HOSTILE FEELING BETWEEN CLASSES
CONDITIONS PRODUCING CLASS ANIMOSITY—THE SPIRIT OF SERVICE ALLAYS
BITTERNESS—POSSIBLE DECREASE OF THE PRESTIGE OF WEALTH—PROBABILITY OF
A MORE COMMUNAL SPIRIT IN THE USE OF WEALTH—INFLUENCE OF SETTLED RULES
FOR SOCIAL OPPOSITION—IMPORTANCE OF FACE-TO-FACE DISCUSSION.
Class animosity by no means increases in proportion to the separation
of classes. On the contrary, where there is a definite and recognized
class system which no one thinks of breaking down, a main cause of
arrogance and jealousy is absent. Every one takes his position for
granted and is not concerned to assert or improve it. In Spain, it
is said, “you may give the inch to any peasant; he is sure to be a
gentleman, and he never thinks of taking the ell.” So in an English
tale, written about 1875, I find the following: “The peasantry and
little people in country places like to feel the gentry far above
them. They do not care to be caught up into the empyrean of an equal
humanity, but enjoy the poetry of their self-abasement in the belief
that their superiors are indeed their betters.” So at the South there
was a kind of fellowship between the races under slavery which present
conditions make more difficult. A settled inequality is the next best
thing, for intercourse, to equality.
But where the ideal of equality has entered, even slight differences
may be resented, and class feeling is most bitter, probably, where this
ideal is strong but has no regular and hopeful methods of asserting
itself. In that case aspiration turns sour and generates hateful
passions. Caste countries are safe from this by lacking the ideal of
equality, democracies by partly realizing it. But in Germany, for
instance, where there is a fierce democratic propaganda on the one
hand, and a stone wall of military and aristocratic institutions on the
other, one may feel a class bitterness that we hardly know in America.
And in England also, at the present time, when classes are still
recognized but very ill-defined, there seems to be much of an uneasy
preoccupation about rank, and of the elbowing, snubbing and suspicion
that go with it. People appear to be more concerned with trying to
get into a set above them, or repressing others who are pushing up
from below, than with us. In America social position exists, but,
having no such definite symbols as in England, is for the most part
too intangible to give rise to snobbery, which is based on titles and
other externalities which men may covet or gloat over in a way hardly
possible when the line is merely one of opinion, congeniality and
character.
The feeling between classes will not be very bitter so long as the
ideal of service is present in all and mutually recognized. And it is
the tendency of the democratic spirit—very imperfectly worked out as
yet—to raise this ideal above all others and make it a common standard
of conduct. Thus Montesquieu, describing an ideal democracy, says
that ambition is limited “to the sole desire, to the sole happiness,
of doing greater services to our country than the rest of our fellow
citizens. They cannot all render her equal services, but they all ought
to serve her with equal alacrity.” He thinks also that the love of
frugality, by which he means compunction in material self-indulgence,
“limits the desire of having to the study of procuring necessities to
our family and superfluities to our country.”[131] If it were indeed so
in our own world, there would be no danger of a class conflict.
Possibly all states of opinion by which any service is despised are
survivals from a caste society, and reminiscent of the domination of
one order over another—just as slavery has left a feeling in the South
that hand labor is degrading. So soon as all kinds of workers share
freely in the social and political order, all work must be respected.
The social prestige of idleness, of “conspicuous leisure,” that still
exists in the Old World, is evidently a survival of this sort, and
it can hardly happen in the democratic future that “people will let
their nails grow that all may see they do not work.” “I do not call
one greater and one smaller,” says Whitman, “that which fills its
period and place is equal to any.”[132] I think, however, that there
will always be especial esteem for some sorts of achievement, but the
grounds for this will, more and more, be distinction in the common
service.
The excessive prestige of wealth, along with much of the ill feeling
which it involves, is also, in my opinion, rather a legacy from
caste society than a trait congenial to democracy. I have tried to
show that the ascendency of riches is really greater in the older
and less democratic societies; and it survives in democracy as much
as it does partly because of the tradition that associates wealth
with an upper caste, and partly because other ideals are as yet crude
and unorganized. A real democracy of sentiment and action, a renewed
Christianity and a renewed art might make life beautiful and hopeful
for those who have little money without diminishing the wholesome
operation of the desire for gain. At present the common man is
impoverished not merely by an absolute want of money but by a current
way of thinking which makes pecuniary success the standard of merit,
and so makes him feel that failure to get money is failure of life.
As we no longer feel much admiration for mere physical prowess, apart
from the use that is made of it, so it seems natural that the same
should come true of mere pecuniary strength. The mind of a child, or
of any naive person, bases consideration chiefly on function, on what
a man can do in the common life, and it is in the line of democratic
development that we should return toward this simple and human view.
It is in accord with this movement that children of all classes are
more and more taught the use of tools, cooking and other primary arts
of life. This not only makes for economy and independence, but educates
the “instinct of workmanship,” leading us to feel an interest in all
good work and a respect for those who do it.
The main need of men is life, self-expression, not luxury, and if
self-expression can be made general material inequalities alone will
excite but little resentment.
As to the use of wealth we may expect a growing sense of social
responsibility, of which there are already cheerful indications. Since
it is no longer respectable to be idle, why may we not hope that it
will presently cease to be respectable to indulge one’s lower self in
other ways—in pecuniary greed, in luxurious eating, in display, rich
clothes and other costly and exclusive pleasures?
We must not, however, be so optimistic as to overlook the ease with
which narrow or selfish interests may form special groups of their own,
encouraging one another in greed or luxury to the neglect of the common
life. Such associations cannot altogether shut out general sentiment,
but they can and do so far deaden its influence that the more hardened
or frivolous are practically unconscious of it. While there are some
cheerful givers on a large scale among us, and many on a small one, I
am not sure that there was ever, on the whole, a commercial society
that contributed a smaller part of its gains to general causes. We
have done much in this way; but then we are enormously rich; and the
most that has been done has been by taxation, which falls most heavily
upon small property-owners. The more communal use of wealth is rather
a matter of general probability, and of faith in democratic sentiment,
than of demonstrable fact.
Much might be said of the various ways in which more community
sentiment might be shown and class resentment alleviated. In the matter
of dress, for example; shall one express his community consciousness
in it or his class consciousness, assuming that each is natural and
creditable? It would seem that when he goes abroad among men the good
democrat should prefer to appear a plain citizen, with nothing about
him to interrupt intercourse with any class. And in fact, it is a
wholesome feature of American life, in notable contrast with, say,
Germany, that high as well as low are averse to wearing military or
other distinctive costume in public—except at times of festival or
display, when class consciousness is in special function. We feel that
if a man wants to distinguish himself in general intercourse he should
do so in courtesy or wisdom, not in medals or clothes.
And why should not the same principle, of deference to the community
in non-essentials, apply to one’s house and to one’s way of living in
general? If he has anything worthy to express in these things, let him
express it, but not pride or luxury.
Let us not, however, formulize upon the question what one may rightly
spend money for, or imagine that formulism is practicable. The
principle that wealth is a trust held for the general good is not to be
disputed; but latitude must be left to individual conceptions of what
the general good is. These are matters not for formulas or sumptuary
laws, but for conscience. To set up any other standard would be to
suppress individuality and do more harm than good.
Some of us would be glad to see almost any amount of wealth spent upon
beautiful architecture, though we might prefer that the buildings be
devoted to some public use. Let us have beauty, even luxury, but let
it be public and communicable. It certainly seems at first sight that
vast expenditure upon private yachts, private cars, costly balls,
display of jewelry, sumptuous eating and the like, indicates a low
state of culture; but perhaps this is a mistake; no doubt there is some
beneficence in these things not generally understood.
We do not want uniformity in earning and spending, more than elsewhere,
only unity of spirit. Some writers praise the emulation that is
determined to have as fine things as others have, but while this has
its uses it is a social impulse of no high kind and keeps the mass of
men feeling poor and inferior. Our dignity and happiness would profit
more if each of us were to work out life in a way of his own without
invidious comparisons. We shall never be content except as we develop
and enjoy our individuality and are willing to forego what does not
belong to it. I know that I was not born to get or to use riches, but I
am willing to believe that others are.
An essential condition of better feeling in the inevitable struggles
of life is that there should be just and accepted “rules of the game”
to give moral unity to the whole. Much must be suffered, but men will
suffer without bitterness if they believe that they do so under just
and necessary principles.
A solid foundation has been laid for this, in free countries, by the
establishment of institutions under which all class conflicts are
referred, in the last resort, to human nature itself. Through free
speech a general will may be organized on any matter urgent enough to
attract general attention, and through democratic government this may
be tested, recorded and carried out. Thus is provided a tribunal free
from class bias before which controversies may be tried and settled in
an orderly manner.
It would be hard to exaggerate the importance to social peace of
this recognition of the ultimate authority of public opinion, acting
slowly but surely through constitutional methods. It means a moral
whole which prescribes rules, directs sane agitation into healthy and
moderate channels, and takes away all rational ground for violence or
revolution. If men, for instance, believe that a particular kind of
socialistic state is the cure for the evils of society, let them speak,
print and form their party. Perhaps they are right; at least, they get
much wholesome self-expression and a kind of happiness out of their
aspiration and labors. And if they are partly wrong, yet they may both
learn and impart much to the general advantage.
But we have made only a beginning in this. Our ethics is only a vague
outline, not a matured system, and in the details of social contact—as
between employer and workman, rich and poor, Negro and white, and so
on—there is such a lack of accepted standards that men have little to
go by but their crude impulses. All this must be worked out, in as much
patience and good will as possible, before we can expect to have peace.
Where there is no very radical conflict of essential principles, ill
feeling may commonly be alleviated by face-to-face discussion, since
the more we come to understand one another the more we get below
superficial unlikeness and find essential community. Between fairly
reasonable and honest men it is always wholesome to “have it out,” and
many careful studies of labor troubles agree regarding the large part
played by misunderstandings and suspicion that have no cause except
lack of opportunity for explanation. “The rioting would not have taken
place,” says a student of certain mining disorders, “had not the
ignorance and suspicion of the Hungarians been supplemented by the
ignorance and suspicion of the employers; and the perseverance of this
mutual attitude may yet create another riot.”[133] There is a strong
temptation for those in authority, especially if they are overworked,
or conscious of being a little weak or unready in conference, to fence
themselves with formality and the type-written letter. But a man of
real fitness in any administrative capacity must have stomach for open
and face-to-face dealing with men.
And a democratic system sooner or later brings to pass face-to-face
discussion of all vital questions, because the people will be satisfied
with no other. An appearance of shirking it will arouse even more
distrust and hostility than the open avowal of selfish motives; and
accordingly it is more and more the practice of aggressive interests to
seek to justify themselves by at least the appearance of frank appeal
to popular judgment.
FOOTNOTES:
[131] The Spirit of Laws, book v, chap. 3.
[132] Leaves of Grass, 71.
[133] Spahr, America’s Working People, 128.
_PART V_
INSTITUTIONS