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diff --git a/29393.txt b/29393.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..56c3bb4 --- /dev/null +++ b/29393.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1016 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Social Justice Without Socialism, by John Bates Clark + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Social Justice Without Socialism + +Author: John Bates Clark + +Release Date: October 24, 2009 [EBook #29393] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOCIAL JUSTICE WITHOUT SOCIALISM *** + + + + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian +Libraries) + + + + + + +Barbara Weinstock Lectures on The Morals of Trade + +SOCIAL JUSTICE WITHOUT SOCIALISM. +By John Bates Clark. + +THE CONFLICT BETWEEN PRIVATE MONOPOLY AND GOOD CITIZENSHIP. +By John Graham Brooks. + +COMMERCIALISM AND JOURNALISM. +By Hamilton Holt. + +THE BUSINESS CAREER IN ITS PUBLIC RELATIONS. +By Albert Shaw. + + + + +SOCIAL JUSTICE WITHOUT SOCIALISM + + + +BY + +JOHN BATES CLARK + +PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY AT +COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY + + + +BOSTON AND NEW YORK +HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY +The Riverside Press Cambridge +1914 + +COPYRIGHT, 1914, BY THE REGENTS OF THE +UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA + +ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + +_Published April 1914_ + + + + +BARBARA WEINSTOCK +LECTURES ON THE MORALS OF TRADE + +This series will contain essays by representative scholars and men of +affairs dealing with the various phases of the moral law in its bearing +on business life under the new economic order, first delivered at the +University of California on the Weinstock foundation. + + + + +SOCIAL JUSTICE WITHOUT SOCIALISM + + +It is currently reported that the late King Edward once said, "We are +all Socialists, now": and if the term "Socialism" meant to-day what His +Majesty probably meant by it, many of us could truthfully make a +similar statement. Without any doubt, we could do so if we attached to +the term the meaning which it had when it was first invented. It came +into use in the thirties of the last century, and expressed a certain +disappointment over the result of political reform. The bill which gave +more men the right to vote did not give them higher wages. The +conditions of labor were deplorable before the Reform Bill was passed +and they continued to be so for some time afterwards. A merely +political change, therefore, was not all that was wanted, and it was +necessary to carry democracy into a social sphere in order to improve +the condition of the poorer classes. The term "Socialism," therefore, +was chosen to describe a play of forces that would act in this way on +society itself, and was an excellent term for describing this right and +just tendency. The name was quickly adopted by those with whose +practical plans most of us do not agree; but its original idea was +democracy carried into business, and at present that is the dominant +tendency of all successful parties. For six months we have been living +under what may be called "triumphant democracy," not because the +Democratic Party has beaten its rivals and come into control of the +Government, but for a much deeper reason, namely, that a democracy +carried into industrial life is the dominating principle of every +political body that can hope for success. Every party must show by its +action that it values the man more than the dollar. To this extent we +are all democrats and wish the Government to act for the people as well +as to be controlled by the people. + +When we differ, it is in deciding on the means to carry out our common +purpose; and here we differ very widely. Some would use the power of +the State to correct and improve our system of industry, and these +constitute a party of reform. Others would abolish that system and +substitute something untried. For private capital they would put public +capital and for private management, public management--either in the +whole field of industry or in that great part of it where large capital +rules. These are Socialists in the modern and current sense of the +term. + +One difference of view which was formerly very sharp is now scarcely +traceable. Every one knows that we must invoke the aid of the State in +order to make industry what it should be. The rule that would bid the +State keep its hands off the entire field of business, the extreme +_laissez-faire_ policy once dominant in literature and thought, now +finds few persons bold enough to advocate it or foolish enough to +believe in it. In a very chastened form, however, the spirit that would +put a reasonable limit on what the State shall be asked to do happily +does survive and is powerful. It seeks a golden mean between letting +the State do nothing and asking it to do everything. It is this plan of +action that I shall try to outline, and it will appear that even this +plan requires that the State should do very much. Under an inert +government the industrial system would suffer irreparably. + +The thing first to be rescued is competition--meaning that healthful +rivalry between different producers which has always been the guaranty +of technical progress. That such progress has gone on with bewildering +rapidity since the invention of the steam engine is nowhere denied; and +neither is it denied that competition of the normal kind--the effort of +rivals to excel in productive processes--has caused it. It has +multiplied the product of labor here tenfold, there, twentyfold, and +elsewhere a hundredfold and more. + +This increased power to produce has rescued us from an appalling evil. +Without it, such a crowding of population as some countries have +experienced would have carried their peoples to and below the +starvation level. Machinery now enables us to live; and if +world-crowding were to go on in the future as it has done, and the +technical progress should cease, many of us could not live. Poverty +would increase till its cruelest effects would be realized and lives +enough would be crushed out to enable the survivors to get a living. Of +all conditions of human happiness, the one which is most underestimated +is progress in power to produce. Hardly any of those who would +revolutionize the industrial State, and not all of those who would +reform it, have any conception of the importance of this progress. It +is the _sine qua non_ of any hopeful outlook for the future of mankind. + +I am to speak, however, of _justice_ in the business relations of life, +and it might seem that this shut out the mere question of general +prosperity. The most obvious issue between different social classes +concerns the division of whatever income exists. Whatever there is, be +it large or small, may be divided rightly or wrongly; but I am not able +to see that the mere division of it exhausts the application of the +principle of justice. While it is clearly wrong for one party to +plunder another, it is almost as clearly wrong for one party to reduce +the general income and so, in a sense, rob everybody. A party that +should systematically hinder production and reduce its fruits would rob +a myriad of honest laborers who are ill prepared to stand this loss and +have a perfect right to be protected from it. + +Every man, woman, and child has a right to demand that the powers that +be remove hindrances in the way of production, and not only allow the +general income to be large and grow larger, but do everything that they +possibly can do to make it grow larger. It is an unjust act to reduce +general earnings, even though no one is singled out for particular +injury. On this ground we insist on trust legislation, tariff reform, +the conservation of natural resources, etc. I am prepared to claim that +it is in this spirit that we demand that private initiative, which has +given us the amount of prosperity that we have thus far obtained, shall +be enabled to continue its work without being supplanted by monopoly. +In a general way I should include public monopoly as well as private +among the things which would put a damper on the progress of +improvement and lessen the income on which the comfort of laborers in +the near future will be dependent. Monopoly of any sort is hostile to +improvement, and in this chiefly lies the menace which it holds for +mankind. + +It is a fairly safe prediction that, if a public monopoly were to exist +in every part of the industrial field, the _per capita_ income would +grow less, and that it would be only a question of time, and a short +time at that, when the laborers would be worse off than they are now. +Though, at the outset, they might absorb the entire incomes of the +well-to-do classes, the amount thus gained would shrink in their hands +until their position would be worse than their present one. They would +have pulled down the capitalists without more than a momentary benefit +for themselves and with a prospect of soon sinking to a lower level +than as a class they have thus far reached. + +The impulse to revolutionize the system comes from the belief that it +is irreclaimably bad. The first thing to be done is to see how much +reclaiming the system is capable of; and the only sure way to test this +question is to use all our power in the effort to improve it. When all +such efforts shall have failed, it will be time for desperate measures. + +Our industrial system has many faults:--here we are happily agreed. It +is the inferences we draw from this fact that are different. The one +that I draw is like one which is recorded in a famous case in +antiquity. When the Macedonian armies seemed about to overwhelm Greece, +Demosthenes encouraged the Athenians by this very sound bit of +philosophy: "The worst fact in our past affords the brightest hope for +our future. It is the fact that our misfortunes have come because of +our own faults. If they had come when we were doing our best, there +would be no hope for us." Now the evils of our own social system which +result from mistakes or faults are just such a ground of hope. Every +such evil which can be cited describes one possible reform, and the +longer the list of evils, the greater is the sum total of gain which we +can make by doing away with them. If we cite them all _seriatim_, what +impression shall we get? Will it merely show how badly off we are? Will +it make us despair for our future? On the contrary, it should fill us +with hope for the future. We start from the fact that we have thus far +survived in spite of the faults. The worst off among us is above +starvation and most of us are in a tolerable state. If we can remove +the evils that exist, we shall make our state very much more than +tolerable. The greatness of the evils measures the gain from removing +them. Every single one that is removed improves the status of our +people. We can take, as it were, a social account of stock, measure our +present state, measure the extent to which we can improve it by putting +an end to one bad influence, count the number of such bad influences, +and so get an estimate of the gains of carrying out a complete +reformatory programme. It will show an enormous possibility of +improvement. + +In the struggle for reforms we have the great middle class with us. All +honest capitalists, great and small alike, are natural allies of honest +labor, and they are interested mainly in the same reforms as are the +members of the working-class. If we recognize a necessity for a +struggle of classes, it is not one that marshals labor against all +wealth. The contention is rather between honest wealth allied with +honest labor, on the one hand, and dishonest wealth on the other; and +in a contest so aligned, victory for the former party means social +justice. + +There is a preliminary reform to be carried through as a condition of +securing most of the others. Who can estimate the benefit which would +come from merely making our Government what it purports to +be--government by the people? The initiative, the referendum, the +recall, the short ballot, direct primaries, and proportionate +representation are all designed to transfer power from rings and bosses +to the people themselves. If they actually do it, as sooner or later +those or kindred measures probably will, they will so far restore the +democracy of our earlier and simpler days as to make us look back on +the rule of rings and bosses as on a nightmare of the past. When the +Government is thus really controlled by the people we can count on +having its full power exerted for them. + +What are a few of the things that we shall then try to get? + +The working day is too long. In some occupations it covers far too many +hours, and in most occupations it covers more than it ideally should. +There are doubtless some industries in which hours might be reduced +with no lessening of wages, because profits are large enough to bear +some reduction. In these cases a strong union might get either more pay +for a day of the present length or the present rate for a shorter day. +A universal reduction of the period of labor would have to mean a +reduction of the product of industry, and without immediate +improvements in method of production it would entail smaller wages. +Improvements, however, might soon obviate that necessity. With +machinery growing more and more efficient, the day may be shortened +with no diminution of wages; and the natural effect of increasing power +to produce has always been some shortening of labor-time coupled with +some enlargement of pay. Within the last one hundred years the period +of daily labor in some types of manufacturing has come to cover only a +little over one third of the twenty-four hours, instead of more nearly +two thirds; while the earnings have become much larger than they were +at the beginning of the period. Normally this progress should continue, +and long before the dawn of the twenty-first century we should see work +still less severe, less prolonged, and better paid. Where, as in some +departments of steel-making, labor in two shifts continues through the +twenty-four hours, there is a chance to make this gain without +appreciable waiting; and elsewhere it should be possible to make it +without waiting for the twenty-first century to come much nearer than +it is. + +Dangerous and injurious occupations still continue; and our country is +slower than others in remedying this trouble. Many safeguards that are +easily obtainable are neglected. Protection for the workers and +indemnities for injuries when they occur can be insured by well-made +laws, properly enforced. Sanitary regulations and pure-food laws need +to be strengthened and more fully enforced. + +Our protective tariff bears heavily on the poor man. His wardrobe +contains little or nothing that is made of wool, and he may well sigh +for the mixed cotton and shoddy of earlier days. Our import duties, +which do, indeed, try to spare his dinner-pail, should be made to spare +his wardrobe and the modest comforts of his life. + +Commercial crises still occur and are followed by hard times; and while +a really wise reform of money and banking would not wholly prevent +them, it would greatly mitigate their severity.[1] + + [1] This was written before the recent reforms of import duties + and of the banking system had been enacted. + +Emergency employment is desperately needed when hard times come. +European Governments excel our own in providing it, but it is entirely +possible to adopt their methods and improve on them. + +Our natural resources have been wasted in a prodigal way. Forests have +been recklessly cut, fires been invited and the soil itself has been +sacrificed. Natural gas and oil have been burned with no regard for the +future. Coal and other minerals have not been husbanded. It should be +possible for us to cease to play the spendthrift with the patrimony +that nature has given to us. + +We have the beginnings of a parcel post, but we need a more highly +developed one that will come nearer to the standards maintained in +other countries. With it we need telephone and telegraph systems that +can be universally used. + +In our larger cities, we are struggling to get rapid transit and shall +have to continue the struggle; but we ought to have, with urban +railroads, subways, and the like, measures that would reduce the amount +of traveling that has to be done between homes and places of labor. A +free use of the principle of "eminent domain" would make it possible to +acquire land for carrying out any policy of general beneficence, and +that, too, without robbing the owners of it. By resorting to this +measure much of the manufacturing which exposes great cities to +imminent danger of conflagration might and should be moved bodily to +outlying districts. + +Of all industrial abuses of the past the cruelest has been the crushing +of the life of young children by hard and prolonged labor. We are +making headway in removing this evil, but much still remains to be +gained; and a vast amount is to be gained by a comprehensive policy for +improving the status of working-women. + +Social justice demands some effective means of getting legal justice. +We have courts, certainly. Do they give the service that we need and, +in particular, do they give it to the poor? We do not here impugn the +motives of judges. Generally speaking, they are honest; but the whole +system of court procedure is hampered by detailed statutes and +technical rules, that mean an amount of cost and delay which in itself +is the very quintessence of injustice. A citizen is offered a choice +between submitting to the wrong inflicted by a fellow-citizen and +accepting the wrong inflicted by a dilatory and crushingly costly legal +procedure. We probably excel some nations in the rightfulness of the +decisions we can get if we live long enough and have money enough to +get them; but there are few civilized nations that do not excel us in +the rapidity and cheapness of the process. A Chinese student in +Columbia University served, during the first year of his residence in +New York, as judge of Chinatown, and, by giving up only the Saturday +evening of each week to the service, he settled the disputes which +arose between Chinese residents. As he was learned in the principles of +Confucius, I doubt not he settled them justly, and many a time in that +same city I have sighed for his services for native Americans. + +The line of division between labor and capital ought not always to be +the sharp boundary that it is. Labor should be enabled to acquire a +modest share of capital and to invest it securely. Protection for small +investments is urgently needed, and would do much to change a +proletariat into an independent working-class. This is an essential +feature of the social system we wish for and work for. The man who +hereafter shall correspond to Longfellow's "village blacksmith" will +perhaps be the owner of a hundred shares in some corporation. In +agriculture small holdings may always survive; but there may be large +ones also, and in that case the farmer of the future may have either +five acres and a hoe, or forty acres and a mule, or a hundred and sixty +acres and a reaper, or an undivided share in a thousand acres and a +traction engine. + +If we could carry through even the reforms thus far enumerated, it +would make us feel as if we had been lifted from a slough and placed on +a plateau abounding in air and sunlight; but if we stopped with this, +we should leave much to be desired. There are still more pressing +measures to be enacted. + +Nearly the greatest evil we are facing is monopoly. This is not the +universal view. Though there are few who approve of monopoly, there are +those who regard it with toleration and think that, if we accept it and +regulate prices under it, we shall fare sufficiently well. As yet, it +is in an incipient stage of development and has by no means revealed +its full power for evil. If we let it grow freely, we shall find later +what it is capable of. Wise measures, adopted even now, will come early +enough to prevent it from ever growing to maturity. + +With the steel trust, the Standard Oil trust, and other combinations +before our eyes, it seems an absurdity to speak of monopolies as being +in an incipient stage. Is it possible that anything whatever which +these great combinations represent can be nipped in the bud? Are they +not already in the fullest flower, and big and mature as they are ever +likely to be? The companies themselves, with their vast material +plants, certainly are so. What we are talking about, however, is not +the mere size of the companies, but _the element of monopoly that is in +them_. Have they such a power that they can safely charge anything they +please for their products? Is it as though they were licensed by the +Government to be the sole makers and vendors of their special wares? +Business men know that this is not the case; and that something puts a +check on their action. They can make their prices higher than they +should be--higher than it is for the interest of the country to have +them; but they cannot make them as high as they would be under a real +and secure monopoly. The point I am making is that we can destroy such +monopolistic power as they have. We can liberate competition, which +has, in the main, afforded reasonable prices, and has also guaranteed +that progress which is indispensable for maintaining a human life that +is worth living. It is to-day the only means of insuring a constantly +increasing power over nature--an ability to turn out, in greater and +greater abundance, the things which make life comfortable. + +These combinations now possess a power which it is highly perilous to +let them keep. They can disable their rivals by foul play, which would +be impossible under proper rules of the ring. By securing control of +raw materials, by selling goods below cost in the territory where a +small rival is operating and keeping up the prices everywhere else, by +forcing merchants to boycott independent manufacturers, by getting, in +spite of laws and commissions, some advantages from railroads, and by +other similar practices, they can drive competitors out of business. +Yet every one of these practices can be defined and prohibited, and +resorting to any of them can be, if not wholly prevented, at least made +so perilous that the practices will become extinct. + +It is possible to give to every competitor a fair field and no favor, +and, in so doing, to infuse again into the industrial system the life +and vigor which competition guarantees. This and only this will insure +that progress in production itself which is the _sine qua non_ of +future comfort. It may then be expected that inventions will continue, +that machines will become more perfect, and that the power of society +to pay wages will grow larger. Labor will then be the heir of the +centuries, and under proper laws can claim and get its inheritance. If +the world crowds itself fuller and fuller of population and progress at +the same time stagnates, nothing can prevent an increase of poverty +unrelieved by any bright outlook. Technical progress, power to make two +blades of grass grow where one grows now, and to do it in the various +departments where men labor, is the sole condition of a sound hope for +the future of the wage-earner. It will be as necessary under Socialism +as under the present system; but under Socialism it will be difficult +to get. In so far as it is possible to judge, it depends on the +preservation of normal competition in the general economic field. + +Leaders of the Industrial Workers of the World have recently announced +an intention of forcing the hours of labor downward from ten hours per +day to eight, six, and finally, four, while at the same time the pay +will be forced up in a more or less corresponding ratio. They have also +announced an intention of making capital useless to its owners, by +crippling its productive power, and so making it easier to seize it. It +goes without saying that a four-hour day and high wages can never come +by a war which destroys most of the income to be divided. Make the +figures more moderate and allow time enough for it, and it may be made +to come by the diametrically opposite plan of making industry more and +more fruitful. The ten-hour day succeeded the twelve- or fourteen-hour +one of former times in exactly that way. + +The division of the social income is of vital importance as well as the +general size of it. I have claimed for the regulation of monopoly that +it is nearly the greatest of possible reforms. Perhaps the very +greatest is a change in the mode of adjusting wages. They are fixed at +present in a rough-and-ready way, though not without some reference to +what labor produces and what employers can pay, and not, therefore, +without the action of a principle which makes, in a powerful way, for +justice. Any method, however, which involves many strikes and lockouts, +is bad economically and worse morally. The contests are always costly, +and they easily run into violent warfare; but underneath all these +struggles and the hates and horrors that result, there is working, if +we will see it, a law that makes for peace founded on justice. It tends +in the direction of a fair division of products between employers and +employed, and if it could work entirely without hindrances, would +actually give to every laborer substantially what he produces. In the +midst of all prevalent abuses this basic law asserts itself like a law +of gravitation, and so long as monopoly is excluded and competition is +free,--so long as both labor and capital can move without hindrance to +the points at which they can create the largest products and get the +largest rewards--its action cannot be stopped, while that of the forces +that disturb it can be so. In this is the most inspiriting fact for the +social reformer. If there are "inspiration points" on the mountain-tops +of science, as well as on those of nature, this is one of them, and it +is reached whenever a man discovers that in a highly imperfect society +the fundamental law makes for justice, that it is impossible to prevent +it from working and that it is entirely possible to remove the +hindrances it encounters and let it have the first play. Nature is +behind the reformer, often unseen, always efficient, and, in the end, +resistless. To get a glimpse of what it can do and what man can help it +do is to get a vision of the kingdoms of the earth, and the glory of +them--a glory that may come from a moral redemption of the economic +system. It is a redemption that man and nature can together bring about +if only man himself is worthy of this alliance. + +Differences of mere interest between the various social classes are +inevitable. There will never be a time when, in the division of any +common property, the mere bald interests of the claimants are alike. +When two fishermen own one boat and fish together, each one is +interested in taking the whole catch. They divide, however, by a fair +rule and live in peace. Any similar division may proceed in harmony if +what the parties want is justice. Till recently American workmen have +lived with their employers without hating them; and if wages can be +fixed now by some appeal to the principle of justice, they can live +with them in that way again. This means a better method of adjudicating +claims than by a crude test of strength. There is no time to discuss a +scheme by which this can be done. I must claim that it can be done, and +take the responsibility of proving it when more time is available. +There are beginnings of a good method in New Zealand, in Australia, and +in Canada, and the point I am making now is that if we get a plan which +works well in the United States, we shall save a deplorable waste and +do more to revive the spirit of fraternity than we can by any measure +ever attempted. Struggles of classes there may be, as there are between +buyers and sellers everywhere; but this need not make the parties +enemies. Its effects do not need to extend to the heart and character +and to put distrust and hatred in the place of confidence and good +will. The moral effects of this reform will be the best ones, but the +economic effects also will be vast and beneficent. + +I am not predicting a complete millennium merely as the result of the +reforms I have described. That would require also the moral perfection +of the human race. Not a little moral improvement is to be expected as +the effect of these measures, but it is too much to claim that they +will repress all vice and crime, reclaim all criminals, and give to +the race generally a keen devotion to duty. A belief in a State where +even this will be realized is deeply implanted in human nature, and +Socialism itself might easily get a major premise from it. The +syllogism would run thus: (1) A better State is bound to come. (2) It +cannot come under the system of private capital. (3) Therefore that +system must be abolished. So would we all say if the minor premise were +true--"The good State is impossible under private capital." We claim +that it is possible and that we can see how to realize it. We can trace +the forces which, without revolution, will make work lighter, pay +better. We also can make a syllogism, and it reads thus: (1) The +present State is tolerable. (2) Every reform will make it better, and +there are many to be made. (3) The coming State will be whatever we +have wit and energy enough to make it. + +Our plea for the justice of the coming system will not convince any man +who starts with the assertion that capital ought to have _no_ return +whatever, and that interest is robbery, and that the men who bring +empty hands to the mill should take all the product of it. To most +men's instinctive judgment this view does not appeal. The general +verdict is that it is right for capital to get something. + +If we are fishing together from the shore and I make a canoe which +multiplies my catch by five, I have a right to the extra return which +my new instrument gives me. If my neighbor asks me to lend it to him +and I do so, I deprive myself of the extra product I have been getting +by means of it, and it is right for him to pay me interest on the cost +of the boat. He can do it and make money by the transaction. If his +catch is now five times what it was, he can afford to pay me a part of +the extra return and still be better off than he was before. + +If my share is still large, other men will make boats and offer them +for hire. They will compete in lending them till a modest percentage of +the cost is all that any owner can get. The borrowers will then get the +major benefit. This implies competition and shows the necessity of +preserving it. + +If, in lieu of lending my canoe, I persuade another man to take it and +fish for me, I shall have to give him more fish than he was originally +catching; and the more the boats multiply, the larger the share which +will have to be given to the men who are hired to work them, and the +smaller the share which will be kept by the owner of any one boat. +_Under a normal condition, multiplying capital means in itself higher +wages._ Higher wages mean that laborers, in the end, begin to get boats +of their own, or shares in boats, and that the laboring-class and the +capitalist class are more and more merged. Invention--that is, devising +and introducing canoes--and accumulation of capital--that is, active +canoe-building--mean for laborers higher pay and a chance to save +capital. + +Do you tell me that this is a primitive State, an Eden of the past and +hopelessly vanished from the present earth; that it is a lost Paradise +whose gates are forever barred? The whole point of the economic study +of which I have given the briefest outline is that it is practicable to +create in complex modern life the most essential condition of this +primitive life--its tendency toward justice. In the Scriptures the +primitive Eden was a garden, but the New Jerusalem is a city. What we +have before us for study is a vast centralized economic system +suggesting the city; and we have to see what can be made of it. + +It is something extremely good. The late Edward Atkinson was fond of +saying that, if improvements are allowed to do their best, the time +will come when, as he expressed it, "it will not pay to be rich." The +workers will be so comfortable that the care of a great capital will +more than offset any additional comfort a man can get by owning it. +Grotesquely exaggerated as this claim may appear to be, it was based on +serious economic study. There are forces at work which, if they have +free play, will carry human life very far in the direction of the State +so described, with its comfort, contentment, and fraternity. + +That fraternity is possible in spite of sharp contention is clear +whenever athletic teams meet and celebrate a game which has been a +victory for one and a defeat for the other; and the parties that +contend in the great industrial field may be equally brotherly if they +play fairly. Foul play always means enmity, and fair play, friendship. +The finest possible type of character grows up in the course of keen +but honorable rivalry. The noblest manhood that can anywhere be +developed would come from competing vigorously in the market and living +together as brothers when the contest closes. The beaten man may not +enjoy his defeat, but he may act rightly and feel rightly toward the +victor. Develop in these economic contests the sense of justice--let +both parties seek to follow a rule of right--and men's hearts, at +least, will not need to be embittered. You will then see a contest, +which, when it is waged with bombs and bludgeons, looks like a Sheol, +so changed that it shall open the way to a transformed world and make +the hope of a future Eden no day-dream, but a scientific deduction from +cosmic law. We may build a new earth out of the difficult material we +have to work with, and cause justice and kindness to rule in the very +place where strife now holds sway. A New Jerusalem may actually arise +out of the fierce contentions of the modern market. The wrath of men +may praise God and his Kingdom may come, not in spite of, but by means +of the contests of the economic sphere. + +Socialism can have no monopoly of beatific visions. It offers much in +that direction. It draws a picture of a future State of great riches +and general equality; and the picture is glorified by a vision of +general brotherhood. To some this seems more attractive than any other +which imagination can create. I confess to a preference for a prospect +which assures, before all else, the continuance of progress, and shows +humanity striving to make forward steps and actually making them so +long as the universe shall exist. As between a stationary paradise and +a progressive purgatory, I should prefer the latter, for the sake of +the permanent well-being of the human race; but what I should choose in +preference to either is a progressive paradise. The capacity for +further improvement is the essential trait of the best condition now in +sight. The reformer can point to his delectable mountains and trace an +unending route to and over them, as they rise range beyond range and +lose themselves in the distance. Men are, in general, following the +route, and each generation advances beyond the point attained by its +predecessor. Every step is forward and upward, and the nearest goal +will soon be reached and passed. Our descendants will reach a better +and more distant goal and then press on to something remoter and still +better. Again and again barriers seemingly insurmountable will be +passed. The impossibility of to-day will be the reality of to-morrow, +and the dazzling vision of to-day will be the reality of the future and +the starting-point for still grander achievements. + + +The Riverside Press +CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS +U . S . 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