The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-08-26
WHAT SOCIALISM REALLY Is.
Something of Which People Talk
Much and Know Little.
From Social Unity.


When the King of England, Karl
Marx, Cardinal. Manning and John
Most, Prince Mismarck and Eugene V.
Debs, Edward Bellamy and Prof. Ely
are called socialists, it is time that we
ask what socialism means. If these
are all socialists, socialism means any
thing or nothing, and the use of the
word throws more darkness than light.
What is the correct use of the word?
There is no dispute among informed
people AS Sidney Webb has pointed
out, not to know is merely intellectual
laziness. The modern lexicons, the en-
cyclopedias, the scholars, the authori-
ties, socialists themselves, are agreed
as to what socialism is. Those who
have introduced confusion into the use
of the word are the sentimentalists on
the one hand, who would call anybody
who had a kind heart a socialist, and
sensationalists on the other hand, who
identify socialism with any kind of a
social revolution. Socialism, to inform
ed people, is neither the one nor the
other, neither a vague dream of love
nor the overturning Of socity by force.
Socialism is a method of social life
which, based upon the brotherhood and
unity of mankind, would have land
and capital owned by the community
collectively, and operated cooperative
ly for the equal good of all. This, by
an overwhelming and practically unan-
imous consensus of the best authors,
is socialism.
Says the Century dictionary: Social
ism is amy theory or system of social
organization which would abolish en-
tirely or in great part the individual
effort and competition on which mod
ern society rests, and substitute for it
cooperative action; would introduce a
more perfect and equal distribution of
the product of labor, and would make
land and capital, as the instrument and
means of production, the joint posses
sion of the members of the commun-
ity."
The Encyclopedia Britannica (article
"Socialism') says: Whereas industry
is at the present carried on by private
capitalists, served by wage labor, it
must be in the future conducted by as
ISOLATED of cooperating workmen joint
ly owning the means of production. On
grounds both of theory and history.
this must be accepted as the cardinal
principle of socialism"
Says Prof. Schaeffle ("Quintessenz
des Socialismus'O: THE alpha and
omega of socialism is the transforma-
ton of private and competing capitals
into a united collective capital"
Says John Stuart Mill (the Fortnight
ly Review, April, 1879: What is
characteristic of socialism is the joint
ownership of all the members of the
community of the instruments and
means of production, which carries
with it the consequences that the divi-
sion of the produce among the body of
owners must be a public act according
to rules laid down by the community"
These definitions agree, too, with the
use of the word by those who call
themselves socialists, and who, if any,
have a right to their own name-such
men as Owens. Rodbertus, Marx, Las
sale, Blanc, Kingsley, Maurice, Hynd-
man, Engels, Morris, Gronlund Bel
lamy, the Fabian society, the Demo-
cratic Socialists of Germany, England,
France, Italy. Belgium, the United
States and other countries. All these
would substantially agree to the above
definitions.
Many popular ideas. therefore, espec-
tally in America, in regard to socialism
are at fault. We popularity identify So
cialism with the tendency to turn
industry and trade over to government.
Yet in not one of the above definitions
does the word government occur
Socialism only uses the government as
means to an end. Its end is the own
ership and operation of the means of
production by the community If the
state be a community democratically
or fraternally organized, then socialists
would have the state conduct industry;
otherwise they would not.
Socialism is fraternalism, not pattern
alism. By the derivation of the word
from the Latin socius, an associate: by
it's history, socialism is the very oppo-
site of paternalism. All the great So
cialists have been Democrats: they
have opposed paternal governments
and the extension of such governments;
owen. Fourier, Blanc, Marx, Engels,
Lasalle, Kingsley, Maurice, Hyndman,
Morris, Blatchford, Bellamy-where is
there a government paternalist among
these? In Germany the socialists vote
against the state schemes of the impe-
rial government; in France the social
lists oppose the present naturalization
of the land, fearing that till the gov
eminent becomes thoroughly socialiZed
it would give the government too much
power. If in America and elsewhere
socialists would use the state TO realize
their ideals, it is only because they
would make the state first democratic.
To call anybody a socialist because he
believes in nationaliZed railroads, is to
confuse. Our postal system, fire depart
ments, public schools, highways, and
much else are indeed, to an extent, ex-
amples of developing socialism; but no
thinker Identifies socialism with the
mere development of state activity.
without reference to what the state is.