XVI The American Capitalists and World Empire
1. The Plutocrats Must Carry on
The American plutocrats—those who by force of their wealth share in the direction of public policy—must carry on. They have no choice. If they are to continue as plutocrats, they must continue to rule. If they continue to rule, they must shoulder the duties of rulership. They may not relish the responsibility which their economic position has thrust upon them any more than the sojourners in Newfoundland relish the savage winters. Nevertheless, those who own the wealth of a capitalist nation must accept the results of that ownership just as those who remain in Newfoundland must accept the winter storms.
The owners of American timber, mines, factories, railroads, banks and newspapers may dislike the connotations of imperialism; may believe firmly in the principles of competition and individualism; may yearn for the nineteenth century isolation which was so intimate a feature of American economic life. But their longings are in vain. The old world has passed forever; the sun has risen on a new day—a day of world contacts for the United States.
Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts stated the matter with rare accuracy in a speech which he made during the discussion over the conquest of the Philippines. After explaining that wars come, “never ostensibly, but actually from economic causes,” Senator Lodge said (Congressional Record, 56th Congress, 2nd Session, p. 637. January 7, 1901):
“We occupy a great position economically. We are marching on to a still greater one. You may impede it, you may check it, but you cannot stop the work of economic forces. You cannot stop the advance of the United States.... The American people and the economic forces which underlie all are carrying us forward to the economic supremacy of the world.”
Senator Lodge spoke the economic truth in 1901. William C. Redfield reënforced it in an address before the American Manufacturers Export Association (Weekly Bulletin, April 26, 1920, p. 7): “We cannot be foreign merchants very much longer in this country excepting on a diminishing and diminishing scale—we have got to become foreign constructors; we have got to build with American money—foreign enterprises, railroads, utilities, factories, mills, I know not what, in order that by large ownership in them we may command the trade that normally flows from their operation.” That is sound capitalist doctrine. Equally sound is the exhortation that follows: “In so doing we shall be doing nothing new—only new for us. That is the way in which Germany and Great Britain have built up their foreign trade.”
New it is for America—but it is the course of empire, familiar to every statesman. The lesson which Bismarck, Palmerston and Gray learned in the last century is now being taught by economic pressure to the ruling class of the United States.
The elder generation of American business men was not trained for world domination. To them the lesson comes hard. The business men of the younger generation are picking it up, however, with a quickness born of paramount necessity.
2. Training Imperialists
Every great imperial structure has had simple beginnings. Each imperial ruling class has doubtless felt misgivings, during the early years of its authority. Hesitating, uncertain, they have cast glances over their shoulders towards that which was, but even while they were looking backward the forces that had made them rulers were thrusting them still farther forward along the path of imperial power. Then as generation succeeded generation, the rulers learned their lesson, building a tradition of rulership and authority that was handed down from father to son; acquiring a vision of world organization and world power that gave them confidence to go forward to their own undoing. The masters of public life in Rome were such people; the present masters of British economic and political affairs are such people.
American imperialists still are in the making. Until 1900 their eyes were set almost exclusively upon empire within the United States. Those who, before 1860, dreamed of a slave power surrounding the Gulf of Mexico, were thrust down and their places taken by builders of railroads and organizers of trusts. To-day the sons and grandsons of that generation of exploiters who confined their attention to continental territory, are compelled, by virtue of the organization which their sires and grandsires established, to seek Empire outside the boundaries of North America.
During the years when the leaders of American business life were spending the major part of their time in “getting rich,” the sweep of social and economic forces was driving the United States toward its present imperial position. Now the position has been attained, those in authority have no choice but to accept the responsibilities which accompany it.
Economically the United States is a world power. The war and the subsequent developments have forced the country suddenly into a position of leadership among the capitalist nations. The law of capitalism is: Struggle to dispose of your surplus, otherwise you cannot survive. This law has laid its heavy hand upon Great Britain, upon France, upon Germany, and now it has struck with full force into the isolated, provincial life of the United States. It is the law—immutable as the system of gravitation. While the present system of economic life exists, this law will continue to operate. Therefore the masters of American life have no alternative. If they would survive, they must dispose of their surplus.
Politically the United States is recognized as one of the leaders of the world. Despite its tradition of isolation, despite the unwillingness of its statesmen to enter new paths, despite the indifference of its people to international affairs, the resources and raw materials required by the industrial nations of Europe, the rapidly growing surplus and the newly acquired foreign markets and investments make the United States an integral part of the life of the world.
The ruling class in the United States has no more choice than the rulers of a growing city whose boundaries are extending with each increment of population. If it is to continue as a ruling class, it must accept conditions as they are. The first of these conditions is that the United States is a world power neither because of its virtue nor because of its intelligence in the delicacies of the world politics, but because of the sheer might of its economic organization.
Economic necessity has forced the United States into the front rank among the nations of the world. Economic necessity is forcing the ruling class of the United States to occupy the position of world leadership, to strengthen it, to consolidate it, and to extend it at every opportunity. The forces that played beside the yellow Tiber and the sluggish Nile are very much the same as those which led Napoleon across the wheat fields of Europe and that are to-day operating in Paris, London, and in New York. The forces that pushed the Roman Empire into its position of authority and led to the organization of Imperial Britain are to-day operating with accelerated pace in the United States. The sooner the American people, and particularly those who are directing public policy, wake up to this simple but essential fact, the sooner will doubt and misunderstanding be removed, the sooner will the issues be drawn and the nation’s course be charted.
3. The Logical Goal
The logical goal of the American plutocracy is the economic and incidentally the political control of the world. The rulers of Macedon and Assyria, Rome and Carthage, of Britain and France labored for similar reasons to reach this same goal. It is economic fate. Kings and generals were its playthings, obeying and following the call of its destiny.
The rulers of antiquity were limited by a lack of transportation facilities; their “world” was small, including the basin of the Mediterranean and the land surrounding the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, nevertheless, they set out, one after another, to conquer it. To-day the rapid accumulation of surplus and the speed and ease of communication, the spread of world knowledge and the larger means of organization make it even more necessary than it was of old for the rulers of an empire to find a larger and ever larger place in the sun. The forces are more pressing than ever before. The times call more loudly for a genius with imagination, foresight and courage who will use the power at his disposal to write into political history the gains that have already been made a part of economic life. Let such a one arise in the United States, in the present chaos of public thought, and he could not only himself dictate American public policy for the remainder of his life, but in addition, he could, within a decade, have the whole territory from the Canadian border to the Panama Canal under the American Flag, either as conquered or subject territory; he could establish a Chinese wall around South American trade and opportunities by a very slight extension of the Monroe Doctrine; he could have in hand the problem of an economic if not a political union with Canada, and could be prepared to measure swords with the nearest economic rival, either on the high seas or in any portion of the world where it might prove necessary to join battle.
Such a program would be a departure from the traditions of American public life, but the traditions, built by a nation of farmers, have already lost their significance. They are historic, with no contemporary justification. The economic life that has grown up since 1870 of necessity will create new public policies.
The success of such a program would depend upon four things:
1. A coördination of American economic life.
2. A fast grip on the agencies for shaping public opinion.
3. A body of citizens, martial, confident, restless, ambitious.
4. A ruling class with sufficient imagination to paint, in warm sympathetic colors, the advantages of world dominion; and with sufficient courage to follow out imperial policy, regardless of ethical niceties, to its logical goal of world conquest.
All four of these requisites exist in the United States to-day, awaiting the master hand that shall unite them. Many of the leaders of American public life know this. Some shrink from the issue, because they are unaccustomed to dream great dreams, and are terrified by the immensity of large thoughts. Others lack the courage to face the new issues. Still others are steadily maneuvering themselves into a position where they may take advantage of a crisis to establish their authority and work their imperial will. The situation grows daily more inviting; the opportunity daily more alluring. The war-horse, saddled and bridled, is pawing the earth and neighing. How soon will the rider come?
4. Eat or Be Eaten
The American ruling class has been thrown into a position of authority under a system of international economic competition that calls for initiative and courage. Under this system, there are two possibilities,—eat or be eaten!
There is no middle ground, no half way measure. It is impossible to stop or to turn back. Like men engaged on a field of battle, the contestants in this international economic struggle must remain with their faces toward the enemy, fighting for every inch that they gain, and holding these gains with their bodies and their blood, or else they must turn their backs, throw away their weapons, run for their lives, and then, hiding on the neighboring hills, watch while the enemy despoils the camp, and then applies a torch to the ruins.
The events of the great war prove, beyond peradventure, that in the wolf struggle among the capitalist nations, no rules are respected and no quarter given. Again and again the leaders among the allied statesmen—particularly Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Wilson—appealed to the German people over the heads of their masters with assurances that the war was being fought against German autocracy, not against Germans. “When will the German people throw off their yoke?” asked one Allied diplomat. The answer came in November, 1918. A revolution was contrived, the Kaiser fled the country, the autocracy was overthrown. Germans ceased to fight with the understanding that Mr. Wilson’s Fourteen Points should be made the foundation of the Peace. The armistice terms violated the spirit if not the letter of the fourteen points; the Peace Treaty scattered them to the winds. Under its provisions Germany was stripped of her colonies; her investments in the allied possessions were confiscated; her ships were taken; three-quarters of her iron ore and a third of her coal supply were turned over to other powers; motor trucks, locomotives, and other essential parts of her economic mechanism were appropriated. Austria suffered an even worse fate, being “drawn and quartered” in the fullest sense of the term. After stripping the defeated enemies of all available booty, levying an indeterminate indemnity, and dismembering the German and Austrian Empires, the Allies established for thirty years a Reparation Commission, which is virtually the economic dictator of Europe. Thus for a generation to come, the economic life of the vanquished Empires will be under the active supervision and control of the victors. Never did a farmer’s wife pluck a goose barer than the Allies plucked the Central Powers. (See the Treaty, also “The Economic Consequences of the Peace,” J. M. Keynes. New York, Harcourt, Brace & Howe, 1920.)
Under the armistice terms and the Peace Treaty the Allies did to Germany and Austria exactly what Germany and Austria would have done to France and Great Britain had the war turned out differently. The Allied statesmen talked much about democracy, but when their turn came they plundered and despoiled with a practiced imperial hand. France and Britain, as well as Germany and Austria, were capitalist Empires. The Peace embodies the essential economic morality of capitalist imperialism, the morality of “Eat or be eaten.”
5. The Capitalists and War
The people and even the masters of America are inexperienced in this international struggle. Among themselves they have experimented with competitive industrialism on a national scale. Now, brought face to face with the world struggle, many of them revolt against it. They deplore the necessities that lead nations to make war on one another. They supported the late war “to end war.” They gave, suffered and sacrificed with a keen, idealistic desire to “make the world safe for democracy.” They might as well have sought to scatter light and sunshine from a cloudbank.
The masters of Europe, who have learned their trade in long years of intrigue, diplomacy and war, feel no such repugnance. They play the game. The American people are of the same race-stocks as the leading contestants in the European struggle. They are not a whit less ingenious, not a whit less courageous, not a whit less determined. When practice has made them perfect they too will play the game just as well as their European cousins and their play will count for more because of the vast economic resources and surpluses which they possess.
American statesmen in the field of international diplomacy are like babies, taking their first few steps. Later the steps come easier and easier, until a child, who but a few months ago could not walk, has learned to romp and sport about. The masters of the United States are untrained in the arts of international intrigue. They showed their inferiority in the most painful way during the negotiations over the Paris Treaty. They are as yet unschooled in international trade, banking and finance. They are also inexperienced in war, yet, having only raw troops, and little or no equipment, within two years they made a notable showing on the battlefields of Europe. Now they are busy learning their financial lessons with an equal facility. A generation of contact with world politics will bring to the fore diplomats capable of meeting Europe’s best on their own ground. What Europe has learned, America can learn; what Europe has practiced, America can practice, and in the end she may excel her teachers.
To-day economic forces are driving relentlessly. Surplus is accumulating in a geometric ratio—surplus piling on surplus. This surplus must be disposed of. While the remainder of the world—except Japan—is staggering under intolerable burdens of debt and disorganization, the United States emerges almost unscathed from the war, and prepares in dead earnest to enter the international struggle,—to play at the master game of “eat or be eaten.”
Pride, ambition and love of gain and of power are pulling the American plutocrats forward. The world seems to be within their grasp. If they will reach out their hands they may possess it! They have assumed a great responsibility. As good Americans worthy of the tradition of their ancestors, they must see this thing through to the end! They must win, or die in the attempt; and it is in this spirit that they are going forward.
The American capitalists do not want war with Great Britain or with any other country. They are not seeking war. They will regret war when it comes.
War is expensive, troublesome and dangerous. The experiences of Europe in the War of 1914 have taught some lessons. The leaders and thinkers among the masters of America have visited Europe. They have seen the old institutions destroyed, the old customs uprooted, the old faiths overturned. They have seen the economic order in which they were vitally concerned hurled to the earth and shattered. They have seen the red flag of revolution wave where they had expected nothing but the banner of victory. They have seen whole populations, weary of the old order, throw it aside with an impatient gesture and bring a new order into being. They have good reasons to understand and fear the disturbing influences of war. They have felt them even in the United States—three thousand miles away from the European conflict. How much more pressing might this unrest be if the United States had fought all through the war, instead of coming in when it was practically at an end!
Then there is always the danger of losing the war—and such a loss would mean for the United States what it has meant for Germany—economic slavery.
Presented with an opportunity to choose between the hazards of war and the certainties of peace most of the capitalist interests in the United States would without question choose peace. There are exceptions. The manufacturers of munitions and of some of the implements and supplies that are needed only for war purposes, undoubtedly have more to gain through war than through peace, but they are only a small element in a capitalist world which has more to gain through peace than through war.
But the capitalists cannot choose. They are embedded in an economic system which has driven them—whether they liked it or not—along a path of imperialism. Once having entered upon this path, they are compelled to follow it into the sodden mire of international strife.
6. The Imperial Task
The American ruling class—the plutocracy—must plan to dominate the earth; to exploit it, to exact tribute from it. Rome did as much for the basin of the Mediterranean. Great Britain has done it for Africa and Australia, for half of Asia, for four million square miles in North America. If the people of one small island, poorly equipped with resources, can achieve such a result, what may not the people of the United States hope to accomplish?
That is the imperial task.
1. American economic life must be unified. Already much of this work has been done.
2. The agencies for shaping public opinion must be secured. Little has been left for accomplishment in this direction.
3. A martial, confident, restless, ambitious spirit must be generated among the people. Such a result is being achieved by the combination of economic and social forces that inhere in the present social system.
4. The ruling class must be schooled in the art of rulership. The next two generations will accomplish that result.
The American plutocracy must carry on. It must consolidate its gains and move forward to greater achievements, with the goal clearly in mind and the necessities of imperial power thoroughly mastered and understood.