marx is not concerned with these things, but only with the value of commodities ; and that in the whole chapter on Value in his 'Capital' there is not the slightest hint whether and to what extent this theory of value is applicable to other forms of society." ^ And Karl Kautsky adds : — "There could be no greater error than to consider that one of the tasks of a socialist society is to see to it that the law of value is brought into perfect operation, and that only equivalent values are exchanged. The law of value is rather a law peculiar to a society of producers for ex- change." ^ But what then, may be asked, is the socialist plan of distribution of wealth? The plain answer to this inquiry is: The socialists do not offer a cut and dried plan of wealth distribution. As a proposition of abstract justice and fairness there is no reason why any discrimination at all should be made in the distribution of the necessaries and material comforts of life between the members of the community. The in- creased productivity of labor and the consequent augmenta- tion of wealth are due to the concerted efforts of men in all fields of endeavor, physical and mental, in generations past as well as present, and the precise share of each in- dividual in the general wealth of the nation is altogether insusceptible of measurement. It must be granted that some individuals are stronger, wiser, more gifted and skillful than others. But what of that? Is there any moral ground for punishing the ' "Herrn Eugen Diihring's Umwalzung der Wissenschaften," pp. 209, 210. ' Karl Kautsky, "The Social Revolution," Chicago, 1903, p. 129. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE II 7 cripple, the invalid, the decrepit, the imbecile, the un- fortunate step-children of nature, by reducing their rations of food or clothing? Is there any moral sanc- tion for rewarding the man of physical strength or mental gifts by special allowances from the storehouse of human society ? Do humane parents discriminate in that manner between their strong and weak, their fortunate and un- fortunate children ? Is the title of the stronger and " abler" to greater material reward based on equity, or is it rather a survival of the barbaric " fist right " of the dark ages? To the socialists the old communistic motto: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," generally appears as the ideal rule of distribution in an enlightened human society, and quite likely the time will come when that high standard will be generally adopted by civilized communities^ The productivity of labor is increasing with such phenomenal rapidity that we may well foresee a time when society will, with cbmparative ease, produce enough to afford to all its members, without distinction, all neces- saries and even luxuries of life, and when there will be just as little justification for a quarrel over the method of distribution of material wealth as there is to-day for a quarrel over the use of air or water. To the wise skeptics the statement may seem extravagant, but when we com- pare the wealth and productivity of modern countries to- day with those of half a century ago, we shall easily realize that we are by no means dealing with pure Utopian dreams. But just and feasible as this ideal method of distribu- tion may be, it is to-day nevertheless a mere ideal, a hope to be realized in the more or less distant future. It is not a part of the present program of the socialist movement. ) Il8 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT Modern socialists recognize that the methods of distribu- tion under the new order of things must take for their starting point the present methods, i.e., payments of vary- ing wages or salaries for services rendered-^^ Here again we run counter to a deep-rooted popular con- ception or rather misconception of the socialist program. One of the pet schemes of the early socialist experimenters was the substitution of "labor certificates" or "time certifi- cates" for money. By this means they expected to fix the value of each commodity with reference to the labor time contained in it as it were automatically, to eliminate the " unearned increment" of the capitalist and the profit of the middleman and to give to each producer the full equivalent of his labor. The scheme was on a par with that of the "equitable labor exchange banks," the communistic societies and the other social experiments of the Utopian socialists. They all proceeded from the belief that a small group of men could dissociate themselves from the rest of society, establish a miniature socialist common- wealth, and induce their fellow-men to follow their ex- ample by the practical demonstration of its excellence. Modern socialists have long discarded all miniature social experimentations and arbitrary social devices as Utopian and puerile, and the continued dissertations of many dis- tinguished critics of socialism about the "socialist plan" of the suppression of money and the abolition of money payments for services, only go to demonstrate how little they are abreast with the developments of socialist thought. Money and wages are both the products of a certain phase of economic development. Neither was known before the rise of private property, and in all likelihood both will at some time in the distant future lose their use- SOCIALISM AND THE STATE II9 fulness and disappear. But these reflections again belong to the sphere of dreams of the golden future, — they have no room in a sober and realistic program of social reform. "Money," says Kautsky, "is the simplest means known up to the present time which makes it possible in as com- plicated a mechanism as that of the modern productive process, with its tremendous far-reaching division of labor, to secure the circulation of products and their distribution to the individual members of society. It is the means which make it possible for each one to satisfy his neces- sities according to his individual inclination (to be sure within the bounds of his economic power). As a means to such circulation, money will be found indispensable until something better is discovered." ^ Incentive Under Socialism i Next to the assertion that it would curtail individual liberty, the most popular objection to the proposed system of socialism is that every such system is bound to paralyze social progress by depriving the individual initiative of the incentive to exert itself usefully in behalf of society. This argument assumes : first, that individual initiative is the chief lever of human progress, and second, that the love of material gain is the principal, if not the only, motive which impels men to strive for the highest degree of excellence in the various fields of private and public endeavor. Since socialism is based on a system of more or less equal and secured incomes, and excludes the pos- sibility of large pecuniary rewards, it is argued that under such a system the man of genius will have no inducement » "The Social Revolution," p. 129. 120 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT to exert his utmost skill, the common mortal will work reluctantly and indifferently, and social stagnation will inevitably result. Let us examine this argument. What constitutes modern civilization is the sum total of all our achievements in industry, in science, in the arts, and in the various organs and institutions of public life and activities which are comprised under the general designa- tion of politics. l_ There is no doubt that a large share of these achieve- . ments is due to the individual initiative and the creative genius of exceptional men. But let us not overestimate the importance of this factor in social progress. Our civilization owes on the whole much more to the collective endeavors of ma:n than to the individual genius of men, and the general improvement in our culture, refinement of work, and mode of life, is vastly more the result of a process of social growth to which the large multitudes of human beings have for many generations contributed their im- known and imperceptible mites, than the merit of the great indi\idual inventors, discoverers or leaders. *i "So- cial achievement," says Professor Ward, "has consisted in the establishment of a social order under and within which individual achievement can go on and civilization is made possible."^ The art of book printing, the use of gunpowder, and the application of steam and electricity have all been invented or perfected by individual geniuses, but the more substan- tial arts of plowing, cooking, tailoring and housebuilding have been invented, developed and perfected by the human race as a whole. What is still more significant, however, is this, that while the collective inventions belong to an ear- ' Lester F. Ward, "Applied Sociology," Boston, 1906, p. 38. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 121 lier age and the individual inventions to a later age, we have undoubtedly reached a period which is characterized by the process of the gradual passing of the individual inventor, initiator or hero, and of the return to a system of social progress through collective effort. And nowhere is this process more distinctly noticeable than in the most vital sphere of human activity, industry. Industrial development depends almost entirely upon the efficient organization of the mechanism of production (which includes a proper division of labor, organization of manage- ment, and use of effective machinery), and of transporta- tion and exchange, and in all these domains collective achievements are rapidly supplanting individual enter- prise. 4^The modern mass production based on the factory system forces the organization and division of labor along lines practically indicated by the machine; and while there is still much room left for the exercise of human in- genuity in the arrangement and rearrangement of details, such arrangements and rearrangements are in most cases the result of simple experience, almost of mathematical cal- culation, and not the work of an exceptional genius. Nor are the other modern industrial categories, the cor- porations and trusts, the stock exchanges and banks, the system of credit and the national and international markets, the individual invention of an industrial genius. They are the products and forms of gradual industrial development ; the entire industrial community, employers and employees, have imperceptibly built them up in the course of centuries, and they are still busily engaged in the process of developing and perfecting these institutions without marked individual initiative or leadership. And in the domain of the invention and perfection of machinery, 122 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT this peculiar territory of the individual genius, the element of personal initiative is gradually and steadily receding / ; to the background,.'- ,__-_(/ The laws of mechanics are being explored with ever in- creasing accuracy and planfulness for the practical re- quirements of industry, and the new improvements in the tools of production are now but rarely in the nature of great and unexpected inventions; more often they are merely the successful solutions of preconceived problems by means of well-defined scientific methods. The hustling, up-to-date experimental laboratory is rapidly crowding out the dreamy inventive genius. What we call "Edison" to-day is not the Thomas A. Edison who early in life made the astounding inventions in telegraphy, but the well- equipped, well-organized electrical laboratory at West Orange, New Jersey, with the number of trained scientific workers engaged in it. -^ 'i^-''And what has been said of the industrial process applies *• ' with almost equal force to the domain of science : the fac- tory system with its specialization, division of labor, and collective production, is the recognized form of modern scientific research almost as much as it is the form of the modern manufacture of market commodities. Scientific work is, as a rule, not done by individuals but by groups of workers; not at home, but in laboratories, clinics and libraries, and scientific discoveries like mechanical inven- tions are most often the results of planned and collective labor. Left to his own individual resources, the modern scientist would be almost helpless. .^_/ / Nor does our public life form an exception to this general tendency of our times. The great individual leg- islators, as Moses, Solon, Lycurgus, and even Napoleon, SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 123 have been superseded by the many-headed bodies of popu- lar representatives in the legislative chambers; the great free-lance statesmen have made room for the chosen leaders of strong political parties, and the success of a modern battle depends not so much on the military genius of the individual commander as on the proper organization and equipment of his army. In the recent Russo-Japanese war the demoralized Russian army and navy did not produce a single military or naval "genius," whereas in the well-organized and well-equipped Japanese army and navy every general and admiral was a "hero." In one domain after the other the individual genius and arbiter of human destiny, the "hero" of Carlyle is being dethroned and subordinated to the collective human fraternity. The domain of the arts is to-day practically the last resting place of the " superman." •fl'^lndividual initiative and talent thus by no means play * such a determining part in the world's progress as the critics of socialism claim. But on the other hand the so- cialists readily admit that they play some part. There always were and probably always will be persons of ex- traordinary gifts and abilities who may contribute vastly more to the store of human welfare and happiness than the average man. Without them the world would probably not relapse into a state of barbarism, but it will fare much better with them and their services. But what of it? Is there any real danger that under a system of socialism these superior individuals would disappear or refuse to give the benefit of their special talents to society? Is the striving for wealth actually the most powerful incentive of the creative genius? The theory seems plausible enough as regards the leader in industry, the business man, but 124 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT how about the scientist, the artist, the statesman? This is a fruitful source for reflection and comparison. / The manufacturer, banker or other active capitalist undoubtedly strives for material wealth. But wealth is for him only secondarily, if at all, a means of procuring physical or intellectual enjoyment. To him wealth rep- resents power, and above all, it is the test of his success in his chosen vocation. To say of a man engaged in industry or commerce that he has made a large fortune is to say that he has proved himself efi&cient and successful in his career; to say of him that he has lost his fortune is equivalent to asserting that he has proved himself the inferior of his rivals, that he is inefl&cient, and that his life work has been a failure. ; The. man of science, on the other hand, would gain or lose but little in the esteem of his contemporaries and in his own self-respect by the gain or loss of a fortune. The test of his success is not the amount of money he has made, but the extent of the recognition accorded to him and his work by the learned fraternity. Scholastic honors and aca- demic titles are to him what money is to the business man ; his incentive is not the love of money but the desire of recognition. Again, the reward of the artist is neither money nor academic titles. As an artist he strives primarily for pub- lic applause and glory, for these are the true tests of his success and efficiency in the side of his existence which he values most, his art. So likewise, the statesman cares most for influence and authority, the soldier for military honors and preferment, and the priest for the respect and reverence of his fellow- SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 25 Of course, it may well happen, and no doubt often does happen, that the scientist, the artist, the statesman, the soldier and the priest are anything but indifferent to material wealth. They may prefer an easy and com- fortable existence, they may sometimes be goaded on to create by sheer poverty and want, and they may even occasionally be grasping and greedy. But these will then be features entirely independent of their respective gifts and talents, and by no means a stimulus to their best application. " It is not true," again observes Ward, "that men of genius depend upon adversity and dire necessity as a spur to activity. This is all a popular illu- sion which the entire history of human achievement dis- proves and should dispel. The instinct of workmanship, if it be in no other form than fear of the hell of ennui, is the great and unremitting spur that drives and goads all ^jnen to action." ' ^ 0^Th.e real incentive moving all men to bring forth the ' ^ best that is in them is just that best that is in them : their desire is to excel and to earn the recognition of their fellow- men in such a form in which such recognition is most fitly expressed. And the business man, whose apparently sole motive is money making, forms no exception to this rule. To-day, when industries are conducted for private gain and in competition between the individual capitalists, accumulated individual wealth is, as we have seen, the only measure of the business man's efficiency and suc- cess. But when the industrial organization passes into the hands of society and becomes a part of its general administration, the distinction between service in that branch of the government and any other branch of it • "Applied Sociology," p. 245. 126 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT will naturally cease. The director of industries will be- come a "statesman" just as any other public functionary, and will be just as much moved by motives of a more ideal nature as the latter. Our post office has been nationalized, and its operation has become an adminis- trative function, while the express business of the country has remained the individual enterprise of competing capitalists. The salary of the Postmaster-General, who is a public officer, is a mere pittance in comparison with the revenues of the head of one of our large express com- panies, and still the government has been able to secure for the administration of its Post-Office Department men at least as capable as the highly paid managers of the express companies^> A socialist society will not destroy the individual in- centive in industrial life ; it will merely change its char- acter by substituting a more ideal standard for the present i standard of pecuniary gain. '-^^ And as for the scientist, artist and statesman, a socialist regime cannot possibly affect their creative work adversely by cutting down their money reward, since that reward, as we have shown, never was their prime incentive. The golden age of Athens knew nothing of immense fortunes and heavy money rewards, but it produced a sculpture, drama, literature and architecture never surpassed in history. "To undertake to state the influence which the com- mimistic elements in Athenian life had upon the ex- traordinary development of Athenian art and literature in the fifth century before our era," says Professor Sey- mour, "would be dangerous. But any reader may see that the artist and dramatist were not stimulated by any SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 127 material rewards or prizes, ^schylus had no income whatever, so far as we know, from his plays, and the architect's pay was only twice that of the stonecutter." * Nor, we may add, did the great statesmen and orators of that period, as Pericles and Demosthenes, receive large pecimiary compensation. / On the other hand, there is every reason to believe that a socialist regime will offer larger opportunities for the imfolding and development of true genius and for its pure artistic exercise than present society does. /'""Our modern capitalist society does all in its power to suppress genius and ability, but does not entirely succeed. Capitalism reduces one part of the population to the con- dition of uncultured, exhausted wage slaves, and forces the other into a wild, all-absorbing race for material wealth; still the exceptional gifts of some break through these formidable obstacles. Capitalism subverts aJI art and science to the worship of the golden calf; it subordinates the beautiful to the practical, the true to the profitable, and strips life of all poetry and noble inspira- tion; still, art and science are not entirely dead. The capitalist manufacturer cheats the inventor, the capitalist publisher robs the author, the capitalist art dealer exploits the painter, — the inventor dies in the poorhouse, the author and artist live in beggary; but the inventor con- tinues inventing, the scientist continues studying and the artist continues creating. Under a state of socialism education and culture will be equally accessible to all, and the citizens will have more leisure to cultivate their gifts. What greater stimulus ' "Socialism and Communism in Greece," by Thomas D. Seymour, LL.D., in Harper's Monthly Magazine for November, 1907. 3 128 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT can human society offer for the full development of fine arts and true sciences?, -" The elaborate and painstaking investigations of Odin^ Galton, de CandoUe and Jacoby, all collated by Mr. Ward in his scholarly work on " Applied Sociology," show conclusively that modem economic conditions smother scores of native genius for every one they allow to mature. Analyzing the economic conditions of 619 well-known men of letters between the years 1300 and 1825, de CandoUe finds that 562 of them had been brought up and had lived in ease and material comfort, while only 57 had spent their youth in comparative poverty; and M. Odin, commenting on the results of this analysis, ob- serves: "This means by the sole fact of economic con- ditions in the midst of which they grew up .the children of the families in easy circumstances had at least forty to fifty more chances of making themselves a name in letters than those who belonged to poor families or to families of insecure economic position." ' But, it is argued, all this may be very well as far as the men of exceptional genius and abilities are concerned, but how about the plain ordinary workingman, the " com- mon laborer" who can neither expect the special homage or approval of his fellow-men for his obscure work nor, under a system of advanced socialism, a commensurate pecuniary reward — what will be his incentive to work conscientiously and efiiciently? This question introduces a distinct feature of present conditions into a state of society based on an entirely different order. To-day our industries are managed by > A. Odin, "Genfese des grands hommes," etc., Paris, 1895, p. 529, quoted in Ward's "Applied Sociology," p. 204. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 29 individual capitalists for their private profit and with but little regard for the health, comfort or needs of the em- ployees; work is exhausting, monotonous, repulsive and often dangerous. In a system of cooperative labor, the workingman will naturally be considered above every- thing else; his hours of labor will be shortened as much as practicable, his occupation will be more varied, the dangers of employment will be reduced to a minimum, the workshop will be clean, bright and hygienic; in a word, labor will be made attractive. "Because," observes J. Stem, "the workingman con- siders as a burden the work which ties him to a mechani- cal, monotonous and cheerless occupation in squalid workshops during inhumanly long hours and for which he receives starvation wages; because the office clerk prefers to play truant rather than to busy himself the entire day with matters that do hot appeal to his mind or heart; because men are reluctant in the exercise of a calling which was forced on them against their wishes and inclinations; because generally the present class state imposes on most persons activities which have no charms for them and only hold out the promise of pecuniary re- ward — because of all that — are we to infer that the human being is generally disposed to laziness rather than to industry? Does not, on the contrary, even the most superficial examination of persons of all ages and classes show that love of action, the irresistible desire to unfold one's strength, to ' do things ' and to create, is implanted in every healthy human individual, and that to the normal person nothing is more unbearable than inaction ? . . . In a million of ways the love of action reveals itself as a mighty power in human life, from early childhood even 130 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT to old age. Whence comes the passion for all kuids of sports but from the mighty instinct of action? Why do people voluntarily choose strenuous and even dangerous activities, as is shown by numerous instances in life and history ? This fear, that without the whip of poverty or force mankind would lapse into a state of inaction, re- minds us of the humorous prophecy upon the advent of the bicycle and automobile that men would hereafter have little occasion for the use of their legs, and the latter would become weak, short and crooked like those of the dachs- hund." ' And furthermore, one of the chief causes operating to-day to make labor disagreeable is the lack of variety in occupation. "The desire for freedom of choice and for change of occupation is deeply implanted in human nature," says August Bebel. "Just as constant and regular repetition without variation will at length make the best food dis- liked, an employment that is daily repeated becomes as monotonous as a treadmill; it blunts and relaxes. The man performs a given task, because he must, but without enthusiasm or enjoyment. Now, every one possesses a number of capabilities and inclinations, which only require to be roused, developed, and put into action to give the most satisfactory results and enable their possessor to unfold his whole and real being. The socialistic com- munity will ofiFer the fullest opportunity for gratifying this need of variety. The enormous increase m produc- tive power, combined with growing simplification in the ' J. Stern, "Der Zukunftsstaat — Thesen uber den Sozialismus, sein Wesen, seine Durchfiihrbarkeit und Zweckmassigkeit," Berlin, 1906, p. 30. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 131 process of production, will permit a considerable limita- tion in the time of labor, while it facilitates the acquire- ment of mechanical skill in a number of different branches."r (The Political Structure of the Socialist State We cannot, of course, attempt a detailed forecast of the political organization of the future socialist state with- out embarking upon the domain of speculation. But we may, nevertheless, profitably endeavor to discern the bold outlines of the political structure of the socialist state, at least in the early periods of its existence, provided we always bear in mind the following two fundamental propositions : — 1. The machinery of government of every state must be adapted to the character and objects of such state. The modem state is the state of the capitalist extracting profits from the working members of the commimity, and the modern government is, in the words of Karl Marx, "but a committee for managing the common affairs of the capitaHst class." The socialist state, on the other hand, is a classless state of cooperative producers, and its government must be a "committee for the managing of the common affairs" of the members of that state. In other words, the main functions of the socialist state will be of an industrial character, and since there will be no separate economic classes with fixed and conflicting interests, the state will represent the citizens. It will be a democratic state. 2. Every new political organization evolves from the ■ "Woman," p. 134. 132 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT organization immediately preceding it and retains all of its features except such as have become useless or in- compatible with the new order of things. The French Revolution has not done away with the entire pohtical structure evolved under the. monarchy; it has merely modified it in a few substantial points. The United States has retained more features of its pre-Revo- lutionary political organization than it has introduced new ones since the Declaration of Independence. The socialist state will probably, on the whole, retain the present forms of political organization with such changes as will be necessitated by the altered character l and objects of organized society. r::;::::;!? Most likely the present geographical limits of the various states will be left substantially intact. The political ideal of the early socialist writers was a globe studded with small autonomous communities. Thus Fourier's political unit is the Phalanx composed of about two thousand inhabitants, and his scheme of political re- organization contemplates the division of our planet into just two millions of such Phalanxes, each economically and politically independent of the rest. It is a note- worthy fact that the proposed Utopian communities grow in size as the authors come nearer to our present era. "The socialist commonwealth," observes Kautsky on this point, "is not the product of an arbitrary figment of the brain, but a necessary product of economic develop- ment, and it is understood more clearly as that develop- ment becomes more apparent. Hence the size of that commonwealth is also not arbitrary, but is conditioned upon the stage of that development at a given time. The higher the economic development, the greater the SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 133 division of labor, the larger the size of the common- wealth. . . . " The division of labor is carried on ever further; ever more do the several industries apply themselves to the production of special articles only, but those for the whole world; ever larger becomes the size of these establish- ments, some of which count their workmen by the thou- sands. Under such conditions a community able to satisfy aU its needs and embracing all requisite industries must have dimensions very different from those of the socialist colonies planned at the beginning of the last century. Among the social organizations in existence to-day, there is but one that possesses the requisite dimensions, and may be used as the framework for the estabhshment and development of the socialist commonwealth, and that is the modern state." ' ""The expectation that the proposed socialist common- wealth will be co-extensive with the modem state, and the assumption that the state will be charged with the man- agement and direction of the industries, have led to the widespread notion that the socialist state will be highly centralized and that the socialist administration will be "paternalistic." Nothing can be less warranted than these assumptions. The modem centralized state is a product of the capitalist system, and especially of capitalist trading. We again quote that acutest observer and thinker of modern socialism, Karl Kautsky : — • ' Karl Kautsky, "Das Erfurter Programm," 8th Edition, Stuttgart, 1907, pp. 117, 118, 119. Compare also "The Socialist Republic," by Karl Kautsky, translated and adapted to America by Daniel de Leon, New York, 1900, pp. 10, 11. 134 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT " Commerce has always had a tendency towards central- ization. It causes the influx of commodities as well as of buyers and sellers to certain points favored by their geo- graphical location and political conditions. Under the capitalist mode of production, which converts all industry into production of commodities, and makes it dependent on commerce, the centralization of commerce leads to the centralization of the entire industrial life. The whole coimtry becomes directly or indirectly dependent on the metropolis, as it becomes dependent on the capitalist class. The metropolis, the center of commerce, also becomes the converging point of all surplus value, of all superfluity of the country, and luxury lures after it the arts and the sciences. " The economic centralization leads to political centrali- zation, and the center of commerce also becomes the cen- ter of government." ' Since there is no room in a socialist commonwealth for production for sale or for commerce, there is no economic need for a strongly centralized government. Moreover, the very fact that the socialist state will be charged with much larger functions than the present state, and will exercise a much larger interference in the economic relations of its individual citizens, will make it an almost impossible task to direct the most substantial activities of the state from one central point and through one set of general ofBcers. While the state as such will probably retain certain general functions, it will no doubt be found more con- venient to vest the more vital and direct functions in political organizations embracing smaller territories. The ' "Der Parlamentarismus," etc., Stuttgart, 1893, p. 30. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 135 socialists regard the present city or township as the nucleus of such a political unit. The city is to-day already charged with many functions of prime importance to the welfare of its inhabitants, and those functions could be readily enlarged under a socialist administration. The municipality could well conduct, direct or regulate all industries except those that from their nature require an organization of national scope, such as the posts, telegraphs, railways, mines, and the great trustified industries. It could, besides, have the sole care of the safety, health, education and amusement of its citizens and of the support and maintenance of its aged, invalid and other dependent members. It is not at all unlikely that these functions may, especially in the case of larger municipalities, be further subdivided, and apportioned among several organized "labor groups" or city districts. "The single communes," says August Bebel, "form a suitable basis for such an institution, and where they are too large to allow of the convenient transaction of busi- ness, they can be divided into districts. All adult mem- bers of the commune, without distinction of sex, take part in the necessary elections, and determine to what persons the conduct of affairs shall be intrusted." * And Anton Menger describes his conception of the practical workings of such organizations in the following language: "At first it will be necessary to divide the larger mimicipalities into local districts in order to facilitate their industrial activities. For the same reason every large municipality in which the industrial life is very complex, will have to organize the members of the same trade ' "Woman," p. 130. 136 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT or calling into separate ' labor groups.' But these inter- mediary organizations are to be considered only as ad- ministrative organs. The municipality remains the owner and the authority in all industrial activity. Hence the members of the group may assert the right of existence as against the municipality, but they have no claim to a division of the product of the group's labor in any fixed proportion. . . . "The municipality may establish or dissolve the labor ■group and may assign to it members, work and ma- terial. ... The managers of the labor group are ap- pointed and discharged by the municipality. . . . "When the socialist state has become firmly established, the labor groups may be transformed with great caution in the direction of greater democracy." ' These ideas are, of course, purely speculative, and there seems to be no valid reason why the managers and foremen of the "labor group" should not be elected by the group members at the very outset as suggested, for instance, by Laurence Gronlimd.^ But the ideas are, nevertheless, valuable as indications of one of the possible arrangements under socialism. The city with or without political and industrial sub- divisions will thus absorb the most important govern- mental activities under socialism, and the central govern- ment will as a result be limited to the management of the "national" industries and to the enactment of general laws and regulations. For while the city will enjoy a much larger measure of independence under socialism than it does to-day, it is ' "Neue Staatslehre," 2d Edition, pp. 199, 200. ^ "The Cooperative Commonwealth," Boston, 1893, p. 186. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 37 not reasonable to suppose that it will be clothed with com- plete autonomy or the power to pass legislation of a general character. To confer such powers on the municipality would mean to weaken the state and to paralyze its usefulness as a factor in the industrial life of the nation. The state being thus retained under socialism, what will be the political form of its administration ? Will it be republican or monarchic? To the American reader the question may seem idle, but it is, nevertheless, true that it has been the subject of considerable differences of opinion in the ranks of the socialists of Europe. Of the early socialist writers Saint-Simon and Fourier asserted that a constitutional monarchy was not neces- sarily incompatible with socialism. Karl Rodbertus, the friend of Ferdinand Lassalle, held similar views, and everi Lassalle himself was not entirely opposed to the notion of a "social kingdom." Of the modern writers on socialism Anton Menger seeks to solve the problem by the following theory : — "Like all great questions of politics between princes and nations, this is a question of power. The answer de- pends upon the revolutionary strength of the nation and upon the power which the monarchy has attained in the course of its historical development. Thus the socialist state will probably appear in the form of a republic in the Latin countries. On the other hand, the dynasties of England, Germany and other Germanic countries may through a proper policy assure the maintenance of the monarchy after the establishment of the socialist r6gime- for some time, perhaps even for an indefinite period." * ' "Neue Staatslehre," pp. 171, 172. 138 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT What seems to lend some plausibility to this pecxiliar conception is the fact that the Englishmen, the Germans and the other Germanic peoples attribute but a secondary importance to the form of government of present society. There are no aggreSfeive republicans in England, not even among the socialists, and the socialists of Norway, after the recent separation of their country from Sweden, sub- mitted to the election of another king without violent protest. The sentiments of the German social-democrats on the respective merits of the republic and monarchy were well expressed by August Bebel in the International Socialist Congress at Amsterdam on the occasion of his famous oratorical duel with the eloquent leader of French socialism, Jean Jaurfe. " As much as we envy you Frenchmen your republic," exclaimed he, "and as much as we wish it for ourselves, we will not allow our skulls to be broken for it : it does not deserve it. A capitalist monarchy or a capitalist repub- lic, — both are class states, both are necessarily and from their very nature made to maintain the capitalist regime. Both direct their entire strength in the effort to preserve for the capitalist class all the powers of the legislature. For the moment that the capitalist class will lose its political power, it will lose also its social and economic position. The monarchy is not so bad and the capitalist republic is not so good as you picture them." ' And similarly, A. Labriola, the brilliant young leader of the extreme wing of Italian socialism, declares : — "Class rule does not express itself in a monarchical ' "Sixifeme Congrfes Socialist International," Compte-Rendu Analy- tique, Brussels, 1904, p. 85. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 139 form of government or in a republican form of govern- ment, but in the fact that one group of men exercise the , political powers in their own interests. We must learn to understand that there are no political forms which exclude class rule, nor such which make it inevitable." ' On the other hand, the Frenchman Benoit Malon afiirms categorically : — "Since the republic is the political form of human dignity, the states which will be founded by emancipated nations, can only be republican. The socialist state must be a federated republic, for federalism alone combines the respect for local and particular needs and the relative autonomy of secondary political organizations (munici- palities, etc.) with the great interests of the nations freely constituted." ^ ( On the whole it is safe to assume that barring per- ' haps some peculiar tricks with which history sometimes amuses itself, the socialist states will be republics, with or without presidents or other individual heads. The affairs of the socialist republics will in all probability continue to be conducted by representative assemblies. The modern parliaments owe their origin to the capital- ist regime, but the social development of the last centuries seems to have made them indispensable for the demo- cratic management of the affairs of every large and com- plex state, and as far as we can see to-day, a socialist regime cannot offer anything better as a substitute. The old"Town meetings and other direct legislative and de- liberative bodies of citizens may be practical for the ' Arturo Labriola, "Riforme e Rivoluzione Sociale," Milan, 1904, p. 99. ^ B. Malon, "Pr&is de Socialisme," Paris, 1892, p. 297. 140 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT regulation of purely local affairs in small communities, but they are entirely inadequate to deal with complex problems of national importJfNor can the institutions of the popular Initiative and S!eferendum take the place of modern representative assemblies. The process of law- making requires even to-day a large measure of skill, special knowledge and precision. The enactment of a wise law or regulation presupposes a careful deliberation over its main object, and the minute and searching ex- amination of its separate provisions. In many cases the original project is modified and improved before adoption, and the law as finally enacted is often the result of a com- promise, more or less satisfactory to all. In all pro- gressive legislation, furthermore, there must be a certain consistency and continuity of idea, — a system; and this feature will be more essential to a socialist legislature, which will have to deal with the most vital problems of the nation, than it is to modern legislative bodies. But such systematic, planful and elastic legislation cannot be introduced by popular Initiative and cannot be enacted by popular Referendum. The Initiative is in its nature spasmodic and often inconsistent, and the Referendum is too rigid and categorical for a regular engine of the popular will. The Initiative and the Ref- erendum are excellent institutions in conjunction with parliaments. As preventives and correctives of legislative abuses they are indispensable to every true democracy; they cannot, however, do away with representative gov- ernment, ^ll^ut if representative assemblies should be retained under "socialism, they will at the same time probably be modi- fied very largely to meet the requirements of greater SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 141 democracy and to comply with the new needs and func- tions of the commonwealth. The Initiative and Referendum will probably be established in conjunction with all legislative bodies, and will be coupled with the right of the constituents to recall i their representative at all times. The representatives of the people will furthermore be elected by the votes of all / adult citizens, male and female, and their powers will naturally be curtailed by the limited fimctions of a so- cialist parliament. What will be these functions, and in what manner will they be discharged? The functions of national government to-day may be roughly divided under two main heads — those of a gen- eral administrative or political character, represented by the departments of foreign affairs, national defense, treas- ury, justice, education, insurance, health, fine arts, etc., and those of a character, prevalently industrial or economic, such as the administration of posts, railroads, telegraphs, canals, mines and other national industries and the de- partments of agriculture, public works, etc. In the modern state the political functions largely pre- ponderate, and the economic functions occupy but a sub- ordinate position. This is natural in view of the fact that the political functions of the present state are largely exercised for the benefit of the ruling classes. Under socialism the industrial activities of the government are ^ bound to increase, and the political activities to diminish. | The division of the governmental functions into those^ of a political and those of an economic nature has given rise to the hypothesis that the socialist parliament will re- main bi-cameral — the political chamber taking the place 142 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT of the lower house and the economic chamber that of the upper house. / "Does any one believe that the earth will cease to re- volve, if the present upper and lower houses of parliament, whose division does not correspond to anything, shall be replaced by a political chamber and an economic cham- ber?" queries B. Malon, and he continues: "The po- litical chamber might be elected by universal suffrage as our present representative assemblies; but the economic chamber, the larger and more important of the two, should be the result of professional elections, with proper regard to the special qualifications of the elected, so that it should truly represent the producers and workers of all categories." * Anton Menger suggests a somewhat similar ar- rangement. "It will be expedient," he asserts, "that legislation in the socialist state shall be enacted by two chambers: one to be elective and to be subject to the democratic tendencies of the people, the other to be aristo- cratic, but to be composed not of the most useless, but of the really best members of the state;" and such "best members," according to Menger, are to be the highest active or retired state officials and the leading representa- tives of the sciences, arts and literature.^ The notion that the industrial affairs of the socialist state will not be administered by officers elected by gen- eral popular vote, but by men chosen by the members of each separate trade and calling for their experience and special quahfications, is generally accepted by the socialists. Wilhelm Liebknecht suggests that the most important ' " Precis de Socialisme," pp. 300, 301. ' "Neue Staatslehre," pp. 179, 180. SOCIALISM AND THE STATE 1 43 work of legislation and administration be performed by committees of experts instead of parliaments,' and Annie Besant, in a somewhat vivid flight of imagination, says: "One may guess that in each nation all the Boards of communal authorities will ultimately be represented in some central Executive or Industrial Ministry; that the Minister of Agriculture, or Mineral Industries, or Textile Industries, and so on, will have relations with similar officers in other lands; and that thus, internationally as well as nationally, cooperation will replace competition." ^ ' "Ueber die politische Stellung der Sozialdemokratie," 9th Edition, Berlin, 1893, p. 5. ' "Industry under Socialism," in Fabian Essays, American Edition, Boston, 1894, p. 147. CHAPTER VI SOCIALISM AND POLITICS Politics, Representative Government and Political Parties Practical politics may be defined as the art or action of guiding or influencing the policy of a government, or the effort to obtam control of or influence over the powers of government. ' And it is essential for the first part of this definition that the guidance and influence to which it refers, should not be exercised by the organized government itself, but by persons or parties outside of it. The difference be-- tween Administration and Politics is just this, that the former consists in the direct management of public affairs by the persons officially vested with the power and charged with the duty to manage them, while the latter is an indirect management secured through influence or power over the public official. In absolute monarchies the powers of government are concentrated," at least theoretically, in the person of the autocrat ; hence the political influence and functions of the country are confined to the small circle of persons who ' "In the narrower and more usual sense, Politics is the act or vocation of guiding or influencing the policy of a government through the organi- zation of a party among its citizens." — Century Dictionary. "The administration of public affairs or the conduct of political mat- ters so as to carry elections and secure public offices." — Standard Dictionary. 144 SOCIALISM AND POLITICS 145 alone have the opportunity to come in frequent contact with the person of the monarch — the high nobility and the dignitaries of the church. Politics in such countries is conducted principally through the medium of court « cliques; its objects are usually the personal advantages and preferment of a set of individuals or a caste; its methods are those of intrigue and conspiracy, and the climax of such politics is a palace or dynastic revolution. Countries of a constitutional form of government, on the other hand, are boimd to evolve politics of an entirely different type. The head of a constitutional government, whether he be designated king or president, is but one wheel in the administrative machinery of the state. His powers are limited by a constitution, and the active and vital functions of government are vested in bodies of popular representatives — the national parliaments, state legislatures and municipal councils. In order to guide or influence the policies of such a government, it is no longer sufficient to gain the good graces of the chief executive; it becomes necessary to enlist the support or obedience of a majority of the representative assembly. This shifting of the field of political operation en- tails a chain of radical changes in the methods, aims and objects of modem politics. The representative assembHes are large bodies of men, frequently of divergent views and interests ; their power is temporary, and its continuance de- pends upon the confidence of their constituencies; their deliberations and actions are pubUc and open to the scrutiny of the people; their actions must, therefore, be such as will be reasonably certain to meet with the ap- proval of at least that portion of the population whose support is indispensable to their public careers. 146 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT Under normal conditions the individual and unsup- ported political intriguer, plotting for his own preferment or for that of the small clique of his friends or confederates, \ • is thus obviously powerless to influence a popular govern- i ment to an appreciable degree. He disappears in politics ! with the disappearance of the absolute state, and his place is taken by the large body of citizens, banded to- gether permanently for the purpose of controlling the government, ostensibly in the interests of the people as a whole according to their views of the needs of the people, but actually in the interest of a given class or section of the population, as we shall endeavor to show presently. The most direct way to control the government which naturally suggests itself to such a body of citizens, is to place men of their own midst in the administration, and its ultimate aim is, therefore, to elect a majority of the representatives in the popular assemblies and of other governmental and public functionaries. Thus arises the modem political party with its strong and ramified or- ganization, its platforms, issues and electoral campaigns. And in practice we observe that the origin of organized political parties coincides in each country with the estab- lishment of a parliamentary regime. "They are a neces- sary evil in free government," as De Tocqueville puts it.^ The British Parliament has largely served as a model for all other constitutional countries, and the life of that body in its modern form, as the real repository of the political power of the country, may be dated from the meeting of the Long Parliament m 1640, when the House of Commons deprived the crown of its two most essential ' Alexis de Tocqueville, "Democracy in the United States," p. 186. SOaALISM AND POLITICS 147 prerogatives — the power to levy taxes and the right to dissolve Parliament indefinitely, and to the Bill of Rights, which practically vested all legislative functions of the United Kingdom in Parliament. Prior to the Long Parliament there were no fixed political parties in the modern sense in England, but the next year already wit- nesses the formation of the first two distinct and well- defined parties of England, the Cavaliers and the Round- heads; and these parties, subsequently known as Whigs and Tories, and still later as Liberals and Conservatives, gradually changing their aims and methods of warfare with the changed conditions of the advancing centuries, reappear as the leading factors in all political struggles of England, from the stormy days of the Long Parliament down to our own time. In France there were no organized political parties prior to the revolutionary Constituent Assembly of 1789, but when the first National Assembly or parliament met in 1791, after the adoption of a constitution for the re- public, it found itself at once divided into at least four distinct political parties — the RoyaUsts, who yearned for a return to the old regime ; the Feuillants or constitutional monarchists, the Girondists or moderate republicans, and the Montagnards or radical republicans. With the accession of Napoleon and the smothering of parliament and constitution, poUtical party life disappears in France, but with the restoration and the new grant of a constitution and parliament, the new political parties of the Moderates and Independents immediately spring into being. In Germany the modern political parties date partly from the days of the Frankfort Assembly in 1848, and 148 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT partly from the establishment of the North German Union in 1867. The colonies of the United States knew little of politi- cal parties, and held such institutions in scant esteem. "Throughout the eighteenth century," remarks Henry Jones Ford, " party was regarded as a gangrene, a cancer which patriotic statesmen should combine to eradicate." ' But immediately following the Declaration of Independ- ence, and even before the formal adoption of the national constitution of the new republic, the Federalists and Anti-FederaUsts appeared in the public arena as full- fledged political parties, and while these parties have since repeatedly changed their issues and watchwords, and have finally settled on the party names of Republican and Democratic, they rule to-day the politics of the United States as absolutely and effectively as any political parties in the world. In Italy the modern political parties appear imme- diately after the accomplishment of the unification of the country as a constitutional monarchy. In Austria, Hungary, Belgium and Holland the grant or conquest of a constitution was in every case regularly followed by the formation of political parties; in Russia the grant of a mere phantom of a constitution was the immediate signal for the spontaneous creation of a number of political parties. Constitutions, representative government and political parties are thus intimately and indissolubly correlated with each other; they have a common origin, and together they constitute one historical phase in the development of ^ "The Rise and Growth of American Politics," New York, 1898, p. 90. SOCIALISM AND POLITICS 149 our political institutions — the phase corresponding on the whole to the modern or capitalist economic system. Just as the fixed absolute state is the most appropriate form of government of a rigorous feudal society, so is the flexible representative system the ideal form of govern- ment of the modern state of free competitive producers. The rise of representative government and political parties marks in all countries the ascendency of the modem industrial classes over the landowning classes formerly in power. It is true we find in history abundant mention of par- liaments and popular assemblies antedating by centuries the modem capitaUst system, and some of them tracing their origin to hoary antiquity. , But while these institu- tions may have had a remote influence on the shaping and forms of the modem parliaments, they certainly had nothing in common with their present substance and function. The essential features of every modem representative assembly may be summarized as follows : — I.. It is an independent governmental organ, whose ex- istence and permanence are guaranteed by a constitution which represents the supreme law of the land. 2. It meets at regular intervals. 3. It has the power to grant or veto the taxes or budget of the state. 4. It is either vested with supreme legislative powers or it acts as a check upon the legislative powers of the crown. 5. The cabinet ministers are directly or indirectly under its control. 6. As a rule it is bi-cameraJ. I50 THE SOCIALIST PHILOSOPHY AND MOVEMENT 7. The lower house, at least, is representative in char- acter, and its members are chosen by and accountable to the citizens entitled to vote. Neither the mediaeval English Parliament, nor any other popular assembly of the early or middle periods of our era possessed these attributes. "The mediaeval Parliament," says Edward Jenks, "represented the estates of the realm, viz.: nobles, clergy, yeomen or peasants, and craftsmen. "But two things about it are well worth noticing: — " (a) It was not, in any ordinary sense of the term, a /io/)mZ