The International resolved to hold yearly congresses. Its members have met at Geneva at least twice, at Basle, at Lausanne, at the Hague, and other places. It is not necessary to give the history of these different meetings, as they were all of one general character.[179] Their importance consists in the repeated emphasis given to the thought of the oneness of the interests of laborers in all civilized states. Delegates at the congresses gave reports of progress, of strikes, reductions in labor-time, and of all matters likely to interest the working classes. Measures for continuing the propaganda more successfully were discussed. The congress at the Hague in 1872 is more important than the others, as it witnessed a split in the ranks of the Internationalists. The original International stood under the influence of Marx, who was the guiding spirit of its general council, with its seat at London. The whole arrangement was that of a strong government. Some were envious of Marx, and others—the Anarchists—objected to the principles of the organization. Bakounine led the opposition, and a new International was formed, based on anarchic principles. Instead of a General Council, they instituted a Federal Council. The Internationalists of the country where the next congress was to be held carried on the correspondence with the various societies, gathered statistics, etc. Thus, their leading body, their central organ (not authority), changed from year to year. Each land was left free to conduct its agitation in its own way, and every individual atom, i.e., local organization, was left free to come and go as it pleased. The Anarchists, and other adherents of this newer branch, made strenuous efforts to spread their organization, and were particularly successful in Spain, where Bakounine was their representative. Both Internationals held congresses in Geneva in 1873.

It is often supposed that the International is dead. This is a great mistake. The formal organization of the old International was dissolved in 1875; but the original spirit survived. I am much inclined to think that the association founded by Bakounine has still a formal organization, but, however that may be, the International to all intents and purposes is stronger to-day than it ever was before.

Membership in the International is one of the conditions of membership in the revolutionary organization of the Black Hand in Spain.[180] Prince Krapotkine and others were this year condemned to imprisonment for belonging to an International Association of Laborers, and to-day organizations are being formed in America, with the title of Branches of the International Association of Laborers. At the great mass meeting held in Cooper Union to honor the memory of Karl Marx, March 19, 1883, speeches were delivered in English, German, Russian, and other languages, to illustrate the spirit of the International, and to impress upon laborers the fact that at such a time no differences existed between them due to the accident of nationality. One of the speakers declared triumphantly to the audience that the spectacle they were then witnessing was conclusive proof that the International still lived. He was right.

The International has caused the governments of Europe no inconsiderable alarm at various times, and it is likely that its importance has been overrated. Still it must be acknowledged that the existence of such a society, presided over by a man of undoubted ability, spreading itself over Europe and America, was in itself a significant fact. Its importance must by no means be estimated by the number of its declared adherents or the attendance at its congresses. Where one laborer avows himself openly an Internationalist, we may be sure that there are twenty holding like views who conceal them from motives of policy. Moreover, the society is still in its infancy. It may yet play a rôle in the world’s history.

At present, the International appears like a little cloud on the horizon, no larger than a man’s hand, but it is possible that it points to growths and formations which in the future shall darken the heavens with black and heavy clouds. It is possible, it foreshadows a tragedy of world-wide import, which shall make all the cruelty and terror of the French Revolution sink into utter insignificance. It is possible, it portends the destruction of old, antiquated institutions, and the birth of a new civilization in a night of darkness and horror, in which the roll of thunder shall shake the earth’s foundations, and the vivid glare of lightning shall reveal a carnival of bloodshed and slaughter.

These are all possibilities, but let us trust that they are not probabilities. The International Workingmen’s Association is one of many signs which gives us reason to hope for a continued growth of international relations; and this growth may terminate in that longed-for internationalism, which shall lead to the formation of a world-organization, guaranteeing to the nations of the earth perpetual peace. There are numerous evidences of this development, of which the following are a few examples; the international postal union, international congresses, international courts of arbitration, and the efforts to establish international factory legislation. It was once hoped that free-trade would help on the good work by knitting nation to nation so firmly that they would realize the identity of their interests. In this people have been disappointed. Free-trade has united, perhaps, a few great merchants and manufacturers, and led to cosmopolitan feelings among the wealthier classes. The masses have never been affected by questions of international commerce. It may be that an international union between the laborers of all lands will finally force upon men the recognition of the folly and crime of war, and will bring to pass that peace and good-will among men prophesied so long ago.

CHAPTER XII.
FERDINAND LASSALLE.

The most interesting figure in the history of social democracy is incontestably Ferdinand Lassalle. In some respects he resembled Marx. He also was of Hebrew descent, and belonged to the higher classes of society. Both were interested in the welfare of the lower classes, and made sacrifices willingly in behalf of their cause. Both intended to become university professors, and there is not the shadow of a reason to doubt that both might have succeeded as such. Lassalle, the son of a wealthy wholesale merchant of Breslau, was born in 1825. His father wished him to devote himself to business, but Lassalle was too fond of his studies to consent. He went to the universities of Breslau and Berlin, where he devoted himself to philology and philosophy. His career as a student was brilliant in the extreme. The most distinguished men of the time were carried away with admiration. Wilhelm von Humboldt called him “Das Wunderkind”—“The Miraculous Child.” His first literary work was an exposition of the “Philosophy of Heraclitus the Obscure.”[181] “Before this book,” to use the words of another, “Humboldt and the whole world bent the knee.” Lassalle’s second important work was one on a system of jurisprudence entitled, “The System of Acquired Rights”—“Das System der erworbenen Rechte” (2 Bde.). The great jurist Savigny called it the ablest legal book which had been written since the sixteenth century. It was published in 1861. Before this, Lassalle had become interested in the case of the Countess von Hatzfeldt, the misused wife of a wealthy but brutal man. While he was indulging in the most extravagant dissipation, she was obliged to live in cramped circumstances. The Countess had begun a suit against her husband for separation and alimony, but did not make much headway until Lassalle took charge of the case, in 1846. After an eight years’ contest, he secured a brilliant triumph. The Countess, although over forty, was still beautiful, and Lassalle, in taking up her case, appears to have been actuated by the same motives as the knights-errant of an earlier period who went about redressing wrong and protecting the weak. The entire affair is illustrative of his fiery, romantic temperament.

It was in 1862 that Lassalle began his agitation in behalf of the laboring classes, an agitation which resulted in the formation of the German Social Democratic Party. Previous to his time, German laborers had been considered contented and peaceable. It had been thought that a working-men’s party might be established in France or England, but that it was hopeless to attempt to move the phlegmatic German laborers. Lassalle’s historical importance lies in the fact that he was able to work upon the laborers so powerfully as to arouse them to action. It is due to Lassalle above all others that German working-men’s battalions, to use the social democratic expression, now form the vanguard in the struggle for the emancipation of labor.

Lassalle’s writings did not advance materially the theory of social democracy. He drew from Rodbertus and Marx in his economic writings, but he clothed their thoughts in such manner as to enable ordinary laborers to understand them, and this they never could have done without such help. Even for an educated man their works are not easy reading; for the uneducated they are quite incomprehensible. Lassalle’s speeches and pamphlets were eloquent sermons on texts taken from Marx. Lassalle gave to Ricardo’s law of wages the designation, the iron law of wages, and expounded to the laborers its full significance, showing them how it inevitably forced wages down to a level just sufficient to enable them to live. He acknowledged that it was the key-stone of his system, and that his doctrines stood or fell with it.

Laborers were told that this law could be overthrown only by the abolition of the wages system. How Lassalle really thought this was to be accomplished is not so evident. He proposed to the laborers that government should aid them by the use of its credit to the extent of 100,000,000 of thalers, to establish co-operative associations for production; and a great deal of breath has been wasted to show the inadequacy of his proposed measures. Lassalle could not himself have supposed that so insignificant a matter as the granting of a small loan would solve the labor question. He recognized, however, that it was necessary to have some definite party programme to insure success in agitation, and could think of no better plan at the time than to work for universal suffrage and a government subsidy. He wrote to his friend Rodbertus to the effect that he was willing to drop the latter plank in his platform, if something better could be suggested.[182] It would be going too far to say that he was positively insincere, for he might have thought that if government had voted the proposed credit of one hundred millions, it would have opened the way for other reforms. He might have regarded this modest proposal merely as an entering wedge.

Lassalle took this project of productive co-operative associations founded on government loans from Louis Blanc, with whose work he was well acquainted; indeed, as he began his agitation, he wrote to the French socialist, and requested some kind of an open letter of recognition which should give him credit with the laborers.[183] We may get some clew to thoughts possibly lingering in the background, which Lassalle might have intended to express later by recalling the proposals of the Frenchman. Louis Blanc, as will be remembered, wished government to use its power of taxation to assist the social workshops with large advances of money, for which no interest was to be charged. No one was to be forced to join these ateliers sociaux. According to this scheme private manufacturers are allowed to continue their business as long as they choose. However, as no interest is paid for the government loans to the co-operative undertakings, the public establishments will be in a position to undersell private employers of labor and thus compel them to fall in line. The only possible termination is the socialistic state. As Lassalle was thoroughly informed concerning Blanc’s ideas, it is quite possible that in the course of time he may have intended to go equally far. The way he presented the matter to the laborers was somewhat as follows: There exists at present a conflict between labor and capital, which must be abolished. This contradiction between the elements of production can only be terminated by their union in co-operative associations, in which no capitalist comes between the working-man and the fruits of his toil, to levy toll thereon. But at the present time only large establishments can succeed, as the increased division of labor makes it necessary to employ a large force of men, and mechanical inventions have forced producers to use many and expensive machines. The laborers have not the means to found large manufactories; consequently government must advance these means in order to cause the existing and unhappy social conflict to cease. Government is to advance capital to different groups of laborers, who conduct various enterprises. These groups are associated, new ones are continually added, and, finally, their united power is so great that they can stand alone without government aid.

This all appears harmless enough, and no government would be justified in refusing 100,000,000 of thalers, or $75,000,000, if so much good could be done by it. But one of the ablest men of his time must have been fully conscious of the utter insufficiency of such a sum. If he had any other idea in his mind than simply to use his demand of government as a rallying-point for purposes of agitation, it cannot well be doubted that he had further petitions to address to government as soon as they had granted his first one. It is not at all improbable he might have been willing to see collateral inheritances abolished, and the income derived therefrom devoted to co-operative undertakings. Proposals, like abolition of interest on loans, must have followed, with the view of rendering private competition impossible. Thus would be introduced the socialistic state longed for by the social democratic party founded by Lassalle.

“On the 23d of May, 1863, German social democracy was born. Little importance was attached to the event at the time. A few men met at Leipsic, and, under the leadership of Ferdinand Lassalle, formed a new political party called the ‘Universal German Laborers’ Union’ (‘Der Allgemeine Deutsche Arbeiterverein’). That was all. Surely, no one could be expected to ascribe great weight to the fact that a handful of working-men, led by a dreamer, had met and passed a few resolutions—resolutions, too, as modest in their expression of purpose as they were harmless in appearance. It was simply declared that the laborers ought to be represented in the different German parliaments, as only thus could their interests be adequately cared for and the opposition between the various classes of society terminated; and in view of this fact it was resolved that the members of the Union should avail themselves of all peaceful and legal means in endeavoring to bring about universal suffrage.

“But it was soon discovered that the members of the Union, the first organization in Germany of social democracy, desired political power only as a means of overthrowing entirely the existing order of the production and distribution of wealth.”[184]

Lassalle never tired of representing in vivid colors the injustice of our present social institutions. The crimes, selfishness, and heartlessness of the bourgeoisie were unfailing topics in his agitation. The laborers were told that they had no right to be contented with their lot. It is this damnable, easily satisfied disposition of you German laborers which is your ruin, they were told.[185]

“The German laborer was finally moved. His anger and discontent became permanent and terrible in proportion as it had been difficult to arouse him. He was not to be easily pacified. He soon showed strength and determination in such manner as to attract the attention of the civilized world. Statesmen grew pale and kings trembled.”[186]

Lassalle did not live to see the fruits of his labors. He met with some success and celebrated a few triumphs, but the Union did not flourish as he hoped. At the time of his death he did not appear to have a firm, lasting hold on the laboring population. There then existed no social-democratic party with political power. Although Lassalle lost his life in a duel, which had its origin in a love affair, and not in any struggle for the rights of labor, he was canonized at once by the working-men, and took his place among the greatest martyrs and heroes of all times. His influence increased more than tenfold as soon as he ceased to live. This was not entirely undeserved. Men remembered and appreciated better his extraordinary talents and his ardent, romantic temperament. Even Bismarck, with whom he had been personally acquainted, took occasion once, in the Reichstag, to express his admiration for Lassalle. I was in Germany at the time, and remember well what a sensation his words created. He expressed himself as follows:[187] “I met Lassalle three or four times. Our relations were not of a political nature. Politically he had nothing which he could offer me. He attracted me extraordinarily as a private man. Lassalle was one of the most gifted and amiable men with whom I have ever associated—a man who was ambitious on a grand scale, but not the least of a republican. He had a very marked inclination towards a national monarchy; the idea towards the attainment of which his efforts were directed was the German Empire, and in this we found a point of contact. Lassalle was ambitious on a grand scale, and whether the German Empire should close with the house of Hohenzollern or the house of Lassalle, that was perhaps doubtful; but his sympathies were through and through monarchical.... Lassalle was an energetic and exceedingly clever man, and it was always instructive to talk with him. Our conversations have lasted for hours, and I have always regretted their close.... It would have given me great pleasure to have had a similarly gifted man for a neighbor in my country home.”

It has, indeed, been stated that Lassalle, at the time of his death, had some thoughts of making terms with the Prussian government. He was to come out as a supporter of Bismarck, and to receive a high appointment in return. I am unable to say how much truth there may be in this report. It is possible he may have begun to lose faith in social democracy; still it must be confessed that he was not a man to be easily diverted from a purpose which he had once formed. This is abundantly shown by his indomitable perseverance in the case of the Countess von Hatzfeldt. It is nevertheless significant that the second edition of his “System of Acquired Rights,” which appeared in 1881, was edited by Lothar Bucher, who bears the title of privy-councillor and holds a high position under the government in Berlin.

There are three doctrines upon which the social democratic leaders lay especial stress in their attacks on the economic institutions of to-day.

The first is “Das eherne Lohngesetz”—“The Iron Law of Wages”—or “Cruel Iron Law of Wages,” as it is also called. It is with this law that the name of Lassalle is especially connected.

The second doctrine teaches the systematic robbery of laborers by capitalists. They rob them by taking from them all the surplus value which they produce, over and above the means necessary to sustain life. This is Marx’s doctrine of the appropriation of surplus value (Mehrwerth) by employers.

The third doctrine is Marx’s theory of industrial crises and panics.

What is “The Iron Law of Wages”? It is, as already stated, only Lassalle’s statement and interpretation of Ricardo’s “Law of Wages.” Ricardo expresses his law in these words: “The natural price of labor is that price which is necessary to enable the laborers, one with another, to subsist and to perpetuate their race, without either increase or diminution.” Ricardo has previously explained what is to be understood by market price and what by natural price. Market price is the price actually obtained for an article; the natural price is that which pays labor and the profits of capital. Through miscalculation, too much or too little of a commodity is at times offered on the market, and it departs from its natural price. If too little is offered, profits will be too high, and capital will rush to the production of the commodity in order to gain the unusual profits, until competition forces them down to the usual rate, or, very likely, below it, when capital will be withdrawn from the production of said commodity. So the market price fluctuates about the natural price with a continual tendency to return to it. Now, labor is a commodity, and may be increased or diminished in quantity like other commodities. In an advancing state of society the market price will be above the natural price, and may continue so for a long time; but early and frequent marriages and large families will produce all the labor required, and reduce it to its natural price eventually. In a declining state of society, on the other hand, labor would sink below its natural price, and the supply would diminish on account of frequent deaths, few marriages, and small families.

This law of wages may be difficult for those to comprehend who are not thoroughly familiar with economic discussions. In order to make it clearer, I will quote, with a few changes and abbreviations, a passage of some length from John Stuart Mill,[188] giving a lucid explanation of the law. “Mr. Ricardo assumes,” says Mill, “that there is everywhere a minimum rate of wages—either the lowest with which it is physically possible to keep up the population, or the lowest with which the people will choose to do. To this minimum he assumes that the general rate of wages always tends; that they can never be lower beyond the length of time required for a diminished rate of increase to make itself felt, and can never long continue higher. This assumption contains sufficient truth to render it admissible for the purposes of abstract science.... But in the application to practice it is necessary to consider that the minimum of which he speaks, especially when it is not a physical, but what may be termed a moral minimum, is itself liable to vary.” A rise of the price of food will permanently lower the standard of living of laborers, “in case their previous habits in respect of population prove stronger than their previous habits in respect of comfort. In that case the injury done to them will be permanent, and their deteriorated condition will become a new minimum, tending to perpetuate itself as the more ample minimum did before.” It is to be feared that this is the way in which a rise in the price of provisions usually operates. “There is considerable evidence that the circumstances of the agricultural laborers in England have more than once in our history sustained great permanent deterioration from causes which operated by diminishing the demand for labor, and which, if population had exercised its power of self-adjustment, in obedience to the previous standard of comfort, could only have had a temporary effect; but, unhappily, the poverty in which the class was plunged during a long series of years brought that previous standard into disuse, and the next generation, growing up without having possessed those pristine comforts, multiplied in turn without any attempt to retrieve them.” ... The salutary effect of a fall in the price of food is of no permanent value “if laborers content themselves with enjoying the greater comfort while it lasts, but do not learn to require it.... If from poverty their children had previously been insufficiently fed or improperly nursed, a greater number will now be reared, and the competition of these, when they grow up, will depress wages probably in full proportion to the greater cheapness of food. If the effect is not produced in this mode, it will be produced by earlier and more numerous marriages, or by an increased number of births to a marriage.” I believe Mill renders the law as plain as it can be made, without entering into subjects foreign to this work. The standpoint is this: labor is a commodity, like wheat or potatoes, which is increased or decreased according to the existing demand. The laborers live not for themselves, but solely for the higher classes, in particular, for the capitalists. This is the way Lassalle expresses it to the laborers of Frankfort in an eloquent speech, which has not yet ceased to be a power in Germany: “What is the consequence of that law, which, as I have proved to you, is accepted by all political economists? What is the consequence of the same? I ask. You believe, perhaps, laborers and fellow-citizens, that you are human beings—that you are men. Speaking from the standpoint of political economy, you make a terrible mistake. Speaking from the standpoint of political economy, you are nothing but a commodity, a high price for which increases your numbers, just the same as a high price for stockings increases the number of stockings, if there are not enough of them; and you are swept away, your number is diminished by smaller wages—by what Malthus calls the preventive and positive checks to population; your number is diminished, just as if you were vermin against which society wages war.” Lassalle then shows them how much shorter the average of life is among the laboring classes than among the wealthy. He demonstrates to them that poor and insufficient food means starvation. “There are, gentlemen,” says he, “two ways of dying of starvation. It, indeed, happens seldom that a man falls down dead in a moment from hunger; but when a man is subjected to a greater expenditure of power than he is able to replace, on account of poor food or a miserable mode of life—when he gives out more physical energy than he takes in—then, I say, he dies of slow starvation.”

Rehearse this in a thousand different ways and with all the resources of oratorical art, to laborers really ill-fed, ill-housed, and ill-clothed, and you shall indeed find yourself soon standing upon a volcano, whose forces are no longer latent and slumbering.

In his definition of capital Lassalle clothes the same thought contained in his “Iron Law of Wages” in other words. The definition reads as follows: “Capital exists where a division of labor obtains and where production consists in the creation of values in exchange, and in such a system of production it is the advance of labor already performed (congealed, coagulated labor), which is necessary to sustain the life of the producer. This advance of coagulated labor brings it to pass that the excess of labor’s product over and above what is necessary to support the life of the producer accrues to the person or persons who made the advance.”

The more one reflects upon this definition, the more meaning is discovered in it. It has furnished the text for many a social-democratic sermon. Like Marx, Lassalle holds that capital is based on a theft—on that theft, namely, “which deprived the masses of their right in the soil, in the earth—the common heritage of all.”

It is substantially the same doctrine which we have met with so often—viz., that labor alone is the source of wealth, and if capitalist and landlord could be swept out of existence the entire social product would go to the laborer. It resulted from a one-sided development of certain teachings of Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations.” “The produce of labor,” says Adam Smith, in one place—and, as will be seen, he means the entire product—“constitutes the natural recompense or wages of labor.

“In that original state of things which precedes both the appropriation of land and the accumulation of stock, the whole produce of labor belongs to the laborer. He has neither landlord nor master to share with him.

“Had this state continued, the wages of labor would have augmented with all those improvements in its productive powers to which the division of labor gives occasion. All things would gradually have become cheaper. They would have been produced by a smaller quantity of labor; and as the commodities produced by equal quantities of labor would naturally, in this state of things, be exchanged for one another, they would have been purchased likewise with the produce of a smaller quantity.”[189]

Repeat this to the man toiling and moiling for a bare subsistence, while he crouches before the employing capitalist surfeited in luxury; or to the poor tenant farmer, whose half-starved family can hardly find the wherewithal to cover their nakedness, while his absentee landlord indulges in the extravagant pleasures of a gay capital—and do you imagine that from it he will be slow to draw a very natural conclusion, and one fraught with tremendous practical consequences? If that originally and naturally belonged to him which another now enjoys, will he not long to return to the state of nature? As he reflects upon his wrongs and sufferings, will he not be filled with hatred towards that one who, as he thinks, unjustly and cruelly keeps him from the fruits of his labor? And as time goes on, and the hardships he endures sink more and more deeply into his mind, will he not finally, in desperation, resolve to put down his oppressor, be he landlord or be he capitalist, and to reverse, by the force of a strong right arm, an unnatural and artificial social organization?

In that thought and in that determination originated social democracy.

CHAPTER XIII.
THE IDEA OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY.

Social democrats form the extreme wing of the socialists, though, at present, many of them are inclined to lay so much stress on equality of enjoyment, regardless of the value of one’s labor, that they might, perhaps, more properly be called communists. But as they are usually known as social democrats, and as the name is not likely to lead to misunderstanding, there is no reason why we should not adhere to the ordinary appellation, especially as there are those among them who do not favor equality. They ought scarcely to be called simply socialists.

They have two distinguishing characteristics. The vast majority of them are laborers, and, as a rule, they expect the violent overthrow of existing institutions by revolution to precede the introduction of the socialistic state. I would not, by any means, say that they are all revolutionists, but the most of them undoubtedly are. The tendency of their popular writings is revolutionary. They are calculated to accustom the thoughts to revolution, and to excite the feelings of laborers to such a pitch as to prepare them for risking all in battle. If one of their prominent organs, as, for example, Their People’s Calendar (Der arme Conrad—“The Poor Conrad”) for 1878, is examined, one finds revolution mentioned frequently, and invariably in such manner as to popularize revolution as revolution. Even the most exceptionable doings of the masses in the French Revolution, in the revolutions of 1848, and in the insurrection of the commune in 1871, are glorified. Every fallen laborer becomes a hero and a martyr. Hitherto the people—so the readers of the Arme Conrad are told—have fought for others, but the next time they engage in battle it will be for themselves, and they will then obtain their well-earned wages.

The most general demands of the social democrats are the following: The state should exist exclusively for the laborers; land and capital must become collective property, and production be carried on unitedly. Private competition, in the ordinary sense of the term, is to cease. Officers, especially charged with this function, are, by means of carefully collected statistics, to regulate production according to the needs of the people. Our present money is to be replaced by money representing labor units; labor is to become the sole purchasing power. One of the party programmes requires a distribution of products according to the needs of each recipient. Some of the planks of the social democratic platforms would find sympathy with the best people in America and England. So, for example, their unceasing demand that even the present state should forbid work on Sunday, the employment of very young children, and labor injurious to the health and morality of working-women. Social democrats have never failed to recognize the advantages of education and the need of improved methods of instruction. Their cry, as that of all popular leaders, is to increase the appropriations for educational purposes. It is unfortunately significant that while in America proposals to decrease the pitiable salaries of school-teachers and otherwise diminish school expenses are often calmly and favorably listened to by even the poorer people, in Germany no popular politician or newspaper would dare advocate such measures. Every project for increasing the school appropriations is there regarded with favor by the great masses of the people.

Even now, despite the movement of the party, as a whole, towards communism, many of the best educated and most intelligent of the social democrats are, no doubt, socialistically, rather than communistically, inclined. I am speaking here not of the professional agitators—those who make the most noise. These classes control the social democratic conventions, and since the death of Lassalle they have approached more and more nearly to the purest communism. By those who are socialistically inclined, I mean such members of the party as do not think of all as occupying like positions in the socialistic state, but expect it will be organized more on the plan of an army. It is, in fact, on this account that so many social democrats look with complacency on the great standing armies of modern times, which include every able-bodied man in their service for a considerable period of his life. They are training-schools for the future social organization. It will thus be seen that emulation and rivalry are provided for, as at present in the army. Those who serve society best will be promoted. The higher officers will receive larger salaries than the lower, while the rank and file will correspond to the laborers of to-day. Industry and intelligence will enable one to rise, but there will be no heaping up of private productive property from generation to generation, for all the means of production will be in the hands of the state—that is, of society collectively. Property which will not enable one to avoid labor, as books, pictures, statuary, all sorts of ornaments, household furniture, etc., will remain private property, and be transmitted from father to son. The children of the higher orders of society will, of course, still enjoy, to a certain extent, superior advantages, inasmuch as they usually inherit greater talents, besides receiving the inestimable advantage of the personal training of gifted and highly educated parents. Fathers and mothers, it might be expected, would take more care than at present in bringing up their children, knowing that their social rank depended entirely on their ability to make themselves useful to society.

In a state like Prussia, where there is now a splendid civil service, the office-holders are often children of office-holding fathers—are, in fact, not rarely descended from families which have held office for generations.[190] The offices are open to universal competition, and are kept in the same families only by the exertions of the children and the self-denial of parents, in expending a large part of their incomes in giving them the best possible advantages. This might be expected to continue to a considerable extent in the ideal socialistic state. No one could, however, leave his children much else than personal talents and abilities well developed, save such articles of enjoyment as have been mentioned—paintings, old family plate, etc. Houses, lands, shops, machines, and everything which yields an income, belong to the socialistic state. No one could be left in such a position as to avoid exertion of some kind. All are thought of as workers, but not what we call common laborers. There would be artists, writers, physicians, etc., as now. If any child of even the poorest member of society should give satisfactory evidence of any special aptitude or talent which might be developed so as to become useful to society, provision would be made for his special training after leaving the common-school. Every one would have an opportunity to attain the highest development of which he was capable. Those who were meant by nature for wood-choppers would not lead an idle life of dissipation, consuming the fruits of other people’s labor.

It is supposed that there would be no financial panics, with their terrible consequences, in the socialistic state. Indeed, if the socialistic ideas could be carried out, panics would be impossible. Every new invention, every advance, would accrue to the benefit of all. The greater the product, the greater the value of each day’s labor; and each one would receive the full product of his labor, as no capitalist would retain a part. Capital exists and increases, but always remains common property. All could live better; since many fold as much would be produced as now. At present the chief difficulty appears to be to avoid over-production. Government appoints a committee in Prussia to inquire into the cause of the late depression, and they report over-production; in England, committees also investigate and report likewise; in America, business companies and factory owners explain their distress by over-production, and are obliged to enter into mutual agreements to produce less. In the socialistic state over-production is an impossibility. The great waste of competition, furthermore, would cease with the competition itself. Two railroads would not be built to perform the service which one could render as well, nor would six dry-goods shops exist in a town where two would be amply sufficient. This saving of capital, labor, energy, and talent would benefit all alike. Strikes, then unheard-of save as a reminiscence of the past, would no longer be a considerable element in the cost of production. Business failures would cease to impoverish the widow and the orphan.

It is impossible at present to enter into a criticism of social democracy and attempt to separate the true from the false. The comparison, however, which social democrats make between the future organization of society and that of the army is suggestive. It might be that we could afford to put up with what that implies, if we attained thereby all that is hoped; still it is terrible to think of army discipline extending itself over society in all its ramifications. To many—to the majority—the restraint would be a very great evil. Then it must be remembered that army discipline is maintained at the cost of no inconsiderable amount of actual, positive suffering. As Roscher pointedly remarks, there are thirty offences punishable with death according to the military penal code.

I have thus presented, in their most favorable aspect, the doctrines of social democrats, apart from the agitators who now preach them. The next chapter will afford an opportunity to judge whether or not the social democratic leaders of the present are men of such a character that it would be wise to give them despotic power over one’s life and actions.

Social democracy is not now precisely what it was when it lost Ferdinand Lassalle, its greatest agitator. Nevertheless, he is still its father. It is the product of his activity. Lassalle did not write history: he created it. He accomplished certain facts which no power can undo. He infused into the minds of German laborers new thoughts, ideas, aspirations. German emigrants become missionaries, and carry with them, as they believe, a gospel of hope and promise, wherever they go. They hold, as Lassalle taught them, “that they are the state, that all political power ought to be of and through and for them, that their good and amelioration ought to be the aim of the state, that their affair is the affair of mankind, that their personal interest moves and beats with the pulse of history, with the living principle of moral development.”[191]

Thus have new factors, for good or for bad, entered into the life of the world, and with them we must deal.

CHAPTER XIV.
SOCIAL DEMOCRACY SINCE THE DEATH OF LASSALLE.

The last chapter contained a description of the desires and demands of the German social democratic party, without entering into any discussion of the careers and characters of its leaders or of the organizations which have been formed to support its programme. This chapter will treat of what may be called social democracy in the concrete. I shall first take up the external history of the political party which is designated by that name, and then enter into a consideration of its internal history. By its external history I mean an account of its outward life, as manifested in the field of politics; by its internal history I mean a description of the men who have led the party, and a presentation both of the ideas which have controlled it and the measures which it has adopted in its political and economic propaganda.

It was the introduction of universal suffrage by the North German Confederation, in 1867, and by the German Empire, in 1871, which enabled the social democrats to enter into political contests with any reasonable hope of success. German laborers do not appear previously to have played any rôle in the politics of their country. The Prussian constitution is so constructed as to give a preponderating influence to wealth. This is not the place to explain the Prussian system of voting. It is only necessary to remark that the voters are divided into three classes, according to their wealth, and that a voter of the wealthiest class in Berlin counts for as much as fifteen voters of the poorest class. The laborer could not, of course, hope to gain political influence with such tremendous odds against him. It was to enable the poor man to fight his own battles that Lassalle demanded universal and equal suffrage for all. This was, as will be remembered, the only explicit demand of the social democratic party, contained in the statutes or by-laws of the “Universal German Laborers’ Union.” Lassalle appears to have been acquainted with Bismarck’s intention to embrace it in the constitution of the empire he was striving to found, and hoped great things therefrom. But as he died in 1864, and the citizens of the North German Confederation first voted in 1867, he was never able to make use of it in his agitation. It is not often profitable to speculate upon what might have happened if this or that event had not occurred, but it is self-evident that Lassalle’s agitation would have been very formidable if he could have led the laborers to the ballot-box and defended their cause, first in the North German, afterwards in the Imperial, parliaments, with all the resources of his learning, mental acumen, and impassioned eloquence. Lassalle’s death discouraged the social democrats for a moment only. It can scarcely be said that it caused an interruption in the progress of the party, though this progress would, we may believe, have been far more rapid had he lived. However, his death itself was made useful. Living, he could scarcely have been glorified as he was after his death, and his name could not have so influenced the laborers.

The social democrats entered into the contest for election of members to the Constituent Assembly of the North German Confederation. In one of the districts their candidate ran against Bismarck and a leading liberal, and received about one fourth of the votes cast for the three candidates. As no one received a majority, a new election was ordered, and Bismarck was elected by the aid of the social democrats, who always prefer conservatives to liberals. As Bismarck was elected in another district, it was necessary to vote for a third time in this place, when the social democrat ran against the celebrated liberal, Dr. Gneist, Professor of Constitutional Law in the University of Berlin, and one of the leading jurists in Germany. The votes were about evenly divided, but the social democrat was defeated by a small majority. The social democrats elected two representatives, however, and in the fall of the same year (1867) they sent eight members to the Parliament of the North German Confederation.

Since the organization of the German Empire the social democratic votes for members of the Imperial Parliament (Reichstag) have numbered as follows: 1871, 123,975; 1874, 351,952; 1877, 493,288; 1878, 437,158. The entire number of votes cast in 1877 was 5,401,021. We see, then, that the social democratic voters numbered over one eleventh of all the voters in that year. When it is remembered that there are nine or ten political parties represented in the Reichstag, it must be acknowledged that the elections revealed a large relative strength of the social democratic party. Its votes have, however, been so scattered that it has not had its proportionate number of representatives in Parliament. The social democratic members of the Reichstag numbered two in 1871, nine in 1874, twelve in 1877, and nine in 1878. The total number of members of the Reichstag is about four hundred. It is thus seen that the social democratic party advanced in strength, as far as that is measured by votes, until 1878, when the decrease was only slight. Two attempts were made on the life of the Emperor William in that year, and the social democrats had to bear a good share of the blame. There was a considerable popular indignation manifested; private employers, as well as government, discharged laborers who entertained social democratic principles; and in the elections following the police put every obstacle in the way of the party. In the Reichstag the celebrated socialistic law was passed, which gave government exceptional and despotic powers to proceed against social democracy. The severity of the government appears to have done more harm than good. In spite of what can be fairly designated as persecution, in the elections which took place in October, 1881, the social democrats secured thirteen seats, the largest number they have ever yet gained.[192] This is, indeed, significant when it is remembered that the exceptional law (Ausnahmegesetz) allows severe measures against the social democrats which would not even be thought of against any other party. Government has thus been enabled to suspend all their party newspapers, to prohibit the sale of their books and pamphlets, and to suppress all public agitation of the party. Their associations were dissolved, and for a hotel-keeper even to rent them rooms for a meeting was made an offence punishable with imprisonment for a length of time varying from one month to a year.

The German government was undoubtedly placed in a trying position, but they appear to have made a mistake. It is said that at the time the Ausnahmegesetz was passed, things were in a bad way with the social democrats. They had twenty or thirty journals, but many of them were on the point of bankruptcy. Differences existed in the party, and no one seemed to know what to do next. It is possible, if the party had been left alone, it might have fallen into a sad state of disorganization, and have become so weak that it would have ceased to trouble the peace of the government for years. However this might have been, it is certain that the measures of government were not altogether unwelcome to the party leaders. It relieved them of numerous perplexities. It was much better, e.g., for them to have their newspapers and magazines suspended by government than to cease to appear for lack of support. Governmental persecution united the divided members and gave new energy to all. Every social democratic laborer experienced, to a certain extent, the elevating feelings of martyrdom. They all became secret missionaries, distributing tracts and exhorting individually their fellow-laborers to join the struggle for the emancipation of labor.

The German social democrats have held two congresses since the socialistic law, both, of course, on foreign soil, and both have indicated progress. The first was held at Wyden, Switzerland, August 20-23, 1880. This resulted in a complete triumph for the more moderate party. The two leading extremists, Hasselmann and Most, were both expelled from the party—the former by all save three votes, the latter by all save two.

The next congress was held at Copenhagen, Denmark, from March 29 to April 2, 1883. It exhibited greater unanimity of sentiment and plan, and a more wide-spread interest in social democracy, than any previous congress. One feature of interest was the very considerable financial aid from America which was reported.[193]

“Bismarck has acknowledged that the measures which government has adopted up to this time have not proved successful in weakening social democracy, or in checking, in any effectual manner, its spread among the people. But he claims that he has not as yet carried out his full programme. This is true. During the discussion upon the socialistic law of October 21, 1878, he declared distinctly that he did not expect to cure the masses of the disease of social democracy by repressive measures alone. Something more than external remedies was needed. The social democrats had built upon well-grounded discontent of the people, and he proposed to win back the masses for king and fatherland by removing the grounds of discontent. These grounds were of an economic nature. Wages were low, taxes high, work scarce, and the entire economic existence of the lower classes uncertain and full of anxiety. But what was to be done about it? No one knew exactly, but all looked forward with eagerness to Bismarck’s proposals. Two years passed away without bringing any of his plans to light. People began to think that the promises of relief to the poor had been thrown out simply as a bait to catch votes for the bill which became the socialistic law.”[194] That they were intended to serve this purpose is undoubted. The only question is whether Bismarck really intended to make any attempt to carry through legislation in behalf of the laborers. The lapse of time made men sceptical. The opinion more and more prevailed that the last had been heard of government institutions designed to ameliorate the condition of the poor. “But Bismarck has a good memory and a strong will. When he has once made up his mind to pursue a certain course of action he is not to be diverted therefrom. More than once Germany has thought that he had forgotten some threat or resolve because he allowed years to slip by without making any public move towards the execution of his plans, but in such cases she has reckoned without her host. It now looks as if Bismarck might have meant all he said when he promised to use the power of the state to relieve the poor classes. He had not for a moment forgotten his promise, but was only working out his plans and waiting for an opportune moment to execute them.” The German emperor, too, had been urging him forward in the path he had marked out for government. The old Kaiser—who seems, in his way, to have a warm, fatherly affection for his people—professed his distress at the sufferings of the unfortunate, and maintained his sincere desire to relieve them. He was an old man, he said, and he longed to see the labor question satisfactorily adjusted before his death. To one who realizes the utter impossibility of his seeing this pious wish gratified, there is something undeniably touching in the simple and honest expressions of this good-natured father of his people. “Early in the year 1881 the Reichstag obtained an earnest of Bismarck’s plans for pacifying the discontented elements in Germany in the Accident Insurance bill, which is merely an episode in the history of German socialism. The aim of the measure is to make provision for industrial laborers injured in the prosecution of their callings, or for their families when they are killed. It is proposed to establish a great insurance society somewhat like the one founded and managed by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company.[195] The resemblance between many features of the two plans is, indeed, surprising. It is desired, however, in Germany, that government should bear a portion of the expenses; at any rate, that is one characteristic of the government bill. Government also wishes to manage the insurance society or societies undertaking this work, although it might allow employers and employees some representation in the administration of the business. In both these respects the bill is clearly socialistic, and no one is better aware of this than Prince Bismarck. It has been deliberately decided that private individuals, or voluntary combinations of private individuals, are unable to perform all the duties of society towards the poorer classes. The state is to become a benefactor and protector of the weak and needy. Bills introduced by government are always accompanied with so-called ‘motives,’ explaining and defending them. The ‘motives’ accompanying the Accident Insurance bill opened with these words: ‘That the state should care for its poorer members in a higher degree than it has formerly done is a duty demanded not only by humanity and Christianity—and the institutions of state should be penetrated through and through by Christianity—but it is also a measure required for the preservation of the state. A sound policy should nourish in the indigent classes of the population, which are the most numerous and least instructed, the view that the state is a beneficial, as well as a necessary, arrangement. Legislative measures must bring them direct, easily perceived advantages, to the end that they may learn to regard the state not merely as an institution devised for the protection of the wealthier classes, but as one which likewise ministers to their needs and interests.’”

Bismarck proposes, then, to conquer social democracy by recognizing and adopting into his own platform what there is of good in its demands. It is curious to notice that friends of Bismarck and supporters of the government have even gone so far as to adopt some of the social democratic phrases. They have spoken of the laborers as the “disinherited” classes of society. Yet this originated with the social democrats; and a few years ago government gave as one reason for prohibiting the sale of a certain book in Germany the fact that it called the laborers the “disinherited” (die Enterbten). Thus far has Bismarck gone in the way of making concessions. In the one point of the Accident Insurance bill he has drawn a number of social democrats to his support. They look upon it as only a beginning, and, indeed, Bismarck has proposed to add features making provision for old age and for death from disease and other causes than accident. But all that Bismarck has promised is to them only one step. Those who regard the matter in this light are willing to support him in this first step. Bebel, one of their leaders at present, was one of the most earnest supporters of Bismarck’s Insurance bill in the Reichstag, when the measure was brought forward. Kayser, another social democrat, declared that he would let no one “terrorize him—he would defend Bismarck.” All this makes a strange impression upon us when we remember the cruelties and persecutions which the social democrats have suffered through the instrumentality of the great German statesman. It is amusing, and, at the same time, it is not devoid of a certain pathos. It reminds one of an ancient prophecy—“The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock.”

However, the two parties drew near together only for one special purpose, and but for a moment. No reconciliation has taken place between the opposing elements of industrial society in Germany. Only one of Bismarck’s schemes for the amelioration of the condition of the laboring man has been adopted.

In treating of these schemes I have brought the external history of social democracy down to the present moment, for they are to-day being discussed in Germany. They are viewed with the deepest distrust by large classes of the population, and Parliament has greeted them coolly. Were they accepted, they alone would not be sufficient to cure so deep-seated a disease; perhaps they would scarcely mitigate it. Radical changes, not to be hoped for in our lifetime, must take place before the conflict between capitalist and laborer—between rich and poor—will cease to disturb the peace of Christendom. The evil is rooted in the very nature of society itself, and can only terminate in a transformation and moral elevation of the various social elements. Its cause lies deeper than the agitation of Karl Marx or the eloquence of Ferdinand Lassalle, who only acted upon latent feelings and expressed thoughts, of which the laborers had already a dim consciousness. Sooner or later their feelings were bound to become active and their thoughts to find adequate expression.

Roscher, in his “Political Economy,” describes five conditions which, meeting together, produce communistic and socialistic movements. As his description of them has become celebrated, and explains not the mere surface phenomena, but the underlying causes of communism and socialism, I think it worth while to present them. I shall, however, take the liberty of making abbreviations and changes, and interspersing such remarks of my own as will better adapt the description to the purpose of this volume.

The first condition is “a well-defined confrontation of rich and poor. So long as there is a middle-class of considerable numbers between them, the two extremes are kept, by its moral force, from coming into collision. There is no greater preservative against envy of the superior classes and contempt for the inferior than the gradual and unbroken fading of one class of society into another.... But when the rich and the poor are separated by an abyss which there is no hope of ever crossing, how pride, on the one side, and envy, on the other, rage! and especially in the centres of industry, the great cities, where the deepest misery is found side by side with the most brazen-faced luxury, and where the wretched themselves, conscious of their numbers, mutually excite their own bad passions. It cannot, unfortunately, be denied that when a nation has attained the acme of its development we find a multitude of tendencies prevailing to make the rich richer and the poor, at least relatively, poorer, and thus to diminish the number of the middle-class from both sides; unless, indeed, remedial influences are brought to bear and to operate in a contrary direction.”

The second condition mentioned is “a high degree of the division of labor, by which, on the one hand, the mutual dependence of man on man grows ever greater, but by which, at the same time, the eye of the uncultured man becomes less and less able to perceive the connection existing between merit and reward, or service and remuneration. Let us betake ourselves in imagination to Crusoe’s island. There, when one man, after the labor of many months, has hollowed out a tree into a canoe, with no tools but an animal’s tooth, it does not occur to another, who, in the meantime, was, it may be, sleeping on the skin of some wild animal, to contest the right of the former to the fruit of his labor. How different this from the condition of things where civilization is advanced, as it is in our day; where the banker, by a single stroke of his pen, seems to earn a thousand times more than a day-laborer in a week; where, in the case of those who lend money on interest, their debtors too frequently forget how laborious was the process of acquiring the capital by the possessors, or their predecessors in ownership! More especially, we have in times of over-population whole masses of honest men asking, not alms, but only work—an opportunity to earn their bread, and yet on the verge of starvation.”

The third condition: “A violent shaking or perplexing of public opinion in its relation to the feeling of right by revolutions, especially when they follow rapidly one on the heels of another, and take opposite directions. On such occasions both parties have generally prostituted themselves for the sake of the favor of the masses.... In this way they are stirred up to the making of pretentious claims which it is afterwards very difficult to silence.” It is in this prostitution of parties that our greatest danger in the United States lies. It is already sought to influence large classes by promises of office. The evils of political contests controlled by those who hope to gain offices and those who fear they may lose them will increase in two ways. First, the number of offices will necessarily become greater with the increase of population and the growth of public business. Instead of one hundred thousand federal office-holders, we will yet have two hundred thousand. Second, as population increases, and it becomes ever more and more difficult to gain one’s bread, to say nothing about ascending the social ladder, public offices will be coveted even more than at present, and over each one there will be waged a bitter personal warfare. What, then, we have to fear is that, as in ancient Rome, politicians will strive to influence the great masses by promises of favors—food and entertainments (panem et circenses). If a beginning is ever made in that direction the enemies of the republic will have already crossed the rubicon. It behooves us to stop in the downward path before it is too late. This can be done only by putting our civil service—federal, state, and municipal—on a sound moral basis.

The fourth condition: “Pretensions of the lower classes in consequence of a democratic constitution. Communism is the logically not inconsistent exaggeration of the principle of equality.” If you reflect upon it, you will perceive that political equality, in the course of time, very naturally leads to thoughts of economic equality—equality in the enjoyment of spiritual and material goods.

The fifth condition: “A general decay of religion and morality in the people. When every one regards wealth as a sacred trust or office, coming from God, and poverty as a divine dispensation, intended to educate and develop those afflicted thereby, and considers all men as brothers, and this earthly life only as a preparation for eternity, even extreme differences of property lose their irritating and demoralizing power. On the other hand, the atheist and materialist becomes only too readily a mammonist, and the poor mammonist falls only too easily into that despair which would gladly kindle a universal conflagration, in order either to plunder or lose his own life.” The maxim of the materialist, sunk in poverty and despair, is, as is noticed, not that noble one of our fathers, “Give me liberty or give me death,” but “Give me pleasure, enjoyment in this life, or let me die in my misery.” “The rich mammonist aggravates this sad condition of things when he casts suspicion on all wealth by the immorality of the means he takes to acquire it and the sinfulness of his enjoyments.”[196]

Turning to the internal history of social democracy after Lassalle’s death, we have first to notice the condition of the “Universal German Laborers’ Union” since that event. It was controlled for some time by the Countess von Hatzfeldt. Her former connection with Lassalle and the possession of large financial resources enabled her for some time to maintain her position as its leading spirit. She interested herself in politics, however, more on account of Lassalle than for the sake of the laborers. She wished to honor his memory and promote the cause which had been dear to him.

Before Lassalle died he mentioned the name of a man whom he recommended as his successor in the presidency of the “Laborers’ Union.” The choice was not a happy one. The new president soon made enemies of the ablest members of the Union, and finally had a falling-out with the countess, in whose house he lived, and who, for the sake of the cause, supported him. It appears that one day the countess commissioned him to purchase butter and cheese for the household. This was too much for the poor president. He regarded the performance of such offices as incompatible with his manly dignity and the respect due his high and honorable position. He did not, indeed, fail to appreciate to the fullest extent the honor which Lassalle had conferred upon him. Identifying the Union with all mankind, he was accustomed to sign himself “President of Humanity.” He compared his noiseless activity to the gentle rain, which, without thunder and lightning, gradually penetrates the hard crust of the earth.

The amenities of life among the social democrats are curiously illustrated by their dissensions during the presidency of this man—Becker by name. Becoming enraged at Marx once, he proposed that the author of “Capital” and the founder of the International should embalm himself with his International and have himself hung in the chimney as a mad herring. In return for this Liebknecht moved, in the Berlin association, that Becker should be expelled from the Union as a low-minded slanderer and a hopelessly incurable idiot.[197]

New presidents were elected yearly for two or three years, but the countess could agree with none. She finally withdrew, with her followers, and established a new association, called the “Female Line.” It never played a considerable rôle, and in a few years died a natural death.

After the withdrawal of the countess the “Universal Laborers’ Union” showed good sense enough to elect their ablest man president. This was Jean Baptista von Schweitzer, a dramatic writer of some note, whose comedies are considered among the best which have appeared recently. Perhaps the best known are “Die Darwinianer,” “Epidemisch,” and “Grosstädtisch.”

Von Schweitzer belonged to an old and wealthy patrician family of Frankfort-on-the-Main. He had led a dissipated life, been involved in a scandalous affair in Mannheim, and become a noted roué. When society in Frankfort could tolerate him no longer he took up his abode in another city, but here again became suspected of improper acts. It is surprising that a man of such character should join the laborers and declaim about their hardships. While it is possible that he was so thoroughly blasé that he could find needed excitement in no other way, I should prefer to regard this move on his part as the first step in a better path. He was a man of talent, and was never entirely absorbed in sensual pleasures. When he took up the cause of the social democrats he began to think about other things than his own selfish and immoral gratifications. For four years he held the post of president of the “Universal German Laborers’ Union;” and in this position not only displayed administrative ability of a high order, but manifested an unwearied devotion in his leadership. He found the Union weak and about to fall to pieces; he left it a strong, compact body. The Social Democrat, one of the most prominent organs of the party, was founded by him, and in this paper he defended the doctrines of Lassalle with vigor and understanding.

Von Schweitzer withdrew from the social democrats in 1871, and led thenceforth an unexceptionable life. The love of woman had finally conquered his wild nature. He was happily married, and passed the last years of his life in literary pursuits. He died in 1875,[198] having already gained an honorable position as an author.