Edward Bellamy

Name: Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly
Author: Edward Bellamy

Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

Summary

“Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly”, published in 1897, is a work by Edward Bellamy. It explores elements such as property, income and citizen.

Quotes from Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (Edward Bellamy)

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ Nothing could have better served the ends of the Revolution, as we have seen, than to raise the issue of the right of property. Nothing was so desirable as that the people at large should be led to give a little serious consideration on rational and moral grounds to what that right was as compared with what it ought to be. It was very soon, then, that the cry of 'the sacred right of property,' first raised by the rich in the name of the few, was re-echoed with overwhelming effect by the disinherited millions in the name of all. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ Of course, Julian, it was in the way of human nature quite a matter of course that your contemporaries should have cried out against the idea of a universal right of property as an attack on the principle of property. There was never a prophet or reformer who raised his voice for a purer, more spiritual, and perfect idea of religion whom his contemporaries did not accuse of seeking to abolish religion; nor ever in political affairs did any party proclaim a juster, larger, wiser ideal of government without being accused of seeking to abolish government. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ By the new system all were assured of a large, equal, and fixed share in the total national principal and income. Before the Revolution even those who had secured a property were likely to have it taken from them or to slip from them by a thousand accidents. Even the millionaire had no assurance that his grandson might not become a homeless vagabond or his granddaughter be forced to a life of shame. Under the new system the title of every citizen to his individual fortune became indefeasible, and he could lose it only when the nation became bankrupt. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ Quite on the contrary, the change in system placed the private and personal property rights of every citizen upon a basis incomparably more solid and secure and extensive than they ever before had or could have had while private capitalism lasted. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ I had, no doubt, heard it a hundred times asserted by the wise men of my day that the equalization of human conditions as to wealth would necessitate destroying the institution of private property, and, without having given special thought to the subject, had naturally assumed that the equalization of wealth having been effected, private property must have been abolished, according to the prediction. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ The Revolution, that is to say, instead of denying or abolishing the institution of private property, affirmed it in an incomparably more positive, beneficial, permanent, and general form than had ever been known before. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ So to tie up property by trusts that the beneficiary could not touch the principal was the study of rich people who desired best to protect their heirs. Take the case of entailed estates as another illustration of this idea. Under that mode of holding property the possessor could not sell it, yet it was considered the most desirable sort of property on account of that very fact. The fact you refer to--that the citizen can not alienate his share in the national corporation which forms the basis of his income--tends in the same way to make it a more and not a less valuable sort of property. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ Suppose you and a number of other men of your time, all having separate claims in a mining region, formed a corporation to carry on as one mine your consolidated properties, would you have any less private property than you had when you owned your claims separately? ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ I said, "that as soon as the revolutionary leaders succeeded in opening the eyes of the people to this view of the matter, my old friends the capitalists must have found their cry about 'the sacred right of property' turned into a most dangerous sort of boomerang." ”

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Source: Wikisource

Edward Bellamy, Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (1897)

“ I think there were few property owners in your day who would not very gladly have relinquished the right to alienate their property if they could have had it guaranteed indefeasibly to them and their children. ”

Edward Bellamy

Summary

Quotes from Equality — Chapter XVII. The revolution saves private property from monopoly (Edward Bellamy)

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