Part 1
Produced by Adrian Mastronardi and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
* * * * *
+-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Bold text is represented =like so=. | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. For | | a complete list, please see the end of this document. | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+
* * * * *
Why I Am
Opposed to Socialism
Original Papers by
Leading Men and Women
EDWARD SILVIN
SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA U.S.A.
Copyright, 1913 By EDWARD SILVIN
INDEX TO AUTHORS
Adams, Thomas Sewall 36-37
Allen, Alfred 27
Allen, John Robert 52
Anderson, Rasmus Bjorn 44-45
Andrews, Martin Register 26
Arford, Fremont 31
Barr, Granville Walter 32-33
Barstow, George Eames 41
Baxter, James Phinney 45-46
Beard, Daniel Carter 20-21
Bell, Mackenzie 22
Benington, Arthur 8
Bigelow, Edward Fuller 30
Binney, Charles Chauncey 23-24
Boyd-Carpenter, William B. 11-12
Brazier, Marion Howard 17
Brown, Mrs. M. McClellan 7
Brownscombe, Jennie 42
Burke, John Butler 19-20
Cavanaugh, John 32
Cazalet, Edward Alexander 17-18
Clark, John Bates 8-9
Crowell, John Franklin 34
Cutler, James Elbert 44
Eggert, Charles Augustus 5-6
Ellis, George Washington 46-52
Ellis, Horace 10
Emerson, Samuel Franklin 46
Esenwein, Joseph Berg 13
Ferguson, Charles 45
Field, Walter Taylor 40
Gaines, Clement Carrington 39
Garvin, Lucius Fayette Clark 12
Giering, Eugene T. 53
Hastings, William Granger 20
Heald, G.H. 35
Hovey, Lewis R. 14-16
Jefferys, Upton S. 20
Kelly, Robert Lincoln 35-36
Kizer, Edwin Dicken 17
Krout, Mary Hannah 14
Ladd, George Trumbull 36
Ladd, Horatio Oliver 21-22
Leckie, A.S. 40
Lee, Elmer 41-42
Levermore, Charles Herbert 22
Leveroni, Frank 44
Lightner, Ezra Wilberforce 43
Linn, Walter R. 37
Long, John Luther 12-13
McConnell, Francis J. 7-8
Mencken, Henry Louis 6-7
Nevin, Theodore Williamson 29-30
Owen, Douglas 27-28
Painter, Franklin Verzelius Newton 28-29
Penrose, Stephen Beasley Linnard 16
Post, Louis Freeland 30
Purrington, William Archer 18
Raymond, George Lansing 9-10
Russell, Isaac Franklin 25-26
Scheffauer, Herman 38
Screws, William Wallace 19
Super, Charles William 13-14
Terhune, William Lewis 37-38
Thayer, William Roscoe 29
Tutt, John Calhoun 31
Walker, Albert H. 30-31
White, William Allen 33-34
Wilcox, Lute 34
Wilson, Alonzo Edes 24-25
_The gentle reader, who is inclined to say why he is opposed to Socialism, is cordially invited to contribute his thoughts to the future editions of this little book._
Why I Am Opposed to Socialism
=Eggert, Charles Augustus.= (Author and College Professor.)
I am opposed to Socialism, first, because it is not an inductively obtained system, but an "ism" that postulates qualities in the individuality of a nation which no nation, or community even, has yet developed to a sufficiently high state to make this "ism" fit to be seriously tried.
Second: Much of what Socialism teaches will be put to the test by society anyhow, for society is based on interest, on financial considerations, and it has been found very long ago, that co-operation cheapens products, while steadying employment.
Third: As a working system Socialism is based on the limited intellectual powers of a large number of people who will not receive systematic instruction, or cannot. Any large school shows how large the proportion of children is who must eventually be, as adults, members of this number, and, by exercising their right to vote for their officers and leaders, will make a scientific and economical management exceedingly difficult, if not impossible. Tried on a limited scale it amounts only to co-operation--different from Socialism.
Fourth: The existing system is based on the rewards held out to individual effort, thus furnishing leaders who, by accumulating capital through self-denial, great moderation in the pursuit of pleasure, and strenuous work, will be eventually enabled to establish large combinations, factories, corporations of all sorts, which, as history and daily experience prove, pay even the unintelligent laborers higher wages and furnish them more security than they could possibly have obtained if left to themselves as Socialistic organizations. In order to obtain the best results, however, a protective tariff must keep out undue foreign competition.
Fifth: Differences of opinion on these points can be settled satisfactorily only by a close and careful study of the history of business, and the leading Socialists, Marx, etc., have been shown to be palpably and grievously incapable of such study.
Sixth: Socialism would lead to governmental art, science and literature, that is to say to the counterfeit of real art, science, and literature. It would be the rule of the unintelligent and largely of the demagogues (for such would stand a better chance than the honest and thoughtful, for election to offices).
Seventh: Socialism could not be established (as an "ism") except by robbery. Good men would not lend themselves to such business.
* * * * *
=Mencken, Henry Louis.= (Author of "The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche," editor of The Players' Ibsen, part-author with Robert Rives LaMonte of "Men vs. the Man." Member of the editorial staff of the Baltimore Evening Sun.)
I am opposed to Socialism because, in general, it means a vain and costly attack upon the immutable natural law that the strong shall have advantage over the weak. I do not defend that law as perfect, nor do I even maintain that it is just. If I had the world to make over I should probably try to find something to take its place, something measurably less wasteful and cruel. But the world is as it is and the law is as it is. Say what you will against it, you must at least admit that it works, that it tends to destroy the botched and useless, that it places a premium upon enterprise and courage, that it makes for health and strength, that it is the most powerful of all agents of human progress. Would brotherhood, supposing it to be achieved, do as well? I doubt it. Brotherhood would help the soft man, the clinging man, the stupid man. But would it help the alert and resourceful man? Answer for yourself. Isn't it a fact that difficulties make daring, that effort makes efficiency? Do not functions develop by use? Does the cell act or react?
Meanwhile, I grant all schemes of brotherhood one indubitable merit. Socialism shares it with Christianity. It is this: that they are eternally impossible of carrying out, that men cannot actually live them. The Beatitudes, after 2,000 years, are still mere poetry. No human fiat will ever repeal the law of natural selection. No rebellion of slaves will ever break down that great barrier which separates slaves from masters.
* * * * *
=Brown, Mrs. M. McClellan.= (Lecturer and Reformer.)
I am opposed to Socialism--
First: Because it is unnatural. Men are born free, but far from being equal in competency mentally, morally, or spiritually to use with advantage to self or others, the proceeds of earth, or the elements, or labor; even under the same civil, social, and educational opportunities (often in the same family) some are incompetent to make ends meet.
Second: Because it is impracticable, unjust, and detrimental to development and ennoblement of the human race, which is the manifest object of human creation.
Third: Because it destroys the ultimate power of individuality, which is the unit of State organization and social protection. The individual is the axis of reality in all the objective changes for human uplift.
Fourth: Because the Spirit of God is the humanizing power in the world, given to individual spirits as a complete fact, large or small, but personal in dynamic currents of bodily gifts as varied as the offices of the human organs.
Fifth: Because civilization is the fruit of developed individual consciousness in a concrete, unsharable experience of free personality which makes the vital push for progress in the world; even a social consciousness so-called, must turn on the axis of the individual.
Sixth: Because the only historic and scientific demonstration of Socialism is original barbarism. Set the pot in the midst of the group and let each use his paw.
* * * * *
=McConnell, Francis J.= (Bishop of Methodist Episcopal Church, Denver, Colorado.)
I am opposed to Socialism because it goes farther than is necessary. The real reforms for which Socialism stands are very important, but I think these can be secured without accepting the extreme puttings of Socialistic doctrine. Within the past twenty-five years we have reached many of the results of the Socialistic programme and yet without adopting extreme Socialism.
* * * * *
=Benington, Arthur.= (Journalist.)
I am opposed to Socialism because I believe that the State was made for man, not man for the State.
Because every one of the infinite number of projects of Socialism tends to discourage individual effort; hence, in a really Socialistic State there would be no incentive to achievement in art, literature, science, discovery, etc. The dull level of mediocrity would prevail; stagnation would take the place of progress.
Because the leading Socialists and all the Socialist newspapers I have ever seen attack religion.
Because Socialism would abolish the home and make the State responsible for the bringing up of children. The result of this would be to substitute a breeding farm for matrimony. Love--which cannot be abolished--would have no place in the scheme of things; it would struggle against institutions, either secretly in spite of them and contrary to them, or openly in rebellion. This is true not only of sex love, but of parental and filial love.
Because it is contrary to all the principles upon which the United States of America have won success in the world. It is an exotic importation from lands in which liberty is stifled, brought here by persons who do not understand American institutions, taken up as a fad by a few dreamers.
Because men always cease to be Socialists as soon as they have won success in life; suggesting that Socialism is merely a vague expression of the discontent of some, the disappointment of others.
* * * * *
=Clark, John Bates.= (Professor of political economy and author.)
I am opposed to Socialism because it would soon impoverish workers. The income to be divided would be smaller than is supposed by advocates of Socialism, and it would grow smaller per capita as the number of workers increased.
* * * * *
=Raymond, George Lansing.= (Author and University Professor.)
I am opposed to Socialism because I think it founded on a misconception of the requirements of human nature; and this, mainly, for three reasons:
First: A great many people will not practice diligence and thrift, unless stimulated to do so by a possibility of obtaining, possessing and using something that they can call their own. This is something that Socialism theoretically, and so far as it has been applied, practically, would deny them.
Second: A great many will not work at all, when their only inducement is that others wish them to work, or need their help. Socialism, if established, would be obliged--merely to secure support for the community--to force such people to work against their own wills. This would inevitably involve the re-establishment of a system of human slavery.
Third: All a man's mental and moral development in this world--to say nothing of what may come after death--needs training. According to a law apparently divine, but certainly human, this training, whether in home, school, business or society, is imparted by means of discipline. The discipline is mainly derived from the circumstances of life in which one finds himself placed, and, in such cases, is always accompanied by dissatisfaction with one's alloted place, and by actual suffering. The Socialist aims to escape from this dissatisfaction and suffering by making a change in his circumstances--such a change, for instance, as would make a king a servant, or make all men kings or servants. But history and experience show that kings, whose friends die, courtiers flatter, and enemies trick, are no more free from the sufferings attendant upon discipline than are servants. The truth seems to be that to occupy a different position in life means merely to be placed in a different part of the same apparently divine and certainly social machine which--as some have faith to believe--is at work grinding out of the coarse grain of humanity what shall, some day, prove to be its fine flour. One who has the wisdom to apply this theory to life, will, in no position that a man can fill, feel either too haughty or too humiliated to sympathize with everybody, and to do his best everywhere to alleviate suffering, lessen oppression, equalize opportunity, enthrone justice, and prove himself, in every sense of the term, a fellow-man. The result upon individual consciousness and conscience of this attitude of mind is the most important of any that can be exerted in order to secure human welfare. It differs from Socialism in being derived--as Socialism is not--from a recognition of the exact and entire truth--a truth that includes, both that which is material and spiritual, philosophical and religious.
* * * * *
=Ellis, Horace.= (President Vincennes University.)
Socialism originally meant to become an effective protest against the tyrannies of all forms of monarchy. If it had succeeded in its ambition we all had been Socialists. But it failed utterly. Its failure may be traced to certain fundamental errors as to the means it should employ to realize its purpose. It presumed that most practices it found in the economic world were inherently bad because they had been employed by heartless men in furthering their individual interests. Socialism denies the accepted maxim relating to competition--in spite of the evidences of history which have fully established the fact that, in every realm of human activity, competition has been one of the mightiest factors for individual, community, national and racial prestige. Socialism would deny to virile, purposeful, masterful leaders of men the privilege of leadership because, forsooth, some such leaders have misused authority reposed in them. In lieu of this practice, it would constitute society at large the rightful leader in all economic matters--because some evidences appear which indicate that society possesses some attributes of stability. Fatal--both of these deductions. There are many thousands of good Socialists, but few substantial economic contentions behind them.
* * * * *
=Boyd-Carpenter, William B., B.A., F.R.G.S.= (Publicist, Address: Wynstones, Ascot, England.)
The world has always sighed after novelty. Even St. Paul found that the Athenians of old longed to hear some new thing. The craze for novelty, or an increasing curiosity are the symptoms of the decline of a philosophic outlook on life. It is the idea that a change means reform. Now reform can never be a change in the substance, but rather an application, a direct and precise application of a thought-out remedy for a particular and authentic grievance. Nor is innovation a real reform--we have to change our clothes because they are wet, but this does not mean we reform ourselves or our clothes. Woman makes an innovation in the shape of her clothes or her hats--she does not reform her clothes or her hats. But Socialists and syndicalists demand the immediate alteration of the capitalists' system of production--by which they mean, if they mean anything, such a reform as will give to them, as a political party within any State, the power of using the forces, political and capitalistic within the State on behalf of their own section of the community, unless they mean this, they cannot hope to benefit wages and employment. If they do not mean this, they are hoodwinking workingmen and merely are seeking a change, not a reform. Change is impermanent--therefore transitory change is merely the expression of want of tone in the political health of a people. But Socialism and syndicalism by seeking the benefit of the many workers at the expense of the few capitalists, is creating a form of injustice, which in their main doctrines Socialists assert they are hoping to avoid. Injustice to any section of a community is the creation of inequality again in a community. If we cannot reform with equity, let us not reform at all. As we put back the hands of the clock's progress, so we recreate inequalities. Life at best is a matter of compensation; it is the disturbance of this balance which makes for injustice and inequality.
Then again, Socialism has been tried and has always resulted in the re-erection of the capitalist system. The Revolutions of France--1789, 1832, 1848, 1871--all were to usher in the millennium. But France is capitalistic today and amongst the wealthiest nations on the earth. The German Revolution, 1848, or the Spanish Revolution--all began in high hopes of republics to be ruled by Democrats. All these countries have gone back to what the world has tried and found stands best the test of time. Nations, like individuals, are impatient and do damage in fits of temper for which many years of steady care are required to effect the repairs. The world wants more religion in active life and more ostracism of the irreligious. The fear of public disgust is the beginning of ordered honesty. The strength of a public opinion is the poor man's friend. "To complain of the age in which we live; to revile the possessors of power; to lament the past; to conceive wild hopes for the future, are the common dispositions of the vast majority of men." They are also the attributes of laziness and the form of a vulgar levity. A nation must have all classes--grumblers and saints, happy and querulous, in order to make strong men.
* * * * *
=Garvin, Lucius Fayette Clark.= (Ex-Governor of R.I.)
I am opposed to Socialism because its theory is not proved to my satisfaction. The public ownership of all artificial instruments of production, means that no interest upon capital should go to individuals. This means that the person who builds a boat to let should not own it, and that the payment made by a borrower for its use should not go to the builder, but into the public treasury.
Socialism asserts that if one person catches fifteen fish, another ten, and third but five, they are not each entitled to the proceeds of the sale of his fish. This is in violation of the natural law that the value produced is the just reward of labor.
Land values, being earned by the community, belong to the community; and economic rent should be taken by the community (in lieu of taxation) for public purposes.
The Socialist does not distinguish between the artificial and the natural instruments of production--two things wholly different in kind. He confuses the just return to capital with the unjust return to monopoly.
* * * * *
=Long, John Luther.= (Author and Playwright.)
I don't know what you mean by mere "Socialism." I wish I did. I wish you did. But, the deuce of it is that no two persons seem to mean the same thing--or else no one knows what any one means. If it means an honest brotherhood, wherein it is recognized that all are not equal, to the end that those who are more or have more shall help those who are less and have less, I am for it with all my heart. If it means that the vicious shall profit from the just--no. If it means that the loafer shall live without work--no. For that means that some one else--many--must be working in his stead. If Socialism means that genius and idiocy must sleep in the same bed and be equals I am very much against it. We are not all equal. We are not even born equal. No pronunciamento can make us so. And if Socialism of the McNamara and Ettor and Giovannitti sort means to make us so, it might as well quit now as later. It is trying to amalgamate unamalgamables.
* * * * *
=Esenwein, Joseph Berg.= (Author and Editor Lippincott's Magazine.)