The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1881-02-02


the store business, and other advantageous invest
ments were made, the best of which were clearly
the libraries, reading looms, and homes Tor men,
bers.
Thus we see how a large number of people whose
living was precarious have made themselves indie
pendent, have become controllers of capital them
selves instead of being its tools, and have supplied
themselves through cooperation with the luxurles
and refnements of civilization, without asking the
aid in the slightest degree of capitalists. The bat
tie for them has been bravey and skilfully fought
out and capital is no longer their tyran but their
obedient servant-their well-controlled machine,
powerful to do their bidding.
Many men go through life living " from hand to
mouth as the saying is without ever being able
10 get ahead or TO make any progress towards OBJ
tanning homes and other of the comforts of life.
With many of these, beginning is all they need
but this beginning is something they cannot make
alone. They can clothe and feed their families
and pay an exorbitant rent for the rooms they oc-
cupy, and this exhausts their resources. Ihey
cannot borrow money, because they can offer no
security; but money they need, money they must
have if ever they are TO improve their position, or
obtain houses which shall belong TO themselves.
In Philadelphia they have devised an ingenious
yet simple system of cooperation for furnishing
the members with capital for buying and building
homes. The society meets once month, at which
time each member pays one dollar upon each share
that he holds This money so collected IS 1mme-
diately put up at auction, and sold to the member
who bids the highest rate of interest. At every
meeting not only are the assessments upon the
these loans, and the whole amount received put
up at auction again. The securities given by the
borrowers are their shares IN the company and
mortgages real estate, which real estate is gen
orally the home which this borrowed money gives
them the chance 10 obtain. These companies are
called building societies. the ultimate object being
the collection and loaning of capital 10 members
for buying land and building homes. Many OF
the members, however, do not borrow money, but
regard the society simply as the best and most
profitable savings bank they know of. There are
now over 800 of these societies IN Philadelphia,
and though the system has been IN operation Tor
thirty years, there has not been single case OF
failure Savings banks carried on by capitalists
and rich corporations have gone down ON all SIDES
carving disaster and want to many who could not
afford 10 lose, while these have stood hrm, proving
themselves worthy of the confidence which, has
been put in them. These 500 building societies of
Philadelphia now carry a capital OF one hundred
millions of dollars-ten times the amount held by
the savings banks of that city. They have gwen
homes TO 10000 workingmen, and now hold $1,000
mortgages, which are being paid on by monthly
installments. So here again capital has been de-
throned, not destroyed, and made the servant q
the strong-armed stout hearted, patient working
man. And the victory has been won IN spite OF
capitalits and monopolies.
These are only instances of what can be done
and what has been done. We might, If there was
time, consider the cooperative societies OF france
that stood like rock through the German wal and
the action of the Commune. Or the German
societies for procuring raw materials IL the dif-
ferent trades, ana loans OF money upon auNall-
tageous terms, numbering IN 1911 twenty -four nun
bred societies and over million members.
Do these great successes have any lessons for
Us In our community there is little poverty but
those who have so wonderfully helped themselves
through the principle of cooperation are not
paupers, but men who may be classed as non
property holders and who needed hope loans,
homes. books, papers, luxuries and retnements,
which they had little hope OF obtaining tnrougn
their individual efforts Now we to certain
extent belong to this class. Not single one feels
that he could afford this library and reading room
as private luxury and yet by uniting every man
owns it and what is more owns 1t at price
that he can afford to pay What else do We want
that we haven't got think that there are great
many things and we are not likely TO have them
unless we cooperate. We ought to have gymna-
Sums, and public swimming baths, good hall
for meetings and meTy-nakings, picture gal
lery or art museum. We ought, all Of us who are
permanently settled in life, to have our own
homes. No one can afford to pay rent for a so
called home and improve 1t In the mean tune for
his landlord. By uniting we can assist each
other to build homes without troubling the banks
or haggling with professional money-lenders.
As TO cooperative stores for furnishing groce-
ries and other domestic articles of Housekeeping
if it is true that living is high, and that somebody
makes good profit in dealing with such goods
we have both the necessity and the opportunity of
success.
In the matter of union for the purchase of raw
material in the different trades; although in this
country skilled workmen as saddlcrs, or shoe
makers or tailors may work at some disadvantage
in importing singly their material or buying 1t
here from other importers who make profit on
it, vet it is doubtful If there are enough persons
engaged in the various trades to make such CO.
operation very advantageous even II pracucaL
Other suggestions might be made pertaining to
cooperative work in these Islands, especially with
reference to the management of plantations and
other enterprises employing numbers of workme
But our time would be insufficient for opening up
tonight new branch of our subject.
Ne havp how canifal has
been dethroned and made slave; how those
whom il had trod down have become Its masters
by becoming capitalists themselves, even In the
humblest way. The ghost of socialism however Is
vet 10 be laid Wherever there is want and desti-
tuition there in some form or other II hourlshes
J; is the weird and shadowy giant that continually
threatens modern civilization and with II lis
clustering systems of law, morals and individual
responsibility and independence In Ireland to-
day it murders men because they are landlords
and seeks arbitrarily to break up established
rights of property; IN continental Europe II shoots
at kings and emperors because they are kings and
emperors and plots against the States III America,
socialists form definite sect and only need to be
stronger TO make trouble. All remember the brief
and bloody revel of the French Commune ten
years ago, and worse, perhaps because of longer
duration you have read time and again OF the /
reign of terrUr" of longer ago, with its cruel
attempt to carve society into equality with the /
guillotine. How shall this energy be met late |
thanksgiving sermon in this place, claimed that |
the security of the State IN righteousness.
Now this is perfectly obyious,-in fact, national
and national prosperity may be
almost regarded as convertible terms. But the
question still remains, how to secure this safe
guard of righteousness. The tendency nowadays
appears to be to make religion or religious prlyi
leges luxury of the well to do. A New York
clergyman said that he always noticed that In his
church the first thing member did when adyer-
siiy overlook him was to sell his pew" Now
socialism, so far as it has religious characteristics,
is hostile to religious belief, and its ranks are
recruited from those who are largely wanting III
those guiding principles which we may call righte-
business or religious principle Christianity has
not the force of novelty that it once had and a
class of people who materialists, who live for
this life, and who,-because life Is short cannot
wait to earn its good things but would force their
prosperous fellovnen to divide with them, are not
nor easily reached by tho demands and
consultations of fash that calls for fair play and
self denia here, ard delays the rewards mainly to
the hereafter The strength OF socialism must
generally be IN rsa:abers As a small minority,
they are not to be specially feared; as majority
they would move Immediately to the long threat
aned assault upon human rights. The problem
then is to keep the numbers down and this, CO.
operation with all of its other great enterprises is
helping to do, and is preparing TO do on greater
scale in the future. Every working man that
becomes capitalist through having a balance
large small to his credit a savings bank a
building association, u who Is entitled to dlYl-
dends of the profits of any cooperative society," or
who is the proprietor of his own home, not only
cannot be socialist but he thereby becomes a
on he nth In