Page:Karl Kautsky - Georgia - tr. Henry James Stenning (1921).pdf/52

 which 576 millions, or 76 per cent., would represent revenue from the national properties. But the war has thrown the State undertakings into a condition of confusion, and lowered the revenue from them. The large estates, which were taken over from the old régime, yield a suplus,surplus, [sic] it is true, but this is not very large. Before the war the railway was one of the few Russian State lines which earned a net profit. On account of the lack of masuth, and the great exhaustion of material by the war, and lately by reason of the cessation of trade, the services had been so restricted that they barely covered the running costs of the undertaking. Repairs can only be effected out of State resources, and many repairs are necessary.

Generally speaking, the exploitation of the national properties of Georgia, such as the forests and mines, has not yet been undertaken. Before they can be set working large outlays are needed for roads and railways.

Thus a great portion of the State possessions yield no immediate revenue, but entail expenditure.

Simultaneously, other branches of State expenditure have grown enormously. It is not merely a question of repairing the immense damage wrought by the war, but special demands are made on the Government because of its socialistic character.

A Socialist Government is not only expected to prepare the way for the development of socialistic production, which, measured by our impatience, is a protracted task. It must also, put an immediate end to all the poverty which it finds in existence. If the kind of poverty which Capitalism, creates is to be found in Georgia in no small degree, all the more abundant is the poverty which has been accumulated by the check to capitalist development—poverty which has arisen from Feudalism., Absolutism, and War.

To make an immediate end of this poverty, with the scanty and impoverished resources of the State, is a task which no government could achieve unless it were