Looking Further Forward / An Answer to Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy

by Richard Michaelis

“That would have been its own fault, and it would, as a matter of course, have had to stand the consequences”, Mr. Forest replied.

“But, suppose, the members of a certain trade had formed a trust, thereby forcing the people to pay exorbitant prices for the products of their guilds?” I objected again.

“A national law should have protected the people against an attempted robbery of this kind, threatening all guilty parties with confiscation of all their property and with the operation of all the plants by men hired by the administration, until the plants could be sold to operators. The importation of the respective goods from other countries would cover the deficiency until all the plants were again in full operation”.

“But how would you have stopped the frequent strikes of our days?” I asked.

“By encouraging the workman to start mutual producing associations”, Mr. Forest answered. “I have mentioned already how mutual producing associations could easily have been started. A dozen tailors or shoemakers could have rented lofts with steam power, purchased a few sewing and other machines and sold their products directly to other workmen, thus securing the profits of the manufacturer, wholesaler, retailer and workman, or in other words all the profit that was in the labor of the members of the association. There was no law in your time to forbid such enterprises or to prevent all other workmen from buying their boots, shoes, clothing, furniture and all other articles from such associations solely. As soon as the manufacturers noticed that all the laborers were commencing to deal with mutual associations they would gladly have sold their plants at a very fair price, and yet cheaper than a new association could have procured them. I imagine there was very little pleasure in conducting a factory or any other business having many employees in 1887, judging from the frequent strikes that made it almost impossible for many business men to figure on prices six months ahead, or to close contracts. Therefore, the owners of factories would, I fancy, have sold their plants at very fair prices. And the workmen could not have done a smarter thing than to cause the former manufacturers to remain with them as business managers at a fair salary. This would have secured a smooth running of the concern. Under such an arrangement the workers would have become the owners of the business concerns, paying for them in installments, they would have secured full pay for their work, and the former owner would have disposed of all his former cares, receiving a fair compensation for his plant and his services”.

“I think that most of the manufacturers and businessmen of my days were so worried by the constantly increased demands of their employees, that they would have gladly sold their property”, I remarked, “but what would have become of the wholesale and retail dealers?”

“They could have sold their goods and have either joined the producing associations as salesmen or gone into another business”, Mr. Forest replied. “And in a similar way the workmen of your time could have organized one trade after another, until the entire manufacturing industry had been based on large guilds, the latter consisting mostly of mutual producing societies”.

“But our workmen preferred to avoid the responsibility, care and risk of business enterprises. They would rather have worked for wages and, occasionally tried to increase them, sometimes by striking and preventing other laborers taking the places of the strikers”, I said. “You are aware of this state of affairs?”

“Yes”, Forest answered, “and it must have been a sad spectacle to see intelligent men who could just as well have been independent, remain journeymen, trying to bulldoze their employer to pay them more than he volunteered, and to intimidate other workers from performing duties at a rate of wages that would have satisfied them. The fact that your workingmen did not possess sufficient enterprise, mental discipline and independence, to establish mutual producing associations, has driven humanity into communism. That this damnable form of society is a failure is a matter of course. When humanity was at so low a standard that shoemakers had not spunk or smartness enough to start and run the shoeshops on a co-operative basis, and tailors could not manage tailorshops on a similar plan, it was simply impossible to make successful an organization which had the power to regulate all production and all consumption. But the principle of mutual productive associations is, in my opinion, the one best adapted for the solution of the labor question, because it secures for the members of the associations the pay for the full real value of their labor and keeps alive competition, the strongest factor in securing the progress of mankind. But whether we shall ever reach this solution of the labor question seems doubtful”.

“I am inclined to believe in your plan”, I admitted, “so far as laborers engaged in manufacturing establishments are concerned. But how would you have organized the work on the farms, the employment of professional man, railroad officials and laborers, employees on streetcars, merchants and bankers and their clerks and those who follow many other avocations?”