THE AIMS AND POLICY OF THE SOCIALISTS
Those people who formerly called themselves Communists now call
themselves Socialists. Marx and Engels wrote in their celebrated
"Manifesto": "The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the
single sentence: Abolition of private property."[279] The policy of
modern British Socialism may be summed up in the identical words.
Indeed, we are told by one of its most eager champions that "The
programme of Socialism consists essentially of one demand--that the
land and other instruments of production shall be the common property
of the people, and shall be used and governed by the people for the
people."[280] "We suggest that the nation should own all the ships,
all the railways, all the factories, all the buildings, all the land,
and all the requisites of national life and defence."[281]
According to the Socialist doctrines which have been given in Chapter
IV, private property is the enemy of the workers. Therefore they quite
logically demand that all private property must be abolished. "The
problem has to be faced. Either we must submit for ever to hand over
at least one-third of our annual product to those who do us the favour
to own our country without the obligation of rendering any service to
the community, and to see this tribute augment with every advance in
our industry and numbers, or else we must take steps, as
considerately as may be possible, to put an end to this state of
things."[282] "The modern form of private property is simply a legal
claim to take a share of the produce of the national industry year by
year without working for it. Socialism involves discontinuance of the
payment of these incomes and addition of the wealth so saved to
incomes derived from labour. The economic problem of Socialism is thus
solved."[283]
A general division of the existing private property among all the
people is not intended, because it is considered to be impracticable.
"Socialism does not consist in violently seizing upon the property of
the rich and sharing it out amongst the poor."[284] "Plans for a
national 'dividing up' are not Socialism. They are nonsense. 'Dividing
up' means individual ownership. Socialism means collective
ownership."[285] "It is obvious that, in the present stage of economic
development, individual ownership is impossible. All the great means
of production are collectively owned now. Individual liberty based
upon individual property is therefore out of the question, and the
emancipation of the working class can only be achieved in social
freedom, based upon social property, through the transformation of
privately owned collective property into publicly owned collective
property."[286]
Starting from these premisses, the Socialists arrive at the demand
that "all the means of production and distribution, all the machinery,
all the buildings, everything that is necessary to provide the
fundamental necessaries of life, must be common property."[287] "We
want all the instruments for the purposes of trade to be the property
of the State. With that will have come at the same time the abolition
of power permitting any individual to exact rent or interest for the
loan of land or of the implements of production. The abolition of all
private property will mean the extinction of the parasite."[288] "The
overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of a system of society
based upon the common ownership and democratic control of the means
and instruments for producing and distributing wealth, by and in the
interest of the whole community: That is Socialism."[289] "The Fabian
Society aims at the reorganisation of society by the emancipation of
land and industrial capital from individual and class ownership, and
the vesting of them in the community for the general benefit. The
Society accordingly works for the extinction of private property in
land, and of the consequent individual appropriation, in the form of
rent, of the price paid for permission to use the earth, as well as
for the advantages of superior soils and sites. The Society, further,
works for the transfer to the community of the administration of such
industrial capital as can conveniently be managed socially."[290]
"Here in plain words is the principle, or root idea, on which all
Socialists agree--that the country and everything in the country shall
belong to the whole people (the nation), and shall be used by the
people and for the people. That principle, the root idea of Socialism,
means two things: (1) That the land, and all the machines, tools, and
buildings used in making needful things, together with all the canals,
rivers, roads, railways, ships, and trains used in moving, sharing
(distributing) needful things, and all the shops, markets, scales,
weights, and money used in selling or dividing needful things, shall
be the property of (belong to) the whole people (the nation). (2) That
the land, tools, machines, trains, rivers, shops, scales, money, and
all the other things belonging to the people, shall be worked,
managed, divided, and used by the whole people, in such way as the
greater number of the whole people shall deem best."[291]
A perusal of the party programmes and other Socialist documents
contained in the Appendix will show that the abolition of all private
property, and its transference to the State, is the aim of all the
Socialist organisations and parties, and no further extracts need be
given in order to prove the unanimity of the Socialists on this point.
The question now arises: How is this transference of all private
property to the State to be effected? Will the present holders of
property be fully compensated, partly compensated, or not compensated
at all? Do the Socialists aim at purchase or at confiscation of
existing private property. Will they respect existing rights, or are
they bent upon open or more or less disguised spoliation?
It is, unfortunately, very difficult to obtain a plain and
straightforward answer upon this important point. Instead of giving
this answer, British Socialists loudly protest that it is not their
aim to destroy or abolish property. As nobody has suspected the
Socialists to be foolish enough to abolish or destroy property--which
means the instruments of production, such as factories, machines,
railways, &c., by the use of which the people live, and thus bring
starvation upon themselves--their eagerness to explain that they do
not intend to abolish or destroy property can only be explained by the
surmise that they hope shallow simpletons will say, "The Socialists
have no intention to take our capital away from us by force and
without compensation, for they have declared that they do not intend
to abolish property." A few of these declarations should here be
given: "So far from abolishing property, Socialism desires to
establish it upon the only basis which makes property secure--that of
service, of creative service."[292] "Socialism does not propose to
abolish land or capital. Only a genius could have thought of this as
an objection to Socialism."[293] "Socialism is far from aiming at the
destruction of private property. Its object is to increase private
property amongst those whose property is so limited that they have a
difficulty in keeping themselves alive."[294] Another Socialist makes
the very irrelevant and unnecessary observation: "It is a firm
principle of Socialism never to interfere with personal property in
order to investigate its origin or to arrange it in a different way.
Never and nowhere! And whoever asserts to the contrary either does not
know the principles of Socialism or willingly and knowingly asserts an
untruth. The Socialists deem an investigation into the origin of an
acknowledged personal property an unnecessary trouble. They consider
the personal property an accomplished fact and respect it: so much so,
that they consider stealing a crime."[295] Mr. Blatchford informs us,
"We do not propose to seize anything. We do propose to get some things
and to make them the property of the whole nation by Act of Parliament
or by purchase."[296]
As regards the question whether compensation or no compensation will be
given, our Socialist leaders give us very vague and unsatisfactory
replies, which rather contain highly respectable but perfectly
irrelevant commonplaces than definite proposals. Most Socialists will
answer the plain question of confiscation or no confiscation with a
quibble or a conundrum, as the following examples will show: "One view
of Socialism is that it is a scheme of confiscation of property from
one class to give it to another class--that Socialists are Dick Turpins
made respectable by using Acts of Parliament instead of pistols. Now
the real fact is that the Socialist has come to put an end to Dick
Turpin methods. Socialism is a rational criticism of our present
methods of production and distribution. It desires to say to the
possessors: Show us by what title you possess; and it proposes to pass
its judgments upon the axiom that whoever renders service to society
should be able to have some appropriate share in the national
wealth."[297] In other words, an inquisitorial tribunal with arbitrary
powers would be empowered to confiscate at will. "Socialism is not a
plan to despoil the rich: it is a plan to stop the rich from despoiling
the poor. Socialism is not a thief; it is a policeman."[298] "Do any
say we attack private property? We deny it. We attack only that private
property for a few thousand loiterers and slave-drivers which renders
all property in the fruits of their own labour impossible for millions.
We challenge that private property which renders poverty at once a
necessity and a crime."[299] "Socialism would not rob anyone. It would
distinguish between the lawful possessor and the rightful possessor,
and it would compel the 'lawful' possessor to restore to the rightful
possessor the property of which he had robbed him."[300] "We do not
propose to rob the rich man of his wealth; we deny that it is his
wealth. Wealth is a social product, and therefore belongs to society.
It is not an act of brigandage to demand that society shall own and use
what society has created."[301]
Some Socialists consider the question of compensation or no
compensation as one of very minor importance. "The question of
compensation need not greatly worry us. Socialists hold that
plutocrats owe all their wealth to society; and therefore that society
has the right at any moment to take it back."[302] The more cautious
and moderate French and German Socialists are apt to promise
compensation in terms such as the following: "We declare expressly
that it is the duty of the State to give to those whose interests will
be damaged by the necessary abolition of laws which are detrimental to
the common interest compensation as far as it is possible and
consistent with the interests of all."[303]
It will be observed that the plain word compensation is circumscribed
by the phrase, "compensation as far as it is possible and consistent
with the interests of all." In other and plainer words, compensation
is to be arbitrarily given, and its proportion to the property
acquired is apparently to be determined not by its value or by
fairness and equity, but by the will of those who may be in power.
English Socialists, on the other hand, are apt to recommend a far more
drastic treatment of property-owners. "We claim that land in country
and land in towns, mines, parks, mountains, moors, should be owned by
the people for the people, to be held, used, built over, and
cultivated upon such terms as the people themselves see fit to ordain.
The handful of marauders who now hold possession have, and can have,
no right save brute force against the tens of millions whom they
wrong."[304] The most moderate school of British Socialism, the Fabian
Society, favours in its statement of policy given under the heading
"Basis of the Fabian Society" the expropriation of all private
capital "without compensation, though not without such relief to
expropriated individuals as may seem fit to the community." In other
words, expropriated property-owners may, or may not, be given
something to protect them from starvation, not as a matter of right,
but of charity.
Most Socialists who favour compensation recommend that it should be
given only in the form of consumable articles such as food, clothes,
&c., or in bonds which are changeable only into consumable articles.
"Rothschild will be paid in bread and meat and luxury and wine and
theatre tickets."[305] "When capitalistic property shall have been
socialised, the holders of compensation deeds will not be able to
purchase either fresh means of production or producers; they will only
be able to buy products."[306]
Some Socialists suggest that the bonds given in exchange for property
acquired by the State might be cancelled later on. The property-owners
could be deprived of their possessions without any difficulty, either
gradually by taxation or at one blow by confiscation at the option of
the men in power. "When the entire capitalistic property takes the
form of State bonds, the property which it is impossible to ascertain
to-day would then be known to everybody. It would only be necessary to
decree that all bonds are to be registered in the name of the owner,
and it would be possible to estimate exactly the capitalist income and
the property of everyone. It would then also be possible to screw up
the taxes to any extent without fear of their being evaded by any
concealments. It would then be also impossible to escape them by
emigration, since it is the public institutions of the country, and in
the first place the State, from which all interest comes, and the
latter can deduct the tax from the interest before it is paid out.
Under these circumstances it would be possible to raise the
progressive income and property tax as high as necessary--if necessary
as high as would come very near, if not actually amount to,
confiscation of the large property."[307] The foregoing is a simple
plan of swindling property-owners out of their holdings.
Some of the more moderate Socialists argue: "There is much to be said
in favour of the liberal treatment of the present generation of
proprietors and even of their children. But against the permanent
welfare of the community the unborn have no rights."[308] On the other
hand, Bax, the philosopher of British Socialism, quite logically and
honestly states that the idea of compensation has no room in the
Socialist code of ethics, that the bourgeois idea of compensation on
grounds of justice is irreconcilable with the Socialist conception of
justice. He says: "Between possession and confiscation is a great gulf
fixed, the gulf between the bourgeois and the Socialist worlds.
Well-meaning men seek to throw bridges over this gulf by schemes of
compensation, abolition of inheritance, and the like. But the
attempts, as we believe, even should they ever be carried out
practically, must fall disastrously short of their mark and be
speedily engulfed between the two positions they are intended to
unite. Nowhere can the phrase 'He that is not for us is against us' be
more aptly applied than to the moral standpoint of modern
individualism and of modern Socialism. To the one, individual
possession is right and justice, and social confiscation is wrong and
injustice; to the other, individual possession is wrong and injustice,
and confiscation is right and justice. This is the real issue. Unless
a man accept the last-named standpoint unreservedly, he has no right
to call himself a Socialist. If he does accept it, he will seek the
shortest and most direct road to the attainment of justice rather than
any longer and more indirect ones, of which it is at best doubtful
whether they will attain the end at all. For be it remembered the
moment you tamper with the sacredness of private property, no matter
how mildly, you surrender the conventional bourgeois principle of
justice, while the moment you talk of compensation you surrender the
Socialist principle of justice, for compensation can only be real if
it is adequate, and can only be adequate if it counterbalances, and
thereby annuls, the confiscation. It is just, says the individualist,
for a man to be able to do what he likes with his own. Good; but what
is his own?"[309] "The great act of confiscation will be the seal of
the new era; then and not till then will the knell of civilisation,
with its rights of property and its class society, be sounded; then,
and not till then, will justice--the justice not of civilisation but
of Socialism--become the corner-stone of the social arch."[310]
I think the straightforwardness of Bax is preferable to the crooked
and insincere explanations and proposals of the British and foreign
Socialist given in the foregoing. Bax's opinion is irrefutable.
According to the doctrines of Socialism given in Chapter IV., labour
is the source of all wealth; the greater part of the products of that
labour is dishonestly abstracted from the labourer by the capitalist
class, which has converted the result of that labour into property.
Hence Socialists think with Proudhon, and they very often openly
declare, that property is theft. Capitalist society will not
compensate the thief when taking from him his booty. Socialism will
not compensate property-owners when taking away their property.
Besides, compensation would be utterly opposed to the root idea of
Socialist justice. At present expropriation without indemnity is
called theft, but it would not be called theft under a Socialist
_regime_. The chapter on "Law and Justice under Socialism" will make
that quite clear.
Socialism teaches that no man is entitled to anything except that
which he has made himself. "No man has a right to call anything his
own but that which he himself has made. Now, no man makes the land.
The land is not created by labour, but it is the gift of God to all.
The earth belongs to the people. For the nonce please take the
statement on the authority of Herbert Spencer, All men 'have equal
rights to the use of the earth.' So that he who possesses land
possesses that to which he has no right, and he who invests his
savings in land becomes a purchaser of stolen property."[311] "No man
made the land, and laws and lawyers notwithstanding no man has any
moral right before God to call a solitary strip of God's earth his
than has the burglar to call his stolen goods his personal property.
It is therefore evident that the bite named 'rent' given to landlords
for permission to live upon and use God's free gift to man is as much
the fruit of robbery, the spoil of plunder, as is the result of a
burglar's night's marauding, a common pickpocket's day's
'takings.'"[312] Capital is in the same position as land, for "Land
and capital are indistinguishable."[313]
The more honest Socialists agree with Bax that compensation for
property acquired would be inadvisable and impracticable. "In a
pamphlet called 'Collectivism and Revolution' M. Jules Guesde said,
'Expropriation with indemnity is a chimera. And whatever regret one
may feel, however difficult may appear to peaceful natures the last
method, we have no other way than to retake violently that which
belongs to all, by--let us say the word--the Revolution.' He added,
'Capital which it is necessary to take from individuals, such as the
land, is not of human creation; it is anterior to man, for whom it is
a _sine qua non_ of existence. It cannot therefore belong to some to
the exclusion of others, without the others being robbed. And to make
the robbers deliver up, to oblige them to restore in any and every way
is not so much a right as a duty, the most sacred of duties."[314] A
respected English Socialist says bluntly, "How to secure the swag to
the workers is the problem."[315] A Christian Socialist clergyman
sarcastically proposes: "If you are a Christian and love your rich
neighbour as yourself, you will do all you can to help him to become
poorer. For if you believe in the Gospel, you know that to be rich is
the very worst thing that can happen to a man. That if a man is rich,
it is with the greatest difficulty that he can be saved; for 'it is
easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich
man to enter into the Kingdom of God' (Mark x. 25). This is startling
now, but it was not less strange and startling to the disciples who
'were astonished out of measure, saying among themselves, Who then can
be saved?' But the needle's eye has not grown any larger since then,
and the camels certainly have not grown smaller! All true Christians
then must desire to relieve the rich man of his excess for his own
sake, since the inequality that ruins the body of Lazarus ruins the
soul of Dives; and Dives is the more miserable of the two, because the
soul is more precious than the body."[316]
The abolition of private property requires also the abolition of the
right of inheritance, as otherwise capital might again be accumulated
in the hands of the thrifty and the enterprising. Therefore the
manifesto of Marx and Engels already demands the "abolition of all
right of inheritance."[317] Other Socialists say that this right
should not be abolished. "Socialists used to insist upon the abolition
of the right of inheritance and bequest. But if what I gain by my own
labour is rightfully my property--and the Co-operative Commonwealth
will, as we have seen, declare it to be so--it will be inexpedient in
that Commonwealth to destroy any of the essential qualities of
propertyship; and I can hardly call that my property which I may not
give to whom I please at my death. No man in a Co-operative
Commonwealth could acquire so much more wealth than his fellows as to
make him dangerous to them."[318] "Socialists do not object to
property; they are not opposed to private property. They are therefore
not opposed to inheritance. The right to acquire and hold involves the
right to dispose by will or by gift. We only object to such a use of
property as enables classes for generation after generation to live on
the proceeds of other people's labour without doing any useful service
to society."[319] This very diplomatic sentence may be explained in a
variety of ways. Probably it means that holders of property of large
size could summarily be deprived of their possessions by order of the
Government, as has been indicated by that writer in another passage
(see page 97). Such a power would make the right to hold and to
bequeath property a farce. Property could be held then only on the
same terms on which, I believe, it is held by Central African negroes.
Another Socialist states, "If I am entitled to what I produce, then it
follows that I am entitled to dispose of all that I produce;" and then
denies the right to personal property by continuing: "The Socialists
say, 'Not thine or mine, but ours.'"[320]
It would be only logical that the Socialist State, after abolishing
private property by following the principle "not thine but ours,"
should not allow its re-creation and re-accumulation. "This pernicious
right (wrong) of inheritance must be abolished. It is the means by
which the 'classes' perpetuate their robbery of the 'masses' from
generation to generation and age to age. The disinherited would of
course have the community to look to for sound education in youth,
suitable employment in years of maturity, generous pension in old age,
&c., and to what else can any rational human being lay just
claim?"[321] Some Socialists argue that in the Socialist State "there
will be nothing to bequeath, unless we choose to regard household
furniture as a legacy of any importance. This settles the question of
the right of inheritance, which Socialism will have no need to abolish
formally."[322] "Socialism condemns as reactionary and immoral all
that tends to the debasement of humanity. It condemns our industrial
and commercial system as a degrading system--degrading both to the few
who amass wealth and to the many who by their labour enable the few to
lay up riches. It is degrading to those who rob and to those who are
robbed; to those who cheat and to those who are cheated; to those who
swim and to those who sink; to those who revel in luxury and to those
who, barely sustaining their own lives, are compelled by their toil to
supply luxuries for others to enjoy."[323] Therefore Socialism means
to abolish the present system root and branch, and the most
straightforward Socialists are frankly in favour of the most thorough
measures for abolishing private property.
Children and poets proverbially speak the truth. Let us see what the
Socialist poets think of the expropriation of property-owners.
Some of the poets tell the workers that the labourers not only produce
all the wealth, but are also all-powerful, and, if they wish to, they
can do what they like with the country.
Shall you complain who feed the world--
Who clothe the world, who house the world?
Shall you complain who are the world
Of what the world may do?
As from this hour you use your power,
The world must follow you.
As from this hour you use your power.
The world must follow you.[324]
Others remind them of their grievances, and urge them to drive the
rich man out of the country:
Think on the wrongs ye bear,
Think on the rags ye wear,
Think on the insults endured from your birth;
Toiling in snow and rain,
Bearing up heaps of gain,
All for the tyrants who grind ye to earth.
Your brains are as keen as the brains of your masters.
In swiftness and strength ye surpass them by far,
Ye've brave hearts that teach ye to laugh at disasters,
Ye vastly outnumber your tyrants in war.
Why, then, like cowards stand.
Using not brain or hand,
Thankful, like dogs, when they throw ye a bone?
What right have they to take
Things that ye toil to make?
Know ye not, boobies, that all is your own?[325]
Arise, unite each scattered band,
To sweep all masters from our land,
Then shall each mine and loom and field
Its produce to the workers yield.[326]
Others, again, urge the workers to seize all property and to make the
rich man work for them.
They're never done extolling
The nobility of work;
But the knaves! they always take good care
Their share of toil to shirk.
Do they send their sons and daughters,
To the workshop or the mill?
Oh! we'll turn things upside down, my lads;
It will change their tune, it will![327]
We'll drive the robbers from our lands, our meadows and our hills;
We'll drive them from our warehouses, our workshops and our mills;
We'll make them fare upon their bonds, their bankbooks and their bills,
As we go marching to liberty.[328]
Some Socialists believe that they will come to power suddenly and by
violence, and abolish private capital at a stroke. Others are inclined
to think that they will only gradually abolish it. Karl Marx was of
the latter opinion. Therefore he wrote in his "Manifesto": "The first
step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the
proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of
democracy. The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest,
by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all
instruments of production in the hands of the State--_i.e._ of the
proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total
of productive forces as rapidly as possible. Of course in the
beginning this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads
on the rights of property and on the conditions of bourgeois
production: by means of measures therefore which appear economically
insufficient and untenable, but which in the course of the movement
outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social
order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the
mode of production. These measures will of course be different in
different countries. Nevertheless in the most advanced countries the
following will be pretty generally applicable:
1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land
to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income-tax.
3. Abolition of all right of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the State by means of a
national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the
hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the
State; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the
improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to labour. Establishment of industrial
armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual
abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more
equable distribution of the population over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of
children's factory labour in its present form. Combination of
education with industrial production, &c."[329]
Marx's programme has served as a model to the English Socialists, as
the following demands of some of our Socialists will show: "The
things you will be working for will be something like this. Shorter
hours is the first thing, then a tax on landlords, then abolition of
the House of Lords and the Monarchy, then more Home-Rule and more
Local Government, then extension of municipal operations, the
socialisation of coal stores, dairy farms, bakeries, laundries,
public-houses, cab-hiring, the slaughter of cattle and the sale of
butcher meat, the building and letting of houses--in short, the taking
over by the local bodies of as many departments of production and
distribution as need be. By this time the Class War will be shaping
for a last great engagement."[330]
"As stepping stones to a happier period we urge for immediate
adoption: The compulsory construction of healthy artisans' and
agricultural labourers' dwellings in proportion to the population,
such dwellings to be let at rents to cover the cost of construction
and maintenance alone. Free compulsory education for all classes,
together with the provision of at least one wholesome meal a day in
each school. Eight hours or less to be the normal working day in all
trades. Cumulative taxation upon all incomes above a fixed minimum not
exceeding _500l._ a year. State appropriation of railways with or
without compensation. The establishment of national banks which shall
absorb all private institutions that derive a profit from operations
in money or credit. Rapid extinction of the National Debt.
Nationalisation of the land and organisation of agricultural and
industrial armies under State control on co-operative principles. By
these measures a healthy, independent, and thoroughly educated people
will steadily grow up around us, ready to abandon that baneful
competition for starvation wages which ruins our present workers,
ready to organise the labour of each for the benefit of all,
determined, too, to take control finally of the entire social and
political machinery of a State in which class distinctions and class
privileges shall cease to be."[331]
The Social-Democratic Federation demands the following immediate
reforms: "The socialisation of the means of production, distribution,
and exchange to be controlled by a democratic State in the interests
of the entire community, and the complete emancipation of labour from
the domination of capitalism and landlordism with the establishment of
social and economic equality between the sexes. Abolition of the
Monarchy. Democratisation of the governmental machinery, viz.
abolition of the House of Lords, payment of members of legislative and
administrative bodies, payment of official expenses of elections out
of the public funds, adult suffrage, proportional representation,
triennial Parliaments, second ballot, initiative and referendum.
Foreigners to be granted rights of citizenship after two years'
residence in the country, on the recommendation of four British-born
citizens, without any fee. Canvassing to be made illegal. Legislation
by the people in such wise that no legislative proposal shall become
law until ratified by the majority of the people. Legislative and
administrative independence for all parts of the empire.
"Repudiation of the National Debt. Abolition of all indirect taxation
and the institution of a cumulative tax on all incomes and
inheritances exceeding _300l._
"Extension of the principle of local self-government. Systematisation
and co-ordination of the local administrative bodies. Election of all
administrators and administrative bodies by equal direct adult
suffrage.
"Elementary education to be free, secular, industrial, and compulsory
for all classes. The age of obligatory school attendance to be raised
to sixteen. Unification and systematisation of intermediate and higher
education, both general and technical, and all such education to be
free. Free maintenance for all attending State schools. Abolition of
school rates, the cost of education in all State schools to be borne
by the National Exchequer.
"Nationalisation of the land and the organisation of labour in
agriculture and industry under public ownership and control on
co-operative principles. Nationalisation of the trusts, of railways,
docks, and canals, and all great means of transit. Public ownership
and control of gas, electric light, and water-supplies, tramway,
omnibus, and other locomotive services, and of the food and coal
supply. The establishment of State and municipal banks and pawnshops
and public restaurants. Public ownership and control of the lifeboat
service, of hospitals, dispensaries, cemeteries and crematoria, and
control of the drink traffic.
"A legislative eight-hour working day or forty-eight hours per week to
be the maximum for all trades and industries. Imprisonment to be
inflicted on employers for any infringement of the law. Absolute
freedom of combination for all workers, with legal guarantee against
any action, private or public, which tends to curtail or infringe it.
No child to be employed in any trade or occupation until sixteen years
of age, and imprisonment to be inflicted on employers, parents, and
guardians who infringe this law. Public provision of useful work at
not less than trade-union rates of wages for the unemployed. Free
State insurance against sickness and accident, and free and adequate
State pensions or provision for aged and disabled workers. Public
assistance not to entail any forfeiture of political rights. The
legislative enactment of a minimum wage of _30s._ for all workers.
Equal pay for both sexes for the performance of equal work.
"Abolition of the present workhouse system, and reformed
administration of the Poor Law on a basis of national co-operation.
Compulsory construction by public bodies of healthy dwellings for the
people, such dwellings to be let at rents to cover the cost of
construction and maintenance alone, and not to cover the cost of the
land. The administration of justice to be free to all; the
establishment of public offices where legal advice can be obtained
free of charge."[332]
Mr. Blatchford suggests the following: "The public maintenance and the
public education of children. The public provision of work for all.
The taxation of the land and of all large incomes. The confiscation of
unearned increment. Old-age pensions. The minimum wage. Compulsory
land cultivation. Universal adult suffrage. The second ballot. The
payment of election expenses. The nationalisation of the railways and
of the land. The nationalisation or municipalisation of trams, gas,
water, bread, liquor, milk, coal, and many other things. The abolition
of hereditary titles and of the House of Lords."[333]
The general policy which the Socialists should follow was summed up by
Marx in the following way. "The Communists everywhere support every
revolutionary movement against the existing social and political order
of things."[334] "Socialism is the only hope of the workers. All else
is illusion. Workers of all lands, unite! You have nothing to lose but
your chains. You have a world to win."[335]
"This is the final struggle. The extinction of classes must follow the
overthrow of the last form of class domination and the emancipation of
the last class to be set free. Rally then, fellow workers, to the
standard of the international class-conscious proletariat, the Red
Flag of Social-Democracy. 'Workers of all countries, unite! You have
nothing to lose but your chains, you have a world to win!'"[336] "The
land of England is no mean heritage."[337]
"What has hitherto prevented the workers from combining for
the overthrow of the capitalist system? A. Ignorance and
disorganisation.--Q. What has left them in ignorance? A. The system
itself, by compelling them to spend all their lives upon monotonous toil
and leaving them no time for education.--Q. What account have they been
given of the system which oppresses them? A. The priest has explained
that the perpetual presence of the poor is necessitated by a law of God;
the economist has proved its necessity by a law of Nature; and between
them they have succeeded in convincing the labourers of the hopelessness
of any opposition to the capitalist system.--Q. How is it that the
labourers cannot see for themselves that they are legally robbed? A.
Because the present method of extracting their surplus value is one of
fraud rather than of force, and has grown gradually."[338]
The philosopher of British Socialism well sums up the aims and policy
of the Socialists. He says: "What is vital in Socialism? In the first
line, I take it, come
"1. The collectivisation of _all_ the instruments of production by
_any_ effective means;
"2. The doctrine of the Class War as the general historical method of
realising the new form of society;
"3. The principle of internationalism, the recognition, _i.e._ that
distinction of nationality sinks into nothingness before the idea of
the union of all progressive races in the effort to realise the ideal
of true society as understood by the Social-Democratic Party;
"4. The utmost freedom of physical, moral, and intellectual
development for each and all consistent with the necessities of an
organised social State.
"The Socialist's adhesion to the doctrine of the Class War involves
his opposition to all measures subserving the interest of any section
of capitalism. This coupled with his 'Internationalism' leaves him no
choice but to be the enemy of 'his country' and the friend of his
country's enemies whenever 'his country' (which means of course the
dominant classes of his country, who always are for that matter his
enemies) plays the game of the capitalist. Let us have no humbug! The
man who cannot on occasion be (if needs be) the declared and active
enemy of that doubtful entity, 'his country,' is no Social
Democrat."[339]
"Justice being henceforth identified with confiscation, and injustice
with the right of property, there remains only the question of 'ways
and means.' Our bourgeois apologist, admitting as he must that the
present possessors of land and capital hold possession of them simply
by right of superior force, can hardly refuse to admit the right of
the proletariat organised to that end to take possession of them by
right of superior force. The only question remaining is, How? And the
only answer is, How you can."[340]
FOOTNOTES:
[279] Page 17.
[280] Blatchford, _Merrie England_, p. 100.
[281] _Clarion_, October 11, 1907.
[282] Sidney Webb, _The Difficulties of Individualism_, p. 10.
[283] _Fabian Essays in Socialism_, pp. 26, 27.
[284] Blatchford, _Merrie England_, p. 99.
[285] Blatchford, _What is this Socialism?_ p. 1.
[286] _Socialist Annual_, 1907, p. 39.
[287] Kirtlan, _Socialism for Christians_, p. 15.
[288] Tillett, _Trades Unionism and Socialism_, p. 12.
[289] _Manifesto of the Socialist Party of Great Britain_, p. 9.
[290] _Basis of the Fabian Society._
[291] Blatchford, _Real Socialism_, p. 10.
[292] Macdonald, _Socialism_, p. 103.
[293] Keir Hardie, _From Serfdom to Socialism_, p. 11.
[294] Ethel Snowden, _The Woman Socialist_, p. 3.
[295] Sorge, _Socialism and the Worker_, p. 9.
[296] Blatchford, _Real Socialism_, p. 3.
[297] Macdonald, _Socialism_, p. 103.
[298] Blatchford, _What is this Socialism?_ p. 2.
[299] _Socialism made Plain_, p. 10.
[300] Blatchford, _The Pope's Socialism_, p. 3.
[301] Hobart, _Social-Democracy_, p. 7.
[302] Gronlund, _Co-operative Commonwealth_, p. 94.
[303] Jaures, _Practical Socialism_, p. 3.
[304] _Socialism Made Plain_, p. 8.
[305] Gronlund, _Co-operative Commonwealth_, p. 105.
[306] Jaures, _Practical Socialism_, p. 5.
[307] Kautsky, _The Social Revolution_, p. 10.
[308] Sidney Webb, _The Difficulties of Individualism_, p. 10.
[309] Bax, _The Ethics of Socialism_, pp. 75, 76.
[310] _Ibid._ p. 83.
[311] Blatchford, _The Pope's Socialism_, p. 6.
[312] Muse, _Poverty and Drunkenness_, p. 9.
[313] _Facts for Socialists_, p. 7.
[314] Guyot, _Pretensions of Socialism_, p. 16.
[315] Davidson, _The Old Order and the New_, p. 9.
[316] Dearmer, _Socialism and Christianity_, pp. 17, 18.
[317] Marx and Engels, _Manifesto_, p. 22.
[318] Gronlund, _Co-operative Commonwealth_, p 105.
[319] Macdonald, _Socialism_, p. 105.
[320] _Socialism, For and Against_, p. 9.
[321] Davidson, _The Old Order and the New_, p. 158.
[322] Bebel, _Woman_, pp. 231, 232.
[323] "Veritas," _Did Jesus Christ teach Socialism?_ p. 2.
[324] _Social-Democratic Federation Song Book_, p. 56.
[325] _Ibid._ p. 30.
[326] _Independent Labour Party Song Book_, p. 33.
[327] _Social-Democratic Federation Song Book_, p. 43
[328] _Independent Labour Party Song Book_, p. 7.
[329] Marx and Engels, _Manifesto_, pp. 21, 22.
[330] Leatham, _The Class War_, pp. 13, 14.
[331] _Socialism Made Plain_, p. 10.
[332] Programme, _Social-Democratic Federation_.
[333] _Clarion_, October 18, 1907.
[334] Marx and Engels, _Manifesto_, p. 30.
[335] _Motto of The Socialist_, weekly, taken from Marx and Engels'
_Manifesto_.
[336] _The Class War_, p. 2.
[337] _Socialism Made Plain_, p. 10.
[338] Joynes, _The Socialist Catechism_, p. 5.
[339] Bax, _Essays in Socialism_, pp. 101, 102.
[340] Bax, _Ethics of Socialism_, p. 82.