Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 4.djvu/791

 NATIONAL-SOCIAL MOVEMENT IN GERMANY 77 I

greater result for the poorer and medium peasant class than has been attained for the handicraftsmen by means of the new asso- ciations of handicraftsmen begun by them : a new, advantageous, half individualistic, half socialistic mode of possession and econ- omy in the country.

Just this last purpose of associations the National Socialists of late hold to be all the earlier and more certainly to be realized, and more easily attained, since a very marked advance in land- property reform has been made. The leaders of their reform are also leaders of the National Socialists, and their organs are those of the National Socialists. Indeed, the German land reformers have a different character from those of other coun- tries. They do not swear by one theory and the battle-cry of the single tax, as we hear they do in America. They have rather learned of recent years, and particularly under the influence of the National Socialists, from Social Democracy and Manchester- ism alike, that a particular one-sided theory never by itself causes economic advance. So they have concluded to saw and split up the entire huge trunk of their land-reform ideal into a number of logs, billets, boards, and beams, which can be used as desired in the many-sided transformation and rebuilding of the social edi- fice, as may be best adapted to German needs. One of these demands of reform, both of the land reformers and of the National Socialists, relates to the socialization of mortgage credits on land security, and a second to a systematic state policy in respect to peasant proprietorship. The first demand is immediately intel- ligible, while the second is different. It is well known that in eastern Germany the feudal, usurious, great landlordism has existed from the Middle Ages to the present, and that it is an Alp and plague for modern Germany. Latterly, however, through various changes in world commerce, these estates have become unprofitable, and they will become even less profitable with time. One huge estate after another, one country squire after another, falls into ruin. The question now arises whether these bankrupt estates, as has often occurred in England, shall pass over into the hands of rich urban manufacturers and mer- chants, and be transformed into forests and pastures, or whether