The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1870-03-16
1,orrespundente.
COOPERATIVE INDUSTRY
As n Means of Transition from Social
Isolation and AntagOnism TO Uni
VersaI Concord and Happiness.
BY E. P. GRANT.
NUMBER xI.
Communal GUARANTEES.

Communal Guarantees.
1t Will be recollected that the word
Commune has been used IN these articles
to designate the associated body of per-
sons engaged in our industrial enterprise
by Communal GUARANTEES therefore Is
meant whatever the Commune insures to
all its members. These guarantees are of
two kinds: lst, Subsistence by which is
meant an adequate supply of food, cloth
ing and all other things necessary to
health and physical comfort ID, Eoluca-
ton, by which is meant the means and op-
portunities for the most complete develop
ment of the corporeal and spiritual organ
ism. OF these two kinds Of guarantees 1
will treat separately and with great brev-
ity.
l. GUARANTY OF SUBSISTENCE.
This is an obligation assumed by the
Commune, to provide for the material
wants of all such persons as may have
been admitted to full membership, and of
all their children thereafter born while
such membership continues. (Children
previously born, and accompanying their
parents, become members with them. -
The managers will find it necessary, in the
beginning, to exercise some caution. in ad-
mitting persons to full membership lest the
obligation thus imposed upon the Com
mune become too great a burden upon its
resources, a danger which can be best
guarded against, probably, by requiring an
investment of capital sufficient to provide
against all ordinary contingencies though
physical vigor and thoroughly tested in
dustrious habits may, in some cases, suf-
fee, without such Investment. In general
however, when sufficient capital cannot be
advanced, full membership should be re-
fused, or at least postponed until the req
uIsite advance can be made, or equivalent
security given by satisfactory industrial
efficiency or in some other way. 1t is i'm
portanJ that the destitute and needy,
however desirous the managers may be to
help them, should not be permitted to
overwhelm the enterprise during the iney-
liable weakness Of its infancy.
The most numerous class of beneficial
rIes with whose subsistence the Commune
will be charged Will always be infants and
children little more advanced, whose in
dustrial capacities are yet too little devel
oped or too imperfectly trained to enable
them to earn their own support. 1t is
true that as soon as the groups are prop
erly organized children will be attracted
to JON some of them at a very early age,
and Will begin to earn their subsistence
much sooner than is possible under our
present system, perhaps generally when
no more than six or eight years old, and
that they will do so without compulsion,
and even by their own eager choice. In
deed compulsion Is what our experiment
especially aims to dispense with, and so
far as labor has to be performed by con-
.fv I'M - Oh o4 l.
other words, our success is to be measured
by the extent to which labor is voluntar-
lily performed. But no degree of success
can ever prevent young children from be-
ing charge upon some or all of the pro-
ductlve workers of the Commune.
As society IS at present constituted, it
subjects parents TO the labor and expense
Of providing for and rearing their child
ren, burden often exceedingly onerous,
and sometimes, when families are numer-
Gus, plunging parents and children into
the despair of pauperism. Our Commune,
when IN full operation, viii by no means
initiate this cruel arrangement, but will
take upon itself the charge of supporting
all It's members who are unable to provide
for themselves, by whatever infrmity
they may be disabled, whether infancy,
sickness or old age. No member as hus-
band or wife, parent or child, should be
charged with the support of any one but
himself During the transitional stage,
and while the organization aimed at Is
struggling with difficulties arising from
imperfect development 1t may indeed be
necessary to make exceptions to this rule,
and to modify it by various provisional
conditions, but such exceptions and con-
ditons can be justified only by the imma-
turity and incompleteness of the enter
prise. The transition passed and reasona-
BILE success secured, the Commune will
take charge of all its helpless ones will
provide hospitals for its sick and infrm,
and nurseries for its children, diversifying
its accommodations to suit different ages
and unlike temperaments, and organizing
| groups of nurses and attendants, who
have taste and aptitude for their voca-
ton, IN such way as to insure to all the
best Of care. In all departments, relays
of nurses will relieve each other frequent
| ly, as often perhaps as once IN three OF
four hours, or even oftener, if experience
shall indicate that more frequent changes
are necessary to prevent the service from
becoming repulsive by its tediousness.-
| These groups of nurses will be Literally
paid, and the mother, who viii, with rare
exceptions, be a member of one of the
groups which superintend the department
to which her infant child is assigned, vii
be paid for all necessary attentions to tha'
child whether in sickness or health, a!
much as any other person would be fol
like services. Children viii be recognized
as NATURES MOST PRECIOUS GIFTS TO HU
MANITY, in a sense which is not yet, and
so long as the religious faiths now curren
| hoH 70 -,
adequately appreciated and being so rec
ognized, viii be cherished with-a watch
fuIness commensurate with the estimation
in which they will be held. They vii
thus be elevated in all respects to degre
of well being which IS totally unattaina
bic IN a society distributed as ours is q
present, into isolated families.
II. GUARANTY OF EDUCATION.
} This IS an obligation assumed by tn
Commune to provide for all infants, child
ren and youth, the most ample means an
facilities for physical and mental training
, with a view to the utmost perfection of a
their corporeal and spiritual faculties 1
the corporeal sphere, the leading objec
+ will be to impart industrial dexterity an
efficiency, so that the youth, whenever
attaches himself, by his spontaneou
choice, to any industrial group, will nc
only be able to perform his part in it wit
credit, but may also be stimulated to a.
pire to its highest honors and distinction
5 by the brilhancy of his industrial achieve
ments Nor should that training be neg
: lected which contributes to elegance
5 department and refinement of manners,
which the pupil Will be enabled to acqu
himself gracefully in the saloon, in Ii
dance, or on parade. In the spiritual sphel
every opportunity should be afforded f,
E. the highest attainments IN knowledg
both practical and theoretical, wheth