LVTFan's Blog

Cornell West on justice

I tuned in at the very end of a program, in time to hear this:

"Justice is what love looks like in public." -- Cornell West, on Tavis Smiley, 1/21/11

An early ad for The Landlord's Game

The Public, May 12, 1906, page 143.

THE LANDLORD'S GAME

invented by Miss Lizzie Magie of Washington, D. C, will be manufactured and ready for the market about June 1st.

DESCRIPTION

The Landlord's Game is played on a board about 18 inches square, divided into 46 spaces representing all the various institutions of modern commercial life. The names of some of these spaces are "Soakum Lighting System," "Slambang Trolley," "Gee Whiz Railroad," "Lord Blueblood's Estate," "Wayback," "Boomtown." "Easy Street." "Broadway," "Timberlands.''  "Oil Fields," "Jail," "Poor House," etc.

The play on the board is started by the throw of dice which indicates the moves of the players and from that time on the transactions between individuals, corporations and the government are entered into with vim and interest. At the start the players are equally equipped but as the moves continue the majority of the players are apt to be forced into poverty, some even arriving at the Poor House, while one player generally becomes the millionaire.

THE SINGLE TAX

This condition prevails until the adoption of the single tax on land values, when the land rents, instead of being appropriated by individual players, are turned into the public treasury and used for public improvements. The game as then continued equalizes opportunities and raises wages, while it is impossible for one player to get any great advantage over the others.

The game brings out with great clearness the exact position in the commercial world of money, transportation and land monopoly. Unlike most games that have sought to teach a problem, this game preserves all the principal features of the popular chance and skill games, at the same time demonstrating the problem with clearness and simplicity. It is easily learned and is played with great enthusiasm by children as well as adults.

TESTIMONIALS:

Mr. John Z. White says:

The Landlord's Game Is something with which all single taxers should be familiar, as It will not only afford them much amusement, but will enable them to make practical illustrations of disputed points. It gives opportunity in this direction that can be secured in no other way. The "cat" is so clearly revealed that even he who runs may perceive.

Mr. Henry George. Jr., says:

The Landlord's Game illustrates the salient points of the single tax philosophy and is also interesting as a game.

Mrs. Jennie L, Munroe. Vice-Pres. of the National Woman's Single Tax League, says:

A thorough understanding of the principles of the Landlord's Game is equal to a whole course in political economy.

Rev. Alex. Kent, Pastor People's Church, Washington. D. C, says:

The game is instructive and at the same time absorbingly interesting.

The game will be furnished in a neat box with lithographed board in colors, will include a pack of cards representing title deeds, railroad charters, etc., besides checkers, dice, money and all other implements necessary to the playing of the game, and will be sent to any address in the United States on receipt of one dollar. Postage 20 cents extra.

Address MISS LIZZIE J. MAGIE, Secretary, ECONOMIC GAME COMPANY. 58 WEST 68th ST., NEW YORK, N. Y.

 

LVTfan here: the ad has no graphics.   But this game is the inspiration for the board game we know as Monopoly.

Play "Brer Fox an' Brer Rabbit," a UK version of "The Landlords Game" (Monopoly)

Pursuing some leads on Lizzie Magie (see the related posts, below this one, and in the Landlords Game links at left), I came across a December, 2010, paper by Frances Hutchinson, about the British version of the Landlords Game, called Brer Fox an' Brer Rabbit.  She makes some very interesting points, and I learned some things about the games. I commend the entire paper to your attention, and am taking the liberty of posting the last third here:

Brer Fox an’ Brer Rabbit

Georgists argued that a system of land taxation could be introduced gradually, following informed public debate on the issues involved. To that end, during the early decades of the twentieth century they devised a series of hand-made games designed to portray the evils of the selfish system of monopoly land holding, with a view to introducing socially responsible reforms of land holding based upon the Georgist Single Land Tax proposals. The games, which circulated throughout the USA and UK, often under the title The Landlord’s Game, were played in three phases. Phase 1, based upon the existing laws of land ownership, finance and taxation, demonstrates the effects of unchecked greed and self-interest in patterns of monopoly capitalism. In Phases 2 and 3 the rules are altered to eliminate the ability of powerful players to benefit from their greed.

The creators of the game held a profound faith in the human capacity for action based upon reasoned argument. The games were designed to be played co-operatively, providing a focus for discussion which took place at each of the three phases of the game. Monopoly was later developed from Phase 1, where powerful, self-interested individuals reign supreme. The later two phases, which each form games in themselves, demonstrate the potential for communities to regain ecologically and socially viable forms of access to land.

Brer Fox an’ Brer Rabbit is an early version of The Landlord’s Game which circulated in the UK. After some years of research we managed to bring together a copy of the original board with a matching set of rules. Despite the title, this is not a children’s game. However, we have found that a major obstacle to the successful use of this original version of the game as a teaching aid, is the almost universal pernicious influence of the selfish, zero-sum game of Monopoly. Phase 1 does not run as smoothly as the polished version of the commercial version, and it can be difficult to shift to the different mindset envisaged in Phases 2 and 3.

The thoughtful playing of Phases 2 and 3 of the Landlord’s Game raises some veryinteresting questions, such as the relationship between the ‘real’ and the ‘financial’ values of land, traditional patterns of common management of land, and the whole question of landless waged-labour. What emerges most forcefully, however, is the role of the Banker, the mysterious figure whose presence is not explained in the Georgist literature, but who is able to pay out ‘wages’ to the players to enable them to continue to participate in the game. This brings into focus the whole question of the wage/salary-slavery system that is corporate capitalism in the world economy of the twenty-first century.

Playing the Game

Monopoly was developed from Phase 1 of The Landlord’s Game, which demonstrates the effects of a greedy selfish pattern of monopoly land-holding. The object of Monopoly is to buy, rent and sell property with sufficiently focused and ruthless skill to bankrupt the other players and thereby force them out of the game. In real life, the Robber Barons of the American Golden Age dominated steel, oil and other essential resources not by creating wealth, but by dominating the field. Mirroring assumptions of economic orthodoxy, the number of houses and hotels in Monopoly are deliberately kept scarce. The game is so designed that all cannot improve their properties equally, and collaboration is prohibited. “Monopoly models the foundation assumption of economics: the principle of scarcity. Every opportunity you act on is thereby denied to another player.”11

To play a version of The Landlord’s Game it is necessary to step back in time, to forget the rush, bustle and constant worry of the twenty-first century and take time to imagine one is alive in the idyllic years before the First World War. Although the commercially designed Monopoly can be played out in a single playing session, several leisurely sessions need to be set aside for playing The Landlord’s Game. The specific uses of the sites laid out on the board would have been familiar to the players, and would have given rise to discussion of local examples. Thus the game offers a refreshing opportunity to reflect on the purposes of the various ‘money making’ institutions on the board, including the actual money-maker, the bank itself.

Devised over a hundred years ago as a DIY exercise, boards, cards and playing pieces were normally assembled from household materials. Playing tokens were buttons, badges, charms, or anything to hand. Brer Fox an’ Brer Rabbit, produced and patented by the Newbie Games Company of Dumfries, Scotland, in 1913, has been reproduced in the attached format* so that all three phases of the game can be played. The family resemblance to Monopoly is immediately obvious. Bearing in mind the history of Monopoly just described, the leisurely playing of all three phases is an excellent consciousness-raising exercise. The later two phases, which form games in themselves, demonstrate the potential for communities to regain access to land by regaining control over all forms of economic activity, including banking. Personally, I tend to agree with Karl Marx, that “in point of theory, the man [Henry George] is a back number”. The notion that an individual should have the right to buy a piece of land simply by right of landing on it when it is free, is original to the game. Equally, the Georgist game does not raise the question of money creation, the role of finance and banking in the economy or the whole question of wage-slavery upon which the edifice of global corporate capitalism rests. But that does not prevent twenty-first century players from using the sites and situations of Brer Fox an’ Brer Rabbit to review accepted assumptions about the institutions of society which govern access to wealth, property, income and power. The game offers at least as much of interest to present-day campaigners for peace, social justice, monetary reform and political sanity as it did a century ago. We look forward to opening a dialogue with groups who have played the games successfully.

Then go here: http://www.douglassocialcredit.com/resources/social-art/monopoly  to print out the rules, board, cards, and money to play this game yourself.

Lizzie Magie's 1902 commentary on The Landlords' Game, on which Monopoly is based

Digging through primary sources can provide some great thrills.  I stumbled onto this article about The Landlords' Game in the Autumn, 1902, number of The Single Tax Review (then a 64-page quarterly, later more frequent) .   It was the Landlord's' Game which was later revised to create the board game Monopoly.   As I've written earlier here, the Landlords' Game (probably in later editions than what is referred to here) came with 2 sets of rules, one which would create widespread prosperity, and the other which would create a winner-take-all situation.

Magie's comments are quite relevant to understanding the game of Monopoly, too:

from The Single Tax Review, Autumn, 1902

THE LANDLORDS' GAME.

AN INTERESTING INVENTION OF A YOUNG LADY IN WASHINGTON BY WHICH CHILDREN AT THEIR PLAY MAY BE TAUGHT THE TRUE LAWS OF ECONOMICS.
Miss Lizzie J. Magie, a single taxer of Washington, D. C has invented an ingenious game, played with checkers and dice as is parcheesi, and thus describes it for the Review:

"It is a practical demonstration of the present system of land-grabbing with all its usual outcomes and consequences," says Miss Magie. " It might well have been called the 'Game of Life,' as it contains all the elements of success and failure in the real world, and the object is the same as the human race in general seem to have, i. e., the accumulation of wealth.  Representative money, deeds, mortgages, notes and charters are used in the game; lots are bought and sold; rents are collected; money is borrowed (either from the bank or from individuals), and interest and taxes are paid. The railroad is also represented, and those who make use of it are obliged to pay their fare, unless they are fortunate enough to possess a pass, which, in the game, means throwing a double. There are two franchises: the water and the lighting; and the first player whose throw brings him upon one of these receives a charter giving him the privilege of taxing all others who must use his light and water.

"There are two tracts of land on the board that are held out of use—are neither for rent nor for sale—and on each of these appear the forbidding sign: 'No Trespassing. Go to Jail.' One of these tracts of land (the largest on the board) is owned by Lord Blueblood, of London, England, and represents foreign ownership of American soil. A jail is provided for any one  who trespasses upon this land, and there the unfortunate individual must linger until he serves out his time or pays the required fine. 'Serving out his time' means waiting until he throws a double.

"Before the game begins, each player is provided with a certain amount of cash, sufficient to pay all necessary expenses until he is well enough along in life to earn his living. Should any one be so unlucky, or so reckless and extravagant, as to become 'broke,' there is a nice little poor house off in one corner where he may tarry until he makes a lucky throw or until some  friend takes pity on him and lends him enough to set him on his feet again. And here is where he generally gets 'soaked,' for the other players, taking advantage of the unfortunate one's necessities, demand an enormous rate of interest which the impecunious individual must pay before he can complete his round and get his wages.
 
"The rallying and chaffing of the others when one player finds himself an inmate of the jail, and the expressions of mock sympathy and condolence when one is obliged to betake himself to the poor house, make a large part of the fun and merriment of the game.

"Each time around the board represents so much labor performed, for which so much wages are paid. When a player has been the rounds ten times he retires from his labors, although he still remains in the game, which is not finished until the last player has made his tenth round. It takes forty moves to make a round and there is in each round one little black-bordered spot marked 'Legacy,' and whenever a player stops on this he receives a cash legacy. In each round there are three spots marked 'Luxury,' and these the player may indulge in or not, according to his inclinations or finances, but each luxury purchased counts the player so much more at the end of the game.

"General directions for playing the game accompany this description, but it is difficult to make a set of rules that will cover all contingencies since no two games are alike. The combination of circumstances are so many that almost every time the game is played new situations are brought out. Thus it is a game that is always interesting—never monotonous. It was the original intention of the author simply to work out a demonstration of how the landlord gets his money and keeps it, but while doing this there gradually developed a game which has proven one of amusement as well as of instruction and one which has attractions for both old and young.

"Children of nine or ten years and who possess average intelligence can easily understand the game and they get a good deal of hearty enjoyment out of it. They like to handle the make-believe money, deeds, etc., and the little landlords take a general delight in demanding the payment of their rent. They learn that the quickest way to accumulate wealth and gain power is to get all the land they can in the best localities and hold on to it. There are those who argue that it may be a dangerous thing to teach children how they may thus get the advantage of their fellows, but let me tell you there are no fairer-minded beings in the world than our own little American children. Watch them in their play and see how quick they are, should any one of their number attempt to cheat or take undue advantage of another, to cry, 'No fair!' And who has not heard almost every little girl say, 'I won't play if you don't play fair.'  Let the children once see clearly the gross injustice of our present land system and when they grow up, if they are allowed to develop naturally, the evil will soon be remedied."

 To read more about The Landlord's Game, explore the two "Monopoly and the Landlord's Game" tags in the cloud (I can't seem to meld them into a single one!)  It is quite an interesting story.

A bit of doggerel, with a point

EXPLANATIONS.

(For the Review.)

Here are words for the wise, with some careful explaning—
Not done in our schools—left out in our training—
Forgot by professor when making his book.
At these explanations, right squarely to look,
You must off with your glasses. They touch on the times,
In very large letters—in excellent rhymes:—

SHIRKERS are persons who willingly live,
On services workers unwittingly give.
WORKERS are fellows who toil and who sweat,
Very much to produce—very little to get.

LORDS are the shirkers to earth laying claim—
Who'd lay claim to the moon, could it better their game.
TENANTS are workers to lords paying rent—
To live on the planet to which they were sent.

DODGERS are lords—who sell their small souls
To keep ev'ry tax from their rents and their tolls.
DUPES are dull tenants—who pay with hard work
What dodgers quite cheaply and skillfully shirk.

MASTERS are dodgers—who make the world moan—
So small is the tax, on what dupes let them own.
They "corner" the earth, get most of the wealth,
And rob and live rich, by legalized stealth.

SLAVES are the dupes who let master and knave
Tax all that they spend—tax all that they save—
Till tax eats their bread, and with tolls, and with rents,
Their birthright to live isn't worth twenty cents.

So figure it out, any way that you can,
It's plain as the nose on the face of a man,

A slave is a dupe, a tenant, a worker—
A master's a dodger, a lord, and a shirker.

Had we done without lords to take rent for the earth,
We'd be richer than lords, from the day of our birth.
But the dreamers who dream to slay lords with a tax—
Banish toll from the roads—throw the knaves from our backs—
And struggle to do it, without any thanks—
We FOOLS—like our masters—defame them as CRANKS.

Asher Geo. Beecher., in The Single Tax Review, May-June 1909

"Cranks" might be a reference to Louis Post's repetition of Judge Maguire's story "Seeing the Cat" (available at wealthandwant.com).

Politics ... Economics ... Philosophy ... Values

Behind politics there is economics: behind economics, philosophy; and when it comes to a philosophy of values, optimism with regard to our present plane of experience, can only be regarded as an attractive form of mental disease.

-- a bit of bottom-of-the-column fillerin The Single Tax Review of March-April, 1909

Financing the Subway

Under our present system of taxation the wages of the worker are taken to run the city by the tax on the home being put in your rent. The increase in land-values that would run the city goes to the land speculator. Example and Proof:

Suppose the people build a twenty million dollar subway. The land increases twenty million dollars in value; the increase would pay for the subway, but it goes to the land-speculator and your wages are taken to pay for the subway by a tax on the home which is put in your rent.

 

-- from The Single Tax Review, March-April, 1909

 

And 100 years later, we're still financing subways from revenue sources other than Land Value Taxation.  Slow learners, aren't we?

 

Progress, Charity, -- and Justice

Two thoughts for the day, both from the January-February, 1909, "Single Tax Review."

 

To be satisfied with things as they are is to believe that progress is at an end.

 

Charity that is a substitute for justice is a loveless charity.

 

Think of the latter one when you see the bumper sticker "practice random acts of kindness."  Random acts of kindness are wonderful, but they aren't a substitute for active seeking of a more just society for all.   Nor is charity to the poor a substitute for examining and correcting the structures which impoverish so many people.

Jack Oliver, Who Proved Continental Drift, Dies at 87

Jack Oliver, Who Proved Continental Drift, Dies at 87 - NYTimes.com.

In his 1998 autobiography, “Shakespeare Got It Wrong: It’s Not ‘to Be,’ It’s ‘to Do,’ ” Dr. Oliver indulged in a fondness for limericks, interspersing them between chapters. Here is one:

The youth wondered what he should be.

His prof said, “You’re missing the key.

Life’s not to be, but to do.

Pick a task, follow through.

You’ll live ever after most happily.”

The Corruption of Economics

American Economic Association May Revamp Ethical Guidelines - WSJ.com.

By JUSTIN LAHART And MARK WHITEHOUSE DENVER –

Amid criticism that academic economists' ethical lapses were partly to blame for the U.S. financial crisis, the American Economic Association said Thursday that it will consider providing new ethical guidelines to its membership.

"The executive committee of the American Economic Association voted unanimously to create a committee to consider the association's existing disclosure and other ethical standards and potential extensions to those standards," the AEA said in a statement here as its annual meeting opened.

The AEA's effort comes as economists face greater scrutiny for their ties to Wall Street banks, hedge funds and other firms. The documentary film "Inside Job," released in October in the U.S., drew widespread public attention to influential academic economists' ties to Wall Street firms through directorships and consulting jobs.

In a recent paper, two economists from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst — Gerald Epstein and Jessica Carrick-Hagenbarth — noted that a number of economists who published comments on financial reforms failed to fully disclose potential conflicts of interest.

This week, Mr. Epstein and Ms. Carrick-Hagenbarth sent a letter, signed by about other 300 economists, to AEA President Robert Hall. It urged the association to "adopt a code of ethics that requires disclosure of potential conflicts of interest that can arise between economists' roles as economic experts and as paid consultants, principals or agents for private firms."

"I think there are many economists who are just as concerned about the issues of disclosure and ethical standards as people outside the profession," said Janet Currie, a Columbia University economist who is a member of the AEA's executive committee.

The AEA has considered adopting ethical guidelines in the past, but decided against it on the grounds that they would not be enforceable. Other than academic journals it publishes, the association exercises no real authority over economists' professional lives, said Harvard economist Lawrence Katz.

"I think the AEA can play a leadership role, but I don't think it can moderate people in any way," he said. That will be a role that the universities that employ the economists will have to take, he added.

Write to Justin Lahart at [email protected] and Mark Whitehouse at [email protected]

If you've not seen the film yet, I commend it to your attention.  But you're probably going to have to live in a town with an independent film house to see it in a theater.  Interestingly, it is being distributed by Sony Classics.  Spend a bit of time exploring the website, at http://www.sonyclassics.com/insidejob/

It contains priceless scenes of people -- academic economists, including the deans of prestigious universities, who have made awesome sums from private "industry" -- who couldn't imagine ever being embarrassed by anyone for lending their prestige and the prestige of their institutions, including Columbia University -- starting to "get it" that perhaps some ordinary Americans might feel they'd done something wrong, and had reaped huge bonuses from the folks who screwed the ordinary folks.

Watch it, too, for Eliot Spitzer's interviews; they turn out to be eloquent and telling, not about Spitzer but about Wall Street. 

Even the music is well chosen!

IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1645089/
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inside_Job_%28film%29

I wonder what, if anything, the current AEA code of ethics says.

1915 Commission's report and 2011's scenario

The issue of whether and how we ought to tax large fortunes upon the death of the second-to-die of a wealth-holding couple seems to have gone away recently, but this report to the federal government in 1915 ("Final Report of the Commission on Industrial Relations") from a Commission created by a 1912 Act of Congress, provides some interesting and timely reading nearly 100 years later -- and not just for questions related to the estate tax, but for economic justice and stability in general.   Those who have seen the film "Inside Job" will also find some interesting items below.    (While initially I wanted to share the David Lloyd-George quote, the length of this post grew some: it was difficult to pick starting and ending points.  This starts on page 23.)

This sense of tension and impending danger has been expressed by numerous witnesses before the Commission, but by none more forcibly than by Mr. Daniel Guggenheim, a capitalist whose interests in mines and industrial plants extend to every part of the country.

Chairman Walsh. What do you think has been accomplished by the philanthropic activities of the country in reducing suffering and want among the people?

Mr. Guggenheim. There has a great deal been done. If it were not for what has been done and what is being done we would have revolution in this country.

The sources from which this unrest springs are, when stated in full detail, almost numberless. But upon careful analysis of their real character they will be found to group themselves almost without exception under four main sources which include all the others. These four are:

1. Unjust distribution of wealth and income.
2. Unemployment and denial of an opportunity to earn a living.
3. Denial of justice in the creation, in the adjudication, and in the administration of law.
4. Denial of the right and opportunity to form effective organizations.

1. Unjust Distribution of Wealth and Income.

The conviction that the wealth of the country and the income which is produced through the toil of the workers is distributed without regard to any standard of justice, is as widespread as it is deep-seated. It is found among all classes of workers and takes every form from the dumb resentment of the day laborer, who, at the end of a week's back-breaking toil, finds that he has less than enough to feed his family while others who have done nothing live in ease, to the elaborate philosophy of the "soap-box orator," who can quote statistics unendingly to demonstrate his contentions. At bottom, though, there is the one fundamental, controlling idea that income should be received for service and for service only, whereas, in fact, it bears no such relation, and he who serves least, or not at all, may receive most.

This idea has never been expressed more clearly than in the testimony of Mr. John H. Walker, President of the Illinois State Federation of Labor:

A working man is not supposed to ask anything more than a fair day's wage for a fair day's work; he is supposed to work until he is pretty fairly tuckered out, say eight hours, and when he does a fair day's work he is not supposed to ask for any more wages than enough to support his family, while with the business man the amount of labor furnishes no criterion for the amount they receive. People accept it as all right if they do not do any work at all, and accept it as all right that they get as much money as they can; in fact, they are given credit for getting the greatest amount of money with the least amount of work; and those things that are being accepted by the other side as the things that govern in everyday life, and as being right, have brought about this condition, this being in my judgment absolutely unfair; that is, on the merits of the proposition in dealing with the workers.

The workers feel this, some unconsciously and some consciously, but all of them feel it, and it makes for unrest, in my judgment, and there can be no peace while that condition obtains.

In the highest paid occupations among wage earners, such as railroad engineers and conductors, glass-blowers, certain steel-mill employees, and a few of the building trades, the incomes will range from $1,500 to $2,000 at best, ignoring a few exceptional men who are paid for personal qualities. Such an income means, under present-day conditions, a fair living for a family of moderate size, education of the children through high school, a small insurance policy, a bit put by for a rainy day — and nothing more. With unusual responsibilities or misfortunes, it is too little, and the pinch of necessity is keenly felt. To attain such wages, moreover, means that the worker must be far above the average, either in skill, physical strength, or reliability. He must also have served an apprenticeship equal in length to a professional course. Finally, and most important, he or his predecessors in the trade must have waged a long, aggressive fight for better wages, for there are other occupations whose demand for skill, strength and reliability are almost as great as those mentioned, where the wages are very much less.

These occupations, however, include but a handful compared to the mass of the workers. "What do the millions get for their toil, for their skill, for the risk of life and limb? That is the question to be faced in an industrial nation, for these millions are the backbone and sinew of the State, in peace or in war.

First, with regard to the adult workmen, the fathers and potential fathers, from whose earnings, according to the "American standard," the support of the family is supposed to be derived.

Between one-fourth and one-third of the male workers 18 years of age and over, in factories and mines, earn less than $10 per week; from two-thirds to three-fourths earn less than $15, and only about one-tenth earn more than $20 a week. This does not take into consideration lost working time for any cause.

Next are the women, the most portentously growing factor in the labor force, whose wages are important, not only for their own support or as the supplement of the meager earnings of their fathers and husbands, but because, through the force of competition in a rapidly extending field, they threaten the whole basis of the wage scale. From two-thirds to three-fourths of the women workers in factories, stores and laundries, and in industrial occupations generally, work at wages of less than $8 a week. Approximately one-fifth earn less than $4 and nearly one-half earn less than $6 a week.

Six dollars a week — what does it mean to many? Three theater tickets, gasoline for the week, or the price of a dinner for two; a pair of shoes, three pairs of gloves, or the cost of an evening at bridge. To the girl it means that every penny mnst be counted, every normal desire stifled, and each basic necessity of life barely satisfied by the sacrifice of some other necessity. If more food must be had than is given with 15 cent dinners, it must be bought with what should go for clothes; if there is need for a new waist to replace the old one at which the forewoman has glanced reproachfully or at which the girls have giggled, there can be no lunches for a week and dinners must cost five cents less each day. Always too the room must be paid for, and back of it lies the certainty that with slack seasons will come lay-offs and discharges. If the breaking point has come and she must have some amusement, where can it come from? Surely not out of $6 a week.

Last of all are the children, for whose petty addition to the stream of production the Nation is paying a heavy toll in ignorance, deformity of body or mind, and permature old age. After all, does it matter much what they are paid? for all experience has shown that in the end the father 's wages are reduced by about the amount that the children earn. This is the so-called "family wage," and examination of the wages in different industries corroborates the theory that in those industries, such as textiles, where women and children can be largely utilized, the wages of men are extremely low.

The competitive effect of the employment of women and children upon the wages of men, can scarcely be overestimated. Surely it is hard enough to be forced to put children to work, without having to see the wages of men held down by their employment.

This is the condition at one end of the social scale. What is at the other?

Massed in millions, at the other end of the social scale, are fortunes of a size never before dreamed of, whose very owners do not know the extent nor, without the aid of an intelligent clerk, even the sources, of their incomes. Incapable of being spent in any legitimate manner, these fortunes are burdens, which can only be squandered, hoarded, put into so-called "benefactions" which for the most part constitute a menace to the State, or put back into the industrial machine to pile up everincreasing mountains of gold. *

In many cases, no doubt, these huge fortunes have come in whole or in part as the rich reward of exceptional service. None would deny or envy him who has performed such service the richest of rewards, although one may question the ideals of a nation which rewards exceptional service only by burdensome fortunes. But such reward can be claimed as a right only by those who have performed service, not by those who through relationship or mere parasitism chance to be designated as heirs. Legal right, of course, they have by virtue of the law of inheritance, which, however, runs counter to the whole theory of American society and which was adopted, with important variations, from the English law, without any conception of its ultimate results and apparently with the idea that it would prevent exactly the condition which has arisen. In effect the American law of inheritance is as efficient for the establishment and maintenance of families as is the English law, which has bulwarked the British aristocracy through the centuries. Every year, indeed, sees this tendency increase, as the creation of "estates in trust" secures the ends which might be more simply reached if there were no prohibition of "entail." According to the income tax returns for ten months of 1914, there are in the United States 1598 fortunes yielding an income of $100,000 or more per year. Practically all of these fortunes are so invested and hedged about with restrictions upon expenditure that they are, to all intents and purposes, perpetuities.

An analysis of 50 of the largest American fortunes shows that nearly one-half have already passed to the control of heirs or to trustees (their vice regents) and that the remainder will pass to the control of heirs within twenty years, upon the deaths of the "founders." Already, indeed, these founders have almost without exception retired from active service, leaving the management ostensibly to their heirs but actually to executive officials upon salary.

We have, according to the income tax returns, forty-four families with incomes of $1,000,000 or more,1 whose members perform little or no useful service, but whose aggregate incomes, totalling at the very least fifty millions per year, are equivalent to the earnings of 100,000 wage earners at the average rate of $500.

1 — The income tax statistics, as a matter of fact, cover only a period of ten months in 1914.

The ownership of wealth in the United States has become concentrated to a degree which is difficult to grasp. The recently published researches of a statistician of conservative views 2 have shown that as nearly as can be estimated the distribution of wealth in the United States is as follows:

2 — Prof. Willard I. King, The Wealth and Income of the People of the United States.

• The "Rich," 2 percent of the people, own 60 percent of the wealth.
• The "Middle Class," 33 percent of the people, own 35 percent of the wealth.
• The "Poor," 65 percent of the people, own 5 percent of the wealth.

This means in brief that a little less than two million people, who would make up a city smaller than Chicago, own 20 percent more of the Nation 's wealth than all the other ninety millions.

The figures also show that with a reasonably equitable division of wealth, the entire population should occupy the position of comfort and security which we characterize as Middle Class.

The actual concentration has, however, been carried very much further than these figures indicate. The largest private fortune in the United States, estimated at one billion dollars, is equivalent to the aggregate wealth of 2,500,000 of those who are classed as "poor," who are shown in the studies cited to own on the average about $400 each.

Between the two extremes of superfluity and poverty is the large middle class — farmers, manufacturers, merchants, professional men, skilled artisans, and salaried officials — whose incomes are more or less adequate for their legitimate needs and desires, and who are rewarded more or less exactly in proportion to service. They have problems to meet in adjusting expenses to income, but the pinch of want and hunger is not felt, nor is there the deadening, devitalizing effect of superfluous, unearned wealth.

From top to bottom of society, however, in all grades of incomes, are an innumerable number of parasites of every conceivable type. They perform no useful service, but drain off from the income of the producers a sum whose total can not be estimated.

This whole situation has never been more accurately described than by Hon. David Lloyd-George in an address on "Social Waste":

I have recently had to pay some attention to the affairs of the Sudan, in connection with some projects that have been mooted for irrigation and development in that wonderful country. I will tell you what the problem is, — you may know it already. Here you have a great, broad, rich river upon which both the Sudan and Egypt depend for their fertility. There is enough water in it to fertilize every part of both countries; but if, for some reason or other, the water is wasted in the upper regions, the whole land suffers sterility and famine. There is a large region in the Upper Sudan, where the water has been absorbed by one tract of country, which, by this process, has been converted into a morass, breeding nothing but pestilence. Properly and fairly husbanded, distributed, and used, there is enough to fertilize the most barren valley and make the whole wilderness blossom like the rose.

That represents the problem of civilization, not merely in this country but in all lands. Some men get their fair share of wealth in a land and no more — sometimes even the streams of wealth overflow to waste over some favored regions, often producing a morass, which poisons the social atmosphere. Many have to depend on a little trickling runlet, which quickly evaporates with every commercial or industrial drought; sometimes you have masses of men and women whom the flood at its height barely reaches, and then you witness parched specimens of humanity, withered, hardened in misery, living in a desert where even the well of tears has long ago run dry.

Besides the economic significance of these great inequalities of wealth and income, there is a social aspect which equally merits the attention of Congress. It has been shown that the great fortunes of those who have profited by the enormous expansion of American industry have already passed, or will pass in a few years, by right of inheritance to the control of heirs or to trustees who act as their "vice regents." They are frequently styled by our newspapers "monarchs of industry," and indeed occupy within our Republic a position almost exactly analogous to that of feudal lords.

These heirs, owners only by virtue of the accident of birth, control the livelihood and have the power to dictate the happiness of more human beings than populated England in the Middle Ages. Their principalities, it is true, are scattered and, through the medium of stock-ownership, shared in part with others; but they are none the less real. In fact, such scattered, invisible industrial principalities are a greater menace to the welfare of the Nation than would be equal power consolidated into numerous petty kingdoms in different parts of the country. They might then be visualized and guarded against; now their influence invisibly permeates and controls every phase of life and industry.

"The king can do no wrong" not only because he is above the law, but because every function is performed or responsibility assumed by his ministers and agents. Similarly our Rockefellers, Morgans, Fricks, Vanderbilts and Astors can do no industrial wrong, because all effective action and direct responsibility is shifted from them to the executive officials who manage American industry. As a basis for this conclusion we have the testimony of many, among which, however, the following statements stand out most clearly:

Mr. John D. Rockefeller, Jr.: 1

1 — Before Congressional Investigating Committee.

..." those of us who are in charge there elect the ablest and most upright and competent men whom we can find, in so far as our interests give us the opportunity to select, to have the responsibility for the conduct of the business in which we are interested as investors. We can not pretend to follow the business ourselves.

Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan.

Chairman Walsh. In your opinion, to what extent are the directors of corporations responsible for the labor conditions existing in the industries in which they are the directing power?

Mr. Morgan. Not at all I should say.

The similitude, indeed, runs even to mental attitude and phrase. Compare these two statements:

Mr. John D. Rockefeller, Jr.
My appreciation of the conditions surrounding wage-earners and my sympathy with every endeavor to better these conditions are as strong as those of any man.

Louis XVI.
There is none but you and me that has the people 's interest at heart. ("II n'y a que vous et moi qui aimions le peuple.")

The families of these industrial princes are already well established and are knit together not only by commercial alliances but by a network of intermarriages which assures harmonious action whenever their common interest is threatened.

Effective action by Congress is required, therefore, not only to readjust on a basis of compensation approximating the service actually performed, the existing inequalities in the distribution of wealth and income, but to check the growth of an hereditary aristocracy, which is foreign to every conception of American Government and menacing to the welfare of the people and the existence of the Nation as a democracy.

The objects to be attained in making this readjustment are: To reduce the swollen, unearned fortunes of those who have a superfluity; to raise the underpaid masses to a level of decent and comfortable living; and at the same time to accomplish this on a basis which will, in some measure, approximate the just standard of income proportional to service.

The discussion of how this can best be accomplished forms the greater part of the remainder of this report, but at this point it seems proper to indicate one of the most immediate steps which need to be taken.

It is suggested that the Commission recommend to Congress the enactment of an inheritance tax, so graded that, while making generous provision for the support of dependents and the education of minor children, it shall leave no large accumulation of wealth to pass into hands which had no share in its production. 1 The revenue from this tax, which we are informed would be very great, should be reserved by the Federal Government for three principal purposes:

1— It is suggested that the rates be so graded that not more than one million dollars shall pass to the heirs. This can be equitably accomplished by several different gradations of taxation.

1. The extension of education.

2. The development of other important social services which should properly be performed by the Nation, which are discussed in detail elsewhere.

3. The development, in cooperation with States and municipalities, of great constructive works, such as road building, irrigation and reforestation, which would materially increase the efficiency and welfare of the entire Nation.

We are informed by counsel not only that such a tax is clearly within the power of Congress, but that upon two occasions, namely, during the Civil War and in 1898, such graded inheritance taxes were enacted with scarcely any opposition and were sustained by the Supreme Court, which held that the inheritance tax was not a direct tax within the meaning of the Constitution. We are aware that similar taxes are levied in the various States, but the conflict with such State taxes seems to have presented little difficulty during the period in which the tax of 1898 was in effect. Under any circumstances this need cause no great complication, as the matter could be readily adjusted by having the Federal Government collect the entire tax and refund a part to the States on an equitable basis.

There is no legislation which could be passed by Congress the immediate and ultimate efforts of which would be more salutary or would more greatly assist in tempering the existing spirit of unrest.

2. Unemployment and Denial of Opportunity to Earn a Living.

As a prime cause of a burning resentment and a rising feeling of unrest among the workers, unemployment and the denial of an opportunity to earn a living is on a parity with the unjust distribution of wealth. They may on final analysis prove to be simply the two sides of the same shield, but that is a matter which need not be discussed at this point. They differ in this, however, that while unjust distribution of wealth is a matter of degree, unemployment is an absolute actuality, from which there is no relief but soul-killing crime and soul-killing charity.

To be forced to accept employment on conditions which are insufficient to maintain a decent livelihood is indeed a hardship, but to be unable to get work on any terms whatever is a position of black despair.

A careful analysis of all available statistics shows that in our great basic industries the workers are unemployed for an average of at least one-fifth of the year, and that at all times during any normal year there is an army of men, who can be numbered only by hundreds of thousands, who are unable to find work or who have so far degenerated that they can not or will not work. Can any nation boast of industrial efficiency when the workers, the source of her productive wealth, are employed to so small a fraction of their total capacity?

Fundamentally this unemployment seems to rise from two great causes, although many others are contributory. First, the inequality of the distribution of income, which leaves the great masses of the population (the true ultimate consumers) unable to purchase the products of industry which they create, while a few have such a superfluity that it can not be normally consumed but must be invested in new machinery for production or in the further monopolization of land and natural resources. The result is that in mining and other basic industries we have an equipment in plant and developed property far in excess of the demands of any normal year, the excess being, in all probability, at least 25 percent. Each of these mines and industrial plants keeps around it a labor force which, on the average, can get work for only four-fifths of the year, while at the same time the people have never had enough of the products of those very industries — have never been adequately fed, clothed, housed, nor warmed — for the very simple reason that they have never been paid enough to permit their purchase.

The second principal cause lies in the denial of access to land and natural resources even when they are unused and unproductive, except at a price and under conditions which are practically prohibitive. This situation, while bound up with the land and taxation policies of our States and Nation, also rests fundamentally upon the unjust distribution of wealth. Land or mineral resources in the hands of persons of average income must and will be used either by their original owners or by some more enterprising person. By the overwhelming forces of economic pressure, taxation, and competition they can not be permitted to lie idle if they will produce anything which the people need. Only in the hands of large owners — free from economic pressure, able to evade or minimize the effects of taxation and to await the ripening of the fruits of unearned increment — can land be held out of use if its products are needed.

There can be no more complete evidence of the truth of this statement than the condition of the farms of 1000 acres and over, which, valued at two and one-third billion dollars, comprise 19 percent of all the farm land of the country and are held by less than one percent of the farm owners. The United States Census returns show that in these 1000-acre farms only 18.7 percent of the land is cultivated as compared with 60 to 70 percent in farms of from 50 to 499 acres. Furthermore, it is well known that the greater part of these smaller farms which are left uncultivated are held by real estate men, bankers and others who have independent sources of income. More than four-fifths of the area of the large holdings is being held out of active use by their 50,000 owners, while 2,250,000 farmers are struggling for a bare existence on farms of less than 50 acres, and an untold number who would willingly work these lands are swelling the armies of the unemployed in the cities and towns.

A basic theory of our Government, which found expression in the Homestead Acts, was that every man should have opportunity to secure land enough to support a family. If this theory had been carried out and homesteads had either gone to those who would use them productively or remained in the hands of the Government, we should not yet have a problem of such a character. But these acts were evaded; land was stolen outright by wholesale, and fraudulent entries were consolidated into enormous tracts which are now held by wealthy individuals and corporations.

The Public Lands Commission, after an exhaustive inquiry, reported in 1905:

Detailed study of the practical operation of the present land laws shows that their tendency far too often is to bring about land monopoly rather than to multiply small holdings by actual settlers.

. . .  Not infrequently their effect is to put a premium on perjury and dishonest methods in the acquisition of land. It is apparent, in consequence, that in very many localities, and perhaps in general, a larger proportion of the public land is passing into the hands of speculators than into those of actual settlers making homes. . . . Nearly everywhere the large landowner has succeeded in monopolizing the best tracts, whether of timber or agricultural land. 1

1 — Senate Doc. 154, 58th Cong., 3d Sess., p. 14.

To one who has not read the preceding statements carefully, there may seem to be a contradiction in proposing to prevent great capitalists from creating an excess of productive machinery and overdeveloping mineral resources, while pointing out the necessity of forcing land and other natural resources into full and effective use by the people. The two propositions are, as a matter of fact, as fundamentally distinct as monopoly and freedom. The capitalist increases his holdings in productive machinery and resources only because through monopolization and maintenance of prices he hopes to reap rewards for himself or increase his power, while the aim in desiring the full development of land and other resources by the people is that they, producing for themselves, may enjoy a sufficiency of good things and exchange them for the products of others, and thus reduce to a minimum the condition of unemployment.

There are, of course, many other causes of unemployment than the inequality of wealth and the monopolization of land which there is no desire to minimize. Chief among these are immigration, the inadequate organization of the labor market, the seasonal character of many industries, and the personal deficiencies of a very large number of the unemployed. It can not be denied that a considerable proportion of the men who fill the city lodging houses in winter are virtually unemployables, as a result of weakness of character, lack of training, the debasing effects of lodging house living and city dissipation, and, last but not least, the conditions under which they are forced to work in the harvest fields and lumber, railroad and construction camps. The seasonal fluctuations of our industries are enormous, employing hundreds of thousands during the busy season and throwing them out on the community during the dull season, and almost nothing has been done to remedy this condition. It would be difficult to imagine anything more chaotic and demoralizing than the existing methods of bringing workmen and jobs together. Certain measures for dealing with these conditions, which are discussed elsewhere in the report, need to be pushed forward with all possible vigor. But it may be confidently predicted that the unemployment situation will not be appreciably relieved until great advances have been made in the removal of the two prime causes — unjust distribution of wealth and monopolization of land and natural resources.

The most direct methods of dealing with the inequality of wealth have already been briefly discussed and will be considered elsewhere in the report. "With respect to the land question, however, the following basic suggestions are submitted:

1. Vigorous and unrelenting prosecution to regain all land, water power and mineral rights secured from the Government by fraud.

2. A general revision of our land laws, so as to apply to all future land grants the doctrine of "superior use," as in the case of water rights in California, and provision for forfeiture in case of actual nonuse. In its simplest form the doctrine of "superior use" implies merely that at the time of making the lease the purpose for which the land will be used must be taken into consideration, and the use which is of greatest social value shall be given preference.

3. The forcing of all unused land into use by making the tax on nonproductive land the same as on productive land of the same kind, and exempting all improvements.

Other measures for dealing with unemployment are discussed under that head on p. 181.

The unemployed have aptly been called "the shifting sands beneath the State." Surely there is no condition which more immediately demands the attention of Congress than that of unemployment, which is annually driving hundreds of thousands of otherwise productive citizens into poverty and bitter despair, sapping the very basis of our national efficiency and germinating the seeds of revolution.

 

So what would a similar Commission say today?

Great fortunes and the rest of us

We have no disposition to say anything about Andrew Carnegie's munificent benefactions. On the one hand there is nothing in this philanthropic spree of a modern Dives to call for commendation; and on the other, the expenditure by any man of what society concedes to be his own fortune, is a private matter outside the pale of criticism.

It is only when the question of how a millionaire ought to use his wealth is brought forward in connection with these charitable performances that the subject becomes one of public concern. Then it is of public concern only to the extent of justifying the retort that it is nobody's business but his own how any millionaire uses his wealth, provided he does not use it prejudicially to the rights of others.

The vital question is not how millionaires use their wealth, but how they get it. Not how they did get it, for what has happened has happened, and by-gones should be by-gones; but how they are getting it now.

Have they a hoard of goods formerly accumulated, from which they draw? Then their getting it hurts nobody.

Do they earn it as they go along? Then their getting it benefits everybody.

Or do they merely possess legal authority to levy continually upon the common earnings for their own enrichment? Then their getting it is a present and continuing wrong, which is of incalculable public concern.

-- From "The Public," March 23, 1901

 

One might be led to ask whether the FIRE sector is levying upon the earnings of the larger community a toll they don't actually rightly earn.

Movements for improving the condition of the unemployed

From "The Public" of March 30, 1901:

The dinner of the "Get-Together Club," which was attended on the 25th at Madison Square garden concert hall, New York city, by 500 people, who listened sympathetically to patronizing speeches from rich men on "movements for improving the condition of the employed," recalls Tolstoi's famous saying about the rich classes being so tender in their sympathies that they are willing to do anything for the poor— except get off their backs.

 

Our System of Taxation

Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart would have fun with the names in this one ...

from The Public, of March 16, 1901:

OUR SYSTEM OF TAXATION.

Old Sam Head made his millions running department stores. His method was simple. He would buy a building or take a long lease in the best part of a town. Then he would divide it up, allotting the front to fancy goods, the center to dry goods and the rear to groceries. He would entice merchants to hire of him sections of the store. He furnished light, heat, elevator service, detectives, caretakers for the building and cleaners for the aisles. For the best situations he charged the highest price, but being a good natured fellow, he gave a peanut man the privilege, for nothing, to sell his wares on the sidewalk.

One day he suddenly disappeared, and the boys took up the business. Wood Head, who was an observing fellow, took a point from the ways our cities are run and reversed the old man's methods. He charged a fee for bringing goods into the store and appointed officers who received the dues as they passed the door. Some of these fees were on the value of the goods, and some of them a fixed price for each article. He argued that, although this required a considerable number of officials, the customers who purchased goods never noticed that there was such a change, and the income derived from it relieved the seller of the goods from a part of his fees for the ground rent.

In addition to this, it induced some of the storekeepers to start making manufactures of their own, which seemed to make a demand for floor space; yet somehow, the receipts fell off and the store did not seem to be prospering.

Another brother, Bill Head, said the best thing to do would be to charge every customer who came to do business a fee based upon his estimated income. Customers seemed to object to this, and would never give their incomes correctly. They were dishonest. But Bill insisted that the principle was a just and fair one. He said "they pay according to their abilities."

Dick Head said he believed in internal revenue, and instituted a tax on all corsets worn in the store. He said corsets were injurious, anyhow. This tax was constantly evaded, however, by unscrupulous women, who said they wore only waists. The young men especially objected to being examined as to whether they wore corsets. Sharp Head, who was a far-sighted sort of chap, seeing that his brother's plans were not working as well as they might, and that a change in the management was bound to come, induced them to give him a lease (which he duly recorded) of the elevators, and charged everybody for going up or down. He put in an improved elevator, and pointed out to the firm what a public service he had done.

Big Head, taking a point from him, got a similar franchise for supplying light, and as he had not the capital to put in the electric lights that were needed, he got an agreement out of the concern that they would give him bonds for an amount sufficient to cover the actual cost of putting in an electric light plant, and he should charge a moderate fee for the service.

The custom of the store, however, seemed to be dwindling, and it was necessary to devise some new methods of raising revenue. A conference of the brothers decided that a proper source would be a small charge for the water in the drinking fonts and the lavatories. By a happy inspiration, the firm also sold outright the exclusive privilege of supplying heat to the building, for which every storekeeper had to pay in accordance with the amount of floor space he occupied. This brought in a large sum which kept the firm going for some time. Nevertheless, the business declined.

Wood Head now admitted that his tariff on goods coming in was not working well, as it did not bring enough revenue. He claimed that it had done its work by establishing industries, and that it would now be well to establish licenses to do business. He urged that those departments which sold soda water and other things that people did not need, ought to pay for the privilege; that if customers did not wish to be taxed, they should not buy these things.

Bill Head stuck to his income tax; but as it was very difficult to collect, he consented to modify it so that only the merchant should pay it. On these, however, he made them swear to the amount of their profits, or rather for the most part, swear that there were none.

Wood Head said that, in his opinion, Sharp and Big were making all the money that was in the business, and that the wise thing would be to charge them a fee for the privilege they had.

These plans, however, were of no avail, and the brothers despairingly concluded that there could be no natural and scientific plan of taxation. and made an assignment. —Bolton Hall, in Johnstown (Pa.) Democrat.

The New Nobility

"So long as individuals and private corporations have the power to monopolize natural resources or public utilities they will be the masters of all who do not share in the monopoly. The coal barons, the railway kings, the steel magnates and the whole piratical fraternity of multi-millionaires all subsist, like the regal plunderers of Europe, upon the fruits of privilege. They are an untitled nobility. The sunshine scintillates upon their gilded palaces in every great city of our land; but in the same cities there are dens of squalid misery and want, where sunbeams never penetrate, and where no kindly ray dispels the darkness of despair that lurks within."

In the 21st century, it is the owners of our privately held businesses and of corporate stock who fill this role.  See "stock ownership" in the topics at left for more detail.    And those who have studied the classical economists will recognize that natural resources fall into the category known as "Land."

The cited paragraph is an excerpt from a longer letter in "The Public" of June 9, 1900.  It seems particularly timely given the reading aloud the U.S. Constitution in the House of Representatives, upon opening the new session of Congress today.

THE NEW NOBILITY.

The constitution of the United States provides, in article 1, section 9, that—

no title of nobility shall be granted by the United States.

Why not?

The "Federalist" does not tell us, and there is little said of it in the constitutional debates. Some of the members, indeed, spoke of creating a peerage, but said that such a thing could not be thought of, because of the deep-seated prejudice prevailing against a hereditary nobility. According to Yates's Minutes, Charles Pinckney said:

There is more equality of rank and fortune in America than in any other country under the sun; and this is likely to continue as long as the unappropriated western lands remain unsettled.

This statesman must have believed as Thomas Carlyle did, when in "Past, and Present," book III., chapter 8, that great Englishman wrote:

It is well said, "Land is the right basis of an Aristocracy;" whoever possesses the Land, he, more emphatically than any other, is Governor, Vice-King of the people.

Conversely stated, Mr. Pinckney's proposition is that with the valuable free lands of the west all taken, there would be danger of a constantly increasing tenant class, keeping pace with the growth of land monopoly and resulting finally in a landed aristocracy on the one hand and complete serfdom on the other; for population must increase, while the area of land cannot. But in view of the vast area of unoccupied land in the west at that time, its complete settlement seemed so remote a contingency that it was scarcely dreamed of by the members of the convention, and had no weight in their deliberations.

They thought it advisable, nevertheless, to put in a clause against the granting of titles of nobility. That clause was a part of the Virginia resolutions. By inserting it, the framers of our constitution showed their aversion to privilege, and their determination that whether privilege existed or or not the government should confer upon its possessors no honorary distinction. But by the use of that phrase they no more rendered their country exempt from the evils of a hereditary aristocracy than they would have made inocuous the serpent's venom by enacting that all snakes shall be called humming-birds. A title is but a name— the rank is but the guinea's stamp.

Privilege does not depend for its existence upon honorary distinctions. Mere titles do not create privilege, although privilege does ultimately create titles. Titles of nobility are but the emblems of the power behind them. Thy are dangerous only because of the "nobility" which they imply. It is not the duke who is dangerous, but the dukedom—the social condition of which the duke is but a symptom. The real value of such a title is in the power which it represents.

Such power is always based upon privilege—upon rights accruing solely to the holder of the title, to the exclusion of others not so favored; in short, it is based upon monopoly. From time immemorial the granting of noble titles has, with few exceptions, been either in recognition of power already in possession, or else has been accompanied by a grant of power—usually a grant of lands— commensurate with the supposed dignity of the title.

So long as individuals and private corporations have the power to monopolize natural resources or public utilities they will be the masters of all who do not share in the monopoly. The coal barons, the railway kings, the steel magnates and the whole piratical fraternity of multi-millionaires all subsist, like the regal plunderers of Europe, upon the fruits of privilege. They are an untitled nobility. The sunshine scintillates upon their gilded palaces in every great city of our land; but in the same cities there are dens of squalid misery and want, where sunbeams never penetrate, and where no kindly ray dispels the darkness of despair that lurks within.

According to Charles B. Spahr, Ph. D., author of a treatise on Distribution of Wealth, one percent of our families own more wealth than do the whole of the remaining 99 percent! Now, who are the favored one percent? Men like John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie; men who own more than any individual could produce in a dozen centuries.

And are they not princes, lords, kings? They have no titles, to be sure. But what could a paltry title add to the man who controls, for instance, the oil-producing lands of the United States? They have no coronets, but they possess that without which the coronet is but a barbaric bauble. The man who bows to the throne really makes his obeisance to the power behind the throne. The king's word, the king's name, is but "as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal;" the king's power is everything. Crowns, scepters, robes of ermine and cloth of gold—all these are nothing; nothing but hated symbols. If the kingly power remain, what boots it though we lack the kingly name? A king by any other name is just as bad. The powerful Earl Warwick, known to history as "the king-maker," was no more a king-maker than one Marcus A. Hanna, of Ohio; and if Hanna really wore the crown which he sometimes wears in the newspaper caricatures he would be no more dangerous than he is today. And what makes him dangerous? The privileges which he and his kind possess.

The real groundwork of an aristocracy is not in the unequal distribution of wealth. It lies farther back than that. We must seek it in the causes which lead to unequal distribution. It is in the inequality of opportunity to produce wealth. Equality of opportunity begets equality of condition. Whether you restrict the opportunities of one class, or grant special privileges to another, it matters not; the result is the same., and that result is seen in the class distinctions which inevitably follow in the wake of privilege.

As there may be serfs without shackles, so may there be nobles without titles. We have both in America today. The thing which our fathers greatly feared has come upon us. We are face to face with as great a crisis as ever threatened any republic since Rome first trembled at the glance of Caesar. The final struggle may not come this year, nor next, but it will come; and when it does, the American people will exclaim, in the words of the immortal Frenchman, "Tyrant, step from thy throne and give place to thy master!"

The ballot is the bloodless guillotine of the new revolution. It is a weapon mightier than the bayonet if used in time. Let us use it while it is still at our disposal. Put a true man in the white house, and the work of reform will be more easily accomplished. Inasmuch as the barons of the United States today, unlike those at Runnymede 800 years ago, are seeking special privileges for themselves instead of magna chartas for the people, it should be our first duty to remove from the presidency of this nation one whose instability of character and inordinate love of powerequaled only by his incapacity to exert it—mark him with peculiar distinctness in these respects as the American ectype of King John.

Are Large Fortunes Legitimate?

The numbers may have changed a bit since 1900, when this appeared in "The Public" (of June 9) -- when a typical worker earned $1,000 a year -- but the point of this piece is worth our time today:

So conservative a man as Walter S. Logan, prominent at the New York city bar and but recently president of the New York State Bar association, is preaching a gospel of wealth limitation. He would start with a maximum of $10,000,000 and hold the possessions of individuals down to that amount by means of graduated income taxes and restrictions upon inheritances. The large public revenues resulting he would expend in the acquisition by the state of those franchises which, as he describes them, "have done so much to enrich its citizens at its expense." He suggests, for example, that New York state might buy and operate the New York Central railroad, while New York city might establish public ice plants and furnish ice to the people at nominal prices.

It is encouraging to find a man of Mr. Logan's professional, business and social environment exhibiting contempt for wealth accumulation and accumulators. But it is not so encouraging to find him so indifferent to the elementary principles of wealth distribution. If Mr. Logan were cross-examined upon his reasons for proposing the confiscation of fortunes in excess of $10,000,000, he would probably justify himself morally by insisting that no one can earn so much. Any other moral justification would be impossible. For if any man should earn more than $10,000,000 the state would have no more moral right to confiscate the excess than the whole. Earnings either are sacred to the last penny, or they are not sacred at all. The instant, therefore, that you empower the state to confiscate any excess of private earnings, that very instant you justify the state in making a total confiscation.

Yet Mr. Logan is right in supposing that no man earns $10,000,000. He would be right if he put it at $1,000,000. For it would take a five-dollar-a-day man some 650 years, without allowing him anything for expenses, to earn and save $1,000,000; and it is beyond the range of probability that any man, however gigantic his productive power, can productively earn and fairly save in a lifetime as much as a five-dollar-a-day man could earn in 650 years. But we are confronted with the fact that there are millionaires. It must be, then, that they get enormously more than they earn. How do they get it? If they do not earn it, but are honest, they must get it by means of legal privileges of some kind. The obvious method, then, for limiting unearned fortunes is to abolish legal privileges. It is the natural and just way, too. If that were done, fortunes would be limited as nature limits them—by the earnings of their owners.

Few Fortunes Survive Three Generations?

"There is nothing to fear," says the complacent Robert Collyer, "from the multimillionaire." The reason for Mr. Collyer's confidence is his assumption that "few fortunes survive three generations." This assumption is a pleasant tradition, formerly phrased as "three generations from shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves;" but it has long since ceased to express a fact, since John Jacob Astor showed Americans how to establish fortunes they have become as stable in America as in England.

But even if the tradition were as true today as it was in the earlier periods of the settlement of this new country, what satisfaction could a thoughtful man draw from it?

The social evil is not great fortunes. It is great poverty among those who earn so much wealth that they do not get.

To them it can make no difference whether fortunes are stable or not.

The great, obtrusive, undeniable and invariable fact is that no matter who may be rich nor how long his fortune may remain intact, the mass of those who do the work of the world, and without whose work there would be fortunes for nobody, are permanently poor and dependent.

To borrow a suggestive illustration from the gambling table, what matters it to the many who never win if the few who do soon lose their winnings again?

-- from "The Public,"  June 9, 1900.

Observing the controversy: who is probably in the right of it?

Now, if you observe two men in controversy, and one of them keeps arguing: "We have no right to do that way; it is unjust, dishonest, wrong." And the other keeps arguing: "You're a liar! You're a copperhead! You're a traitor!" Which of these men do you presume to be right? And which do you fancy feels surest of his ground?

If you were a tourist from Mars and saw two great crowds of men debating a policy; and one crowd appealing to history, to reason, to liberty and justice and the eternal standards of right, even as against their own usual party; and the other side appealing to party spirit, and passion, and chances to make money and "glory"—which would you think was probably in the right of it?

—Charles F. Lummis, in the Land of Sunshine, quoted in "The Public," June 2, 1900.

A Convention Prayer

This seems relevant with a new Congress taking their seats.

From The Public, July 14, 1900

A CONVENTION PRAYER.

The prayer offered by Rev. Herbert S. Bigelow, of Cincinnati, at the opening of the silver republican convention, Kansas City, Mo., July 4.

Our Father who art in heaven. May thy spirit of truth preside over this convention. If we have any claim upon thy favor or any right to call thee Father may it be because we have not knowingly trampled upon the rights of any of thy children.

Hallowed be thy name. May the reverent heart find thy presence everywhere and seek to work in harmony with the mighty forces that make for righteousness and peace.

Thy kingdom come. May we speed its coming by making the acts of our legislatures accord with the eternal laws of that moral government which is supreme above the nations.

Thy will be done on earth as in heaven. May we prove the sincerity of our faith by practicing in senate chambers the lofty precepts which we profess in the sanctuary.

Give us this day our daily bread. We do not ask for the bread of others. Give us the bread that is ours by right of useful labor. May the claims of justice be satisfied in the laws of the land that all may have bread, that the starving millions may be fed, not by the hand of charity, but by the labor that wears no chains and owns no master.

Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Save us from that egotism which magnifies the faults of others while blinded to our own. Grant us, in the name of eternal justice, grant us only that measure of liberty which we accord to the weakest of our neighbors.

Lead us not into temptation. Grant us the moral courage to turn our back upon the alluring visions of the kingdoms of this world and their glory, remembering that righteousness alone exalteth a nation.

Deliver us from evil. Now, when the chains are being forged and the golden padlocks are being fashioned for our lips; now, when men are forgetting the faith of the fathers and putting their trust in the might of armies and the majesty of fleets; now, ere the choice goes by forever, deliver us from the greed that takes refuge in the sanction of law, save us from the thrice accursed murder that kills in the name of the Prince of Peace.

On this day of freedom's birth we consecrate our hearts anew to the liberty which our fathers purchased with so great a price. Before the sacred altar of our fathers' God we pledge renewed devotion to the principles which have made the flag we love an emblem of hope to the oppressed of all the world. On that solemn day which comes to men and nations, when the seeds of our sowing shall have borne fruit in national character and the destiny shall be revealed which our hands are shaping, forbid that we shall then have to point for justification to thrones and altars founded upon the bodies and souls of our fellowmen; standing before the tribunal of history may we be able to point with confidence to the fact that we have followed the golden rule of justice.

May we never covet the gold that drips with the tears of bondmen. May we never feel strong enough to do wrong. May we do justly and love mercy and walk humbly with our God, and to Him shall be the Kingdom and the power and the glory, forever.

Tolstoy Remains Snubbed in Russia

Tolstoy Remains Snubbed in Russia - NYTimes.com.

The article begins,

MOSCOW — A couple of months ago one of Russia’s elder statesmen set out on a paradoxical mission: to rehabilitate one of the most beloved figures in Russian history, Tolstoy.

This would have seemed unnecessary in 2010, a century after the author’s death. But last year Russians wrestled over Tolstoy much as they did when he was alive. Intellectuals accused the Russian Orthodox Church of blacklisting a national hero. The church accused Tolstoy of helping speed the rise of the Bolsheviks. The melodrama of his last days, when he fled his family estate to take up the life of an ascetic, was revived in all its pulpy detail, like some kind of early-stage reality television.

And in a country that rarely passes up a public celebration, the anniversary of his death, on Nov. 20, 1910, was not commemorated by noisy galas or government-financed cinematic blockbusters. Officially speaking, it was barely noted at all.

By coincidence, I am reading an account of the Single Tax Conference which was taking place in New York City at the time of his death:

Resolutions on the Death of Leo Tolstoi

Mr. Joseph Dana Miller offered the following resolutions on the death of Leo Tolstoi, which were seconded by Henry George, Jr., and adopted by a rising vote:

"Whereas, The news has arrived this morning of the death of Count Leo Tolstoi, we, the Single Taxers of America, send our sympathetic greeting to Countess Tolstoi; and

"Whereas, This foremost man of the world, whose teachings have made him famous in all lands, has repeatedly announced his belief in the doctrines of Henry George, for which we stand, and which we are engaged in popularizing in the United States; therefore, be it

"Resolved, That we deeply deplore the death of the Russian prophet and express our hope that the endorsement by this man, on whose soul rested so much of

" 'The burden and the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world,'

of those doctrines to which we are pledged, and his statement that he regarded Henry George as the greatest of Americans, may be the means of drawing attention to the plan of industrial emancipation to which he lent the weight of his splendid name."

Mr. Henry George, Jr., seconding the resolutions, said: "I take a solemn joy in seconding these resolutions. The last words of this great man addressed to me in parting at the time of my visit to him at Yasnaya Polyana were in relation to my father. He said that we should never meet again in this life, and that he would soon meet my father. He asked me what message he should bear to him. I gave him the message. I believe he is now with my father and giving him that message and the glad tidings of the movement that both of them worked for in this world.

"To me there is something peculiarly fitting in the place and manner of Tolstoi's death. It reminds me of that part of the Scripture that tells of Moses leaving his brethren and going to parts unknown to die alone. Proscribed by the church, proscribed by the government—an outcast, so to speak, in his own country—this man of eighty-two, old in years but young in spirit, sought to die apart from his family.

"To me there is something wonderfully illuminating in the attitude of Privilege as we see it reflected in the attempts of the hierarchy to bring him back into the fold of the church; that hierarchy that meant so much pain to the toilers of Russia; that sought to make the hewers of wood and the drawers of water contented with their lot, and offered them a reward in after life for what they are robbed of in this life. There was no more chance of Tolstoi's going back to that church in this life than there was of his seeking to go to perdition hereafter. That church meant an armed despotism to him for the souls and bodies of the men and women, not only of Russia, but of all Europe.

"To me Tolstoi was a prophet. I confess that in going to Russia I had a feeling that he was an eccentric man, and I had a fear that I should find him wrapped up with his genius—perhaps much of what is commonly called a 'crank.' But face to face I found a frail old man, yet an understandable man, a man of sweet and indomitable spirit, trying to live not as a beggar, but as one of the people whom Lincoln delighted to call the 'plain people.' For the people of Russia are, in the main, farmers who give most of their substance to support a great imperial government.

"I give the lie to all this talk of domestic infelicity, and I say that the domestic life, as I saw it at Yasnaya Polyana, was a great love. Tolstoi, at thirty-four, married a girl of seventeen, who bore him thirteen children. She stuck to him through thick and thin, through all his spiritual changes. She took care of the material side of life, and as I saw here, a little more than a year ago, a splendid woman of sixty-five, Tolstoi rested upon her. She was a sturdy supporter and a sweet comforter. I came away with the feeling that there was a real marriage.

"Of course, she had to look after the welfare of the family. That was why she expostulated with him about giving all to the poor. She said that he must not forget the children he had brought into the world. Therefore it was that he gave to her for herself and their children the copyrights of his earlier works and novels. But to the public he gave everything else that he wrote. On his later works you will find the words, "No Rights Reserved." This is why we have seen so much of Tolstoi's recent writings in the newspapers; why his latest writings have been translated into every language and circulated so largely throughout the world.

"Within the last few hours the greatest spirit in the world has passed—the spirit of a man who looked into the eyes of death calmly, fearlessly, with the confidence of a child. Old in the experiences of the world, born into great riches and station, and given to all the luxuries and dissipations of his class, of which he reserved nothing in his confessions, he was born again into the simpler physical and a new spiritual life. A great man; great in every sense of greatness; a man who left the court of princes to follow the man born in the manger.

"To me it was one of the great events of my life to have spent a few hours under his roof, and now his death is a new inspiration. For now all the contradictory things, the things not understandable, will fall away and the majesty of this prophet of brotherhood and justice will shine out. Great is Tolstoi, greater the truth he taught, and greater still will both become as the centuries roll on."

I am reminded that Bolton Hall wrote a book entitled "What Tolstoy Taught."  The final chapter is quoted here:

CHAPTER XII     HUMAN RIGHTS

(Tolstoy proclaimed the law of love as enunciated by Christ; the political rights as enunciated by Thomas Jefferson; the economic rights as announced by Henry George: the two latter as amplifications of the first; all being essential to man's earthly welfare. Tolstoy's philosophy was progressive. At first he saw that the law of love was necessary; then he recognized the necessity of equal political rights; next he recognized that without economic justice these remedies were futile, and he accordingly embraced the philosophy of Henry George, as evidenced by the following article addressed to the Russian people.— Ed.)

A Number of suggestions have been made as to how to divide, in the most just manner, all land among the workers, but of all these only the one made by the late Henry George appears to me to be practicable.

The property right, Henry George wrote in his book about the single tax, is founded not on human laws, but on the laws of God. It is undeniable and absolute, and everyone who violates It, be it an individual or a nation, commits a theft.

A man who catches a fish, who plants a tree, builds a house, constructs a machine, sews a dress or paints a picture, thereby becomes the owner of the results of his own efforts — he has the right to give them away, to sell them or to leave them to his heirs. As the land has not been created by us, and only serves as the temporary residence of changing generations of human beings, it is clear that nobody can own the exclusive right to possess land, and that the rights of all men to it are equal and inalienable.

The right to own land is limited by the equal rights of all others, and this imposes upon the temporary possessor of land the duty to remunerate society for the valuable privilege given him to use the land in his possession.

When we impose a tax upon houses, crops, or money in any form, we take from members of society something which by right belongs to them, we violate the property right and commit a theft in the name of the law; while when we impose a tax upon land we take from members of society something which does not belong to them, but to society, and which cannot be given to them except at a detriment to others. We thus violate the laws of justice when we place a tax on labor or the results of labor, and we also violate them if we do not levy a tax on land.

Let us, therefore, decide to stop levying all taxes except the tax on the value of land, regardless of the buildings erected or the improvements made on it, but only on the value which natural or social conditions give to it.

If we place this single tax on land the results will be these:

1. The tax will relieve us of the whole army of officials necessary to collect the present taxes, which will diminish the cost of government, at the same time making it more honest. It will rid us of all the taxes which lead to lying, to perjury, to frauds of all kinds. All land is visible, and cannot be hidden, and its value is fixed easier than that of any other property, and the single tax can be determined at less expense and less danger to public morals.

2. It will to a great extent increase the production of wealth, doing away with the discouraging tax upon labor and thrift, and it will make the land more accessible to those who want to work or improve, as the proprietors, who do not work themselves, but speculate in its increasing value, will find it difficult to keep up such expensive property. The tax on labor, on the other hand, leads to the accumulation of immense fortunes in a few hands, and the increasing poverty of the masses. This unjust division of wealth on one side leads to the creation of one class of people who are idle and corrupt, because they are too rich, and the creation of another class of people who are too poor, and thus doubly delays the production of wealth. This unjust division of wealth creates on one side terrible millionaires, and on the other side vagrants, beggars, thieves, gamblers and social parasites of various kinds, and necessitates an enormous expense for officials to watch these — policemen, judges, prisons and other means which society uses in self-defense.

The single tax is a remedy for all these evils.

I do not mean to say that this tax will transform human nature, for that is not within the power of man, but it will create conditions under which human nature will grow better instead of worse, as under the present conditions. It will make possible an increase of wealth, of which it is hardly possible to form an idea. It will make undeserved poverty impossible. It will do away with the demoralizing struggle for a living. It will make it possible for men to be honest, just, reasonable and noble, if they desire to be so. It will prepare the soil for the coming of the epoch of justice, abundance, peace and happiness, which Christ told His disciples of.

Let us suppose that in a certain place all land belongs to two owners — one very rich, who lives far away, and another, not rich, living and working at home — and to a hundred of small peasants owning a few acres each. Besides these, there live on that place some scores of people who own no land — mechanics, merchants, and officials.

Now let us suppose that the people of that community, having arrived at the conclusion that the land is common property, decide to dispose of the land according to their new conviction.

What would they do? Take all the land away from those who own it, and give everybody the right to take the land he desires? That could not be done, because there would be several people who would want the same ground, and this would lead to endless quarrels. To form one society and work all things in common would be difficult, because some have carts, wagons, horses and cattle, while others have none, and, besides, some people do not know how to till the soil, or are not strong enough.

To divide all the land in equal parts, according to its value, and allow one part to each is very difficult, and this would, besides, be impracticable, because the lazy and poor would lease their property to the rich for money, and these would soon again be in possession of it all.

The inhabitants of the community, therefore, decide to leave the land in the possession of those who own it, and to order each owner to pay into the common treasury money representing the revenue which had been decided on after appraising the value of the land, not according to the work or the improvements made on it, but to its quality and situation, and this money was to be divided equally among all.

But as it was difficult first to take this money from all those who held the land, and then divide it equally among all the members of the community, and as these members, besides, paid money toward the public needs — schools, fire departments, roads, etc.— and as this money was always needed, they decided to use all the money derived from those who had the use of the land, for public needs.

Having made this arrangement, the members of the community levied the tax for the use of land on the two large owners, and also on the small peasants, but no tax at all was imposed on those who held no land.

This caused the one landowner who lived far away, and who derived little income from his property, to realize that it did not pay to hold on to land thus taxed, and he gave it up. The other large owner gave up part of his land, and kept only that part which produced more than the amount of his tax. Those of the peasants who held small properties, and who had plenty of men, and not enough land, as well as some of those who held no land at all, but who desired to make a living by working the land, took up the land surrendered by its former owners.

After that all the members of the community could live on the land and make a living from it, and all land passed into the hands of or remained with those who loved to work it, and who made it produce the most. The public institutions flourished and the wealth of the community increased, for there was more money than before for public needs; and the most important fact was that this change in the ownership of land took place without any discussions, quarrels, or discord, by the voluntary surrender of the land by those who did not derive any profit from it.

This is the project of Henry George, which, if tried here, would make Russia wealthy and happy, and which is practicable all over the world.