The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-06-22
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From the London Spectator
What will be the effect of the Communist
failure on the social elevation of the masses
When the passions justly aroused by last
weeks catastrophe have died away, the mo-
tives and objects of an insurrection designed
to reorganize society, and its ultimate effect
on the real welfare of the masses, will form
the chief subjects of interest connected with
it. Those who are trying to make
the Europe of the future more like
what they would wish to see it, will
have forced on them the question how far
their aims are impeded or promoted by the
civil war of Paris and its terrible tragedies.
In the midst, therefore, of the hurry and ex-
citement of the moment we should like to
step aside for little, and look at the perma-
nent issue which underlies so much of the
contest AT first sight, the prospect is some
what disheartening. To take the very SIM
plest view, it is impossible not to see that the
destruction and waste of the last few months,
and the disruption of business relations, will
retard for years the production and accumu-
lation of wealth upon which primarily
the material welfare of the masses
depends. Before wealth can be dis
tributed, it must exist, and the pro-
blem of distributing an average amount of
well-being among large industrial communi-
ties is not simplifed, but the reverse, by
diminution of the aggregate means. Still
more will the object in view be at least tenn
porarily hindered by the aggravation of
political and class animoslties through the in
surreotion itself. We may quite expect at
first more jealous and grasping selfshness
on the part of those who possess, at least in
country like France, looming out in a
rougher application of the rules Of compe-
tition, and q more distant intercourse with
the ''inferiors" employed, and CON-
ing out in legislation in every kind of restric-
tive regulation to make capital and property
secure, and guard those who possess against
another irruption from below. These condi-
tions of the problem of elevating the masses
are in the highest degree unfavorable. For
years, perhaps, it will be uphill work to
bring the old questions to the foreground,
and it will certainly take some time before the
recently existing vantage-ground of accumu-
lating wealth to be distributed, and to employ
laborers, is reacquired in France But it is i'm
possible not to see that this is only super
fetal aspect of the question. The problem
we have stated is not to be shelved by any
catastrophes, or the blunders of the workmen
themselves in aiming at vague and shadowy
ideal. If the vices of old societies are not to
be stereotyped in modern Europe, or some
of the worst phenomena of a slave commu-
nifty are not to be reproduced in q society
which consists of impoverished workmen and
wealthy employers, then the economic ques-
tions which were at the bottom of the insur-
rection must be again and again taken up,
however wide the true solution may be from
the ideas and aims of the insurgents.
In reality we believe that the insurrection,
Notwithstanding the immediate loss to the
cause of the masses involved in its defeat will
in the end accelerate, and, if statesmen are
wise, ought to accelerate, the end desired. 1t
is the nature of such events as we have Just
seen to emphasize the ideas associated with
them, and give them compelling power over
mems minds most powerful in promoting their
acceptance, or the study of the right means of
opposing them, in spite of the prejudices they
excite. The first French Revolution, with all
its horrors, substituted new society for the
old; even the Revolution of 184S left trace
of its peculiar ideas behind
it, in the vast expenditure on
public works which answered some
of the objects of national workshops" more
recently we have seen how abortive attempts
at insurrection in Ireland awakened mems
minds to the urgency of measures which
were, if anything, not desired by the insur-
gents, but were the only means possible for
meeting the insurrection. In the same way
the civil war of the last two months cannot
but concentrate political thought on the vast
discomfort which bred it, and on the state of
education among the masses which gave so
much currency to Utopian delusions and ag-
gravated the crimes of the closing scenes. 1t
is of little use to say that the motive power is
only envy-that in the nineteenth century,
notwithstanding better wages aud more COM
fort, the artisans have not got beyond the
ideas which produced a Jack Cade rebel
lion. The phenomenon will not be got rid of
by hard names, even if it deserves them, and
the unstable equilibrium it creates will be
continual source of anxiety. And the actual
history of the insurrection, though the insur-
gents and their allies have temporarily lost
power and prestige, will certainly aggravate
the discomfort and danger. The misery re-
sulting will be fresh stimulus to passion,
awhile there has been nothing like the failure
of an experiment to make the Socialist doc
trine unpopular with rejecting artisans
The Commune, they may say, never
had O chance. 1t had to fight for dear
life from the very beginning, and could
camp. The partial socialist experiments
that were tried, they may add, were SO far
not successful. The whole circumstances of
Paris for many months were such as to neces-
state State organization for satisfying the
ordinary wants of living, and the organization
did not break down. Why not render perma-
nent an arrangement which was possible
under the stress of siege, and which at
least bestowed on the artisans of Paris a state
of comfort which they had not before en-
ioyed? There is thus nothing in the history
to create distrust among working-men of
the theories to which they have been prone.
The spirit in which the insurrection has been
suppressed, as all must recognize, will also
aggravate the evil They were hated, the
artisans will say, with a perfect hatred
because the bourgeoisie, the capitalists,
the State psnsionaries, the gentle
man were esoer 10 oet back To their monav.