THE WORKING CLASS 
 
 (The Proletariat) 
 
 w '-,„ 
 
 By KARL KAUTSKY 
 
 Translated from the German and Adapted to America 
 By DANIEL DE LEON 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE 
 
 NEW YORK LABOR NEWS COMPANY 
 
 2 to 6 New Reade Street 
 New York City 
 
33 
 
 -H 
 
 
 BOOKS BY KARL KAUTSKY 
 
 The 
 
 Working Class, 
 
 Five 
 
 The 
 
 Capitalist Class, 
 
 Five 
 
 The 
 
 Class Struggle, 
 
 Five 
 
 The 
 
 Socialist Republic, 
 
 Five 
 
 Cents 
 
 Cents 
 
 Cents 
 
 Cents 
 
 Copyright, 1900, by the 
 NEW YORK LABOR NEWS COMPANY 
 
26 . /v ‘ 
 
 / 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 “The Working Class” is one of the four “Kautsky pamphlets,” 
 “The Capitalist Class,” “The Class Struggle,” and “The Socialist 
 Republic” completing the series. Each of the pamphlets is virtu- 
 ally a chapter from Kautsky’s valuable work, “Das Erfurter Pro- 
 gram” (The Erfurt Program”). “Das Erfurter Program” is a 
 treatise on the platform or program adopted at Erfurt in 1891 by 
 the Socialist Party of Germany — the Social Democratic Party. It 
 takes up the various subdivisions or planks of the platform, and in 
 explaining them gives a comprehensive and systematic exposition of 
 Socialist economic and sociologic theory. 
 
 In working this exposition into English for the American public, 
 substantial alteration, not in the essence, but in the manner of pres- 
 entation, became necessary. Some chapters had to be omitted as 
 wholly inapplicable here, and the others were recast into four 
 pamphlets, each of which stands on its own feet. While they are 
 connected with each other by the subject, and, together, present a 
 fairly connected exposition of Socialism, they can be read inde- 
 pendently in any sequence and be perfectly intelligible. 
 
 A word as to terms used. In the “Communist Manifesto” Engels 
 explains the meaning of the terms “bourgeoisie” and “proletariat” 
 as follows: “By bourgeoisie is meant the class of modern capitalists, 
 owners of means of social production and employers of wage-labor. 
 By proletariat, the class of modern wage-laborers who, having no 
 means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labor- 
 power in order to live.” In Europe the word “bourgeoisie” is uni- 
 versally used to designate the class known in the United States as 
 the “capitalist class.” In Europe, also, the word “proletariat” is 
 used to designate the class known in the United States as the “work- 
 ing class.” The term working class has served so long in America to 
 designate the wage-earning class, as distinguished from the profit- 
 receiving class, that in this adaptation the term working class has 
 been used quite largely for that purpose. But it has been impossible 
 rr-jdJy to adhere to one term in every connection. Let it be observed, 
 therefore, that the terms “proletariat,” “working class,” “wage-earn- 
 ing .class,” “wage-earners,” “wage-slaves,” “workingmen,” and “work- 
 men,” are used synonomously to indicate the “class of modern wage- 
 
 *’ Y 2 1636 
 
iv 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 laborers who, having no means of production of their own, are re- 
 duced to selling their labor-power in order to live.” 
 
 For information relative to the effect on the working class of 
 the introduction of the capitalist system of production, the reader is 
 referred to Frederick Engels’ “The Condition of the Working Class 
 in England.” In this volume Engels traces with a masterly hand 
 the development of English capitalism from 1800 down to 1844. By 
 citations from factory reports, newspapers, and magazines, and 
 from his own observation, he reveals the lamentable condition of 
 the English working class, and then analyzes that condition with 
 a desire to determine the cause. The book is a mine of information 
 that should be quarried by every workingman. 
 
 For the effect on the working class of the later development of 
 the capitalist system of production, reference should be made to 
 Marx’s “Capital.” In the last three parts of this work Marx traces 
 the condition of the English working class from 1845 to 1870, and 
 uses that condition «as an exemplification of the principles advanced 
 in the first part. These two books (“The Condition of the Working 
 Class in England” and “Capital”) give a complete history of the 
 struggles of the English proletariat with the capitalist system of 
 production from its early days down to recent times. 
 
 For foot-notes throwing additional light on the text, recourse 
 has been had to “The Condition of the Working Class in England,” 
 “Woman in the Past, Present, and Future,” by August Bebel, and 
 “The Socialist Almanac,” by Lucien Sanial. The student will do well 
 to have “The Socialist Almanac” always at hand. For statistical 
 articles and facts relative to capitalism in the United States, ma- 
 chinery, woman and child labor, trusts, bankruptcy, etc., it contains 
 accurate information that can be obtained in no other book. Its his- 
 torical monographs, giving a complete history of the development of 
 Socialism in the several countries of Europe, will also be of great 
 aid to the student. 
 
 THE PUBLISHERS. 
 
REMOTE STORAOE 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 ("The Proletariat.) 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EFFECT OF MACHINERY. 
 
 In all countries in which the capitalist system of production 
 prevails, especially in such countries as the United States, where 
 capitalism has reached the point of production on a large scale, we 
 find the population divided mainly into two classes: first, the capi- 
 talists, who possess the means of production — tools, machinery, land, 
 etc. — but who take no part in production itself; and, secondly, the 
 wage-workers, the proletariat, who possess nothing but their labor- 
 power on the sale of which they live, and whose labor alone brings 
 forth the whole wealth of the land. 
 
 Capitalists need a large supply of proletarians; originally, in 
 other countries and in ages gone by, forcible methods were resorted 
 to, to furnish this requisite supply. To-day, however, in the United 
 States especially, such methods are no longer needed. The superior 
 power of capitalist production on a large scale over small produc- 
 tion is sufficient, without doing open violence to the law or to pri- 
 vate property, but, on the contrary, with the very assistance of these, 
 year in and year out to strip of all property a sufficient number of 
 small farmers and industrialists, who are then thrown upon the 
 streets, who merge with the mass of the proletariat, and who thereby 
 satisfy the ever-increasing capitalist demand for more human flesh. 
 
 CAPITALIST PRODUCTION INCREASES THE NUMBER OF THE PROLETARIAT. 
 
 That the number of the proletariat is steadily on the increase in 
 the United States is such a palpable fact that it is even no longer 
 denied by those who would make us believe that society to-day rests 
 upon the same basis that it did a hundred yars ago, and who try to 
 paint in rosy colors the picture of the small producer. Indeed, a rev- 
 olution has taken place in the make-up of society, the same as it has 
 in the system of production. The capitalist form of production has 
 overthrown all others and become the dominant one in the field of 
 industry. Similarly, wage-labor is to-day the dominant form of 
 labor. A hundred years ago the farming peasantry took the first 
 
 f lace; later, the small city industrialists; to-day it is the wage- 
 arners, or proletariat. 
 
 In all civilized countries the proletarians are to-day the largest 
 class; it is their condition and modes of thought that control those 
 
6 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 of all the other subdivisions of labor 1 . This state of things implies 
 a complete revolution in the condition and thought of the bulk of 
 the population. The conditions of the proletariat differ radically 
 from those of all other former categories of labor. The small farmer, 
 the artisan, the small producers generally, were the owners of 
 the product of their own labor by reason of their ownership of the 
 means of production; contrariwise, the product of the labor of the 
 proletarian does not belong to him, it belongs to the capitalist, to 
 the purchaser of his labor-power, to the owner of the requisite in- 
 struments of production. True enough, the proletarian is paid there- 
 for by the capitalist, but the value of his wages is far below that of 
 his product. 
 
 PROLETARIAN LABOR THE SOURCE OF CAPITALIST PROFIT. 
 
 When in industry (and let it be here said, once for all, that, at 
 the present stage of economic development, agriculture is as much 
 an industry as any other branch of production) the capitalist pur- 
 chases the only commodity which the proletarian can offer for sale, 
 to wit, his labor-power, he does so only for the purpose of utilizing 
 it in a profitable way. The more the workingman produces, the 
 larger the value of his total product. If the capitalist were to work 
 his employees only long enough to produce the worth of the wages he 
 pays them, he would clear no profits. But, however willing the capi- 
 talist is to pose as the “benefactor of suffering humanity,” his capi- 
 tal cries for “profits,” and finds in him a willing listener. The 
 longer the time is extended during which the workmen labor in the 
 service of the capitalists over and above the time needed to cover 
 their wages, the larger is the value of their product, the larger is the 
 surplus over and above the capitalist outlay in wages, and the larger 
 is the quantity of exploitation to which these workmen are sub- 
 jected. This exploitation or fleecing of labor finds a limit only in the 
 powers of endurance of the working people, and in the resistance 
 which they may be able to offer to their exploiters. 
 
 In capitalist production, the capitalist and the wage-worker are 
 
 Regarding the relative numerical strength of the classes, according to 
 the census of 1890, the following figures taken from “The Socialist Almanac” 
 
 are interesting : 
 
 Plutocratic [capitalist] Class 177,478 
 
 Middle Class 6,548,862 
 
 Professional Class 944,333 
 
 Working Class 15,064,988 
 
 It should be observed that in the above figures the persons in occupation 
 are alone included, and no account is taken of their immediate family depend- 
 ents who are not reported by the census as engaged in any pursuit — such as 
 wives at home, children at school or at home, aged parents, etc. When these 
 dependents are included the result is as follows : 
 
 Plutocratic [capitalist] Class 887,390 
 
 Middle Class -22,517,472 
 
 Professional Class 3,777,332 
 
 Working Class 34,440,046 # 
 
 For a scientific analysis of the classes in the United States, their relative 
 strength, relative quantity of wealth owned, and relative importance in 
 society, the student should refer to “The Socialist Almanac,” pages 97 to 112. 
 
EFFECT OF MACHINERY. 
 
 7 
 
 not active together as the employer and the employed were in 
 previous industrial epochs. The capitalist soon develops into, and 
 remains essentially, a merchant. His activity, in so far as he may 
 be at all active, limits itself, like that of the merchant, to the opera- 
 tions of the market. His labors consist in purchasing as cheaply 
 as possible the raw material, labor-power, and other essentials, and 
 to turn around and sell the finished products as dearly as possible. 
 Upon the field of production itself, he does nothing except to secure 
 the largest quantity of labor from the workmen for the least possible 
 amount of wages, and thereby to squeeze out of them the largest pos- 
 sible quantity of surplus values. With regard to his workmen, he is 
 not a fellow-worker, he is only a driver , an exploiter. The longer they 
 work, the better off he is; he is not tired out if the hours of labor 
 are unduly extended; he does not perish if the method of produc- 
 tion becomes a murderous one. Of all ruling classes the capitalist 
 is the most reckless of the life and safety of his operatives. Exten- 
 sion of the hours of work, abolition of holidays, introduction of 
 night labor, damp or overheated factories, filled with poisonous 
 gases, such are the “improvements which the capitalist mode of pro- 
 duction has introduced for the benefit of the working class. 
 
 HOW MACHINERY LOWERS THE CONDITION OF THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 The introduction of machinery increases still further the dan- 
 ger to life and limb for the workingman. The machine system fet- 
 ters him to a monster that moves perpetually with a gigantic power 
 and with insane speed. Only the closest, never-flagging attention 
 can protect the workingman attached to such a machine from being 
 seized and broken by it. Protective measures cost money; the 
 capitalist does not introduce them unless he is forced thereto. 
 Economy being the much vaunted virtue of the capitalist, he is con- 
 strained by it to save room and to squeeze as much machinery as 
 possible into the workshop. What cares he that the limbs of his 
 workingmen are thereby endangered? Workingmen are cheap, but 
 large airy workshops are dear. 
 
 There is still another respect in which the capitalist application 
 of machinery lowers the condition of the working class. It is this: 
 The tool of the former mechanic was cheap; it was subject to few 
 changes that would render it useless. Otherwise with the machine; 
 in the first place, it costs money, much money; in the second place, 
 if, through improvements in the system, it becomes useless, or if it 
 is not used to its full capacity, it will bring loss instead of profit to 
 the capitalist. Again, the machine is worn out not only through use, 
 but also through idleness. Furthermore, the introduction of science 
 into production, the result of which is the machine itself, causes 
 constant new discoveries and inventions to take the place of older 
 ones, and renders constantly, now this, then that sort of machine, 
 «md often whole factories at once, unable to compete with the im- 
 proved ones before they have been used up to their full extent; 
 owing to these changes, every machine is in constant danger of be- 
 ing made useless before it is used up. This is sufficient ground for 
 
8 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 the capitalist to utilize his machine as quickly as possible from the 
 moment he puts it in operation. In other words, the capitalist appli- 
 cation of the system of machinery is a particular spur that drives 
 the capitalist to extend the hours of labor as much as possible, to 
 carry on production without interruption, to introduce the system of 
 night and day shifts, and, accordingly, to rear the unwholesome sys- 
 tem of night work into a permanent system. 
 
 At the time the system of machinery began to develop, some 
 ideologists declared the Golden Age was at hand: the machine was 
 to release the workingman and render him a free man. In the 
 hands of the capitalist, however, the machine has become the most 
 powerful lever towards making heavier the load of labor borne by 
 the proletariat, and to aggravate his servitude into an unbearable 
 condition. 
 
 But it is not only with regard to the hours of work that the con- 
 dition of the wage-worker has suffered with the introduction of ma- 
 chinery. It has suffered also with regard to his wages. The proletarian, 
 the workman of to-day, does not eat at the table of the capitalist; 
 he does not live in the same house. However wretched his home 
 may be; however miserable his food, nay, even though he may 
 famish, the wellbeing of the capitalist is not disturbed by the sick- 
 ening sight. The words Wages and Starvation used to be opposites; 
 the free workingman could formerly starve only when he had no 
 work; whoever worked earned Wages, he had enough to eat, Star- 
 vation was not his lot. The unenviable distinction was reserved for 
 the capitalist system of production to reconcile these two opposites 
 — Wages and Starvation — and to raise Starvation-Wages into a 
 permanent institution, into a prop of the present social system . 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 WAGES. 
 
 Wages can never rise so high as to make it impossible for the 
 capitalist to carry on his business and live; under such circum- 
 stances it would be more profitable for the capitalist to give up his 
 business. Consequently, the wages of the workingman can never rise 
 high enough to equal the value of his product. They must always be 
 below that, so as to leave a surplus; it is only the prospect of a 
 
 Machinery itself is of course a part of the surplus value created by the 
 workers and appropriated by the capitalists. How large a portion of this 
 surplus value is embodied in that mighty weapon it were at least interesting 
 to know. According to figures taken from the last census the total money 
 value of the machinery, tools, and implements used in manufacturing and 
 mechanical industries was $1,584,000,000, or about 24 per cent, of the total 
 capital employed in those industries. On the other hand, the net profits of 
 manufacturing capitalists, all legitimate reductions having been made for 
 taxes, repairs, etc., amounted to about $1,930,000,000. Therefore the manih 
 facturing and mechanical workers produced in one year over and above the}' 
 own sustenance a net value, factory price , exceeding by three hundred an^ 
 forty-six million dollars the whole cost of the machinery by means of which 
 they were exploited and through which they and their posterity will keep 
 enslaved until Capitalism is abolished. — Socialist Almanac, p. 183, 
 
WAGES. 
 
 9 
 
 surplus that moves the capitalist to purchase labor-power. It is, 
 therefore, evident that in the capitalist social system the wages of 
 the workmen can never rise high enough to put an end to the ex- 
 ploitation of labor. 
 
 SIZE OF THE SURPLUS APPROPRIATED BY THE CAPITALIST CLASS. 
 
 This surplus, which the capitalist class appropriates, is larger 
 than is usually imagined . 1 It covers, not only the “profits” of the 
 manufacturer, but many other items that are usually credited to the 
 costs of production and exchange. It covers, for instance, rent, in- 
 terest on loans, salaries, merchant’s profits, taxes, etc. All these 
 have to be covered with the surplus, or the excess of the value of the 
 product over the wages of the workingman. It is evident that this 
 surplus must be a considerable one if a concern is to “pay;” the 
 exploitation of the workingman must be great, even where the 
 wages are high. It is clear that the wages of the workingman can- 
 not rise high enough to be even approximately equal to the value of 
 his product. The capitalist wages system means, under all circum- 
 stances, the thorough exploitation of the working class. It is im- 
 possible to abolish this exploitation without abolishing the system 
 itself . 2 
 
 INFLUENCES THAT TEND TO RAISE AND LOWER WAGES. 
 
 But wages rarely reach the highest point which they might, 
 even under these circumstances; more often they are found to oe 
 nearer to the lowest possible point. This point is reached when the 
 
 1 In each of the three census years here considered [1870, 1880. and 1890] 
 the Plutocratic [capitalist] Class, including all its family dependents — men, 
 women, and children — constituted an insignificant fraction of the total popu- 
 lation. Whether such a fraction be a little less or a little more than one 
 per cent, is of course immaterial. * * Of its stupendous growth in 
 
 wealth there can, of course, be no question. With the exception of a compara- 
 tively few shares and bonds held by people of middle and professional classes, 
 it owns the railroads, telegraphs, shipping, banks, mines, and all the great in- 
 dustries which are generally conducted by corporations ; it owns all the ware- 
 houses and the vast stocks of merchandise stored therein, waiting for the hand 
 to mouth demands of the retail trade ; all the most valuable business real 
 estate in cities, besides palatial residences, immense tracts of land held on 
 speculation and farms cultivated by tenants ; also art treasures, sumptuous 
 furniture, costly apparel, etc. Lastly, it is the chief creditor of municipalities 
 and States anu of many private persons — farmers, traders, real estate owners, 
 etc. — belonging to the middle class. — Socialist Almanac, p. 101. 
 
 2 It therefore appears from the foregoing table : 
 
 That in 1890 the Plutocratic [capitalist] Class, representing less than 
 1 % per cent, of the population, held more than 64 per cent, (and with its 
 allies, the foreign investors, about 67% per cent.) of the total wealth 
 produced by American labor. 
 
 That the Middle Class represented 37% per cent, of the total population 
 and 24% per cent, of the total wealth. 
 
 That the Professional Class, representing 6 per cent, of the population, 
 had a little less than 4 per cent, of the total wealth. 
 
 That the Working Class, representing 55 per cent, of the population, 
 had a little more than 4 per cent, of the total wealth. — Socialist Almanac, 
 %>■ H3. 
 
 I It is further pointed out in the “Almanac” that this 4 per cent, of 
 wealth held by the working class consists chiefly of wealth in the “perishable 
 form of tools, instruments, household goods, and wearing apparel, having a 
 use value, but no exchange value.” 
 
10 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 wages do not even supply the workingman with his barest necessi- 
 ties; when the workingman not only starves but starves rapidly, all 
 work is at an end. 
 
 The wages swing between tnese two extremes; they are found to 
 be lower, the lower the necessities of the workingman, the larger the 
 supply of labor in the labor market, and the slighter the capacity of 
 the workingman for resistance. 
 
 In general, wages must be high enough to keep the workingman 
 in a condition to work, or, to speak more accurately, they must be 
 high enough to secure to the capitalist the measure of labor-power 
 which he needs. In other words, wages must be high enough, not 
 only to keep the workingman in a condition to work, but also in 
 a condition to produce children, who may be able to replace him. 
 It follows that the industrial development has a tendency that is 
 most pleasing to the capitalist, to wit, to lower the necessities of the 
 workingman in order that his wages may be lower in proportion. 
 
 MACHINERY ENABLES CAPITALIST CLASS TO EXPLOIT WOMEN AND 
 
 CHILDREN. 
 
 There was a time when skill and strength were requisites for a 
 workingman. The period of apprenticeship was then long, the cost 
 of his training considerable. Now, however, the progress made 
 in the division of labor and the system of machinery render skill 
 and strength in production more and more superfluous; they make 
 it possible to substitute unskilled and cheap workmen for skilled 
 ones; and, consequently, to substitute weak women and even chil- 
 dren in the place of men. In the early stages of manufac- 
 ture this tendency is perceptible; but not until machinery is intro- 
 duced into production does the wholesale exploitation commence of 
 women and children of tender age — an exploitation of the most help- 
 less among the helpless — who are made a prey of shocking maltreat- 
 ment and abuse. Thus machinery develops a new and wonderful 
 quality in the hands of the capitalist. 
 
 Originally, the wage-worker had to earn wages high enough to 
 defray not only his own expenses, but those of his family, in order 
 to enable him to propagate himself and to bequeath his labor-power 
 to others. Without this process on his part, the heirs of the capital- 
 ists would find no proletarians ready made for exploitation. 
 
 When, however, the wife, and, from early infancy, the children 
 of the workingmen are able to take care of themselves, then the 
 wages of the workingman can be safely reduced to the level of his 
 own personal needs without the risk of stopping the supply of fresh 
 labor-power. 
 
 Over and above this, the labor of women and children affords 
 the additional advantage that they offer less resistance than men; 
 and their introduction into the ranks of the workers increases won- 
 derfully the quantity of labor that is offered for sale in the market. 1 ^ 
 
 x The grand total of women in occupations in 1870 was 1,645,188. In 
 1890 the number had risen to 3,712,144 — an increase in twenty years of 
 2,066,956. — Socialist Almanac, p. 141. 
 
DISSOLUTION OF THE PROLETARIAN FAMILY. 11 
 
 Accordingly, the labor of women and children does not only 
 lower the necessities of the workingman, but it also diminishes his 
 capacity for resistance in that it overstocks the labor market; owing 
 to both these circumstances, it lowers the wages of the workingman . 1 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 DISSOLUTION OF THE PROLETARIAN FAMILY. 
 
 WOMAN-LABOR IN INDUSTRY DESTROYS FAMILY LIFE OF THE WORKINGMAN. 
 
 The labor of woman in productive pursuits betokens the total 
 destruction or the family life of the workingman, without substitut- 
 ing for it a higher form of family relationship. The capitalist system 
 of production does not yet generally destroy the single household of 
 the workingman, but robs it of all its bright sides, and leaves only 
 its dark ones. The activity of woman to-day in industrial pursuits 
 does not mean to her freedom from household duties; it means to 
 her an increase of her former burdens by a new one. tut we can- 
 not serve two masters. The household of the workingman suffers 
 whenever his wife must help to earn the daily bread. What present 
 society puts in the place of the individual household and family, 
 which it destroys, are miserable substitutes: souphouses and day- 
 nurseries , , where the offals of the physical and mental sustenance of 
 the rich are cast to the lower classes. 
 
 CAPITALIST CLASS ENDEAVORING TO ABOLISH THE FAMILY. 
 
 Socialists are charged with an intent to abolish the family. 
 We do know that every system of production has had a special form 
 of household, to which corresponds a special system of family rela- 
 tionship. We do not consider the existing form of the family the 
 highest possible nor the last utterance upon the subject; and we do 
 expect that a new and improved social system may yet develop a 
 new and higher form of family relationship. But to hold this view 
 is a very different thing from striving to dissolve all family bonds. 
 They who do destroy the family bonds — who not only mean to but 
 who in fact do destroy them right under our own eyes — they are, not 
 the Socialists, but the capitalists themselves. Many a slave-holder 
 has before this torn husband from wife, and parents from grown-up 
 children; but the capitalists have improved upon the abominations 
 of slavery: they tear the suckling from the breast of its mother, 
 
 1 In the article in “The Socialist Almanac” on “Child Labor,” the author 
 shows that the figures of the census department relative to employment of 
 children in industry are “grossly inaccurate,” and then adds : 
 
 “But there stands glaring above all this statistical darkness the por- 
 tentous and undeniable fact that, with a total school population between 5 
 and 18 years numbering 20,865,000 in 1896, the average school attendance 
 was only 9,747,000, or 46.7 per cent., and that the average school term for 
 the whole country was only 140 days. From which it may be safely asserted 
 that ignorance is growing apace throughout the United States and that the 
 number of children and yourhs between the said ages actually employed for a 
 more or less extended portion of the year in mean, hard, and brain-stunting 
 labor cannot be less and is probably more than 5,000,000.” 
 
12 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 and compel her to intrust it to strangers’ hands. And yet a society 
 in which hundreds of thousands of such instances are of daily 
 occurrence, a society whose luminaries promote “benevolent” insti- 
 tutions for the purpose of making easy the separation of the 
 mothers from their babes, such a society has the effrontery to accuse 
 the Socialists of contemplating the abolition of the family simply 
 because they, basing their opinion upon the fact that the “family” 
 has ever been one of the reflexes of the system of production, foresee 
 that further changes in that system must also result in a more per- 
 fect system of family relationship. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PROSTITUTION. 
 
 CAPITALIST SYSTEM OF PRODUCTION PROMOTES PROSTITUTION. 
 
 Hand in hand with the accusation on the subject of the family 
 bonds goes the accusation that Socialists aim at a community of 
 wives. This charge is as false as the otner. Socialists, on the con- 
 trary, maintain that just the reverse of a community in wives, and 
 of all sexual oppression and license, to wit, ideal love, will be the 
 foundation of matrimonial connections in a Socialist Common- 
 wealth, and that pure love can only prevail in such a social system. 
 What, on the other hand, do we see to-day? 
 
 The irrational system of modern production tears the sexes 
 apart. It builds up sTie-towns in New England and Tic-towns in the 
 mining districts of Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, and the farther 
 West, thereby directly promoting and inciting prostitution as a 
 natural and inevitable result. Furthermore, helpless women, forced 
 to earn their living in the factories, shops, and mines, fall a prey to 
 capitalist cupidity; the capitalist takes advantage of their inexperi- 
 ence, offers them wages too slight for their support, and hints at, or 
 even brazenly refers them to, prostitution as a means of supplement- 
 ing their income . 1 Everywhere the increase of female labor in in- 
 dustry is accompanied by an increase of prostitution. In the mod- 
 ern State, where Christianity is preached and piousness is at a 
 premium, many a “thriving” branch of industry is found whose 
 working women are paid so poorly that they would be compelled to 
 starve unless they prostituted themselves; and, wonderful to say, 
 in such instances the capitalist will ever be heard to protest that 
 these small wages are indispensable to enable him to compete suc- 
 
 x We only need to J consider the miserable wages earned by the greater 
 number of workwomen, wages upon which it is impossible to exist, and 
 which the recipients are forced to eke out by prostitution, to understand 
 why things are as they are. Some employers ere infamous enough to excus* 
 the lowness of the salary by pointing to this means of indemnification. Suclf i 
 Is the position of hundreds of thousands of seamstresses, dressmakers, milli- 
 ners, and workwomen in all kinds of factories. — “Woman in the Past, Present, 
 and Future,” by August Bebel. 
 
EARLY DAYS OF THE WORKING PROLETARIAT. 13 
 
 cessfully in the market, and to maintain his establishment in a 
 ‘'thriving” condition . 1 
 
 UNDER CAPITALISM PROSTITUTION BECOMES A PILLAR OF SOCIETY. 
 
 Prostitution is as old as the contrast between rich and poor. 
 At one time, however, prostitutes constituted a middle class between 
 beggars and thieves; they were then an article of luxury which 
 society indulged in, but the loss of which would in no way have 
 endangered its existence. To-day, however, it is no longer the 
 females of the slums alone, but working women who are compelled 
 to sell their bodies for money. This latter sale is no longer simply 
 a matter of luxury, it has become one of the foundations upon which 
 production is carried on. Under the capitalist system of production, 
 prostitution becomes a pillar of society. What the defenders of this 
 social system falsely charge Socialists with, is the very thing they 
 are guilty of themselves: Community of wives is a feature of capi- 
 talism. Indeed such deep roots has this system of community of 
 wives cast in modern society that its representatives agree in declar- 
 ing prostitution to be a necessary thing. They cannot understand 
 that the abolition of the proletariat implies the abolition of prosti- 
 tution. So deep are they sunk in intellectual stagnation that they 
 cannot conceive a social system without community of wives. 
 
 But be it noted, community of wives has ever been an invention 
 of the upper layers of society, never of the proletariat. The com- 
 munity of wives is one of the modes of exploiting the proletariat; 
 it is not Socialism; it is the exact opposite of Socialism. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 EARLY DAYS OF THE WAGE-WORKING PROLETARIAT. 
 
 CONDITION OF THE WORKING CLASS DURING EARLY DAYS OF CAPITALISM. 
 
 The capitalist system of production at first drew its wage-work- 
 ers from the servant class, the menials, and the slums. It needed 
 not so much able as patient, resistless workers, disposed to submit 
 meekly to the requirements of a large mill or mine, which could run 
 smoothly only in case eacn of its innumerable wheels, whether ani- 
 mate or inanimate, fulfilled punctually and well the movements to 
 which it was assigned. Such being the character of the bulk of the 
 labor upon which the large capitalists drew originally, it followed 
 that the treatment to which these submitted established also the 
 standard for the treatment which the capitalists meant to bestow 
 upon their workmen in general. Labor, whose ennobling influence 
 
 x The struggle for existence, which is becoming fiercer year by year, not 
 infrequently compels men and women to commit actions and suffer indignities 
 that would otherwise fill them with disgust. For Instance, it was ascertained 
 in Munich. Germany, in 1877, that among the registered prostitutes under 
 % the surveillance of the police no fewer than 203 were wives of day-laborers 
 't and artisans. And how many married women are driven by hunger to carry 
 on this disgraceful trade, without subjecting themselves to police .control 
 which so shamefully violates every feeling of decency and of personal dig- 
 nity? — “Woman in the Past, Present, and Future.” 
 
14 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 capitalist moralists and economists love to descant upon, became for 
 the whole proletariat a source not of dignity, but of further degra- 
 dation. The resistlessness of the working people made it possible 
 for the capitalists to extend the hours of work indefinitely. Unless 
 forced to it, capital will allow to the proletariat leisure neither for 
 rest nor for culture. Where it is not checked, it will drive the 
 worker to death. If between the hours of sleep and work there be a 
 short respite, it is just long enough to satisfy the most transient 
 pleasures, to dull the sense of misery in the fumes of alcohol or in 
 the indulgences of sexual intercourse. The working in common 
 of men and women, adults and children, which, if carried on by 
 happy, free, and conscientious beings, can be a source of the highest 
 intellectual enjoyment and moral elevation for all concerned, became 
 in the mines and mills of capital a fresh stimulant to the demoraliz- 
 ing and enervating influences which spread like pest among the 
 proletariat. 
 
 THE WORKING PROLETARIAT ORIGINALLY IS MERGED WITH THE SLUMS. 
 
 To this circumstance is to be ascribed the fact that in the early 
 days of large capitalist production the working proletariat was hardly 
 to be distinguished from the slums. How low the former had 
 sunk in crime, drunkenness, vulgarity, and filth — both physical and 
 moral — appears graphically from the strong, yet not overdrawn, pic- 
 ture presented by Frederick Engels in his classic work, “The Condi- 
 tion of the Working Class in England” during the first decades of 
 this century . 1 In the United States the working proletariat was 
 saved the bitterness of this experience to the extent that it was 
 forced upon its European brothers. Owing to the conditions of the 
 country, owing to the absence in any large numbers of the slow ac- 
 cretions of generations of exploited classes previous to the time 
 when capitalist large production began to unfold its wings among 
 us, the proportion of the slums to the number of working proleta- 
 rians was not here, as in Europe, large enough to degrade the latter 
 quite to the level of the former. Nevertheless, the working proleta- 
 
 x The streets are often so narrow that a person ran step from the window 
 of one house into that of its opposite neighbor, while the houses are piled so 
 high, story upon story, that the light can scarcely penetrate into the court or 
 alley that lies between. In this part of the city there are neither sewers nor 
 other drains, nor even privies belonging to the houses. In consequence, all 
 refuse, garbage, and excrements of at least 50.000 persons are thrown into 
 the gutters every night, so that, in spite of all street sweeping, a mass of 
 dried filth and foul vapors are created, which not only offend the sight and 
 smell, but endanger the health of all the inhabitants in the highest degree. 
 ♦ * * * The houses of the poor are generally filthy, and are 
 
 evidently never cleansed. They consist in most cases of a single room which, 
 while subject to the worst ventilation, is yet usually kept cold by the broken 
 and badly-fitting windows, and is sometimes damp, and partly below ground 
 level, always badly furnished and thoroughly uncomfortable, a straw-hey 
 often serving the whole family for a bed. upon which men and women. youif t 
 and old, sleep in revolting conditions. Water can only be had from the publrl 
 pumps, and the difficulty of obtaining it naturally fosters all possible filth. — 
 From the chapter on “The Great Towns” in Engels’ “Condition of the Work- 
 ing Class in England.” 
 
UPLIFTING OF THE PROLETARIAT. 
 
 15 
 
 riat, clad with the dignity of its class, is even here a historic figure 
 of a comparatively recent date, 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE UPLIFTING OF THE WORKING PROLETARIAT. 
 
 The word “proletariat” conveyed at one time in the history of 
 capitalist production the idea of extreme degradation. Even to-day 
 there are people who entertain this notion, and among them not a 
 few who claim to be abreast of the times. This, however, arises 
 from a woeful confusion of thought. However numerous the ex- 
 ternal marks may have been which, at one time, the working prole- 
 tariat had in common with the slums, even then the two were sepa- 
 rated by a deep chasm. 
 
 The slums have continued to be essentially the same, in what- 
 ever historic epoch and under whatever system they may have made 
 their appearance. The slums of New York, Chicago, San Francisco, 
 or any other large modern center of population, are hard to dis- 
 tinguish from those of ancient Rome. On the other hand, the mod- 
 ern working proletariat is a peculiar phenomenon, never before no- 
 ticed in the history of mankind. 
 
 CONTRASTS BETWEEN THE SLUMS AND THE WORKING PROLETARIAT. 
 
 Between the slums and the working proletariat of capitalist pro- 
 duction there is above all the immense and fundamental difference 
 that the former always were and still continue to be parasites, 
 whereas the latter is one of the principal roots of modern society — 
 a root that develops, not only into leading importance, but into the 
 only one from which society draws its strength and support. The 
 working proletariat is a propertiless, but not an almstaking, element, 
 feo far from its being supported by society, it supports society with 
 its labor. True enough, during the early days of the capitalist sys- 
 tem, the working proletariat looked upon itself as a pauper class, 
 and upon the capitalist who exploited it as a benefactor, as the pro- 
 vider of work, and, consequently, as the bread-giver. Of course, this 
 patriarchal relation is highly pleasing to the capitalists; they still 
 demand from their workingmen for the wages paid to them, not 
 only the labor contracted for, but also humilty and gratitude. 
 
 But the capitalist system can nowhere proceed very far without 
 the patriarchal conditions that exist at its inception going wholly by 
 the board. However enslaved and ignorant the workingmen may at 
 any time be, they realize, sooner or later, that they are the bread- 
 givers of the capitalists, and not vice versa. While they remain 
 poor, or even become poorer, the capitalist becomes ever richer. And 
 when they demand more bread from the capitalist, from this would-be 
 patriarch, he gives them a stone. 
 
 r The working proletarians differ from the slums and from the 
 servant and menial classes in that they do not live upon the ex- 
 ploitation carried on by the exploiters; and they differ from the 
 
16 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 workers under former systems of production in that they do not 
 live and labor together with tneir exploiters, and that all the per- 
 sonal bonds and relations that existed between these have wholly 
 disappeared between the modern employer and employee. They live 
 in miserable tenements or rickety frame houses that are a libel 
 upon the word “home,” while they rear palaces for the exploiter; 
 they famish while they spread for him a luxurious feast; they go 
 unclad, while they prepare for him costly raiment; they toil and 
 moil till they drop with exhaustion to furnish him and his the 
 means whereby to kill time. 
 
 WHY THE WORKING CLASS HATES AND DESPISES THE RICH. 
 
 The contrast between these two elements is a very different one 
 from that between the rich and the poor man of precapitalist days; 
 and very different also between the capitalist and the “small man” 
 of to-day. The latter envies the rich man, whom he looks up to with 
 admiration, who is the example he wouid imitate, the ideal he holds 
 up to himself; he wishes to be in that capitalist’s place, and become 
 an exploiter like him; he never for a moment thinks of abolishing 
 the system of exploitation. The working proletariat, on the con- 
 trary, does not envy the modern rich man; it does not wish itseif 
 in his place; it hates and despises him; it hates him as the ex- 
 ploiter; it despises him as a drone. At first, the working proleta- 
 rian hates only those capitalists with whom he is brought into direct 
 contact, but soon he realizes the fact that all of them stand in the 
 same posture towards him, and his hatred, which originally was per- 
 sonal, develops into a conscious hostility towards the whole capital- 
 ist class. 
 
 CLASS HATRED NOT THE RESULT OF SOCIALIST PROPAGANDA. 
 
 This hostility towards exploitation itself is one of the first dis- 
 tinguishing marks of the working proletariat. This class hatred is 
 by no means a result* of socialist propaganda; it was noticeable long 
 before the influence of Socialism began to make itself felt among 
 the working classes. Among the workers under former social sys- 
 tems, such a well developed class hatred as exists to-day was impos- 
 sible; the intimate personal relations that existed between them and 
 their “masters” excluded all thought of such class antipathies; hos- 
 tilities might and did often break out between the master and his 
 underlings personally, but these could never be carried beyond a 
 certain point without forthwith stopping production itself; and, 
 as a result, whatever lengths they went to, reconciliation always fol- 
 lowed. Under the capitalist system, however, the workers may en- 
 tertain the most bitter enmity against their employers without pro- 
 duction being thereby interfered with, and even without the em- 
 ployer being at all aware of it. 
 
 This class hatred expresses itself at first only timidly and iif* 
 isolated instances. If it takes some time for the working proletariat 
 to realize that magnanimity is the last thing that moves the em- 
 
UPLIFTING OF THE PROLETARIAT. 17 
 
 ployer to furnish it work, it takes still longer for it to gather courage 
 to enter into an open conflict with the “boss .” 1 
 
 The slums are cowardly and humble; they feel themselves 
 superfluous and know that they lack all material standing. Sim- 
 ilarly are the early characteristics of the working proletariat. It 
 resented the ill-treatment to which it was subjected, but protested 
 only silently; clenched its fist in its pockets; and as a result of this, 
 its indignation was wont to vent itself — as it unfortunately still 
 does, here and there, among the least informed — in deeds of thought- 
 less passion or secret crime. 
 
 The sense of conscious strength and the spirit of resistance 
 develop themselves among the working proletariat only after it has 
 awakened to the understanding of the community of interests that 
 binds its members, and of the solidarity of its ranks. With the 
 quickening of the feeling of solidarity begins the moral new birth of 
 the working proletariat, and its uplifting from the swamp in which 
 it, together with the slums, originally is immersed . 2 
 
 CAPITALIST CLASS UNCONSCIOUSLY TRAINS THE WORKING CLASS IN THE 
 METHODS REQUIRED FOR THE OVERTHROW OF CAPITALISM. 
 
 The conditions themselves under which labor is performed in 
 the capitalist system point out to the proletariat the necessity of 
 firmly holding together, of moving in a body, and of subordinating 
 the individual to the whole. While, in the classic days of handicraft, 
 each individual produced a whole article himself, capitalist industry 
 is based upon co-operative labor. Here the individual worker can 
 do nothing without his fellow-worker. If they start to work united 
 and planfully, the capacity of each is doubled and trebled. Thus 
 their labor itself brings home to them the power of union, and 
 develops among them the sense of voluntary and gladsome discipline 
 — both of which are the conditions precedent for socialist produc- 
 tion, and are likewise the conditions precedent for the successful 
 struggle of the proletariat against the system of exploitation that 
 prevails under capitalist production. And thus it happens that 
 
 1 In the patriarchal relation that hypocritically concealed the slavery of 
 the worker, the latter must have remained an intellectual zero, totally igno- 
 rant of his own interest, a mere private individual. Only when estranged 
 from his employer, when convinced that the sole bond between employer and 
 employee is the bond of pecuniary profit, when the sentimental bond between 
 them, which stood not the slightest test, had wholly fallen away, then only 
 did the worker begin to recognize his own interests and develop independ- 
 ently ; then only did he cease to be the slave of the bourgeoisie in his 
 thoughts, feelings, and the expression of his will. And to this end manu- 
 facture on a grand scale and in great cities has most largely contributed. — 
 “Condition of the Working Class in England,” p. 123. 
 
 2 If the centralization of population stimulates and develops the property- 
 holding class, it forces the development of the workers yet more rapidly. 
 ..The workers begin to feel as a class, as a whole ; they begin to perceive that, 
 y hough feeble as individuals, they form a power united : their separation 
 Trom the bourgeoisie, the development of views peculiar to the workers and 
 corresponding to their position in life, is fostered, the consciousness of oppres- 
 sion awakens, and the workers attain social and political importance. — “Con- 
 dition of ^he Working Class in England,” p. 122. 
 
18 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 capitalism itself trains the proletarians in the methods requisite 
 for its own overthrow, and educates them in the system of labor that 
 will be required of them in socialist society. 
 
 More powerfully, perhaps, than co-operation in labor does the 
 equality in the present conditions of work tend to awaken among 
 the proletarians the sense of solidarity among themselves. In a 
 modern well-developed mill there is as good as no distinction of 
 rank, no hierarchy, among the workers. The higher posts are, as 
 a rule, inacessible to the proletarians; at all events, they are so few 
 that they do not affect the masses. Slight is the number of those 
 who can be corrupted by these favorite posts. For the large ma- 
 jority the conditions of labor are identical; to the individual all 
 possibility is shut off of lifting Irriself up alone; he can better his 
 condition only if the condition of all his fellow-toilers is bettered. 
 The capitalist realizes this fact and its effects upon his men, and in 
 not a few cases he tries to counteract both by the introduction of 
 artificial distinctions in his mills, to the end of throwing the apple 
 of discord among the workers; but such is the leveling influence 
 and power of modern large production that all such schemes are un- 
 able to undermine permanently the sense of solidarity which it 
 evokes in the ranks of the working proletariat. The longer the 
 capitalist system of production lasts, all the more powerfully does 
 the solidarity of the proletariat manifest itself, all the stronger does 
 it cast its roots, and all the more prominently does it stand out 
 as one of the distinguishing characteristics of the working pro- 
 letariat. 
 
 Among the slums, among the menials, there can be no thought 
 of solidarity. It was among the journeymen under the old feudal 
 and guild systems that the solidarity of the exploited class against 
 the exploiters first cropped up; but the solidarity of the modern 
 working proletariat has taken long strides beyond that of the ex- 
 ploited class under the previous system of production. Neither 
 limited itself to the confines of one and the same industry; the 
 same as the modern working proletariat, so did its prototype of the 
 guild days arrive slowly at the perception of the fact that the 
 worker knocks himself everywhere against the identical adversary, 
 and has everywhere the same interests. The journeyman’s old 
 established national organizations were necessarily limited, 
 as the State or nation was then still a very imperfect conception. 
 The modern working proletariat is not organized nationally only, it 
 has widened its basis; despite all wars and hostilities between one 
 nation and another, it has organized itself internationally; the 
 the working proletariat of all countries are united. 
 
 CONTRASTS IN THE SOLIDARITY OF THE WORKERS UNDER FEUDALISM AND 
 UNDER CAPITALISM. 
 
 Already in the days of the journeymen mechanics the begin- 
 nings may be found of international organizations. The exploited 
 classes of those days showed they were able to rise above national^ 
 barriers; but there was one barrier above which they could not lift 
 themselves — that of their own trade. The hatmaker, for instance. 
 
UPLIFTING OF THE PROLETARIAT. 19 
 
 of one country felt one with those of others, but the shoemakers, 
 tailors, and other workers of his own country remained strangers 
 to him. At that time the various trades were separated by 3harp 
 lines; the applicant for admission to any of them was held to a long 
 apprenticeship before he became a journeyman, and he remained 
 loyal to his trade for life. The power and prosperity of his trade 
 were his own; although, in a certain sense, the journeyman’s inter- 
 ests were opposed to those of his guild master, yet were they op- 
 posed to those of both master and journeyman of all other trades. 
 The spectacle was frequent during the most flourishing period of the 
 guilds that the journeymen of the various trades were involved in 
 fierce strifes with one another. 
 
 The capitalist system of production, on the contrary, throws 
 the various trades together and mixes them up inextricably. In a 
 capitalist establishment, people of different trades are seen generally 
 working together, and jointly operating towards a common end. 
 Furthermore, the capitalist system has the tendency to wipe out 
 the very idea of a trade in production; the machine shortens the 
 time of apprenticeship, that formerly extended over years, down 
 to weeks and days; it makes it possible for the several workmen to 
 pass from one occupation to another without great difficulty, and it 
 often even compels them to the change by frequently rendering them 
 superfluous in their former lines, throwing them out of work, and 
 compelling them to look for another job. The freedom in the choice 
 of a pursuit which the Philistines fear to lose in socialist society, is 
 a thing that has lost all meaning to the working class under the 
 present system. 
 
 UNDER CAPITALISM ALL SECTIONS OF THE WORKING CLASS ARE WELDED 
 
 TOGETHER. 
 
 Under such circumstances, it has become an easy matter for 
 the workingman to lift himself above the barriers before which the 
 journeyman of old halted. The sense of solidarity among the mod- 
 ern working proletariat is, accordingly, not only international, It 
 now extends over the whole working class. 
 
 Already in the Middle Ages there was a variety of forms of 
 wage labor; neither are the conflicts between wage-workers and 
 their exploiters something new; but it was not until the rule of the 
 capitalist system came into force that the spectacle was presented 
 of the rise of an embattled class of wage-workers, conscious of the 
 oneness of their interests, and ever more ready to subordinate to 
 the interests of their class, as a whole, not only their personal, but 
 also their local and, in so far as these still continue to exist, their 
 separate trade interests. It is only in our own century that the 
 struggles of the wage-workers, the working proletariat, against ex- 
 ploitation assume the character of a class struggle. It is onlv by 
 virtue thereof that these struggles are enabled to aim at a higher 
 ^goal than that of simply removing this or that objectionable feature 
 of the existing system, and that the Labor Movement has become a 
 revolutionary movement. 
 
 Under these conditions, the horizon of the working class broad- 
 
20 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 ens steadily. This holds good, in the first place, with regard to the 
 working proletariat employed in large production; but the same as 
 the industrial form of capital becomes more and more the standard 
 for all capital, and even for all economic undertakings within the 
 reach of capitalist nations, so likewise do the thoughts and senti- 
 ments of that portion of the proletariat that is engaged in large 
 production strike the keynote for the thoughts and sentiments of 
 the whole wage-working class. The consciousness of the unity of the 
 interests of all takes possession of one set of workers after another, 
 just as fast as the all-pervading influence of large production forces 
 itself into the various classes of industries. 
 
 Next follow the workers engaged in non-productive occupations 
 — in trade, communication and transportation, etc. Lastly, the agri- 
 cultural wage proletariat will finally be drawn in by the recognition 
 of the oneness of its interests with those of all other wage-work- 
 ers, a recognition that is being hastened by the introduction of capi- 
 talist methods into the old and until now, to a great extent, patri- 
 archally conducted system of agriculture, and, consequently, by the 
 inevitable transformation of the farm-hands into out-and-out wage- 
 working proletarians, wholly disconnected by any personal bonds 
 from the family of the employer. Progress in this direction from 
 this source is already perceptible. 
 
 Thus, by degrees, all the sections of the working class are being 
 welded into one, animated by the spirit of the proletariat employed 
 in large production, and which is steadily on the increase. Steadily 
 the whole mass is being leavened by the spirit of comradeship, of 
 discipline, and of hostility to the capitalist class that is peculiar to 
 the workers in large production; and above all, hand in hand with 
 this progress, the unquenchable thirst for knowledge, which is one 
 of the leading features of the progressive proletarians, permeates all 
 the ranks of t*^ir class. 
 
 Thus, by degrees, there rises out of the despised, maltreated, 
 degraded proletariat a historic power before which the powers that 
 be have begun to tremble. Thus a new class is in the process of 
 formation that brings with it a new code of morals and new phil- 
 osophy; a class that grows daily in numbers, in compactness, in 
 consciousness of its mission, in intelligence, and into an economic 
 necessity. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 COUNTER TENDENCIES THAT UPLIFT AND ABASE THE 
 PROLETARIAT. 
 
 The uplifting of the proletariat from its degradation is an in- 
 evitable and natural process; but the process is neither a peaceful 
 nor a uniform one. The tendencies of the capitalist system of pro- 
 duction are to debase the working population. The moral new birth 
 of the proletariat is possible only by antagonizing these tendenciv 
 and their promoters, the capitalists; and this can be done only by 
 imparting sufficient strength to the counter tendencies that are born 
 
COUNTER TENDENCIES. 21 
 
 of the new conditions in the camp of the proletariat itself, the con- 
 ditions under which the working class toils and lives. The debasing 
 tendencies of the capitalist system are, however, very different at 
 different periods, in different localities, and in different industries: 
 they depend upon the condition of the market, upon the degree of 
 competition among the several establishments, upon the grade 
 reached in the development of machinery in the respective branches 
 of industry, upon the extent and measure of the clearness with 
 which the capitalists understand their class interests, etc. 1 Likewise 
 do the counter tendencies that develop in the several layers of the 
 proletariat depend upon manifold circumstances: they depend, in 
 turn, upon the customs and wants of the population from whose 
 ranks the class of the proletariat has been recruited; upon the de- 
 gree of skill or strength required in the respective industries; upon 
 the extent to which woman and child labor prevails; upon the size 
 of the industrial reserve army, which is very different in several in 
 dustries; upon the clearness with which the working people perceive 
 their class interests; and, lastly, upon the nature of the work, 
 whether it isolates or brings the workers together. 
 
 Bach of these several sets of circumstances in the several in- 
 dustries and subdivisions of the proletariat vary not only greatly, 
 but they are subject to constant changes owing to the uninterrupted 
 course of the technical and economic revolution in production 
 Every day capital subjects some new section of the country and 
 some new branch of industry to its process of exploitation and re- 
 duces the respective population to the level of the proletarians: 
 every day new branches of industry spring into life, and existing 
 ones are revolutionized. The spectacle presented at the inception of 
 the capitalist system of production is seen to-day. Even now, new 
 layers of the population are thrown into the class of the working 
 proletariat, others sink below into the slums, and others again rise 
 above the lowest grades; among the working proletarians them- 
 selves there is a constant flux and reflux noticeable; some portions 
 are seen to rise, others to decline, according as the uplifting or the 
 depressing tendencies may temporarily have the upper hand. 
 
 Competition is the completest expression of the battle of all against all 
 which rules modern civil society. This battle, a battle for life, for existence, 
 for everything, in case of need a battle of life and death, is fought not 
 between the different classes of society only, but also between the individual 
 members of these classes. Each is in the way of the other, and each seeks 
 to crowd out all who are in his way, and to put himself in their place. The 
 workers are in constant competition among themselves, as the members of the 
 bourgeoisie among themselves. The power-loom weaver is in competition with 
 the hand-loom weaver, the unemployed or ill-paid hand-loom weaver with 
 him who has work or is better paid, each trying to supplant the other. Rut 
 this competition of the workers among themselves is the worst side of the 
 present state of things in its effect upon the worker, the sharpest weapon 
 against the proletariat in the hands of the bourgeoisie. 
 
 The proletar’an is helpless : left to h ? mse!f he cannot Eve a s ; ngle day. 
 JJhe bourgeoisie has gained a monopoly of all means of existence in the broad- 
 ,4st. sense of the w°M What the proletarian neads. he can obtain only from 
 this bourgeoisie, which is protected in its monopoly by the power of the State. 
 The proletarian, is. therefore, in law and in fact, the slave of the bour- 
 geoisie, which can decree his life or death. It offers him the means of living, 
 
22 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 Fortunately, however, for the cause of human rejuvenation, a 
 time is reached, sooner or later, by most of the layers of the prole- 
 tariat when the uplifting tendencies obtain a decided mastery, and 
 when they are effective enough to awaken in some section or another 
 of the proletariat a consciousness of self, a consciousness of its class 
 distinction, a consciousness of the solidarity of all its members and 
 of the whole working class, a consciousness of power that is born 
 of their close union. So soon as any portion of the proletariat has 
 reached the understanding of the fact that its class is an indispen- 
 sable economic element in society; so soon as the sense of self- 
 respect is kindled in its ranks; so soon as it arrives at the convic- 
 tion that a brighter future is in store for its class and that its 
 emancipation depends upon itself; so soon as any portion of the 
 proletariat has risen high enough in the understanding of its situ- 
 ation and its mission, then is its influence bound to pervade its 
 whole class and it becomes difficult to push it back into the level of 
 those degraded beings, who are able to hate but not to hold out 
 together in a prolonged struggle; who, despairing of their future, 
 seek to forget their misery in debauch; and who have not the 
 stamina for revolt, but are fit only for abject submission. It is next 
 to impossible to eradicate the class-consciousness out of that portion 
 of the proletarians where it has once taken hold. However strongly 
 the debasing influences of the capitalist system may make them- 
 selves felt, they may be able to push down such a portion of the 
 proletariat economically , but never morally , provided always the 
 pressure be not crushing. With this exception, the pressure brought 
 to bear by capitalism upon the class-conscious proletariat will have 
 the effect of producing a counter pressure; it will not debase, but 
 embitter; it will not degrade the proletariat to the ignominy of the 
 slums, it will raise them to the dignity of martyrdom. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE INDUSTRIAL RESERVE ARMY. 
 
 ARMY OF THE UNEMPLOYED IS RECRUITED THROUGH IMMIGRATION. 
 
 We have seen that the introduction of female and child labor in 
 industry is one of the most powerful means whereby the capitalists 
 reduce the wages of workingmen. There is, however, another means, 
 which, periodically, is just as powerful, to wit, the introduction of 
 workingmen from neighborhoods that are backward, and whose 
 
 but only for an “equivalent” for his work. It even lets him have the appear- 
 ance of acting from free choice, of making a contract with free, unrestrained 
 consent, as a responsible agent who has attained his majority. 
 
 Fine freedom, where the proletarian has no other choice than that of 
 either accepting the conditions which the bourgeoisie offers him, or of starv- 
 ing, of freezing to death, of sleeping naked among the beasts of the forest! 
 A fine equivalent valued at pleasure by the bourgeoisie. And if one pr^er 
 tarian is such a fool as to starve rather than to agree to the equitable propo- 
 sitions of the bourgeoisie, his “natural superiors,” another is easily found in 
 his place ; there are proletarians enough in the world, and not all so insane 
 as to prefer dying to living. — “Condition of the Working Class in England.” 
 
THE INDUSTRIAL RESERVE ARMY. 23 
 
 population has slight wants, but whose labor-power has not yet 
 been unnerved by the factory system. The development of produc- 
 tion upon a large scale, of machinery, namely, makes possible not 
 only the employment of such untrained workmen in the place of 
 trained ones, but also their cheap and prompt transportation to the 
 place where they are wanted. Hand in hand with the development 
 of production goes the system of transportation; colossal production 
 corresponds with colossal transportation, not of merchandise only, 
 but of persons also. Steamships and railroads, these much-vaunted 
 pillars of civilization, not only carry guns, liquor and syphilis to 
 barbarians, but they also bring the barbarians to us, and with them 
 their barbarism. The flow of agricultural laborers into the cities is 
 becoming ever stronger; and from ever further regions are the 
 swarms of those drawing nearer who have less wants, are more 
 patient, and offer less resistance. Slovacs, Swedes, and Italians 
 emigrate to Germany; Germans, Belgians, Italians emigrate to 
 France; Slovacs, Germans, Italians, Irishmen, Swedes, emigrate to 
 England; Slovacs, Russians, Armenians, Swedes, Italians, Irish, Eng- 
 lish, and Chinese emigrate to the United States — all of them bearing 
 down upon wages in each place. All these foreign workingmen are 
 partly expropriated people, small farmers and producers, whom the 
 capitalist system of production has ruined, driven on the street, and 
 deprived, not only of a home, but also of a country. Socialism is 
 often charged by the Philistines with a lack of patriotism. Look at 
 those swarms of emigrants; what is it but capitalism that has expa- 
 triated these wretches, and inflicted upon them the bane of exile? 
 
 ARMY OF THE UNEMPLOYED IS RECRUITED THROUGH WOMAN AND CHILD 
 
 LABOR. 
 
 Through the expropriation of the small farmers and producers, 
 through the importation from distant lands of large masses of labor, 
 through the development of woman and child labor, through the 
 shortening of the time necessary to acquire a trade, through all these 
 means the capitalist system of production is enabled to increase stu- 
 pendously the quantity of labor forces that are at its disposal. And 
 side by side with this goes a steady increase in the productivity of 
 human labor as the result of the uninterrupted progress in technical 
 arts. 
 
 ARMY OF THE UNEMPLOYED IS RECRUITED THROUGH INTRODUCTION OF 
 
 MACHINERY. 
 
 Simultaneously with these tendencies, the machine steadily 
 tends to displace workingmen and render them superfluous. Every 
 machine saves labor-power; unless it did that it would be useless. 
 In every branch of industry — and be it well remembered, agriculture 
 is to-day an industry and is identically affected — the transition from 
 hand to machine labor is accompanied with the greatest amount of 
 differing to the workingmen who are affected by it, who, whether 
 fcAey be mechanics or handicraftsmen, or whether they be farm- 
 hands, engaged in ploughing, reaping, or picking cotton, are made 
 superfluous by the machine and are thrown out upon the streets and 
 
24 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 roadsides. It was this effect of machinery that the workingmen 
 felt first. Numerous riots during cue first years of this century, and 
 not infrequent occurrences to-day, attest the quantity of suffering 
 which the transition from hand to machine labor, or the introduc- 
 tion of improved machinery, inflicts upon the working class, and 
 the despair to which they are thereby driven. The introduction of 
 machinery, as well as its subsequent improvement, is every time 
 baneful to the workingmen whom it affects. True enough, under cer- 
 tain conditions, other workingmen may gain thereby, such working- 
 men, for instance, as may be employed in the manufacture of the 
 machine itself; but, in the first place, these happy ones are to-day 
 always much fewer than those who suffer; and, in the second place, 
 it may well be doubted whether a consciousness of this fact could go 
 far to console the starving ones. 
 
 Every machine causes either as much to be produced as before 
 witn fewer workmen, or a larger quantity of articles with no in- 
 crease in the number of workmen. It follows that, if in a country 
 the number of workmen employed does not decrease with the devel- 
 opment of the system of machinery, then the market must be ex- 
 tended in proportion to the increased productivity of these workmen. 
 Seeing, however, that we economic development increases the pro- 
 ductivity of labor at the same time that it increases in a greater 
 degree the quantity of disposable labor, it follows that, in order to 
 prevent enforced idleness among the workmen, the market must be 
 extended at a much more rapid pace than the pace at which the 
 productivity of labor is increased by the machine. Such a rapid 
 extension of the market has, however, rarely occurred under the 
 rule of capitalist production. The “expansion” theory to-day advo- 
 cated by capitalists, will be found inadequate. It follows that en- 
 forced idleness is a permanent phenomenon under the capitalist sys- 
 tem of production, and is inseparable from it. Even m the best of 
 times, when the market suddenly undergoes a considerable extension 
 and business is most brisk, production is not able to furnish work to 
 all the unemployed. During bad times, however, when business is 
 at a standstill, their number rises to fabulous figures. In fact, the 
 unemployed constitute quite an army — the industrial reserve army, 
 as Marx called it; it is an army of la.bor forces that stands ever 
 ready, at the disposal of the capitalist; an army out of which he 
 can draw his reserves whenever the industrial campaign grows hot. 
 
 VALUE OF THE ARMY OF THE UNEMPLOYED TO THE CAPITALIST CLASS. 
 
 To the capitalist, this reserve army is invaluable. It places in 
 his hands a powerful weapon with which to curb and subject the 
 army of the employed. After excessive work on the part of some 
 has produced lack of work for others, then the idleness of these is 
 used as a means to keep up and even increase the excessive work of 
 the former . 1 And yet there are people who will deny that matters 
 are to-day arranged at their best. * 
 
 1 Whence comes this incongruity? It lies in the nature of industrial com- 
 petition and the commercial crises which arise from it. In the present unreg- 
 
THE INDUSTRIAL RESERVE ARMY. 25 
 
 Although the size of the industrial reserve army rises and falls 
 with the ups and downs of business, nevertheless, on the whole, it 
 shows a steady tendency to increase. This is inevitable. The tech- 
 nical development moves on at an ever-increasing pace, and steadily 
 increases its fields of operations, while, on the other hand, the ex- 
 tension of the markets is hemmed in by natural bounds. 
 
 What, then, is the full significance of lack of work? It signifies 
 not only want and misery to the unemployed, not only intensified 
 vassalage and exploitation to the employed; it signifies, further- 
 more, uncertainty of livelihood to the whole working class. 
 
 Whatever hardships former modes of exploitation inflicted 
 upon the exploited, one boon they left them: the certainty of a liveli- 
 hood. The sustenance of the serf and the slave was assured at least 
 so long as the life of the master himself was assured. Only when 
 the master perished was the existence of his dependents in peril. 
 Whatever amount of misery and dearth broke out over the people 
 under former systems of production, such visitations were never tne 
 result of production itself, they were the result of a disturbance of 
 production, brought on by failures of crop, drouths, floods, irruptions 
 of hostile armies, etc. 
 
 To-day, the existence of the exploiter and the exploited are not 
 bound up in each other. At any moment the workman can be 
 thrown upon the street with wife and children, and be given over 
 to starvation, without the exploiter, whom he has made rich, being 
 the worse for it. 
 
 To-day, the misery of enforced idleness is only in very excep- 
 tional instances the result of a disturbance in production through in- 
 fluences from without; enforced idleness among the workingmen 
 is but a necessary result of the development of the present system 
 of production. To-day, just the reverse happens of what happened 
 under former systems of production. To-day, such disturbances in 
 production rather improve the opportunities for work than other- 
 wise; war, with all its devastating influences, has for its result an 
 immediate increase in the demand for labor. 
 
 Under our former system of production on a small scale, the 
 income of the worker was in proportion to his industry. Laziness 
 ruined him, and finally threw him out of work. To-day, on the con- 
 trary, lack of work is greater the more and the longer the workman 
 
 ulated production and distribution of the means of subsistence, which is 
 carried on not directly for the sake of supplying needs, but for profit, in the 
 system under which everyone works for himself to enrich himself, disturb- 
 ances inevitably arise at every moment. For example, England supplies a 
 number of countries with most diverse goods. Now, although a manufacturer 
 may know how much of each article is consumed in each country annually, 
 he cannot know how much is on hand at every given moment, much less can 
 he know how much his competitors export thither. He can only draw most 
 uncertain inferences from the perpetual fluctuations in prices, as to the quan- 
 tities on hand and the needs for the moment. He must trust to luck In 
 jpxporting his goods. Everything is done blindly, as guess-work, more or less 
 fat the mercy of accident. Upon the slightest favorable report, each one 
 exports what he can, and before long such a market is glutted, capital remains 
 inactive, prices fall, and English manufacture has no further employment for 
 Its hands. — “Condition of the Working Class in England,” p. 82. 
 
26 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 toils; he brings enforced idleness upon himself by his own toil. 
 Among the many homely adages, which originated during the system 
 of small production, and which capitalist large production has re- 
 versed, the following is one: “The industry of the laborer builds up 
 his house.” Likewise has the maxim, so often upon the lips of the 
 Philistines, that “whoever will work will find bread” been turned 
 into a lie. 
 
 To-day the possession of strength to labor is, to the workingman, 
 as unreliable a shield against want and misery as property itself is 
 to the small producer. As the spectre of bankruptcy casts its shadow 
 across the path of the small farmer and small industrialist, so does 
 the spectre of “out of work ” darken that of the w T age-worker. Of 
 ail the ills that attend the present system of production, the most 
 trying, the most aggravating, that which harrows men’s souls deep- 
 est, and which pulls by the roots every instinct of conservatism, is 
 the permanent uncertainty of a livelihood. This eternal uncertainty 
 of one’s own condition undermines one’s hope in the certainty of 
 life, and all his interest in its preservation. 
 
 Excessive work, lack of work, the dissolution of the family — 
 these are the gifts which the capitalist system of production carries 
 to the proletariat at the same time that it causes that class to swell 
 from day to day, and its condition to spread perceptibly, more and 
 more, over the ’whole population. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE STEADY INCREASE OF THE PROLETARIAT-MERCAN- 
 TILE AND EDUCATED PROLETARIAT. 
 
 It is not only through the extension of large production that 
 the capitalist system causes the condition of the proletariat to be- 
 come more and more that of the whole population. It brings this 
 about also through the circumstance that the condition of the wage- 
 workers engaged in large production strikes the keynote for the con- 
 dition of wage-workers in all other branches. The conditions under 
 which the latter work and live are revolutionized; the advantages 
 which they may have had over those employed in capitalist industry 
 are turned into so many disadvantages under the influence of the 
 latter. To illustrate: In those localities where mechanics still work 
 for, and board and lodge with, the master mechanic, the poor board 
 and lodging which the wage-worker employed in a capitalist indus- 
 try can afford become a pretext for the master mechanic to reduce 
 both the board and the comforts of lodging which his workmen 
 enjoy. Again: Formerly the long period requisite for apprenticeship 
 was the means to prevent the overstocking of a trade; to-day, the 
 system of apprenticeship, conducted under the guise of benevolence 
 in many of our large cities, and called. Trades Schools, notably 
 New York and Pittsburg, is one of the most effective means to over- 
 run many a trade with cheap labor, and to knock the bread from 
 the mouths of the adult laborers. In this respect also, as in so 
 
MERCANTILE AND EDUCATED PROLETARIAT. 27 
 
 many others, those instiutions, which, under the system of small 
 production, were sensible and beneficent, have, under the influence 
 of the capitalist system, become either nonsensical or hurtful. 
 
 EFFECT OF CAPITALISM ON SMALL STORES. 
 
 There is another, and very extensive, domain on which the capi- 
 talist system of large production exercises its influence of turning 
 the population into proletarians — the domain of commerce. The 
 large stores have begun to bear, and are now bearing, heavily upon 
 the small ones. The number of small stores does not, therefore, 
 necessarily diminish. On the contrary, it increases. The small 
 store is the last refuge of the bankrupt small producer. Were the 
 small stores actually crowded out, the ground would be wholly taken 
 from under the feet of the small traders; they would then be forth- 
 with thrust below the class of the proletariat into the slums; they 
 would be turned into beggars, vagabonds, and candidates for the peni- 
 tentiary. Such in fact is, to a great extent, the evolution of the 
 small trader. 
 
 But it is not in the reduction of the number of small stores, it 
 is in the debasement of their character that the influence of large 
 production manifests itself in commerce. The small trader deals in 
 ever worse and cheaper goods; the tribe of the haberdasher grows; 
 and the streets and roads are overrun with peddlers, itinerant ven- 
 ders, and hucksters of all manner of worthless articles; of spoiled 
 fruit, decayed vegetables, etc., sold under false pretences with all 
 sorts of fraudulent devices, such as deceptive measures and weights. 
 Thus the livelihood of the independent small trader becomes ever 
 more precarious, more proletarian-like, while, steadily and at the 
 same time, in the large stores, the number of employees goes up — 
 genuine proletarians, without prospect of ever becoming independ- 
 ent. Woman and child labor, with their accompaniment of prostitu- 
 tion; excessive work; lack of work; starvation wages — all the 
 symptoms of large production appear also in increasing quantity in 
 the domain of commerce. Steadily the condition of the employees in 
 this department approaches that of the proletarians in the depart- 
 ment of production. The only difference perceptible between the 
 two is that the former preserve the appearances of a better living, 
 which require sacrifices unknown to the industrial proletarians. 
 
 CAPITALISM TURNS EDUCATION INTO A COMMODITY. 
 
 There is still a third category of proletarianism that has gone 
 far on the road of its complete development: the educated proleta- 
 rians. Education has become a special trade under our present sys- 
 tem. The measure of knowledge has increased greatly, and grows 
 daily. Capitalist society and the capitalist State are ever more in 
 need of men of knowledge and ability to conduct their business, in 
 order to bring the forces of nature under their power, be it for pur- 
 j^ses of production or of destruction, or to enable them to expend 
 i?i luxurious living their increasing profits. Now, then, it is not only 
 the hardworking small farmer, mechanic, or the proletarians in 
 general, who have no time to devote themselves to science and art; 
 
28 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 the merchant, the manufacturer, the banker, the stock-jobber, the 
 landlord class — all of these are in the same fix. Their whole time is 
 taken up either with their work, or with their “business” and pleas- 
 ures, as the case may be. In modern society, it is not, as it used to 
 be under previous social orders, the exploiters themselves, or, at 
 least, a class of them, who nurse the arts and sciences. The present 
 exploiters, our ruling class, leave these pursuits to a special class, 
 whom they keep in hire. Under this system, education becomes a 
 merchandise. 
 
 A hundred years ago or so, this commodity was rare. There 
 were few schools; study was accompanied with considerable ex- 
 pense. So long as small production could support the worker, he 
 stuck to it; only special gifts of nature or favorable circumstances 
 would cause the sons of these to dedicate themselves to the arts and 
 sciences. Incredible, or unlikely, as it may look at first blush, even 
 in so new a country as the United States, the demand for physicians, 
 teachers, artists, etc., was, for quite a long number of years, sup- 
 plied almost entirely by this limited class and its descendants. 
 
 So long as this condition of things lasted, the merchandise edu- 
 cation commanded a high price. Its possession procured, at least 
 to those who applied it to practical ends, lawyers, for instance, phy- 
 sicans, professors, etc., quite comfortable livings; not infrequently 
 it also brought fame and honor. The artist, the poet, the philosopher, 
 were, in monarchical countries, the companions of royalty; in our 
 republic they were persons of unquestioned distinction. The aristoc- 
 racy of intellect felt itself superior to the aristocracy of birth or of 
 money. The only care of such was the development of their intel- 
 lect. Hence it happened that people of culture could be, and often 
 were, idealists. This circumstance explains the appearance, in the 
 forties, of that galaxy of men and women who took up in this 
 country the idealist philosophy of Fourier, resulting in the com- 
 munistic tidal wave that swept over the land at that time. These 
 aristocrats of education and culture stood above the other classes 
 and their material aspirations and antagonisms. Education meant 
 power, happiness, and worthiness. The conclusion seemed inevitable, 
 that, in order to make all men happy and worthy, in order to banish 
 ail class antagonisms, all poverty, all wickedness and meanness out 
 of the world, nothing else was needed than to spread education and 
 culture. 
 
 GREAT INCREASE OF EDUCATED PEOPLE. 
 
 Since those days the development of higher education has made 
 immense progress. The number of institutions of learning increased 
 wonderfully, and, in a still larger degree, the number of pupils. In 
 the meantime, the bottom was knocked out of small production. 
 The small property-holder knows to-day no other way of keeping his 
 sons from sinking into the proletariat but by sending them to co& 
 lege; and he does this if his means will at all allow. But, further- 
 more, he must consider the future, not of his sons only, but of his 
 daughters also. The rapid development in the division of labor Is 
 
MERCANTILE AND EDUCATED PROLETARIAT. 29 
 
 steadily encroaching upon the household; it is converting one house- 
 hold duty after another into a special industry, and steadily dimin- 
 ishing household work. Weaving, sewing to a great extent, knitting, 
 baking, and many other occupations, that at one time filled up the 
 round of household duties, have been either wholly or substantially 
 withdrawn from the sphere of house-keeping. More than fifty years 
 ago, the “store close” of which Artemus Ward loved to make fre- 
 quent mention, began, in this country, to compete with and sup- 
 plant the homespun; and similarly, many another home-made staple 
 was extinguished, and its production absorbed by specialized indus- 
 tries. As a result of all this, matrimony, where the wife is to be 
 housekeeper only, is becoming more and more a matter of luxury. 
 But it so happens that the small property-holder and producer is, at 
 the same time, sinking steadily, and steadily becoming poorer; ever 
 more and more he loses the means to indulge in luxuries. In con- 
 sequence of this, the number of spinsters grows apace, and ever 
 larger is the number of those families in which mother and daughter 
 must work for a living. Accordingly, woman labor does not only 
 increase in the domains of both large and small production and com- 
 merce, it also spreads in other directions, in government offices, on 
 the telegraph, telephone, railroads, banks, in office clerkships — book- 
 keeping, typewriting, stenography — and in the sphere of the arts and 
 sciences. However loudly prejudices and personal interests may 
 rebel against it, woman labor presses itself forward more and more 
 upon the various professional pursuits. ±t is not vanity, nor im- 
 portunity, nor pride, but the force of the economic development that 
 drives woman to labor in these as well as in other departments of 
 human activity. In those countries and those localities of the 
 United States where the men have succeeded in excluding the com- 
 petition of women from those branches of intellectual pursuits whicn 
 are still organized upon the old guild principle, the latter press with 
 all the greater force upon those pursuits that are not so organized,, 
 like writing, painting, music, etc. 
 
 The result of this whole development is that the number of 
 educated people has increased enormously. Nevertheless, the benefi- 
 cent results which the idealists expected from an increase of educa- 
 tion have not followed. So long as education is a merchandise, its ex- 
 tension is tantamount to an increase in the quantity of that mer- 
 chandise, consequently, to the falling of its price, and the decline of 
 the condition of those who possess it. The number of educated peo- 
 ple has grown to such an extent that it more than suffices for the 
 wants of the capitalists and of the capitalist State. The labor mar- 
 ket of educated labor is to-day as overstocked as that of manual 
 labor. To-day, it is no longer the manual workers alone who have 
 their reserve army of the unemployed, and are afflicted with lack 
 of work; the educated workers also have their reserve army of idle- 
 ness, and among them also lack of work has taken up its permanent 
 ^quarters. Those who strain for a public office experience the diffi- 
 culty of obtaining it by reason of the crowd; those others who seek 
 employment elsewhere experience the extremes of idleness and excea- 
 
30 
 
 THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 sive work the same as the manual workers, and just the same as 
 these they are the victims of wage-slavery. 
 
 CONDITION OF EDUCATED WORKERS CONTINUALLY DETERIORATES. 
 
 The condition of the educated workers deteriorates visibly; 
 formerly, people spoke of the “aristocracy of the intellect,” to-day we 
 speak of the “intellectual” or “educated” proletariat; the time is near 
 when the bulk of these proletarians will be distinguishable from the 
 others only by their conceit. Most of these still imagine they are 
 something better than the manual proletarians; they fancy them- 
 selves members of the ruling class; but this attitude distinguishes 
 itself in nothing from that of the lackeys, who, behind the backs of 
 their masters, put on airs of lordship. These “educated proletarians” 
 have ceased to be the intellectual leaders of the capitalist class; 
 they are to-day, to the capitalist and to capitalist institutions, what 
 “bruisers” and “gougers” are to low taverns. Scheming and plotting 
 are their leading pursuits; their first thought is not the development 
 of their intellectual goods, but the sale of these; their principal 
 method of getting along is the prostitution of their own individu- 
 ality. The same as with the small producers, they are dazzled by a few 
 brilliant prizes in the lottery of life, they shut their eyes to the 
 numberless blanks in the wheel, and barter away body and soul for 
 the merest chance of drawing such a prize. The barter and sale of 
 one's convictions and a marriage for money , these are, in the eyes 
 of the majority of our educated proletarians, two means, as natural 
 as they are necessary, “to make one’s fortune.” Into such creatures 
 has the capitalist system of production turned our idealists, inven- 
 tors, thinkers, and dreamers! 
 
 Still, the supply of this class grows so rapidly that there is little 
 to be made out of education, even though one throw his own indi- 
 viduality into the bargain. The decline of the bulk of educated peo- 
 ple into the class of the proletariat can no longer be checked . 1 
 
 Whether this development will result in a movement of the 
 educated people to join the battling proletariat in mass, and not, as 
 hitherto, singly, is still uncertain. This, however, is certain: the 
 fact that the educated people are being turned into proletarians has 
 closed to the class of the proletariat the only gate that was still 
 open, and through which its members might, by dint of their own 
 unaided efforts, have been able to escape into the class above. 
 
 It is out of all question that the wage-worker can become a 
 capitalist, at least not in the ordinary run of events. Sensible peo- 
 ple do not consider the chances of earning a prize in a Louisiana 
 Lottery, or of one’s falling heir to the wealth of some unknown 
 
 ^he great bulk of the professional class, the oniv portion of ?t which 
 is now increasing in number, can no more boast of economic independence 
 than the manual worker, although living, on an average, upon a higher plane 
 of comfort. Books, instruments, costumes, etc., according to professions, are the 
 necessary and only possessions of an overwhelming majority of the people or-* 
 this class. It is from this poorer stratum — from this intellectual proletariat, 
 so-called — that Socialism, in the countries where it is now strongest, nas 
 recruited some of its most active, gifted and courageous exponents. — “Social- 
 ist Almanac,” p. 104. 
 
a 
 d 
 
 MERCANTILE AND EDUCATED PROLETARIAT. 
 
 ative, when they deal with the condition of the working class, 
 der certain particularly favorable circumstances it did formerly 
 pen, here and there, that a workman succeeded by dint of great 
 privations in saving up enough wherewith to start a little industry of 
 his own, or set up a little retail shop, or give his son a chance to 
 study and become something “better” than his father. It was always 
 ridiculous to hold out such possibilities to the workmen as the 
 means of improving their condition. In the ordinary course of 
 events the workingman may thank his stars if he is at all able, 
 during good times, to lay by enough not to remain empty handed 
 when work becomes slack. To-day, however, to hold out such pos- 
 sibilities to the workman is more ridiculous than ever. The eco- 
 nomic development does not only make saving on the part of the 
 workingman more and more difficult, if at ail possible, but it also 
 renders it utterly impossible, even though he may be able to save 
 up something, to therewith pull himself or his children out of the 
 class of the proletariat. To invest his little savings in some small 
 independent industry, were for him to jump from the frying-pan into 
 the fire; ten to one, he will be flung back to his previous condition, 
 with the bitter experience that the small producer can no longer 
 keep his head above water — an experience which he will have pur- 
 chased with the loss of his hard-earned savings. 
 
 Still more difficult than the transition into the class of the small 
 producer, indeed, utterly hopeless, is the attempt on the part of the 
 proletarian to give his son a chance to study. But let it be accepted, 
 for the sake of argument, that such an attempt has been successful; 
 of what use will a college education be to the son of the proletariat, 
 who, being without funds and without influence, cannot wait for a 
 good chance to sell his knowledge, in these days when thousands of 
 lawyers, doctors, engineers, and all manner of professional men are 
 going about hungry? 
 
 SOCIALIST REPUBLIC THE HOPE OF THE WORLD. 
 
 To-day, whichever way the proletarian may turn, he finds await- 
 ing him the same proletarian conditions of life and of toil. Those 
 nditions pervade society more and more; in all countries the bulk 
 of the population has sunk to the level of the proletariat; to the 
 individual proletarian all prospect has vanished of ever being able, 
 by his own efforts, to pull himself out of the quagmire into which 
 the present system of production has pushed him. The forecast of 
 .'James Madison, made sixty-five years ago, that, owing to our com- 
 petitive social system, the bulk of our people would ere long have 
 ^fost, not only all property, but even the hope of the prospect of 
 uiring any , has been verified to the letter. 
 
 The individual proletarian can accomplish his own redemption 
 with the redemption of his whole class. That consummation 
 ot, however, be reached without the collective ownership by the 
 le of their instruments of production, namely, by the Socialist 
 ublic. 
 
 At every previous social revolution, or be it evolution, class 
 rseded class. Thus the theocratic class superseded the patri- 
 
THE WORKING CLASS. 
 
 archie; the feudal superseded the theocratic; and, in our own c 
 the capitalist superseded the feudal. In each instance a class be 
 upset the class above, emancipated itself by subjugating others, 
 introduced a new form of human exploitation. 
 
 To rear, on the contrary, the Socialist Republic; to abolish 
 class antagonisms by abolishing the last of the systems of hu 
 exploitation; to redeem itself, and, alone of all classes in the sc 
 evolution of the human species, to accomplish its own redempi 
 together with that of the whole, not ac the expense of any port 
 of mankind — that is the historic mission of the Proletariat; tin 
 the noble aim that swells with pride the breast, and sweetens 
 present bitterness of the lot of every Proletarian who is consc 
 of his class distinction and the obligation it imposes upon him. 
 
✓ LASS 
 
 By KARIj KAUTSKY. 
 
 Translated From the German and Adapted to America 
 by DANIEL. DE LEON. 
 
 The struggle for supremacy between the Working Class and the Capitalist 
 3 becomes more marked and acute as capitalist production develops. 
 $ Ciass Struggle” gives a comprehensive description of the nature of the 
 est, its history, and its inevitable outcome. Each page is replete with 
 s for the Socialist. “The Class Struggle” is the third of the “Kautsky 
 phiets.” It should be followed by “The Socialist Republic.” 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 IAPTER I. — -Socialism and the Property-Holding Glasses. — Why the 
 Rich Will Not Become Socialists— Property-Holding Classes Are Tied to 
 Capitalist Production. 
 
 YPTER II. — Servants and Menials. — The Servant Class Is the Foe of the 
 Working Class. 
 
 PTER III.— The Slums.^— The Slums Are the Allies of the Capitalist 
 Class. 
 
 PTER IV. —Philanthropy and Labor, Legislation. — Capitalism Develops 
 Pauperism— Why Capitalists Would Not Abolish Poverty if They Could — 
 Importance of Factory Laws. 
 
 PTER V. — The Political Struggle. — How the Capitalists Render Labor 
 Unions Ineffective— Proletariat Begins Struggle by Alliances with the 
 Capitalist Class— Political alliances with the Capitalist Class End — 
 The Socialist Labor Party Appears — Certainty of the Ultimate Triumph 
 of the Proletariat — Why the Proletariat Is Bound to End All Exploita- 
 tion. 
 
 PTER VI.— The Labor Movement and ' Socialism f — Development of the 
 Labor Movement — Utopian Socialists Were Hostile to the Labor Move- 
 nent— “Labor Socialists” Were Hostile to the Class Struggle — Socialism 
 jf a Hundred Years Ago the Anarchism of To-day. 
 
 PTER VII. — The Socialist Labor Party — Union of the Labor Movement 
 Thd Socialism.— The Socialist Labor Party and the Class Struggle — 
 Objects and Results of the Class Struggle. 
 
 PTER VIII . — I nter nationality of the Socialist Labor Party. — Develop- 
 ment of International Capitalism— Development of International Sooial- 
 : sm— Internationality of the Class Struggle — Marx Organizes the Inter- 
 national Association of Workingmen — The “International” Falls with the 
 Paris Commune — Later Evidences of International Working Class Soli- 
 darity. 
 
 PTER IX. — The Socialist Labor Party and the People. — The Socialist 
 Labor Party the Friend of the Working Class— -The Socialist Labor 
 Party the Friend of the Small Producer— When and Why Socialists 
 Jppose the Small Producer — Small Production Cannot Defend Itself 
 \gainst Capitalism. 
 
 Single Copies, 5 cents. One Hundred Copies, $2.50. 
 
 EW YORK LABOR NEWS CO., 
 
 2 to 6 New Reade Street, New York City. 
 
In 
 
 SOCIALISM 1ST EUROPE 
 
 is striking terror to tjie jm&nafchies and< rppuVjiics from the Baltic to the 
 Mediterranean, and 1 from the Ur^il to t^he Atlantic. 
 
 An accurate account of Socialism in Europe, its history and its develop- 
 ment, is now , i f qr -the first time, accessible to the Americans. The last 
 National Convention of ; the ’Socialist Labor Party instructed the Na- 
 tional Executive Committed to have prepared a book which would give the 
 American people a. reliable history of International Socialism and keep 
 them fully informed on the details of its irresistible advance. Lucien 
 Sanial, of New York City, was authorized to proceed with the work. He 
 has recently completed the task, and the 
 
 SOCIALIST ALMANAC 
 
 is now for sale. It is a volume of 230 pages. The first part is historical 
 and gives a detailed history of Socialism in Europe, from 1800 down to 
 1899, under the" following heads: 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Socialism in Germany. I Socialism in Belgium. 
 
 Socialism in Italy. Socialism in Spain. 
 
 Socialism in Austria. | Socialism in Poland. 
 
 The second part of the Almanac contains instructive theoretical and 
 statistical articles, on every subject connected with Capitalism and the 
 Working Class. Here are a few of the topics discussed : 
 
 The Classes: 
 
 The Classes According to Occupations. 
 
 The Classes According to Population. 
 
 The Plutocratic Class. The Mercantile Middle Class. The Agricultural 
 Middle Class. The Professional Class. The Wage-Working Class. 
 Distribution of Wealth. 
 
 Progress of Bankruptcy. Commercial Failures in the United States from 
 1857 to 1897. Failures in the United States and Canada According 
 to Capital Employed. 
 
 The Trusts, their Basis and History. 
 
 Female and Child Labor. 
 
 Agriculture: Number and Size of Farms According to Acreage and to 
 Tenure. Agricultural Machinery. Number of Agricultural Laborers 
 in 1880 and in 1890. Wages of Farm Labor. Wages and Profits on 
 Truck Farms. Increased Productivity of Farm Labor. 
 
 Manufactures: Capitalist Concentration in Manufacture. Clerical Force 
 in Manufacture. Net Product of Manufacturing Industry. Share of 
 Labor in its Product. 
 
 Comparative Earnings of Wage-Workers and Profit-Makers. “Sav- 
 ings” and Waste of Capitalist Class. Land Values in Manufacture. 
 Machinery in Manufacture. Coal Production. Pig-iron Production, 
 etc., etc. 
 
 Savings *Banks: Number of Depositors, amount deposited, and average 
 to each Depositor in Savings Banks of each State. Who Owns the 
 Savings? 
 
 Strikes and Lockouts: Strikes in the United States. Strikes in France, 
 1890-96. Arbitration in France. Strikes in Austria, 1891-95. Strikes 
 in Switzerland, 1860-94. Strikes in Italy, 1869-95. Trade Unions in 
 Holland. 
 
 Railroads: Finances. Labor. Accidents. 
 
 Telegraphs and Telephones. 
 
 National Banks. 
 
 Mineral Products of the United States. 
 
 Socialist Labor Party Vote by States since 1890. 
 
 livery Socialist and every Student shoud have a Copy of the Socialist 
 Almanac. It is an authority in all disputes, and will settle every argu- 
 ment. 
 
 PRICE, 50 CENTS. 
 
 ADDRESS ORDERS TO THE 
 
 NEW YORK LABOR NEWS CONPANY, 2 to 6 New Reade St., New York,