Page:Alexander Jonas - Reporter and Socialist (1885).djvu/66

 (interrupting): Hold on, Sir! I know what you are about to say. You are going to voice the common prejudices and slanders of the wealthy populace whose ruling propensities are threatened by the advent of victorious socialism. But, I shall answer you immediately. To-day, my dear Sir, the overwhelming majority of mankind does not enjoy the real blessings of matrimony and family-life. For, matrimony to-day is an institution for the support of some of our female population, while hundreds of thousands of women and children are compelled to work for a living in order to satisfy the dire wants of their bodies. In our society all this will be different. Woman will be equal to man. If she be married her existence will be guaranteed on account of the labor she performs as a mother and a teacher of her young children. And no woman will be compelled to take a husband merely to be supported; her work will support her under all circumstances, and children will, of course, be expected to participate in the process of production considerably later in life than at present, after having been fitted thereto by a thorough scientific and practical education. You may ask, whether society will have the means thus to educate the growing generation? Indeed, it will. The work of assessing and collecting taxes, if you chose to call it so, will be very simple and practical. The necessary amount to be raised for public purposes will be estimated, and regulated according to the demands of the time; and from every certificate for labor produced, or certificate of wages, if you please, a certain percentage will be deducted, and the amount of the deduction will be according to the amount of the wages, which may also be affected by the number of members in each family. You see that it will not be very difficult to solve all these questions. But now let me tell you one thing: we might sit here till to-morrow morning to talk over all these minor arrangements and yet we would not get through; therefore, let us speak about them at some other time when you are at leisure. May it suffice at present that I have shown you by what the Socialists propose to replace the present system of production which brings misery and starvation to the masses of the people. Consequently, if it be impossible to attack the principle upon which the entire socialistic structure is based, it would be reasonable to suppose