Socialism and Democracy in Europe Part 1

Socialism and Democracy in Europe.

by Samuel P. Orth.

PREFACE

It is becoming more and more evident that democracy has served only the first years of its apprenticeship. Political problems have served only to introduce popular government. The economic problems now rushing upon us will bring the real test of democracy.

The workingman has taken an advanced place in the struggle for the democratization of industry. He has done so, first, through the organization of labor unions; secondly, through the development of political parties--labor parties. The blend of politics and economics which he affects is loosely called Socialism. The term is as indefinite in meaning as it is potent in influence. It has spread its unctuous doctrines over every industrial land, and its representatives sit in every important parliament, including our Congress.

Such a movement requires careful consideration from every point of view.

It is the object of this volume to trace briefly the growth of the movement in four leading European countries, and to attempt to determine the relation of economic and political Socialism to democracy--a question of peculiar interest to the friends of the American Republic at this time.

In preparing this volume, the author has made extended visits to the countries studied. He has tried to catch the spirit of the movement by personal contact with the Socialist leaders and their antagonists, and by many interviews with laboring men, the rank and file in every country visited.

Everywhere he was received with the greatest cordiality, and he wishes here to express his appreciation of these many kindnesses.

He wishes especially to acknowledge his obligations to the following gentlemen: Mr. Graham Wallas of the University of London; Mr. W.G.

Towler of the London Munic.i.p.al Society; Mr. John Hobson of London, and Mr. J.S. Middleton, a.s.sistant secretary of the Labor Party; to Dr.

Robert Herz and Prof. Charles Gide of the University of Paris; Dr.

Albert Thomas and M. Adolphe Landry of the Chamber of Deputies; M.

Jean Longuet, editor of _L'Humanite_; to Dr. Franz Oppenheimer of the University of Berlin; Dr. Sudek.u.m of the Reichstag; Dr. Hilferding, editor of _Vorwarts_; Prof. T.H. Norton, American Consul at Chemnitz; M. Camille Huysmans, secretary of the "International," Brussels; as well as to many American friends for providing letters of introduction which opened many useful and congenial doorways.

S.P.O.

January, 1913.

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION--WHY DOES SOCIALISM EXIST?

The answer to this question will bring us nearer to the core of the social movement than any attempted definition. The French Socialist program begins with the a.s.sertion, "Socialism is a question of cla.s.s."

Cla.s.s distinction is the generator of Socialism.

The ordinary social triptych--upper, middle, and lower cla.s.ses--will not suffice us in our inquiry. We must distinguish between the functions of the cla.s.ses. The upper cla.s.s is a remnant of the feudal days, of the manorial times, when land-holding brought with it social distinction and political prerogative. In this sense we have no upper cla.s.s in America. The middle cla.s.s is composed of the business and professional element, and the lower cla.s.s of the wage-earning element.

There are two words, as yet quite unfamiliar to American readers, which are met with constantly in European works on Socialism and are heard on every hand in political discussions--_proletariat_ and _bourgeois_. The proletariat are the wage-earning cla.s.s, the poor, the underlings. The bourgeois[1] are roughly the middle cla.s.s. The French divide them into _pet.i.ts_ bourgeois and _grands_ bourgeois.

Werner Sombart divides them into lower middle cla.s.s, the manual laborers who represent the guild system, and bourgeoisie, the representatives of the capitalistic system.[2]

It will thus be seen that these divisions have a historical basis. The upper cla.s.s reflect the days of feudalism, of governmental prerogative and aristocracy. The middle cla.s.s are the representatives of the guild and mercantile systems, when hand labor and later business ac.u.men brought power and wealth to the craftsman and adventurer. The lower cla.s.s are the h.o.m.ologues of the slaves, the serfs, the toilers, whose reward has constantly been measured by the standard of bare existence.

Socialism arises consciously out of the efforts of this cla.s.s to win for itself a share of the powers of the other cla.s.ses. It is necessary to understand that while this cla.s.s distinction is historic in origin it is essentially economic in fact. It is not "social"; a middle-cla.s.s millionaire may be congenial to the social circles of the high-born.

It is not political; a workingman may vote with any party he chooses.

He may ally himself with the conservative Center as he sometimes does in Germany, or with the Liberal Party as he sometimes does in England, or with either of the old parties as he does in the United States. On the other hand, a bourgeois may be a Socialist and vote with the proletarians. Indeed, many of the Socialist leaders belong to the well-to-do middle cla.s.s.

This cla.s.s distinction, then, is economic. It is a distinction of function, the function of the capitalist and the function of the wage-earner. Let us go one step further; it is a distinction in property. The possessor of private wealth can become a capitalist by investing his money in productive enterprise. He then becomes the employer of labor. There are all grades of capitalists, from the master wagon-maker who works by the side of his one or two workmen, to the "captain" of a vast industry that gives employment to thousands of men and turns out a wagon a minute.

The inst.i.tution of private property is the basis of Socialism because it is the basis of capitalistic production. It places in one man's hands the power of owning raw material, machinery, land, factory, and finished product; and the power of hiring men to operate the machinery, and to convert the raw material into marketable wares. As long as this power was limited to hand industry the proletarian movement was abortive. When the industrial revolution linked the ingenuity of man to the power of nature it so multiplied the potency of the possessor that the proletarian movement by stress of circ.u.mstances became a great factor in industrial life.

While the possession either of wealth or family tradition was always the basis of cla.s.s distinction, the industrial revolution brought with it the enormously multiplied power of capital and the glorification of riches. The proletarians multiplied rapidly in number, and all the evils of sharp cla.s.s distinction were heightened. In all lands where capitalistic production spread, the two cla.s.ses grew farther apart, the distinction between possessor and wage-earner increased.

It is not the mere possession of wealth, however, which forms the animus of the Socialist movement. It is probably not even the abuse of this wealth, although this is a large factor in the problem. It is the psychological effect of the capitalist system that is the real enginery of Socialism. It is the cla.s.s feeling, the consciousness of the workingman that he is contributing muscle and blood and sweat to the perfection of an article whose possession he does not share. This feeling is aroused by the contrasts of life that the worker constantly sees around him. He feels that his own life energy has contributed to the magnificent equipages and the palatial luxuries of his employer.

He compares his own lot and that of his family with the lot of the capitalist. This feeling of envy is not blunted by the kaleidoscopic suddenness with which changes of fortune can take place in America to-day. By some stroke of luck or piece of ingenious planning, a receiver of wages to-day may be the giver of wages to-morrow.

Nor does the spread of education and intelligence dull the contrasts.

It greatly heightens them. The workman can now begin to a.n.a.lyze the conditions under which he lives. He ponders over the distinctions that are actual and contrasts them with his imagined utopia. To him the differences between employer and employee are not natural. He does not attribute them to any fault or shortcoming or inferiority of his own, nor of his master, but to a flaw in the organization of society. The social order is wrong.

The workingman has become the critic. Here you have the heart of Socialism. Whatever form its outward aspect may take, at heart it is a rebellion against things as they are. And whatever may be the syllogisms of its logic, or the formularies of its philosophy, they all begin with a grievance, that things as they are are wrong; and they all end in a hope for a better society of to-morrow where the inequalities shall somehow be made right.

In his struggle toward a new economic ideal, the proletarian has achieved a cla.s.s h.o.m.ogeneity and self-consciousness. The individuality that is denied him in industry he has sought and found among his own brethren. In the great factory he loses even his name and becomes number so-and-so. In his union and in his party he a.s.serts his individuality with a grim and impressive stubbornness. The gravitation of common ideals and common protests draws these forgotten particles of industrialism into a ma.s.sed consciousness that is to-day one of the world's great potencies. The very fact that we call this body of workers "the ma.s.ses" is significant. We speak of them as a geologist speaks of his "bas.e.m.e.nt complex." We recognize unconsciously that they form the foundation of our economic life.

The cla.s.s struggle, then, is between two clearly defined and self-conscious elements in modern industrial life that are the natural product of our machine industry. On the one hand is the business man pursuing with fevered energy the profits that are the goal of his activity; on the other hand are the workingmen who, more and more sullen in their discontent, are clamoring louder each year for a greater share of the wealth they believe their toil creates.

There is some reason to believe that this cla.s.s basis of Socialism is vanishing. In England J. Ramsay MacDonald denies its significance.[3]

Revisionists and progressive Socialists, who are throwing aside the Marxian dogmas, are also preaching the universality of the Socialist conception. However, the economic factor based on cla.s.s functions remains the essence of the social movement.[4]

What are the ideals of Socialism? They are not merely economic or social, they embrace all life. After one has taken the pains to read the more important ma.s.s of Socialist literature, books, pamphlets, and some current newspapers and magazines, and has listened to their orators and talked with their leaders, confusion still remains in the mind. The movement is so all-embracing that it has no clearly defined limits. The Socialists are feeling their way from protest into practice. Their heads are in the clouds; of this you are certain as you proceed through their books and listen to their speeches. But are their feet upon the earth?

For a literature of protest against "suffering, misery, and injustice," as Owen calls it, there is a wonderful buoyancy and hope in their words. It is one of the secrets of its power that Socialism is not the energy of despair. It is the demand for the right to live fully, joyfully, and in comfort. The Socialists demand ozone in their air, nutrition in their food, heartiness in their laughter, ease in their homes, and their days must have hours of relaxation.

The awakening aspirations of the proletarian were expressed by one of their own number, William Weitling, a tailor of Magdeburg. He afterwards migrated to America and became one of our first Socialist agitators. His book is called _Garantieen der Harmonie und Freiheit_ (Guaranties of Harmony and Liberty). The book is illogical, full of contradictions, and all of the errors of a child's reasoning. But it remains the workingman's cla.s.sic philippic, one of the most trenchant recitals of social wrongs, because it blends, with the illogical terminology of sentimentalism, the a.s.surance of hope. "Property," he says, "is the root of all evil." Gold is the symbol of this world of wrongs. "We have become as accustomed to our coppers as the devil to his h.e.l.l." When the rule of gold shall cease, then "the teardrops which are the tokens of true brotherliness will return to the dry eyes of the selfish, the soul of the evildoer will be filled with n.o.ble and virtuous sentiments such as he had never known before, and the impious ones who have hitherto denied G.o.d will sing His praise." The humble tailor is a.s.sured that the reign of property will be terminated and the age of humanity begin, and he calls to the workingman, "Forward, brethren; with the curse of Mammon on our lips, let us await the hour of our emanc.i.p.ation, when our tears will be trans.m.u.ted into pearls of dew, our earth transformed into a paradise, and all of mankind united into one happy family."[5] Nor is the closing cry of his book without an element of prophecy. He addresses the "mighty ones of this earth,"

admonishing them that they may secure the fame of Alexander and Napoleon by the deeds of emanc.i.p.ation which lie in their power. "But if you compel us (the proletarians) to undertake the task alone with our raw material, then it will be accomplished only after weary toil and pain to us and to you."

Let us turn to Robert Owen, who was at an early age the most successful cotton spinner in England. He adapted an old philosophy to a new humanitarianism. He saw that a "gradual increase in the number of our paupers has accompanied our increasing wealth."[6] He began the series of experiments which made his name familiar in England and America and made him known in history as the greatest experimental communist. His experiments have failed. But his hopefulness persists.

In his address delivered at the dedication of New Lanark, 1816, he said that he had found plenty of unhappiness and plenty of misery.

"But from this day a change must take place; a new era must commence; the human intellect, through the whole extent of the earth, hitherto enveloped by the grossest ignorance and superst.i.tion, must begin to be released from its state of darkness; nor shall nourishment henceforth be given to the seeds of disunion and division among men. For the time has come when the means may be prepared to train all the nations of the world in that knowledge which shall _impel them not only to love but to be actively kind to each other in the whole of their conduct, without a single exception_."

Here is an all-inclusive hopefulness. Its significance is not diminished by the fact that it was spoken of his own peculiar remedy by education and environment.

This faith and hope runs through all their books like a golden song.

Excepting Marx, he was the great gloomy one. Even those who condemn modern society with the most scathing adjectives link with their denunciations the most sanguine sentences of hope.

The Christian Socialism of Kingsley is filled with optimism. "Look up, my brother Christians, open your eyes, the hour of a new crusade has struck."[7]

The song of the new crusade was sung by Robert Morris:

"Come, shoulder to shoulder ere the world grows older!

Help lies in naught but thee and me; Hope is before us, the long years that bore us, Bore leaders more than men may be.

"Let dead hearts tarry and trade and marry, And trembling nurse their dreams of mirth, While we, the living, our lives are giving To bring the bright new world to birth."

This song of hope is sung to-day by thousands of marching Socialists.

Their bitter experiences in parliaments and in strikes, and all the warfare of politics and trade, have not blighted their rosy hope. They are still looking forward to "the bright new world," in which a new social order shall reign.