Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/724

706 to modern governments; and, secondly, a criticism of the tendency, just at present in the ascendant, of looking to legislation for the cure of all ills and the securing of all benefits. "The spirit of the individualist movement," the author tells us, "is one of resistance to any overstepping by the legislature of its normal boundaries. It is the embodiment of the absolute principle of civil liberty, or the greatest possible liberty of each compatible with the equal liberty of all." We need hardly observe that this is sound Spencerian doctrine. Later on in the volume the author has a good deal to say in criticism of Mr. Spencer's "Man vs. the State"; but this does not prevent his recognizing Mr. Spencer, on the first page of his preface, as the man "who has contributed more to the scientific study of society than any other thinker—not even excepting Auguste Comte or John Austin"; and as the one to whom the merit belongs "of formulating this (the individualistic) theory of government, and thus of laying the rough foundation on which a sound art of politics may be based." Mr. Donisthorpe laments the fact that in England to-day "the Conservative party have thrown in their lot with state socialism," and are "now playing with the Liberals a game of grab for the votes of those whom a Socialistic programme attracts. He shows reasons, however, for holding that the present tendency is rather an eddy in the general current, than a main movement likely to be continued in the future—a reaction toward unintelligent political methods due to the recent inclusion (he is speaking of England) of lower layers of the population in the electorate.

We pass over Chapters IV and V, entitled "What is Property?" and "What is Capital?" which do not seem to us to have a very direct bearing on the main purpose of the bock; while the style in which they are written is somewhat tiresomely disputatious. The chapters on "The Labor Question" and "The Capitalization of Labor," which immediately follow, are, on the other hand, full of interest. In the first of these the author describes with great force the present economic condition of the laboring classes. He accepts without reserve the Ricardian doctrine of the tendency of wages to a minimum, maintaining that it has been so irresistibly proved a priori that to discuss it in the light of any partial facts or observations is the merest waste of time. He pours unmeasured ridicule on the newfangled doctrine of "the standard of comfort" by which some political economists try to make the Ricardian law appear less cruel in its operation. "Wagedom," says Mr. Donisthorpe, is only a shade better than serfdom, and is virtually a kind of serfdom. The remedy for it, however, does not lie in socialism, which would only aggravate all the ills of society, but in the substitution for the wage system of what Mr. Donisthorpe calls "the capitalization of labor." His idea is briefly this: The wage-earner at present takes, when he can get it, a certain average wage from his employer, the amount of which does not depend upon the profitableness or otherwise to his employer of the business carried on. In other words, the employer insures the laborer a certain wage independently of the fortunes of his business. Now, nobody insures another without charging something for it; and the capitalist class recoup themselves for insuring a certain average wage to their employés by putting that average wage somewhat, perhaps considerably, below what their average profits would justify. By the capitalization of labor Mr. Donisthorpe means treating labor as capital (which he contends it is), and establishing a partnership between it and capital—a true partnership, in which gains and losses would be shared. Mr. Donisthorpe shows how a beginning might be made by taking the average wages in one or more lines of business for a certain number of years, and fixing the proportion which these had borne to average profits during the same period. The laborers might then approach the capitalists and say: These are the wages you have been able to pay us on the principle of insuring us a fixed compensation whether your business prospered or not. Now, we wish to throw our labor as so much capital into your business, on the understanding that, if your profits are greater than the average profits of the period we have been considering, you will pay us in proportion, and that, if they are less, you will pay us in proportion also.

We must refer those of our readers who wish to see how much can be urged on behalf