History of American Socialisms Part 9

Such is our interpretation of his life; and something like this must have been his own interpretation, when he confessed in the light of his later experience, that by overlooking spiritual conditions, he had missed the most important of all the elements of human improvement.

And yet we must not push our parallel too far. Owen, unlike Napoleon, never knew when he was beaten, and fought on thirty years after his Waterloo. It would be a great mistake to imagine that the failure of New Harmony and of the attempts that followed it, was the end of Owen's achievements and influence, even in this country. Providence does not so waste its preparations and inspirations. Let us see what was left, and what Owen did, after the disasters of 1826-7.

In the first place the failure of his Community at New Harmony was not the failure of the _village_ which he bought of the Rappites. That was built of substantial brick and stone. The houses and a portion of the population which he gathered there, remained and have continued to be a flouris.h.i.+ng and rather peculiar village till the present time.

Several Communities that came over from England in after-years made New Harmony their rendezvous, either on their arrival or when they broke up. So Macdonald, with the enthusiasm of a true Socialist, on landing in this country in 1842 first sought out New Harmony. There he found Josiah Warren, the apostle of Individualism, returned from his wanderings and failures, to set up a "Time Store" in the old seat of Socialism. We remember also, that Dr. J.R. Buchanan, the anthropologist, was at New Harmony in 1842, when he astonished the world with his novel experiments in Mesmerism, which Robert Dale Owen reported in a famous letter to the _Evening Post_, and which gave impetus and respectability to the beginnings of modern Spiritualism.

These facts and many others indicate that New Harmony continued to be a center and refuge of Socialists and innovators long after the failure of the Community. Notwithstanding the unpopularity of Communism which Macdonald says he found there, it is probably a semi-socialist village to this day, representing more or less the spirit of Robert Owen.

In the next place, with all his failures, Owen was successful in producing a fine family; and though he himself returned to England after the disaster at New Harmony, he bequeathed all his children to this country. Macdonald, writing in 1842, says: "Mr. Owen's family all reside in New Harmony. There are four sons and one daughter; viz., William Owen, who is a merchant and bank director; Robert Dale Owen, a lawyer and politician, who attends to the affairs of the Owen Estate; David Dale Owen, a practical geologist; Richard Owen, a practical farmer; and Mrs. Fauntleroy. The four brothers, with the wives and families of three of them, live together in one large mansion."

Mr. Owen in his published journal says that "his eldest son Robert Dale Owen, after writing much that was excellent, was twice elected member of Congress, and carried the bill for establis.h.i.+ng the Smithsonian Inst.i.tute in Was.h.i.+ngton; that his second son, David Dale Owen, was professor of chemistry, mineralogy and geology, and had been employed by successive American governments as their accredited geologist; that his third son, Major Richard Owen, was a professor in a Kentucky Military College; and that his only daughter living in 1851, was the widow of a distinguished American officer."

Robert Dale Owen undoubtedly has been and is, the spiritual as well as natural successor of Robert Owen. Wiser and more moderate than his father, he has risen out of the wreck of New Harmony to high stations and great influence in this country. He was originally a.s.sociated with Frances Wright in her experiment at Nashoba, her lecturing career, and her editorial labors in New York. At that time he partook of the anti-religious zeal of his father. Opposition to revivals was the specialty of his paper, the _Free Enquirer_. In those days, also, he published his "Moral Physiology," a little book teaching in plain terms a method of controlling propagation--_not_ "Male Continence."

This bold issue, attributed by his enemies to licentious proclivities, was really part of the socialistic movement of the time; and indicated the drift of Owenism toward s.e.xual freedom and the abolition of marriage.

Robert Dale Owen originated and carried the law in Indiana giving to married women a right to property separate from their husbands; and the famous facilities of divorce in that State are attributed to his influence.

He, like his father, turned toward Spiritualism, notwithstanding his non-religious antecedents. His report of Dr. Buchanan's experiments, and his books and magazine-articles demonstrating the reality of a world of spirits, have been the most respectable and influential auxiliaries to the modern system of necromancy. There is an air of respect for religion in many of his publications, and even a happy freedom of Bible quotation, which is not found in his father's writings. Perhaps the variation is due to the blood of his mother, who was the daughter of a Bible man and a preacher.

So much Mr. Owen left behind. Let us now follow him in his after career. He bade farewell to New Harmony and returned to England in June 1828. Acknowledging no real defeat or loss of confidence in his principles, he went right on in the labors of his mission, as Apostle of Communism for the world, holding himself ready for the most distant service at a moment's warning. His policy was slightly changed, looking more toward moving the nations, and less toward local experiments. In April 1828, he was again in this country, settling his affairs at New Harmony, and preaching his gospel among the people.

During this visit the challenge to debate pa.s.sed between him and Rev.

Alexander Campbell, and an arrangement was made for a theological duel. He returned to England in the summer, and in November of the same year (1828) sailed again for America on a scheme of obtaining from the Mexican government a vast territory in Texas on which to develop Communism. After finis.h.i.+ng the negotiations in Mexico (which negotiations were never executed), he came to the United States, and in April 1829 met Alexander Campbell at Cincinnati in a debate which was then famous, though now forgotten. From Cincinnati he proceeded to Was.h.i.+ngton, where he established intimate relations with Martin Van Buren, then Secretary of State, and had an important interview with Andrew Jackson, the President, laboring with these dignitaries on behalf of national friends.h.i.+p and his new social system. In the summer of 1829 he returned to England, and for some years after was engaged in labors for the conversion of the English government, and in some local attempts to establish "Equitable Commerce," "Labor Exchange" and partial Communism, all of which failed. Here Mr. Sargant, his English biographer, gives up the pursuit of him, and slurs over the rest of his life as though it were pa.s.sed in obscurity and dotage. Not so Macdonald. We learn from him that after Mr. Owen had exceeded the allotment of three-score years and ten, he twice crossed the ocean to this country. Let us follow the faithful record of the disciple. We condense from Macdonald:

In September 1844, Mr. Owen arrived in New York and immediately published in the _Herald_ (Sept. 21) an address to the people of the United States proclaiming his mission "to effect in peace the greatest revolution ever yet made in human society." Fourierism was at that time in the ascendant. Mr. Owen called at the office of the _Phalanx_, the organ of Brisbane, and was received with distinction. In October he visited his family at New Harmony. On his way he stopped at the Ohio Phalanx. In December he went to Was.h.i.+ngton with Robert Dale Owen, who was then member of Congress. The party in power was less friendly than that of 1829, and refused him the use of the National Halls. He lectured, or advertised to lecture, in Concert Hall, Pennsylvania Avenue. "In March 1845," says Macdonald, "I had the pleasure of hearing him lecture at the Minerva rooms in New York, after which he lectured in Lowell and other places." In May he visited Brook Farm. In June he published a manifesto, appointing a World's Convention, to be held in New York in October; and soon after sailed for England.

Stopping there scarcely long enough to turn round, he was in this country again in season to give a course of lectures preparatory to the October Convention. After that Convention (which Macdonald confesses was a trifling affair) he continued his labors in various places. On the 26th of October Macdonald met him on the street in Albany, and spent some time with him at his lodgings in much pleasant gossip about New Lanark. In November he called at Hopedale. Adin Ballou, in a published report of the visit, dashed off a sketch of him and his projects, which is so good a likeness that we copy it here:

"Robert Owen is a remarkable character, in years nearly seventy-five: in knowledge and experience super-abundant; in benevolence of heart transcendental; in honesty without disguise; in philanthropy unlimited; in religion a skeptic; in theology a Pantheist: in metaphysics a necessarian circ.u.mstantialist; in morals a universal exclusionist; in general conduct a philosophic non-resistant; in socialism a Communist; in hope a terrestrial elysianist; in practical business a methodist; in deportment an unequivocal gentleman.**

"Mr. Owen has vast schemes to develop, and vast hopes of speedy success in establis.h.i.+ng a great model of the new social state; which will quite instantaneously, as he thinks, bring the human race into a terrestrial Paradise. He insists on obtaining a million of dollars to be expended in lands, buildings, machinery, conveniences and beautifications, for his model Community; all to be finished and in perfect order, before he introduces to their new home the well-selected population who are to inhabit it. He flatters himself he shall be able, by some means, to induce capitalists, or perhaps Congress, to furnish the capital for this object. We were obliged to shake an incredulous head and tell him frankly how groundless, in our judgment, all such splendid antic.i.p.ations must prove. He took it in good part, and declared his confidence unshaken, and his hopes undiscourageable by any man's unbelief."

The winter of 1845--6 Mr. Owen appears to have spent in the west, probably at New Harmony. In June 1846, he was again in Albany, and this time for an important purpose. The Convention appointed to frame a new Const.i.tution for the State of New York was then in session. He obtained the use of the a.s.sembly Chamber and an audience of the delegates; and gave them two lectures on "Human Rights and Progress,"

and withal on their own duties. Macdonald was present, and speaks enthusiastically of his energy and dignity. After reminding the Convention of the importance of the work they were about, he went on to say that "all religious systems, Const.i.tutions, Governments and Laws are and have been founded in _error_, and that error is the false supposition that _man forms his own character_. They were about to form another Const.i.tution based upon that error, and ere long more Const.i.tutions would have to be made and altered, and so on, until the truth that the _character of man is formed for him_ shall be recognized, and the system of society based upon that principle become national and universal." "After the lecture," says Macdonald, "I lunched with Mr. Owen at the house of Mr. Ames. We had conversation on New Harmony, London, &c. Mr. Ames having expressed a desire for a photograph of Mr. Owen, I accompanied them to a gallery at the Exchange where I parted with him--perhaps forever! He returned soon after to England where he remains till the present time." [1854.]

Six times after he was fifty years old, and twice after he was seventy, he crossed the Atlantic and back in the service of Communism!

Let us not say that all this wonderful activity was useless. Let us not call this man a driveller and a monomaniac. Let us rather acknowledge that he was receiving and distributing an inspiration unknown even to himself, that had a sure aim, and that is at this moment conquering the world. His hallucination was not in his expectations, but in his ideas of methods and times.

Owen had not much theory. His main idea was Communism, and that he got from the Rappites. His persistent a.s.sertion that man's character is formed for him by his circ.u.mstances, was his nearest approach to original doctrine; and this he virtually abandoned when he came to appreciate spiritual conditions. The rest of his teaching is summed up in the old injunction, "Be good," which is the burden of all preaching.

But theory was not his function. Nor yet even practice. His business was to seed the world, and especially this country, with an unquenchable desire and hope for Communism; and this he did effectually.

We call him the Father of American Socialisms, because he took possession of this country first. Fourierism was a secondary infusion.

His English practicality was more in unison with the Yankee spirit, than the theorizing of the French school. He himself claimed the Fourierites as working on his job, grading the track by their half-way schemes of joint-stock and guaranteeism for his Rational Communism.

And in this he was not far wrong. Communism or nothing, is likely to be the final demand of the American people.

The most conspicuous trait in all Owen's labors and journeyings is his indomitable perseverance. And this trait he transmitted to a large breed of American Socialists. Read again the letter of John Harmon at the close of our last chapter. He is now an old man, but his faith in Communism remains unshaken; it is failure-proof. See how the veterans of Haverstraw, when their Community fell in pieces, moved to c.o.xsackie, and when the c.o.xsackie Community broke up, migrated to Ohio and joined the Kendal Community; and perhaps when the Kendal Community failed, they joined another, and another; and probably never gave up the hope of a Community-home. We have met with many such wanderers--men and women who were spoiled for the world by once tasting or at least imagining the sweets of Communism, and would not be turned back by any number of failures. Alcander Longley is a fine specimen of this cla.s.s. He has tried every kind of a.s.sociation, from Co-operation to Communism, including Fourierism and the nameless combinations of Spiritualism; and is now hard at work in the farthest corner of Missouri on his sixth experiment, as enthusiastic as ever!

J.J. Franks is a still finer specimen. He began with Owenism. When that failed he enlisted with the Fourierites. During their campaign he bought five-thousand acres of land in the mountains of Virginia for a prospective a.s.sociation, the Const.i.tution of which he prepared and printed, though the a.s.sociation itself never came into being. When Fourierism failed he devoted himself to Protective Unions. For twenty years past he has been a faithful disciple and patron of the Oneida Community. In such examples we trace the image and spirit of Robert Owen.

CHAPTER X.

CONNECTING LINKS.

In the transition from Owenism to Fourierism and later socialist movements, we find that Josiah Warren fulfills the function of a modulating chord. As we have already said, after seeing the wreck of Communism at New Harmony, he went clear over to the extreme doctrine of "Individual Sovereignty," and continued working on that theme through the period of Fourierism, till he founded the famous village of Modern Times on Long Island, and there became the master-spirit of a school, which has developed at least three famous movements, that are in some sense alive yet, long after the Communities and Phalanxes have gone to their graves.

Imprimis, Dr. Thomas L. Nichols was a fellow of the royal society of Individual Sovereigns, and an _habitue_ of Modern Times, when he published his "Esoteric Anthropology" in 1853, and issued his printed catalogue of names for the reciprocal use of affinity-hunters all over the country; whereby he inaugurated the system of "Free Love" or Individual Sovereignty in s.e.xual intercourse, that prevailed among the Spiritualists. He afterwards fell into a reaction opposite to Warren's, and swung clear back into Roman Catholicism. But "though dead, he yet speaketh."

Secondly, Stephen Pearl Andrews was publis.h.i.+ng-partner of Josiah Warren in the propagandism of Individual Sovereignty; and built or undertook to build a notable edifice at Modern Times, when that village was in its glory. He subsequently distinguished himself by inst.i.tuting, in connection with Nichols and others, a series of "Sociables" for the Individual Sovereigns in New York city, which were broken up by the conservatives. He is also understood to have originated a great spiritual or intellectual hierarchy, called the "Pantarchy," and a system of Universology, which is not yet published, but has long been on the eve of organizing science and revolutionizing the world. On the whole he may be regarded as the American rival of Comte, as A.J. Davis is of Swedenborg.

Lastly, Henry Edger, the actual hierarch of Positivism, one of the ten apostles _de propaganda fide_ appointed by Comte, was called to his great work from Warren's school at Modern Times. He is still a resident of that village, and has attempted within a year or two to form a Positivist Community there, but without success.

The genealogy from Owen to these modern movements may be traced thus:

Owen begat New Harmony; New Harmony (by reaction) begat Individual Sovereignty; Individual Sovereignty begat Modern Times; Modern Times was the mother of Free Love, the Grand Pantarchy, and the American branch of French Positivism. Josiah Warren was the personal link next to Owen, and deserves special notice. Macdonald gives the following account of him:

JOSIAH WARREN.

"This gentleman was one of the members of Mr. Owen's Community at New Harmony in 1826, and from the experience gained there, he became convinced that there was an important error in Mr. Owen's principles, and that error was _combination_. It was then that he developed the doctrine of Individual Sovereignty, and devised the plan of Equitable Commerce, which he labored on incessantly for many years. He communicated his views on Labor Exchange to Mr. Owen, who endeavored to practice them in London upon a large scale, but failed, as Mr.

Warren a.s.serts, through not carrying out the principle of _Individuality_. A similar attempt was made in Philadelphia, but also failed for the same cause.

"After the failure of the New Harmony Community, Mr. Warren went to Cincinnati, and there opened a Time Store, which continued in operation long enough, as he says, to demonstrate the truth of his principles. After this, in a.s.sociation with others, he commenced an experiment in Tuscarawas Co., Ohio; but in consequence of sickness it was abandoned. His next experiment was at Mount Vernon, Indiana, which was unsuccessful. After that he opened a Time Store in New Harmony, which he was carrying on when I became acquainted with him in 1842.

"The following must suffice as a description of

THE NEW HARMONY TIME STORE.

"A portion of a room was divided off by a lattice-work, in which were many racks and shelves containing a variety of small articles. In the center of this lattice an opening was left, through which the store-keeper could hand goods and take pay. On the wall at the back of the store-keeper and facing the customer, hung a clock, and underneath it a dial. In other parts of the room were various articles, such as mola.s.ses, corn, buckets, dry-goods, etc. There was a board hanging on the wall conspicuous enough for all persons to see, on which were placed the bills that had been paid to wholesale merchants for all the articles in the store; also the orders of individuals for various things.

"I entered the store one day, and walking up to the wicket, requested the store-keeper to serve me with some glue. I was immediately asked if I had a '_Labor note_,' and on my saying no, I was told that I must get some one's note. My object in going there was to inquire if Mr.

Warren would exchange labor with me; but this abrupt reception scared me, and I hastily departed. However, upon my becoming further acquainted with Mr. Warren, we exchanged labor notes, and I traded a little at the Time Store in the following manner:

"I made or procured a written labor note, promising so many hours labor at so much per hour. Mr. Warren had similar labor notes. I went to the Time Store with my note and my cash, and informed the keeper that I wanted, for instance, a few yards of Kentucky jean. As soon as he commenced conversation or business with me, he set the dial which was under the clock, and marked the _time_. He then attended to me, giving me what I wanted, and in return taking from me as much cash as he paid for the article to the wholesale merchant; and as much time out of my labor note as he spent for me, according to the dial, in the sale of the article. I believe five per cent. was added to the cash cost, to pay rent and cover incidental expenses. The change for the labor notes was in small tickets representing time by the five, ten, or fifteen minutes; so that if I presented a note representing an hour's labor, and he had been occupied only ten minutes in serving me, he would have to give me forty minutes in change. I have seen Mr.

Warren with a large bundle of these notes, representing various kinds and quant.i.ties of labor, from mechanics and others in New Harmony and its vicinity. Each individual who gave a note, affixed his or her own price per hour for labor. Women charged as high, or nearly as high, as men; and sometimes unskillful hands overrated their services. I knew an instance where an individual issued too many of his notes, and they became depreciated in value. I was informed that these notes were refused at the Time Store. It was supposed that public opinion would regulate these things, and I have no doubt that in time it would. In this experiment Mr. Warren said he had demonstrated as much as he intended. But I heard him complain of the difficulties he had to contend with, and especially of the want of common honesty.

"The Time Store existed about two years and a half, and was then discontinued. In 1844 Mr. Warren went to Cincinnati and lectured upon his principles. On the breaking up of the Clermont Phalanx and the Cincinnati Brotherhood, Mr. Warren went to the spot where both failures had taken place, and there found four families who were disposed to try 'Equitable Commerce.' With these and a few other friends he started a village which he called Utopia, where he published the _Peaceful Revolutionist_ for a time.

"His next and last movement was at Modern Times, on Long Island, a few miles from New York, whither he came in 1851."

From a copy of the _Peaceful Revolutionist_, published by Warren at Utopia in 1845, we take the first of the two following extracts. The second, relating to Modern Times, is from a newspaper article pasted into Macdonald's collection, without date, but probably printed in 1853. These will give a sufficient idea of the reaction from New Harmony, which, on several important lines of influence, connects Owen with the present time.

A PEEP INTO UTOPIA.

From an editorial by J. Warren.

"Throughout the whole of our operations at this village, everything has been conducted so nearly on the _Individual_ basis, that not one meeting for legislation has taken place. No organization, no delegated power, no const.i.tutions, no laws or bye-laws, rules or regulations, but such as each individual makes for himself and his own business; no officers, no priests nor prophets have been resorted to; nothing of this kind has been in demand. We have had a few meetings, but they were for friendly conversation, for music, dancing or some other social and pleasant pastime. Not even a single lecture upon the principles upon which we were acting, has been given on the premises!

It was not necessary; for, as a lady remarked, 'the subject once stated and understood, there is nothing left to talk about; all is action after that.'