Free Money First

It is a mistake, too, to think that land is not a good basis for currency. True, unimproved vacant land, not having properly a market value, cannot properly give value to any thing that represents it; but permanent improvements on land, which should have a market value and carry with them a title to possession, are an excellent basis for currency. It is not the raw material of any product that fits it for a basis, but the labor that has been expended in shaping the material. A~ for the immovability of land unfitting it for a basis, it has just the opposite effect. We should not be misled by the idea that currency can be redeemed only in that on which it is based. FREE MONEY FIRST J. M. M'GREGOR, a writer for the Detroit Labor Leaf thinks -free land the chief desideratum. And yet he acknowledges that the wage-worker can't go from any of our manufactur ing centres to the western lands, because ((such a move would involve a cash outlay of a thousand dollars, which he has not got, nor can he get it." It would seem, then, that free land, though greatly to be desired, is not as sorely needed here and now as free capital. And this same need of capital would be equally embarrassing if the eastern lands were free, for still more capital would be required to stock and work a farm than the wage-worker can command. Under our present money system he could not even get capital by putting up his farm as collateral, unless he would agree to pay a rate of in terest that would eat him up in a few years. Therefore, free land is of little value to labor without free capital, while free capital would be of inestimable benefit to labor· even if land should not be freed for some time to come. For with it labor LIBERTY 95 could go into other industries C on the spot and achieveitsinde pendence. .Not. free. land, .then, but. free .money.is .the chief deisiderat\tm. It is·in the perception of this iprime .importance of the money question that the greenbackers, despite their ut..

terlyerroneous solution of it, show their marked superiority to the State Socialists and the .land nationalizationists. The .. craze.to get people upon the. land·is one of the lnsan.. it~esthat has.• dominated. social.reformers ever· since social re formwasnrst thought of. It. is a.great mistake..•0£ agricul ture it is as true as of~very. other industry that there should 1:>eas few people<engageciinit aspossible,-that is" just enough to supply the .world with all the agricultural products which it •wants. ••The fewer farmers there.··are, •after •• this point. of necessary supply is reached, the more useful people there are to engage ill other industries which have not yet reached this point, and to devise and .. work at new industries hitherto un thought of. It is altogether likely that we have too many farmers now. It is not best that anymore of us should be c011lefarmers, even if every homestead could be made an J\.J:cadia. The plough is very well in its way, and Arcadia.was very well in its clay... But the way of the plough is not as.wiqe as the world,>and the world has outgrown the day of Arcadia.

Human life henceforth is to be, not a sil11ple, but a complex: thing. The wants· and aspirations of •mankind ate daily mul tiplying. .. They can be satisfied only bY.ithe .diversification· of industry, which is the method of progress and the record of .civilization. This is one •.of..·the.great .. truths .• which. Lysander Spooner has so.•.. long been>shouting into. unwilling. ears... But the further diversification of industry in such away as to bene fit, noJonger the few and the idle, .but the many and the industrious, depends upon· the control .of capital by .labor. ~nd this, asProudhon, .. Warren,. Greene, and .Spooner have shown, can be secured only bya free money system. In anSwer.to .my article,· CtFree Money First/" ·in which was discussed.the.comparative.importance of. the money. and land questions, ]. M. M'Gregor, of the Detroit Labor Leaf, says: ttLgrant free money first. I firmly believe free money willcome.first, too, though ..• my ·.critic .and myseIfmay. be wigelyatvariance inregardi to what. would. constitute free money," ·I.mean.by free moneythe.utter.absenceo£ restric96 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY tion upon the issue of all money not fraudulent. If Mr.

M'Gregor believes in this, I am heartily glad. I should like to be half as sure as he is that it really is coming first. From the present temper of the people it looks to me as if nothing free would come first. They seem to be bent on trying every form of compulsion. In this current Mr. M'Gregor is far to the fore with his scheme of land taxation on the Henry George plan, and although he may believe free money will be first in time, he clearly does not consider it first in im portance. This last-mentioned priority he awards to land reform, and it was his position in that regard that my article was written to dispute. The issue between us, thus confined, hangs upon the truth or falsity of Mr. M'Gregor's statement that CCto-day landlord ism, through rent and· speculation, supports more idlers than any other system of profit-robbing known to our great com monwealth." I take it that Mr. M'Gregor, by ccrent ," means ground-rent exclusively, and, by the phrase ((supports more idlers," means takes more from labor; otherwise, his state ment has no pertinence to his position. For all rent except ground-rent would be almost entirely and directly abolished by free money, and the evil of rent to labor depends, not so much on the number of idlers it supports, as on the aggregate amount a,nd quality of support it gives them, whether they be many or few in numbe'r. Mr. M'Gregor's statement, then, amounts to this:· that ground-rent takes more from labor than any other form pf usury. It needs no statistics to disprove 1:his. The principal forms of usury are interest on money loaned or invested, profits made in buying and selling, rent of buildings of all sorts, and ground-rent. A moment's reflection will show anyone that the amount of loaned or invested capi tal bearing interest in this country to-day far exceeds in value the amount of land yielding rent. The item of interest alone is a much more serious burden on the people than that of ground-rent. Much less, theil, does ground-rent equal in 1:erest plus profit plus rent of buildings. But to make Mr.

M'Gregor's argument really valid it must exceed all these combined. For a true money reform, I repeat, would abolish almost entirely and directly everyone of these forms of usury except ground-rent, while a true land r~form would directly abolish only ground-rent. Therefore, unless labor /INDIVIDUAL LlnERTY 97 pays more in ground-rent than in interest, profit, and rent of buildings combined, the money question is' of ·more· im~ porta-nee tpan the land· question. There are countries where this is the case, but the United States is not one of them. It should also be borne in mind that free money, ind~$tr~y ingthepower to ac€umulate large fortunes in the ordinary industries of life, will putaverypower£ul check upon the scramble·forcorner-lots'and other advantageous positions, and thereby have a cons~derable inf1u~nc~ul'oitgrou1'ld-rent itself. ttrI0w,can .capital he free," asks Mr., M'Gregor, tCwhen·it cannot get rid of rent?" It cannot be entirely free till iteaD.