This, then, is what the schoolmaster, with a relentless logic which appears to me to be irresistible, deduces from the principle of the national sovereignty.
From the principle of equality he deduces another point. "All men are equal by nature and before the law." That is to say, if there were justice, all men ought to have been equal by nature, and further, if there is to be justice, all men ought to be equal before the law.
Very obviously, however, all men are not equal before the law, and they are not equal by nature. Very well then, we must make them so.
They are not equal before the law. They appear to be so, but they are not. The rich man, even supposing that the magistrates are perfectly and strictly honest, by reason of the fact that he can remunerate the best solicitors, advocates, and witnesses, by reason further of the fact that he intimidates by his influence all those who could appear against him, is not in every respect the equal of the poor man before the law.
Even less does this equality exist in the presence of that union of constituted social forces which we call society. In this respect the rich man will be the "influential man"; the "man well connected," the man on whom no one depends, but whom no one likes to cross or to contradict. There is, between the rich and the poor man, however equal we may pretend them to be before the law, the difference between the man who gives orders and the man who is obliged to obey. Real equality, in society, in presence of society and even in presence of the law, only exists where there is neither rich nor poor.
But there will always be rich and poor, as long as the institution of inheritance remains. Abolish inheritance therefore!
But, even with inheritance abolished, there will still be rich and poor. The man who can make his fortune rapidly will be a strong man relatively to the man who can not make a fortune, and, I would have you note it, even when we have abolished inheritance, the son of the strong man, during the life of his father, will be strong himself, so that even if we abolish inheritance, a privilege, namely, the privilege of birth will still exist and equality will not exist.
There is only one state of affairs under which equality is possible, that is when no one possesses and no one can acquire anything. The only social policy so devised that no one can possess and no one can acquire anything is the policy of a community of goods, that is Communism or Collectivism. Collectivism is nothing very wonderful. Collectivism is equality; and equality is collectivism, otherwise our equality will be nothing but a phantom and an hypocrisy. Every one who is a convinced and sincere egalitarian, and who takes the trouble to think, is forced to be a collectivist. Bonald asked very wittily: "Do you know what is a deist? It is a man who has not lived long enough to be an atheist." We in our turn ask: "Do you know what is an anti-collectivist democrat? It is a man who has not lived long enough to be a collectivist, or who, having lived long enough, has never taken the trouble to think, and to perceive what are the necessary consequences of his own principles."
But surely collectivism is a chimæra, an utopia, a thing impossible. Certainly it is impossible in the sense that in the country which adopts it the source of all initiative will be destroyed. No man will make an effort to improve his position, since it must never be improved. The whole country will become one of those stagnant pools to which one of our ministers lately referred. Everyone having become an official, everyone will realise the ideal of the official which the Goncourts have very neatly described. "The good official," they say, "is the man who combines laziness with extreme accuracy." It is a definitive definition. The country that reformed itself in this way would be conquered at the end of ten years by some neighbouring people more or less ambitious.
That admits of no question; but what does it prove? That collectivism is only impossible because it is only possible if established in every country at once. Very well, and in order to establish it in every country at once, only one thing is needful, namely, that there shall no longer be distinct and separate countries and no longer any nationalities. It surely will not answer to establish collectivism before the abolition of nationalities, since, once established, it will serve no purpose except to bring into prominent relief the vast superiority of countries which have not adopted collectivism. We must, therefore, take our problems in order and abolish nationalities before we can establish collectivism.