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 Johann Jakoby. 
 
 Being a Speech Delivered Before his Constituency, January 10, 1810. 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 Florence Kelley-Wischnewetzky. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 New York Labor News Company, 
 
 172 First Avenue. 
 
 1887 . 
 

 
 
 V 
 
 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 imrt 
 
 The speech herewith placed before the 
 workers of America is the noteworthy 
 utterance of the Konigsberg physician 
 and noble friend of the working-class, 
 Dr. Johann Jakoby, a democrat in the 
 best sense of the word, a warm advocate 
 of the enlightenment of the people and 
 of the improvement of their condition. 
 Johann Jakoby, following the democratic 
 thought to its logical conclusion, per¬ 
 ceived that the bearer of the democratic 
 idea in our day is the modern social de¬ 
 mocracy, and he the most eminent of his 
 party was first to join the young Social¬ 
 ist Labor Party. 
 
 In America the old Jefferson democ¬ 
 racy perished long ago, and with it as 
 with the democracy of Jakoby the “dem¬ 
 ocratic” party of to-day has its name 
 alone in common, as may best be seen 
 £ from the phases of “development” 
 through which the “democratic” party 
 has passed, the last stage included. The 
 “democratic” party after being the pro¬ 
 slavery party, passed through a phase in 
 which it differed from its “republican” 
 rival only in representing Free Trade as 
 opposed to Protection. Then, the Tariff 
 -question ceasing to serve as an issue, and 
 
 the old parties surviving only to divide 
 the spoils (to the shame not alone of the 
 “democratic” party, be it said), a presi¬ 
 dential election became possible which 
 turned not upon party platforms but up¬ 
 on the relative decency of two candi¬ 
 dates. The rise of the United Labor 
 Party at the November election of 1886, 
 which has been rightly characterized as 
 the beginning of a new era in American 
 politics, lent the “democrats” a passing 
 raison d' etre as “saviors of society,” 
 representing neither platforms nor de¬ 
 cency, but the great “principle” of “Pa¬ 
 triotism.” And the fusion of the two 
 old parties for the furtherance of this 
 “principle” is only a question of time. 
 Already during the campaign of the past 
 autumn, naively upright “democrats” 
 who take “Society Saving” seriously, 
 showered bitter reproaches upon the ‘ ‘re¬ 
 publicans” for their “unpatriotic” action 
 in nominating separate candidates. 
 And the complete fusion of the “demo¬ 
 crats” with their kindred spirits, the “re¬ 
 publicans,” will be delayed so long only 
 as each of the old parties may still hope 
 to “save” something for itself. Mean¬ 
 while the general saving of society is not 
 
 
4 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 lost sight of, and bills are pending in 
 Congress to provide for the more effec¬ 
 tive establishment of the militia, a point 
 which we shall touch upon later. 
 
 One pre eminently democratic quality 
 our party with this glorious record unmis¬ 
 takably possesses, to do it justice, far be¬ 
 yond all true democracy, namely, a co¬ 
 lossal respect for popular majorities. A 
 majority it must have at all costs, and 
 since it would have hard work to con¬ 
 vince one, it buys its majority wherever 
 it can. Accordingly, bribes proving un¬ 
 availing among the masses of workers 
 now awakening to a consciousness of 
 their class interests, we behold the spec¬ 
 tacle of these worthy “democrats” and 
 “patriots” buying among the tenement- 
 house populations of our great cities that 
 popular majority which they so greatly 
 respect. For the purchase of a majority 
 no sacrifice of money is too great, and 
 every fair-minded person must admit 
 that this is the heaviest sacrifice which a 
 party can make that represents only the 
 interests of that class whose domination 
 in State and society rests solely upon its 
 possessions. Thus do our “patriots” sac¬ 
 rifice that which in their eyes is most 
 sacred. It is, however, a sacrifice that 
 brings its own reward. 
 
 In spite of all this decay and corrup¬ 
 tion within the old parties, the spirit and 
 traditions of the Jeffersonian Democracy 
 still live in a considerable part of the 
 Laboring Class; and we see here among 
 us in the person of Henry George a man 
 who is following in the path of Jakoby 
 
 and, as an upright Democrat, lias placed 
 himself upon the side of the Laboring 
 Class. If he follows to the end the path 
 he has entered, as we do not doubt he 
 will do, he is, we believe,destined to play 
 an honorable part in the development of 
 the Labor Movement in America. His 
 exclusive demand for the nationalization 
 of the land is totally insufficient for any 
 society which rests upon the capitalist 
 method of production, least of all for the 
 country of the industrial proletariat par 
 excellence. If Henry George extends his 
 demand to cover the demand for the 
 socialization of all the means of produc¬ 
 tion, the demand which, after all, forms 
 Jhe kernel of the Labor Question, that 
 is to say, if he places himself upon the 
 standpoint of modern Scientific Socialism, 
 then only can he become a true repre¬ 
 sentative of the workers; for then he 
 will express the actual interests of the 
 Laboring Class. Otherwise he will be 
 condemned to be a mere leader of a sect, 
 instead of representing a mighty and de¬ 
 cisive Labor Movement which, once 
 awakened to class-consciousness, is being 
 driven by the logic of events to modern 
 Socialism, and cannot possibly stop with 
 the land question. We say stop with 
 the land question because the modern 
 Labor Movement embraces the land ques¬ 
 tion as a matter of course. 
 
 The noble hearted Johann Jakoby ar¬ 
 rived at his Socialist position, thanks to his 
 high intelligence and, one might almost 
 say, to his healthy instinct, when we 
 take into consideration the backward 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 5 
 
 economic condition of Germany in his 
 day and the consequent far from con¬ 
 spicuous class antagonisms. 
 
 Wholly different is the position of 
 Henry George. This can be clear and 
 well considered to its utmost conse¬ 
 quences. He has the good fortune to 
 live and work in a country which is econ 
 omically and politically perhaps the most 
 advanced; in which the antagonism of 
 the classes is glaring, blurred by no medi¬ 
 aeval social traditions such as are so fre¬ 
 quent even in the most advanced States 
 of the Old World where the so-called mid¬ 
 dle parties base their existence upon them. 
 
 Here, no one who has eyes for the 
 reality can fail to recognize the compara¬ 
 tively small class of capitalists mighty by 
 reason of their possessions; and face to 
 face with it, separated by diametrically 
 opposed interests, by a gulf that can 
 neither be bridged over nor filled up 
 with specious phrases of harmony, the 
 Laboring Class. 
 
 Another factor must be especially em¬ 
 phasized which is of eminent importance, 
 namely, the possibility of clear insight 
 into the economic process going on about 
 us and a true comprehension of it, i. e„ 
 scientific enlightenment such as exists to 
 a considerable extent in the more progres¬ 
 sive proletarian movements of Europe and 
 in an especially high degree among our 
 German brothers who can already point 
 to a brilliant political Past. 
 
 Our young Labor Party is now on the 
 way towards becoming a great political 
 party, and its next task, as it has itself 
 
 recognized, is the work of consolidation 
 in a national Party. With its growth 
 and the simultaneous increase in politi¬ 
 cal influence, the need of that enlighten¬ 
 ment which is now naturally wanting, 
 will become more urgent in order that 
 the Labor Party may press with full in¬ 
 telligence towards the attainment of its 
 main object, the political and economic 
 emancipation of the Laboring Class. 
 
 The labor question has left the phase 
 of utopian plans far behind it. It has 
 become a science, among whose chief 
 representatives recognized as founders of 
 Modern Scientific Socialism are Karl Marx 
 and his lifelong friend and co-worker, 
 Frederick Engels. The fundamental 
 works upon Socialism, Marx’s Capital and 
 Engels’ Condition of the Working Class 
 in England, have very recently been made 
 accessible in translations to English-read- 
 ing workers. 
 
 To return to the accompanying pam¬ 
 phlet. There are two points in which So¬ 
 cialists to-day will not agree with the au¬ 
 thor as to the means by which the Object 
 of the Labor Movement is to be attained. 
 
 Socialists differ from Jakoby in his es¬ 
 timate of profit-sharing, finding it a 
 measure irrational in theory and reac¬ 
 tionary in its practical working, a trick 
 of the employer to divert the attention 
 of the workers from their class interests. 
 
 All profit is produced by labor, is in 
 the ultimate analysis unpaid labor. The 
 workers’ share would therefore naturally 
 be the whole of the profit. But under 
 our present system the workmen have 
 
6 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 /no claim upon any part of it. The whole | 
 belongs legally to the capitalist, and the 
 workers cannot well find any logical ar¬ 
 gument for claiming a part of what is 
 rightfully theirs and legally another’s. If 
 they insist upon having the whole of 
 what is their own they insist upon the 
 Social Revolution, for no measure less 
 radical can secure it for them. But if 
 they consent to be bought off by their 
 plunderers with a share of the booty 
 they assume a position which is not con¬ 
 ducive to the speedy abolition of legal- 
 \ ized robbery. 
 
 In practice profit-sharing has been 
 characterized as embodying the principle 
 of the fly on the window pane which, 
 being close to the eye, shut out the view 
 of the dome of St. Peter’s. For profit- 
 sharing has been found by shrewd em¬ 
 ployers to occupy the minds of workers 
 with petty economies and with watching 
 each other in order to insure the largest 
 possible ‘ ‘share” to the exclusion of larger 
 considerations of class interest. That 
 this is the real object of the arrangement 
 is indicated by two facts. It is in the 
 employing class and not in the working 
 class that profit-sharing finds its apostles, 
 and this is an unfailing danger signal. 
 And in the second place, it is adopted 
 chiefly by a certain class of employers to 
 whom it offers especial advantages in 
 the struggle for existence. The most 
 powerful monopolies do not share their 
 profits with their employes because they 
 do not especially need to* attach the 
 “hands” to the “concern.” Employers of 
 
 labor upon a small scale cannot as a rule 
 share profits with their employes, their 
 margin is too small. It is the middle- 
 class of employers who, hard-pressed to 
 fight the large capitalists on the one 
 hand and the labor organizations on the 
 other, are thankful to buy peace with 
 their own employes upon upon such 
 favorable terms as profit-sharing offers. 
 
 Socialists therefore do not recommed 
 profit-sharing. If enlightened workers 
 accept it when offered they are not 
 thereby blinded; they know that profit- 
 sharing bears no criticism from an econ • 
 omic standpoint, but would if disinter¬ 
 ested, be mere philanthropy; they know 
 that there is no standard by which the 
 workers’ share can be determined, and 
 they fully understand that the trifling in¬ 
 crease in their annual income is merely 
 the price which employers gladly pay for 
 decided advantages obtained in the econ¬ 
 omy and intensity of the labor thus paid 
 for and in the immunity from strikes. 
 But Socialists do not, with Jakoby, 
 recognize profit-sharing as a means to a. 
 peaceful solution of the labor question. 
 
 The second point upon which Socialists- 
 will not agree with Jakoby is his assump¬ 
 tion of the possibility of effort for a peace¬ 
 ful solution of the Labor Question on the 
 part of the State and the Capitalist class. 
 
 The individual employer who could 
 recognize his employe “as his own equal 
 and treat him accordingly,” gives place 
 more and more to the corporation “with, 
 no body to be kicked and no soul to be 
 damned.” And it were folly indeed to> 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 7 
 
 look to the capitalist corporations of 
 America to promote the transition to 
 the Socialist system. That would be 
 asking them to commit suicide. 
 
 Moreover the State becomes year by 
 year more completely the property, the 
 willing tool, of these same corporations 
 and less capable of action in the interest 
 of the people. Such slender concessions 
 as it makes in the direction of protecting 
 and advancing the interests of the work¬ 
 ing class are made in answer to the de¬ 
 mands of Labor organized so powerfully 
 that its demand is a threat. And so far 
 as it dares, the State of to-day renders 
 illusory the trifles that it yields. If we 
 pass in review the demands which Johann 
 Jakoby makes of the State we find that, 
 here in America, when the Government 
 yielded to the demand for the eight-hour 
 working day for its employees, the en¬ 
 forcement of the law remained practi¬ 
 cally nil. In the separate States the 
 eight-hour law, wherever passed, is 
 either a dead letter or vitiated in the 
 first place by the private contract clause. 
 The prohibition of the employment of 
 children under fourteen years of age, 
 though in some States enacted, is gener¬ 
 ally evaded for want of adequate inspec¬ 
 tion by men and women appointed from 
 the working class, or of that indispens¬ 
 able accompaniment of such a prohibi¬ 
 tion, sufficient school accommodation 
 and an efficiently enforced compulsory 
 
 law. A graduated income tax could be 
 imposed by the Government only under 
 the stress of the civil war and the State 
 was the far-too-humble servant of its 
 plutocratic owners to attempt stringent 
 enforcement. Instead of universal com¬ 
 pulsory military training we find the 
 irresponsible mercenaries of the great 
 corporations, the Pinkerton armed de¬ 
 tective force, growing in recklessness 
 from year to year; while the militia, 
 once meant to serve the ends indicated 
 by Jakoby, has been perverted, corrupted 
 and hedged about with costly conditions 
 until, to-day, it bears the character of a 
 bourgeois volunteer re-enforcemont of 
 the regular army maintained by the 
 State for the support of the capitalists in 
 the suppression of lawful protests of the 
 proletariat. 
 
 It is evident that all hope of help to¬ 
 wards the peaceful solution of the labor 
 question by the capitalist class and 
 the State is illusory. The transition 
 from the Wage-System to the Socialistic 
 organization of society is going on 
 around us and its peaceful consumma¬ 
 tion clearly rests with the Working Class. 
 The clearer the insight of the workers 
 the speedier and more peaceful the 
 change. “In proportion as the proleta¬ 
 riat absorbs socialistic and communistic 
 elements, will the Revolution diminish 
 in bloodshed, revenge and savagery.” 
 
 F. K. W. 
 
THE OBJECT OF THE LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 Fellow Citizens and Friends: 
 
 Permit me to-day to make the Labor 
 Movement, the so-called Social Question, 
 the subject of my remarks. In view of 
 the close connection between the politi¬ 
 cal and the social conditions of a nation, 
 every constituent has a well-founded 
 right to demand of his representative a 
 social confession of faith besides his po¬ 
 litical one. I shall endeavor to meet this 
 demand with the utmost frankness. 
 
 One of the greatest thinkers of an¬ 
 tiquity, Aristotle, divides the whole hu¬ 
 man race into two classes, free men and 
 slave natures. The Greeks he declares 
 are appointed by reason of their free na¬ 
 ture to rule over other peoples. The bar¬ 
 barous races on the contrary, are fitted 
 for being ruled and performing the ser¬ 
 vices of slaves. But slavery and slave- 
 labor he explains as a social necessity, 
 as the indispensable material foundation 
 of State and Society; for if the free citi¬ 
 zens were obliged to do the work re¬ 
 quired for their maintenance, how could 
 they have the time and the wish to cul¬ 
 tivate their intelligence and attend to 
 the affairs of the State ? And yet, Aris¬ 
 totle makes a remarkable observation as 
 to the conceivableness of a society with¬ 
 
 out slavery. If, he says, an inanimate 
 object, a tool, an implement, could ren¬ 
 der the service of the slave, if every in¬ 
 strument could perform its function at 
 command or, still better, without even a 
 command, as the old tradition relates of 
 the statues of Daedalus, and Homer sings 
 of the three -legged table of Hephaestus 
 which entered the halls of the gods of 
 its own motion; if the looms could weave 
 and the zither produce its tones spontan¬ 
 eously, then the artificers would need 
 no helpers and the masters no slaves. 
 
 Now, everyone knows that the miracle 
 here sketched has to a great extent been 
 wrought and that without the help or 
 intervention of the gods, in the most 
 natural way in the world, by insight into 
 the laws of nature and mastery of its 
 forces. What once seemed impossible 
 to the wisest of the Greeks happens 
 daily before our eyes. But how has the 
 miracle worked ? Has the success which 
 Aristotle supposed, attended it ? Expe¬ 
 rience teaches that the wealth of nations 
 has been immeasurably increased by the 
 magnificent mechanical appliances of 
 our time. Yet, the toilsome, anxious lot 
 of the laboring class has been anything 
 but lightened. 
 
10 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 Now, let us carry this dream of Aris¬ 
 totle farther in the light of actual expe¬ 
 rience. Let us assume that in the remote 
 future of the human race the soil of the 
 whole earth had passed into the hands of 
 individual owners, and man had attained 
 by the progress of knowledge to the ab¬ 
 solute control over Nature. Suppose the 
 perfection of mechanical contrivance to 
 have gone so far that machinery itself is 
 produced and tended by machinery, and 
 human labor is thus minimized if not 
 superseded. What would be the result 
 of such a state of things? In conse¬ 
 quence of the attractive power which 
 large capital exercises upon small, a com¬ 
 paratively small number of wealthy 
 persons would hold exclusive possession 
 of all machinery and other implements 
 of labor. The whole income of the na¬ 
 tion, all the goods requisite for the 
 necessities and enjoyments of life would 
 fall to these few alone and that right¬ 
 fully according to the views now current. 
 
 Under such circumstances, human 
 labor being wholly valueless, what would 
 become of the non-possessing mass if the 
 capitalists did not furnish them the bread 
 of charity ? What else would remain to 
 these unfortunates than to die of starva¬ 
 tion or to reverse the existing conditions 
 of production and possession if not by 
 cunning, then by force ? 
 
 It will be said that this picture is mere¬ 
 ly a horrible fancy, that such a state 
 of things can never be reached. This, I 
 admit, not because the thing itself is in¬ 
 conceivable but because sane men and 
 
 women will never let it go so far. But 
 can we deny that our present social life, 
 founded upon Capitalist rule and Wage- 
 Labor, moves in a direction which, if it 
 should continue unchanged, must bring 
 us with every passing day nearer to the 
 social conditions just depicted? Must 
 we not admit that even now, the income 
 of the nation is distributed in a manner 
 which subjects at least a part of the pro¬ 
 letariat to the want just described ? 
 
 In such a state of affairs it becomes the 
 duty of every good and thoughtful hu¬ 
 man being to ask himself the question: 
 
 “How are the present economic and 
 social conditions to be so changed as to 
 attain an equitable distribution of the in¬ 
 come of the people and to lessen the 
 daily-increasing poverty of the work¬ 
 ers ?” 
 
 Let us examine more closely the prob¬ 
 lem that is to be solved. 
 
 Two cardinal features characterize our 
 present methods of production and dis¬ 
 tinguish them from those of the past, 
 namely, wages labor and production 
 upon a large scale. 
 
 Whereas formerly, productive labor 
 was chiefly performed by slaves, serfs or 
 bondsmen, all rights of ownership in 
 human beings ceased at the French Rev¬ 
 olution. Rightfully, legally, every work¬ 
 er is free and his own master. But as a 
 matter of fact he is anything else rather 
 than free. Cut off from the means and 
 conditions of employment, with no other 
 possession than his labor power, he is 
 forced to work for wages in the employ 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 11 
 
 of others, and for wages which suffice 
 at the utmost for the bare necessities of 
 life. But if he finds no purchaser for 
 the only commodity at his command, for 
 his force of labor, he and his fall into 
 the utmost misery. Yet, despite this 
 wretched insecurity of his position, it 
 will hardly occur to any workman to 
 wish the old conditions back. It is a 
 life worthy of man that he strives for, 
 and he knows that this can be attained 
 only in a state of freedom. 
 
 As the French Revolution proclaimed 
 the workers personally free, so did it lib¬ 
 erate inanimate property from the last 
 shackles of the Middle Ages. Without 
 reference to previous restrictions and 
 obligations, whoever was in possession 
 at the moment, found his right to the 
 absolute control of his property recog¬ 
 nized. This release of property, the ap¬ 
 plication of steam power which followed 
 soon after, and the general introduction 
 of machine work produced a mighty and 
 far-reaching transformation in the ex¬ 
 isting economic and social conditions. 
 
 Handicraft and trade upon a small scale 
 were ever more crowded into the back¬ 
 ground; production by wholesale, the 
 capitalistic method of production, took 
 their place. But precarious as this 
 change has rendered the lot of the hand¬ 
 icraftsman without means and the small 
 retail dealer, the advantages for the 
 development of civilization connected 
 with production and distribution upon 
 a large scale are too weighty for Society 
 ever to renounce them. A general re¬ 
 
 turn to production on a small scale by 
 handicraft is as impossible as a return to 
 slavery. 
 
 We must therefore limit the question 
 under consideration as follows: How can 
 a more equal distribution of the national 
 income in the interest of all be attained 
 without limiting freedom of labor, and 
 without interfering with the progress of 
 civilization won by production on a large 
 scale ? 
 
 The answer cannot be doubtful, for us 
 at least. There is but one means to that 
 end: ABOLITION of the WAGE-SYS¬ 
 TEM and the substitution for it, of Co¬ 
 operative Labor. 
 
 Whoever has an open eye for the signs 
 of the the times must recognize that this 
 thought more or less clearly formulated 
 forms the basis of the Labor Movement 
 now making itself felt in every country 
 in Europe. As slavery and serfdom,once 
 a “necessary” social institution also, at 
 last made way for Wage-Labor, so in 
 our day there is coming about a similar 
 change of no less importance, the transi¬ 
 tion from the Wage-System to free co¬ 
 operative work. The important point is 
 that the transition should take place 
 in the most peaceful way. But this is 
 possible only on condition of the har¬ 
 monious activity of all the social forces 
 concerned. 
 
 The question which occupies our at¬ 
 tention should therefore finally be form¬ 
 ulated thus: 
 
 What has the workman, what has the 
 capitalist employer, and what has the 
 
12 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 State to do to further the transition al¬ 
 ready begun to the co-operative method 
 of production, and to bring this change to 
 its consummation in the way most ad¬ 
 vantageous to the community ? 
 
 We shall see that to answer this ques¬ 
 tion we need do no more than collate the 
 facts before our eyes, a clear proof that 
 the present age is in the midst of the 
 process of social remodelling. 
 
 First as to the workers themselves. 
 The main point is that they become 
 clearly conscious of their own situation 
 and that they recognize and respect 
 their own inherent nobler nature. 
 
 I have stated in the foregoing that as 
 a rule the worker ’s wages barely suffice 
 for scanty maintenance for himself and 
 his family. If any one doubts this rela¬ 
 tion, the so-called iron law of wages, let 
 him refer to the testimony recently given 
 by the Committee of the German Board 
 of Trade in an opinion upon the seizure 
 of wages. 
 
 There he will find, word for word, this 
 statement: 
 
 “We cannot let pass without qualifica¬ 
 tion the assertion that there is a consid¬ 
 erable difference between the laborer’s 
 wages and the means of subsistence re¬ 
 quisite for his scant maintenance. It 
 is exactly this point, the rate of wages, 
 upon which practically the whole great 
 social question turns. The workingmen 
 insist upon the insufficiency of the wages 
 rate. The employers do not deny this, 
 but explain the rate of wages as a link in 
 the chain of economic phenomena which 
 
 they cannot arbitrarily change (under 
 the pressure of the market in the midst 
 of which they themselves stand) without 
 destroying the whole chain. So long as 
 this controversy is not settled, and we 
 fear it is an everlasting one (sic), so long 
 shall we be obliged to maintain the opin¬ 
 ion as the only correct one, that the ex¬ 
 pressions ‘wages of labor’ and ‘necessary 
 means of subsistence’ are in general 
 identical.” 
 
 The “indestructible chain of economic 
 phenomena!” Indeed a more striking 
 expression could not have been found ! 
 True the capitalist rulers of labor are 
 not prevented by it from heaping capital 
 upon capital, but heavily does the 
 “chain of economic phenomena” press 
 upon the laboring class. Yet, even here 
 the poet’s word proves true: 
 
 “There dwelleth a spirit of Good in all Evil.” 
 
 The ruling industrial system, by mak¬ 
 ing indispensable the assemblage of 
 masses of workers at one point, gives the 
 first impulse to the removal of the evil 
 itself has created. As man first sees his 
 own features in the mirror, so the labor¬ 
 er first awakens to a full appreciation of 
 his own pitiable situation when, in the 
 misery of masses of his comrades in suf¬ 
 fering the image of his own lot stares 
 him in the face. Sharing the life of his 
 companions in toil, men placed like him¬ 
 self and equally oppressed, in constant 
 contact and interchange of thought with 
 them, working together for reciprocal 
 support and the common defense against 
 common danger, there arises a class con- 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 13 
 
 sciousness which sustains and elevates 
 the individvual and inspires the masses 
 to battle for their social rights. It is a 
 strange fate which decrees that Capitalist 
 production itself shall assemble and drill 
 the powers destined to make an end of 
 capitalist and class rule. 
 
 From the great central rallying places 
 of industry the Labor Movement has 
 proceeded, which within a few decades 
 has spread from England over France, 
 Belgium, Germany and Switzerland, and 
 has attained power and definite form in 
 the foundation of the International 
 Workingmen’s Association. Every¬ 
 where we see unions forming whose ob¬ 
 ject is the improvement of the material 
 condition of the laboring class; crafts¬ 
 men’s guilds and workingmen’s clubs, 
 educational and beneficial associations, 
 co-operative, loan and credit societies, 
 trades unions and co-operative manufac¬ 
 turing companies. Under the prevail¬ 
 ing conditions of credit and production 
 all these undertakings, originating in the 
 working class and resting upon the prin¬ 
 ciple of self-help must x^rove x^oweriess 
 to cure the misery of the masses. But 
 they have acconrplished a vast work for 
 the intellectual and moral elevation of 
 the laboring class and in leaving the 
 way for a thorough reform of labor. 
 The true significance of these associa¬ 
 tions, their value which cannot be over¬ 
 estimated lies in this that, wholly ax>art 
 from the esx>ecial object at which they 
 aim, they are a school for self-culture for 
 their members; that they confer upon 
 
 them skill in the independent manage¬ 
 ment of their own affairs and in harmo¬ 
 nious action with others for common 
 ends; that by education, x>romotion of a 
 comprehension of business and fraternal 
 imblic spirit they prepare the worker 
 for a gradual transition from the pre- 
 vailing Wage-System to the co-ox>erative 
 method of x>roduction of the future. 
 
 It was the spirit of co-operation which 
 in the the Middle Ages raised the work¬ 
 ing middle class to so high a level of 
 culture and prosperity, of x^ower and 
 consequence. The re-awakening of the 
 spirit of co-operation in our day will 
 bear similar and still more x>recious fruit, 
 not for one class alone but for the whole 
 human society. The labor question as 
 we aiyprehend it, is no mere stomach 
 and money question, it is a question of 
 Civilization, Justice and Humanitv. 
 When our saving of State and Society, 
 the “glorious” achievements of our 
 policy of blood and iron like a lost tradi¬ 
 tion shall long have been forgotten, it 
 will be remembered to the credit of our 
 time that it quickened and cherished the 
 spirit of co-operation, the germ of hu¬ 
 man greatness and virtue in the labor¬ 
 ing world, so laying the foundation for 
 a new and truly moral social life which 
 shall rest upon the principle of equality 
 and fraternity. The founding of the 
 smallest workingmen’s club will be for 
 the historian of Civilization of greater 
 worth than—the victory of Sadowa. 
 
 Let us x^ass to the second question: 
 
 What has the employer to do ? 
 
14 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 The demand that we make of him is 
 simply this, that he respect in every 
 worker the human being, that he recog¬ 
 nize the laborer whom he employs as a 
 being fully his own equal, and that he 
 treat him accordingly. 
 
 Everything, they say, has two sides. 
 In this every-day saying lurks a good 
 piece of popular wisdom;—the most diffi¬ 
 cult problems of knowledge as of life find 
 their solution in it. Like everything 
 else man himself has two sides, a per¬ 
 sonal one peculiar to himself as an indi¬ 
 vidual, and a universal one which marks 
 him as a member of a greater whole. 
 In reality the two sides can neither be 
 separated nor sharply distinguished, for 
 it is the two taken together which in 
 their unity, make the man. But in our 
 consciousness temporarily or permanent¬ 
 ly one side or the other can very well 
 press into the foreground and assert a 
 predominant influence upon our thought 
 and action. Let us assume the case 
 that the special, individual side predom¬ 
 inates in a man’s character. It would 
 find expression primarily in his estimate 
 of himself, as self-consciousness, self- 
 confidence. “Help yourself,” “Hercules 
 helps him who helps himself,” becomes 
 such a man’s maxim, the rule of his 
 thought and action. If he retains the 
 consciousness of the other universal side 
 of his nature, not losing sight of the 
 connection between himself and his fel¬ 
 low men, he will admit that his own 
 powers do not suffice to obtain him by 
 his personal effort alone, a subsistence 
 
 worthy of a human being; that man can 
 live and prosper only in society, that 
 brotherly co-operation with others there¬ 
 fore lies in his own interest. Respect 
 for others, sympathy and public spirit 
 will hold his self-consciousness and self- 
 confidence properly in check. Quite 
 otherwise if the consciousness of self 
 gets the upper hand in a man. True, 
 the insufficiency of his own unaided 
 powers cannot escape him even then, 
 for the consciousness of the broad, uni¬ 
 versal side cannot be wholly suppressed. 
 But the conclusion which he draws from 
 it is in this case different, he will regard 
 others not as his equals, not as equal 
 members of a great whole, of which he, 
 too, forms a part, but as subservient to 
 himself, mere tools for satisfying his 
 needs and gratifying his desires. Thus 
 the consciousness of self, praiseworthy 
 enough in its place, deteriorates into self¬ 
 ishness, and self-consciousness into con¬ 
 ceit. Selfishness, pretension and the 
 desire to rule tempt him to make his 
 fellow men serve his own will, all that 
 he believes to be for his own advantage. 
 
 What is here said of the individual 
 applies to the whole community. The 
 same powers which are active in the 
 mind of the individual make themselves 
 felt in the life of peoples, in the history 
 of the human race. 
 
 The power of man over man, the right 
 of the strong and the oppression of the 
 weak, that is the characteristic feature, 
 the scarlet thread that is woven into the 
 history of antiquity and of the Middle 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 15 
 
 Ages. And is it otherwise now ? 
 
 Does not the order of society to-day, 
 rest in spite of the much-praised prog¬ 
 ress of Civilization, upon the same prin¬ 
 ciple of human subservience ? Has the 
 Present a right to look back to the con¬ 
 ditions of heathen antiquity and of the 
 Christian Middle Ages with pride and 
 self-satisfaction ? 
 
 With a frankness which leaves nothing 
 to be desired a statesman of the Nine¬ 
 teenth Century, Count Joseph de Maistre, 
 has expressed himself, literally, thus: 
 
 “The human race was created for the 
 benefit of a few men. It is the business of 
 the clergy, the aristocracy, and the higher 
 officers of the State to teach the people 
 what is good or bad, true or false in 
 the worlds of morals and intellect. 
 Other persons have no right to dispute 
 about such matters, they must endure 
 without murmuring.” 
 
 If this is rather highly colored, the 
 picture is none the less drawn from na¬ 
 ture. So long as the shepherds of the 
 nations go to war without saying “by 
 your leave” to the people, so long as ec¬ 
 clesiastics come together in council and 
 synod “To judge false human science 
 under the auspices of the Holy Ghost,” 
 so long we have no right to accuse de 
 Maistre of falsehood. But wrong and 
 incomprehensible it is that de Maistre 
 approves this state of things, that he 
 dreams such conditions can and will en¬ 
 dure for all time. 
 
 Let me produce another witness: 
 
 Robert Owen, the founder of the co¬ 
 
 operative system in England, once met 
 in the house of a Frankfort banker Fred- 
 rich von Gentz, the well-known states¬ 
 man. Owen set forth the excellence of 
 his socialistic system and observed: 
 
 ‘ Tf only unity could replace disunion 
 all men would have enough to live 
 upon.” 
 
 “That may be true,” replied von 
 Gentz, “but we do not wish the masses 
 to be prosperous and independent of us, 
 for how could we then continue to gov¬ 
 ern ?” 
 
 There we have the whole Social Ques¬ 
 tion of the present in a nutshell! If 
 Owen speaks the E word of deliverance, 
 the Unity of Mankind, Gentz proclaims 
 the fundamental evil that stands in the 
 way of redemption: the love of power of 
 the more favored classes. Aristotle also 
 divided mankind, it will be remembered, 
 into two classes, such as are destined to 
 command and such as are born to serve. 
 But it was difference of nationality, as 
 between Greeks and Barbarians, which 
 lay at the foundation of his distinction. 
 Gentz and de Maistre on the contrary 
 draw a dividing line within the same 
 race, between the upper ten thousand 
 who are ordained to rule and prosper, 
 and the remaining masses destined to be 
 governed and to languish. 
 
 Whether we examine the state of the 
 Church, the State or Society everywhere 
 —we cannot ignore it—we meet with 
 the class rule of the Middle Ages, the 
 mediaeval system of guardianship. In 
 one point only does the Present differ 
 
16 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 from the Past, namely that, thanks to 
 the German Reformation and the French 
 Revolution, the conviction gains ground 
 from day to day in ever-widening circles 
 down to the lowest strata, that it cannot 
 go on so forever, that men are not cre¬ 
 ated to he ruled and governed, held in 
 leading strings and oppressed by their 
 fellow men. For thousands of years 
 love of one’s neighbor and the fellow¬ 
 ship of man have been preached to the 
 people. The present demands that in 
 every deed, in daily life, in the State and 
 Society this teaching be applied in 
 earnest. 
 
 There was a time—the older men 
 among you remember it—when everyone 
 who doubted the right of absolute gov¬ 
 ernment was branded a rebel. To-day 
 a similar fate is the lot of everyone who 
 ventures to lay hands upon the “chain 
 of economic phenomena.” Do but ven¬ 
 ture to attack the privilege of the pos¬ 
 sessing class, the abuse of power by Cap¬ 
 ital, the prevailing credit and loan sys¬ 
 tem, or even to broach a more equal dis¬ 
 tribution of material goods, and you are 
 in certain circles branded forthwith as 
 the enemy of all social order, a social 
 heretic, a Communist. But this shall 
 not deter me from recognizing freely 
 and publicly that all individual.property, 
 material not less than intellectual, is the 
 common good of society. Like man 
 himself, every form of the property of 
 man possesses, besides its special charac¬ 
 ter which makes it the private possession 
 of an individual, a universal side which 
 
 gives the community a well-grounded 
 claim to a right to it. That the State 
 and the municipality appropriate a part 
 of the property of every citizen as taxes 
 we all consider a matter of course, or 
 that the law limits the free control of 
 the individual’s property. But, we ask, 
 has the property-holder no other duties 
 than those which the law of the land 
 prescribes and in case of need compels 
 him to fulfill ? Has he not duties to so¬ 
 ciety as well as to the family, the munic¬ 
 ipality, the commonwealth ? What the 
 individual calls his own, whether of real 
 or personal property, is it, can it be 
 solely the product of his own activity? 
 Does he not owe by far the greater part 
 of it to the co-operation of others, to the 
 social labor, the labor in common, of 
 the people who have lived before him 
 and of his contemporaries ? And as the 
 individual attains possession of property 
 only by means of the help of others, so 
 he cannot enjoy its fruits without the 
 help of others. Only in society lias 
 property value, only in society can man 
 rejoice in it. Hence the moral obliga¬ 
 tion of every owner of property so to 
 use his fortune that it may be of use not 
 to himself alone but to the community 
 as well, especially to those of his fellow 
 men who are less favorably placed than 
 himself. 
 
 The grand Labor Movement of the 
 last forty years has had a wholesome 
 effect in this respect. As it has awak¬ 
 ened in the workman the consciousness 
 of his social rights, so has it sharpened 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 17 
 
 in the possessing class the sense of social 
 duty. 
 
 We are glad to admit that there are 
 employers for whom the laborer is not 
 a commodity which one buys as cheaply 
 as possible, like every other commodity, 
 to make the most of the use of it. In 
 England, France, and even with ns in 
 Germany, there is no lack of individual 
 examples of mill-owners, business men 
 and landlords who endeavor to improve 
 the sad lot of their employes through 
 increase in wages, or shortening the 
 hours of labor, the foundation of savings- 
 banks, beneficial societies and insurance 
 for old age, or by the erection of health¬ 
 ful dwellings, asylums, hospitals, educa¬ 
 tional institutions, and other means. 
 Especially worthy of notice in this res¬ 
 pect is the system of profit-sharing, 
 according to which the workman re¬ 
 ceives besides his wages a regular share 
 of the profit obtained by his labor. In 
 England alone there are some ten 
 thousand workmen who hold this rela¬ 
 tion to their employer, and both sides 
 have reason to be content with their suc¬ 
 cess. Yet, we must not overlook the fact 
 that here everything depends more or 
 less upon the good will of the employer, 
 and that in the best case certain work¬ 
 ingmen or groups of workingmen only 
 are benefitted by it. Valuable as such 
 humane endeavors are as educational 
 preparation for the removal of the social 
 wretchedness which has arisen out of 
 the wages system they are as little ade¬ 
 quate as the workmen’s attempt at self¬ 
 
 help. That great task requires another 
 power, capable of taking general and 
 radical measures. And this brings us to 
 the third question: 
 
 What has the State to do to bring 
 about a peaceful solution of the Labor 
 Question ? 
 
 The new constitution of the Canton 
 Zurich adopted April 18tli, 1869, answers 
 our question as follows: 
 
 Art. 23. “The State promotes and 
 facilitates the development of the co¬ 
 operative system based upon self-help. 
 It enacts through its law-giving power 
 the provisions requisite for the protection 
 of the workers.” 
 
 Art. 24. “It creates, for the further¬ 
 ance of the general credit, a Cantonal 
 bank.” 
 
 The original wording of the articles 
 was still more precise. It was as follows: 
 Art. 23. “It is the duty of the State to 
 protect and advance the welfare of the 
 working class and the development of 
 the co-operative system.” 
 
 Art. 24. (As above). 
 
 Protection, Advancement—in these 
 two words the object of the great co¬ 
 operative body which we call the State 
 is sharply and clearly formulated. But 
 how are protection by the State and 
 advancement by the State to be under¬ 
 stood ? The despot calls himself shield 
 and protector of the people, and war is 
 praised as a means of promoting civili¬ 
 zation. Vera rerum vocdbula amissimus, 
 the right names of things are lost to us. 
 The more need then to specify the sense 
 
18 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 in which the terms are here used. 
 
 “Protection by the State” means the 
 duty of the whole body of persons as¬ 
 sembled and united into a State to pro¬ 
 tect each individual in the free develop¬ 
 ment and employment of his power so 
 far as the like freedom of others is not 
 thereby interfered with. 
 
 But with mere protection the duty of 
 the State is not exhausted, however much 
 the politician may prefer to limit it 
 thereto. The reciprocal advancement 
 of the members of the State must be 
 added. 
 
 Under advancement by the State we 
 understand the duty of the whole commu¬ 
 nity to step in with its means wherever 
 the welfare of the individual does not 
 suffice to obtain him a life worthy of a 
 human being. 
 
 As protection by the State corresponds 
 to the principle of Liberty, and Ad¬ 
 vancement by the State to the principle 
 of Fraternity, so the assurance of pro¬ 
 tection and advancement to all, “to each 
 according to his need,” meets the de¬ 
 mand of Equality. 
 
 This doctrine of the object of the State 
 is quite the same as that which I ex¬ 
 pressed on a former occasion in the 
 formula: 
 
 Each for all—is human Duty ! 
 
 All for each—is human Right; 
 
 “But,” some one may object, “if protec¬ 
 tion and advancement by the State are 
 to be afforded to all equally, why is the 
 working class especially emphasized in 
 the article of the Zurich constitution ? 
 
 Is the working class to be especially fa¬ 
 vored by the State, advanced at the 
 cost of the others ?” 
 
 Reasonable as this objection at first 
 sounds, it does not bear scrutiny. 
 
 It must be remembered that the equal¬ 
 ity of all consists solely in every man’s, 
 being protected and helped ‘ ‘according 
 to his need;” and who can deny that at 
 this time it is precisely the wage-worker 
 who most needs protection and help ? 
 
 But wholly apart from this greater 
 need, there is another circumstance 
 which, for the Present and the immedi¬ 
 ate Future, makes an especial considera¬ 
 tion of the working class by the State a 
 demand of reparative justice. 
 
 It is only necessary to call to mind the 
 genesis of what is commonly called cap¬ 
 ital to make this perfectly clear. How¬ 
 ever the definitions of capital may differ, 
 in this they all agree, that it is accumu¬ 
 lated labor, applicable to further pro¬ 
 ductive ends. But who has performed 
 this labor? They, perhaps, who now 
 control capital! Does the manufactur¬ 
 er, the merchant, the landlord, owe his 
 wealth of accumulated labor to his own 
 activity and the industry of his ancestors ? 
 Is the want of capital, the poverty of 
 the toiling proletarians solely due to 
 their own and their fathers’ fault ? But 
 if the present inequality of fortune is 
 not solely due to the economically cor¬ 
 rect action of the property-holding class 
 and the shiftlessness of the non-possess¬ 
 ing class, to what other cause can it be 
 attributed ? Whence comes it that Cap- 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 19 
 
 ital concentrates more and more in 
 the hands of the small minority while 
 the mass of wage-laborers, despite their 
 industry, can scarcely satisfy their barest 
 needs ? The reason for this can evident¬ 
 ly be found nowhere else than in a dis¬ 
 tribution of the product of labor dis¬ 
 proportionate to the labor performed, 
 and therefore, unjust. 
 
 We shall not investigate the chain of 
 historical conditions in consequence of 
 which the workman was gradually sep¬ 
 arated from the means of production and 
 the present disproportion between work 
 and wages brought about. The question 
 now is: 
 
 What has the State done to'bring about 
 a more just distribution of the product 
 of labor? Has it made any attempt by 
 legislation or otherwise to protect the 
 workingman against the superior power 
 of capital or to set a limit to the social 
 inequality that is growing from day to 
 day? 
 
 Whoever scrutinizes the history of the 
 nations down to the present day will 
 find that in this direction practically 
 nothing has been done. 
 
 Nobility, clergy and the higher digni¬ 
 taries of State have separately and to¬ 
 gether exercised an almost exclusive 
 control in public affairs; they have not 
 hesitated to turn to account for them¬ 
 selves and their own interests power and 
 wealth from which all should have prof¬ 
 ited equally. Legislation itself, far from 
 distributing air and sunshine equitably 
 in the economic race, has contributed its 
 
 large share by conferring privileges on 
 the one hand and interfering^with liber¬ 
 ty on the other, to widen and. deepen 
 the chasm between the property-holding 
 and the non-possessing classes. 
 
 How then can any one blame the men 
 of toil, if, having awakened to the con¬ 
 sciousness of their rights and their 
 power, they demand from the State a 
 very special consideration of their so 
 long neglected interests? When, in the 
 article of the Zurich Constitution, State 
 protection and State help is especially 
 promised to the workers, there is in¬ 
 volved in this no infringement’upon the 
 principle of equality. There is no 
 question, as some anxious souls fear, of 
 feeding the poor working man at the 
 cost of the rich citizen; still less of form¬ 
 ing a privileged class of workingmen, 
 stipendiaries of the government. It is 
 simply the frank and honorably out¬ 
 spoken recognition by the law-givers of 
 the State's duty to do that which has 
 been left undone and to expiate injus¬ 
 tice committed, so righting the social 
 wrong for which the State is, in part, 
 responsible. It is only the wished-for 
 fulfillment of that which we have called 
 the demand for reconciliating and rep¬ 
 arative justice. 
 
 But the Zurich Constitution does not 
 stop with the recognition of the duty 
 and responsibility of the State in general, 
 it specifies in precise terms the means by 
 which alone the working class can now 
 be helped: 
 
 “The development of co-operation 
 
20 
 
 THE OBJECT OF THE 
 
 based upon self-help shall be promoted 
 and assisted.” 
 
 The ultimate object of this process of 
 development is: The abolition of wages- 
 labor by the gradual transition from 
 the wages system to that of co-oper¬ 
 ative labor. 
 
 Let us glance now in detail at the 
 demands to be made of the State, i. e., 
 the whole community of individuals. 
 
 First comes unrestricted freedom of 
 opinion and the right to organize and 
 hold meetings at will. The repeal of all 
 laws framed for the purpose of limiting 
 or, as the phrase goes, “regulating” 
 liberty. Next, equal right of participa¬ 
 tion in public affairs for all, universal, 
 direct suffrage and its corollary,universal 
 direct participation of the people in leg¬ 
 islation and administration. Further, 
 free compulsory education in public 
 secular institutions and the introduction 
 of universal compulsory military train¬ 
 ing in place of standing army and 
 militia. These two demands we com¬ 
 bine because public instruction and the 
 peoples’ power of defense are most 
 closely connected. For the conduct of 
 war the primary need is money and effi¬ 
 cient soldiers; both are secured by effi¬ 
 cient schools. The wealth of a country 
 depends upon the successful labor of its 
 inhabitants, but work is the more suc¬ 
 cessful the better the workman can cal¬ 
 culate the success of what he undertakes, 
 that is, the more intelligent he is. And 
 the soldier, like the workman, will be 
 more skillful in the performance of his 
 
 task, the defense of his country. With 
 us in Germany, as in most of the countries 
 of Europe, nearly half of the nation’s 
 income is spent in preparation for war, 
 while education and culture are put off 
 with sums scarcely worth mentioning. 
 Let us reverse the proportion and the 
 people’s wealth will multiply ten-fold 
 without injury to our power of defense, 
 A Minister of Education who under¬ 
 stands his business is the best Minister 
 of Finance and War. 
 
 For the working class especially, and 
 that in the interest of the Commonwealth, 
 we demand: 
 
 SHORTENED HOURS OF LABOR AND A LEGAL 
 WORKING DAY. 
 
 The wage-worker, too, must have 
 time and leisure “to cultivate his intelli¬ 
 gence and attend to the affairs of State.” 
 The Congress of English Trades Unions, 
 held last year in Birmingham, recom¬ 
 mended the eight-hour working day for 
 all trades, and expressed its conviction 
 that by this means “the physical and 
 mental power of the workers will be in¬ 
 creased and morality promoted and the 
 number of the unemployed diminished.” 
 
 Prohibition of the employment of Chil¬ 
 dren and equal pay for equal work for 
 Men and Women. 
 
 Both are necessary to prevent the 
 further sinking of wages and to save the 
 rising generation from deterioration. 
 
 Abolition of indirect Taxes and intro¬ 
 duction of a Progressive Income Tax. 
 
 Every tax upon necessaries of life is a 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 21 
 
 tax upon the worker’s force of labor, 
 hence a restriction upon production and 
 an injury to the prosperity of the 
 people. 
 
 Finally: Reform of the Money and 
 Credit System, and promotion of Indus¬ 
 trial and Agricultural Productive Co¬ 
 operative Associations by the intervention 
 of State Credit or State Guaranty. 
 
 The point is to make credit accessible 
 to the working class. This the State has 
 done in most generous measure both 
 directly and indirectly for the promo 
 tion of the capitalistic method of pro¬ 
 duction. Let the State now in its own 
 interest do the same for the co-operative 
 associations of the workers. Nothing is 
 more advantageous to the Common¬ 
 wealth than justice in all things.’ 
 
 So much for the preliminary condi¬ 
 tions of labor reform. The working¬ 
 men have been advised, perhaps honestly 
 enough, to keep out of politics and busy 
 themselves solely with their economic 
 interests, as if political and economic in¬ 
 terests could be separated as kindlings 
 are split, with a hatchet. Whoever has 
 followed our line of reasoning thus far 
 cannot, I think, be in doubt that pre¬ 
 cisely the working class must first of all 
 and most of all resolve to transform po¬ 
 litical conditions in the direction of 
 freedom. State-help no less than self- 
 help is needed for securing to the work¬ 
 er the full, undiminished result of his 
 industry, that is, an existence worthy of 
 a man. 
 
 The State alone, and only a free State 
 will help the workers ! 
 
 Let us sum up briefly, the substance 
 of the foregoing: 
 
 The system of wages-labor meets the 
 demands of Justice and Humanity as 
 little as did the slavery and servitude of 
 former times. Like slavery and servi¬ 
 tude, wages-labor was once a step 
 forward in civilization from which un¬ 
 deniable advantages have accrued to 
 society. 
 
 The social question of the Present is 
 how to abolish the wages system without 
 losing the advantages of production and 
 distribution en gros by means of associ¬ 
 ated labor. 
 
 To this end there is but one means, the 
 system of free associated labor, the co¬ 
 operative system. The Present is a 
 time of transition from the wages sys¬ 
 tem (capitalistic method of production) 
 to the system of Associated Labor. 
 
 In order to secure a peaceful transition, 
 the worker, the employer and the State 
 must work together: 
 
 It is the part of the workers to offer 
 united resistance to the pressure of cap¬ 
 italistic rule, and by self-culture to pre¬ 
 pare themselves for independence. 
 
 It is the part of the employer to con¬ 
 cern himself for the welfare of the work¬ 
 ers, and especially to yield them a share 
 of the profits. 
 
 It is the duty of the State to promote 
 the efforts of the workers for self-culture 
 by promoting their organization, deter¬ 
 mining a legal working day and afford- 
 
LABOR MOVEMENT. 
 
 ing adequate opportunity for free in¬ 
 struction. It is the further duty of the 
 State to assist the development of the 
 co-operative system by reform of the 
 bank and credit system and by affording 
 to co-operative effort the support of 
 State-credit. 
 
 Such help being possible only on the 
 part of a free State, it follows that all 
 workers, and all friends of the workers, 
 must aim primarily at establishing true 
 freedom within the State. Political and 
 social freedom, freedom of the citizen 
 without the sacrifice of the majority of 
 mankind as wage-slaves; this is the task 
 of our century. The achievements of 
 the policy of blood and iron, the clang 
 
 of arms in these, our days, the chase and 
 struggle for wealth and sensual enjoy¬ 
 ment, these are but ripples upon the 
 surface of the stream of the spirit of 
 our time. In the depths, still but cease¬ 
 less is the forward movement of our 
 knowledge of nature and of mind, and 
 with this knowledge the consciousness 
 of the sovereignty of man, that thought 
 which moves the world, the Liberty, 
 Equality, Fraternity of all. Though 
 years may pass in vain, the word of 
 scripture shall yet be fulfilled, the joy¬ 
 ful message which the electric wire sped 
 as its first greeting from free America to 
 Europe still armed to the teeth: 
 
 “Peace on Earth; Good Will to Men !” 
 
 THE 
 
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