A PARABLE.
A family was once shipwrecked upon a large island. There were five
members of the family all able to work, and by a proper division of
their labor they managed to provide themselves with food, clothes, and
shelter. After a time another family was shipwrecked upon the same
island. The second family followed the example of the first, and each
prospered independently of the other. During the next year a third and
fourth family were also stranded upon the same island, for it was
unmarked on the charts and many a ship had met its fate upon its rocky
shores. As each family developed and multiplied, each having selected a
different part of the island, four little villages, some distance apart,
sprang up. During the daily hunts several other similar villages were
discovered in the interior, each representing a shipwrecked family of
previous years. As time wore on, and each village grew, and other
shiploads of people from all nations were deposited upon the island, it
came to pass that the island became quite densely inhabited, and the
villages almost touched one another at their outskirts.
One day a philosopher mysteriously made his appearance; and after
touring the island, he asked all of the inhabitants to meet him in an
open field. When the appointed day came, the entire adult population was
there, and the philosopher spoke as follows:
"You have a fine country here, and fine people. You are industrious and
simple. Each little village is independent of the other villages, for
each can provide itself with everything its people actually need. You
never ask favors from your neighboring villages. Each village has its
own corn field, its own carpenters, woods, cows, sheep, horses and
stores. But I find that you have no music, no books, no art, no places
of amusement and very little ingenuity. You all work from morn till
night and you have no time for these things. It is a constant, ceaseless
struggle for all of you to keep body and soul together. Each of you men
and women is an isolated unit. Each village is an isolated unit. You are
all isolated from the great commercial countries far beyond the seas.
Now, in travelling through your island, I found that one village had a
coal mine and all the people there used coal for fuel, while all the
other villages have to hew great trees, chop them up, and burn wood, in
order to get heat. In one village I found oil wells and the people there
burn oil, while all the other villages have to use bullrush torches. In
one village I found the soil of clay, so that the people made their
houses of bricks, while the other villages have to use blocks of wood,
or logs. In another village I found iron ore and their people have sharp
tools, while other villages have to use sharpened stones. And so on,
for I found each village has some peculiar and natural advantage over
the other. Now, my friends, why do you keep these God-given advantages
to yourselves? You villagers who have coal know that there is enough for
all the island, and so with you who have the iron, bricks, or cotton, or
fruits, or silks, or furs. Why don't you exchange what you make or raise
for the products of your neighbors? The whole island must have so many
hats, so many shoes, and so many houses, and if you divide your labors
and freely exchange your products with one another, you will find that
you will all have more comforts, and you won't have so long to work each
day. And when you have more leisure, you will begin to invent, and plan,
and enjoy yourselves, and write books, and visit one another to exchange
ideas. The gross amount that all you people produce each year is really
very, very small. If you should co-operate, you could create many times
as many commodities as you now produce."
The philosopher disappeared. The people talked about it for weeks
thereafter, and they finally began to adopt his plan. They built
railroads, and they freely exchanged products with one another. Money
then came into use. With money one could do almost anything. It
represented bread and butter. Every man tried to get all he could,--not
only to provide against future wants, but that he might outshine his
neighbors. There was gradually a great division of labor on the island,
and a great saving in work. The people no longer worked fifteen hours a
day. They did not have to. Men who had strong arms moved to the village
where they were doing something which required strength. Men who had
thick skulls moved to the cotton fields to work under a hot sun. Men who
had sharp eyes moved to the manufacturing village. Men with
executiveness became foremen, and superintendents, and presidents. And
so every village gradually became adjusted to the changed plans. Every
man sought that village or field best adapted to his physique or
abilities. Every man and every village finally became a specialist. In
the coal village they did nothing else but mine and transport coal. In
the oil village they only produced and shipped oil. In one village they
had several swift streams running through to the coast, and this village
was in the middle of the isle and not far from the iron and cotton
villages. It became the manufacturing village. This village was divided
into many different districts, and was very large. In one section, the
Manchester-like climate and misty atmosphere, and nearness to the
cotton fields, made it a natural cotton manufacturing center. Another
section was adapted for making steel and iron goods. And so on.
As time wore on, every industry on the island, localized, and every man
became specialized. Inventions and machinery multiplied. But every new
labor-saving machine saved labor, of course, and produced better goods
than hand labor. So every new machine took a job away from several
workmen. There was much complaint about this but new inventions kept
coming. There were now twenty different hat factories in the
manufacturing village, each trying to undersell the other. One day they
combined and built a large addition on the largest factory building.
Then they moved most of the other hat factory machinery in, and
destroyed the old buildings and the machinery they did not want. They
also discharged nineteen engineers, nineteen foremen, fifty bookkeepers,
two hundred drivers and packers and many other men, because they no
longer needed them. These poor discharged workmen did not know what to
do, for they had spent their lives at that business and knew no other.
First, there was a great hue and cry raised by all the little villages,
for they all felt sorry for the poor discharged workmen.
But soon, this big partnership concern began to sell the same hats for
far less than formerly, and they told the people that they could afford
to because they did not have so many men to pay, so much rent, so much
advertising, and were running things more economically. Other big
partnerships were formed all over the island, and after a while, so
great was the economy of combination that many men could not get any
work to do. Every big partnership soon took in all the little concerns
on the island, or else it drove them out of business by competition.
Some men became discouraged and began to drink rum, and others even
began to cheat and steal.
One day, some of the big partnerships had a banquet, and they talked
things over and they said: "We're making money and getting rich, but we
could do it faster if we did not have to pay so much wages. Let us raise
prices and cut wages down." This they did, and finally the workingmen
got together into a partnership of their own. They organized, and they
all said they must have just so much wages or they would not work at
all. This forced the big partnership people to pay better wages for a
while, but the two partnerships, employer and employee, were always
quarrelling. One day a very serious thing happened in the coal village.
The workmen refused to work because they thought they were not getting
enough wages. They stopped mining coal, and, while they were idle, all
other workmen on the island sent them money and provisions out of
sympathy. It was dead winter and people began to suffer and some of the
factories had to shut down. Even the railroads could not run their
engines. But the people made such an uproar that the coal owners finally
surrendered a little, reluctantly, and again the mines were operated.
Not long after this, a similar disturbance took place in the cotton
fields, and for a long while the whole island suffered for want of the
hundreds of things which cotton goes to make, even to shoe strings and
lampwicks.
For several years these outbreaks in the different villages were very
frequent. First it was a cry of, "no oil;" then, "no milk;" then, "no
iron;" then "no meat." Finally, as a last straw on the back of the
already exhausted camel, all the railroads formed a partnership, and
they too became tied up, and ceased operation. Without them, the people
could scarcely get anything to eat, or drink, or wear, or burn, and
famine threatened the island; because, every village had become devoted
to only one thing, and it could not do or produce anything else. Each
had learned to depend upon the other villages for every other article.
Then there was a great public uprising. Meetings were held everywhere.
Many people said that the trouble was because people formed
partnerships. Others answered by saying that that was not the cause, for
even if there were no partnerships, still one village would continue to
have all the coal, another all the oil, and another all the cotton, on
the island. There were no tariffs, no land monopoly, no special
privileges, no government favoritism, no railroad discrimination, and no
taxes, so those whose fathers had heard of such things in other
countries could not advance such arguments. Nature had given certain
villages a natural monopoly of certain industries. Nature had also given
certain men a natural monopoly over certain trades and pursuits by
making them apt and proficient therein. Therefore, Nature was the
criminal, and she alone was to be blamed. But what were the forlorn
islanders to do about it?
One fine day, when everything was in a turmoil of discontent and
perplexity, the philosopher again made his appearance upon the island.
Many thought him a Divine being sent from heaven to succor and advise
them; and so, when he had called them all together, he addressed them
thus:
"My friends, you have advanced and progressed and developed wondrously
in one direction, but you have made a fatal mistake. You have
specialized and localized your industries, and have affected an
efficient system of division of labor, but, you forget that this means
monopoly in private hands. You have overlooked the fact that now, every
man is dependent upon every other man, and every industry is dependent
upon every other industry. Again, when one hundred concerns combine into
a partnership, or Trust, as we call it, and throw thousands out of
employment, or when a new machine does so, you now have no way of
providing for these unemployed thousands, and you cast them out upon the
world to shift for themselves."
"O, Sir," cried one of the islanders, "why can we not return to the old
way and not have all these modern ideas? We were getting along all right
before we began to exchange commodities with each other. Why can we not
go back to the old way?"
"Ah, too late, my friend, even if you all wished it," the old
philosopher said.
"But, surely, you do not wish it," he added. "Do you remember when you
worked from early morn till late at night and then had no stoves, no
lamps, no blankets, no carpets, no crockery, no cooking utensils, no
gas, no chairs, no wagons? Do you wish to return to that? Do you wish to
isolate yourself from your fellow men and separately make and raise
everything you eat and wear?"
Everybody saw the logic of this simple philosophy, and he was beseeched
to show them what to do.
"What you must do, my friends, is to organize. Organization is all you
require. You have as yet only organized into simple isolated groups. You
must now organize all these groups. Every industry, every partnership,
is a group. Each group is dependent upon all the others. This being
true, you must form a whole. Let every man stick to his special work,
let every locality remain in its special work, let every industry and
every partnership stick to its special work,--don't disturb nature--_but
all these must stick to each other_! How? By forming yourselves into one
solid, compact, organized body. Call yourselves a nation. Have a
convention at stated times, and let every industry, every labor
organization, and every locality send representatives and delegates to
this convention. It is foolish of you to let the coal villages send
coal wherever, whenever, and in such quantities, as they wish. And so
with every other industry. The law of demand is not always sufficient,
as a guide to what is needed. All are demanding more coal now, yet the
coal village is sending it out, here and there, without organized plan,
system or method. The national convention should determine these
questions, and all other national questions that do not adjust
themselves naturally. When they do not adjust themselves naturally
complaint should be and will be made to the national convention, and
then the convention shall have power to settle the question in dispute.
If one industry fails to do its duty and supply the others with its
specialty, be it coal, oil, cotton, bricks or gloves, it is ground for
complaint, and it then becomes a question for the national convention.
If a partnership or industry fails to pay its employees suitable wages,
and those employees refuse to work, it becomes a national question, and
the national convention must direct that that industry must give to the
workmen a greater share or proportion of the profits of that industry.
Whether it shall be a raise in wages, or compulsory profit-sharing, is a
question for the national convention to settle. Again when men cannot
work, and they become a burden upon society, it becomes a national
question, because their non-employment is caused by the organization of
the industries, and it becomes the nation's duty to give these men an
opportunity to earn a living. This it can do by lessening the hours of
work in the industries. If all the workmen are required to work fewer
hours each day, more men will be required to work, and thus employment
can be given to all. Every national question can therefore safely be
entrusted to the national convention; and, so long as that convention
has power to act, you will have no trouble.
I believe, however, that so long as the national convention is known to
be in existence, and that it has such power of direction, there will be
little for it to do. Because, the great partnerships and industries and
labor organizations, knowing of such a supreme judicial power, will
usually so adjust their differences, and in a natural and peaceful way,
that but few questions will come before the national convention. It is
therefore the knowledge of the existence and power of such body that
will urge all men to act honorably with one another. It is the fear of
it which will be the potent factor, and not the thing itself."
After a few more remarks of explanation, the old philosopher disappeared
as mysteriously as he had come. After deliberating upon his wise
suggestion for a while, the islanders finally adopted his plan, and
forever thereafter the island never had occasion to seek his counsel.