III. Trade And Industry

III-TRADE AND INDUSTRY THE ATTITUDE ·OF ANARCHISM TOWARD INDUSTRIAL COMBINATIONS FROM September 13 to 16, 1899, the Civic Federation held a Conference on Trusts, in Chicago, before which it invited about one hundred individuals from every walk of life and of various political and economic beliefs to / discuss the question of trusts from every angle. Mr. Tucker was Qne of those invited to address the assembly, and his paper, which is here r~produced in full, excited more interest and comment, according to the .newspaper accounts at the time, than the remarks of any other speaker at the conference: HAVING to deal very briefly with the problem with which the so-caHed trusts confront us, I go at once to the heart of the subject, taking my stand on these propositions: That th~ r~ht to cooper~te is as unquesti?nable as the .right to con:ete; that the rIght to compete Involves the rIght to refratn rom competition; that cooperation is often a method of com..

etition, and that competition is always, in the larger view, a method of cooperation; that each is a legitimate, orderly, non-invasive exercise of the individual will under the social law of equal liberty; and that any man or institution attempt ing to prohibit or restrict either, by legislative enactment or by any form of invasive force,. is, in so far as such man or institution may fairly be judged by such attempt, an enemy of liberty, an enemy of progress, an enemy of society, and an enemy of the human race. Viewed in the .light of these irrefutable propositions, the !, trust, then, like every other industrial combination endeavor\ 24 8 IN D I VI D U ALL I B ER T Y 249 ingto doconectively nothing but what· each. member of the l;ombination rightfully may' endeavor to do individually, is per se, art· unimpeachable institution. To assail or control or denythisJor~ of cooperation on the ground that it is itself a denial of competition.is an absurdity. It is an absurdity, because it prove&too much. The trust is a denial of compe tit ion in no other sensethan that in whichcompetitionitsel£ is a denial of'c01ll:petiti<rn. The trust denies competition only by pl:"Qclucingandsel11. hs 1nore. che~ply than tl,os~ outsid~' of the trust can produce and sell; but in that sense every S1.1ccess"

f1.lLindividualcompetitor also denies competition. And if the trust; .is, to ,be suppressed f()r.such denial of competition, ,then the very .competition in the name of which the. trust is to he suppressed must itself be suppressed also. I repeat: the argu ment proves too much. The fa.ct is that there is one denial of competition which is ,the .' right of •aU, and that there is another denial ofc9mpetition which. is the right of, none. All ,of us, whether out of a trust ()r in it, have a right to deny compe tition by competing, but none of us, whether in a trust or out of it,-have a right to, deny competition by arbitrary decree,' by interference '. withvpluntary effQrt~ by forcible, suppression.of initiative. , " ,A.g:;t~n:Toclaimithatthe trust should be abolished or con 'trolled. bec~use' the great resources and consequent power of endu.rance which it' acquires by combination give it an undue advantage, and •thereby enable it to. crush competition, is eq~ally aft argument that proves too much. If John D. Rocke felle.rwere. to start a grocery store in his. individual capacitYt we should not think of suppressing, or restrict!ng 'or hamper ip.g,his enterpri~e, simply because, with his five hundred mil..

.lions, ,he could afford to sell groceries at less than cost '. until the day when. the accumul~ted ruins of all other grocerystores should ,afford him· a sure foundation for a profitable 'business. But, if Rocke.feller's po~session of.nve hundred millions is not agoodgrou.ndfor the suppression of his grocery store, no bettet,gtoundisthe control of still greater wealth £orthe suppression Qfhis oil trust. It is ,true that these vast,accumu lations under 'one, contfol are abnormal, and dangerous,but the reasons for them lie outside of and behind ap.d benea~hall t~ustsand in:dustrialcombinations,'7reasons which I shall come tPpresently,~feasons 'which. are'all" in some form, or .other, an '250 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY arbitrary denial of liberty; and, but for these reasons, but for these denials of liberty, John D. Rockefeller never could have acquired five hundred milliQns, nor would any combina tion of men be able to control an aggregation of wealth that could not be easily· and successfully· met by some other com bina tion of men.

Again: There is no warrant in reason for deriving a right to control trusts from the State grant of corporate privileges under which they are Qrganized. In the first place, it being pure usurpation to presume to endow any body of men with rights and exemptions that are not theirs already under the social law of equal liberty, corporate privileges are in them selves a wrong; and one wrong is not to be undone by at tempting to offset it with another .. But, even admitting the justice of corporation charters, the avowed purpose in grant ing them is to encourage cooperation, and thus stimulate in dustrial and commercial development for the benefit of the community. Now, to make this encouragement an excuse for its own nullification by a proportionate restriction of cooperation would be to add one more to those interminable imltations of the task of Sisyphus for which that stupid insti tution which we call the State has ever been notorious.

Of somewhat the same nature, but rather more plausible at first blush, is the proposition to cripple the trusts by stripping them of those law-created privileges and monopolies which are conferred, not upon trusts as corporate bodies, but upon sundry individuals and interests, ostensibly· for protection of the producer and inventor, but really for purposes of plunder, and which most trusts acquire in the process of merging the original capitals of their constituent menlbers. I refer, of course, to tariffs, patents, and copyrights. Now, tariffs, pat ents, and copyrights either have their foundations in justice, or they have not their foundations in justice. If they have their foundations in justice, why should men guilty of nothing but a legitimate act· of cooperation and. partnership be pun ished therefor by having their just rights taken from them? If they have not their foundations in justice, why should men who refrain from cooperation be left in possession of unjust privileges that are denied to men who cooperate? If tariffs are unjust, they should not be levied at all. If patents and copyrights are unjust, they should not be granted to anyone INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 2S1 whomsoever. But, if i. t~riffsand patents and copyrights are just, they should be levied. or granted in the interest of all who. are. entitled to their· henefitsfrom the viewpoint of the motives in·whicp •these privileges .. have. their ·origin, and to make .such levy or· grant dependent upon any foreign motive, such, for instance, as willingness to refrain from cooperation, would he sheer impertinence.

Nevertheless, at this point in the hunt.·for the solution of ~~:tt~S:s1r:;~e:;h~h:r:~.ce~~gth:.. ~h~t.. a::!s~~;\h:::~.:~ instea&of i growing out. of competition,· as IS so•generally sup posed,bave been made •possible only. by the absence of compe tition,J~nly .by the difficulty of. competition, only by the obstat~es placed •. in the way. of. competition,---only, in shott, ;Jt~a~~:l~i~f~il~;::.~~:::~~::of:t~:i.~~ just spoken, and in one or two •others, less direct, but still more far-reaching and i dea.dly in their destructive influence· upon enterprise. And it isi with this thought that· Anarchism, the doctrine· that .. in .aU matters there·. should. be·· the greatest amount of individuallibertyc()mpatiblewith equality of lib erty, .approaches the case in hand, and offers its diagnosis.and itS remedy. The first and great Jact to be noted .in the case, I have .. already hinted at. It is the fact that the trusts owe their p0-werto vast accumulation and concentration of wealth, un matched, and, under present conditions, unmatchable, by any ~qu~l accumulation of wealth, and that this accumulation of we~lthhas been effected ibythe ·combination of severalac cumulations only less vast ~nd in themselves already ~igantic, each of which owed its existence to one or more of the only means·by·. which· large ·fortunes can be rolled up,-interest~ rent,and monopolistic profit. But for. interest, rent, i and monopolistic profit,· therefore, trusts .would be impossible.

Now, what causes interest, rent, and monopolistic profit? For aU.there is but one'. cause,-the denial.of liberty, the suppres sion or restriction of competition, the legal creation of monop olies.. This single cause,'however, takes vario1.lsshapes. MOllopolisticprofit is due to that denial. of liberty which takes the shape of patent, copyright, and tariff legislation, pat~52 INDIVIDU AL LIBERTY ent and copyright laws directly forbidding competition, and tariff laws placing competition at a fatal disadvantage. Rent is due to that denial of liberty which takes the shape of land monopoly, vesting titles to land in individuals and as sociations which do not use it, and thereby compelling the non-owning users to pay tribute to the non-using owners as a condition of admission to the competitive market. Interest is due to that denial of liberty which takes the shape of money monopoly, depriving all individuals and asso ciations, save such as hold a certain kind of property, of the right to issue promissory notes as currency, and thereby com pelling all holders of property other than the kind thus priv ileged, as well as all non-proprietors, to pay tribute to the hold ers of the privileged property for the use of a circulating me diumand instrument of credit which, in the complex stage that industry and commerce have now reached, has become the chief essential of a competitive market.

Now, Anarchism, which, as I have said, is the doctrine that in all matters there should be the greatest amount of individ ual liberty compatible with equality of liberty, finds that none of these denials of liberty are necessary to the main tenance of equality of liberty, but that each and everyone of them, on the contrary, is destructive of equality of liberty. Therefore it declares them unnecessary, arbitrary, oppressive, and unjust, and· demands their immediate cessation. Of these four monopolies-the banking monopoly, the land monopoly, the tariff monopoly, and the patent and copyright monopoly-the injustice of all but the last-named is manifest even to a child. The right of the individual to buy and sell without being held up by a highwayman whenever he crosses an imaginary line called a frontier; the right of the individual to take possession of unoccupied land as freely as he takes possession of unoccupied water or unoccupied air; the right of the individual to give his IOU, in any shape whatsoever, under any guarantee whatsoever, or under no guarantee at all, to anyone willing to accept it in exchange for some thing else,----.all these rights are too .clear .for argument, and anyone presuming to dispute them simply declares thereby his despotic and· imperialistic instincts.

For the fourth of these monopolies, however,-the patent and copyright monopoly,-a more plausible case can be pre~NDIVIDU AL L'IBERTY 253 sented,£or the question .of .property in, ideas,is a. very subtle one.', The defenders of such property set up an analogy be tween the production of material things and the production ofabstractions, and on the strength of it declare that the man u£actur~r of mental products, no less than the manufacturer of material products, is a laborer worthy of his hire. So far, so good" •.•.. B\lt, to make .out their case, they 'are' obliged to go further,. and to claim, in violation of ,their own analogy, that.th~ ,laborer who crea.tes mental products, unlike the la borer who creates material. products, is entitled to exemption from' competition. Because the Lord, in his wisdom, 'or the Devil, in his malice, has so arranged-matters that the inventor and, the author produce naturally at a disadvantage, map, in his might, proposes to supply the divine or diabolic deficiency by an ••'artificial. arrangement that shall. not, only destroy this disadvantage,butac_tually give the inventor and author an advantage that no other Iflborer enjoys,~an advantage, more over,which, in practice,. goes, not to the inventor and the author, but to the promoter and' the publisher and the trust.

Convincing as the atgt1Jmentfor property in ideas may seem at:6rst· hearing, .• if you, think about it long enough, you will begin to be: st1;spicious. The first thing, perhaps, to arouse your.suspicion will be. the. fact that none ()fthe champions of such property :p,roposethe punishment,ofthosewho violate it, contenting ·themselves with subjecting the. offenders to the risk of damage suits, and that-nearly all of them are willing that even the risk of suit shall disappear when the proprietor h~senjoyed his right for a certain number 'of years. Now, if, ;tst~e .French writer, •• AiphonseKarr, .remarked, property· in ideas is a property like' any other propertY:J.then its violation, ' like the' violation of any other property, deserves criminal punishment, and' its life, like that of any other property, should be secure in right against tp.e lapse· of time. And, 1;hisnot. being claimed, by the upholders of property in' 'ideas, the suspiCion arises that such a lack of the courage of their (;onyictionsmay be·due to an instinctive :fe~1ing'that they are 'W'r()ng~ .

The necessity ·of being brief prevents me from examining thisphasepf my subject in detail. Therefore I must content myself with developing a single consideration, which, I hope, y,nlproye suggestive.

254 INDIVIDUAL LIBER TY I take it that, if it were possible, and if it had always been possible, for an unlimited number of individuals to use to an unlimited extent and in an unlimited number of places the same concrete things at the same time, there never would have been any such thing as the institution of property. Under those circumstances .the idea of property would never have entered the human mind, or, at any rate, if it had, would have been summarily dismissed. as too gross an absurdity to be seriously entertained for a moment. Had it been possible for the concrete creation or adaptation resulting from the ef forts of a single individual to be used contemporaneously by all individuals, including the creator or adapter, the realiza tion, or impending realization, of this possibility, far from being seized upon as an excuse for a law to prevent the use of this concrete thing without the consent of its creator or adapter, and far from being guarded against as an injury to one, would have been welcomed as a blessing to all,-in short, would have been viewed as a most fortunate element in the nature of things. The raison d'etre of property is found in the very fact that there is no such possibility,-in the fact that it is impossible in the nature of things for concrete objects to be used in different place,s at the same time. This fact existing, no person can remove from apother's possession and take to his own use another's concrete' creation without thereby de priving that other of all··opportunity to use that which he created, and for this reason it becaD;le socially necessary, since successful society rests on individual initiative, to protect the individual creator in the use of his concrete creations by for bidding others to use them without his consent. In other words, it became necessary to institute property in concrete things.

But all this happened so long ago that we of today have entirely forgotten why it happened. In fact, it is very doubt ful whether, at the time of the institution of property, those who effected it thoroughly realized and understood the motive of their course. Men sometimes do by instinct and without analysis that which conforms to right reason.~he institutors of property may have been governed by circumstances in hering in the nature of things, without realizing that, had the nature of things been the opposite, they would not have insti tuted property. But, be that as it may, even supposing that INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 255 they t~oroughly understodtheir course, we, at any rate; have pretty \nearly forgotten their understanding. .And so it ,has comec1bout that we have made ot property a fetich; that we consider' it .',a· sacred thing; ·that we ,have, set" up the god of property on an altar as, an object of 'idol-worship; and that most of us 'are not only doing what we can to strengthen and perpetuate his reign within the proper and original limits of his sovereignty, but also are mistakenly endeavoring to ex ten.d h~s dom.inion over things and. und.er c~rcuttlstanceswhich~ in their .', pivotal characteristic, are precisely the opposite of those out of which 'his power developed.

'Allof which is to~ay in'briefer compass, that from the jus ticeand social necessity of property, in concrete things ,we have erroneously assumed the justice and social necessity of property in abstract things,-that is, of property in ideas, with the result of.'nullifying to a,large and lamentable. extent that fortunate element, in ,the 'nature of things, in this 'case not hypothetical, but real,--namely, the immeasurably fruit f~lpossibility, of the. use of abstract things by any number of individuals in any ,number of plac,esat precisely the same time, without in the slightest· degree impairing. the use thereof by .. any single individual. '.Thus we "have,hastily and stupidly jumped to the conclusion that property in concrete things"log" icallyimplies 'property in abstract things, whereas, if we had had the' care and the ,keenness to accurately analyze, we should have£oundthat\thevery.reason which dictates theadvisabil ..

ityofiproperty in concrete ,things denies the advisability. of property, in abstract things. We see.here a .curious inst~nce of ~h1tJrequent mental, phenomenon,-the precise inversion of the truth by a superficiaL view. Furthermore, were the.,conditions the .same 'in,., both cases~ and concretethings capableof use by differentpersonsin-ai£ ferent:places, at the same time, even then, 1 say, the institu tion .' of property in concrete thillgs, though under those. con ditions manifestly absurd, would be infinitely less destructive of individual opportunities,., and therefore infinitely' less' dan ger~usand dett1mental to, human welfare, than is the, institu tion. of property in abstract things. For it is easy to see that~ even should .,we. accept the rather'startling hypothesis. that .,a single ear of corn is continually and permanently consumable, otr1ther incQJJjsumable"by an indefinite number of persons 2.56 INDIVIDUAL LIBER TY scattered over the surface of the earth, still the legal institu tion of property in concrete things that would secure t(\ the sower of a gr~in of corn the exclusive use of the resultant ear would not, in so doing, deprive other persons of the right to sow other grains of corn and become exclusive users of their respective harvests; whereas the legal institution of property in abstract things not only secures to the inventor, say, of the steam engine the exclusive use rof the engines which he actu ally makes, but at the same time deprives all other persons of the right to make for themselves other engines involving any of the same ideas. Perpetual property in ideas, then, which is the logical outcome· of any .theory of property in abstract things, would, had it been in force in the lifetime of James Watt, have made his direct heirs the owners of at. least nine tenths of the now existing wealth of the world; and, had it been in force in the lifetime of the inventor of the Roman alphabet, nearly all the highly civilized peoples of the earth would be today the virtual slaves of that inventor's heirs, which is but another way of saying that, instead of becoming highly civilized, they would have remained in the state of semi-barbarism. It seems to me that these two statements, which in my view are incontrovertible, are in .themselves suf..

ncient to condemn property in ideas forever. If then, the four monopolies to which I have referred are unnecessary denials of liberty, and therefore unjust denials of liberty, and if they are the sustaining causes of interest, rent, and monopolistic profit, and if, in turn, this usurious trinity is the cause of all vastaccumtllations of wealth,-for further proof of which propositions I must, because of the limitations of my time, refer you to the economic writings of the An archistic school,-it clearly follows that the adequate solution of the problem with which the trusts confront us is to be found only in abolition of these monopolies and the consequent guarantee of perfectly free competition. . The most serious of these four monopolies is unquestionably the money monoply, and I believe that perfect freedom in finance alone would wipe out nearly all the trusts, or at .least render them harmless,· and perhaps helpful. Mr. Bryan told a very important truth when he declared that the destruction of the money trust would at the same time kill all the other trusts. Unhappily, Mr. Bryan does not propose to destroy the INDIVIDUAL LIBER TY 257 money trust. He •• wishes simply to transform it from a gold trust into a .gold. and silver trust'. The m()ney trust canllot be destroyed. by the remonetization of silver.,That would be only a mitigation of the monopoly, not the abolishment of it.

It can be .abolishedonly by monetizing all wealth that has a market'value,-that is, by giving' to· all wealth the right of representati9n by currency, and to all currency, the right-to circulate wherever it can on its own merits. And this is not only a solution o£ the'~rus~ question, but ~he :&rs~ s~ep that should be taken, and the greatest single step that can be takehj in economic and social refortll. I have tried, in the few ritinutes allotted to me, to state COn'cisely the' attitude of Anarchism toward industrial.cQmbin~ tions. .It discountenances all direct attacks on them, all inter .. ference .with them, all anti-trust. legislation whatsoever. In fact, it regards' industrial combinations as very useful when~ ever they spring into existence in ... response to demand created in a healthy social body. If at present they are baneful, it is. because' they .are symptoms of a social disease.'originally caused and .persistently aggravated by· a regimen of tyranny and quackery. Anarchis~ wants to call off the quacks, and -give liberty,· nature's great. cure-all, a chance to do its··perfect work.

Free access to the world of mat~er~abo1ishing land monop oly;freeaccess to the w~rld o(mind, abolishing ideamonop .. 011; £reeaccess to al1.untaxed and unprivileged •market, abol... ishing tax:iff m011opoly.and moneymonopoly,--secure thes~, and all the'·rest shall be added unto you. For liperty is the relt1~dy of every.social evil, and ·to Anarchy the world .must look at last for any endurin$ guarantee of social order. STRIKES AND FORCE In. thetamous HOl).lesteadStrike, the. rights and inter estsof 'both ,capital and labor were so intermingled' and jumbled. in the discussions in the daily press that it ,was difficult for the .man(on. the street to form an impar;tial opinion; it was not· easy even for the student of sociology 25\8 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY to reach a rational conclusion. So the editor of Liberty stepped into the fray: to reprove one of the most vicious of the muddlers: REGARDING methods, one of the truths that has been most steadily inculcated by this journal has been that social ques tions canno~ be settled by force. Recent events have only confirmed this view. But when force comes, it sometimes leads incidentally to the teaching of other lessons than that of its own uselessnessand becomes thereby to that extent useful. The appeal to force at Homestead affords a signal example of such incidental beneficence; for it has forced the capitalistic papers of the country, and notably the New York Sun, to take up a bold defense of liberty in order to protect property. Now, all that Anarchism asks is liberty; and when the enemies of liberty can find no way of saving their own interests except by an appeal to liberty, Liberty means to make a note of it and hold them to it.

Applied to the conduct of the Homestead strikers, this principle of equal lil;>erty, of which the Sun's words are an expression, instead of condemning it as the Sun pretends, pal liates and even excuses it; for, before these strikers violated the equal liberty of others, their own right to equality of lib erty had been wantonly and continuously violated. But, ap plied to the conditctof capitalists generally, it condemns it utterly, for the original violation of liberty in this matter is traceable directly to them. This is no wild assertion, but a sober statement of fact, as I will explain. It is not enough, however true, to say that, ceif a man has labor to sell, he must find some one with money to buy it"; it is necessary to add the much more important truth that, if a man has labor to sell, he has a right to a free market in which to sell it,-a market in which no one shall be pre vented by restrictive laws from honestly obtaining the money to buy it. If the man with hbor to sell has not this free mar ket, then his liberty is violated and his property virtually taken from him. Now, such a market has constantly been denied, not only to the laborers· at Homestead, but to the laborers of the entire civilized world. And the men who have denied it are the Andrew Carnegies. Capitalists of whom this INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY; 2.59 Pittsburg £orge-masterisa typical representative have placed and kept upon the statute,-books all sortsQf, prohibitions and taxes, (of which ,the customs. tariff. is ,among the least harm ful) "designed to limit and effective in limiting" the, number of bidders for the labor of those who have.,labor to selL If there were no,tariffs on imported goods;if'titles to unoccupied land were not recognized by. the State; above all, ,if the right. to issue money were not vested in a monopoly,--bidders for the labor ofCarn-egie's employees wO\1ld become so numerous that the offer would soon equal the laborer's product." Now, to.sol emnly tell these men who are thus prevented bylaw from getting thew-ages which their labor would command in a free market that they have a •right ,to reject any price that may be offered for their labor is undoubtedly to ,speak a formal. truth, but it is also to utter a rotten commonplace and a cruelim pertinence. Rather tell the capitalists, that· the, •laborer, is entitled toa free market, and that they,.in.denying it to him, are guiltYQf criminal invasion. This would be not' only a formaL truth, but an opportune applica.tion of a vital prin ciple.

Perhaps,it will be claimed in answer to this that the laborers, being voters, are responsiblefor any monopolies that exist,and are thereby debarred from pleading them, as an excuse for violating the liberty of their employers. This is only true to the extent to which we may consider these laborers as the ufools" ,p~rsuaded ',by the capitalists who are the uscoundrels" that ~tviolence(in the form of enforced monopoly) is a friend of the workmen"; which 40es not make it less unbecoming in. the scoundrels. to rebuke and 'punish the fools for any disastrous ·consequences that may arise out·,of this appalling combination. of scoundrelism. and folly. Conspicuous,among the $coundrels'who have upheld these 1l1onopoliesis the editor of the New York Sun. ,If heteUs truth to-day, he tells it. as the devil.quotesscripture,-to' suit hispurpose~ . He wiUnever consent to an application of equal lib~rty in the interest of lahor, for he belongs to the brother noodof thieves who prey upon labor. If h~only would, we Anarchists ,would meet him with cheerful acquiescencein .its fullest, application '.' to the interest. of capital. Let Carnegie, D~na&:C9. first see to it that every law in violatioJ).of equal liberty is· removed from the statute-books .. If, after thai, a~y .260 INDIVIDUAL LIBER TY laborers shall interfere with the rights of their employers, or shall use force upon inoffensive tescabs," or shall attack their employers' watchmen, whether these be Pinkerton detectives, sheriff's deputies, or the State militia, I pledge myself that, as an Anarchist and in consequence of my Anarchistic faith, I will be among the first to volunteer as a member of a force to repress these disturbers of order and, if necessary, sweep them from the earth. But while these invasive laws remain, I must view every forcible conflict that arises as the consequence of an original violation of liberty on the part of the employing classes, and, if any sweeping is done, may the laborers hold the broom! Still, while my sympathies thus go with the under dog, I shall_never cease to proclaim my conviction· that the annihilation of· neither party can secure justice, and that the only effective sweeping will be that which clears from the statute-book every restriction of the freedom of the market.

Of the multitude of novel and absurd and monstrous sug gestions called forth from the newspapers by the. telegraphers' strike, none have equalled in novelty and absurdity and mon strosity the sober proposal of the editor of the New .York Nation, that unsentimental being who prides himself on his hard head, that hereafter any and all employees of telegraph companies, railroad companies, and the post-office department who may see fit to strike work without first getting the cot'- sent of their employers be treated as are soldiers who desert or decline to obey the commands of their superior officers; in other words (we suppose, though the Nation does not use these other words), that they. may be sUlV-marily court-mar tialled and shot. During the rebellion, when all of us, except the much abused cccopperheads," temporarily lost control of our reason ing faculties (we dare say that even the editor of th~ N.ation at that time forgot himself and became sentimental for once), we got very angry with Carlyle for patly putting the Ameri can Iliad in a nutshell and epigrammatically establishing the substantial similarity between the condition of slave labor at the South and that of so-called tefree" labor at the North.

England's blunt old sham-hater was answered with much bois terous declamation about ((freedom of contract," and his at,.. tention was proudly called to the fact that the laborer of the INDIVIDUA,L LIBERTY 2.61 North could follow.·his own sweet will, leaving his employer when he SClW'fitJlattachinghimself to any other willing to hire !lim, or, if he preferred,setting up In business for himself, and employing others. He was at liberty~ it was.. loudly proclaimed by our .abolitionists and free..traders, to work when he pleased, where he pleased, how. he pleased, and on what tei-rns he pleased, ,and nomClncouldsay him nay. What are we to thin.k, tnen, when.the ,chief newspaper exponent of the ~~free dorn of contr1ct" philosophy,deliber1tely.s1crihceg the only answer tnClt it could >make to Carlyle's indictment by propos ing ·,the. introe;JuctipIlof. a military. discipline into industry, which,inassimilating the laborer to' the soldier, would make him-wh~tthe soldier is~a slave? Think? Simply this, that the, hypocriticalthieyesandtyrahts who for years have heen endeavoring •• to l11a,ke·.their victims believe. themselves freemen ·see that the •.•. game is' nearly up, and that the time is£ast _approaching when they must take by the horns the bull of outraged ,industry~which, .1lladdened'by the discovery of its ••hitherto. invisjbleqhains, is making frantic ·efforts to burstthemit knows not h,ow. It is a point gained. An enemy in, the open•field is '. less formidable than, one". in ambush.

When •the capitalis~s shallbe£orcea" to show their true colors, the la~orers will then kn0w against whom •they are fighting. Fighting, did we say?, Yes. For. the laborer in these days is a sQldier,though not in the sense which the Nation meant. His employer is not, as the Nation ,would have it, his superior officer, but simply a,member of an ,opposing army. The whole industrial and commercial.world is in a state of inter necine war, in which theproletaires are.massed on one side and the proprietor~ on the other. This is the fact that justi.. fies strikers in subjecting society to what the Nation calls a upartial paralysis." Jt is a war. nleasure. The laborer•sees that he does not ,get his due..• He knows that the' capitalists have beenintrusted bysQciety, .through itsexternal represen tative, the State,' with privileges which enable them to control production and distribution; and that, in abuse of these privileges,. they have seen' to it that the demand for labor should fall far below the supply, .and have then taken advan tClgeof the nece~sities of the laborer andr-educed· his wages.

Tq.tl~Pore~and hisfeUows> therefore, resort to the<policy of uniting, in such. numbers in a refusal to work at the reduced '262 INDIVIDU AL LIBERTY rate that the demand for labor becomes very much greater than the supply, and then they take advantage of the necessi ties of the capitalists and society to secure 'a' restoration o£ the old rate of wages, and perhaps an increase upon it. Be the game fair or foul, two can play at it; and those who begin it should not complain when they get the worst of it. If society objects to being Uparalyzed," it can very easily avoid it. All it needs to do is to adopt the advice which Liberty has long been offering it, and withdraw from the monopolists the privi leges which it has granted them. Then, as Colonel William B. Greene has shown in his ((Mutual Banking," as Lysander Spooner has shown in his works on finance, and as Proudhon has shown in his uOrganization of .Credit," capital will no longer be tied up by syndicates, but will become readily available for investment on easy terms; productive enterprise, taking new impetus, will soon assume enormous proportions; the work to be done will always surpass the number of labor ers .to do it; and, instead of the employers being able to say to the laborers, as .the unsentimental Nation would like to have them, UTake what we offer you, or the troops shall be called out to shoot you down," the laborers will be able to say to their employers, teIf you desire our services, you must give us in return an equivalent of their product,"-terms which the employers will be only too glad to accept. Such is the only solution of the problem of strikes, such the only way to turn the edge of Carlyle's biting satire.

LABOR AND ITS PAY Communists and State Socialists on the one hand and Anarchists and Individualists on the other will never be able to agree on the question of wages, because the re ward of labor represents one of. the fundamental differ ences between them. Here is a specimen of the eternal 'controversy, from the pen of Mr. Tucker: IN No. 121 of Liberty, criticising an attempt of Kropotkine to identify Communism and Individualism, I charged him INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 26, with ignoring uthe real question. of whether· Communism will permit· the individuill to .labor inpependently,own tools,· sell his labor or his· products,. and buy the labor or. products of others." . In Herr Most's eyes this IS so outra,geous that, in re printing it, he puts the wordsUthe labor of others" in large ·blilck type .. Most being aCommun~st, he must, to be con sistent, object to the purchase andsille of anything. whatever; but why he should particularly object to the purchase and sale of labor~sn1ore than I can understand. IteaU y , tnthe last analysis, labor .is the only thing that .has any title· to be bought or sold. Is there any just basis of price except cost?

Andis .. there .anything .' that' costs except labor or suffering (another narpe' for labor)? Labor should be paid! Hor ti~le'lisn't it? .Why, ~tho\1ght that~he£act that it is not paId.-,va$the. whole gnevance. cCUnpaId labor" .has been the chief complaint of •all Socia1ists~ .and that .labor should get its reward has .been theirchie£ contention. Suppose I had said to Kropotkine that the real question is whether Communism will permit individuals to exchange their labor or products on their own· tetms. . Would Herr .. Most have been so shocked? WQuld he have printed. that in black type? .Yet in another form I said precisely that. If the men who oppose wages-that is, .the purchase and sale.of .labor--were. capable ..• of .analyzing their thought and feelings, they would see that what. really excites. their anger is not the ·fact that labor· is. bought and sold,.but the fact· that one class of men <are dependent for their living upon the sale of their labor, while another class of men are relieved of the necessity ·of·labor by being legally privileged to sell something that is not htbor,· and that, .but for the •privilege, would' be enjoyed by all gratuitously. And to such a state of things lam .• as. much opposed'as anyone. But the' minute you re~ mov~ privilege, the'.class that now. enjoy it· will be .forced·to sell their labor, and then, when there will be nothing but labor with which to buy labor, the distinction between. wage payers and wage-receivers will be wiped-out, and every man will, be a laborer exchanging with fellow;..laborers. Not to.

abolish wages,.but •to •make every. man dependent upon wages and secure to •every man. his whole wages is the ai~of Anarchistic· Socialism. What, Anarchistic Socialism .aims to .,/' 264 IN D I VID U ALL I BE R TY abolish is usury. It does not want to deprive labor of its reward; it wants to deprive capital of its reward. It does not hold that labor should not be sold; it holds that capital should not be hired at usury. But, says Herr Most, this idea of a free labor market from which privilege is eliminated is nothing but ((consistent Man chesterism." Well, what better can a man who professes Anarchism want than that? For the principle of Manches terism is liberty, and consistent Manchesterism is consistent adherence to liberty. The only inconsistency of the Man chester men lies in their infidelity to liberty in some of its phases. And this infidelity to liberty in some of its phases is precisely the fatal inconsistency of the Freiheit school,-the only difference between its adherents and the Manchester men being that in many of the phases in which the latter are· in fidel the former are faithful, while in many of those in which the latter are faithful the forlIler are infidel. Yes, genuine Anarchism is consistent Manchesterism, and Communistic or pseudo-Anarchism is inconsistent Manchesterism. CCI thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word."

Kropotkine, arguing in favor of Communism, says that he has Halways observed that workers with difficulty understand the possibility of a wage-system of labor-checks and like arti ficial inventions of Socialists," but has been ((struck On the contrary by the easiness with which they always accept Com munist principles." Was Kropotkine ever struck by the easi ness with which simple-minded. people accept the creation theory and the difficulty with which they understand the pos sibility of evolution? If so, did ·he ever use this fact as an argument in favor of the creation hypothesis? Just as it is easier to rest satisfied with the statement, ((Male and female created he them," than to trace in the geological strata the intricacies in the evolution of species, so it is easier to say that every man shall have whatever he wants than to find the economic law by which every man may get the equivalent of his product. The ways of Faith are direct and easy to follow, but their goal isa quagmire; whereas the ways of Science, however devious and difficult to tread, lead to solid ground· at last. Communism belongs to the Age of Faith: Anarchistic Socialism to the -Age of Science~ I N D I V I D U ALL I B ER T Y 265 THEPOSTQFFICE AND PRIVATE MAIL SERVICE THE Winsted Press makes' a long' le~der to ridicule the Anarchists for favoring .private enterprise in 'the letter-carry ing' business. It grounds its ridicule on' .two clajms,-first, that private enterprise would charge high rates of postage, and, second, that it would not furnish transportation to Qut of-the-way points. An indisputable fact has frequently been -cited in Llberly which instantly and. utterly overthrows .bo~h of these claims. .Its frequent .citation, however, has had no effect upon the believers in a igovernment postal monopoly.

I do nQtexpect another repetition to produce any effect upon t~eWil1stedPress; still I· shall try it. Some· half-dozen .years ago, when letter postage was still thre.e.cents, Wells, Fargo & Co. were doing a large ·'businessill ca.rrying letters throughout the Pacific States and Territories~ Their' ~te was five cents, more than three of which they ex pende ,as ,the legal monopoly required, in purchasing of the Unite S/tates a stal11:pedenvelope.in which. to carry the letter intrus ed to ,their care. That is to say, on every letter which they c rriedthey' had to pay a. tax of mote than three cents. Exclus ve ·ofthi$ tax, Wells, Fargo· & Co. got less than two cents or each letter which' they carried, while the government got "th ee cents for each letter· which it carried itself,and more han three cents for' each letter" which. Wells, Fargo & Co.ca. ried~', On' the other hand, it .cost every individual five cents' o send by Wells, Fargo & Co., anq. only three to senq by the government. Moreover, the area 'covered was one in which immensity of distance, sparseness!ot population, and irregulrities of surface made out-of-the-way points \lnusually difficull" of .access.. Still, in spite of all" these· advantages on the side of the g(!).vernment,its patronage steadily ·dwigdled, Whi.1e~hat of Wells, Fargo & Co. as .steadily grew. Pecl.lni ~rily tis,' of course, was' a benefit to· the-government. But forthi very reason such a condition' of: affairs was all the more •.•ortifying .•Hence~ thepostma~ter+general sent a spe~ . cial •• cOJ;nmissionerto investigate. the matter .. He ,fulfilled his duty·apd .reported to his superior .that Wells, F~rgo & Co.

were complying with the law in every particular, and were taking· a~ay. the .business of the government by furnishing a 266 I N D I V I D U ALL I B ER T Y prompter and securer mail service, not alone to principal points, but to more poihts and remoter points than were in cluded in the government list of post-offices. Whether this state of things still continues I do not know. I presume, however, that it does, though the adoption of two cent postage may have changed it. In either case the fact is one that triumphs over all possible sarcasms. In view of it, what becomes of Editor Pinney's fear of ruinous rates of postage and his philanthropic I anxiety on account of the dwellers in Wayback and Hunkertown? Appreciating the necessity of at least seeming to meet the indisputable fact which I opposed to its championship of gov ernment postal monopoly, the Winsted Press presents the fol lowing ghost of an answer, which may be as convincing to the victims of political superstition as most materializations are to the victims of religious superstition, but which, like those materializations, is so imperceptible to the touch of the hard-headed investigator that, when he puts his hand upon it, he does not find it there.

«The single instance of Wells, Fargo & Co., cited by B. R. Tucker to prove the advantage of private enterprise as a mail carrier, needs fuller explanation of correlated circumstances to show its true significance. As stated by Mr. Tucker, this company hal( a dozen years ago did a large business carrying letters throughout the Pacific States and Territories to distant and sparsely populated places for five cents per letter, paying more than three to the government in compliance with postal law and getting less than two for the trouble, and, though it cost the senders more, the service was enou~ better than government's to secure the greater part of the business." This reStatement of my statement is fair enough, except that it but dimly conveys the idea thatW ells, Fargo & Co. were carrying, not only to distant and sparsely populated places, but to· places thickly settled and easy of access, and were beating the government there also,-a fact of no little importance.

«Several facts may explain this.: I. Undeveloped govern ment service in a new country, distant from the seat of government. " Here the ghost appears, all form and no substance. «John Jones is a better lJ1essenger than John Smith," deINDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 2.67 clares .the Winsted Press,. C(because·•Jones can run over stony· ground, .while Smith cannot. " uIndeed!" I .answer; ((why, then, did Smith outrun Jones the other day in going from San FranciSC0 1 1 toWayback?". (COhl ,that may be ex plained," the .Press. ejoins, CCby the fact that the ground was stony." The Press .had complained. against the Anarchistic theory. of free. com etition in postal service that private en. t.erp,rise WQul.d nQhreach remote p<>ints, 'While SO,vernment does reach. them. I proved by .facts that private enterprise was more successful thangover1'J.ment in .reaching remote points. ,What sense, then, is there in answering that these poiJits are distant from the government's headquarters and that it had not developed its service? The whole point lies in the fact that private enterprise· was the first to develop its service and .the most successful in maintaining it at a high degree ofefliciency.

((2. GovernmJnt competition which kept WeUs, Fargo from charging monopoly prices." If the object of a government postal service is to' keep private enterpri$e' from charging high prices, no more striking iI1ustr~tion of the 'stupid wayin which government wor-ksto achieve its objects could be, cited than its imposition of a tax of two (then three) .cents a letter upon private postal com papies. It is obvious that this tax was all that kept Wells, Fargo & Co•• fro,m reducing their letter-ra,te to three or even two cents, in .which case the government probably would have .lost 'the remnant of business which it .still· commanded. This is guarding againstmonopolYfprices with a vengeance! ':(he c011lpetitor, whether governme~t or individual, who must tax his •rival. in order to live· is nol competitor at all, but. a monopolist himself. It is not gov~rnment' competition that Anar~histsare iighting,butgovern~ent monopoly. It should be .• ".dded, .howeyer, that, pending t~e transformation of gov ernments into voluntary associations, even government com petitiQnis unfa~r,because anassoc~ation supported by com pulsory taxation could always, if it I chose, carry. themails.at less than cost and tax the' deficit out of. the. people.

tC 3. Other paying business whic,h trought the company into .contact with remote districts and! warranted greater satt guards to convreyance than gover~entthen offered to its mail. carriers." . I 268 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY Exactly. What does it prove? Why, that postal service and expr.ess service can be most advantageously run in con junction, and that private enterprise was the first to find, it out. This is one of the arguments which the Anarchists use. «4. A difference of two cents was not appreciated. in a country where pennies were unknown." Here the phantom attains the last degree of attenuation. If Mr. Pinney will call at the Winsted post-office, his post master will tell-what common sense ought to have taught him-that of all the stamps used not over five per cent. are purchased singly, the rest being taken two, three, five, ten, a hundred, or a thousand at a time. Californians are said to be very reckless in the matter of petty expenditures, but I doubt if any large portion of them would carry their prodigality so far as to pay five dollars a hundred for stamps when they could get them at three dollars a hundred on the next corner.

((These conditions do not exist elsewhere in this country at present. Therefore the illustration proves nothing." Proves nothing! Does it not prove that private enterprise outstripped the government under the conditions that then and there existed, which were difficult enough for both, but extraordinarily embarrassing for the former? «We know that private enterprise does not afford express facilities to sparsely settled districts throughout the country." I know nothing of the kind. The express companies cover practically the whole' country. They charge high rates to points difficult of access; but this is only just. The govern ment postal rates, on the contrary, are unjust. It certainly is not fair that my neighbor, who sends a, hundred letters to New York every year, should have to pay two cents each on them, though the cost of carriage is but one cent, simply be cause the goverpment spends a dollar in carrying for me one letter a year to Wayback, for which I also pay two cents. It may be said, however, that where each individual charge is so small, a schedule of rates w()uld cause more tr{)uble and ex pense' than saving; in other words, that to keep books would be poor economy. Very likely; and in that case no one would find it out sooner than the private mail companies~ This, however,. is not the .case in the express business, where parcels of all sizes and· weights are carried.

UNo more would it mail ,facilities. A remarkable e~ception only proves the rule. But, Hprivate enterprise can and will do so much, why doesn't it do it noW;? ,The law stands no mor~ in the way of.'Adams Express. tliail it did in the way of the. Wells. & Fargo, express." This~eminds' me of 'the question with ,which Mr. Pinney closed his discussion with me regarding ,free money. He de... sired to' know why the Anarchists did not start a free 'money systern, s~yim.g that they ought to be shrewdenough to devise some,way of evading the law.• As if any competing business could beex:pected to succeed, iiit h~d 'to spend a .fortune inconte~ting lawsuits or in paying a heavy ~ax to which its rival was 'not, subject. So handicapped, it could not possibly succeed unless its work w:as_of such a nature, as to admit, the widest range of variation in point of<exqellence. This was the. caSe in the competition between Wells" Fargo &' Co. and the government. The territory covered was so ill-adapted to postal facilities that it, afforded a wide margin for the display of superiority, and Wells,.Fargo & Co. took. advantage of this to such an extent that they beat the government in spite of their' handicap. But in the territory covered by Adams Ex press it ,is essentially different. There the postal service is so simple a matter that the possible margin of superiority would not warrant an extra charge of even.one cent a letter. But I am •• told, that Adams Express would be only too glad of the ~'chance to carry letters at one ,cent each, if there were no tax to .be paid on, the ·business. If the' governmentalists think that the' United States can beat Adams Express" why do they not. dare to place the two on ~qual terms? •That. is a fair qu~tion.. But when a man's hands are tied, to ,ask him why he. doesn't :fight is a coward's question.

Yes, as The Anti-Monopolist says, .'Uncle Sam carrie~ one hundred pounds of newspapers. two thousand miles, not for twodollars,bl,lt for one dollar, pays the railroad more than its services are· "worth, and. loses about :fiveaollars a 'trip. Yes, a~ express company would ch'lrgetwenty' donars ,for the. same service,'because it knows' it would. be folly to attempt to compete with theone-dollar rate, 'and thetefore charges for its necessarily limited business•such rates as those who desire a guarantee of prornptness andsec.urity axe willing to pay.

2.70 IN D I VI D U ALL I BE R TY Uncle Sam nevertheless continues to carry at the one-dollar rate, knowing that this is a good way to induce the newspapers to wink at his villainies, and that he can and does make up in two ways his loss of :five dollars a trip,-I, by carrying one hundred pounds of letters two thousand miles for thirty-two ·dollars and forbidding anybody else to carry them for less, although the express companies would be glad of the chance to do the same service for sixteen dollars; and, .2, by taking toll from all purchasers of whiskey and tobacco at home, and of' various other articles from foreign countries'. And yet some people don't know why the thousands of officeholders who are pulling away at the public teats are get ting fat while the people are getting poorer. In fact, some people don't know anything at all except, as Josh Billings said, ((a grate menny things that ain't so." It is very unfortunate that such people are intrusted with the editing of newspapers.

In 1907 a Chicago millionaire came forward with an ofter to take over the postal service of the country, re duce rates on first and second-class matter one-half, and pay over 'to the government all surplus earnings above seven per cent. on the capital invested. This announce ... ment led' the Springfield (Mass.) Republican to ask [whether his company would also agree to preserve to the iemployees of the service the hours and wages now ac tcorded by the government; and, it then facetiously added: \JtWe shall next have syndicates offering to do the policing of the country on a private monopoly basis, and then taking charge of public education." Mr. Tucker made clear the position of Anarchism on this 'point: '''':~'''''''"''>'~-~>,i, {~ I understand that there was some doubt in Chicago whether. /the millionaire refered to ((meant business" and was entitled to Iserious consideration. But suppose a like offer to be made by \ a known and entirely competent and responsible or corpora ltion; would congress and Teddy [President Roosevelt] en "~ertain it for a moment? Would the intelligent and earnest t~ublican urge them to accept it? If not, why not? The INDIVIDUAL LIBE R'fY 271 hint.in regard to the. etnpJoyeesls rather. unfortunate. The government has not been.a good employer in the postal service, as eve.rybodyknows. It pays low wages, requires hard. work, and forbids the clerks and mail-carriers to bother congress or to •agitate· .politically against unfriendly individuals in .that body.. A private corporation could not in these days do m,uch worse. . . . .. '~ But suppose further that .the aforesaid responsible bidqet t should ~gre~. to raise the wages and shortenthe hours of, the !

employees, and· to .refer disputes •• to arbitrators named by,J Teddy himself; would the Republican·. then. favor acceptancei of the offer? I doubt it. But .. why .not? What would be its j objection? As to the remark ablll1t the private 'police and J private education it is not the paradox, the reauctio ad ab-l sllraum, our.·friend.·imagines .. it to he. Underhealthyeco-i n0tnic \and political conditions private. enterprise in those i spheres wO\lld be not only. Hpossihle,"buteminently desir-I a.ble. .And Anarchists contemplate even a private police with-I out the least consciousness of particular audacity.",,/ , .• .... .,#-p.~f,f, LIBERTY OR. AUTHORITY It ·has alwars been difl1cult todnduce the superficial thinker to distinguish between •.things .. libertarian and things authoritarian. Hence.·.even·. trained ~conomists have frequently. confused State Socialism andCommun ism with Anarchism. In the following article the ed.itor of •Liberty proceeded to clarify the ·.subject· for one who had.failed·to .make the proper discrimination: PROFESSOR. SUMNER, who occupies the ·chair of political economy at Yale, addressed recently the. New Haven Equal Rights Debating Club. He told the State Socialists and Com munists of. that city much .wholesome truth. But, as far as I·· can Iearnfrom the· newspaper reports,which may of course have left out, as usual, the most important .things .that the speaker·.said, he made· no .discrimination in his criticisms.

He appears to have entirely ignored the fact that the Anar2.72 IN D I V I D U ALL I B E R T Y chistic Socialists are the most unflinching champions in exi~t ence of his own pet principle of laissez faire. He branded Socialism as the summit of absurdity, utterly failing to note that one great school of Socialism says teAmen" whenever he scolds government for invading the individual, and only re grets that he doesn't scold it oftener and more uniformly. Referring to Karl Marx's position that the employee is forced to give up a part of his product to the employer ,(which, by the way, was Proudhon's position before it was Marx's, and Josiah Warren's before it was Proudhon's), Pro fessor Sumner asked why the employee does not, then, go to work for himself, alld answered the question very truthfully by saying that it.is because he has no.capital. But he did not proceed to tell why he has no capital and how he can get some. Yet this is the vital point in dispute between An archism and privilege, .between Socialism and so-called politi cal economy. He did indeed recommend the time dishonored virtues of industry and economy as a mean~ of getting capital, but every observing person· knows that the most industrious and economical persons are precisely the ones who have no capital and can get none. Industry and economy will' begin to a.ccumulate capital when idleness and extravagance lose their power to steal it, and not before. , Professor Sumner also told .Herr Most and his followers that their proposition to have the employee get capital by forcible seizure is the most short-sighted economic measure possible to conceive of. Here again he is entirely wise and sound. Not that the17e may not be circumstances when such seizure would be advisable as a political, war, or terroristic measure calculated to induce political changes that will give freedom to natural economic processes; but as a directly eco nomic measure it must always and inevitably be, not only futile, but reactionary. In opposition to all arbitrary distri bution I stand with Professor Sumner with all my heart and mind. And so does every logical Anarchist.

But, if the employee cannot at present get capital by in dustry and economy, and if it will do him no good to get it by force, how is he to· get it with benefit to himself and injury to no other? Why don't you tell us that, Professor Sumner? You will, to be sure, send us a stray shot somewhere near the mark when, in answer to a question why shoemakers have no LNIDIVIDUAL LIBEltTY 273 shoes, you said that, where such a condition. of things pre... ,vailed, it was due to sQmeevilwork of the governmerit,--said evil •• work heingmanif¢stat present. in the currency and taxa tion.Butwhat is the precise nature .of the evils thus mani fest? Tell me tha·tdefinitely, and thenl will tell you whether you area consistent man. 1 fancy that, if lshould ask you what the great evil in our taxation is, you would answer that it is the protective. tariff. Now, the protective tari£f .is.~n evil cert1inly: ~nd ~n out..

rage; but, SO far as it affects the power of the laborer to accumulate capital, it is a.~omparatively small one. In .fact, its abolition.~ unaccompanied by the abolition of the banking monopoly, would takeaway from· very large classes of laborers not only what little chance they now have of getting capital, but also their power of sustaining the •lives of •themselves ;ilnd their families. The amount abstracted from labor~s. pockets by the protective tariff· and by all .other methods of getting governmental revenue is simply one of the smaller drains on industry •.. The amount of capital which it is thus prevented from getting will hardly be worth considering until the larger drains are stopped. As. far as taxation gQes, the .great evils involved in it are to be found, ,not in the. material damage don.e.to labor by a loss of earnings, but in the assumption of the right to takemen's property without. their consent, and in· the· use of this ·propetty to •pay. the salaries of the •officials through whom, and the expenses· of~he machine· through which, .lahor is oppressed and ground down. Are you heroic 'enough,Professor Sumller,to adopt'¢his applicati()n of laissez fairer I summon you to it under penalty of conviction of an infidelity to logic which ought to oust you from your posi tionas .a teacher of youth.

If taxation, then (leaving out the.enormous mischief that itdoesa~.an instrument of tyranny), is only one of the minor methods of keeping •. c~pital from .labor, what evil is•. there in the currlency that constitutes. the .major method? Your answer to this question, Professor Sumner 1 will again test your consistency. But] am not so sure what it will be in this case asI wasin the .other. If you answer it as most of yonrfel low-professors would, you will say that the great evil in .the currency. is the. robbery of ·labor through adi-shobes,t .silver dollar. But this isa >greater hugbe~r than the protective LIBERTYINDIVIDUAL 1~ tariff. The silver dollar is just as honest and just as dishonest as the gold dollar, and neither of them is dishonest or a robber of labor except so far as it is a monopoly dollar. Both, how~ ever being monopoly dollars, and all our other dollars being monopoly dollars, labor is being robbed by them all to an extent perfectly appalling. And right here is to be found the real reason why labor cannot get capital. It is because its wages are kept low and its credit rendered next to valueless by a financial system that makes the issue of currency a monopoly and a privilege, the result of which is the maintenance of in terest, rent, and profits at rates ruinous to labor and destruc tive to business. And the only way that labor can ever get capital is by striking down this monopoly and making the issue of money as free as the manufacture of shoes. To demonetize silver or gold will not help labor; what labor' needs is the monetization of all marketable wealth. Or, at least, the opportunity. of such monetization. This can only be secured by absolutely free competition in banking. Again I ask you, Profesor Sumner, does your anxiety lest the individual· be interfered with cover the field of finance? Are you willing that the individual shall be ((let alone" in the exercise of his right to make his own money and offer it in open market to be taken by those who choose? To this test I send. you a second summons under the same penalty that I have already hung over your head in case you fail to respond to the first.

The columns of Liberty are open for your answer. Before you make it, let me urge you to consistency. The battle between free trade and protection is simply one phase of the battle between Anarchism and State Socialism. To be a consistent free trader is to be an Anarchist; to be a con sistent protectionist is to be a State Socialist. You are assail ing that form of State Socialism known as protection. with a vigor equalled by no other man, .but you are rendering your blows of little effect by maintaining, or encouraging the belief that you maintain, those forms of State Socialism known as compulsory taxation and the banking monopoly. You assail Marx and Most mercilessly, but fail to protest against the most dangerous manifestations of their philosophy. Why pursue this confusing course? In reason's name, be one thing or the other! Cease your indiscriminate railing at Soci~lism, for to be consistent you must be Socialist yourself, either of I ND IVJ D U ALL IBE RTY '-7S the Anarchistic or 'the ••governmental sort: either be a State, Socialist and·· denounce liberty everywhere and always, or be an Anarchist and· denounce authority everywhere and always; else you must consent to be taken for what you will appear to be,-an impotent. hybrid.

Herbert Spencer was prone to err in a similar manner, and he was no more immune than Professor Sumner to Mr. Tucker's shafts' of critiCIsm: Liberty welcomes and criticises in the same breath the series of papers by· Herbert Spencer on (CIThe New •Toryism," «The Coming Slavery," «The Sins of Legislators/' etc., now running in the Popular Science Monthly· and the English Con temporary Review.· Th~y are very true, very. important, and very misleading. They are true for the most part in ,what they say, and false and misleading in what they fail tosay. Mr.' Spencer convicts legislators of undeniable and enormous sins in. meddling with and curtailing and destroying the peo pIe's. rights. Their .sins are sins of commission. But Mr. Spencer's sin of ,omissionis quite as grave.•. He is' one of those persons who are making a wholesale onslaught 'on Socialism. as. ,the incarnation. of the doctrine 'of State omnipotence carried to its highest power. And I, am not sure that he is quite honest in this. I begill to be a little suspiciQus of him.

It,seems ... as .• if he· had forgotten the teachings. of •his earlier writings, and had .become a charn.pioIi'<lfthe capitalistic class. It ,will behQticed that in these later articles, amid his multi tudinous illustrations '(of which he is as prodigal. as ever). of the evils of legislation, he. in ev~ry instance cites some law passed, ostensiblyat least, to, protect·labor~ alleviatesuffering, orpromot~ the. people's welfare.Ii:e demonstrates beyond dispute the lamentable failure in th'8 direction. But never on~e does he call attention to the fa~ more deadly and deep seated 'evils· growing· out of the in~umerable laws creating privilege. and sustaining ,monopoly. ·1 You must not· protect the weak against the strong, he seems to say, but freely supply all the weapons needed by the strong to oppress the weak. He is greatly .. shocked that the, rich should be directly taxed to support the poor, but that the poor. should be.indirectly taxed 276 INDIVIDU AL LIBER TY and bled to make the rich richer does not outrage his delicate sensibilities in the least. Poverty is increased by the poor laws, says Mr. Spencer. Granted; but what about the rich laws that caused and still cause the poverty to which the poor laws add? That is by far the more important question; yet Mr. Spencer tries to blink it out of sight.

A very acute criticism of Mr. Spencer's position has been JPade recently before the Manhattan Liberal Club by Stephen Pearl Andrews. He shows that Mr. Spencer is not the radical laissez faire philosopher which he pretends to be; that the only true believers in laissez faire are the Anarchists; that in dividualism must be supplemented by the doctrines of equity and courtesy; and that, while State Socialism is just as dan gerous and tyrannical as Mr. Spencer pictures it, ((there is a higher and nobler form of Socialism which is not only not slavery, but which is our. only means of rescue from all sorts and degrees of slavery." All this is straight to the' mark, telling" thrusts, which Mr. Spencer can never parry. But the English philosopher is doing good, after all. His disciples are men of independent mind, more numerous every day, who accept his fundamental truths and carry them to their logical conclusions. A notable instance is Auberon Her bert, formerly a member of the House of Commons, but now retired from political life. While an enthusiastic adherent of the Spencerian philosophy, he is, fast outstripping his master.

In a recent essay entitled uA Politician in Sight of Haven," written, as the London Spectator says, with an unsurpassable charm of style, Mr. Herbert explodes the majority lie, ridicules physical force as a solution of social problems,strips govern ment of every function except the police, and recognizes even that only as an evil of brief necessity, and in conclusion pro~ poses the adoption of voluntary taxation with a calmness and confidence which must have taken Mr. Spencer's breath away. To be sure, Mr. Herbert is as violent as his master against So cialism, but in his case only because he honestly supposes that compulsory Socialism is the only Socialism, and not at all from any, sympathy with legal monopoly Qr capitalistic privilege in anJ:";term. l"'/ Mr. Willis Hudspeth, in a communication to Liberty, f stated that an Anarchist paper defines an Individualist to \ li",~~, INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 277 .be ~~newho believes in the principle of recognizing the~\ right of every non-aggressive individuaJ. to the full con-I trol of his person and property"; and. he then inquired , how,•if that were correct, does.Anarchism conflict with.\ Socialism.or .. Itl.d~vidualis11l.. Mr. Tucker answered hisJ question in this manner: THE definition offered of Individualism tnlghtnot be accept~d by .• all Individualists, hut it will do very well as a definition of.t\n~rc~ism.... .. ~hen"'my~·corresponaelit·'''speaks'of'Socialisrti I unaetstaiia-l1ith .• to .mean· s.t~~t~".,,§o~i~l~s~ alld.,. ~ati~llalism) a.. n..•.d.......••.•••n... o..•....t..••f.. t•..h.....•.. a....••t.. ,An..• a.. r.. c... hi.S~.I·C .....sOC••. i.al.is.m..·..·:.w... 'n·.... 1C.'.Ii.'~.. -L. ....'.1.."'..[;.. -.e!>1y.•,~.'.•• r"'ep.·~.r.~~.eselit.'.S.'.I shall a. swer hIm on thIS SUppoSItIon. •He. WIshes to know, then, no .State Socialism and Nationalism' would restrict the .

non-aggressive individual in the fuU.control· of his·person and property. In a thousand and one ways. .I will tell him one, an~ leave him to find oUF the thousand. The principal plank int~e platform of State~ocialism and Nationalism. is thecon~ fiscation of .all capital by the. State. i What becomes, in-that case, of.the·.property.ofa~yindividual, whether he be aggressive ornon7aggressive?rw'hat becomes also of private indus try? Evidently it is tolally destroyed. What becomes then of the personal.liberty ofithose non-aggressive individuals. who are .thus prevented from carrying on business.for themselves OJ:' from •. assuming_relations. between •• themselves. as employer and employee if they .. pr.efer, and who are obliged to'.pecoineem ployees.ofthe State ~gainst their. will? State Socialism and Nationalism mean the utter destruction of human liberty and private property •. LIBERTY AND LABOR Theitldlftstrial problem has always been an acute one in GreatBriti~in,. and the politicians .haV'e been struggling with it :fo~ a. great many, years. From time to time the editor of tiberty recorded and co.mmentedupon the ef forts.of d1e more clear-sighted economists in .that coun278 IN D I VI D U ALL I B E R T Y try to solve the problem, hence his welcome of a new book on the subject: ~UBERON HERBERT, whose essay, teA Politician in Sight of Haven," creates such an enthusiasm for Liberty in the minds of all thinking people who read it, has recently published still another. book of similar purport and purpose. He calls it teThe Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State: A State ment of the Moral Principles of the Party of Individual Lib erty, and the Political Measures Founded Upon ~hem." It consists of a series of papers written for Joseph Cowen's paper, the Newcastle Chronicle, supplemented by a letter to the London Times on the English factory acts. Dedicated to Mr.

Cowen's constituents, ((The Workmen of Tyneside," it appeals with equal force to workmen the world over, and their wel fare and their children~s will depend upon the readiness with which they accept and the bravery with which they adhere to its all-important counsel. The hook is a magificent assault on the majority idea, a searching exposure of the inherent evil of State systems, and a glorious assertion of the inestimable benefits of voluntary action and free competition, reaching its climax in the emphatic declaration that ((this question of power exercised by some men over other men is the greatest of all questions, the one that concerns the very foundations of society," upon the answer to which ((must ultimately depend all ideas of right and wrong.~~ This is a bold and, at first sight, (an astonishing claim; but it is a true one, nevertheless, and the f fact that Mr. Herbert makes it so confidently shows that he I is inspired by the same idea that gave· birth to this journal, \.~c.aalused it to be chriStened Liberty, and determined it to labor ~t and foremost for Anarchy, or the Abolition of the State.

~his is no fitful outburst on Mr. Herbert's part. He evi dently has enlisted for a campaign which will end only with victory. The book in question seems to be the second in a series of ((Anti-Force Papers," which promises to include spe cial papers dealing more elaborately, but in the light of the same· general principle, with the matters of compulsory taxa tion, compulsory education, land ownership, professional mo nopolies, prohibitory liquor laws, legislation against vice, State regulation of love regulations, etc., etc. I know no more in spiring spectacle in England than that of this man of excepINDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 279 tionallyhigh sQciaI position doing •battle almost single-handed with the giant' monster, government, and showiqg, in ita men tal •••• rigor ,and vigor and a 'wealth, ,of ,moral fervor rarely equalled in any cause. Its only parallel at the present day is to b~£oundinthesplendid attitudeo£ Mr. Ruskin, whose earnest eloquence in behalf of economic equity'rivals Mr.. Herbert's in behalf ofindividual liberty.

This thought leads to the other, that each of these men lacks thetr»th that the otherpo!:se!:ses., Mr;.Ru~ki:rt~~~~ v~ry clearly theecon()mic principle which makesalLforms of usttry unrighteous and wages' for work ,the.only ,true method of sus taitling life" but ~enever perceives for a moment that indi vidual human beingsha ve ", sovereign •• rights over themselves. Mr.• Herbert .proves beyond" question •that ••• t~e governme l1tof man by"1l1anis utterly~ithout justification,b1.lt is quite rgno rant of the fact, th~t interest, rent, ,and profits. will ,find 'no place in the perfect Ieconomic order.. ", ,Mr.R~skin's ,error is by far the. more serious'of the.two,because the ;realization of ',Mr. Herbert'sideasiwould inevitablY,result in,t~equity that Mr.. Ruskin sees, whereas this equity can never be achieved for anylength of time without an,,at leastpa,rtial fulfilment of in dividual liberty. Nevertheless it cannot· be gainsaid that Mr.

Herbert's failure to see the' economic results of his ideas con siderably impairs his."power, of ,carrying them home to .men's, Jaearts.Unfortunately, therear.e many people whom the most perfectdedttctive reasoning fails to convince. The beauty of a great !principle and its harmonizitlg influence wherever it touches, I, they are unable, .. to. appreciate., ',They can only. see certain great and-manifest wrongs, and they demand that theseshaU-be righted. Unless they areclearIyshown the con'nectlon. between these wrongs and their real· causes, they are almostsure to associatethem with imaginarycauses.and to try the most •futile and, sometimes disastrous remedies. Now, the one great wrong that these people see' today is the fact. that indl.lstryand, poverty ,commonly go hand in hand' and. are assQciated in the same persons,and the Qnething. that they are determined upon,reg~rdless .of •everything else whatsoever, is ,that 'hereafter those. who do the,. work ,of this world shall enjoy the w.ealth of this world. It is a righteous determina. tion, and in it is to be found, the true significance of the State-Socialistic movement which Mr••Herbert very properly 280 IND IVIDU AL L IBER TY condemns and yet only half understands. To meet it is the :first necessity incumbent upon the friends of Liberty. It is sure that the workers call never permanently secure themselves in the control of their products except through the method of Liberty; but it is almost equally sure that, unless they are shown what Liberty will do for them in this respect, they will try every other method before they try Liberty. The neces sity of showing them this Mr. Herbert, to be sure, dimly sees, but, the light not having dawned on himself, he cannot show it to others. He has to content himself, therefore, with such inadequate, unscientific, and p~rtially charitable proposals as the formation of voluntary associations to furnish work to the unemployed. The working people will never thus be satis fied, an~ they ought not to be.

But Mr. Herbert can satisfy them if he can convince them of all. that is implied in his advocacy of ((complete free trade in all things." To many special phases of this free trade he does call marked attention, but never, I believe, to the most important of all, free trade in banking. If he would only dwell upon the evils of the money-issuing monopoly and emphasize with his great power the ·fact that competition, in this as in other matters, would give us all that is needed of the best possible article at the lowest possible price, thereby stead ily reducing .interest and rent to zero, putting capital within the comfortable rea.ch of all deserving and enterprisingpeo pie, and causing the greatest liberation on record of hereto fore restricted energies, the laborers might then begin to see that here lies their only hope; that Liberty, after all, and not Government, is to be their saviour; that their first duty is to abolish the credit monopoly and let credit organize itself; that then they wilal have to ask nobody for work, but everybody will be asking work of them; and that then, instead of having to take whatever pittance they can get, they will be in a posi tion to exact wages equivalent to their product, under which condition of things the reign of justice will be upon us and labor will have its own. Then Mr. Herbert's work for Liberty will ·no longer be a struggle, but an unmixed pleasure. He will no longer have to breast the current by urging workmen to self-denial; he can successfully appeal to their self-interest, the tide will turn, and he will be borne onward with it to the ends that he desires.

INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY ~8I COMPETITION AND CO..OPERATION «Is competition ot: .cooperation .the truest expression of that mutual trust and fraternal good..will which alone can, replace prese,rtt forms of authority, usagesandcus toms as the social bond of union?" asked W. T. Horn, in a cOlnm~nication to Liberty. Here is the editor's answer; THE supposition that' com.petition means war rests upon old notions and false phrases that have b~en long current, '. but are rapidly passing into the limbo of exploded fallacies.Cornpe titionm.eans war only when it, is it1 some way restricted., either inscopeorintensity,~that is, when it is not perfectly free competition; for then its benefits are won by one class at the expense of anothe.r, instead of. by .all atthe expense of nature's forces. When universal and-unrestricted, compet;ition means the lnostperfectpeace and the tru,est cooperation; for then it becomes simply a test of forces resulting in their most advan tageous utilization. ~As soon as' the demand £()r labor begins to exceed the supply~makingitan easy matter foreveryon.e to get' work at' wages equal to his product, it is for the interest of all (inc.luding.his· ipllT.lediate competitors) that the best man should win; which is another .way.ot saying that, 'where freedom prevails,· competition . and cooperation are identical, For further proof .•. and elaboration. of •this pr()positio~ I refer Mr••, Horn •to Andrew's. «Science· of Society" ,and '. Fowler's pamphlets on uCooper~tion." The realproblem,then, is to make the d~mand for labor greater than the supply, and this can only be done thrOJlgh cOplpetition.in the supply of money O~ use of credit, This is abundantly shown in Greene's\«Mu tual Banking" and the. financial writings •of Proudhon and Spooner. My correspondent seems filled with the sentiment of good..£ellowship, but ignorant of the science tpereof,' and even of the fact that there is such a science. He will find this science expounded in the works already named. If, .after studying and mastering these, hesdll should have any doubts, Liberty will then try to set them at rest.

What the person who goes qut into the work ..a-day world will see there-depends very much upon the power of his mental ~8~ I N D I V I D U ALL I B E R T Yj VISIon. If that is strong enough to enable him to see that the evils around him are caused by a prohibition of competition in certain directions, it is not unlikely that he will be filled with a ((wish to foster competition." Such, however, willnot be the case with a man who so misapprehends competition as to suppose that monopoly is its soul. Instead of its soul, it is its antithesis. Whatever the reason for which men strive for wealth, as a general thing they get it, not by competition, but by the ap plication of force to the suppression of certain kinds of com petitlon,-in other words, by governmental institution and protection of monopoly. Inasmuch as the monopolist is the victor, it is true that to deny him the spoils of victory is to sheathe the sword of mo nopoly. But you do not thereby sheathe the sword of compe tition (if you insist on calling i~ a sword) ,. because competi tion yields no spoils to the victor, but only wages to the la borer.

When my correspondent says that all monopolies are U te_ sultants ofa competition as free as nature could make it," he makes competition inclusive of the struggle between invasive forces, whereas he ought to know that free competition, in the economic sense of the phrase, implies the suppression of in vasive forces, leaving a free field for the exercise of those that are non-invasive. Ifa man were to declare that, when the benefits of labor cease to be won by one class at the expense of another and when they are shared by all at the expense of nature's forces, labor loses its raisond'etre and dies, his sanity would not long remain unquestioned; but the folly of such an utterance is not lessened an iota by the substitution of the word competi tion for the word labor. As long as the gastric juice contin ues to insist upon its rights, I fancy that neither labor nor competition will lack a raison d'eire, even though the laborer and competitor should find himself under the necessity of wresting his ((spoils" from the bosom of his mother earth in stead of from the pocket of his brother man.

In Mrs. Glass's recipe for cooking a hare, the first thing was to catch the hare. So in Mr. Horn's recipe for the solution of economic forms in ethical concepts,· the first thing is to get the concepts. Now, the concepts of mutual confidence I NO IV IDU A LL I BERT Y 2.83 and good-fellowship are not to be 'obtained ,by '.preaching, otherwise the church militant would long ago have ~ecome the church triumphant; ,or by force,-otherwise progress wgu1d have gone hand in hand with authority instead of with liberty; but only by unrestricted freedom,-that is, by compe tition,' the necessary condition. of confidence, fellowship, and cooperation, which. can.never ,come as long as monopoly, uthe economic expres~ion of hostility and mastership,''-continuesto exi~t. . r~>. .. LIBEltry ANDum BOYCOTT {,LO;NDON 1us does not see clearly in the matter of boycotting. {" UEvery man," is says, tthasa perfect right to refuse to hold ~ intercourse' with any other man or class from whom he rchoo$es to keep aloof. But where doeslrbertycome in when i several persons conspire together to put pressure upon another to induce or (;oerce him (by threats expressed or implied) to refrain also from intercourse with the boycotted man? It is 'not that the boycotted man has grounds of legal complaint against those' who voluntarily put him in coventry. His comI plaint is against those who compel (under whatsoever sanc \ tion) third persons to do likewise. Surely· the' distinction is \~peci:fic."'· ••Specinc, ,yes" but .not ,'r,ational.,.',.Theline of teal distinction does not run in .the direction which Jus tries to give it. Its course does not lie between.the second person and a third pe~son, but between the threats of invasion and, the threats of ,.ostracism by which 'either the second or a third person is coerced or ind~ced. '.. All boycotting, no matter ,0( what person, consists either in the utterance of a threat o~ in its execution. A man has.aright to threaten what he has ai right. to execute. The boundary-line of 'justifiable boycotting is. fixed by the nature of the threat. used.. , B. and.G~",.!a~.?re~st: ::f~~~4;1at\~~f~V~r~~~~~~~i:~;1.

are~entJ:ded'to''Say'to··'·A':J·,$,·t,lf')fyutrao not dIscharge the non-E unroU'fil'en·in'youremp1'oy,-we·will quit buying shoes of you.'t Sifnil~r,IY they are entitled to'luitbuying;<:lothes of Dj .. tailo4, Therefore they',are entitled to say to D:(Clfyou do notcooplo '\, 284 I N D I V I D U ALL I B E R T Y erate with us in endeavoring to induce A to discharge his non union employees,-that is, if you do p.ot quit buying shoes of him,-we will quit buying clothes of you." But Band C are not entitled to burn A's shop or D's shop. Hence they are not entitled 'to say to A that they will burn his shop unless he discharges his non-union employees, or to D that they will burn his shop unless he withdraws his patronage from A. Is it not clear that the rightful attitude of Band C depends wholly upon the question whether or not the attitude is in vasive in itself, and not at all upon the question whether the ,object of it is A or D?

" In reply, Jus, being convinced by the argument, cheer,{ fully acknowledged its error, but asserted that the prin ciple di~ not apply when two or more persons conspired to conduct a boycott, saying, ((That which may not be il legal or' even wrong in one person becomes both illegal and morally wrong when in a crowd of persons." Mr. rucker then proceeded to demolish that contention: f Jus still thinks, however, that something may be said on the other side, and declares.·that there are some things that one person may rightfully. do which become illegal and immoral when done by a crowd. I should like to have Jus give an in stance.· There are some invasive acts or threats which can not be executed by individuals, but require crowds-or con spiracies, if you will-for their acccomplishment. But the guilt still arises from the invasive character of the act, and not from the fact of conspiracy. No individual has a right t~ do any act which. is invasive, but any number of indi'V,id~-tlals may rightfully ((conspire" to commit any. act which\is .,·,:...•.'.no.n-l.·nv.,..a.,s,.i.V,.e, ,. .·.JUS ack.,n.. a".w.I.edges, the force of L.ib...e:U'Y~sa.rg\-.men~.. _fh~t A may as pr~B~j;1¥-b~c..,as"~",,..Fttrther con\ siderati~n·;"r~~!~~!:~:,:!!tt£Q!llPeL4.t~'toacknO'Wl~that A. an~\ i~,~comblfI~!!,.,~~~l",,~.~",.E!8.P~~~!I"..,~~l~,~:::..~,,~~~,1!!,~.Y.~,A.,Jl1Qn~. ,QLW ,aWRei'"

if. In these days of boycott trials a great deal of nQn~~nse· is ~;being talked and written regarding ((blackmail." This is a INDIVIDUAL LIBERl'Y 2.85 ijuestion which the' prin.ciple of Liberty settles' at once. It {may be well to state the verdict boldly and baldly. Here it fitt Any individual mav ,nlace any condition hecfiooses·~~.pro v4kd"tne·nconartl(r~>M~'b:'·~DaTts]rrmvasive--u-on·W"th;~ dOlIl, btt~~~~t~~¥~~~rr~iri~~\Vhi~~TI~~tiion incumbent u~n any 01. me co~tracting partles: From whictrtr follows fnat a1ttridf-rid~~;;;~T;rghttuU~;!¢itoJ.;t" xnoney. :from.another by ~Cthr~~iPL-him.. with certain co~ces, ££~ea diose c~nse~:e~e~.,,~::. of such, a natu;c ~11i'F1ie can ~auSe "them ') .wlthout .lnrrl!iglii~"upnrr-anybodys tlg~ .,iggL,.UtWJ.talC: ~~~~jher mean Bus~~ttlt ther.e.are cjrcul1lstal1ce~ , under Whlch the· most high-min, e of men might resort to. i \:.t.l,a,·.•..t;~.~.l.}d..•. ~,.~~I.i~~.:.d.. ~he. =.f~.. ~::~;.~~l1~~~•\hreatened IS InvaSIve an~efore wron " ul.Therefore t ' ~1S1nrrelX wlro""hm"'tal<en riioney-ror !ifiinj,a· .OY~Ottl.

~~~hatever may e the'corrJ gAja\\7':~J):fl1iGiat~'~.Qa~ffiiFt"""'---·, QOne!.'~e--is ~~e natural.law .!uh;tt governs }!,_ .. .~'" .\ The courts. ate at last beginning to take rational views on the question of peaceable picketing and peaceable boycot,ting. Sevetal r~£reshing'decisions have. been' rendered' within. a short time in which the principle is recognized that what one man may •legitimately •do·. several.men may. do ,in ·concert ..•But eyen. the most ~nde,pendent and intelligent of •the judges still stultify themselves by.attempting baseless distinctions between self..regarding boycotts and purely sympatheticb()ycotts.' A, they say, may boycott B, if he has an.y grievance against •him, hut he may not askC. to boycottB and threaten to boycott h.imin turn in the event of .refusal.When they undertake to defend this position, they failmisera.b1y,·· of course,andthe t,ruthis that they $hrink from the clear logic of the principle which they lay down at the outset .••..But let us. not expect too much ofthe 111 at once. nIt is. the first step that is diffi cult." ~aving accepted a.. sound principle, its corollaries will force themselves on them.

.286 IN D I VI D U ALL I BERTY ANARCHISM AND COPYRIGHT Not alone on the land question did Mr. Tucker find himself in disagreement with Henry George. In his news paper, the Standard of June 23, 1888, the latter discussed with a correspondent the question of property in ideas. The editor of Liberty thus took exception to his argu ments: MR. GEORGE, taking his stand upon the principle that pro ductive labor is the true basis of the right of property, ar ,gues through three columns, with all the· consummate ability for which credit should be given -him, to the triumphant vin ,dication of the position that there can rightfully be no such thing as, the exclusive ownership of an idea. No man, he says, U can justly claim ownership in natural laws, nor in any of the relations which maybe perceived by the human mind, nor in any of the potentialities which na ture holds for it.... Ownership comes from production. It cannot come from discovery. Discovery can give no right of ownership .•••No man can discover anything which, so to speak, was not put there to be discovered, and which some one else might noe in time have discovered. If he finds it, it was not lost. It, or its potentiality, existed before he came.

It was there i to be found. • .. In the production of any material thing-a machine, for instance-there are two sep arableparts,-the abstract idea of principle, which may be usually expressed by drawing, by writing, or by word of mouth; and the concrete form of the particular machine itself, which is produced by bringing together in certain relations certain quantities and qualities of matter, such as wood, steel, brass, brick, rubber, cloth, etc. There are two modes in which labor go'es to the making of the machine,-the one in ascer taining the principle on which such machines can be made to work; the other in obtaining from their natural reservoirs :and bringing together and fashioning into shape the' quanti ties and qualities of matter which in their combination consti tute the concrete machine. In the first mode labor is expended in discovery. In the second mode it is expended in producINDIVIDU ALLIBERTY 281 tiona The work of. discovery may be done once for all, as in the case, of' the discovery in prehistoric ,time of the principle OJ: idea of the wheelbarrow. But the work of production is required afresh in the"case of each particular thing. , No mat terhowmany thousand ,millions. of wheelbarrQws have been produced, it requires fresh labor of prod;uctionto make an other one.•••'The ~aturalreward of labor expended in dis covery· is in 'the use that can be made of the discovery with.

out in.t~r£erencewith the right of ~n.y ,one ,else to use it., ,But i to this natural reward our patent laws endeavor to add an arti ficial reward. Although the effect of giving to the discoverers of useful devices,or processes,an absolute right ,to .their ,exclu sive use would be to burden all industry with most grievous monopolies, and to greatly retard, if not put a stop to, further inventions, yet the theory of our :patent laws is that we cain stimulate discoveries by giving a modified right of, ownership / in ,their use fora term ,of years. In this. we, seek by special laws to give a special reward to labor expended in discovery, which does hot belong to it of natural rig~t, and is of the na ture of a bounty. But as for labor expen4edin the second of thesemodes,-inthe production of the machine by the •• bring ing together in certain r,elations ,of ,certain, quantities and qualities of matter,-we need 110 special laws to, reward that.

Absolute ownership attaches to the results of. such labor, not by ,special,laW"'.,butby common law. ,And if ••"a11 human laws were, abolished, men would still hold that, whether it were a .wheelharrow or a '. phonograph, the, conc'rete thing belonged to the man,wpo ,produced it. And this, not for a term of years, but jin perpetuity. It would pass at his death to his heirs or to ,those to whom he d~vised it." The. whole of the preceding paragraph is" quoted, from Mr. George's article. I regard it as conclusive,' unanswerable. It proceeds, it will be noticed, entirely by the method of ergo. But it is time for t;he philosopher to disappear. He has done his part of the work, which· was the demolition of patents. Now it is the prestidigitator's turn. It remains for him to jus tify copyright,-that is, property, not in the ideas set forth ! ,i.: in a book, but in the manner of expressing them. So juggl~r " George steps upon the scene. Presto/he exclaims: (COver and above.any clabor.of discovery' expended in .thinking out ", ,what to say, is th~ clabor of production' expended on how to ~ 288 INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY say it." Observe how cunningly it is taken for granted here that the task of giving literary expression to an idea is labor of production rather than labor of discovery. But is it so?

Right here comes in the juggler's trick; we will subject it to the philosopher's test. The latter has already been quoted: tryhe work of discovery may be done once for all. •••but the work of production is required afresh in the case of each par ticular thing." Can anything be plainer than that he who does the work of combining words for the expression of an idea saves just that amount of labor to all who thereafter choose to, use the same words in the same order to express the same idea, and that this work, not being required afresh in each particular case, is not work of production, and that, not being work of production,.it gives no right of property? In quoting Mr. George above I did not have to expend any labor on uhow to ~ay" what he had already said. He had saved me that trouble. I simply had to write and print the words on fresh sheets of paper. These sheets of paper belong to me, just as the sheets on which he wrote and printed belong to him. But the particular combination of words belongs to neither of us.

He discovered it, it is true, but that fact gives him no right to it. Why not? Because, to use his own phrases, this combi nation of words uexisted potentially before he came"; ttit was there to be found"; and if he had not found it, some one else would or might have done so. The work of copying or printing books is analogous to the production of wheelbar rows, but the original work of the author, whether in think ing or composing, is analogous to the invention of the wheel barrow; and the same argument that demolishes the right of the inventor demolishes the right of the author. The method of expressing an idea is itself an idea, and therefore not appro priable. THE END BIBLIOGRAPHY Outo£ a. great number of hooks that could be cited as showing a tendency of mpdern thought toward the ideals of· Individualist Anarchism, the following are thos~ •that bear' most clirectly on tpe. subject, anJ,. k some instances :may be considered as sour'ce books. Where they are •avail..