The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1889-08-08
LOOKING RACKHARn.n

Very few of us have the opportunity
OF falling into trance and waking up in
the year 1000, as did the hero of Mr.. Ed
ward Bellamy's latest novel, Looking
Backward But this young gentleman
found the world so much pleasanter and
more delightful to live in then, be could
not be sorry for the CHANGE O All agree
that the world needs making over, and
every sweet girl graduate, every newly
tiedged alumnus, every hoary-headed
exponent of science or philosophy wants
finger in the pie, consequently we have
osophies and isms till our souls are sur
feited. Mr.. Bellamy is the prophet of
the latest tcreed-Nationalism. As Mrs.
Ward tried to give us a new religion,
MIR. Bellamy wants to give us q new
politics, which with a thin coating of
romance, he explains in this book. The
America of 2O0O is very different from
the America of 1889. Instead Of thou
sands of monopolies, all in competition,
but all agreeing in trying to give the
least for the most money, and the least
money for the best labor, there is one
great monopoly, the government, the
chief object of which is tO promote the
best interests of It's citizens The gov
ernment-that is, the people, owns all
land, houses, stores, railroads, manufac-
tories, fuel, everything, except per-
sonal property. The government pro-
duces, distributes, controls everything,
and every citizen is enrolled in some ca
pacity as laborer in this great industrial
army. Every one re ceives exactly the
same income, which is paid, not in
money, that is obsolete, but in credit
cards, for which the nation gives an
equivalent,in whatever commodity one
desires. Equal incomes are given, not
because each citizens work is OF the
same value, but simply because each is
human being and entitled to an equal
share in the fatherhood of the nation
and the, brotherhood of humanity. ALI
the curses which hang about money are
taken away, No man cares to save or to
worry for he knows he will be provided
for all his life, and his children will have
the same privilege. Work is not COM
pulsory. it is simply necessary. II q
man does not work he is outside the pale
OF humanity and can only die. There Is
no divisioni between educated and uned-
ucated for the nation educates all alike
till they are twenty-one, when each has
to choose the work which he is best fit
ted for, and go at it. At forty-five they
are mustered out Of service and spend
the rest of their lives in whatever honor.
able and useful way suits them best.
Women are co-workers with men in this
great industrial army, not superior or in
ferior, simply equals. The terrors Of
housework are done away with, for the
cooking is done in public kitchens, the
washing in public laundries and Bridget
is thing of the past A man may be-
gin al the bottom of the Industrial lad
der and work his way up through every
grade of work until he reaches the high
est, that of president. There is no in
centive to endeavor but honor, which
seems to be enough. There are no banks
because there is no money. There are
no courts because there is no property to
quarrel over. There are no lawyers be-
cause the law is 80 simple everyone un-
derstands it. There are no burglars, be-
cause there is nothing to "burgle."
Think of land without tramps or book
agents, lawyers or Bridgets ! 1t is too
much. We do not want the earth. We
are content to have one burden removed
at time. Mr.. Bellamy, Edward Ever
EFT Hale, Col T. W. Higginson and other
well known optomists have organized a
society of Natlonalists to bring this
scheme into effect. Itlooks very pretty,
but whether it will wear well is another
thing. What are these gentlemen going
to do in their Utopia with the thieves,
gamblers, liberators, drunkards, dead
beats, and dishonest cusses generally
that infest society now If everybody
did just right and loved his neighbor as
himself the world would be all right.
The only trouble now is the people in it,
and it will take a pretty powerful factor
to change human nature much in the
next hundred years. When people get
tired of paying eleven cents pound for
sugar, and of shaving and fighting and
cheating through life with the fear of
poverty at their heels, they will rise up
in body and find some better way.
hBut for the present we shall have to go
right on setting type and making butter,
compelling people to buy what they
don't want and envying our neighbors,
till Mr.. Bellamy's millennium comes.
May we live to see it.-NOrthJfeld NeiUS,