Socialism As It Is - free ebook by William English Walling

WILLIAM ENGLISH WALLING

12 minute read

Read Chapter

PREFACE

The only Socialism of interest to practical persons is the Socialism of the organized Socialist movement. Yet the public cannot be expected to believe what an organization says about its own character or aims. It is to be rightly understood only through its acts . Fortunately the Socialists' acts are articulate; every party decision of practical importance has been reached after long and earnest discussion in party congresses and press. And wherever the party's position has become of practical i

4 minute read

Read Chapter

INTRODUCTION

The only possible definition of Socialism is the Socialist movement. Karl Marx wrote in 1875 at the time of the Gotha Convention, where the present German party was founded, that "every step of the real movement is of more importance than a dozen programs," while Wilhelm Liebknecht said, "Marx is dear to me, but the party is dearer." [1] What was this movement that the great theorist put above theory and his leading disciple valued above his master? What Marx and Liebknecht had in mind was a soc

7 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER I

Only that statesman, writer, or sociologist has the hearing of the public to-day who can bind all his proposed reforms together into some large and far-sighted plan. Mr. Roosevelt, in this new spirit, has spoken of the "social reorganization of the United States," while an article in one of the first numbers of La Follette's Weekly protested against any program of reform "which fails to deal with society as a whole, which proposes to remedy certain abuses but admits its incapacity to reach and r

29 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER II

President Taft says that if we cannot restore competition, "we must proceed to State Socialism and vest the government with power to control every business." As competition cannot be revived in industries that have been reorganized on a monopolistic basis, this is an admission that, in such industries, there is no alternative to "State Socialism." The smaller capitalists and business interests have not yet reconciled themselves, any more than President Taft, to what the Supreme Court, in the Sta

29 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER III

We are told that the political issue as viewed by American radicals is, "Shall property rule, or shall the people rule?" and that the radicals may be forced entirely over to the Socialist position, as the Republicans were forced to the position of the Abolitionists when Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. Mr. Ray Stannard Baker notes also that capital is continually the aggressor, as were the slaveholders, and that the conflict is likely to grow more and more acute, since "no one imagi

28 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER IV

State Capitalism has a very definite principle and program of labor reform. It capitalizes labor, views it as the principal resource and asset of each community (or of the class that controls the community), and undertakes every measure that is not too costly for its conservation, utilization, and development— i.e. its development to fill those positions ordinarily known as labor , but not such development as might enable the laborers or their children to compete for higher social functions on e

40 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER V

So far I have spoken only of the constructive side of the new capitalism's labor program, its purpose to produce healthy and industrially efficient laborers so as to increase profits. "State Socialism" gives the workingman as a citizen certain carefully measured political rights, and legislates actively in his behalf as a profit-producing employee at work, but its policy is reversed the moment it deals with him and his organizations as owners and sellers of labor . Towards the individual workers

37 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VI

Australia and New Zealand are commonly taken as the most advanced of all countries in government ownership, labor reforms, and "State Socialism." Indeed they are often pictured as almost ideally governed, and the credulity with which such pictures are received shows the widespread popularity of "State Socialism." The central principle of the Australian and New Zealand reforms is, however, not government ownership or compulsory arbitration, as commonly supposed, but a land policy. By means of a p

24 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VII

Many reformers admit that no reforms can bring us towards democracy as long as class rule continues. Henry George, for example, recognizes that his great land reform, the government appropriation of rent for public purposes, is useless when the government itself is monopolized, "when political power passes into the hands of a class, and the rest of the community become merely tenants." [83] In precisely the same way every great "State Socialist" reform must fail to bring us a single step towards

20 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VIII

"State Socialism" as I have described it will doubtless continue to be the guiding policy of governments during a large part, if not all, of the present generation. Capitalism, in this new collectivist form, must bring about extremely deep-seated and far-reaching changes in society. And every step that it takes in the nationalization of industry and the appropriation of land rent would also be a step in Socialism, provided the rents and profits so turned into the coffers of the State were not us

15 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER I

The Socialist movement must be judged by its acts, by the decisions Socialists have reached and the reasoning they have used as they have met concrete problems. The Socialists themselves agree that first importance is to be attached, not to the theories of Socialist writers, but to the principles that have actually guided Socialist parties and their instructed representatives in capitalist legislatures. These and the proceedings of international and national congresses and the discussion that co

26 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER II

The Socialist parties in Italy, Belgium, and France, where "reformism" is strong, are progressing less rapidly than the Socialists of these countries had reason to expect, and far less rapidly than in other countries. It would seem that in these cases the same cause that drives the movement to abandon aggressive tactics also checks its numerical growth. For example, it is a matter of principle among Socialists generally to contest every possible elected position and to nominate candidates in eve

27 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER III

The British Socialist situation is almost as important internationally as the German. The organized workingmen of the world are indeed divided almost equally into two camps. Most of those of Australia, South Africa, and Canada, as well as a large majority in the United States, favor a Labour Party of the British type, and even the reformist Socialist leaders, Jaurès in France, Vandervelde in Belgium, and Turati in Italy, often take the British Party as model. On the other hand the majority of th

2 hour read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER IV

Because of our greater European immigration and more advanced economic development, the Socialist movement in this country, as has been remarked by many of those who have studied it, is more closely affiliated with that of the continent of Europe than with that of Great Britain. The American public has been grievously misinformed as to the development of revolutionary Socialism in this country. A typical example is the widely noticed article by Prof. Robert F. Hoxie, entitled, "The Rising Tide o

22 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER V

An American Socialist author expresses the opinion of many Socialists when he says of the movement: "It strives by all efforts in its power to increase its vote at the ballot box. It believes that by this increase the attainment of its goal is brought ever nearer, and also that the menace of this increasing vote induces the capitalist class to grant concessions in the hope of preventing further increases. It criticizes non-Socialist efforts at reform as comparatively barren of positive benefit a

37 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VI

In the most famous document of international Socialism, the "Communist Manifesto" (published by Marx and Engels in 1847), there is a fulmination against "reactionary Socialism," which it will be seen is approximately what we now call "State Socialism." After describing the Utopian Socialism of Fourier, of Saint-Simon and of Owen, the "Manifesto" says:— "A second form of Socialism, less systematic but more practical, tried to disgust the working people with every revolutionary movement, by demons

33 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VII

With the exception of a few years (1899 to 1903) the revolutionary and anti-"reformist" (not anti-reform) position of the international movement has become stronger every year. It is a relatively short time, not more than twenty years, since the reformists first began to make themselves heard in the Socialist movement, and their influence increased until the German Congress at Dresden in 1903, the International Congress of 1904 at Amsterdam, and the definite separation of the Socialists of Franc

53 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER I

Socialists have always taught that Socialism can develop only out of the full maturity of capitalism, and so favor the normal advance of capitalist industry and government and the reforms of capitalist collectivism—on their constructive side. But if capitalism in its highest form of "State Socialism" is the only foundation upon which the Socialism can be built, it is at the same time that form of capitalism which will prevail when Socialism reaches maturity and is ready for decisive action; and

47 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER II

I have pointed out the relation of the Socialist movement to all classes but one,—the agriculturists,—a class numerically next in importance to the industrial wage earners. On the one hand most agriculturists are small capitalists, who, even when they do not own their farms, are often forced to-day to invest a considerable sum in farm animals and machinery, in rent and interest and in wages at the harvest season; on the other hand, a large part of the farmers work harder and receive less for the

51 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER III

If the majority of Socialists are liberal in their conception of what constitutes the "working class," they are equally broad in their view as to what classes must be reckoned among its opponents. They are aware that on the other side in this struggle will be found all those classes that are willing to serve capitalism or hope to rise into its ranks. In its narrow sense the term "capitalist class" may be restricted to mean mere idlers and parasites, but this is not the sense in which Socialists

19 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER IV

One of the grounds on which it is proposed by some Socialists to give manual labor a special and preferred place in the movement is that it is supposed to be the only numerically important non-capitalist element that is at all well organized or even organizable. Let us see, then, to what degree labor is organized and what are the characteristics of this organization. First, the labor unions represent manual wage earners almost exclusively—not by intention, but as a matter of fact. They include o

39 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER V

In America, France, Italy, and England, as well as in Germany (in a modified form) a new and more radical labor-union policy has been rapidly gaining the upper hand. This new movement—in its purely economic, as well as its political, bearings—is of far greater moment to Socialists than the political tendencies of those unions that continue to follow the old tactics in their direct relations with employers. In America and in England, unfortunately, the name given to this new movement, "industrial

2 hour read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VI

Nearly all strikes are more or less justified in Socialist eyes. But those that involve neither a large proportion of the working class nor any broad social or political question are held to be of secondary importance. On the other hand, the "sympathetic" and "general" strikes, which are on such a scale as to become great public issues, and are decided by the attitude of public opinion and the government rather than by the employers and employees involved, are viewed as a most essential part of

27 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VII

"The workers do not yet understand," says Debs, "that they are engaged in a class struggle, and must unite their class and get on the right side of that struggle economically, politically, and in every other way—strike together, vote together, and, if necessary, fight together." [277] Socialists are prepared to use force when governments resort to arbitrary violence—for example, to martial "law." In the Socialist view no occasion whatever justifies the suspension of the regular government the pe

28 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER VIII

"The legal constitution of every period," says Rosa Luxemburg, "is solely a product of revolution. While revolution is the political act of creation of class history, legislation is the continued political growth of society. The work of legal reform has in itself no independent driving force outside of the revolution; it moves during each period of history only along that line and for that period of time for which the impetus given to it during the last revolution continues, or, to speak concret

21 minute read

Read Chapter

CHAPTER IX

The Socialist policy requires so complete a reversal of the policy of collectivist capitalism, that no government has taken any steps whatever in that direction. No governments and no political parties, except the Socialists, have any such steps under discussion, and finally, no governments or capitalist parties are sufficiently alarmed or confused by the menace of Socialism to be hurried or driven into a policy which would carry them a stage nearer to the very thing they are most anxious to avo

22 minute read

Read Chapter