Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1905-09-06
Is Socialism Inevitable?

exists is the immutable order of ma.
ture, incapable of being changed.
The vast majority of the races of
the civilized world believe that be-
cause capitalism has been in exist
ence for about one hundred years il
will so continue; that because as hith-
erto the human race has been divided
into classes, there is no available
remedy for the unequal distribution
of wealth.
There is nothing farther from the
truth than this. The history of our
civilization proves that the same law
of progress which rules in organic
nature, rules also in society.
Nothing in this infinite universe OF
which we are a part stands still;
everything is in a state of hux OF
change.
The past produced the present
which in its turn is parent of the flu
ture; one age is simply a prepara-
ration for the next.
The slave system of the nations OF
antiquity, the feudalism of the mid
die ages each had their periods OF
vigor, then declined and ultimately
fell; hence it is absurd and unscien-
tific to suppose that capitalism is the
consumation of the systems of the
world; that the immense progress of
the past has reached its goal in a
system so we'll described in the lines
of Tennyson:
Peace sitting under her olive, and
slurring the days gone by,
When the poor are huddled and hus-
tied together, each sex, like swine.
When only the ledger lives, when
only not all men lie;
Peace in her vineyard-yes, but a
company forges the wine.
Socialism is necessary stage in
the evolution of society. The entire
industrial tendency of our age is So
cialistic.
Herbert Spencer recognized the
economic trend of things when he
said: The numerous Socialist
changes made by act of parliament,
joined with the numerous others
presently to be made, will by and
by be all merged in state Socialism. y
Evidently, then, the changes made,
the changes in progress, and the
changes urged will carry US towards
state control of all industries. John
Ruskin confirms this view when
speaking of the factory system, the
greatest evil of capitalism, and in.
evitable under that system when he
says: Shall the Parthenon be ruin:
on its rock, and Bolton Priory be
ruins in its meadow and these build
ings of years be the consumation ot
the buildings of the world"
The economic tendency of toda y
however, is too apparent to need the
support of authority. But wher
such intellectual giants like Spence,
land Ruskin (and they do not stanc
alone on this) give utterance to idea
contained in the above passages, i
induces the prejudiced mind to stol
and consider, that after all ther'
may be something in the so-callec
utopian dreams of the Socialists.
To continues; the economic ten
dency to repeat is too apparent t.
escape even the notice of the mos
casual observer.
State control of the postal system
of the nations of the civilized world
the telegraph and the railways il
several countries of Europe, munic
ipal control which has reached il
present highest point in England
and is progressing with more or les
speed in other parts of the continent
all tend to show the increasing activ
ity of the state, and as one write
puts it: That society is reaching
crisis in its development"
The vast amount of educationa
and factory legislation in England
i GERMANY America and other coun