XIV
EVOLUTION: INHIBITORY POWER
THE industrial corporation of to-day is organized for effective constructive work; it has developed the characteristics necessary for economic efficiency—continuity of organization and at the same time flexibility to adapt itself in a high degree to the requirements of industrial production, and to the personality of its members; it has within itself the responsibility of the individual toward the whole, and encourages initiative and individualistic development as important factors of industrial progress, and especially it has solved the problem of filling the offices with competent and qualified men. Neither the political Government nor any other organization has these characteristics, and it therefore appears the natural and most logical step that the executive and administrative Government of our nation in the co-operative era which we are now entering should evolve from the industrial corporation.
Such organization is commensal—that is, every member of it gives and receives, and the maintenance and advance of the organization thus is to everybody's interest. It thus should form a stable and permanent form of society, permanent at least as long as the foundation of our civilization endures, as stable as was the classic age or the feudal age of human society, and not self-destructive by its own success, as was the individualistic age. At least, so it appears.
It might be called an aristocratic democracy, using the term aristocratic in its original meaning, that the influence of the individual on society should be proportional to his capacity—democratic; everybody has the same chance, the same right, and there is no discrimination—égalité; everybody is free to choose his activity, to develop his individuality—liberté; everybody is guaranteed in his standard of living, as a matter of necessity, as otherwise the organization would not be commensal, and could not exist, but the present indifference and antagonism of the "proletarian" would remain—fraternité.
But who guarantees that the industrial government remains commensal and that the higher officers do not develop into an oligarchy, a patriciate, or nobility; exclude all individuals from the lower ranks, no matter how competent, from the higher offices, and reserve the offices for their own descendants, no matter how incompetent?
It must be realized that by the law of heredity—which holds for the average, however exceptional an individual may be—the son of the prominent man starts, and always will start, with better chances of success than the son of the poor and uneducated, even if every other condition is the same, no preference given to the former, but both treated entirely on their merits. The law of inheritance, in its broadest sense, means that the offspring of the highly educated, intelligent prominent man has inherited some of his parent's ability, absorbed some more in his early years from his parents, his surroundings, that his education is watched by more qualified parents, thus better directed and more efficient, and thus—if not spoiled by opportunity and becoming a failure, he should be expected to rise farther than the offspring of parents who cannot give him the same opportunities. Thus, in all fairness, we must expect more of descendants of prominent parents than of obscure parents in the higher ranks.
In some respects this is one of the most consoling features to the masses of people who have not risen; more and more, with the increasing complexity of civilization, it becomes difficult to qualify for higher places in our industrial organism, without starting with a first-class education and a more than average intelligence, and chance for a man, starting from the bottom of the ladder, to rise to great heights thus becomes increasingly less. But this law of inheritance means that while the individual, starting from the depths, may not rise very high, whatever he accomplishes is not lost, but is a gain for his offspring; they start from a higher plane than he did, and thus will rise higher, and if we abandon the narrow and selfish viewpoint of considering only our own individual self, it means that everybody, not as individual, but as family, through generations, has the same chance to rise to the highest positions in industrial society. But, as stated, there is a possibility of abuse of power of higher position, for the benefit of the "ruling" families. An individual, or small group, could not do this, as it would be wiped out by its inefficiency; but the entire society may well drift into such class government, just as individual corporations have drifted into the control of cliques.
Especially great is this danger with the financial power, as financial power is not inherently constructive, like industrial power. The financial power controlling industrial corporations may be used as one of the greatest constructive organizing forces in bringing about co-operation, but it may be abused as a destructive disorganizing power, and, therefore, it is probable that with the progress of the co-operative industrial organization the industrial administrative powers will more and more come into the foreground, the financial power become less dominating.
Thus such industrial government based on the development of the corporation is not by itself entirely safe against abuse drifting in and destroying its efficiency and thereby endangering its existence.
Thus, there must be an inhibitory power outside of the industrial government; a power not organized for constructive administration and executive work, not capable to do such work nor permitted to do it, but invested with an absolute veto to stop any action of the industrial senate which is against the public's interest; that is, which is not commensal—a Tribuniciate.
The constructive activities of our industrial commonwealth require professional qualifications for their direction, and economic efficiency thus demands an organization which reasonably assures such professional qualifications. There are, however, questions of general policy which have nothing to do with professional qualifications, but where the decision depends on the personal preference, but is dictated by no economic law, and requires no special experience or knowledge. Such would, for instance, be the question whether the increasing efficiency of industrial production should be utilized by increasing the standard of living, or by reducing the time of work, or by both; and this question the unskilled laborer can decide just as efficiently as the corporation president, as it is merely a question of personal preference. Such matters, therefore, must be decided by majority vote of all the citizens, and cannot safely be left to an industrial senate or other professional body without endangering the nation. Of necessity, the viewpoints of men in different positions differ, and quite frequently the view of the majority of all the citizens would differ from that of the industrial leaders, and if the latter small minority should prevail it would be the end of democracy, the nation would not be self-governing any more in accordance with the wishes of the majority of its citizens, but would be under autocratic rule of a minority, and the only way by which the majority could secure its wishes would be outside of the laws—by revolution—just as it did occur in the great French Revolution, when feudalism had ceased to be commensal.
This has nothing to do with the question whether the view of the intellectual minority is the preferable one; the majority is always right, because it is the majority—that is, if the majority of the people desire a thing, we, as individuals, or as minority, have no right—and no power, in the long run—to set ourselves up as judges and say that we are right and the rest of the world is wrong; we are wrong if we cannot convince the majority of the correctness of our views.
Thus there must be, in a democratic nation, an organization through which the wishes of the majority of the citizens are expressed and carried out, an organization whereby the nation or any of its sub-groups, such as the municipality, can by majority vote settle the policies under which it desires to live, decide questions such as woman suffrage, decide on war or peace, on imperialism or particularism, decide whether the municipality wishes many civic improvements, though resulting in a high tax-rate, or a low tax-rate and no improvements. All these matters are not professional and industrial, but are questions of policy, of viewpoint, and thus to be settled by majority vote—while the execution of the policy decided upon by such democratic vote would of necessity devolve on the industrial government as the permanent administrative organization.
Such a government, with superior, but general and essentially negative powers, would gradually develop from our present political government, when by the corporate organization of the industries the administrative or constructive government is more and more taken over by the co-operative organization of the industries.
Thus in the natural course of development by evolution, from our present industrial political situation, there should evolve—if not checked by interference—a dual government of our nation in the co-operative era: a constructive industrial government, developed from the co-operative organization of the industrial corporations; permanent and self-perpetuating, therefore consisting of the men best qualified for the direction of the innumerable different activities of modern civilization.
An inhibitory power, the development of our present political government, elected at frequent intervals by the majority vote of all the citizens, having general supervisory power, the decision on national policies, and the absolute veto, but having no administrative or executive power; but the latter is entirely vested in the positive government, the industrial senate, while the political government with its national and local officers is entirely negative.
Such a dual government, a positive constructive one and a negative, inhibitory one, is not a new idea in the world's history; it has existed once, and has been the most successful and most efficient government the world has ever seen—the government of the Roman Republic. The Roman Senate, with its officers, consuls, praetors, etc., was the positive power, in charge of the executive, administration, and legislation of the republic, and the Senators were not elected nor appointed, but were the representatives of the various national interests, at that time mainly agricultural and commercial, while now they would be industrial. The people's tribunes represented the negative, inhibitory power; they had the absolute veto and thereby were superior to all other officers. But they had no executive or administrative power. They were the only officials elected by all the people. The inscription on the Roman standards, "S. P. Q. R.," well represented the character of this dual government: "Senatus Populusque Romanus," "The Senate and thus the Roman People."
This government finally failed in the Roman Republic, by the tribuniciate degenerating and the Senate then drifting into selfish interests, as class government. But the tribuniciate failed because the means of communication in those days were insufficient. With the expansion of the republic over larger territory it became impossible for all the citizens to take part in the election of the tribunes, but only the population of the capital could attend the election, and this was rather the least desirable part of the population. Thus the tribunes ceased to be the representatives of all the people, lost their prestige, and finally their power over the Senate (Gracchus-Sulpicius), and the Senate became the representative of special interest, until finally militarism (Marius) and its natural consequence, Cæsarism (Sulla, Cæsar), ended the republic.
But the foundation laid by this dual republican government carried the state onward by its momentum, long after the republican government had ended, to the dominion of the world, and held for three centuries the entire civilized world in peace and prosperity, until there was nothing left of the classic civilization but a hollow shell which crumbled before the onslaught of the barbarians.
Thus the government of the Roman Republic, the greatest governmental structure which the world has ever seen, was the same in principle as the dual government, of permanent administrative and democratic inhibitory power, toward which we are now drifting.