IX. Owen's General Career

81 CHAPTER IX. OWEN'S GENERAL CAREER. CONFINING ourselves strictly to memoirs of Associations, we might leave Owen now and go on to the experiments of the Fourier school. But this would hardly be doing justice to the father of American Socialisms. We have exhibited his great failure; and we must stop long enough to acknowledge his great success, and say brieRy what \ve think of his whole life and influence. Indeed such a review is necessary to a just estimate of the Owen movement in this .country. We accept what he himself said about his early achievements, that he was under the guidance of the Spirit of God, and was carried' along by a wonderful series of special providences in his first labors for the good of the working classes. The originality, wisdom and success of his doings at New Lanark were mani festly supernatural. His factory village was indeed a light to the world, that gave the nations a great lesson in practical beneficence; and shines still amid the dark ness of money-making selfishness and industrial misery.

The single fact that he continued the wages of his operatives when the embargo stopped his business, actually paying out$3S,OOO in four months, to men who had nothing to do but to oil his machinery and l\~ep it 82 AMERICAN SOCIALISMS. clean, stamps him as a genius of an order high~r than Napoleon. By this bold maneuver of benevolence he won the confidence of his men, so that he could manage them afterwards as he pleased; and then he went on to reform and educate them, till they became a wonder to the world and a crown of glory to himself So far we have no doubt that he walked with inspiration and special providence. On the other hand, it is also manifest, that his inspi ration and success, so far at least as practical attempts were concerned, deserted him afterwards, and that much of the latter part of his life was spent in disastrous attempts to establish Communism, without the necessary spirituaL conditions. His whole career may be likened to that of the first Napoleon, whose "star" insured vic tory till he reached a certain crisis; after 'which he lost every battle, and sunk into final and overwhelming defeat.

In both cases there was a turning-point which can be marked. Napoleon's star deserted him when he put away Josephine. Owen evidently 103t his hold on prac tical success when he declared war against religion. In his labors at New Lanark he was not an active infidel. The Bible was in his schools. Religion was at least tol erated and respected. He there Inarried the daughter of Mr. Dale, a preacher of the Independents, who was his best friend and counsellor through the early years of his success. But when his work at New Lanark be came famous, and he rose to companionship with dukes and kings, he outgrew the modesty and practical wisdom of his early life, and undertook the task of Uni versal Reform. Then it was that he fell into the mistake of confounding the principles of the Bible with the charOWEN'S CAREER. acter and pretensions of his ecclesiastical opposers, and so came into the false position of open hostility to religion. Christ was in a similar temptation when he found the Scribes and Pharisees arrayed against him, with the Old Testament for their vantage ground; but he had wisdom enough to keep his foothold on that van tage ground, and drive them off: His programme was, " Think not that I am come to destroy the law and the prophets. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill."

Whereas Owen, at the turning-point of his career, aband oned the Bible with all its magazines of power to his enemies,· and went off into a hopeless warfare with Christianity and with all God's past administrations. From that time fortune deserted him. The splendid success of New Lanark was followed by the terrible defeat at New Harmony. The declaration of war against all religion was between them. Such is our interpreta tion of his life; and something like this must have been his own interpretation, when he confessed in the light of his later expenence, that by overlooking spiritual condi tions, he had missed the most important of all the elements of human improvement. And yet we must not push our parallel too far. Owen, unlike Napoleon, never knew when he was beaten, and .fought on thirty years after his Waterloo. It would be a great nlistake to imagine that the failure of New Harmony and of the attempts that followed it, was the end of Owen's achievements and influence, even in this country. Providence does not so waste its preparations and inspirations. Let us see what was left, and what Owen did, after the disasters of 1826-7.

In the first place the failure of his Community at New Harmony was not the failure of the village which AMERICAN SOCIALISMS. he bought of the Rappites. That was built of substan tial brick and stone. The houses and a portion of the population which he gathered there, remained and have continued to be a flourishing and rather peculiar village till the present time. Several Communities that canle over from England in after-years made New Harmony their rendezvous, either on their arrival or when they broke up. So Macdonald, with the enthuiasm of a true Socialist, on landing in this country in [842 first sought out New Harmony. There he found Josiah Warren, the apostle of Individualism, returned from his wander ings and failures, to set up a "TIme Store" in the old seat of Socialism. We rem em ber also, that Dr. J. R. Buchanan, the anthropologist, was at New Harmony in 1842, when he astonished the "vorld with his novel experiments in Mesmerism, which Robert Dale Owen reported in a famous letter to the Evening Post, and which gave impetus and respectability to the beginnings of modern Spiritualism. These facts and many others indicate that New Harmony continued to be a center and refuge of Socialists and innovators long after the failure of the Community. Notwithstanding the un popularity of Communism which Macdonald says he found there, it is probably a semi-socialist village to this day, representing more or less the spirit of Rocert Owen.

In the next place, with all his failures, Owen was suc cessful in producing a fine family; and though he himself returned to England after the disaster at New Harmony, he bequeathed all his children to this country. Macdonald, writing in 1842, says: "Mr. Owen's family all reside. in New Harmony. There are four sons and one daughter; viz., William Owen, who is a merchant OWEN'S CAREER. and bank director ; Robert Dale Owen, a lawyer and politician, who attends to the affairs of the Owen Estate; David Dale Owen, a practical geologist; Richard Owen, a practical farmer; and Mrs. Faunt leroy. The four brothers, with the wives and families of three of them, live together in one large mansion." Mr. Owen in his published journal says that " his eldest son Robert Dale Owen, after writing much that was excellent, was twice elected member of Congress, and carried the bill for establishing the Smithsonian Institute in Washington; that his second son, David Dale. Owen, was professor of chemistry, mineralogy and geology, and had been employed by successive American governments as their accredited geologist; that his third son, Major Richard Owen, was a professor in a Kentucky Military College; and that his only daughter living in 185 I, was the widow of a distinguished Ameri can officer."

Robert Dale Owen undoubtedly has been and is, the spiritual as well as natural successor of Robert Owen. Wiser and. more moderate than his father, he has risen out of the wreck of New Harmony to high stations and great influence in this country. He was originally associated with Frances Wright in her experiment at Nashoba, h~r lecturing career, and her editorial labors in New York. At that time he partook of the anti religious zeal of his father. Opposition to revivals was the specialty of his paper, the Free Enquirer. In those days, also, he published his" Moral Physiology," a little book teaching in plain terms a method of controlling propagation-not "Male Continence." This bold issue, attributed by his enemies to licentious proclivities, was really· part of the socialistic movement of the time; and 86 AMERICAN SOCIALISMS. indicated the drift of Owen ism toward sexual freedom and the abolition of marriage.

Robert Dale Owen originated and carried the law in Indiana giving to married women a right to property separate from their husbands; and the famous facilities of divorce in that· State are attributed to his influence. He, like his father, turned toward Spiritualism, not withstanding his non-religious antecedents. His report of Dr. Buchanan's experiments, and his books and maga~ine-articles demonstrating the reality of a world of spirits, have been the most respectable and influential auxiliaries to the modern system of necromancy. There is an air of respect for religion in many of his publica tions, and even a happy freedom of Bible quotation, which is not found in his father's writings. Perhaps the variation is due to the blood of his mother, who was the daughter of a Bible man and a preacher. So much Mr. Owen left behind. Let us now follow him in his after career. He bade farewell to New Harmony and returned to England in June 1828.

Acknowledging no real defeat or loss of confidence in his principles, he went right on in the labors of his mission, as Apostle of Communism for the world, hold ing himself ready for the most distant service at a moment's warning. His policy was slightly changed, looking more toward moving the nations, and less toward local experiments. In April 1828, he was again in this country, settling his affairs at New Harmony, and preaching his gospel among the people. During this visit the challenge to debate passed between him and Rev. Alexander Canlpbell, and an arrangement was made for a theological duel. He returned to England in the summer, and in November, of the same year OWEN'S CAREER. 87 ( I 828) sailed again for America on a scheme of obtain ing from the Mexican government a vast territory in. Texas on which to develop Communism. After finish ing the negotiations in Mexico (which negotiations were never executed), he canle to the United States, and in April 1829 met Alexander Campbell at Cincinnati in a debate which was then famous, though now forgotten.

From Cincinnati he proceeded to Washington, where he established intimate relations with Martin Van Buren, then Secretary of State, and had an important interview with Andrew Jackson, the President, laboring with these dignitaries on behalf of national friendship and his new social system. In the summer of 1829 he returned to England, and for some years after was engaged in labors for the conversion of the English government, and in some local attempts to establish" Equitable Commerce," "Labor Exchange" and partial Commun~sm, all of which failed. Here Mr. Sargant, his English biographer, gives up the pursuit of him, and slurs over the rest of his life as though it were passed in obscurity and dotage. Not so Macdonald. We learn from him that after Mr. Owen had exceeded the allotment of three-score years and ten, he twice crossed the ocean to this country. Let us fol low the faithful recQrd of the disciple. We condense from Macdonald: In September 1844, Mr. Owen arrived in New York and immediately published in the Herald (Sept. 21) an address to the people of the United States proclaiming his mission "to effect in peace the greatest revolution ever yet made in human society." Fourierism was at that time in the ascendant. Mr. Owen called at the office of the Phalanx, the organ of Brisbane, and \-vas received with distinction. In October he visited his 88 AMERICAN SOCIALISMS.

family at New Harmony. On his way he stopped at the Ohio Phalanx. In December he went to Washington with Robert Dale Owen, who was then member· of Congress. The party in power was less friendly than that of 1829, and refused him the use of the National Halls. He lectured, or advertised to lecture, in Concert Hall, Pennsylvania Avenue. "In March I 845," says Macdonald, "I had the pleasure of hearing him .lecture at the Minerva rooms in New York, after which he lectured in Lowell and other places." In May he visited Brook Farm. In June he published a manifesto, appointing a World's Convention, to be held in New York in October; and soon after sailed for England. Stopping there scarcely long enough to turn round, he was in this country again in season to give a course of lectures preparatory to the October Convention. After that Convention (which Macdonald confesses was a trifling affair) he continued his labors in various places. On the 26th of October Macdonald met him on the street in Albany, and spent some time with him at his lodgings in much pleasant gossip about New Lanark. In November he called at Hopedale. Adin Ballou, in a published report of the visit, dashed off a sketch of him and his projects, which is so good a likeness that we copy it here: "Robert Owen is a remarkable character. In years nearly seventy-five: in knowledge and experience super abundant; in benevolence of heart transcendental; in honesty without disguise; in philanthropy unlimited; in religion a skeptic; in theology a Pantheist: in meta physics a necessarian circumstantialist; in morals a uni versal excusionist; in general conduct a philosophic non-resistant; in socialism a Communist; in hope a OWEN'S CAREER.

terrestrial elysianist; in practical business a methodist; in deportment an unequivocal gentleman. * * "Mr. Owen has vast schemes to. develop, and vast hopes of speedy .success in establishing a great model of the new social state; which will quite instantan eously, as he thinks, bring the hunlan race into a terrestrial Paradise. He insists on obtaining a million of dollars to be expended in lands,· buildings, machinery, conveniences and beautifications, for his model Com-. munity; all to be finished and in perfect order, before he introduces to their new home the well-selected popu lation who are to inhabit it. He flatters himself he shall be able, by some means, to induce capitalists, or perhaps Congress, to furnish the capital for this object. We were obliged to shake an incredulous head and tell him frankly how groundless, in our judglnent, all such splendid anticipations must prove. He took it in good part, and declared his confidence unshaken, and his hopes undiscourageable by any man's unbelief."

The winter of 1845-6 Mr. Owen appears to have spent in the west, probably at New Harmony. In June 1846, he was again in Albany, and this time for an important purpose. The Convention appointed to frame a new Constitution for the State of New York was then in session. He obtained the use of the Assembly Cham ber and an audience of the delegates; and gave them two lectures ·on "Human Rights and Progress," and withal on their own duties. Macdonald was present, and speaks enthusiastically of his energy and dignity. After reminding the Convention of the inl portance of the work they were about, he went on to say that "all religious systems; Constitutions, Govern ments and Laws are and have been founded in error, AMERICAN SOCIALISMS. and that error is. the false supposition that man fonns his OWIZ character. They were about to form another Constitution based upon that error, and ere long more Constitutions would have to be made and altered, and so on, until the truth that the character of man is for1tled for him shall be recognized, and the system of society based upon that principle become national and univer sal." "After the lecture," says Macdonald, "I lunched with Mr. Owen at the house of Mr. Ames. We had conversation on New Harmony, London, &c. Mr.

Ames having expressed a desire for a photograph of Mr. Owen, I accompanied them to a gallery at the Ji~x change where I parted with him-perhaps forever! He returned .soon after to England where he remains tIll the present time." [1854.J Six times after he was fifty years old, and twice after he was seventy, he crossed the Atlantic and back in the service of Communism! Let us not say that all this wonderful activity was useless. Let us not call this man a driveller and a monomaniac. Let us rather acknowledge that he was receiving and distributing an inspiration unknown even to himself, that had a sure aim, and that is at this moment conquering the world. His hallucination was not in his expectations, but in his ideas of methods and times. Owen had not much theory. His main idea was Communism, and that he got from the Rappites. His persistent assertion that man's character is formed for him by his circumstances, was his nearest approach to original doctrine; and this he virtually abandoned when he came to appreciate spiritual conditions. The rest of his teaching is summed up in the old injunction, "Be good," which is the burden of all preaching.

OWEN'S CAREER. 91 But theory was not his function. Nor yet even prac tice. H is business was to seed the world, and especially this country, with an unquenchable desire and hope for Communism; and this he did effe.ctually. We call him the Father of Alnerican Socialisms, because he took possession of this country fjrst. Fourierism was a secondary infusion. His English practicality was more in unison with the Yankee spirit, than the theorizing of the French school. He himself claimed the Fourierites as working on his job, grading the track by their half-way schemes of joint-stock and guaranteeism for his Rational Communism. And in this he was not far wrong. Communism or nothing, is likely to be the final demand of the American people. The most conspicuous trait in all Owen's labors and journeyings is his indomitable perseverance. And this trait he transmitted to a large breed of American Social ists. Read again the letter of John Harmon at the close of our last chapter. He is now an old man, but his faith in Communism remains unshaken; it is failure-proo£ See how the veterans of Haverstraw, when their Com m.unity fell in pieces, moved to Coxsackie, and when the Coxsackie Community broke up, migrated to Ohio and joined the Kendal Community; and perhaps when the Kendal Community' failed, they joined another, and another; and probably never gave up the hope of a Community-home. We have met with many such wan derers-men and women who were spoiled for the world by once tasting or at least imagining the sweets af Com munism, and would not be turned back by any number of failures. Alcander Longley is a fine specimen of this class. He has tried every kind of Association, from Cooperation to Communism, including F ourierism and AMERICAN SOCIALISMS.

the nameless combinations of Spiritualism; and is now hard at work in the farthest corner of Missouri on his sixth experiment, as enthusiastic as ever! J. J.Franks is a still finer specimen. He began with Owenism. When that failed he enlisted with the Fourierites. During their campaign he bought five thousand acres of land in the mountains of Virginia for a prospective Association, the Constitution of which he prepared and printed, though the Associa tion itself never came into being. When Fourierism failed he devoted himself to Protective Unions. For twenty years past he has been a faithful disciple and patron of the Oneida Community. In such examples we trace the image and spirit of Robert Owen.