Principles of Political Economy Part 39

[Footnote 252-3: Among the Maoris, the number of sterile women is 9 times as great as the average in Europe. Compare Reise der Novara, III, 129.]

[Footnote 252-4: The decreasing number of English Quakers, among whom, in 1680-89, there occurred 2,598 marriages, and in 1840-49 only 659, finds expression in the unfrequency of marriage, a comparatively small number of women and a small number of children, all in conjunction with a small mortality. (Statist. Journ., 1859, 208 ff.) There is no reason to have recourse here to vice as a cause, and scarcely to physiological reasons for an explanation, because these phenomena are accounted for in great part by the fact that adult males so frequently leave the sect.]

[Footnote 252-5: In this respect, however, there is a great difference between bondage and slavery. As early a writer as _Polybius_ speaks of the depopulation of Greece. (_Polyb._, II, 55; x.x.xVII, 4.) He looks for the cause in this, that in every family, for luxury's sake, either no children whatever were wanted, or at most from one to two, that the latter might be left rich. (Exc. Vat., 448.) Very remarkable, _Seneca_, Cons. ad. Marc, 19. Further, _Cicero_, ad. Div., II, 5. _Strabo_, VII, 501; VIII, 595; IX, 617, 629.

_Pausan._, VII, 18; VIII, 7; X, 4; _Dio Chr._, VII, 34, 121; x.x.xIII, 25. _Plutarch_ claimed that h.e.l.las could, in his time, number scarcely 3,000 hoplites, while in the time of Themistocles, Megalis alone had put as many in the field.

(De Defectu Orac., S.) Antium and Tarentum similarly declined under Nero. (_Tacit_., Ann., XIV, 27.) The depopulation even of the capital, which began under Tiberius, is apparent from _Tacit._, Ann., IV, 4, 27.

National beauty also declined with the nation's populousness. _aeschines_ saw a great many beautiful youths in Athens (adv. Timarch., 31); _Cotta_, only very few (_Cicero_, de Nat. Deorum, I, 28); _Dio Chrysostomus_, almost none at all (Orat., XXI). On the necessary lowering of the military standard of measure, see _Theod._, Cod., VII, 13, 3, _Verget_, de Re milit., I, 5. The depopulation of the later _orbis terrarum_ is confirmed by the easiness of the new division of land with the German conquerors.

Compare _Gaupp_, Die Germanischen Niederla.s.sungen und Landtheilungen (1845), pa.s.sim.]

CHAPTER III.

POPULATION-POLICY.

SECTION CCLIII.

DENSE POPULATION.--OVER-POPULATION.

The nation's economy attains its full development wherever the greatest number of human beings simultaneously find the fullest satisfaction of their wants.

A dense population is not only a symptom of the existence of great productive forces carried to a high point of utilization;[253-1] but is itself a productive force,[253-2] and of the utmost importance as a spur and as an auxiliary to the utilization of all other forces. The new is always attractive, by reason of its newness; but at the same time, we hold to the old too precisely because of its age: and the force of inertia would always turn the scales in favor of the latter. This inertia, both physical and mental is so general, that perhaps the majority of mankind would continue forever satisfied with their traditional field of occupation and with their traditional circle of food, were it not that an impulse as powerful and universal as the s.e.xual and that of the love of children compelled them to extend the limits of both. That man might subdue the whole earth it was necessary that the Creator should make the tendency of man to multiply his kind more powerful than the original production-tendency of his earliest home. The unknown far-away deters as much as it attracts.[253-3] It is easy to see how the division and combination of labor become uniformly easier as population increases in density. Think only of large cities as compared with the country.[253-4] "Under-populated"[253-5] countries, which might easily support a large number of human beings, and which, notwithstanding have for a long period of time had only few inhabitants, are on this account abodes of poverty, regions where education and progress are unknown. While, therefore, it cannot be questioned that a nation under otherwise equal circ.u.mstances is more powerful and flourishing in proportion as its population embraces a large number of vigorous, well-to-do, educated and happy human beings, the last mentioned attributes should not be left out of consideration.

The possibility of over-population is contested by a great many theorizers (-- 243); and, indeed, the complaints on this score are in most cases only a baseless pretext of the inertia which feels the pressure of the population without being helped and spurred thereby to an increase of the means of subsistence. This inertia itself, especially when it governs a whole nation, is a fact which cannot be ignored.

Over-population, as I use the term, exists whenever the disproportion between the population and the means of subsistence operates in such away that the average portion of the latter which falls to the share of each is oppressively small, whether the effect produced thereby manifests itself in a surprisingly large mortality, or in the limitation of marriages and of the procreation of children carried to the point of hardship. Over-population of this kind is, as a rule, curable by extending the limits of the field of food, either as a result of the advance of civilization at home, or by emigration.

That the whole earth should be incurably over-peopled is an exceedingly remote contingency.[253-6] But where, within a smaller circle, by reason of the great stupidity or weakness of mankind, or by the too great power of circ.u.mstances, over-population cannot act as a spur to new activity, it is indeed one of the most serious and most dangerous political diseases.[253-7] The immoderate compet.i.tion of workmen involves the majority of the nation in misery, not only materially but also morally; one of the most dangerous temptations, for the rich to a contempt for human kind, for the poor to envy, dishonesty and prost.i.tution. In every suffocating crowd, the animal part of man is wont to obtain the victory over the intellectual. Precisely the simplest, most universal and most necessary relations are most radically and disastrously affected by the difficulty or impossibility of contracting marriage, and the sore solicitude for the future of one's children.[253-8]

[Footnote 253-1: A map of Europe, which would show the density of population by the intensity of shade, would be darkest in the vicinity of the lines between Sicily and Scotland, between Paris and Saxony, and grow lighter in proportion to the distance from their point of intersection.

Italy is the country with the earliest highly developed national economy of modern times, and England that which possesses the most highly cultivated national economy; as the Rhine is, from the standpoint of civilization, the most important river in Europe. It is remarkable, in this connection, how slowly population increased in all European countries during the 18th century, and how rapidly after the beginning of the 19th, and especially since 1825. According to _Dieterici_ (Berliner Akademie, 16 Mai, 1850), the population increased annually per geographical square mile:

=========================================================== _In_ |_1700-1800._|_1800-1825._|_1824-1846._ ---------------------+------------+-----------+------------ | BY | BY | BY France | 4 | 16 | 32 Naples, | 15 | 18 | 49 Piedmont, | 6 | 8 | 50 Lombardy, | 19 | 40 | 80 England and Wales, | 16 | 42 | 136 Scotland, | 3 | 16 | 34 Ireland, | 17 | 80 | 77 Holland, | 13 | 14 | 95 Belgium, | 15 | 44 | 136 Prussia, | 7 | 17 | 68 Hanover, | 6 | 12 | 32 Wurttemberg, | 17 | 12 | 56 Bohemia, | 16 | 27 | 73 ===========================================================]

[Footnote 253-2: "The useful rearing of children the most productive of all outlay." (_Roesler._)]

[Footnote 253-3: Compare _J. Harrington_ (ob. 1677), Prerogative of a popular Government, I, ch. II; _Sir J.

Stewart_, Principles, I, ch. 18; _Malthus_, Principle of Population, IV, ch. 1; _McCulloch_ very happily shows how seldom those who can live comfortably without it are extraordinarily active. The Malthusian law prevents this ever becoming the condition of the majority. Precisely during those years that man is most capable of labor, there is a prospect of a great increase of outlay, in case one does not remain single, which would inevitably degrade every one, a few over-rich excepted, who had not taken care to provide for a corresponding increase of income. Were it not for this, human progress would become slower and slower, for the reason that the _dura necessitas_ would be felt less and less.]

[Footnote 253-4: According to _Purves_, Principles of Population, 1818, 456, there were, in England (London not included):

Column Head Key A: _In the seven most densely populated counties._ B: _In the seven counties of average population.

C: _In the five most spa.r.s.ely populated counties.

| A | B | C ----------------------------+-----------+---------+--------- Inhabitants per | | | geographical sq. mile, | 4,904 | 2,229 | 1,061 One man with 60 income | | | in every |34 inhab'ts| 37 | 77 One man with 200 income | | | in every | 193 " | 199 | 472 Aggregate of all incomes | | | over 200 per square mile,| 25,118 | 12,676 | 2,441 ----------------------------+-----------+---------+---------

Compare _Rau_, Lehrbuch, II, -- 13. Something a.n.a.logous has frequently been observed as to taxation capacity. Thus, for instance, the Hessian provinces paid in direct taxation and taxation on wines, liquors, etc.; and the density of the population was in the ratio--

In Rhenish Hessen, 100 100.

In Starkenburg, 65 64.

In Upper Hessen, 64 59.

(_Rau_, Lehrbuch, III, -- 280.) In many European countries, the population has for a long period of time, and in a comfortable way, increased most rapidly where it has been densest. Thus, for instance, the kingdom of Saxony was, in 1837, the most densely populated of all the monarchical states of Germany (6,076 inhabitants per square mile), Hanover (2,416) and Mecklenburg-Schwerin (2,004) were among the most spa.r.s.ely peopled. And yet the annual increase of population between 1837 and 1858 was greatest in Saxony (1.36 per cent.) while Hanover (0.44) and Mecklenburg-Schwerin (0.59) stood very low in this respect.

In very thinly populated countries, nature permits even the civilized man to deteriorate: thus the French in Canada, the Spaniard in the valley of the La Plata.]

[Footnote 253-5: This excellent expression seems to have been first used by _Gerstner_, Grundlehren der Staatsverwaltung, 1864, II, 1, 176 ff. It must indeed be distinguished from a rapidly growing, but for the time being, a spa.r.s.ely settled country. A nation with an equal population on a larger surface is, frequently in the immediate present weaker than another in which the population is more dense; but it has the advantage of a greater possibility of growth in the future. Think of the electorates of Saxe and of Brandenburg in the sixteenth century. Just as _Thaer_, Landwirthschaftliche Gewerbelehre, -- 149, advises that a mere annuitant should, values being the same, rather purchase a smaller fertile estate; a very able husbandman the reverse.]

[Footnote 253-6: We need only call to mind such facts as for instance that the United States wealth of coal is 22 times as great as that of Great Britain. (_Rogers_, The Coal Formation and a Description of the Coal Fields of North America and Great Britain, 1858.) In addition to this, only about 16 per cent. of the combustible material is really used in the way furnaces are now generally filled, only 10 per cent. in foundry furnaces, and from 14 to 15 per cent.

in the transportation of pa.s.sengers on railways. The Falls of Niagara afford a water-power equal to 2/3 of all the steam engines which existed, a short time since, in the whole world. (_E. Hermann_, Principien der Wirthschaft, 1873, p. 49, 153, 243.) But that single families, houses, branches of business, etc. may be over-peopled, and the impoverishing disproportion between numbers and the means of subsistence not be susceptible of immediate removal by the unaided power of the crowded circle, cannot be questioned.]

[Footnote 253-7: _Aristotle_ had recognized the possibility of over-population. (Polit., II, 4, 3, 7, 4; VII, 4, 5; VII, 14.) _Schmitthenner_, Staatswisensschaften, I, distinguishes between relative and absolute over-population: the former is remediable by intellectual and especially by political development, while the latter borders on the extreme physical and possible limits of the means of subsistence.

_W. Thornton_, Over-population and its Remedy, 1849, 9, considers a country in English circ.u.mstances over-populated when a man between twenty and seventy years of age is not in a condition to support, by means of his wages, 1 persons in need of a.s.sistance (children under 10, women over 60, and men over 70 years of age).]

[Footnote 253-8: Thus, for instance, in war, one million of peasants are infinitely more powerful, especially in case of a protracted defensive war, than two millions of proletarians. Alaric's saying: "thick-growing gra.s.s is most easily mowed."]

SECTION CCLIV.

THE IDEAL OF POPULATION.

Hence it was not an erroneous policy that most governments have sought to promote the increase of population in undeveloped nations. So far as the influence of the acts of government can reach, such a course must tend to the earlier maturity of a people's economy. Much more questionable are positive provisions by government intended to hinder the further increase of population in a country already supposed to be fully peopled; if for no other reason, because even the deepest, most varied and extensive knowledge can scarcely ever predict with certainty that no further extension of the field of food is possible under the spur of momentary over-population; and also because questions of population reach so far into the life and tenderest feelings of the individual that a government which has regard for the personal freedom of its subjects, instead of promoting or hindering marriage, emigration etc. by police regulations, cannot but limit itself to a statistical knowledge and legislative regulation of these relations.[254-1] [254-2]

Whether the population of a country increase in a well-to-do or proletarian manner; whether, therefore, the state should rejoice or lament over such increase, may generally be inferred with some certainty from the other conditions of the country's economy, especially from the height of the rate of wages and from the consumption of the nation (-- 230). Thus, for instance, the population of England, between 1815 and 1847, increased 47 per cent.; but during the same period the value of its exports increased 63 per cent.; the tonnage of its merchant marine, 55 per cent.; the amount yielded by the tax on legacies, and therefore moveable property, by 93 per cent.; the value of immoveable property by 78 per cent. Wherever in agriculture the ancient system of triennial rotation (_Dreifelder-system_ = _three-field system_) has been exchanged for the so-called English system, not only is a greater number of men supported, but, as a rule, each is more abundantly provided for.[254-3]

The construction of new houses is an especially good symptom, because a habitation is a want which governs many others, and which, at the same time, may be much curtailed in case of need. Only, there should be no thoughtless building speculations, the existence or absence of which may readily be inferred from the ratio between the rent of houses and the rate of interest usual in the country. In England and Wales there was, in 1801, one house to every 5.7 inhabitants; in 1821, to every 5.8; in 1841, to every 5.4; in 1861, to every 5.39; in 1871, to every 5.35.[254-4]

The taking of the census at regular intervals in accordance with the principles of modern science, and with the apparatus of modern art, is one of the chief means to enable us to form a correct judgment of the health of the national life and of the goodness of the state.[254-5]

[Footnote 254-1: Compare _R. Mohl_, Polizeiwissenschaft, I, -- 15.]

[Footnote 254-2: There may be observed a regular ebb and flow in the opinions of theorizers on this subject. During the latter, great enthusiasm is manifested over the increase of population, which is considered an unqualified benefit; later, over-population gives rise to uneasiness. Not many had as much insight as Henry IV.: _la force et la richesse des rois consistent dans le nombre et dans l'opulence des sujets_. (Edict., in _Wolowski_ in the Memoires de l'Acad.

des Sciences morales et politiques, 1855.) Thus, for instance, _Luther_, in his sermons on the married state, advises all young men to marry at 20, and all young women at from 15 to 18 years of age. The person who fails to marry because he cannot support a family has no real confidence in G.o.d. G.o.d will not allow those who obey his command to want the necessaries of life. Werke by _Irmischer_, XX, 77 ff. In England, great dread of depopulation under the first two Tudors: 4 Henry VII., c. 19; 3 Henry VIII., c. 8. _J.

Bodinus_, De Rep., VI, is charmed with the Lex Julia et Papia Poppaea. Its repeal was immediately followed by the greatest looseness of morals and by depopulation.

On the other hand, a great dread of over-population prevailed among English political economists at the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century.

They recommended their colonial projects by saying that they desired to avert this danger. Thus, for instance, _Raleigh_, History of the World, I, ch. 4; _Bacon_, Sermones fid., 15, 33, and his essay, De Colonies in Hiberniam deducendis.

Compare _Roscher_, Zur Geschichte der englischen Volkswirthschaftslehre, 24, 26, 31, 34, 42. Similarly, at the end of the fifteenth century, in highly developed Italy, which had become stationary. According to _F. Patricius_ (De Inst. Republ., VI, 4; VII, 12): _incolarum mult.i.tudo periculosa est in omni populo_. Since _Colbert's_ time, the opposite opinion has become the prevailing one. The densest population had been observed in the wealthiest and relatively the most powerful countries, and people thought they had here sufficient data for a wide generalization. The thought of military conscription by degrees obtained weight in this connection. Thus, _Saavedra Faxardo_, Idea Principis christiano-politici (1649), Symb. 66; _De la Court_, Aanwysing (1699), I, 9. _Sir W. Temple_, says that the fundamental cause of all commerce and wealth lies in a dense population, which compels men to the practice of industry and frugality. (Works, I, 162 ff., 171, III, 2.) _Imperii potentia ex civium numero astimanda est._ (_Spinoza_, Tract, politicus, VII, 18.)

Thus _Petty_ says that 1,000 acres which can support 1,000 men are better than 10,000 which do the same thing. He would give Scotland and Ireland up entirely, and have the inhabitants settle in England. In this way all combination for common purposes would be facilitated. (Several Essays, 107 seq., 147 ff.) Peter the Great is said to have entertained a similar view: uvres de Frederic le Grand, II, 23. More moderate is _Child_, Discourse of Trade, 298, and still more so in 368 ff.; _Locke_, Works, I, 73 ff.; II, 3, 6, 191. In Germany, _v. Seckendorff_ advises that great establishments for children should be erected, in which orphans and even the children of poor parents should be brought up at the expense of the state, simply with the object of increasing the number of healthy men. (Teutscher Furstenstaat, ed. 1678, 203, Add. 179.) _Becher_, Polit.

Discours, 21, would have murderers punished because they detract from population, although he elsewhere in his definition of a city, "a nourishing populous community," is no blind enthusiast over-population. According to _v.

Horneck_; Oesterreich uber Alles, 1684, 29 ff., the third fundamental rule of public economy is the greatest possible increase and employment of men. _Vera regni potestas in hominem numero consist.i.t; ubi enim sunt homines, ibi substantiae et vires._ (_Leibnitz_, ed., Dutens, IV, 2, 502.) According to _Vauban_, Dime royale, 150, Daire, no child can be born of a subject by which the king is not a gainer.

Compare 46,145. Numbers of People the greatest riches.

(_Law_, Trade and Money, 209.) Similarly, Law's disciple _Melon_, Essai politique sur le Commerce, ch. I, 3. The number of people is both means and motive to industry (_Berkeley_, Works, II, 187) and hence the public are interested in nothing so much as in the production of competent citizens. (Querist, Nr., 206.) _Sussmilch_, Gottl.

Ordnung, I, Kap. 10; uvres de Frederic M. IV, 4; VI, 82.

About the middle of the 18th century, we find a whole school of political thinkers who decide every question from the standpoint of the influence of the solution on the increase of population. (Excellently refuted by _Schlozer,_ Anfangsgrunde, II, 15 ff.) Thus especially _Tucker_, Important Questions, IV, 11; V, 5; VII, 4; VIII, 5. Four Tracts, 70. _Forbonnais_, Finances de France, I, 351, who considered it one of the princ.i.p.al objects of a good industrial policy to employ the greatest possible number of men. _Necker_, Sur le Commerce et la Legislation des Grains, 1776. _v. Sonnenfels_, Grundsatze der Polizei, Handlung und Finanz (1765), in which the principle of population is called the highest principle of all four sciences of the state (I, -- 25 ff.). These writers understand the "balance of trade" in such a way, that a nation always operates most advantageously which gives employment to the largest number of men with its export articles, (_v. Sonnenfels_, II, -- 210 ff., 354 ff.) _v. Justi_, Staatswissenschaft, I, 160 ff., says plainly that a country can never have too many men.

According to _Darjes_, Erste Grunde, 379, "even the increase of beggars brings something into the treasury by means of the excise tax which they pay." Compare, also, _J. J.

Rousseau_, Contrat Social, III, 9; _Galiani_, Della Moneta, II, 4; _Verri_, Opuscoli, 325; _Filangieri_, Leggi Politiche ed Economiche, II, 2; _Paley_, Moral and Political Philosophy, III, ch. 11. On similar grounds, _A. Young_ laments that the increase of proletarians is greatly hindered by the English poor laws. (In later writings it is somewhat different: compare Travels in France, I, ch. 12.) How deeply such ideas had penetrated public opinion is apparent from the opening words of the Vicar of Wakefield, as well as from the declaration of _Pitt_ in parliament in 1796, that a man who had enriched his country with a number of children had a claim upon its a.s.sistance to educate them.