Mildred Minturn

“ If we are to answer "yes" to this question, we must be able to show that the mere fact of owning wealth contributes in some way to the growth of that wealth, because we have seen that it is the ability to become an owner of wealth, and no other sort of ability, that gives a man a place on the moving sidewalk.
But it is impossible to establish any causal connection between the ownership of capital and its wealth-producing quality. It may be owned by a single man, or by a group of men, by an idle woman living in Europe, or by a little child: the owner, as owner, is a negligible quantity. ”

“ But if the essence of Socialism consists only in the fact that the most important control over wealth is exercised by groups of men more or less large, instead of by individuals, we shall see that this system does not necessarily involve equal division of wealth among the citizens. The wealth destined for the immediate satisfaction of desires may, even in the Socialist State, be divided unequally, according to the quality and quantity of work performed, the rank occupied by each in the State, and many other factors. ”

“ The manager of an impersonal business concern may be a most just and tender-hearted man, but as an agent he has no choice but to ensure the profit of his employers before he can consider the "standard of life" of their employees. And the individual owner may be a just and tender-hearted man, but what can one shareholder in a great trust do to change the wages or conditions of work of the employees of the trust? Our vast organisation of industry has completely separated the owner from the producer. ”

“ Every child would have a fair start in life, and no child would have the undue advantage that comes to those who, through no virtue of their own, find themselves in possession of a legal right to share in the product of the labour of others. For this is the true meaning of inheritance: the father leaves his son a lien on the labour of other men which he himself has obtained by clever management, special ability, or even by a stroke of luck, the rise or fall of the market, or the mere possession of a piece of land whose value has increased. ”

“ After the first necessities and comforts have been obtained, what most men really want to get out of life is success. But in almost all cases, success is vulgarly measured in terms of wealth, and so men seek wealth. But in the army and navy, in art, science, and literature, and in the English civil service and English political life, success is measured by the grade attained, by various rewards and decorations, by fame or authority over others, things that often bring no corresponding increase of wealth but that are as ardently pursued as wealth itself. ”

“ The great differences which we now see will disappear of themselves, since they result from the private ownership of wealth whose utility is permanent. There will be just enough inequality to serve as a spur to effort and a reward for excellence.
"If, however, the principle of equality be added to the above idea of the Socialist system. Socialism becomes Communism. Under this system the amount of wealth given to each citizen is quite independent of the quantity and quality of the work he performs and of any difference in the rank he has attained." ”

“ If he is very industrious or very skilful and earns more wealth than he needs to satisfy his immediate wants, or if he is very thrifty and sacrifices some of his less pressing desires, he is able to accumulate wealth. This accumulation he will use to create more wealth, and he then becomes a capitalist. The capitalist, therefore, is either an exceptionally industrious, an exceptionally skilful, or an exceptionally abstemious man. In any case he is an exceptionally valuable member of the community, and deserves his exceptional rewards. ”

“ God in His infinite wisdom had chosen certain worthy men to administer the wealth of the country, and the inference was that any revolt against their authority was impious. If it is fair to judge any system by the statements that its warmest supporters make concerning it, the present system under which wealth is produced must stand condemned on the strength of the defence offered by that railroad president. According to the standard of justice and social expediency the process by which wealth is created is as imperfect as that by which it is divided. ”

“ We lay upon every man elected to any executive or legislative office the first duty of striving to procure whatever is for the workers' most immediate interest, and for whatever will lessen the economic and political powers of the capitalist, and increase the like powers of the worker. ”

“ If we grant the unequal distribution of wealth, some hierarchical grouping of the workers seems almost inevitable. The two great difficulties to be faced would be the possible exaggeration of the differences in rewards given to the members of the different groups and the danger of a corrupt official class. We must not forget, however, that it is never capital but only salaries that are to be distributed, and that the means of corruption would therefore be limited. ”

“ The most they can lose by delay is an expected addition to their wealth: he loses the necessities of life. From this superior position in the matter of the labour contract it results that the owners or their agents do actually control the conditions of life of the non-owner. They decide in the first place whether he shall work at all: if for any reason it seems more profitable for them that he should remain in idleness, they deny him access to the material he needs in order to work, and he has no choice but to wait their good pleasure. ”

“ Nine tenths of the human race walk on their own feet and go fast or slow according to the strength they have and the effort they put forth. These are the manual workers, artisans, and propertyless professional men, whose reward is indeed proportioned to their industry, skill, and thrift. But one tenth are able to jump on to the moving sidewalk, or are deposited there by the effort or favour of others; they get a share of wealth-producing wealth and are carried along by it. They may keep on walking or not just as they choose ”

“ Now if private ownership of capital is not a necessary factor in the production of new wealth, and if it is a necessary factor in the unjust distribution of that wealth, our philosopher will ask himself why the problem should not be solved by eliminating the individual owner from the scheme of production and distribution altogether, and by putting in his place society as a whole. ”

“ Some Communists hold that the only just principle is summed up in the saying: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." They show a faith in the altruistic possibilities of human nature that one is tempted to characterise as visionary. Perhaps the time may come when the average man will give his best work to the community without regard to the reward he is to receive for it, and will be contented when he sees other men, less able and perhaps less industrious than he, paid at the same rate. ”

“ And when he has grasped this fact, that wealth is a social product, and that, being the product of society, it should be owned and administered by society for the benefit of all its members and not by individuals for their own benefit, he may call himself a Socialist. ”

“ Although between these two extremes there exist an almost infinite number of degrees of wealth, statistics will tell him that in both England and America "nine tenths of all the realised property to-day belongs to a class that comprises only one tenth of the population—that ninety per cent, of the citizens, the great mass of the people, share among them, even including their little homes and furniture, and all their much-vaunted hoards, the ownership of not more than ten per cent, of the capital wealth." ”

“ In order to understand the process of thought by which Socialists have arrived at this formula, we may imagine an unprejudiced observer of a philosophic turn of mind who has set himself to consider the spectacle offered by modern societies, and to judge it according to two standards, the standard of abstract justice and the standard of social expediency. ”

“ Under this system the State will manufacture the necessities of life, and require every citizen to work for it four hours a day. During the remainder of the day each man will be free to engage in any occupation he chooses: artists will devote themselves to their art with minds freed from anxiety, and energetic business men will create supplementary industries on the competitive plan. Since a decent livelihood is assured to every man by his State labour, the unjust advantage that purely capitalistic production gives to the owner is done away with. ”

“ Under the Socialist system the natural differences between man and man would bring their natural differences in comforts and pleasure, and the average man's mainspring of activity would still be in operation.
But at this point we should note the classic objection to Socialism. Men, it is said, work from two motives, first, in order to amass wealth for themselves, and, second, in order to hand on the fruits of their labour to their children. Socialism would do away with both these motives, and the inference is that men would no longer work. ”

“ Society has evolved from savagery to barbarism, from barbarism to feudalism, from feudalism to individualism, and with every change the relations of individuals to each other have been modified, the form of the struggle has altered, and the situation of those individuals who have not been successful is somewhat improved. ”

“ He may feel a sense of responsibility for the lives of those non-owners whose work brings him his yearly quota of comfort and pleasure, but he is as helplessly a part of the system as the poorest labourer. ”

“ It is the system and not the individual who profits by it that is the important factor in the situation, and it is therefore not so important to enquire whether the moral character of the individual can be reformed, as to discover whether the system can be so changed that it will become impossible for the natural egotism of man to bring about conditions so unjust to the majority and so inexpedient for society as a whole. ”

“ During an interval of four years in his parliamentary career he wrote a history of the French Revolution that is said by some authorities to be based on a more careful study of original documents than any other history of the period. But it is as a political leader and orator that he is best known and most successful. He attends political meetings all over the country and wherever he goes he communicates some of his indomitable enthusiasm and splendid energy to his hearers. ”

“ One sees constant examples of this during strikes, when the employees urge on the one hand that they are working ten hours a day for a bare "living wage," and the answer of the representative of the employers always is: "But as it is we only just make enough profit to pay our dividends, so any question of raising wages is absurd." ”

“ For them the best books are written, the best plays acted, the fastest steamers hurry across the seas, and all the discoveries of science are applied. It is they who live to the full, it is they who enjoy, who develop mentally and spiritually through their contact with the beauty and civilisation of their own and other worlds. They are the ones who can pay. But the other nine tenths are condemned not only to physical discomfort but, far more tragically, to a stunting even of their capacity for the higher forms of enjoyment. They cannot pay. ”

“ This is a seductive theory, but the knowledge of a little history and a little science candidly brought to bear upon it will soon reveal its superficial nature. Ever since the first group of savages found that it was safer for them to unite in the eternal fight against the animals and against other savages than to face the hostile world as individuals, there have been two sets of phenomena to be considered: those which have to do with man as an individual, and those which have to do with him as a member of a community. ”

“ In so far as the smart business man uses his brain to help on this great productive process or to facilitate the exchange of the product, he has earned a share of the common wealth. But as a mere owner he is outside the creative process.
It is clear, then, that our philosopher must answer "no" to the question whether the division of wealth is just. It certainly does not go in due proportion to the people who have created it. But is it perhaps distributed according to some principle of social expediency? ”

“ We must, however, distinguish between those riches which are not destroyed by use and those which are destroyed by use. The former, when controlled by individuals, bring about the present economic superiority of a class, with all the frightful results we know so well: the latter only concern the individual who uses and destroys them, and are not therefore matters of public concern. ”

“ They depend upon the "class-warfare" that undoubtedly exists, to bring about a revolution, possibly peaceful in character, which will have for its object the abolition of private property in the means of production and the substitution of social property in its place. Their method of action, then, is to rouse the non-owners to a sense of their position, and to teach them to look forward to the day when they shall be strong enough to bring about this radical change. ”