what is the same thing, receives higher wages for the same work. There are no unemployed, or partially employed, laborers to bid against each other for a chance to work at small wages.

At the same time, taxation being now adjusted according to site value, there is no shifting of tax burdens from the larger to the smaller owners and borrowers of capital, as at present. We have seen that under the present system farmers pay far more in proportion than do city people, and smaller holders everywhere more in proportion than larger holders. This reform in the collection of government revenue would therefore mean that borrowed capital could be more quickly acquired in ownership than under the present system. Farmers and small property holders would pay less to the State under the single tax than they now pay.

At the same time, also, the increased amount of labor products and money in the hands of the laboring people would make them less keen for "low prices" in the retail stores, thus relaxing the jug-handled competition of retail traders, and consequently of jobbers. Under the present system, the retailer must resort to "sales," and adulteration, and handle poor goods, etc. Likewise the manufacturer and jobber. Everybody knows how difficult it is to procure good articles of certain kinds; but everybody says, "What are you going to do about it?" If the masses of the working people had more labor products and money in their hands, they would refuse to buy poor goods; and manufacturers would have to make better goods.

After the inauguration of the single tax program, capital could be combined into the largest efficient masses; but throughout the community at large there would be no means by which all or a majority of capitalists could combine to push prices up and push wages down. There could be no secret rebates and special favors from railroads, whereby a ring of shippers could combine and undersell independent shippers; for the railroads, as is now the case in many civilized countries, would then be treated as im

proved public highways over which all must pay the same toll. There could be no monopolizing of natural resources, whereby only a small portion of nature is developed by a ring of capitalists and the remainder of nature is fenced away from other capitalists and laborers. Capitalists who were developing, say, the one thousandth part of a great coal field could not raise the price above a certain figure without attracting other capital into the un-monopolized fields. At present, the occupying coal company, or all occupying companies together, hold an enormous amount of coal territory, work a small part of it, pay little or no tax on the unused coal deposits, yet hold these vacant deposits against other capitalists at a high price. If others choose to pay the price, these other capitalists know that they must then submit to heavy taxation on the property which they improve and develop. Under the land value tax, the present holders and monopolizers could not afford to retain the unused property; and other capitalists could open new mines at half or less than half the present initial expense. This opening of land, it must be remembered, would be universal under the proposed reform.

The situation can be condensed into even fewer words as follows: Our present system of property and of taxation operates unconsciously to establish everywhere in civilized society an informal Earth Trust. It is the Earth Trust that lies unperceived at the heart of the present industrial problem. It is the Earth Trust that gives vitality to capitalistic trusts. If the Earth Trust were abolished, capitalists could not combine from one end of a country to another for purposes of extortion. The self-interest of capitalists would be turned against itself, and forced to compete for the public good.

Probably it would not be necessary to tax land up to its full value in order to collect sufficient revenue for government.

There is no present need for discussing the problems that would arise in a single tax community. There will never be a time in human history when there will not be

problems of some kind; and we are here viewing the single tax program as a step in the conscious evolution of society.*

$181. The state of the public mind with reference to current problems is one of confusion. Perhaps there has never been a more discordant medley of opinions. Throughout a large part of western civilization the increasing social stress has forced a further political development. We have seen that the Clan State passed long ago into the State based on property regardless of descent. The nineteenth century witnessed the establishment of manhood suffrage. Doubtless the twentieth century will see womanhood suffrage likewise. This practical enfranchisement of the lower economic class is a result of the blind struggles of that class against the evils which, along with the growth of every civilization, issue in luxury at one extreme of the social scale and poverty at the other. The social problem no longer finds expression in theological terms. Church and State are either legally or practically divorced throughout the larger part of western civilization — since disestablishment and the tolera

*If the single tax is a wise program, it excludes all compensation to landowners. In order to compensate landowners, it would be necessary to issue bonds equal to the value of all the improved and vacant land now held by private persons. It would then be necessary to pay annual interest on these bonds equal to the present annual value of the land. The usual amount of revenue for governmental purposes would have to be raised also; and society would thus fare worse than at present. We do not deny that the single tax would at first perhaps tend to make a breach in the present ethical sense of society; but it is becoming apparent that the present ethical sense of society is based on very insecure foundations. The earlier single tax advocate said that his program would conserve the present ethical sense. He said that no compensation should be given for land because "the value of land is due to no individual exertions or labors, but to nature and society." The single tax argument shows that capital ought to be left in private hands at present (and perhaps always), as a matter of expediency; but capital, as our inquiry shows, is due as much to forces outside the individual as land values are. Conduct on the part of individuals or society is right because it is good; not good because right.

tion of non-conformity have the same social issue. It is not necessary to set forth here the sequence of cause and effect which has led to the separation of Church and State. This is a novel fact in history. But the essential involutions of the history leading up to it reveal nothing of novelty in the working of human nature. If Church and State were still united, the present social question would, of course, take a theological form or flavor. Superficial observers, looking back on the present from the future, would then put a theological interpretation on strikes, tariff disputes, anti-trust agitations, trade unionism, etc. But since the old regime no longer obtains, there is no opportunity for the ancient interpretation. It is natural that, on the whole, the enfranchised millions should be uncertain as to the proper exercise of their newly acquired power. It is natural that the attention of the masses should at first focus upon capital rather than upon land, since capital is a more dramatic factor than land. Hence the growing popularity of socialism in Europe and America. In the meantime the great political parties, having exhausted their earlier issues, reflect by their uncertainty the confusion of the public thought. Despite the recent revelations of science, and the spread of socialism, the psychology of society is, on the whole, individualistic. There is ignorance of the essentially collectivistic nature of society. Although everybody walks about on the earth, and although everything that we use comes from the land, there seems to be a profound public unconsciousness that the social question has anything to do with land.* From all that the psychology of

*The movement for the heavy taxation of land values is numerically far behind the socialist movement. It counts among its adherents Lyman Abbott; E. Benjamin Andrews; Charles Francis Adams; Count Leo Tolstoy; Hamlin Garland; Governor Garvin, of Rhode Island; Mayor Johnson, of Cleveland, Ohio; Judge Moran, of the Chicago Bar. Two of the great English Reviews - The Fortnightly, for January, 1899, and The Westminster, for April, 1899- have published outspoken articles championing the movement.

present society reveals, one would think that history is, indeed, "a ghost-dance on a floor of clouds." As the twentieth century opens, all the characteristics of later nineteenth century thought persist; but signs are not lacking that we are about to enter a new era.

(1) — GEORGE, Social Problems (N. Y., 1893), pp. 40-45. Cf. BRYCE, The American Commonwealth (N. Y., 1891), II, p. 717f. Cf. MACKENZIE, Introduction to Social Philosophy (Glasgow, 1895), pp. 99100.

(2) — Cf. Dictionary of National Biography, under names "Dove" and "Spence."

(3) In an article entitled "The Single Tax: What It is, and Why We Urge it."

281.

(4) The American Journal of Sociology (Chicago), I, pp. 279

(5) BAGEHOT, Physics and Politics, p. 74.

(6) We take this case, and the quotation, from Mr. G. J. Bryan's illuminating booklet, "Practical Effects of Advances in Tax Law," published by F. Vierth, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1902, pp. 12, 13.

(7) The National Single Taxer (N. Y., Jan., 1900), p. 5

(8)

-

- From The Deutsche Volksstimme, through the Melbourne Beacon, Australia, May 1, 1898.

(9) — Cf. Report of the Special State Revenue Commission of Colorado (Second ed.), p. 49.

(10) Municipal Affairs Quarterly (N. Y., June, 1899), p. 332f. Cf. Financial Reform Almanack (Liverpool, 1899).

(11)

(12) BOOTH, Life and Labor of the People (London 1892-1897). (13) — SPAHR, The Present Distribution of Wealth (N. Y., 1896), pp. 83, 84.

(14) Eighth Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of Illinois (Springfield, Ill., second ed., 1896), p. 89.

(15)

(16)

(17)

The Outlook (N. Y.), LXVII, pp. 89, 90.

SPAHR, Distribution of Wealth, pp. 106, 107.

Labor Library (N. Y., Oct. 1902), XII, No. 10, p. 3.

(18) United States Supreme Court Reports (16 Wallace), p. 678. Statistical Report of the Interstate Commerce Commission

(19)

(1890), p. 47.

(20) Forum (N. Y.), XIX, p. 649.

(21) Cf. the pamphlet "Finance and Transportation," by J. D. Miller (Oak Park, Ill., 1898). Cf. North American Review, June, 1902, pp. 816, 817.