WCP7121

[1] [p. 101]

23rd July 1900

MY DEAR DR. WALLACE.

Your very important letter of July 4th has been constantly before my mind as demanding most careful and explicit rejoinder. I should have replied sooner only that I am in the midst of serious complications with my work.

I do not wish this reply to be understood in any other way than as a whole-hearted agreement with your position, and as in sympathy with the immediate practical legislative proposals you set forth, which are quite the best my own mind can discover.

Six to ten years ago, during the then existing semi-crisis of popular discontent and Socialist agitation, I stated and advocated broadcast in the press and from the platform exactly these proposals of yours for the development and extension of productive and distributive Co-operation, and nationalization or municipalization of all material social resources and functions, necessarily beginning with the land.

A recent meeting with Earl Grey¹, for whose strong furtherance of Productive Co-operation I can find no better epithet than noble, reminded me that behind the ranks of idea-less politicians of the talking order, we have throughout society honourable and practical men who perceive the issue more or less as you have set it out.

If there is to be a party of progress, perceptible and effective in the coming election, that party must of necessity be one which combines in its care both Trade Unionism and Co-operation; a Trade Unionism which has for its object, not conflict with the employer, but rather the [2] [p. 102] organization of members into Productive and Distributive Co-operative Societies.

In agitation for this New Co-operation, one word must be borne in the forefront, - Anti-interest. The capital held in these concerns must bear no interest. This to prevent unjust accumulation. And that which is now distributed as dividend or profit must be turned from this misapplication and used to reduce prices or increase wages, or to provide such contingent fund as may be necessary from time to time to cover possibility of loss in business. A long and wide experience in commerce enables me to understand these proposals in their business sense; and I make such a suggestion, not as a politician seeking votes, but as a man of business advising his friends as to the best method of conducting their affairs.

In this advocacy of the new co-operation we shall be but reviving, clarifying and furthering the teachings and labours of Robert Owen², Charles Kingsley³ and the whole industrial movement associated with Chartism⁴.

But all such proposals are in the air so long as our legislation does not, in a quite literal sense, draw them down to earth. That is to say, free land, free in Carlyle's⁵sense of use-possession, (the very phrase I have adopted in "The Anatomy of Misery") is the people's first need. To realize this I find in all history no sounder scheme than that of the Mosaic legislation, and of the kindred Lycurgan system in Sparta (minus the Spartan helotage); which Socialised the land by a simple division of the fields into lots suitable for individual, family or even group-communal use; a tenure existing so long as a legitimate use was made of the land. Here is the only means by which the individual can receive the due fruit of his labour.

Among us, for reasons only too well seen, the realisation of such a state of land ownership involves a difficult programme. The first step in that programme, however, must necessarily be such agitation as you plead for; agita [3] [p. 103] tion upon the moral and economic aspects of the question which shall arouse such enthusiasm and clearness of perception in the masses that the authorities shall be compelled to move in our direction. Enquiry must be instituted as to:

(1) The present conditions of ownership of all agricultural lands.

(2) The conditions of the unemployed in various trades.

(3) Ways and Means of organising men in their proper callings upon the land of the country.

For if ever the judgement of God was spoken in history, it is spoken to-day, prophesying quick ruin upon the infamous system which has drained the land of its inhabitants and heaped them up in cities.

As Henry George⁶ has so perfectly demonstrated in the first section of his "Progress and Poverty" (I commend that part of the book only), morality commands that we should consider the interests of existing owners, whether of land, railways or other resources, as secondary only to a superior interest—the general welfare. Agricultural land is now chiefly held by insurance companies, banks and other mortgage societies, and some new-made capitalists. These interests represent only dishonest inflations of power given through our unjust system of commerce; and not only may be, but must be, ruthlessly sacrificed in their swollen pretensions. Such reasonable and good provision for the holders of these interests as you suggest, must, however, be made.

For the practical political position, this is the programme of the future as I see it, and one to which I commit myself—body, soul and spirit.

But there is one further consideration. This I may state as defence of the conclusion of "The Anatomy of Misery." Through years of every kind of labour for these very [4] [p. 104] reforms, I perceived that the effectiveness of a man, whether leader or led, depends first, last and wholly, upon his personal character. The perfect personal character is one which I speak of to myself as that of Jesus Christ the golden—golden in His purity and brilliancy of spirit. Therefore everywhere and always I preach that gospel turns men to the source of their life as to a Father, and the central aspiration of which, as far as this present bodily life of man is concerned, is "Forgive us our debts as we forgive those who are indebted to us." Many years ago, I learnt with amazement from John Ruskin⁷ that the word "debts" in this prayer means debts, and my business experience taught me that it is the power of law, by which property is held and debts are collected, that enables the landlord, interest-monger and exploiter, to clutch the throats and empty the pockets of their fellows.

Eleven years ago I remarked to William Morris⁸, that I felt the only vote worth casting in Parliament would be for a Bill which should propose "That in such a time after the passing of this Act, all laws relating to debt and contract should be repealed." "Why," said Morris, "that would be the revolution!" And such is the fact. This, of course, is pure idealism for our day, but should commend itself to every soul that says the Lord's prayer.

But here again, as always, rises the need of character. To achieve any of our proposals, as much as to live under the Society that would result from them, men are needed who are first of all men of goodwill, and with that, men of truthfulness at all cost. Such men will concentrate their whole strength, not in the coercive forces, but upon the administrative function, of government; in that spirit of the Christian Gospel so well understood by Leo Tolstoy⁹, which I have endeavoured to explain and spread among my fellow-countrymen.

I have written so much in furtherance of your letter, hoping that this correspondence will do something to revive [5]¹⁰ [p. 105] the forces of progress, which are now dropping, strangled by mere party organization and dulled by temporary surfeit of what is mistakenly called "good times."

Thank you for the information about your own work and the facilities you offer me towards my purpose of doing some little justice to a life of such sanity and power for good as your own.

Believe me,

Ever yours sincerely,

John C. Kenworthy