The new régime implies first of all the abolition of all class distinction. There will be no need for either nobles, bourgeois, or clergy. There will be only two categories, workers and idlers—or the bees and the drones, as Saint-Simon puts it. Sometimes he refers to them as the national and anti-national party. In the new society the second class[445] is bound to disappear, for there is only room for the first. This class includes, besides manual workers,[446] agriculturists, artisans, manufacturers, bankers, savants, and artists.[447] Between these persons there ought to be no difference except that which results from their different capacities, or what Saint-Simon calls their varying stakes in the national interest. “Industrial equality,” he writes, “consists in each drawing from society benefits exactly proportionate to his share in the State—that is, in proportion to his potential capacity and the use which he makes of the means at his disposal—including, of course, his capital.”[448] Saint-Simon evidently has no desire to rob the capitalists of their revenues; his hostility is reserved for the landed proprietors.
Not only must every social distinction other than that founded upon labour and ability disappear, but government in the ordinary sense of the term will largely become unnecessary. “National association” for Saint-Simon merely meant “industrial enterprise.” “France was to be turned into a factory and the nation organised on the model of a vast workshop”; but “the task of preventing thefts and of checking other disorders in a factory is a matter of quite secondary importance and can be discharged by subordinates.”[449] In a similar fashion, the function of government in industrial society must be limited to “defending workers from the unproductive sluggard and maintaining security and freedom for the producer.”[450]
So far Saint-Simon’s “industrialism” is scarcely distinguishable from the “Liberalism” of Smith and his followers, especially J. B. Say’s. Charles Comte and Dunoyer, writing in their review, Le Censeur, were advancing exactly similar doctrines,[451] sometimes even using identical terms. “Plenty of scope for talent” and laissez-faire were some of the favourite maxims of the Liberal bourgeois. Such also were the aspirations of Saint-Simon.
But it is just here that the tone changes.[452]
Assuming that France has become a huge factory, the most important task that awaits the nation is to inaugurate the new manufacturing régime and to seek to combine the interests of the entrepreneurs with those of the workers on the one hand and of the consumers on the other. There is thus just enough room for government—of a kind. What is required is the organising of forces rather than the governing of men.[453] Politics need not disappear altogether, but “must be transformed into a positive science of productive organisation.”[454] “Under the old system the tendency was to increase the power of government by establishing the ascendancy of the higher classes over the lower. Under the new system the aim must be to combine all the forces of society in such a fashion as to secure the successful execution of all those works which tend to improve the lot of its members either morally or physically.”[455]
Such will be the task of the new government, where capacity will replace power and direction will take the place of command.[456] Applying itself to the execution of those tasks upon which there is complete unanimity, most of them requiring some degree of deliberation and yet promptness of action, it will gradually transform the character of politics by concentrating attention upon matters affecting life or well-being—the only things it need ever concern itself with.[457]
In order to make his meaning clearer, Saint-Simon proposes to confine the executive power to a Chamber of Deputies recruited from the representatives of commerce, industry, manufacture, and agriculture. These would be charged with the final acceptance or refusal of the legislative proposals submitted to them by the other two Chambers, composed exclusively of savants, artists, and engineers. The sole concern of all legislation would, of course, be the development of the country’s material wealth.[458]
An economic rather than a political form of government, administering things instead of governing men, with a society modelled on the workshop and a nation transformed into a productive association having as its one object “the increase of positive utility by means of peaceful industry”[459]—such are the ruling conceptions which distinguish Saint-Simon from the Liberals and serve to bring him into the ranks of the socialists. His central idea will be enthusiastically welcomed by the Marxian collectivists, and Engels speaks of it as the most important doctrine which its author ever propounded.[460] Proudhon accepts it, and as a practical ideal proposes the absorption of government and its total extinction in economic organisation. The same idea occurs in Menger’s Neue Staatslehre,[461] and in Sorel’s writings, where he speaks of “reorganising society on the model of a factory.”[462]
It is this novel conception of government that most clearly distinguishes Saint-Simon’s industrialism from economic Liberalism.[463]
But, despite the fact that he gave to socialism one of its most fruitful conceptions, we hardly know whether to class Saint-Simon as a socialist or not, especially if we consider that the essence of socialism consists in the abolition of private property. It is true that in one celebrated passage he speaks of the transformation of private property.[464] But it is quite an isolated exception. Capital as well as labour, he thought, were entitled to remuneration. The one as well as the other involved some social outlay. He would probably have been quite content with a purely governmental reform.
It would not be difficult, however, to take the ideal of industrialism as outlined by Saint-Simon as the basis of a demand for a much more radical reform and a much more violent attack upon society. Such was the task which the Saint-Simonians took upon themselves, and our task now is to show how collectivism was gradually evolved out of industrialism.
II: THE SAINT-SIMONIANS AND THEIR CRITICISM OF PRIVATE PROPERTY
Saint-Simon’s works were scarcely ever read. His influence was essentially personal, and the task of spreading a knowledge of his ideas devolved upon a number of talented disciples whom he had succeeded in gathering round him. Augustin Thierry, who was his secretary from 1814 to 1817, became his adopted son. Auguste Comte, who occupied a similar post, was a collaborator in all his publications between 1817 and 1824. Olinde Rodrigues and his brother Eugène were both among his earliest disciples. Enfantin, an old student of the Polytechnic, and Bazard, an old Carbonaro who had grown weary of political experiments, were also of the number. Soon after the death of Saint-Simon his following founded a journal called Le Producteur with a view to popularising his ideas. Most of the articles on economics were contributed by Enfantin. The paper lasted only for one year, although the number of converts to the new doctrine was rapidly increasing. All of them were persuaded that Saint-Simon’s ideas furnished the basis of a really modern faith which would at once supplant both decadent Catholicism and political Liberalism, the latter of which, in their opinion, was a purely negative doctrine.
In order to strengthen the intellectual ties which already united them, this band of enthusiasts set up among themselves a sort of hierarchy having at its summit a kind of college or institution composed of the more representative members of the group, upon whom the title “fathers” was bestowed. The next lower grade was composed of “sons,” who were to regard one another as “brothers.” It was in 1828, under the influence of Eugène Rodrigues, that the Saint-Simonians assumed this character of an organised sect. About the same time Bazard, one of their number, was giving an exposition of the creed in a series of popular lectures. These lectures, delivered during the years 1828–30, and listened to by many men who were afterwards to play an important