First World War Centennial

XI

DEMOCRACY AND MONARCHY

As seen in the preceding chapters, a reorgan­ization of our nation's industrial-political system is inevitable, if we hope to retain and extend our industrial prosperity against the highly organized and efficient co-operative sys­tems of industrial society into which the Euro­pean war is forcing the nations. We will have to stop our muddling, our interference of every­body with everybody, and prepare to meet Europe by a still more efficient co-operative industrial system.

How can we organize such efficiency of in­dustrial co-operation? What forms or shapes must such organization assume in our nation? It is a matter of evolution, of which we cannot foresee the end, but one thing we can see with certainty, and that is, how not to proceed; we cannot copy European organizations and hope to be successful. It would, indeed, be an easy task if we could. We all realize that Germany had reached the highest industrial efficiency before the war, and thus it would appear nat­ural to copy the German methods, the German organization, and thereby expect to get the same efficiency. But the industrial organiza­tion which has been so successful in Germany, if attempted in our country, would, in all prob­ability, be a disastrous failure. We may just as well realize this, as there is a strong sentiment in our country to copy European ways, es­pecially now, when the need of preparedness to meet the European nations after the war has been so forcibly impressed upon us, that many of us have lost all perspective and hysterically call for doing something or anything, however foolish it might appear on calmer consideration. Methods of organization and industrial prog­ress which have been successful in Europe can­not be successful in our country, nor can American ways be transplanted to Europe and there give the same results as here, because our national temperament is entirely different, is, indeed, the opposite of that of all European na­tions. America's national character is democrat­ic, while that of all the European nations, from republican France to constitutional Germany and autocratic Russia or theocratic Turkey, is monarchical, and between these two national temperaments there is an unbridgeable gulf.

The fundamental difference between the two national temperaments is best illustrated by con­sidering the different ways by which a change, such as an industrial progress, is brought about.

In the monarchical nation the problem such as the necessity of vocational education, or of labor legislation, old-age insurance, etc., is dis­cussed by individuals, societies; political parties write it in their platforms, etc.; but all this re­mains a mere academic discussion without re­sults, until the central Government is converted to the new idea. Then the new idea is intro­duced by governmental order; the central Gov­ernment makes the plans and establishes the organization; a federal bureau, with sub-organizations in the states or provinces; below them others in the municipalities, etc. A part of the new organization is first introduced, as much as the federal Government considers ad­visable, then more and more, and so from the central Government the organization is ex­tended toward the periphery, to the individual. Thus Germany's social and industrial progress was accomplished; until the federal Govern­ment was convinced of the necessity of social legislation all the demands of the Social Demo­cratic party were in vain as regards construc­tive action; though they obviously were the driving force which finally converted the Gov­ernment. But when, finally, the Government was convinced, progress started and proceeded until the results were accomplished.

Entirely the reverse is the development and introduction of a new idea in a democratic nation, as ours. There is no strong federal Gov­ernment which could force new ideas on the nation by governmental order, and even if laws could be passed to this purpose they would either be declared unconstitutional or remain a dead letter, like so many of our laws.

A new idea, a proposition toward progress, etc., is suggested by individuals. It spreads and is discussed by groups of individuals, and when it has made sufficient progress it is tried locally by groups of individuals, local societies, corporations, or municipalities. Other private or public groups also try constructively the new idea, usually in a different form, and finally it is tried in many different places, by many kinds of organizations. Thus vocational education is being tried to-day in our nation. There is an enormous waste of energy by duplication of work, by repeating the same mistakes, etc., but gradually the more serious errors are recog­nized and avoided, the experience of previous constructive work is made at least partly avail­able in later attempts. With the spreading of the idea it reaches larger organizations; na­tional societies, state governments, groups of corporations, or entire industries. The results and methods of procedure are codified and in­formation is exchanged, and when finally the new idea reaches the national Government it has been fairly well crystallized into the final form in which it is feasible, and dangerous errors and mistakes are eliminated, and if the federal Gov­ernment takes action, it practically consists in what may be called standardizing best practice. But when this occurs, the new idea has long ceased to be a new idea, has permeated all the nation, and practically become a part of the national economy.

This democratic method is very inefficient, very slow in accomplishing results, and very discouraging compared with the rapidity with which progress is possible in a centralized mon­archical nation. It has, however, the advan­tage that when results are at last accomplished they are permanent, are a part of the nation, and especially—and this is the most important advantage—no great mistakes can be made, as the first constructive trials are on a small scale, and thus any errors and mistakes limited in extent, and when the idea becomes national in scope, all serious errors have been eliminated by the experience of constructive work in smaller scope.

Thus the monarchical method is superior by getting quicker results, but a mistake is liable to be a national disaster. The democratic method is slow, but safe. An illustration hereof is social legislation. We realize that the most serious problem before our nation, which must be solved before we can hope for efficient indus­trial reorganization, is to secure the active co-operation of the masses, those who are becom­ing increasingly indifferent, if not antagonistic, to the maintenance of existing society. The German Government has solved this problem by eliminating the three great fears of the masses by an effective social legislation. The result was that when called upon for national defense even the "revolutionary" Social Dem­ocratic party, with its millions of members, stood solidly—and actively—behind the Gov­ernment, a phenomenon little understood in other nations, even by the socialists. We have been muddling with this problem for half a generation, and conditions are becoming more unsatisfactory, rather than better. Here the monarchical method seems to have shown a vast superiority, accomplished results, where we have failed thus far. But was it really so? Be­fore Germany started its successful social legis­lation it had tried, under Bismarck, to solve the problem, in the true monarchical way, by for­cibly suppressing the elements which were be­coming indifferent and antagonistic, and had split the nation in twain, made millions open­ly hostile to the nation. At the end of the ten years' war against socialism, when revo­lutionary socialism had even entered and per­meated the army, if then Germany had been involved in a serious war it would have gone to pieces at the first blow. All that would have happened which those unfamiliar with the changed social conditions of Germany expected to happen and failed to see at the beginning of the present war.

Thus it cannot be said that the democratic method—from the individual toward the cen­tral Government—"concentral," is inferior, nor that it is superior to the "decentral" monar­chical method—from the central Government toward the individual.

But it can be said that the decentral method is the only feasible and only possible one for a nation of monarchical temperament—that is, for any of the large European nations, and the concentral method is the only feasible one for a nation of democratic temperament like ours, and decentral methods thus are unsuitable and impossible for a democratic nation—that is, we cannot copy Europe's successful methods and hope to succeed.

Our nation is the only large democratic na­tion, thus we have no example which we can follow, and the problem of our industrial re­organization thus is a far vaster one than it appears at first; we have to find new ways and means, accomplish a thing which has never been accomplished before—co-operative organization of a democratic nation. Democracy itself thus is on trial before the judgment of history; if we fail, democratic America ends as a world power, is an unsuccessful experiment in the world's history, and the world goes back to monarchical forms of organization—even if they should call their ruler "President," and play at elections.