[238] W. H. Mallock, Socialism.
[239] Above, p. 472.
CHAPTER XXV
UNSETTLED PROBLEMS IN THE ECONOMIC ORDER (Continued)
§ 4. THE THEORY OF PUBLIC AGENCY AND CONTROL
The various theories of public direction, including socialism in the technical sense, are primarily interested in the just distribution of goods. It is not so much "How many goods can be produced?" as "Who is to get them?" Individualism was chiefly concerned in increasing public wealth, assuming (in the case of the democratic individualists) that all would get the benefit. Socialism is more concerned that the producing persons shall not be sacrificed, and that each member shall benefit by the result. Public agency and control might assert itself (1) as a method of production, (2) as a method of distribution of goods and returns, (3) as a method of property. It is important to note at the outset that all civilized peoples have some degree of social direction in each of these fields. (1) Practically all peoples collect taxes, coin money, carry mails, protect life and property, and supply such elementary demands as those for water and drainage, through State or municipal agency instead of leaving it to private initiative. And in every one of the instances the work was formerly done privately. (2) Under distribution, all progressive peoples give education through the State. Further, the benefits of the mail service are distributed not in proportion to receipts, but on other principles based on social welfare. (3) As a method of property-holding, all civilized peoples hold certain goods for common use, and in the United States, after a period in which it has been the policy to distribute for little or no compensation public lands, public franchises, and public goods of all kinds, the public policy is now not only to retain large tracts for forest reserve, but to construct irrigation plants, and to provide public parks, playgrounds, and other forms of property to be used for common advantage. Just as the individualist does not necessarily carry his doctrine to the extreme of dispensing with all social agency, at least in the matters of public protection and public health, so the socialist does not necessarily wish to abolish private property or private enterprise. We have, then, to consider briefly the ethical aspects of public agency for production, public control over distribution, public holding of wealth.
§ 5. SOCIETY AS AGENCY OF PRODUCTION
The advantage claimed for society as an agent of production is not primarily greater efficiency, although it is claimed that the present method is enormously wasteful except where there already is private monopoly. Nor is it in the social service rendered by providing great variety of goods, and of the kinds most wanted. It is rather (1) that in the case of public service enterprises, such as transportation or lighting, fairness to the various shippers, localities, and other users can be secured only through public control or operation. These services are as indispensable to modern life as air or navigation. Only by public agency can discrimination be avoided. (2) That the prizes to be gained are here so enormous that bribery and corruption are inevitable under private management. (3) That the profits arising from the growth of the community belong to the community, and can only be secured if the community owns and operates such agencies of public service as transportation, communication, and in cities water supply and lighting. (4) That the method of individualistic production is reckless of child life and in general of the health of workmen. Great Britain is already fearing a deterioration in physical stature and capacity. (5) The motive of self-interest, relied upon and fostered by individualism, is anti-social. How can morality be expected to improve when the fundamental agency and method of business and industry is contradictory to morality? (6) More complete socialism maintains that, under modern capitalism, a disproportionate share is sure to fall to the capitalist, and, more than this, to the great capitalist. Modern production is complex and expensive. It requires an enormous plant; the capitalist, not the workman, has the tools, and can therefore charge what he pleases. The small capitalist cannot undertake competition with the great capitalist, for the latter can undersell him until he drives him from business, and can then recoup himself by greater gains. Hence the only way to secure fair distribution is through social ownership of the tools and materials for production.
Private Interests and Public Welfare.—Touching these points it may be said that the public conscience is rapidly coming to a decision upon the first five. (1) The public has been exploited, the officials of government have been bribed, and individual members of society discriminated against. The process of competition always involves væ victis, but the particular factor which makes this not only hard but unjust, is that in all these cases we have a quasi-public agency (monopoly, franchise, State-aided corporation) used to give private advantage. This must be remedied either by public ownership or public control, unless the ethics of the struggle for existence is accepted. The corruption which has prevailed under (2) must be met either by public ownership or control, or by so reducing the value of such franchises as to leave "nothing in it" for the "grafter" and his co-operators. Vice—gambling, excessive use of drugs and liquors, prostitution—is no doubt injurious to its victims, and when leagued with public officials and yielding enormous corruption funds to debauch politics, it is a public evil as well. But its victims are limited, and its appearance not attractive to the great majority. The exploitation and corruption practiced by the more generally successful and "respectable" members of society, is far more insidious and wide-reaching. It demoralizes not individuals only, but the standards of society. As to (3) there is no doubt as to the rights of the matter. Gains due to social growth should be socially shared, not appropriated by a few. The only question is as to the best method of securing these gains. European States and cities have gone much farther than the United States along the line of public agency, and, while there is still dispute as to the balance of advantage in certain cases, there is a growing sentiment that the more intelligent and upright the community, the more it can wisely undertake. The moral principle is that the public must have its due. Whether it pays certain agents a salary as its own officials, or a commission in the form of a moderate dividend, is not so important.[240] But to pay a man or a small group of promoters a million dollars to supply water or lighting or transportation, seems no more moral than to pay such a salary to a mayor or counsel or superintendent of schools. Taxpayers would probably denounce such salaries as robbery. Such franchises as have for the most part been given in American cities have been licenses to collect high taxes from the citizens for the benefit of a few, and do not differ in principle from paying excessive salaries, except as the element of risk enters. What is needed at present in the United States is a larger number of experiments in various methods of agency to see which type results in least corruption, fairest distribution, and best service.