Anarchism and the State

v~nted from doing them, Liberty. proposes .to .• snowin'l1}ore detail hereafter in. the prosecution of her purpose. Enpt1gh to say now that monopoly and .privilege. must be destro}"~d, Qpportuni~y. afforded, .. and competition~ncouraged.·. ·This is Liberty's work, and ((Down with Authority" her war-cry. l\NARCH:ISM AND THE STATE Mr. Henry Appleton, one of Liberty'sorlginal edi t:oriaL~ontrihU:tors, was obliged to ce.ase to act in that c:l'pacity when lie took a position not ill.harmony with that of the editor ana point of great importance,whereat 32 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY he later complained, and tried to explain his view of the controversy. In answering him Mr. Tucker dealt with some essential questions of principle: I DO NOT admit anything except the existence of the individual, as a condition of his sovereignty. To say that the sovereignty of the individual is conditioned by Liberty is simply another way of saying that it is conditioned by itself.

To condition it by the cost principle is equivalent to insti tuting the cost principle by authority,-an attempted fusion of Anarchism with State Socialism which I have always under stood Mr. Appleton to rebel against. It is true that the affirmation of individual sovereignty is logically precedent to protest against authority as such. But in practiCe they are inseparable. To protest against the in vasion of individual sovereignty is· necessarily to affirm indi vidual sovereignty. The Anarchist always carries his base of supplies with him. He cannot. fight away from it. The moment he does so he becomes an Archist. This protest contains all the affirmation that there is. As I have pointed out to Comrade Lloyd, Anarchy has no side that is affirma tive in the sense of constructive. Neither as Anarchists nor-what is practically the same thing-as individual sov ereigns have we any constructive work to do, though as pro gressive beings we have plenty of it. But, if we had perfect liberty, we might, if we chose, remain utterly inactive and still be individual sovereigns. Mr. Appleton's unenviable experi ences aJ;e due to no mistake of mine, but to his own folly in acknowledging the pertinence of the hackneyed cry for con struction, which loses none of its nonsense on the lips of a Circuit Court Judge.

I base my assertion that the Chicago Communists are not Anarchists entirely on the ground that Anarchism means a protest against every form of invasion. (Whether this definition is etymologically correct I will show in the next paragraph. ) Those who protest against the existing political State, with emphasis on the existing, are not Anarchists, but Archists. In objecting to a special form or method of in... vasion, they tacitly acknowledge the rightfulness of some other form or method of invasion.Proudhon never fought a~y particl:a~:ta::l~~~~f :::i:S:t:t~oo itS¢1£.3a: necessarily negative of individual sovereignty, whatever form it .may, take'•• ,,'His. use of'. the. word Anarchism •• shows.,that ,.he considered, it coextensive with',individual sovereign.ty.'., ,If his application's of it were directed against political government, it~as because <he considered political government the only invader of individual sovereignty worth talking abou.t,having neJknowledge of Mr. Appleton's ttcomprehensivephilosophy,"

wpich thinks it takes cognizance ofa (tvaSt mountain of gov ernmentoutside of. the organized State.", ••,The ,reason why Most••. and ••Parsons are, not Anarchists, while. I am one, "is be caus,etheir Communism is another •State, while my voluntary co-o1?erationis not a State at aU. ' It. is a ,very easy matter to tell who' is an Anarchist and who is not., One questiohwill always readily decide it. ,Do you, believe in any form o£illl p()sition upon •• the hu11lanwill by force? ,If youdo,you;lre not all.Anarchist. , If you do not, you are' an ,Anarchist. '. What call anyone ask more reliable, more scientific, than this? Anarchy does,.not mean simply. opposed 'to the ... arcbos, pr,)?olitic,alleader., It means'opposed toarchE. Now". arche, in the first instance, means beginning, origin. From ,this it co1n,es.to mean a first principle, an element; ,then first place, supreme power, sovereignty, ," dominion, command" authority; an.dfinallya sovereignty, an empire,arealm, amagistracy,a go~ernmenJal office. Etymologically, "then, the word anarchy may have. several. meanings, ,among them, as Mr. Appleton s~ys, .'Without guiding principle, .and to this use of the word I haye never objected, always striving, on the contrary, to in terpret in accordance with their definition the th0ught of those "\VUO ,so" use it. But the word Anarchy as a philosophical,term . and the word Anarchist as the name of a philosophical. sect 'Were ttrst appropriated in the. sense of, opposition to dominion, to, authority, and are so held by right of occupancy, which fact makes any other philosophical,use of them improper and •con fusing. Therefore, as Mr. Appleton does not make the polit ical sphere coextensive with. dominion or authority, he cannot claim that Anarchy, .when extended •••beyond the political sphere, necessarily comes, to' mean without. guiding principle, for it may mean, and by appropriation does mean, without dominion, withoutauthority ..Consequently it isa term which completely and. scientifically covers the individualistic ,'protest.

34 INDIVIDUAL LIBER TY I could scarcely name a wor~ that has been more abused, misunderstood, and misinterpreted than Individualism. Mr. Appleton makes so palpable a point against himself in in stancing the Protestant sects that it is really laughable to see him try to use it against me. However it may be with the Protestant se~ts, the one great Protestant body itself was born of protest, suckled by protest, named after protest, and lived on protest untilthe days of its usefulness were over. If such instances proved anything, plenty of them might be cited· against Mr. 4ppleton. For example, taking one of more re cent date, I might pertinently inquire which contributed most to the freedom of the negro,-those who defined themselves through their affirmations as the Liberty Party or as Coloniza tionists, or those who defined themselves through their protests as the Anti-Slavery Society or as Abolitionists. Unquestion ably the latter. And when human slavery in all its forms sflall have disappeared, I fancy that the credit of the victory will be given quite as exclusively to the Anarchists, and" that these latter-day Colonizationists, of whom Mr. Appleton has suddenly become so enamored, will be held as innocent of its overthrow as are their predecessors"and namesakes of the over throw of chattel slavery.

It is to be regretted that Mr. Appleton took up so much space with other matters that he could not turn his ttflood of light" into my ((delusion" that the State is the efficient cause of tyranny over individuals; for the question whether this" is a delusion or not is the very heart of the issue between us. He has asserted that there is a vast mountain of government outside of the organized State, and that our chief battle is with that; I, on the contrary, have maintained that practically; almost all"the authority against which we have to contend is exercised" by the State, and that, when "we have abolished the State, the struggle for individual sovereignty will b~ well-nigh over. I have shown that Mr. Appleton, to maintain his posi tion, m.ust point out this vast mountain of government and tell us definitely what it is and how it acts, and this is what the readers of Liberty have been waiting to see him do. But he no more does it in his last article than in his first. And his only attempt to dispute my statement that the State is the efficient cause of tyranny over individuals is confined to two or three sentences which culminate in the conclusion that the INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 3S initial cause is the surrendering individual. I have never de nied it, and am charmed by the airofinnocence.with'which this substitution of initial for efficient iseffected.• Of initial causes finite intelligence knows nothing; it ,can only know ca,uses•• as more or less rem,ote. But using the .word .initial in the, sense of remoter,. I 'am, willing. to admit, for the .sake of the argument (though ~t is .not a settled 'matter) '. that the initial cause was the suctendering individual. Mr. Appleton doubtless,·:means_ voluntar~ly •surrendering individual, for com pulsory surrender would 'imply the prior- ~xistence of a power to exact it, or a prill1itiveform of State. But the State, hav ingcome into. existence. through such voluntary surrender, becomes apositive,$tr~ng, growin,.g, encroaching insti~ution, )Vhichexpands, noeby further voluntary surrenders, but by exacting surrenders ,from its individual subjects,and.which contracts only as they successfully rebel. ,That, atanyrate,is what it is to-day, and hence it is the efficient cause of tyranny.

The only sense, then, in which it is true that uthe individual is the proper objective' point of' r~£ormu is this,-thathe must be.penetrated with t~e. Anarchistic idea and •taught to rebel. But this is not .what Mr. Appleton means. Ii it were, his 'criticism would not be pertinent" for I have.never advocated any .other •method ,.of abolishing the State. The logic of his position compels another interpretation of his words,-namely that the State .cannot .disappear, until the individual is per fected. In saying -, which, Mt. Appleton _joins hands., with [those wise, persons whoad1l1it that. Anarchy will. be ,practi :cable when the millennium arrives.. It is an utterahandon :mentof ·,Anarchistic·Socialism,... Nodop.bt. it.,is. true tha.t,. if ithe individual could perfect h~mself while1:he barriers to his 1perfection are stanq.ing,the State WQuid <a£terw~ards disappear. Perhaps, too, he, could go '. to· heaven, if.he could Iifthimself ' by his boot-straps. ._ .. 1 ; If . one' must favor colonization, ori localization, as Mr.

l'Appleton calls it, as a result, of looking!useriously" into these :rp.atters, th~n he must have bee? tr~~inc?1 withthemfor a long t1tne. ',He has combated colonlzatlon'lt!t these columns mor~ .vigorously than ~ver I did or can,al1d 116t until comparatively lately didlle write anything seeming to favor it. Even then he declared tha t he was not given over to the idea, ,and seemed only.to be making a tentative.venture·into a region, which 'he 36 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY had not before explored. If he has since become a settler, it only indicates to my mind that he has not yet fathomed· the real cause of the people's wretchedness. That cause is State interference with. natural economic .processes. The people are poor and robbed and enslaved, not because Uindustry, com merce, and domicile are centralized,"-in fact, such centrali zation has, on the whole, greatly benefited them,-but because the control of the conditions under which industry, commerce, and domicile are exercised and enjoyed is centralized. The localization needed is not the localization of persons in space, but of powers in persons,-that is, the restriction of power to self and the al>olition of power over others. Government makes itself felt alike in country and in city, capital has its usurious grip on the farm as surely as on the workshop, .and the oppressions and exactions of neither government nor capital can be avoided by migration. The State is the enemy, and the best means of fighting it can only be found in communities already existing. If there were no other reason for opposing colonization, this in itself would be sufficient.