The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-04-11
WAR ADVANCES SOCIALISM
 FIFTY YEARS IN EUROPE
Ky STEPHEN AsrpnN

eSuNoh ls turning out 10 De SoelallSm in disguise. It has brought Europe SO years nearer to state ownership, State control, state dictation. state ev- erything. Germany's militant profes- sorial, state socialists. such as Adolph Wagner. are delighted. and in Russia
 Professor Isaikoff who has written
 ton of books on socialism, holds that after the war, political individualism
 will be dead Armageddon has pur the
 state in charge of nearly everything.
 The longer the war lasts the more
 state socialism there will be. If
 1t lasts five years. as Prince Beelow
 thinks possible. the hopes of Marx and Liebkneteh will be realized; ana if II
 lasts 20. as Premier Asquith alum
 brates. We shall attain the widest visions of Fourier
 This is a paradox. The socialists claim to be a peace party, but what they could not get through peace. they will get through war When war broke out short-sighted people said that socialism had disappeared. So- cialists everywhere-in France. Ger many and Austria-stuck patriotioally to their governments. The short sighted proclaimed that by this sur render to Chauvinism the socialists Gave their cause away. In reality the socialists were unconsoiously doing so- cialism the best conceivable service.
 They were helping the state to realize
 Professor Wagner's old prediction tha. War on the scale of our modern mil lion armies can be provided for econ
 cmically only if the state have refuge
 to the most drastic schemes of social istic appropriation The war Is d
 bloody way of realizing socialistic notions. A social revolution might be
 equally bloody; and il would have no chance of success,
 Germany, which led state socialism
 in time of peace, easily keeps the lea1 in time of war Germans first has
 made state corner of all the food sup plies of her 20,000.000 population. The federal council has declared that from
 February 1. all grain and flour be- long to the state. It forbids all sale and purchase of grain. owners of corn must report their stocks. The state will take them over at it's own price. Distribution to the population
 l. iil be done by the local self-govern- ing organs No man or woman Will get more than two lSilogrammes of
 flour, which is four German pounds, a week. That is enough for life And
 the town and country municipalities
 Will De ODllEeu to 1DlitNl PiONiSioHF
 for preserving and canning. Tho gov
 ernment will tell the citizens what to
 cat; and it requests him. if he can af-
 ford meat and dear foods, not 10 con-
 sume his two kilogrammes of flour
 so that the surplus may go to the
 poor.
 This is the greatest experiment in
 state ownership ever made. With it go other soeialstic plans of Identical principle Since the war broke out everything that Germany needs for war has been regulated by the srate Sometimes this has meant exprcpria- tion; sometimes prohibition against ex- port; sometimes compulsion to produce Copper, lead, leather. wool. nitre arc all regulated. In peace time, economic exigencies and crises however seve1 Q, could not induce the non socialist ma jority in the Reichstag to touch the sacred rights of property War has acted as magician's wand. Tic Bundesrat, or the military authorities, realize without word of opposition. the extremist socialists dreams.
 | France, Russia and England are all 1 deep fin war socialistic experiments. 1m- mediately after war began France and England put their private railroads under state control. English railroad national | izers have thundered for this reform for l go years but state socalistc war first brought the reform. The British state immediately began to deal in nugar on a vast scale, and the other belligerent states set to regulating prices. Russia s
 minister of commerce. Timasheff, threat ems that food supplies will be seized. Food prices rushed up after the war, chiefly because mobilization hampered transport When mobilization was fin | isned and transport had become normal. l food prices stayed up. That says Timas- Ioti Tho remedy iS n appropriate to the state all food supplies! | In England food prices have risen 20 per | cent or even more. The chief cause is ] the rise in freight rates. A subsidiary cause is speculation. The malcontents urge the government to do as Germany did: to appropriate, if necessary, the cargo ships, and to import food direct Everyone in England who wants state socialism rejoices at the effect of the war.
 All these socialistic measures are war mea sures But they will remain peace
 measures. Unless one of the combat ant groups abandons it's plan to crush entirely the other. the war probably will last for years. In these years the con ditions which have compelled the states to socialistic appropriations will continue; and will be accentuated. There will be more and more drastic measures. The present revolutionary measures will be- come normal, and people VIII wonder how they ever lived in an age Of pri- vate ownership of bread. The state bread monopoly will seem as neutral and as
 inevitable as did the state tobacco and match monopolies which existed In France before the war.
 Sccialistic war monoplies will persist after the war also because the wis inertia of bureaucracy makes for their persist ence Every new war monopoly means more officials. The officials are salaried and pensionable men. A European state never under any conditions throws its off, ficials out of employment. If monopoly is abandoned some other monopoly must
 take its place. When war broke out
 Russia had to stop the state traffic in vodka Vodka and war could not go together The vodka traffic gave work
 to 10000 officials. These cannot be away and Russia having lost the vodka moi opoly revenues, has to stand the ex-
 p,nse of supporting the officials. Ger
 niany's new bread monopoly will mean state or municipal employment of thou
 sands of officials. These will consider they have a right to salaries far life. That will make it impossible to do away with the bread monopoly when peace comes This will be true of other mo- nopolies. Russia proposes to replace the drink monopoly with temporary war inonopolies. of tea and tobacco. Once these monopolies are introduced they must be kept.
 Probably the political state of Europe after the war will also keep war sociali ism in being. The war. whichever side wins, will mean more armaments, more