Part 36 (1/2)
The payment of such rent to cease as soon as the total amount of rent paid is equal to the value of the land, and the tenant thereby acquires for himself _and his children_ the right of occupancy. The t.i.tle to all such lands remaining with the commonwealth.[232]
I have italicized the most significant items. The preference given to landless farmers in the last paragraph shows that the party in Oklahoma does not propose to distribute its greatest favors to those who are now in possession of even the smallest amount of land. On the other hand, once the land is governmentally ”owned”
and speculation and landlordism (or renting) are provided against, the farmer pa.s.ses ”the right of occupancy” of this land on to his children. European Socialist parties, with one exception, have not gone so far as this, and it is doubtful if the American Party will sustain such a long step towards permanent private property. It may well be doubted whether the Socialist movement will favor giving to children the identical privileges their parents had, simply because they are the children of these parents, especially if these privileges had been materially increased in value during the parents' lifetime by community effort, _i.e._ if there has been any large ”unearned increment.” Nor will they grant any additional right after forty years of payments or any other term, but, on the contrary, as the land rises, through the community's efforts they would undoubtedly see to it that _rent was correspondingly increased_. Socialists demand, not penalties against landlordism, but the community appropriation of rent--whether it is in the hands of the actual farmer or landlord. Why, moreover, seek to discriminate against those who are in possession _now_, and then favor those who will be in possession after the new dispensation, by giving the latter an almost permanent t.i.tle? May there not be as many landless agricultural workers forty years hence as there are now? Why should those who happen to be landless in one generation instead of the next receive superior rights?
Not only Henry George, but Herbert Spencer and the present governments of Great Britain (for all but agricultural land) and Germany (in the case of cities), recognize that the element of land values due to the community effort should go to the community. The political principle that gives the community no permanent claim to ground rent and is ready to give a ”right of occupancy” for two _or more_ lifetimes (for nothing is said in the Oklahoma program about the land returning to the government) without any provisions for increased rentals and with no rents at all after forty years, is _reactionary_ as compared with recent land reform programs elsewhere (as that of New Zealand).
Even Mr. Roosevelt's Commission on Country Life goes nearly as far as the Oklahoma Socialists when it condemns speculation in farm lands and tenancy; while Mr. Roosevelt himself has suggested as a remedy in certain instances the leasing of parts of the national domain. Indeed, the ”progressive” capitalists everywhere favor either small self-employing farmers or national owners.h.i.+p and leases for long terms and in small allotments, and as ”State Socialism” advances it will unquestionably lean towards the latter system. There is nothing Socialistic either in government encouragement either of one-family farms or in a national leasing system with long-term leases as long as the new revenue received goes for the usual ”State Socialistic” purposes.
The American Party, moreover, has failed so far to come out definitely in favor of the capitalist-collectivist principle of the State appropriation of ground rent, already indorsed by Marx in 1847 and again in 1883 (see his letter about Henry George, Part I, Chapter VIII). In preparing model const.i.tutions for New Mexico and Arizona (August, 1910), the National Executive Committee took up the question of taxation and recommended graduated income and inheritance taxes, but nothing was said about the State taking the future rise in rents. This is not a reaction when compared to the present world status of non-Socialist land reform, for the taxation of unearned increment has not yet been extended to agricultural land in use, but it is decidedly a reaction when compared with the Socialists' own position in the past.
In a semiagricultural country like the United States it is natural that ”State Socialism” should influence the Socialist Party in its treatment of the land question more than in any other direction, and this influence is, perhaps, the gravest danger that threatens the party at the present writing.
By far the most important popular organ of Socialism in this country is the _Appeal to Reason_ of Girard, Kansas, which now circulates nearly half a million copies weekly--a large part of which go into rural communities. The _Appeal_ endeavors, with some success, to reflect the views of the average party member, without supporting any faction. As Mr. Debs is one of its editors, it may be understood that it stands fundamentally against the compromise of any essential Socialist principle. And yet the exigencies of a successful propaganda among small landowners or tenants who either want to become landowners or to secure a lease that would amount to almost the same thing, is such as to drive the _Appeal_ into a position, not only as to the land question, but also to other questions, that has in it many elements of ”State Socialism.”
A special propaganda edition (January 27, 1902) is typical. Along with many revolutionary declarations, such as that Socialism aims not only at the socialization of the means of production, but also at the socialization of _power_, we find others that would be accepted by any capitalist ”State Socialist.” Government activities as to schools and roads are mentioned as examples of socialization, while that part of the land still in the hands of our present capitalist government is referred to as being socialized. The use of vacant and unused lands (with ”a fair return” for this use) by city, towns.h.i.+p, and county officials in order to raise and sell products and furnish employment, as was done by the late Mayor Pingree in Detroit, and even the public owners.h.i.+p of freight and pa.s.senger automobiles, are spoken of as ”purely Socialist propositions.” And, finally, the laws of Oklahoma are said to permit socialization without a national victory of the Socialists, though they provide merely that a munic.i.p.ality may engage in any legitimate business enterprise, and could easily be circ.u.mscribed by state const.i.tutional provisions or by federal courts if real Socialists were about to gain control of munic.i.p.alities and State legislature. For such Socialists would not be satisfied merely to demand the abolition of private landlordism and unemployment as the _Appeal_ does in this instance, since both of these ”inst.i.tutions”
are already marked for destruction by ”State capitalism,” but would plan public employment at wages so high as to make private employment unprofitable and all but impossible, so high that the self-employing farmer even would more and more frequently prefer to quit his farm and go to work on a munic.i.p.al, State, or county farm.
The probable future course of the Party, however, is foreshadowed by the suggestions made by Mr. Simons in the report referred to, which, though not yet voted upon, seemed to meet general approval:--
”With the writers of the Communist Manifesto we agree in the principle of the 'application of all rents of land to public purposes.' To this end we advocate the taxing of all lands to their full rental value, the income therefrom to be applied to the establishment of industrial plants for the preparing of agricultural products for final consumption, such as packing houses, canneries, cotton gins, grain elevators, storage and market facilities.”[233]
There is no doubt that Mr. Simons here indorses the most promising line of agrarian reform under capitalism. But there is no reason why capitalist collectivism may not take up this policy when it reaches a somewhat more advanced stage. The tremendous benefits the cities will secure by the gradual appropriation of the unearned increment will almost inevitably suggest it to the country also. This will immensely hasten the development of agriculture and the numerical increase of an agricultural working cla.s.s. What is even more important is that it will teach the agricultural laborers that far more is to be gained by the political overthrow of the small capitalist employing farmers and by claiming a larger share of the benefit of these public funds than by attempting the more and more difficult task of saving up the sum needed for acquiring a small farm or leasing one for a long term from the government.
The governmental appropriation of agricultural rent and its productive expenditure on agriculture will in all probability be carried out, even if not prematurely promised at the present time, by collectivist capitalism. Moreover, while this great reform will strengthen Socialism as indicated, it will strengthen capitalism still more, especially in the earlier stages of the change. Socialists recognize, with Henry George, that ground rent may be nationalized and ”tyranny and spoliation be continued.” For if the present capitalistic state gradually became the general landlord, either through the extension of the national domain or through land taxation, greater resources would be put into the hands of existing cla.s.s governments than by any other means. If, for example, the Socialists opposed the government bank in Germany they might dread even more the _present_ government becoming the universal landlord, though it would be useless to try to prevent it.
It is clear that such a reform is no more a step in Socialism or in the direction of Socialism than the rest of the capitalist collectivist program. But it is a step in the development of capitalism and will ultimately bring society to a point where the Socialists, if they have in the meanwhile prepared themselves, may be able to gain the supreme power over government and industry.
Socialists do not feel that the agricultural problem will be solved at all for a large part of the agriculturists (the laborers) nor in the most satisfactory manner for the majority (self-employing farmers) until the whole problem of capitalism is solved. The agricultural laborers they claim as their own to-day; the conditions I have reviewed lead them to hope also for a slow but steady progress among the smaller farmers.
FOOTNOTES:
[223] Karl Kautsky, ”Parlamentarismus und Demokratie,” edition of 1911, p. 127.
[224] Karl Kautsky, ”Parlamentarismus und Demokratie,” edition of 1911, pp. 126-128.
[225] Quotations from Kautsky following in this chapter are taken chiefly from his ”Agrarfrage.”
[226] emile Vandervelde, ”Le Socialisme Agraire.”
[227] _Die Neue Zeit_, June 16, 1911.
[228] Proceedings of 1910 Convention of the Socialist Party of the United States.
[229] _Die Neue Zeit_, June 16 and 30, 1911.
[230] A. M. Simons, ”The American Farmer,” pp. 160-162.
[231] The 1908 Convention of the Socialist Party of the United States.