The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Origin, Tendencies and Principles
of Government, by Victoria C. Woodhull
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Title: The Origin, Tendencies and Principles of Government
A review of the rise and fall of nations from early historic time
to the present; with special considerations regarding the future
of the United States as the representative government of the
world and the form of administration which will secure this
consummation. Also, papers on human equality, as represented by
labor and its representative, money; and the meaning and
significance of life from a scientific standpoint, with its
prophecies for the great future.
Author: Victoria C. Woodhull
Release Date: January 8, 2022 [eBook #67127]
Language: English
Produced by: Richard Tonsing and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from
images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ORIGIN, TENDENCIES AND
PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT ***
[Illustration: _Victoria C Woodhull_]
THE
ORIGIN, TENDENCIES AND PRINCIPLES
OF
GOVERNMENT:
OR,
A REVIEW OF THE RISE AND FALL OF NATIONS
FROM EARLY HISTORIC TIME TO THE PRESENT;
WITH
SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING THE FUTURE OF
THE UNITED STATES
AS THE
REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT OF THE WORLD
AND THE
FORM OF ADMINISTRATION WHICH WILL SECURE THIS CONSUMMATION. ALSO, PAPERS
ON HUMAN EQUALITY, AS REPRESENTED BY LABOR AND ITS REPRESENTATIVE,
MONEY; AND THE MEANING AND SIGNIFICANCE OF LIFE FROM A SCIENTIFIC
STANDPOINT, WITH ITS PROPHECIES FOR THE GREAT FUTURE.
BY VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.
NEW YORK:
WOODHULL, CLAFLIN & CO., 44 BROAD STREET.
1871.
Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1871, by VICTORIA C.
WOODHULL, in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
FROM THE
CO-OPERATIVE PRESS,
30 BEEKMAN STREET,
NEW YORK.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
God in Creation, History and Government, 1
Constitution of the United States, 3
First Pronunciamento, 19
A Review of the General Situation, 23
Second Pronunciamento, 36
The Tendencies of Government, 41
Woman’s Idea of Government, 86
The Limits and Sphere of Government, 88
The Principles of Government, 109
Papers on Labor and Capital, 128
Paper on Finance and Commerce, 174
The Basis of Physical Life, 205
The Tendencies and Prophecies of the Present Age, 223
INTRODUCTORY.
Specializations have been characteristic of the present generation.
Branches of science, philosophy or art have been selected and treated as
though possessed of great and independent importance. The process of
individuality has been the cause; but true evolution, whether in man or
matter, consists in viewing whatever is presented for consideration as
being related to all the rest, and as a part of the whole.
It will be evident to the careful reader that the various subjects
contained in this volume were not originally prepared for this purpose.
In several instances the same points receive consideration, which, while
they perhaps interfere with the general consecutiveness of the entire
work, would interfere still more with the construction of its parts,
were they omitted. For this we have no other apology to offer.
Perhaps, however, an explanation is due for errors which have
undoubtedly been passed unnoticed. During the publication we have been
variously engaged and not able to devote the time actually requisite to
reviewing a work of this character. Very much of the proof-reading has
necessarily been intrusted to others, and we regret that some
typographical errors have crept in. Those we have noticed are so evident
they scarcely need be mentioned. In one case evolution has been rendered
revolution; in another, evolve, revolve; in another, farce, force, etc.
All who might desire to read part of this book may not care for other
parts. Those who would find food for thought in “The Basis of Physical
Life” might not care to inquire whether the governmental evolution of
the world has been consistent and persistent; but we trust that
everybody who takes up this book will carefully read “The Limits and
Sphere and the Principles of Government,” and “Papers on Labor and
Capital and Commerce,” for these immediately concern us all.
In introducing the Constitution of the United States and the late action
in reference to human rights, it is hoped to meet in a manner the
rapidly-growing demand for information upon the Woman Question, and in
giving it the prominence of introducing the book to our readers, we
trust to cause further inquiry into the subject of the equality of human
rights. Asking the indulgence of an ever generous public we commit our
effort to its care, with the hope that the Providence of God may approve
it, and that it may benefit that humanity in whose cause I profess to
labor.
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL
NEW YORK, February 1, 1871.
GOD IN CREATION, IN HISTORY AND IN GOVERNMENT.
Almighty God! Who art alone first cause,
Of all that Nature works through changeless laws,
Maker and author of whate’er we see
That lives Thy life amid eternity.
Look back ere time was, and the face of earth,
Lifeless and still, was solitude and dearth;
No lovely valleys and no hills sublime;
No rocks or waters marked the hours of time.
Yet look again; behold the grass-clad hills,
Dew-spangled, multitudinous with rills,
Yet lifeless still: no reason and no sight,
That in these many glories know delight.
Yet look again; field-beasts and birds of sky
Range woods and glades mere hunger to supply;
And time rolls onward, rocks grow old and gray,
And Nature’s face is wrinkled with decay.
Yet look again; Creation’s fullness past,
And one supreme is born. Man comes at last;
Man, who to man is what God is to earth;
God’s image in the soul; in form her birth.
Yet look again; Man reaches to his prime,
Like God, creating through fixed laws and time,
Must he not, too, through each gradation go,
Reaching to higher passes from the low?
Is not our life breathed forth from God’s own breath?
Once having lived, can we in truth know death?
Each soul from birth until the final sleep,
Must on God’s own fixed lines its travel keep.
Then, wherefore, with loud prayer and unctuous face,
To brother say: “Ye run a foolish race
To the abyss.” For how shall any know
Whither God’s ministry shall make us go?
Doubt ye the power that governs everything
That lovely earth from chaos forth did bring?
Canst mark the line where ceases God’s command
From work that’s done by man’s own shaping hand?
Forever, no! For man is but effect
Of causes which the Father doth direct;
Each act and thought and movement of his soul
Hath source in God, the Infinite and Whole.
From earthly things man must his body feed;
But doth not soul from Heaven its nurture need?
His earthly frame bound earthward by fixed laws,
Doth not the soul yearn for a heavenly cause?
Brothers to brothers linked, and each to all,
Live we one life on this terrestrial ball;
One life of those who live and those who die,
Of those whom sight knows and whom memory.
Those elder brothers on that farther shore,
Risen higher than we in wisdom and in lore,
Send messages of knowledge and of love;
But know we well that these come from above!
For angels’ wisdom to the earth descends,
And each fresh hour some bright, fresh wisdom sends;
Each day some wonder of new lore displayed,
Each year man’s mind with triumph new arrayed.
Can mouldering relics, or can fossiled creeds,
Provide the quickening age her mighty needs?
Can codes, half dead, framed in days long gone by,
The soul’s new wants, so manifold, supply?
New palaces of Science, Faith and Truth,
Tower o’er the humble dwellings of our youth.
Shall rule and State, then, in their old ways stand,
Denying Progress her supreme demand?
Yet stand they do, and with contemptuous pride,
Fling Reason, Progress, Hope and Faith aside.
Shall the soul’s mighty yearnings thus have end?
As well with words think God’s own plans to bend.
Decrees are sealed in Heaven’s own chancery,
Proclaiming universal liberty.
Rulers and Kings who will not hear the call,
In one dread hour shall thunder-stricken fall.
So moves the growing world with march sublime,
Setting new music to the beats of Time;
Old things decay, and new things ceaseless spring,
And God’s own face is seen in everything.
CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.
ARTICLE I.
SEC. I.—All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a
Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House
of Representatives.
SEC. II.—1. The House of Representatives shall be composed of members
chosen every second year, by the people of the several States; and the
electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for
electors of the most numerous branch of the State Legislature.
2. No person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained the
age of twenty-five years and been seven years a citizen of the United
States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of the State
in which he shall be chosen.
3. Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the
several States which may be included within this Union, according to
their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the
whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a
term of years, and excluding Indians, not taxed, three-fifths of all
other persons. The actual enumeration shall be made within three years
after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within
every subsequent term of ten years in such manner as they shall by law
direct. The number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every
thirty thousand, but each State shall have at least one Representative;
and until such enumeration shall be made the State of New Hampshire
shall be entitled to choose three; Massachusetts, eight; Rhode Island
and Providence Plantations, one; Connecticut, five; New York, six; New
Jersey, four; Pennsylvania, eight; Delaware, one; Maryland, six;
Virginia, ten; North Carolina, five; South Carolina five, and Georgia,
three.
4. When vacancies happen in the representation from any State, the
executive authority thereof shall issue writs of election to fill such
vacancies.
5. The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other
officers, and shall have the sole power of impeachment.
SEC. III.—1. The Senate of the United States shall be composed two
Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof, for six
years; and each Senator shall have one vote.
2. Immediately after they shall be assembled in consequence of the first
election, they shall be divided, as equally as may be, into three
classes. The seats of the Senators of the first class shall be vacated
at the expiration of the second year, of the second class at the
expiration of the fourth year, and of the third class at the expiration
of the sixth year, that one-third maybe chosen every second year; and,
if vacancies occur by resignation or otherwise, during the recess of the
Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may make temporary
appointments until the next meeting of the Legislature, which shall then
fill such vacancies.
3. No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained the age of
thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and
who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State for which he
is chosen.
4. The Vice-President of the United States shall be President of the
Senate, but shall have no vote unless they be equally divided.
5. The Senate shall choose their other officers and also a President
_pro tempore_, in the absence of the Vice-President or when he shall
exercise the office of the President of the United States.
6. The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. When
sitting for that purpose they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the
President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall
preside; and no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of
two-thirds of the members present.
7. Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend farther than to
removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office
of honor, trust or profit under the United States; but the party
convicted shall, nevertheless, be liable and subject to indictment,
trial, judgment and punishment according to law.
SEC. IV.—1. The times, places and manner of holding elections for
Senators and Representatives shall be prescribed in each State, by the
Legislature thereof; but the Congress may, at any time, by law, make or
alter such regulation, except as to the places of choosing Senators.
2. The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year; and such
meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless they shall by
law appoint a different day.
SEC. V.—1. Each House shall be judge of the elections, returns and
qualifications of its own members; and a majority of each shall
constitute a quorum to do business, but a smaller number may adjourn
from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of
absent members, in such manner and under such penalties as each House
may provide.
2. Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its
members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of
two-thirds, expel a member.
3. Each House shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to
time publish the same, excepting such parts as may, in their judgment,
require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either House on
any question, shall, at the desire of one-fifth of those present, be
entered on the journal.
4. Neither House, during the session of Congress, shall, without the
consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any place
than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.
SEC. VI.—1. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a
compensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out
of the treasury of the United States. They shall, in all cases, except
for treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest
during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and
in going to or returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in
either House they shall not be questioned in any other place.
2. No Senator or Representative shall, during the time for which he was
elected, be appointed to any civil office under the authority of the
United States, which shall have been created, or the emoluments whereof
shall have been increased during such time; and no person holding any
office under the United States, shall be a member of either House,
during his continuance in office.
SEC. VII.—1. All bills for raising revenues shall originate in the House
of Representatives, but the Senate may propose or concur with
amendments, as on other bills.
2. Every bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and
the Senate, shall, before it become a law, be presented to the President
of the United States; if he approves, he shall sign it; but if not, he
shall return it, with his objections, to that House in which it shall
have originated, who shall enter the objections at large on their
journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If, after such reconsideration,
two-thirds of that House shall agree to pass the bill, it must be sent,
together with the objections, to the other House, by which it shall
likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two-thirds of that House,
it shall become a law. But in all such cases the votes of both Houses
shall be determined by yeas and nays; and the names of the persons
voting for and against the bill, shall be entered on the journal of each
House respectively. If any bill shall not be returned by the President
within ten days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to
him, the same shall be a law in like manner as if he had signed it,
unless the Congress, by their adjournment, prevent its return; in which
case it shall not be a law.
3. Every order, resolution, or vote, to which the concurrence of the
Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on a
question of adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the
United States; and before the same shall take effect, shall be approved
by him, or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two-thirds of
the Senate and House of Representatives, according to the rules and
limitations prescribed in the face of a bill.
SEC. VIII.—The Congress shall have power—
1. To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises; to pay the
debts, and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the
United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform
throughout the United States:
2. To borrow money on the credit of the United States:
3. To regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several
States, and with the Indian tribes:
4. To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on
the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States:
5. To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and
fix the standard of weights and measures:
6. To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and
current coin of the United States:
7. To establish post-offices and post-roads:
8. To promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing, for
limited times, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their
respective writings and discoveries:
9. To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court; to define and
punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offences
against the law of nations:
10. To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules
concerning capture on land and water:
11. To raise and support armies; but no appropriation of money to that
use shall be for a longer term than two years:
12. To provide and maintain a navy:
13. To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and
naval forces:
14. To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the
Union, suppress insurrection and repel invasions:
15. To provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia, and
for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the
United States, reserving to the States respectively, the appointment of
the officers, and the authority of training the militia, according to
the discipline prescribed by Congress.
16. To exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over
such district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of
particular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of
Government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all
places purchased by the consent of the Legislature of the State in which
the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals,
dock-yards, and other needful buildings:—And
17. To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying
into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this
Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any
department or officer thereof.
SEC. IX.—1. The migration or importation of such persons as any of the
States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited
by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight;
but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importation not exceeding ten
dollars for each person.
2. The privilege of the writ of _habeas corpus_ shall not be suspended
unless when, in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may
require it.
3. No bill of attainder, or _ex-post facto_ law, shall be passed.
4. No capitation, or other direct tax shall be laid, unless in
proportion to the census or enumeration herein before directed to be
taken.
5. No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State. No
preference shall be given, by any regulation of commerce or revenue, to
the ports of one State over those of another; nor shall vessels bound to
or from one State, be obliged to enter, clear or pay duties in another.
6. No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in consequence of
appropriations made by law; and a regular statement or account of the
receipts and expenditures of all public money, shall be published from
time to time.
7. No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States; and no
persons holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without
the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office or
title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state.
SEC. X.—1. No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or
confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit
bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in
payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, _ex-post facto_ law, or
law impairing the obligation of contracts; or grant any title of
nobility.
2. No State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any imposts or
duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary
for executing its inspection laws; and the net produce of all duties and
imposts laid by any State on imports or exports, shall be for the use of
the treasury of the United States; and all such laws shall be subject to
the revision and control of the Congress. No State shall, without the
consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops or ships of
war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another
State, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually
invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.
ARTICLE II.
SEC. I.—1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the
United States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of
four years, and together with the Vice-President, chosen for the same
term, be elected as follows:
2. Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof
may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators
and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in Congress; but
no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or
profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.
3. [Annulled. See Amendments, Art. XII.]
4. The Congress may determine the time of choosing the elector, and the
day on which they shall give their votes; which day shall be the same
throughout the United States.
5. No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United
States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be
eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be
eligible to that office, who shall not have attained to the age of
thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the United
States.
6. In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death,
resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said
office, the same shall devolve on the Vice-President; and the Congress
may by law provide for the case of removal, death, resignation, or
inability, both of the President and Vice-President, declaring what
officer shall then act as President, and such officer shall act
accordingly, until the disability be removed, or a President shall be
elected.
7. The President shall at stated times receive, for his services, a
compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the
period for which he shall have been elected; and he shall not receive
within that period any other emolument from the United States or any of
them.
8. Before he enter on the execution of his office he shall take the
following oath or affirmation:
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the
office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my
ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United
States.”
SEC. II.—1. The President shall be Commander-in-Chief of the army and
navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States when
called into actual service of the United States; he may require the
opinion in writing of the principal officer in each of the executive
departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective
offices; and he shall have power to grant reprieves and pardon for
offences against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.
2. He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the
Senate, to make treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present
concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the consent and advice of
the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers, and
consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the
United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for,
and which shall be established by law. But the Congress may, by law,
vest the appointment of such inferior officers as they think proper, in
the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of
departments.
3. The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may
happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which
shall expire at the end of their next session.
SEC. III.—He shall, from time to time, give to the Congress information
of the State of the Union, and recommend to their consideration such
measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on
extraordinary occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in
case of disagreement between them, with respect to the time of
adjournment, he may adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper;
he shall receive ambassadors and other public ministers; he shall take
care that the laws be faithfully executed, and shall commission all the
officers of the United States.
SEC. IV.—1. The President, Vice-President and all civil officers of the
United States shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and
conviction of, treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.
ARTICLE III.
SEC. I.—1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in
one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may, from
time to time, ordain and establish. The judges, both of the Supreme and
inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behavior, and
shall, at stated times, receive for their services a compensation, which
shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.
SEC. II.—1. The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and
equity arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States,
and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority; to all
cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls; to all
cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction; to controversies to which
the United States shall be a party; to controversies between two or more
States, between a State and citizens of another State, between citizens
of different States, between citizens of the same State claiming lands
under grants of different States, and between a State or the citizens
thereof, and foreign States, citizens or subjects.
2. In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and
consuls, and those in which a State shall be a party, the Supreme Court
shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before
mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as
to law and fact, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the
Congress may make.
3. The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by
jury; and such trial shall be held in the State where the said crimes
shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the
trial shall be at such place or places as the Congress may by law have
directed.
SEC. II.—1. Treason against the United States shall consist only in
levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them
aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the
testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in
open court.
2. The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason;
but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or
forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted.
ARTICLE IV.
SEC. I.—1. Full faith and credit shall be given, in each State, to the
public acts, records and judicial proceedings of every other State. And
the Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such
acts, records and proceeding, shall be proved, and the effect thereof.
SEC. II.—1. THE CITIZENS OF EACH STATE SHALL BE ENTITLED TO ALL
PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES OF CITIZENS IN THE SEVERAL STATES.
2. A person charged in any State with treason, felony or other crime,
who shall flee from justice, and be found in another State, shall, on
demand of the executive authority of the State from which he fled, be
delivered up to be removed to the State having jurisdiction of the
crime.
3. No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws
thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or
regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall
be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may
be due.
SEC. III.—1. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union;
but no new State shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of
any other State, nor any State be formed by the junction of two or more
States, or parts of States, without the consent of the Legislature of
the States concerned, as well as of the Congress.
2. The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful
rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property
belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall
be so construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States or of
any particular State.
SEC. IV.—THE UNITED STATES SHALL GUARANTEE TO EVERY STATE IN THIS UNION
A REPUBLICAN FORM OF GOVERNMENT, AND SHALL PROTECT EACH OF THEM AGAINST
INVASION; AND, ON APPLICATION OF THE LEGISLATURE, OR OF THE EXECUTIVE
(WHEN THE LEGISLATURE CANNOT BE CONVENED), AGAINST DOMESTIC VIOLENCE.
ARTICLE V.
The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both Houses shall deem it
necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution; or, on the
application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of the several States,
shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case,
shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this
Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three-fourths
thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by
Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year
one thousand eight hundred and eight, shall, in any manner, affect the
first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; AND
THAT NO STATE, WITHOUT ITS CONSENT, SHALL BE DEPRIVED OF ITS EQUAL
SUFFRAGE IN THE SENATE.
ARTICLE VI.
1. All debts contracted, and engagements entered into, before the
adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United
States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation.
2. This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be
made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made
under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of
the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby; anything
in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary
notwithstanding.
3. The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of
the several State Legislatures, and executive and judicial officers both
of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by oath
or affirmation to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall
ever be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust,
under the United States.
ARTICLE VII.
The ratification of the convention of nine States shall be sufficient
for the establishment of this Constitution between the States so
ratifying the same.
GEORGE WASHINGTON, President.
WILLIAM JACKSON, Secretary.
AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION.
ARTICLE I.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to
assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
ARTICLE II.
A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free
State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be
infringed.
ARTICLE III.
No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house without
the consent of the owner; nor in time of war, but in a manner to be
prescribed by law.
ARTICLE IV.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers
and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be
violated; and no warrant shall issue but upon probable cause, supported
by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be
searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
ARTICLE V.
No person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous
crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in
cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in
actual service, in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be
subject, for the same offence, to be twice put in jeopardy of life or
limb; nor shall he be compelled, in any criminal case, to be a witness
against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty or property without
due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use
without just compensation.
ARTICLE VI.
In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right to a
speedy and public trial by an impartial jury of the State and district
wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have
been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and
cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against
him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor,
and to have the assistance of counsel for the defence.
ARTICLE VII.
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed
twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved; and no
fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the
United States than according to the rules of the common law.
ARTICLE VIII.
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor
cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
ARTICLE IX.
The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be
construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
ARTICLE X.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor
prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively,
or to the people.
ARTICLE XI.
The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend
to any suit in law or equity commenced or prosecuted against one of the
United States by citizens of another State, or by citizens or subjects
of any foreign State.
ARTICLE XII.
1. The electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by
ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall
not be an inhabitant of the same State with themselves; they shall name
in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct
ballots the person voted for as Vice-President; and they shall make
distinct lists of all persons voted for as President and of all persons
voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which
list they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of
Government of the United States, directed to the President of the
Senate; the President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate
and House of Representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes
shall then be counted; the person having the greatest number of votes
for President shall be the President, if such number be a majority of
the whole number of electors appointed; and if no one has such majority,
then, from the persons having the highest numbers, not exceeding three,
on the list of those voted for as President, the House of
Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But
in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by States, the
representation from each State having one vote; a quorum for this
purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the
States, and a majority of all the States shall be necessary to a choice.
And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President,
whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth
day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as
President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional
disability of the President.
2. The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President
shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole
number of electors appointed; and if no person have a majority, then,
from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the
Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of
the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall
be necessary to a choice.
3. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President
shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
ARTICLE XIII.
If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive or
retain any title of nobility or honor, or shall, without the consent of
Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, office or emolument,
of any kind whatever, from any emperor, king, prince or foreign power,
such person shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall
be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them or
either of them.
ARTICLE XIV.
1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to
the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the
State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United
States. Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or
property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
2. Representatives shall be appointed among the several States according
to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in
each State, excluding Indians not taxed; but whenever the right to vote
at any election for electors of President and Vice-President, or for
United States Representatives in Congress, executive and judicial
officers, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of
the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age and
citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for
participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation
therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male
citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one
years of age in that State.
3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, elector
of President or Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military,
under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously
taken an oath as member of Congress, or as an officer of the United
States, or as a member of any State Legislature, or as an executive or
judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United
States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the
same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; but Congress may,
by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by
law, including debts incurred for the payment of pensions and bounties
for service in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be
questioned, but neither the United States nor any State shall assume or
pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion
against the United States, or claim for the loss or emancipation of any
slave, but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal
and void.
ARTICLE XV.
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied
or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race,
color or previous conditions of servitude.
[Revised from the New York Herald of April 2, 1870.]
FIRST PRONUNCIAMENTO.
The disorganized condition of parties in the United States at the
present time affords a favorable opportunity for a review of the
political situation and for comment on the issues which are likely to
come up for settlement in the Presidential election in 1872. As I happen
to be the most prominent representative of the only unrepresented class
in the republic, and perhaps the most practical exponent of the
principles of equality, I request the favor of being permitted to
address the public through the medium of the _Herald_. While others of
my sex devoted themselves to a crusade against the laws that shackle the
women of the country, I asserted my individual independence; while
others prayed for the good time coming, I worked for it; while others
argued the equality of woman with man, I proved it by successfully
engaging in business; while others sought to show that there was no
valid reason why women should be treated, socially and politically, as
being inferior to man, I boldly entered the arena of politics and
business and exercised the rights I already possessed. I therefore claim
the right to speak for the unenfranchised women of the country, and
believing as I do that the prejudices which still exist in the popular
mind against women in public life will soon disappear, I now announce
myself as candidate for the Presidency.
I am quite well aware that in assuming this position I shall evoke more
ridicule than enthusiasm at the outset But this is an epoch of sudden
changes and startling surprises. What may appear absurd to-day will
assume a serious aspect to-morrow. I am content to wait until my claim
for recognition as a candidate shall receive the calm consideration of
the press and the public. The blacks were cattle in 1860; a negro now
sits in Jeff Davis’ seat in the United States Senate. The sentiment of
the country was, even in 1863, against negro suffrage; now the negro’s
right to vote is acknowledged by the constitution of the United States.
Let those, therefore, who ridiculed the negro’s claim to exercise the
right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” and who lived to
see him vote and hold high public office, ridicule the aspirations of
the women of the country for complete political equality as much as they
please. They cannot roll back the rising tide of reform. The world
moves.
That great Governmental changes were to follow the enfranchisement of
the negro I have long foreseen. While the curse of slavery covered the
land progress was enchained, but when it was swept away in the torrent
of war, the voice of justice was heard, and it became evident that the
last weak barrier against complete political and social equality must
soon give way. All that has been said and written hitherto, in support
of equality for women has had its proper effect on the public mind, just
as the anti-slavery speeches before secession were effective; but a
candidate and a policy are required to prove it. Lincoln’s election
showed the strength of the feeling against the peculiar institution; my
candidacy for the Presidency will, I confidently expect, develop the
fact that the principles of equal rights for all have taken deep root.
The advocates of political equality for women have, besides a
respectable known strength, a great undercurrent of unexpressed power,
which is only awaiting a fit opportunity to show itself. By the general
and decided test I propose, we shall be able to understand the woman
question aright, or at least have done much toward presenting the issue
involved in proper shape. I claim to possess the strength and courage to
be the subject of that test, and look forward confidently, to a
triumphant issue of the canvass.
The present position of political parties is anomalous. They are not
inspired by any great principles of policy or economy. Political
preachers paw the air; there is no live issue up for discussion. The
only seemingly distinctive feature upon which a complete and
well-defined diversion exists, is on the dead issue of negro equality,
and this is to the political leaders a harp of a thousand strings.
The minor questions of the hour do not affect parties as such, and no
well-defined division of sentiment exists. A great national question is
wanted, to prevent a descent into pure sectionalism. That question
exists in the issue, whether woman shall remain sunk below the right
granted to the negro, or be elevated to all the political rights enjoyed
by man. The simple issue whether woman should not have this complete
political equality with the negro is the only one to be tried, and none
more important is likely to arise before the Presidential election. But
besides the question of equality others of great magnitude are
necessarily included. The platform that is to succeed in the coming
election must enunciate the _general_ principles of enlightened justice
and economy.
A complete reform in our system of prison discipline, having specially
in view the welfare of the families of criminals, whose labor should not
be lost to them; the rearrangement of the system and control of internal
improvements; the adoption of some better means for caring for the
helpless and indigent; the establishment of strictly mutual and
reciprocal relations with all foreign Powers who will unite to better
the condition of the productive class, and the adoption of such
principles as shall recognize this class as the true wealth of the
country, and give it a just position beside capital, thus introducing a
practical plan for universal government upon the most enlightened basis,
for the actual, not the imaginary benefit of mankind.
These important changes can only be expected to follow a complete
departure from the beaten tracks of political parties and their
machinery; and this, I believe my canvass of 1872 will effect.
That the people are sick of the present administration and the
principles it professes to sustain, is a proposition, I think, that does
not require to be argued; but as I have now taken a decided stand
against its continuance for another term of four years, and offered
myself as a candidate for the Presidential succession, a few preliminary
observations on the general management of our home and foreign policy
will not be out of place. The present administration has been a failure
from the beginning; weak, vacillating and deficient in moral courage, it
commands neither the respect nor admiration of foreign Powers nor
receives the active support of its party. The general management of our
foreign and domestic affairs does not seem to have risen to the dignity
of a policy; though it be allowed to have been consistent in its various
parts, it has been destitute of that decision and firmness which
characterized the victorious soldier who is now President.
A decided Cuban policy would not only have settled at once the
inevitable destiny of that island, but would also have given republican
sentiment in Spain an impetus, strengthened the South American republics
and exercised a healthy influence in Mexico and Canada. But instead of
this we have to submit to the consequences of a policy of cowardice.
American citizens abroad are murdered by Spanish cut-throats, our
consuls are insulted, and our flag is disgraced. This is unworthy of the
American nation, and the people will hold Grant accountable. A giant who
never shows his strength is neither feared nor respected. On the
important questions of taxation, the tariff and the public debt, the
administration seems to have no settled policy. Taxation, whether for
the support of the Government or the payment of the debt, should in all
cases be general and never special. No special interest, nor several
special interests, should be singled out to sustain an extra proportion
of taxation. And in regard to the tariff the same principle should be
enforced. Whether the public debt be a blessing or a curse, it exists.
Created to save the republic, it must be paid strictly according to both
the spirit and the letter of the law. But there is no immediate
necessity for paying it off. By a proper policy its payment might be
made to extend through a hundred years, for even beyond that time will
the benefits its creation produced be felt and appreciated. In older
countries the pressure of national debt becomes a heavier charge and a
mightier burden every succeeding year, but with us this is reversed. The
development of our magnificent resources will render the gradual payment
of our indebtedness easier of accomplishment with each decade of time.
All other questions, whether of a foreign or domestic nature, stand
illustrated by the Cuban policy of the administration. A bold, firm and,
withal, consistent national policy, if not at all times strictly within
the conservative limits of international law, will always command the
respect and support of the people.
With the view of spreading to the people ideas which hitherto have not
been placed before them, and which they may, by reflection, carefully
amplify for their own benefit, I have written several papers on
Governmental questions of importance and will submit them in due order.
For the present the foregoing must suffice. I anticipate criticism; but
however unfavorable the comment this letter may evoke I trust that my
sincerity will not be called in question. I have deliberately and of my
own accord placed myself before the people as a candidate for the
Presidency of the United States, and having the means, courage, energy
and strength necessary for the race, intend to contest it to the close.
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.
A VIEW OF THE GENERAL SITUATION.
NEW YORK, November 10, 1870.
In national as well as in individual affairs, it is well to occasionally
take an exact account of the situation in which we are; to balance “our
general books,” to see whether the balance is to the “debit or credit”
or “profit and loss,” and to decide from the results obtained whether
satisfactory progress has been made. As nothing more than “a journal” of
such affairs as we shall take into the account has been kept, it will be
our duty to “post” these affairs into a new “ledger” from existing
“journals,” and also to enter up the new balances which we may find
standing to the several accounts.
At no time since the close of the Revolutionary War has there been a
time more fitting and inviting for such a work. The whole world is in a
ferment, which was begun by the terrific strife into which the course of
events forced us, and from which we have just emerged through the
reconstruction of an almost demolished Governmental structure. Not all
of the legitimate results of that strife are even yet externally
apparent, either in our own country or in the world at large. There are
various undercurrents, eddies and outcroppings which have never been
taken into any consideration; but when considered, the destiny of this
country, so long foreshadowed, but which was pretty nearly eclipsed,
shines forth more clearly brilliant than ever before.
Whatever may have been the arguments favorable for the continuance of
the institution of slavery, the destruction of it has rendered them
nugatory, and but few of those who once used them could now be found to
favor its resurrection. The atmosphere is cleared of the cloud it was
draped with, under its influence, and the radiant sun of freedom now
shines for all, and the star of hope our night was illumined by shall
now no more be dimmed by the dense fogs that were wont to arise from its
then already decaying carcass. With its destruction the lives of two
great political parties passed away, and left the people with no
distinct lines of demarkation. It is true that there bodies still exist,
but the process of disintegration is rapidly going on, and the stench of
their decay fills the nostrils of all whose senses are rendered acute by
the intensifying power of intuitive perception.
Creation is from one point toward one purpose, the extremes of which
course, are beyond the comprehension of human ken. Any fact in the line
of its progress may be considered, and the relations it bears to
contemporaneous facts determined. A fact isolated from all connections
loses its significance. The comparison of a fact with other facts forms
the basis of all relative knowledge, and the further this comparison is
extended, the wider the range of this knowledge becomes: while an
infinite series of facts constitutes the sum total of creation.
Hence, to obtain a substantially correct knowledge of the present, the
facts of it must not only be considered as facts of the present, but
their relations to, and dependencies upon prior facts, out of which they
arose, must be traced, so that it may be determined why they exist. It
is not sufficient to simply assert that this or that is thus or so. To
do so carries no conviction nor prophetic knowledge of what must be
next, as a necessary sequence. But if a retrospective glance be taken of
the causes that produced it, it is thus demonstrated why it is thus. If
the demonstration is placed with the fact, and their tendencies are
examined, it may be fair to conclude that what they may next lead to,
may be in a measure predicated. The chief value, then, of an intimate
knowledge of the past is, that from it the future may be foreseen, and
that the lesson it teaches may assist in the formation of aids to the
natural order of things.
If a tree or plant is desired in a certain place, for a certain purpose,
its growth is promoted by all the means which experience has
demonstrated will assist. All other growths that draw from the same
source for supplies, and thereby diminish its fountain of supplies, are
destroyed; the weeds are uprooted, and if the natural supplies which the
earth and air furnish are not sufficient for its demands, that which is
lacking is supplied. The same line of action should govern in the
various departments of nature, and especially in the higher departments
of mind.
There is another consideration that should never be lost sight of when a
survey of the situation is to be attempted; and this is, that while the
facts which are to be passed upon bear special relations to their
immediate predecessors and surroundings, that these with them bear
certain definite, general relations to the facts of all past time, and
to those that will be in all future time. The present is a part of the
common order of the universe, extending infinitely backward and
forward—a part of the line of evolvement, neither end of which can be
compassed by human mind; and if we would learn well, we must learn all
there is to learn regarding what we learn.
It is a definite and unanswerable proposition, then, that every nation
of which we have historic record, was a result of pre-existing causes,
and led to further effects, and that each filled and performed a part,
especially its own, which was a natural and necessary result of the time
and place it existed in. By a careful study of the rise and fall of each
of the great nations that have existed and an analytic comparison of the
elements of strength and decay that were prominent therein, and of their
relations to each other, just deductions as to what the present will
lead to, may be arrived at. If the present is the result of the past,
the future must be the result of the present, and like it be the
experiences of creation in the process of evolution from the infinite to
the infinite.
Government, standing forth prominently as the grandest of all human
conceptions and realizations, has in all times been the representative
of civilization, and the principal means of its diffusion. Bearing this
impress of importance, it may be well to examine the real significance
of the term, or to find the relations it sustains to society. One fact
meets us wherever we may search in the past—the fact of government
Though it is one of the universal necessities and accompaniments of
existence, it is extremely doubtful if its composition is realized to
any considerable extent. Government means control—implies power. No
people can create government because they cannot create power. An
existing power may be organized into form by a people, and this becomes
their government. This power is not in the individuals who exercise it,
they are simply its servants. It is not the people who organize or
consent to it; they are simply represented by it. It is above
individuals, and is independent of peoples, though its channels of
operation may be modified by individuals and peoples. Thus come all
governments, while revolutions are the results of the outworking of
principles, through peoples, who are their representatives. When
analyzed, it thus appears that governments are independent of peoples,
and always exist in some form while peoples come and pass away.
It is problematically true, that China was the first nation that arrived
at a system of government at all removed from brute, individual force,
and historically so, that there always was a westward tendency to
empire. After China, India; then Assyria, Egypt, Persia, Greece, Rome,
general Europe and America. Each one of these nations, to Rome, was the
result of the course of events, begun in China, to the course of which
each succeeding one added its experiences. The progress of this course
of events has encircled the world. It can go no further westward without
crossing the Pacific and beginning again in China. What is the
significance of this fact, or has it no special indications? It is
evident that the old order of nature has completed a cycle, and that a
new order will be commenced, and that, the new order is to spring from
this country, and consequently, that we are its representatives. This is
made doubly plain, when we refer to the fact that Asiatic tendencies are
now eastward, and that John Chinaman is the new competition our laboring
classes have to encounter.
It cannot be expected that the new order of events, we, as a country are
inaugurating, will be characterized by the element of the old, just
completed. It had its mission to perform. It accomplished it, and has
passed away. Its fruit is our Government and the civilization of the
present. A new mission begins. Are there any sources from which its
character may be predicated? Though the creation has completed another
cycle of progressive development, the common course of nature never
stops. Therefore the same common order prevails now, that did when the
planes of Iran poured forth its people westward.
One of the principal features of natural events has been a tendency on
the part of all great nations to acquire universal dominion. Each in
turn attempted it and failed, because of the imperfectly developed form
of the government they sought to control by. What are the evidences that
all future forms may not fail from similar causes, or specially, that
the form we represent will not fail?
The first and most important evidence is, that in its organic principles
the Brotherhood of the Human Race is recognized. All men are born free
and equal, does not mean that all men born in the United States are free
and equal, but that all men everywhere are. This, then, is the basis
idea upon which our Government is built; whether the structure is yet
perfect or not the foundation is, and can never be overturned. There can
be no higher proposition upon which to build; therefore additions,
tending to perfectability, must be made upon this foundation.
Another evidence is, that the world is becoming Americanized: that is,
the world is assimilating to the American idea of freedom and equality.
How and why? The vast populations other countries have transplanted to
our soil are in constant communication with friends they left behind,
who thus catch the spirit of equality and freedom, and become imbued
with the spirit of our institutions, and thus involuntarily become like
us, while still subjects of other powers.
All nations contribute to our strength, and by so doing render us not
only peculiarly American in character, but cosmopolitan to the world. We
are not only American, but European, Asiatic and African; while each of
these are becoming American. We are, therefore, the centre of attraction
for the world, and the world involuntarily recognizes our superior
strength by giving up its population to increase it; while we repay it,
not in physical strength, but with progressive and comprehensive ideas.
In accordance with these facts, patent to every one, it is asserted,
that The World is becoming Americanized, and that this is an evidence
that the form of government by which we tend to universal control is
founded on those general principles which give it that permanency, which
insures its continuance until it shall become universal.
If the order of civilization is observed the same deduction will be
arrived at The material universe has had its geologic periods The social
has had and will have its periods to correspond. Nature maintains a
regular and consistent order everywhere. It is the degree that this
order is understood, by the general mind, that constitutes the
sociologic periods of the world. The first era of civilization was
inaugurated by the Assyrian and Egyptian empires, more especially the
latter, more than 2000 years B. C.
This civilization began to spread in the barbaric world immediately
after the famous conquests of Sesostris, and continued during the time
of the Persian, Grecian and Roman empires, culminating with the downfall
of the latter, and thus completing the order of civilization made
possible by Egypt. Egypt conquered and levied tribute upon the
barbarian. Rome conquered, and the barbarian became the Roman citizen.
The present configuration of Europe rose from the ruins of Rome, and
assumed the form through which a greater variety of power could operate
than in the previous era.
No part of the world but has felt the mighty modifying influence of the
civilizing power of modern Europe. It has permeated the entire temperate
zone, penetrated the frozen latitudes north and south, and attacked the
Hottentot of Central Africa and the Bushman of Australia. It organized
legislation, perfected and maintained administration and made it
possible for all minds to attain individuality, and for individuals, as
such, to rise by personal merit, even from the lowest strata of society.
By its procreative power a new continent, full of native purity and
vitality, conceived, and a higher degree of life than it represented
burst upon the startled world.
In the first era, it was one controlling mind operating for personal
ends and aggrandizement; in the second, it was several, operating for
the same end; in the third, it will be all minds merged in one channel,
to operate for the good of the whole. The first was personal
civilization thrust upon the barbarism of the world compelling it into
servility; the second was sectional civilization exerting its influence,
first upon its immediate subjects, and through them upon others less
advanced; the third shall be general civilization, in which the utmost
parts of the earth can join in one grand and common effort for mutual
advancement, its peoples having risen to the recognition of the greatest
of all human facts—the common brotherhood of mankind.
From these general observations the tendencies in the order of the
universe must be inferred, and if there is any inference possible to be
drawn, which will coincide with the present aspect of affairs, it is,
that upon this country devolves the duty, no less than the privilege, of
presenting the world with a form of administrative government that shall
be possessed of the elements of perfection and duration; and this brings
us down to the consideration, whether this general indication of the
centuries does coincide with the condition in which the world is to-day.
Europe contains but four positive determining powers: Russia, Prussia,
France and England, while the remainder of the Eastern Continent is
unrepresented. The Western Continent contains the United States. France
and Prussia have been the contending parties for simple European
supremacy: the former probably also entertaining an ulterior design upon
Africa. The policy of England and Russia is more comprehensive, and
undoubtedly includes the possibility of a consolidated Continent.
Consistent with this view, England is performing in India what Cæsar did
in Gaul; and Russia, in Western Asia, what Rome did in “The East.” They
comprehend that every nation is an object upon which change is indelibly
stamped, and that it will remain so until some one of them shall arrive
at a perfect system of government, which shall be the pattern for all
government, or which shall absorb all government. These countries labor
under one insurmountable difficulty. All the effort they expend to carry
their policies abroad detracts just so much from their actual home
strength, and they have no fountain, furnishing supplies to make good
their expenditure, and they thus expand at the expense of vitality.
Notwithstanding this great difficulty, Russian supremacy might be a
consistent conclusion, could the fact of the rapid diffusion of
principles antagonistic to monarchy be left out of the consideration;
but considered, as it necessarily must be, the legitimate conclusion is
entirely different. It is too well known what sentiments lie suppressed
in various parts of continental Europe—in Poland, Hungary, Italy,
France, Germany, Spain and England—to ever make it possible that the
common order of advancement should so change as to compel the general
mind from general freedom toward absolute monarchy, as represented by
Russia, or to any monarchy represented by any of the nations of Europe.
The common course of events will not so change, but it will continue in
the direction of general freedom, not only in Europe but over the entire
continent. Considering the progress this sentiment has already made in
connection with events which are transpiring in Europe, it is not
presuming very much to say that it will ultimately convert Western and
Central Europe into great republics, represented by the Latin and the
Teuton.
So much for the special situation of Europe proper, as connected with
its local policies. England and Russia have further reaching
pretensions, and, by so having, their policies become intermingled with
American policies.
The processes of civilization are soon to receive accelerating powers in
Asia. England, by virtue of her great commercial influence, has already
exerted very considerable modifying effect upon the vast population of
India. China, by its fickle action regarding foreigners resident there,
is claiming the attention of all interested countries, in such manner as
will undoubtedly force these countries to use some other than moral
suasion to compel its people to the common usages of the civilized
world. Thus barbarism invites the elements which ultimately transform it
into general worldly utility.
With China, the United States has more intimate connection, by reason of
recent scientific progress, and, with England, will divide the honor of
civilizing Eastern Asia. American influence, however, will be the
preponderant influence, for the Chinese are attracted to this country,
and the genius of our institutions cannot fail to react through such as
come here upon China itself. While this process of evolution is going on
in Eastern Asia, Russia will be effecting the same purposes in Western
Asia, and thus these three nations will in due course of time reclaim
the most densely populated part of the world and add it to the sum total
of civilization.
There is a very important and highly suggestive inference to be drawn
from the tendency the peoples of Europe have been exhibiting during the
past few years. Italian unity has been accomplished, and German unity is
about to be accomplished. It is not to be supposed that this process
will stop short of further consolidations. Continental Europe is Latin
and Teuton, and Slav, and this process cannot well cease until these are
united under their respective governments. When this shall have been
accomplished, thrones and crowns will have done their work, and the
peoples will be ready to erect the Latinic, the Teutonic, and the
Slavonic Republics, three mighty nations which could in peace and quiet
pursue their respective appointments in the path of progress, until a
necessity should arise for a still wider and more comprehensive unity,
in which, under one head, the three should be united. They who have
studied the general tendencies of governmental evolution cannot doubt
but such a consummation awaits Continental Europe, nor that Asia is
destined to be regenerated as above shadowed forth.
If such be the course events must take, what is the lesson to be
gathered by that part of the world’s people who speak the English
language? The location of the countries they inhabit does not so readily
point to unity, but all their interests will compel it. The nations of
the world instinctively seek equality of power, or rather, they seek to
keep pace with each other in acquiring power. In view of the prospective
union of the three dominant races in Continental Europe, where shall
England look for her compensating power, except it be in a unity of all
peoples speaking the English Language?
It is true that in this Western Continent there is a new race being
built up, in whose composition all other races are destined to become
blended, and which will inevitably be the dominant and the absorbing
future race of the world. However, in the mean time, England’s only hope
for the retention of an existence, or at least of any general power,
will be to unite its peculiar national characteristics to the younger
and more rapidly changing peoples of America. There might be reasons
without number adduced in support of the suggested course, while valid
ones against it cannot be found. The power such a nation would represent
would be one that neither nor all of the prospective Continental
European countries could hinder from pursuing its predestined work in
Asia and Africa, to which latter division enterprise is just being
attracted by the discovery of immense diamond countries, which are first
offered as the necessary temptation to draw people to it, who shall
afterward find other riches than precious stones within its virgin soil,
as other than golden wealth has been found in California.
Thus, in as comprehensive a manner as possible, is presented the present
general situation and its evident tendencies, which bring us to the
special consideration of the present condition of the country, which, of
all countries, is destined to play the most prominent part in the third
order of civilization—the United States of America.
We have just arisen mightier than ever from a civil war which was
intended by the world’s conservatism to destroy us, and with a
population of forty millions we step at once into the front ranks of,
and into the lead in, the grand march of progress. Our Government is a
nearer approach to a popular form, and more nearly allied to true
freedom and justice than any other in existence. We have, however, only
to review the causes which led to the civil war to see how far we still
are from a perfect form.
This war was either a necessary result of existing causes or else it was
a great national blunder. Many who recognize no order or law in the
progress of civilization, deny both these propositions, and affirm that
the war was produced solely by the personal ambition of party leaders,
representing the _pro_ and _con._ of the institution of slavery. If the
matter is viewed from the standpoint of the science of society, each one
of these propositions is relatively true, but neither is absolutely so.
The war was the necessary result of the growth of the principles of
freedom within the general mind, in antagonism to special, local
interests, which evidences that it did arise naturally, out of the
existing conditions, while the individuals who were prominent upon
either side may be considered as responsible for precipitating it. Those
who stood by, constituting much the larger proportion of the
representative men of the nation, and observed the growth of the
conflict between the two extremes, without stepping in to control the
situation, place it altogether in the light of a great national blunder
or crime. Had the circumstances been controlled by this large third
party, the first proposition would have been true, and yet the war have
been prevented.
We are obliged to speak relatively of relative things, and to consider
facts, isolated from the general sum of all facts, and in a special
sense, and in this sense the war was an enormous national blunder, and
should have been averted by a bold grasping and control of the
circumstances on the part of the Government and those whose _duty_ it
was to have known what the result would be. These servants of the
people, to whom was intrusted the welfare of the country, were utterly
false and faithless, and allowed us to be precipitated, entirely
unprepared, into a fratricidal war which cost the common country
millions of lives and billions of treasure.
How much better would it have been had the situation been understood and
controlled; had the Government shown itself competent to meet it; had it
raised armies and occupied the disaffected country and then abolished
slavery, which it was finally obliged to do, but which could have been
done previously without the sacrifice of life and wealth. Such action
would have exhibited the highest order of statesmanship and would have
been the admiration of ages.
This examination of the causes which led to the war is made to show,
that in our system of government as now administered, there is no
responsibility anywhere, and if we drift into danger and destruction no
one is accountable; and also, that it is the habitual practice, to evade
issues which press for solution, by dodging along with small expedients,
hoping the issues themselves will die out or pass away. This has been
true of us as a government since corruption first began to find its
emissaries among our legislators, and since, it has continually grown
more and more decidedly a feature of its administration, until to-day we
stand a gigantic nation without giving any indication that we realize
our power or that we have any national policy other than to be quite
certain that we do not interfere with any of the nice arrangements of
other nations, or that we do not lend struggling freedom a sympathetic
helping hand, such as we first acquired life by.
By whom are our legislative halls filled? Do we find any Jeffersons,
Jacksons, Hamiltons, Bentons, Websters or Clays among them? No! As a
rule, to which, however, there a few most honorable exceptions, there
are all small men with ideas no more comprehensive than the districts or
States they represent, and who make the purposes of personal gain the
mainspring of all their actions. What can such men thus employed, know
of a great nation’s power; or what her policy should be?
There have been two great political divisions of the people called
Republican and Democratic, the issue between which, grew entirely out of
the slavery question and its sequel, War and Reconstruction. These
issues are all settled. Slavery can never more be made a party issue.
All efforts that have been made to galvanize it into life have proved
futile. The Democratic party leaders have pretty nearly given up the
issue as utterly dead, though many of the rank and file still mouth “the
nigger.” The Republican party has absolutely nothing to make it hold
together except possession of place and power, which in these times of
levying official taxation is no inconsiderable advantage. As for issues
and policies, both parties absolutely lack them. The Democratic and
Republican parties exist to-day in opposition to each other, simply and
solely because they were opposed to each other upon the issues now dead.
No live issues divide them. All of these which are before the people
find advocates and opposers in both ranks, so that in reality there are
no political parties in existence which represent any question to be
solved or settled. Nothing could be more appropriate in the political
musterings and parades of either party than that upon their banners
should be inscribed—
WANTED, A POLICY.
It is evident, if another Presidential canvass passes over, that some
grand issue must come up to give the people inspiration, and which will
be of such character as to _divide_ them, not such as would _unite_ them
unanimously; for to this last condition, it is to be feared, we have not
yet arrived _though there may be such things arise as will command as
much unanimity_ as Washington commanded; but this could not be, _except
revolution_ occurs and it becomes the result of it.
With a young intelligence such as we represent, no old issues can be
made to divide parties. Upon such questions as have heretofore been made
the distinguishing features of political parties, there should be no
misunderstanding. That there is, demonstrates that the principles of
government have not been taught to the people. It teaches that party
leaders have built up theories which lack the support of science and
principle; and in this way all those issues upon which the permanent
vitality of the country depends have been put before the people, colored
and trimmed to suit their prejudices and to shape parties into
opposition. Were all of these issues taught to the people as the
legitimate deduction of the science of government, and entirely bereft
of partisanship, they would all work together for the obtaining of more,
greater and better conditions and privileges. To bring about this course
for the people is the object of the science of society which is just
beginning to be recognized.
There are but three principles by which all questions should be tested:
Freedom, Equality and Justice; and when legislation shall be brought to
the test of these, and entirely abstracted from partisanship, there will
not be very much further legislation to be performed. All questions now
undecided, which still remain before the people, such as those of
finance, commerce, revenue, internal improvements, and international
policy, should have the touchstone of these principles applied, and they
should be decided thereby. It should be asked of them, What course do
you point out which will be consistent with freedom, which shall not
interfere with equality, and which shall be just to everybody? We
venture to assert that, tried by these tests, not a single line of
policy which is now being pursued by the Government will stand. Surely
its financial policy cannot; for what is there in it which is consistent
with the constitutional question of freedom? Surely its revenue, its
tariff system, cannot, for what is there in either which is not in
direct antagonism with equality?—while we may look in vain for even the
skeleton of justice wherever money can find its way.
All this is true, and very much more, and it comes of the departure of
legislation and administration from the fundamental propositions of the
Constitution. It is also true that such conditions cannot last. The
people, as a whole, are not entirely unregenerate, though so many of
their self-appointed leaders are. It only remains for the people to
become fully aroused to the depths of corruption to which legislation
and administration have been carried to demand and obtain the needed
redress. This corruption is not confined to Government, but it has
permeated nearly all corporate organizations, many of which are
organized specially to defraud the productive classes of their
hard-earned wealth. The possibility of this being done is because our
system of finance is entirely wrong, and nothing will save the country
from general financial and commercial ruin except complete revolution in
this system. If the ruin comes it will ultimately fall upon the
producing classes. In other words, the producing interests of the
country cannot sustain the inflation of prices which has been brought
about by speculation, in alliance with fraud, which are the ruling
spirits of the day.
It may be said that such radical changes as will depose the powers which
rule us, and inaugurate the reign of principles, which will secure
freedom, equality and justice to every power, cannot yet be introduced.
We aver that they can; and further, we aver that unless it is done,
revolution such as has never yet been known will inaugurate them for us.
The whole substrata of society is seething and foaming with pent-up
endurance of injustice and wrong, and unless those abuses which have
produced this condition are remedied at once, the existence of the
Government cannot be counted upon. And it is criminal to seek to ignore
this fact. We must not “lie supinely upon our backs while the enemy
binds us hand and foot,” and delivers us to destruction.
In view, then, of our destiny as a nation, and in view of the position
which the order of events seems to have assigned us, we are called upon
to put our Government in perfect order before the constructive part of
the work of the third part of the order of civilization is to be begun.
We must be perfect within ourselves before we can expect to become the
pattern for others, or expect that others will gravitate to us. THE
REVIEW OF THE GENERAL SITUATION, then, results in the finding that the
process of diffusive government has culminated, and that the process of
a continuously constructive and concentrating government has already
been begun, in which our Government, as the most progressive
representative of the principles upon which a perfect government can
alone exist, is assigned the leading position, and that we, recognizing
this assignment, should proceed to assume the responsibilities and the
duties which legitimately flow from it; and they are great in the same
degree that our destiny is great.
It was under the realization of what our destiny should be that the
Pronunciamento of April 2, 1870, in the New York _Herald_, was made; and
now, having offered this general review, my Second Pronunciamento, which
is supplementary to and the completing of the first, is laid before the
people. It is believed that the policy and principles underlying it,
proclaimed therein, will be the final departure necessary to be made, as
the point from which progress will be continued, until the grand
realization of the prophecies of all ages is fulfilled, when all
nations, kindred and tongues shall be united in one harmonious family,
they having risen into the full knowledge of the truth, that whether we
be Christian or Pagan, Greek or Roman, Atheist or Spiritualist, we are
all the children of one common Father, God, whom we shall ever worship
as the Creator, Ruler and Final Destiny of the Universe.
SECOND PRONUNCIAMENTO.
CONSTITUTIONAL EQUALITY THE LOGICAL RESULT OF THE XIV. AND XV.
AMENDMENTS, WHICH NOT ONLY DECLARE WHO ARE CITIZENS, BUT ALSO DEFINE
THEIR RIGHTS, ONE OF WHICH IS THE RIGHT TO VOTE, WITHOUT REGARD TO SEX,
BOTH SEXES BEING INCLUDED IN THE MORE COMPREHENSIVE PROHIBITORY TERMS OF
RACE AND COLOR.
THE STATE LAWS WHICH PROSCRIBED WOMEN AS VOTERS WERE REPEALED BY THE
STATES WHEN THEY RATIFIED SAID AMENDMENTS—THERE ARE NO EXISTING
OPERATIVE LAWS WHICH PROSCRIBE THE RIGHT OF ANY CITIZEN TO VOTE—THE
PERFECTED FRUITS OF THE LATE WAR—THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES IS
BOUND TO PROTECT ITS CITIZENS, MALE AND FEMALE, IN THE EXERCISE OF THEIR
RIGHT TO VOTE—THE DUTY OF CONGRESS IN THE PREMISES.
The time has now arrived when it becomes proper to present the final and
unanswerable proposition, which cannot by any possibility be
controverted, that the several States which, until recently, assumed and
exercised the right of defining which of its citizens should exercise
the right to vote, have by their own voluntary act not only forever
repealed all such prohibitory laws, but also have forever barred their
re-enactment.
Of this I have been fully aware since the proclamation by the President
that the XV. Amendment had become a part of the Organic Law of the
country.
To bring the whole matter properly before the public I published an
address on the 2d of April last, in which I announced myself a candidate
for the Presidency in 1872, and thus asserted the right of woman to
occupy the highest office in the gift of the people.
After that address had had its legitimate effect in arousing the press
of the country to the realization that women are a constituent part of
the body politic, and to a discussion in a much more general way than
had ever been before, I published my second address to the people,
announcing that the XVI. Amendment was a dead letter, and that the
Constitution fully recognized the equality of all citizens.
In this address the general bearings of the Constitution were examined,
and from the blending of its various parts the conclusion was arrived at
that no State should deny the right to vote to any citizen.
I now take the final step, and show that the States themselves, by their
legislative enactments, have removed the only obstacle which until then
had prevented women from voting, and have forever debarred themselves
from receding to their former position. It is as follows:
SUFFRAGE, or the right to vote, is declared by the XV. Article of
Amendments to the Constitution to be a RIGHT, not a privilege, of
citizens of the United States.
A right of a citizen is inherent in the individual, of which he cannot
be deprived by any law of any State.
A privilege may be conferred upon the citizen of the State, and by it
may be taken away. This distinction is made to show that _to vote is not
a privilege_ conferred by a State upon its citizens, but a
CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT of every citizen of the United States, of which
they cannot be deprived. The language of the Constitution is most
singularly emphatic upon this point. It is as follows:
ARTICLE XV.
1. _The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be
denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of
race, color, or previous condition of servitude._
It is thus forever proclaimed, in unmistakable terms, that _to vote is a
right_ of citizens of the United States.
Were it an immunity, or even were it a privilege, to vote, those who
possess it could not be deprived of it by any State, for the State is
bound to protect every citizen within its jurisdiction in the exercise
thereof. It being declared by the XV. Amendment that citizens of the
United States have the right to vote, the next step to determine is, Who
are citizens? This is also definitely, though for the first time,
determined by Article XIV. of Amendments to the Constitution as follows:
ARTICLE XIV.
1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to
the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the
State wherein they reside. _No State shall make or enforce any law which
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United
States._ Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or
property without due process of law, _nor deny to any person_ within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
The next point of inquiry is, How is it that the State laws which
formerly did proscribe women and exclude them from the exercise of
suffrage, no longer _do_ so? Simply and effectively by this fact, that,
by the adoption of the XV. Article of Amendments to the Constitution,
the States established, as the “SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND,” the fact that
no person born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the
jurisdiction thereof shall be denied or abridged by the United States,
or by any State, of the RIGHT TO VOTE.
Women are citizens of the United States; and the States themselves, by
their own voluntary act, have established the fact of their citizenship,
and confirmed their right to vote, which, by such action, has become the
supreme law of the land, which supersedes, annuls and abrogates all
previous State laws inconsistent therewith or contravening the same. The
XV. Article of Amendments to the Constitution is as much a part of it as
any originally adopted; for Art VI., ¶ 2, says:
This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be
made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be
made under the authority of the United States, _shall be_ THE SUPREME
_law of_ THE LAND; and the _judges in_ EVERY _State shall_ BE BOUND
THEREBY; anything in _the Constitution or laws_ OF ANY _State_ TO THE
CONTRARY NOTWITHSTANDING.
The XV. Amendment was adopted by the several States as a legislative
enactment by their Legislatures, under Art V., which provides:
The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both Houses shall deem it
necessary, _shall propose amendments to this Constitution_; or, on the
application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of the several States,
shall call a convention for proposing amendments, _which_, in either
case, _shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this
Constitution_, when _ratified by the Legislatures of three-fourths
thereof_ as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by
Congress, provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year
one thousand eight hundred and eight, shall, in any manner, affect the
first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; AND
THAT NO STATE, WITHOUT ITS CONSENT, SHALL BE DEPRIVED OF ITS EQUAL
SUFFRAGE IN THE SENATE.
Since, therefore, all citizens have the RIGHT TO VOTE under this act or
participation by the Legislatures of the several States, all State Laws
which abridge the right are inoperative, null and void, and the
exclusion of women who are citizens from the right to vote, was repealed
and must stand repealed until the Legislatures of the several States
shall again pass an act positively excluding her. If we again examine
Art XV. we shall see that this right shall not be denied or abridged by
the United States or any State on account of RACE, COLOR, or PREVIOUS
CONDITION OF SERVITUDE; it is left to be inferred that it might be on
account of SEX, but this denial has not yet been attempted, nor could it
be accomplished if it were, for here the XIV. Amendment again comes to
our relief saying, “That no State shall make or enforce any law which
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United
States.”
Again, the Constitution is assuredly a contract between States and
citizens, and Sec. 10, Art I., provides that no State shall pass any law
impairing contracts.
Art I., Sec. 4,¶ I, provides that:
“The times, places and _manner of holding elections_ for senators and
representatives shall be prescribed in each State, by the Legislature
thereof; but the _Congress may, at any time, by law, make or alter
such regulations_, except as to the places of choosing senators,”
while the judiciary of the United States has acquired complete
jurisdiction over this matter by the authority of Art III., Sec. 2,¶
1, which provides that: “_The judicial power shall extend to all cases
in law and equity arising under this Constitution, the laws of the
United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their
authority_.”
And for all these reasons, the State Legislatures having, by the
adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment, abrogated all previously existing,
conflicting laws on the subject of suffrage, are now forever precluded
by the Fourteenth Amendment from re-establishing any restriction to
apply to women, whom the authorities of the United States, in their
support of the Constitution, are in duty bound to protect in their right
to vote.
Now what was the fruit of the late war, which threw the entire nation
into such convulsive throes, unless it is found in the Fourteenth and
Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution, namely: that grand change in
the fundamental laws which declares _who_ are citizens and what are
their _rights_, _privileges_ and immunities, which cannot be abridged?
Will any one pretend that these great enactments can be understood to
mean less than the language thereof plainly conveys? Or will any one
claim that the old, absurd State laws, which were sunk in oblivion by
the adoption of these amendments to the Constitution, are still in
force? Who will _dare_ to say, in the face of these plainly worded
amendments, which have such an unmistakable meaning, that the women of
America shall not enjoy their emancipation as well as the black slave?
WOMEN HAVE THE RIGHT TO VOTE! It is the duty of the Government to see
that they are not denied the right to exercise it, and, to secure the
necessary action of Congress in the premises, I did, on the 21st day of
December, 1870, memorialize Congress as recorded in the Congressional
_Globe_, December 22, 1870.
In the Senate:
Mr. Harris presented the memorial of Victoria C. Woodhull, praying for
the passage of such laws as may be necessary and proper for carrying
into execution the right vested by the Constitution in the citizens of
the United States to vote without regard to sex; which was referred to
the Committee on the Judiciary and ordered to be printed.
In the House:
Mr. Julian—I ask unanimous consent to present at this time and have
printed in the _Globe_ the memorial of Victoria C. Woodhull, claiming
the right of suffrage under the XIV. and XV. Articles of Amendments to
the Constitution of the United States, and asking for the enactment of
the necessary and appropriate legislation to guarantee the exercise of
that right to the women of the United States. I also ask that the
petition be referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.
No objection was made, and it was ordered accordingly.
The petition is as follows:
THE MEMORIAL OF VICTORIA C. WOODHULL,
_To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States in Congress assembled, respectfully showeth_:
That she was born in the State of Ohio, and is above the age of
twenty-one years; that she has resided in the State of New York during
the past three years; that she is still a resident thereof, and that she
is a citizen of the United States, as declared by the XIV. Article of
Amendments to the Constitution of the United States.
That since the adoption of the XV. Article of Amendments to the
Constitution, neither the State of New York nor any other State, nor any
Territory, has passed any law to abridge the right of any citizen of the
United States to vote, as established by said article, neither on
account of sex or otherwise:
That, nevertheless, the right to vote is denied to women citizens of the
United States by the operation of Election Laws in the several States
and Territories, which laws were enacted prior to the adoption of the
said XV. Article, and which are inconsistent with the Constitution as
amended, and, therefore, are void and of no effect; but which, being
still enforced by the said States and Territories, render the
Constitution inoperative as regards the right of women citizens to vote:
And whereas, Article VI., Section 2, declares “That this Constitution,
and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance
thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the
authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land;
and all judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the
Constitution and laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding:” And
whereas, no distinction between citizens is made in the Constitution of
the United States on account of sex; but the XV. Article of Amendments
to it provides that “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall
abridge the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States,
nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of
the laws:”
And whereas, Congress has power to make laws which shall be necessary
and proper for carrying into execution all powers vested by the
Constitution in the Government of the United States; and to make or
alter all regulations in relation to holding elections for senators or
representatives, and especially to enforce, by appropriate legislation,
the provisions of the said XIV. Article:
And whereas, the continuance of the enforcement of said local election
laws, denying and abridging the Right of Citizens to Vote on account of
sex, is a grievance to your memorialist and to various other persons,
citizens of the United States, being women,—
Therefore, your memorialist would most respectfully petition your
Honorable Bodies to make such laws as in the wisdom of Congress shall be
necessary and proper for carrying into execution the right vested by the
Constitution in the citizens of the United States to vote, without
regard to sex.
And your memorialist will ever pray.
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.
Dated NEW YORK CITY, _December 19, 1870_.
This memorial having been referred to the Judiciary Committee, I then
prepared and submitted the following legal deductions in support
thereof:
CONSTITUTIONAL EQUALITY.
TO THE HON. THE JUDICIARY COMMITTEES OF THE SENATE AND THE HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES OF THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES:
The undersigned, VICTORIA C. WOODHULL, having most respectfully
memorialized Congress for the passage of such laws as in its wisdom
shall seem necessary and proper to carry into effect the rights vested
by the Constitution of the United States in the citizens to vote,
without regard to sex, begs leave to submit to your honorable body the
following in favor of her prayer in said Memorial which has been
referred to your Committee:
The public law of the world is founded upon the conceded fact that
sovereignty cannot be forfeited or renounced. The sovereign power of
this country is perpetual in the politically-organized people of the
United States, and can neither be relinquished nor abandoned by any
portion of them. The people in this Republic who confer sovereignty are
its citizens: in a monarchy the people are the subjects of sovereignty.
All citizens of a republic by rightful act or implication confer
sovereign power. All people of a monarchy are subjects who exist under
its supreme shield and enjoy its immunities.
The subject of a monarch takes municipal immunities from the sovereign
as a gracious favor; but the woman citizen of this country has the
inalienable “sovereign” right of self-government in _her own proper
person_. Those who look upon woman’s status by the dim light of the
common law, which unfolded itself under the feudal and military
institutions that establish right upon physical power, cannot find any
analogy in the status of the woman citizen of this country, _where the
broad sunshine of our Constitution has enfranchised all_.
As sovereignty cannot be forfeited, relinquished or abandoned, those
from whom it flows—the citizens—are equal in conferring the power, and
should be equal in the enjoyment of its benefits and in the exercise of
its rights and privileges.
One portion of citizens have no power to deprive another portion of
rights and privileges such as are possessed and exercised by themselves.
The male citizen has no more right to deprive the female citizen of the
free, public, political expression of opinion than the female citizen
has to deprive the male citizen thereof.
The sovereign will of the people is expressed in our written
Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land. The Constitution
makes no distinction of sex. The Constitution defines a woman born or
naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction
thereof, to be a citizen. It recognizes the right of citizens to vote.
It declares that the right of citizens of the United States to vote
shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on
account of “race, color or previous condition of servitude.”
Women, white and black, belong to races; although to different races. A
race of people comprises all the people, male and female. The right to
vote cannot be denied on account of race. All people included in the
term race have the right to vote, unless otherwise prohibited.
Women of all races are white, black or some intermediate color. Color
comprises all people, of all races and both sexes. The right to vote
cannot be denied on account of color. All people included in the term
color have the right to vote unless otherwise prohibited.
With the right to vote sex has nothing to do. Race and color include all
people of both sexes. All people of both sexes have the right to vote,
unless prohibited by special limiting terms less comprehensive than race
or color. No such limiting terms exist in the Constitution.
Women, white and black, have from time immemorial groaned under what is
properly termed in the Constitution “previous condition of servitude.”
Women are the equals of men before the law, and are equal in all their
rights as citizens.
Women are debarred from voting in some parts of the United States,
although they are allowed to exercise that right elsewhere.
Women were formerly permitted to vote in places where they are now
debarred therefrom.
The Naturalization Laws of the United States expressly provide for the
naturalization of women.
But the right to vote has only lately been distinctly declared by the
Constitution to be inalienable, under three distinct conditions—in all
of which woman is distinctly embraced.
The citizen who is taxed should also have a voice in the subject matter
of taxation. “No taxation without representation” is a right which was
fundamentally established at the very birth of our country’s
independence; and by what ethics does any free government impose taxes
on women without giving them a voice upon the subject or a participation
in the public declaration as to how and by whom these taxes shall be
applied for common public use?
Women are free to own and to control property, separate and apart from
males, and they are held responsible in their own proper persons, in
every particular, as well as men, in and out of court.
Women have the same inalienable right to life, liberty and the _pursuit
of_ happiness that men have. Why have they not this right politically,
as well as men?
Women constitute a majority of the people of this country—they hold vast
portions of the nation’s wealth and pay a proportionate share of the
taxes. They are intrusted with the most holy duties and the most vital
responsibilities of society; they bear, rear and educate men; they train
and mould their characters; they inspire the noblest impulses in men;
they often hold the accumulated fortunes of a man’s life for the safety
of the family and as guardians of the infants, and yet they are debarred
from uttering any opinion, by public vote, as to the management by
public servants of these interests; they are the secret counsellors, the
best advisers, the most devoted aids in the most trying periods of men’s
lives, and yet men shrink from trusting them in the common questions of
ordinary politics. Men trust women in the market, in the shop, on the
highway and the railroad, and in all other public places and assemblies,
but when they propose to carry a slip of paper with a name upon it to
the polls, they fear them. Nevertheless, as citizens women have the
right to vote; they are part and parcel of that great element in which
the sovereign power of the land had birth: and it is by usurpation only
that men debar them from their right to vote. The American nation, in
its march onward and upward, cannot publicly choke the intellectual and
political activity of half its citizens by narrow statutes. The will of
the entire people is the true basis of republican government, and a free
expression of that will by the public vote of all citizens, without
distinctions of race, color, occupation or sex, is the only means by
which that will can be ascertained. As the world has advanced in
civilization and culture; as mind has risen in its dominion over matter;
as the principle of justice and moral right has gained sway, and merely
physically organized power has yielded thereto; as the might of right
has supplanted the right of might, so have the rights of women become
more fully recognized, and that recognition is the result of the
development of the minds of men, which through the ages she has
polished, and thereby heightened the lustre of civilization.
It was reserved for our great country to recognize by constitutional
enactment that political equality of all citizens which religion,
affection, and common sense should have long since accorded; it was
reserved for America to sweep away the mist of prejudice and ignorance,
and that chivalric condescension of a darker age, for in the language of
Holy Writ, “The night is far spent, the day is at hand, let us therefore
cast off the work of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let
us walk honestly as in the day.”
It may be argued against the proposition that there still remains upon
the statute books of some States the word “male” to an exclusion, but as
the Constitution in its paramount character can only be read by the
light of the established principle, _ita lex Scripta est_; and as the
subject of sex is not mentioned and the Constitution is not limited
either in terms or by necessary implication in the general rights of
citizens to vote, this right cannot be limited on account of anything in
the spirit of inferior or previous enactments upon a subject which is
not mentioned in the supreme law. A different construction would destroy
a vested right in a portion of the citizens, and this no legislature has
a right to do without compensation, and nothing can compensate a citizen
for the loss of his or her suffrage—its value is equal to the value of
life. Neither can it be presumed that women are to be kept from the
polls as a mere police regulation: it is to be hoped, at least, that
police regulations in their case need not be very active. The effect of
the amendments to the Constitution must be to annul the power over this
subject in the States whether past, present or future, which is contrary
to the amendments. The amendments would even arrest the action of the
Supreme Court in cases pending before it prior to their adoption, and
operate as an absolute prohibition to the exercise of any other
jurisdiction than merely to dismiss the suit.
3 Dall., 382; 6 Wheaton, 405; 9 Id., 868; 3d Circ., Pa., 1832.
And if the restrictions contained in the Constitution as to color, race
or servitude, were designed to limit the State governments in reference
to their own citizens, and were intended to operate also as restrictions
on the Federal power, and to prevent interference with the rights of the
State and its citizens, how then can the State restrict citizens of the
United States in the exercise of rights not mentioned in any restrictive
clause in reference to actions on the part of those citizens having
reference solely to the necessary functions of the General Government,
such as the election of representatives and senators to Congress, whose
election the Constitution expressly gives Congress the power to
regulate?
S. C., 1847: Fox vs. Ohio, 5 Howard, 410.
Your memorialist complains of the existence of State Laws, and prays
Congress, by appropriate legislation, to declare them, as they are,
annulled, and to give vitality to the Constitution under its power to
make and alter the regulations of the States contravening the same.
It may be urged in opposition that the Courts have power, and should
declare upon this subject.
The Supreme Court has the power, and it would be its duty so to declare
the law; but the Court will not do so unless a determination of such
point as shall arise make it necessary to the determination of a
controversy, and hence a case must be presented in which there can be no
rational doubt. All this would subject the aggrieved parties to much
dilatory, expensive and needless litigation, which your memorialist
prays your Honorable Body to dispense with by appropriate legislation,
as there can be no purpose in special arguments “ad inconvenienti,”
enlarging or contracting the import of the language of the Constitution.
_Therefore_, Believing firmly in the right of citizens to freely
approach those in whose hands their destiny is placed, under the
Providence of God, your memorialist has frankly, but humbly, appealed to
you, and prays that the wisdom of Congress may be moved to action in
this matter for the benefit and the increased happiness of our beloved
country.
Most respectfully submitted,
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.
Dated NEW YORK, January 2, 1871.
The issue upon the question of female suffrage being thus definitely and
clearly set forth, and its rights inalienably vested in woman, a
brighter future dawns upon the country. When Congress shall have moved
in the matter, and thus secured to woman the free exercise of these
newly-defined rights, she can unite in purifying the elements of
political strife—in restoring the Government to pristine integrity,
strength and vigor. To do this, many reforms become of absolute
necessity. Prominent among these are—
A reform in representation by which all Legislative Bodies and the
Presidential Electoral College shall be so elected that minorities as
well as majorities shall have direct representation.
A complete reform in Executive and Departmental conduct, by which the
President and the Secretaries of the United States, and the Governors
and State Officers shall be forced to recognize that they are the
servants of the people, appointed to attend to the business of the
people, and not for the purpose of perpetuating their official
positions, or of securing the plunder of public trusts for the
enrichment of their political adherents and supporters.
A reform in the tenure of office, by which the Presidency shall be
limited to one term, with a retiring life pension, and a permanent seat
in the Federal Senate, where his Presidential experience may become
serviceable to the nation, and on the dignity and life emolument of
Presidential Senator he shall be placed above all other political
position, and be excluded from all professional pursuits.
A radical reform in our Civil Service, by which the Government, in its
executive capacity, shall at all times secure faithful and efficient
officers, and the people trustworthy servants, whose appointment shall
be entirely removed from, and be made independent of, the influence and
control of the legislative branch of the Government, and who shall be
removed for “cause” only, and who shall be held strictly to frequent
public accounting to superiors for all their official transactions,
which shall forever dispose of the corrupt practices induced by the
allurements of the motto of present political parties, that “to the
victor belong the spoils,” which is a remnant of arbitrarily assumed
authority, unworthy of a government emanating from the whole people.
A reform in our systems of finance, by which the arbitrary standard of
ancient and feudal despotisms shall be removed; by which the true source
of wealth shall become the basis and the security of a national
currency, which shall be made convertible into a National Bond bearing
such an interest, while in the hands of the people, as shall secure an
equilibrium between the demands of all the varieties of exchanges and
the supply of money to effect them with, the Bond being also convertible
at pleasure into money again, by which system of adjustment, “plethora”
equally with “tightness” shall be banished from the financial centres of
our country; and which, in its practical workings, shall secure such
pecuniary equality between the employing and the laboring classes as
will forever make poverty and its long list of consequent ills
impossible in our country; and which shall suggest the solution of those
schemes which are being discussed for “funding the public debt” at a
lower rate of interest.
A complete reform in our system of Internal improvements, which connect
and bind together the several States in commercial unity, to the end
that they shall be conducted so as to administer to the best interests
of the whole people, for whose benefit they were first permitted, and
are now protected; by which the General Government, in the use of its
postal powers, and in the exercise of its duties in regulating commerce
between the States, shall secure the transportation of passengers,
merchandise and the mails, from one extremity of the country to the
opposite, and throughout its whole area, at the actual cost of
maintaining such improvements, plus legitimate interest upon their
original cost of construction, thus converting them into public
benefits, instead of their remaining, as now, hereditary taxes upon the
industries of the country, by which, if continued, a few favored
individuals are likely to become the actual rulers of the country.
A complete reform in commercial and navigation laws, by which American
built or purchased ships and American seamen shall be practically
protected by the admission of all that is required for construction of
the first, or the use and maintenance of either, free in bond or on
board.
A reform in the relations of the employer and employed, by which shall
be secured the practice of the great natural law, of one-third of time
to labor, one-third to recreation and one-third to rest, that by this,
intellectual improvement and physical development may go on to that
perfection which the Almighty Creator designed.
A reform in the principles of protection and revenue, by which the
largest home and foreign demand shall be created and sustained for
products of American industry of every kind; by which this industry
shall be freed from the ruinous effects consequent upon frequent changes
in these systems; by which shall be secured that constant employment to
workingmen and workingwomen throughout the country which will maintain
them upon an equality in all kinds and classes of industry; by which a
continuous prosperity—which, if not so marked by rapid accumulation,
shall possess the merit of permanency—will be secured to all, which in
due time will reduce the cost of all products to a minimum value; by
which the laboring poor shall be relieved of the onerous tax, now
indirectly imposed upon them by government; by which the burden of
governmental support shall be placed where it properly belongs, and by
which an unlimited national wealth will gradually accumulate, the ratio
of taxation upon which will become so insignificant in amount as to be
no burden to the people.
A reform by which the power of legislative bodies to levy taxes shall be
limited to the actual necessities of the legitimate functions of
government in its protection of the rights of persons, property and
nationality; and by which they shall be deprived of the power to exempt
any property from taxation; or to make any distinctions directly or
indirectly among citizens in taxation for the support of government; or
to give or loan the public property or credit to individuals or
corporations to promote any enterprise whatever.
A reform in the system of criminal jurisprudence, by which the death
penalty shall no longer be inflicted—by which the hardened criminal
shall have no human chance of being let loose to harass society until
the term of the sentence, whatever that may be, shall have expired, and
by which, during that term, the entire prison employment shall be
for—and the product thereof be faithfully paid over to—the support of
the criminal’s family; and by which our so-called prisons shall be
virtually transformed into vast reformatory workshops, from which the
unfortunate may emerge to be useful members of society, instead of the
alienated citizens they now are.
The institution of such supervisory control and surveillance over the
now low orders of society as shall compel them to industry, and provide
for the helpless, and thus banish those institutions of pauperism and
beggary which are fastening upon the vitals of society, and are so
prolific of crime and suffering in certain communities.
The organization of a general system of national education, which shall
positively secure to every child of the country such an education in the
arts, sciences and general knowledge as will render them profitable and
useful members of society, and the entire proceeds of the public domain
should be religiously devoted to this end.
Such change in our general foreign policy as shall plainly indicate that
we realize and appreciate the important position which has been assigned
us as a nation by the common order of civilization; which shall indicate
our supreme faith in that form of government which emanates from, and is
supported by, the whole people, and that such government must eventually
be uniform throughout the world; which shall also have in view the
establishment of a Grand International Tribunal, to which all disputes
of peoples and nations shall be referred for final arbitration and
settlement, without appeal to arms; said Tribunal maintaining only such
an International army and navy as would be necessary to enforce its
decrees, and thus secure the return of the 15,000,000 of men who now
compose the standing armies of the world, to industrial and productive
pursuits.
Thus in the best sense do I claim to be the friend and exponent of the
most complete equality to which humanity can attain; of the broadest
individual freedom compatible with the public good, and that supreme
justice which shall know no distinction among citizens upon any ground
whatever, in the administration and the execution of the laws; and also,
to be a faithful worker in the cause of human advancement; and
especially to be the co-laborer with those who strive to better the
condition of the poor and friendless; to secure to the great mass of
working people the just reward of their toil,—I claim from these, and
from all others in the social scale, that support in the bold political
course I have taken, which shall give me the strength and the position
to carry out these needed reforms, which shall secure to them, in
return, the blessings which the Creator designed the human race should
enjoy.
If I obtain this support, woman’s strength and woman’s will, with God’s
support, if He vouchsafe it, shall open to them, and to this country, a
new career of greatness in the race of nations, which can only be
secured by that fearless course of truth from which the nations of the
earth, under despotic male governments, have so far departed.
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.
NEW YORK, JANUARY 10, 1871.
TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of April 16, 1870.]
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL ON THE “TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.”
GOD IN CREATION, IN HISTORY, AND IN GOVERNMENT—A PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE
TO A PHILOSOPHICAL DISCOURSE.
[The head of the firm of Woodhull, Claflin & Co., Commodore Vanderbilt’s
financial _proteges_—the famous brokers of Broad street—has undertaken
the difficult task of correcting popular errors in the science of
government, and has prepared a paper on the subject, which, as the lady
expects to be too busy to deliver for some time to come, we publish it
_in extenso_. Whether her conclusions will agree with her premises or
not, the document will be found exceedingly interesting, as showing the
quality of the female mind against which the money changers of Wall
street will have to contend in business:]
As far back into the past as dim historic lights enable us to see, and
still much farther, even behind the appearance of man upon the face of
this planet, the existence of government can be plainly traced. Wherever
two or more of any species of animals—not to descend lower and including
man—are or have been, something simulating to what is in our day
denominated government exists or existed; and, whether it is or was over
a greater or less community, it is or was possessed of certain
characterizing elements, from and by which a clear insight into the
composition of the community can be obtained by those who will analyze
the elements somewhat philosophically; that is to say governments are
truthful reflections of the governed when considered as a whole, and all
changes or modifications that occur therein, result from growth of the
governed.
No just nor advantageous deductions from any subject or fact which is
worthy of a position in the world’s history, and which is capable of
permanently maintaining such a position, can be arrived at, except
through a complete philosophical analysis of all the elements entering
into its composition. All facts as well as all chemical compounds are
made up of elementary principles brought into intimate productive
relations by some general power, operating by some general law of
combination. By such an analysis the composition of such subjects and
facts as are analyzed are not only determined, but the relations which
they sustain to all other subjects and facts are also demonstrated, and
thus a general law of relativity is found which makes the whole round of
creation one in purpose and effect.
It is not proposed in the present article to prosecute an exhaustive
analysis of government as it is or as it has been, but rather to observe
the chain of progression which has been evolved, and to endeavor to
determine whether, link by link, it does not form one harmonious whole,
from the present aspect of which its culmination may be caught sight of;
and whether that culmination will not be found a complete circle,
containing within its immense area all that has conspired and assisted
in its completion, and which will be entitled to positions in such a
community of interests by virtue of having thus conspired and assisted
in its formation.
Neither is it proposed to extend the limits of this inquiry beyond the
consideration of human government, except in so far as analogies may be
sought to enforce the application of general laws and to assist by such
application in the solution of such questions as may not be entirely
apparent from the evidences contained specifically within the said
limits. Philosophically considered, however, the objects sought could as
well be obtained from any other department of government; for, while a
general law underlies all forms and systems of human government and
controls all its modifications, the self-same law underlies and controls
all other forms and systems of government, from which human government
sprung and upon which it rests as a primary basis.
It is believed that there is sufficient mental development and
comprehension contained in the philosophic minds of this latter part of
the nineteenth century to gather into form the evidence that has been
and is being presented, in the evolution and dissolution of government,
and grasp its signification, so that in its application to existing
things, permanent instead of politic modifications in governmental
affairs may be inaugurated. Governed by any other than such a broad
standard, changes and modifications in present systems and forms are
made simply to meet the exigencies of the times, and with no view to
place government upon a basis which should never need modification, and
which should meet all exigencies of all times. The reasons why such
government has not hitherto been inaugurated or attempted, are, because
in no country has the general mind as yet become sufficiently broad and
comprehensive to discover that great general laws underlie the universe
and govern all its manifestations, applying to each and every department
thereof with perfect uniformity. It is not my province to discuss what
these great general laws and principles are. I assume that they do
exist, and it is my office to predicate what the future of government
must be when it shall have its basis in such laws and principles, and to
judge whether what has been, and what is, may be considered as gradual
approaches from the most simple and homogeneous forms in which the
interest of all were very indefinite, either individually or
collectively, toward that wherein the interests of all, while becoming
more distinct individually, shall be merged in the general interests of
the whole and become identical therewith.
Mr. Maine says, in his “Ancient Law,” that “society in ancient times was
not what it is assumed to be at present—a collection of individuals. In
fact, and in view of the men that composed it, it was an aggregation of
families. The contrast may be best and most forcibly expressed by saying
that the unit of an ancient society was the family; of a modern society,
the individual.”
In speaking of ancient society, Mr. Fiske says: “Family government
excluded not only individual independence but also State supremacy; and
that vestiges of a time when there were no aggregates of men more
extensive than the family may be found in every part of the world, when
social organization was but one step removed from absolute and ferocious
anarchy;” and this he defines as a social aggregate of the first order;
the coalescence of families into civic communities an aggregate of the
second order; the coalescence of civic and tribual communities into the
nation an aggregate of the third order. The coalescence of nations would
then describe an aggregate of the fourth order. Under these four orders
all the forms of government which can ever exist in the world must be
classified.
As low a form of government as can be conceived as existing next above
that of the family, worthy to be called human government, still exists
among the barbarians inhabiting some portions of Central Africa, some of
the East India Islands, and perhaps some of the South Sea Islands. These
people unite in bands or tribes, and rove about seeking the means of
subsistence and endeavoring to conquer other tribes. Some have central
points of rendezvous, where the rudest habitations are constructed, in
which the women and children remain during the absence of the men. The
women almost universally are considered very much in the light of slaves
by all these nomadic tribes, and as only fit to minister to their
passions and to perform their drudgery. Their language is as rude as
their habits, consisting of little more than a comparatively few
spasmodically uttered harsh sounds. Written language they have none,
excepting perhaps some images or rude figures symbolizing some special
event they in this way attempt to commemorate, and which may be
considered as the foundation of it for the tribes using them as they
were the primary foundation of all written language.
One notable feature is universally observable among all these
representatives of primitive government—they all recognize the necessity
of a leader under some of the many forms of control exercised by the one
over the many, and he is generally one who has exhibited some particular
prowess in battle, the capacity to perform which he is supposed to be
endowed with by some unknown power, and which renders him superior to
all others, and best capable of ruling and protecting those who thus
recognize him, and who obey him in every particular, even to sacrificing
their lives. Such may be considered an outline of our conceptions of the
most primitive form of government of the present day; and the fact that
such still exists has a marked bearing upon the subject of general
government, when it is remembered that the time was when no higher form
existed on the face of the earth.
The law of evolution and that of dissolution being a universal deduction
from the philosophic ultimatum _that force persists_, they apply to all
things wherein force is exhibited; consequently human government must be
the objective result of the persistence of force exhibited among the
people of the earth, and at the same time the subject of all
modifications that grow out of its transformations and equivalent
relations. In whatever light, then, human government is viewed, these
philosophic laws should never be lost sight of nor disregarded; but the
causes of all the rises and falls, transformations, modifications and
amalgamations, should be sought by the application of those laws to the
objective points under consideration.
The question now naturally arises, Can human government, then be
analyzed, and the facts it presents be found to correspond to the
deductions of philosophic law?
It has been remarked that the simplest combinations of force among human
beings, representing government which existed when none higher had been
attained, was still represented on the earth by certain of its
inhabitants. Beginning with this as the basis of the superstructure of
human government, can there be traced a gradual scale of progress from
it to the government of this country, in which scale each nation, tribe
and tongue will find its appropriate place, which, unoccupied, would
render the scale imperfect, as a chain would be imperfect were one of
its central links missing? and would an analysis of each of these
governments develop the fact that each successive one in the progressive
scale would represent some new application of the principle of liberty,
some more extended idea of equality, or some better formula of justice
than the preceding had, which application, idea or formula entitles it
to rank superior thereto, and also determines its position in the scale?
Of all systems and forms of government that came and passed away during
the long lapse of ages, from the time the most primitive alone existed
on the earth to the time wherein those flourished that have left records
of their existence, we can know nothing except what may be gathered from
philosophic deduction unsupported by any actual record of facts
concerning them. It is, however, philosophically certain that very many
such intermediate governments did exist, variously modified and
advancing from the primitive forms. Possessing, as we may justly infer,
but little capability for duration, their integration was rapidly
succeeded by disintegration; being exposed to numerous and different
external influences, rapid and successive changes were inevitable,
because they were possessed of but little individuality and consequently
but little capacity for resisting external influences. They were bound
together by none of the higher laws of association, but were led by
transient ephemeral contingencies, combining at times together, to soon
divide and subdivide only to again form new and equally temporary
amalgamations. Thus constantly organizing and dissolving, the long
interval alluded to was occupied by primitive inhabitants in their march
from the purely homogeneous toward the individualized times wherein
civilization left records of itself.
While no special inquiries into the correctness of the formulas laid
down at various times by various philosophers, which seek to include and
cover all the phenomena of the universe, will be made, those of the most
eminent may with propriety be stated; indeed, if it be attempted to show
that history obeys a fixed law of evolution, the law that it is presumed
to obey must be given, that it may be seen whether the deductions
arrived at are included within the limits of the formula. If it should
not so turn out, then either the deduction must be illegitimate, the
formula imperfect or impossible, or the fact made apparent, that, while
all the other sciences, as biology, psychology and their various
divisions, are known to conform to certain well determined laws of
causation, sociology, in which all history and government find their
basis, conforms to no law, but is the product of the merest chance.
Until within the present century it was not claimed by any of the
various philosophers who had flourished that there was such a science as
sociology; or, if so claimed by any far-seeing mind, the attempt to
demonstrate or formulate it was not made until the time of Comte, who,
about the year 1830, did attempt it, and he may be justly styled the
father of the present system of formulated science. Though his system is
now shown to contain many imperfections and omissions, it is
nevertheless certain, that but for it, the improvements since made would
not have been possible to the present degree attained, though those who
have made them may repudiate the idea, and scorn to acknowledge that
they have built upon Comte.
Gathering from his profuse writings upon this point his earlier and most
continuous opinions, the following are the terms in which they can be
the most simply expressed: Social progression is a gradual change from
rudimentary, homogeneous and anthropomorphic conditions to civilization,
heterogeneity and to definite conceptions of the external world; and at
the same time from nomadic characteristics, with aggressive purposes, to
inhabitative propensities and individual industrial pursuits.
A number of philosophers, who have written since the days of Comte, have
from time to time presented formulas which at best can only be
considered as modifications of his, and it may confidently be asserted
that no real addition was acquired until the Spencerian was made, which,
while it included Comte’s, was more general and comprehensive, and at
the same time more definite and special. This seeming anomaly was made
possible by his having discovered the law of evolution, and by having
exhaustively demonstrated that all mental action—emotional as well as
intellectual—was included in it. It is as follows: Evolution is an
integration of matter and a concomitant dissipation of motion, during
which the matter passes from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a
definite, coherent heterogeneity, and during which the retained motion
undergoes a partial transformation. This general formula includes all
evolution, organic and inorganic, and interprets not only the genesis of
the sidereal and solar systems and of the earth, but also of life upon
the earth, and has become the law of all social, moral and intellectual
change. He afterward found it necessary to make a supplement especially
applicable to organic life, in such terms as should not include the
inorganic. It was as follows: “Life—and intelligence being the highest
manifestations of life—consists in the continuous establishment of
relations within the organism, in correspondence with relations existing
within the environment or the surroundings.”
To this exhaustive statement a late generalization and specialization
has been made by Mr. Fiske, especially applicable to social evolution,
as follows: The progress of society is a continuous establishment of
psychical relations within the community, in conformity to physical and
psychical relations arising within the environment, during which, both
the community and the environment pass from a state of incoherent
homogeneity to a state of coherent heterogeneity, and during which the
constitutional units of the community become ever more distinctly
individuated.
Having now arrived at that point where history must furnish the facts
upon which the subject rests, it may be well to comprehensively
recapitulate a perhaps somewhat too long introduction. It was seen that
all over the face of the earth where human life was represented,
government exists, and that this government was representative of one or
another of the three orders of aggregates of individuals—the family, the
tribal, or the nations, and that an aggregate of nations would add the
fourth order. It was also seen that the evolution of government was the
objective result of the persistence of force among its component parts.
Fixing the basis of government in this philosophic fact, it was
necessary to examine the history of government to see if in its
evolution it had conformed to this law, according to present accepted
formulas; and if so found to have done, to extend the same into the
future, to ascertain if possible what the future would be. Thus by a
present understanding of the law and its tendencies, all modifications
and changes made in present systems and forms might be so made in
harmony therewith, and not with a simple view to meet the present
exigencies, but with an understanding that would meet all exigencies of
all time, which alone is perfect legislation.
THE TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of April 25, 1870.]
SECOND PART OF MRS. VICTORIA C. WOODHULL’S PHILIPPIC—LAWS, PEOPLES AND
COMMUNITIES FROM A FEMALE POINT OF VIEW—LESSONS IN HISTORY, POLITICS AND
WAR.
[Mrs. Victoria C. Woodhull, head of the firm of female brokers in Broad
street, presents to the readers of the _Herald_ the following
communication, the second part of her paper on “The Tendencies of
Government,” the preface to which has already appeared. Mrs. Woodhull
has undertaken the difficult task of enlightening the public mind on the
best means of running the Government machine of America. Though her
views, expressed in this paper, have a wide range, it must be said that
she is but putting herself in wind for a tremendous attack on “the best
Government the world ever saw.” Being already in the race for the
Presidency (not of the Sorosis, but of the United States), her
pronunciamentos are of course very important:]
It must begin to be apparent that the proposition is, that the evolution
of government does not differ from that of simplest organic forms either
in principle or in mode of operation. The same laws that govern the
growth and multiply the plant also govern society and multiply it. The
same laws that bring fruit to perfection and dissolution perfect and
dissolve societies. The same laws that produce and control the units of
the animal kingdom produce and control the units of society. The same
law that governs the ebbing and flowing of the tides, that determines
whether the component parts of water shall exist as water or vapor,
determines the movements of society and the conditions of its existence;
and the same law that produces an earthquake here, a volcanic eruption
there or a terrific hurricane elsewhere, produces the earthquakes,
volcanic eruptions and the hurricanes that are ever modifying and
changing society. Symbols of all the various processes society passes
through in its growth and extension can be found in every other
department of the universe; or, to assert the same fact differently,
everywhere in the universe there is a constant effort to attain an
equilibrium—a continuous working to supply wants, an unceasing process
of demand and supply, which are universal exemplifications of the law
that motion is always in the direction of the least resistance or the
greatest traction, or the resultant of the two operating conjointly.
But what does history tell of the foundation and dissolution of
governments, and what illustrations of the law of progress does it
afford? As before stated, those who have most earnestly studied
pre-historic time have found ample evidence that the time was when the
head of the family was the highest sovereign power, and so absolute in
its character that the individual was entirely submerged in it, and
State supremacy was an impossibility. Nothing but anarchy and confusion
could have attended such rule; constant rivalry, jealousy and contention
must have kept up a continual strife between adjacent families, which
could know no settlement except through the subjugation or destruction
of the weaker of the contending parties. Of this order of governmental
aggregations, it is questionable if the earth at present furnishes any
illustrations, unless it be in some part thereof to which the discoverer
has not yet penetrated. Of the next, or tribal, order of aggregates, it
does, however; and with this second order the real analysis and
comparison must begin, though we have no objective means of
demonstrating the conditions stated as existing. When family sovereignty
was universal it can readily be seen that the continued existence of
such conditions would be impossible, for the continuous subjugations and
amalgamations of families would lead directly to tribal communities, at
first in absolute subjection to one tribe, which would grow into some
power, distributed among the several tribes. So also would the joining
together of several weak families to resist a more powerful neighbor
lead directly to confederation.
The subjugation and reduction of families to bondage and slavery was the
beginning of that system of interdependence now so broadly extended into
commerce, exchange and mutual dependence for almost the necessities of
life. In the times referred to every man was his own farmer, tailor,
carpenter and cook, and this condition was only modified when the
individuals of conquering families began to rely upon the conquered for
certain services they otherwise would have been obliged to render
themselves. All of these facts exemplify another philosophic
proposition—that for anything in the universe to remain in its
homogeneous condition is impossible, which impossibility is the result
of the fact that motion must produce change, while constant motion is
inevitable so long as force persists and matter resists.
That eminent historian of the third decade of the eighteenth century,
Rollin, thus remarks of the earliest monuments which are preserved,
treating of the progress from simple to complex forms of government:—“To
know in what manner the states and kingdoms were founded that have
divided the universe, the steps whereby they rose to that pitch of
grandeur related in history, by what ties families and cities united in
order to constitute one body of society, and to live together under the
same laws and common authority, it will be necessary to trace things
back in a manner to the infancy of the world and to those ages in which
mankind, being dispersed into different regions, began to people the
earth.” In these early ages every father was the supreme head of his
family; the arbiter and judge of whatever contests and divisions might
arise within it; the natural legislator over his little society, the
defender and protector of those who, by their birth, education and
weakness, were under his protection and safeguard. The laws which the
paternal vigilance established in this domestic senate being dictated
with no other view than to promote the general welfare, were concerted
with such children as were come to years of maturity and accepted by the
inferiors with a full and free consent, were religiously kept and
preserved in families as an hereditary polity, to which they owed their
peace and security.
But different motives gave rise to different laws. One man, overjoyed at
the birth of a first born son, resolved to distinguish him from future
children by bestowing on him a more considerable share of his
possessions, and giving him greater authority in his family. Another,
more attentive to the interests of a beloved wife or darling daughter,
whom he wanted to settle in the world, thought it incumbent on him to
secure her rights and increase her advantages. The solitary and
cheerless state a wife might be reduced to in case she should become a
widow affected more intimately another man, and made him provide
beforehand for the subsistence and comfort of a woman who formed his
felicity. In proportion as every family increased by the birth of
children and their marrying into other families, they extended their
domain, and by insensible degrees formed towns and cities. From these
different views and others of a like nature arose the different customs
and rights of nations.
These societies growing in time very numerous, and the families,
dividing into different branches, each having its head, it was necessary
to intrust one person with the whole in order to unite all these heads
under one authority and to maintain the public good by a uniform
administration. To heighten the lustre of this newly acquired dignity
and to cause them to devote themselves entirely to the public good, the
title of king was bestowed upon them and they were invested with full
power to administer justice and to punish crime.
At first every city had its particular king, who, being more solicitous
of preserving his dominion than of enlarging it, confined his ambition
within its limits But the unavoidable feuds that break out between
neighbors, the jealousy against a more powerful rival, the turbulent
spirit of a prince, his martial disposition or thirst for aggrandizing
himself and displaying his ability, gave rise to wars which frequently
ended in the entire subjugation of the vanquished and the addition of
their cities to the victors. Thus a first victory led the way to a
second, which, making a prince more powerful and enterprising, several
cities and provinces became united under one monarch, forming kingdoms
of greater or less extent, according to the degree the victor pushed his
conquests. Such was the origin of the famous empires that at times
included the greater part of the known world.
From various historical authorities the following summaries of history
are obtained, and are presented as containing some of the principal
points by which the general progress of the world should be judged. The
principal empires of ancient time will be observed separately; those of
modern time under one head, because of the more connected character of
their histories, and because of the more general knowledge that is
possessed of them. Then the general course events took will be noticed,
the deductions that legitimately flow from them introduced, and the
bearing they have upon present affairs of the world in reference to its
future condition of government considered.
There are several nations that have, at various times, and that still do
claim, the greatest antiquity. The Chinese, the Indians, the Syrians and
Egyptians appear to have the most evidence to support their claim. The
Egyptians once accorded it to the Phrygians, through the result of the
somewhat singular experiment of confining two children away from all
intercourse with the world until they began to cry, “_Beecos_,” which
was found to be the Phrygian word for bread. This word, Psammetichus,
the King decided must be of the original language, and consequently that
the Phrygians were the original people.
Manetho, a high priest in Egypt, who had charge of the sacred archives,
pretends to have extracted from the writings of Mercurius and to have
proved thereby that up to the time of Alexander the Great, whose reign
began 356 years B. C., there had been thirty dynasties in Egypt, which
together covered a space of more than 5,300 years. If this claim be
allowed, Egypt has existed 7,500 years. Herodotus says “that the
Egyptian priests computed 341 generations until the reign of Sethon,”
which began 719 years B. C. “These generations,” he adds, “make 11,341
years.” They also counted a like number of priests and kings, who had
succeeded one another without interruption, under the name of “Pyromas,”
signifying good and virtuous. These priests hewed 341 colossal statues
in wood of these Pyromas, all arranged in a large hall in the order of
their succession.
Let these claims be false or true, historians unanimously agree that
Menes was the first King of Egypt, and that his reign began 2,188 years
B. C., which would make its historic age about 5,000 years; undoubtedly
its fabulous age would cover a sufficient period to make what is
claimed, at least by Menetho, if not by the priests Herodotus mentions.
These claims will seem the more probable when we are informed that a few
ages only after Menes, the first King, one Busiris, built the famous
city of Thebes, and made it the seat of his empire, which would seem to
indicate that the arts and sciences had at that time been carried to a
considerable degree of perfection, not only in the building of cities,
but also in their adornment; for we are told that the public buildings
were decorated with sculptures and paintings of the most exquisite
beauty.
Additional force is also given these claims by the fact that Osymandyas,
the successor of this Busiris, collected a magnificent library at
Thebes, called “The Treasury of Remedies for Diseases of the Soul,”
which would indicate that polite learning had made considerable
advancement as well in philosophy as in religion. Historians also inform
us that Cham, the father of Misriam—the same with Menes—was the second
son of Noah, and it is supposed that he retired into Africa after the
“confusion of tongues.” He was doubtless the Jupiter Ammont so long
worshiped as a god by the Egyptians. We are also informed that this
Cham, or Ham, had three other sons—Chus, who settled Ethiopia; Phut, who
settled Africa westward from Egypt, and Canaan in the country that
afterward was called after him, and whose descendants were called
Phœnicians.
When we remember the so-called flood; that Cham was the second son of
Noah and the father of Menes, the first king, 2,189 years B. C., and
that 200 years later Osymandyas, one of his successors, was able to fit
out an expedition against the Bactrians of Asia, consisting of 400,000
foot and 20,000 horse, it must be conceded that if the “flood” destroyed
all the people existing on the face of the earth, except those saved in
the ark, the descendants of Cham must have multiplied with inconceivable
rapidity to have made the collecting of such an army possible. But this
is not more astonishing than the supposition would be that there could
be contained in the atmosphere surrounding the earth sufficient moisture
to form the amount of water, which, falling through a space of forty
days and nights, should cover the whole earth to the depth narrated of
Noah’s flood; nor more so than that the temperature of the whole earth
at that time should have been so uniform as to have permitted rain
throughout, instead of hail or snow, in frigid portions thereof. And if
we were to inquire where such a quantity of water was borrowed from and
returned, a consistent reply would be equally surprising; for it is now
known that there is just as large a quantity of the elements that
compose water at present as there was then.
Considerable latitude can be allowed the statements regarding the flood,
when it is remembered that the knowledge of geography, astronomy and
meteorology must have been exceedingly limited at that time. But if
credence is given to it as having occurred—and it is conceded that all
the people Noah knew were destroyed by it—and a solution is sought, it
can be imagined that a tremendous upheaval of mountains in Northern Asia
might have thrown the waters of the Arctic Ocean southward over the
country Noah dwelt in; but this could not have been the result of forty
days and forty nights rain, though it may have rained continuously
during that period, and may have been considered such by Noah.
This digression was not made so much to consider the probabilities of a
flood having occurred as to give additional force to the historic fact
that but a few generations after it is said to have occurred, immense
tribes of people did exist in that portion of the world bordering on the
eastern Mediterranean Sea, who were possessed of considerable general
knowledge, immense wealth, and, for that age, good ideas of governmental
justice; besides these people, it must also be remembered vast hosts of
barbarians existed in the more remote parts of Europe, Asia and Africa,
of whose origin and condition nothing can be positively known, either of
which bodies of people could not have descended from Noah’s family
through the common course of reproduction.
What concerns this inquiry most, is not whether all or any of the
narratives of ancient writers are entitled to credence, but how and in
what directions the ancient tribal nations extended themselves and
became merged one with another. Following the history of Egypt from the
time of Menes through the reigns of his successors—Busiris, Osymandyas
(whose mausoleum displayed such extravagant magnificence), and
Euchoreus, who built the famous Memphis and made it the key to the
Nile—on through the space of two hundred and sixty years of the Shepherd
Kings, from Phœnicia to Amosis, who expelled them, and reunited the
country, and to Sesostris, the most powerful king and the greatest
conqueror the world had then known, but little evidence of increasing
proficiency in science and art is found, but much that the acquired
standard was continually being extended among the people and among
surrounding nations.
With the reign of Sesostris a new era was inaugurated, and a mighty
impetus to general civilization, as well as to special advancement, was
given by his wisdom and foresight. Amenophis, the father of Sesostris,
no doubt feeling the weight of impending events, foresaw the necessity
of preparing him to meet them. He not only took great care that his
education in the arts and sciences, the principles of government,
philosophy and the art of war, should be complete, but also caused all
male children of Egypt born the same day he was, to be educated with
him, with the distinct understanding that they were to be his future
comrades, his officers, ministers and friends in the aggressive wars he
intended he should engage in when he should ascend the throne. It is
said that the celebrated Mercurius had charge over them all, especially
in politics, war and government.
The first war Sesostris engaged in was against the Arabs, which his
father sent him upon while yet quite young, that he might acquire
practical knowledge in conducting military campaigns. This people, who
had never before been subdued, he conquered, and added their country to
Egypt The next year he invaded Lybia, a country to the southwest of
Egypt. During this expedition his father died, leaving the throne to
him. He immediately formed a no less design than of conquering the whole
world. This was in 1491 B. C., and he was probably the first of the
great conquerors of ancient times who conceived the idea of reducing the
world to a single form of government, and most assuredly the first
possessed of sufficient wisdom to carry out so gigantic an undertaking.
The manner he set about to do this, and the capacity he evinced in all
the preparations, we shall have occasion to compare hereafter with that
pursued and shown by others in after time, simply remarking here that it
is safe to conclude that Sesostris was great among the greatest; for, to
boundless ambition—possessed by many—he united the capacity to sustain
it, which few can boast. While making the most extensive preparations
for raising and disciplining armies for foreign operations, he was not
less active in providing for sustaining the dignity and power of his
Government during his absence, which he foresaw would give opportunity
for rivals to attempt to overthrow for their own benefit. His first army
consisted of 600,000 foot, 24,000 horse, and 27,000 armed chariots, and
its principal officers were the 1,700 youths who had been educated with
him, and who now made it possible for him to secure perfect discipline
and the greatest efficiency.
With this army he first invaded and conquered Ethiopia, and made it
tributary to Egypt. He next fitted out an expedition of 400 sail, and
made himself master of all the islands and coasts of the Red Sea, as a
preparatory step to the conquest of Asia, then advanced into Asia,
subduing all the countries, even “beyond the Ganges.” Returning
westward, he conquered Scythia, Armenia, Cappadocia, Colchis, and all
Asia Minor: then crossed into Europe, and would probably have subdued
all its nations had he not encountered a great scarcity of provisions in
Thrace, which caused him to return. Herodotus says that the Egyptian
Empire extended from the Danube even beyond the Ganges, and included all
of Africa, and that all over this vast territory there were erected
pillars, on which was inscribed “Sesostris, king of kings and lord of
lords, subdued this country by the power of his arms;” which, while it
displayed a commendable spirit in marking the limits of his conquest, it
at the same time evinces a growing personal vanity that afterward
seriously tarnished his early fame.
After having thus conquered the then entire known world, Sesostris
returned to Egypt with innumerable captives and laden with spoils, and,
by devoting himself to enriching and benefiting Egypt, rather than to
extending his dominions, fame and grandeur, showed that his ambition had
expended itself in his first great campaign. From all that can be
gathered of his reign over Egypt, it must be inferred that no country
before, if since, was ever more happily disposed toward its sovereign.
The many monuments of his greatness, throughout his dominions, were
covered with inscriptions, asserting that all Sesostris’ mighty deeds
were accomplished without burdening his subjects; but, on the contrary,
they all had become able, through them, to pass the remainder of their
days in “calm and repose.”
Having subdued so much of the world, had he been equally ambitious to
extend over it the same beneficent Government that he held over
Egypt—which he could easily have done through the numerous competent
persons the foresight of Amenophis had provided him with, who were well
versed in his policy and administration of affairs—Sesostris would
undoubtedly have earned and been entitled to the appellation of the
world’s benefactor. It appears, however, that he did not exert himself
at all in this direction, but was content to receive the annual tributes
he levied to enrich Egypt proper. His reasons for pursuing this course,
rather than of endeavoring to reward his most worthy adherents by making
them rulers of the countries they had assisted him to conquer, are
incomprehensible, and that they should not have urged him to it equally
so. When it is considered how wisely and happily he governed Egypt, it
can be imagined how vastly he might have benefited the conquered people
by diffusing correct knowledge of the art of government among them
through extending his rule over them.
As it was, it came about, that various Egyptian colonies scattered here
and there over the conquered country, and in this way were instrumental
in spreading the wisdom of their nation. It was one of these colonies
that afterward became the famous Athens—the seat of learning, literature
and philosophy. It was about this time also that the use of letters was
introduced by one Cadmus, whom the Egyptians claimed to be of their
country; but the majority of writers agree that they originated in
Syria, and that they were identical with the Hebraic. Of these, however,
there were but sixteen, four others being added some two hundred and
fifty years later, and the remaining four a long time afterward.
The reign of Sesostris may justly be considered as having produced more
general and extended influence upon the world than that of any of his
ancestors of any country, and that nothing occurred that can hold any
degree of comparison to it until the time of Alexander, more than a
thousand years afterward. Sesostris was succeeded by Pheron, and he by
Proteus, who dedicated the beautiful temple to “Venus the Stranger,”
supposed to be “Helen of Troy,” famous for her beauty, and who was
stolen by Paris, from whom she was taken by Proteus and returned to the
Greeks.
Under succeeding reigns, the glory of Egypt began to decline, violence
and cruelty to usurp the places where justice and moderation had so long
prevailed, and jealousies, petty malice and personal aggrandizement to
take the place of that love of country which is superior to self; nor
could aught else have been expected from the ill-advised luxury and ease
the country obtained under Sesostris, which should have been converted
into action and expended upon tributary nations. The downward tendency,
or the disintegrating process, having begun, demonstrated that the
principle upon which Egypt rose and flourished had culminated, and was
now to be disseminated among other nations and tribes. Nor could any
effort of succeeding rulers, who saw the process at work and understood
the causes thereof, stop the downward tendency, which continued with but
temporary interruptions until the death of Tharaca, 687 years B. C.,
when the kingdom remained in a state of anarchy, until twelve noblemen
conspired to divide it among themselves. For some superstitious reasons
Psammetichus, one of the twelve, was banished; but he, entering into a
league with some Greeks, made war upon the eleven, defeated them, and
again united the kingdom under one rule, and remained sole possessor of
it until his death.
Six hundred and sixteen years B. C. one Nechos arose, who attempted the
cutting of a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea, but was unsuccessful.
This, however, was partly atoned for by the accomplishment of a voyage
entirely around the coast of Africa by some skilful Phœnician sailors he
employed, they leaving Egypt by the Red Sea and returning by the way of
the Mediterranean after an absence of three years. This passage was made
some 2,000 years before the Portuguese discovered this way to the
Indies, by which these Phœnicians were able to enter the Mediterranean
through the Straits of Gibraltar.
Trouble after trouble now distracted the kingdom, and its power and
influence declined with every reign, until the Persians, under Cambyses,
525 years B. C., subdued it. Since the downfall of the Persian Empire,
Egypt has successively been subject to the Macedonians, Romans,
Saracens, Mamelukes, and lastly the Turks, by whom it is now nominally
possessed. The late accomplishment of the project Nechos failed in may
be prophetic of radical changes in the condition Egypt has so long been
submerged in—the indications being favorable for a return to
considerable importance among the nations of the earth.
THE TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of May 2d, 1870.]
MRS. WOODHULL’S THIRD LETTER.
Nearly all historians who have written since Josephus have endeavored to
reconcile sacred and profane history. This task Rollin attempts
regarding the origin of the Assyrian empire. Diodorus says that “Ninus,
the most ancient Assyrian king, performed great actions. Being naturally
of a warlike disposition, and ambitious of glory which results from
valor, he armed a considerable number of young men that were brave and
vigorous, like himself, and trained them to all manner of hardships.”
This Ninus, Rollin endeavors to make it appear, was the Nimrod of the
Scriptures, and the Belus who was afterward worshiped as a god.
Calisthenes, a philosopher, who was one of the retinue of Alexander the
Great, says the Babylonians reckoned their origin back some 115 years
after the Deluge, which would be about 2,250 years B. C. The conflict of
authority upon the origin of this empire, renders it competent for our
purpose to assume this date, and that Nimrod was the first historic king
of Assyria.
* * * * *
Assyria is supposed to have derived its name from Asshur, the son of
Shem, who, the Scripture says, settled this country. Nimrod possessed
himself of the province, introduced his own subjects into it, built
cities and made himself generally beloved. It is said he built Nineveh,
more grand and magnificent than all the rest, and named it after his son
Ninus, who, on his accession to the throne, conceived the design of
extending his conquests, and began to prepare troops and officers
capable of carrying it out. In seventeen years he conquered all the
country between Egypt, India and Bactriana, which last country he did
not think himself strong enough to attack with success.
While preparing for further and greater conquests he also determined to
immortalize his name by making of Nineveh a city at once commensurate
with his power and wealth. His design, says Diodorus, was “to make it
the largest and noblest city in the world, and to put it beyond the
power of others who might come after him to ever build another such.
Nor,” as Rollin adds, “was he deceived in this; for never did any city
come up to the greatness and magnificence of this.” It was eighteen
miles and three-quarters long and eleven miles and one-quarter broad,
and was surrounded by a wall one hundred feet high.
Having completed Nineveh he pursued his intended campaign against the
Bactrians, into whose country he marched an army of 1,700,000 foot,
200,000 horse and 20,000 chariots, armed with scythes. With this vast
array he quickly overran the whole country and finally laid siege to its
capital. This city was strongly fortified and stoutly defended, so much
so that Ninus began to despair of reducing it, when the wife of one of
his officers advised him how to attack its citadels so as to capture
them, and by them the city. This woman was the afterward celebrated
Semiramis. Ninus made use of her advice, and the city fell into his
hands with but little loss to him.
Ninus, finding a woman possessed of such remarkable capacity to aid him
in his ambitious designs, at once conceived for Semiramis the most
violent passion. Her husband, upon hearing this, killed himself to
escape the fury of Ninus. Having married her, he not long after
died—some assert by her connivance—and left the kingdom to her.
It was Semiramis who undertook the building of the mighty Babylon, in
which work she employed two million men. Dr. Prideaux tells us the walls
around Babylon were three hundred and fifty feet high and eighty feet
thick, and that it contained six hundred and seventy-six squares two
miles and a quarter in circumference. His description of the walls, the
quays and bridges, lakes, ditches, canals, palaces, hanging-gardens and
temple of Belus presents a picture of grandeur and magnificence unknown
in this age. Diodorus also says even in his time there were many
monuments of grandeur still standing bearing the name of Semiramis.
This beautiful and extraordinary woman possessed the most marvelous
control over all she came in contact with. Her simple presence was
sufficient to quell any tumult or mutinous proceeding. Not satisfied
with the immense possessions left her by Ninus, she conquered Ethiopia
and the larger part of Africa. Not yet content, she determined upon the
subjugation of India, against which she set out with 3,000,000 foot,
500,000 horse and a multitude of camels, with which she thought to make
head against the Indian elephants. After she had successfully crossed
the river Indus the Indian King fell upon her army, with his elephants,
with such fury that it was utterly routed. Semiramis was by this defeat
compelled to give over the conquest of India. Having reigned forty-two
years she resigned the throne to Ninyas, her son, whom she discovered
was plotting against her life, as the Jupiter Ammon of Egypt had told
her years before he would. She retired from the sight of men, hoping
speedily to have divine honors granted her name, which was also
prophesied for her by the Egyptian god.
Of these vast armies, which predicate still more vast population, Rollin
remarks: “I must own I am somewhat puzzled with a difficulty which may
be raised against the extraordinary things related of Ninus and
Semiramis, as they do not seem to agree with the times so near the
deluge; I mean such vast armies; such a numerous cavalry; so many
chariots armed with scythes; such immense treasures of silver and gold,
and the magnificence of the buildings. The temple of Belus alone
contained more than twenty millions pounds sterling hoarded treasure.”
Rollin argues that the Greek historians, from whom he compiled, must
have fallen into some grave errors, since, that such things should have
occurred so soon after the deluge, presupposes what must have been
beyond the range of possibility.
The Assyrian empire, having attained the zenith of power and
magnificence under Semiramis, began to sink into a gradual decay, the
kings themselves setting the example of indolence and dissipation. This
process of decay continued until the time of Sardanapalus, about 700
years B. C. He surpassed all his predecessors in effeminacy, cowardice
and licentious luxury, and abandoned himself completely to pleasure,
wine and women; even dressing and painting his cheeks as the women did.
It seems strange that a people so used to glory and conquest should not
have sooner revolted against such debauchery and dissoluteness. This was
left for one Arbaces to do; he obtained entrance to the King’s palace,
and with his own eyes witnessed the truth of the reports about the King.
Arbaces at once began to incite rebellion; by his reports he gained over
the governors of several provinces, who raised an army and marched
against the King, whom they succeeded in shutting up in the city of
Nineveh. The King considered Nineveh impregnable, but the river Tigris
suddenly rose to a great height and broke down some portions of the
walls of the city, which admitted the troops of the rebellious
governors. Sardanapalus then proceeded to burn himself, his women and
treasure, which latter, according to Atheneus, amounted to “a thousand
myriads of talents of gold and ten times as much silver, each myriad of
which was of the value of $7,000,000.” Such treasure we in this age know
nothing of. After the death of Sardanapalus the empire was dismembered,
and the kingdoms of Babylon, Nineveh and Medea formed from its ruins.
Between these there was constant warfare waged. During the time of
Cyazares a horde of Scythian barbarians devastated the three kingdoms,
remaining their masters until the people disposed of them by a general
stratagem—slaughtering them while drunk with wine, at feasts to which,
by concert, each family of Assyrians had invited them upon an agreed
day. Such as escaped this, fled the country. Cyazares, after repeated
efforts, succeeded in utterly destroying Nineveh, the last city that
held out against him, and with the aid of his nephew, Cyrus, united the
three kingdoms again under one government, which was the beginning of
the famous empire of the Medes and Persians.
Crœsus, King of Lydia, is here entitled to a slight digressive reference
on account of the influence he at this time exercised. Vast riches in
most kingdoms had led to indolence, effeminacy and licentiousness; but
Crœsus thought it unworthy for any person, much less a king, to
surrender himself to these. Not only was he vastly rich, and an
extraordinary conqueror, but his chief delight consisted in literature
and science; he patronized the learned and wise of all nations; so much
so that they all made particular effort to visit his dominions to
receive his assistance. His court was the ordinary residence of the
seven wise men of Greece. It was with him that Æsop, the author of the
Fables, flourished. The possession of these characteristics entitle
Crœsus to most honorable mention and memory, and he should be regarded
as a representative king.
It will be remembered that Cyrus was the first king of Persia, which by
conquest he enlarged until it comprised all the territory between the
Tigris and Indus, the Caspian Sea and Indian Ocean. His uncle, Cyazares,
retained Medea. He, finding himself involved in a terrible war with the
kings of several provinces—among whom was Crœsus of Lidya—sent to Cyrus
for aid, who set out at once with an army. The vast preparations made on
both sides culminated in the battle of Thimbra—one of the most
remarkable events of ancient times—which decided the empire of Asia
against the Assyrians and in favor of the Persians. This battle has
always been the study of great commanders, because the military genius
there displayed by Cyrus makes him rank as one of the greatest of
generals. After reducing all the smaller nations of Asia Minor, Cyrus
turned his whole power against Babylon, which he determined upon
destroying. He accomplished its capture by emptying the river Euphrates
into the vast ditches prepared by Semiramis, and marching his army over
its dry bed into the city at night, while its inhabitants were engaged
in some general entertainment. Thus the mighty city built by Semiramis
fell, and the destruction ceased not, until not even its walls remained
to tell the story of its grandeur.
With the reunion of what constituted the first Assyrian empire, the
conquests of Cyrus seem to have ceased. He turned his whole attention to
perfecting a system of government for the vast country he had acquired.
This he accomplished most wisely. All historians agree that in this task
he was greatly aided by the wisdom and counsel of Daniel the Prophet,
who obtained a position of great power and influence. It was no doubt he
who obtained from Cyrus the famous decree regarding the Babylonish
captivity of the Jews. So prosperous and happy did the empire become
under the reign of Cyrus, that historians affirm “that after his death
he was universally regarded as the common father of the people.” Having
reigned seventy years he died 529 years B. C., leaving the empire to
Cambyses, his son, who was as great in crime as his father had been in
virtue. He caused the death of his only brother, Smerdis, married his
youngest sister (who was very beautiful), and afterward killed her
because she lamented the death of Smerdis. Happily his reign was cut
short by death, having lasted less than eight years.
It was not generally known that Cambyses had caused the death of his
brother Smerdis, which made it possible for Smerdis the magician to
usurp the throne, giving out that he was the true Smerdis. He was
exposed by one of his wives, at the instance of a nobleman named Darius,
who managed to slay him, and was then unanimously named king, by his
brother noblemen, for having done so. Soon after becoming king, Darius,
with an army of 1,000,000 men, marched into Europe to chastise the
Scythians for having overrun Assyria in the time of Cyazares. The
expedition resulted disastrously to Darius, who could not even bring the
Scythians to battle. They continually retired before him, and left him
to be defeated by the scarcity of provisions, from which cause Darius
came near losing his whole army, and was obliged to beat a hasty retreat
to his own country. Darius then determined upon the conquest of India,
which he accomplished. Of the particulars of this campaign no records
are left, though it is known that India remained a Persian province many
years, and paid annual tributes of £50,0000 sterling. Darius was the
only conqueror who ever subjugated India sufficiently to reduce it to a
tributary province; it made the twentieth that had been added to Persia.
During the reign of Darius, the Ionians revolted against Persian
control, and succeeded in involving the Athenians with them; they
furnished the Ionians twenty ships, by the aid of which Sardis was
captured and burned. This so enraged Darius that he formed a solemn
resolve to destroy Greece. Thus began that implacable strife of the
Persians against the Grecians, by which Persian power was almost
destroyed, and in which the Greeks performed the most remarkable
exploits known in military history. These, coming more properly under
Grecian summary, it will only be remarked here that Miltiades on the
plains of Marathon, Leonidas at Thermopylæ, Themistocles at Salamis,
Aristides at Plateæ, Leotychides at Mycale, and Simon at Eurymedon,
taught the Persian monarchs that they were not to be subdued by them,
though they should expend their mightiest power in their attempts.
So exhausted was the empire from the Grecian wars, that when the
Egyptians revolted during the reign of Darius II. he found himself
unable to subdue them. The superb empire made and left by Cyrus the
Great under such admirable government was now becoming thoroughly
corrupted and debauched, and was given to all species of licentiousness.
Its former glory rapidly departed, and the elements of destruction were
actively at work preparing it for the blow Alexander of Macedon was soon
to deal it, from which it was destined never to recover.
After the dismemberment of the Macedonian Empire, Persia in part
recovered, but became the field for constant barbarian inroads, which
kept the kingdom in poverty and misery. Under Chosron, about the year
600, the empire again extended from the Indus to the Mediterranean.
Justinian I. waged a successful war against Chosron, and compelled a
disadvantageous peace. This was annulled by Chosron II., who again
raised Persia to her former greatness by conquering Egypt, Ethiopia,
Lydia and Yemen. These sudden conquests were soon lost, and the
partially resuscitated empire passed into a rapid decline. At no time
since has Persia exerted any considerable influence upon surrounding
nations. Under Timour, in the fourteenth century, and the Turks in the
fifteenth, it decayed rapidly; in the sixteenth century it became nearly
extinct, and, as a nation, it remains virtually so to this day.
THE TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of May 9, 1870.]
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL’S FOURTH PAPER—A RETROSPECT OF ANCIENT GRECIAN AND
ROMAN HISTORY.
[Below we present the fourth subdivision of Mrs. Woodhull’s treatise
on “The Tendencies of Government,” from which it will be perceived
that the lady has delved deep into the mines of governmental lore, and
is vigorously training for the Presidential sweepstakes of 1872:]
Regarding the earliest traditions of Greece, it can be said they are
less indefinite than those of Egypt or Assyria. No country of antiquity
can be reverted to with more admiration and respect than this. In
whatever light her history is considered, illustrious examples of true
greatness abound. If her military career be reviewed, where can more
glory be found to have been achieved? If her government be examined,
where has greater wisdom and moderation ever been exercised? If the
comparative advancement of science, literature, art and philosophy made
within her domain be appealed to, where has greater proficiency ever
been attained? If the personal characteristics of her great men be
analyzed, where has patriotism ever risen to so sublime a degree? In
many respects Greece may be considered the school-house of the world,
wherein it has been taught the rudimentary principles of knowledge,
especially that species of knowledge that conduces to the development of
wisdom.
The territory of ancient Greece was by no means the Greece of to-day,
but embraced all that country lying southward from Illyria and Thrace,
now forming a part of Turkey in Europe. It then consisted of the
provinces of Epirus, Peloponnesus, Greece proper, Thessaly and
Macedonia, besides many islands in the Ægean Sea. The earliest
inhabitants of Greece of whom anything is known were the Pelasgi, who
“knew no other law than force, were ignorant even of agriculture, and
fed on roots and herbs.” A people called the Hellenes, from Asia,
mingled with them, and their common name became Greeks, from Græcus, the
son of Pelasgus. Although Greece was afterward the seat of so much
knowledge and wisdom, it does not appear that these originated among the
descendants of its original inhabitants, but that they sprung from the
Phœnecian and Egyptian colonies that from various causes found their way
into Greece.
Of the constant internal strife carried on between the several Grecian
provinces no mention will be made. The first of these to arise was
Sicyon, followed by Argos, Mycenæ, Athens, Sparta, Corinth and Macedon.
When the population of any of these became large, it was the custom to
send out colonies, thus distributing Grecian influence, instead of by
war. The powerful cities of Rhegium, Syracuse, Sybaris, Crotona,
Tarentum, Gela, Locris, Messina, Marseilles and Agrigentum, were formed
from such colonies. For the space of a thousand years, or until 520
years B. C., the Grecians appear to have confined their operations
within their own dominions. Being continually engaged in war with each
other, they had no opportunity of carrying on aggressive warfare—this
was never a Grecian characteristic, though so forcibly illustrated by
Alexander of Macedon, and by Cimon and Agesilaus, for retaliation rather
than aggression.
It is to be specially observed as illustrating the part Greece performed
in the general advancement and diffusion of civilization that while all
other great nations were made so by aggressive conquests, Greece rarely
ever made war except in self-defence. The influence other nations had
upon the world was gained by conquering contiguous countries. The
influence Greece exercised was by diffusing among other nations the
principles of science, philosophy and government and by commercial
intercourse. Thus it is found that up to the time of the first Persian
invasion there had been no concentration of the military forces of the
several provinces, except as they had taken sides against each other in
their feudal wars.
The Persian attempt to subjugate Greece was most unpropitious from the
very onset. Mardonius marched a large army into the very heart of
Greece, with scarcely any opposition; but his fleet, in approaching the
coast of Macedon, encountered a storm, and was destroyed. Meanwhile,
Mardonius took no pains to encamp his vast army in a place or form of
security. A mere band of Thracians, taking advantage of this, fell upon
the Persians in the night, and completely routed the whole army. This
double defeat, by such unexpected means, caused Mardonius to return
quickly into Asia.
Nothing daunted by this defeat, which he attributed to the inexperience
of Mardonius, Darius dispatched another army, consisting of 500,000 men
and 600 ships. The fleet first captured Eretrea, while the army caused
such consternation in Greece that only Sparta, of all the provinces,
responded to the Athenian call for succor. The Spartan troops, even, did
not arrive in time to participate in the battle of Marathon, where
Miltiades, with 10,000 Athenians, completely routed the whole Persian
army. This victory gained by the Greeks over an army outnumbering theirs
nearly twenty times, was, no doubt, the inspiring cause by which all
succeeding victories over the Persians were gained. It taught the Greeks
that a few determined men, fighting in defence of their country, were
mightier than a multitude with no such incentive. Through the course of
succeeding ages the Grecians exhibited a noble emulation of, and desire
to imitate, if not excel, their ancestors, who fought and conquered at
Marathon.
Xerxes, the successor of Darius, persisting in his determination to
destroy Greece, crossed the Hellespont on a “bridge of boats,” with an
army of 1,700,000 and 80,000 horse, to which submitting countries added
300,000, so that he appeared before the pass of Thermopylæ with
2,000,000 men. Against this force Leonidas opposed 12,000 Spartans and
allies. The whole power of the Athenians had been turned into
preparations for naval warfare, which, as the sequel showed, was the
salvation of Greece. The manner in which Leonidas and his 300 Spartans
defended Thermopylæ, still further raised the determination of the
Greeks to resist after the same fashion all movements of the invaders.
On the same day as the battle of Thermopylæ a great, though indecisive,
naval battle was fought at Artemesium. Xerxes advanced upon, captured
and burned Athens. The fate of Greece seemed decided; but the great
naval battle of Salamis entirely changed the face of affairs. Xerxes
being secretly informed that it was the intention of Themistocles to
proceed with the Athenian fleet and destroy his “bridge” across the
Hellespont, precipitately abandoned Greece, leaving Mardonius with
300,000 men and instructions to subdue Greece “if he was able.” At the
battle of Platæa, which soon followed, Mardonius was completely
defeated, and the same day the remainder of the Persian fleet was
destroyed at Mycale.
Having thus rid themselves of the Persians the Athenians set about to
rebuild their city. The Spartans, fearing Athens would gain great naval
superiority over them, opposed it; thus the Grecians were no sooner rid
of a common foe than strife broke out among themselves. This tendency
arose from the process of individualization and is specially
illustrative of the progress of evolution. Athens was rebuilt, and, as
the Spartans feared, soon exceeded all other States in power and
splendor. Athens also became the centre of the arts and sciences,
knowledge of which was at this time rapidly developed. Sparta, no longer
able to endure the overbearing pride of Athens, brought on the
Peloponnesian war. This war devastated Greece and enslaved Athens.
Sparta in turn was compelled to yield to Epaminondas, the Theban. In
spite of this terrible war, poets, philosophers, artists and statesmen
continued to arise, commerce flourished and the customs of the people
were raised to the highest degree of perfection.
But a time of unhappiness soon came upon this too prosperous condition.
Philip of Macedon, bold and cunning, took advantage of the dissensions
that at all times prevailed, and by a sudden _coup de main_ thought to
make himself master of all Greece. It can be asserted that not Greece,
but one man, for forty-eight years continually frustrated the designs of
Philip, who himself said, “The eloquence of Demosthenes did me more harm
than all the armies and fleets of the Athenians. His harangues are like
machines of war and batteries raised at a distance, by which all my
projects and enterprises are ruined. Had I been present and heard that
vehement orator declaim I should have been the first to conclude that it
was necessary to declare war against me. Nor can I reach him with gold,
for in this respect, by which I have gained so many cities, I find him
invincible.” Antipater also says of him, “I value not the galleys nor
armies of the Athenians. Demosthenes alone I fear. Without him the
Athenians are no better than the meanest Greeks. It is he that arouses
them from their lethargy and puts arms into their hands almost against
their will. Incessantly representing the battle of Marathon and Salamis,
he transforms them into new men. Nothing escapes his penetrating eye,
nor his consummate prudence. He foresees all our designs; he
countermines all our projects and disconcerts us in everything. Did the
Athenians confide in him and follow his advice we should be irremediably
undone.”
From all that can be gathered about this remarkable man it may seriously
be considered whether, had he had the power of a Sesostris, a Cyrus or
an Alexander, he would not have conquered and ruled the world. But the
Athenians failed to follow his advice, and were reduced to submission to
Macedon by the youthful Alexander, who said of him, when he passed
Thermopylæ, “Demosthenes called me a child when I was in Illyria; he
called me a young man when I was in Thessaly: I must now show him before
Athens that I am a man grown.”
After the conquest was complete Alexander summoned at Corinth
representatives from the several Grecian States, and requested from them
the supreme command of all their armies against the Persians. No
assembly ever held was embryotic of more momentous events. It was the
Western World taking counsel and resolving upon the destruction of the
Eastern, and was the initiatory step to almost incredible events, and to
the revolutions that were to change the condition of the whole world,
through the unexampled career of him who caused its assembling.
After the death of Alexander, the several Grecian States renewed the
struggle for freedom. The Romans, who had risen in the West, becoming
involved in the strife, proved fatal to Greece; for in the year 146 B.
C. the capture of Corinth reduced Greece to a Roman province.
During the whole period of strife from the battle of Platæa, the arts
and sciences flourished in a most extraordinary manner. Indeed, it was
the golden age of art. The Grecian colonies were still more prosperous
than their mother country. Alexandria, in Egypt, especially, became
famous as the seat of learning. In the time of Augustus, the Greeks lost
even the shadow of their former freedom and ceased to be an independent
people; but they became the instructors of their conquerors; for their
language, manners, customs, learning, arts and tastes spread over the
whole Roman empire. After a time the Romans came to esteem the Greeks as
the most worthless of creatures.
Asiatic luxury, acquired from the Persians, had wholly corrupted the
Greek’s ancient love of freedom, and a mean servility became substituted
therefor. At the beginning of the fourth century the people scarcely
showed a single trace of their former noble characteristics of
simplicity and grandeur; and thus Greece passed into her condition of
unimportance.
ROME.
Rome originally was but an insignificant city, founded on the banks of
the Tiber by some herdsmen, whose small numbers were swelled somewhat
“by strangers and outcasts from all the country about.” The herdsmen
were without doubt Pelesgians, who had previously occupied the more
easterly portions of Europe. The language they introduced bears
unmistakable evidence of similarity to the Greek. That a people so
humble as the original Romans were, who labored principally upon an
unproductive soil for sustenance, should have increased in numbers,
power and influence, so as to rule the world, seems almost incredible;
but so it was.
A three-fold division of the people was early spoken of, probably
representing as many different tribes. Each of these tribes was divided
into ten smaller bodies called “Curial;” in war these divisions were
represented by thirty centuries that made up the “legion.”
There were very few women among the early Romans. They seized on some
Sabine women who came among them to witness their games, which seizure
caused a war with the Sabines; the result of the war was the union of
the Sabines with the Romans, and the extension among them of the same
rules and divisions that existed among the Romans. This first conquest
was prophetic of all future conquests, terminating as it did by the
conquered country being added to Rome to increase its territory and
power. The system of conquest thus begun continued with more or less
activity during four centuries, when Rome had acquired nearly all the
country as far east as the Euphrates. 500 years B. C. Tarquin, the last
king, was expelled by the Senate, and the Roman republic began. During
its first century, contentions among themselves prevented the Romans
from materially extending their conquests. About the eightieth year of
the republic the Gauls first attacked, captured and plundered Rome; nor
could the Romans expel them until the banished Consul Camillus was
recalled to command the armies. Soon after this, rapid strides to
greatness were made, and Rome became the centre of attraction for the
world. All countries, not already Roman, sought alliance, thereby hoping
to escape conquest.
It was during this time of glory that luxury was first admitted and
practised by Romans; and, as in all other countries, it laid the
foundation for future ruin, by introducing into use licentious, vicious,
and effeminate practices, where simplicity, purity and honor had
previously held full sway.
Two hundred and eighty years B. C. the Carthagenians forming an alliance
with the King of Syracuse brought on the first Punic war. The Syracusans
soon deserted to the Romans and ever remained constant to them. The
Romans had now acquired such love of, and thirst for, glory that they
were considered unconquerable. In Sicily they gained great naval
victories, and Africa trembled when her fleets neared its shores. The
Carthagenians, through the advice of the Lacedemonian, Xantippus,
defeated the army commanded by Regulus and captured him; he subsequently
lost his life at the hands of the Carthagenians for opposing at Rome the
conclusion of peace. The war continued by the advice of Regulus, turned
in favor of the Romans, and the Carthagenians were compelled to accept
the terms of peace offered by the Romans, thus ending the first Punic
war.
The conquest of Seguntum by the Carthagenians, contrary to the terms of
peace, led to the second Punic war, in which the celebrated Hannibal
figured so conspicuously, and for a time made Rome tremble. From this
temporary fear the Romans emerged more terrible than ever. They not only
put a stop to the victorious career of Hannibal, but conquered Spain,
and, crossing into Africa, compelled the recalling of Hannibal to defend
Carthage. The famous battle of Zama ensued, in which both Hannibal and
Scipio displayed the greatest military talent. The study of this battle
has since been the admiration of all great military captains. The
victorious Romans dictated again the terms of peace, which Carthage was
obliged to accept. Thus ended the second Punic war.
The ambition of Rome now increased to such an immoderate extent as to
threaten the reduction of the whole world to submission. Macedon and
Syria endeavored to make head against them, but nothing could withstand
the irresistible power of the perfectly disciplined Roman legions.
Macedon was glad to end the war by becoming a Roman province, and Syria,
to escape total destruction, by ceding to Rome the larger portion of her
territory.
Carthage, the former powerful rival of Rome, still existed, which so
annoyed the Romans that its destruction was determined upon and
accomplished by the third Punic war, which ended 145 years B. C. The
complete subjugation of all the Greek and Spanish provinces immediately
followed, and Roman power was unparalleled. This begat a spirit of
intolerance which goaded many of her conquered provinces into revolt.
Combining their armies, they for a time successfully resisted the
Romans. Pompey, coming into command, rapidly crushed out all resistance.
Internal contentions between the several factions at Rome quickly
followed the reduction of the formidable revolt. Cæsar, Pompey and
Crassus, more active than the rest, divided the government between
themselves. This was the first triumvirate. Cæsar would have no equal,
and Pompey could endure no superior. The rivalry between these two
powerful men was the initiatory step to the conditions that ruined the
republic. Cæsar obtained the consulate and government of Gaul, and began
to lay the foundation for his future greatness by extending his military
enterprises in all directions. He defeated the Swiss, conquered the
Germans, subdued the Belgians, reduced the whole of Gaul, invaded
Britain, imposed tributes upon the people everywhere, and became the
master spirit of the time.
When Cæsar returned to Rome Pompey fled. Cæsar then became perpetual
dictator. This was about 50 years B. C. Pursuing Pompey into Greece,
Cæsar defeated him at the great battle of Pharsalia, and thus overcame
all opposition to unlimited power. In this possession Cæsar became so
intolerably overbearing that a conspiracy was formed against him, which
resulted in his death at the hands of Brutus. The love of the people,
especially the women, remained Cæsar’s, so the new ruler found no peace.
The strife between Brutus, Antony, and Octavius waxed warm, and Rome, as
in the days of Marius and Scylla, became the scene of infamy and horror.
Octavius and Antony, overcoming all opposition, divided the empire
between them. Octavius remained in the west, Antony went to the east,
and there became enamored of Cleopatra, the Egyptian Queen, for whom he
abandoned Octavio, the sister of Octavius. This brought about a
conflict, and Octavius proceeded to the east with a great army to
chastise Antony. By the treachery of Cleopatra, whose army and navy
deserted to Octavius, Antony was totally defeated. The treachery of
Cleopatra determined him to take his life, which in turn caused her such
grief that she sought and found relief through the aspen’s bite.
Octavius thus became sole master of the mightiest empire the world had
ever beheld. It comprised nearly every country then known under a
universal monarchy. Octavius assumed the title of Augustus Cæsar, and
reigned over this mighty empire forty-five years with the most
consummate skill and prudence, and with a profound appreciation of the
position he occupied. It was during his reign that literature flourished
so extensively. The best literary age of all countries has since been
called its Augustan age, as likened to that of Rome under him. In the
thirtieth year of his reign Jesus Christ was born. The Roman Empire at
this time assumed its proudest and grandest pitch of power and glory,
which will ever be the wonder and admiration of coming ages, until
another nation shall arise to a greater and still more glorious
condition, of which Rome will forever remain prophetic until fulfilled.
From the reign of Augustus to Constantine the Great, who transferred the
capital to Byzantium, the empire sustained a series of good and bad
rule, and declined somewhat from its previous proud position. On the
death of Constantine the Great, Constantine II., Constantius and
Constance divided the empire. Constantine II. had all Europe west of the
Alps; Constantius Italy, Sicily and Africa; and Constance Asia, Egypt
and the whole East. This division was the beginning of the great
disasters that came fast upon Rome. Constantine and Constantius being
disposed of by treason, Constance usurped the whole power; being
destitute not only of all capacity for so extended rule, but also of all
honor, the empire began to disorganize. During his reign and that of his
successor, until Theodosius, about the year 400, country after country
successfully revolted against the power of Rome. Everything in which her
former renown and glory consisted degenerated, until Rome was
precipitated into that condition which ultimated in her entire
destruction, so that she who so lately was the proud mistress of the
world, was unable to resist the barbarians of Northern Europe, who
extinguished her light, thereby leaving the world in the midnight and
anarchy of the “Dark Ages.”
MODERN EUROPE.
With the downfall of Rome that portion of history called ancient ceases.
The numerous provinces of Europe that had been under the Roman power
were completely under the control of the various barbarians who had
destroyed that power. Out of this condition of anarchy modern Europe
rose. As it consists of a number of countries their separate histories
will not be considered; only such prominent facts regarding the whole
will be observed as seem to indicate and mark its general progressive
steps.
From the fall of Rome in 476 to the time of Charlemagne in 800, Western
Europe was the scene of those operations that determined its present
divisions. The barbaric tribes that occupied it were the Vandals, Suevi,
Alans, Visigoths, Burgundians, Germans, Franks, Lombards, Angles, Saxons
and Huns. The Visigoths founded Spain; the Angles and Saxons formed the
seven kingdoms of Britain; the Germans fixed themselves on the Danube,
and from these grew all the German States; the Lombards had Italy, and
the Franks France. During this period Mohammed founded an empire in
Asia, out of the ruins of which most of the monarchies of Western Asia
arose.
Charlemagne was the ruling spirit of what may be termed the second
period of modern European history, from 800 to 1074. Under him France
took form and rank as one of the first powers of the world, and has
never since been entirely divested of it. He temporarily re-established
the Western Empire, but with his death it went to pieces. Spain was the
theatre of the terrible wars between the Moors and Christians. The seven
Saxon kingdoms were united by Egbert, who became the first King of
England. The whole north of Europe was still barbarous, and frequently
poured its hordes over the civilization in the south that was struggling
for existence. The Danes ravaged England, and became masters of it;
while Germany, under Otho the Great, rose to great power. The other
present European States were still in obscurity.
The third period of modern European history extended from 1074 to 1453.
During this period the German Empire was the scene of constant quarrels
between the Emperors and the Popes, under the factions called Guelphs
and Ghibelines, which dimmed the lustre Otho had conferred on it; Naples
and Sicily were erected into kingdoms by the Normans; Denmark arose to
some importance under Wildemar II.; in France, legislation and police
restraints were introduced, but her power was nearly crushed by Edward
III. of England, which country was in turn deluged in blood by the “Wars
of the Roses;” Genoa and Venice increased in rank and importance; Spain
still suffered from the Moors; Portugal became a distinct kingdom;
Sweden and Norway came into existence; Russia emerged from the barbaric
rule of the Tartars; Poland put on the royal dignity; Hungary and
Bohemia were added to Austria, and the Turkish Empire rose to great
power, putting an end to the Eastern Empire. The arts and sciences began
to be cultivated again in the West, and literature and learning to
flourish. Many inventions were produced, such as paper making, printing,
engraving, painting in oil, gunpowder, and the mariner’s compass, and
this brings us to the fourth period of history, which was pregnant with
events that were to modify and change the general conditions of the
world.
The fourth period extended two hundred years to 1650. In it America and
the West Indies were discovered. The Reformation brought about great
changes in very many respects in nearly every European country, many of
which underwent important revolutions. Germany made important
legislative improvements; feudal government was destroyed in France;
Spain became a Christian kingdom; England rose to great power,
especially under Elizabeth; Italy divided herself into numerous small
States; Switzerland became a republic; the provinces of Holland declared
their independence of Spain; Poland flourished; Denmark became of
importance; affairs in Russia assumed a new appearance, the power of the
Tartars being destroyed, and the Ottoman Empire became grand under
Solyman II.
About 1650, the beginning of the fifth historic period, the political
systems of Europe began to undergo considerable change, which, from
various causes, continued until the time of Bonaparte. Revolutions in
England, France, Germany and Russia caused various modifications, not
only in the limits of the various countries, but also in their
governments. England and France seemed to divide the other Powers about
equally in the support and continuance of their wars; the general
configuration of Europe, however, did not sustain any radical changes.
This period is important in another and new aspect. Colonies from all
the western kingdoms were continually going to the new America—that
country which should in future exercise such control over the destinies
of the world.
From time to time in the history of the world there have arisen single
great men who by the grandeur of their enterprises and the power of
their intellect and ambition, have left indelible impressions of
themselves upon its history and condition. Such were Sesostris, Cyrus,
Alexander, Cæsar and Charlemagne. Though they all possessed many traits
of character which the present age cannot admire, they must ever be
regarded as having given general civilization those great impulses that
have so rapidly evolved the world from barbarism.
At the beginning of the next period another great man appeared, the
waves of whose power were felt over the whole world, and who, by the
grandeur of his conceptions, power and executive will, rose from
obscurity to dictate to Europe, which was at that time the world. From
1789 to 1815 may justly be styled the Bonapartean period. It would be
superfluous to recapitulate his career; nor would it be less so to trace
the rescuing of America from the savages by the resistless advance of
civilization, which, since the settlement of Jamestown, in 1607, has
made such unexampled progress in all things that pertain to greatness,
grandeur and glory—in literature, science, art and government.
Before closing the _resume_ of general history it should be observed
that many great events have been passed unnoticed, the principal aim
having been to follow the western tendency of empire, and to present
only such facts as were prominent in forming standards of progress,
perpetual landmarks and historic eras. In Asia particularly, great
events occurred, such as the career of Ghengis Khan and Tamerlane. The
former, it is computed, slaughtered fifteen millions of human beings
during his reign. The efforts of such as he were the last struggles of
barbarians to arrest the onward course of general progress. Though for a
time triumphant in their course the genius of progress could never be
entirely eradicated where once it had found root and growth. China and
India have been passed because, for the most part, they have been
confined within themselves; the reason whereof will be discussed
hereafter.
THE TENDENCIES OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of May 16, 1870.]
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL’S LAST LESSON IN POLITICAL HISTORY.
[The following communication from Mrs. Woodhull, who, as the public is
already informed, has devoted herself to enlightenment on the question
of government, will be found as interesting as any of her previous
letters on the same subject This is Mrs. Woodhull’s concluding letter
on the Tendencies of Government:]
In entering upon the next and third part of the subject, we are
conscious of the imperfect construction of the second. It must be
remembered that the purpose of the _resume_ was not to give consecutive
historic detail, but to mark such special facts as evidently show there
was a progressive and consecutive rise and fall of nations. Without
apology for omissions and minor errors, we proceed to the consideration
whether the facts elicited from history form a consecutive chain of
progress, by which the world has been evolved from barbarism, and
whether this evolution has been according to present philosophic
formulas. The first and most prominent fact that becomes obvious to the
observer of general history is that the progress of empire has always
been from the east, westward. The progress of the earth in its daily
rotation upon its own axis and also in its orbital movement around the
sun is toward the east. This is believed to explain the order maintained
by the course of empire. Motion being in the direction of the least
resistance, the general tendency of the surface influence of the earth
must be west. Counter side influences have at times caused deviations
from straight lines, but this only makes the general proposition still
more forcible. Therefore, as a general proposition, the course of empire
and of civilization and population has always been westward.
If this proposition is applied to pre-historic times, to govern
deductions regarding it, neither Assyria nor Egypt can be considered as
having been the first powerful empire of the world. It is known that in
them there existed a numerous and powerful people of whom history fails
to give the exact or even supposed origin; the same is true of all the
surrounding countries, in Europe, Asia and Africa. If it is allowed that
population has resulted from the same general law that civilization has,
it must be admitted that China and India were the predecessors of
Assyria and Egypt.
Allowing that China and India existed as vast tribal communities
previous to the historic age of Assyria and Egypt, it will be seen that
population, general civilization and improving government crossed Asia
westward and developed the Assyrian Empire, which, for the same general
reasons must be held the predecessor of Egypt.
The Assyrian Empire attained its greatest power under Semiramis, 2,150
years B. C., which was about the beginning of the historic age of Egypt,
and 700 years before Sesostris conquered the greater part of the known
world. In whatever comparative light the histories of these two
countries are viewed, Assyria must be deemed the more ancient empire. It
may be further observed, if Nimrod was the first King of Assyria, and
the father of Ninus, who was the husband of Semiramis, the empire came
to its greatest glory in an exceedingly short time. Very many reasons
can be assigned why Assyria must have been an empire of centuries when
Semiramis reigned.
The Assyrian Empire, in the year 2,150 B. C., was the great power of the
world, having sway over the greater part of Asia and Africa. Seven
hundred years afterward, or 1,499 years B. C., Egypt had risen to its
greatest glory, and under Sesostris acquired the Assyrian Empire,
besides a vast country in Europe and Africa which Semiramis had never
subdued.
Out of the ruins of Assyria, Babylon, Nineveh and Medea were formed,
and, after being consolidated, were merged into the famous Persian
Empire by Cyrus, 536 years B. C., or 950 years after the proudest
Egyptian period. The Persian Empire absorbed the Indian and Egyptian,
and became the most splendid power that had existed, and with rising
Greece divided the world.
Grecian power being concentrated by Alexander of Macedon, he acquired
the ascendancy over the Persians, and became the world’s conqueror.
Numerous Grecian colonies, following the general tide of influence
westward, formed powerful kingdoms in various parts of the Mediterranean
coasts and islands.
Rome, rising to power, contended with Carthage for supremacy in the
west. Carthage being destroyed by the three Punic wars, the attention of
Roman armies was turned eastward, to gather in the elder empires that
were verging on decay. Greece, 146 years B. C., became the Roman
province of Achaia. Continuing its conquests further, fifty years B. C.,
Rome became ruler of a greater part of the inhabited world than any of
the previous empires, and existed in the utmost pomp and glory several
centuries, until the northern barbarians swept over and extinguished it.
No considerable Power existed after 476, until Charlemagne’s, though
some influence attached to several Asiatic countries. Civilized nations
were extinct in Europe. From Charlemagne, in 800, to 1500, civilization
continued to rear its blighted head in various parts of Europe, and to
mark the countries that should play the next last act in the drama of
unceasing general progress.
The historic age of the world, then, has been occupied thus: The
Assyrian Empire existed and was subdued by the Egyptian, which was
conquered by the Persian, which was destroyed by the Grecian, which was
compelled to yield to the Roman, which was destroyed by the barbarians,
that from its ashes numerous kingdoms and empires should arise, to exist
together, and to spread over and occupy the outside world Rome had never
known.
From this succession of empire many deductions might be drawn which
would assist in forming a well-defined line of progress. Many are so
obvious that it would be superfluous to name them; therefore we leave
them, with the general observation, that in each succeeding empire the
condition of the people was more directly and distinctly recognized,
while each, in grasping for universal sway, and not possessing the
principles upon which universal government was possible, exceeded the
limits of its central strength, and thereby fell. India and China alone,
of all ancient nations, survive, because they have never sought to
extend their limits, but have expended their strength within their own,
though it often was in war.
The commercial greatness of England, more than any other present
externally apparent power, is promoting the general assimilation of the
world. This influence is producing very great and diffusive results in
Asia, Africa and South America, and the way is being opened and cleared
for more radical and general control. It is impossible that the
increasing power of civilized and enlightened ideas and customs in
India, China and Asia generally, should not revolutionize those
countries. Many Chinese will return from this country, carrying with
them the solvent power of the genius of our institutions, which,
combining with all similar powers, will ere long kindle the flame of
popular individual freedom. This flame will cause republics to spring
into existence where one form of government has existed through historic
time over the same defined limits of kingdom. Another great and powerful
influence is being evolved that cannot fail to exercise a tremendous
modifying power over Asia. Russia, the European giant, is slowly but
surely pushing into Asia from the west. If it continue its present
well-consolidated home strength, it will absorb Asia until it meet the
same absorbing process proceeding westward, when Asia will be prepared
for a still grander consummation.
In Europe, Russian influence is also gaining the ascendancy. Though one
of the youngest of European kingdoms, it seems possessed of an inherent
strength superior to them all, which Bonaparte, with all his terrible
power and ambition, could not scatter nor weaken, and which stands ever
ready to gather under its protecting wings the sickening adjacent
kingdoms. At present Russia is biding her time and strengthening her
arms, which she is conscious shall soon reach out and grasp all they can
compass.
Prussia, meantime, is spending its strength in the vain, though
apparently successful, endeavor to consolidate a country under absolute
control, that is impossible of a people so numerously and diffusively
represented, in a country where freedom is the rule. Throughout
Southern, Central and Southwestern Europe, republicanism impatiently
awaits the time to burst forth, and sweep among the debris of the past
all traces of monarchy. The country over which the Roman eagles
triumphed will again be under a republican form of government, improved
upon that of Rome by 2,000 years of successful experiment. Russia will
then occupy a central position between the republics of Europe and Asia,
and its emperors be the last to yield their crowns. Like no other
country, Russia has vast possessions in the unyielding frigid zone,
which gives way but slowly before the gradually equalizing temperature
of the globe, and of the character of which Russian Government naturally
partakes.
Though revolutionized, Southeastern Asia will remain China and India,
the ancient Assyrian, Persian and Grecian Empires will be resurrected
under the consolidated Russian, while Africa will be left for Egyptian
control, the promise of which begins to be visible in the direction
given to civilization and commerce by the successful accomplishment of
Nechos’ defeated project, and, Egypt returned to be a nation of
importance. Africa will naturally gravitate to Egypt, as it is possessed
of no other salient point from which dominion and power can spring. In
this regard Africa differs from all the other grand divisions of the
globe. The character of its inherent wealth is also different. Other
countries have their frozen regions, inland seas and marshes, stupendous
mountains and deep jungles, but Africa alone has its Sahara. Commerce
has scattered the germs of civilization here and there upon the coasts
of Africa, but its central portions are to all intents as undeveloped as
when Semiramis went into Ethiopia, and Sesostris levied his tributes of
gold, silver, precious stones and woods. What Africa is held in reserve
for by the general economy of the universe it is impossible to
determine; but that a time will come when her resources will be required
and obtained, is philosophically certain.
In Europe, where the more prominent scenes of modern history have been
enacted, a modified method of conquest was begun by its countries,
resembling that which was pursued by ancient Greece. This was not so
much a subdual of foreign countries to actual control as it was the
general diffusion among them of civilization upon a more extended scale,
made possible by improvements in the art of navigation. The assimilation
of the world was thus begun upon a more perfect basis than by force of
arms, and which differed widely from it in this fact: that while
arbitrary control was at all times open to overthrow, the process of
becoming alike, could never be interrupted except by the suspension of
intercourse. Under the former, no two empires could exist side by side
for any length of time without one being subjugated by the other; under
the latter a number of kingdoms have existed for centuries, and though
frequently engaged in conflict to settle some dispute of boundary or
policy, it has seldom been pursued to utter destruction. The same end
grasped for by Semiramis first and by Bonaparte last is being reached by
the much more certain though gradual process of assimilation.
Thus far America has been untouched, but its consideration now becomes
necessary. The Old World, as has been found, must continue its
evolution, until like conditions shall exist everywhere. Similar
interests beget union. When the general people shall begin to realize
that their common interests depend upon the interests of each
individual, one system of government must follow, whether it proceed
from one common centre or from several centres.
What is America? Americus Vespucius and Christopher Columbus, acting
upon sound scientific principles, discovered to the inhabitants of the
Old World a new country, that was to be a haven of retreat for such of
them as sought greater freedom and better equality, in which
individuality could expand without coming in contact and being dwarfed
by personal government. In continuing to be this haven of retreat it has
become the representative country of the world. To its hospitable and
ever-inviting shores people of all nations and climes have come, so that
in two centuries the principal country of it has grown to be a Nation of
more inherent strength than any country of the Old World, and to rank
among its nations as a first class Power, both feared and respected.
The United States of America, all genuine Americans believe, will become
the United American States. The very name is prophetic of what shall be,
while the progress made in that direction begins to give well-defined
outlines of it. Beginning on the Atlantic coast an infant republic, the
United States has stretched its arms westward across the Continent. The
same oceans that bound the east and west of the Old World wash its
eastern and western shores. Having gained ocean-bound limits
latitudinally, which form a central basis of strength, it will expand
longitudinally until it shall become an ocean-bound republic—a grand
confederation of States and interests, which, while being peculiarly
American, will be so far cosmopolitan as to represent the descendants of
every nation of the world—we no longer say of the known world. Europe
has its well-defined limits of kingdoms and states, the people of which
seldom pass from one to the other to become citizens; so also has Asia,
while Africa is more nearly homogeneous; but they all give up their
people to America. America, besides being American, is European, Asiatic
and African, while each of these is becoming American. No well-informed
person doubts that the progressive greatness, of republican forms of
government, is rapidly dissolving the strength and solidity of all the
monarchies of the Old World; though they may affect to despise
republics, and to call ours a failure, their subjects are anxiously
asking, When can we successfully revolutionize? Though such a step may
not be openly advocated by any, it is, nevertheless, secretly discussed,
and preparatory means are being devised, in every country.
And for these reasons the United American States will be the
representative country of the world. Some may argue, because the
commercial power of England is so superior; because she has such
numerous general possessions, the English language being the one that
must become universally used, that, by virtue of these, that dignity
belongs to England. The fact cited above, showing that the general
disintegrating influence of the world centres and is integrated in the
United States, is a sufficient answer to such an illegitimate
argument—illegitimate, because it is evident to all, that the process of
the diffusion of English influence throughout the world is, so far as
England is concerned, one of disintegration; while that going on upon
American soil is diametrically opposite, being most decidedly one of
integration. If the process of integration is pursued until it
culminates, and the argument is educed that disintegration must follow
in America as it has in England, it may be answered that the English
influence that is being diffused world-wide is peculiarly English;
while, when that process shall have commenced in America, it will
proceed from a centre formed by previous influx from all countries in
the world, and in this sense is not a process of disintegration, but
simply of reaction.
The general law of direction for population and civilization was
westward until it had encircled the globe, and in their last conquest
found a country of sufficient inherent vitality to attract all other
countries toward it. Not only does the tide of influence continue to
flow to America from the east, but since her power has made itself felt
upon the Pacific coast, the same tide has set in from the west, and Asia
pours her surplus population upon our western coast, which exemplifies
one of the modifying portions of the rule of motion. For the time,
therefore, though preponderant commercial importance must be accorded
England, the United States thereby loses none of its general prestige as
the representative country of the world.
From whatever point consideration begins, the conclusion that is
inevitably reached is, that the world must, in due time, become subject
to one system of government. Whether that system shall at first proceed
from one common centre or from several centres, is not so presently
apparent, though that such a consolidation will be ultimately reached no
one can doubt, who gives proper weight to the established fact that all
perfect things become universal. So it is with everything of vital
interest to the general people; rapid and sufficient communication is
the only limiting power that controls their diffusion. In proportion as
the diffusive means increase, in number and extent, so do the interests
of the people become proportionately assimilated and best systems
prevail.
A striking exemplification of the benefit that would flow from the
adoption of general systems in all things may be drawn from the system
of international telegraphing. A universal language in this becomes of
the first importance. How much more important when the general uses and
benefits are considered. The adoption of a universal language would
remove the greatest obstacle from the path of the general diffusion of
knowledge and innumerable difficulties from methods of communication.
It should be further observed, that the same law governs in all
communications between the different countries. This is a necessity, in
order that the intercourse may be preserved and be at all times safe.
Should it be inquired, how much of the common law of the world is
similar, the answer returned would astonish all who had not given it
consideration, by being so considerable a portion of the whole. Were the
inquiry pressed further, to find how great modifications of common law
would be required in the various nations to make a common administration
possible to all, a still greater astonishment would be developed by the
slight disparities that would be shown to exist.
It has been remarked that England has possessions in very many latitudes
and longitudes of the world. Over these possessions a governing control
is exercised, which control foreshadows the possibility of a government
that shall control every country in all latitudes and longitudes. When
it is remembered that the countries of Asia are practically as near
Washington as California, there can be no argument deduced from distance
against a common and world-wide administration of government. The broad
assertion is made, that there is no argument against universal
governmental administration, but that every possible argument urges all
people to prepare for it as the thing of all things to be desired by
them.
It only remains for some one of the great countries of the world to
arrive at, or to approximate to, a perfect system of government that
shall contain the elements and principles of sufficient inherent
strength, to insure to that country the power which shall control the
destinies of the world. From what has been said regarding the position
of the United States, it must be admitted, that nearly all the natural
advantages, as well as the general order of things, are on this side of
the globe. If any conclusions naturally flow from the observation of the
past tendencies in the order of nature, they are that the United States
is destined to be the centre of a universal government.
The tendencies of government from earliest historic time have
persistently been to universal sway. The systems and forms through which
this tendency has been manifested have changed from time to time, as the
circumstances that created them—the environment—the sum total of the
governed—have changed. These systems will continue to be modified, until
this tendency shall have opened such channels for itself, as will permit
free and untrammeled action; until these channels shall have encircled
the world, and its utmost limits shall have been attracted within the
realm of its positive flow and negative reaction, and until the
commanding magnetic influence that shall proceed from its central seat
of power shall reach all subjects and find in their general heart an
answering response of fidelity and confidence.
In such fidelity and confidence each and all can safely and earnestly
devote themselves to the best aims and wisest purposes of life—to
intellectual, moral and spiritual growth. In this general and universal
pursuit the millennium, so long prophesied and prayed for, can alone be
gained, through which reaching, the government of heaven can alone be
administered on earth.
Government, then, will be no longer one of physical force, but of the
more powerful control of wisdom, including, perhaps, modified forms of
force. Caste will no longer be distinction regarding material position
or possession, but in moral and spiritual position and intellectual
possession. In such government and caste a true aristocracy can exist in
the midst of a true democracy. All will be born free and entitled to the
inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in
self-chosen paths, which alone is perfect equality. Perfect equality in
the order of nature does not presuppose that all shall be alike, but it
does presuppose that all shall be equal in the right to apply their
natural or acquired talent according to the dictates of the power that
governs them—the same as the flower and the tree follow their natural
courses, and are equal, but not alike. As the lightning and the
sunshine, the mountain and the river, the bird and the bee, the
earthquake and the storm, follow their natural courses and tendencies
under the government of the universal God, so shall the people follow
theirs under a universal social government, when fashioned after the
same general principles that obtain in the domain of nature. For
Honest nature’s voice shall give
The laws to man by which he’ll live.
It will be seen, then, that the philosophic formulæ that it has been
demonstrated the evolution of matter conforms to, apply with equal
force, effect and directness to the evolution of society, which is the
fruit, so to speak, of the evolution of matter. The evolution of
society, then, is “a continuous establishment of psychical relations
within the community, in conformity to physical and psychical relations
arising within the environment, during which both the community and the
environment pass from a state of incoherent homogeneity to a state of
coherent heterogeneity, and during which the constitutional units of the
community become ever more distinctly individualized.” Thus it has been
from the earliest existence of communities, and this formulæ applies to
all communities, whether Assyrian or American.
The process of revolution in its ultimate effects brings about a perfect
state of action and reaction in all the various productions of nature,
by which they are first perfected and then destroyed. The process in
society must also continue until an equilibrium shall have been attained
between the governing power and the power governed. When this is reached
its perpetual continuance will depend solely upon the perpetuity of that
over which it acts, or upon continuous individual existence. Continuous
existence does not belong to the kingdoms below man, but does to man,
from the fact that inherent within his consciousness there is a
persistent though utterly unexplainable and undefinable knowledge of
continuous existence, which is forever independent of all the changeable
circumstances of the purely material, and which represents in him that
characteristic of Divine power exhibited everywhere in the universe
which is forever beyond scrutiny and limitation.
This evidence of Divine power within the individual, then, is the
distinction between man as the product of nature and all other products
of nature; while the consciousness of its existence is the direct
evidence to the understanding that as the Divine power is eternal, so
must that within be, which partakes of it, or is made up of its
essential attributes.
It becomes the duty, then, of each individual who can catch but faint
glimpses of such a consummation as universal government, to point it out
and to assist by all legitimate means in the dissemination of light upon
it and all relevant subjects. It becomes the duty of each nation to see
that its people are educated to the same ultimate perception; and
specially does it become the duty of that nation which seems appointed
by the Divine order of things to become the central power of all the
rest to push its influence and the genius of its institutions abroad and
into every nation. A mere passive acquiescence in this Divine
appointment will not suffice; an active and positive acceptance of the
mission, and the faithful and persistent performance of the great trust,
is required.
When the people of this country shall rise to a true and competent
conception of the responsibilities of the position assigned it in the
order of the universe, the present system of things will undergo such
rapid transformations as no revolution ever yet accomplished, and to
which the destruction of the Roman empire by the barbarians can alone
compare in magnitude. By that the dominion of the world was wrested from
Rome; by this that shall come, it shall be restored to that country of
which Rome was the Divine prophecy. Personal, sectional and national
motives will be sunk in oblivion, and such governing rules of action
will obtain as shall bring the world into intimate, harmonious and
Divine relations, such as will know no Jew nor Christian, Mohammedan nor
Pagan, but one general and acknowledged brotherhood of man, flowing from
the common fatherhood of God.
[Editorial from the New York Herald of May 27, 1870.]
WOMAN’S IDEA OF GOVERNMENT.
The public have, during the past few months, been interested and perhaps
edified by the ideas and impressions put forth by Mrs. Victoria C.
Woodhull upon the broad, general subject of human government, as well as
by her subsequent nomination of herself as a candidate for the
Presidency in the election of 1872. The articles in which she has
announced these views and purposes have from time to time appeared in
the _Herald_, and to-day we present a further communication on the
question of the “Limits and Sphere of Government.” It is evident Mrs.
Woodhull is imbued with at least one very sensible idea, and that idea
is one which it would be well for large numbers of aspirants for public
positions to emulate—viz., that fitness is the first prerequisite of
qualifications entitling the seeker to enjoy the position sought for.
This it is, doubtless, which has led her not only to study and perfect
herself in the nature of the functions she seeks to exercise, and their
effect, but, in the honest belief that she does understand the question,
to give her opinions to the people, that they may judge of her ability
and the correctness of her views.
At the same time it is somewhat difficult to see what good will come out
of this particular Nazareth. Mrs. Woodhull offers herself in apparent
good faith as a candidate, and perhaps has a remote impression, or
rather hope, that she may be elected, but it seems that she is rather in
advance of her time. The public mind is not yet educated to the pitch of
universal woman’s rights. At present man, in his affection for and
kindness toward the weaker sex, is disposed to accord her any reasonable
number of privileges. Beyond that stage he pauses, because there seems
to him to be a something which is unnatural in permitting her to share
the turmoil, the excitement, the risks of competition for the glory of
governing. There is therefore but one position that may be taken in
considering the aim of this ambitious lady, and that is that, perceiving
and fully appreciating the natural obtuseness of man, she has boldly put
herself forward with a view to wearing down these scrupulous angles in
his sympathetic character and nature, and that she will, after all, be
content with the knowledge that she has done her full share in educating
him for the new order of things which shall supervene when woman, in all
matters, has equal rights and duties with him.
LIMITS AND SPHERE OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of May 27, 1870.]
MRS. WOODHULL’S LATEST EPISTLE TO THE AMERICANS—“THE LIMITS AND SPHERE
OF GOVERNMENT” CONSIDERED FROM A FEMALE POINT OF VIEW.
[In the following communication Mrs. Woodhull, whose former essays on
political matters have been published in the HERALD, considers the
question of government with special reference to the system under
which we live in the United States:]
Having in “The Tendencies of Government” traced the rise and fall of
nations, and found that from earliest historic time to the present,
there has been a continual grasping for universal power, and a constant
failure to maintain the extent of control actually reached; that the
systems through which universal control was sought were too imperfect to
admit of support for any great length of time over an extended area of
country; that the general order of the world seems to indicate that
universal government will become a fact, and that the United States
shall be the seat of such governmental power, we may now come to
consider what control a government must be invested with in order that
it shall at all times meet the demands of the people and the times, and
therefore be continuous while becoming universal.
It is predicated that government exists by the consent of the governed.
While this is nominally true, it virtually contains but an undeveloped
germ of truth. In no country as yet does the government exist by the
consent of the governed. In this country least of all does it apply,
though superficially it may not so appear.
Government is universal. All things in all the various kingdoms of
nature are the objects of governing laws which form the subjective order
of the universe. In all natural government the relations between the
governing power and the powers governed are always well defined, while
the requirements of the governed are always met by requisite modes of
administration. Each coming demand falls into some common method of
being answered. Thus, in the greatest conceivable diversity of
conditions, are found the fewest and simplest laws of control. Rising
from purely material to the more refined powers of mind, represented
only in the human, a new phase of development springs up. Being an
individualized power within itself, the human family represents the
divine power that controls the whole, and in this relation fashions its
governments according to the limitations of its acquired standard of
wisdom, which must always necessarily be imperfect in comparison with
the common laws of the universe, in the same proportion as human wisdom
is imperfect when compared with divine wisdom.
The world of mind has now arrived at an age and corresponding
development, which begins to comprehend the general laws of the
universe, and to understand their great simplicity and perfect
adaptation to all things under them. Seeing that such a perfect system
of government exists throughout the universe of matter, the inquiry is
beginning to be earnestly made, why the universe of mind cannot be
controlled by equally simple and general laws and systems of
administration. Seeing that changes are never necessary in the common
universal laws, the inquiry is also beginning to be made, why the laws
that govern society cannot be so fashioned after the laws of nature as
not to require the constant remodelling now necessary when changes come,
in the circumstances required to be met.
The solution of the difficulty in which the mind becomes involved when
considering these most serious questions, seems reduced to a single
proposition—that all strifes, difficulties and controversies regarding
government and its administration, arise from the fact, that the
governing power is not general but specific in its operations, or that
the powers governed are not subservient to a common law of control. This
is still more clearly perceptible if the question of “reserved rights”
on the part of any of the governed is considered. No individual can have
a reservation that militates against the general welfare of others, or
the whole, without specific laws to sustain him in it. If no individual
can have such special reservation, no number of individuals less than
than the whole, can have reservations without specific protection.
Therefore no city, county, State, or number of them, less than all
cities, counties and States forming a consolidated union, can hold in
reserve any rights or privileges that do not contribute to the general
welfare of the whole, without sooner or later coming into conflict
regarding them. This theory of reserved rights was pretty forcibly,
logically and effectually refuted by the late war; so must all such
reservations be equally well refuted before permanent peace, harmony and
prosperity can be expected to flow from government and it remain
permanent.
Analytically and philosophically considered, government exists for the
general good of all the governed, in which individual rights and
privileges can find freedom and justice without conflict. All systems
that exist upon a less comprehensive basis than this must eventually be
swept away. All parts of systems that conflict with the general
fundamental propositions in which they were based and reared must be
expunged, so that administration can be in perfect harmony with
profession, before it will be possible for general good to flow from
administration. The fundamental propositions upon which this government
professes to rest—that all men and women are born free and equal and
entitled to the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness—are in accordance with the general order of the universe below
man, and are therefore of the highest possible authority.
That all are born free is a proposition that no one can question; but
this freedom is general to all, and does not refer to the individual,
nor entitle him or her to push his freedom so as to encroach upon the
same freedom guaranteed to every other individual. Therefore, individual
freedom is merged in, and is a part of, general freedom.
That all men and women are born equal is another strictly philosophic
proposition that can never be refuted by the concurrent scientific truth
that no two of the whole are born alike in every particular. Equality,
in a philosophic sense, does not imply similarity or even likeness; one
thing may be equal to another, or a number of others, and still be
unlike them all. A pound of feathers is equal to a pound of lead in
gravitating power, but the lead does not resemble the feathers in any
respect; hence, equality does not presuppose likeness.
The pursuit of happiness is an additional common right, naturally
resulting from freedom and equality, and which can be prosecuted in any
direction that does not interfere with the general pursuit of it on the
part of the whole. From this analysis of inherent rights it would seem
that it should be the sphere of government to maintain such freedom and
equality, and thus guarantee to all and every the pursuit of happiness,
and to protect them therein; and, co-relatively, that the limits of
government should be nothing less than the circle that will permit such
fatherly—such motherly—control.
It will scarcely be questioned by those who accept the evolution of
government as a common law, that the government of this country, as a
system, comes nearer being an exponent of the philosophic limit and
sphere than that of any other country, though it must be confessed that
the practices under it belie its fundamental principles. So much is this
true, that, while it is safe to assert of the system that it is the best
of all, scarcely one can be named wherein so great distinctions obtain
between the intentions of the system and the effects obtained by its
administration. This follows because, having asserted fundamental
principles of freedom and justice, the lines of policy pursued have not
been shaped by them. The principles have been lost sight of in the
pursuit of party and personal or sectional policies, so that the
government is no longer an exponent of principles, but rather of the
persons, parties or sections which have raised themselves above
principles as authorities: hence the government has limitations put upon
the operations of its principles, and becomes thereby inconsistent
within itself.
All the corrupt practices that are prevalent in the various parts of the
governing process are possible only because the professions and
practices of government are not in harmony. The professions of
government relate to principles; the practices to its limits and sphere.
Therefore, in the present article, the practices will be dealt with. In
dealing with them it will come within the intended limits to examine the
machinery by which government is administered, and to determine what
movements within the body of society should be under its general
control, so that all its movements may be made in harmony. Were any
other branch of government than that relating to society being examined,
its limits and sphere would be found so plainly determined there would
be no possibility of even apparent departure by the governing control
from them; for in all these the divine power is that control, and
consequently is perfect. In society, the divine power, though the
controlling element, is maintained over human minds, which are finite
and imperfect representatives of the divine power, and are thereby
incompetent to so arrange and order subservient circumstances, that
harmony shall be the only result of the combinations formed to secure
consecutive order.
The government of this country is selected for analysis because, as a
system, it is the latest production of the social order of things, and,
consequently, the highest in the scale of evolution. It represents a
greater “coherent heterogeneity” in its construction than any other, and
its “constituent units” are more “distinctly individuated,” which
demonstrates that it is the highest order of government yet attained on
the globe. The fault in its construction is, that the powers of the
constituent units are not harmoniously related to the central power, nor
to each other, discord being the natural consequence of such inequality.
Though the constituent parts of society are in themselves imperfect,
their relations to each other and to the governing power may be so well
defined and regulated that their imperfections shall not have power to
mar the harmony of action proceeding from the central power. And this is
the point which is sought.
LIMITS AND SPHERE OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of June 4, 1870.]
GRAVELY IMPORTANT QUESTIONS CONNECTED WITH GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATION AND
ITS ADMINISTRATIVE DEVELOPMENT, AS VIEWED AND REVIEWED BY ONE OF THE
FIRM OF FEMALE BROKERS OF WALL STREET.
There are a variety of operations, natural and artificial, by which the
proper limits and sphere of government may be illustrated. It is
desirable that some of them be presented, so as to convey a correct idea
of a perfect controlling power, which bears the same relations to the
parts controlled as government should to the people under it.
The cotton mills of New England are good artificial representatives of
government. In them all the various parts are compelled into unity of
action by the controlling power evolved from coal or transformed from
water. The crude cotton is first taken and freed from all foreign
substances by “the picker;” the pure remainder is then formed into a
homogeneous mass by “the cards;” this mass is then divided and
subdivided into the different degrees of heterogeneity required, and
these are more distinctly individuated into “the webbing and filling” by
“the jacks and mules,” and are then reunited by “the webber and loom”
into cotton cloth, the ultimate result. Every part of this process forms
points of resistance more or less easily compelled into unity of
purpose. Every bobbin, spindle, shuttle and card are so many different
experiences which are required to be gone through with before the result
can be reached, while all parts of the process are going on at the same
time. The power is the government; the operatives its administrators;
the various pieces and parts of the machinery are the people working in
the several parts of the process; the cloth is the attained
civilization, while the different degrees of fineness are its
progressive steps.
Thus it should be with human government. It is the power resident in the
central part which should control all the processes by which the people
are guided to produce the ultimate result. It should be of such
character as to take the people in the homogeneous mass, and, by
picking, carding, spinning and weaving, compel them into a unit of
action for divine use. Every operation in nature, if analyzed, presents
the same process and similar results. A central power competent for its
purposes, through various means and avenues, controls the materials into
perfected productions, each one of which is perfect of its kind. The
sphere of this government is to produce the legitimate result; and its
limits are only bounded by the necessities of the power that the result
shall flow; but flow it must and does always.
It is then predicated, that a power, competent to produce harmony in
that over which it reigns, must be sufficient to control all the
different parts to one end; whatever individual or combined points of
resistance may be raised to its edicts must yield to the general
purpose, even to the extinction of their resistance. It is necessary,
therefore, that the governing power must be invested by the governed
with the necessary control, to compel them into harmonious action, so
that no antagonism may arise, to divert the tendency to unity of
purpose. It must not be supposed that a self-constituted, absolute power
is argued for; but this power should be one fashioned and organized by
and with the consent of the people, who, knowing their weakness and
acknowledging it in their sober and wiser moments, shall recognize the
necessity of it, to compel them, if need be, to act with the general
whole for the general good, even if it seemingly militate against their
individual good, and which shall be of sufficient strength and
diffusiveness to regulate all the movements within the body of society.
We will now proceed to the analysis of the various operations of
government, to find to what the inharmonious relations between the
governing power and the resistance are attributable, and thereby be able
to determine the required remedy. Wherever this may lead, whatever
“infallible” political dogmas it may destroy, or cherished forms and
privileges disprove, it will be pursued as relentlessly—unmercifully if
you will—as the crucible and the flame proceed to disorganize material
compounds and separate their constituent elements into the poisonous,
the nutritious and the useful, that the former may be put away and the
remainder appropriated to promote the general good.
Government has its centre and its circumference. From its centre its
power is distributed to its entire circumference, measuring and shaping
the various channels through which it flows, into such form as permits
harmony in all its parts, and, having spent its positive force, is then
returned to its centre. This centre and circumference must be the
perfect body, every member of which must not only bear its proper
relations to all the other members, but must be in such accord with
them, as to permit the uninterrupted flow and action of the power by
which the whole is bound together. No individual member of it can say to
the body itself, “I have functions and rights peculiarly my own, which,
if they are not such as your general power can recognize as contributing
to the general good, you cannot interfere with.” The member, in becoming
such, merges its function and power with the general functions and
powers of the body. By consenting to become a part of the body it gives
up special sovereignty over itself and becomes a part of the general
sovereignty. By adding its life and power to the body, it increases the
sum total of its life and power and receives its portion of the
aggregated and assimilated mass. Its parts and functions must change—if
change is required—so that the power distributed to it by the general
power can perform its mission in harmony with all its other parts. Like
the body human, the body corporate must be under one governing power,
while each part is different in form from all other parts, and performs
separate—perhaps distinct—functions. The eye may not say to the ear, nor
the hand to the foot, “I have no need of you,” for each and all, are
alike dependent upon a central part for existence, while the central
part could not itself exist without the surrounding and distant parts.
The very nature of the compact is, that each and every part is joined in
a system of mutual and reciprocal interdependence, to which general
system no member can set up for itself any system peculiarly its own, in
contradistinction or opposition to, or to interfere with, the general
system.
The government of any country, originally, is a compact among a certain
number of previously separate or unorganized powers, by which they merge
and consolidate into one power, or are compelled so to do. This power,
so formed, is the governing power, which, while all parts have
contributed to its formation, is in itself superior to any power that
can be organized within its limits by any part of the originally
consolidating powers. If at any time an opposition is organized to it,
the result must either be, the reduction of the opposition or the
destruction of the confederation. For a natural illustration the human
body is again referred to.
If from any cause an opposition to the harmonious action of the general
powers of the body be raised, a contest for supremacy is inevitable. If
the bowels refuse to perform their allotted part in the general economy
of the whole, a conflict ensues, and never ends until they are returned
to duty or until they demonstrate that their opposition to the general
administration is more powerful than its general power, and that the
organization must be dissolved in conformity to this power. On the other
hand, the general power cannot compel any of the constituent parts to
conform to rules and forms not operative in the whole, nor to bear any
inequality of any kind, nor to perform duty outside its special sphere.
The governing power, though superior to all, must itself be subject to
the common law of justice. Specialties of conferment or requirement are
utterly inconsistent with a perfect form of government. The same rule of
contributing to the general support, and in turn receiving appropriate
sustaining power, must be uniform throughout the whole. Such a body,
thus acting, be it human or corporate, is alone a healthy and
harmoniously constituted power. All governments, to be able to
contribute to the public welfare, must exist upon general similar
principles and act by similar means.
It must again be observed that when several parts or powers are
organized into one, no power less than the whole has authority therein;
for, in consenting to the union at first, all absolute individuality is
forever waived; the individual is no longer simply an individual power,
but forms a part of the common power. Nor can absolute individuality
ever again be maintained, except a superior antagonistic strength is
developed, which demonstrates that the powers originally attempted to be
consolidated were impossible of harmonious action—a natural and
sufficient reason for dissolution. Tested by these propositions, what
conditions and relations does the government of the United States, as a
whole composed of parts, present? Does it form one homogeneous whole,
the paramount interests of the parts of which is the best welfare of the
whole? Does each and every part act in unity and harmony with every
other part, and in turn yield to the preponderant authority of the
whole, with that grace and dignity which bespeak unison of purpose and
interest? If not, where does the difficulty find its starting point? Is
it in the system by which the power was organized—in the interpretation
of it, or in its administration? For this the Constitution must be
referred to to find wherein, if at all, its organization is defective.
If the conferment of power by the organization is complete, then it must
be concluded that those who administer its organic force either fail to
comprehend the extent of its application or to perform their duty in
applying it.
LIMITS AND SPHERE OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of June 19, 1870.]
ANOTHER LETTER FROM VICTORIA C. WOODHULL ON POLITICAL HISTORY.
ARTICLE IX. of Amendments to the Constitution declares that “The
enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed
to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
ART. X.—“The powers not delegated to the United States by the
Constitution, nor prohibited by it, to the States, are reserved to the
States respectively, or to the people.”
SECTION 1 of Article IV. of the Constitution says, “Full faith and
credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records and
judicial proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by
general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, &c., shall be
proved, and the effect thereof.”
SEC. 2.—“The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges
and immunities of citizens of the several States.”
SEC. 8.—“That Congress shall have power to provide for the general
welfare of the United States,” which last is tantamount to saying, the
general welfare of the people as a whole.
It seems from these quotations, made in inverse order, that it was the
intention of the framers of the Constitution, to make such provisions as
would permit and compel harmonious action throughout the States, but
that subsequently it became a part of party policy to maintain that the
States had rights reserved, and while not defining what these rights
were, to declare that such as were not distinctly and positively
delegated constituted this reservation.
Under this interpretation it is possible for serious difficulties to
arise between the general government and the States, as they have. It
seems from the general tenor of the original Constitution that these
amendments are nugatory, because the inference to be drawn from them is
inconsistent therewith. One of the most prominent, as well as the first
declaration, is to the effect that nothing shall exist in any State
injurious to the general welfare of the whole. While it is within the
scope of Congress to determine what is for or against the general
welfare of the whole, no State can set up its rights against such
judgment. When it is further made the duty of the United States to
guarantee a republican form of government to every State, and to protect
each State in such against all others, there can be no limit set upon
the general powers of Congress.
The only fault, if fault it may be called, in the original Constitution,
lies in this—that while the power to do is vested in the United States,
it is not made an imperative duty to perform, though the duty is to be
inferred by the vesture of the power. In failing to exercise this power
in its fullest sense and to perform this inferred duty, lies the cause
of all the disturbances within the limits of the country.
We can now proceed to the consideration of what duties Congress is
invested with the power to perform, which have not been exercised, and
which, being exercised, would contribute to the general welfare of the
people, and thereby promote the public good. It will also be considered
whether there are any additional powers Congress should possess which
can be conferred, and which the Constitution neither directly nor
inferentially vests. This consideration will proceed without regard
being given to separating what comes within the limits already possessed
from that which should be conferred.
First in importance, because of general application, stand the common
laws of the country. Of these it is asserted, with the utmost directness
and force, that when a general condition is to be provided for in the
country, it should be the sphere of the government to make the same law
applicable everywhere, so that the citizens of the United States shall,
at all times and places within its limits, be subject to the same
controlling and guiding rule. There should be no such possibility as an
Indiana divorce under Indiana law, differing so much from those of other
States as not to be recognizable by them. There should be only United
States divorces, under a general law that could not be questioned
anywhere, and by which the parties to it, should stand in the same
relations to each other, in whatever part of it they might chance to be,
also in such relations to every one, that they may remarry without
becoming liable to the charge of bigamy.
Within the last few years, many States have found it necessary to so
reconstruct their general systems of law as to cut off all special
legislation. This course is eminently judicious in every respect it can
be viewed, and has proved excellent in practice, by relieving
legislation and procuring uniformity. If this is a desirable result, so
far as a State is concerned, why should not the application be made
general for the United States, with prospect of proportional benefit?
All people would then be subject to the same rule of action and
responsibility. To illustrate: A State has a general law under which
joint stock and other companies can become incorporate. Before this,
each proposed company was obliged to make direct application to the
State government for an act of incorporation. After it, any proposed
organization could become incorporated by conforming to the regulations
prescribed, and thereby obtain all the power that could be conferred by
the Legislature direct.
No one having knowledge of the tedious processes of legislation will
question the advantage of this general law, both as regards legislation
and the people. This admitted, it must be further admitted, that the
advantage would be still greater, were this a general law of the United
States, applying in every State, instead of a mere State law, with the
probabilities that each State having it would provide different steps
and regulations, so that a person familiar with that of one State, finds
he knows nothing of it in the State he removes to.
The same line of reasoning applies with more or less force to every
branch of legislation. Especially is it pointed regarding the Criminal
Code, for here very great distinction exists in the several States. The
penalty for a specified crime is scarcely the same in any two States;
while some have abolished the taking of life for life, others still
imprison for debt, which shows a degree of divergence entirely
incompatible in a country that professes unity of purpose and practice.
In civil practice it is utterly impossible for the most studious and
profound jurist to acquire and retain accurate knowledge of it, in even
a small proportion of the States. Every lawyer can testify to the
difficulties he encounters at every turn when the laws of another State
have any bearing in the case he is engaged upon.
Some States require that deeds executed in another State for property
within itself, shall be acknowledged before a notary, while another
requires a commissioner of deeds; and still another the certificate of
some Court of Record that the notary is duly appointed, &c. The
difficulties that arise from this condition of things are of such
magnitude as scarcely to be conceived of by those who have never
experienced them; nor can they be adequately presented in the limited
space of this article. It is, however, held to be apparent, that if a
general bankrupt and election law is to be preferred to thirty-seven
different ones, general laws upon all other subjects are also
preferable. It is a logical conclusion that the “public welfare” would
be promoted if Congress should pass general laws for the whole country,
to cover all cases and causes that are general to the whole country,
leaving for the States such legislation only as can have no application
outside of their individual limits.
It is not surprising that well instructed jurists of foreign countries
have no faith in our existence as a consolidated nation. They argue,
that it is impossible of a country containing so many internal sources
of discord and differences. “A house divided against itself cannot
stand” they hold to equally apply to nations. If this has stood thus
long and prospered, it by no means follows that it will always stand and
prosper; but the inference is, that sectional interests will be the
source of continual disturbances and revolutions, until some great
sectional interest shall become powerful enough to separate itself from
the rest of the country and to defy its power successfully. In view of
that consideration, should not the attention of Congress be called to
the fact that it is its inferred duty, at least, to enact all laws that
will promote the public welfare? And to this end it should inquire how
the public welfare is suffering from the neglect thus far practised,
that the remedy may be applied.
If it is found that its power under the Constitution to remedy such
evils is doubtful, amendments granting it should be at once proposed and
submitted. Whatever opposition there might be on the part of present
State Legislatures and officials the people will welcome any measure
looking to the eradication of the cause of internal agitation. It cannot
be that patriotism is to pass away entirely, though it appears to be
nearly submerged by the rising tide of individual selfishness. Let it
arouse itself and consider whether there be not room for exercise in the
direction indicated, and whether it is not better to prevent disaster
than to repair damages. The example of Louis Napoleon is an excellent
one to follow. Nor should patriotism be blinded by the mere name of
freedom and justice, sounded so loudly to cover the deformities
practised under their shelter.
In many directions, this is eminently an analytic age. Let the fruits of
government be submitted to the crucible. Many of them would be found not
only hollow, but basely deceptive. It is well enough to cry peace when
war rages, but the crying will not bring it. It is well enough to laud
the freedom of the land, but why not make the direct inquiry to find how
much of it is real, and how much is fancied freedom, not to say genuine
slavery? It is well to assert that justice holds sway everywhere, but
those who have had most occasion to find it, must hold their peace lest
the fair delusion be dispelled. Let the peace that is cried, the freedom
that is lauded and the justice that is asserted, be subjected to the
test of analysis, that it may be really known what principles enter into
their composition. It is much to be feared that when all the dross and
foreign substances are separated, and the pure residuum only left, its
proportion to the mass submitted would be lamentably small. Still let us
have the analysis.
LIMITS AND SPHERE OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of July 4, 1870.]
THE FIFTH PART OF MRS. WOODHULL’S DISQUISITION ON GOVERNMENT—INDIVIDUAL
ENTERPRISE AND ITS DEVELOPMENT AS AFFECTED BY GOVERNMENT.
Individual enterprise, especially among Americans, has produced the most
wonderful results. Very much of the advancement of the country is
directly attributable to it. Great minds have been obliged to operate
singly and alone to develop their inspirations, ideas and conclusions.
Thousands possessed of comprehensive principles in a semi state of
application have sunk with them into obscurity for lack of appreciation
and support. In the infancy of the republic, before it was possible for
any to catch the idea of its grand destiny, it was not to be expected
that any great or general system of interdependence between the
government and the people should be adopted. There was a general fear of
everything that did not seem to promote that individual freedom which
seeks no harmony with the greatest freedom of the whole, while no regard
was paid to any philosophic relations of the individual to the whole
number of individuals represented by the government. This was
intellectual individuality, lacking the harmony of wisdom.
It came after a while that the great enterprises demanded by the rapidly
increasing growth of the country could not be conducted by single
individuals, and numbers of them combined to carry them out. Rapid means
of transit began to be developed, which in many instances redounded to
the pecuniary benefit of the company prosecuting them, but always to the
general interest of the whole, both as a people and as a government. On
the contrary, many enterprises which have proved equally beneficial to
the country have ruined those who projected them. Thus the general
welfare has been promoted by the sacrifice of individual interests.
Especially has this been true of the great system of railroads that
binds the nation together with bonds of iron, too powerful, it seems,
for any sectional interest ever to sever.
Internal improvements are eminently a legitimate branch of the general
government. They are not for the benefit of individuals or sections, but
for the benefit of the whole. So true is this that a seemingly purely
local government cannot confine its benefits and uses to the section it
is located in. Its influence permeates the very extremes of the country.
A railroad connecting two cities in the same State may be built. At
first glance this would be declared simply and only of benefit to the
localities it passes through. But upon close scrutiny a variety of ways
develop themselves that must be advantageous to thousands, residing in
all parts of the country, and to the government itself. It therefore
conduces to the public welfare and convenience in a much more general
sense than to sectional or local good. It is therefore entitled to the
protection of the government, whose duty it is to look after and promote
the interests of the public. Is it entitled to anything more, or does
the full duty of the government begin and cease with simple protection?
Continuous railroad connections exist between Maine and California,
between Minnesota and Louisiana, which have been built by private
enterprise, and are still maintained and conducted by combinations of
private enterprise. These, with their connections, form a net work that
penetrates every section of the whole country, all parts of which system
are conducted as nearly as possible, considering the variety of
management, with regard to the harmonious working of the whole as a
general railroad system of the country. The representatives of the
several roads meet and arrange terms of transfer and connection, first,
to accommodate themselves; second, the public which patronizes them (be
it especially remembered that the public welfare is always secondary);
and thus it comes that that which is made the duty of the government to
guard with jealous care is subserved to the interests of a company of
incorporated individuals, whose profits, drained from the productive
interests of the country, amount in many instances to an enormous per
cent per annum upon the original costs of the enterprises This is not
the greatest good to the greatest number. It is the greatest good to the
smallest number at the expense of the greater number. The public is
hoodwinked into the toleration of their extortions by fictitious arrays
of figures, and by the increase of the “watering” of their capital stock
whenever an eight per cent. dividend will not consume their unexpended
balances.
Again, there are railroads of great importance to the general public
whose earnings are not sufficient to make any returns to stockholders,
scarcely sufficient to meet current expenses, and yet the public welfare
would not permit of their discontinuance.
The same line of policy that controls the postal service should be
pursued by government in regard to railroads. None now think of
intrusting that very important department of the government to private
enterprise. Is the transportation of the public itself of less vital and
general importance than its thoughts and wishes are, that it should be
obliged to rely upon private enterprise to accomplish its welfare, and
to obtain it be subject to its extortions? The custody of transportation
of all kinds by government would insure regularity, harmonious
operation, safety and dispatch, at minimum cost, to all whose pursuits,
interests or comfort, incline or compel them to its use. If the sphere
of government is to be determined upon principle, and it is the true
principle for the government to conduct the postal service, to the end
that the public welfare be subserved, then the same principle determines
that railroads and telegraphs should also be conducted by government to
the same end.
The time was, when it was necessary to the general good for the
government to guarantee protection and even assistance to enterprises
that should introduce these improvements into the country. The country
needed them. Government, not understanding its true relations to the
people, failed to provide them. Private enterprise, more sagacious and
more perceptive of the actual demands of the age, stepped forward, and,
taking advantage of governmental supineness, developed the true
greatness of the country. The time has now come, and the government is
in position and understanding, to not only guarantee all needed internal
improvements to the public, but also to take charge of those already
existing, and to conduct them in the interests of the people.
These improvements are not patents that should forever remain hereditary
charges upon the industry of the country. They are granted privileges,
made by the government to promote the public welfare, and not for the
continuous private gain of wealth and power. Let a limitation be put
upon these patented privileges, so that the public good may be still
further promoted. Let government purchase what are already in operation
and construct others, as demanded, and conduct them all under one grand
system, to subserve the interests, necessities and comforts of the
people, which it is its duty to provide for, even if in exceptional
instances it be at the expense of the public, as in some instances it is
in sparsely populated districts regarding the postal service. Let the
same rule of action that governs this service be applied to telegraphs,
railroads and all improvements that are public in their character. Let
the present owners and conductors of them become the servants of the
government and the people, instead of remaining, as now, their masters,
thus forcing them, by the only possible way, to comply with the
interests and demands of the general welfare.
Besides, these gradually consolidating interests are becoming too
powerful and selfish to longer allow of the government or the people
regarding them with indifference. Even now they control a deal of
legislation by the power they possess. Unless soon dispossessed of the
means of increasing their power and influence, they will become greater
than the government, and even dangerous to liberty. The national banks
are powerful enough to feel they can dictate to Congress. What might not
a grand consolidation of railroads, representing thousands of millions
of dollars, be able to do, if left to present tendencies? This is a
matter of most serious import, which is tending to a despotism more
intolerable than that exercised by any of the monarchies of the Old
World—the despotism of capital over labor.
This despotism is making the productive interests of the country utterly
subservient to the power they have created, fostered and protected,
which should forever remain their servant instead. These improvements
are demanded by all the growing interests of the country that express
themselves through commerce between the several States, and it is the
duty of Congress to “regulate” them. It has the power. The remedy is
required. Let it be applied, and at once, so that the greatest and most
beneficial of all the many systems of internal improvements any country
possesses, both for the country as a whole, and to the comforts of the
people as individuals, may be conducted and extended in accordance with
the interests and demands of the public welfare. Nor should there be any
outcry raised against the purchase and control of railroads by
government, as an unwarrantable interference with private rights. There
are no such things as private rights when the public good stands in
question. If the public good demands a new street through the most
densely populated part of the city, the property of private citizens is
condemned to its use, and damages assessed, from which the individual
has no appeal. The same rule must apply to all property that the public
demands for the promotion of its interests, telegraphs and railroads not
excepted.
LIMITS AND SPHERE OF GOVERNMENT.
[Revised from the New York Herald of July 11, 1870.]
MRS. VICTORIA C. WOODHULL’S CONCLUDING CHAPTER ON THE SCIENCE OF
GOVERNMENT
[The following is the concluding chapter of the essay on government,
its aims, sphere and tendencies, by Mrs. Woodhull, the female
candidate for the Presidency:]
There are no circumstances existing within the range of government which
are deleterious to the conditions among which they are found that do not
come within the sphere of its control. If it were attempted to enumerate
all such conditions, a very large proportion existing would come in for
mention. Special reference will be made to such only as are represented
by crime, indigence, helplessness and perverseness. While government has
its duty to perform regarding all these, in their relations to society
in general and the public welfare, it must not be lost sight of that
they form a part of the general public, and, as such part, it has a duty
to render even to them and to the relations they sustain as individuals
to other individuals.
The criminal is not only the son and brother, but often the husband and
father. Though he may have, by some act, forfeited the guarantee of
liberty government extends to the people, he has not thereby sundered
family relations, responsibilities and duties. It is the duty of
government to foster these, while protecting public welfare by
preventing the criminal from pursuing his course of individual freedom
at the expense of the freedom or happiness of other individuals or the
public. In this view penitentiaries should not be what they are, but
should be changed into vast workshops, where the convicted may labor at
some not altogether distasteful employment, to the same end that he
should labor when free. The theory of punishing crime is not all that
should be taken into consideration regarding the criminal. As now
practiced it is exceedingly doubtful whether the State does not do the
individual greater injustice than he has done the public. The State
should pursue such a course as is perfectly clear from injustice, such
as can conscientiously be held as committing no crime against the
criminal. To render to him what and only what he has rendered another is
maintaining the old Mosaic rule of “an eye for an eye,” which in these
latter times should be obsolete. The world has risen from the condition
of Mosaic times by the experience of thousands of years. Fear was the
only controlling power then. Should it be so now? Prevention is better
than remedy; besides, there is no such thing as remedy for crime already
committed. The criminal can by no possible means—nor can the State—undo
the wrong. Reparation in most cases is impossible, but should be
rendered, wherever possible. It becomes, then, the chief duty of the
State to prevent the recurrence of wrong by putting such restraint upon
those who are inclined to it as will effectually prevent their
inclinations finding expression.
Supposing that all living persons who have ever committed any
infringement upon the rights, liberties or privileges of others of
sufficient moment to warrant preventative means being applied were
restrained from mingling with the public, what would be the ratio of
decrease in crime? These persons have trespassed upon the public welfare
and it must be protected from further trespass. It is the duty of the
State to see this done. At the same time the means of prevention must be
such as shall not encroach upon the culpable one’s rights further than
such prevention actually requires. As a member of society he has
forfeited to society, to a certain extent, the freedom of expressing his
privileges and rights as an individual, by the infringement upon the
privileges and rights of another individual, also a member of the same
society; and for this, society is in duty bound to restrain him. It only
requires that the present universally adopted theory, that crime is
against the people and not the individual suffering, be carried to its
legitimate sequences to teach the proper limitation to this restraint.
Having arrived at that, it remains for the State to concede every other
individual privilege to him.
It should be his right and privilege to labor and receive its full
recompense, to which the State should have no right, further than the
cost of his maintenance. The profits should be given those dependent
upon him, or should go toward reparation for the damages done by him. He
should have the privilege of amusement, should have access to a public
library and the daily news. His whole restraint should be made as nearly
as possible analagous to the every-day life of a useful citizen. He
should no longer be the condemned criminal, but the member of society
whom the public welfare requires shall be restrained from following the
freedom his proclivities indicate.
There is another class of individuals who, either from circumstances
beyond their control, from indolence, from incapacity, from settled
habits or from perverseness, do not perform sufficient labor to maintain
themselves and families in a condition that renders them useful members
of society. Society suffers more or less from all the different
representatives of this class. They must live, and society must, in some
manner, furnish the means to them of living. If it is not earned, it is
begged or stolen. There are those also who, being too honest to steal
and too proud to beg, suffer untold privations. All who would cannot
obtain remunerative occupation, or that which they are suited to
perform. To all of these as members of society, as a part of the people,
government owes a duty. Society, of which they are a part, owes them the
necessities of life, even if it be compelled to force them to earn them.
It cannot be made the duty of individual members of society to look
after the amelioration of these conditions. It is a general condition
growing out of the relations of all its members, and hence becomes a
governmental function, not only so far as they, as a class, are
concerned, but also to protect individuals of other classes from being
made to bear the burdens of them, either by voluntary contributions or
from the impositions of beggary and theft. Every one who has attained
proper age, and is possessed of moderate health, is capable of
performing sufficient service to support him or herself, and by so doing
is a useful member of society, because contributing to the sum total of
its productions. If he cannot obtain employment, society should supply
it to him. If he will not labor, society should compel him. If he cannot
labor, society should maintain him. Were this practice once instituted,
the dens of infamy and vice, the sink-holes of crime and disgrace, the
pest-houses of disease, and the crammed-to-suffocation attics and
cellars of our large cities, would be emptied of their occupants, and
they be made useful, instead of, as now, iniquitous members of society.
They are a dead weight society has to carry. It is a duty society owes
them and itself to compel them to assist in maintaining its general
progress. The same principle that applies to the criminal should also
include them. The general influence they exert upon society is even
worse than that of the downright criminal—for where the criminal is one
they number thousands. If it is necessary for the interests of the
people that he who steals a hundred dollars should be restrained of his
liberty—and it is the sphere of government to do it—how much more would
it be for its interests to transpose these leeches upon the vitality of
society into producing members of it? As a subject wherein the public
welfare suffers, it is strictly within the sphere of government. Other
citations of unprofitable members of society could be made, but
sufficient has been alluded to to indicate the general limits and sphere
of government when considered philosophically. The evidences of a
perfect government must not be sought among the most powerful and useful
members of society, but among the very lowest classes. A good government
can have no classes so low in the scale of development or use as to be
detrimental to its interests. And here is the test of governmental
perfectability. If the United States, as a nation, occupies any superior
or conspicuous position in prophecy which is to make it
representative—if it is the point around which consolidation into
universal government is to begin, and from which control shall revolve
until the world is its object—it becomes the imperative duty of our
statesmen and legislators to extend the sphere of government until its
limits are bounded by nothing that is detrimental to the general welfare
of the people. Such government, and such only, can be enduring while
becoming universal.
VICTORIA C. WOODHULL, 44 Broad Street.
THE PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT.
NO. I.
Government being an organization of power, and power always presupposing
action, motion, it becomes a matter of the gravest importance to a
people who are formulating a government that they should lay hold of the
highest sources from which action can spring—that is to say, as all
action is the result of some prime motor power, to have action which
will proceed in perfect channels, producing harmonious motion, it is
primarily essential that the motor, or moving or controlling force,
shall be of that character which in expression will move majestically
yet sympathetically against all opposition, always having in view the
fact that the presence of low forms of any development is detrimental to
all higher forms with which they come in contact, either directly or
through exerted influence.
It has previously been found that the deductions which are to be drawn
from a complete analysis of all the tendencies which governments have
exhibited during the historic age of the world, conform to the
propositions of the highest form of religious conviction, which is, that
God being the common Father of humanity, that humanity must be a common
brotherhood. Consistent with this the tendencies of government are found
to have ever been to one common form. If these propositions grow out of
the fact that the principle of unity is at all times operating to bring
about a perfect expression of itself, through humanity, the legitimate
deduction is, that the time will come when its ends will be
accomplished, and that that time will be when humanity has risen into a
complete recognition and acceptance of the fact that they are all
children of one common parent.
Principles never change. They constitute the basis of creation, the
forms of which are constantly changing under the influence of the
application of the same power. The same force which caused the matter of
which this planet is composed to first assume its orbital position and
motion, now causes the various parts of it to exhibit the almost
infinite variety of manifestation which is now presented. The same power
that was exhibited in the construction of the original rocks, is also
exhibited in the construction of the sweetest, most fragile flower. The
evidence of evolution—progress—being, that from the rocks the flower has
been produced. Ascending to the animal kingdom, motion, the result of
power applied to matter, was found manifesting itself in the simplest of
organic forms. There, as in the previous periods, it continued its
constructive workings, until the perfect animal form, man, was evolved.
In the strictest examination which can be made into the power which
controls, there can be nothing detected which would seem to, even
indicate that there is anything outside of, and superior to the
contained life, to which to attribute the direction the form takes
through which life is manifested. If this be so, the principles which
underlie the physical universe are but names for this inherent power,
which cannot be attributed to any power less than the Source of all
power. Manifested principles of action, then, which relate to matter,
may justly be considered as the perfect operation of divine law through
the physical universe.
It becomes resolved to this: that the power which is the compelling
principle of all action is at all times the same, but that it manifests
different results, as the channels through which it operates are
different Thus, the motion of the atmosphere over the surface of the
ocean exhibits power by the waves it produces; while the same power
proceeding to land bends the forests and the fields, verdure before it.
The tiller of the soil involuntarily recognizes this fact, when he
destroys all growths which exhaust the constructive power of the air and
soil except the particular one he desires to further or perfect. He
knows that to concentrate all the power upon this one, he must
concentrate its expression in the form he wishes developed. If this
process could be understood, it should be the ordinary rule in every
department of the universe. All the power there is, should be
concentrated into action through the most advanced, and consequently the
most perfect forms—perfect forms always being those which are adapted to
the highest uses.
Wherever this rule is generally applied by nature or man, the lower
existing forms disappear, and in due time the higher fill the places
they occupied. Thus, species of plants and animals are constantly
disappearing from the economy of the universe, while new and higher are
as constantly appearing. And it is to be specially observed, that where
the new exists the old dies out. This law is also distinctly visible in
the development of the different races and types of the human, all of
which a universal tendency prophesies will ultimately be merged into one
grand, all-comprehending race. The tendency to this condition was
distinctly traced in the Tendencies of Government, and was held to be
the basis for the conclusion, that, in its continuance, the condition
named would be naturally and inevitably reached. It may be stated then,
as a general rule, that the most certain method there can be to destroy
the bad—the old—and to inaugurate the reign of the good—the new—is to
attend to introducing the good in the most rapid and best manner, which
will naturally live upon and sap the life from the old, which must
necessarily pass away.
If a new race of humans is introduced among a race which is not
possessed of that capacity which makes it possible for it to develop or
assimilate to the new, it will most certainly die out. Such races are
fixed types of the human, and their characteristics can never be merged
among the general characteristics of the future common race of humanity.
The North American Indians are good examples of this fixedness, and they
will soon cease to exist upon the face of the earth; while the Negro is
an excellent representative of the capacity of evolution and also of
amalgamation. It is not to be lost sight of, that when the Anglo-Saxon
and the Negro amalgamate, the direction the amalgamation takes is always
from the black to the white, and never from the white to the black,
which is positive evidence that the Negro will ultimately be entirely
lost in the white races.
A mighty lesson is also to be gathered from observing the constructive
process of the several kingdoms of the earth, each one of which is built
upon the preceding and leads to the succeeding. The vegetable kingdom
could not exist until the elements comprising the mineral had gone
through their various processes of integration and destruction, by which
vegetable life was made possible. The vegetable, taking up the process
inherited from the mineral, began moving through the same cycle of
advancement by which the mineral had made it possible, and it gradually
merged into the animal; and so gradually that it can scarcely be decided
whether some forms of life belong to the latter or to the former. The
evolution of the animal, having ultimated in the production of the
human, it is not to be inferred that there is nothing beyond the animal
kingdom which is the fruit thereof, as the vegetable was of the mineral
and the animal was of the vegetable.
Again, the vegetable world feeds from the animal—the animal feeds from
the vegetable, which is the only source which furnishes living
protoplasmic food, upon which the animal can alone exist. Humanity takes
this protoplasmic dish either fresh from the vegetable or second-hand
from the animal. It will thus be seen that everything which nature
accomplishes serves specific purposes, and that when the supply is
exhausted the demand ceases. If this principle is followed to its
legitimate end, it will close in the life of the whole animal kingdom
being merged into humanity, which will then feed entirely from the fresh
protoplasmic dishes of the highly developed fruit of the vegetable
kingdom.
These arguments are not pursued as a necessary part of the Principles of
Government, but that the working of universal principles may be caught
sight of and made use of in the endeavor which will be made to decide
how humanity can best assist the operations of these principles as
applied in its own government. Nature being ever consistent in all her
movements in the several kingdoms, how shall “Mind” assist her in
accordance with her own principles of operation, in establishing perfect
channels for her powers to produce the perfect fruit of the animal
kingdom?
In the Tendencies of Government it was found that all movements in
government which have been made during the historic age of the world
have been in the direction of universal control, the persistence of
which course leads to the conclusion that it will be attained when
government shall be based in those principles which, proceeding from a
common centre, shall be sufficiently potent to control the entire
circumference of humanity. The limits and sphere for such a government
to exercise its power in, was found to properly extend to all matters in
which the common interests of the public are concerned as against
assumed individual interests, which would in reality be to the “greatest
good of the greatest number.”
An exemplification of the natural working of a government founded and
administered according to strictest governmental justice may be seen in
the growth and in the maintenance of the life of the tree, which may be
made to represent the tree of humanity. The tree is a complete community
within itself; all its branches and twigs, even to the extremest
distance, are dependent upon the same fountain for its controlling life
currents that the parts nearer the base are. No single branch can
maintain its life independent of the rest. Each separate one must draw
its proportion of supplies from the same source and return the stream to
its fountain when its demands upon it are completed. This power,
starting from a common fountain, is delegated to the various branches
for still further and more general distribution; but no branch can set
up a distributing process for itself in opposition to the general
process. If the branches had the power to set up processes of their own,
the inevitable result would be inharmonies in the common order, which
would work ultimate injury to all parts connected with the main body.
Thus it is with a country. It must possess a common governmental
fountain, and all divisions of it must be directly dependent upon the
common fountain. No division can be permitted to set up special channels
of administration for itself. Each must work in harmony with all others,
and all be equally dependent and dutiful to the common head. In such and
in only such can harmony prevail and life be continuous.
Having found, then, what the destiny of government must be, and having
determined its proper limits and sphere for operation, it becomes still
more essential and necessary that the true mainsprings of governmental
power shall be recognized, for without this, government would still
linger in its age of temporary resorts to get over the constantly
arising contingencies of the times. When this recognition takes place,
legislation will have accomplished its work, and the vast talent therein
expended can be turned into the channels of governmental art. It is to
attract the mind to the operation of general principles in nature that
we have thus far dealt with the material universe. In advancing into the
subtler department of mind, it cannot be for a moment supposed that an
entirely new arrangement of principles lies at its base, any more so
than that there should have been new rules of nature to introduce the
animal or the vegetable. Instead of this having been, it is perfectly
demonstrated that the same laws govern in each and all; that is to say,
that the same principles of government control them all. Bearing this in
mind, we now proceed to the consideration of the operation of principles
wherein the human mind comes to assist nature in its strife for
perfection, itself joining in the race.
THE PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT.
NO. II.
It was remarked previously that Nature is consistent in all her
operations throughout her entire domain; to which may now be added that
the nearer the human approximates his rules and methods to those
exhibited in the departments of Nature below him, the nearer will he
approach to true rules and methods. Arbitrary and dogmatic formulas do
not belong to Nature in her free manifestations, nor can they be
administered in any of her combinations. In all the uses men may make of
the elements of matter, he must comply with the laws of their existence:
he cannot frame a law, and then command that Nature shall obey it.
Certain quantities of certain elements will combine and form a compound;
but no other proportions of the same elements will combine to form the
same compound, and in many cases they will not combine at all, unless
certain fixed quantities are adhered to. Again, an effort may be made to
unite two or more bodies, and they will be found to be incompatibles;
that is, incapable of being united, because each has a stronger
self-affinity than for any property existing in either of the other
bodies with which they are brought in contact; but to these two or more
bodies another principle may be added, which will produce the effect of
uniting the whole. It is this principle in nature by which its elements
combine and form all the various and diversified manifestations that are
visible everywhere. These forms are none of them absolutely independent:
they may, by their inherent power, attract other forms to themselves, or
be by others attracted; the more complex and distinctly individuated
ones being dependent upon those from which they spring for their
existence; thus, as was before stated, the animal world is absolutely
dependent upon the vegetable world for the protoplasm it must make use
of to replace that expended by the animal economy. No animal can take
the elements protoplasm is composed of and manufacture it; that process
is alone the office of the vegetable world. And thus it is that a
complete and infinite system of dependence exists from the lowest form
of organic life to the highest; each is necessary to every other, while
every one fills a special individual position of its own, and this is
because they are all bound together by the same controlling powers or
principles of action.
It is readily seen that the principles referred to are the same that are
expressed by a common humanity, a universal brotherhood: one is a
brotherhood of the elements; the other is a brotherhood of the ultimates
of elements, of which mind is a product. Each kingdom has its beginning
and culmination, and by the observation of their evolution we must draw
the deductions as to what really governs that age of the world, and the
special kingdom we find ourselves living in. The beginning of the
mineral kingdom was when simple elements began to unite to form
compounds; which was when the cooling process had so far progressed as
to allow of combination; this process of the uniting and dispersing of
elements culminated in the production of the simplest vegetable life,
and thus ushered in the vegetable kingdom. In this, again the same
process of uniting and dispersing was gone through with that had
characterized the mineral. It began as it did, and culminated as it did
by producing the next higher, or the animal kingdom, the simplest form
of which is a single unit of nucleated protoplasm. Upon this single unit
the animal kingdom began to be built. The same process of integration
and disintegration continued through countless ages and until a form was
produced, which is the ultimate of form in the animal kingdom. This
ultimate, man, is the perfection of form that protoplasm can produce,
and hence is the grand ultimate of the process of elemental combination
first referred to. No other or higher form is possible to be arranged
from the elements that the earth is composed of. Therefore, all future
advancement to perfection must be in the perfecting process in man, and
therefore it is logical to conclude that the same law that governed the
beginning, the evolution and the ultimation of each of the kingdoms that
produced man, will also govern the beginning, the evolution and the
ultimation of the different stages in the perfecting process in him; and
not only in the perfecting process as a whole, but in each division of
the perfecting process; and this brings us to that part of the process
illustrated by government, and to the principles of government which are
under consideration.
It will be observed that there is a perfect analogy in the process of
evolution that is observed below man, and in that which comes of man.
First, there was the elementary unit, which corresponds to what was the
governmental unit—the family government. Next, and second, there was the
vegetable division, which corresponds to the second order of
government—the consolidation of families into tribes. Third, there was
the animal division of the process, which corresponds to the
amalgamation of tribes into nations. Fourth, there was man, the ultimate
of the whole process, containing in him the elementary principles
represented by all the preceding forms—in none of which were they all
represented as they are represented in him—and he corresponds to the
ultimate of the process of governmental evolution, the complete
consolidation of nations into one grand nation, as man is the complete
consolidation of all animal forms in one grand animal form. His form is
the animal form, containing all animal forms. A universal government
would be a national form, containing the form of all nations gathered
into one grand form. Here it is that the analogy is complete, and Nature
is consistent in all her parts and processes, at all times and in all
forms observing the simple general principles which so unerringly lead
her.
There is, however, one important addition to the processes in which man
takes part, over those where principles apply only in the so-called
material control. Below man there is nature only. After man there is art
added to nature; and it is this power to administer to Nature’s
processes, to assist in them, and to remove and replace obstacles to
activity in higher channels, that distinguishes man from all previous
formations, and which virtually makes him an assistant in the after and
higher evolutions of mind, which have, until very recently, been
generally considered not of material origin, but which science now
demonstrates are purely physical results—are combinations in
consciousness of consecutive manifestations of matter. Here we have the
ultimate production of the ultimate of the animal kingdom, the mental
kingdom, or the kingdom of ideas.
Science also demonstrates that ideas evolve after the same formula which
all preceding processes observed, and that all new discoveries of ideas
are not discoveries of existing facts, but that they are new truths
evolved from preceding forms of truth; or, in other words, that they are
higher forms of truth.
These relations are thus specifically stated, because in them is found
the authority for man to make use of all things which exist, that by
such use, higher purposes may be subserved and better general conditions
obtained. As the gardener destroys all weeds and foreign growths about
the vegetables he would produce, so must the gardener in ideas pull up,
eradicate or destroy, all false or decaying ideas which sap the vitality
from those he would have flourish; and this authority is the same—the
authority of the higher over the lower, to the extent of individual
freedom and within the limits of the general good.
Such is the province of art, and man, in whatever department of nature
he operates, is the artist, adding to her beauties, which she can
produce by her laws, those which the evolution of higher ideas proposes.
Thus art utilizes and beautifies all that nature produces. Nature alone
could never produce a Central Park, nor the perfection in fruits and
flowers that is now presented to please the taste and gladden the eye.
No one will question the right of man to make from nature the most of
beauty it is capable of, nor to make it most conducive to all his
natural desires. And here is found the basis for the authority from
which it is analogically argued, that man has the right to practice as
an artist in ideas. The position this artist in ideas should be assigned
should be as much higher in the scale of importance as ideas are higher
than crude matter.
Government being the most formidable director of ideas and the most
powerful opponent of their diffusion, if they are not in channels it can
operate through, its perfectability according to the highest existing
ideas is a matter of the most fearful importance. It is for this reason
that so great importance attaches to the diffusion among the people of
knowledge of the principles government should be constructed upon that
its administration may be productive of the greatest individual, and the
greatest public good, which it is possible to obtain from the
application of the highest evolved ideas.
THE PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT.
NO. III
It has been the intention to show the importance of unity of purpose in
government, and that such unity of purpose can only be obtained by the
application to administration of those principles which in operation
produce unity in the kingdoms below the kingdom of ideas. Human
government differs from all other kinds of government in this, that it
is for the control of Mind instead of Matter. The natural direction the
individual would pursue results not only from causes which arise in his
material nature, but to these are superadded those which pertain to the
Mental in contradistinction to Matter. Each individual is not only an
epitome of all previous material forms which have been evolved, but he
is also the finite representative of the Infinite Power which caused all
those evolutions, and therefore has an individualized, determining power
of his own to the extent that he represents the Infinite; and as this
extent differs in degree so extensively among the total of individuals
over whom government presides, it is the most difficult of all tasks to
prescribe forms for it to operate through, by which it can reach and
control this diversity.
This most serious difficulty which arises at every step in the search
for the true source of government, comes from the innate sentiment of
freedom in man, which is the truthful expression of the characteristics
of the Infinite, which are indigenous, so to speak, to his nature. He
involuntarily resists all attempts to exercise authority over him
because of these sentiments. He feels, he realizes, that no individual,
nor any number of individuals, has any authority from any competent
authority to exercise supreme control over him; and thus it is that all
individuals resist control.
Just at the point arrived at comes in the other part of the fact, which
being considered, modifies the absoluteness of individuality. Every
individual must either ever remember, or be compelled to remember, that
he is but one of millions of individuals who live upon the face of the
earth, each one of whom feels the same innate sentiment of self-right;
and thus it comes that there should be no restraint at all over each
individual exercising all his selfish ideas of rights strictly within
his individual sphere; and that all these should be compelled to
harmonize so that none may interfere with others. Even to this last
proposition there are natural modifications to be inferred from
everything below man. The higher order has the authority of its position
in the natural scale of evolution, over all that precedes it; and this
authority is of that absolute character which receives the sanction of
nature in all the kingdoms which man can view.
The higher orders of ideas and thoughts should thus be the controlling
power among men. They should assume the business of the artist in ideas,
and prune, dig and destroy, if possible, all lower ideas which, live but
to sap the vitality from the more advanced. The best expression, then,
which it is possible for principles to find in the individualized
productions of the highest animal form, must be sought in the most
highly developed mentality; or in that mentality which expresses the
most of the Infinite, and which is consequently the highest authority
represented through humanity.
Mentality represents the most important department of the duality which
constitutes the source of governmental power; but this, acting alone,
would not prove the perfect principle. It would pursue its aims with no
regard to sentiment or feeling. It would ruthlessly destroy all
imperfections which debarred it from having absolute control, instead of
endeavoring to consolidate their life with the higher and the better
because it is the higher. To this active, sternly analytic principle,
must be added the principle of unity or the affectional, which seeks to
combine all mentality in one harmony. The head and the heart should act
in concert; the head perceiving that the same general principles should
be used to direct the forms of every department of life, and endeavoring
to apply them to control humanity, should head the appeals of the heart,
which, from its mainsprings of love and tenderness, feels, that the
whole universe is bound together by the indissoluble ties of fraternity,
and, therefore, should realize that as a father and mother, they should
govern their children. Of these principles, government should be the
true exponent, representative and administrator.
But here the question arises: How shall such government be inaugurated?
How shall those who are the best representatives of advanced ideas and
the broadest fraternal feeling become installed as the administrators of
government? Every thinking person knows that no such persons or
principles are in authority now, and that they have not been these many
years. In the early days of the republic, which was constructed by men
whose souls were imbued with these principles—or at least the fraternal
principle—it may be fair to admit that something nearly assimilating to
the true kind of government did exist. A government founded in the
principles ours was could not have been organized except by men of the
very highest order of development in the true principles of government.
They were hundreds of years in advance of the general people, for whom
they wrought, and it may be seriously questioned whether they have had
any representatives since, and whether they have any at present, who are
actuated by any such lofty patriotism as they were. So long as they
lived it was but natural that the people should have continued them at
the head of what they had constructed, by the means they prepared for
the expression of their right of self-government. It is well
demonstrated that these men fully realized the principles of freedom,
equality and justice, which realization comes from the conspicuous
development of the paternal and affectional elements. Mentality, it is
plain, was not so conspicuously developed, for they did not comprehend
that the time would come in which those who should fill their places
should be almost infinitely lower in the scale of true governmental
principles than they were, or that the controlling motives of such could
ever descend from their lofty stand to grovel in the purely selfish. But
the time has come and now is, in the which the present places the
fathers of the republic occupied are filled by those who are not in any
sense the representatives of the true principles of government. It is
quite true that the people are responsible for the men they select to
represent them, but that does not better the very bad fact that the
people are not represented, any more than that the true principles of
government are. When this fact is seriously considered, it becomes
apparent that there is a difficulty somewhere in the processes of
government which has such imperfections that the ends of government as
understood by its founders are utterly defeated. The result of this
imperfection is, that instead of the true and best representative men of
the country—those whom the previous analysis points out as possessed of
the qualities demanded in government—being chosen to perform the
function for which they are adapted, they are left one side, while
others without ideas are sent where they should go. In short, the whole
governmental operations have been and are being prostituted to the
selfish ambitions of party leaders, who do not care a whit what means
are used so that they win thereby. This shows not only that there are
imperfections in the organization, but that there is much which is
radically wrong. It is even now being more than whispered around that
there is a plot being matured by which some of those who are now in
power intend to continue themselves in power, even if they are obliged
to seize upon the government in spite of the people. Such a plot could
only bring destruction upon the actors; but that such a disgraceful
thing could occur, or even be conceived, proves that a remedy is needed
somewhere, which shall prevent such persons acquiring the power they
would thus prostitute to their own purposes, at the expense of the
sacrifice of the rights of the people.
This government is either a government for the people or for the office
holders; latter practices incline outside observers to the opinion that
it is the people’s only in theory. If we examine the theory, it looks
finely enough; but when the manner it is outwrought comes under
observance, nothing can be found which entitles it to the name of the
people’s government. It is not the people’s government by a very great
deal; nor is it a government for one-half the people even; neither is it
a government which guarantees equality to its citizens; every count
which can be made is against it, as the exponent of principles upon
which it professes to stand.
In the first instance, one-half of the people are debarred from all
political rights whatever, and they are those who form the producing
part of humanity, and whose interests in government are in every way
equal to that of those who exercise all the political power. Thus at the
very outset we find a professed equal government proscribing one-half
the people over whom its authority is exercised; and, be it ever
remembered, is fully maintained. While they are made responsible for all
infringement of law, they have no voice in determining what that law
shall be. While they are compelled to assist equally with the preferred
class to maintain and support government by the payment of taxes,
revenues, &c., they have no power to control the use that shall be made
of them. This proscribed class, though living in the United States of
America, a so-called Republic, are in no better condition and stand in
no superior relation to the government they are compelled to give
adhesion, respect and support to, than are those of the most absolute
monarchy upon the face of the earth. What think you, enslaved people, of
the great, the free, the exalted government of a country which professes
so much and grants you nothing?
In the next instance, it is not the government of the one-half of the
people it has really the semblance of being, and which many think it is.
To completely establish this significant fact, the attention of the
people is called to the immense minorities in the several States, and
the relations which they sustain to a Presidential election, wherein the
sum total of all the citizens of all the States who are permitted to
cast their ballots, and who do so cast their ballots, for the electors
who vote for the defeated candidate, exceed the sum total of all the
citizens of all the States who are permitted to cast their ballots and
who do so cast their ballots for the electors who vote for and elect
their candidate. Such results have obtained; but a President thus
elected is elected by the votes of the minority of the citizens of the
United States who are permitted to vote, and consequently, within the
Union as a whole, a person may occupy the Presidential chair against the
will of the majority of the voting citizens of all the States. Such is
the perfection of the forms which have been framed and used through
which to obtain popular self-government; and such the results obtained.
The same line of argument applies with equal directness and force to the
citizens of each State in relation to their entire State government,
with the exception of such officers as are elected upon the ticket with
the Governor; their representation in the lower House of Congress, and
in their Legislatures and through their Legislators and their
representation in the Senate of the United States may be, and often is,
that of the minority of the voting citizens of the State. The same is
also true of all incorporated cities outside of their general officers.
This condition of affairs shows that there are two conflicting
principles ever operating against each other, and that their very worst
features appear when their object is the “first office in the gift of
the people,” which, above all others, should be filled by the choice of
the majority of all the citizens of all the States.
Scarcely less in importance, as compared with the Chief Magistracy of
the Union, is the importance of Congressional legislation, which should
be determined by Representatives and Senators who should represent the
majority of all the voting citizens of all the States. This government
will always stand in danger of being overthrown by the unrepresented
majority, so long as such forms of arriving at representation are
allowed to determine these questions, which lie at the very basis of a
republican form of government.
The whole difficulty which this question presents arises from the
seeming stubbornness with which the people refuse to understand that the
interests of the people as a whole can only be promoted by promoting the
interests of each individual composing the whole. In this consideration
the Democratic doctrine of States rights, to which the Democrats adhere
even yet with so much apparent stubbornness, is utterly subversive of
the first principles of unity and it may be emphatically stated that
until enlightenment is obtained upon this point by the common ignorance
of the country, there is no security from wars such as that from the
effects of which we have not yet fully recovered. The same principle of
States rights, as compared with those of all the States, if a correct
principle of self-government, should also be recognized as the proper
one to be acted upon in counties as against the State, and in cities as
against counties and States, and in wards as against cities, and by
citizens as against the wards in which they reside, and by the several
partners of firms as against the authority of the firm as a whole. It is
the only mischievous principle which is operating to destroy the
Republic which is prophetic of so much civilization and advancement to
the whole world.
Under the application of such principle a single government for all the
“nations, kindred and tongues” of the earth would be utterly impossible
and impracticable. Nothing but strife, contention and wars would follow
a government founded on such principles of individuality as do not and
will not recognize the superiority of the community as compared to the
individual members of it. Upon this principle brought down to
individuals, every individual would have the absolute right to act upon
his own self-interests, no matter how seriously such action might
interfere with others possessing the same right. The community would
have no right to compel any restraints upon the individual under this
principle of rule. This principle applied everywhere would carry us back
to pre-historic times, when every individual was his own supreme
authority, and maintained it at the risk of his life. This is the purest
form of anarchy, and as such is laid down by all writers upon
pre-historic times.
Why do not the advocates of States rights contend for the application of
the same principle to its fullest extent, and thereby become consistent?
Why do they advocate any general government at all? The truth and the
facts of the case are, that such doctrines as recognize the rights of
the individual as superior to the rights of the community in which he
resides, are subversive of the first principles of order. Suppose such
principles governed the entire sidereal and solar systems, what chance
among so many vast planets would our little earth have? _It is saved
from destruction because there is a Prime Power which compels them all
into harmony of action and movement, whatever courses their individual
proclivities would lead them to._ The application of this general
superior controlling power in governmental affairs is the only method
which can secure—because it will compel—harmony.
THE PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT.
NO. IV.
Notwithstanding all this, which has been said in opposition to the
doctrine of individual sovereignty as the true principle of government,
it contains the germ of an ultimate truth, which will be realized when
the total of individuals forming the world’s community shall have become
so advanced from the present low conditions to those of wisdom and love,
as to make every individual involuntarily recognize the rights of every
other individual. In other words, individual sovereignty will be the
principle of government when that time shall come wherein there will be
no necessity for government, because the people shall have grown into
the condition of a universal brotherhood. It is this innate sense of
individual right which is present in the consciousness of every
individual who has grown to know he is an individual, which makes this
constant conflict between ultimation and approximation. It is the
expression, politically, of the same principle which, religiously
expressed, makes it possible for the consciousness of the individual to
contain an undefinable knowledge of a Great First Cause, and at the same
time to feel that he is an individual agent. In other words, it is the
old doctrine of free agency reproduced in the political world, which, if
it is but considered a single moment with an unprejudiced mind, it must
be seen that there is no such thing as free agency; for every individual
is dependent upon something, over which he has no control, every instant
of his whole life, which something even produces the capacity which
gives him the power to think he is free.
It will be seen, then, that the great general principles which govern
the entire universe, are recognized in the proposition that all people
are born free and equal, and entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit
of happiness, which are inalienable rights; but it fails to be
comprehended that the inalienable rights of freedom are limited by the
other condition of equality, which makes every individual free within
the distinct sphere of his individuality, but not free within the sphere
of other individuals. He has the inalienable right to life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness, when it is not exercised at the expense of the
inalienable rights of others in the same direction. These are the
governing laws which the worlds obey, and which control the minutest
particles of matter. And these are the true “Principles of Government.”
It will be also seen that the forms by which the principles of our
government are administered are imperfect, and consequently that,
however much we may reverence the Constitution of the United States, it
requires remodeling to enable the true principles of government to find
expression through it. The inconsistencies, also, of the rights of
States, as represented by the common government, must also be removed.
The State is either the source of governmental power or it must proceed
from all the States, as combined in government. If the former, we are no
more to be respected as a Union than the numerous Italian and German
States were before the consolidation. The republic, under such
construction, amounts to nothing more or less than a union for offensive
and defensive purposes, _at the option_ of the several States, which is
as purely a governmental force as could well be imagined. The
inconsistency of this construction of the Constitution was fully shown
in No. III. of the “Limits and Sphere of Government,” and need not be
repeated here; the subject has been pursued here, that the utter folly,
inconsistency and impossibility of the recognition of individual rights,
where such rights conflict with the community as a whole, might be the
more palpably apparent. Having considered the source of the
imperfections which exist in the form of our government, what should
legitimately follow for consideration is, the remedy. In the first
place, the theory of States rights must be abandoned, and each State
must become a member of the Union by organizing under a common form, to
be prescribed by them all, or by the present required constitutional
majority of them all, to make an amendment to the Constitution valid.
The same rule should be applied as that which has come to be a
recognized necessity in States regarding incorporating companies. All
the States should be required to organize under a general State law,
which should be clearly and concisely set forth in the Constitution,
which should recognize the general government as the determining power,
and not that it exists by the sufferance of the States, but that the
States exist as organic bodies, because they have complied with the
requirements of the Constitution, which was necessary to constitute them
States. In conformity with such acquired power, States should prescribe
the means by which cities can become incorporated. In this way, unity of
purpose and harmony of interest can be secured from the individual up to
the total of individuals forming the nation.
Such a government would be a strong government indeed, but one in which
its composing members of States and the composing members of individuals
would have the utmost extent of freedom that the interests of the whole
would admit. If this is not the end to be gained by government, then
government is a simple farce, and unworthy of being allowed to exist
anywhere. From the earliest historic ages the world has constantly been
extending to individuals through its forms of government, more and wider
freedom and greater privileges and immunities. This process will
continue to spread, as the general people become more and better fitted
to be the recipients and the appreciators of such extensions to them.
The individual has more rights and privileges to-day in the world than
at any other previous time, but all individuals have not yet become such
perfect laws to themselves that no formulated law is required to
restrain them from the infraction of others’ present rights, privileges
and immunities. Until such time come, a strong central government is
required.
A strong central government does not necessarily mean anything
approaching a monarchy. But it does mean a republic which will have the
support of all its citizens as a central support, instead of each State
comprising the Union reserving to itself the right to differ from the
central power. In such a government, the majority of the people would,
at any time, have the right to elect new officers, as provided for, so
that the strong central power would not be in the individuals
administering the government, but in the organic law which constitutes
the several parts of the country a common government, which, while being
the strongest possible governmental form, it would, at the same time
guarantee the greatest possible freedom, equality and justice to its
people which would be compatible with the common interests and the
common good.
Lastly, such a central power of government is the only one to which
peoples not already within the government could be admitted without
endangering its existence. A new State desires to become associated with
the several States forming the present Union. Immediately she is
admitted, she has, under the present doctrine and practice, the right to
withdraw. She has been admitted by and with the consent of the required
majority of the States previously constituting the Union; therefore,
logically, she has not the right to withdraw without the same consent It
required this consent added to her free and self-expressed desire to
become a State; it should also require the same consent before she
should be allowed to withdraw from the Union.
Under a general rule for the admission of new States, and of allowing
addition to the present limits of the Union, all that would be required
would be for the people of a certain limit to adopt the requirements of
the Constitution, and present themselves to Congress for admission.
Aggregation, according to this rule, could always proceed without ever
endangering the safety of the general government, because a country once
having become a part of the Union would be under the mighty constraint
of the whole Union to properly and peacefully perform the functions of a
State in the Union. This condition can be well illustrated, by supposing
that there was a confederation of all the European powers to preserve
peace among themselves under certain defined agreements. If a single
power violated any of those agreements, or attempted to make war upon
its own account against another nation, a party to the agreement, all
the other contracting powers would be in honor bound to make the
interest of the nation against which proceedings were being had contrary
to the common agreement their own. War, under such conditions, would be
practically impossible. So would disunion, under the proposed system of
confederation.
The country which shall first adopt such a system will be the centre of
the future Universal Government of the world; and it is with this view
in mind that these suggestions are offered to the people of the United
States of America, which country is, by the common order of the
universe, appointed to be that centre, to the end that they shall see
the necessity of immediate action to perfect the organic laws of the
country.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL
NO. I.
It is a mistaken notion that the interests of labor and capital are in
any way antagonistic to each other. This fallacy has, however, taken
such hold of the minds of the representatives of both these interests,
that it is engendering a spirit of bitterness which, it is to be feared,
will grow into as fierce a character as that against slavery did. It is
always hard to produce any argument that will convince this spirit If
convinced, the spirit of opposition will not be calmed, and obstinacy,
assuming the place of all sentiment, compels the individual to remain
rebellious.
It is most true that there could be no capital unless labor first
existed. This stamps labor as of the greater importance. Let a person be
cast upon a fertile island, without pecuniary means, and he will live by
labor from its fertility; but let him fall upon an utterly barren and
sterile land, and all the millions of a Rothschild would not insure his
existence. So it is everywhere, and under all circumstances, to a
greater or less extent. Labor can exist—though not flourish—without
capital; but capital cannot exist entirely divorced from labor. Being
dependent upon it for primary existence, it must ever remain under a
direct analysis in the state of semi-importance.
The capitalist is the more unreasonable of the two in the position he
assumes. He continues to apply all his energies to the acquisition of
wealth, utterly regardless, in most cases, of any idea of justice to
what has given it to him. The general practice is—and this is the true
test, for whatever is of general application must be governed by some
underlying principle of right—when capital requires any given thing done
which it is obliged to apply to labor to accomplish, it must give
one-half interest in the venture to enlist its co-operation. This is
true regarding nearly all speculative pursuits, and when there is an
actual necessity for either to apply to the other for aid to carry out
its desires, this rule of agreement always obtains. This forms one of
the most conclusive arguments by which to demonstrate the true relations
of labor and capital, and should be made the basis of all co-operation.
It is not for the best interests of the wealthy to become still more so
at the expense of poverty to those under them. On the contrary, it is
their true interest to render fullest justice and strictest equality to
the demands of labor, to be determined by the principles that shall
promote the most general good. It is the greatest mistake of the age—it
has been the greatest mistake of all ages—to suppose that individual
benefit must accrue from the acquisition of wealth at the expense or
sacrifice of any general principle of justice. It is also a great
mistake for labor to array itself in opposition to wealth, and to form
combinations to control it. It is too late in the ages for these kinds
of arguments to convince. They can only end in producing still more
injustice and distance between the two interests, which distance will be
filled by rankling bitterness and contemptuous insinuation. An approach
of the two interests is what is desired—an assimilation of them, so that
the same end shall be best for each.
It may be laid down as an unanswerable proposition that there can be no
general happiness, peace or comfort among a people so long as the
principles society is built upon tend to promote unequal distributions
of the products of labor; and this brings us to the consideration of the
remedy. It is to reconstruct society upon such principles as shall tend
to promote complete unity, harmony and equality among its various
classes. To accomplish this it should be the special aim of every one
possessed of wisdom enough to comprehend a common logical proposition to
endeavor to bring about this equality by diffusing the deductions of it,
in all possible ways, among both classes. Let the various producing and
exchanging classes exist as they do, but let their relations be governed
by such rule of law as shall render them equal, both as to caste and to
the benefits to be derived from an equal interest in the common cause of
the brotherhood of mankind.
NEW YORK. July 10, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. II.
The strife that is being urged to create divergence between the
interests of these bases of society is purely the result of ignorance of
the first principles of constructive use on the part of their
representatives. Instead of an endeavor to demonstrate to the
understanding of all, the true principles which underlie these
interests, which would effectually unite them, those who have selfish
personal ends in view seek to further them, by engendering a spirit of
bitterness and a desire for strife. There are those who cherish the
ideas of aristocracy who have no wealth, on the one hand, and are too
indolent to endeavor to attain their desires by active labor, on the
other, who think to create some serious diversion, and upon it to ride
into place and power. This class of individuals are ever busy stirring
the coals of dissatisfaction into flames of rebellion, thinking thereby
to become the acknowledged representatives of the labor interest. It is
generally true that a cause supported by such means has no principles
upon which to base its claims; but in this instance the most absolute
and just principles are ignored, while cant and bombast usurp their
proper sphere.
It is quite true that there is a growing tendency to centralize capital,
and that consolidation of monetary interests is the rule; but the fault
of this does not lie in capital or capitalists—it is farther back than
it or they. It is in the people themselves, and in the fundamental
principles upon which society is built, and those which the people allow
government to be administered upon. If the laws of a country permit the
doing of a certain thing, which it is for the interests of a certain few
to do, and they chose to avail themselves of it, there are many to be
found in these times so much governed by the desire for the public
welfare as to take the advantage offered them by the people, for it
comes down to that at last. The labor class have it in their power to
send to Congress just those who shall fully represent their interests;
but they do not do this; most of them are found actively supporting
those whom Capital selects and holds up for their suffrages. The remedy
lies with the people, and they must make use of it before they can ever
expect to see their rights adjusted.
There is, as was said above, no conflict between Capital and Labor. The
conflict is among their representatives. On the contrary, there is an
entire harmony of interests between them. The true interests of each are
best promoted by rendering justice, full and complete, to the other, and
in the understanding of this lies the _only_ solution of the Labor
Question. Strife may continue, war, even, may come of the strife, but
finally the settlement must be made upon the principles of justice,
which underlie their relations. One comes from the existence of the
other; this, when created, should ever acknowledge its paternity, and
never assert supremacy, nor be allowed to do so; to be so allowed shows
that defects exist in the fundamental principles of government, or in
its application to existing things. These defects it should be the duty
of those who prate with so much volubility to discover and proclaim, to
the end that they may be understood by the people. The people in turn
should send as their representatives to frame laws, such persons as
shall make it their business to attend to their duties rather than those
who allow themselves to become immersed in the schemes of plotting
politicians who seek eternally to continue themselves in place and
power, and who lose all sight of, or care for, their constituency, in
their necessarily continuous efforts to secure that end. Such
representatives should be religiously ostracized by the common people,
and none tolerated but such as understand the relations which the
interests they wish fostered bear to those they feel they are becoming
subjected to, and who will unflinchingly advocate them at all proper
times and in all proper places. The durability of government rests upon
the entire harmony of all the interests it is framed to protect, and no
country can ever become continuously prosperous that has within it the
elements of discord; no country can endure for any length of time that
does not seek to eradicate all causes of dissatisfaction, and to so
adjust its interdependencies that they shall be mutual and just to each
as individuals, and to all as the public.
NEW YORK, July 20, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. III.
The duty of the philanthropist is to point out the harmony of interests
that exists between the extremes of the different grades that society
consists of. There are a certain class of would-be reformers, who make
it their business to stir up strife and contention between these grades,
and thus to separate their interests, and to make it appear that they
are antagonistic. The number of the latter class as compared with the
former, gives them a preponderant influence, which, added to the real
grievances existing, enables them to create considerable excitement and
much imagined wrong, which has no foundation in fact.
The laboring classes, being occupied by their labor, do not devote much
time to the study of the circumstances that control their condition.
They see that other classes fatten from their productions, and without
stopping to inquire why it is so, straightway conclude that they are the
subjects of an oppressive power which desires to completely wrest the
results of their labor from them, and to always keep them in the
condition of virtual vassalage. This conclusion rouses the spirit of
independence in the laborer, and he determines to redress his wrongs. He
sets about forming combinations, having in view the control of wages and
hours, not comprehending that the remedy lies deeper than these, or that
these would regulate themselves, could the true cause of the condition
they rebel against be reached and generally understood. While it is true
that capital can never enslave labor to a degree that can be considered
compulsory on the part of capital, and unnecessary on the part of labor,
it is equally true that labor cannot compel capital to its commands.
Therefore both these methods of cure should be abandoned, and preventive
means be resorted to instead. And these it is our duty to point out.
The judicious architect, before pulling down the old structure, provides
the material to replace it; in other words, he substitutes the new for
the old, and in the process leaves no unnecessary interval in which the
fostered interests shall be left to the vicissitudes of anarchy. It is
evident from the rapidly spreading knowledge among the laboring classes,
that they will soon demand some modifications in the forms, and in the
relations they sustain through them to society. Before breaking down the
present organizations society exists in, by revolution, which would end
in a period of anarchy, out of which better conditions _might_ grow, the
better conditions should be first considered, prepared and determined
upon, and, by being thoroughly understood, should be substituted for the
present by general consent, without society being compelled to pass
through the anarchical period that succeeds all violent disruptions of
present forms, whether in government, religion or society.
As society is constructed at present, it must look to legislation to
produce forms and to enforce order through them, that society may
observe in their operations the better results to them. Society
expresses itself most powerfully through legislation. Public opinion is
a force capable of many things, but is powerless to redress grievances
or to institute the new and better for the old and decayed, unless it is
directed by the formula of law. All the energies of labor reform, then,
should be directed to the main point, from which benefit to itself must
spring. It should waste no time nor strength upon the minor issues, but
concentrate all upon the one strategic point. And when this
concentration is effected, it should not fritter away its strength by
dealing with the contingencies of the present, or in small expedients,
to enable us to dodge along, simply escaping shipwreck, to be again
forced the next day, week or year, to the same expedients to escape
similar shoals. Instead, it should direct all its capacities to
substitute a new and better foundation, upon which a new and better
superstructure of society can be reared. How shall such a work be begun?
Legislation is the primary constructive point from which better
conditions must emanate. The laboring classes, then, must see to it that
they are properly represented in legislation. Nor should they be
deceived into the support of any who, by bluster and tongue, loudly
proclaim themselves the champions of labor, without the understanding of
the first principles that control the relations of labor to capital. Let
it be set down, once for all time, that he who denounces capital as the
oppressor is not the representative labor should choose to right its
wrongs. In every community there are some who think a great deal and say
little; these, as a general thing, are the antipodes of those who say a
great deal and think little. Though the last are usually found floating
about the surface of society, it is to the first, society must look for
that wisdom, judgment and executive ability that shall guide it to the
desired harbor.
It should be the first duty of the labor interest, in each State or
national district, to select and elect one from that class that has
calmly observed the workings of present systems, and who can show where
the cause of existing ills lies. It is to the philosopher, and not to
the politician, that the labor interest must turn its eyes, and though
he be not smooth of tongue and glib of speech, he will lay such a
foundation in law as will produce the conditions desired. Your present
representatives, State and national, have shown themselves incompetent
to the task you demand of them. Leave them to seek their level, and turn
you to others, who will not lose sight of your interests in the
allurements which place and power present. You cannot expect that those
who are not of you can appreciate your wants or understand your
conditions. Choose from among yourselves and you will not go far astray.
There are, however, noble exceptions to this rule of decision. There are
those who were reared in wealth whose hearts sympathize with you, and
who feel quite as keenly as you do the injustice you suffer. In these
you will find your best advocates, but see to it that your suffrages are
never, once again, worse than withheld.
You are in the majority, and the fault is your own if you do not make
use of the power you possess. Nominate and elect your own men; if your
first choice fails you, try again, and continue trying, until the right
man for the position is found; and when found, while holding him
strictly accountable, give him your cordial support while he is true to
your interests. Most persons who occupy position now, feel compelled to
yield principle to the demands of policy, in order to retain it. This
must be remedied. None are fit to hold position who will sacrifice one
iota of their conviction in order to retain it. Self-interest must be
surrendered to those whose power fills the place, and for the time being
it must act as the representative of them and not as its own. It cannot
be too strongly insisted upon, nor too often repeated, that it is the
first duty of the labor interest to look to it that our halls of
legislation are filled by those who understand the true and the
harmonious relations of labor and capital.
NEW YORK, July 27, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. IV.
In our last the attempt was made to show how important the laborer
should consider the choice of representatives to be, and also what class
of persons should be chosen. The task of making these selections cannot
be begun too soon. In every district in the Union the laborers should be
made alive to this question. Some who fully appreciate its importance
should take it upon themselves to begin the work; they should converse
with the few they come in contact with, and these, becoming interested,
should be induced to extend the agitation; and finally, all over the
country, primary labor meetings would come to be held for the full and
complete discussion of the whole subject.
It is the most complete evidence of supineness on the part of the
laboring classes that they are not now represented as they should be.
Being so vastly in the majority, every office should be filled by them.
The difficulty has been—and we fear will be—that while the laborer has
been busy at his regular task, others have managed the incipient stages
that produce the candidates, in such a manner that the interests of the
majority have been entirely ignored. Finally, when the regular party
ticket is presented, the least objectionable one receives the support;
and thus it comes that the real interests and wishes of the people are
seldom represented, and as seldom is the elected candidate the real
choice of the people.
Unless our laboring classes arouse themselves to the real importance of
this matter, and become willing to devote sufficient time to preparing
their candidates, they should cease blaming others for results; for they
now complain of things they have it in their power to remedy, but which
they cannot expect others, whose interests seem to be at variance with
theirs, to correct for them. Those who declaim so loudly and profusely
about the wrongs labor suffers at the instance of capital, should be
strictly guarded against, lest they, unwittingly, become your leaders
and advisers.
There are at all times numbers of persons standing waiting and ready to
step forward to take advantage of any favorable movement among the
people which seems to offer inducements. It matters not to them in what,
or where the movement may originate; they have no principles to crush
out or control in order that they may fall into the current. It is
almost impossible to escape the curse of these ever-ready tools. The
safest and surest remedy against them is to select those who have never
mingled in politics, and who will come direct from the shop or the
field. It does not matter so much if they are not able advocates, if
they only understand the work to be done and are devoted and true. Let
this course be pursued a few years, and the enormous proportion of
lawyer-legislators would be diminished by one-half. Many of these have
no sympathies in common with you, most of them are, by all their
controlling influences, drawn from the consideration even of your
condition. What does it matter to them if the few articles you must
purchase to render yourselves and families comfortable, cost you ten,
twenty or fifty per cent. more than the actual cost of their production,
if corporations for which they are attorneys become still more corpulent
upon this that is indirectly filched from you! For, do you not know that
capital under such rule does not pay the taxes of the country, but that
your labor does? In this way, the common laborer, who should not be
compelled to pay any levy at all, is taxed on almost everything he eats,
drinks and wears, and thus labor is compelled not only to produce what
makes wealth possible, but also to sustain it after having produced it.
This is a vast inequality in favor of capital and against labor, and
still it is the laborer’s fault; and it lies just where we pointed, in
the selection of proper candidates as representatives, State and
national.
There are but a very few newspapers that do not _profess_ to be the
advocates of the rights of labor. Let them be called upon to take hold
of this matter, and take hold of it at just that point where the remedy
must be applied. Let them lay before the people a plain exposition of
the matter, and certainly aim to make the people understand it. Let them
urge the people to assemble and concert plans and devise means to carry
them out, and to warn them to no longer intrust the most vital parts of
the “necessary course” to the care of hereditary members of the caucus,
whom money buys or whisky controls. It has become proverbial that he who
would be elected to any important position must dispense both these
“powers” with a lavish hand; and he who can do this the most profusely
is pretty sure to “be elected.” You may rest perfectly assured that if
he spend ten thousand dollars to secure his election by your votes, he
intends at least to double his venture during his official term. You
should know by this time that “the purity of the ballot box” is simply a
“play upon words,” and that elections are but farces to approve what is
previously determined.
The people, then, must look on every side for treachery to their
interests and dishonesty of purpose, not forgetting that a large portion
of the press that profess your interests so warmly, that you almost know
their truth, are open to the influence of at least one of the
abovementioned powers, and that to go counter to the _commands_ of those
who “back them” is to go to certain destruction. Nevertheless, demand of
the press a course that cannot be denominated hypocritical, and if it
does not respond, withdraw your patronage, and give it where it will
contribute to your interests.
These introductory details cannot be dwelt upon too long nor insisted
upon too earnestly. To begin a work right, is to have it half
accomplished; and most powerfully does this apply in the matter of
determining who shall be your representatives.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. V.
One of the great questions of the day, if not the greatest, is the true
relations that should exist between labor and capital. It is one fraught
with more direct benefit to a greater number of people than any other
question has even the external appearance of being. The real merits of
the question are of much greater significance than is generally
supposed, even by those who raise it. The welfare and the individual
rights of three-fourths of the people are at stake. The question assumes
this shape: Labor has, by its continuous efforts, produced a certain
amount of wealth, from the use of the materials nature presents, that
has not been required to support and sustain the general life of man. By
certain advantages, either of general policy or of individual acuteness,
certain individuals have accumulated more than their necessities
demanded they should expend, and this accumulation has become an added
power to that possessed by the individual previously, which power
endeavors to maintain itself partly at the expense of that which first
produced it, and to transfer just so much of the cost of its production
from itself.
That such conditions can exist and really increase in power and
importance, so that they can virtually control legislation, gives
evidence that principles are operative that do not promote the interests
of the entire people. There must be a fault somewhere, which fault it is
necessary to discover and expose, and then remedy. Now, where does this
fault really have beginning? It is in certain protections and guarantees
that law extends to individuals, which permit them to have an advantage
over those with whom they sustain the relations of society. These laws
arise out of false conceptions of the principles of common equality and
economy, which pertain to man as a common fraternity. In legislation,
which first allows and then fosters such departures, then, must the
point at which reform should begin be sought. Any attempt to teach the
general mind can have no practical effect, unless, finally, the result
of the teachings express themselves through legislation. Legislation
presupposes legislators, and to have the right kind of legislators
involves the necessity of the laboring classes giving sufficient time
and attention to the matter of nominations and elections to insure that
those who will represent their true interests shall be returned.
Although the remedy for all the laborer’s ills must be sought through
legislation, there are, nevertheless, many fallacies still received,
even by the laborer, that have the direct tendency to degrade labor and
to elevate the position of capital. One of the principal of these is a
false monetary basis, a false representative standard of values, which
is arbitrarily imposed upon the people, with no positive and absolute
value within itself, except that which such arbitrary law gives it.
Gold, as a standard of values, has been set up and worshiped so long,
that people submit to its decrees with about the same appreciation of
its real merits that they have of the mysteries of religion, as
expounded by their paid oracles, who have constituted themselves into
authorities to declare, “Thus saith the Lord.” The people have
surrendered their reason in these matters to these self-constituted
authorities, and so have they surrendered common sense to the god of
value.
Another, and almost as important fallacy, is that of interfering with
the natural ebb and flow of the products of the world by imposing upon
certain of them such tribute as makes it pretty nearly impracticable for
them to find their way to the locality of natural demand, in order that
a special few who inhabit that locality may produce the same at a
greatly increased cost, which the consumer must pay in order to obtain.
It does not matter how this plain statement may be twisted and bent by
the alluring sophistries and glittering generalities of the
protectionist; a plain statement, viewed with clear light, needs no
authoritative sanction to determine its truth. If it be any benefit for
a thousand men to pay one man ten per cent more for a desired article,
because it is of home production, than it could be purchased for from a
foreign producer, we should be most happy to have it demonstrated. The
argument used is, that by that one man being protected in its production
he is thereby enabled to give employment to a certain number of
laborers. But to make even this tenable upon their own statement, they
must at the same time prove that those laborers would not have been able
to apply themselves to any other labor during the time required to
produce the article in question. This at once leads to such an intricacy
of cause and effect that those who attempt to solve the mysticism prefer
to accept the declaration that protection is a good thing rather than
acknowledge that they are lost in the fog and obscurity they have been
sent to explore to find the required evidence.
Another extensive popular fallacy is that of the continuation of special
protection to monopolies after their existence as monopolies is assured,
which renders them perpetual taxes upon the labor that must make use of
them, and perpetual patents upon the industry of the country, by which a
few already plethoric capitalists become still more obese. The great
systems of internal improvements of the country belong to the country,
and the country should so arrange their conduct that the people could
make use of them at the least possible expense of support.
It is these and sundry like matters that the laborers of the country
should require their representatives to understand and act upon, and
they should cast their vote for no one that will not, at all times and
under all circumstances, advocate and vote for the greatest good of the
greatest number. In this way, labor may hope to arise from its present
position of degradation to sit side by side with capital in all public
and profitable positions and those of honor and trust.
NEW YORK, August 10, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. VI.
From various sources we learn that there is beginning to be a manifest
interest in all the different States and Congressional districts
regarding the next elections. The representatives of labor seem to begin
to realize the great importance of special attention to all that belongs
to primary organization, and to perceive that heretofore they have been
obliged to throw their strength away or waste it in unprofitable
directions, from the very fact that they did not give the necessary
attention to the first steps in the process of determining who should be
set up for them to choose between. It does not seem possible that any
should be returned to office who entertain opinions antagonistic to the
general interests of labor. Three-fourths of the entire population of
the country are in this interest, and whether they be artisans in
mechanics or nature—whether they be by the anvil or the plow—whether
they be printers or writers—their interests are all the same; it only
requires that they should all understand this to consolidate them into a
power that would control every movement of government. Should this unity
once be found practical, and should it be recognized by capital as
consummated, its representatives would be compelled to come to those,
who now look to them, for the granting of ameliorating conditions. It is
most probable that when such a unity shall be attained both the
capitalist and the laborer will, for the first time, discover that
whatever really militates against the true interests of one, is equally
antagonistic to the best interests of the other.
Some who have thought this might be so, have endeavored to devise
methods by which harmonious action could be secured. Various schemes of
co-operation have been suggested, many of them tried and found faulty
and then discarded, until it has come to be pretty thoroughly understood
that there is no level upon which they can meet and part in mutuality of
interest. It is true that no perfect method can be suggested or
instituted that will from the first give complete results; but the
principle must be sought that governs the relations between the separate
interests and applied, at first, with imperfect results, which must
afterward be improved as the interests grow into a true comprehension of
each other’s character.
The principle is this, that labor and capital are equally interested in
the productions that flow from their joint operations; that is, the
capital that gives employment to one hundred laborers is entitled to an
equal interest with the laborers in what is produced. But here is an
inequality to begin with. The capital may only represent one individual,
while the laborers are one hundred; still, this is the relation, and the
final result of its operation will be a complete equality in this wise:
The one hundred laborers perform their regular duties, receiving
therefor such regular wages as are proper; and also their respective
proportions of the profits of their productions. In, say, five years,
these one hundred laborers will have accumulated a sufficient capital
with which to transact the business on their own account; and here is
where a system of equality is reached, which again would be followed by
another degree of progress for the laborer. The capitalist, finding
himself left out of the count by the operation of this method, would
come forward and offer his capital to labor organizations at a
reasonable rate of interest, and in this way a common interest would be
the only possible result. The entire profits of the labor would then be
divided among the producers, while the capitalist would have to be
satisfied with the moderate interest he would realize, in place of the
extraordinary sums now sometimes acquired from the sweat and muscle of
the laborer. There is one point, however, in the first instance, that
modifies the inequality mentioned in a very material degree. The
capitalist, while enjoying as much profit as all the laborers, is also
liable for all losses, in which the laborer has no interest.
Following the results of the co-operation above mentioned would be
various modifications in society and in the locality of populations.
People engaged in the same pursuits would naturally gravitate to each
other and into distinct localities, while the various interests they
represented would gravitate to those localities that should offer the
most inducement to their respective trades. One of the results of this
would be that all raw material would, in all cases—where all the
requirements were present—be manufactured in the locality of its
production, thereby saving vast amounts of transportation; and this
again would be illustrative of another department of general economy, in
the light of which protection to special manufacturing interests would
be seen in its true colors.
We have thus briefly endeavored to point out the practical results that
would flow from the adoption, generally, of the true principle of
co-operation for the specific purpose of assisting the labor interest in
selecting candidates for their representatives, both State and national.
They should be those who understand these relations, and what would
naturally follow them, and who would at all times, and under all
circumstances, advocate their adoption, and, in the first instance, such
policies as would most materially assist in their development, and lead
to their introduction and practice on the part of all who compose both
interests. Labor is the basis upon which all society rests, and nothing
is entitled to so much consideration at the hands of legislation.
Nothing heretofore has been so grossly neglected, insulted and imposed
upon.
NEW YORK, August 20, 1870
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. VII.
PRIORITY OF RIGHT—THEIR POSITION IN THE PROCESSES OF SOCIETY—THE EARTH
BELONGS TO MAN AT LARGE—INDIVIDUAL CLAIMS, PURE ASSUMPTION—PRINCIPLES,
PRACTICE, REMEDIES AND CURE.
Capital, primarily, is the product of labor, but labor, in the abstract,
could produce nothing of itself. It must have something upon which to
apply itself. It cannot create anything; it can only alter, readjust or
rearrange the materials which nature offers, and by bringing them into
new relations with each other make it possible for them to subserve
other and better purposes than when, in the constitution assigned them
by the operation of natural laws, they are unmodified by the touch of
mind. Therefore, while capital is the direct result of labor, labor
would not be possible without the free gifts of nature. Absolute
originality, then, or absolute priority of right, as between labor and
capital, cannot be claimed by or for either.
The formula of the operation, beginning with nature and ending in the
ultimate use of its productions, in contributing to the happiness of the
race, is this: Nature is made up of the elements of the universe, which,
compounded into forms, are offered to man to be modified into other
forms and to combine in new relations which may best contribute to the
needs of the human family. In this view, and in view of the inharmonious
relations that exist between capital and its co-equal labor, it becomes
necessary to give the whole matter a complete analysis, in order to
discover, if possible, where the primary fault lies, and to find the
proper solution of all differences.
The human race exists upon the earth. At a past period no human being
existed upon it. At a later day the human race arose. Before man,
nothing claimed the ownership of any part of the earth’s surface. When
man presented himself he began to make use of various parts of it for
his own ends, but to the land thus appropriated he acquired no permanent
title or right of ownership. It was his to obtain from it all that his
genius and strength made possible. So much as he could thus extract he
could possess, but further than this his title was valueless.
The races of men that now inhabit the earth are scattered over the
greater part of its surface, drawing what it spontaneously yields and
what they can force it to yield. From these premises it would seem
unquestionable that each individual of the human family had an equal
right to its benefits. The only difference that ought to exist should be
that limited and bounded by the capacity of each to produce. No person
could therefore ever acquire, under the rule of universal justice, an
absolute ownership to any part or portion of the earth’s surface. If the
chain of title to any claimed ownership is followed backward
sufficiently, it will be found to have originated in an assumption in
the first instance of ownership to something that belonged to men in
common.
We can now acquire landed property from the government, and this creates
the most absolute ownership that can exist; but here again comes the
question whether governments can do what is impossible to individuals?
Can a system organized by a people perform acts not in the power of the
people themselves to perform? Can a government by the mere fact of
having been organized to preserve harmony among a people acquire an
absolute title to the earth that is contained within its jurisdiction?
If an individual cannot go into an unclaimed territory and take absolute
possession of a certain portion of it, then no number of persons, nor
can any government they may establish, do so. And here exists one cause
of discord between labor which produces and capital which monopolizes.
All monopolies arise from landed monopolies. Were there no inequalities
between men in claims to certain areas of the earth’s surface, no other
monopolies would find a basis for existence. Every individual should
have a right to the use of a certain quantity of the real estate of the
country, and the right to all improvements he might make upon it. Here
would be a basis of equity which would forever prevent the accumulation
in the hands of any few persons, of vast quantities of real estate,
which is the real basis of all securities. It is such a basis because
everything is produced from it. All manufacturers must rely upon it for
their raw material, and, therefore, a practical equality in the
occupation and use of the public domain would insure a certain degree of
equality in all things that might spring from it. It was the perception
of this principle that caused Lycurgus to divide the lands of Lacedemon
equally among all the people; and a general recognition of it should now
take place.
While these are the principles that underlie the workings of society,
and which must be practiced before a general equality can exist, it is
not to be expected that they can be immediately introduced. There are
too few who understand the real rights of man, and too many who do not
wish to understand them. While this condition of ignorance and
perverseness keeps the world inharmonious and subjected to suffering, we
should avail ourselves of all the alleviatory methods that can be
suggested in our present system. Between two evils choose the least; but
in the pursuit of remedies, the root of the disease should never be lost
sight of. Nor should the spirit that is exhibited in many so-called
Labor and Workingmen’s Journals be encouraged. Strife and animosity will
never accomplish half so much as calmness, reason and persuasion. “Come,
let us reason together,” was never more judiciously proposed than it
could now be by capitalists and workingmen. The latter must remember
that they cannot compel capitalists to their terms, and capitalists must
not forget that if there are real causes of dissatisfaction growing out
of injustice, the sooner justice is done the less serious will be the
reckoning with the laborer. Instead of strife let us have co-operation;
instead of war let us have peace; instead of the process of fermentation
let us have that of mutual understanding.
NEW YORK, August 27, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. VIII.
THE CINCINNATI CONVENTION—NEW PARTIES AND NEW ISSUES—PEOPLE’S EYES
OPEN—DETERMINATION TO TAKE MATTERS INTO THEIR OWN HANDS—WILL THEY MAKE
JUDICIOUS MOVEMENTS?—THE RIGHTS OF LABOR—SHALL THEY BE IGNORED?—OUR
POSITION REGARDING THE LABOR MOVEMENT.
The National Labor Convention lately held in Cincinnati was called for
the special purpose of beginning an organization having in view the next
Presidential canvass. It had taken the means of obtaining the views of a
number of the most prominent public men, letters enunciating which views
were duly presented before the convention. That of Governor Geary, of
Pennsylvania, appears to have occupied the position of most prominency,
and to have been regarded with peculiar and unanimous favor. The views
presented by him are such as were sure to find favor with the
representatives of labor, and so far he stands A No. 1 as the
prospective candidate for the Presidency of the National Labor party.
It has been very evident for the last year that the old parties had lost
their power of inspiration over the people. The Democratic party sold
itself out to slavery and virtually died when slavery died. A party may
exist called Democratic, but it will be upon new issues and must take
new departures. The hard conservatism that attaches to it from its
former practices does not suit the spirit of the eighth decade of the
nineteenth century. The rank and file that have so long blindly followed
wherever their leaders commanded are becoming imbued with this spirit,
and they begin to realize that they have been mere automatons that have
been moved with no acquiescent will of their own. Newspapers have become
too commonly read. That the blind should be led necessitates the
continuous condition of blindness. So, too, with, the understanding.
What have the masses known of the essence of the issues that have formed
the platform of the political parties for the last fifty years? When war
came, as the result of a blind course on the part of politicians, the
masses began to open their eyes to the fact that they had been
unwittingly betrayed into a most dangerous and fearful condition,
wherein it became necessary to cut each other’s throats. Since the close
of the war they have not only kept their eyes open to the full extent
the war opened them, but they have also opened their understanding and
for the first time fully realize that they are indeed freemen; and to
become conscious that heretofore they have been so only in name. Awaking
as they have from the delusion so long hugged to their hearts, it will
not be strange if they do some inconsiderate and short-sighted things.
It is the duty of all who have the true interest of the whole people at
heart to warn them of all the extremes they are likely to contend for,
and to suggest permanent practical methods, which shall spring from
principles that will apply at all times to all men—and women. The
Republican party being composed of somewhat different elements is
disintegrated from different action of the same causes; with the
destruction of slavery and the reconstruction of the country its
strength was expended. All people who were opposed to slavery had
concentrated in the Republican party, because of the similarity of
sentiment upon this single question; this settled, they find themselves
without a common rallying idea; they differ as widely upon the old and
common topics among themselves as they differ from those who do not
belong to the party and never did. Place and power are the sole things
that hold the Republican party together at all; these gone it will be
gone.
It is just at this time that new parties are demanded, and they are sure
to arise. The conditions are all favorable. It remains for wise counsels
to prevail in the formation and departure of these, to insure them
something more than death with the accomplishment of one of their
central ideas, which destiny fell to the lot of the Republican party.
Unquestionably there will be a Labor party in the next canvass. We are
sorry it is denominated the Labor party, because it should be something
more than a Labor party, and because this is a direct challenge to
capital, and it will very probably result in arraying these two
interests in an antagonism which will be but a repetition of the slavery
antagonism. No party built upon a specific idea, looking in a single
direction, can ever attain to even the promise of permanency; and it is
for this reason we say we are sorry to see a party sectionalizing itself
at the very outset of its attempting a general movement toward
organization.
It seems, also, a little premature that an organization calling itself a
Labor organization, should at the outset put itself upon the record
against the freedom of labor, let it come from whence it may, and be of
whatever nature it may. This policy is short-sighted, and will prove a
stumbling-block to the party, though for the time Chinese emigration may
serve for a rallying-cry. All assertions that the Chinese emigrants can
be reduced to a system of slavery among us are humbuggery of the first
water. There is no law to prevent a person contracting with a hundred
American workmen at the best terms he can. It is quite certain there is
no law to prevent him from employing Irishmen, Germans or even Chinese
upon the same terms. And if it is done, and labor is thereby obtained
cheaper than the citizens of this country desire to furnish it, the
laboring class must not lay the charge to the capitalist who
accomplishes it, but to the imperfections of our social and financial
systems which make such resorts possible. Then, instead of committing
this new national organization against any form of legal labor, its
managers should have proposed remedies for the existing imperfections in
our systems.
We are no special advocate of the introduction of Chinese or any other
labor into this country; neither are we desirous of advocating any
policy that will conflict with the interests of any laborer, but we are
advocates, and always expect to be, of justice and equity to all people
everywhere, because the time has come in the ages when we must begin to
remember that we are all brothers under the sun, and that he or she who
does not recognize and act upon this universal truth will, sooner or
later, be obliged to learn it at the cost of dear experience. We expect
to be found advocating very many of the principles laid down in the
platform of the Labor party, and could wish that we may find nothing
there adverse to the principles which are of general application. We
desire to see the Labor interest advanced to the right and position of
equality with capital, and we shall put forth our best endeavors to
assist in this most just movement. At the same time we shall not commit
ourselves to sustain or advocate anything that we conceive will be
ultimately injurious to the true interests of humanity, or any part of
it, therefore we shall at all times point out what we regard as errors
in whatsoever this new party may endeavor to carry out. At the same time
we shall, perhaps, be among its firmest and truest advocates. The best
friends are those who show us our faults and sustain us in the right.
NEW YORK, September 3, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. IX.
This question forms one of the corner-stones of future society, but of
all the questions in which society seems interested it is the worst
understood. Four-fifths of the people of the world toil on, year after
year, and all the time see the other fifth revelling in the luxuries the
sweat of their brows has produced. While the one-fifth enjoy the
luxuries thus produced, as though they had acquired them by divine
right, which none may call in question nor dispute, the great power of
the laboring many has never been felt. It has never been concentrated or
organized into concert of action. Even now this immense force is still
dispersed. It seems to have no centre around which it can gather. It has
no organization, and herein lies its weakness.
Organization should be effected for two principal ends: First, for
construction; second, for destruction. The old systems cumber the ground
whereon the new must be reared, and they must be pulled down to give it
room; nevertheless, the constructive part of the operation must first
begin; before the old will yield, the new must at least be formulated.
This is not impossible in the department of principles. This new rests
upon foundations deeper down than existing things, and these can,
therefore, be used previously to the destruction of the foundations of
the old. The new also reaches higher than the old; hence its frame-work
may be reared, while yet the old stand comparatively intact. The work of
construction once begun, that of destruction must necessarily
immediately follow, and when the former shall have been completed the
latter will have been but finished. This is the philosophy of
Integration and of Disintegration in all departments of the universe.
Labor and Capital is a question relating in the first instance to the
material prosperity of a people; but secondarily it reacts upon all
other interests—intellectual, moral, physical and religious. None of
these interests can flourish among a people who are burdened by material
wants; neither are they usually unitedly prosperous among that part of a
people who are greatly advanced in material possessions. Either extreme
in material interests appears to be deleterious to the best and most
harmonious general advancement of all the other interests. It is the
mean between the extremes—the calling up from those below, and the
leveling down of those above the mean—in which the harmony of all is
found.
Harmony of all the interests of humanity can alone be attained through
organization. A permanent basis of organization can only be discovered
by scientific investigation. The organization of society must be
realized through the science of sociology, which, of all sciences is the
least understood by the general mind. Yet there are among the great
minds of the planet a large number of those who thoroughly comprehend
this science, and it is to these that the world must look for a
reconstruction of its society upon such principles as shall render it
permanent; upon such, as it can constantly be improved upon, without
changing its methods of operation.
Into such a reconstruction the branch of sociology that relates to
production and use, or labor and capital, will enter largely, and must
be the portion of it to be first entered upon, because all things which
are built upon earth must have a material foundation until there shall
be such a harmony and unity of interests, and such co-operation among
mankind as would proceed from a universal brotherhood, in which each
would have his special part to perform to contribute to the common
result.
The agitation that is beginning to be felt all over the world where
intelligent labor exists, indicates that the time is at hand wherein the
first steps toward a constructive organization of society, upon
scientific principles, is to be begun. Not only is this agitation shown
to exist in this country, but it has lately been developed that labor
societies exist throughout Europe, having a common head and centre, and
that they deem themselves strong enough to express wishes entirely
antagonistic to the ruling powers.
Now what these organizations require to become—something more than mere
instruments for agitation, mere means by which the injustice between
labor and capital is exposed—is to become constructive in their action;
instead of expending all their means and strength in the work of pulling
down the old systems of things, they should begin the actual
construction of a new system. For this end they must bring science—the
science of sociology—to their aid, and make its professors active
leaders and trusted assistants in the grand work. Capital is putting
forth some strong efforts to confine science in its interests, but the
teachings of science are of too general and cosmopolitan a character to
permit its professors to ally themselves with a pseudo aristocracy—the
aristocracy of wealth.
Well may the political parties view with alarm the beginning of
organization among the classes they have until now relied upon to carry
themselves into power. If bereft of the capacity to influence the masses
who heretofore have not thought for themselves, they know their power
will depart. How has it been possible thus long for leaders to control
the masses, except that the masses have permitted others to act for
them, and that without rendering any account for such action? The time
for such representation has passed. The people have arrived at that
degree of understanding of their actual interests, that will not admit
of a blind acquiescence in all that even a “People’s Congress” may do.
They will begin to instruct their representatives instead of being led
by them.
’Tis true that by capital coming to the rescue of the country it is
intact to-day; but it asked its price and has been paid. So far the
obligation is removed, and justice to all is demanded. Legislation
entirely in the interests of capital will not be any longer tacitly
acknowledged as binding those whose interests are sacrificed. Whatever
obligations the country may be under to those who hold its securities,
it is under still greater to the producing interest, to which it must
look for the ability to retire them when called upon so to do by the
tenor of the contract they contain. It thus appears that all the
interests and all the prosperity of the country are dependent upon the
producing classes, and therefore to them government must listen, for
they will not be ignored much longer.
NEW YORK, Oct. 10, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. X.
Production lies at the basis of all progress. Material production
precedes all other kinds of acquirement. In the first degrees of social
evolution, labor was merely to obtain the means of bodily sustenance and
comfort; from this the present has widely departed; while the future
must still further widen the distance between production as an end and
production as the means to some end beyond. Production in early times
meant simple muscular toil; it still means this, but also a great deal
more; the proper direction of power makes it possible for a given amount
of force to accomplish a greatly increased result. In the next century
make proportionate rapid advancement in the better adaptation of means
to ends than last made over the preceding, the direct application of
muscular exertion to accomplish a material purpose will be almost
unknown. Steam and water have relieved muscle of nearly all its most
laborious occupations and increased the capacity of production a
thousand fold.
The reduction of these powers to the uses of man will be supplemented by
that of still more subtle and powerful agents to the same end, and this
reduction will be followed by a proportionate relief to manual labor.
The results of this advancement in the discovery of the means of
reducing the elements of nature to the service of man, is to be
revolutionary to the present grades and distinctions between the laborer
and the capitalist—unless a proper understanding and application of the
science of society first perform that inevitable result—which will
guarantee to all individuals the possibility of like attainment in all
things.
Science equalizes everything that comes within its sphere. Let the great
scientist be never so destitute of material wealth, he is still the
great man sought for and honored by those who have nothing but material
wealth to recommend them. Any person may incidentally become wealthy in
material possessions, but none but the devoted student of nature can
become rich in mind; and, none but the devoted philanthropist can become
rich in heart and soul. Even those who have immense earthly possessions,
show their consciousness of inferiority by courting the great in other
fields of acquirement. This alone should teach all people that true
greatness is not to be gained through riches, and that these should only
be considered advantageous as the means by which to acquire other
greater riches and blessings.
The true uses of wealth are to advance the peoples of earth from the
conditions in which they are to higher and better conditions, to those
where caste and distinctions shall not be measured by it, but by the
good that is accomplished by its use, in which he will be considered the
greatest man and the most honored, who shall make the best uses of
material wealth in benefiting humanity as a common brotherhood.
It has become too late in the ages for individuals to think of living
for themselves, or even for those immediately connected with them.
Mutuality of interest is spreading from family interests to world-wide
interests, and the greatest minds of the present are those which
perceive and act upon this fact. The leavening power of assimilation is
rapidly at work among the nations, races and peoples of the earth. The
electric telegraph makes it possible for all the different nations of
the earth to be possessed of the same thought at the same time. For the
last two months the minds of the whole world have been turned toward
France, where the real contest of the future has but just begun. It is
impossible for this concentration of mind upon one centre to be
productive of anything but a growing likeness among those who are the
subjects of it. All the discoveries in all departments of life tend to
the same unification of thought and interest. In this unification is
contained the prophecy of what the future shall be when no individual,
family, nation or race, shall feel that they can live entirely for
themselves.
The lesson the present movers in labor reforms have to learn is that of
harmonizing the interests of labor and capital by the demonstrations of
science. Springing from a common source and tending toward a common end,
humanity must learn to progress on its course according to rule, to law
and the requirements of order. These sustain the harmonies of the
universe, and should be never-failing authorities for humanity to
pattern after. Those who achieve the greatest conquests are they who can
bring themselves into harmony with the principles that govern the
movements of the innumerable worlds, no two of which are ever known to
disastrously cross each other’s path.
The world is capable of producing luxuriousness for all its children. It
is their fault that all do not have it. A very large proportion of the
capacity of humanity for production is diverted from natural occupations
by the illegitimate relations existing in society. A part live off of
the vitality of the rest; the principal object of the part being to see
how much of the fruits of the rest they can aggregate, either by
personal capacity, trickery or cunning, or by ingenious devices of law
formed and administered in their interests. A perfect equality and an
equal justice condemns all such distributions of the fruits of the
earth. If capacity for acquisition exist among a part of the people,
government should interfere to stop its being practiced at the expense
of others.
We are aware that this kind of social rule will be repudiated as an
infringement upon individual freedom of action. In this connection,
however, it must ever be remembered that the individual can never be
greater than the community of which he forms a part; in other words, the
interests of the community must always be superior to those of the
individual, and when individual interests conflict with the interest of
the community they must yield to the community. This principle is
recognized in very many things in government; for instance, the public
demands a common highway which must interfere with the rights and
interests of individuals; the individuals are compelled to give way for
the public, from whose adjudgment there is no appeal. To this rule of
action all the relations of society must sooner or later become subject,
and the sooner it is reduced to this scientific determining power, the
quicker society will have begun a progress whose course need never be
deviated from.
NEW YORK, October 17, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XI.
One of “our Fundamental Propositions” is the ultimate analysis of the
perfected results of harmonious relations between labor and its reward.
It is not laid down in any spirit of mere speculation, but as a mark
which the human family is capable of attaining, and one to which it
should aspire. Neither is it at all impossible with some of the present
representatives of the race; but it is a natural and legitimate
condition for society when it shall have become sufficiently “grown” to
be possible of organization.
Organization is the first step to be made toward reaching such
conditions as the proposition indicate. Simple individual exertion can
never be constructive of society. Neither can the exertions of a great
number of individuals become constructive unless their action is
combined or organized in one direction and for the same purpose.
Agitation must always precede organization, and hence it is that nearly
all primary movements are simply destructive or disintegrating to
existing conditions. A perfect system of society cannot be organized to
conta in those who are under any condition of servitude other than is
rendered by the collective number to the law or rule they shall
formulate, to control these relations. A perfect system of freedom is
one of the first essentials, and this must be regulated by an exact
justice, as between a community of brothers and sisters. No ignoring of
any part of the community, whether male or female, can exist The
organization must recognize each and every member of the community, and
they in turn must also recognize the organization which becomes the rule
of government.
No one will attempt to deny but that there is sufficient capital or
wealth in the world to enable every one to live in a palace; neither
would any deny that the conditions of humanity would be very much
improved could such a leveling down and such a leveling up, as this
equalization would require, be attained. This cannot result from any
arbitrary rule of force, but must be the result of the operation of the
proper principles of law in the relations of society. It must emanate
from a consciousness within society itself of the justice of such
principles therefore the mind of society must be imbued with these
principles; and to do this is the business of those who understand the
science of society. It has been denied that there is a science of
society. The recognition now that there is such a science, and the fact
that the evolution of society thus far has been formulated under it, is
a vast step toward a general recognition of it. When once it is
generally received as one of the demonstrated sciences, there will be
various attempts in all directions to organize upon its not yet
demonstrated principles.
Those who have followed these articles will begin to see that the
attainment of great wealth will not constitute one of the principal aims
of the society of the future. It will only be considered as a means to
other and higher ends. It has not been until quite recently that the
fact of continuous life has been any more than _theoretically_ received.
The practices of mankind have been just such, and only such, as would
obtain, were there no life after physical death, and they have lived as
though the whole of this life should be devoted to purely material ends,
to the gratification of physical desires, and to comforts and pleasures
arising from material possessions. Since the conviction has been
stealing into the minds of humanity that life is continuous, that death
is simply a change of the conditions of life, and that the best wealth
that can be accumulated in the material life is that kind that will make
the best capital to begin the next with, there is a marked change in the
community at large.
It is beginning to be realized that there is a great deal more to live
for in this life than mere bodily satisfaction and accumulation of
wealth—of money. Nor is complete luxury one of the most preferable of
circumstances. It is not conducive, under present conditions, to the
best and most rapid development of the true wealth of the soul, nor can
it ever be until correct views of the uses of wealth more generally
obtain than they do at present.
In a true condition of society there would be no such thing as wealth,
in its present signification. It would be reduced to the requirements of
men in obtaining better wealth for themselves, and for the diffusion of
it among their kind. In this consideration of the uses of life, there is
no more important feature of it than that of organization in all
departments. Such organization as will dispose of misery, poverty,
ignorance and crime. All these can be cast out of society; and it is to
be sincerely hoped for, that there will be formed a political party
having its basis in the necessity and the possibility of such a
disposal. Such conditions cannot exist in the midst of a community
without exerting their deleterious influences over the higher and better
conditions. People lose sight of this fact, and in all legislation it is
ignored. Government now has the power to take these conditions in hand,
and none are more interested in having it do so than the so-called labor
party. Why should not this party organize upon some such radical
principles of reform that will reach the roots of the ills they feel
society labors under?
The policy of a party that would be permanently successful must be one
that will include all of the great principles of reform. If such a party
is not shortly organized, there will be conditions developed which will
make such a party a necessity, even without organization. It would arise
as if by magic out of the conditions of the times, and leaders will rise
and come to the front as though Heaven-directed, and they will be
received by the people by acclamation. The force of elections will be
dispensed with, and party trickery forever killed.
The whole substrata of society is in foment. The terrific strifes that
have been waged, and are being waged, lift the weight from the strata,
and it begins to rise into demanding such recognition as has not been
accorded it. The “Moses” who shall divide the “waters of the Red Sea,”
that separates them from their “Canaan,” will be their God-appointed
leader, whom to oppose would be futile. Political parties have been in
the hands of such leaders, and have been used for such corrupt purposes,
that the people have lost all confidence in them, and they demand A NEW
ORDER OF THINGS, in which common honesty may properly find a place.
Labor and capital, lying, as they do, at the foundation of present
society, and as they will enter largely into all societies of the
future, so long as material wants are conducive to the true interests of
humanity, should receive such consideration at the hands of the present
as will so arrange their interests that there may be no violent
disruption between them, when present governmental forms shall change.
The sphere of government must be enlarged and made to include very many
questions which are now utterly ignored, before society can ever be
considered as resting upon a surely permanent foundation. To arrive at
this foundation is the first and most important step for humanity to
take. All minor ones are insignificant beside it, because the corner
stones of this foundation must consist of a perfect individual justice,
which will not be inconsistent nor at war with perfect collective
justice. This condition the present inequalities between labor and
capital forbid, and hence the importance of their harmonization.
NEW YORK, October 25, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XII.
Perhaps there is a no more suggestive or instructive fact in all the
realm of society than that the laboring classes are the liberal classes.
It is among them that nearly all social reforms begin, and among them
that all governmental reforms first find moving power. The wealthy
classes are systematically conservative; and by instinct they are
opposed to all movements which tend to equalization. They are to social
reform just what bigots are to religious liberalization. They adopt a
creed which their practice is never to depart from, and it is only by
the force of the large majority of the people combined against them that
they ever do depart from them. The time was when it was the grossest
infidelity to question any of the extravagant assertions contained in
the Bible; but nearly all Christian sects now assume the right to place
their own construction upon what is found therein. This construction is
found to grow more human and liberal every year. Twenty years ago, the
more “hell-fire and brimstone” a minister gave forth, the more Gospel it
was considered that he taught. The same rule obtains in regard to all
social questions, and the same rule of extending liberalization will
continue, until the balancing point of equalization is reached, in which
there shall be no power to determine for the individual, except himself
or herself, what is for his or her individual good, or what to him or
her is right.
Wealth, in its present position, is aristocratic; and Labor, in its
present position, is democratic. Aristocracy always assumes to control
that which is under it, in a material sense. It has always assumed this
control, and whenever possible has exercised it. This assumption has
been exercised so long that those over whom it has been swayed have come
to regard it as something approaching a “divine right.” This condition
of servitude was possible so long as ignorance possessed the masses over
whom it sought control. When education began its silent yet potent work,
the power of assumed “divine right” began to weaken. General education
is all that the world requires to emancipate it from the rule of all
kinds of aristocracy. Common schools for children, and the public press
for adults, have done and are doing the work of emancipation.
It was not until quite recently that the representatives of labor began
to know the benefits to be derived from organization. They do not yet
know the full benefits which it is possible for them to obtain from it;
much that they do obtain from it is, on the whole, deleterious rather
than beneficial. They require more general knowledge. They need the aid
of science to point out the paths in which they should seek to walk.
Science, to the organizations of labor, is what discipline is to the
army. Without it, the first is powerless, and the last dangerous to
those who command and support it.
It is very much to be regretted that so much of bitter denunciation of
the wealthy is heard among laborers. It shows that they, if possessed of
the power, would wield it more despotically than it is now wielded by
those possessing it. Force, as a regulator, can at best be but a mere
temporary makeshift, which, unless quickly followed by justice in
organization, degenerates into absolutism. This is the danger which it
is to be feared would follow the elevation of labor into the position
now occupied by wealth. Hence it is that it takes long years of
disappointment to chasten the hearts of those who seek change, before
the order of civilization will allow it to come in its fullest extent.
Could changes in society be arranged and managed as changes in other
departments are, no danger would ever supervene. New railroad bridges
are constructed before the old ones are removed, and throughout the
process of change the trains continue their regular movements. So it
will be with society, when science shall have so enlightened the people
that they shall know just what they are preparing to pass to.
The Labor Party now desires to be elevated into political place and
power; but have its advocates any well-defined ideas regarding the
results which are to follow such a change in the administration of
government? It is much to be feared that the same old story of “Make hay
while the sun shines,” would be the ruling element. We would not have it
understood from these suggestions that we are opposed to such a change
as the success of the Labor Party would imply. Any change cannot be for
the worse. Principle could not, in any event, be less the ruling power
than now; nor could money buy more politicians than it does now. One has
to spend but a “season” in Washington to convince himself that there is
a deal more truth than there is vulgarity in the saying, that “money
makes the mare go.” Representatives and Senators who prate with loudest
mouths of patriotism and devotion, spend all their own money and all
they can borrow to get to Congress, and retire to private life, having
made a fortune upon “five thousand a year.” The inference is too
palpably plain. It is not necessary for us to say that all such fortunes
are the results of bribery and corruption, and their possessors public
thieves, and utterly unworthy of the confidence of honest devotees to a
popular form of government.
It is this species of corruption that is becoming a stench in the
nostrils of all those whose patriotism is more than pocket deep. In its
growth they see the process of national disintegration begun, which they
well know cannot continue indefinitely without bringing destruction to
our country. The almost criminal indifference with which the masses of
the people regard these examples of the power of money over the
consciences of those to whom they have intrusted their most sacred
political rights, speaks badly for the safety of republican
institutions, as now operated. A saving power is needed. Where shall it
be sought? All true reformers are looking to the Labor party for it. Let
it unite to itself the principle of equal rights, regardless of sex, and
it will succeed. Then, if it fill its mission well, it will prove itself
to be what the present demands, to crush corruption which is so rapidly
permeating our whole body politic.
NEW YORK, November 1, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XIII.
The principles which should regulate these two great interests are, even
in this age of scientific attainment and philosophic speculation, very
imperfectly considered and still more imperfectly understood. There can
be no perfect practice of the true principles which should govern their
relations until the practices of the peoples are based on the
recognition of the fact of the common brotherhood of humanity. There are
a few people now living who fully appreciate the relationship which
exists between the peoples of the world, and who would regulate their
conduct toward their brothers by the “Golden Rule.” All the governments
of the world are in direct opposition to this rule; hence it becomes an
utter impossibility for isolated individuals to practice upon it to any
great extent.
It is an acknowledged fact that the world is gradually being evolved by
the means of government; and that government was at first organized to
control individuals who would otherwise have operated from their own
standpoint for selfish purposes. This kind of control will continue to
be exercised until government will be able to control all individuals to
act for the general public good, and this again will eventuate in all
people acting for the public good of their own accord, when government
in its present sense and for its present purposes will be done away
with.
The relations of labor and capital are most intimately connected with
the frame-work of all governments, because they could not exist without
their active support. The difficulty with all present systems of
government is that they are built upon the supposition that capital is
the primarily controlling power; while the fact is that behind capital
labor stands first and strongest. As intelligence becomes more and more
generally diffused the domination of capital over labor becomes weaker
and weaker, and the dignity of labor more and more apparent, and, as a
necessary result of the growth of this sentiment, labor is accorded more
and wider privileges.
It is a singular fact, and one to be regarded with a feeling bordering
on astonishment, that it is possible for all legislation to be either
conducted in the interests of capital or controlled by it, when the
capitalists of the country are to the laborers as one is to ten. The
same principle makes it possible for one man to control a dozen horses
possessed of a hundred times his own strength. It is the power of
knowledge over ignorance. The horses on the one hand are ignorant of
their real power and yield it obediently to the command of assumed
authority. So, too, is it with the mass of laborers; they do not know
their real power and they yield obedience to the power of assumption
aided by a superior intellect.
It is for this reason that the general diffusion of knowledge among the
common people should receive so much more attention than it has or does.
Every child, whether born of wealth or poverty, should inherit the right
from government of a complete education in all the important branches of
education. Not only should they inherit this right but the government
should see to it that the right is obtained, compulsorily if need be.
The acquisition of knowledge has ever tended to the liberalization of
existing orders of things, and it was not until something akin to its
general diffusion was obtained that any adequate ideas of the advantages
of freedom became fixed in the minds of the people. It was a
grand—almost a fatally grand—mistake which the people made when they
considered that they had obtained complete freedom when they emancipated
themselves from the so-called “tyranny” of England.
First, then, and that which is the basis of all other tyranny, is the
fact that man, individually considered, is, in the strictest sense of
the term, a slave to the conditions of his existence. Whatever else he
may be free to perform he can never be emancipated from the necessity of
yielding obedience to the demands of this existence. In his ignorant,
undeveloped condition, intellectually, he has been led to yield himself
in obedience to others whom it seemed to him were able by their
superiority, mentally, to better administer to these prime necessities
than he could do it for himself. This was the argument for the
continuation of slavery in the South. They said the negroes were better
off than they would be if cast upon their own resources for the supply
of the necessities of life. Many persons felt the strength of this
argument and yielded to its pleading. It is the same principle—that of
inferior intelligence yielding to superior intelligence—which makes the
possibility of all forms of slavery. It is this principle which has made
it thus long possible for government to be conducted entirely in the
interests of capital.
But it is just at this point, where the beginning of comprehension on
the part of the representatives of labor is, that the fallaciousness of
this arbitrary form of control begins to be felt by the masses who have
hitherto yielded to it. They begin to see that they obtained freedom
from one “tyranny” only to yield themselves to another, less odious than
it was from the fact that one was represented by one person, while the
other is represented by numerous persons. In some regards the last
condition is worse than the first; for in it there is nothing to guard
the constant encroachments of the tyrant upon their “reserved” rights.
They are constantly subjected to legislation which filches from them the
last possible farthing, that it may go to swell the coffers of some
wealthy individual or some obese corporation.
At present the indications are anything but favorable for the interests
of the producing classes. It seems as though the representatives of
corporate interests, in which large amounts of money are invested, are
organizing to make a crusade against the present possessed rights of the
producing classes, to the end that, by all corporate organizations
combining and making their interests mutual, they may come into the
position that shall give them supreme and lasting control over the
destinies of the country. They behold with jealousy the attempts at
organization among laborers, knowing that, if it is carried to its full
results, it will compel equality of interest and obtain the means
necessary to enforce it.
It is the age of rapid change. What it would once have required an age
to accomplish, is now performed in a single night. It would not _be very
strange_ should the interests of labor control the next Presidential
election. One thing is patent to all, some great issue must come up
which will be of sufficient magnitude and general importance to arouse
the people from the slough of indifference into which they have fallen
since the settlement of the slavery issue. It is also equally patent
that this issue must be some new combat between some form of slavery and
a growing freedom; perhaps a consolidation of the several questions of
progress into one interest to crush out, at once and forever, the reign
of conservatism of all kinds, and the substitution therefor of an
enlightened freedom, to be governed, guided and supported by the lights
of science which shall point the way to all things which ought to be
obtained.
What the world needs to-day is, that science, supported by wealth, shall
come into power. Could this be arrived at, the dangers and difficulties
now hovering around the issues between the still captive and the
interests of enslaved labor, would be dispelled, and society, without
further convulsive efforts, could assume its uninterrupted march toward
perfect conditions of existence. It is to be feared that wealth will not
yield to science, and that it will endeavor to bring it under its sway
to further enslave the “toiling millions” and make them minister longer
to its despotism. Let this be as it may, the existence of government
upon its present basis of liberty and equality depends upon its checking
a power that is being organized to control it. The New York _Herald_,
not many days ago, pointed out this danger, but did not warn the people
that it was a danger, leaving each to gather his or her own deduction
from the mere presentation of the facts. Subsequently, however, it said,
editorially, as follows:
“Now it is possible the American people may not be alarmed at the
probable effects a combination of the capital and influence of these
vast railroad corporations may have upon the future of the
country—upon the permanency of its institutions and the perpetuity of
its political liberties; but, in view of possible contingencies, we
think we are justified in cautioning the people against the possible
creation of a railroad oligarchy here that may prove as dangerous to
the nation in times to come as was the Southern cotton oligarchy in
times past.
“This subject is one of considerable interest to the American people,
and the elections of members to the next Congress should be graduated
accordingly.”
It is the duty, then, of the New Labor Party to become the best
representative of general reform and a wider freedom for all
individuals, male and female, which freedom should have no limit except
that which borders upon interference with the freedom and rights of
others, or that would be detrimental to the common interests of the
public if practiced. In the widest freedom there is the most virtue,
because, under restraint, compulsion often passes for virtue, while its
semblance only is there. Freedom stamps all that is genuine, and exposes
and denounces all that is counterfeit and affected. Enforced virtue in
any direction, except for the protection of the community, is not one of
the principles of a free government; but everything that the government
can do that will further the interests of the community, come
legitimately within its sphere. And it is to this end and purpose that
the Labor party should press its claims to recognition upon the
representatives of labor.
The workingman makes the government, and therefore has it in his hands
to unmake it. If the government is not what it should be, it is because
the workingmen have permitted it to exist and not perform its duty. It
seems, then, that the _main point at issue_ is, to acquaint the
representatives of labor everywhere with their power; to make them
recognize the fact that they, being the majority, have it in their power
to elect the men who will legislate in their interests, and, by so
doing, do away with this insane denunciation of wealth by the mouths of
those would-be leaders, who, to become leaders, would stir up any kind
of strife, required to gain their wishes. Of all such, the Labor Party
should beware.
NEW YORK, Nov. 10, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XIV
We have repeatedly appealed to the productive classes to arouse from the
slough of trustfulness and indifference in which they have remained so
long, and to bestir themselves about their business of governing
themselves. Thus far they have utterly failed in all duties of
self-government. They have nominally lived in a country which proffers
equality to all, but under which proffering they have virtually
surrendered themselves to be governed by the considered mighty few, who,
for their own purposes, exalt themselves into the position of The
People’s candidates until office is obtained, when they begin at once to
invent schemes for continuing themselves in power; or, if they know it
is impossible to be again returned, they devote themselves to making the
most of what time they have.
The present doings of the people’s representatives, both State and
national, are practically limited to getting the most they can for
themselves and their friends, while the study of the interests of their
constituents and the country is either entirely ignored or shirked to
the greatest possible extent. Each year this condition becomes more and
more the controlling element of Congress and Legislature, and unless
soon remedied, it will lead the country on blindly to its destruction.
This course being directly in the interest of special and favored
interests, has the favor and support of capital, while labor looks on
with the utmost indifference, and sees its productions filched year
after year.
Capital, of the two, is the more foolishly blind to its future; for it
does not seem to comprehend that with the continuation of this course
must come the day of reckoning, in which the debit side of all accounts
will be heavily against it—so heavily that it will never be able to
satisfy the demand which humanity will have for it to settle.
This consummation may be averted, but only in one way. The laboring
classes must exercise their right of self-government themselves, after
the dictates of reason and common sense, and no longer blindly intrust
their interests and the common interests of the country to the
self-selected few who prate with so much volubility, and who mouth the
“King’s English” so furiously about their undying patriotism and
self-denying devotion. It may be set down at once and for all time that
the patriotism and devotion professed by this class of orators and
statesmen will be certain to continue until after their election is
sure, after which it will do to watch them carefully lest they may have
entirely expended it in their efforts for election.
While we have urged the laboring classes to arouse, we have at the same
time shown the necessity of complete and thorough organization, and we
now further urge the absolute withdrawal of affiliation with any party,
and the devotion of their entire strength to the construction of their
own party, upon the principles of freedom, equality and justice for all,
let them lead where they may. All that is required by them is granted in
the present Constitution, though, perhaps, in some points, were so,
blindly, for the time, but which are now made plain and clear by late
events in some of our States.
It is time that active movements should begin to be made toward
organization for the next Presidential election. Both political parties
are manœuvring in every possible direction to gain advantages. If the
Labor Party will act wisely it can take up one of these parties and
incorporate its remnants before the election comes off. But if the class
who should form this party will remain stupidly blind, and continue to
maintain these virtually defunct parties by their strength, instead of
constructing a new party of their own, nothing which will positively
shape the future course of events can be accomplished. The old will
simply be bolstered up for another term, and four years more of
submission to the behests and dictates of capital must be endured.
There will be a desperate attempt made during the coming session of
Congress by capital to obtain further, and greater and stronger hold
upon the vitals of the country. Efforts to effect the perpetuation of
the franchises it already has, it counts upon making, with certainty of
success; but the very extent of its efforts which it will make under the
knowledge that what is to be obtained must be so at once, will press it
to such extremes that it will most probably defeat its own purpose. This
event will be rendered certain if the Labor Party will take a positive
stand upon its own ground, which will make effective the springing of
some “mines” that are prepared, which will put their representatives in
such a light before the country as will most effectually dispose of all
selfish schemes which are now afloat. Let it be seen that no shirking of
duty is permitted on the part of pretended labor representatives, and
also let it be seen that all who lend themselves to the schemes of
capital are properly shown up to the country.
Our interests are great and our country is dear to us, for it has cost
us immense treasure and blood. Is it not worthy of being defended from
all schemes, when so much has been required to construct and preserve
it? To the care of laboring classes its preservation is now committed.
Will they prove themselves worthy of the high trust? Or will they sell
their birthright for less than a “mess of pottage?” Is it necessary that
some great calamity come before an awakening to the reality of the
condition will occur? Let it rather be, that wisdom be gleaned from the
sore trials and the desperate situation of our brethren in France, which
shall teach the use to be made of possessed rights and privileges.
NEW YORK, November 18, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XV.
The New York _Sunday Despatch_, of the 20th inst., contains a lengthy,
interesting and highly instructive article, based upon recent interviews
with Thomas Hughes and J. P. Mundella, members of the British House of
Commons, who are also workingmen and employers. They are strongly of the
opinion that “strikes” were never productive of anything but damage to
both parties, and that arbitration is the only reasonable resort for the
settlement of all mooted questions between laborers and their employers.
As examples of the misery engendered by “strikes,” several instances are
quoted, among which is found that of the potters and moulders in the
vicinity of London, which proceeded to the very last extremity on the
part of the strikers. Arbitration at last was resorted to, and resulted
in no gain of conditions to the strikers.
These facts go to show that the immediate purposes of labor
organizations are detrimental to their true interests. They must
acknowledge that they cannot compel capital to their terms, and that in
moderate counsels and wise action they will be much more likely to find
their interests advancing.
The ultimate purposes of the Labor party which are to obtain control of
legislation, may be productive of much good, or may be made the most
fruitful cause of national disaster. We have all the time endeavored to
show that the real interests of both capital and labor lie in the
direction of complete unity; and that although labor is now suffering at
the instance of capital, that it should not be laid to the charge of
capital that it is in position to thus infringe upon the rights of
labor, but to the charge, secondarily, of legislation, which is
performed by the very men whom the laboring classes do their utmost to
elect to office: and, primarily, to the imperfections in our present
financial and social systems, which must be remedied before any very
great benefit can accrue to the oppressed conditions of society.
To accomplish what is required in order that labor may rise to an
equality with capital, the laboring classes must become enlightened upon
the principles of political and social economy. Revolution, which is
threatened from some quarters, would only lead away from justice and in
the direction of anarchy. We are sorry to be obliged to say that we can
find but little in the present propositions of the Labor Party which
promises very much of good. For the most part, its leaders are bigoted
and cliquish to the extreme, possessing but little of the philosophic
comprehension of the conditions through which labor must be elevated.
Declaration of principles in series of resolutions which form a
necessary part of all political gatherings amounts to nothing unless the
party presenting them “squares” itself by them. This is the fatal error
of all parties and all governments. They set out by making certain
fundamental declarations, which they afterward endeavor to compel into
meeting the exigencies of the times.
There is a great work the Labor Party can do. There are imperfections in
our government, and these it should take up and remedy. It is a
well-established fact, as every one knows, that a government that is not
a representative of the minorities as well as of the majorities is not a
government of freedom, equality and justice. If imperfections exist even
in the much revered Constitution, it should not be held so sacred that
none of its faults can be remedied. If there are inconsistencies in it,
or if it contain provisions which the present has outgrown, let it be
thoroughly amended, and as often as it can be, and made better. We do
not believe in anything being held so sacred as not to be submitted to a
complete analysis, so that it may be determined just what there is good,
and what there is which can be bettered. We are inclined to the opinion
that the whole Constitution should be revised, clarified and simplified,
and made so plain that there would be no possibility of different
constructions being put upon any part of it.
Our government should soon be so formulated, and the people so well
informed upon the true principles of government, that all existing
administrations should exist by the unanimous consent of all the people.
The strife should not be for party, representing different principles,
but for the best representative men to administer the Constitutional
principles which all would be agreed upon.
There will a party arise having these objects in view, and it need not
be predicted that such a party, once organized, will begin a new era in
the history of governments, for sufficient comprehension of what the
future will be exists to make this a foregone conclusion. The Labor
Party should make itself that party. Has it the requisites?
NEW YORK, November 25, 1870.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XVI.
In the full and legitimate consideration of this subject the range
should extend beyond the things immediately attaching to the capitalist
and the laborer as persons, and merge into the question of Philosophic
Equality, out of which consideration arises the true relations of the
extremes of it represented by these two classes. Under a true republican
form of government the inherent right to equality on the part of all its
citizens should not only be recognized but guaranteed. Equality, except
as a mythical name, does not exist in practice in this country; nor for
that matter in any country, except where each individual is his own
governor, to the extent of his power to maintain such authority; and
each individual being possessed of this right to maintain it, comprises
that equality. Philosophic Equality presupposes the right of each
individual to exercise all the powers possessed by him, in which
exercise the rights of no other individual would be interfered with, but
which exercise should not be aided or protected by any device of law.
The moment a law is made to assist an individual, or any number of
individuals, in the performance of his or their undertaking, that moment
equality on the part of all other citizens ceases. Not only is this true
specifically, but it is a great deal more; it is true generally that if
an individual or a class of individuals receive aid, comfort and
protection from the law, in their pursuits, all other individuals of all
pursuits are rendered unequal in their competition with them in all of
their respective pursuits.
That is to say, if a person is protected in the manufacture of salt by
the law, which imposes a heavy tax on all foreign salt imported into the
country, the manufacturer or producer of grain is at once placed by the
law in a condition of inequality with him, and in a double sense if he
be a consumer of salt; for not only is the price of the home
manufactured salt increased by the imposition of the tax, while the
price of the home grown grain is not proportionately increased, but the
producer of the grain is obliged to pay the increased price for the salt
which he consumes. The same rule is applicable to all things wherein
individuals are obliged to seek protection from foreign importations, to
be able to produce the same at home.
The argument in favor of this course is, that while protection, extended
to certain interests, increases the prices of their productions to the
consumers of them, the consumers by it are also enabled to obtain higher
prices for what they have to place upon the market. This is all very
well so far as it has any application, but what is the effect upon the
very large proportion of the working people of the country who are not
producers of anything in their own right, but are simply laborers for
such producers? If there is only an equality maintained to the employers
of such labor, how can the benefit extend to the employed?
In making this complex argument, it is forgotten that real wealth and
real prosperity do not consist in high prices for everything, but in the
quantity which is actually possessed. Prices under protection must ever
fluctuate, and a person rich this year may be rendered poor next year,
by the depreciation of his property. Witness the fall of real estate in
this city for an exemplification of what we mean. High prices are not
the ultimatum to be gained by any people of any country; but, on the
contrary, the true point to attain is the employment of the industry of
a country in those directions, wherein _the most can be produced at the
least cost_, in the accumulation of the proceeds of which the country,
as a whole, must become wealthy more rapidly than in the pursuit of the
other extreme, which is the production of the least at the greatest
cost; or in any modification of this proposition.
The result of continuous protection to any interest of the country may
be exemplified by the application of it to something which comes
directly home to us. Suppose that there are some gardeners on the upper
part of Manhattan Island who appeal to the city authorities for
protection against the gardeners of Long Island, New Jersey, &c.,
because their soil being not so fruitful as that of Long Island and New
Jersey, they cannot afford to sell their vegetables as low as those can
be sold which are produced outside. Thereupon a tax of twenty-five per
cent. is levied by the city upon all foreign vegetables sold in the
market. The result is, that all purchasers of vegetables in the city are
forced to pay the additional cost merely to enable a few insignificant
persons to pursue a calling which they would otherwise abandon for some
other which they could pursue without protection. This, though a common
illustration, exemplifies the operation of special protection in all its
phases. It enables the few to pursue callings at the expense of the many
without returning to that many any adequate benefit.
The trouble with our manufacturers is, that they want to get rich too
fast. They are not willing to begin a new business in a way
proportionate to their small means, and from this grow gradually into
large producers as the manufacturers of other countries have done. They
want to be able to employ labor and pay much larger prices than are paid
to those laborers who toil in unprotected industries. Nor is the laborer
any better off in the general result. The laboring classes of the
country are not so well off under the present system of high prices as
they were before the war, which indicates that the advance in wages has
been more than counterbalanced by the increase in the prices of the
laborers’ necessities. As a general proposition, it is true that low
prices are more favorable to the laborer than high prices; and that,
under a system of protection to special favored interests, those
interests become rich at the expense of the laborer; or, in more general
terms, the rich become richer and the poor poorer with each succeeding
year.
Such is the general argument against protective duties; but it does not
by any means follow that all protection should be immediately abandoned
and Free Trade become at once and fully inaugurated. This would be as
grossly unjust to all these interests which have been encouraged into
existence by the present system, as that of protection was to the common
industries. What should be done is this: Unrestricted commerce, which
would allow of the natural demands of a country being supplied, without
restrictions of any kind, should be laid down as the true principle, and
a gradual approach from present protective measures to freedom be
inaugurated. No immediate jump—nor even rapid advance that would produce
misfortune to any branch of industry, should it be attempted—but an
approach, running through a sufficient number of years to allow of the
adjustment of industries, should be the course. Under such a system all
the various industries of the country would gradually equalize, and the
laborers and employers in each would approach an equal footing. The
farmers of the rich Western prairies would no longer be able to complain
of the discrimination of government in favor of the cotton, woolen and
iron manufacturers of the sterile East. Whether this policy is
immediately adopted by government or not, it certainly will be, when the
rapidly increasing West shall become the dominant power in it. Better
that steps looking to it should be at once adopted than that it come
after awhile upon an unprepared country, which course has been so often
erroneously pursued to the destruction, demoralization and
discouragement of those classes of industries which require
consideration in their youth from the strong arm of the government; to
accord which is not only for the interests of the country, but which is
also its duty to its acknowledged citizens; the error heretofore having
been that the consideration thus extended has been at the expense of a
_part of the citizens_ of the country and not at the expense of the
country as a whole.
Equality to all the citizens of the country can only be possible where
there is no special discrimination on the part of government toward any,
whether that discrimination is in the form of specific protective
duties, unequal levies of taxes, or through devices of law; or, in other
words, equality is an impossibility so long as special legislation is
allowed either in our State or National councils.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
NO. XVII.
The great object of a republican form of government is to arrive at that
condition wherein all the people constituting its citizens will stand
upon a perfect equality in all things, which can be effected by
government. A government cannot determine that each citizen shall have
equal capacity to apply and make use of the rights, privileges and
immunities which it guarantees to its people, but it can determine that
each citizen shall have an equality of right to these benefits, the
perfect attainment of which must rest with the citizen.
The question of Labor and Capital, as was said before, is included in
the greater and more important question of a Common Equality, or an
equality which is predicated upon the fact that all mankind are
brethren. A republican form of government should find its fountain in
this fact, and all its causes should be governed by its deductions. All
the means of providing for the administration of the government, for its
maintenance and for the correction of any existing abuses, should be
formulated with this one greatest of all human possibilities ever in
view. Thus formulated, its practices would ever tend to bring all the
people into a comprehension of it, which comprehension is now scarcely
existent except in meaningless words, which are dealt from pharisaical
pulpits. In our last number the practice of protection to favored
interests was considered, with reference to its general effect upon
other unfavored industries; the unequal working of the system of levying
duties does not stop with generalities; it extends and touches a still
more vital point, and one which the people are more sensitive upon than
almost any other. The laying of specific duties upon imported goods and
wares is an indirect way of _taxing_ that portion of the people who
consume such imported goods and wares. It not only makes it possible for
the protected interest to exist at the expense of other interests which
consume, but by this operation the government obtains revenue which is
an indirect tax gathered from those who are compelled to pay the
advanced prices which the levying of duties implies. The amount obtained
by such unequal and indirect methods of revenue for the last fiscal year
was the enormous sum of $194,448,427, every dollar of which was in
reality but an additional tax drawn from the individuals who purchased
such imported merchandise. This manner of levying taxes would not matter
so much as a system of taxation did it fall equally upon the taxable
property of the country, upon which general taxes are levied, but nearly
$100,000,000 of the above sum was collected upon woolens, cottons,
sugar, molasses, coffee and tea, of all of which the poorest in common
with the richest are almost equal consumers.
Laborers of the United States! How like you this manner of filching your
hard-earned dollars, under the specious, fraudulent name of “protection
to home industries.” It is no wonder that your hard-earned wages will
scarcely supply your families’ necessities, when you are compelled to
pay such a sum upon the most common staple articles of general
consumption. It is no wonder you are continuously laborers, never being
able to become producers upon your own account, when you, who should
not, and, under general principles of taxation would not be called upon
to pay a single dollar as a direct tax, are thus burdened.
Thus it will be seen that the levying of specific duties on imported
goods is a most unequal and iniquitous manner of taxing the poor
laboring classes of the country to support the government, which is
administered to all intents and purposes in the interests of the rich,
and under which the really poor become poorer every year.
Nor are the other means to which the government resorts to support
itself entitled to very much more consideration than that of the
indirect one just mentioned. There is no equality to the general people
in any of them; and it is quite evident that the whole system of revenue
for the support of the government should be remodeled, so as to fall
where it should, in justice, upon the taxable property of the whole
Union. This done, and a sound financial system also inaugurated, the
lower classes of society would begin to be leveled up to the medium, and
the upper classes to be leveled down to the same basis of material
prosperity.
A system of taxation for the support of all government—town, city,
county, state and national—should be formulated and inaugurated, based
upon the proposition that all taxes should be general and none special.
All of these taxes, for the several purposes, should be assessed, levied
and collected by one set of revenue officers, and thereby an immense
system of economy introduced, whereby the collection of the revenues of
the country should not consume, by one-twentieth part, what is now
consumed in the almost innumerable methods which are adopted to obtain
the people’s money by indirect means. All of these subjects are for the
laboring classes to take up, examine, decide upon and rectify, and never
will they obtain the possibility of an equality until this is done.
Never can equality be possible under the forms through which government
is now administered and supported, and never will the laboring classes
become independent of the wealthy classes until the freedom, equality
and justice, which are the birthright of every citizen of the United
States, become possible of attainment under its government.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. I.
In the following papers it will be our design to treat the questions of
Finance and Commerce in a somewhat different manner from the ordinary
and current way. The mere records of the transactions had in the world
of money and of merchandise belong to the ordinary method of dealing
with all matters that interest the people. The facts—the results—only
enter into the consideration, and if serious conflict or serious faults
are recorded, no attention is paid to the sources from which they
spring, and from which they will continue to spring so long as the
sources furnish the causes. All subjects, and all parts of the common
interests of humanity, will receive from us not only the attention which
the present demands, but if the present brings unhappiness to humanity,
or does not bring happiness, the fountains will be examined to discover
where the stream takes on its bitterness and its sediment—and, for
instance, produces financial disease—with the view of exposing to the
people what causes their unhappiness or lack of happiness.
As society is constituted at present, nothing within its interests has
so much power for good or ill as money. He that has it is independent—is
a free man; while he that has it not is dependent—a slave in some one or
other of the forms of slavery. Men recognize that this is an imperfect
condition of society, made up, as it is of people born free and equal in
the eyes of the law, and by it entitled to their chosen path of
happiness. These being the birthright of every one, the construction of
society should be such as to guarantee it to every one. As society
improves its condition, the advance made will be ever toward practical
equality in all temporal things. It is the duty of those who labor in
the interests of society to lay hold of the future, and bring its
conditions into the broadest present application.
Money being the corner-stone upon which society is now built, is thereby
that stone of all others which should be perfect, not only in form, but
perfect in duration: that is, it should be of such composite elements
that time nor change should be able to produce any effect, either upon
its external appearance or upon the arrangement of its parts. It becomes
apparent, then, at first observation from this standpoint, that our
present corner-stone is not one that can endure; it becomes plain that
it not only will change, but that it should change, because of its
capability to meet the requirement of a perfect corner-stone, upon which
society can rest with perfect and continuous security.
Gold has long been the accepted money standard of value. Intrinsically,
it has no value other than for the other uses to which it is adapted,
but custom and long usage have raised it into the position of a god,
before whom the world falls down and worships with as much devotion as
Pagans do before their various gods. And, considered as a god, none
other has in this day and age one-half the power, nor is any other
worshiped with one-half the devotion it is. This may be considered an
unjust reflection upon the so-called Christians; but let them, as a
class, examine themselves individually, and if the analysis does not
sustain the proposition, we shall be very willing to confess our error,
and appeal for forgiveness. Gold _has_ been the accepted money standard,
but the practice, since the depreciation of our country’s credit, has,
to all intents and purposes, reduced it to a mere commodity. Our money
is not measured by Gold—Gold is measured by it. It may be said that this
is merely for temporary convenience, but nevertheless it is so measured,
and the practice has demonstrated that so far as facilitating exchange
of products in our own country is concerned, its use might be dispensed
with. If it can be dispensed with and trade continue, its importance as
money entirely disappears. Would dispensing with its use offer any
impediments to commerce with other countries? But this article is simply
introductory, intended rather to indicate what our treatment of finance
will be, than for the discussion of any of the questions that arise
under it. These will remain for future consideration; here we will
simply state that we do not believe gold to be a true standard of value;
that we do not believe its use as money is at all necessary; that we do
not believe that its use as money contributes to general prosperity; and
that we do believe that its use will be supplanted by a new medium—the
true representative of that portion of the real wealth of the country
which is at the given time in the process of exchange.
NEW YORK, August 25, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. II.
Finance and commerce are so intimately connected that one cannot be
treated without the other being, at least, indirectly alluded to. If
these terms are analyzed, their relations will be perfectly understood.
Commerce is the simple exchange of something one individual possesses
for something another individual is possessed of. This exchange may be
between neighbors, or between nations; it is all commerce. In ancient
times, articles of merchandise were exchanged for articles of
merchandise, but as commerce increased in amount, and its limits became
extended, it became necessary to make use of something that should
represent value, so that there need not, in all cases, be an actual
transfer of property for property. The medium used to facilitate these
exchanges was money in its first phases, and out of this necessity have
grown all the different monetary devices made use of, at various times,
in the history of civilization.
To demonstrate that money is only a convenience and not an absolute
necessity, any one has only to observe that frequent purchases, sales
and payments are made without the use of money or any other
representative of value, but by the direct transfer of value for value.
It is plain, then, that money, be it gold, silver or what else it may,
if not intrinsically of the value set upon it, but that it represents
something that has intrinsic value. If this is questioned, let any one
who doubts it procure some gold in its original state and endeavor to
make exchanges with it. He will find that no one will receive it, even
at its value by weight. Were he to apply to a dozen places where gold,
in mass, is dealt in, he would be offered a dozen different prices for
his article. It is only after gold has passed through the hands of the
government, and has received its impress as an indorsement, that it
becomes current as money.
It is further to be observed that the time came when even coin became
too burdensome to be directly transferred in making exchanges, and
something representing it was brought into use. This consisted of bits
of paper, containing upon them promises to pay so much in coin, &c.,
&c.; and under this practice banks of issue sprung into existence, their
issues being supposed to represent a gold or coin basis of value. But a
full representation alone of coin deposited was found not to supply a
sufficient circulating medium to accommodate the movement of produce,
and for other uses, and it became customary for the banks to expand
their issues beyond the amount of coin on hand, upon the supposition
that these promises to pay would never be presented in sufficient
quantities to consume their actual specie. But suppositions are only
true _generally_, and hence it came that promises to pay often exhausted
the ability to pay, and here began the ills that must necessarily attend
a false standard of values.
In all seasons of financial distress, gold, as a standard, has failed.
The necessities of our late war demonstrated and represented the fallacy
of an absolute standard in gold, and happily suggested a better
standard. No sooner did the supply of gold at the command of the
government fail, than the latter was compelled to resort to its credit,
or to a direct representation of the true value and wealth of the
country. The credit of the government was the ability and intention of
the country to meet the promises of its government, and this ability
determined its currency. It was not the amount of gold, absolutely, that
the country was supposed capable of acquiring that thus entered into
consideration, but the ability of the country to produce certain
quantities of merchandise, which should, in time, be sufficient, above
consumption, to balance these promises to pay. It was the productive
capacity of this country that gave value to its currency and bonds
irrespective of gold. The productive capacity of a country is then the
virtual standard of the value of its currency, and as gold can only be
obtained by the products of the country, its necessity as a medium may
be dispensed with. It is now predicted that the sooner gold, as the
money god, is dethroned in the hearts and customs of the people, the
sooner a sound and perfect system of finance will be inaugurated.
That there is a true standard of value, and one that can never fail in
time of need, nor be made use of for speculative purposes as gold is,
must be apparent to every thinking mind. How many of the people of this
country, during the last eight years, have received gold or silver for
what they have disposed of, or have used it to purchase their
necessities? And yet the talk of a return to specie payment is
everywhere heard. When will the idol worship of the god of gold be
completely abolished?
NEW YORK, August 31, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. III.
We have said that there is a true standard of value, and that this is
based in the capacity of a country to pay without infringing upon the
country itself; that is, without resorting to an actual transfer of
supposed title to any part of its domain for something the domain itself
produced. Actual ownership in the soil of a country is an assumption, as
has been stated in the “Papers on Labor and Capital.” If the title to
any real estate is traced back far enough, it would be found to have
originated in the practice of “Squatter Sovereignty.” The inhabitants of
a country having the right to make use of the land they occupy, render
it more or less valuable, according to the amount they can make it
produce, whether it be in the shape of its natural products or those of
artificial assistance, or whether it is simply occupied for purposes
other than production.
The basis, however, of the value is in the productions of the soil of a
country; it matters not how much value may be added by the art of man to
what nature furnishes. This would find no scope for action did the earth
not first yield the fruits of her bosom to the hand of the artist. The
finest cloth, the most delicate silks and laces, the most costly jewels,
even the light that robs night of its darkness, are all primarily the
products of the earth. Without this yielding of the earth there would be
nothing. This giving up of the earth to the demands, efforts and desires
of man, is the process by which he acquires all his wealth. Even the
gold that has so long been called money the earth has yielded, and still
yields. When this is considered in its true light, we come to a
realization that gold is no more money, absolutely, than any other of
the different products of the earth, but with them all it forms the real
value standard. Gold is relatively valuable for the general uses it can
be made to subserve; so, too, and only so, are all other products. Any
other metal might just as well have been selected out of which to coin
money as gold. It no longer answers the purpose it has been used for so
long. It is not “radical” enough to suit “the times.” It is one of the
landmarks of conservatism, reminding us that once it required at least
six months to communicate with, and receive an answer from, London,
whereas we now know the 5 o’clock P. M. closing prices of stocks in
London at 1 o’clock of the same day.
Such annihilation of time and space is entirely ahead of, and above, the
era of gold, which must yield its sway to something more elastic, and
consequently possible of better adaptation to the constantly varying
requirements of the peoples. The world having been so long held in
financial bondage to gold, is now approaching a period wherein it will
rid itself of the yoke. A very few people in the world rule it. What of
the thrones of Europe without the Rothschilds? and what of them if not
for gold? The vast debts of those countries alone render crowns longer
endurable. Just a little more intelligence among the common people—just
a few more newspapers and readers, and the work is done; those who play
king, and they who are the real kings, will fall together. Kings rule
the people, but money rules kings. This is beginning to be realized, and
the realization is not satisfactory to those who produce wealth; they do
not care to live under the tyranny of a god they themselves have
fashioned. But after gold, what?
NEW YORK, Sept 7, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. IV.
If gold, as a medium of exchange, is behind the requirements of the
times—and that it is has been pretty fully demonstrated—some reform
should be instituted to supply the failure; some reform—not merely to
meet the exigencies of present time and circumstances—which should be
inaugurated as a permanent change.
Our government, during the last war, was obliged to resort to what was
considered then by nearly all people, and is still considered by many
people, as very extreme measures, in order to furnish the material by
which the war might be carried on. Without the greenbacks we never could
have succeeded as we did. To the person who conceived this project we
are as greatly indebted as to our generals, who successfully prosecuted
the war upon the means furnished through his financial foresight. This
was one means of resorting to the credit of the country. If the credit
of the country was sufficiently good to furnish it with the means to
carry on such an exhaustive war as ours was, it surely should be good
for any peaceful time.
For our part, we cannot see the propriety of returning to specie
payment; and there is one insuperable objection to it. Gold cannot
furnish the circulating medium for the world, and credit must be
resorted to; and the necessity of having two kinds of circulation
involves difficulties which the mercantile world would be glad to have
forever done with.
Why should people be obliged to use one kind of circulating medium to
purchase another kind with, and then use this second kind to pay his
debts to another party, who will sell it again to obtain what the first
person used to purchase it? This is the logic of specie payments. If it
is argued that the actual transfer of the gold is not necessary, we
would then ask why is specie payment desirable at all? The facts
regarding this question are that people have become wedded to the idea
that gold is the only possible thing that can be made money, while all
their practice has been that it is the least entitled to the name of
money of anything they have ever used as such.
As has been said, the real standard value of a country is its capacity
to produce, and it is this production that requires to be moved,
exchanged, bartered or sold. The use of something to represent this, for
which it can stand responsible in general terms, is what is required of
money. That kind of money which will best meet all these requirements is
the best money. That kind of money which has elasticity, that will be
plenty when business is active, and that can be readily put to other use
for profit when business is less demanding, is the kind the prosperity
of a country demands. With a money of this kind, all financial crises
would be impossible. It is the possibility of making a stringent market
that unsettles financial matters and causes financial destruction. And
it is because we have not a financial system of our own that it is
possible for exigencies in other countries to unsettle values here.
To-day, the price of our securities in London determines the price of
gold here. In view of the possible complications in which Europe is
liable to be involved any time, and which she must within a very few
years be involved in, it becomes a matter of considerable moment,
whether our finances are to be governed and guided by the condition of
things there, when these things shall come.
As a nation we are or can be, were it necessary, independent of the
world, and are the first and best representative of a republican form of
government. Why should we not be the nation to give to the world a
reformed currency? The world—or that part of it which has grown to
appreciate our kind of freedom—involuntarily turns its eyes to us for
patterns of all things that a people during a change of government
require. One of the first things a government requires is money. Why
shall we not show the nations how to make the best use of their means,
and give them a system that will do more for them than any system that
has yet been tried, and by so doing also meet our own needs?
The capability to do this would instantly place us at the head of
nations, and financially to stand thus, is to complete the measure of
our greatness. Politically, we can never be subdued. During our late war
there were two millions of men under arms. Just in this proportion,
also, should we be powerful financially, and to become so would be to be
allotted by the world the lead of it and all its nations.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. V.
The gravest of all questions of political economy is that of a country’s
money. A very great deal more of the people’s common happiness depends
upon money than even political economists generally suppose. Happiness
is very closely allied to prosperity, and general prosperity in a
country can never obtain unless it is under a sound financial system.
Very few people understand what general prosperity means. It does not
mean vast sums of gold in the hands of a few of the inhabitants of the
country, while the great majority struggle month after month for the
absolute necessities of life. There may be a great deal of money in a
country and still be very little general prosperity with the common
people. The question of money has never been considered philosophically,
nor with due regard to the common interests of humanity. It is always
viewed from the standpoint of the wealthy, and usually by the wealthy or
by those in their direct interests.
The producing classes, however, are beginning to awake to the fact that
they have never been represented in any of the legislation that has been
had regarding finance and the currency they have been forced to use. On
the contrary, they perceive that all legislation has been in the
interests of capital, and this perception is what is arraying these
supposed two interests against each other. The facts existing have only
to be considered to prove that our financial system is unsound, and this
should be sufficient to force our legislation to take up the question,
and to handle it in the light of the demands of the present, utterly
regardless of the superstition that has so long existed about the gold
idol.
The objectors to any thing as money but gold, make much of the need of
it to make good the balances of trade between different countries. But
these forget that gold is nothing but merchandise until the country has
placed its indorsement upon it, and that it is this which gives it the
character of money, and that it does not derive this character from the
fact that it is gold. The indorsement of a country upon gold coin is a
simple guarantee that it is of a specific purity, after this, its value
is determined by its weight. Thus gold sent to other countries to pay
balances against us, is sent and received, as so much by weight of a
specific quality of gold, and not as so much of our national money. The
force of this objection, then, is utterly destroyed by these
considerations; and especially so, when this same gold, coined by our
government, is recoined by the country we send it to. Here it is
distinctly proved that gold is not money, and that it is only a
commodity which we produce and part with in exchange for other
commodities, and that it is just as valuable for this purpose if it goes
direct from the mines where we produce it, to other countries, as it is
if it goes by the way of a United States Mint, where it receives the
indorsement of the government.
To go still deeper, there is a no more mischievous idea than that all
paper money should be redeemable in gold which should alone be
legal-tender, because everybody knows that the amount of currency this
country demands cannot by any possibility ever be redeemed by gold. It
may be redeemed by using the same gold coin over and over again, as it
is again and again received and paid; but just here is the difficulty;
for ten dollars of currency in reality have to be redeemed by the one
gold dollar. This is the _practice_ of specie payments, and a most
mischievous one it is, too; it is the sole idea that leads to great
inflations, and consequently to great collapses in finances and values.
Under this system there never was nor never can be a reliable mercantile
value to anything. Fluctuation is its direct result, while speculation,
without this, would cease, and the vast horde of mere speculators who
spend their whole time in it, would of necessity be compelled to become
producers of some kind. It will thus be seen that the first principles
of economy are in direct opposition to the results coming from the use
of gold as money; and that these declare that something should supersede
its use as such that it would be impossible to speculate upon; something
that would have such absolute and never varying value as could be
positively counted upon to endure a month, a year, a century or a
thousand years, as the cases in question should respectively involve.
Such a substantial thing might with propriety be called money, and in
comparison to it gold would sink into utter insignificance and be
forgotten.
NEW YORK, September 14, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. VI.
A very fallacious argument has been the rule, because gold has been
considered “money,” that all currency is “credit;” this at first blush
would seem to be still further strengthened by the proposition that gold
is only merchandise. By no means, however, is all currency credit. All
bank currency is credit. All currency that is not legal-tender for
contracts and debts is credit; but a currency which is of itself
legal-tender is money, because it is itself intrinsically valuable. All
the uses one has for money it fills; it not only meets all demands that
“credit currency” can meet, but it fills other and specific demands that
bank currency cannot. It is receivable for nearly all governmental
demands upon the people; it pays taxes, and cannot be refused by any one
in payment of contracts and obligations. Such a currency has all the
features and characteristics of money, except that in our practice it
has not been receivable for duties upon imports. Had greenbacks been
made legal-tender for all governmental purposes, they would have been
“real money,” having intrinsic value, of which nothing short of the
absolute destruction of the country and death of its inhabitants could
have robbed them. The gold fallacy, however, prevented Congress from
seeing the real drift of what they did, and the country, therefore, must
yet a little longer be blinded by the thought that gold is the only
money.
The only argument which is at all tenable, that converts anything that
has all the qualities of merchandise into a measure of value is, that
the article thus rendered costs at all times, and in all countries, the
same labor to produce it. This test, every one knows, is not applicable
to any single thing the earth yields; and as little as to any other does
it attach to gold, and, therefore, gold in itself is subject to
fluctuation, and can in no sense be considered an absolute measure of
anything. This country, since California began to yield her gold, has
been a great producer of the precious metal; that is, a certain amount
of labor has produced a larger proportionate quantity of it than has
generally been produced in this or in other countries; consequently we
have been large exporters, not of money, but of gold, in its character
as merchandise: very much of this has been exported in mass, uncoined,
in which condition not even the most rigid gold stickler will pretend it
is money.
Hence it follows that we do not need “money” to balance our accounts
with other countries; we need particular kinds of merchandise which we
have in larger quantities than we have use for, or which other countries
need more than they do some merchandise they have which we require more
than they do; which system brings about exchange, the sum total of which
is commerce. If commerce were left to regulate itself without any
interference to prevent the natural flow and reflux of the products of
the earth, as stated above, there would soon become established
permanent courses for certain products, to take which would still
further localize all kinds of labor, and render each of nearly unvarying
profit. It is this interference with the natural demand and supply of
the various parts and peoples of the earth that breaks down the
equilibrium of labor, and makes possible the extreme unequal
distribution of wealth.
It will be seen that all questions of finance and commerce are
intimately connected, while those of labor and capital grow out of the
conditions they make possible and inevitable. To properly understand the
relations of capital and labor, and to harmonize them, demands a correct
comprehension of the basic principles of economy which relate to finance
and commerce. If these were based in correct universal principles, there
could be no questions to settle between labor and capital. Hence it is
that it becomes specially requisite at this time, when labor is rising
to a sense of the unjust position it is confined to, that these
questions of finance should be agitated as the most important ones for
adjustment. To begin at the root of the evil is the philosophic way to
deal with all the ills of society as it is with all ills which result in
the gradual evolution of all departments of the universe.
For a measure of value and to aid exchanges, then, there is required a
currency, or medium, that does not possess any of the characteristics of
merchandise, that is not a commodity nor a product in any sense of those
terms, but something that has intrinsic value of itself, being a true
representative of value, and of equal and absolute value at all times
and under all circumstances and changes. Such a thing would be money,
and anything not possessing these requirements is not worthy the name of
money.
The question arises, then, Can there be anything formulated or brought
into use that would possess all these requirements under all
circumstances? It is quite certain that there never has been, as yet,
anything used as money that was as absolute as a dollar, as a pound is
as a pound, or as a foot is as a foot. A pound is just a pound under any
and all circumstances; so, too, is a foot under the same; and so is a
gallon, and so is a cord of wood; whether a greater or less number of
any of them are required at one time or another for use, they are always
a pound, a foot, a gallon, or a cord, and no more nor no less. Now, what
we require is a measure of values of just as fixed and absolute a
character as any of these. When this is acquired, then just as unvarying
value will attach to the measure of values as there does to those
measures. Money is but another name for values, and the dollar is one of
the divisions of its measures. There is no more reason why money should
fluctuate in its capacity of measuring or of being measured than there
is that the foot should grow longer or shorter, or the pound greater or
less, and there is just the same reason why it should not.
Then, the products of the earth once placed upon this unvarying
standard, the cost of producing each different product would determine
its exact value, and in time the producers of each kind would be upon an
exact equality in regard to the value of their products. It is the
attaching, in practice, of absolute value to something that can have no
absolute value which makes possible all the various degrees of poverty
that belong to the laboring or producing classes. If these inequalities
are to be remedied, there is but one method by which it can be done—that
is, to reduce our money systems to the same fixedness that we have
reduced all our other systems to. This once done, all labor will
gravitate to an equality, and capital will become its best ally instead
of, as now, its apparent enemy, while each of these interests, and all
divisions of each of them, everywhere in the world, would become mutual,
and by so being would prepare the way and lay the foundation for that
grand harmonization of society which must precede the practical
co-operation of mankind, as brethren, under a universal unitary
government of the United States of the World.
NEW YORK, Sept. 20, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. VII.
The point has now been arrived at where it is to be considered as
decided that gold is not, cannot, be money; that it is a valuable
article of merchandise. Its utility beyond this character has not only
departed as a principle, but in practice a very considerable portion of
the most enlightened people in the world consider it the source of great
mischief, and the more the causes of the financial ills we are subjected
to are analyzed, the more they will be found to be dependent upon the
attaching of a specific value to something that is as changeable in cost
of production as it is possible for anything to be.
The philosopher and the best reformer would here step in and say that it
is their province not so much to tear down the old as it is to prepare
the new that shall take the place of the old. This is the science of all
reform. However, before there can be a field prepared in which the new
can be used, the defunct condition of the old must be pointed out, and
its _debris_ cleared away, so that the new may find space for operation.
This preparation has in reality been already made. The necessities of
the Government in the late war broke the first ground for the
consideration of this very important question, and prepared the minds of
the mass of the people, though, perhaps, unconsciously, for the
reception of the idea that it is possible to do without gold; that
specie payment is by no means a necessary accompaniment of a sound
financial condition, and that a money system which is made dependent
upon a redemption by something else, is not only not to be desired, but
that it is the real foundation for all financial disasters, because it
makes an undue expansion possible. The people who would once have
considered a proposition for an irredeemable currency with the utmost
alarm now discuss it as one of the things that is sure to be. It is
believed by those who have studied this subject deepest that the time
has arrived when this government must enter upon the consideration of a
permanent change in our financial system, and that a return to the gold
standard would be a disaster.
But, says the objector, how can an irredeemable currency ever be made to
adapt itself to the varied demands of the country? How can anything so
unsubstantial as a paper currency, without gold support, be made as
absolute a measure of values as the yard-stick is of distance? and, if
this can be accomplished, where will the elasticity of the currency be
found? In general terms it is assumed that, unless the proposed
financial system will answer all these conditions—that unless it will be
elastic, adapting itself to all the demands that can be made, be they
great or small, and at the same time remain absolute in its value, it is
not even fit to be thought of, much less to be seriously considered as a
substitute for what has been.
And this brings us back to the beginning of the argument—to the point
from which the first departure was made. The course that will be
pursued, however, after leaving this point this time will not be that of
reconnoitring—looking over—the ground to be covered, but a steady, firm
and final advance directly toward the objective result desired, which,
if a failure is made in reaching, the campaign against gold may be
considered a failure. Under the system of currency being good only when
it can be redeemed by gold, there is required, to make the currency
actually in circulation good, just as many gold dollars as there are
currency dollars—that is, if there is at any time in circulation any
more currency than there is gold to redeem it, then there is an
expansion, which any sudden change in any of the circumstances by which
nations are surrounded is liable to convert into a collapse. So long as
everything is prosperous, so long as nothing arises to shake the
confidence of the people, or to call the attention of any considerable
number to the possibility that there is not gold enough to redeem all
the currency that is in circulation, so long everything goes well; but
so soon as any one of said conditions occur or change, then there is a
rush to see who shall get what gold there is; the supply exhausted, the
unredeemed currency is valueless. This is the practice and the result of
a redeemable currency; the same results will also follow so long as such
a system is tolerated.
Everybody knows that there never has been a currency in circulation
sufficient in quantity to meet all the requirements of commerce that had
a complete basis in gold, and everybody also knows that there is not
gold enough in the world to meet this specific requirement. Hence it is
that institutions possessing, say $100,000 in gold, put forth and obtain
interest upon $500,000 in currency—that is to say, with a real capital
of $100,000, which is worth six per cent. interest, they really obtain
thirty per cent. interest, thus making it possible for them to double
their original capital every three or four years. Did those who now so
loudly complain of the National Banks receiving interest from the
government upon their bonds deposited, and from the people upon their
circulation, ever object to the greater enormities of the specie-paying
banks?
The only use of money is to facilitate exchanges of what the earth
produces, voluntarily or under compulsion. Money, then, has its direct
relation to these products as a whole, and can have no special relation
to any part of them; if made to enter upon and sustain any such special
relation, it is a purely arbitrary law, without foundation in principle,
that compels it, and all arbitrary laws belong to the ages past, when
brute force was required to guide ignorance; they cannot be long in this
age without generating irritation, and such irritation is now being
rapidly developed all over the world, wherever the laboring classes have
become at all advanced in knowledge. The few can no longer control the
many; the many are to control the few. Capital, through false systems of
values, has been able to control labor; but the time has nearly come
when the producing many will control the accumulated wealth of the world
for the benefit of the whole world—not simply and only because they are
the many, but because they are to be reinforced by the invincible powers
of demonstrated science, which are always to be found operating for the
“greatest good for the greatest number.”
NEW YORK, Sept. 27, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. VIII.
Money was invented as a method to facilitate the exchanges of the
products of the industry of the world. If this is a true definition of
money, the only legitimate money it is possible to have is something
that naturally grows out of the uses it is required for. A national
currency, then, should be a representative of that which it is its
sphere to exchange; that is to say: a currency dollar should stand for a
certain amount of the different products, which have been produced at
the expense of a certain amount of labor. It will be perceived that this
representation is upon an entirely different hypothesis from that of a
currency which is supposed to represent gold.
To begin with something which everybody can understand: It may be
supposed that a farmer, occupying a given quantity of land, can, in a
series of ten years, produce an average amount of ten thousand dollars
per year to dispose of commercially. During the process of production he
is obliged to have, say, eight thousand dollars’ worth of means to
enable him to continue the process. Now, instead of his being obliged to
obtain credit based upon his prospective crop, he is supplied with a
representative currency based upon it; this enables him to purchase from
time to time that which he requires. When his crop is harvested, it is
disposed of, and his currency is _redeemed_ by it.
Now, make this application general to all kinds of production in the
country—which is the only basis of value a country can have—and make the
government the appraiser of the value thereof, and the maker and utterer
of its representative, and a currency will be obtained that will possess
all the requirements and characteristics of money; because it will be
used to exchange that upon which it is based and of which it is
representative, and which is substantially redeemed every time it
exchanges any products of the country.
Now, how shall this system be instituted? In the census now being taken,
the value of the total products of the country can be arrived at, which
sum total should be used as the basis of issue, and continue as such
during the next _ten years_, at the end of which time the increased
products would require another valuation to amend the bases for an
increased issue for the next ten years.
A currency thus obtained would possess all the substantial value that
could be required of money. It is really the basis of value when gold is
used; for how are a people to obtain gold unless they have produce to
exchange for it?—which operation is, in reality, nothing more than the
exchange of one commodity for another, of which it is not and cannot be
representative, while in the case of the proposed currency an exchange
is effected for that of which it is representative.
In this view of currency for a country, our system of greenbacks come
nearer being money than anything that has ever been in use in this or in
any other country. They were based upon the capacity of the country to
produce, and had the government confined itself to their use, and had
not been obliged to invent some further means to predicate securities,
we should now have had a real money currency. Who is there to find fault
with “greenbacks” as a national currency, provided there are enough of
them to transact the business of the country with, _and no more than
just enough_? But they lack one essential quality of real money—they are
not receivable for all things that people need money for, and which the
government demands of the people. They should have been made receivable
for all government demands, _even for duties on imports_. But the
necessities of the government, which was then struggling with all its
might for existence, made it a “military necessity” to exact gold for
duties on imports, as an indirect way of taxing the people who could
afford to indulge in the luxuries of foreign products.
Though not available for duties there never has been in the history of
the world so stable and invariable a measure of value as the greenbacks,
since government ceased issuing any more than the amount already out.
There has been no great financial panic and no considerable unsettling
of commercial values. They require that one thing more should be
done—they should be given a _fixed measure of value_. Then nothing more
could be required of a currency than would be found in the greenbacks.
The reason, and the only reason, why the people can feel that such a
currency may be unstable is the fear that the government may be induced
to issue it in greater amount than primarily authorized, and
consequently that it would depreciate; but this could not be until the
nation should issue more than the value of its property. But for this
deficiency there is a good and sufficient remedy, which can be provided
and used in connection with the proposed new currency, which is to be
based upon the capacity of the country for production, and which will
also provide for different seasons or parts of seasons when more or less
circulating medium is demanded to fulfill the business indications of
the country; and with this it is believed all the objections are covered
that can possibly be raised by the most strenuous stickler for a
currency with a gold basis, though the government may issue never so
great a volume of the currency proposed.
NEW YORK, Oct. 3, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. IX.
There are several propositions which should always remain in all
considerations about money, so that the mind may not be led from its
true sphere, and so that it may not be invested with peculiarities and
characteristics that never did nor never can belong to money:
_First_ and most important—most important because it is the determining
point which gives all that follows tangibility—is, that _money, in its
primary uses, is a means and not an end_. It is a means, because it was
invented to assist the people in performing something that could be
performed without, but not so well without it. And this is the _sole
use_ of money. Because this has been lost sight of and it has been
invested with other functions, it has been possible for it to be
converted to uses which at times, in culminating, have almost turned the
world topsy-turvy.
_Second._ Money is the medium of exchanging commodities, and when
diverted from its legitimate use and is made an end, results will ever
follow which _must_ be detrimental to the general interests involved.
_Third._ All the material value money possesses is so possessed because
of the relation it bears to commodities, that relation being
representative of or standing for.
_Fourth._ While money is the medium of exchanges, and while it is in use
representative of valuable materials, it is in its _last_ analysis the
_objective_ of that department of life of which labor is the
_subjective_, and, therefore, when scientifically viewed, it resolves
itself into a principal which is one of those upon which society must be
built when a perfect foundation is formulated.
In providing a currency, therefore, to meet the uses which are demanded
of it, its _scientific_ feature, as a principle, should be the point of
departure, and should be the only guide until it is attained. Labor
being the basis of production, is the positive power which reaches forth
and expends itself, where money, the other pole of the social battery,
is reached; this reaction upon labor completes the circuit, and here is
the process which is continually going on: A certain amount of labor—a
positive power—produces a certain amount of money or negative result The
interference with this natural process by extraneous means, through
which undue quantities of negative forces are accumulated, is that
process which robs labor of its natural and, therefore, just results.
The labor which the people of this country are capable of performing,
then, is the real basis upon which money should be formulated, and, as
in practice, the results generally are annual in their return, this
basis should be measured by all they can produce annually. It follows
that the basis upon which money should be uttered is this annual
capacity of labor, and there should be sufficient uttered to completely
measure this capacity, between which two, when once established, there
would be an equilibrium produced, which would only require to be
permanently regulated and maintained to insure a perfect harmony in the
material interests of society.
For example, let it be supposed that the extremest legitimate amount of
currency that would be warranted under the previous rule is one billion
of dollars; and that this amount is all that the uses of money require
when there is the largest amount of business being transacted. It must
be remembered that this is not a redeemable currency, but that it is
money; that it is the representative of the wealth of the nation, and
that the government, as the head of the nation, has uttered it, upon the
soundest and best basis of value any money could possibly have—the
productive capacity of the country. In this money system there could be
no such thing as the failure of banks to redeem their issues; nor of any
loss to be sustained by the individual because of the mismanagement of
any board of directors; and what is more than all the rest, in the
present systems of society, its value would be sustained by the
collective accumulated wealth of the whole country, and it could by no
possibility depreciate in value so long as the value of the country was
not exceeded by the amount of the issue.
To guard the people against all apprehension of such a result ever being
possible, there should be a measure placed upon this currency that will
at all times make it just as absolute in its measure of value as the
pound is in its measure of weight, or as inches are in their measure of
distances. Though this is comparatively a new proposition, and one that
but very few minds think a possibility, it nevertheless is just as
possible and just as essential—and more so—as all other absolute and
arbitrary standards are, that have been invented to give regularity and
stability in their respective spheres of use.
This currency—this money—should be made convertible into a United States
Bond, which should bear such a rate of interest—say four per cent.—as
experience has or should demonstrate to be the true point of balance;
and the bond should also be convertible into the currency at the option
of the holder. The rate of interest should be open to readjustment every
ten years, when the estimates for the currency are made. Thus it would
come that whenever there should be so much currency in circulation that
it would be worth less than four per cent. for business uses, the
surplus would immediately be converted into four per cent. bonds; and
whenever money for business should be worth more than four per cent.,
the bonds would be converted into the currency in just sufficient
quantities to meet the demand and to restore the equilibrium.
It will be readily seen how perfectly this meets all the requirements of
money, and how perfectly all the irregularities of demand and supply are
met by it. Thus, when business is dull, and but little money is
required, it (the surplus) will be in bonds drawing four per cent.
interest; the moment business revives, the bonds will be at once
converted, and the currency will meet the demand, and thus the constant
conversion of the one into the other will regulate and maintain the
equilibrium that all previous systems of money have so signally failed
to do.
In our next the advantages of such a system will be still further
considered and expounded, so that every one may be able to comprehend
that a money system is possible of invention, upon which foreign bankers
can not play their long-practiced games to any further one-sided
advantage.
NEW YORK, Oct. 11, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. X.
The advantages of a currency which, instead of possessing the capacity
of redeemability, is at all times convertible into something that is
itself productive, cannot fail to be appreciated by all who have given
any attention to the science of money. Theories regarding this branch of
social science have been about as destructive to the proper development
and understanding of the science as religious theories have been to that
of a proper appreciation of the functions and the benefits of religion.
The last have at all times stood in the path of progress. So, too, have
the first. And for this reason are we to-day almost at the mercy of
those who are possessed of the accumulated wealth of the world, which in
combination would be a power sufficient to control all government in its
interests, and thus it would be enabled to bring the world again under a
despotism to which that of past despotism would hold no comparison.
In such a money system too much circulating medium could never be
uttered, for the moment a surplus quantity over the demands of
legitimate business was in circulation, that moment it would begin to be
converted into the four per cent. bonds; so that if there were two
thousand millions uttered, it would always be worth just four per cent.;
and if there were but five hundred millions uttered, it would never be
worth any more than four per cent. Thus it is plainly to be seen that
the government would always be necessitated to provide just as near the
amount of circulating medium demanded as it would be possible to arrive
at, _and no more_; for on any such surplus it would, as a matter of
course, be obliged to pay the interest provided, which thus becomes the
absolute measure of value that money requires to make it substantial,
and which is required to deprive it of that capacity for producing great
commercial inflations, which, in the financial history of this country,
develop and burst about every second decade, and which produce not only
the complete destruction of all purely speculative enterprises, but also
the most wide-spread and fearful demoralization in all legitimate
business.
Under such a money system, speculation, with all its accompanying
demoralization, would rapidly depart from all classes of society. It is
a notorious, yet unappreciated fact, that speculative enterprises lie at
the foundation of all financial disorder, for which, if a remedy can be
provided, the very considerable talent and time which is now devoted to
it would be turned into channels of general usefulness and
productiveness. Production is the foundation of all wealth, and,
consequently, to increase wealth, production must be increased.
Speculation is that spirit which constantly saps the vitality of wealth,
and, therefore, society has no greater nor more debasing enemy than
speculation.
It may be objected to by some that speculation leads to national
development; that in many of the wild railroad, emigration, city and
other schemes, that have been projected and carried through under its
stimulus, the welfare of the country has been subserved. To this
ingenious objection it may be answered that, under a sound financial
system, these enterprises would have been undertaken everywhere when the
demands of the country warranted them, and because there was a demand
for them, instead of for the pure purposes of individual or corporate
speculation. One of the best results that would flow from this change of
incentive would be, that no “Bubbles” could be palmed off on the unwary
by “flash” advertising, which would burst at some future time, to the
destruction of some deluded victims of unscrupulous financiers.
It is one of the most fatal of commercial errors to suppose that large
general prices are an evidence of prosperity. On the contrary, it is
true that when the prices affixed to any kind of property are larger
than its real capacity for production, it is an expansion which must at
some time collapse, to the detriment of the holder. Thus, whenever
property is valued at such a price that it cannot be used to pay a
certain per cent. income, its value is expanded, and though this
expansion may continue under the pressure of a so-called prosperity, and
become general, even country-wide, if the general productive capacity of
the country cannot sustain this increased value, collapse must as surely
come as results follow causes. Even in this demonstration it is
conclusively shown that the productive capacity of the country is the
_real_ measure of value, and that, _finally_, no matter how irrelevant
the process of wealth and prices may have been to it, _it is the power
which ultimately measures all values_.
This appears to us such a plain proposition that it seems almost
superfluous to present further arguments to prove the desirability of at
once proceeding to make the productive capacity of the country the basis
of value upon which to issue a currency to meet the legitimate demands
of the people for the purposes of exchange. The attention of all who
realize the unstableness of our present system, and the desirableness of
providing against the tremendous fluctuations it is capable of, is
called to the necessity of uniting to bring this matter prominently
before the NEXT CONGRESS, with the view of having it thus brought
prominently before the _country_, and of having it thoroughly analyzed
and understood. When analyzed and comprehended, the idea of a _gold
basis_ will forever depart from all progressive minds, and the impetus
the new money system will thereby receive will never be checked until
its science is developed into general national practice.
NEW YORK, Oct. 27, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. XI.
In our last, the necessity of urging the consideration of the finance
question upon Congress, with the view of having the whole range of the
matter brought prominently before the country, was proposed. Of all
practical questions that require immediate solution, none is of so much
importance to man as this; and none more so to woman unless that of
equality for herself is. No country can enjoy a series of years of
uninterrupted commercial prosperity when that country has a circulating
medium which can be affected by the manipulations of shrewd financiers
for their own ends. And no financial policy is more ruinous to the true
interests of a whole country than that of a constantly changing
commercial valuation upon either personal or real estate, excepting
alone in the latter, when it becomes the location of more capacity for
actual production.
Real estate, abstractly considered, has no appreciable value. It only
becomes relatively valuable when labor can make use of it to produce
something valuable from it or by it. Absolutely there can be no
individual title to any part of the soil of any country. Taken as a
whole, the land comprised within the limits of the authority of any
government can be made such use of as such government may determine, but
as to actual conveyance of absolute individual ownership, that is
impossible, because none of the powers involved in the attempt at
conveyance could have had any part in the production of said land, and,
therefore, could have no right or authority to transfer it, from the
fact of an entire lack of title to transfer.
It may be objected that these are merely technical assumptions which the
customs of society have never admitted. So, too, may it be objected to
all encroachments of scientific principles upon old forms and customs.
Nevertheless, science continues to analyze and demonstrate, and the
world continues to come more and more under its guidance every year. In
the principles of government science has not, until very recently, found
grounds of attack. Since it has come to be recognized that there really
is a science of society, and consequently that all its structure can be
analyzed, understood and guided by its deductions many of the customs
and practices that have so long controlled the people are found to be
entirely without the support of principles fundamentally necessary to
assure a permanently constructive form of society.
Wherever maxims of temporary policy are the guiding rules, there will
ever be alternate construction and destruction; but wherever scientific,
demonstrable principles are the governing power, there will be found
permanency. That “money” is susceptible of analysis, and of being
predicated upon a scientific basis is no longer to be questioned. It is
a branch of the science of society, and as such must receive
consideration as the science itself becomes disseminated among the
peoples. It was not many years ago that “the sciences” were unknown in
our common schools. It will not be many years hence until the science of
society will be a recognized branch of every child’s education in the
most enlightened portions of the world. Political economy, which is a
branch of social science, is regarded with favor by many now, and,
comprehensively speaking, all these questions which have been looked
upon as “too abstract” for common comprehension, are found to be the
real principles which underlie all social strictures.
First in importance, because it leads to the recognition of the
“ultimate condition,” is the question of intercourse between the peoples
of the earth. Money, as the means of bringing about this intercourse,
should receive primary consideration. Let the fact once be generally
recognized that the world is at last tending to “a unity of the
peoples,” and financial and commercial unity are the introductory
unities upon which to hasten governmental unity. Were these fully
established upon a basis of mutual interest instead of upon the policy
of each obtaining all the personal and selfish advantages possible,
there could no such strifes as the one convulsing Europe to-day ever
occur. Thus it appears that the assimilation of the world under one
common interest is in the first instance a question of a unity of
material interests which must serve as the foundation for all others to
build upon.
Finance and commerce, then, lie at the very threshold of all the
progress that is to be made in the direction of governmental
consolidation, and when so recognized they will be rescued from the
position that they now occupy as the means only of pursuing selfish
interests, and be raised into that of principles and rules of action by
which all intercourse must be regulated. Commerce, in its most
comprehensive sense, does not apply merely to the exchange of the
material products of the world, but to the exchange of intellectual,
moral, social and religious products also, and its application thereby
becomes common to all the interests of humanity. And as finance grows
out of the necessities of commerce, it also becomes equally with
commerce a humanitarian question. It is in this broad and general sense
that all questions regarding it should hereafter be considered and not
upon the basis of how much advantage such a measure will give an
individual or a nation over another individual or nation.
Like all other questions that are now coming prominently before the
world for solution, this one of finance and commerce rises to the
dignity of a question of humanity. They are all to be considered in
regard to their application, not merely to nations, but to all
nations—all peoples—as forming the basis of the future confederation of
the world under one government to be known as the United States of the
World, when all the people will be inspired with a common Religious
sentiment in regard to their primary origin and their ultimate destiny;
when all the peoples will be governed in their relation to each other by
the common social sentiment arising from the recognition of the fact
that they are necessarily a community of brothers from having a common
origin and destiny; when all the peoples will give a common adhesion to
and support the deductions of a Universal Science, let those deductions
militate as they will and must against whatever of speculation and
theory there may still hang like a pall of night over the intellect of
man. To all of these ultimate conditions of mankind, finance and
commerce must furnish the means of attainment; and being thus the first
essentials to the beginning of the actual constructive process which,
when completed, will be this grand consummation, they should be treated
with that gravity and consideration which is due to so grand a position
as they are assigned in the third order of general civilization. Policy
should be entirely discarded from all place in the argument, and
principles should alone be discussed. When the consideration is fairly
begun upon this basis, scientific ideas regarding money will be rapidly
diffused among the people, who now do not even dream that money can be
reduced to the rules of scientific demonstration.
We urge again that this question should receive its proper share of
attention at the hands of our next Congress as being the questions upon
which the future good of mankind depends more immediately than any other
that will be likely to command the undivided attention of it. This once
settled upon the true principles, all other questions which all future
Congresses will have to consider will be virtually determined by it.
NEW YORK, Nov. 4, 1870.
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. XII.
In the treatment of these subjects in the general sense in which they
become important to all the people the range is very much extended
beyond that commonly compassed by those whose interest compels them to
temporary considerations for the promoting of immediate interests under
the systems in vogue. All such kind of treatment deals with effects, and
would never remedy an existing want, nor correct illegitimate practices.
If there are wants in existing systems, and if there are illegitimate
practices which are possible under them, there is but one way to supply
the one or to correct the other, and that is to go to the root of the
matter where the causes exist which make these possible.
In this series of articles it has been the endeavor to point out some of
the most prominent evidences that our financial system was unsound, and
also to show, by as strict an analysis as was possible in the space
allotted, what the true basis for a sound financial system was, and
where it was to be found, and, having done this, such methods of
administration were hinted at as would reduce the system, when put into
operation, to a permanent and fixed measure of all values, which it was
argued was equally as necessary when value is to be measured as the same
fixedness is when any other quantity is to be measured.
It has been suggested by some that, in presenting our statements in the
terse, undiluted manner we have, that those who have not been habitual
thinkers upon this subject might fail to catch the full application of
the propositions, and by so failing consider the system impracticable.
To obviate such objections we shall, by further treatment of obscure
points, attempt to make them plain to all who can understand the English
language.
First, a brief re-statement and condensation of the entire outline:
Money, being an invention to facilitate the exchanges of the products of
labor, it should be formulated with direct reference to the conditions
which made the invention necessary, out of which it should naturally
grow; and also with direct regard as to how the invention should best
meet the required case—that is, the invention should be adapted to the
conditions, instead of making an invention without regard to the
conditions, and then attempting to force the conditions to comply with
the capacity of the invention.
This is a point which should be thoroughly comprehended, for in it lies
the whole fault of making gold a measure of value, and we therefore
shall attempt to offer a common illustration directly in point.
Let it be supposed that there is a stream which, to accommodate travel,
requires to be bridged, and that the bridge has to be constructed and
moved to the stream. The first procedure would be to determine just how
long the bridge must be to span the stream. It would then be constructed
and moved to the stream, which it of course would span. But suppose
persons knowing there was a stream to be crossed, but not knowing its
breadth, had gone to work and constructed the bridge and then had
attempted to compel it, when too short, to extend across the stream.
This would have been a case of attempting to compel the conditions for
which the invention was made to accommodate themselves to the invention.
And this has been just what the world has been all this time doing in
attempting to compel the conditions for which money was invented to
accommodate themselves to the possibilities of gold, which was invented
as money without any reference being had to the functions it was to
perform, or to the conditions it was required to meet.
It would be just as reasonable and just as sensible to attempt to compel
a house to perform the functions of a bridge as it is to attempt to
compel gold to perform the functions of money, for gold is not nor
cannot ever be made to meet the requirements for which money is
demanded; whereas, money should be of such character as to fully meet
the requirements for which it is used, but should not be possessed of
_any qualities that would render it useful for any other purpose
whatever_, so that there could be no possibility of its ever being used
for any other purposes, which impossibility would forever make
speculation impossible.
It is believed that we have made clear the purposes for which money is
required and also clear that it is utterly futile to attempt to compel
any invention to meet those requirements where it is not formulated for
the express purpose. We have heretofore shown that gold is a purely
arbitrary standard which has no scientific relations whatever to the
product of labor which it is required to measure, but that it is itself
a product, and as such requires to be measured. A gallon of molasses
would never be thought of as a measure of distance, but it would be just
as reasonable to expect it to measure it as it is to expect a certain
quantity of gold to measure the value of a horse. A horse may be
exchanged for a certain amount of gold. So, too, may a horse be
exchanged for a certain amount of wheat, but that process does not make
either the horse or the wheat money. Money is that which can equally
represent the wheat, the horse and the gold; and anything that cannot do
this is not money.
Hence it is seen that every step we take in examining the true bearings
of the money question brings us nearer and clearer to the proposition
already made—that the capacity for production is the true basis of
value.
NEW YORK, Nov. 11, 1870
PAPERS ON FINANCE AND COMMERCE.
NO. XIII.
We are perfectly aware of the very many objections which arise in the
minds of the people to such a currency as has been proposed, but the
thoughtless one of “What! an irredeemable paper money! Oh, no! that will
never do; that means utter repudiation,” which is the most commonly
made, scarcely merits attention. Will those, who so earnestly place
themselves in opposition to a convertible currency, stop and consider
for just one moment. What is the ten-dollar gold piece you have just
received for a ten-dollar note good for? Will it feed or clothe you? or
will it _directly_ minister to any of your needs or to those of any of
your family? Directly, it will do none of these things for you; _but you
can have it really redeemed by something that will_ feed, clothe and
minister to all your requirements. You will thus perceive that you have
been and still are laboring under a foolish delusion regarding this
precious metal, for you have all the time been getting your paper money
redeemed by your gold money, which you finally are obliged to redeem by
that which is really valuable—that which it takes to maintain life and
make it desirable.
Now, you know very well that the gold there is in the world cannot
redeem or represent the values of the world. Were it a thousand times as
valuable as it really is—that is to say, could the consent of the world
be obtained to making the amount of gold which now represents one dollar
to represent a thousand dollars—there would be a possibility of the gold
in existence representing the value of the world; but as no such result
as this is anticipated, it is in vain for you to cling to any such
mythological and speculative theory.
Again: What terrible outrage would your conscience sustain if you would
give a little calmer consideration to a proposition which you have
always heretofore rejected without thought. With your gold you have been
able to obtain that which you required to sustain and make life
agreeable. These necessities, then, are the really valuable things of
the world. What objection, then, can you make that can have the
sanction, even of your own reason, to at once admitting that these are
the only real values the world contains, and consequently—because
legitimately—that whatever is money must be a representative of these
valuables: and also and further, that anything bearing the name of
money, which does not justly and fully represent the sum total of these,
is not money in the true sense of that term.
Again: Money may be considered the negative pole of the battery of
value. To all things there are two extremes and a mean, the evidence of
perfection being that there is always an equilibrium sustained between
the extremes through the medium of the mean. Products are positive
existences which go forth to administer to the demands of human nature,
and expend themselves in the negative returning force, money; which, in
being brought back to the point which it represents, becomes a positive
power itself, having the capacity to obtain labor which restores what
has been expended, and thus the circuit is complete and nothing is lost;
the same products exist and the same representation of them also exists.
If, perchance the return of the products is not always immediately made,
the power to return them is never lost, though that may be in a thousand
years.
Thus it will be seen by all, if they will but give the necessary
attention, that the proposed currency which shall be representative of
the products of labor is not only the only natural money there can be,
but that it can never appreciate nor depreciate, because every twelve
months it is worth just one twenty-fifth part of itself—for it is
believed that this per cent. of increase is the true balance between
accumulation and production; if, on trial, this balance should be found
too small, or too much in favor of production, it would be increased;
and if found too large, or too much in favor of accumulation it could be
reduced. This must be a subject of test, and when tested, legislation
can increase or decrease the standard of value by making the “measure”
larger or smaller, just the same as it does other “measures.”
We believe that the inauguration of such a money system would be the
beginning of the “leveling down and the leveling up” of the capitalist
and the laborer, and that such a thing as practical equality will be
impossible under any less radical and comprehensive change from present
systems. It is to be hoped that that large proportion of the whole
people which is represented by the classes that desire to be “levelled
up,” will give this most serious matter their most serious attention. We
are aware that it is a subject but little understood, and that the
prejudice of the people is in favor of the money god, gold. But, as in
religion, so will it be in money; when reason and common sense are
admitted to the debate, mythologic spectres and theoretic fancies will
begin to assume their true shapes, and the realities to arise from the
depths in which they have been confined.
NEW YORK, Nov. 25, 1870.
BASIS OF PHYSICAL LIFE.
THE UNITY OF LIFE, POWER AND MOTION.
I beg to present the following as the foundation for a series of
articles which it is proposed to present in due time. At first glance it
may be deemed too abstract for the purpose in view, but it must be
remembered that all action is primarily derived from a common basis of
life, and that it is from this basis all action _must_ spring, because
general principles only are deducible from it:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God.” Although human conception cannot trace existence back to the
time when “the Word was God,” the proposition is one which consciousness
can accept without analysis, and define and understand as the Absolute
in its broadest sense; but, when invested with the infinitude of
phenomena and facts, the mind loses itself and gives way beneath the
universal evidence that life, power and motion form a unit. Accepting,
then, this proposition, without attempting to solve it, a basis is found
from which to reason, and which we could not have discovered by
reasoning backward from effects. God was in the beginning: the beginning
was God. Acknowledging this, the mind cannot conceive of aught else
existing in the beginning. He was the Supreme Whole, the great Central
Heart, from and by which all things were to come. This truth should be
fully accepted, for from it can be shown that the facts of the present
are the legitimate outgrowth of this complete Oneness.
All nations have had a god or gods, though no two of them have been
identical. Nor has the conception of a god remained unchanged with any
people for any great length of time. Were each person to define his idea
of a god, there would be nearly as many different ideals as there are
individuals in the nation, thus showing that all knowledge is relative
or symbolic. As there can be but one god conceived of under our
proposition, the question arises how so many can be held up before the
Christian world, and each claimed to be “the only true god.” In the
solution of this will be found the chief burden which ignorance and
superstition use to load the mind with their absurdities. Freed from
this burden, the mind would form a true conception of the unity in
diversity of nature, and recognize God as infinite and eternal. It will
be readily admitted that God is indestructible. So, too, is matter. Then
we have from the beginning two indestructibles—or, at least, for the
present, it must be assumed they are two—God and Nature, Spirit and
Matter, or Power and Resistance. These embrace “the Whole,” from which
nothing could have been taken away or added thereto. As God, therefore,
was All in All at the beginning, so he must ever remain the same; and
this is true also of Nature.
Reasoning thus from this basis it must be found that every power has its
origin in the first power—God, the mainspring of all action. Life, then,
may be said to be motion making itself manifest under the influence of
power—to what? It may be difficult for the mind to accept so broad an
application of this all-pervading power, but it confesses it without
comprehending it whenever it declares that God is omnipotent and
omnipresent. The world little thinks of the extent of such an assertion,
for it breaks down all the Christian ideas of that antagonism known as
the Powers of the Devil; it banishes the possibility of creation proving
a partial failure and enables the soul to recognize an ever-present,
all-pervading, though inscrutable God.
It may then be asked, Is God omnipotent? If believers in an incarnation
of Evil answer yes, what becomes of the foundation for such a belief? If
no, what becomes of their God? If He be omnipotent, He must be not only
the source of all power, but All Power. To assert otherwise is to
declare that there are two infinites—an assertion which contains its own
refutation. While the mind can conceive that God is All in All, it
cannot at the same time conceive that He is not All in All, or that the
Devil is a part of the All in All, in opposition and contradistinction
to God. Those, therefore, who believe that God is All in All, and also
believe in a Devil, believe an impossibility, for two persons or things
cannot be the same, or occupy the same place at the same time. The
absurdity, then, of the divisibility of the Supreme Power becomes at
once apparent. The argument is of importance as it furnishes a
well-defined basis, which meets every difficulty and arrays it in
support of the unity of all things and the supremacy of God.
The question, what and where is God? has been often asked; but the
various attempts to answer the unanswerable, have only given the
unreflecting mind another’s idea instead of a just and comprehensive
conception of God’s complete existence. In reasoning on so important an
inquiry, the mind should soar above principles and ideas, and in one
vast grasp say that God is the whole. Where is God? He is everywhere. In
this answer we have no clearer solution of the query than we have when
we say God is incomprehensible to the human mind; still the form is such
as the mind can use in measuring its relative parts.
From the Great First Cause, and from it alone, has come the present in
all its beauty and variety, material and spiritual. Though the effects
may continue to increase in number throughout an infinite future, the
sum of them can never amount to the First Cause. God must and will
forever remain superior to all the effects of the workings of this
power.
The material universe, science tells us, is composed of some sixty-four
or more elementary parts. An element cannot be resolved into two or more
different substances. These elements combine under certain conditions
and in certain proportions with each other to form compounds differing
materially from their component parts. Everything we see in nature is
formed of these elementary materials; yet, extensive as these compounds
are, they are fashioned according to universal and unchangeable laws.
While the existence of any of the elements uncombined is rare, their
combinations fill all space, and are co-extensive with the Divine
Spirit. Spirit and Matter—God and Nature, seem, therefore, to be forever
united.
But how have all these things come? What is this inexhaustible power
everywhere manifested, and what the laws governing its application? Go
back to the time when no compound bodies existed on this planet, and
what was there? God was there in all his absoluteness, all his infinity.
All the elements of matter were there in the same proportions and
quantities as now exist, but uncombined. In an abstract sense, an
element is a unit mass, without life, power or motion. What constitutes
it an existence, gives it life, power and motion, and the capacity of
combining with other diverse existences? We cannot conceive of matter,
even in its simplest form, as devoid of all active life principles, for
that would be to conceive a place, occupied by matter, where God is not.
Each element, therefore, contains its portion of the Eternal Spirit,
without which it would not even be a substance, but with which it can
unite with other similarly endowed simples. It seems impossible not to
conclude, then, that the life, power and motion found in all material
substances, is that life and power we call Infinite.
To further illustrate this indwelling life principle, we quote from a
celebrated author, who, speaking of the “winds and currents of the sea,”
says: “Men try to explain everything by the wind and the current. Now
there is in the air a force which is not wind, and in the water a force
that is not current. This force, the same in the air as in the water, is
effluvium. The air and the water are two masses of liquid nearly
identical and changing mutually into each other. * * * The effluvium is
alone fluid; the wind and the current are only impulses. The effluvium
is a steady stream * * * and is invisible. Yet from time to time it
says, ‘There I am;’ and its way of saying so is a thunder clap. The sea
is as much magnetic as watery. An ocean of forces floats unknown in the
ocean of currents. To see in the ocean only a mass of water is not to
see it at all.” To which we would add, that to see in the manifestations
of nature, nature only, is not to see it at all, for the power producing
it is not recognized. What is seen is not the reality, but that through
which the reality makes itself known.
What has thus far been considered may be consolidated into this
comprehensive proposition: That there is a power existing everywhere, of
which we can know nothing absolutely except that consciousness tells us
it is. At the same time we are conscious of our incapability to define
or comprehend it, and that all we can ever know of this power is its
physical manifestations. Hence the knowledge of what we see, hear, feel,
taste and smell is abstractly symbolic and relative, the only absolute
knowledge we can possibly have—if knowledge it be—is a consciousness of
our infinite existence. In this view of the existence of God, which is
the basis of all religious ideas, religion may be said to be superior to
science, because it remains immovable in consciousness. Religion belongs
to the unknowable; science deals with the knowable, which is the
manifestation of the unknowable. Therefore, viewed philosophically,
religion and science stand for the subjective and objective whose
relations comprise the whole. The presence, then, in consciousness, of
what we can by no means account for, must be the actual presence of that
of which consciousness is made up—the elementary spiritual principles
representative in us as individual existences of the great Infinite
existence.
Ambiguity in the use of terms leads to confusion of ideas and thought,
and is one great general cause of the ignorance and superstition still
existing among apparently enlightened nations. Many terms, supposed to
convey certain well-defined ideas, are found to be deficient when
analyzed, and others stand for nothing in substance. Many are in common
use whose meaning the man of religion, science or philosophy would be
embarrassed to explain. Chief among these are: The Infinite, The
Absolute, Causation and Effect, Power, Motion, Matter, Space, Time,
Resistance, Eternity, Immortality, Good, Evil, Heat, Light, Rewards,
Punishment, Justice, Law, Order. As the argument proceeds it will be
seen how nearly the whole of these and many similar terms are resolvable
into the few which convey realities.
All things that can be resolved into parts cannot be said to be
existences. Existence carries with it the idea of permanent continuity,
something self-dependent, superior to everything else as an entity. What
one term will express absolute superiority? The universe of space is
occupied by matter which, acted upon by an incomprehensible Power,
produces manifestations or motions. These being successive, time becomes
a necessary constituent. Do we need any other term to cover all the
manifestations? Is there any part of the universe left untouched by the
few terms? But allowing that they include the Whole, some one must be of
primary consequence, while the others are auxiliary thereto.
The term Motion will be found, on analysis, to be the result of Power
acting upon Matter, and the proposition is comprehensive enough to
include every known movement. Hence every manifestation in the material
world can readily be accounted for by the combination of these two
terms. Though not so immediately apparent, it will be shown that mental
manifestations are also included in this. If all manifestations are then
explainable by these two terms, all minor terms must be but names for
the different forms under which these two manifest themselves, and into
which they must ultimately be resolved. Motion, it was found, was
resolvable into Power and Matter. Can these be resolved into anything
more general than themselves?
The universe is composed objectively of matter. Is it made up of
anything else? An absolute vacuum is an impossibility in thought. Then
what we term space is filled with something, and only matter is
comprehensive enough to include all. But matter alone would convey the
idea of space filled with something at perfect rest. The term motion
then becomes necessary. This involves a subject, the cause of the
motion; and an object, the thing moved—power the cause, motion the
object. Can these be resolved into anything more general? As stated, the
universe is composed of matter, manifesting itself by and through
motion; and motion, as was seen, can be caused only by the application
of power to matter, and no other term is sufficiently general to
comprehend the causes of motion. By the union or duality of power and
matter everything is brought within the sphere of consciousness, if not
of comprehension. But which of all the manifestations of power acting
upon matter is of primary importance? Of which does consciousness
earliest take cognizance?
The universe of matter is boundless. Space conveys the idea of something
beyond which there is nothing. Else it would be limited by that which is
beyond, and we can conceive of nothing as existing without extension,
and extension implies the occupancy of a certain defined limit, which
limit must be within space. Space being undefinable, that which occupies
it must partake of the same characteristic when considered as a whole.
The same line of reasoning applies to power and time. Succession of
events compels an occupation of a part of infinite duration as matter,
relatively considered, occupies space; that is, between two or more
separate facts there must be a lapse of time before consciousness can
arrange them so as as to take cognizance thereof. Whether this is of
itself an actual existence, or some method of an actual existence, it is
a necessity to consciousness. Hence, time is related to power as space
is to matter. Power and matter being the subjective realities, while
space and time are their objective results, or the necessary effects of
the experience in consciousness of their united result, which is motion.
Our ideas of space and time are derived from experiences of power acting
upon matter, while motion, the effect thereof, unites the two in
consciousness as relative realities which must be a part of absolute
realities.
It is clear, then, that all we can know of the unknowable arises from
our experience of power and matter, and that within the sphere of their
manifestations all effects are included. But while each is necessary to
produce effect, we must not forget that we would have no consciousness
of the existence of matter were it not the object of the application of
power; hence we must conclude that power is of primordial importance,
and, as such, the most general and comprehensive of scientific terms.
All knowledge and consciousness grow out of experiences of power, which
must be considered the general ultimate. All theories regarding it are
but theories. Power is untouched by them, while matter, space, time and
motion may be considered either as its constituents or as modes of its
manifestations.
To make the argument more complete to those unaccustomed to resolve
phenomenon into its ultimate cause, some illustrations of such
resolutions will prepare the mind to accept the conclusions arrived at:
Let it be supposed that some circumstance calls for the manufacture of
cotton cloth unlike, in some respect, any ever manufactured—say in
width—how must it be produced? Reasoning inductively and given the raw
material, the last necessity apparently is a loom that will admit of the
width required and the prepared webbing and filling. Still, the cloth
cannot be produced without the further aid of motion in the loom, which
motion must be generated by power through certain machinery, obtained
from setting free such portion of power as had been concentrated in
coal. This expands water into steam; steam in escaping compels the
piston of the engine to move, and this motion is communicated to the
loom, the required cloth being the effect. It will be seen that whatever
intermediate processes were necessary they were all resolvable into the
power concentrated in the coal. What was then of first importance in the
production of cloth? It was neither the loom nor the cotton nor the
machinery, but the power giving motion to all. This illustration may be
used symbolically to explain everything incomprehensible in the
universe, that is, all manifestations of power working in and through
matter, producing motion and its effects.
All material effects being explained by power acting on matter, may not
this simple formula equally symbolize all mental operations the product
of which is thought? The question primarily arising would be, what is
thought and how is it produced? Let us analyze it. Something cannot be
produced from nothing. Thought is something. Thought is then the product
of something previously existing. Immateriality cannot be conceived of.
Therefore thought is not only material in itself, but the product of
matter in motion; and as motion is only possible through power applied
to matter, thought must be a result of such an operation. Can it be
explained and comprehended upon this theory? Let it be supposed that
some great noise should suddenly occur just outside a house in which
were 5,000 people. Each one would ask the mental question, or “think,”
What was that caused by? Now, that thought would be the product of the
sound heard. But how heard? Simply thus: Rapid vibrations of the air,
caused by some unknown matter in motion, came in contact with the organs
of hearing, were transmitted to the nerves, and finally taken up into
consciousness. The whole operation is a purely physical one, and there
is a perfect equivalent between the amount of vibration and the
resulting sensation; in other words, the effect corresponds to the
cause. It may also be remarked that a hundred physical bodies of
different weights produce as many different sensations; the difference
being always in exact proportion to the difference in their respective
weights. Similar differences follow when matter at various degrees of
temperature comes in contact with the body. The same is true regarding
light upon the optic nerve.
Let us next see if that variety of thought or sensation which arises
spontaneously within the individual is due to any different agency.
Perhaps the most comprehensive and conclusive evidence of the material
origin of thought is, that a child born under even favorable
circumstances, but kept from all external, material and mental
manifestations, grows up a simple idiot. Without, then, the
manifestation of power acting upon matter, no original individual
thought or conception is possible with the supposed exception of
spontaneous thought hereafter to be treated. Further evidence of this is
seen when an adult is kept in solitary confinement, or cast away upon an
uninhabited island; memory fails, language is lost, and the person
becomes a semi-idiot. The following extract, from an address by Dr. J.
W. Draper, is made to show that scientific men are admitting the fact
that the mind is the result of the processes here indicated—a collection
of facts gained by impressions constantly repeated. He says: “There are
successive phases * * * in the early action of the mind. As soon as the
senses are in working order * * * a process of collecting facts is
commenced. These are at first of the most homely kind, but the sphere
from which they are gathered is extended by degrees. We may, therefore,
consider that this collecting of facts is the earliest indication of the
action of the brain, and it is an operation which, with more or less
activity, continues through life. * * * Soon a second characteristic
appears. The learning of the relationship of the facts thus acquired to
one another. * * * This stage has been sometimes spoken of as the dawn
of the reasoning faculty. A third characteristic of almost
contemporaneous appearance may be remarked—it is the putting to use
facts that have been acquired and the relationships that have been
determined. * * * Now this triple natural process * * * must be the
basis of any right system of instruction. It appears, then, that contact
and constant intercourse with external manifestations is not only
necessary for the production of thought and its collaterals, but that to
retain the consciousness which makes thought possible such
manifestations must be continuously impressed upon the individual. This
seems to be conclusive that mind is the result of the experiences of the
manifestations of power.”
There is still more subtle evidence that thought, which is only the
memory of past manifestations of power, or deduction of reason upon
them, is the product of material action. All mental action depends upon
the nervous apparatus, and is limited by its capacity. The activity and
power of this apparatus is in a great measure dependent upon the
quantity of phosphorus supplied to it, and this varies at different
periods of life.
The point in question is further sustained by the fact that the rapidity
of thought varies with the supply of blood to the brain. Reduce the
action of the heart to forty beats per minute, and a feeling of languor
permeates the whole system. On the other hand, excess of cerebral
circulation results in excitement amounting sometimes to actual
delirium. We must, then, either admit that mental action is a product of
material power, and consequently itself material, or else conclude that,
while it is the result of the expenditure of power, it is in its
character immaterial, which would be absurd, because it is impossible to
represent immateriality in thought, as consciousness requires a
subjective action and objective reception of it to complete a thought,
while immateriality is neither.
Not only is mental action affected by the quantity of blood supplied to
the brain, but also by its quality. This is fully shown in the progress
of certain diseases that prevent its being properly oxygenized, and even
more conspicuously in the administration of anæsthetics. A similar
effect can be produced upon the brain by deep, full and continuously
rapid breathing, by which an undue amount of oxygen is introduced into
the circulation.
It appears, then, that having a perfect nervous apparatus, certain
special materials must be supplied to it from or by which to manufacture
mental and nervous action. Excessive mental action and powerful and
continuous emotions produce, as everybody knows, physical prostration.
From whatever position, then, we may view any action the physical,
mental or nervous system is capable of producing, we come finally to the
conclusion that they are possible only as the result of the expenditure
of some physical power, and every mind that will justly consider the
evidence must give its adhesion to what science is rapidly making plain.
Before closing the consideration of thought another phase of its
manifestations demands attention. Who has not observed the effect of one
or two minds concentrated upon another person unconscious of the
intention? The object of such concentration becomes conscious of the
fact, and invariably, though involuntarily, looks in the direction
whence the influence proceeds. Before following this to its legitimate
deductions it must be taken for granted that there is an individual
existence after the dissolution of the physical body. Nearly all people
accept this as a part of consciousness. From two propositions already
received and well understood, a third may be deduced, and along with it
will follow such legitimate additional thoughts, ideas, impressions, and
modifications of former ones, as such deductions necessarily imply. But
how shall those thoughts not derived from anything already in
consciousness, be accounted for? And are not all conscious of receiving
many such thoughts in passive conditions and during sleep? Following up
the truth that something cannot be produced from nothing, the source of
these must be found, else our premises are false or incomplete.
Every variety of mental action can be communicated. Given a mind
possessed of a new truth and one that has not yet perceived it, the
former can communicate it to the latter. This communication and
reception have been effected through the medium of speech. Another
method is through written or printed language. All this is simply
symbolic. Sounds and written or printed forms are in themselves nothing
but motion in the atmosphere and material formations by common consent
accepted to represent other and previous material formations. The one
thing of primary importance is, that the symbols used must be previously
understood by both parties to represent identical things at all times.
Thought, expressed in an unknown language, is not comprehended; this
indicates that thought abstracted from form is never communicated. It
cannot rise into consciousness even, except through an established form.
Capability of thought is only possible as the result of constant contact
with external manifestations, systematized under certain regular and
received forms which always remain purely symbolic.
It remains to be considered how mind affects mind, through the
concentration of the will, without the apparent use of the above methods
of communication. We have seen that sounds produce an effect upon the
object through the sense of hearing. But can you analyze hearing, and
show how the sounds rise into consciousness? When forms are used an
effect is produced through vision. But how does vision rise into
consciousness? We have seen that an effect is produced by a
concentration of the mind upon an object, but how this effect rises into
consciousness is beyond our comprehension.
We can now proceed to the application of what has been offered, to the
communication between minds by other methods than sound and form. Whence
all these thoughts and impressions that steal into consciousness through
no apparent form? The conclusion seems inevitable that mind can
influence mind, whether it be within a physical organization or out of
it. We predicate, therefore, that all thoughts, ideas, impressions, and
sensations not coming from present external manifestations nor from
previously acquired facts, nor yet from direct communications through
recognized symbols, are emanations received from some unknown mind
either in or out of the physical form. Nor can we escape from this
conclusion, unless we concede that this case forms an exception to the
general law. All forms, then, of thought, emotion and sensation are the
legitimate result of the expenditure of power, and may be arrayed in
support of the premises that Life, Power, and Motion, wherever found,
are Unitary.
Let us consider in continuation, what application this unity has as the
basis of physical life. What constitutes this basis? Is physical life
the direct effect of the edict of a God reigning over the whole universe
from some unknown point within it? No, the theory of a special
Providence is fast giving place to new and better things—to law and
order. It is beginning to dawn upon mankind that “the only true God”
must be beyond our comprehension as the universe is, and that it is
folly or presumptive egotism to assert that God is this or that. A God
possessing such inconsistent infinite powers as are usually ascribed to
him, is fast being discarded by all thinkers. Therefore the basis must
be sought elsewhere.
The universe is ruled in uniform ways. Special enactments for special
contingencies are inconsistent with our conception of the nature of that
general law by which all is governed. This alone is inferable, when
viewed with the conclusions previously arrived at, that things of which
we can be conscious are unitary in origin and in ultimate effect.
Supreme rule is removed beyond the pale of vicissitudes of time and
circumstance. The deduction, then, is that the cause of physical life is
universally the same, the manifestations being varied according to the
properties involved in them. Does life then consist of anything more
than this uniform Basis Power?
The world of mind demands facts, not theories. Truth is no longer
feared, no matter how terribly it may shock the sensibilities of the
religiously-educated and philosophically-dwarfed intellect. Let us have
truth, then, even if it strips away the last of our preconceived
opinions. The cry for more light continues to extend. You who cannot yet
endure its brightness hide yourselves behind clouded dogmas, creeds and
theories. We know no creed but that which declares that an infinite,
inscrutable Power is the life of all things, material and spiritual; we
know no dogma save that life is the operation of this Power; we know no
theory but that which makes clear the laws and modes by which these
operations are governed.
Discarding, then, all dogmas, the growing minds strikes boldly out for
truth, and he who catches but faint glimpses of it badly performs his
duty if he attempts to hide it from his brothers. If in its attainment
the Church crumbles, why falter? If governments totter, why falter?
Whatever will be crushed out by new discoveries and publication of truth
has already performed its mission. Suppose, for example, that the
grossest materialism ever conceived of was absolutely true, would it not
be best that the world should be convinced of its truth? It speaks
little for any system of religion or philosophy that it cannot bear the
light of facts, but evades, shuts out, or hurls anathemas at that which
it cannot refute. Such a course stands condemned before the tribunal of
a progressive philosophy. The very effort of a late institution in
opposition to physical freedom precipitated upon it its own destruction;
such will doubtless be the result of an attempt now being made by a
powerful institution to rivet religious bondage upon its subjects.
In continuing this subject, extracts will be made from Prof. Huxley’s
lecture, “The New Theory of Life, or Matter the Basis of Vitality,” to
show that science has demonstrated that “life” is the same everywhere;
and though he disclaims materialistic philosophy, the tendency of these
extracts is in that direction. While matter must be looked to for all
expression of facts, it must not be overlooked that the realm of power
or spirituality is the producing cause; consequently, while allowing
science full scope in analyzing, demonstrating and systematizing facts,
religion must not be despoiled of its basis idea which remains immovably
fixed in consciousness. The Professor says: “I have translated the term
_Protoplasm_, which is the scientific name of the substance I am about
to speak of by the words ‘The Physical Basis of Life.’ * * * * To many,
the idea that there is such a thing as a physical basis or matter of
life may be novel. * * * Even those who are aware that matter and life
are inseparably connected may not be prepared for the conclusion plainly
suggested by the phrase ‘The Physical Basis of Life.’” After giving
various illustrations, drawn from nearly every department of nature,
grasping contrasts and dissimilarities, he adds: “I propose to
demonstrate that, notwithstanding these apparent difficulties, a
three-fold unity—a unity of power or faculty, a unity of form and a
unity of substantial composition, does pervade the whole living
world; * * that the complicated and multifarious activities of man are
comprehensible under three categories—either they are immediately
directed toward the maintenance and development of the body, or they are
to effect transitory changes in the relative positions of parts of the
body; or they tend toward the continuance of the species. Even the
manifestation of intellect, of feeling and of will, are not excluded
from the classification.”
Prof. Huxley then illustrates the action of the _protoplasm_ in the
common nettle and in the drop of blood, showing that both plants and
animals have their origin in a particle of nucleated _protoplasm_, and
that this _protoplasm_ “not only dies and is resolved into its mineral
and lifeless constituents, but is always dying, and strange as the
paradox may seem, could not live unless it died.” Thus we are led to the
conclusion that all matter has a common basic principle by which we
obtain our evidences of it. It is equally clear that analysis fails to
grapple this principle, for the process dissipates the power that
compelled the combination. Dead _protoplasm_ differs from living in that
something has departed from it, and though we cannot catch this to
decide upon its nature, can we with consistency say it is a property of
matter? If it is, what has become of it that it does not manifest itself
again upon the recombination of the matter it once made use of? One fact
is evident, and seems to be conclusive. This life principle never
manifests itself through artificial combinations of matter. Again, is
there no difference between ordinary matter and “matter of life?” What
changes the former into the latter, and _vice versa_? If chemical
analysis can tell us nothing about the composition of living matter,
what can it tell us of life itself? If nucleated _protoplasm_ is the
basis of all life, and yet nothing but matter, why does one “structural
unit” of it produce a plant, another an animal? While it is evident that
the material composition of these units is uniform, it seems to be quite
absurd to say that chemical analysis teaches everything that they
comprehend.
If the manifestations of matter are the result of its properties, the
law must be of general application. Water always seeks its level: is
that a property of water or the result of gravitation? Water can be
expanded into vapor: is this a property of water or the result of the
introduction of heat? Is it a property of matter that transfers the
digestible and animal food we eat into man? Does man exhibit nothing but
the properties of matter? It is evident that after the strictest
chemical analysis the vital life principle common to all matter remains
unreached—thus indicating its great ultimate character, which is beyond
the reach of both chemical and mental analysis.
What is this power by which the nucleated _protoplasm_ of the various
species always produces representatives of the one which furnished the
germ? If it were simply a property of nucleated _protoplasm_, considered
as matter, why should not a germ from the lion just as readily produce a
lamb? In the various crosses between animals, the aggregated masses of
_protoplasm_ partaking of both, the inference plainly is that in each of
the particles of _protoplasm_ was contained a power which controlled
their successive aggregations and modifications. Other evidence that the
determining power is something more than a mere property of matter is
found in the fact that if the young of several different species of
animals be reared in company and fed with the same material, they will
each retain the peculiarities of the species they represent, modified
somewhat by the community of influence exerted on them. The same is true
of the offspring of different races and nations.
The law indicated is still more generally applicable, descending as it
does from the wide range of species and nations to each individual
member thereof. Upon different individuals the same cause, acting under
like circumstances, produces different effects, and this difference is
dependent upon something more persistent than matter which is constantly
changing. Is this persistent individuality a property of the matter we
possess now, or of that which we shall be made up of some years hence?
The consciousness of each one answers that this individuality is
superior to the vicissitudes of matter—this consciousness having this
peculiarity over its consciousness of the manifestations of matter, that
while it constantly acquires new experiences it loses none of those
previously acquired.
We know nothing of this power, except that it is a name for an unknown
cause: and so far as practical utility is concerned, the distinction
between power and matter might be discarded, the danger of falling
thereby into the slough of materialistic philosophy being avoided, if we
remember that all the knowledge we can acquire is simply relative and
symbolic.
Returning for a moment to the fact of reproduction, to ascertain if
possible the determining power by which one “structural unit” of
nucleated protoplasm develops into a beast, and another chemically
identical into a man, and realizing fully that this power is beyond
common modes of proof we infer that a reasonable conclusion can only be
deduced from observing the general unchanging law of the constant
recurrence of similar results under similar circumstances. The first
step in the inquiry is to ask what “protoplasm” is, and how and where it
is obtained.
Prof. Huxley informs us that its chemical constituents are carbon,
hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen, which form carbonic acid, water and
ammonia; and that these are compounded by plants into the “matter of
life” or protoplasm, which is the first compound of elements possessing
inherent organic motion. This being the only way protoplasm can be
produced, we must always look to the vegetable world for continuous
supplies of it; and though we obtain it in large quantities from the
animal world, it is only at second-hand. In the vegetable world, then,
must we find the first traces of organic life. But though plants thus
manufacture protoplasm, they are not wholly protoplasm, but consist of
various other elements necessary in an organized form. The manufacture
of protoplasm may be considered the end of the vegetable world. This
substance builds up the animal world, and forms a connecting link
between the kingdoms.
How long it took protoplasm to produce its ultimate animal man we cannot
ascertain, but the numerous species and varieties thereof between the
simplest and most complete compounds signify a labor of which we can
scarcely conceive, and yet science has traced and classified it all,
each succeeding link in the chain being a little more complex, until man
appears. As no higher types have been produced it is fair to presume
that none can be. The formula, then, that will present man will include
everything below him in the order of creation, not only in the animal
and vegetable kingdoms, but in the inorganic world upon which the
vegetable is founded.
It remains to be observed that in the order of nature each of the
various species of animals reproduces its kind, and gradually merges
into the next higher, but never recedes. Each species represents in
different proportions and numbers the “structural units,” from which,
reproduction follows, each unit containing the life principle
representative of the general life principle of the animal from which it
comes. Now, it is predicated as a result of the study of nature that
this life principle is the determining power that controls the process
whereby protoplasm builds up such various and dissimilar material
reforms. Dead protoplasm consists of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and
nitrogen; living protoplasm, of these permeated and held together by
this life principle, and this differs in its controlling power according
to the formations it has gone through. Thus the “structural unit” of the
lion or of the horse, containing the life principle peculiar to each,
develops into a lion or a horse, as the case may be, unless in this
process it is furnished with living protoplasm containing a life
principle of different determining powers, when the aggregate result is
a modification of the two powers.
Again, if the phenomena presented by matter are its absolute properties,
the same elements and combinations should always produce identical
results when taken into the human system. Do facts coincide with this?
This “matter of life” should, if it is simply matter, always produce
similar effects from whatever source it is derived. It is a
physiological fact, however, that habitual living upon certain kinds of
food—all containing this identical “matter of life”—does produce
heterogeneous effects, mental and physical, upon the system. Thus, if a
person who has constantly lived upon animal food changes his diet
entirely to fruit and vegetables, a corresponding change will take place
in his individual capacities.
The same point is well illustrated by a case which occurred in England,
where saltpetre, obtained direct from the soil, was quite inert compared
with that obtained from animal substances, the cause of the difference
being due to the tact that the latter, in passing through the animal
kingdom, had acquired a power which it did not previously possess. This
illustration is of general application. It is evident that matter, in
passing through each successive and higher organic form, becomes
impregnated with the life principle which determines such form, and
which manifests itself in all future combinations into which such matter
enters.
The question now naturally arises, Is there a life principle common to
all matter, which has become variously modified as the elements of
matter have become modified by having given rise to or passed through
the different changes and steps between its original homogeneous state
and its present heterogeneous condition? Or are we to conclude that all
matter is dead, except that termed “matter of life?” That there is,
consequently, no life except organic life, and that this organic life is
a special creation entering into a single compound, which thereby raised
to the dignity of “matter of life,” makes use of other elements as
auxiliaries to its supreme rule? With all proper deference to “matter of
life,” we would ask, what do we know of life except as a result of
motion? and where can matter be found that does not manifest motion? and
how could the compound in which the “matter of life” is first found,
have been compounded without motion? If the life principle, manifested
by protoplasm, is simply a property of matter, I see no logical reason
why the motion existing in matter should not with equal propriety be
called its property. This brings us to first principles, to the
threshold of elemental combination, for if this power determines the
forms compounds shall assume, why should it not determine simple
elemental form also?
Protoplasm is the foundation of all organic life; and if we add to this
that this substance is itself the ultimate of a previous system of
formation, the formula will express the whole. Yet it must not be
forgotten that the building up of organic life is the result of a
constructive power common to the universe, and not indigenous to
protoplasm alone. It must then be apparent that there is a power common
to all matter, of which the motion or life inherent in living protoplasm
is but a modification; also, that the capacity of this common power for
modification is only limited by the necessary forms to represent it, and
the time required to develop them.
If this view of the power that pervades the universe is correct, the
real basis of life lies retrospectively far behind the motion contained
in or manifested by the matter of life, and this motion, instead of
being life of matter in its absolute sense, is but one of its modes of
expression. This homogeneous power common to matter still exists,
undisturbed in extent, though most heterogeneously distributed in the
formations which make up the present external universe.
The basis of physical life, then, is this power, and this power is the
same that was found to be unitary, though incomprehensible in its
extent, while its manifestations are simply symbolic of that unlimited
power which is alone attributable to the Unknowable, commonly designated
God. If this conclusion is not in accordance with the modes of
manifestation, there is no halting-place between it and the opposite
extreme of the materialist that “there is no God”—that matter is all
there is in the universe. If materialistic philosophy involve “grave
error,” it becomes the duty of all who detect this tendency to preserve
and point out the distinctions between the “matter of life” and the life
of matter.
If the true province of philosophy is to discern the “soul of truth,”
said to exist “in all erroneous things,” it ill becomes the ultra
Spiritualist with a “soul of truth,” contained within his vast body of
errors, to denounce the ultra Materialist, who, if he has not the “soul
of truth,” has a vast body of it. To the superficial thinker, the
Materialist may seem to be the more consistent of the two, as he can in
part comprehend his truth, while the Spiritualist cannot. Whether one is
more or less consistent than the other matters not, so far as their
predications are concerned.
But the ultra Spiritualist would show his consistency by descending to
the plane of the Materialist to find in his “body of truths” evidences
of the handiwork of his God, which his ultra religious ideas fail to
furnish; and the ultra Materialist would show his by ascending to the
plane of the Spiritualist to find in his “soul of truth” the key that
shall transform his “body of truth” into living evidence of an unlimited
Power entirely beyond the pale of matter or the keenest scientific
analysis.
TENDENCIES AND PROPHECIES OF THE PRESENT AGE.
[Revised from the American Workman of October 9, 1869.]
NO. I.
It is eminently proper, before approaching the future of any subject, to
make strictest inquiry and most diligent search in and around its
present—to look with retrospective glance upon the convergent paths of
the past that have led to its present, and to catch the indices pointing
onward; and, having found them, to judge whether such as Time’s
unfolding calendar has left here and there along the pathway of passing
events were reliable prophecies of what was to come—were truthful
indications of what was to follow. In the judgment determined and
warranted by the evidences obtained, a certain basis may be found upon
which to predicate the prophecies of the living present.
The existing present is the absolute result of the eternal past; the sum
total of all that has gone before; the product of God’s everlasting
workings, by and through unchangeable law upon the elemental material
universe; nor can there be extracted from this result, this sum total,
this product, one simple separate effect which is not the legitimate
offspring of the operation of immutable law, co-extensive with the
universe, and co-existent with God.
A proposition that there are powers within God’s realm which did not
spring from Him, or that the Original Cause has, in the economy of
Nature, found it necessary to amend and change the original law, in
order to accomplish His original purpose, or that contingencies have
arisen which have demanded special enactments on the part of the Divine
Ruler, presupposes that God did not know the end from the beginning, or,
knowing it, was incompetent to provide therefor. Such a proposition,
entertained by the human mind, destroys within it the God of the
universe, and leaves the world, to it, a mere toy in the hands of its
master, subject, at all times, to the caprices of his infinite rule, to
be led here and there by circumstances he knew not of previous to their
external development.
It may be said, that reasoning upon the character of God’s government,
or the mode through which he manifests himself to the world, is not
pertinent to the subject in view; to those who think thus the query
should be propounded—What of the _future_ without a reliable present?
and what of the effects that must follow, if the operating, existing
general laws of the universe be not the same in a thousand years as now?
It becomes, then, extremely important that some permanent, unchangeable
basis be found before proceeding to predicate the future; and unless God
is the same yesterday, to-day and forever, we can find no certain basis
upon which to stand and from which we can start.
We have but to question the earth whether or not, from its incipiency
onward through countless ages, it has obeyed the one great command,
Progress? and in answer received, determine if, in the past, God has
found it necessary to change the great fundamental laws of the universe.
Geology tells in unmistakable writings what the earth was; we have but
to look about us to see what it is. At no time since _it was_ can we
learn that the law of progressive unfoldment has been inverted, and the
world turned backward toward its commencing point. Since this has not
occurred in the past, we may safely assume that it will not occur in the
future; the law of progress may be accepted as one of God’s immutable
decrees. The universe to-day, in all its variety and beauty, is no more
in essence than it was millions of years ago, when it first assumed its
orbital movements; the same elements exist in the exact quantity—nothing
added—nothing taken away. Progress is simply a new arrangement of
elementary principles.
Simple elements are indestructible; when two or more are combined, and
produce an effect, the combination may be destroyed, and the elements
separated and returned to their natural condition. This process is not
one of destruction, but simply of change of the relations of the
elements that formed the combination. An acorn deposited in the earth
attracts to itself such elements as produce growth; after years of
labor, the mighty oak is the result. Although in its formation it has
taken from the earth and air certain properties, the same quantity of
such proportions still exists—nothing new has been created, a new form
only has been produced by Nature, testifying that she never rests. Now,
suppose a power were applied to the oak to dissolve it, the oak only
would be destroyed, not the properties that entered into its
composition.
It is supposed there are a certain number of elementary principles
contained in and that make up the material universe; were these
principles simple units, incapable of divisibility, we could, by
applying the rule of geometrical progression, soon arrive at the exact
number of different combinations, and consequently the exact number of
different forms they are capable of producing; but, being infinite in
quantity and divisibility, infinitude of form and effect is possible.
The power of arrangement being infinite, infinitude of association and
combination is the legitimate result.
Combination and association began in the simplest forms! When God, by
his omnipotent voice, spoke the earth into existence, as an individual
planet, it contained exactly the same elements of which it is now
composed; but they were simply in elemental form, without organization,
and, consequently, without variety of manifestation in form; motion
being an inherent quality, constant agitation brought the elements into
relations and combinations, simple at first; but by constant change they
arose from the simple to the complex, and from the complex toward the
infinite, and in the sum total of them we have the living present.
The argument does not require that minute examination of geological
science be made, following, one by one, the rise and fall, the
organization and destruction of each of its classified periods, nor of
the specific results by and through each; but only to recognize _the
law_ by which these results are arrived at. It is possible to so trace
and classify these results as to show a continuous chain of progression,
link by link, from the simplest form of combination, to the most complex
and perfect, wherein all the original elements were first
represented—man! Having arrived at perfection of form, wherein all the
properties of the material world find themselves forming a part, it
might reasonably be accepted that progression in formation would cease;
while it has ceased so far as producing higher types is concerned, it
has not in the quality of the types already produced; and in this
proposition lies the greatest problem of life; the one most difficult
for the human mind to grasp. Man, representing in form all that has gone
before, is the result of the grand chain of progressive material
formations; and, having combined within his physical form a portion of
every element contained in the world, he may be likened in his infancy
to the infancy of the earth. God, in spirit, pervades all material
nature, and the union—if union it may be called—forms a perfect whole,
and man being an epitome of all things contained in the material world,
receives into his organization the spirit of each of its representative
constituent parts, and consequently is endowed with all the spiritual
attributes of the universe, the attributes of God! and, as God is
eternal, man, created in His image, must likewise be eternal.
As the earth, in its first efforts at organization, combined but few of
its principles, and presented the crudest form, and as time rolled on
and its combinations continued to include more and more of the several
principles, so with man; in his infancy his spiritual manifestations
were crude in the extreme, but there has constantly been brought into
co-operative combination, more and more of the spiritual principles, and
higher and higher types of spiritual manifestations have been the
result.
If man, as a unit, were analyzed to-day, he would be found to be made up
spiritually of the elements corresponding to that age of the development
of the physical world of which he is now the representative; that is to
say, in his manifestations spiritually, he exhibits the same ratio of
spiritual elements that the earth did in her manifestations in material
elements at the time in her growth corresponding with the present
condition and growth of man.
If cool and deliberate reason, unbiased by mythological and theoretical
dogmas, be applied to the correspondence between the material and
spiritual elements, the conclusion can scarcely fail to be arrived at,
that each primary element of the material universe is the external
expression and representative of a spiritual attribute of God; and as
there are a definite number of elements in nature, forming the perfect
_material whole_, so there are an equal number of analagous spiritual
elements that constitute the _spiritual whole_.
As the elements and their corresponding interior principles are
susceptible of infinite combinations and associations, the varied
manifestations of nature and man are readily accounted for. Nor should
it be forgotten that each of the manifestations is the legitimate and
inevitable result of the combination out of which it springs; and, as
the combination is not self-creative, but the result of the action of
progressive law, so the effect of the combination is but the outward
expression of the purposes contained within the law, behind the
formation of the combination, and is thus the result of God’s operative
law of progress.
Having argued thus far to show that the _present age_, material, mental
and spiritual, is the legitimate result of the law of progressive
development, the following propositions are deduced therefrom, forming a
basis or platform from which to ask of the present—What of the future?
Whither doth it lead?
First—All power, wherever manifested, is a unit.
Second—God is the source of all power, and the elements the subject of
its application.
Third—Each attribute of God has its corresponding material element.
Fourth—All the material elements constitute the material world; all the
spiritual elements, God.
Fifth—There is nothing contained in creation outside of the power of
God, on the one hand, and the elementary principles on the other—the
first positive, the last negative.
Sixth—Nothing can be added to what was; nothing taken away from what is.
Seventh—All the diversities in nature are the legitimate effect of the
power of God, operating through and upon different elements, and
different proportions of different elements, contained in nature, the
diversity being infinite, because the material and producing power are
infinite.
Eighth—Man, collectively, being the representative of all the material
and spiritual elements, the individual diversities observed in him are
the legitimate result of the different relative proportions of these
elements contained in his organization.
Ninth—The present is the result of spiritual principles acting upon and
through the material elements during the eternal past.
Giving a comprehensive glance at the world it will be seen that
_government_ of some kind is everywhere established, which purports to
rule the people embraced within certain geographical boundaries. An
analysis of each form, from the crudest and most barbarous up through
all the modifications of civilized government, will discover that each
government was a true exponent of the character of the people by or over
whom it was established. Every country, as it advances in intellectual
and moral development, demands modifications in its government adapted
to the improved capacity of the people. Hence, as the character of the
governed progresses, so must that of the government keep pace with that
of the governed, else the power behind it will rise to its _might_, and
_sweep it away_.
There is but little doubt that the government of this country is the
highest form now in existence on the earth; but to show how crude and
even barbarous it is, reference only has to be made to the terrible
conflict it has just survived, which became inevitable and necessary as
the only practical demonstration of the power of the principles upon
which it purports to have been founded—that all men are born free and
equal, and entitled to certain inalienable rights, among which are life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This proposition was made
fundamental by great and good men, the representative lights of the
country at that time, standing far in advance of the general mind.
Liberty and equity had burst upon their souls under the sway of tyranny
and oppression, which became so odious that anything was preferable to
them, to longer enduring its injustice. In this land, far removed from
that where freedom could not lift its head—with a mighty ocean rolling
between, they felt they had found a secure asylum from further
oppression, and a land where their new-born hopes could be realized.
But, unfortunately, all who came to the _New World_ had not these hopes
and anticipations; some there were who still desired the strong hand of
the tyrant to sway; and, thus invoked, it reached even across the mighty
deep, and sought anew to enslave these new-born sons of freedom.
Submission they never thought of—resistance was their only theme; and
most thoroughly did they resist; through the long conflict that ensued,
carried on by them under every conceivable disadvantage, their hopes
never completely died out; and at last—triumphant over the crown—freedom
reigned!
It cannot be wondered at that souls rising from such a conflict as the
Revolution, triumphant, should assert so broad a proposition in behalf
of equality as they did at the commencement of the struggle; nor is it
wonderful that the great majority of the people did not understand, or
did not have a full perception of the principle for which their
representatives periled their lives and fortunes and pledged their
sacred honor; but principles which were but partially discerned by the
Fathers of the Republic have now grown into rules of action enforced by
the sanctions of fundamental law; slavery of the body is no longer
possible; the verdict of the majority of the people proclaimed it
“behind the age.”
The South, recognizing this fact, knew that separation from the
progressive mind of the North was the only chance for the continuance of
a system which furnished so many excuses for physical, mental and moral
lethargy; and in their attempt to separate, they precipitated a conflict
in which history repeated itself, and freedom came out triumphant; thus
what sprung from the seeds of tyranny and oppression, left scattered
here and there by those who made that broad declaration, have been
finally uprooted, and never more can take root and flourish under the
scorching blaze of freedom’s noontide sun.
That physical, mental and spiritual lethargy was the condition of the
South under the system of slavery all statistics touching this point
indisputably attest; and the verdict of fifty years will pronounce the
abolition of their system the greatest blessing God has yet vouchsafed
them; it has opened the door of progress for all things, material and
spiritual, and has rescued from the barbaric chains of the past a
country more favored by God, in the bestowal of natural advantages, than
any other on the face of the globe.
The general love of freedom, because it is an inherent right, is one of
the first evidences the soul presents that it is growing from the
boundaries and control of the material, from which it sprang, into those
of the spiritual toward which it tends. When this love first takes root
the soul has attained that degree of development wherein the spiritual
has the superior control of the individual, resulting from the
predominance of the spiritual over the material.
The fact that the general sentiment of the country demanded that slavery
should no longer exist within its boundaries, is a very significant one,
when considered in connection with the tendencies and prophecies of the
present; it shows that the capacity and desire for freedom is being
rapidly developed in the human soul; it indicates that the mind begins
to appreciate what freedom really guarantees to its votaries in its
broadest signification; it begins to recognize the glorious truth that
every soul will, sooner or later, demand and receive all its rights.
The demands of public sentiment, which have already resulted in
modifications of the constitution of the country, will not stop at the
door of African slavery, which it has thrown wide open; there are many
other systems of slavery still left to be abolished; while they do not
all enslave the body, they so fetter the soul and the mind, that their
influence is even more pernicious and galling than the enslavement of
the body.
The African slave, toiling under the burning sun in the cotton, rice and
sugar plantations of the South, was virtually in possession of more
freedom of soul than are many of the white race, even in our own midst.
Look into these things, and see if, while you have “cast the mote out of
your brother’s eye,” you have not a “_beam_” in your own; these, however
numerous, will in turn and time demand of the people and of the
government, when in its province, such attention as may be required to
extend freedom in all directions where “life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness” legitimately lead.
The history of the past as well as the tendencies of the present
prophecy with distinctness and positiveness that the demand will soon go
out, not only for a government founded on equal rights to all, but whose
laws shall be administered with justice and equity, guaranteeing freedom
of body, mind and soul to every living intelligence.
From evidences rapidly accumulating, it is believed that this country is
ripening for such a form and administration of government; but in the
present condition of society and of servitude to its customs, the
imperfect and partial manner of arriving at representation, and of
making and administering law, such a reform cannot be inaugurated; that
is to say, although such a reform would be acceptable to and welcomed by
the country, and will soon be demanded by it, as yet it is impossible to
organize an effort, strictly within itself, that could effect it,
because there is not a sufficient concentration of understanding upon
the requirements to be met, nor of wisdom enough to draft for these
requirements adequate laws and forms of administration. Were such a code
prepared and submitted to the people, do you think it would be rejected?
In the earlier days of the republic legislation seems to have been
conducted upon constitutional principles; but in these latter days it
has so far departed from its seeming mainsprings of action that it is
safe to assert that legislation, founded strictly upon considerations of
principles of justice and right, is unknown in the land. If sometimes a
great principle is demonstrated through legislation, it will invariably
be found upon strict investigation, that the legislation was not
predicated upon the principle, but upon some personal or party benefit
expected to flow therefrom; the _principle_, therefore, stands under
obligation to the expected benefit, and to the party _needing_ it, and
will doubtless, in its impartial operations, _remember_ them. While this
condition is a perfectly legitimate one, flowing from adequate producing
causes, there are individual minds and souls, by thousands, who rise in
their capacities for government out of it, and demand reform and the
essential truth of Principle.
Government may be compared to an individual who, having committed some
infringement upon the law of justice, is impelled, by the position it
forces him into, to continue the practice to sustain himself from
falling; but as a system of injustice cannot be perpetual, fail he must,
sooner or later; and the longer it is delayed, the more complete will be
the wreck and ruin when it comes;—as with the individual, so it must be
with the State. Once started upon a system of law-making and executing
not founded upon principles of justice and right, the course must be
pursued and sustained by further enactments, either to _cover_ the
deformities of the previous proceeding or _hide_ its purposes, and
unless righteous judgment come to the rescue before the course has led
to wide-spread and apparent corruption throughout all its channels of
administration, it must eventually culminate in the downfall of the
government, if not in the destruction of the nation.
Policy, not principle, is the ruling power behind all present
legislation. Policy, inevitably and indiscriminately, leads to
corruption. Corruption, obeying the inherent laws of its own nature,
untouched by and beyond the control of the enactments that first gave it
life and afterward fostered its growth, must culminate in certain
destruction to all parts involved, whether it be within the body human,
the body corporate or the body politic.
Did the Republican party, as a party, desire the freedom of the negro
simply and solely because it was one of his natural rights? Would
freedom have been extended to him by that party had it been positively
known that all his influence would be used against it? Or would the
Democratic party, as a party, have opposed the enfranchisement of the
negro had it been known that he would become its political ally?
Judging from the indices of the past, it is fair to suspect, at least,
if not to conclude, that the Republican party is expecting another such
exigency as existed when it was found politic to extend freedom and
suffrage to the negro; and in the question of female suffrage, for which
the demand is now being earnestly made, there is but little doubt that
it sees another means of salvation in the future, and seeks to postpone
the question until the exigency shall become more imminent and
dangerous. It may be argued that the Republican party was organized upon
the principles of freedom. If this were wholly true, it would be also
true that it had no sooner become a party in power than it resolved
itself into a tribunal to define the limits for the application of the
very principles that had placed it in power; thereby endeavoring to
prostitute the principle to subserviency to the policy of its leaders,
instead of calmly and firmly following where it would legitimately lead;
like all parties and sects, of previous origin, it built upon a
principle, and then, instead of wisely following, recklessly attempted
to guide it.
With all the prestige of possession, and of being the acknowledged
representative of the principle which had carried it into power, the
result of the late elections began to be feared by the party, because
its leaders knew they had driven it from its birthright, and led it
after strange gods; and, had the opposing party been actuated by true
progressive principles of justice, no man, however popular in himself,
could have saved it from destruction.
Conscious of having departed from the principles that gave it power, the
Republican party is even now seeking every means within its grasp to
fortify itself behind measures looking solely to success in ’72; but it
is prophesied that ere that time there will have sprung into existence
another party that will not be the mere professed representative of
freedom and equal rights to all, but the actual, living, moving,
irresistible incarnation of those principles.
The lines of policy pursued by party leaders, and the channels of
corruption opened by the executive officers of the government, have
produced a result so wide-spread in its influence and ramifications
that, instead of their being under the control of the government, they
exert a vast if not controlling power over all its actions; it is not
necessary to go beyond its own records to establish this fact; every
newspaper in the country teems with evidence in point; the clergy have
deemed the situation dangerous enough to hurl the anathemas of the
Church against it; the dramatist and the artist, the poet and the
philosopher, have each dealt his blow, while the “toiling millions”
everywhere cry for reform.
So general and earnest has the demand for reform become that something
must be done; the gathering masses of corruption all over the body will
soon have ripened to bursting; and who can tell how much the body itself
has become involved. May it not be feared that it does not possess
sufficient recuperative purity and strength to stand the shock? Could
the enlightened mental, moral and spiritual elements of the country
which are possessed by those who stand in the front ranks of the
advancing column of progress be combined into organized action, they
might be able to arrest the abnormal growth of corruption, and, by
strengthening and stimulating the sound members of the body to
co-operative action, restore the whole system to its normal condition.
The machinery of the government has become so complex and unwieldy—so
full of departmental and petty offices—that it is utterly beyond the
power of one man, though he be “_a great and mighty_ President,” to
understand and control it.
The tendencies of the government being dangerous to the liberties of the
people, their demand for reform is earnest, and must be heeded. But
where will reformation begin? To whom must we look for relief? If we go
to Congress with the Constitution in our hands, and demand such
legislation as would give practical efficiency to the preamble and
charter of freedom, they may possibly pay sufficient attention to the
subject to pass a joint resolution setting forth that, while certain
inalienable rights seem to be guaranteed to all, still Congress must be
the dispensing power and judge of its application; and that it has
decided that the negro shall be the first on the list—next, perhaps, the
Indian may come in—next the Chinaman, and all the ends of the
earth—except woman. Yes, go to Congress for relief from onerous taxes,
wrung from the blood and bones of the laboring poor to fill the coffers
of government vampires, and they will answer you by passing some new
_Revenue Act_, in whose cunningly prepared articles will be found traps
set for the people’s money, which the trained bands of political party
secretly manage on joint account for themselves and their party leaders;
it will answer you by granting new subsidies to corporations already
grown rich from the fruits of the labor of the people; by granting to
powerful monopolies still further privileges increasing their power
through bribery and corruption to make subordinate the welfare of the
country to their own selfish purposes, and by favoring all schemes for
the _centralization of power_. Such being the answers to your demands,
there is still a tribunal to which you can appeal, which in all time
past has heard and answered the _demands of the age_.
In the system of _special_ and _class_ legislation causes of corruption
and the downfall of governments may always be found; it is the bane of
the nations, whence flows that subtle, entrancing poison that permeates
all the arteries and veins of a country—so quietly and alluringly to the
people, that, before its effects are suspected, the vital principle of
the government is destroyed, and the lifeless form finally falls to rise
no more forever; or, if the spiritless form be still upheld by the
usurper, it is only retained as “a cheat and a delusion” to shield the
person of the tyrant who has enslaved his victims in the name and under
the guise of liberty.
TENDENCIES AND PROPHECIES OF THE PRESENT AGE.
[Revised from the American Workman of Oct. 16, 1870.]
NO. II.
The subject of government and the solution of all its difficulties seem
to hinge upon the question, Where does God’s government drop its sway
(if it does so at all), and where does man take it up, on his own
account, by inherent natural right, guaranteed to him by the law that
gave him being? The only modification of this question required to be
considered is, How far man is or can be the authorized, competent agent
of the Almighty in working out His purposes? To solve all these
questions it becomes necessary to determine what the fundamental
principles of government must be, to be in harmony with the laws of God,
and to adopt them and to follow them out to all their legitimate
conclusions and results, discarding everything else. In such government
and legislation the eternal principles of right, which are God’s laws,
are in full force and effect, and _man_, thus far, an authorized
competent agent in the administration of His decrees in the material
world.
Whether a government founded or administered upon any other basis than
the eternal principles of right and justice can or cannot be enduring,
is a proposition the simplest mind may solve. Progress is from the lower
to the higher; in its certain and irresistible march all systems and
things that have risen out of the circumstances of the times to which
they belong will be swept away to make room for the new and the better;
but principles and self-evident truths that were contained in such
systems will endure to be incorporated into all future systems.
There can be no higher form of expression than that life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness are “_inalienable_” rights to _all_; and, being
such, it is safe to assume that it will always remain as a fundamental
proposition in the organic law of this country; and legislation will be
required to guide itself by it, instead of being its exponent.
Change upon change will come in the future, as it has in the past, until
government will become so simplified as to have for its foundation
nothing but an annunciation of general principles of justice and equity,
as self-evident truths upon which all legislation must be based.
Passing, for a time, the consideration of the principles of government,
it may be well to inquire into the injustice of some of its present
details. All men, and women, too, are _born_ free and equal, entitled to
certain natural rights, which no government has the right to take from
them. While every man and woman is a result of the general law of
procreation, there are distinguishing points peculiar to each, which
renders every _one_ different from every _other_; thus no two persons
can be so precisely alike as to make their individuality the same;
consequently no two persons are governed by the same internal and
external mainsprings of action and influence. Let the same power and
influence be exerted upon different individuals, no matter how nearly
they may _resemble_ each other, different results will flow from each,
the character of which will be absolutely determined by the status of
the development of, and the relations between the material, and
spiritual elements represented in the individuals acted upon. No
argument is needed to prove this proposition; and the legitimate
deduction to be drawn from it is, that no judgment of the action of the
individual, by others, is just that does not take into consideration all
the various points in character and influence under which action is
produced.
It must not be forgotten that all thought and action on the part of an
individual is the legitimate result of some competent producing cause,
operating by natural law. The cause being competent, the law of
operation natural, and the result consequently legitimate, can another’s
idea of right step in to sit in judgment over the action, and render a
verdict of justice to the actor? Or, can any number of individuals
determine what the demands of justice are which God himself has declared
by the mouth of all His holy prophets, material and spiritual. “Judgment
is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.”
No one can hope to escape the judgments of the eternal law, or to hide
himself from God’s officers of justice; but must by them be brought
before its stern, undeviating bar, to receive its unpardonable sentence.
But, says the objector, this does not satisfy me, who have suffered from
the offence. What if it does not satisfy you? God is satisfied; and are
you greater than He, that you may question His justice? If you are not
yet satisfied, God will most surely satisfy you in His own good time.
Look into your statutes, and within them, find their own stultification.
They assert that no criminal shall be subjected to two trials and
penalties for the same offence; but, in the face of this righteous rule,
and with the positive knowledge that God has already tried, convicted
and sentenced the murderer, the courts of the country take possession
and control of the criminal, proceed to try, convict, condemn and hang
him by the neck until he is dead. Rest assured God will not overlook
this attempt of yours to forestall his judgments.
We stop here to make a broad assertion: For man to affix certain
definite penalties as punishment for so-called crime is to arrogate to
himself what alone belongs to God!
Stumbling-blocks are constantly found in the path of progress, against
which the earnest traveler finds himself precipitated; these consist of
the ideas of the past, clothed with form and expression, and which were
set up by their conceivers as “guides and lights” of their times, for
those who groped their way by such assistance. The earnest seeker after
light finds these set up all along his path, declaring “thus far shalt
thou go, and no farther;” but he, catching a glimpse of the light so
bright beyond, clears the obstruction by a single bound, and goes on his
way rejoicing, seldom deeming it his duty to turn upon and cast what to
him was but a hindrance from the path of progress, so that others coming
that way should not encounter it, who perhaps might lack the power to
surmount it. “Let your light shine” so that those who come after you may
be aided thereby.
A single argument upon the question of the relations between debtor and
creditor, which is maintained by the present laws, will be sufficient to
illustrate the whole subject of customs, authorities and laws, which are
obstructions in the path of progress. The time was when imprisonment for
debt was authorized by law in all the States of this land of freedom
(?); but the spirit of progressive justice has been at work until but
few of the States now retain this libel upon Christian civilization to
disgrace their statutes. Imprisonment for debt! What good ever resulted
from it? The malignity of the creditor may have satisfied itself by
still further humiliating the broken spirits of the debtor; but the
creditor, by such action, places it still further beyond the power of
the unfortunate debtor to satisfy the demand. It is asserted, without
fear of successful contradiction, that the same deleterious effects
generally flow from all similar laws. All kinds of crime are but species
of debt, and the same rule applies with about the same force to its laws
and penalties. Imprisonment for debt has been pretty generally
abolished, but still our statute books are laden with laws to enforce
collection.
A philosopher and economist, not long ago, fully investigated the
relations between debtor and creditor, and the practical results of the
laws now in force, and arrived at the “deliberate conclusion” that the
costs attending the attempts to collect debts by legal process were
three times the amount collected; not a very flattering commentary upon
the policy of the law, and certainly not a paying investment to the
crediting part of our community. This conclusion may at first thought
appear fallacious; but when the expensiveness of courts, and the immense
incomes of lawyers who practice at their bars, are considered, the
afterthought will fully sustain the conclusion. It is believed by many
that if there were no laws at all to enforce collection, there would be
many less _bad debts_; even now a debt of honor is held by public
opinion to have precedence of those which the _law_ claims the right to
enforce.
The thinker of ordinary capacity will see at a glance that an immense
amount of labor would be withdrawn from the courts, which now bears
heavily upon the people, not only in the form of taxes to pay for
court-houses, jury-rooms and judges’ salaries, but in the waste of time
employed in jury-boxes by men dragged from their inevitable toil, and
held as prisoners, while their wives and children are often suffering,
and even dying, from the want of their care and attention at home.
Contracts should be so well defined as to admit of no misunderstanding;
and if there was no method of collection and enforcement, there would be
very many less disagreements; hence, in no light in which it can be
viewed, does our present system commend itself to the wisdom and justice
of the reflecting; on the contrary, it throws open the door for cunning
and knavery to enter to test their strength through technical evasions
and blind inferences, practiced, on the unwary and ignorant by the
“_Quirks_, the _Gammons_ and the _Snaps_,” who, as _vampires_ of the
time-honored profession they disgrace, feed and fatten upon the
misfortunes of the deluded, long-forbearing, long-suffering _children of
toil_.
It may be safely asserted that a very large part of _all law_ contained
within the statutes of the world, when analyzed, will present about the
same deleterious results in practice and in the opportunities presented
for infringement and subsequent evasion of their penalties that
inevitably flow from all laws for the collection of debts.
The time has probably not yet come for the abolishment of all such laws,
but the time has come when the relations of individual debtors and
creditors should be left to the control of general principles of
justice, which declare that a contract once fairly made, an obligation
once fairly incurred, can never be discharged until satisfaction shall
have been entered upon the record by divine justice.
TENDENCIES AND PROPHECIES OF THE PRESENT AGE.
[Revised from the American Workman of Oct. 30, 1870.]
NO. III.
When it is considered, how much the useful portion of life is dependent
upon the preparatory part, the character of the influences brought to
bear during that part, and the manner of their application, become a
subject of deep importance. Education has received the most special
attention from scholars, savants and professors; but they seem to have
forgotten or to have ignored the fact that within the mind is contained
the germ of all acquirements, and that teaching by rule merely what
others have said or written, cramps and dwarfs the mind which, under a
more natural system, would more rapidly and more healthfully develop its
latent powers, through its stimulated efforts to evolve ideas connected
with such facts and phenomena as may be exhibited to it, and thus become
a part of the mind itself.
Instead of training the mind to rely upon method, books and authorities
as rules, it should be encouraged to form methods of its own. The mind
should be questioned, and its answers listened to, instead of being
furnished by the teacher.
The mode proposed has many decided advantages. It inspires
self-reliance, disciplines the mind to think for itself, accustoms it to
express its own conclusions in its own chosen language, leads to clear
and comprehensive forms of expression, gives decision and confidence,
and tends to produce individuality of thought and character.
The Children’s Progressive Lyceum, instituted upon this idea, has
already been inaugurated, and should receive the careful and
unprejudiced attention of all interested in educational reform. Children
who have been under this system but a few months are able to stand
before an audience, and, in a clear and comprehensive manner, speak
without embarrassment upon any subject comprehended by their minds. The
coming generations will acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the founder
of this system which no depth of respect or reverence could fully
express.
No proposition can be made which will be more readily accepted by the
general progressive mind than that, as the world advances in knowledge
and wisdom, its general welfare becomes more and more dependent upon
reciprocal interests; that is to say, as _persons_ and _nations_ become
more and better individualized, their reliance upon interests outside of
themselves becomes more positively and distinctly defined; thus a system
of mutual dependence and reciprocal interests is every day being more
widely inaugurated, which will continue to spread until the whole world
will be brought into harmonious co-operation. This is _commerce_!
Commerce, to the material world, is what thought is to the
spiritual—interchange and exchange of material product in the one and of
spiritual in the other—hence no restrictions or embargoes should be
placed on the one which would not be legitimate if placed upon the
other. The dependence and independence of each is mutual and general.
Restrictions upon commerce is a system of commercial slavery, flowing
from _politic_ and _special_ legislation, and is in violation of the
eternal principles of right, because it renders equality in interchange
impossible. If it is the right principle to restrict commerce between
nations, it extends to States, to cities and to individuals as well.
Under the rule of an unrestricted commercial intercourse throughout the
world, the principle of supply and demand would control the movements of
commerce without the aid of legislation; and, when once fully
established, it would give stability and security to production
everywhere. The products of the world entering into commerce would
localize themselves where they naturally belong—where most could be
produced with the least labor; and, population obeying the laws of
equalization, would adjust itself to the demands of the respective
interests of productive labor. This is a vast problem, in the solution
of which the whole world is vitally interested, and one which, sooner or
later, must be solved. If its solution were possible _now_, coming
generations would look back and bless us for the solving. An
international congress should be called to consider the subject, and to
take proper measures for the inauguration of a system of general economy
in production and consumption. The prophecies of the age point to this
as a reform of sufficient magnitude to demand the immediate attention of
the nations, and to call for a _Christ_ to rise up for their salvation
more powerful than the Democratic Party.
The political, national or personal advantages which are supposed to
flow from restraints upon commerce, have nothing to do with the question
of general reform. While it is the duty of every nation and every
individual person to press forward the work of reform upon general
principles, each nation and person must always keep in view the law of
_self-preservation_, otherwise individuality will be lost in the
struggle for supremacy, which has hitherto characterized the legislation
of nations and the conduct of individual persons. The great principle of
unrestricted universal commerce can only be practically established by
universal acquiescence in its wisdom and justice. When legislation shall
conform itself to general principles, instead of sectional, local or
personal policy, and when its course shall be shaped by such broad
action, it may be safely prophesied that the government it represents
will be perfect and perpetual. Commerce will then obey the law of
progress, and rise from the petty policies of nations, which strangle
its development and limit its benefits: it will rise to be conducted
upon the dignity of principle, untrammeled by policy; and on this
platform the world will unite in harmonious prosperity under a universal
government, not limited even by the boundaries between the material and
the spiritual world.
Underlying all advancement and prosperity, material and spiritual, is
action—motion—which, guided by intellect, results in _labor_, without
which the world would be as though man had never been; for no form of
creature below him has ever left permanent artificial beauty, systems of
economy or usefulness as the result of its workings, except in so far as
the form itself may be accounted such.
What, in two hundred years, has so changed the face of this country from
the wilderness it was to the teeming garden it is, dotted all over with
the habitations of men? What has produced the floating palaces that
everywhere walk its deep waters “like a thing of life?” What has united
all its distant parts by iron bands, along whose guiding lines those
other representatives of _art_ and _motion_ speed, almost outstripping
the wind? What has overcome time and space, and is now extending its
arms to embrace the globe, that we may speak, and that the ends of the
earth answer our call? Marvelous demonstration of the rapidly growing
mutual and reciprocal dependence of the children of men! What has made
the wilderness to blossom as the rose? What has achieved all these
glorious, god-like results? Labor! labor! labor! physical, mental and
spiritual labor!
Labor, therefore, is the fulcrum of the great lever of progress, lifting
humanity from the material up to the spiritual realm. One short century
ago nearly all physical labor was performed by the hands of man. Since
then the mind has come up to the work, and rescued the body from the
laborious servitude of former times; and now a single mind, directing a
single machine, produces an hundred-fold more than it could when acting
through its own personal machine. The inventive powers of the mind will
continue to produce more labor-saving machines until labor directly with
the hand will be almost, perhaps entirely, superseded.
The products of the mind, when compared with purely physical labor, are
of inestimable value, and the great distinction everywhere recognized in
their relative compensations is still too limited. No argument is needed
to establish the dignity of labor; it has established itself in becoming
the architect of the great future, by building the past and the present.
Out of the multiform phases of labor, questions will arise which will
require for their adjustment equitable rules of compensation; the best
talent in the world can find ample scope for useful employment in the
solution of the numerous problems growing out of this vast subject.
_Labor_—physical, mental and spiritual—finding itself in a position of
injustice, is in a state of constant irritation and discontent, and
legitimately seeks redress through the organization of associations to
control its price; but it is at least questionable whether such
combinations have been productive of any permanently beneficial results.
If it could be perceived and comprehended, there must be, in the nature
of things, perfect and complete harmony in the practical operation of
all the working elements or agencies, not only in this world, but in the
boundless universe.
This problem may find a practical solution in co-operative labor
associations, in which the members share equally the profits upon what
they produce.
Suppose the entire labor of the country were conducted upon this just
principle, what would be the result? The rapidly accumulating wealth of
the country is the result of labor; if the united labor of the country,
producing this increase, should henceforward share it equally, the
result, in time, would be the _equalization_ of the wealth of the
country, which is now rapidly growing into a necessity, to modify the
luxurious habits of the rich on the one hand, and the crying evils of
poverty on the other, which are rapidly engendering an antagonism, which
will continue to increase in volume and intensity until it will
culminate in a storm that will consume the elements of discord in the
same manner (and upon the same immutable principles) by which African
slavery was abolished in the Southern States of this Union.
A careful investigation of the co-operative principle will show that it
is not only possible, but perfectly simple and practicable, and that it
is full of glorious prophecy to the vast numbers who are now “ground to
the earth” by the condition of actual slavery to the ordinary demands of
nature which is entailed upon them from generation to generation,
through the operations of false systems, which were founded upon and
which are sustained by injustice and usurpation.
While viewing this subject in its practical aspects, it must not be
forgotten that _it_, too, is intimately connected with progress, and
subject to its decrees.
It is a well-established fact that the powers of endurance of the
physical system are growing less, generation after generation, while the
mental power is increasing in about the same ratio; the legitimate
deduction from this fact is in perfect harmony with the general
progressive tendency of all things leading from the purely physical to
the spiritual, from which we may safely prophecy that the time will come
when all labor will be performed by the mind, and when it shall have
acquired perfect dominion over the material. The necessity for physical
endurance will then have ended. The tendency to such a condition, though
it has been, is, and may continue to be gradual, is nevertheless
positive and well-defined.
Intimately connected with the subject of labor, and the tendency to
perform by the agency of inventions what still devolves upon the direct
application of physical strength, is that of supplying the demands of
the body. The food used now is very different from that of a hundred
years ago. Some who recognize this fact argue that the change of diet
has produced the change in the physical condition; but reasoning from
analogy, and applying the general rules of progress, leads to the
conclusion that the changes in the relative conditions of the physical
and mental, by which the latter asserts superior control, have rendered
a corresponding change of diet necessary; hence it is fair to conclude
that the change grows out of the necessities of the consumer, and is not
the producing cause in the premises; in other and general terms, the
physical system demands and should receive appropriate supplies.
Hundreds of people who once made use of the flesh of swine have entirely
discarded it from their boards, instinctively feeling that it does not
meet their present demands, and there is a growing distaste for it.
Common observation shows that all kinds of flesh are gradually falling
into disfavor, especially among those who labor mentally or are devoted
to spiritual things.
As the physical system is gradually being relieved of labor and the
consequent waste of its energies, the character of food it requires
necessarily changes, and in the place of physical strength to be
supplied is that upon which the brain can draw to replenish its wasting
stock; the failure to recognize these demands causes very much of the
dyspepsia from which those who lead sedentary lives suffer so generally;
these should discard those articles of diet that principally contribute
to build up the material, and use such as will impart strength to the
mind.
There are quite a number of well-authenticated cases of the actual
subsistence of the body upon the elements contained in the atmosphere a
sufficient length of time to show that it could be continued
indefinitely if the proper conditions were preserved. One of these cases
in the State of Kentucky has remained seventeen years in this condition;
one in Chicago nearly four years; there is one in Brooklyn of three
years’ duration; and a number of others from ten to sixty days. In this
condition the physical system becomes entirely renovated, purified, and
almost transparent, and the spiritual faculties intensified many fold.
TENDENCIES AND PROPHECIES OF THE PRESENT AGE.
[Revised from the American Workman of Nov. 20, 1870.]
NO. IV.
Arguing from the fact that the character of food subsisted upon is
gradually changed from the purely physical to the more refined and rare,
in connection with that of exceptional cases having existed, in which
supplies were drawn from entirely different sources than digested food,
leads toward the conclusion, at least, that the time will come when men
will have grown out of the necessity of supplying the wasting energies
of the body and mind by the use of food, and into that refined spiritual
condition in which he can draw directly upon the elements which the
atmosphere does or will furnish to supply all his demands. All the
arguments nature furnishes point to this condition. All know how very
important it is to have a plentiful supply of pure air; but how far this
goes toward furnishing the elements of supply demanded by the body, the
deepest inquiries have not decided.
In a given case, the actual amount in weight that is furnished the body
can be determined; deducting the weight of the excretions and palpable
secretions, it is supposed the difference is consumed by some undefined
process within the body; but who can tell how much and what the system
takes directly from the atmosphere, or how much it gives up to it, that
we have no means of defining by weight or otherwise? We also know that
the atmosphere maintains an immense pressure upon the body, and that it
involuntarily resists this pressure; this could not happen were there
not some well defined and intimate relations between the two upon which
man, as the object, must be greatly dependent.
Another strong and pointed argument is to be found in the process
sometimes resorted to to sustain life: in cases of great prostration of
the physical system, under exhaustive disease, when the means cannot be
supplied through the medium of the stomach and digestion, they are
furnished by being absorbed into the system through the pores of the
skin.
The constant death and decay of all the materials upon which we feed,
besides all that vast amount not drawn upon directly, is continually
giving off to the atmosphere the same kind of elements which the body
retains and uses from supplies of food; as they exist in the atmosphere
in the form of elements, and there is a demand within the body for them,
it is only necessary to create and maintain the means of supply to solve
the problem. A glorious prophecy comes forth from the tendencies of
labor toward the mental, and the accompanying necessity for
modifications of diet, adapted to the many gradations man must pass
through to reach a purely spiritual condition.
The physical system has been the accredited medium through which the
spirit within it—the real man—has wrought, and still is, in all
individuals who are not beyond the point where _spirit_ becomes the
predominant and governing characteristic. In the present, however, there
are scattered here and there among the masses individuals who have
passed—are passing—or are approaching that point in which the spirit, at
times, acts independently of its material machine in which it has been
fostered and cultured, and gives positive proofs of an existence within
the body of an individualized life, which can and does act without the
agency of the body, and performs functions before impossible. There are
a thousand persons, at least, in this country who have a sight entirely
independent of the physical eye, which overleaps the boundaries of
physical vision; penetrates the barriers of external sense, tears off
the mask of hypocrisy and deceit, detects the motives and mainsprings of
action, and lays bare the heart of man. While comparatively but few have
attained this, all are approaching it. What does Paul mean but this when
he says, “Now we see, as through a glass, darkly; but then face to
face”? When the spirit-eye shall have fully pierced its barriers of
flesh, when the body shall have become subservient to the spirit,
instead of the spirit being dependent upon the body, when we “shall see
as we are seen, and know as we are known,” how radical the changes, and
how rapid the strides of advancement will then be!
Reason for a moment upon the effect that would be produced were every
tenth person suddenly endowed with spirit-sight, and compelled to
demonstrate it by exposing the hearts and the lives of all the rest.
Where could oppression hide itself? Where could the lusts of the flesh
plot their treason against the sovereignty of the spirit, beyond the
range of _spirit vigilance_—this new safeguard of human society, the
eternal law of progress, which is now unfolding? In such a condition of
things, courts of justice, with all their attendant judges, bailiffs and
attorneys-at-law, would find their occupation gone. Prisons would be
converted into asylums and workshops for the weak and unfortunate, and
their keepers into superintendents and teachers. Churches would be
converted into lecture-rooms; and preachers, now hurling their anathemas
against unrepentant sinners, would become professors of the great
principles through and by which the world, and all things, have been
brought from the primary condition thus far on their march toward the
_perfect_.
Many individuals know that they are under the surveillance of this
spirit-sight, and demonstrate in conduct its beneficent influence; but
the capacity has not yet become sufficiently general to compel the
recognition of its efficacy by the public mind. As the rising sun first
gilds the mountain’s loftiest peak, next the hill-top, then glides along
the inviting slope to the universal plain, where all creation rejoices
under the refulgence of its noonday glories—so comes this _rising
light_, to illumine the hearts and souls of all when it shall have
reached the zenith of its mid-day glory. As the beams reflected from the
mountain top are of the sun, and not the mountains, so are these
spiritual rays of the spiritual sun, and not of the individual
reflecting them, or through whom they may chance to shine. Verily,
verily, I say unto you, this people vaunteth and puffeth itself with
knowledge, but wisdom hath surely departed to the lowly ones of earth!
Religion, clad in its robes “of purple and fine linen,” faring
“sumptuously every day,” forgetting that Christ was cradled in a manger,
and that His disciples were fishermen, continually cries, as did the
“Pharisees and hypocrites” of old: “Can any good thing come out of
Nazareth?”
The time is not far distant when the possession of spirit-sight will be
accounted of the first importance, not to those only who possess it, but
to the public generally, and will be sought for and made practical to
the honor of its possessors and to the inestimable benefit of all. The
time will come in the not far distant future when those who now cry out,
“Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” will bow, with becoming
humility, before the later-day _fishermen_; for these will then occupy
the places of public trust, and spirit-telegraphy, having superseded
material wires, will convey the commands of God’s accredited ministers
from the central seat of Power throughout the world.
Where are all the great of the _past_; its orators, philosophers and
statesmen; Confucius, Zoroaster, Moses, David, Solomon, Lycurgus,
Demosthenes, Cicero, Bonaparte, Washington, and many others, of all
nations and climes, to whom history points as having stood hundreds of
years in advance of their times? Do they still live? and, living, are
they idle? Are their minds withdrawn from subjects to which they were
devoted in this primary school-house of the children of God? Are not
their minds expanded to the comprehension of the great principles of
governmental justice? Are they not better qualified to direct
legislation _now_ than the wisest among us? If they still live as
spirits, if they have had better opportunities of obtaining wisdom and
knowledge pertaining to earth-life than we—can this world avail itself
of their assistance to establish on earth the government of heaven? If
the angel in the bush were possible, why may not angels manifest the
wisdom, power, and justice of God in our legislative halls? Who will
dare to assert that they are not even now seeking another Moses to lead
“His people” up out of Egypt? Then will the prophecies of the present
have reached consummation; then will commence the earthly reign of the
King of kings and Lord of lords, as prophesied by all the holy prophets
of the world; then old things shall pass away and all things become new;
then _the Christ_ shall sit upon the throne, and from his inexhausted
fountain of love, justice shall continually flow over all the earth, “as
the waters cover the sea.”
As vanish the heavy mists of the morning before the radiance of the
rising sun, so will vanish the clouds that hang around the minds of man,
and shut out the rising spiritual sun, for whose “star in the East”
_wise men_ are continually watching; the sun that will rise higher and
higher, and extend its rays wider and wider, until it shall enlighten
the minds of all mankind, until the icebergs of ignorance, tradition and
superstition are dissolved which now float in the ocean of
progress—society, with its cankered, festering heart; commerce robbed of
its legitimate function; labor of its recompense, and religion of its
spirituality; education lacking wisdom, marriages forming “disunions,”
and women without rights.
All the false forms of the present must yield their sway to God’s
command—“Let there be light.” The laws of God are never changed—though
old as creation—they are ever new, ever sufficient for all the
vicissitudes of life; they are ever full of wisdom, justice and love;
they are written all over the face of creation, in the bosom of the
earth and in the heart of man; they are uttered by the raging tempest
that rocks the mighty ocean; in the terrible mutterings of the
earthquake; in the fury of destructive battle, when hosts are hurled on
hosts in fraternal strife; through all these the voice of God
proclaims—“Let there be light,” and there is light.
We also hear its whispers in the gentle zephyrs that stir the bursting
buds and in the blooming flowers that lift their heads to drink the
falling dew; in the hum of busy nature; in the gushing fountain; we see
it in the gambols of the bubbling brook; in the mother’s love for the
new-born life; in the father’s pride; in the unspoken joy of the
maiden’s soul, listening to the first sweet tones of love; in the
magnetic ties of human sympathy which bind all mankind in a common
brotherhood, and in the dawning light of heaven brought to earth by the
angelic hosts to usher in the reign of universal justice, peace and
love.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in
spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.
3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
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