Part 15 (1/2)
Such vicious indulgence is the result of cultivating unnatural and destructive appet.i.tes. Familiar ill.u.s.trations are those connected with the drink habit, the opium habit, or any other vice whose chief effect is seen upon the individual life of the one indulging himself. These involve the very highest wastefulness, because they destroy not only wealth, but ability. n.o.body can begin to compute in terms of money the actual waste of our country through indulgence in strong drink. The value of liquors consumed is no measure of the entire wastefulness. Yet this is more than enough to furnish all with bread.
The wrongfulness of such indulgence, from its harm to society through reducing the power of the race, is seldom disputed. Yet the right of society to restrict the individual indulgence is quite generally disputed.
The larger need of freedom in the exercise of judgment among mature members of a community outweighs the need of preventing even vice. Society does well to bring the restraints of law upon the immature, whose judgment is not yet formed, thus supplementing by law the directive energy of parental control. It may yet go further, and prohibit such indulgence to all who have lost the power of self-control. But in general it has been found impossible to enforce restriction upon vicious indulgence except where such acts occasion direct suffering upon others, or help to maintain an immoral business. The right of restraint and constraint, even to prohibition, of that which fosters vice and extends its range must be admitted by all thoughtful persons. Still, the right to prohibit and the power to prohibit are not identical. The only sure preventive is early education of public conscience through the training of youth to a clear understanding of the vicious practices and their relation to the poverty and weakness and crime of humanity.
_Destructive consumption._-A more obvious trespa.s.s upon prudential consumption is criminal destructiveness of every kind. Until society outgrows a condition in which fraud, theft, robbery and murder must be warded off by locks and bars, by immense bodies of policemen and armed militia, its wealth cannot be wholly invested for welfare. The possibility of such crimes as arson or train obstruction and destruction shows the condition of the best of modern communities to be far from ideal. n.o.body pretends to measure the actual waste in society resulting from such criminal purposes. It extends to almost every detail of production and trade, and occupies a large portion of the inventive and executive energy of the people. Organized society attempts to restrain such waste by its police force, or by restraining laws and in actions enforced by severe penalties. Every honest man is financially interested in the conviction of every knave. Sympathy with fraud, even in trifles, is contributing toward such destructive waste.
In this connection the enormous expenditure in maintenance of standing armies and navies for the protection of national boundaries is of special importance. Reduction of this waste of wealth and power should be desired by every cla.s.s of society. Though war has been the means by which human liberty has grown, it has also been the means of crus.h.i.+ng it. It would seem that every incentive is offered each citizen to make an appeal to arms and the maintenance of armies a most remote necessity. Yet it seems that the ma.s.s of men of every rank are tenacious of national honor. While most communities have abandoned the duel as both wasteful and immoral in personal difficulties, the spirit of the duel is still rife in the differences between nations. A clearer perception of mutual interests in national welfare will bring nations, like individuals, to accept some method of enforcing neutral judgment for settling disputes, in place of war. The farmers of a country, being nearly 50 per cent of its people, and bearing a large proportion of the expense of armies and wars, have a tremendous interest in maintaining peace. This can be done not so much by reducing the provision for armies as by cultivating the spirit of fair settlement, against the false patriotism which claims everything for one's own nation.
_False notions of waste._-Wasteful expenditure and luxury and possibly even vicious indulgence are often excused with the plea that expenditures of this kind make employment for labor, and so aid the poor. While it is true that mult.i.tudes are employed in catering to the vices of others, all must grant that the same wealth might be much better employed in other occupations. More than that, the larger wealth resulting from acc.u.mulation in place of waste would provide capital needed for fuller employment of all who can work. All imprudent expenditure reduces the power of society to acc.u.mulate wealth for giving occupation to all who will work. Moreover, such wastefulness creates a tendency toward thriftless character among the people. The welfare of the whole community depends upon the thrift of the whole community. The thriftlessness of rich men's sons is more damaging than the thriftlessness of tramps, because it is more tempting to others.
Any man who lives simply to spend, however busy he keeps himself, is one of the wasteful ones in the community, unless he has some higher object than gratifying his desires. The energetic idler may be doing his worst for the community without being ranked as a spendthrift, because he makes such idleness respectable. It should be the desire of all good citizens to increase the ability of every other citizen, not only to live, but to live well. This thriftlessness can be overcome only by a strong public sentiment that corrects the early tendencies of youth to waste of means and energy.
_Waste in rivalry._-There is another kind of wastefulness resulting from excessive compet.i.tion for a particular business or a particular trade.
Immense amounts are expended upon rival advertis.e.m.e.nts, all of which enter into the general cost to consumers. A mult.i.tude of retail dealers maintain stocks of goods entirely out of proportion to the needs of the community, because they are rivals in trade. Very likely the business rents are higher than they need be because of such rivalry. Not only is there a strong compet.i.tion for a place, but also for showy equipment and elegance of display. All this could be saved by better organization. A still more evident waste is from the multiplication of agents and middle men of all kinds, employed simply in catching trade. Some of them act simply as interlopers, hoping to gain a small commission without the use of capital or painstaking in their business. These are the useless middle men maintained at the expense of the community. Full market reports and general information of buyers and sellers greatly reduce such waste.
Chapter XXVI. Social Organization For Consumption.
_Individualism._-While the social organization is necessarily thought of as a group of individuals, whose individual wants and plans and growth and character must be the chief incentive for action, it is necessary to avoid the extreme of individualism. In escaping from the false a.n.a.logy implied in considering society an organism, there is a tendency to make the individual not only of final importance but independent of a.s.sociation.
Excess of compet.i.tion is represented in the maxim, ”Every man for himself.” In the effort to carry out this maxim and in opposition to restraints of society, whether by law or by custom, many are led to advocate an abolition of organization, leaving all welfare to be secured by appeal to the individual judgment and conscience of men. It is true that back of all law is the law of righteousness in individual souls.
Under the name of ”autonomy” theorists propose to appeal to this conscience of individuals, making every soul a law to itself. Such theorists a.s.sume that every human being will be wise and virtuous, or take the consequences of his failure. They forget that all organizations for constraint are a part of the natural consequences of failure in self-control.
Under the name of ”anarchy” groups of people all over the world have united to destroy what they consider arbitrary rules in government.
Anarchists differ from autonomists in putting foremost the destruction of existing governments. Their ideals of right and wrong and their methods of individual action for individual welfare are left for the future to develop, after the rule of the present has become no-rule. Their present organization, as far as it is public, appears to be, in almost direct contradiction of their principles, an absolute despotism. The same idea has gained followers in some countries, particularly in Russia, under the name of ”nihilism.”
While in some instances such movements may be but a natural reaction against tyranny, the view of human wants and human welfare which all these advocates present is far from being correct. The grand economic fact that groups are superior to individuals in actual efficiency is beyond dispute; and it is equally true, though not so often stated, that groups gain greatest satisfaction for a given consumption of wealth. It is only when great numbers share in satisfaction that the highest range of wants can be gratified. Moreover, even individual wants are largely social. Each finds his highest pleasure in the society which nature has provided. The chief reasons for acc.u.mulating wealth are in what men can do for each other. Any individualism which overlooks these principles is opposed to welfare, and so self-contradictory.
The famous French phrases, ”laissez faire” and ”laissez pa.s.ser,” which represent the individualistic side of economic theory, are often extended beyond the intent of the phrase makers. They mean essentially, let do, let go, and have their proper application in an appeal to conservative society to so modify laws and customs that individual enterprise, ingenuity and thrift shall be stimulated to its best by freedom. Freedom from restrictions in right-doing, under the evident motive furnished by general welfare, is an ideal for society. In economic directions it has great importance. No thinker can fail to see the trend of civilization toward such freedom. So far in the history of the world the enlargement of individual responsibility, by freedom from constraint among the mature members of society, has been the chief mark of progress. Yet the constraint of welfare, and of the general judgment as to what is welfare, as well as the necessity for agreement as to ways and means of reaching it, are better recognized today than ever before. The extreme of individualism destroys the natural constraint of a common judgment.
_Socialism._-The opposite extreme is the a.s.sumption that common wants are of supreme importance and common judgment absolutely efficient. Under the name of ”communism” it stands in direct contrast with anarchy. Anarchists and communists may unite upon a platform of a single plank, opposition to existing inst.i.tutions; but in all ideals and purposes and plans for future welfare they are absolutely opposed to each other. The natural community of interests so evident in society gives a fair basis for the general principles of communism. No doubt the welfare of all is the interest of each, and the world is growing to recognize it. Among a group of beings perfectly wise and virtuous there could be no clas.h.i.+ng of either interests or judgment. The ideal of Louis Blanc, ”From every man according to his powers, to every man according to his wants,” would represent the natural activity of such a group. But in application to humanity, as it is and is bound to be by its weakness and waywardness, it seems abstractly ideal. In fact it is only roughly applicable in ends to be served, and suggests almost nothing as to ways and means. Like the golden rule, it applies to the disposition and purpose of the actor, but leaves the acts to be decided by individual judgment.
The numerous phases of opinion in application of this principle cannot be presented even by name in this short chapter. They are worthy of study as indicating a growth of opinion and sentiment in recognition of the mutual dependence of all human beings. They are also worthy of study as indicating how arbitrary a zealot may become in enforcing his opinions upon others. All of them are grouped somewhat loosely under the name of ”socialism,” but there are many gradations in the supremacy of the social ideal over the individual welfare. There are also many shades of opinion as to how the final result of social supremacy shall be reached. Many are expecting a revolution by force of arms to establish the ideals of the leaders. More are opportunists, s.n.a.t.c.hing every opportunity in legislation, in decision of courts, and in executive power, to apply their methods.
Under the name of ”collectivism” appeals are made to the mult.i.tude to combine their energies under leaders.h.i.+p: first, to overcome present restraints; and then to secure combined action in all modes of production and consumption. ”Nationalism” is more familiar to our thought in the United States, as embracing the aim of a somewhat noisy party to bring about the compulsory organization of all industries under the control of the nation, even to placing all property and all methods of consumption under an official despotism.
Few recognize the actual logic of their views as compelling complete subjection of every individual to others' judgment, and fewer still have any idea of the official machinery needed for such control. The great majority are satisfied in seeing evils which might be cured by greater social accord, expecting at once to vote into existence the necessary machinery. Most of these are misled into considering wealth and its uses to be the chief elements of welfare. They forget that wealth is only a means of accomplis.h.i.+ng one's purposes toward his fellows and himself. The greed of power and position and praise are far stronger as evil motives than greed of wealth. If wealth were distributed by omniscient wisdom and power according to the maxim of Louis Blanc, the higher welfare would still be as far away as ever, unless the same omniscience should control all actions. Such control by outward force would banish the very idea of virtue, the highest of all welfare.
It is easy to see that every form of socialism, in practical methods, involves a leveling process inconsistent with human nature and its surroundings. Equality of environments is possible only by reducing all to the lowest condition. Equality of aspirations reduces all toward the most brutal of the race. Even equality of efficiency reduces all to the power of the least efficient. So the whole range of method, a.s.suming equality of wealth as important to welfare, lowers the welfare of the whole by destroying the best abilities and the best capacities for enjoyment in order to prevent inequality.
And yet it has not been proved that equality in any of these particulars is desirable. It is equally beyond proof that actual equality is possible.
The most absolute communism implies the greatest inequality in official power. Even the pleasing phrase, ”Equality of opportunity,” will not bear a.n.a.lysis as applied to human nature and human welfare, under the very highest ideals of social unity. Indeed, the lesson of facts in all activity is that inter-dependence of _unlike_ and _unequal_ forces makes the true unity of organization, and the surest welfare of mult.i.tudes. That each individual should have the best opportunity possible for his own development is best for each and for all in a community; but that such opportunities shall be equal in any other sense no wisdom can contrive.
Most socialistic theories presuppose almost immediate change of human nature under the new form of administration. But for this supposition there is little ground in the history of the race or of all nature. Growth there will be, and evolution of ideals; but the administration grows out of these, instead of being their cause.
_Socialistic tendencies._-Socialistic theories gain adherence under the provocation of certain tendencies in society. First, they appear whenever by oppression or fraud of any kind a community is made up of one cla.s.s possessing wealth directly opposed to another cla.s.s without wealth, with no extended middle cla.s.s, and therefore with no ready means of transition from one cla.s.s to another. As long as the doors are open for real progress in power of accomplishment, all the way from poverty to wealth, society has a unity in its variety that is better than any communism promises. At present in our own country, with the great mult.i.tude of farmers' families furnis.h.i.+ng not only the necessities of life, but the larger part of human energy that goes into every calling and every rank, socialism does not appeal to any large number. An earnest, thriving farmer's family will never believe advantage to come either to themselves or to the race by making them all practically mere wage-earners.
Second, a common cause of socialistic views is separation, under extreme division of labor and opposing organizations sustained by it, of the workers in very distinct fields of labor. The jealousies arising between these cla.s.ses, or guilds, or between employers and employed, foster the revolutionary spirit which jumps at any promise of relief from unsatisfactory conditions.
In the third place, a political revolution, if it has destroyed landmarks of the past and any natural sentiments growing out of social relations, leaves a ma.s.s of people at sea with reference to the nature of rights.