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XIV.
WAGES.
Men are always anxiously on the outlook for something fixed. We
meet sometimes with restless and unquiet spirits who have a craving
for risk and adventure. But, taking mankind in the gross, we may
safely affirm that what they desire is to be tranquil as regards
their future, to know what they have to count upon, and be enabled
to make their arrangements beforehand. To be convinced how precious
fixity is in their eyes, we have only to observe how very anxious
men are to obtain for themselves Government employments. Nor is this
on account of the honour which such places confer, for there are
many of these situations where the work is not of a very elevated
description, consisting in watching and vexing their fellow-citizens,
and prying into their affairs. Such places, however, are not the
less sought after—and why? Because they confer an assured position.
Who has not heard a father speak [p353] thus of his son: “I am
soliciting for him a place as a candidate or supernumerary in such
or such a Government office. It is a pity, no doubt, that so costly
an education is required—an education which might have ensured his
success in a more brilliant career. As a public functionary he will
not get rich, but he is certain to live. He will always have bread.
Four or five years hence he will begin to receive a salary of thirty
pounds a year, which will rise by degrees to a hundred and twenty or
a hundred and sixty. After thirty years’ service he will be entitled
to retire. His livelihood then is secured, and he must learn to live
upon a small income,” etc.
Fixity, then, has for most men an irresistible attraction.
And yet, when we consider the nature of man, and of his occupations,
fixity would seem to be incompatible with them.
Go back in imagination to the origin of human society, and you
will have difficulty in comprehending how men can ever succeed in
obtaining from the community a fixed, assured, and constant quantity
of the means of subsistence. Yet this is one of those phenomena which
strike us less because we have them constantly before our eyes. We
have public functionaries who receive fixed salaries; proprietors
who can count beforehand on their revenues; men of fortune who can
calculate on their dividends; workmen who earn every day the same
wages. Apart from the consideration of money, which is only employed
to facilitate exchanges and estimates of value, we perceive that what
is fixed is the quantity of the means of subsistence, the value of
the satisfactions received by the various classes of workmen. Now, I
maintain that this fixity, which by degrees extends to all men and
all departments of industry, is a miracle of civilisation, and a
marvellous effect of that social state which, in our day, is so madly
decried.
For, let us go back to a primitive social state, and suppose a nation
of hunters, or fishers, or shepherds, or warriors, or agriculturists,
to be told, “In proportion as you advance on the road of progress,
you will know more and more beforehand what amount of enjoyment will
be secured to you for each year,” they would not believe us. They
would reply, “That must always depend on something which eludes
calculation,—the inconstancy of the seasons, etc.” The truth is, they
could form no idea of the ingenious efforts by means of which men
have succeeded in establishing a sort of mutual assurance between all
places and all times.
Now, this mutual assurance against all the risks and chances of the
future is entirely dependent on a branch of human science which
I shall denominate ‹experimental statistics›. This department
[p354] of science, depending as it does upon experience, admits of
indefinite progress, and consequently the fixity of which we have
spoken also admits of indefinite progress. That fixity is favoured
by two circumstances which are permanent in their operation: ‹1st›,
Men desire it. ‹2dly›, They acquire every day greater facilities for
realizing it.
Before showing how this fixity is established in human transactions,
in which it is little thought of, let us first of all see how it
operates in a transaction of which it is the special object. The
reader will, in this way, comprehend what I mean by experimental
statistics.
A number of men have each a house. One of these houses happens to
be burnt down and its owner is ruined. All the rest immediately
take alarm, and each says to himself, “The same thing may happen to
me.” We cannot be surprised, then, that these proprietors should
unite and divide the risk of such accidents as much as possible, by
establishing a mutual assurance against fire. The bargain is very
simple—here is its formula: “If the house of one of us is burnt down,
the rest will club to make good the loss to the man who is burnt out.”
By this means each proprietor acquires a double security; in the
first instance he must take a small share in all losses of this
nature; but then he is assured that he will never himself be obliged
to suffer the whole loss arising from any such misfortune.
In reality, and if we extend the calculation over a great number of
years, we see that the proprietor makes, so to speak, a bargain with
himself. He sets aside a sufficient fund to repair the misfortunes
which may afterwards befall him.
This is ‹association›. Indeed it is to arrangements of this nature
that the Socialists give exclusively the name of ‹association›.
Whenever speculation intervenes, association, as they think,
disappears. It is improved and perfected, as I think, and as we shall
afterwards see.
What has led the proprietors to associate, to enter into this mutual
assurance, is the love of fixity, of security. They prefer known
risks to risks which are unknown, a multitude of small risks to one
great one.
Their design, however, has not yet been completely attained, and
there is still much uncertainty in their position. Each of them
may say, “If accidents are multiplied, my ‹quota› will become
insupportable. In any case, I should like to know beforehand, and
to have insured in the same way my furniture, my merchandise, etc.”
[p355]
It would seem that such inconveniences belong to the nature of
things, and that it is impossible for men to get rid of them. After
each step of progress we are tempted to think that all has been
accomplished. How, indeed, can we elude this ‹uncertainty›, which
depends upon accidents still unknown to us?
But mutual assurance has developed in the social state an
experimental knowledge, namely, the average annual proportion between
the values lost by accident and the values assured.
Having made all the necessary calculations, a company or an
individual says to the proprietors, “In entering into a mutual
assurance, you have wished to purchase freedom from anxiety, and the
indeterminate quota which you reserve annually to cover accidents is
the price which you pay for this immunity. But if you do not know
what this price is beforehand, your tranquillity is never perfect. I
now propose to you, therefore, another expedient. In consideration of
a ‹fixed annual premium› which you shall pay me, I take upon myself
all your chances of accidents. I will insure you all, and here is the
capital which will guarantee the fulfilment of my engagement.”
The proprietors accept the proposal, even although this fixed premium
should amount to somewhat more than the sum which their mutual
assurance cost them; for their object is not so much to save a few
shillings as to obtain perfect repose and freedom from anxiety.
At this point the Socialists pretend that the principle of
association is destroyed. For my part, I think it is improved, and on
the road to other improvements to which I can see no limits.
But, say the Socialists, the assured have no longer any mutual tie.
They no longer see each other and come to a common understanding.
Intermediary parasites have come among them, and the proof that the
proprietors are now paying more than is required to cover accidents
is to be found in the fact, that the insurers obtain large profits.
It is not difficult to answer this objection.
First of all, association exists, but under another form. The premium
contributed by the assured is still the fund which is to make good
the losses. The assured have found the means of remaining in the
association without taking part in its business. This is evidently
an advantage to each of them, seeing that the design they have in
view is nevertheless attained; and the possibility of remaining
in the association whilst they have their [p356] independence of
movement and free use of their faculties restored to them, is just
the characteristic of social progress.
As regards the profit obtained by the intermediate party, it is
easily explained and justified. The assured remain associated for the
purpose of repairing accidents and making good what is lost. But a
company has stepped in which offers them the following advantages:
‹1st›, It takes away whatever of uncertainty remained in the position
of the assured; ‹2dly›, It frees them from all care and trouble in
connexion with accidents. These are ‹services›, and the rule is,
service for service. The proof that the intervention of the company
is a service possessed of value is to be found in the fact that it
is freely accepted and paid for. The Socialists only make themselves
ridiculous when they declaim against such middlemen. Do they intrude
themselves into commercial transactions by force? Have they any other
means of introducing themselves and their services than by saying to
the parties with whom they deal, “I will cost you some trouble, but I
will save you more?” How, then, can they be called parasites or even
intermediaries?
I affirm, moreover, that association thus transformed is on the
direct road of progress in every sense.
In fact, companies which expect to realize profits proportioned to
the extent of their business, promote insurances. To aid them in this
they have agents in all quarters, they establish credits, they devise
a thousand combinations to increase the number of the assured—in
other words, of the ‹associated› parties. They undertake a multitude
of risks which were unknown to the primitive mutual insurance
associations. In short, association is extended progressively to a
greater number of men and things. In proportion as this development
takes place, the companies find they can lower their prices; they are
even forced by competition to do so. And here we again get a glimpse
of the great law, that profit soon escapes from the hands of the
producer to settle in those of the consumer.
Nor is this all: companies insure each other by reassurances, so
that, with a view to providing for losses, which is the principal
object in view, a thousand associations scattered over England,
France, Germany, and America, are melted into one grand and unique
association. And what is the result? If a house is burnt down at
Bordeaux, Paris, or elsewhere, the proprietors of the whole world,
English, Belgians, Germans, Spaniards, club together and repair the
disaster.
This is an example of the degree of power, universality, and
perfection, which may be reached by means of free and voluntary
[p357] association. But to attain this they must be left free to
manage their own business. Now, what happened when the Socialists,
those great partisans of association, were in power? Their chief
business was to threaten association in every form, and principally
association for insurance. And why? Just because, in order to render
itself more universal, it adopted those expedients which left each of
its members in a state of independence. How little these unfortunate
Socialists understand the social mechanism! They would bring us
back to the rude and primitive forms which association assumed when
society was in its infancy, and they would suppress all progress
under the pretext that it has departed from these forms.
We shall see, by-and-by, that from the same prejudices, the same
ignorance, arise their incessant declamations against ‹interest›. The
‹interest› and ‹wages› are ‹fixed›, and, consequently, improved forms
of remuneration for the use of labour and capital.
The wages-system [‹salariat›] has been peculiarly the butt of the
Socialists. They have almost gone the length of representing it as a
modified, and not greatly modified, system of slavery and thraldom.
At all events, they see in it only a bargain which is one-sided and
leonine, founded on liberty merely in appearance, an oppression of
the weak by the strong, or the tyranny of capital over labour.
Continually wrangling about new institutions to be founded, the
Socialists display in their common hatred of existing institutions,
and especially of the system of remuneration by wages, a striking
unanimity. If they cannot attain unity as to the new social
organization to be established, they are at least marvellously united
in calumniating, decrying, running down, hating, and making hated,
everything which actually exists. I have assigned the reason for this
elsewhere.[76]
Much unfortunately takes place which is beyond the domain of
philosophical discussion; and the Socialist propaganda, seconded by
an ignorant and cowardly press, which, without avowing Socialism,
seeks for popularity in fashionable declamations, has succeeded in
instilling hatred of the wages-system into the minds of the very
people who live by wages. Workmen have become disgusted with this
form of remuneration. It appears to them unjust, humiliating, and
odious. They think it brands them with the mark of servitude. They
desire to participate on another principle in the distribution of
wealth. Hence they have fallen passionately in love with the most
extravagant Utopias. They had but one [p358] step to take, and
they have taken it. When the revolution of February broke out,
the grand object of the working classes was to get rid of wages.
Upon the means of accomplishing this they consulted their oracles;
but when these oracles did not remain mute, they followed the
usual mode by giving obscure utterances, in which the word which
predominated was ‹association›, as if ‹association› and ‹wages›
were incompatible. Then the workmen would try all the forms of this
liberty-giving association; and, to impart to it greater attraction,
they were pleased to invest it with all the charms of Solidarity,
and attributed to it all the merits of Fraternity. For the moment,
one would have been led to believe that the human heart itself had
been about to undergo a grand transformation, and to throw off the
yoke of self-interest, in order to give place to the principle of
sympathy. By a singular contradiction, they hoped from association to
reap at once all the glory of self-sacrifice, and material profits
of hitherto unheard-of amount. They fell down before the statue of
Fortune, prayed, and decreed to themselves the glory of martyrdom. It
seemed as if these workmen, thus misled, and on the point of being
seduced into a career of injustice, felt it necessary to shut their
eyes to their true position, to glorify the methods of spoliation
which had been taught them by their apostles, and place them covered
with a veil in the sanctuary of a new revelation. Never, perhaps,
had so many and such dangerous errors, so many and such gross
contradictions, found their way before into the human brain.
Let us inquire, then, what wages really are, and consider their
origin, form, and effects. Let us trace the subject to its
foundation, and make sure whether, in the development of humanity,
wages constitute retrogression or progress—whether in receiving wages
there be anything humiliating or degrading, or which can in any
degree be allied with slavery.
Services are exchanged for services, labour, efforts, pains, cares,
natural or acquired ability,—these are what we give and receive.
What we confer on one another is satisfaction or enjoyment. What
determines the exchange is the common advantage, and its measure
is the free appreciation of reciprocal services. The various
combinations to which human transactions give rise have necessitated
a voluminous economic vocabulary; but the words, Profits, Interest,
Wages, although indicating shades of difference, do not change the
nature and foundation of things. We have still the ‹do ut des›, or
rather the ‹facio ut facias›, which constitutes the basis of the
whole economic evolution.[77] [p359]
The class which lives by wages forms no exception to this law.
Examine the subject attentively. Do these men render services?
Unquestionably they do. Are services rendered to them? Undoubtedly
they are. Are these services exchanged freely and voluntarily? Do
we perceive in this kind of transaction any appearance of fraud or
violence? It is at this point, perhaps, that the grievances of the
workman begin. They don’t go the length of pretending that they
are deprived of their liberty, but they assert that this liberty
is merely nominal and a mockery, because the man whose necessities
force the determination is not really free. It remains for us to
inquire, then, whether the defect of liberty thus understood does not
belong to the situation of the workman rather than to the mode of his
remuneration.
When one man enters into the service of another, his remuneration may
consist in a part of the work produced, or in a determinate wage. In
either case he must bargain for this part of the product—for it may
be greater or less,—or for this wage—for it may be higher or lower.
If the man is in a state of absolute destitution, if he cannot wait,
if he acts on the spur of urgent necessity, he must submit, and
cannot get rid of the other’s exactions. But you will observe that it
is not the form of remuneration which gives rise to this dependence.
Whether he runs the risk of the enterprise by stipulating for a share
of the product, or bargains for a fixed remuneration whether the
other gain or lose, it is his precarious situation which gives him an
inferior position in the discussion which precedes the arrangement.
Those innovators who have represented association to the working
classes as an infallible remedy have misled them, and are themselves
mistaken. They can convince themselves of this by observing
attentively the circumstances in cases where the indigent workman
receives part of the product in place of wages. There are assuredly
no men in the country worse off than fishermen or vine-dressers,
although they have the satisfaction of enjoying all the benefits
which the Socialists denominate, exclusively, ‹association›.
But before proceeding to inquire into the circumstances which
influence the quota of wages, I must define, or rather describe, the
nature of the transaction.
Men have a tendency—which is natural, and, therefore, advantageous,
moral, universal, indestructible—to desire security with reference to
the means of subsistence, to seek fixity, and avoid uncertainty.
However, in the early stages of society uncertainty reigns supreme,
and it has frequently astonished me that Political [p360] Economy
has failed to mark the great and happy efforts which have been made
to restrain this uncertainty within narrower and narrower limits.
Take the case of a tribe of hunters, or a nomad people, or a colony
newly founded,—is there a single man who can say with certainty what
to-morrow’s labour will be worth? Would there not even seem to be an
incompatibility between the two ideas, and that nothing can be of a
more causal nature than the result of labour, whether applied to the
chase, to fishing, or to agriculture?
It will be difficult, then, to find, in an infant society, anything
which resembles stipends, salaries, wages, revenues, rents, interest,
assurance, etc., which are all things which have been invented in
order to give more and more fixity to personal situations, to get
quit, to a greater and greater degree, of that feeling so painful to
men of uncertainty with reference to the means of subsistence.
The progress which has been made in this direction is indeed
admirable, although custom has so familiarized us with this
phenomenon that we fail to attend to it. In fact, since the results
of labour, and consequently the enjoyments of mankind, may be so
profoundly modified by events, by unforeseen circumstances, by the
caprices of nature, the uncertainty of the seasons, and accidents of
every kind, we may ask how it comes to pass that so great a number of
men find themselves set free for a time, and some of them for life,
by means of rents, salaries, and retiring pensions, from this species
of ‹eventuality›, of uncertainty, which would seem to be essentially
part of our nature.
The efficient cause, the motive power of this beautiful evolution of
the human race, is the tendency of all men towards competency and
material prosperity, of which Fixity is so essential a part. The
means consist in the substitution of a fixed unconditional bargain
for one dependent merely on appreciable chances, or the gradual
abandonment of that primitive form of association which consists in
committing all the parties concerned irrevocably to all the risks
and chances of the enterprise; in other words, the improvement of
association. It is singular, at least, that all our great modern
reformers exhibit association to us as destroyed by the very element
which improves and perfects it.
In order that men should consent to take upon themselves,
unconditionally, risks which fall naturally on others, it is
necessary that a species of knowledge, which I have called
‹experimental statistics›, should have made some progress; for
experience alone can place them in a situation to appreciate these
risks, at least [p361] approximately, and consequently to appreciate
the ‹value of the service› rendered in securing them against such
risks. This is the reason why the bargains and transactions of rude
and ignorant nations admit no stipulations of this nature, and hence,
as I have said, uncertainty exercises over such people uncontrolled
power. Were a savage, grown old, and having laid up some stock of
game, to take a young hunter into his service, he would not give him
fixed wages, but a share in the produce of the chase. How, indeed,
could either of them, from the known infer the unknown? The teachings
of past experience do not permit them to insure the future beforehand.
In times of barbarism and inexperience, men, no doubt, ‹associate›,
for we have demonstrated that otherwise they could not exist; but
association can assume among them only that primitive and elementary
form which the Socialists represent as the only one which can secure
our future safety.
When two men have long worked on together, encountering equal risks,
there at length comes a time when, from experience, they can estimate
and appreciate the value of these risks, and one of them consents to
take the entire risk upon his own shoulders, in consideration of a
fixed recompense.
This arrangement is undoubtedly a step of progress, and it is shown
to be so by the very fact that it has been effected freely and
voluntarily by the two parties, who would not have entered into it
had it not been felt to be for their mutual benefit. It is easy to
see in what the benefit consists. The one party gains by obtaining
the exclusive management of an undertaking of which he takes all the
risks upon himself; the other by obtaining that fixity of position
which is so much desired. And society at large must be benefited by
having an enterprise, formerly subjected to two minds and two wills,
henceforth conducted with unity of views and unity of action.
But although association is modified in this way, it by no means
follows that it is dissolved. The co-operation of the two men is
continued, although the mode of dividing the product of their
enterprise has been changed. Association is not vitiated by an
innovation voluntarily agreed to, and which satisfies all parties.
The co-operation of anterior labour and present labour is always, or
almost always, required in order to realize new means of satisfaction
and enjoyment. Capital and labour, in uniting in a common
undertaking, are, in the first instance, forced to undertake each its
share of the risk; and this continues until the value of the risk can
be experimentally estimated. Then two tendencies, which are [p362]
alike natural to the human heart, manifest themselves—I mean the
tendencies towards ‹unity of direction› and ‹fixity of situation›.
Capital then says to labour: “Experience has taught us that your
eventual profit amounts, on an average, to so much. If you wish it, I
will ensure you this amount, and take charge of the operation, taking
upon myself the chances of profit or loss.”
Labour may possibly answer: “This proposal suits me very well.
Sometimes I earned twenty pounds a year; sometimes I earn sixty.
These fluctuations are very inconvenient, for they hinder me from
regulating uniformly my own expenditure and that of my family. It is
an advantage to me to get rid of this uncertainty, and to receive a
fixed recompense of forty pounds.”
By this arrangement the terms of the contract will be changed. They
will continue to ‹unite their efforts›, and to ‹share the proceeds›,
and consequently the association will not be dissolved; but it will
be modified in this way, that the capitalist will take all the risks
with the compensation of all the extraordinary profits, whilst the
labourer will be secured the advantages of fixity. Such is the origin
of Wages.
The agreement may take place in the reverse way. Frequently the
person who undertakes a commercial enterprise says to the capitalist:
“Hitherto we have worked together, sharing the risks. Now that we are
in a situation to appreciate these risks, I propose to make a fixed
bargain. You have invested a thousand pounds in the undertaking,
for which one year you receive twenty-five pounds, another year
seventy-five. If you agree to it, I will give you fifty pounds, or 5
per cent. per annum, and free you from all risk, on condition that I
have henceforth the entire management of the concern.”
The capitalist will probably answer: “Since, with great and
troublesome fluctuations, I receive, on an average, only fifty pounds
per annum, I should much prefer to have that sum regularly assured to
me. I shall, therefore, allow my capital to remain in the concern,
but I am to be exempted from all risk. My activity and intelligence
will now be free to engage in some other undertaking.”
This is an advantage in a social, as well as an individual point of
view.
We see that men are constantly in quest of a fixed and stable
position, and that there is an incessant effort to diminish and
circumscribe on all sides the element of uncertainty. Where two
men participate in a common risk, this risk, having a substantive
existence, cannot be annihilated; but the tendency is for one of
[p363] them to take that risk upon himself. If the capitalist
undertakes the risk, the labourer’s remuneration is fixed under the
name of ‹wages›. If the labourer runs the chances of profit or loss,
then the remuneration of the capitalist is fixed under the name of
‹interest›.
And as capital is nothing else than human services, we may say that
‹capital› and ‹labour› are two words which in reality express one
and the same idea; and, consequently, the same thing may be said of
‹interest› and ‹wages›. Thus, where false science never fails to find
antagonism, true science ever finds identity.
Considered, then, with reference to their origin, nature, and form,
‹wages› have in them nothing degrading or humiliating any more
than ‹interest› has. Both constitute the return for present and
anterior labour derived from the results of a common enterprise.
Only it almost always happens that one of the two associates agrees
to take upon himself the risk. If it be the present labour which
claims a uniform remuneration, the chances of profit are given up in
consideration of wages. If it be the anterior labour which claims a
fixed return, the capitalist gives up his eventual chance of profits
for a determinate rate of ‹interest›.
For my own part, I am convinced that this new stipulation which is
ingrafted on the primitive form of association, far from destroying
it, improves and perfects it. I have no doubt of this, when I
consider that such a stipulation takes its rise from a felt want,
from the natural desire of all men for stability; and, moreover, that
it satisfies all parties, without injury, but, on the contrary, by
serving the interests of the public.
Modern reformers, who, under pretence of having invented association,
desire to bring it back to its primitive and rudimentary forms, ought
to tell us in what respect these ‹fixed bargains› are opposed to
justice or equity, in what respect they are prejudicial to progress,
and on what principle they wish to interdict them. They ought also to
tell us why, if such stipulations bear the stamp of barbarism, they
are constantly and more and more mixed up with that association which
is represented as the perfection of human society.
In my opinion, such stipulations are among the most marvellous
manifestations, as they are among the most powerful springs, of
progress. They are at once the perfection and reward of a past and
very ancient civilisation, and the starting-point of a new and
unlimited career of future civilisation. Had society adhered to
that primitive form of association which saddles all the parties
interested with a share of the risks of an enterprise, ninety-nine
[p364] out of every hundred of such enterprises never would have
been undertaken. The man who at the present day participates in a
score of enterprises would have been tied down for ever to one. Unity
of design and of will would have been wanting in all commercial
operations; and mankind would never have tasted that precious good
which is perhaps the source of genius—stability.
The ‹wages-system› [‹salariat›], then, takes its rise in a natural
and indestructible tendency. Observe, however, that it satisfies
men’s desires but imperfectly. It renders the remuneration of workmen
more uniform, more equal, and brings it nearer to an average; but
there is one thing which it cannot do, and which their admission to a
participation in profits and risks could not accomplish, namely, to
ensure them employment.
And here I cannot help remarking how powerful the feeling is to which
I have made reference throughout the whole of this chapter, and the
very existence of which our modern reformers do not seem even to
suspect,—I mean men’s aversion to uncertainty. It is exactly this
very feeling which has made it so easy for Socialist declaimers to
create such a hatred on the part of the working classes to receive
their remuneration in the shape of wages.
We can conceive three phases in the condition of the labourer: the
predominance of uncertainty; the predominance of stability; and an
intermediate state, from which uncertainty is partly excluded, but
not sufficiently so to give place to fixity and stability.
What the working classes do not sufficiently understand is, that the
association which the Socialists preach up to them is the infancy
of society, the period when men are groping their way, the time of
quick transitions and fluctuations, of alternations of plethora
and atrophy—in a word, the period when absolute uncertainty reigns
supreme. The wages-system, on the contrary, forms the intermediate
link between uncertainty and fixity.
Now, the working classes, being far as yet from feeling themselves in
a state of stability, place their hopes—like all men ill at ease—on
a certain change of position. This is the reason why it has been an
easy task for Socialism to impose upon them by the use of the grand
term ‹association›. The working classes fancy themselves pushed
forward when they are in reality falling behind.
Yes, these unfortunate people are falling back to the primitive and
rudimentary stage of the social movement; for what is the association
now so loudly preached up to them but the subjection of all to all
risks and contingencies? This is inevitable in times of ignorance,
since fixed bargains presuppose some progress at [p365] least in
experimental statistics. But the doctrine now inculcated is nothing
else than a pure and simple revival of the reign of uncertainty.
The workmen who were enthusiasts for association when they knew it
only in theory, were enchanted when the revolution of February seemed
to render possible its practical adoption.
At that period many employers of labour, either infected with the
universal infatuation, or giving way to their fears, offered to
substitute a participation in the returns for payment by wages.
But the workmen did not much fancy this solidarity of risk. They
understood very well what was offered them; for in case the
enterprise turned out a losing concern, they would have had no
remuneration of any kind,—which to them was death.
We saw then what would not have been to the credit of our working
classes, had the blame not lain with the pretended reformers, in
whom, unhappily, they placed confidence. The working classes demanded
a sort of bastard association in which the rate of wages was to be
maintained, and in which they were to be entitled to a share of the
profits without being subject to any of the losses.
The workmen would probably never of themselves have thought of
putting forward such pretensions. There is in human nature a fund of
good sense and a feeling of justice to which such barefaced iniquity
is repugnant. To corrupt man’s heart, you must begin by depraving his
intellect.
This is what the leaders of the Socialist school did not fail to do;
and with this fact before us I am frequently asked whether their
intentions were not perverse. I am always inclined to respect men’s
motives; but it is exceedingly difficult, under such circumstances,
to exculpate the Socialist chiefs.
After having, by the unjust and persevering declamations with which
their books are filled, irritated the working classes against their
employers, after having persuaded them that they were in a state of
war, in which everything is fair against the enemy, they enveloped
the ultimatum of the workmen in scientific subtleties, and even in
clouds of mysticism. They figured an abstract being called Society,
which owed to each of its members a ‹minimum›, that is to say,
an assured means of subsistence. “You have, then, a right,” they
told the workmen, “to demand a fixed wage.” In this way they began
by satisfying the natural desire of men for stability. Then they
proceeded to teach them that, independently of wages, the workmen
should have a share in the profits; and when asked whether he was
also to bear his share of the losses, [p366] their answer was, that
in virtue of State intervention and the guarantee of the taxpayer,
they had invented a system of universal industry, protected from all
loss. By this means they removed all the remaining scruples of the
unfortunate workmen; and when the revolution of February broke out we
saw them, as I have said, disposed to make three stipulations:—
‹1st›, Continuance of wages;
‹2d›, Participation in profits;
‹3d›, Immunity from losses.
It may be said, perhaps, that these stipulations were neither so
unjust nor so impossible as they appeared, seeing that they are
introduced in many enterprises, having reference to newspapers,
railways, etc.
I answer that there is something truly puerile in allowing oneself
to be duped by high-sounding names applied to very trivial things.
A little candour will at once convince us that this participation
in profits, which some concerns allow to their workmen receiving
wages, does not constitute association, nor merit that title, nor is
it a great revolution introduced into the relations of two classes
of society. It is only an ingenious and useful encouragement given
to workmen receiving wages, under a form which is not exactly new,
although it has been represented as an adhesion to Socialism.
Employers who, in adopting this custom, devote a tenth, a twentieth,
or a hundredth part of their profits, when they have any, to this
‹largesse› bestowed on their workmen, may make a great noise about
it, and proclaim themselves the generous renovators of the social
order; but it is really unworthy of occupying more of our time at
present, and I return to my argument.
The system of payment by wages, then, was a step of progress. In the
first instance, anterior labour and present labour were associated
together with common risks, in common enterprises, the circle of
which, in such circumstances, must have been very limited. If society
had not discovered other combinations, no important work could ever
have been undertaken. Men would have remained hunters and fishers,
and there might have been perhaps some rude attempts at agriculture.
Afterwards, in obedience to the double feeling which prompts us to
seek stability, and, at the same time, retain the direction of those
operations of which we must encounter the risks, the two associates,
without putting an end to the association, seek to supersede the
joint hazard by a fixed bargain, and agree that one of them should
give the other a fixed remuneration, and take [p367] upon himself
the whole risk, along with the exclusive direction of the enterprise.
When this fixity applies to the anterior labour, or capital, it is
called ‹interest›; when it applies to the present labour, it is
called ‹wages›.
But, as I have already said, wages serve only imperfectly to
constitute a state of stability for a certain class of men, or of
security in regard to the means of subsistence. It is one step, and
a very marked one, towards the realization of this benefit, and so
difficult that at first sight we should have thought it impossible;
but it does not effect its entire realization.
And it is perhaps worthy of remark in passing, that fixity of
situation, stability, resembles in one respect all the great results
of which mankind are in pursuit. We are always approximating to such
results, but we never fully attain them. For the very reason that
stability is a good, a benefit, we must always be making efforts more
and more to extend its domain; but it is not in our nature ever to
obtain complete possession of it. We may even go the length of saying
that to obtain such possession would not be desirable for man in his
present state. Absolute good of whatever kind would put an end to all
desire, all effort, all combination, all thought, all foresight, all
virtue. Perfection excludes the notion of perfectibility.
The working classes having then, with the lapse of time and the
progress of civilisation, reached the improved system of payment by
wages, have not stopped short at that point, or relaxed their efforts
to realize stability.
No doubt wages come in with certainty at the conclusion of the
day’s work; but when circumstances—as, for example, an industrial
crisis, or a protracted illness—have interrupted work, the wages are
interrupted also. What, then, is the workman to do? Are he and his
wife and children to be deprived of food?
He has but one resource, and that is, to save, while employed, the
means of supplying his wants in sickness and old age.
But, in the individual case, who can estimate beforehand the
comparative length of time in which he has to assist, or be assisted?
What cannot be done in the individual case may be found more
practicable with reference to the masses in virtue of ‹the law of
averages›. The tribute paid by the workman while employed to provide
for his support in periods of stoppage answers the purpose much
more effectually, and with much more irregularity and certainty,
when it is centralized by association, than when it is abandoned to
individual chances. [p368]
Hence the origin of ‹Friendly Societies›—admirable institutions which
benevolence had given birth to long before the name of Socialism
was ever heard of. It would be difficult to say who was their
inventor. The true inventor, I believe, was the felt want of some
such institutions—the desire of men for something fixed, the restless
active instinct which leads us to remove the obstacles which mankind
encounter in their progress towards stability.
I have myself seen friendly societies rise up spontaneously, more
than five-and-twenty years ago, among the most destitute labourers
and artisans of the poorest villages in the department of the Landes.
The obvious design of these societies is to equalize enjoyments, and
to spread and distribute over all periods of life the wages earned in
days of health and prosperity. In all localities in which they exist,
these societies have conferred immense benefits. The contributors
are sustained by a feeling of security, a feeling the most precious
and consolatory which can enter the heart of man in his pilgrimage
here below. Moreover, they feel their reciprocal dependence and their
usefulness to each other. They see at what point the prosperity or
adversity of each individual, or of each profession, becomes the
prosperity or adversity of all.
They meet together on certain occasions for religious worship,
as provided by their rules; and then they are called to exercise
over each other that vigilant surveillance so proper to inspire
self-respect, which is the first and most difficult step in the march
of civilisation.
What has hitherto ensured the success of these societies,—a success
which has been slow, indeed, like everything which concerns the
masses,—is liberty: of this there can be no doubt.
The natural danger which they encounter is the removal of the sense
of responsibility. It is never without creating great dangers and
great difficulties for the future, that we set an individual free
from the consequences of his own acts.[78]
Were all our citizens to say, “We will club together to assist
those who cannot work, or who cannot find employment,” we should
fear to see developed to a dangerous extent man’s natural tendency
to idleness; we should fear that the laborious would soon become
the dupes of the slothful. Mutual assistance, then, implies mutual
surveillance, without which the common fund would soon be exhausted.
This reciprocal surveillance is for such association a necessary
guarantee of existence—a security for each contributor that he shall
not be made to play the part of dupe; [p369] and it constitutes
besides the true morality of the institution. By this means we see
drunkenness and debauchery gradually disappear; for what right
could that man have to assistance from the common fund who has
brought disease and want of employment upon himself by his own
vicious habits? It is this surveillance which re-establishes that
responsibility which the association might otherwise tend to enfeeble.
Now, in order that this surveillance should operate beneficially,
friendly societies must be free and select, and have the control of
their own rules, as well as of their own funds. It is necessary also
that they should be able to suit their rules to the requirements of
each locality.
Suppose Government to interfere, it is easy to see the part which
it would play. Its first business would be to lay hold of all these
funds, under the pretence of centralizing them; and to give a colour
to the proceeding, it would promise to enlarge the funds from
resources taken from the taxpayer. “Is it not,” it would be said,
“very natural and very just that the State should contribute to so
great, so generous, so philanthropic, so humane a work?” This is the
first injustice—to introduce the element of force into the society,
and, along with the contributions, to obtrude citizens who have no
right to a share of the fund. And then, under pretence of unity, of
solidarity, the State would set itself to fuse all these associations
into one, subject to the same rules.
But, I would ask, what will become of the morality of the institution
when its funds are augmented by taxation; when no one except a
Government official has an interest to defend the common stock; when
every one, instead of feeling it his duty to prevent abuses, will
take pleasure in favouring them; when all mutual surveillance has
ceased; and when to feign disease would only be to play off a good
trick on the Government? The Government, to do it justice, is well
disposed to defend itself; but being no longer able to avail itself
of private action, it must necessarily substitute official action. It
will name examiners, controllers, inspectors. Countless formalities
will be interposed between want and assistance. In short, what was
originally an admirable institution will be transformed into a mere
department of police.
The State will, in the first instance, perceive only the advantage
of swelling the mob of its creatures, of multiplying the places at
its disposal, and of extending its patronage and electioneering
influence. It will not remark that in arrogating to itself a new
function, it has assumed a new responsibility,—a responsibility
[p370] which I venture to designate as fearful. For what must the
immediate consequence be? The working classes will no longer regard
the common fund as a property which they administer and keep up, and
the limits of which are the limits of their rights. They will soon
accustom themselves to regard assistance in cases of sickness or
want of employment, not as proceeding from a limited fund prepared
by their own foresight, but as a debt due to them by society. Its
resources will appear to them unbounded, and they will never be
contented with their share. The State will find itself under the
necessity of demanding constant additions to the budget. Encountering
opposition in that, the Government will find itself involved in
inextricable difficulties. Abuses will go on increasing, which, year
after year, they will shrink from reforming, until an explosion
comes at last. And then it will be found that we have to deal with
a population which can no longer act for itself, which expects
everything from a minister or a prefect, even subsistence, and whose
ideas are so far perverted as to have lost all rational notions of
Right, Property, Liberty, or Justice.
Such are some of the reasons which alarmed me, I confess, when I saw
lately that a Commission of the Legislative Assembly had been charged
to prepare a project of law on friendly societies. It struck me that
the hour of their destruction was approaching, and it afflicted me
the more that I had thought a great future was in store for them,
could we only preserve them in the bracing air of liberty. Is it
then, I would ask, so very difficult a thing to leave men to make
a trial, to feel their way, to make a choice, to find themselves
mistaken, to rectify their mistakes, to inform themselves, to act in
concert, to manage their own property and their own interests, to act
for themselves on their own proper risk and peril, and on their own
responsibility? Is it not evident that this is the way to make them
really men? Shall we never cease to begin with the fatal hypothesis
that all governors are guardians, and the governed only children?
I maintain that, left to the vigilance of the parties interested, our
Friendly Societies have before them a great future, and I require no
other proof of this than what has taken place on the other side of
the Channel.
“In England, individual foresight has not waited for Government
impulse to organize a powerful and reciprocal association between
the working classes. For a long period, ‹free› associations,
administering their own affairs, have been founded in all the
principal towns of Great Britain,” etc. . . . . [p371]
“The total number of these associations for the United
Kingdom amounts to 33,223, including not less than 3,052,000
individuals—one-half of the adult population of Great
Britain.” . . . .
“This great confederation of the working classes, this institution of
effective and practical fraternity, rests on the most solid basis.
Their revenue is five millions sterling, and their accumulated
capital amounts to eleven millions and two hundred thousand pounds.”
“It is upon this fund that the contributors draw when out of
employment. We are astonished to see how England rallies from the
immense and profound perturbations which her gigantic industry
experiences from time to time, and almost periodically—and the
explanation of the phenomenon is to a great extent to be found in the
facts now stated.”
“Mr Roebuck wished, on account of the great importance of the
question, that the Government ‹would assume the initiative› by taking
the question into its own hands. . . . This was opposed by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer.”
“Where individual interests are sufficient for their own free
government, power, in England, judges it useless to interpose its
action. It watches from above to see that all goes on regularly;
but it leaves to every man the merit of his exertions, and the care
of administering his affairs, according to his own notions and
convenience. It is to this independence of her citizens that England
assuredly owes a portion of her greatness as a nation.”[79]
It might have been added that it is to that independence also that
the citizens owe their experience and personal worth. To that
independence, too, the English Government owes its relative freedom
from responsibility, and consequently its stability.
Among the institutions which may take their rise from Friendly
Societies, when they shall have made that advance which has scarcely
yet been begun, I should give the first place, on account of their
social importance, to the labourer’s ‹Caisse de Retraite›.[80]
There are persons who treat such an institution as a chimera. Such
people, no doubt, pretend to be acquainted with the extreme limits
as regards Stability, beyond which the human race is not permitted
to go. I would ask them a few simple questions: If they had never
known anything beyond the social state of those barbarous tribes who
live by hunting and fishing, would they have been able to anticipate
the existence, I do not say of our present [p372] land revenues,
of Government funds, and fixed salaries, but even of the system of
payment by wages, which is the first step towards fixity in the
condition of the poorest classes? And then, if they had never seen
anything beyond this wages-system, as it exists in countries which
have not yet displayed the spirit of association, would they have
ventured to predict the destinies reserved for ‹Friendly Societies›
as we find them at work in our own day in England? Do they imagine
that these first steps of progress were more easy than it is for us
to establish ‹Caisses de Retraite›? Is this third step more difficult
to take than the other two?
For myself, I see clearly that mankind thirsts after stability. I see
them, century after century, adding to their incomplete conquests,
for the benefit of one class or another, and this by marvellous
processes, which would seem to be much above individual invention,
and I confess that I dare not venture to predict at what point men
will stop short on the road of progress.
One thing is certain, that these ‹Caisses de Retraite› are
universally, unanimously, ardently desired by all our workmen; and
very naturally so.
I have frequently interrogated them, and I have always found that
the great pain and grief of their existence is not the severity of
their work, nor the smallness of their wages, nor even the irritation
which the spectacle of inequality is calculated to excite. No, what
affects them, discourages them, pains them, tortures them, is their
uncertainty as regards the future. Whatever profession we may belong
to, whether we are public functionaries, or men of independent
fortune, or landed proprietors, or merchants, physicians, lawyers,
soldiers, magistrates, we enjoy without perceiving it, consequently
without acknowledging it, the progress which has been realized by
Society—so that we cannot comprehend the torture of uncertainty.
Let us place ourselves, then, in the situation of a workman, of an
artisan who, on getting up every morning, is haunted by such thoughts
as these: “I am young and robust; I work on, and sometimes harder
than my neighbours, and have less leisure than they. And yet I have
difficulty in providing for the modest wants of myself and of my
wife and children. But what will become of me, what will become
of them, when old age or disease shall have palsied my arm? To
provide for those days of helplessness by saving from my wages would
require self-control and prudence almost superhuman. Yet in spite of
sickness, I have the prospect of enjoying happiness by means of a
Friendly Society. Old age, however, is not an eventuality; it will
come inevitably and without fail. Every day I feel its approach;
it will soon [p373] overtake me; and then, after a life of honest
labour, what prospect have I before me? For myself the garret, the
hospital, or the jail; fur my wife, beggary; for my daughter, worse
still. Oh, for some social institution which would compel me even by
force, while still young, to secure a provision for old age!”
Such are the thoughts, feebly as I have expressed them, which every
day, and every night, and every hour, haunt the terror-stricken
imaginations of vast numbers of our fellow-men. And when a problem
presents itself under such conditions, you may be very sure that it
is not insoluble.
If in their efforts to impart more stability to their future, the
working classes have disseminated alarm among the other classes of
society, it has arisen from their having given to these efforts a
false, dangerous, and unjust direction. Their first idea, according
to French custom, has been to attack the treasury; to found the
‹Caisses de Retraite› on the contributions of the taxpayer, and to
bring into play the State and the Law, that is to say, to secure all
the profits of spoliation without incurring the dangers, or bearing
the shame of it.
It is not from this quarter of the social horizon that the
institutions so much desired by the working classes may be expected
to come. The ‹Caisse de Retraite›, in order that its origin may be
in keeping with its end and design, and to ensure its being useful,
solid, and respectable, must proceed from the working classes
themselves, must be the fruit of their exertions, their energy, their
sagacity, their experience, their foresight. It must be supported by
their contributions, and fed and nourished by their sacrifices. All
they have to ask from Government is liberty of action and repression
of fraud.
But has the time come when a ‹Caisse de Retraite› for the working
classes is possible? I think it has. In order that an institution
which brings new stability to the interests of a class should be
established, a certain amount of anterior progress is necessary. It
is necessary that a certain stage of civilisation should have been
reached by the Society in the midst of which such an institution
is to be established, a healthful atmosphere must be prepared for
it. If I am not mistaken, it is to friendly societies, with the
material resources which they create, and the spirit of association,
the experience, the foresight, and the sense of dignity which they
infuse into the working classes, that we are to owe the establishment
of those kindred institutions which provide for the old age of the
workman.
For if you observe what is going on in England, you will be [p374]
satisfied that all such things are bound up together and depend upon
each other, and that one step of progress, in order to be attainable,
must be preceded by another step of progress.
In England all the adults to whom it is an object to join benefit
societies have done so of their own accord; and that is a point of
very great importance, seeing that operations of this kind require to
be conducted on a great scale, and according to the law of averages.
These societies are possessed of large accumulated capitals, and
have, besides, considerable annual revenues.
We cannot help thinking that, with the advance of civilisation, the
prodigious sums which these societies now require to pay to their
members will become proportionally smaller and smaller.
Good health is one of the benefits which civilisation develops. The
healing art makes progress; machinery performs the harder and more
painful part of labour; longevity increases. All these causes tend to
lessen the calls on such associations.
A still more decisive and infallible symptom is the disappearance of
great commercial crises in England. Such convulsions have had their
origin sometimes in sudden manias with which the English are now
and then seized for enterprises which are more than hazardous, and
which entail a great loss of capital; sometimes they arise from great
fluctuations in the price of food, the consequence of restrictive
laws, for it is evident that when the price of bread and butcher’s
meat is very high, all the resources of the people are absorbed in
the purchase of necessaries, and other branches of trade languish,
and a stoppage of manufactures is the inevitable result.
The first of these causes is now disappearing under the teachings of
experience and public discussion; and we can already foresee that
the English nation, which in former days threw itself into American
loans, Mexican mines, and railway schemes with such sheep-like
credulity, will now be much less a dupe than others to Californian
illusions.
What shall I say of Free Trade, the triumph of which is due to Mr
Cobden, not to Sir Robert Peel;—for the apostle would always have
called forth a statesman, but the statesman could not have dispensed
with the apostle. Here, then, we have a new power ushered into the
world, which I hope will go far to do away with commercial stoppages
and convulsions. Restriction has the admitted tendency and effect of
placing many of the manufactures of the country, and, consequently,
part of its population, in a precarious situation. As those piled-up
waves which a transient force keeps for a moment above the level of
the sea have a [p375] constant tendency to descend, so factitious
industries, surrounded on every side by victorious competition, have
a constant tendency to collapse. A modification in a single article
of a single home or foreign tariff may bring ruin to them; and then
comes a crisis. The variations in the price of a commodity, moreover,
are much greater when you limit the field of competition. Surround
a department, or a district, with custom-houses, and you render the
fluctuation of prices much more marked. Liberty acts on the principle
of insurance. In different countries, and in successive years, it
compensates bad harvests by good ones. It sustains prices thus
brought back to the average. It is a levelling and equalizing force.
It contributes to stability, and it combats instability which is the
great source of convulsions and stoppages. There is no exaggeration
in asserting that the first fruit of Mr Cobden’s work will be to
lessen many of those dangers which gave rise, in England, to friendly
societies.
Mr Cobden has undertaken another task which will have a not less
beneficial influence on the stability of the labourer’s lot, and
I doubt not he will succeed in it; for good service in the cause
of truth is always triumphant. I refer to his efforts for the
suppression of war, or, what is the same thing, for the infusion of
the spirit of peace into that public opinion by which the question
of peace or war comes always to be decided. War constitutes always
the greatest disturbing force to which a nation can be subjected in
its industry, in its commerce, in the disposal of its capital, even
in its tastes. Consequently, it is a powerful cause of derangement
and uneasiness to those classes who have difficulty in changing their
employment. The more, of course, this disturbing force is lessened,
the less onerous will the burdens be which fall upon benefit
societies.
On the other hand, by dint of progress, by the mere lapse of time,
the resources of these societies will be extended; and a day will
come when they can undertake something more decisive—with a view to
lessen the instability which is inherent in human affairs. These
societies might then be transformed into ‹Caisses de Retraite›, or
institutions for old age, and this will undoubtedly happen, since it
is the ardent and universal desire of the working classes that it
should be so.
And it is worthy of remark, that while material circumstances
thus pave the way for such a transformation, moral circumstances
arising from the influence of these very societies tend in the same
direction. These societies develop among the working classes habits,
qualities, and virtues, the possession and diffusion of which [p376]
are in this respect an essential preliminary. When we examine the
matter closely, we must be convinced that the creation of such
societies presupposes a very advanced stage of civilisation. They
are at once its effect and its reward. They could, in fact, have no
existence if men had not been previously in the habit of meeting, of
acting in concert, and of managing in common their own affairs; they
could not exist if men were prone to vices which induce premature old
age; nor could they exist were the working classes brought to think
that everything is fair as against the public, and that a common fund
is the object at which every one intent on fraud may legitimately
take aim.
In order that the establishment of ‹Caisses de Retraite› should not
give rise to discord and misunderstanding, the working classes should
be made to feel that they must depend upon nobody but themselves;
that the common fund must be voluntarily created by those who are
to have the benefit of it; and that it is supremely unjust and
anti-social to call for co-operation from other classes, who are to
have no share in the advantage, and who can only be made to concur by
means of the tax-gatherer, that is to say, by means of force. Now,
we have not yet got that length—so far from it that the frequent
appeals to the State show us but too plainly what are the hopes and
pretensions of the working classes. They think that their benefit
society should be fed and alimented by State subventions like that
for public functionaries. And thus it is that one abuse always gives
rise to another.