“As the ‘expert’ comes to the front and ‘efficiency’ becomes the watchword of administration, all that was human in Socialism vanishes out of it. Its tenderness for the losers in the race, its protests against class tyranny, its revolt against commercial materialism,” all the sources of the Socialist doctrines are gone like a dream, and “instead we have the conception of society as a perfect piece of machinery pulled by wires radiating from a single centre, and all men and women are either ‘experts’ or puppets.”
It is thus that humanity, liberty and justice must vanish under Socialism, for the ultimate result, said Mr. Spencer (“A Plea for Liberty,” p. 26), “must be a society like that of ancient Peru ... in which the mass of the people, elaborately regimented in groups of 10, 50, 100, 500 and 1,000, ruled by officers of corresponding grades and tied to their districts, were superintended in their private lives as well as in their industries, and toiled hopelessly for the government organization.”
Not in practice alone, but in theory as well, the Socialist form of government is nothing short of absolute despotism. The very fact that the citizens of a nation—or of the world, should International Socialism become possible—are divided into the two classes of controllers and controlled necessarily provides for inequality in rank and an unequal enjoyment of the right of liberty. Socialists urge that, because the controlling class will derive their rights from the voluntary act of the controlled, such a condition of affairs will be freely undertaken. This may be possible in the beginning. It is quite probable that those destined to be controlled may, through their whole-hearted belief in Socialism, co-operate in the establishment of the new régime. But, later, it would begin to be a different story. Once having experienced the privilege of directing, it is quite beyond the bounds of reason to suppose that the director will consent freely to take his place in the servient class. A member of the official class, once that class has become firmly established, would strenuously resist any act threatening his position, and it would be doing an injustice to Socialists to assume that some of them have not seen this necessary consequence of their system. What would happen were such a move contemplated is frankly stated by Professor Karl Pearson. “Socialists,” he says (“Ethics of Free-thought,” p. 324), “have to inculcate that spirit which would give offenders against the State short shrift and the nearest lamp-post.” As Professor Flint remarks, such a sentiment “gives expression to the thought which animated the first tyrant.”
If you were to read the works of the prominent Socialist writers, John, you would find that Professor Pearson does not stand alone in his opinion. Robert Blatchford, in his popular presentation of Socialism (“Merrie England,” p. 75), goes just as far in asserting that man has no right to demand any other freedom than that which the majority may be willing to permit him to have. “Just as no man can have a right to the land, because no man makes the land, so no man has a right to his self, because he did not make that self.”
In spite of the crudeness and illogical character of this statement, it expresses only too forcibly the claim for the deification of the Socialist State at the cost of the complete suppression of the individual.
What does all this mean? In the last analysis it means that, if there is to be a servient class and a bossing class, it really is immaterial whether the worker belongs to the minority or to the majority. In either case, if he is selected as one to be bossed, such will be his fate, for the only people who will actually count at all are the officials who have been chosen, by one means or another, to become the bosses. What will make the conditions of the worker under Socialism infinitely worse than it is to-day, is the absence of any means of associated action for redress. Under no circumstances could such an existence be tolerable save in an ideal State in which benevolence reigns supreme—a State where envy, hatred, tyranny, ambition, indolence, folly and vanity no longer exist; a State where there are only wise and good men; and in such a State even law and direction might logically become unnecessary.
The human race, John, is not fitted for such a State. Untold centuries will pass before this ideal millennium can even remotely be realized. In the meantime we are trying to improve conditions with the material which we have at hand. With such material, even were all the theories of Marx to be put into operation, human nature must be considered as a factor, and it takes no prophet to foresee what a hopeless muddle we should make of things if we tried to run society upon the principles which Socialism proposes. Even John Spargo admits that “there is no such thing as an ‘automatic democracy,’ and eternal vigilance will be the price of liberty under Socialism, as it has ever been” (“Socialism,” p. 217).
Mr. Spargo is right as far as he goes, but he does not go far enough. He does not tell us that under Socialism vigilance would no longer be possible because it would not be tolerated; that with all trades and industries in the hands of the government, with all men and women dependent on the government for daily bread and compelled to do the work assigned to them, the State will consist of two classes only—state functionaries and ordinary people, controllers and controlled, masters and slaves. In what manner could man protect the rights of liberty under such a régime? What remedy could he have against oppression when he would always be pitted against “the State”—a State which would be placed in a position of being able to do no wrong.
“Wage slavery,” John? Isn’t this infinitely worse than any “wage slavery” of which you have ever dreamt?