The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1911-05-08
THE INDIVIDUAL MAN
Hartford TimeS.)


Mr. j. o. Pagan has a very able
paper in the current Atlantic entitled
Socialism and National Efficiency
Mr.. Pagan is afworking man himself,
and is gifted with clear perceptive
powers and a command of nervous
English. His main proposition is
that Socialism tends to impair the
energy and ambition of the individual
and to reduce all to q common level
of productive ability by the injunction
that no man is to produce more per
day than a certain amount, which
must be low enough to fit the slow
est, and the daily wage must be the
same for all in given trade without
reference to skill or aptitude. This.
of course, would diminish the aver
age production of the producer. If
this takes place the country must in
evitably fall behind other countries
where labor is more efficient. And it
must fall behind not only in wealth
and the average standard of living,
but in character. Listlessness and in
difference will take the place of en-
ergy and interest.
At the same time Mr.. Pagan is a
firm believer in organized labor and
comprehends perfectly the evils that
attend our industrial system if the
duties to society and to their en-
ployees which the enormous develop
upon employers are entirely ignored
by them. Some employers conscien-
tiously endeavor to live up to these
duties, which are summed up in fair
and honest treatment, others do not,
and, as human nature is constituted
power over other men-judicial, mill
itary or capitaiistic-must be subject
to regulation by law. Mr. Pagan
contends that some of the laws en-
forced or attempted to be enforced
by the labor unions are suicidal. These
laws or regulations, as said before,
are those which impose uniformity of
production and lessen the RESPONSE
bility of the individual by merging
him entirely in the collective body of
workers.
Of course this tendency to unifor-
nifty is only one feature of Socialism
a name given to a hundred different
principles, from the abolition of pri-
vate ownership, which only the ex-
tremists advocate, to the general wild
ening of sympathy and breaking down
of class prejudices which comes under
the head of Christian Socialism" Mr..
Pagan says: "Co-operation, brother
ly love and sufferance have their place
in modern society and glorious mis-
sions at that" but he adds:
1t is absolutely fatal to good gov
eminent as well as to human progress
in general to separate the Individual
from his personal responsibility. The
of collective interest and
responsibility for personal responsible
ity and personal interest in a business
on a railroad or in
human affairs of any description, must
be looked upon as change
for the worse. Applied to society. it
is simply a return to the soulless cor
poration.
Society cannot shoulder all the risk
and take all the responsibility for
the individual. There must be a
wide province where personal ouali-
ties determine the conduct and issue
If life. Character is built by fric.
lion and difficulties. Competition is
war, but war must be regulated by the
military code and competition must
stop short of conspiracy to destroy, |
But to throttle competition entirely |
would block the wheels of progress |
Ind bring society down to a dull uni