64

THE  SOCIALISM  OF  TO-DAY.

capital  should  be  at  the  service  of  labour.  Man  created  capital
to  help  him  in  his  work  ;  it  is  not  necessary  that  he  should
work  for  the  benefit  of  capital.  It  is  well  for  him  to  make
capital,  but  not  to  have  “  capital  made  out  of  him.”  Instead
of  wages,  always  reduced  to  the  minimum  by  the  “  iron  law,”
the  labourer  should  get  the  entire  produce  of  his  labour.
Capital  and  labour  should  cease  to  make  war  upon  each
other;  they  should  live  in  peace  and  act  in  unison.  The  solution ­
  is  plain  :  let  them  be  united  in  the  same  person.  In  order
to  obtain  this  result,  which  would  effect  the  transformation  of
existing  society,  there  is  no  need  to  seek  what  is  new,  nor  to
rush  into  Utopias.  It  would  suffice  to  favour  the  development
of  institutions  already  working  under  our  eyes  in  different
countries.  These  are  co-operative  societies  of  production.
The  labourers  are  there  the  owners  of  the  capital  ;  they  direct
the  enterprise  and  receive  all  the  profits.  Thus,  capital  is  the
servant  of  labour,  and  the  workman  receives  as  remuneration
the  entire  product  of  his  work.  Societies  of  this  kind,  which
have  been  founded  in  Paris  and  England,  and  of  which  those
established  by  the  “  Equitable  Pioneers  of  Rochdale  ”  are  the
best  known,  prove,  beyond  doubt,  the  possibility  of  success
for  these  combinations.  But  the  only  way  of  insuring  their
progress,  and  of  thus  changing  the  face  of  society,  is  to  largely
increase  their  number  ;  and  for  that  purpose  the  intervention
of  the  State  is  necessary.  When  Schulze-Delitzsch  rejects  such
intervention,  says  Lassalle,  he  has  “  a  mere  night-watchman's  ”
idea  of  the  State.  *
According  to  Lassalle,  the  rô/e  of  the  State  is  not  merely
that  of  maintaining  order,  but  also  of  furthering  all  the  great
enterprises  of  civilization.  And  this,  he  declares,  is  what  the
State  has  always  done.  Is  it  not  to  the  intervention  of  the
State  that  we  owe  our  roads,  harbours,  canals,  postal  and  telegraph ­
  systems,  and  our  schools  ?  When  the  construction  of  a
railway  is  in  question,  does  not  the  State  frequently  grant  a
*  [Lassalle  calls  this  a  night-watchman’s  idea,  or  a  policeman’s  idea,
“  because  it  represents  to  itself  the  State  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  policeman, ­
  whose  whole  function  consists  in  preventing  robbery  and  burglary.”
Arbeiter-programiHy  Peters’  translation,  p.  53.—Tr.'\