Why I am in favor of socialism Part 4

=Weber, Gustavus Adolphus.= (Economist.)

The ideal of Socialism, as I understand it, is a condition of society in which each individual will render his share of service in the production and distribution of wealth, and in which each will receive his proportionate share for consumption. I do not dispute the desirability of such a condition. I take issue with the Socialists in their contention that this condition can be brought about, or that a material advance toward such a condition can be accomplished, by legislation.

Society must advance by gradual evolution, as it has done since its beginning, and I believe that this ideal condition is still many generations, perhaps centuries, distant. The only way to strive for its realization is for each generation to do its part in promoting a spirit of temperance, co-operation, fairness and intellectuality.

Society will then gradually realize the waste, unfairness and barbarism of industrial compet.i.tion, of inheritance and of unequal distribution and consumption. While man is thus slowly becoming civilized, he will naturally devise from time to time, such laws and such forms of government as will fit each stage of his development.

=Strobell, George H.=

I work and vote for Socialism. Every age has its special problems, its special tyranny to combat, its own liberty and independence to preserve, to hand down to its descendants. The machine has destroyed hand labor and a.s.sociation in labor is inevitable. The machine, too large and complex to be owned by individuals, has made necessary combinations of owners. Combinations of owners destroyed compet.i.tion, and, through resultant economy and increase of production and profit, became rich and powerful corporations. These corporations control the means of life of over nine-tenths of the people. The owners no longer are the administrators of their property. They hire the necessary business abilities to run the business machine, but they insistently demand higher dividends and profits. These demands cause the virtual slavery of the workers, and millions work today long hours at a speed and productive capacity never before known in the world, and get so little for it that they are hungry all the time, live in squalor and dress poorly. More and better machinery being constantly invented, turns loose on the labor market a host of unemployed to compete with their fellow workers for work. We are not the freeman our fathers were.

Fortunes so vast as to stagger the imagination for a few; dire, ever-increasing poverty for the ma.s.ses is now and will be increasingly the result of this development unless--

Unless we look at it in the sane way, as a development toward a new order, where the people will, in their collective capacity, own and operate and democratically manage all industry. That will be Socialism. There is no other way of escape in sight. Socialism is not, however, inevitably the outcome. There must be conscious action by the people to turn this evolution away from its present tendency. To continue as we are is to invite the destruction of our civilization.

Therefore I work and vote for Socialism. It is a step forward in the progress of the race and a promise of the fulfillment of the prayer, "Thy Kingdom come, on earth as it is in Heaven."

=Kalley, Ella Hartwig.= (Lecturer.)

I have long felt the need of a more humane form of government, a system of justice regulating international commercial relations, insuring peace and education for the older as well as the younger persons.

Our country should be a republic, industrially as well as politically, and liberate the wage slave by the abolition of the capitalist.

As a writer, I shall continue to defend the interests of the ma.s.ses instead of the cla.s.ses, and as a Temperance Suffragette Socialist lecturer, I shall endeavor to inspire my audiences above the misty horizon of all other political parties to the star line of true reform, which is "the hoe of promise" and basis of a nation's greatness.

I am not alone in the thought that a temperance plank added to the Socialist Platform would cause the greatest majority to leave other parties, as Socialism would be more attractive than ever, to the very finest and best representatives of society everywhere, while justice would flower and bloom and the Dove of Peace perch upon our banners.

It would be a lame platform for any political party to overlook the crying need of reform on all lines and to enforce the boasted pure food law, and at the same time to tolerate and uphold distilleries, saloons and breweries, is to herald the weakness and sandy foundation of the parties, old or new. As comrades and co-workers in behalf the downtrodden, let loyal men and women unite and lead in the vanguard of Christian political victory.

=Levermore, Charles Herbert.= (Educator and Author.)

I am in favor of Socialism because I believe in the common owners.h.i.+p of land and water and of instruments of production and distribution, and because I believe that the highest ideals of social and moral perfection would lead us all to labor for the welfare of the community rather than of any individual.

But I am not convinced that any party now called Socialist, or any group of avowedly Socialist leaders has as yet shown a safe and practicable plan for the realization of those ideals.

=Kinney, Abbot.= (Author, Venice, Cal.)

We are all Socialists. Man is a social animal. It is consequently impossible that any government of man should be anything but a Socialism.

The people have lost sight of the fact that all property in a State belongs to the State. The exercise by every State of the right of eminent domain is an ill.u.s.tration of this. Modern governments customarily pay the private user or holder of property, when the property is taken for public use. This is always the rule when property is taken by corporations, or persons under a delegation to them of the right of eminent domain. It is only properly so delegated for public utilities in private hands.

Public payment for property so taken is a matter of convention and convenience. It is deemed fair that property taken from one member of the society for the benefit of all, should be paid for by all. Or, if such property is taken by a common carrier, for instance, that such common carrier should pay for it. In case of public stress, however, as in the blowing up of a row of houses to stop the course of a fire, or in the seizure of food or quarters for the use of military in national defense, or in the clearing away of houses or property for defensive purposes, payment may or may not be made as the conditions indicate.

More than this, every human life in a society belongs to the State.

Thus the State may draft its citizens to fight fire, suppress disorder, or take part in the military defense of the society or State. The State also imprisons and even executes its members who attack the general welfare.

=Cazalet, Edward Alexander.= (President of the Anglo-Russian Literary Society, Imperial Inst.i.tute, London.)

The ideals of Socialism might be realized by the precepts of Christianity, "love your neighbor as yourself." Difficult social questions which cannot be solved by the head are sometimes settled by the heart, for it appeals to the conscience, diminis.h.i.+ng selfishness and making all cla.s.ses friends. Christian Socialism, by encouraging mutual concessions, might perhaps attain better results than agitation and violence.

=Allen, Fred Hovey.= (Clergyman and Author.)

I believe in a Socialism which levels upward, which makes a man what he was not, only a higher, n.o.bler, richer being. I believe that next to being G.o.d, the greatest thing is to be a man. The more G.o.dlike he becomes, the more man will reflect the true and only permanent Socialism.

I am in favor of such Socialism as will attach the chain of brotherhood to the lowest, if that lowest is capable of rising into true manhood, because truth, honesty, love and kindness mean the Kingdom of Heaven begun on earth, and equal rights to all the children of G.o.d.

=Helms, E.J.= (Clergyman.)

I am in favor of Socialism insofar as it is the practical application of Christianity to our economic and industrial life.

=Conger-Kaneko, Josephine.= (Editor, The Progressive Women.)

I am in favor of Socialism because it seems to be the next step in social evolution, carrying the human race toward a more perfect civilization.

=Hitchc.o.c.k, Charles C.= (Merchant and Author.)

We are fast coming to realize that co-operation in the use of our economic resources is the only form of society worthy of civilized people.

A co-operative commonwealth demands that the able-bodied individual shall not be allowed to consume more wealth as measured in labor power, than he creates. Is not this so evidently reasonable that the system should command the approval of every fair mind? It doubtless would do so were we not born into and environed by the capitalist order, thereby being naturally prejudiced against an innovation so radically different as is Socialism.

Perhaps no more comprehensive definition of Socialism can be given than that by Walter Thomas Mills, which is:

"First. The collective owners.h.i.+p of the means of producing the means of life."