the words, "Proletarians of all countries, unite." Werner Sombart says that Marx had "vainly attempted to introduce the ideals of solidarity and union from without." They certainly have not

radiated from within.

The French Socialists do not display the slightest sympathy for Belgian or Italian workmen who come to France; the English workmen have obtained the passing of the "Aliens' Act," and the expulsion of the Chinese from the Transvaal; the American workmen have inherited the European immigration difficulties and have prohibited the entry of the Chinese and Japanese.

Socialists nevertheless talk of Society with a big S, of Society with neither frontiers nor nations. When Karl Marx said, "Proletarians of all nations, unite," he did not say that the proletarians of China were excluded from his excluded from his appeal. The agrarians of Eastern Prussia have suggested the importation of Chinese coolies. Is the German Socialist Party disposed to welcome them as brothers?

At the Stuttgart Congress, the Germans displayed a strong national sentiment and were very angry with Hervé. Still it is Hervé, and not they, that is logical. Every Socialist who admits the existence of a separate nation, admits individual property; for a nation presupposes the ownership by a group of individuals of a portion of the earth's surface.

Speaking generally, the Socialists act contrary to their professions. They say that they want to place property in the hands of the people, but they will either place it in the hands of bodies of men which, whatever the name by which they may go, are greedier than any Harpagon, or in the hands of the State, which, in its turn, will delegate it to departments of administration; and these will exploit it for their own benefit, not for that of the public,

They talk of liberty, but all their proposed legislation is the legislation of tyranny and police, and we have seen them reassimilate free to the type of servile labour.

They talk of an ideal of government, and instead of limiting its attributes, they endow it with powers as vague and indeterminate as those of Oriental or African potentates.

They say nothing of liberty, for they understand it in the same sense as the maid-servant of Frankfort who, on the day after the Revolution of 1848, said to her mistress, "Now that we are equal, you shall carry the coal-box and I will wear the diamonds."1

1 Quoted by M. Georg Simmel, "Philosophie de la Souveraineté" Journal des Economistes, 15 juillet, 1907.

CHAPTER II

SOCIALISM VERSUS DEMOCRACY

Factors opposed to "social evolution"-Socialism opposed to small industries and small properties-Appeal to workmen's legislation-Sidney Webb opposed to thrift and co-operation-Apology for idleness-The Confederation of Labour and the "slough of democracy"-"The class for itself and the class in itself'' -Some leaders of the proletariat class-The primary school teachers and the class in itself.

In order that the "Socialist evolution" may be realised, it is necessary that industry and capital should be concentrated in a few hands, and, on the other hand, that there should be a great mass of wage-earners, increasingly wretched and deprived of all personal property. Such is the process as determined by Marx and Engels in the "Communist Manifesto," and confirmed by the Erfurt Congress in 1891.

But this phenomenon does not appear if the "artisan" works in isolated independence; neither does it appear if those who carry on small industries, working in their own houses, have not been previously absorbed in the proletariat crowd of workmen employed in the great industries; nor does it appear if the small proprietor preserves his love of individual property. The prophesied social evolution miscarries; the heralded paradise of the socialisation of all the means of production and exchange vanishes. Democracy and Socialism are antagonistic.

Have I invented and formulated this proposition for polemical purposes? It comes from a Socialist, Herr Werner Sombart.1

"What should be the attitude of socialism with regard to the masses which have not yet fallen into the ranks of the proletariat, such as the lower middle

1 "Le Socialisme et le mouvement social au xixe siécle,” p. 144 foll.

class (petite bourgeoisie) and of that part of the population which may perhaps never exhibit any tendency to inclusion in the proletariat? Should the object of the proletariat be essentially proletarian or should it be democratic? If it become democratic, what becomes of its programme? Is it to be socialism or democracy? The fundamental contention is expressed in the opposition between these two points of view."

Bernstein published a series of articles in 1905 under the title, "Will Social Democracy Become Popular ?"1

In order to obtain recruits for the Socialist army it is necessary to "proletariarise" those who carry on small industries as well as small trades, and the owners of small properties, all of whom display elements of resistance to the socialisation of the means of production. The movement of concentration, which does not take place naturally, must be obtained by force, in order to arrive at the catastrophe foretold by Karl Marx, as "on the one hand a few large industrial establishments and on the other the masses who possess nothing at all, the former absorbing the latter without their being able to offer resistance."

In order to reach this point, the simplicity and ignorance of the very persons is to be exploited whom it is proposed to ruin, and of their representatives in Parliament. And legislation is to be carried out on the lines of social insurance and regulation of labour, in such a manner as to annihilate the small men, to overburden them with general expenses and risks, to close their shops and businesses and to try by artificial means to bring about the concentration of industries to which economic liberty fails to lend itself.

Werner Sombart frankly recognises this when he says that "a good system of workmen's legisla

1 "Socialistische Monatshefte," August, October and November, 1905. See the "Mouvement socialiste," January 15th, 1906, p.117.

tion is a weapon of the highest order for proprietors of undertakings on a large scale, wherewith to ruin the small men and disembarrass themselves of their competition.1

M. E. Vandervelde also demands this factitious concentration. "We must," he says, "wish for, and even foster by legislative measures, the passing of the degenerate forms of individual production into the superior forms of production in common.'

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People exclaim that the small or family workshop gets out of control, and demand its suppression. It will be the compulsory stage on the road to proletarisation, if small proprietors, small industrialists and small traders, in fact all persons with a moderate position in life, fail to remember that democracy and socialism are antagonistic. They have already, in spite of numerous warnings, frequently been the dupes of those who lured them to work for their own destruction. Laws, such as those with reference to a weekly day of rest, are of a nature to give them such warning. Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Webb protest against a group of careful artisans carrying on an enterprise by themselves. They would be supporting a minor industry, "which is diametrically opposed to the Socialist ideal." They would be producing for their own profit, and the community would obtain no more power over their industry than over the industry of the individual.

While the Belgian Socialists make use of Vooruit and of some other co-operative societies, Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Webb declare that they present "the worst aspect of current affairs." Work and thrift are considered as vices by Socialists. M. Paul Lafargue has written the apology of idleness. This is one way of flattering the lowest instincts, and it is evident that if these excellent apostles

1 Werner Sombart, op. cit.

2 "Le Collectivisme et l'évolution industrielle,” p. 53.