--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Mosiah Hall collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 7 number: 8 published: 1904-06 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Mosiah Hall, "A Political Prophecy. II," *Improvement Era* 7, no. 8 (June 1904): 576–585.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0708unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera0708unse start_page: 576 end_page: 585 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1904-06) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0708unse publication_year: 1904 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1904, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # A Political Prophecy. II A POLITICAL PROPHECY. BY MOSIAH HALL, b s., d. b ph. m., PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION, , BRIGHAM YOUNG COLLEGE, LOGAN, UTAH. 11. When freedom fought with tyranny, every victory won was good and great; but when oppression had been overcome, and free- dom had no opponent to fight, she turned her attention upon her- self and became vain and reckless — freedom crossed the line and degenerated into license. Equality of privileges was a noble ob- ject to struggle for, so long as she was held captive by the rich and well born, but when released, she fell in love with herself, and — forgot her virtue she crossed the line and changed to selfishness. When intelligence struggled with ignorance, every battle won was a gain for humanity, but after the victory was assured, intelligence became proud and self-sufficient —he crossed the line and became a skeptic. Should love cross the line, she will become silly senti- mentality. If courage crosses, he will become a braggart and a bully. When individualism crosses, anarchy will be the result. Are there any indications that individualism is crossing the line? If we discover that the tendency of freedom is towards license; if equality of privileges exists in theory more than in practice; and if the rule of each is to grasp as much as possible with little re- gard to the rights of others; if intelligence is becoming skeptical, and faith weak and timid; if selfishness is a giant and love a dwarf —we may have a strong suspicion that the danger line is be- ing crossed. Anarchy is the logical outcome of individualism, and it is but another name for that despotism in which each individual seeks to become a despot. Are there any evidences that a despotic indi- vidualism is arising in our nation? A POLITICAL PROPHECY. 577 In every community and every state will be found a few men of great ability, who, favored by circumstances, control the indus- tries in their localities. The great body of the people have neither voice in these affairs, nor share in the benefits. The few are masters, the many are The few put the industrial slaves. price upon everything, and they decide what industries shall be established. They open the mills and close them. They build railroads, and decide the rates. They reach out and monopolize the land, water, and light, and sell these necessities at their own prices to the people. They own the mines, the metals, and the money. They build the factories and let the people work in them, if they will do so at the wages offered. They set the price upon the crops raised, and upon the cattle and sheep produced. They control the raw material, and the manufactured product, and decide The air only is free, but when in liquid form it the price of each. becomes a commercial necessity, it too will be monopolized. Some illustrations in line with the above may be interesting. Lyman Abbott, in his speech on Wealth and Democracy, says that a country cannot be counted either Christian or Democratic in which one per cent of the people own one-half of the wealth, and the other half is very unequally distributed among the other ninety-nine per cent — a few millionaires at one pole of society who cannot possibly spend their income, and a great multitude at the other pole of society who have little or no income to spend. Jay Gould started in life with a mouse trap; at the end of twenty-five years his wealth was one hundred million dollars. He made four million dollars on the average each year, and if we count three hundred working days in the year, over thirteen thou- sand dollars a day. Statisticians tell us that the average wages of unskilled labor in this country is about one dollar a day, and of skilled labor between three and four dollars a day. John D. Rockefeller is said to control interests amounting to a billion dollars. If Adam had lived until the present time, and had put aside five hundred dollars each working day during the six thousand years that have passed, he would- not own today, without interest, as much money as Rockefeller is reputed to con- trol. This amount is nearly one-half the per capita of money in circulation in the United States. The following is from Public Opinion, December 10, 1903: One-twelfth of the estimated wealth of the United States is repre- sented at a meeting of the board of directors of the United States Steel Corporation when they are all present. The twenty- four directors control more than two hundred companies, whose capitalization aggre- gate more than nine billion dollars. As the power to make rates of freight and rates of interest is the highest power in the business world, and as the power over railroad rates, and to a large degree, the power over rates of interest, are wielded by the same small group of capital- ists, it would not be impossible to name, say, twenty or thirty men as practically controlling the trade and thus the wealth of the United States. Henry W. Grady, in his speech Against Centralization, says: "When a syndicate or trust can arbitrarily add twenty-five per cent to the cost of a single article of common use, and safely gather forced tribute from the people —when a dozen men can get together in the morning and fix the price of a dozen articles of common use with no standard but their arbitrary will, and no limit but their greed or daring, and then notify the sovereign people of this free republic how much, in the mercy of their masters, they shall pay for the necessaries of life — then the point of intolerable shame has been reached." The conditions thus described are indeed alarming. They in- dicate that individualism has crossed the line, and become at least a lusty infant despot. Statesmen are not wanting to predict a period of anarchy and revolution before an adjustment of these inequalities can take place. But when due consideration is given to the strong opposing tendencies that are developing, and to other modifying facts, the seemingly fatal outcome is not so prob- able. Among the modifying facts and influences are the following: A country so rich in resources and opportunities as to furnish the conditions that make possible this phenomenal accumulation of wealth, is a source of pride and congratulation. A body of men with the brains and energy to conceive, organ- ize, and carry to success these great enterprises are worthy of re- A POLITICAL PROPHECY. 579 spect. The country needs their abilities, and could not afford to be without them. The masses of the people, while not sharing directly in this wealth, are nevertheless sharing indirectly. This is proved by the fact that the people of the United States are better off in all re- spects than the people of any other nation that exists or ever has existed. Trusts are not without some redeeming features. They teach important lessons in economy. They show the foolishness of com- petition, and the value of co-operation. They furnish one of the necessary elements of opposition required to bring men to their senses — a sort of whip to drive men into a unity of interests. A curious anomaly is this, that while we deplore the existence of trusts, and have a long vocabulary of invectives to hurl at them, when we are perfectly candid with ourselves, we admit that they — would not be so bad, if we were in them they would give us such splendid opportunities for exercising charity. Forces are arising that tend to equalize the ownership and dis- tribution of wealth. It is in this direction that hope for the fu- ture is most pronounced. People are beginning to comprehend that the trusts are here to stay. The wonderful growth and success of the trusts indicate that there is something fundamental in their way of doing busi- ness; and people are asking whether the methods that are so effec- tive for the few may not be of advantage to the many. The an- swer appears to be in the affirmative. So not a few are saying, "Since the trusts will get us if we don't get them, let us go into the trust business." The modern invention of the stock company, which, by dividing its capital into small shares, allows persons of limited means to enter, makes it possible for many to join the corporations. Hence, along with the tendency of industries to centralize, there is an accompanying tendency towards diffusion of ownership. The United States Steel Corporation, for example, has nearly seventy thousand stockholders. Another hopeful sign is the sentiment in favor of public ownership of public necessities. Almost every village and city be- lieves it should own its own water system and electric light plant. Many cities are acquiring the ownership of street railways and telephones. In the nation there is a strong belief that the gov- ernment should own or control the railroads and telegraph lines. The rapid growth and success of the postal system and civil ser- vice are object lessons that prove the desirability of government control of national necessities. In like manner, each state should control those utilities that vitally effect its welfare, and each community, those that are its special concern. The irresistible trend of the times is towards community ownership, and towards state and national control. Necessity is compelling belief in a unity of interests, as opposed to faith in the present struggle of neighbor against neighbor and interest against interest. The latter is extravagant and unscientific, and it re- sults in distrust, dishonesty and selfishness. Let the one who doubts this look around him for evidences of its truth. Here, for instance, is a little community of five thousand souls. Four banks are each doing a little business where one would prosper exceedingly. Ten merchandise stores have a pre- carious existence, furnishing poor goods at high prices, where one good store would do a splendid business, and save much to the community. Some dozen groceries eke out a miserable existence, poorly serving the public, where one, if well conducted, would be a source of pride. Five concerns dabble in lumber and building material; one would do a flourishing business. Four dealers fur- nish coal to the community, except during freezing weather, when Four they haven't any; one reliable dealer would be a joy forever. drag stores and six saloons supply drugs and poor whiskey to kill off the people; one drug store with a public dispensary would do this work with much less fatal results. And so on through the whole list of public enterprises; the crowning shame of all being the fact that greedy despots are permitted to own such public necessities as water and light. Consider the great number of clerks and employes who are unnecessary or who duplicate each other's work in this wasteful system. Probably if we include the middle men and those who are employed a part of the time, five hundred men could be spared, and put into productive occupations. Think, too, of the real estate, buildings, equipments, and capital uselessly employed. Now, if all these interests were owned by the community and A POLITICAL PROPHECY. 581 conducted on economical and scientific principles, how much better service could be rendered, and what a large amount of money could be saved. There is no reason, except the false belief in despotic individualism, why a community should not conduct its own necessary business. Because of the law of relationship and interdependence, when one member of a community succeeds, all succeed in proportion; when one fails, all fail. The community, therefore, has to foot the bills of extravagance, and pay the debts of its bankrupts. And when the subject is considered candidly, does it not seem foolish to turn over the vital interests of a com- munity to a set of irresponsible individuals who wax rich and in- solent in proportion to the amount they extort from the com- munity ? We imagine you are now saying, "0, pshaw! what you advo- cate is nothing but rank socialism. Everybody knows that a com- munity could never run its own business. What is everybody's business is nobody's business." We admit there is some truth in the charge, but believe there is more error. In the first place, the plan suggested is not the rank socialism, which, according to the popular conception, would vest all power, authority, and initiative in the state or nation, and take from the individual all privileges and freedom, except as they were granted to him from the center. Individualism has too strong a hold upon society to permit this form of socialism to prevail. In the second place, the maxim: "What is everybody's business is nobody's business," is liable to a great misconstruction, if not likely to become a positive false- hood. The maxim should be changed to this, "What is every- body's business is everybody's business," and just to the extent that each and every individual performs his full duty, will the good of all be achieved. Most of the political evils that exist are due to the neglect of the latter maxim. People generally do not perform their political duties; they allow a few to exercise politi- cal power for all, and the result is that the majority lose political freedom, and the political boss rules supreme. In Public Opinion, December 10, 1893, we note the following: Brag as we will, we Americans are not a free people, and this is not a free country.This has become a government of bosses, by the bosses, and distinctly for the bosses. And not only in politics, but in other de- 682 IMPROVEMENT ERA. partments of our life. For the boss is not peculiar to politics; he is the very disease of democracy. In shorf, we are ruled by usurping middle- men; thftboss is a middleman, a sort of broker in government to whom we assign our obvious and personal rights and duties, because we are too busy making money or spending it, to care whether we are free or not. No, this is not a free country, because we, the people, are not intelligent and honest and brave enough to use freedom. What we do have in this country to a degree unequaled elsewhere in the world is the opportunity of freedom. That is the triumph of the American democracy; it in- sures the people freedom if they wish to take it; but it cannot force freedom upon any man who does not want it, or who is too lazy or too take it. Half of our reformers are today en- selfish or too ignorant to gaged in the utterly stupid task of trying to make people free by new laws. It is like trying to make a man happy by legislation. If, therefore, the people's business is to be done properly, they must do it themselves, or at least see that it is correctly done. They must not let their business or their politics go by default, or else they will lose both their business and their freedom. If it were true that human progress is like a pendulum, swing- ing from one extreme to another, and then repeating the move- ment, socialism would be the certain prophecy of the future. But history does not repeat itself, except in vague and general out- lines. History is not the mechanical repetition that the pendulum maxim would indicate. Because of the interdependence and re- lationship of things, and as a result of habit, tradition, and he- redity, the characteristics of one age persist, and are transmitted to the next. These characteristics form the content, and furnish the tendencies of succeeding thought. Hence, we are certain that the brilliant period of individualism through which we are passing cannot fail to impress the future exceedingly. Indeed, it does not seem too much to say, that the dignity of the individual, his freedom, and his worth, as emphasized by individualism, will continue so long as a vestige of our civilization remains. What, then, is the prophecy of the future? We offer the following from I Corinthians, 12: 14-26, as an introduction to the answer: "For the body is not one member, but many. And if they were all one member, where were the body? But now are they many members, yet but one body. And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I A POLITICAL PROPHECY. 583 have no need of you. * * * That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honored, all the mem- bers rejoice with it." Man's body is a living organism. Every part is vitally re- lated to every other part and to the whole. Each part has a par- ticular function which no other part could perform, yet each de- pends for its welfare, and for its existence, upon the whole. The eye is the organ of sight, but it sees for the whole body, not for itself, and in return for the labor of seeing, the body gives it food, water, heat, protection, and all other things needed. If re- moved from the body, it would no longer be an eye; it would be a mass of perishing matter. And so with all other parts; in return for the special work each one does, it receives immeasurably more blessings than it contributes. The welfare of the whole depends upon how well each part performs its duty. The whole is more than an aggregate of parts; it is, in addition, that which unifies and gives meaning and purpose to all. A community should be conceived of as an organism similar to the body. Just as the cells of the body are differentiated into various organs, each with a special work to do, so the individuals in a community should arrange themselves into groups, in order to carry on the labor necessary to the welfare of each other, and to the whole. One group should produce the required products; an- other should deliver them where needed; others, like the digestive system, should manufacture the raw material into suitable shape for use; others, like the circulatory system, should carry the manufactured products to the localities where required. Some would be builders who would make new structures, and tear down the old, and others would remove and carry off the waste material. In like manner other groups should perform all the other neces- sary labor. The community would be healthful and progressive, when every group did its particular work faithfully; but just as the body suffers when any organ is diseased or fails to perform its function, so the community would be impaired, if any group neg- lect or refuse to render its service. Why ig every community not an organic unity like unto the body? Because the law of an organism, which is that of inter- dependence and relationship, is not observed. This law demands that all the parts shall act in harmony with each other. No one part can be considered more important than another, because each is necessary to the life of the whole; nor can any one be granted privileges which would be at the expense of others. In the com- munity, on the contrary, the importance of the individual has been so exalted that his freedom is allowed to pass beyond the law of the organism and degenerate into license. This is the primary cause of the want of harmony and equality that exists. That the individual must be free is true, for all progress depends on his initiative, and on the thought and energy which he displays; but his freedom must be in accordance with law. Freedom is not vio- lation of law, it is obedience to law. When the individual is raised to first importance, and the community made secondary, it is natural that the individual should believe himself superior to law. He will argue that since he himself makes the law, the law is made for man, and not man for the law; why then may he not change, or even violate law, if he sees fit? But suppose an organ of the body should act according to this argument, what would be the result? Let the stomach, for instance, make a corner on the food it digests, and decide to starve the other organs until they yield to its selfish demand for more bile or less hours of labor. Or let the heart choose to withhold its supply of blood to the brain, until that organ is forced to grant the heart some special privi- lege. How supremely foolish such action would be ! If persisted in, the result would be serious impairment, if not destruction, of the organ concerned, as well as of the whole system. In a com- munity such actions are common, but in the body, they are impos- sible, because all the parts are amenable to law. When the organic law is violated, in a community, some groups are honored, and others are degraded. Some become ex- ceedingly intelligent, and others deplorably ignorant. Some be- come wealthy, and others poor. One individual struggles with another for an advantage, one group arrays itself against another; one grasps privileges in this direction, another gains control in that, while all are more or less engaged in a selfish struggle for supremacy. Is it a wonder, therefore, that the struggle to over- A POLITICAL PROPHECY. 585 come poverty, ignorance, and crime, is so difficult, and the gain so small? An organic system of government seems to be the remedy for the evils mentioned. Not that we believe that any government, no matter how perfect, would do away with all evil; we incline rather to the opinion that opposition will always give occasion for the exercise of charity. But that evil would be reduced to a min- imum, in an organic government, is a reasonable supposition. In this system, both the individual and the state would receive just con- sideration: neither could be supreme, because one conditions the other; but the freedom of the individual would be secured, and the authority of the state maintained. Each would be free to invent and initiate in the sphere to which it belonged, and the great central principle that would rule and guide all would be the law of unity and interdependence. Hence, no one would have license to impose " upon another, or to monopolize any blessing required by others. The free- dom of each and all would be secured in accordance with law. Emulation would exist without strife, freedom without oppression, harmony without discord; and each would be interested in all, and all in each. Profiting, therefore, from the experience of the past, and gaining wisdom from the lessons of the present, the future holds the promise of a time of peace and good will, when selfishness shall be no more, and when unity and sympathy shall prevail. And we do not fear to venture the prediction that this generation shall not pass away without substantial progress being made towards com- munity interest in business, and an organic form in government. Extreme individualism shall pass away, and the brotherhood of man shall take its place. [the end.]