Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-03-03
NATIONALIST.
Some OF the Defects in Bellamy's SYs-
TEN Pointed Out by Joseph Cook.
The Remedies Oder d for IRE Industrial Pprils
OF Our Time snd How They Ara to be APP
plied-EviIs Of Glass Government
JOSEPH COOKS PRELUDE q.

1OSE1h IOOh , fhELODEs
1. It concentrates national power of
colossal extent ia the hands of probably
less than half what is now the voting
population. It changes republican into
class government.
Everybody has to go to school until
twenty one, and then, according to the
scheme OF nationalism, everybody has to
be a member of the industrial army until
the age OF torty-hve, and nobody is to
vote until he has graduated from the in
dustrial army. The graduates of that
army are to manage the nation. think
this concentration of power in the hands
of men over forty-five years of age-Or
OF men and women, for I believe female
suffrage prevails, and therefore l sup
pose there Is involved in the scheme
cure for the cigar and the wine
cup. This Limitation OF political power
to fraction of the people appears TO
me 10 be contrary to the trend OF modern
political reform. Most Americans would
call this practically an aTistocraCy. My
first count against nationalism is, not
that il limits universal suffrage, for
would he glad to limit 1t by the reading
and writing test, but that it limits 1t
savagely, with a broad slash into ap-
proved ideas as TO freedom. It institutes
government by class less in numbers
than majority of the mature part of
the people. We believe, most OF us,
suppose, that If a man can read and
write he ought TO have voice at the
ballot-box after he is twenty-one. But
according TO MIR. BelIamy's scheme you
cannot vote, any of you, till you are
fortY-fve, and by that time many of
you will have lost interest in politics.
Laughter.
2. Nationalism cen be re ached only by
processes that are at once uutried and
revolutionary.
The parallel which Mr. Bellamy draws
between the operations Of the national
government proposed under his scheme
has in it much Obsrurity. l do not really
understand how we are to make the tran
uition from trusts which are governed by
uuadulterated selfishness to Mr.. Bel
lamy's scheme, which cannot work I'M
less governed by unauthorized unseifsh-
ness. What is a trust? 1t Is a combina-
ton OF capitalists. It's leaders come to-
gether in a parlor in New York, and as
Gen. Walker has told us in the Atlantic
Monthly, they agree that they will raise
the price Of certain staples they have to
sell; they will not compete with each
other. but in order to divide
profits, they agree upon GER
tam price. They tax sixty millions
Of US as much as they please. This
means the crushing OF competition out
side the ring and millions of gain inside
it. They have the whole public to plum
der; they have their inner ring to en-
rich. Now, in MIR. BeI!amy's scheme
CT natioGaiism there Is no inner ring to
enrich, and there are no people to plum
der How then can there be a close
parallel between trusts and the scheme
OF nation0lism? How can the former
develop into the latter? / do not see
how the transition is to be made from
our present arrangements to the scheme
of natiOnalism along the line of the OPP
erations of trusts, because the cases are
by no means parallel. There is no inner
ring LEFT in the nation, after MIR. Bel
lamy's scheme is put On foot. The con-
ditions under which trust enriches
itself no longer exist, and so the motives
which give vigOr TO trust are lacking.
do not understand either how Mr..
BeIla;ny makes provision for the purchase
OF property now in private hands. There
is TO be no property of private sort, or
almost none, except individual belong
ings, under Mr.. BellamY 5 scheme. The
land is to be uationalized. How is it to
be obtained. Is private property to be
confScated? Are you TO abolish inner
itance? Is the scheme TO be purchase or
spoliation? Tins question always arises
when uaIionalistio schemes are brought
70 n n q sIp
to il in this book, or even IN the speeches
OF its distinguished author. When
private property is to become public
property, are the private owners to
be ompsnsatsd? Are the minority to
be forced to accept the viii OF the
majority IN this matter? Are we to have
nGtionalisC1? These are all
fair questions and very old ones, for the
topic is not new. The objection to most
of these schemes Is that they mean the
abolition of the right of inheritance and
of the right of private property. They
mean spoilation, forced looms, forced
sales. Where is the money to come from
to buy what is now private property?
Money is to he abolished, and men are to
live on credit cards. The scheme is said
TO be simple. In the field that am now
traversing the scheme appears to me TO
be dangerously complex.
8. 1t is defect of this scheme that it
opens the way to prodigious political COR
ruption.
The more we concentrate the manage
msnt of industry in the hands of class,
the wider and deeper we make the grab
bag for national parties. The wider and
deeper the grab-bag the greater will be
the dangers from partisan greed and
fraud The remedy for the concentra-
ton of wealth in the hands of capitalists
is not IFS concentration in the hands Of
political parties, and especially not in the
bands of parties made up exclusively of
citizens over forty five years of age.
4, The scheme does not provide mo-
tives sufficient TO induce men to work
without votes in the manner proposed,
for the driving wheels of the whole plan
are simply pap aud prizes. It cuts the
nerve of private ownership and destroys
individual initiative ia industry.
All men are paid eIike. One of the
grand ideas in this book is that all that