Page:Karl Kautsky - The Class Struggle (Erfurt Program) - tr. William Edward Bohn (1910).djvu/219

 to gain from this degeneration. On the contrary, its advantage lies all in the opposite direction. The more degraded the groups from which the proletariat is recruited the more difficult it is to elevate the recruits to the point at which they are willing and able to join the ranks of the militant proletariat. It is upon the extension of this division of the proletariat, however, that the size and strength of the socialist movement depend. The fewer the demands made upon society by the farmer or independent craftsman, the more accustomed he is to ceaseless labor, the less resistance he will be able to offer after he has fallen into the proletariat. To a certain extent the same causes which bring about the international solidarity of the workers lead to a solidarity with the classes wromfrom [sic] which the proletariat is recruited.

Of course if the sinking farmer or small business man attempts to keep his head above water at the cost of the working-class, if, for example, he tries to lower wages or hinder the organization of labor, then he will always be opposed by the proletariat and by the Socialist Party. On the other hand, the socialist movement does all in its power to support measures which are calculated to bring about, without injury to the working-class, an amelioration of conditions for the farmer and small business man.

This appears unmistakably in the nature of the immediate demands which the socialist parties of different lands make on their respective governments. Certain of these demands are purely industrial in their nature, designed especially to