Germany -- Politics and government -- 1888-1918; William II, German Emperor, 1859-1941; World War, 1914-1918
Those workers, on the other hand, who blindly followed the Socialist
leaders, gave me no word of thanks for the protection created for them
nor for the work I had done. Between them and me lies the motto of the
Hohenzollerns, "Suum cuique." That means, "To each his own"--not, as
the Social Democrats would have it, "To everyone the same!"
I also harbored the idea of preventing to some extent competitive
warfare, at least in the industrial world of the European continent,
by bringing about a sort of quota-fixing in foreign lands, thereby
facilitating production and making possible a healthier mode of life
among the working classes.
There is great significance in the impression which foreign workers
get in studying Germany's social legislation. A few years before the
war people in England, under the pressure of labor troubles, awoke
to the conviction that better care must be taken of the workers.
As a result of this, commissions visited Germany, some of them
composed of workingmen. Guided by representative Germans, among them
Socialists, they visited the industrial regions, factories, benevolent
institutions, sanatoria of insurance companies, etc., and were
astonished at all the things they saw. At the farewell dinner given
them the English leader of the workingmen's deputation turned to Bebel
and made this concluding remark:
"After all we have seen of what is done in Germany for the workers, I
ask you: Are you people still Socialists?" And the Englishmen remarked
to a German that they would be quite satisfied if they could succeed,
after long fights in Parliament, in putting through one tenth of what
had already been accomplished years before in Germany toward bettering
the condition of the laboring classes.
I had observed with interest these visits of the English deputations
and marveled at their ignorance of German conditions. But I marveled
even more at a question asked by the English Government, through the
channel of the English Embassy, on the same subject, which betrayed an
absolutely amazing lack of knowledge of the progress made in Germany
in the province of social reform. I questioned the English ambassador,
remarking that England, having been represented in 1890 at the Berlin
Social Congress, must certainly have been informed, at least through
the Embassy, of the Reichstag debates, which had dealt in a detailed
way with the various social measures. The ambassador replied that the
same thing had also occurred to him and caused him to have the earlier
records of the Embassy investigated, whereupon it had transpired that
the Embassy had sent the fullest reports on the subject to London
and that thorough reports had been forwarded home concerning every
important stage in the progress of social reform; but, "because they
came from Germany, nobody ever read them; they were simply pigeon-holed
and remained there ever since; it is a downright shame; Germany does
not interest people at home."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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