THE FUTURE OF SOCIALISM
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about step by step in a way which will not disrupt the fabric of
custom, law, and mutual confidence upon which personal rights
depend. That is, the transition must be piecemeal; it must be parlia–
mentary; it must respect civil liberties and due process of law. Social–
ism by such means used to seem fantastic to the hard-eyed melo–
dramatists of the Leninist persuasion; but even Stalin is reported
to have told Harold Laski recently that it might be possible.
The classical argument against gradualism was that the capi–
talist ruling class would resort to violence rather than surrender its
prerogatives. Here, as elsewhere, the Marxists enormously overesti–
mated the political courage and will of the capitalists. In fact, in the
countries where capitalism really triumphed, it has yielded with far
better grace (that is, displayed far more cowardice) than the Marxist
schema predicted. The British experience is illuminating in this respect,
and the American experience not uninstructive. There is no sign in
either nation that the capitalists are putting up a really determined
fight. Liberal alarmists who feel that the clamor of a political cam–
paign or the agitation of hired lobbyists constitutes a dete.rmined fight
should read the history of Germany. In the United States an indus–
trialist who turned a machine gun on a picket line would be disowned
by the rest of the business
comm~mity;
in Britain he would be sent
to an insane asylum. Fascism arises in countries like Germany and
Italy, Spain and Argentina, where the bourgeois triumph was never
complete enough to eradicate other elements who believe in what the
bourgeoisie fears more than anything else- violence, and who then
used violence to "protect" the bourgeoisie.
There seems no inherent obstacle to the gradual advance of so–
cialism in the United States through a series of New Deals. In 1933,
Frances Perkins has reported, the coal operators pleaded with the
government to nationalize the mines. They offered to sell "to the
government at any price fixed by the government. Anything so we
can get out of it." The government was not ready to take over the
coal mines in 1933, as it was not ready to take over the banks, as it
was not ready to keep the railroads in 1919. But the New Deal
greatly enlarged the reserves of trained personnel; the mobilization
ofindustry during the war provided more experience; and the next
depr25$ion will certainly mean a vast expansion in government owner–
ship
~~d
control. The private owners will not only acquiesce in this.
In
cha~cteristic
capitalist panic, they will demand it.
Government ownership and control can take many forms. The
independent public corporation, in the manner of TVA, is one;
