Socialism and Democracy in Europe Part 34

* They form the extreme Radical Left.

(These groups are those given in Kurchner's _Deutscher Reichstag_, p. 398.)

4. PROGRAM OF THE GERMAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY

_Adopted at Erfurt, 1891_

The economic development of bourgeois society leads by natural necessity to the downfall of the small industry, whose foundation is formed by the worker's private ownership of his means of production.

It separates the worker from his means of production, and converts him into a propertyless proletarian, while the means of production become the monopoly of a relatively small number of capitalists and large landowners.

Hand-in-hand with this monopolization of the means of production goes the displacement of the dispersed small industries by colossal great industries, the development of the tool into the machine, and a gigantic growth in the productivity of human labor. But all the advantages of this transformation are monopolized by capitalists and large landowners. For the proletariat and the declining intermediate cla.s.ses--petty bourgoisie and peasants--it means a growing augmentation of the insecurity of their existence, of misery, oppression, enslavement, debas.e.m.e.nt, and exploitation.

Ever greater grows the number of proletarians, ever more enormous the army of surplus workers, ever sharper the opposition between exploiters and exploited, ever bitterer the cla.s.s-war between bourgeoisie and proletariat, which divides modern society into two hostile camps, and is the common hall-mark of all industrial countries.

The gulf between the propertied and the propertyless is further widened through the crises, founded in the essence of the capitalistic method of production, which constantly become more comprehensive and more devastating, which elevate general insecurity to the normal condition of society, and which prove that the powers of production of contemporary society have grown beyond measure, and that private ownership of the means of production has become incompatible with their application to their objects and their full development.

Private ownership of the means of production, which was formerly the means of securing to the producer the ownership of his product, has to-day become the means of expropriating peasants, manual workers, and small traders, and enabling the non-workers--capitalists and large landowners--to own the product of the workers. Only the transformation of capitalistic private ownership of the means of production--the soil, mines, raw materials, tools, machines, and means of transport--into social ownership and the transformation of production of goods for sale into Socialistic production managed for and through society, can bring it about, that the great industry and the steadily growing productive capacity of social labor shall for the hitherto exploited cla.s.ses be changed from a source of misery and oppression to a source of the highest welfare and of all-round harmonious perfection.

This social transformation means the emanc.i.p.ation not only of the proletariat, but of the whole human race which suffers under the conditions of to-day. But it can only be the work of the working-cla.s.s, because all the other cla.s.ses, in spite of mutually conflicting interests, take their stand on the basis of private ownership of the means of production, and have as their common object the preservation of the principles of contemporary society.

The battle of the working-cla.s.s against capitalistic exploitation is necessarily a political battle. The working-cla.s.s cannot carry on its economic battles or develop its economic organization without political rights. It cannot effect the pa.s.sing of the means of production into the ownership of the community without acquiring political power.

To shape this battle of the working-cla.s.s into a conscious and united effort, and to show it its naturally necessary end, is the object of the Social Democratic Party.

The interests of the working-cla.s.s are the same in all lands with capitalistic methods of production. With the expansion of world-transport and production for the world-market the state of the workers in any one country becomes constantly more dependent on the state of the workers in other countries. The emanc.i.p.ation of the working-cla.s.s is thus a task in which the workers of all civilized countries are concerned in a like degree. Conscious of this, the Social Democratic Party of Germany feels and declares itself _one_ with the cla.s.s-conscious workers of all other lands.

The Social Democratic Party of Germany fights thus not for new cla.s.s-privileges and exceptional rights, but for the abolition of cla.s.s-domination and of the cla.s.ses themselves, and for the equal rights and equal obligations of all, without distinction of s.e.x and parentage. Setting out from these views, it combats in contemporary society not merely the exploitation and oppression of the wage-workers, but every kind of exploitation and oppression, whether directed against a cla.s.s, a party, a s.e.x, or a race.

Setting out from these principles the Social Democratic Party of Germany demands immediately--

1. Universal equal direct suffrage and franchise, with direct ballot, for all members of the Empire over twenty years of age, without distinction of s.e.x, for all elections and acts of voting. Proportional representation; and until this is introduced, re-division of the const.i.tuencies by law according to the numbers of population. A new Legislature every two years. Fixing of elections and acts of voting for a legal holiday. Indemnity for the elected representatives.

Removal of every curtailment of political rights except in case of tutelage.

2. Direct legislation by the people by means of the initiative and referendum. Self-determination and self-government of the people in empire, state, province, and commune. Authorities to be elected by the people; to be responsible and bound. Taxes to be voted annually.

3. Education of all to be capable of bearing arms. Armed nation instead of standing army. Decision of war and peace by the representatives of the people. Settlement of all international disputes by the method of arbitration.

4. Abolition of all laws which curtail or suppress the free expression of opinion and the right of a.s.sociation and a.s.sembly.

5. Abolition of all laws which are prejudicial to women in their relations to men in public or private law.

6. Declaration that religion is a private matter. Abolition of all contributions from public funds to ecclesiastical and religious objects. Ecclesiastical and religious communities are to be treated as private a.s.sociations, which manage their affairs quite independently.

7. Secularization of education. Compulsory attendance of public primary schools. No charges to be made for instruction, school requisites, and maintenance, in the public primary schools; nor in the higher educational inst.i.tutions for those students, male and female, who in virtue of their capacities are considered fit for further training.

8. No charge to be made for the administration of the law, or for legal a.s.sistance. Judgment by popularly elected judges. Appeal in criminal cases. Indemnification of innocent persons prosecuted, arrested, or condemned. Abolition of the death-penalty.

9. No charges to be made for medical attendance, including midwifery and medicine. No charges to be made for death certificates.

10. Graduated taxes on income and property, to meet all public expenses as far as these are to be covered by taxation. Obligatory self-a.s.sessment. A tax on inheritance, graduated according to the size of the inheritance and the degree of kinship. Abolition of all indirect taxes, customs, and other politico-economic measures which sacrifice the interests of the whole community to the interests of a favored minority.

For the protection of the working-cla.s.s the Social Democratic Party of Germany demands immediately--

1. An effective national and international legislation for the protection of workmen on the following basis:

(_a_) Fixing of a normal working-day with a maximum of eight hours.

(_b_) Prohibition of industrial work for children under fourteen years.

(_c_) Prohibition of night-work, except for such branches of industry as, in accordance with their nature, require night-work, for technical reasons, or reasons of public welfare.

(_d_) An uninterrupted rest of at least thirty-six hours in every week for every worker.

(_e_) Prohibition of the truck system.

2. Inspection of all industrial businesses, investigation and regulation of labor relations in town and country by an Imperial Department of Labor, district labor departments, and chambers of labor. Thorough industrial hygiene.

3. Legal equalization of agricultural laborers and domestic servants with industrial workers; removal of the special regulations affecting servants.

4. a.s.surance of the right of combination.

5. Workmen's insurance to be taken over bodily by the Empire; and the workers to have an influential share in its administration.

6. Separation of the Churches and the State.

(_a_) Suppression of the grant for public worship.

(_b_) Philosophic or religious a.s.sociations to be civil persons at law.

7. Revision of sections in the Civil Code concerning marriage and the paternal authority.

(_a_) Civil equality of the s.e.xes, and of children, whether natural or legitimate.

(_b_) Revision of the divorce laws, maintaining the husband's liability to support the wife or the children.

(_c_) Inquiry into paternity to be legalized.

(_d_) Protective measures in favor of children materially or morally abandoned.

5. COMMUNAL PROGRAM OF THE BAVARIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY

Inasmuch as our communes are hindered in the fulfilment of their economic and political duties by reactionary laws, we demand:

A.--OF THE STATE:

1. A change of the munic.i.p.al code, granting genuine local autonomy. A single representative chamber, a four-year term of office, one-half retiring every two years. Universal adult suffrage, secret ballot, the franchise not to be denied to those receiving public aid.