Where Karl Marx Agrees With Henry George |
[Reprinted from Land and Freedom, May-June 1938]
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We have Socialists, Communists, Trade Unionist
Employers Federationists, Anarchists, Free Trader
Tariff Reformers, Revenue Protectionists, Money and
Credit Reformers, Prohibitionists, Religious Bodies, Georgeans, etc., etc.
The pity is that workers for reform are so divided
their aims. Is there a possibility of reaching some common agreement;
of co-ordination, of bringing plan of chaos? All these may be divided into two classes
those who believe that ideal conditions are to be sought
through authority and those who believe that liberty
enough. In chemistry a certain element will clarify
clouded mixture; in mechanics, the principle of economy
secures simplification.
Our Socialists and Communists follow Marx, and both
George and Marx largely agree on the evils of Land
Monopoly, Taxation, and Protection. The first plan
of the Marx and Engels Manifesto demands the diversion
of the People's Ground Rent into the public treasury
The following statements in Das Kapital by Marx
(Vol. I, pp. 842, 829, 830; Vol. Ill, 896-7-8, 956
also practically accord with George's teachings:
"The
expropriation of the mass of people from the soil form
the basis of the capitalist mode of production."
"When
land is very cheap and all men are free ... not only
labor very dear, as respects the laborer's share of the
product, but the difficulty is to obtain combined labor at
any price."
"The starting point of the development that gave rise
to the wage-laborer as well as to the capitalist, was the
servitude of the laborer. ...The expropriation of the
agricultural producer of the peasant, from the soil, is the
basis of the whole process." (Page 739.)
"In England ... the great feudal lords created an
incomparably larger proletariat by the forcible driving
of the peasantry from the land, to which the latter had
the same feudal right as the lord himself, and by the
usurpation of the common lands." (Page 741.)
"The proletariat created by the breaking up of the bands
of feudal retainers and by the forcible expropriation of the
people from the soil; this 'free' proletariat could not
possibly be absorbed by the nascent manufacturers as
fast as it was thrown upon the world. On the other
hand, these men suddenly adapt themselves to the discipline of their new condition. They turn en masse into
beggers, robbers, vagabonds, partly from inclination,
in most cases from stress of circumstances." (Page 758.)
In the Communist Manifesto of 1847, issued in London
following a ten days' discussion by a Committee of which
Marx and Engels were both members, the very first operative clause of that document called for "Abolition of
property in land and confiscation of ground rents to the
State."
In the International Socialist Review (Vol. VIII, pp.
643-646), Marx wrote: "In the society of today the
means of labor are monopolized by the landed proprietors; monopoly of landed property is ever the basis of
monopoly of capital by capitalism."
On Taxation and Protection, Marx says: "... Modern
fiscality whose pivot is formed by taxes on the most necessary means of subsistence, thereby increasing their price. ...Its expropriating efficacy is still further heightened
by the system of Protection. ... Protection was an
artificial means of manufacturing manufacturers, of expropriating independent laborers, of capitalising the
natural means of production and subsistence." He
clearly distinguishes between landlord and capitalist.
'Private land has nothing to do with the actual process
of production. Its role is confined to carrying a portion
of the produced surplus value from the pockets of the
capitalist to its own." "Rent, instead of falling into the
hands of the capitalists who extract it from their laborers,
is captured by the landlords, who extract it from the
capitalists." But while Marx aimed at abolishing "Capitalism," George attacked the evils attached to "Capitalism" through our land laws and other monopolistic laws.
"The landlord does not only receive interest on the
capital of other people that costs him nothing, but also
pockets the capital of others without any compensating
return." Capital, Vol. Ill, chap, xxxvii, paragraph 12.
"They (capitalist tenants) shouted for a reduction in
their rents. They succeeded in individual cases. But
on the whole they failed to get what they wanted. They
sought refuge in a reduction of the cost of production,
among other things, by the introduction of the steam
engine and new machinery. ... Here high ground
rent is directly identified with a depreciation of labor, a
high price of land with a low price of labor." Vol. Ill,
part VI, chap, xxxvii, paragraph 24. (See also paragraph
20.)
"It (landed property) represents merely a certain
tribute of money which he (the land owner) collects by
the force of his monopoly from the industrial capitalist
(and) the capitalist farmer." Same work and chapter,
paragraph 5.
Concerning the effect of Socialist regulation of industry,
the futility of which the Georgeist is constantly emphasizing, Marx says: "The compulsory regulation of the
working day in respect to its length, its pauses, the hour
at which work shall begin and end, the system of relays
for children, the prohibition of the employment of children
below a certain age, and so on necessitate an increased
use of machinery, a greater outlay of capital. As far
as concerns the intermediate forms between manufacturer
and domestic industry, and domestic industry itself,
they can no longer compete." Vol. I, part IV, chap,
xiii, sec. 8E, paragraph 18.
"The capitalist performs at least an active function
himself in the development of surplus value and surplus
products. But the land owner has but to capture his
growing share in the surplus product and the surplus
value created without his assistance." Vol. Ill, part VI,
chap, xxxvii, paragraph 45.
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