The chief contention of Socialists is that Socialism is the next step in civilization, that it represents a great advance over capitalism, that it will end poverty and industrial depressions, and that Socialism must come unless civilization is to go backward. CHAPTER VI THE “PRIVATE PROPERTY” BOGEY-MAN Socialists want the people, through the government, to own and operate the country’s great industries. In making this proposal, however, they always specify that they also want the people to own and operate the government. Upon this slight basis rests the charge that Socialists oppose the right of the individual to own private property. Gentlemen who own much private property—hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth—energetically try to frighten gentlemen whose holdings of private property are chiefly confined to the clothes they stand in and the chairs they sit in. “Beware of those Socialists,” say these gentlemen. “They are your worst enemies. They would deprive you of the right to own private property. They would have everybody own everything jointly, thus permitting nobody to own anything individually. Look out for them.” We Socialists say to you: “Look out for the gentlemen who are so fearful lest you shall lose the right to own private property. If you will observe carefully, you will note that they are the ones who own practically all of the private property. You have hopes, perhaps, but they have the property. Your hopes do not increase. Their property does. Besides, we have no desire to deny you the right to own private property. On the contrary, we want to make your right worth something. It is not worth anything now, because you don’t own anything and can’t own anything. You are kept too busy making a bare living.” The imagination can picture no more seductive subject than the right to own private property. The right to own private property suggests the power to exercise the right. The power to exercise the right a little suggests the power to exercise it much. The power to exercise it much suggests the power to put the world at one’s feet; to reach out and get this, whatever it may be; to go there and get that, wherever it may be. Nothing that is of earth or on earth is beyond the dreams of one who owns enough private property. Therefore, the subject may be worth a little more than ordinary consideration. What, then, is property? Let us look around us. One man has property in land. So far as the eye can see, maybe, the laws of the state defend him in his power to say: “This is mine. I bought it. I paid for it. No one can take it from me without my leave. No one may even pick a flower from the hillside, or a berry from a bush without my consent.” Property in land may be called property in natural resources—property in things that man did not make.