Ioth. Abolition of all indirect taxes and transformation of all the direct taxes into a progressive tax upon incomes in excess of 3000 francs. Suppression of inheritance in the collateral line and of all inheritance in the direct line exceeding 2000 francs. 481. Program of the Social-Democratic Federation in England. The following is the program of the English Social-Democratic Federation, as revised at the annual conference of 1893: OBJECT The socialization of the means of production, distribution, and exchange, to be controlled by a democratic state in the interests of the entire community, and the complete emancipation of labor from the domination of capitalism and landlordism, with the establishment of social and economic equality between the sexes. PROGRAM 1. All officers or administrators to be elected by equal direct adult suffrage, and to be paid by the community. 2. Legislation by the people in such wise that no project of law shall become legally binding till accepted by the majority of the people. 3. The abolition of a standing army, and the establishment of a national citizen force; the people to decide on peace or war. 4. All education, higher no less than elementary, to be compulsory, secular, industrial, and gratuitous for all alike. 5. The administration of justice to be gratuitous for all members of society. 6. The land, with all the mines, railways, and other means of transit, to be declared and treated as collective or common property. 7. The means of production, distribution, and exchange to be declared and treated as collective or common property. 8. The production and the distribution of wealth to be regulated by society in the common interests of all its members. PALLIATIVES As measures called for to palliate the evils of our existing society, the Social-Democratic Federation urges for immediate adoption : The compulsory construction of healthy dwellings for the people, such dwellings to be let at.rents to cover the cost of construction and maintenance alone. Free secular and technical education, compulsory upon all classes, together with free maintenance for the children in all board schools. Eight hours or less to be the normal working day fixed in all trades and industries, by legislative enactment, or not more than forty-eight hours per week, penalties to be inflicted for any infringement of this law. Cumulative taxation upon all incomes exceeding £300 a year. State appropriation of railways; municipal ownership and control of gas, electric light, and water supplies; the organization of tramway and omnibus services, and similar monopolies in the interests of the entire community. The extension of the post-office savings bank, which shall absorb all private institutions that derive a profit from operations in money or credit. Repudiation of the national debt. Nationalization of the land, and organization of agricultural and industrial armies under state or municipal control on coöperative principles. As means for the peaceable attainment of these objects the SocialDemocratic Federation advocates: Payment of members of parliament and all local bodies and official expenses of election out of the public funds. Adult suffrage. Annual parliaments. Proportional representation. Second ballot. Abolition of the monarchy and the House of Lords. Disestablishment and disendowment of all state churches. Extension of the powers of county councils. The establishment of district councils. Legislative independence for all parts of the empire. 482. Periods of socialist development in the United States. After the various utopian communistic experiments that marked the early history of socialism in the United States, the progress of the movement proper may be divided into the following periods: The first beginnings of modern socialism appeared on this continent before the close of the first half of the last century, but it took another half a century before the movement could be said to have become acclimatized on American soil. The history of this period of the socialist movement in the United States may, for the sake of convenience, although somewhat arbitrarily, be divided into the following four periods: 1. The Ante-bellum Period, from about 1848 to the beginning of the civil war. The movement of that period was confined almost exclusively to German immigrants, principally of the working class. It was quite insignificant in breadth as well as in depth, and was almost entirely swept away by the excitement of the civil war. 2. The Period of Organization, covering the decade between 1867 and 1877, and marked by a succession of socialist societies and parties, first on a local then on a national scale, culminating finally in the formation of the Socialist Labor Party. 3. The Period of the Socialist Labor Party, extending over twenty years, and marked by a series of internal and external struggles over the question of the policy and tactics of the movement. 4. Present-Day Socialism, which embraces the period of the last few years, and is marked by the acclimatization of the movement and the advent of the Socialist Party. 483. Platform of the Socialist party in the United States. The following demands are contained in the platform drawn up by the national convention of the Socialist party in the United States: While we declare that the development of economic conditions tends to the overthrow of the capitalist system, we recognize that the time and manner of the transition to socialism also depend upon the stage of development reached by the proletariat. We therefore consider it of the utmost importance for the Socialist Party to support all active efforts of the working class to better its condition and to elect socialists to political offices, in order to facilitate the attainment of this end. As such means we advocate: 1. The public ownership of all means of transportation and communication and all other public utilities, as well as of all industries, controlled by monopolies, trusts, and combines. No part of the revenue of such industries to be applied to the reduction of taxes on property of the capitalist class, but to be applied wholly to the increase of wages and shortening of the hours of labor of the employees, to the improvement of the service and diminishing the rates to the consumers. 2. The progressive reduction of the hours of labor and the increase of wages in order to decrease the share of the capitalist and increase the share of the worker in the product of labor. 3. State or national insurance of working people in case of accidents, lack of employment, sickness, and want in old age; the funds for this purpose to be collected from the revenue of the capitalist class, and to be administered under the control of the working class. 4. The inauguration of a system of public industries, public credit to be used for that purpose in order that the workers be secured the full product of their labor. 5. The education of all; state and municipal aid for books, clothing, and food. 6. Equal civil and political rights for men and women. 7. The initiative and referendum, proportional representation, and the right of recall of representatives by their constituents. 484. Platform of the "International." The following platform was adopted by the International Workingmen's Association at the height of its power, and has since been adopted by several socialist parties as their national platform: In consideration that the emancipation of the working class must be accomplished by the working class itself, that the struggle for the emancipation of the working class does not signify a struggle for class privileges and monopolies, but for equal rights and duties, and the abolition of class rule; That the economic dependence of the workingman upon the owner of the tools of production, the sources of life, forms the basis of every kind of servitude, of social misery, of spiritual degradation, and political dependence; That, therefore, the economic emancipation of the working class is the great end to which every political movement must be subordinated as a simple auxiliary; That all exertions which, up to this time, have been directed toward the attainment of this end have failed on account of the want of solidarity between the various branches of labor in every land, and by reason of the absence of a brotherly bond of unity between the working classes of different countries; That the emancipation of labor is neither a local nor a national, but a social problem, which embraces all countries in which modern society exists, and whose solution depends upon the practical and theoretical coöperation of the most advanced countries; That the present awakening of the working class in the industrial countries of Europe gives occasion for a new hope, but at the same time contains a solemn warning not to fall back into old errors, and demands an immediate union of the movements not yet united; The First International Labor Congress declares that the International Working-Men's Association, and all societies and individuals belonging to it, recognize truth, right, and morality as the basis of their conduct toward one another and their fellow men, without respect to color, creed, or nationality. This Congress regards it as the duty of man to demand the rights of a man and citizen, not only for himself, but for every one who does his duty. No rights without duties; no duties without rights. CHAPTER XXV THE FUNCTIONS OF GOVERNMENT I. CLASSIFICATION OF GOVERNMENTAL FUNCTIONS 485. The actual working of government. In his presidential address, delivered before the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association in 1909, President Lowell emphasized the importance of a study of the physiology of politics, the actual functioning of political institutions. To advocate in this twentieth century the importance of studying the actual working of government may seem like watering a garden in the midst of rain. But that this is not the case every one must be aware who is familiar with current political literature on such living topics as proportional representation, the referendum and initiative, and the reform of municipal government. These discussions are for the most part conducted in the air. They are theoretical, treating mainly of what ought to happen rather than what actually occurs; and even when they condescend to deal with facts it is usually on a limited scale with very superficial attention to the conditions under which the facts took place. The waste of precious efforts at reform, from a failure to grasp the actual forces at work, is indeed one of the melancholy chapters in our history. . . . Reformers are prone to imagine that a new device will work as they intend it to work, and are disappointed that it does not do so. They are far too apt to assume that if their panacea be adopted mankind will become regenerate; whereas the only fair supposition is that men will remain under any system essentially what they are a few good, a few bad, and the mass indifferent to matters that do not touch their personal interests. We are all familiar with cases where forms of government have been imitated without the corresponding functions; where institutions have been copied under conditions in which they could not produce the same effects as at home. A well-known example of this is the attempt of other European countries to adopt the English parliamentary system. The system has yielded in new lands results of varying merit; but it has not worked as it does in England, because the environment which |