CONCLUSION
We have now concluded our survey of the political activities of
Socialism in the four countries that present the most characteristic
features of this movement of the working classes. It is peculiarly
difficult to draw general conclusions from the study of a movement so
protean. Democracy is young; Socialism is in its early infancy.
Is there a rational trend in Socialism? Or is it only a passing whim
of the masses? Is it a crude theory, an earnest protest, a powerful
propaganda? Or is it a current of human conviction so strong, so
deep-flowing that it will be resistless?
It is futile to deny the power of the Socialist movement. The greatest
proof of its virility is its ability to break away from Marxian dogma
and from the fantasies of the utopists, and acknowledge mundane ways
and means. In spite of this earthiness, it still has its fanciful
abstractions. Some of its prophets are still glibly proclaiming a new
order,--as if society were artificial, like a house, and could be torn
down piecemeal or by dynamite, and then rebuilt to suit the vagaries
of a new owner.
On the other hand, a portion of the Socialists are learning that
society is a living thing that can be shaped only by training, like
the mind of a child. Socialism, as a whole, is metamorphosing. Some of
its vicious eccentricities, like the ravings against religion and the
espousal of free love, have already vanished. It is learning that
institutions are the product of ages, not of movements, and cannot be
changed at the fancy of every new and disgruntled social prophet.
The best school for Socialism has been the school of parliamentary
activity. Here the hot-blooded protesters become sober artisans of
statecraft. We have seen how the early utopian ideas, with their
edenesque theory of the guilelessness of man, were abruptly exchanged
for the theory of violence, based on the materialistic conception of
the universe and of man. Neither the soft humanities of the utopists
nor the blood and thunder of revolution overturned the existing state.
But when the workingmen appeared in parliaments, then things began to
change.
In every country where the Socialists have entered parliament, they
appeared suddenly, in considerable numbers. So in France, Germany,
England, Belgium, Austria. And they always produced a flutter, often a
scare, among the conservatives. They were an untried force. Their
preachings of violence and their antagonism to property made them an
unknown quantity, to be feared, and not to be lightly handled--a bomb
of political dynamite that might explode any moment and scatter the
product of ages into fragments!
But no explosion came. And one more example of the persistence of
human nature was added to the long annals of history.
In every country the parliamentary experience has been the same: the
liberal and radical element, attracted by the legislative demands of
the labor party, coalesced, for specific issues, with the Socialists,
and a new era of economic and social legislation was ushered in. Even
in Germany, with its unmodern conditions in government, all the powers
of feudal autocracy failed to crush the rising forces of the new
political consciousness.
In France and England we have seen Socialists take their places in the
cabinet, to the chagrin of that portion of the Socialists who still
regard social classes as natural enemies, and consider social
co-operation among all the elements of society impossible.
In brief, Socialism has entered politics and has become mundane. You
need a microscope to tell a Socialist from a Socialist-Radical in
France, and a Laborite from a Radical-Liberal in England. Briand and
Millerand may be voted out of the Socialist Party, and John Burns may
be spurned by the I.L.P. But these men are teaching a double lesson:
first, that there are no new ways to human betterment; second, that
the old way is worth traveling, because it does lead to happier and
easier conditions of toil. Socialists the world over will soon be
compelled to realize that the political force which shrinks from the
responsibility of daily political drudgery will never be a permanent
factor in life. A political party that is afraid to assume the
obligations of government for fear that it will lose its ideal, is too
fragile for this world.
The Socialist Party wherever it exists is a labor party, with a labor
program that is based on conditions which need to be remedied. Their
practical demands as a rule are of such a nature that all of society
would benefit by their enactment into law. The mystery has all gone
out of the movement. It is not necromancy, it is plain parliamentary
humdrum which you see. The threatened witchery is all words; the
doing is intensely human, of the earth earthy.
The Socialist movement tends toward the latest phase of democracy,
which is social democracy; the democracy that has ceased to toy with
Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, and the other tinsel abstractions
of the bourgeois revolutions; the democracy that sees poverty and
suffering increase as wealth and ease increase. It is the democracy of
the human heart, that cares for the babe in the slums, the lad in the
factory, the mother at the cradle, and the father in his old age.
Against all these helpless ones society has sinned. And it is to a
universal, sincere, social penance that the new democracy calls the
rich, the powerful, and the comfortable.
Socialism is merging rapidly into this new democracy. In doing so it
is abandoning its two great illusions. The first illusion is that the
interests of the worker are somehow different from the interests of
the rest of the community. Class war has been a resonant battle-cry,
and has served its purpose. It is folly for any class to magnify its
needs above those of the rest of society. Civilization and culture
embrace the artisan and the artist, the poor and the powerful. Any
class interest that clashes with the welfare of society as a whole
cannot survive. Socialism is abandoning the tyranny of class war, is
being mellowed by class co-operation. Socialists are now claiming that
their interests are the interests of society. The social complexion of
the party in the countries of its greatest advancement is an
indication of this. Many of the party leaders are of middle-class
origin. Some of them are rich. You call at their homes and servants
open the door and receive your card on a silver tray. Multitudes of
lawyers, physicians, journalists, and professors are in the movement.
Dr. Frank of Mannheim, the leader of the Badensian Socialists, said to
me that the degree to which Socialism can gain the support of the
intellectual element is the measure of success of the movement. All
this indicates that Socialism is breaking the bonds of self-limited
class egoism. The peasant landowner, the small shopkeeper, the
intellectualist, and occasionally a man or two of wealth and high
social position are being drawn into this new democracy.
The question is now being seriously asked: Can there be a social
co-operation? Must there always be industrial war? Von Vollmar,
Millerand, Vandervelde, MacDonald proclaim the possibility of rational
co-operation. MacDonald says: "The defense for democracy which is far
and away the weightiest is that progress must spring, not from the
generosity or enlightenment of a class, but from the common
intelligence." "It must be pointed out that the labor legislation now
being asked for is very much more than a sequel to that passed under
the influence of Lord Shaftesbury. This differs from that as the
working of the moral conscience differs from the motives of the first
brute man who shaped his conduct under a contract of mutual defense
with a friendly neighbor. To use the arm of the law to abolish crying
evils, to put an end to an ever-present injustice, is one thing; to
use that arm to promote justice and to keep open the road to moral
advancement, to bring down from their throne in the ideal into a place
in the world certain conceptions of distributive justice, is quite
another thing. And yet this latter is now being attempted, and was
certain to be attempted as soon as democracy came into power. When
society is enfranchised, the social question becomes the political
question."[1]
"The state is not the interest of a class, but the organ of
society."[2] There can be no broader foundation for political action
than this. All progress springs from the "common intelligence" to
which every one contributes his quota.
The second great illusion of Socialism is the social revolution. No
one except a few extremists any longer thinks of the revolution by
blood. Engels, the friend of Marx, shows that everywhere violence is
giving way to political methods. "Even in the Romance countries we see
the old tactics revised. Everywhere the German example of using the
ballots is being followed. Even in France the Socialists see more and
more that no lasting victory is to be theirs unless they win
beforehand the great masses of the people. The slow work of propaganda
and parliamentary activity is here also recognized as the next step in
party development."[3] Engels shows how Socialists have entered the
parliaments of Belgium, Italy, Denmark, Bulgaria, Roumania, as well as
the parliaments of the great powers. And he indicates that the
revolution of the Socialist must come as a revolution by
majorities--which is democracy.
Engels still believed that violence would follow the accession of
democratic power. If he had lived another decade he would have
discarded this last remnant of the theory of violence. In Germany the
bourgeois are more frightened over the legal than over the illegal
acts of the Socialist. They fear the results of elections more than
rebellion. Violence they can suppress with a bayonet, but laws--they
must be obeyed.
This is true in every country. The power of the ballot is infinitely
greater than the power of the bullet, provided it is followed up with
common sense and energy.
The theory of violence, then, has almost disappeared. The Syndicalist,
in his reversion to anarchy, attempts to revive the forsaken theory.
He does this by a general strike. But the general strike is not to be
confused with the social revolution. The general strike, wherever it
has been tried as an economic forcing valve, has failed. But whenever
it has been used as a political uprising, demanding political rights,
it has been more or less successful. In Belgium we have seen how it
brought results. In Sweden a few years ago there was a general strike
that not only shut every factory, but stopped the street cars and all
transportation lines, closed the gas-works, and even the newspapers
were suspended. It was a powerful political protest, but the number of
striking workmen did not equal the non-strikers.
In Italy in 1904 a general strike was called to protest against the
arbitrary attitude of the government toward the labor movement. In
some of the cities all work ceased, even the gondoliers of Venice
joined the strikers. In Russia in 1904-5 the transportation lines and
post and telegraph lines were tied up while the workingmen
demonstrated for their political liberty.
The violence of Socialism to-day is political; the violence of trade
unionism is economic. As the democratic consciousness spreads, there
may be such a coalescing of interests that violence will cease. But a
human society without warfare and contention is still a tax upon the
imagination. Strikes are increasing in number and bitterness and all
the arbitrations and devices of democracies seem helpless in the
turmoil of economic strife.
I am not unmindful that behind all this parliamentary activity there
is the dim background of hope in the hearts of many Socialists that
somehow the wage system will vanish, that competition will cease, that
the primary activities of production and distribution will be assumed
by society, and that economic extremes will become impossible. In a
people of fitful temper and ebullient spirit the doctrine of
overturning remains a constant menace. Socialism in Spain and Italy
wears a scarlet coat, in Germany a drab, and in England a black. The
danger to civilization lurks, not in the survival of the doctrines of
the older Socialism, but in the temper of the people who espouse them.
The Socialist movement has accomplished three notable things. First,
it has spread democracy. The bourgeois revolutions established
democracy; Socialism extends it. We have seen how in Belgium it
compelled the governing powers to give labor the ballot; how in
Germany, hard set and dogmatic, it is shaping events that will surely
lead to ministerial responsibility and to universal suffrage; and how
in England it is resulting in universal manhood suffrage and probably
"votes for women." Socialism is spreading the obligations of
government upon all shoulders. It is not, however, democratizing the
machinery of administration. In France the centralized autocracy of
Napoleon's empire remains almost untouched. In England the ancient
traditions of administration are slow to change. In Germany the civil
service will be the last barrier to give way.
Secondly, Socialism has forced the labor question upon the lawmakers.
This is a great achievement. The neglected and forgotten portions of
the human family are now the objects of state solicitude. The record
of this revolution is written in the statute books. Turn the leaves of
the table of contents of a modern parliamentary journal, and compare
it with the same work of thirty years ago. Almost the entire time is
now taken up with questions that may be called humanitarian rather
than financial or political. Grave ministers of state make long
speeches on the death-rate of babies in the cities, on the cost of
living in factory towns, on the causes of that most heartbreaking of
modern woes, non-employment. Budgets are now concerned with the
feeding of school children as well as the building of warships, and
with the training of boys as well as the drilling of soldiers.
Nowhere has this radical change taken place without a labor party. The
laboring man forced the issue. He bent kings and cabinets and
parliaments to his demands. The time was ripe, society had reached
that stage of its development when it was ready to take up these
questions. But it did not do so of its own free will. When labor
parties sprang like magic into puissance, a decade ago, the social
conscience was ready to hear their plea. Bismarck foresaw their
demands. But he was too obsessed of feudalism to realize their
motives. Therefore his state socialism failed to silence the
Socialists. The workman had his heart in the cause, not merely his
tongue.
And the third great achievement is the natural result of the other
two. When democracy is potent enough to force its demands on
parliament, then the power of the state is ready to fulfil its
demands. So we find in every country where Social Democracy has gained
a foothold a constant increase of the functions of the state. What
shall the state do? That is now the great question. One hundred years
ago it was, What sort of a state shall we have? That is answered: a
democratic state; at least, a state democratic in spirit. The state is
no longer merely judge, soldier, lawmaker, and governor. It is
physician, forester, bookkeeper, schoolmaster, undertaker, and a
thousand other things. Society has grown complex, and the state, which
is only another name for society, has developed a surprising
precocity.
We have seen that in England especially the trend of legislation is to
deprive the individual, one by one, of those prerogatives which gave
him dominion over property. A man owning land in the city of London,
for instance, has not the liberty to build as he likes or what he
likes. He must build as the state permits him, and the exactions are
manifold. He can be compelled to build a certain distance from the
street,--that is, the city demands a strip of his land for common use.
He can build only a certain height,--the community wants the sunlight.
If his older buildings are dilapidated, the city tears them down. If
the streets through his allotment are too narrow, the city widens
them. In short, he may have title in fee simple, but the community has
a title superior. Even his income from this parcel of land is not all
his own. The state now takes a goodly slice in taxes. If he is
inclined to resent this, and does not improve his property, the state
taxes him on the unearned increment, and if he refuses to submit to
this "socialism," the constable seizes the whole parcel, and he can
have what is left after the community has satisfied its demands.
The taxes that he pays are distributed over a vast variety of
activities. They go to feed school children, to pension aged workmen,
to send inspectors into the factories, to keep up hospitals, as well
as to light and pave the streets and pay policemen. Other taxes that
he pays on other forms of property go to the improvement of
agriculture, to the payment of boards of arbitration, and so on. In
short, ownership is becoming more and more only an incident; it is not
merely a badge of ease, but a symbol of social responsibility.
The burden of the law is shifting from property to persons, from
protecting things to protecting humanity. This change from the Roman
law is almost revolutionary. Even Blackstone, our halfway-mark in the
evolution of the common law, is busy with postulates protecting
property.
Where is this encroachment of the state on private "rights" going to
end? There are some things which the state (society) can do better
than the individual; like the marshaling of an army or conducting a
post-office, and things that are done to counteract the selfishness of
individuals, like factory inspection. But there are other things which
society cannot do; things that depend on individual effort, like art,
literature, and invention. The two fields of state and individual
activity merge into each other. Each nation marks its own
distinctions. But this is certain: _in a democracy the state will do
the things which the people want it to do_. And in a Social Democracy
these things are numerous.
Social Democracy strikes a balance between individual duty and
collective energy. It brings the power of government (collective
power), not to the few who are rich, therefore ignoring oligarchy; nor
to the few who are clever, thereby ignoring tyranny; nor to the few
who are well-born, thus discarding aristocracy; but it brings all the
power of the government to all the people. It attempts to coalesce the
cleverness of the tyrant, the experience of the aristocrat, the wealth
of the industrial nabob, and the aggregate momentum of the mass, into
a humanitarian power. It attempts to use the gifts of all for the
benefit of all.
Social Democracy is the resultant of two forces meeting from opposite
directions: the forces of industrialism, and Socialism, of
collectivism and individualism. No one can draw the exact direction of
this resultant. It attempts to avoid the tyranny and selfishness of
the few, and the tyranny and greed of the many.
Our study of the operation of governments under the sway of Social
Democracy has shown the sort of legislation that is demanded. It is
not necessary to repeat here the details of these laws. But it is
necessary to bear in mind that there are two industrial questions
which have absolutely refused to bend to the power of government: the
question of the length of the workday and the question of wages. The
vast majority of strikes are due to differences over these two
questions. The eight-hour day and the minimum wage have been
successful only in a limited government service.[4] Nor has any
machinery set up by governments to avoid industrial collisions between
workmen and employers been successful in avoiding differences over
hours and wages. The elaborate system of Germany, for instance, is
nothing more than the good will of the state offered to the warring
industrial elements in the interests of peace. The questions of hours
and wages are so fundamental that they embrace the right of private
property. Any power that divests an individual of the right to dispose
of his time or substance by contract virtually deprives him of the
right of ownership.
The limits to the possibilities of Social Democracy are the limits of
private ownership. This brings us at once to the verge of the eternal
question of government--the finding of a just ratio between individual
and collective responsibility: a ratio that varies with varying
nationalities, and that will vary with the passing years. Each
generation in every land will have to fix the limitations for itself.
The new Social Democracy has acquired certain characteristics which
will help us in determining the trend of its movements. In the first
place it is an educated Social Democracy. The taunt of ignorance
applied to the old Socialism of passion cannot be applied to the new
Socialism of practice. The nations of Europe no longer debate the
suitability of universal education. That question happily was settled
for the United States with the landing of the Pilgrims. It took one
hundred years for Europe to understand the Ordinance of 1787, that
"schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged." Not
all of the European nations have touched the heights of this ideal,
but Social Democracy is struggling towards it, and schools, more or
less efficient, are open to the workmen's children. This education is
extended to adults by the press and by self-imposed studies. The
eagerness with which men and women flock to lectures and night classes
is a great omen. In Paris the _Ecole Socialiste_ and _Universite
Populaire_, in Germany and Belgium the night classes in the labor
union clubhouses, the debates and the lecture courses, are evidences
of intellectual eagerness.
In the second place it is a drilled democracy. It is organized into
vast co-operative societies and trade unions. Here it learns the
lesson of constant watchfulness over details. This training in the
infinite little things of business is a good sedative. Socialists
bargain and sell and learn the lessons of competition; do banking and
learn discount; engage in manufacture and learn the problem of the
employer.
They are, moreover, drilled in parliaments, in city and county
councils, in communal offices. They learn the advantages of give and
take, are skilled in compromise, and feel the friction of opposition.
All this has wrought a wonderful change in Socialism. To a Belgian
co-operativist running a butcher-shop, the eight-hour day is a
practical problem; and to a Bavarian member of a city council the
question of opening communal dwellings ceases to be only a subject for
debate. Nothing has brought these people to earth so suddenly as the
infusion of earthly experience into their blood. And this transfusion
has given them life. It has rid them of their many adjectives and
given them a few verbs. It has robbed them in large measure of their
mob spirit.[5] Every year the arbitrary governments of Europe are
finding police coercion more and more unnecessary. The Socialist crowd
is growing orderly, is achieving that self-control which alone
entitles a people to self-government.
It is not unnatural that this movement has made leaders. Of these,
Herr August Bebel is the most remarkable example. This woodturner,
turned party autocrat and statesman, is a never-ending wonder to the
German aristocracy. His speeches are read as eagerly as those of the
Chancellor, and his opinions are quoted as widely as the Kaiser's.
When in 1911 he made his great speech on the Morocco Question in the
Social Democratic Convention, it was reported by the column in all of
the great Continental and English dailies. Bebel is an example of what
the open door of opportunity will do, and he had to force the door
himself. A few years ago, in a moment of reminiscent confidence, he
confessed that he used to cherish as an ideal the time when he could,
for once, have all the bread and butter he could eat. In America we
are accustomed to this rising into power of obscure and untried men.
But in Europe it is rare. European Social Democracy is an expression
of the desire on the part of the people for the open highways of
opportunity.
In the third place, Social Democracy is self-conscious. I have not
used the word class-conscious, because it is more than the
consciousness of an economic group. History is replete with instances
that reveal the irresistible power generated by mass consciousness.
This is the psychology of nationalism. The dynamo that generates the
mysterious voltage of patriotism, of tribal loyalty, is the heart.
Socialism has replaced tribal and national ideals and welded its
devotees into a self-conscious international unity. Whatever danger
there may be in Socialism is the danger of the zealot. The ideal may
be impracticable and discarded, but the devotion to it may be blind
and destructive.
As a rule, Socialist leaders and writers maintain that this drawing
together of Socialism and democracy is only transitory, and that
beyond this lies the promised land of social production. Jaures has
explained this clearly: "Democracy, under the impetus given it by
organized labor, is evolving irresistibly toward Socialism, and
Socialism toward a form of property which will deliver man from his
exploitation by man, and bring to an end the regime of class
government. The Radicals flatter themselves that they can put a stop
to this movement by promising the working classes some reforms, and by
proclaiming themselves the guardians of private property. They hope to
hold a large part of the proletariat in check by a few reforming laws
expressing a sentiment of social solidarity, and by their policy of
defending private property to rouse the conservative forces, the petty
bourgeoisie, the middle classes, and the small peasant proprietors to
oppose Socialism."[6]
So we see that in spite of their experiences Socialists still draw a
clear distinction between their Socialism and democracy. The Socialist
is willing to ignore the experiences of the past twenty years in his
ecstasy of vision. He claims that whatever has been done is mere
reform. He affects to belittle it, the Marxian scorns it. To the
Socialist, democracy is only the halfway house on the road to the
economic paradise. He has his gaze fixed on the New Jerusalem of
"co-operative production" and "distributive justice." Whether this New
City, with its streets paved with the gold of altruism and its gates
garnished with the pearls of good will and benevolence, will be
brought from the fleecy clouds of ecstatic imagination to our sordid
earth remains a question of speculation to that vast body of sincere
and practical citizens who have not scaled the heights of the
Socialistic Patmos.
European Socialism has been transplanted to America. But its growth
until quite recently has been very slow, and confined largely to
immigrants. There is no political spur to hasten the movement. Here
democracy has been achieved. The universal ballot, free speech, free
press, free association are accomplished. Many of the economic
policies espoused by the Social Democratic parties of Europe are
written into the platforms of our political parties. There will be no
independent labor party of any strength until the old parties have
aroused the distrust of the great body of laboring men, and until the
labor unions cut loose from their traditional aloofness and enter
politics. How socialistic such a party will be must depend upon the
circumstances attending its organization. The two third-party
movements which have flourished since the Civil War, the Greenback
movement of the '70's and the Populist movement of the '90's, were
virtually "class" parties, restricted to the agricultural population
of the Middle and Far West; and both of them feared Socialism as much
as they hated capitalism. Neither of these parties outlived a decade.
Economic prosperity abruptly ended both.[7]
The stress of political exclusiveness and the harsh hand of government
will not produce a reactionary movement among the workingmen of
America. But economic circumstances may do so. We are still a young
country full of the hope of youth. The ranks of every walk of life are
filled with those who have worked their way to success from humble
origin. Most of our famous men struggled with poverty in their youth.
Their lives are constantly held up to the children of the nation as
examples of American pluck, enterprise, and opportunity. A nation that
lures its clerks toward proprietorship and its artisans toward
independence offers barren soil for the doctrines of discontent. We
have no stereotyped poverty in the European sense. Our farmers own
their acreage, and many of the urban poor are able to buy a cottage in
the outskirts of the city.
But there are signs that these conditions are undergoing profound
changes. Unlimited competition has led to limitless consolidation of
industries, and the financial destinies of the Republic repose in the
hands of comparatively few men. So much of the Marxian proposition is
fulfilled, at the moment, in America. This concentrated wealth has not
been unmindful of politics. Governmental power and money power are
closely identified in the public mind. Our cities are overflowing with
a new population from the excitable portions of southern Europe, a
population that is proletarian in every sense of the word. Panics
follow one another in rapid succession. The uneasiness of business is
fed by the turmoil of politics. Unrest is everywhere. Labor and
business are engaged in constant struggles that affect all members of
society. The cost of living has increased alarmingly in the last ten
years. We are becoming rapidly a manufacturing nation; the balance of
power is shifting from the farm to the city.[8]
European Socialists are taking a keen interest in American affairs.
Bebel said to me: "You are getting ready for the appropriation of the
great productive enterprises and the railways. Your trusts make the
problem easy." John Burns prophesied that violence and bloodshed alone
would check us in our mad career for wealth. Jaures asked how long it
would take before our poverty would be worse than that of Europe. At a
distance they see us plunging headlong into a Socialist regime.
Professor Brentano of Munich knows us better. He said to me,
"Conservation will be your Socialism."[9] If the fundamental
principles of conservation can be embodied in constitutional laws,
then there will be an almost indefinite extension of the power of the
state over industry. It will embrace mines, forests, irrigated
deserts; it will extend to the sources of all water supply and water
power; the means of transportation may ultimately be included. So that
without radical legal and institutional changes it will be possible
for many of the sources of our raw materials to be placed under
governmental surveillance, leaving the processes of manufacture and
exchange in the hands of private individuals.
There are at present many indications that this will be our general
process of "socialization." The people appear to want it; and in a
democracy the will of the people must prevail.
Before we have advanced far along the new road of conservation we will
find it necessary to reconstruct our whole system of administration.
The haphazard of politics must be foreign to public business.
Everywhere in Europe, especially in Germany and England, the people,
including the Socialists, appear satisfied with the efficiency of
their administrative machinery. Who would intrust the running of a
railroad to our Federal or State governments?
We have reached the extreme of rampant _laissez-faire_. Our youthful
vigor and material wealth have kept us buoyant. Politically we will
become more radical, economically less individualistic, in the next
cycle of our development. There is no magic that saves a people except
the magic of opportunity. In a democracy especially it is necessary to
constantly purge society by free-moving currents of talent and virtue.
This replenishing stream has its sources in the sturdy, healthy
workers of the nation. The movement is from the depths upward. It is
the supreme function of the state to keep these sources unclogged.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] J. RAMSAY MACDONALD, _Ethical Democracy_, pp. 61-71.
[2] J. RAMSAY MACDONALD, _Socialism and Government_, Vol. II, p. 117.
[3] FREDERICK ENGELS' Introduction to MARX' _Klassenkampf_, pp. 16-17,
1895.
[4] The coal strike in England in March, 1912, brought the question of
a legalized minimum wage before the people.
[5] On November 28, 1905, a vast army of working men and women,
estimated at 300,000 by the anti-Socialist papers, marched under the
red flag through the streets of Vienna as a protest against the
existing franchise laws. They were given the right of way and walked
in silence through the streets of the capital. Their orderliness was
more impressive than their vast numbers. It was an object-lesson that
the government did not forget.
[6] JEAN JAURES, _Studies in Socialism_, Eng. ed., p. 25.
[7] What the so-called Progressive Party will accomplish, in this
direction, remains to be seen.
[8] The Socialist vote in the United States is as follows:
1892 21,164
1896 36,274
1900 87,814
1904 402,283
1908 402,464
1910 607,674
1911 1,500,000 (estimated)
The vast increase shown in 1911 was made in municipal and other local
elections. On January 1, 1912, 377 villages, towns, and cities in 36
States had some Socialist officers. Several important cities have been
under Socialist rule, notably Milwaukee and Schenectady, where the
Socialists captured the entire city machinery. In 1912 the Socialists
lost control of Milwaukee, although their vote increased 3,000. Their
overthrow was accomplished by the coalescing of the old parties into a
Citizens' Party, a line-up between radicalism and conservatism that
will probably become the rule in American local politics.
The party is organized along the lines of the German Social Democracy.
Its membership has grown as follows:
1903 15,975
1904 20,764
1905 23,327
1906 26,784
1907 29,270
1908 41,751
1909 41,479
1910 48,011
1911 84,716
1912 (May) 142,000
[9] In this statement, Professor Brentano re-enforces the opinions of
the American economist to whose teachings and writings the
"progressive" movement in American economics and politics, and
especially the movement for conservation of natural resources, must be
traced. For many years Professor Richard T. Ely has been pointing the
way to this conservative "socialization" of our natural wealth.
APPENDIX
I. BIBLIOGRAPHY
The following list of the principal works consulted in the preparation
of this volume may serve also as a bibliography on the subject. There
are very few American books in the list, because the object of this
volume is to summarize the European situation.
For the spirit of the movement the student must consult the
contemporary literature of Socialism--the newspapers, magazines, and
pamphlets, and the campaign documents that flow in a constant stream
from the Socialist press. These are, of course, too numerous and too
fluctuating in character to be catalogued. Lists of these publications
can be secured at the following addresses:
The Fabian Society, 3 Clements Inn, Strand, London, W.C.
The Labor Party, 28 Victoria Street, Westminster, London, S.W.
The Independent Labor Party, 23 Bride Lane, Fleet Street, London, E.C.
German Social Democracy, Verlags-Buchhandlung _Vorwaerts_, 68
Lindenstrasse, Berlin, S.W.
Belgian Labor Party, _Le Peuple_, 33-35 rue de Sable, Brussels.
French Socialist Party, _La Parti Socialiste_, 16 rue de la Corderie,
Paris.
GENERAL WORKS: THE FOUNDERS OF SOCIALISM
BLANC, LOUIS: _Socialism._ An English edition was published in
1848.
---- _Organization of Labor._ English edition in 1848.
BOOTH: _Saint-Simon and Saint-Simonism._
CABET, ETIENNE: _Le Vrai Christianisme_, 1846.
FEUERBACH, FRIEDRICH: _Die Religion der Zukunft_, 1843-5.
---- _Essence of Christianity._ An English translation, 1881, in
the "English and Foreign Philosophical Library."
FOURIER, F.C.M.: _Oeuvres Completes._ 6 vols. 1841-5.
GAMMOND, GATTI DE: Fourier and His System, 1842.
GIDE, CHARLES: _Selections from Fourier._ An English translation
by Julien Franklin, 1901.
GODWIN, WILLIAM: _An Inquiry Concerning Political Justice_, 1796.
KINGSLEY: _Cheap Clothes and Nasty_, 1851.
MORRELL, J.R.: _Life of Fourier_, 1849.
MORRIS, WILLIAM: _Works of_; _Chants for Socialists_, 1885.
OWEN, ROBERT: _An Address_, etc., 1813.
---- _Addresses_, etc., 1816.
---- _An Explanation of the Distress_, etc., 1823.
---- _Book of the New Moral World_, etc., 1836.
PROUDHON, PIERRE JOSEPH: The Works of. English translation by
Tucker, American edition, 1876.
SAINT-SIMON: _New Christianity._ An English translation by Rev.
J.E. Smith. 1834.
WEIL, G.: _L'Ecole Saint-Simonisme--son Histoire_, etc., 1896.
WEITLING, WILLIAM: _Garantieen der Harmonie und Freiheit_, 1845.
GENERAL WORKS: MODERN DISCUSSION
BEBEL, A.: _Woman, in the Past, Present, and Future._ An English
translation appeared in London in 1890.
BERNSTEIN, EDWARD: _Responsibility and Solidarity in the Labor
Struggle_, 1900.
BROOKS, J.G.: _The Social Unrest_, 1903.
ELY, R.T.: _French and German Socialism_, 1883.
ENSOR, R.C.K.: _Modern Socialism._ A useful collection of
Socialist documents, speeches, programs, etc.
GRAHAM, W.: _Socialism New and Old_, 1890.
GUTHRIE, W.B.: _Socialism Before the French Revolution_, 1907.
GUYOT, Y.: _The Tyranny of Socialism_, 1894.
JAURES, J.: _Studies in Socialism_, 1906.
KAUTSKY, K.: _The Social Revolution._ An English translation by
J.B. Askew. The best Continental view of modern Marxianism,
and the most widely read.
KELLY, EDMOND: _Twentieth Century Socialism_, 1910. The most
noteworthy of recent American contributions to Socialist
thought.
KIRKUP: _A History of Socialism_, 1909. A concise and
authoritative narrative.
KOIGEN, D.: _Die Kultur-ausschauung des Sozialismus_, 1903.
LEVY, J.H.: _The Outcome of Individualism_, 1890.
MACDONALD, J.R.: _Socialism and Society_, 1905. MacDonald is not
only the leader of the British Labor Party, but his writings
comprise a comprehensive exposition of the views of labor
democracy.
---- _Character and Democracy_, 1906.
---- _Socialism_, 1907.
---- _Socialism and Government_, 1909.
MILL, J.S.: _Socialism_, 1891. A collection of essays, etc., from
the writings of John Stuart Mill touching on Socialism.
RAE, J.: _Contemporary Socialism_, 1908. A standard work.
RICHTER: _Pictures of the Socialist Future_, 1893.
SCHAEFFLE: _The Impossibility of Social-Democracy_, 1892.
---- _The Quintessence of Socialism_, 1898. Probably the most
authoritative and concise refutation of the Socialist dogmas.
SOMBART, WERNER: _Socialism and the Social Movement_, 1909. Widely
read, both in the original and in the English translation.
Contains an interesting critique of Marxianism.
SPENCER, HERBERT: _The Coming Slavery_, 1884. A reprint from _The
Contemporary Review_.
STODDARD, JANE: _The New Socialism_, 1909. A convenient
compilation.
TUGAN-BARANOVSKY, M.I.: _Modern Socialism_, 1910. A systematic and
scholarly resume of the doctrines of Socialism.
WARSCHAUER, O.: _Zur Entwickelungsgeschichte des Sozialismus_,
1909.
WELLS, H.G.: _New Worlds for Old_, 1909. One of the most popular
expositions of Socialism.
MARX AND ENGELS
AVELING, E.B.: _The Student's Marx._ A handy compilation. 1902.
BOEHM-BAWERK: _Karl Marx and the Close of His System._ An English
translation was made in 1898.
ENGELS, FRIEDRICH: _Die Entwickelung des Socialismus von der
Utopie zur Wissenschaft_, 1891.
---- _Socialism--Utopian and Scientific_, 1892.
---- _L. Feuerbach und der Ausgang der Klassischen Deutschen
Philosophie_, 1903.
---- _Briefe und Auszuege von Briefen_, 1906.
---- _Friedrich Engels, Sein Leben, Sein Wirken und Seine
Schriften_, 1895.
MARX and ENGELS: _The Communist Manifesto._ There have been many
editions; that of 1888 is probably the widest known for its
historical Introduction.
MARX, KARL: _The Poverty of Philosophy._ An answer to Proudhon's
_La Philosophie de la Misere_. An English translation was made
by H. Quelch, 1900.
---- _Enthuellungen ueber den Kommunisten Process zu Koeln_, 1875.
Engels' Preface gives an account of the origin of the "Society
of the Just."
---- _Die Klassenkaempfe in Frankreich, 1848-50._
---- _Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Germany in 1848._ An
English translation appeared in 1896.
---- _Capital_, 1896.
---- _The International Workingmen's Association._ Two addresses
on the Franco-Prussian War, 1870.
---- _The international Workingmen's Association--The Civil War in
France._ An address to the General Council of the
International, 1871.
THE INTERNATIONAL
DAVE, V.: _Michel Bakunin et Karl Marx_, 1900.
ENGELS, F.: _The International Workingmen's Association_, 1891.
FROEBEL, J.: _Ein Lebenslauf_--for an account of Marx vs. Bakunin.
GUILLAUME, J.: _L'Internationale: Documents et Souvenirs_, 1905.
JAECKH, GUSTAV: _L'Internationale._ An English translation was
published in 1904.
JAEGER, E.: _Karl Marx und die Internationale Arbeiter
Association_, 1873.
MAURICE, C.E.: _Revolutionary Movements of 1848-9_, 1887.
TESTUT, O.: _L'Internationale--son origine, son but, son
principes, son organisation_, etc. Third edition, 1871. A
German edition translated by Paul Frohberg, Leipsic, 1872.
---- _Le Livre Bleu de l'Internationale_, 1871.
VILLETARD: _History of the International._ Translated by Susan M.
Day, New Haven, 1874.
_Ein Complot gegen die Internationale Arbeiter Association_, 1874,
gives a careful version of the Marxian side of the Bakunin
controversy.
"International Workingmen's Association"--"_Proces-verbaux,
Congres a Lausanne_," 1867.
_Troisieme Congres de l'Association Internationale des
Travailleurs_, Brussels, 1868.
_Manifeste aux Travailleurs des Campagnes._ Paris, 1870.
_Manifeste addresse a toutes les associations ouvrieres_, etc.
Paris, 1874.
_International Arbeiter Association Protokoll._ A German edition
of the Proceedings of the Paris Congress, 1890, with a
valuable Introduction by W. Liebknecht.
FRANCE
JAEGER, EUGEN: _Geschichte der Socialen Bewegung und des
Socialismus in Frankreich_, 1890.
JAURES, JEAN: _L'Armee Nouvelle--L'Organisation Socialiste de la
France_, 1911. The initial installment of the long-promised
account of the Socialist state.
LAVY, A.: _L'Oeuvre de Millerand_, 1902. An appreciative history
of Millerand's work. Contains many documents, speeches, etc.
PEIXOTTO, J.: _The French Revolution and Modern Socialism_, 1901.
VON STEIN, LORENZ: _Der Sozialismus und Communismus des Heutigen
Frankreichs_, 1848.
WEIL, GEORGES: _Histoire du Mouvement Socialiste en France_, 1904.
BELGIUM
BERTRAND, LOUIS: _Histoire de la Democratie et Socialisme en
Belgique depuis 1830_, 1906. Introduction by Vandervelde.
---- _Histoire de la Cooperation en Belgique_, 1902.
BERTRAND, LOUIS, et al.: _75 Annees de Domination Bourgeois_,
1905.
DESTREE et VANDERVELDE: _Le Socialisme en Belgique._
LANGEROCK, H.: _Le Socialisme Agraire_, 1895.
STEFFENS-FRAUWEILER, H. VON: _Der Agrar Sozialismus in Belgien_,
Munich, 1893.
VANDERVELDE, EMILE: _Histoire de la Cooperation en Belgique_,
1902.
---- _Essais sur la Question Agraire en Belgique_, 1902.
---- Article on the General Strike in _Archiv fuer Sozial
Wissenschaft_, May, 1908.
GERMANY
BEBEL, AUGUST: _Die Social-Demokratie im Deutschen Reichstag._ A
series of brochures detailing the activity of the Social
Democrats--1871-1893. Of course from a partisan point of
view.
---- _Aus Meinem Leben_, 1910. An intimate recital of the
development of Social Democracy in Germany.
BERNSTEIN, EDWARD: _Ferdinand Lassalle und Seine Bedeutung fuer die
Arbeiter Klasse_, 1904.
BRANDES, GEORG: _Ferdinand Lassalle: Ein Literarisches
Charakter-Bild._ Berlin, 1877. An English translation was
published in 1911. This is a brilliant biography.
DAWSON, W.H.: _German Socialism and Ferdinand Lassalle_, 1888.
---- _Bismarck and State Socialism_, 1890.
---- _The German Workman_, 1906.
---- _The Evolution of Modern Germany_, 1908.
EISNER, K.: _Liebknecht--Sein Leben und Wirken_, 1900. A brief
sketch of the veteran Social Democrat.
FRANK, DR. LUDWIG: _Die Buergerlichen Parteien des Deutschen
Reichstags_, 1911. A Socialist's account of the rise of German
political parties.
HARMS, B.: _Ferdinand Lassalle und Seine Bedeutung fuer die
Deutsche Sozial-Demokratie_, 1909.
---- _Sozialismus und die Sozial-Demokratie in Deutschland._
HOOPER, E.G.: _The German State Insurance System_, 1908.
KAMPFMEYER, P.: _Geschichte der Modernen Polizei im Zusammenhang
mit der Allgemeinen Kulturbewegung_, 1897. A Socialist's
recital of the use of police.
---- _Geschichte der Modernen Gesellschafts-klassen in
Deutschland_, 1896. From a Socialist standpoint.
KOHUT, A.: _Ferdinand Lassalle--Sein Leben und Wirken_, 1889.
LASSALLE, FERDINAND: _Offenes Antwortschreiben an das
Central-Comite zur Berufung eines Allgemeinen Deutschen
Arbeiter Congress zu Leipzig_, 1863.
---- _Die Wissenschaft und die Arbeiter_, 1863.
---- _Macht und Recht_, 1863. A complete edition of Lassalle's
works was published in 1899, under the title "Gesamte Werke
Ferdinand Lassalles."
LOWE, C.: _Prince Bismarck: An Historical Biography_, 1885. A
sympathetic description of Bismarck's attempt to solve the
social problem.
MEHRING, F.: _Die Deutsche Sozial-Demokratie--Ihre Geschichte und
Ihre Lehre_, 1879. Third edition. A compact narrative.
MEYER, R.: _Emancipationskampf des Vierten Standes_, 1882.
NAUMANN, FRIEDRICH: _Die Politischen Parteien_, 1911. History of
German political parties. A Radical account.
SCHMOELE, J.: _Die Sozial-Demokratische Gewerkschaften in
Deutschland seit dem Erlasse des Sozialisten Gesetzes_, 1896,
etc.
_Sozial-Demokratische Partei-Tag-Protokoll._ Annual reports of the
party conventions.
_Documente des Sozialismus._ An annual publication edited by
Bernstein.
ENGLAND
ARNOLD-FOSTER, H.: _English Socialism of To-day_, 1908.
BARKER, J.E.: _British Socialism_, 1908. A collection of
quotations.
BIBBY, F.: _Trades Unionism and Socialism_, 1907.
BLATCHFORD, R.: _Merrie England_, 1895.
CHURCHILL, WINSTON: _Liberalism and the Social Problem_, 1909.
ENGELS, F.: _The Condition of the Working Classes in England in
1844_, 1892.
FAY, C.R.: _Co-operation at Home and Abroad_, 1908.
GAMMAGE, R.G.: _History of the Chartist Movement_, 1894.
HARDIE, KEIR: _From Serfdom, to Socialism_, 1907.
HOBHOUSE, L.T.: _The Labor Movement_, 1898.
---- _Liberalism_, 1911.
---- _Democracy and Reaction_, 1904.
HOBSON, J.A.: _The Crisis in Liberalism_, 1909.
HOLYOAKE: _History of Cooperation_, 1906.
KNOTT, Y.: _Conservative Socialism_, 1909.
LECKY, W.E.H.: _Democracy and Liberty_, 1899.
MACDONALD, J.R.: _The People in Power_, 1900.
---- _Socialism To-day_, 1909.
MASTERMAN, C.F.G.: _The Condition of England_, 1909.
MCCARTHY, J.: _The Epoch of Reform_, 1882. For Chartism and the
reform movements of the nineteenth century democracy.
MONEY, CHIOZZA: _Riches and Poverty_, 1911.
NICHOLSON, J.S.: _History, Progress and Ideals of Socialism._ A
criticism of the Socialist viewpoint.
NOEL, CONRAD: _The Labor Party._ A criticism of the attitude of
Liberals and Conservatives toward the social problems. From
the Labor Party viewpoint.
SNOWDEN, P.: _The Socialist Budget_, 1907.
TOWLER, W.G.: _Municipal Socialism._ The anti-Socialist viewpoint.
_The Times_: _The Socialist Movement in Great Britain_, 1909. A
reprint of a series of carefully prepared articles in _The
Times._
VILLIERS, B.: _The Opportunity of Liberalism_, 1904.
---- _The Socialist Movement in England_, 1908.
WEBB, S.: _Wanted--A Program: An Appeal to the Liberal Party_,
1888.
---- _Socialism in England_, 1890.
WEBB, B. and S.: _Industrial Democracy_, 1902.
---- _The History of Trade Unionism_, 1911.
II. FRANCE
1. NOTE ON THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT
Yves Guyot, the distinguished French publicist, told the writer that
there was only one compact, disciplined political party in France, the
United Socialists. Other than the Socialists, there is no
well-organized group in the Chamber of Deputies. The Right, Center,
and Left coalesce almost insensibly into each other. Party platforms
and party loyalty are replaced by a political individualism that to an
American politician would seem like political anarchy.
The Chamber of Deputies is supreme--the ministry stands or falls upon
its majority's behest. This gives to the deputy a peculiar personal
power. He is only loosely affiliated with his group, is a powerful
factor in the government of the Republic, and is directly dependent
upon his constituents for his tenure in office. The result is a
personal, rather then a party, system of politics.
This remarkably decentralized system of representative governance is
counterbalanced by a highly efficient and completely centralized
system of administration, which is based on civil service, and
outlives all the mutations of ministries and shifting of deputies. The
ministry, naturally, has theoretical control over the administrative
officials. During the campaign for reorganizing the army and navy, and
the disestablishment of the Church, under the Radical-Socialist
_bloc_, a few years ago, General Andre, acting for the ministry,
resorted to a comprehensive system of espionage to ferret out the
undesirable officers. Every commune has its official scrutinizer, who
reports the doings of the employees to the government.
This, in turn, has created a clientilism. The deputy is needed by the
ministry, the deputy needs the votes of his constituency, the local
officials need the good will of the deputy. The result is a fawning
favoritism that has taken the place of party servitude as we know it
in America.
The Socialists have precipitated a serious problem in this relation of
the government employee to the state: Can the state employees form a
union? There are nearly 1,000,000 state employees. This includes not
only all the functionaries, but all the workmen in the match
factories, the mint, the national porcelain factory and tobacco
plants, and the navy yards. In 1885 and again in 1902 the Court of
Cassation decided that "the right of forming a union (_syndicat_) is
confined to those who, whether as employers or as workmen or employed,
are engaged in _industry, agriculture, or commerce_, to the exclusion
of all other persons and all other occupations."
The government has, however, countenanced some infringements. A few
syndicates of municipal and departmental employees are allowed; but
they are mostly workmen, not strictly functionaries. There are several
syndicates of elementary school teachers. But they have not been
allowed to federate their unions. At Lyons the teachers formed a union
and, according to law, filed their rules and regulations with the
proper official, who turned them over to the Minister of Justice, and
after a cabinet consultation it was decided that the union was
illegal, but would be ignored. They then joined the local _Bourse du
Travail_ (federation of labor), and Briand, then Minister of
Education, vetoed their action. Then a number of branches in the
public service, including post-office and customs-house employees,
teachers, etc., united in forming a committee "_pour la defense du
droit syndical des salaries de l'etat, des departements et du
commerce_." This "Committee of Defense" petitioned Clemenceau on the
right to organize, and intimated that the great and only difference
between the state and the private employer is that the former adds
political to economic oppression. This is pure Syndicalism. Under the
individual political jugglery that takes the place of the party system
in France, the problem is not made any the easier.
2. PROGRAM OF THE LIBERAL WING OF THE FRENCH SOCIALISTS, ADOPTED AT
TOURS, 1902, UNDER THE LEADERSHIP OF JAURES
_I.--Declaration of Principles_
Socialism proceeds simultaneously from the movement of democracy and
from the new forms of production. In history, from the very morrow of
the French Revolution, the proletarians perceived that the Declaration
of the Rights of Man would remain an illusion unless society
transformed ownership.
How, indeed, could freedom, ownership, security, be guaranteed to all,
in a society where millions of workers have no property but their
muscles, and are obliged, in order to live, to sell their power of
work to the propertied minority?
To extend, therefore, to every citizen the guarantees inscribed in the
Declaration of Rights, our great Babeuf demanded ownership in common,
as a guarantee of welfare in common. Communism was for the boldest
proletarians the supreme expression of the Revolution.
Between the political regime, the outcome of the revolutionary
movement, and the economic regime of society, there is an intolerable
contradiction.
In the political order democracy is realized: all citizens share
equally, at least by right, in the sovereignty; universal suffrage is
communism in political power.
In the economic order, on the other hand, a minority is sovereign. It
is the oligarchy of capital which possesses, directs, administers, and
exploits.
Proletarians are acknowledged fit as citizens to manage the milliards
of the national and communal budgets; as laborers, in the workshop,
they are only a passive multitude, which has no share in the direction
of enterprises, and they endure the domination of a class which makes
them pay dearly for a tutelage whose utility ceases and whose
prolongation is arbitrary.
The irresistible tendency of the proletarians, therefore, is to
transfer into the economic order the democracy partially realized in
the political order. Just as all the citizens have and handle in
common, democratically, the political power, so they must have and
handle in common the economic power, the means of production.
They must themselves appoint the heads of work in the workshops, as
they appoint the heads of government in the city, and reserve for
those who work, for the community, the whole product of work.
This tendency of political democracy to enlarge itself into social
democracy has been strengthened and defined by the whole economic
evolution.
In proportion as the capitalistic regime developed its effects, the
proletariat became conscious of the irreducible opposition between its
essential interests and the interests of the class dominant in
society, and to the bourgeois form of democracy it opposed more and
more the complete and thorough communistic democracy.
All hope of universalizing ownership and independence by multiplying
small autonomous producers has disappeared. The great industry is more
and more the rule in modern production.
By the enlargement of the world's markets, by the growing facility of
transport, by the division of labor, by the increasing application of
machinery, by the concentration of capitals, immense concentrated
production is gradually ruining or subordinating the small or middling
producers.
Even where the number of small craftsmen, small traders, small peasant
proprietors, does not diminish, their relative importance in the
totality of production grows less unceasingly. They fall under the
sway of the great capitalists.
Even the peasant proprietors, who seem to have retained a little
independence, are more and more exposed to the crushing forces of the
universal market, which capitalism directs without their concurrence
and against their interests.
For the sale of their wheat, wine, beetroot, and milk, they are more
and more at the mercy of great middlemen or great industries of
milling, distilling, and sugar-refining, which dominate and despoil
peasant labor.
The industrial proletarians, having lost nearly all chance of
individually rising to be employers, and being thus doomed to eternal
dependence, are further subject to incessant crises of unemployment
and misery, let loose by the unregulated competition of the great
capitalist forces.
The immense progress of production and wealth, largely usurped by
parasitic classes, has not led to an equivalent progress in well-being
and security for the workers, the proletarians. Whole categories of
wage-earners are abruptly thrown into extreme misery by the constant
introduction of new mechanisms and by the abrupt movements and
transformations of industry.
Capitalism itself admits the disorder of the present regime of
production, since it tries to regulate it for its gain by capitalistic
syndicates, by trusts.
Even if it succeeded in actually disciplining all the forces of
production, it would only do so while consummating the domination and
the monopoly of capital.
There is only one way of assuring the continued order and progress of
production, the freedom of every individual, and the growing
well-being of the workers; it is to transfer to the collectivity, to
the social community, the ownership of the capitalistic means of
production.
The proletariat, daily more numerous, ever better prepared for
combined action by the great industry itself, understands that in
collectiveness or communism lie the necessary means of salvation for
it.
As an oppressed and exploited class, it opposes all the forces of
oppression and exploitation, the whole system of ownership, which
debases it to be a mere instrument. It does not expect its
emancipation from the good will of rulers or the spontaneous
generosity of the propertied classes, but from the continual and
methodical pressure which it exerts upon the privileged class and the
government.
It sets before itself as its final aim, not a partial amelioration,
but the total transformation of society. And since it acknowledges no
right as belonging to capitalistic ownership, it feels bound to it by
no contract. It is determined to fight it, thoroughly, and to the end;
and it is in this sense that the proletariat, even while using the
legal means which democracy puts into its hands, is and must remain a
revolutionary class.
Already by winning universal suffrage, by winning and exercising the
right of combining to strike and of forming trade-unions, by the first
laws regulating labor and causing society to insure its members, the
proletariat has begun to react against the fatal effects of
capitalism; it will continue this great and unceasing effort, but it
will only end the struggle when all capitalist property has been
reabsorbed by the community, and when the antagonism of classes has
been ended by the disappearance of the classes themselves, reconciled,
or rather made one, in common production and common ownership.
How will be accomplished the supreme transformation of the capitalist
regime into the collectivist or communist? The human mind cannot
determine beforehand the mode in which history will be accomplished.
The democratic and bourgeois revolution, which originated in the great
movement of France in 1789, has come about in different countries in
the most different ways. The old feudal system has yielded in one case
to force, in another to peaceful and slow evolution. The revolutionary
bourgeoisie has at one place and time proceeded to brutal
expropriation without compensation, at another to the buying out of
feudal servitudes.
No one can know in what way the capitalist servitude will be
abolished. The essential thing is that the proletariat should be
always ready for the most vigorous and effective action. It would be
dangerous to dismiss the possibility of revolutionary events
occasioned either by the resistance or by the criminal aggression of
the privileged class.
It would be fatal, trusting in the one word revolution, to neglect the
great forces which the conscious, organized proletariat can employ
within democracy.
These legal means, often won by revolution, represent an accumulation
of revolutionary force, a revolutionary capital, of which it would be
madness not to take advantage.
Too often the workers neglect to profit by the means of action which
democracy and the Republic put into their hands. They do not demand
from trade-unionist action, co-operative action, or universal
suffrage, all that those forms of action can give.
No formula, no machinery, can enable the working-class to dispense
with the constant effort of organization and education.
The idea of the general strike, of general strikes, is invincibly
suggested to proletarians by the growing magnitude of working-class
organization. They do not desire violence, which is very often the
result of an insufficient organization and a rudimentary education of
the proletariat; but they would make a great mistake if they did not
employ the powerful means of action, which co-ordinates working-class
forces to subserve the great interests of the workers or of society;
they must group and organize themselves to be in a position to make
the privileged class more and more emphatically aware of the gulf
which may suddenly be cleft open in the economic life of societies by
the abrupt stoppage of the worn-out and interminably exploited
workers. They can thereby snatch from the selfishness of the
privileged class great reforms interesting the working-class in
general, and hasten the complete transformation of an unjust society.
But the formula of the general strike, like the partial strike, like
political action, is only valuable through the progress of the
education, the thought, and the will of the working-class.
The Socialist party defends the Republic as a necessary means of
liberation and education. Socialism is essentially republican. It
might be even said to be the Republic itself, since it is the
extension of the Republic to the regime of property and labor.
The Socialist party needs, to organize the new world, free minds,
emancipated from superstitions and prejudices. It asks for and
guarantees every human being, every individual, absolute freedom of
thinking, and writing, and affirming their beliefs. Over against all
religions, dogmas, and churches, as well as over against the class
conception of the bourgeoisie, it sets the unlimited right of free
thought, the scientific conception of the universe, and a system of
public education based exclusively on science and reason.
Thus accustomed to free thought and reflection, citizens will be
protected against the sophistries of the capitalistic and clerical
reaction. The small craftsmen, small traders, and small peasant
proprietors will cease to think that it is Socialism which wishes to
expropriate them. The Socialist party will hasten the hour when these
small peasant proprietors, ruined by the underselling of their
produce, riddled with mortgage debts, and always liable to judicial
expropriation, will eventually understand the advantages of
generalized and systematized association, and will claim themselves,
as a benefit, the socialization of their plots of land.
But it would be useless to prepare inside each nation an organization
of justice and peace, if the relations of the nations to one another
remained exposed to every enterprise of force, every suggestion of
capitalist greed.
The Socialist party desires peace among nations; it condemns every
policy of aggression and war, whether continental or colonial. It
constantly keeps on the order of the day for civilized countries
simultaneous disarmament. While waiting for the day of definite peace
among nations, it combats the militarist spirit by doing its utmost to
approximate the system of permanent armies to that of national
militias. It wishes to protect the territory and the independence of
the nation against any surprise; but every offensive policy and
offensive weapon is utterly condemned by it.
The close understanding of the workers, of the proletarians of every
country, is necessary as well to beat back the forces of aggression
and war as to prepare by a concerted action the general triumph of
Socialism. The international agreement of the militant proletarians of
every country will prepare the triumph of a free humanity, where the
differences of classes will have disappeared, and the difference of
nations, instead of being a principle of strife and hatred, will be a
principle of brotherly emulation in the universal progress of mankind.
It is in this sense and for these reasons that the Socialist party has
formulated in its congresses the rule and aim of its
action--international understanding of the workers; political and
economic organization of the proletariat as a class party for the
conquest of government and the socialization of the means of production
and exchange; that is to say, the transformation of capitalist society
into a collectivist or communist society.
_II.--Program of Reforms_
The Socialist party, rejecting the policy of all or nothing, has a
program of reforms whose realization it pursues forthwith.
(1) _Democratization of Public Authorities_
1. Universal direct suffrage, without distinction of sex, in every
election.
2. Reduction of time of residence. Votes to be cast for lists, with
proportional representation, in every election.
3. Legislative measures to secure the freedom and secrecy of the vote.
4. Popular right of initiative and referendum.
5. Abolition of the Senate and Presidency of the Republic. The powers
at present belonging to the President of the Republic and the Cabinet
to devolve on an executive council appointed by the Parliament.
6. Legal regulation of the legislator's mandate, to be revocable by
the vote of any absolute majority of his constituents on the register.
7. Admission of women to all public functions.
8. Absolute freedom of the press, and of assembly guaranteed only by
the common law. Abrogation of all exceptional laws on the press.
Freedom of civil associations.
9. Full administrative autonomy of the departments and communes, under
no reservations but that of the laws guaranteeing the republican,
democratic, and secular character of the State.
(2) _Complete Secularization of the State_
1. Separation of the Churches and the State; abolition of the Budget
of Public Worship; freedom of public worship; prohibition of the
political and collective action of the Churches against the civil laws
and republican liberties.
2. Abolition of the congregations; nationalization of the property in
mortmain, of every kind, belonging to them, and appropriation of it
for works of social insurance and solidarity; in the interval, all
industrial, agricultural, and commercial undertakings are to be
forbidden to the congregations.
(3) _Democratic and Humane Organization of Justice_
1. Substitution for all the present courts, whether civil or criminal,
of courts composed of a jury taken from the electoral register and
judges elected under guarantees of competence; the jury to be formed
by drawing lots from lists drawn up by universal suffrage.
2. Justice to be without fee. Transformation of ministerial offices
into public functions. Abolition of the monopoly of the bar.
3. Examination from opposite sides at every stage and on every point.
4. Substitution for the vindictive character of the present
punishments, of a system for the safe keeping and the amelioration of
convicts.
5. Abolition of the death penalty.
6. Abolition of the military and naval courts.
(4) _Constitution of the Family in conformity with Individual Rights_
1. Abrogation of every law establishing the civil inferiority of women
and natural or adulterine children.
2. Most liberal legislation on divorce. A law sanctioning inquiry into
paternity.
(5) _Civic and Technical Education_
1. Education to be free of charge at every stage.
2. Maintenance of the children in elementary schools at the expense of
the public bodies.
3. For secondary and higher education, the community to pay for those
of the children who on examination are pronounced fit usefully to
continue their studies.
4. Creation of a popular higher education.
5. State monopoly of education at the three stages; as a means towards
this, all members of the regular and secular clergy to be forbidden to
open and teach in a school.
(6) _General recasting of the System of Taxation upon Principles of
Social Solidarity_
1. Abolition of every tax on articles of consumption which are primary
necessaries, and of the four direct contributions;[1] accessorily,
relief from taxation of all small plots of land and small professional
businesses.[2]
2. Progressive income-tax, levied on each person's income as a whole,
in all cases where it exceeds 3,000 francs (L120).
3. Progressive tax on inheritances, the scale of progression being
calculated with reference both to the amount of the inheritance and
the degree of remoteness of the relationship.
4. The State to be empowered to seek a part of the revenue which it
requires from certain monopolies.
(7) _Legal Protection and Regulation of Labor in Industry, Commerce,
and Agriculture_
1. One day's rest per week, or prohibition of employers to exact work
more than six days in seven.
2. Limitation of the working-day to eight hours; as a means towards
this, vote of every regulation diminishing the length of the
working-day.
3. Prohibition of the employment of children under fourteen; half-time
system for young persons, productive labor being combined with
instruction and education.
4. Prohibition of night-work for women and young persons. Prohibition
of night-work for adult workers of all categories and in all
industries where night-work is not absolutely necessary.
5. Legislation to protect home-workers.
6. Prohibition of piece-work and of truck. Legal recognition of
blacklisting.
7. Scales of rates forming a minimum wage to be fixed by agreement
between municipalities and the working-class corporations of industry,
commerce, and agriculture.
8. Employers to be forbidden to make deductions from wages, as fines
or otherwise. Workers to assist in framing special rules for
workshops.
9. Inspection of workshops, mills, factories, mines, yards, public
services, shops, etc., shall be carried out with reference to the
conditions of work, hygiene, and safety, by inspectors elected by the
workmen's unions, in concurrence with the State inspectors.
10. Extension of the industrial arbitration courts to all wage-workers
of industry, commerce, and agriculture.
11. Convict labor to be treated as a State monopoly; the charge for
all work done shall be the wage normally paid to trade-unionist
workers.
12. Women to be forbidden by law to work for six weeks before
confinement and for six weeks after.
(8) _Social Insurance against all Natural and Economic Risks_
1. Organization by the nation of a system of social insurance,
applying to the whole mass of industrial, commercial, and agricultural
workers, against the risks of sickness, accident, disability, old age,
and unemployment.
2. The insurance funds to be found without drawing on wages; as a
means towards this, limitation of the contribution drawn from the
wage-workers to a third of the total contribution, the two other
thirds to be provided by the State and the employers.
3. The law on workmen's accidents to be improved and applied without
distinction or nationality.
4. The workers to take part in the control and administration of the
insurance system.
(9) _Extension of the Domain and Public Services, Industrial and
Agricultural, of State, Department, and Commune_
1. Nationalization of railways, mines, the Bank of France, insurance,
the sugar refineries and sugar factories, the distilleries, and the
great milling establishments.
2. Organization of public employment registries for the workers, with
the assistance of the Bourses du Travail and the workmen's
organizations: and abolition of the private registries.
3. State organization of agricultural banks.
4. Grants to rural communes to assist them to purchase agricultural
machinery collectively, to acquire communal domains, worked under the
control of the communes by unions of rural laborers, and to establish
depots and entrepots.
5. Organization of communal services for lighting, water, common
transport, construction, and public management of cheap dwellings.
6. Democratic administration of the public services, national and
communal; organizations of workers to take part in their
administration and control; all wage-earners in all public services to
have the right of forming trade-unions.
7. National and communal service of public health, and strengthening
of the laws which protect it--those on unhealthy dwellings, etc.
(10) _Policy of International Peace and Adaptation of the Military
Organization to the Defense of the Country_
1. Substitution of a militia for the standing Army, and adoption of
every measure, such as reductions of military service, leading up to
it.
2. Remodeling and mitigation of the military penal code; abolition of
disciplinary corps, and prohibition of the prolongation of military
service by way of penalty.
3. Renunciation of all offensive war, no matter what its pretext.
4. Renunciation of every alliance not aimed exclusively at the
maintenance of peace.
5. Renunciation of Colonial military expeditions; and in the present
Colonies or Protectorates, withdrawn from the influence of
missionaries and the military regime, development of institutions to
protect the natives.
3. BASIS OF THE UNITED SOCIALIST PARTY OF FRANCE
_Adopted January 13, 1905_
The representatives of the various Socialistic organizations of
France: the revolutionary Socialist Labor Party, the Socialist Party
of France, the French Socialist Party, the independent federations of
Bouches-du-Rhone, of Bretagne, of Herault, of the Somme, and of
l'Yonne, commanded by their respective parties and federations to form
a union upon the basis indicated by the International Congress of
Amsterdam, declare that the action of a unified party should be based
upon the principles established by the International Congress,
especially those held in France in 1900 and Amsterdam in 1904.
The divergence of views and the various interpretations of the tactics
of the Socialists which have prevailed up to the present moment have
been due to circumstances peculiar to France and to the absence of a
general party organization.
The delegates declare their common desire to form a party based upon
the class war which, at the same time, will utilize to its profit the
struggles of the laboring classes and unite their action with that of
a political party organized for the defense of the rights of the
proletariat, whose interests will always rest in a party fundamentally
and irreconcilably opposed to all the bourgeois classes and to the
state which is their instrument.
Therefore the delegates declare that their respective organizations
are prepared to collaborate immediately in this work of the
unification of all the Socialistic forces in France, upon the
following basis, unanimously adopted:
1. The Socialist Party is a class party which has for its aim the
socialization of the means of production and exchange, that is to say,
to transform the present capitalistic society into a collective or
communistic society by means of the political and economic
organization of the proletariat. By its aims, by its ideals, by the
power which it employs, the Socialist Party, always seeking to realize
the immediate reforms demanded by the working class, is not a party of
reforms, but a party of class war and revolution.
2. The members of Parliament elected by the party form a unique group
opposed to all the factions of the bourgeois parties. The Socialist
group in Parliament must refuse to sustain all of those means which
assure the domination of the bourgeoisie in government and their
maintenance in power: must therefore refuse to vote for military
appropriations, appropriations for colonial conquest, secret funds,
and the budget.
Even in the most exceptional circumstances the Socialist members must
not pledge the party without its consent.
In Parliament the Socialist group must consecrate itself to defending
and extending the political liberties and rights of the working
classes and to the realization of those reforms which ameliorate the
conditions of life in the struggle for existence of the working class.
The deputies should always hold themselves at the disposition of the
party, giving themselves to the general propaganda, the organization
of the proletariat, and constantly working toward the ultimate goal of
Socialism.
3. Every member of the legislature individually, as well as each
militant Socialist, is subject to the control of his federation; all
of the officials in all of the groups are subject to the central
organization. In every case the national congress has the final
jurisdiction over all party matters.
4. There shall be complete freedom of discussion in the press
concerning questions of principle and policy, but the conduct of all
the Socialist publications must be strictly in accord with the
decisions of the national congress as interpreted by the executive
committee of the party. Journals which are or may become the property
of the party, either of the national party or of the federations, will
naturally be placed under the management of authorities permanently
established for that purpose by the party or the federations. Journals
which are not the property of the party, but proclaim themselves as
Socialistic, must conform strictly to the resolutions of the congress
as interpreted by the proper party authorities, and they should insert
all the official communications of the party and party notices, as
they may be requested to do. The central committee of the party may
remind such journals of the policies of the party, and if they are
recalcitrant may propose to the congress that all intercourse between
them and the party be broken.
5. Members of Parliament shall not be appointed members of the central
committee, but they shall be represented on the central committee by a
committee equal to one-tenth of the number of delegates, and in no
case shall their representation be less than five. The Federation
shall not appoint as delegates to the Central Committee "_militants_"
who reside within the limits of the Federation.
6. The party will take measures for insuring, on the part of the
officials, respect for the mandates of the party, and will fix the
amount of their assessment.
7. A congress charged with the definite organization of the party will
be convened as soon as possible upon the basis of proportional
representation fixed, first upon the number of members paying dues,
and second upon the number of votes cast in the general elections of
1902.
III. GERMANY
1. POLITICAL PARTIES IN GERMANY
There are a great many "fractions" in German politics. But, following
the Continental custom, they are all grouped into three divisions, the
Left or Radical, Right or Conservative, and the Center. In Germany the
Center is the Catholic or Clerical Party. The leading groups are as
follows:
1. _Conservative._--The "German Conservatives" are the old tories; the
"Free Conservatives" profess, but rarely show, a tendency toward
liberal ideas, although they have, at intervals, opposed ministerial
measures. The Conservatives are for the Government (Regierung) first,
last, and all the time. They were a powerful factor under Bismarck and
docile in his hands. Since his day they have suffered many defeats
because of their reactionary policy. But the group still is the
Kaiser's party, the stronghold of modern medievalism, opposed to
radical reforms, and adhering to "the grace of God" policy of
monarchism. Economically they are _junker_ and "big business." The
anti-Socialist laws were the expression of their ideas as to Socialism
and the way to quench it.
2. _National Liberal._--This party is not liberal, in the sense that
England or America knows liberalism. It is really only a less
conservative party than the extreme Right, although it began as the
brilliant Progressist Party of the early '60's. It was triumphant in
the Prussian Diet until Bismarck shattered it on his war policy. In
the first Reichstag it had 116 members, nearly one-third of the whole.
But Bismarck needed it, got it, and left it quite as conservative as
he wished. It voted for the anti-Socialist laws and for state
insurance.
3. _Progressive_ (_Freisinnige_, literally, "free-minded").--This
faction is a cession from the old Progressist Party of which Lassalle
was a member for a few months. They are Radicals of a very moderate
type, and are opposed to the junker bureaucracy. There are two
wings--the People's Party (_Freisinnige Volkspartei_) and the
Progressive Union (_Freisinnige Vereinigung_). It is a constitutional
party, and has counted in its ranks such eminent scholars as Professor
Virchow and Professor Theodor Mommsen. They are in favor of
ministerial responsibility, are free traders of the Manchester type,
opposed to state intervention and state insurance, but favor factory
inspection, sanitation, and other social legislation. They are in
favor of freedom in religion, trade, and education, and espouse ballot
reform. They have a well-organized party, but do not seem effective
in winning elections. They share, to some degree, with the Social
Democrats the prejudice of the religious folk against free-thinking
and religious latitudinarianism. It is the middle-class party of
protest against bureaucracy.
4. The _Center_, or Catholic Party, is a homogeneous, isolated,
well-disciplined, inflexible group, dominated by loyalty to their
religion. Whenever they have co-operated with the government it has
been in return for favors shown. The ranks of this party were closed
by the _Culturkampf_, which resulted in the expulsion of the Jesuit
orders and the separation of the elementary schools from the Church.
The party is reactionary in politics and economics.
5. _Anti-Semitic._--The name discloses the ideals of a party inspired
by dread and hatred of an element that comprises less than 1.5 per
cent. of the population, and whose political disabilities were not all
removed until 1850 in Prussia and 1869 in Mecklenburg. This party was
formed in 1880, largely through the agitation of the Court Chaplain,
Pastor Stoecker, whose diatribes were peculiarly effective in Berlin,
where some very disgraceful scenes were enacted by members of this
party.
6. _Independent groups_ are formed by the various nationalities that
are under subjection to German dominance. These are the Danish,
Hannoverian, Alsace-Lorraine, and Polish groups. They usually are
grouped with the Center.
7. There are also a number of independent members in the Reichstag.
They adhere loosely to the larger groups, but as a rule merit the name
given them--_Wilden_, "wild ones."
The accompanying table (p. 297) shows the distribution of seats in the
Reichstag, for the past thirty years.
2. SOME MODERN GERMAN ELECTION LAWS
_Analysis of the New Election Law of Saxony_
_A._ One vote--every male 25 years of age.
_B._ Two votes, every male, as follows:
1. Those who have an annual income of over 1,600 marks
($400).
2. Those who hold public office or a permanent private
position with an annual income of over 1,400 marks ($350).
3. Those who are eligible to vote for Landskulturrat
(Agricultural Board) or Gewerbskammer (Chamber of
Commerce) and from their business have an income of over
1,400 marks. (This includes merchants, landowners, and
manufacturers.)
4. Those who are owners or beneficiaries of property in the
kingdom from which they have an income of 1,250 marks
($312.50) a year, and upon which at least 100 tax units
are assessed.
5. Those who own, or are beneficiaries of, land in the
kingdom, to the extent of at least 2 hectares, devoted to
agriculture, or forestry, or horticulture, or more than
one-half hectare devoted to gardening or wine culture.
6. Those who have conducted such professional studies as
entitle them to the one-year volunteer military service.
_C._ The following have three votes:
1. Those who have an income of over 2,200 marks ($550).
2. Those in division B, 2 and 3, who have an income from
office or position of over 1,900 marks ($475).
3. Those who are not in private or public service and have a
professional income of over 1,900 marks. (This includes
lawyers, physicians, artists, engineers, publicists,
authors, professors.)
4. Those in B, 4, whose income is over 1,600 marks ($400).
5. Those in B, 5, with 4 hectares devoted to agriculture,
etc., and 1 hectare to gardening or wine culture.
_D._ The following have four votes:
1. Those who have an income of 2,800 marks ($700).
2. Those in B, 2 and 3, or in C, 3, with an income over 2,500
marks ($625).
3. Those in B, 4, with an annual income of over 2,200 marks
($550).
4. Those in B, 5, with 8 hectares devoted to agriculture or 2
hectares devoted to gardening or wine culture.
_E._ Voters over 50 years old have an extra vote (Alters-stimme),
but no voter is allowed over four votes.
Sachsen-Altenburg, in 1908-9, modified its election laws as follows:
The legislature is composed of 9 representatives elected by the
cities; 12 by the rural districts; 7 by the highest taxpayers; one
each by the Chamber of Commerce, the Board of Agriculture, the Craft
guilds (Handwerks-kammer), and the Labor Council (Arbeiter-kammer).
The vigorous protest of the Social Democrats did not avail against the
passage of this law.
Saxe-Weimar recently modified its election law as follows: All
citizens of communes were given the right to vote. The great feudal
estates (165 persons in 1909) elect 5 representatives to the Diet; the
rest of the highest taxpayers, i.e., those who have a taxable income
of over 3,000 marks, elect 5. The University of Jena elects 1 member,
the Chamber of Commerce 1, the Handwerks-kammer (Craft Guilds) 1,
Landwirthschaftkammer (Agricultural Board) 1, the Arbeitskammer (Labor
Council) 1. There are 38 members in the Diet: the remaining 23 are
elected at large.
3. STATISTICAL TABLES
STATE INSURANCE IN GERMANY
_Industrial Insurance in Germany, 1908._
Sick benefits: Number insured 13,189,599
Men 9,880,541
Women 3,309,058
Income 365,994,000 marks
Outlay 331,049,900 "
Accident Insurance: Number insured 23,674,000
Men 14,795,400
Women 8,878,600
Income 207,550,500 marks
Outlay 157,884,700 "
Old-Age Pensions: Number insured 15,226,000
Men 10,554,000
Women 4,672,000
Income 285,882,000 marks
Outlay 181,476,800 "
From 1885 to 1908 a total of 9,791,376,100 marks ($2,447,844,025) was
paid out in industrial insurance. (Compiled from _Statistisches
Jahrbuch des Deutschen Reiches_.)
LABOR UNIONS IN GERMANY
=================+===================+=============+======================
_Name of Union_ | _Membership_ | _No. of | _Amount in
| | Unions_ | Treasury--Marks_
-----------------+---------+---------+------+------+----------+-----------
| 1908 | 1909 | 1908 | 1909 | 1908 | 1909
+---------+---------+------+------+----------+-----------
Social Democratic|1,831,731|1,892,568|11,024|11,725|40,839,791|43,743,793
Hirsh-Duncker | 105,633| 108,028| 2,095| 2,102| 4,210,413| 4,372,495
Christian | 264,519| 280,061| 3,212| 3,856| 4,513,409| 5,365,338
Patriotic | 16,507| 9,957| 69| 91| 57,786| 24,858
"Yellow" | 47,532| 53,849| 79| 85| 386,305| 437,602
Independent* | 615,873| 654,240| | | 1,357,802| 1,655,325
-----------------+---------+---------+------+------+----------+-----------
* This is a nondescript group of local organizations, containing (1909)
56,183 Poles, as well as the organization of railwaymen, telegraph
operators, postal employees, all in the government service, and
organized as friendly societies rather than as fighting bodies.
Government employees are not supposed to participate in "Unionism."
Compiled from _Statistisches Jahrbuch des Deutschen Reiches_.
TABLE SHOWING VOTE CAST IN REICHSTAG ELECTIONS SINCE THE FOUNDING OF
THE EMPIRE*
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
Election Year | 1871 | 1874 | 1877 | 1878 |
Population of Empire |40,997,000|42,004,000|43,610,000|44,129,000|
Number of voters | 7,656,000| 8,523,000| 8,943,000| 9,128,000|
Number who voted | 3,885,000| 5,190,000| 5,401,000| 5,761,000|
Per cent. of vote cast | 51.0 | 61.2 | 60.6 | 63.3 |
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
Conservative | 549,000| 360,000| 526,000| 749,000|
Imperial Conservative | 346,000| 376,000| 427,000| 786,000|
Anti-Semites | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Other Conservative Groups| ... | ... | ... | ... |
Center | 724,000| 1,446,000| 1,341,000| 1,328,000|
Guelphs | 73,000| 72,000| 86,000| 107,000|
Danes | 21,000| 20,000| 17,000| 16,000|
Poles | 176,000| 209,000| 216,000| 216,000|
Alsatians | ... | 190,000| 149,000| 130,000|
National Liberal | 1,171,000| 1,499,000| 1,470,000| 1,331,000|
Other Liberal groups | 281,000| 98,000| 89,000| 69,000|
Progressist or Radical | 361,000| 469,000| 403,000| 388,000|
People's Party | 50,000| 39,000| 49,000| 69,000|
Social Democrats | 124,000| 352,000| 493,000| 437,000|
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
Election Year | 1881 | 1884 | 1887 | 1890 |
Population of Empire |45,428,000|46,336,000|47,630,000|49,241,000|
Number of voters | 9,090,000| 9,383,000| 9,770,000|10,146,000|
Number who voted | 5,098,000| 5,663,000| 7,541,000| 7,229,000|
Per cent. of vote cast | 56.3 | 60.6 | 77.5 | 71.6 |
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
Conservative | 831,000| 861,000| 1,147,000| 895,000|
Imperial Conservative | 379,000| 388,000| 736,000| 482,000|
Anti-Semites | ... | ... | 12,000| 48,000|
Other Conservative Groups| ... | ... | ... | 66,000|
Center | 1,183,000| 1,282,000| 1,516,000| 1,342,000|
Guelphs | 87,000| 96,000| 113,000| 113,000|
Danes | 14,000| 14,000| 12,000| 14,000|
Poles | 201,000| 203,000| 220,000| 247,000|
Alsatians | 147,000| 166,000| 234,000| 101,000|
National Liberal | 747,000| 997,000| 1,678,000| 1,179,000|
Other Liberal groups | 429,000| ... | ... | ... |
Progressist or Radical | 649,000| 997,000| 973,000| 1,160,000|
People's Party | 108,000| 96,000| 89,000| 148,000|
Social Democrats | 312,000| 550,000| 763,000| 1,427,000|
==========================+==========+==========+==========+==========+
==========================+==========+==========+==========+
Election Year | 1893 | 1898 | 1903 |
Population of Empire |50,757,000|54,406,000|58,629,000|
Number of voters |10,628,000|11,441,000|12,531,000|
Number who voted | 7,674,000| 7,753,000| 9,496,000|
Per cent. of vote cast | 72.2 | 68.1 | 75.8 |
==========================+==========+==========+==========+
Conservative | 1,038,000| 859,000| 935,000|
Imperial Conservative | 438,000| 344,000| 333,000|
Anti-Semites | 264,000| 284,000| 249,000|
Other Conservative Groups| 250,000| 250,000| 230,000|
Center | 1,469,000| 1,455,000| 1,866,000|
Guelphs | 106,000| 109,000| 101,000|
Danes | 14,000| 15,000| 15,000|
Poles | 230,000| 252,000| 354,000|
Alsatians | 115,000| 107,000| 127,000|
National Liberal | 997,000| 984,000| 1,338,000|
Other Liberal groups | 258,000| 235,000| 285,000|
Progressist or Radical | 666,000| 558,000| 538,000|
People's Party | 167,000| 109,000| 92,000|
Social Democrats | 1,787,000| 2,107,000| 3,011,000|
==========================+==========+==========+==========+
==========================+==========+===========
Election Year | 1907 | 1912
Population of Empire |61,983,000|65,407,000
Number of voters |13,353,000|14,442,000
Number who voted |11,304,000|12,207,000
Per cent. of vote cast | 84.7 | 84.5
==========================+==========+===========
Conservative | 1,099,000| 1,126,000
Imperial Conservative | 494,000| 383,000
Anti-Semites | 261,000| ...
Other Conservative Groups| 272,000| 424,000
Center | 2,159,000| 1,991,000
Guelphs | 94,000| 91,000
Danes | 15,000| 17,000
Poles | 458,000| 448,000
Alsatians | 107,000| 157,000
National Liberal | 1,696,000| 1,723,000
Other Liberal groups | 435,000}
Progressist or Radical | 744,000} 1,506,000
People's Party | 139,000}
Social Democrats | 3,259,000| 4,250,000
==========================+==========+===========
* In round numbers. From Kuerschner's _Deutscher Reichstag_, p. 24.
PARTY REPRESENTATION IN THE REICHSTAG
THE YEARS ARE THOSE OF GENERAL ELECTIONS--EXCEPTING 1911
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
_Party or Faction._ | 1881 | 1884 | 1887 | 1890 | 1893 | 1898 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
RIGHT
Conservatives | 50 | 76 | 80 | 72 | 67 | 53 |
German or Imperial | | | | | | |
Conservatives | 27 | 28 | 41 | 20 | 28 | 22 |
"Wild" Conservatives | 1 | 2 | -- | 1 | 5 | 4 |
Anti-Semites | -- | -- | 1 | 5 | 16 | 14 |
League of Landowners | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 5 |
Bavarian Land League | -- | -- | -- | -- | 4 | 5 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
CENTER
Center | 98 | 99 | 98 | 106 | 96 | 102 |
Poles | 18 | 16 | 13 | 16 | 19 | 15 |
Guelphs | 10 | 11 | 4 | 11 | 7 | 9 |
Alsatians | 15 | 15 | 15 | 10 | 8 | 10 |
Danes | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
"Wild" Clericals | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
LEFT
National Liberals | 45 | 51 | 98 | 41 | 53 | 48 |
RADICALS
United Progressives | 47 } | | { 14 | 13 |
(Radicals) | } 64 | 32 | 64 { | |
Other Progressive | } | | { | |
groups (Radicals) | 59 } | | { 23 | 29 |
People's Party | 8 | 7 | -- | 10 | 11 | 8 |
"Wild" Liberals | 3 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 3 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
Social Democrats* | 12 | 24 | 11 | 35 | 44 | 56 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
_Party or Faction._ | 1900 | 1903 | 1906 | 1907 | 1911 | 1912 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
RIGHT |
Conservatives | 51 | 52 | 52 | 58 | 59 | 43 |
German or Imperial | | | | | | |
Conservatives | 20 | 19 | 22 | 22 | 25 | 14 |
"Wild" Conservatives | 7 | 6 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 2 |
Anti-Semites | 13 | 11 | 14 | 20 } 29 | 13 |
League of Landowners | 4 | 3 | 4 | 7 } | |
Bavarian Land League | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | -- | 2 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
CENTER |
Center | 102 | 100 | 100 | 104 | 103 | 90 |
Poles | 14 | 16 | 16 | 20 | 20 | 18 |
Guelphs | 7 | 7 | 7 | 2 | 3 | 5 |
Alsatians | 10 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 7 | 9 |
Danes | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
"Wild" Clericals | 1 | -- | 1 | -- | -- | 1 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
LEFT |
National Liberals | 53 | 50 | 51 | 54 | 51 | 45 |
RADICALS |
United Progressives | 15 | 9 | 10 | 14 } | |
(Radicals) | | | | } | |
Other Progressive | | | | } 49 | 42 |
groups (Radicals) | 28 | 21 | 20 | 28 } | |
People's Party | 7 | 6 | 6 | 7 } | |
"Wild" Liberals | 3 | 2 | -- | 4 | 4 | 2 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
Social Democrats* | 58 | 81 | 79 | 43 | 53 | 110 |
--------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+------+
* They form the extreme Radical Left.
(These groups are those given in Kuerchner's _Deutscher Reichstag_,
p. 398.)
4. PROGRAM OF THE GERMAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY
_Adopted at Erfurt, 1891_
The economic development of bourgeois society leads by natural
necessity to the downfall of the small industry, whose foundation is
formed by the worker's private ownership of his means of production.
It separates the worker from his means of production, and converts him
into a propertyless proletarian, while the means of production become
the monopoly of a relatively small number of capitalists and large
landowners.
Hand-in-hand with this monopolization of the means of production goes
the displacement of the dispersed small industries by colossal great
industries, the development of the tool into the machine, and a
gigantic growth in the productivity of human labor. But all the
advantages of this transformation are monopolized by capitalists and
large landowners. For the proletariat and the declining intermediate
classes--petty bourgoisie and peasants--it means a growing
augmentation of the insecurity of their existence, of misery,
oppression, enslavement, debasement, and exploitation.
Ever greater grows the number of proletarians, ever more enormous the
army of surplus workers, ever sharper the opposition between
exploiters and exploited, ever bitterer the class-war between
bourgeoisie and proletariat, which divides modern society into two
hostile camps, and is the common hall-mark of all industrial
countries.
The gulf between the propertied and the propertyless is further
widened through the crises, founded in the essence of the capitalistic
method of production, which constantly become more comprehensive and
more devastating, which elevate general insecurity to the normal
condition of society, and which prove that the powers of production of
contemporary society have grown beyond measure, and that private
ownership of the means of production has become incompatible with
their application to their objects and their full development.
Private ownership of the means of production, which was formerly the
means of securing to the producer the ownership of his product, has
to-day become the means of expropriating peasants, manual workers, and
small traders, and enabling the non-workers--capitalists and large
landowners--to own the product of the workers. Only the transformation
of capitalistic private ownership of the means of production--the
soil, mines, raw materials, tools, machines, and means of
transport--into social ownership and the transformation of production
of goods for sale into Socialistic production managed for and through
society, can bring it about, that the great industry and the steadily
growing productive capacity of social labor shall for the hitherto
exploited classes be changed from a source of misery and oppression
to a source of the highest welfare and of all-round harmonious
perfection.
This social transformation means the emancipation not only of the
proletariat, but of the whole human race which suffers under the
conditions of to-day. But it can only be the work of the
working-class, because all the other classes, in spite of mutually
conflicting interests, take their stand on the basis of private
ownership of the means of production, and have as their common object
the preservation of the principles of contemporary society.
The battle of the working-class against capitalistic exploitation is
necessarily a political battle. The working-class cannot carry on its
economic battles or develop its economic organization without
political rights. It cannot effect the passing of the means of
production into the ownership of the community without acquiring
political power.
To shape this battle of the working-class into a conscious and united
effort, and to show it its naturally necessary end, is the object of
the Social Democratic Party.
The interests of the working-class are the same in all lands with
capitalistic methods of production. With the expansion of
world-transport and production for the world-market the state of the
workers in any one country becomes constantly more dependent on the
state of the workers in other countries. The emancipation of the
working-class is thus a task in which the workers of all civilized
countries are concerned in a like degree. Conscious of this, the
Social Democratic Party of Germany feels and declares itself _one_
with the class-conscious workers of all other lands.
The Social Democratic Party of Germany fights thus not for new
class-privileges and exceptional rights, but for the abolition of
class-domination and of the classes themselves, and for the equal
rights and equal obligations of all, without distinction of sex and
parentage. Setting out from these views, it combats in contemporary
society not merely the exploitation and oppression of the
wage-workers, but every kind of exploitation and oppression, whether
directed against a class, a party, a sex, or a race.
Setting out from these principles the Social Democratic Party of
Germany demands immediately--
1. Universal equal direct suffrage and franchise, with direct ballot,
for all members of the Empire over twenty years of age, without
distinction of sex, for all elections and acts of voting. Proportional
representation; and until this is introduced, re-division of the
constituencies by law according to the numbers of population. A new
Legislature every two years. Fixing of elections and acts of voting
for a legal holiday. Indemnity for the elected representatives.
Removal of every curtailment of political rights except in case of
tutelage.
2. Direct legislation by the people by means of the initiative and
referendum. Self-determination and self-government of the people in
empire, state, province, and commune. Authorities to be elected by the
people; to be responsible and bound. Taxes to be voted annually.
3. Education of all to be capable of bearing arms. Armed nation
instead of standing army. Decision of war and peace by the
representatives of the people. Settlement of all international
disputes by the method of arbitration.
4. Abolition of all laws which curtail or suppress the free expression
of opinion and the right of association and assembly.
5. Abolition of all laws which are prejudicial to women in their
relations to men in public or private law.
6. Declaration that religion is a private matter. Abolition of all
contributions from public funds to ecclesiastical and religious
objects. Ecclesiastical and religious communities are to be treated as
private associations, which manage their affairs quite independently.
7. Secularization of education. Compulsory attendance of public
primary schools. No charges to be made for instruction, school
requisites, and maintenance, in the public primary schools; nor in the
higher educational institutions for those students, male and female,
who in virtue of their capacities are considered fit for further
training.
8. No charge to be made for the administration of the law, or for
legal assistance. Judgment by popularly elected judges. Appeal in
criminal cases. Indemnification of innocent persons prosecuted,
arrested, or condemned. Abolition of the death-penalty.
9. No charges to be made for medical attendance, including midwifery
and medicine. No charges to be made for death certificates.
10. Graduated taxes on income and property, to meet all public
expenses as far as these are to be covered by taxation. Obligatory
self-assessment. A tax on inheritance, graduated according to the size
of the inheritance and the degree of kinship. Abolition of all
indirect taxes, customs, and other politico-economic measures which
sacrifice the interests of the whole community to the interests of a
favored minority.
For the protection of the working-class the Social Democratic Party of
Germany demands immediately--
1. An effective national and international legislation for the
protection of workmen on the following basis:
(_a_) Fixing of a normal working-day with a maximum of eight hours.
(_b_) Prohibition of industrial work for children under fourteen
years.
(_c_) Prohibition of night-work, except for such branches of industry
as, in accordance with their nature, require night-work, for technical
reasons, or reasons of public welfare.
(_d_) An uninterrupted rest of at least thirty-six hours in every week
for every worker.
(_e_) Prohibition of the truck system.
2. Inspection of all industrial businesses, investigation and
regulation of labor relations in town and country by an Imperial
Department of Labor, district labor departments, and chambers of
labor. Thorough industrial hygiene.
3. Legal equalization of agricultural laborers and domestic servants
with industrial workers; removal of the special regulations affecting
servants.
4. Assurance of the right of combination.
5. Workmen's insurance to be taken over bodily by the Empire; and the
workers to have an influential share in its administration.
6. Separation of the Churches and the State.
(_a_) Suppression of the grant for public worship.
(_b_) Philosophic or religious associations to be civil persons at
law.
7. Revision of sections in the Civil Code concerning marriage and the
paternal authority.
(_a_) Civil equality of the sexes, and of children, whether natural or
legitimate.
(_b_) Revision of the divorce laws, maintaining the husband's
liability to support the wife or the children.
(_c_) Inquiry into paternity to be legalized.
(_d_) Protective measures in favor of children materially or morally
abandoned.
5. COMMUNAL PROGRAM OF THE BAVARIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY
Inasmuch as our communes are hindered in the fulfilment of their
economic and political duties by reactionary laws, we demand:
A.--OF THE STATE:
1. A change of the municipal code, granting genuine local autonomy. A
single representative chamber, a four-year term of office, one-half
retiring every two years. Universal adult suffrage, secret ballot, the
franchise not to be denied to those receiving public aid.
2. Radical tax reform, through the establishing of a uniform,
progressive income and property tax, collected by the communes; local
taxes to be assessed upon increment value; and prohibition of all
taxes upon the necessaries of life.
3. A common-school law providing universal public education free from
all religious bias, compulsory up to fourteen years of age. Obligatory
secondary schools, the inclusion of social and political economy in
their curricula; the defraying of expenses of pupils by the state.
Substitution of professional supervision of schools for clerical
supervision.
4. Enactment of a domiciliary law, in place of the present inadequate
laws, providing for all the necessary sanitary and socio-political
demands. Extending the municipalities' right of condemnation to the
extent that towns may erect houses and schools, open streets, and make
all necessary public improvements demanded by the public welfare.
5. Passage of a sanitary code. Regulation of sanitation in the public
interests. Free medical attendance at births. Public nurseries.
6. The administration of public charities by the local authorities.
B.--OF THE COMMUNE WE DEMAND:
1. Abolishing all taxes upon the rights of citizenship and of
residence. Granting of full franchise rights after one year's
residence.
2. Elections to be held on a holiday or on Sunday.
3. Pensions for communal employees.
4. The cost of local administration to be borne by local property or
from additions to the direct state taxes. Abolishing of all indirect
taxes. Denial of all public aid to the Church.
5. All public services to be conducted by the commune; these to be
considered as public conveniences and necessities, and not to serve a
mere pecuniary interest, but to be run as the public welfare demands.
Rational development of existing water-power, means of communication,
etc.
6. Stipulating, in every contract for municipal work, the wages to be
paid, and other conditions of labor, such arrangements to be made with
the labor organizations; the right to organize into unions not to be
denied to laborers and municipal employees and officers. Abolishing of
strike clause in contracts for public works. Prohibition, of the
sub-contractor system. Securing wages of workmen by bonds. Forbidding
municipal officers participating in any business that will bring them
into contract relations with the municipality.
7. Development of a public school system which shall be non-sectarian
and free to all. Restricting the number of pupils in the classes as
far as practical. Furnishing free meals and clothing to needy school
children; such service not to be counted as public charity.
Establishing continuation schools for both sexes, and schools for
backward children. Establishing of public reading-rooms and free
public libraries.
8. The advancement of public housing plans. The purchasing of large
land areas by the municipality, to prevent speculation in building
lots. Simplification of the procedure in examination of building
plans, and the granting of building permits. Simplifying the
regulations pertaining to the building of cottages and small
residences. Municipal aid in the building of workingmen's homes.
Providing cheaper homes in municipal houses and tenements. Providing
loans of public moneys to building associations and agricultural
associations. Leasing of land by the municipality. Municipal
inspection of dwellings and of all buildings, the municipality to keep
close scrutiny on all real estate developments. Establishment of a
public bureau of homes, where information and aid can be secured, and
where proper statistics can be gathered concerning building
conditions.
9. Providing for cheap and wholesome food through the regulation and
supervision of its importation and inspection.
10. Extension of sanitation. Conducting hospitals according to modern
medical science. Establishing municipal lying-in hospitals. Free
burials.
11. Public care for the poor and orphans. The bettering of the
economic condition of women. The granting of aid out of public funds.
Public inspection and control of all orphanages, hospitals for
children, and nurseries.
12. The establishment of public labor bureaus, which are to act as
employment agencies, information bureaus, gather labor statistics, and
supervise the sociological activities of the municipality.
Providing work for those in need of employment, on the public works of
the commune. Provision for the support of those out of work in
co-operation, with the labor unions' efforts in the same direction.
The extension of municipal factory inspection and labor laws, as far
as the general laws permit. Appointment of laborers as building
inspectors. The development of the industrial and commercial courts.
Sunday as a day of rest.
13. Liberal wages to be paid workmen employed on public works. Fixing
a minimum wage in accordance with the rules of the labor unions;
formation of public loan and credit system; eight-hour day. Insuring
public employees against sickness, accident, and old age. Making
provision for widows and orphans of public employees. Right to
organize not to be denied all municipal employees and officials.
Recognition of the unions. Annual vacation, on full pay, to every
municipal employee and official. Municipal employees to be given their
wages during their attendance on military manoeuvers, and the payment
of the difference between their wages and their sick-benefits in case
of illness.
14. Formation of a union of communes or towns, when isolated
municipalities find themselves impotent in securing these demands.
6. ELECTION ADDRESS (WAHLRUF) OF THE GERMAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATS FOR THE
REICHSTAG ELECTIONS OF 1912
On the 12th of January, 1912, the general election for the Reichstag
takes place. Rarely have the voters been called upon to participate in
a more consequential election. This election will determine whether,
in the succeeding years, the policy of oppression and plundering
shall be carried still farther, or whether the German people shall
finally achieve their rights.
In the Reichstag elections of 1907 the voters were deceived by the
government and the so-called national parties: many millions of voters
allowed themselves to be deluded. The Reichstag of the "National"
_bloc_ from Heydebrand down to Weimar and Nauman has made nugatory the
laws pertaining to the rights of coalition; has restricted the use of
the non-Germanic languages in public meetings; has virtually robbed
the youth of the right of coalition, and has favored every measure for
the increase of the army, navy, and colonial exploitation.
The result of their reactionaryism is an enormous increase of the
burdens of taxation. In spite of the fact that in 1906 over
200,000,000 marks increase was voted, in stamp tax, tobacco tax, etc.,
in spite of the sacred promise of the government, through its official
organ, that no new taxes were being contemplated, the government has,
through its "financial reforms," increased our burden over five
hundred millions.
Liberals and Conservatives were unanimous in declaring that
four-fifths of this enormous sum should be raised through an increase
in indirect taxes, the greater part of which is collected from
laborers, clerks, shopkeepers, artisans, and farmers. Inasmuch as the
parties to the Buelow-_bloc_ could not agree upon the distribution of
the property tax and the excise tax, the _bloc_ was dissolved and a
new coalition appeared--an alliance between the holy ones and the
knights (Block der Ritter und der Heiligen). This new _bloc_ rescued
the distiller from the obligations of an excise tax, defeated the
inheritance tax, which would have fallen upon the wealthy, and placed
upon the shoulders of the working people a tax of hundreds of
millions, which is paid through the consumption of beer, whiskey,
tobacco, cigars, coffee, tea--yea, even of matches. This
Conservative-Clerical _bloc_ further showed its contempt for the
working people in the way it amended the state insurance laws. It
robbed the workingman of his rights and denied to mothers and their
babes necessary protection and adequate care.
In this manner the gullibility of the voters who were responsible for
the Hottentot elections of 1907 was revenged. Since that date every
by-election for the Reichstag, as well as for the provincial
legislatures and municipal councils, has shown remarkable gains in the
Social Democratic vote. The reactionaries were consequently
frightened, and now they resort to the usual election trick of
diverting the attention of the voters from internal affairs to
international conditions, and appeal to them under the guise of
nationalism.
The Morocco incident gave welcome opportunity for this ruse. At home
and abroad the capitalistic war interests and the nationalistic
jingoes stirred the animosities of the peoples. They drove their
dangerous play so far that even the Chancellor found himself forced to
reprimand his _junker_ colleagues for using their patriotism for
partisan purposes. But the attempt to bolster up the interests of the
reactionary parties with our international complications continues in
spite of this.
Voters, be on your guard! Remember that on election day you have in
your hand the power to choose between peace or war.
The outcome of this election is no less important in its bearing upon
internal affairs.
Count Buelow declared, before the election of 1907, "the fewer the
Social Democrats, the greater the social reforms." The opposite is
true. The last few years conclusively demonstrate this. The
socio-political mills have rattled, but they have produced very little
flour.
In order to capture their votes for the "national" candidates, the
state employees and officials were promised an increase in their pay.
To the high-salaried officials the new Reichstag doled out the
increase with spades, to the poorly paid humble employees with spoons.
And this increase in pay was counterbalanced by an increase in taxes
and the rising cost of living.
To the people the government refused to give any aid, in spite of
their repeated requests for some relief against the constantly
increasing prices of the necessities of life. And, while the
Chancellor profoundly maintained that the press exaggerated the actual
conditions of the rise in prices, the so-called saviors of the middle
class--the Center, the Conservatives, the anti-Semites and their
following--rejected every proposal of the Social Democrats for
relieving the situation, and actually laid the blame for the rise in
prices upon their own middle-class tradesmen and manufacturers.
_New taxes, high cost of living, denial of justice, increasing danger
of war_--that is what the Reichstag of 1907, which was ushered in with
such high-sounding "national" tom-toms, has brought you. And the day
of reckoning is at hand. Voters of Germany, elect a different
majority! The stronger you make the Social Democratic representation
in the Reichstag, the firmer you anchor the world's peace and your
country's welfare!
The Social Democracy seeks the conquest of political power, which is
now in the hands of the property classes, and is mis-used by them to
the detriment of the masses. They denounce us as "revolutionists."
Foolish phraseology! The bourgeois-capitalistic society is no more
eternal than have been the earlier forms of the state and preceding
social orders. The present order will be replaced by a higher order,
the Socialistic order, for which the Social Democracy is constantly
striving. Then the solidarity of all peoples will be accomplished and
life will be made more humane for all. The pathway to this new social
order is being paved by our capitalistic development, which contains
all the germs of the New Order within itself.
For us the duty is prescribed to use every means at hand for the
amelioration of existing evils, and to create conditions that will
raise the standard of living of the masses.
Therefore we demand:
1. The democratizing of the state in all of its activities. An open
pathway to opportunity. A chance for every one to develop his
aptitudes. Special privileges to none. The right person in the right
place.
2. Universal, direct, equal, secret ballot for all persons twenty
years of age without distinction of sex, and for all representative
legislative bodies. Referendum for setting aside the present unjust
election district apportionment and its attendant electoral abuses.
3. A parliamentary government. Responsible ministry. Establishment of
a department for the control of foreign affairs. Giving the people's
representatives in the Reichstag the power to declare war or maintain
peace. Consent of the Reichstag to all state appropriations.
4. Organization of the national defense along democratic lines.
Militia service for all able-bodied men. Reducing service in the
standing army to the lowest terms consistent with safety. Training
youth in the use of arms. Abolition of the privilege of one-year
volunteer service. Abolition of all unnecessary expense for uniforms
in army and navy.
5. Abolition of "class-justice" and of administrative injustice.
Reform of the penal code, along lines of modern culture and
jurisprudence. Abolition of all privileges pertaining to the
administration of justice.
6. Security to all workingmen, employees, and officials in their right
to combine, to meet, and to organize.
7. Establishment of a national Department of Labor, officials of this
Department to be elected by the interests represented upon the basis
of universal and equal suffrage. Extension of factory inspection by
the participation of workingmen and workingwomen in the same.
Legalized universal eight-hour day, shortening the hours of labor in
industries that are detrimental to health.
8. Reform of industrial insurance, exemption of farm laborers and
domestic servants from contributing to insurance funds. Direct
election of representatives in the administration of the insurance
funds; enlarging the representation of labor on the board of
directors; increasing the amounts paid workingmen; lowering age for
old-age pensions from 70 to 65 years; aid to expectant mothers; and
free medical attendance.
9. Complete religious freedom. Separation of Church and State, and of
school and Church. No support of any kind, from public funds, for
religious purposes.
10. Universal, free schools as the basis of all education. Free
text-books. Freedom for art and science.
11. Diminution and ultimate abolition of all indirect taxes, and
abolition of all taxes on the necessities of life. Abolition of duties
on foodstuffs. Limiting the restrictions upon the importation of
cattle, fowl, and meat to the necessary sanitary measures. Reduction
in the tariff, especially in those schedules which encourage the
development of syndicates and pools, thereby enabling products of
German manufacture to be sold cheaper abroad than at home.
12. The support of all measures that tend to develop commerce and
trade. Abolition of tax on railway tickets. A stamp tax on bills of
lading.
13. A graduated income, property, and inheritance tax; inasmuch as
this is the most effective way of dampening the ardor of the rich for
a constantly increasing army and navy.
14. Internal improvements and colonization; the transformation of
great estates into communal holdings, thereby making possible a
greater food supply and a corresponding lowering of prices. The
establishment of public farms and agricultural schools. The
reclamation of swamp-lands, moors, and dunes. The cessation of foreign
colonization now done for the purpose of exploiting foreign peoples
for the sake of gain.
Voters of Germany! New naval and military appropriations await you;
these will increase the burdens of your taxes by hundreds of millions.
As on former occasions, so now the ruling class will attempt to roll
these heavy burdens upon the shoulders of the humble, and thereby
increase the burden of existence of the family.
Therefore, let the women, upon whom the burden of the household
primarily rests, and who are to-day without political rights, take
active part in this work of emancipation and join themselves with
determination to our cause, which is also their cause.
Voters of Germany! If you are in accord with these principles, then
give your votes on the 12th of January to the Social Democratic Party.
Help prepare the foundations for a new and better state whose motto
shall be:
Death to Want and Idleness! Work, Bread, and Justice for all!
Let your battle-cry on election day resound: Long live the Social
Democracy!
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC
REPRESENTATION IN THE REICHSTAG.
BERLIN, December 5, 1911.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Personal tax; tax on movables; tax on land; door and window tax.
[2] A license to trade is required for many businesses in France.
IV. BELGIUM
POLITICAL UNIONISM IN BELGIUM
The Catholic Church essayed to organize in Belgium a "Christian
Socialist" movement, patterned after Bishop Kettler's movement in the
Rhine provinces. The movement was called "Federation des Societes
Ouvriers Catholiques" and grew to considerable power. The federation
soon, however, developed democratic tendencies that separated it from
the Clerical Party, and the Abbe Daens, their first deputy in the
Chamber of Representatives, provoked the hostility of the
ecclesiastical authorities and was deprived of his clerical
prerogatives.
The Catholic labor unions, which did not join in this democratic
movement, have in the last few years developed some strength, and have
now about 20,000 members.
The Progressists or Radicals have from the first been favorable to
labor and have in their ranks many workmen from the industries "de
luxe," such as bronze workers, jewelers, art craftsmen, etc.
The Liberals have a trades-union organization which does not flourish.
It has about 2,000 members. The Liberals have, however, together with
the Progressists, some influence over the independent unions, with
their 32,000 members.
The Socialist labor unions are the largest and most powerful. Their
average yearly membership in the years 1885-90 was 40,234; in 1899 it
was 61,451; in 1909 it had increased to 103,451.
STATISTICAL TABLES
TABLE SHOWING THE DEVELOPMENT OF CO-OPERATIVE SOCIETIES IN BELGIUM
=======+===========+============+===========+=========+
| | | | |
| _No. of | _Sales-- | _Profits--| _No. of |
_Year_ | Societies_| Francs_ | Francs_ | Members_|
-------+-----------+------------+-----------+---------+
1904 | 168 | 26,936,873 | 3,140,210 | 103,349 |
1905 | 161 | 28,174,563 | 3,035,941 | 119,581 |
1906 | 162 | 33,569,359 | 3,493,586 | 126,993 |
1907 | 166 | 39,103,673 | 3,843,568 | 134,694 |
1908 | 175 | 40,655,359 | 3,855,444 | 140,730 |
1909 | 199 | 43,288,867 | 4,678,559 | 148,042 |
---------+-----------+------------+-----------+---------+
=======+===========+============+============
| _No. | _Value of | _Paid-up
| of | Realty | Capital
_Year_ | Employees_| Francs_ | Francs_
-------+-----------+------------+------------
1904 | 1785 | 10,302,059 | 1,146,651
1905 | 1752 | 12,091,300 | 1,655,061
1906 | 1809 | 12,844,976 | 1,694,878
1907 | 2093 | 14,280,955 | 1,940,175
1908 | 2128 | 14,837,114 | 1,942,266
1909 | 2223 | 15,850,158 | 1,893,616
---------+-----------+------------+------------
TABLE SHOWING THE GROWTH OF THE WHOLESALE CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT IN
BELGIUM FROM THE DATE OF ITS BEGINNING IN 1901
========+=====================
| _Amount of Business
_Year_ | Done--Francs_
--------+---------------------
1901 | 760,356
1902 | 1,211,439
1903 | 1,485,573
1904 | 1,608,475
1905 | 2,219,842
1906 | 2,416,372
1907 | 2,796,196
1908 | 2,995,615
1909 | 3,221,849
1910 | 4,489,996
--------+---------------------
PROGRAM OF THE BELGIAN LABOR PARTY
_Adopted at Brussels in 1893_
DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES
1. The constituents of wealth in general, and in particular the means
of production, are either natural agencies or the fruit of the
labor--manual and mental--of previous generations besides the present;
consequently they must be considered the common heritage of mankind.
2. The right of individuals or groups to enjoy this heritage can be
based only on social utility, and aimed only at securing for every
human being the greatest possible sum of freedom and well-being.
3. The realization of this ideal is incompatible with the maintenance
of the capitalistic regime, which divides society into two necessarily
antagonistic classes--the one able to enjoy property without working,
the other obliged to relinquish a part of its product to the
possessing class.
4. The workers can only expect their complete emancipation from the
suppression of classes and a radical transformation of existing
society.
This transformation will be in favor, not only of the proletariat, but
of mankind as a whole; nevertheless, as it is contrary to the
immediate interests of the possessing class, the emancipation of the
workers will be essentially the work of the workers themselves.
5. In economic matters their aim must be to secure the free use,
without charge, of all the means of production. This result can only
be attained, in a society where collective labor is more and more
replacing individual labor, by the collective appropriation of natural
agencies and the instruments of labor.
6. The transformation of the capitalistic regime into a collectivist
regime must necessarily be accompanied by correlative transformations--
(_a_) In _morals_, by the development of altruistic feelings and the
practice of solidarity.
(_b_) In _politics_, by the transformation of the State into a
business management (_administration des choses_).
7. Socialism must, therefore, pursue simultaneously the economic,
moral, and political emancipation of the proletariat. Nevertheless,
the economic point of view must be paramount, for the concentration of
capital in the hands of a single class forms the basis of all the
other forms of its domination.
To realize its principles the Labor Party declares--
(1) That it considers itself as the representative, not only of the
working-class, but of all the oppressed, without distinction of
nationality, worship, race, or sex.
(2) That the Socialists of all countries must make common cause (_etre
solidaires_), the emancipation of the workers being not a national,
but an international work.
(3) That in their struggle against the capitalist class the workers
must fight by every means in their power, and particularly by
political action, by the development of free associations, and by the
ceaseless propagation of Socialistic principles.
I.--POLITICAL PROGRAM
1. _Electoral reform._
(_a_) Universal suffrage without distinction of sex for all ranks
(age-limit, twenty-one; residence, six months).
(_b_) Proportional representation.
(_c_) Election expenses to be charged on the public authorities.
(_d_) Payment of elected persons.
(_e_) Elected persons to be bound by pledges, according to law.
(_f_) Electorates to have the right of unseating elected persons.
2. _Decentralization of political power._
(_a_) Suppression of the Senate.
(_b_) Creation of Legislative Councils, representing the different
functions of society (industry, commerce, agriculture, education,
etc.); such Councils to be autonomous, within the limits of their
competence and excepting the veto of Parliament; such Councils to be
federated, for the study and defense of their common interests.
3. _Communal autonomy._
(_a_) Mayors to be appointed by the electorate.
(_b_) Small communes to be fused or federated.
(_c_) Creation of elected committees corresponding to the different
branches of communal administration.
4. _Direct legislation._
Right of popular initiative and referendum in legislative, provincial,
and communal matters.
5. _Reform of education._
(_a_) Primary, all-round, free, secular, compulsory instruction at
the expense of the State. Maintenance of children attending the
schools by the public authorities. Intermediate and higher instruction
to be free, secular, and at the expense of the State.
(_b_) Administration of the schools by the public authorities, under
the control of School Committees elected by universal suffrage of both
sexes, with representatives of the teaching staff and the State.
(_c_) Assimilation of communal teachers to the State's educational
officials.
(_d_) Creation of a Superior Council of Education, elected by the
School Committees, who are to organize the inspection and control of
free schools and of official schools.
(_e_) Organization of trade education, and obligation of all children
to learn manual work.
(_f_) Autonomy of the State Universities, and legal recognition of the
Free Universities. University Extension to be organized at the expense
of the public authorities.
6. _Separation of the Churches and the State._
(_a_) Suppression of the grant for public worship.
(_b_) Philosophic or religious associations to be civil persons at
law.
7. _Revision of Sections in the Civil Code concerning marriage and the
paternal authority._
(_a_) Civil equality of the sexes, and of children, whether natural or
legitimate.
(_b_) Revision of the divorce laws, maintaining the husband's
liability to support the wife or the children.
(_c_) Inquiry into paternity to be legalized.
(_d_) Protective measures in favor of children materially or morally
abandoned.
8. _Extension of liberties._
Suppression of measures restricting any of the liberties.
9. _Judicial reform._
(_a_) Application of the elective principle to all jurisdictions.
Reduction of the number of magistrates.
(_b_) Justice without fees; State-payment of advocates and officials
of the Courts.
(_c_) Magisterial examination in penal cases to be public. Persons
prosecuted to be medically examined. Victims of judicial errors to be
indemnified.