The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1897-09-12

being placed upon the greed that
has already invaded politics and
almost subverted our institutions, what
escape would there be from the deluge
We're the great private interests men
toned to be added to the spoils of Of
flee? The remedy, on the face of 1t. is
worse than the disease. Nor is that
all. The complaint today is far less
against railroad or telegraph corpora
lions than against the trusts. 1t is the
great combinations that deal with the
necessaries of life that are the objects
government, for the protection of the
people, were to take charge of the rail-
roads and the telegraphs. how can their
condition be bettered unless it take
charge also of the fields of industry
now occupied by the trust? 1t would
have to assume control, as well, of the
manufacture and sale Of steel, lead
glass, kerosene and the thousand and
one articles whose supply is now in the
hands of syndicates or other combina-
tions
If there is anything at all in the ar
guments advanced by Altgeld and the
rest, it logically necessitates the substi-
tuition of government for individual en-
terprise in the entire field of human
activity. When a man makes up his
mind to enter this field of speculation
he should consult, not AItgeld and the
socialists but Mr.. Edward Bellamy
Bellamy may be more wildly visionary.
but he is strictly logical. If any COM
munity ever makes up its mind to try
the experiment of state control, it will
not, because it cannot, stop halfway
1t will not rest with the proposition put
forward by, the special pleaders against
few combinations, but it will push
forward to its inevitable goal of COM
plete state socialism.
To understand what this means, one
needs only to consult Mr.. Bellamy's re-
cent book Equality" He has there
set down, with great circumstantiality
Of detail and with remarkable clearness
of thought, the argument of the thor
oughgoing state socialist. He sees,
what the others fail or refuse to see.
that, if any modern society begins to
uSurp the province of the individual, it
must take it over wholly and not piece
meal Mr.. B2lamy's state, however
millennial and chimerical it may be, is
in logical accord with his principles In
that state there is no such thing as pFi-
vate property. Everything, Including
not merely land and the facilities for
transportation and the transmission of
intelligence. but buildings, implements
and every possible accessory of produce
ton, together with the entire annual
product, is the belonging of the whole
community, and every individual in it
has an equal right in the common in
heritance.
Another indispensable condition
which Mr.. Bellamy accepts is the
abolition of money and of debt or
credit between individuals Given tie
existence of money as a representa- tive
OF property which a man may. acquire,
or given the right Of private property,
so that one man can accumulate while
another becomes destitute, and the
whole theory of socialism topples over
into the abyss. In Mr.. Bellamy's scheme
the state is the great overload of the
land and its Inhabitants 1t owns ev-
erything. Every unit gifts people has an
indefeasible title to that portion of the
nations wealth which would be repre-
sented by its total accumulated capital
divided by its total population Every
individual owes to the state a certain
number of hours of labor per day dur
ing all the years of his active life, in
an occupation to be assigned by the
state itself. Every individual receives
at birth a right to a fixed annual in
come from the state, which is the same
fer all. This income is not paid in
money, but in kind Each man, woman
and child receives at the beginning Of
the year card after the fashion
Of a restaurant meal ticket, emitting
him to SO many dollars worth of GEM
modities or services Whenever he
wants dry goods or groceries or rail-
road ticket or a theater ticket, or any
thing that man can desire, he goes to
the public warehouse or the public
agent and orders it and has it punched
out of his yearly income card. He can
obtain ne more than that calls for dur
ing the year. He cannct sell or trade his
card to anybody elSe There being no
such thing as money for which. these
commodities and services might be ex-
changed. and nc man having right
to hold property outside of his personal
effects and the furnishings of his home,
accumulation Of great wealth is impos-
sible
We do not need tc enter here upon
discussion of the possibility of putting
such scheme into operation, or of its
probable effect upon human character
upon human incentive and upon the
evolution Of the race. We are not con-
sidering Mr.. Bellamy's plan on its mer-
its as either the description Of a para
disc or the filmy fragment of a dream.
We are locking at it merely as the de-
, velopment OF the socialistic idea, and
from that point of view we say that it
is the emily plan that can possibly COM
mend itself to a man given over to So
cialistic theories, but retaining at the
same time some reverence for logic. The
state of Altgeld would be not merely a