Socialism and American ideals | Page 6

why many of our foreign-born population
look upon a government as "something from above." They are wont to
be more subservient to it, or to look upon it as responsible for the
welfare of its citizens. Therefore Socialism, which stands essentially for
the dependence of the individual upon the State as well as for the
governmental direction of the individual and the substitution of State
for individual judgment, for this reason appeals to them, and it has
made its greatest gains upon the Continent of Europe or among the
foreign-born or descended citizens of the United States.
The Socialists answer the charge that Socialism is not American by
saying--"Neither is Christianity. It is a 'foreign importation.' Its founder
was a 'foreigner,' and never set foot on American soil. Then there is the
printing press. It isn't American, either, though somehow we manage to
get along with it as well as the other 'foreign importations' mentioned."
Of course this smart kind of argument gets nowhere. It is, in fact,
intended to appeal to the half-baked type of mind which has only begun
to think and has never progressed beyond the point of a consequent
mental indigestion that would account for its Socialist nightmare. What
the Socialists do know and are not honest enough to admit, is that this
country was settled three centuries or more ago by a people who did not
come hither to enjoy the fruits of other men's labor but who came here
to carve out a new State in America literally by the sweat of their brows.
Also they consciously founded it upon the basis of individual freedom

and responsibility as proclaimed and enforced by the precepts of the
Christian-Jewish religion and by the English Common Law. It is upon
this foundation that they built their success. Upon this same basis their
descendants and successors to-day weigh, measure and estimate that
which is new in thought or invention whether "native" or
"foreign-born." And they have weighed Socialism in this American
balance and found it wanting.
But they brought with them neither certain loathsome diseases nor
Socialism. All of these are likewise the results of immorality--moral
and _political_--and of a type of decadent civilization still prevalent on
the Continent of Europe and at that time threatening to gain a foothold
even in England. It was this last-named threat from which the founders
of the American nation were wise and energetic enough to escape, even
though their escape meant going into the hardships of an unknown and
almost uninhabited wilderness.
Socialism is not only essentially un-American, but it is essentially
undemocratic. A democracy means a government by public opinion,
and this opinion is the result of the co-operative impulse or community
feeling of the people of a free country--a people who are given the
opportunity to think for themselves, and are not thought for by a
divinely constituted government. As Thomas Jefferson maintained,
liberty is not a privilege granted by a government, but government is a
responsibility delegated to its officers by the people. "On this
distinction hangs all the philosophy of democracy."[5] The people must
decide questions for themselves and make their common will known
through the representative organs of a government which is after all
only the instrument intended to produce the best expression and
administration of this public will.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 5: David Saville Muzzey, Thomas Jefferson, p. 311.
"Generally speaking, one may say of the German soldier that he is
normally good-natured and is not disposed to do injury to harmless
people, so long as he finds no obstacles put in his prescribed way. But
once disturbed, he becomes frightful, because he lacks any higher

capacity of discrimination; because he merely does his duty and
recognizes no such thing as individual conscience and, besides, when
he is excited becomes at once blind and super-nervous." "The Germans
are, indeed, a good-natured people, born to blind obedience and humble
willingness to let others do their thinking for them." Wilhelm Mühlon,
The Vandal of Europe, pages 172 and 251.]

III
ITS CONFLICT WITH THE BASIC PRINCIPLES OF
DEMOCRACY AND RELIGION
In the course of a conversation during the past winter one of the
members of the present city government of New York remarked that
although he was not a Socialist, yet he failed to see how the election of
Morris Hillquit on his un-American platform to be Mayor of New York
would have had any result except as regards the national safety and the
immediate influence upon our international relations. He added that the
life of the city would have gone on just the same for a time at least;
hence why the great fear of Socialism? What this man failed to see was
that in fact the life of the city would go on for a time without