A SOCIALIST VIEW OF AMERICAN HISTORY

...Turner's Pioneer Work It is not my purpose to expound theory...

...In the South, the planters had long regarded East and West Florida as a barrier to the expansion of the planter system and the chick, vegetation and swamps of this region also offered a refuge for fugitive slaves...

...Then It was the new generation of politicians like Calhoun and Clay from the South and West, regions that had no shipping or commercial capital, who insisted on war...

...It is true that New England shippers had long suffered because of British impressment of American seamen but the merchants, shippers and commercial men of New England also feared the rise of the agrarian West and South to control at Washington...

...This antagonism of interest continued till the frontier line disappeared on the Pacific Coast, l but some writers have interpreted each section as though its population was a solid whole without any economic conflicts within it...

...If there was any economic loss because of the British policy it was small...

...With the exhaustion of the soils of the upper South and emigration to the West of its most vigorously human stock, the economic and political power of Virginia gradually passed to the great planters of the Lower South...

...They stored then- aristocratic views in the attic with their wigs and sUk breaches and went to the masses with demagogic apstsU to the farmers and laborers in 1840 and they won the election...

...He opposed the extension of the suffrage to those who were without property...

...In my opinion it Impairs the value of a great service you have done to the English speaking peoples and to the whole world...

...Its first fundamental duty is to protect the Individual in his right of access to the natural resources and industrial equipment without which no one is able to work...

...The profitable returns from the cultivation of cotton wrought a revolution in the ideas of the southern ruling class...

...Then, if Socialism does not offer a workable principle for the distribution of wealth it is reduced to futility...

...Ts^uali^^aASSt^L the incomes went!* have to be unequal...

...Blare owners obtained psychic compensation, and even nfliglous justification from the slave trade on the ground that soma otherwise lost were brought to * knowledge of the Christian rehgksa, Ooohdge doss not wage an wMsssssol war against Nicaragua for [American baiKers bat to "preserve order" in Central America...

...Supply and demand will adjust the pay for different occupations very exactly to the social value of each when the occupations are open to everybody upon equal conditions and these conditions are widely known, and when the private ownership of the Industrial equipment no longer limits the demand for labor artificially to the opportunities for private profit...

...But the East was not a section In the sense that the frontier West was...

...Socialism would reduce the inequalities to the natural and healthy differences in the social value of labor of different kinds...

...The Nation (New York) says: "The heart of the argument which beats on every page Is that Socialism means equality of incomes...

...In the fall elections of 1863 Wisconsin, Ohio...

...Town proprietors and land speculators of the East were already exploiting the frontiersmen of the Connecticut Valley and farther west...

...I know of no ether formula which explains so much sad that is so reliable In -"-Mfnr as to Interpret the complex forces of changing human society...

...George Bernard Shaw, t London...

...In the North, the conflict of interest between the capitalistic East and the agrarian West resulted In anSattempted Insurrection to attach Ohict Indiana, Illinois, Missouri and Kentucky to the Confederacy...

...Your sharp wit cleaves for you a way through prejudice and Indolence...

...The economic law which now determines the relative pay for different kinds of work when it is not obstructed by human intervention is the law of supply and demand...

...Unequal wealth does not imply or make possible the private ownership of socially necessary resources and equipment for production...

...The western lands were to be parcelled out in great estates with black and white laborers bound to serve the owners...

...The only objection to equality ol shoes Is that scarcely anybody would be comfortably fitted...

...but It was in condemnation of this declaration and particularly or .this part of It that Marx stated his own...

...An attempt to carry on production, distribution, and all the' funcions of our social organism, paying every worker the same, would be worse than futility...

...It finally dawned upon the custodians of the aristocratic tradition that they could not win elections by asserting it in the face of a rapidly extending manhood suffrage As early as 1808, Rufus King had advised that the aristocratic politicians should go with the popular stream, not against it, with the view of regaining political control...

...The gospel of perpetual servitude was carried to the North in lectures by George Fitshugh and others, while leading exponents of it corresponded with men abroad in the hope of winning the ruling classes ow the world by this propaganda...

...Lincoln was aware of the defense sssoV anisms which are employed to dssjaha' the real motives of men...

...The ruling planters had never permitted the Interior and upland sections to have the representation they were entitled to by reason of their numbers...

...On the other hand the words^' economic determ In Ism" imply a casual basis of history that is too restricted to account for all the changes in society...

...Perhaps the most illuminating work1 has been done by Frederick Jackson Turner in his numerous essays on sectional history and the influence of a moving frontier upon American life and American institutions...

...Any incentive which there is in the fancy for finer shoes could not be used to stimulate individual effort to the greater social good...

...The Southwest also had dreams of the conquest of Mexico...

...Northern capitalism was to find escape from strikes and the agitation of dangerous "isms" by disfranchising the workers and binding them in perpetual servitude to the owners of industry...

...I have not read all the official papers of the Socialist movement in more than a score of different languages...

...The Rule of the Wise and Rich Geography, soil and climate may also explain why manufacturers should appear In the North, but, as these are also constant factors, they cannot explain the changes in the social order of this region since the revolution nor the decline of the aristocratic ideas of Otis, Ames sad the peculiar contradictions involved in the War of 1812...

...One can understand why slavery found a setting In the rich soli and warm climate of the South, but the evolution of this philosophy of servitude can only be understood when interpreted in terms of the economics of cotton culture...

...In brief, it declared that subjection of laborers, white and black, to the discipline, control and ownership of the masters of lands and Industries was the basis of a noble and enduring social order...

...It is thus seen that geography snay to some extent explain the origin of peculiar sectional areas, bat economics is required to explain class antagonisms within each section and between the sections...

...Views of Other Writers Where is the authority for such an interpretation of Socialism...

...So the fact that an author like Edward Bellamy In Looking Backward makes this the fundamental idea in an economic fairy tale does not make the Socialists of the world sponsors for it...

...The geographical or sectional influence of this region has been a constant factor since settlement times but its social order and the Ideas of its ruling class in the last two decades before the Civil War were in marked contrast with the South of the days of Washington, Jefferson and Madison...

...The new philosophy conquered every phase of the intellectual life of the southern leaders...

...In the days of the ascendancy of these statesmen there was a general sentiment in the South for the emancipation of the slaves...

...They formed a sectional society of comparative equals and had no internal economic divisions till they became settled areas and the frontier line had passed much farther west...

...Historians down to a recent period explained these contradictions toy simply ascribing to the ruling classes of New England narrow and parochial views and to the new school of politicians from the South and West a "nationalist" point of view...

...Professor Ogburn concludes that It is "permissable to think of the economic motive as harnessing in Its train, at various times, quiet a variety and number of the instincts," Economic determinism is valid If at includes geography, climath and the survival of taboos, prejudices, and foperstitions which had then- origin In pre*- - ieos economic eras...

...He said in his own laborious style that masranch as B!"ji"'i...

...Another View Of Equal Income A Letter to Qeorge Bernard Shaw In Criticism of His Theory of Distribution of Wealth By Warren Atkinson Mr...

...in a paper read before the American Economic -Association in December, 1018, Professor William F. Ogburn showed the variety of forms which psychic disguises of economic motives take sad which, in Lincoln's phrase, often msho a man's "conduct a riddle...

...I wish to observe here, in answer to Mr...

...How explain this on the score of economic Interests...

...It is evident that if the agrarian interests succeeded in their ambitious program, a swarm of new agrarian states would enter the Union and New ningiand interests would be outvoted at Washington...

...The' most remarkable of these puzzles was the War of 1812, a war ostensfmy waged in defense of American commerce and yet opposed by commercial New England to the extent of opposing subscriptions to war loans, refusing the service of state militias, and plotting reunion with the British Empire through union with Canada...

...The ruling classes regarded general 'manhood suffrage with apprehension, believing that property would not be safe in the hands of a propertyless voting multitude...

...It would offer unequal incentives to different kinds of work, larger pay, that is the greater incentive for the kind of work which needs most urgently to be done...

...This is a plain and convincing answer to the problem...

...Webster could frankly asert in his Plymouth Oration in 1820 that political power belongs to those who own the property of the nation and that all the revolutions in history are revolutions in property...

...Unequal Wealth Unequal pay would lead, it is true, to unequal accumulation of wealth...

...When one referred to the West it included the whole population, but reference to the East as a section is misleading...

...Others subscribe to a definite statement that equality of pay Is not an essential part eg* the Socialist aim...

...Economics and Slavery Another example of the importance of the economic factor is the history of the slave economy, in the South...

...Therefore, equality of pay has no reason in nature or economic laws to support it...

...I shall leave that to others and will consider some of the important contributions that have been made to an understanding of American history by those scholars who have aproached their problems in terms of geography, climate and economics...

...Important the material factors are In explaining historical changes may be Observed by comparing the work of modern historical scholars who accept this thesis with the work of those who wrote in terms of the great man, or of manifest destiny, or of the patriotic epic, or or politics, of military leaders pr of religious influences...

...Professor Pratt has shown that the war had its supporters "not only ha the Northwest but along the whole frontier from New Hampshire to Georgia" and the composition of the war party in Congress consisted of members overwhelmingly representative of this long frontier line...

...How...

...It cannot be defended either from the standpoint of justice, because It is unjust, or from the standpoint of utility, because there is no use or advantage in it...

...Is this not a merely individual conception...

...Can Comrade Shaw, put his finger upon one such official declaration of aim...

...Indeed it is hard to understand how such a fanciful idea could be lodged In a mind like that of our beloved Shaw...

...In the South, the upland sections held few slaves and their population of small farmers, mechanics, and laborers feared the great planters of the East and the lower South...

...This continued to be the attitude of the Federalists and their successors, the Whigs, till after the second election of Jackson in 1832...

...In the authoritative declarations of their duly delegated representatives the Socialists have not declared any such aim so far as I know...

...nor does it enable the wealthy to exploit labor, unless society organized as a government fails in Its primary duty...

...what enhances its value Is favored...

...This appears to me to be fundamental...

...Man must eat before he can paint, write, dream or speculate...

...Public opinion is founded, to a great extent," ht said, "on a property basis...

...I am wondering why you, who could not breathe the atmosphere of conformity without suffocation, should wish to reduce the rest of us to a dreary uniformity...

...When society protects the individual in this right and provides him the opportunity to work for a just remuneration under good conditions no one will be compelled to submit to exploitation by the wealthy...

...We did not enter the World War for tthwH* reasons bat for the holy purpose of "making tag world safe for Democracy...

...Socialist platforms do not refer to it, leaving the intelligent reader to draw his own conclusions...

...Perhaps in no other section of the world has there been such a complete transformation in such a short period...

...Professor Dodd declares that "Every newspaper of every state, so far as I have been able to check them, accepted the ideal...

...What they wanted was agrarian expansion through the annexation of Canada, to destroy the Indian barriers to fertile lands and the fur trade in the West, and to destroy British influence with the western Indians which checked western expansion...

...By James Oneal IF BY economic determinism we mean the material factor* at the basis of society my answer to the question, "Is the Economic Interpretation of History Valid...

...The price of this control was to play the demagogue before the voters, exchange buncombe for their votes, transform the votes into governing power, and then use the power for null owners, land speculators, or slave owners...

...It is evident that the South as a section was not a solid economic and social unit and that the North was disturbed by economic class antag****** to the South, the conflict be•acssasm"** **** **<>t rt8uKed m ginia and, in eastern Tennessee, it brought civil war between its population and the Confederate forces...

...In the North, the economic antagonism may be observed in the opposition of the agrarian West to the tariff and financial policy of the government which favored New England and Pennsylvania capitalists, the bankers, and war contractors...

...If remuneration were to be based upon the need of the individual, it could not be equal...

...The War of 1812 There have been puzzles in our history that baffled reasonable explanation until the economic historians appeared on the scene...

...It would be interesting to know if any definite statement can be found to support it In any official declaration of a duly delegated body with authority to speak for Socialists anywhere in the world...

...Believes >Vlew Futile It is in the review by the New York Times that the following quotation occurs: "Socialism is concerned with the distribution of wealth and the nature of property...

...England...

...But distinguished literary men have glorified others of the fallacies and myths with which suffering humanity has been bedeviled: and no one has been more able and courageous than yourself in dispelling such myths...

...The law of supply and demand "will not be abolished, however, because it Is, a natural law of human relations wherever people are engaged in production and service...

...It is with a real pang of regret that an admirer reads this serious error in your exposition of Socialism...

...Perhaps you feel intuitively that you would still yourself be a sport and the more brilliantly the exception while all the rest of us conform to a monotonous uniformity...

...Webster changed his political creed which favored free trade, to views favoring protective tariffs and even accepted large sums of money contributed by mill owners to keep him in Washington as a spokesman for their economic interests...

...Education and the franchise should be withheld from the working class...

...Efforts failed and the southern philosophy was shot to pieces by northern armies...

...It would abolish all incomes derived from exploitation...

...However, the aristocratic views of the old Federalist schoof survived this shift from a commercial to a manufacturing basis in New irngiand The philosophy of rule by the "wise and good and rich" may be found in the writings and speeches of the Federalist merchants, journalists and politicians after the New England mill owners became Jhe ruling class of this section...

...Apparently the economic motive explained nothing...

...What lessees the value of property is opposed...

...It is a desirable and even necessary means of automatically stimulating the production of things which society needs...

...A philosophy of human bondage which included white and black laborers was the intellectual phase of the economic transformation...

...You let the light Into many well meaning but dull minds...

...The former dominion of tobacco could not produce it and did not produce it, as tobacco culture did not have the possibilities of large economic returns which cotton had...

...More Than a Sectional Struggle One criticism may be made of much of this work...

...Certainly the monstrous Inequalities of Income now due to capitalist ownership of the industrial equipment will be done away with by Socialism...

...nor would it be desirable nor would it serve any useful purpose...

...Under Socialism the pay of Individuals may be determined just as It is determined now by the ordinary action of supply and demand...

...On the other hand, remuneration based upon the value of the work done by the individual could not be equal without ignoring facts...

...This philosophy had been rounded out into a formidable system of sociology )y the year 1850, when the economic ewer of the Cotton Kingdom had been concentrated into the hands of four or five thousand families...

...Equality of pay for all kinds of work is not a defensible proposition, and our editors are now cautions about making any statement which would allow that inference...

...Merchant and commercial capital formed the basis of the New England social order in the colonial period and into the period of the second war with England when considerable capital Invested in commerce was transferred to manufactures...

...A similar misuse of terms is occasionally observed by writers who have considered the struggle between the North and the South...

...Since his initial essay appeared in 1893, it may be truthfully said that the whole history of American politics has been rewritten and the whole economic and sectional life of the United States are understood, where before economic and political puzzles too often baffled the historians...

...On the other hand, the "War Hawks" from the agrarian interior, which possessed no ships or sailors, no ports or seaborne commerce, certainly cared little for New England's investments in commerce...

...Only the reiteration of the thought In the following quotations from the Intelligent Woman's Guide makes it necessary to consider it seriously: "The first and last commandment of Socialism is Thou shalt not have greater or less Income than thy neighbor...

...It apparently ignores geography and climate and, strictly interpreted...

...Webster, Otis and ethers of the die-hard aristocrats had not changed their views, bat, facing the reality of almost complete ssanhbod suffrage, they changed their tactics...

...Slave owners here and there manumitted their slaves and others were willing to release their bondmen if some intelligent system of colonisation were worked out...

...These illustrations shew how limited geographical and sectional interpretation of politics is and how important economics Is in understanding changing America and how vital sach understanding is for rational and progressive political action...

...Anything less than absolute equality of income is a sham and worthless Socialism...

...position...

...In the old days, when gentlemen with property, the lawyers and clergy, monopolized politics and office-holding, there was a general acceptance of the view that possession of property was essential to the exercise or political privileges...

...Supply and demand will not adjust the wages of different occupations fairly so long as it can be thwarted by monopoly power or private interests in control of socially necessary means of production...

...Likewise the authors referred to have re' vised their sentences, making them noncommital...

...Dear Comrade Shaw: * Having read the reviews of your late book...

...Even Bernard Shaw will develop what he calls his lucrative talents...

...Those who needed better shoes would not be permitted to have them...

...A SOCIALIST VIEW OF AMERICAN HISTORY The Influence of Qeography, Climate and Economics In Sectional and Political Struggles - i The following is the report of an address delivered at the Conference of the League fpr Industrial Democracy at Forest Park, Pa., on June 28...

...and certainly it would greatly simplify the making of shoes to make them all alike...

...The recent researches of Julius W. Pratt show that the economic motive was operative in both regions...

...Slavery was regarded as a wasteful form of production and as a standing contradiction to the idealist abstractions of the Declaration of Indepence...

...Any future state or political program or ism, hawever admirable, which is not based on equality of income is not Socialism...

...Today the sectional antagonism Is apparent between the agriculturml West and the capitalist Bast and this conflict induced Senator Nye recently to suggest the possibility of » third party uniting the West and Sooth acalnst the East...

...but, like any rough and ready answer, it may require some qualification and a statement of the conditions which are in mind when it is made...

...Facts are stubborn things, and there are differences in the work of different individuals which simply cannot be ignored for very long...

...it would shortly end In disaster, and would totally destroy public confidence in the political party, communist or other, which should so ignore plain facts...

...It is from this election in 1840 that we may date the general practice in American politics of concealing from the voters the real aims of the party managers and their *»r*"»wi*i backers...

...However, with the success of Van Buren in 1836, Jacksonlan Democracy was becoming an appetite for office and there was more demagogy than sincerity in the- sppwsls of the Democratic politicans...

...It is frequently referred to as a war between the two sections, as though each region was the home of a people who had no economic differences and conflicts...

...I am wondering why equality of incomes would be any more comfortable than equality of shoes...

...Compare the work of the patriotic Bancroft with that of Charles A. Beard on the making of the Constitution, or Bancroft with Schlesinger on the revolutionary period, and the importance of economics in unfolding the history of events immediately becomes evident...

...The Jacksonian Democrats won wttti sincere appeals to the farmers and mechanics in 1828 and 1832 and sharp attacks on the banking and capitalist cliques...

...The economic motive is near,- always concealed sad it often required diligent research to m» - veal It...

...Fortunes were beginning to accumulate from investments in land, ship building, and commerce and with them control of the colonial assemblies by mercantile, shipping and commercial capitalists with a state-kept clergy as allies...

...Geography, soil and climate do not explain these shifts in political views but the oh«ng<wg economic order does...

...It is true that a number of writers who were widely read as Socialists set up this proposition for a Utopia...

...The Idea appears reasonable on the basis of sectional history and conflict, but It becomes absurd and harmful when subjected to the test of economic analysis...

...As for British impressment of American seamen, it was an annoyance, to be sure, but there was compensation In the knowledge that enlistments of British deserters to American ships were as large or even larger than the number of American sailors seized by the British...

...Simplicity seems to be the only advantage to recommend it...

...It is true that the North constituted a society based on industrial and banking capital and the South on large estates and slaves and that the Civil War was a struggle for mastery between k the leaders of the two social orders, but even while the controversy was being settled to the roar of cannon, the economic antagonism between East and West raged, not only in the North but in the South as well...

...This law is much respected and used by capitalist economists, and they talk as though they have the patent rights to it Some Socialist writers accept that view and think they must attack and finally abolish it...

...It is not the only factor in society but it is primary and it influences all other factors...

...Its substance was that the southern ruling class had discovered the solution of the social/ enigma which had.puzzled the philosophers since the days of Plato and Aristotle...

...is yes...

...Turner and his disciples have shown that, as population moved westward since the first settlements on the Atlantic Seaboard, a struggle has been waged between the capitalistic East and the agrarian West...

...This was generally true, of the newly formed communities in the moving West...

...As a whole these frontier areas were more or less in conflict with the commercial, land speculating, and banking section of the East...

...or they omit reference to the subject...

...In the.higher categories of income it has been established under oath that more than 90% of the Income is received for the ownerShip of socially used property and less than one half of one percent for some supposed service performed by the beneficiaries of the great incomes...

...The Technique of Controlling The Suffrage The whig aristocrats finally Wrnnd the lessen...

...Hidden Motives Finally, it is important to point out that statesmen, politicians and leaders of ruling groups never bare their real motives, especially their economic motive...

...It was a more intensive study of the economics of these puzzles that enabled us to understand them...

...Goldenweiser, that one might carry on extensive research into the geographic, climatic, patriotic, religious and ethical factors to unravel these puzzles in American history and this research would be fruitless...

...As manufacturing became an important Interest, free trade New England transferred Its allegiance to tariff duties...

...Indiana, and Illinois were carried by the Democrats who frankly appealed to the voters on a program which denounced the capitalist and banking classes of the East...

...The East against which the Senator would organise contains million* of wage workers who are as much In need of representation at Washington and In their own legislatures as the farmers of the West and Sooth axe...

...The Gotha Program Is one...

...Here was a war evidently fought for the defense of New England shipping and' commerce yet the merchant, shipping and commercial classes, whose incomes were at stake, were ranged In bitter opposition to the war...

...Socialism would abolish such inequality...

...The materialistic conception of history is a more correct statement of the theory, although to many the definition appears to include some implications that are not intended...

...but It could not make incomes equal...

...The philosophical creed of the revolutionary period was subjected to devastating criticism...

...The pompous gentleman Jsehtng down on workers as "boors" and "mudsills" was perfectly proper In the Federalist days of property •.salifications for the suffrage, but it was ridiculous and futile before masses armed with the ballot...

...There were other economic factors involved in this political struggle, but it is sufficient to show that only a more thorough' study of the economics of the period has enabled the historians to solve the contradictions of the political struggle of that period...

...The invention of the telegraph in 1835 and of the rotary press in 1847 revolutionised journalism and enormously, enhanced the power' of party publications over the minds of the voters...

...At one time 1 the Socialist editors in this country labored distractedly, because on occasions , they felt called upon to defend it...

...It is impossible to prevent this...

...Cotton replaced tobacco as king and Virginia masters turned to slave breeding to supply the rapidly expanding cotton kingdom...

...The power of the capitalist lies in the fact that he is performing a function which society should take care of itself...

...A cautions extension of the suffrage revealed that they could control the actions and shape the views of the masses...

...Its upper classes constituted the "section", for they alone had the power to speak and act for the East...

...Much that had been a puzzle in our history has been made understandable by Turner and other students who eagerly followed the trails he opened up...

...Your shining blade flashes in many dark places where others like the writer could never follow...

...It makes no allowance for the .impact of religious, ethical and other ideas upon society or the survival of myths and taboos which shape the thinking and conduct of millions of peoples...

...Economic stratification was apparent in New England before the end of the seventeenth century...

...The property basis will have Its Weight* which "often makes a man's course seen crooked, his conduct a riddle...

...and the same objection applies to equality of income...

...It was formulated In terms of history, science, religion, ethics, politics, journalism, literature and philosophy...

...What a dissappointment that our bright armored knight, the one we have watched with delight, should be so easily unhorsed be...