SOCIALISM IN ENGLAND.
321
more important than the mere material loss, involved in the
means proposed, is the end in view in itself desirable ? Shorter
hours of labour, more leisure, a more equal distribution of wealth,
the substitution of an “ intelligently ordered co-operation for
existence ” for the present “ physically disordered struggle for
existence ”—all this sounds very inviting. Let us see what are
the probabilities of obtaining it, and, apart from the initial cost,
what price must we pay for its maintenance.
The Social Democrats never attempt to give any clear notion
of the working of the Collectivist State, either because they have
formed none themselves, or because a frank statement would
expose its absurdity. All they say is that land, mines, and all raw
Materials ; railways, shipping, and all means of communication ;
factories, machinery, and all instruments of production all
the land and capital of the country, in short—is to be concentrated
in the hands of a democratic State, and the work
of production, distribution, and exchange is to be carried on
“agricultural and industrial armies under State control.
Competition will, it seems, be merged in the huge State
nionopoly, and exchange will be effected, in some undescribed
way, without profit. Every article produced will, I suppose, be
ticketed as equivalent to so many hours’ labour, and will be interchangeable
with labour-notes in some such way as suggested by
Rodbertus.* As nobody will have any private capital, everybody
will have to enlist in the service of the State ; and to produce the
wealth necessary to secure a reasonable competence, something
like two hours’ work a day will, they maintain, suffice. 1 here
will be a great saving, they say, in the wages of superintendence
and in the costs of distribution. The superintendents—including,
I presume, the whole hierarchy of State officials who are to
organize labour—are to be remunerated on the same basis as that
of productive labourers, pure and simple, j This little admission
—which is, indeed, only the logical consequence of the Socialist
theory of value—enables us to form an estimate of the probable
efficiency with which the gigantic task of organization will be
* See supra. Chapter III. r
t See Mr. Bax’s article, “ The Modem Revolution, m To-day, for
July, 1884, pp. 71, 72.
