William of Germany

by Stanley Shaw

Other objects are universal suffrage for both sexes over twenty, electoral reform, two-year parliaments, direct legislation "through the people," some form of parliamentary government, autonomy of the people in Empire, State, Province, and Parish, conscription, national militia instead of standing army, international arbitration, abolition of State religion, free and compulsory education, abolition of capital punishment, free burial, free medical assistance, free legal advice and advocacy, progressive succession duties, inheritance tax, abolition of indirect taxation and customs, parliamentary decisions as to peace and war, and undenominationalism in schools.

Especially for the working classes are intended the following: National and international protective legislation for workmen on the basis of a normal eight hours day, prohibition of child labour under fourteen years, prohibition of night work save rendered necessary by the nature of the work or the welfare of society, superintendence of labour and its relations by a Ministry of Labour, thorough workshop hygiene, equality of status between the agricultural labourer, servant class, and the artisan, right of association, and State insurance, as to which the working class should have an authoritative voice.

The programme contains nothing as to the practical consequences of the provisions it contains, but Herr Bebel, in his book on "Woman and Social Democracy," gives some examples. One is that the working time will be alike for men and women, another that domestic life will be limited to the cohabitation of man and woman, for children are to be brought up by society, and a third that cooking and washing will be the care of central public kitchens and washhouses. Meanwhile, all these years, it may be noted, Herr Bebel and his millions of followers have been living exactly like everybody else.

The student of working-class conditions in Germany is unlikely to think clearly unless he distinguishes between such terms as Social Democracy, Socialism, Trade Unionism, and Labour party. Social Democracy is a species of Socialism. All Social Democrats are Socialists, but not all Socialists Social Democrats. The latter, as an enrolled political party, paying annual subscriptions and looking forward to the future state as conceived by Marx, and now by Bebel, number something under a million; the remaining three millions who voted for Social Democratic candidates at the last general election may have included men who believe in Social Democratic ideals, but the vast majority of them, unless one does grave injustice to their common sense, voted for such candidates owing to dissatisfaction with the policy of the Government and present conditions generally—the high cost of living, the pressure of taxation, the severity of class distinctions, and like grievances, real or imaginary. These people are Socialists in the English or international sense of the word, not Social Democrats strictly speaking; and with these people the Emperor is most angry because he knows they form the element most capable of dangerous expansion.

Again, though the vast majority of German Socialists in the broader sense are Trade Unionists, not all Trade Unionists are Socialists. Trade Unionism—the organization of labour against capital—is represented in Germany by two main bodies; the free or Socialist Unions containing about two million working men, and the "Christian" or loyal "National" Unions, which are anti-Social Democrat and anti-Socialist. These have a membership of about 300,000. The Hirsch-Duncker Unions, with 100,000 members, are Liberal, but also loyal and anti-Socialist. In labour conflicts, naturally, as distinguished from politics, all workmen of the particular branch in conflict work together, whether they are Socialist or not. It need only be added that there is no so-called "Labour party" in the German Parliaments. The Social Democratic party in the Reichstag represents labour interests generally, and promote them much more insistently and successfully than they do the Utopia of their dreams.

But enough has been said to show the comprehensive and revolutionary nature of Social Democratic doctrine. The only other feature that requires mention in connexion with the movement is the desire on the part of a section of the party for a revision of its programme. The party of revision is usually identified with the names of Heinrich von Vollmar, who first suggested it, and Eduard Bernstein, who is in favour of trying to realize that portion of the programme which deals with the social needs of the existing generation, the demands of the present day, and would leave to posterity the attainment of the final goal. The views of the Revisionists differ also from those of the Radicals in respect of two other main questions which divide the party, that of voting budgets and that of going to court. The Revisionists are willing to do both, and the Radicals to do neither. A decisive split in the party is annually looked for, but hitherto, when congress-day came, the Revisionists, for the sake of peace and unity in the party, have refrained from pushing their views to extremes. One might suppose that professors of the tenets of Social Democracy would get into trouble with the police, but they avoid arrest and imprisonment by taking care to avoid attacking property or the family, advocating a republic, or introducing religious questions into their discussions.

In dealing with the growth of Social Democracy in Germany the philosophic historian would doubtless refer to the French Revolution, or go still farther back to the Reformation, as the starting-point of every great change in the views of civilized mankind during the last four and a half centuries; but it is with more recent times these pages are chiefly concerned and consequently with causes now operative. The main specific cause is the change from agriculture to industry, and with it the growth of what is generally spoken of as "industrialism." Industrialism means the assemblage of large masses of intelligent men forming a community of their own, with its special conditions and the wants and wishes arising from them. This is the most fertile field for Socialism, for a new organization of society. In Germany Socialistic ideas kept growing with the increase of industrialism, and came to a head with the attempts by Hödel and Nobiling on the life of the Emperor William. The anti-Socialist laws, passed for a definite period, followed, but they were not renewed; the Emperor and his Government pressed on instead with a great and far-reaching social policy, and Socialism, in the form of Social Democracy, freed from restraint, took a new lease of life.

Another cause of as general, but less ponderable, a nature is the remnant of the feudal spirit and feudal manners which lingers in the attitude of the German governing and official classes towards the rest of the population. The most objectionable features of the feudal system have passed away, the cruel and exclusive rights and privileges which only men in ignorant personal servitude to an all-powerful master could permanently endure; but traces of the system still exist in the official attitude towards the public and in the tone of the official communications issued by the administrative services generally. Attitude and tone may be referred in part to the traditional character of the Prussian monarchy, which regards the people as a flock of sheep, or as a "talent," as the Emperor has called it, entrusted to its care and management by Heaven; but it is also due in part to the systematization of public life—and largely of private life—which at times makes the foreigner inclined to think Germany at once the most Socialistic and at the same time the most tyrannically ruled country in the world. Everything in Germany must be done systematically, and the system must be the result of development. But there is no use in having a system unless it is enforced—otherwise it remains, like Social Democracy, a theory. Compulsion, therefore, is necessary, and the Government provides it through its official machinery and its police. The systematization has enormous public advantages, but it is difficult for the Anglo-Saxon, jealous of his individual right to direct his public life through his own representatives and his private life according to his own judgment, to accommodate himself to a system which seems to him unduly to interfere with both right and judgment.

Perhaps it is the manner in which, under the name of authority, compulsion is exercised by subordinate officialdom and in especial by the police, as much as the compulsion itself, which irritates in Germany. Every profession, business, trade, and occupation, down to that of selling matches and newspapers in the streets, is meticulously regulated; and while there is nothing to object to in this, what strikes the Anglo-Saxon as objectionable is that the regulations are enforced with the manners and in the tone of a drill-sergeant. The official in Germany, he finds, is not the servant of the public. There is a story current in England of a Duke of Norfolk, when Postmaster-General, going into a district post-office and asking for a penny stamp. The clerk was dilatory, and the Duke remonstrated. "Who are you, I should like to know?" asked the clerk impertinently, "that you are laying down the law." "I am the public," replied the Duke simply, at the same time showing the clerk his card. An English Foreign Secretary once told a deputation that the Ministry was "waiting for instructions from their employers—the people." In Germany it is the opposite; the official is the master and the public his dutiful servant. In Germany the official expects marked deference from the public: the post-office clerk is "Mr. Official," the guardian of the law "Mr. Policeman" (with your hat off). The Anglo-Saxon rather expects the deference to be on the other side, and has a sordid subconsciousness that he pays the official for his services. Perhaps the Social Democrat has something of the same feeling.

One of the chief consequences of industrialism in Germany is that the people of the country are migrating to the towns. To the country bumpkin the city is an Eldorado and a lordly pleasure-house. In truth, he is much better off in it than in the stagnant life of the country. In the city he sees comfort on every hand, with possibilities of enjoyment of every kind, and if he does not soon get a share of the good things going he grows discontented and turns Socialist. In the city, too, he learns to think and compare, he perceives the distinction of classes and notices that certain classes have open to them careers from which he is excluded. Then there is the apparently inevitable antagonism between labour and capital, between the employer and employed, which drives the worker to Social Democracy, as offering the prospect of his becoming his own master and enjoying the whole fruits of his labour. He may not know Matthew Arnold's "Sick King in Bokhara," but he would endorse Arnold's lines:—