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XIII. Some Steps already taken towards Socialism. The restitution to public purposes of rent and interest of every kind cannot be effected by revolution, or by one or a dozen Acts of Parliament. Legislative reforms are needed, but they must be supplemented by a thoroughly organized exercise by all local authorities, from Parish to County Councils, of the powers they already possess, as well as by the acquisition of 1 new and more far-reaching powers. The supply of water, milk, gas, and electric light; the establishment of markets, slaughter-houses, tramways, steamboats, baths, wash-houses, cemeteries, harbors, libraries, Bands, art galleries, museums, open spaces, gymnasia, allotments; the building of workmen's dwellings and municipal lodging-houses, are being carried on by municipal authorities for the common good. They might be extended to every urban community in the kingdom if public opinion and public enterprise were sufficiently alert to their opportunities. The following figures show the influence of Socialistic principles in our municipal administration. A House of Commons. Return, issued in December, 1902, gives a summary of the reproductive undertakings carried on by 299 out of the 317 municipal boroughs in England and Wales: total capital, 121,172,372; balance outstanding, 31st March, 1902, 104,925,853; average annual income for four years to 31st March, 1902, 13,368,702; average annual working expenses for the same period, 8,228,706; average annual net profit for the same period, 4,812,005 (H. C.— 308, 16th December, 1902). No later returns have been made.

The establishment of Works Departments and the direct employment of labor are municipal developments which are yearly transforming hundreds of workers into State servants.

The transfer of rent and interest from private pockets to public purposes will be mainly brought about by means of progressive taxation in the shape of graduated death duties, a graduated differentiated income tax, and the rating of land values. The budgets of 1904, 1905, and 1907 have not only cleared the way for the application of Socialist principles to taxation, but have brought a largely increased revenue into the national exchequer. An estate duty, varying from 1 per cent. on estates of £500 to 10 per cent. on those of £1,000,000 and over, with an additional percentage from 11 to 15 per cent. on the amount of the estate in excess of £1,000,000, is now exacted. The income tax is not only graduated, but also differentiated as between earned and unearned incomes. During the year 1906-7 the revenue from the death duties was £18,958,763. In the period 1894-5 to 1906-7 no less than 212,488,604 was collected from the death duties, an average of 17.707,383 a year, as against £9,979,691 in 1893-4 (Cd.-3,686). The extension of these means by the Socialist Chancellors of the Exchequer of the future will extinguish unearned incomes and, so far as taxation can do it, bring about the emancipation of the people from private monopoly.

Secretary, at the Fabian Office, 3 Clement's Inn, London, W.O.

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CAPITAL AND LAND.

PUBLISHED AND SOLD BY

THE FABIAN SOCIETY.

"For the right moment you must wait, as FABIUS did most patiently when warring against HANNIBAL, though many censured his delays; but when the time comes you must strike hard, as FABIUS did, or your waiting will be in vain, and fruitless."

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PEOPLE OF ALL CLASSES and of all political parties are genuinely anxious to revive village life. Thus we may prevent the constant drifting of the people to the towns, with much concurrent misery. Everyone will therefore be interested to read "Mother Earth," by MONTAGUE FORDHAM, a thoughtful and practical book on this question.

It deals not only with the economic changes needed in order that a permanent life should be built up in the country districts, but also gives important information on co-operation, on the financing of small holdings through loan societies, and on agricultural education and productivity. The building up of a stable community of agriculturists and artizans in permanent country homes and the Land Club system are also fully dealt with.

The book has been widely reviewed and highly praised. It can be obtained through all booksellers and from the Fabian Society. A few press notices follow :

The Economist.-" Mother Earth" should be read by all who are anxious to find remedies for the decay of agriculture.

The Globe.-Students will find much sense and ability in this short practical treatise.

The Church Times.-His book should be read by all who are concerned with the problem. It has the advantage of being a real book, written with a style.

The Manchester Courier.-It may be strongly recommended to the attention of all having any connection with the administration of the 1907 Small Holdings Act.

The Yorkshire Observer.-This book should be studied by land reformers of all shades of opinion.

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The Manchester Guardian.-This beautifully printed essay has, as Mr. Hobson says, the conspicuous method of outlining a large, bold, comprehensive and genuinely organic reform."

The Daily News says: The [Land Club] movement is so full of promise, because it has sprung voluntarily from the country people themselves. It is one of the very few efforts in modern rural England that can be called truly democratic. . . . Homes and land—that is the talisman that has called these clubs into being.

The Morning Leader.-A book so temperate and sane that all thoughtful people should read it.

The book is published in a special Library Edition, beautifully printed on deckle-edge paper at 5s. net, post free; and a Popular Edition will be issued in April at 1s. net, postage 2d.

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CAPITAL AND LAND.

THE practical aim of Socialists with regard to the materials of wealth is "the emancipation of land and industrial capital from individual and class ownership, and the vesting of them in the community for the general benefit."* Land and capital are instruments with which man works for the production of wealth, material for the maintenance of his existence and comfort. Now it is important to notice that, though in common talk we separate the two, and though political economists have given a scientific dignity to this rough classification of the instruments of production, distinguishing as "land" that which has been provided by "Nature," and as "capital" that which has been made by human industry, the distinction is not one which can be clearly traced in dealing with the actual things which are the instruments of production, because most of these are compounded of the gifts of Nature and the results of human activity.

66 Land."

The only instruments given to us by Nature are climate, physical forces, and virgin soil. The use of these passes with legal" property" in the land to which they belong, and they are consequently classed with "land." Those virgin soils are called good or fertile which contain in abundance elements which the chemistry of animal or vegetable life can convert into the materials of human food, clothing, etc. Other mineral elements of particular patches of soil are convertible, by the arts of the mining, metallurgic, building, and engineering industries, into a thousand forms of wealth.

How "Land" gets Value.

But even these qualities of virgin soil are of no use or value unless they are found in accessible positions; and their advantage to the proprietor of the land increases rapidly as human society develops in their neighborhood; whilst in all advanced societies we find large areas of town lands whose usefulness and value have nothing to do with their soils, but are due entirely to the social existence and activity of man. Land in Cornhill, worth a million pounds an acre, owes its value to the world-wide industry and commerce whose threads are brought together there, not to its natural fertility or to the attractions of its climate. "Prairie value" is a fiction. Unpopulated land has only a value through the expectation that it will be peopled.

* See the "Basis" of the Fabian Society, page 18.

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