S;
II
THE LIBRARY
OF
THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES
The State
ITS HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT VIEWED
SOCIOLOGICALLY
By FRANZ OPPENHEIMER, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science in the University of Frankfort-on-Main
Authorized Translation
By JOHN M. GITTERMAN, Ph.D., LL.B.
(Of the New York County Bar)
New York
VANGUARD PRESS
Copyright, 1914
The Bobbs-Merrill Company
Copyright, 1922
B. W. HuEBSCH, Inc.
VANGUARD PRINTINGS
First — August, 1926
Second — February, 1928
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
'ASS
College
33(o
THE MAN (1864—):
Franz Oppenheimer, one of a fairly large number
of British, French and German physicians who aband-
oned their medical pursuits and rose to fame as
political economists, was born in Berlin. He studied
and practiced medicine, became private Lecturer of
Economics at the Berlin University in 1909, and Pro-
fessor of Sociology at the Frankfort University in
1919. His libertarian views made him, for many
years, the target of academic persecutions, \intil the
growing fame of his masterpiece, The State, effec-
tively silenced his detractors.
THE BOOK (1908):
The organic history of the State is a long and ex-
citing adventure, usually rendered dull in learned
accounts. Not so in Oppenheimer's The State which
extracts that history, in a highly stimulating manner,
from the sharp necessities and homicidal conflicts of
all sorts and conditions of men, from the Stone Age
to the Age of Henry Ford. The easy flow of import-
ant information derivable from this German volume
has rendered it highly acceptable to American readers.
^
^
^
.i;:i7533
OTHER BOOKS BY
DOCTOR FRANZ OPPENHEIMER
Die Siedlungsgenossenachaft . . • . 1896
Grossgrundeigentum und Soziale Frage . . 1898
Das Grundgesetz der Marxschen Gesellschaflslehre 1903
Robertus' Angriff auf Ricardos Renten-theorie
und der Lexis-Diehl'sche Rettungsversuch . 1908
David Ricardos Grundrententheorie . . . 1909
Theorie der Reinen und Politischen Okonomie . 1910
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
TO THE SECOND AMERICAN EDITION
This little book has made its way. In addition to
the present translation into English, there are author-
ized editions in French, Hungarian and Serbian. I am
also informed that there are translations published in
Japanese, Russian, Hebrew and Yiddish; but these, of
course, are pirated. The book has stood the test of
criticism, and has been judged both favorably and un-
favorably. It has, unquestionably, revived the discus-
sion on the origin and essence of the State.
Several prominent ethnologists, particularly Holsti,
the present Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Finnish
Free State, have attacked the basic principle formulated
and demonstrated in this work, but they have failed,
because their definition of the State assumed the very
matter that required to be proven. They have brought
together a large array of facts in proof of the existence
of some forms of Government and Leadership, even
where no classes obtained, and to the substance of these
forms they have given the name of "The State." It is
not my intention to controvert these facts. It is self-
evident, that in any group of human beings, be it ever
so small, there must exist an authority which deter-
mines conflicts and, in extraordinary situations, assumes
the leadership. But this authority is not "The State,"
Hi
iv PREFACE
in the sense iu which I use the word. The State may
be defined as an organization of one class dominating
over the other classes. Such a class organization can
come about in one way only, namely, through conquest
and the subjection of ethnic groups by the dominating
group. This can be demonstrated with almost mathe-
matical certainty. Not one of my critics has brought
proofs to invalidate this thesis. Most modern sociol-
ogists, among whom may be named Albion Small, Al-
fred Vierkandt and Wilhelm Wundt, accept this thesis.
Wilhelm Wundt, in particular, asserts in unmistakable
language, that "the political society (a term identical
with the State in the sense employed in this book)
first came about and could originate only in the period
of migration and conquest," whereby the subjugation of
one people by another was efiPected.
But even some of my opponents are favorably in-
clined to my arguments, as in the case of the venerable
Adolf Wagner, whose words I am proud to quote. In
his article on "The State" in the Handwbrterhuch der
Staatswissenschaften, he writes: "The sociologic con-
cept of the State, to which I have referred, particularly
in the broad scope and treatment of it given by Op-
penheimer, deserves careful consideration, especially
from political economists and political historians. The
vista opened out, from this point of view, of the eco-
nomic development of peoples and that of the State dur-
ing historic times, should be attractive even to the op-
ponents of the concept itself."
The "sociologic concept of the State," as Ludwig
Gumplowicz termed it, is assured of ultimate general
acceptance. Its opponents are strenuous and persever-
PREFACE V
ing, and I once called them "the sociologic root of all
evil;" but the concept, none the less, is the basic prin-
ciple of "bourgeoisie" sociology, and will be found of
value in the study, not only of economics and history,
but in that of Law and Constitutional History. I per-
mit myself to make a few remarks on this point.
The earliest evidence of the recognition of the idea
underlying the law of previous accumulation, may be
traced back, at the latest, to the period of the decay of
classical civilization, at the time when the capitalistic
slave economy brought the city states to ruin as though
their peoples had suffered from a galloping consump-
tion. As in our modern capitalistic age, which re-
sembles that period in many respects, there occurred a
breach in all those naturally developed relations in
which the individual has found protection. What Fer-
dinand Toennies calls the "community bonds" were
loosened. The individual found himself unprotected,
compelled to rely on his own efforts and on his own
reason in the seething sea of competition which fol-
lowed. The collective reason, the product of the wis-
dom of thousands of years of experience, could no
longer guide or safeguard him. It had become scattered.
Out of this need for an individual reason, there arose
the idea of nationalism. This idea had its justification
at first, as a line of development and a method in the
newly born science of social government; but when
later it became what Rubenstein (in his work Romantic
Socialism) calls a "tendency," it was not justified. The
community, to use Toennies' term, changed into a "soci-
ety." "Contract" seemed to be the only bond that held
men together — the contract based on the purely ration-
vi PREFACE
alistic relation of service for service, the do ut des, the
"Contrat Social" of Rousseau. A "society" would
thus appear to be a union of self-seeking individuals
who hoped through combination to obtain their per-
sonal satisfactions. Aristotle had taught that the State
had developed, by gradual growth, from the family
group. The Stoics and Epicureans held that individ-
uals formed the State — with this difference, that the
former viewed the individual as being socially inclined
by nature, and the latter that he was naturally anti-
social. To the Stoics, therefore, the "State of Nature"
was a peaceful union; to tlie Epicureans it was a war
of each against the other, with Society as a compelling
means for a decent modus vivendi. With the one a
Society was conditioned "physei" (by nature) ; with the
other it was "nomo" (by decree).
In spite, however, of this fundamental difference be-
tween these schools, both assumed the premise that, at
the beginning, individuals were free, equal politically
and economically, and that it was from such an original
social order there had developed, through gradual dif-
ferentiation, the fully developed State with its class
hierarchy. This is the law of previous accumulation.
But we should err if we believed that this thesis was
originally intended as a historical account. Rational-
ism is essentially unhistoric, even anti-historic. On the
contrary, the thesis was originally put forward as a
"fiction," a theory, a conscious unhistorical assumption.
In this form it acquired the name of natural law. It
was under this name that it came into modern thought,
tinctured stoically in Grotius and PufFendorf, and epi-
cureanally in Hobbes. It became the operative
PREFACE vii
weapon of thought among the rising third estate of the
capitalists.
The capitalists used the weapon, first against the
feudal state with its privileged class, and, later against
the fourth estate, with its class theory of Socialism.
Against the feudal domination it argued that a "Law
of Nature" knows and permits no privileges. After its
victories in the English Revolution of 1648, and the
great French Revolution of 1789, it justified, by the
same reasoning, its own de facto pre-eminence, its own
social and economic class superiority, against the claims
of the working classes. According to Adam Smith,
the classes in a society are the results of "natural" de-
velopment. From an original state of equality, these
arose from no other cause than the exercise of the ec-
onomic virtues of industry, frugality and providence.
Since these virtues are pre-eminently those of a bour-
geoisie society, the capitalist rule, thus sanctioned by
natural law, is just and unassailable. As a corollary
to this theorem the claims of Socialism cannot be ad-
mitted.
Thus, what originally was put forward as a "fiction,"
became first, a hypothesis and finally the axiom of all
bourgeoisie sociology. Those who support it accept the
axiom as self-evident, as not requiring proof. For
them, class domination, on this theory, is the result of
a gradual differentiation from an original state of gen-
eral equality and freedom, with no implication in it of
any extra-economic power. Robert Malthus applied
this alleged law to the future, in his attempt to demon-
strate any kind of Socialism to be purely Utopian. His
celebrated Law of Population is nothing but the law of
viii PREFACE
original accumulation projected into the future. He
claims that if any attempt were made to restore the
state of economic equality, the workings of the law
would have the effect — because of the difference in
economic efficiency — of restoring modern class conditions.
All orthodox sociology begins with the struggle against
this supposed law of class formations. Yet every step
of progress made in the various fields of the science of
sociology, has been made by tearing up, one by one, the
innumerable and far-spreading roots which have pro-
ceeded from this supposed axiom. A sound sociology
has to recall the fact that class formation in historic
times, did not take place through gradual differentia-
tion in pacific economic competition, but was the result
of violent conquest and subjugation.
As both Capitalism and Socialism had their origins
in England, these new ideas were certain to find their
first expression in that country. So that we find Ger-
rard Winstanley, the leader of the "true levellers" of
Cromwell's time, arraying the facts of liistory against
this anti-historical theoretical assumption. He showed
that the English ruling class (the Squirearchy) was
composed essentially of the victorious conquerors, the
Normans, and that the subject class were the conquered
English Saxons. But his demonstration had little in-
fluence. It was only when the great French Revolution
brought the contrast out sharply that the thought sunk
in. No less a person than Count St. Simon, acknowl-
edged as the founder of the science of modern sociology,
and the no less scientific Socialism, discovered in the
dominant class of his country tlie Frankish and Bur-
gundian conquerors, and in its subject population, the
PREFACE ix
descendants of the Romanized Celts. It was the pub-
lication of this discovery that gave birth to Western
European sociology. The conclusions drawn from it
were carried further by St. Simon's disciple, August
Comte, in his Philosophy of History, and by the Saint
Simonists, Enfantin and Bazard. These thinkers had
great influence on the economic development of the next
century; but their chief contribution was the elabora-
tion of the sociologic idea of the State.
Among the peoples of Western Europe, the new so-
ciology found a readier acceptance than it did among
those of Eastern Europe. The reason for tliis can
easily be seen when it is remembered that in the East
the contrast between the "State" and "Society," had not
been so definitely realized, as it had been in the West.
Even in the West, this contrast was only fully appre-
ciated, as a social fact, in England, France, the Nether-
lands and Italy, because in these countries only the class
of mobile wealth which had worked its way up as the
third estate, had succeeded in ousting the feudal
"State." In France, the league of the capitalists with
the Crown against the then armed and active nobility
had succeeded in subjecting the Frondeurs under the
absolute power of the King. From this time on, this
new estate represented itself as the Nation, and the
term "National Economy" takes the place of the older
term "Political Economy." The members of this third
estate felt themselves to be those subjects of the State
whose rights and liberties had been curtailed by the
piivileges of the two dominant estates of the nobility
and the clergy. Henceforth, the Third Estate pro-
claims the rights of "Society" and against the "State,"
X PREFACE
opposes the eternal Law of Nature — that of original
equality and freedom — against the theoretic-historical
rights of the Estates. The concept of Society as a con-
trast to the concept of the State, first appears in Locke,
and from his time on this contrast was more and more
defined, especially in the writings of the physiocrat
school of economists.
In this struggle between classes and ideas, neither
?'fiddle nor Eastern Europe played any important part.
In Germany there had once developed a Capitalist class
(in the period of the Fuggers of Augsburg) which at-
tained to almost American magnitude. But it was
crushed by the Religious Wars and the various French
invasions of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
which left Germany a devastated, depopulated desert.
At the end of the period there remained a few cities and
small states under the absolute domination of princes.
Within the cities the artisans were bound together in their
craft-leagues, and the rest consisted of those of educa-
tional pursuits and academic officials. In a large de-
gree all these were dependent on the State — the mem-
bers of the craft-guilds because they accepted a priv-
ileged condition, the officials because they were servants
of the State, and the professional men, because they be-
longed to the upper estate of the society. For this rea-
son there was no economic or social movement of the
third estate in Germany; there was only a literary move-
ment influenced by the flow of ideas from the West.
This explains why the contrast between the two ideas of
the State and of Society was not present in the minds
of the German people. On the contrary, the two terms
PREFACE 3d
were used as synonyms, both connotating an essentially
necessary conformity to nature.
But there is still another cause for this difference in
the mental attitude between Western and Eastern Eu-
rope. In England and France, from the time of Des-
cartes, the problems and inquiries of science were set
by men trained in mathematics and the natural sciences.
Especially in the new study of the philosophy of history,
the beginning of our modern sociology, did these men
act as guides. In Germany, on the contrary, it was the
theologians and especially the Protestant theologians
who were the leaders of thought. In their hands the
State came to be looked upon as an instrument of Divine
fashioning, and, indeed, of immanent divinity. This
thought resulted in a worship of the State, which
reached its height in the well-known Hegelian system.
It thus happened that two rivers of thought flowed for
a time side by side — the Sociology of Western Europe,
and the philosophy of History of Germany — with occa-
sional intercommunicating streams, such as Althusios
and PufFendorf into the French, English and Dutch
teaching of natural law, and that of Rousseau into
Hegel. In 1840, however, a direct junction was ef-
fected through Lorenz Stein, one of Hegel's most gifted
pupils who, later, became the leading German teacher
of administrative law, and influenced generations of
thinkers. He came to Paris, as a young man, for the
purpose of studying Socialism at the fountain head. He
became acquainted with the celebrated men of that
heroic time — with Enfintin and Bazard, with Louis
Blanc, Reybaud, and Proudhon.
xii PREFACE
Lorenz Stein absorbed the new thought with enthu-
siasm, and in his fertile mind there was precipitated the
creative synthesis between the Western Europe scientific
sociological thought and the metaphysical German phil-
osophy of history. The product was called by him the
Science of Society {Gesellschaftswissenschaft). It is
from the writings of Stein that almost all the important
developments of German sociologic thought received
their first impulses. Karl Marx, especially (as Struve
has shown), as well as SchaeflBe, Othmar Spann and
Gumplowicz are largely indebted to him.
It is not my purpose to develop this historical theme.
I am concerned only in tracing the development of the
sociologic idea of the State. The first effect of this
meeting of the two streams of thought was a mischie-
vous confusion of terminology. The writers in Western
Europe had long ago lost control of the unification of
expressions in thinking. As stated above, the Third Es-
tate began by thinking itself to be "Society," as op-
posed to the State. But when the Fourth Estate grew
to class consciousness and became aware of its own the-
oretic existence, it arrogated to itself the term "Society"
(as may be seen from the selection of the word Social-
ism), and it treated the Bourgeoisie as a form of the
"State," of the class state. There were thus two widely
differing concepts of "Society." Yet here was an un-
derlying idea common to both Bourgeoisie and Socialist,
since they conceived the State as a collection of priv-
ileges arising and maintained in violation of natural law,
while Society was thought of as the prescribed form of
human union in conformity with natural law. They dif-
fered in one essential only, namely, that while the Third
PREFACE xiii
Estate declared its capitalistic Society to be the result
of the processes of natural law, the Socialists regarded
their aims as not yet attained, and proclaimed that the
ideal society of the future which would really be the
product of the processes of natural law, could only be
realized by the elimination of all "surplus value."
Though both were in conflict with regard to fundamen-
tals, both agreed in viewing the "State" as civitas diaboli
and "Society" as civitas dei.
Stein, however, reversed the objectives of the two
concepts.- As an Hegelian, and pre-eminently a wor-
shipper of the State, he conceived the State as civitas
coelestis. Society, which he understood to mean only
the dominant bourgeoisie Society, he viewed through the
eyes of his Socialist friends and teachers, and con-
ceived it as civitas terrena.
What in Plato's sense is the "pure idea," the "ordre
naturel" of the early physiocrats and termed by French-
men and Englishmen "Society," was to Stein, the
"State." What had been contaminated and made im-
pure by the admixture of coarse matter, they termed the
"State," while the German called it "Society." In real-
ity, however, there is little difference between the two.
Stein realized with pain, that Hegel's pure concept of
a State based on right and freedom, was bound to re-
main an "idea" only. Eternally fettered, as he assumed
it must be, by the forces of property and the culture
proceeding from them, it could never be a fact. This is
his conclusion regarding "Society," so that its effective
development is obstructed by the beneficent association,
of human beings, as Stein conceived that association.
Thus was attained the very pinnacle of confused
xiv PREFACE
thinking. All German sociologists^ with the single excep-
tion of Carl Dietzel, soon realized that the Hegelian
concept of the State was impotent, existing only in the
"Idea." In no point did it touch the reality of his-
torical growth, and in no sense could it be made to stand
for what had always been considered as the State.
Long ago both Marx and Bakunin — respectively the
founders of scientific collectivism and practical anar-
chism — and especially Ludwig Gumplowicz, abandoned
the Hegelian terminology and accepted that of Western
Europe and this has been generally accepted every-
where.
In this little book I have followed the Western Eu-
ropean terminology. By the "State," I do not mean the
human aggregation which may perchance come about to
be, or, as it properly should be. I mean by it that sum-
mation of privileges and dominating positions which are
brought into being by extra economic power. And in
contrast to this, I mean by Society, the totality of con-
cepts of all purely natural relations and institutions be-
tween man and man, which will not be fully realized un-
til the last remnant of the creations of the barbaric "ages
of conquest and migration," has been eliminated from
community life. Others may call any form of leader-
ship and government or some other ideal, the "State."
That is a matter of personal choice. It is useless to
quarrel about definitions. But it might be well if those
other thinkers were to understand that they have not
controverted the sociologic idea of the "State," if a con-
cept of the "State" grounded on a different basis, does
not correspond to that which they have evolved. And
they must guard themselves particularly against the
PREFACE XV
danger of applying any definition other than that used
in this book to those actual historical products which
have hitherto been called "States/' the essence, develop-
ment, course and future of which must be explained by
any true teaching or philosophy of the State.
Franz Oppenhkimer.
Frankfort-on-Main, April 1922.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
Authoh's Preface . <, iii
I Theories of the State ..... o 1
The Sociologioil Idea of the State .... 15
II The Genesis of the State 22
(a) PoUtical and Economic Means .... 24
(b) Peoples Without a State : Huntsmen and
Grubbers 27
(c) Peoples Preceding the State : Herdsmen and
Vikings 33
(d) The Genesis of the State 51
III The Primitive Feudal State 82
(a) The Form of Dominion 82
(b) The Integration 89
(c) The DiflFerentiation : Group Theories and
Group Psychology 92
(d) The Primitive Feudal State of Higher
Grade 105
IV Tbce Maritime State 121
(a) Traffic in Prehistoric Times . . . .122
(b) Trade and the Primitive State .... 135
(c) The Genesis of the Maritime State . . .140
(d) Essence and Issue of the Maritime States . . 155
V The Development of the Feudal State . . . 174
(a) The Genesis of Landed Property . . . 174
(b) The Central Power in the Primitive Feudal State 182
(c) The Political and Social Disintegration of
the Primitive Feudal State . . . .191
(d) The Ethnic Amalgamation . . . .213
(e) The Developed Feudal State . . . .221
VI The Development of the Constitutional State . . 229
(a) The Emancipation of the Peasantry . . .231
(b) The Genesis of the Industrial State . . .236
(c) The Influences of Money Economy . . . ^43
(d) The Modern Constitutional State . . .257
VII The Tendency of the Development of the State . 274
Notes ..,..••••• 293
THE STATE
CHAPTER I
THEORIES OF THE STATE
This treatise regards the State from the
sociological standpoint only, not from the
juristic — sociology, as I understand the word,
being both a philosophy of history and a theory
of economics. Our object is to trace the de-
velopment of the State from its socio-psycho-
logical genesis up to its modern constitutional
form ; after that, we shall endeavor to present
a well-founded prognosis concerning its future
development. Since we shall trace only the
State's inner, essential being, we need not con-
cern ourselves with the external forms of law
under which its international and intra-na-
tional life is assumed. This treatise, in short,
is a contribution to the philosophy of State de-
2 THE STATE
velopment ; but only in so far as the law of de-
velopment here traced from its generic form
affects also the social problems common to all
forms of the modern State.
With this limitation of treatment in mind,
we may at the outset dismiss all received doc-
trines of public law. Even a cursory exami-
nation of conventional theories of the State is
sufficient to show that they furnish no expla-
nation of its genesis, essence and purpose.
These theories represent all possibly shadings
between all imaginable extremes. Rousseau
derives the State from a social contract, while
Carey ascribes its origin to a band of robbers.
Plato and the followers of Karl Marx endow
the State with omnipotence, making it the ab-
solute lord over the citizen in all political and
economic matters; while Plato even goes so
far as to wish the State to regulate sexual re-
lations. The Manchester school, on the other
hand, going to the opposite extreme of liberal-
ism, would have the State exercise only need-
ful police functions, and would thus logically
have as a result a scientific anarchism which
THEORIES OF THE STATE 3
must utterly exterminate the State. From
these various and conflicting views, it is im-
possible either to establish a fixed principle,
or to formulate a satisfactory concept of the
real essence of the State.
This irreconcilable conflict of theories is
easily explained by the fact that none of the
conventional theories treats the State from
the sociological view-point. Nevertheless, the
State is a phenomenon common to all history,
and its essential nature can only be made plain
by a broad and comprehensive study of uni-
versal history. Except in the field of soci-
ology, the king's highway of science, no treat-
ment of the State has heretofore taken this
path. All previous theories of the State have
been class theories. To anticipate somewhat
the outcome of our researches, every State has
been and is a class State, and every theory of
the State has been and is a class theory.
A class theory is, however, of necessity, not
the result of investigation and reason, but a
by-product of desires and will. Its arguments
are used, not to establish truth, but as weapons
4 THE STATE
in the contest for material interests. The re-
sult, therefore, is not science, but nescience.
By understanding the State, we may indeed
recognize the essence of theories concerning the
State. But the converse is not true. An un-
derstanding of theories about the State will
give us no clue to its essence.
The following may be stated as a ruling con-
cept, especially prevalent in university teach-
ing, of the origin and essence of the State. It
represents a view which, in spite of manifold
attacks, is still affirmed.
It is maintained that the State is an or-
ganization of human community life, which
originates by reason of a social instinct im-
planted in men by nature (Stoic Doctrine);
or else is brought about by an irresistible im-
pulse to end the "war of all against all," and
to coerce the savage, who opposes organized
effort, to a peaceable community life in place
of the anti-social struggle in which all budding
shoots of advancement are destroyed (Epi-
curean Doctrine) . These two apparently ir-
reconcilable concepts were fused by the in-
THEORIES OF THE STATE 5
termediation of medi£eval philosophy. This,
founded on theologic reasoning and behef
in the Bible, developed the opinion that
man, originally and by nature a social crea-
ture, is, through original sin, the fratricide of
Cain and the transgression at the tower of
Babel, divided into innumerable tribes, which
fight to the hilt, until they unite peace-
ably as a State.
This view is utterly untenable. It confuses
the logical concept of a class with some subor-
dinate species thereof. Granted that the
State is one form of organized political co-
hesion, it is also to be remembered that it is a
form having specific characteristics. Every
state in history was or is a state of classes, a
polity of superior and inferior social groups,
based upon distinctions either of rank or of
property. This phenomenon must, then, be
called the "State." With it alone history oc-
cupies itself.
We should, therefore, be justified in desig-
nating eveiy other form of political organiza-
tion by the same termj without further diff eren-
6 THE STATE
tiation, had there never existed any other than
a class-state, or were it the only conceivable
form. At least, proof might properly be
called for, to show that each conceivable politi-
cal organization, even though originally it did
not represent a polity of superior and inferior
social and economic classes, since it is of neces-
sity subject to inherent laws of development,
must in the end be resolved into the specific
class form of history. Were such proof forth-
coming, it would offer in fact only one form
of political amalgamation, calling in turn for
differentiation at various stages of develop-
ment, viz., the preparatory stage, when class
distinction does not exist, and the stage of
maturity, when it is fully developed.
Former students of the philosophy of the
State were dimly aware of this problem. And
they tried to adduce the required proof, that
because of inherent tendencies of development,
every human political organization must grad-
ually become a class-state. Philosophers of
the canon law handed this theory down to
philosophers of the law of nature. From
THEORIES OF THE STATE 7
these, through the mediation of Rousseau, it
became a part of the teachings of the econo-
mists ; and even to this day it rules their views
and diverts them from the facts.
This assumed proof is based upon the con-
cept of a "pHmitive accumulation," or an origi-
nal store of wealth, in lands and in movable
property, brought about by means of purely
economic forces; a doctrine justly derided by
Karl Marx as a "fairy tale." Its scheme of
reasoning approximates this:
Somewhere, in some far-stretching, fertile
country, a number of free men, of equal status,
form a union for mutual protection. Grad-
ually they differentiate into property classes.
Those best endowed with strength, wisdom,
capacity for saving, industry and caution,
slowly acquire a basic amount of real or
movable property; while the stupid and less
efficient, and those given to carelessness
and waste, remain without possessions. The
well-to-do lend their productive property to
the less well-off in return for tribute, either
ground-rent or profit, and become thereby con-
8 THE STATE
tinually richer, while the others always remain
poor. These differences in possession grad-
ually develop social class distinctions; since
everywhere the rich have preference, while
they alone have the time and the means to de-
vote to public affairs and to turn the laws ad-
ministered by them to their own advantage.
Thus, in time, there develops a* ruling and
property-owning estate, and a proletariate, a
class without property. The primitive state
of free and equal fellows becomes a class-state,
by an inherent law of development, because in
every conceivable mass of men there are, as
may readily be seen, strong and weak, clever
and foolish, cautious and wasteful ones.
This seems quite plausible, and it coincides
with the experience of our daily life. It is not
at all unusual to see an especially gifted mem-
ber of the lower class rise from his former sur-
roundings, and even attain a leading position
in the upper class; or conversely, to see some
spendthrift or weaker member of the higher
group "lose his class" and drop into the
proletariate.
THEORIES OF THE STATE 9
And yet this entire theory is utterly mis-
taken; it is a "fairy tale," or it is a class theory
used to justify the privileges of the upper
classes. The class-state never originated in
this fashion, and never could have so origi-
nated. History shows that it did not; and
economics shows deductively, with a testimony
absolute, mathematical and binding, that it
could not. A simple problem in elementary
arithmetic shows that the assumption of an
original accumulation is totally erroneous, and
has nothing to do with the development of the
class-state.
The proof is as follows: All teachers of
natural law, etc., have unanimously declared
that the differentiation into income-receiving
classes and propertyless classes can only take
place when all fertile lands have been occupied.
For so long as man has ample opportunity to
take up unoccupied land, "no one," says Tur-
got, "would think of entering the service of
another;" we may add, "at least for wages,
which are not apt to be higher than the earn-
ings of an independent peasant working an
10 THE STATE
unmortgaged and sufficiently large property;"
while mortgaging is not possible as long as
land is yet free for the working or taking, as
free as air and water. Matter that is obtain-
able for the taking has no value that enables
it to be pledged, since no one loans on things
that can be had for nothing.
The philosophers of natural law, then, as-
sumed that complete occupancy of the gi'ound
must have occurred quite early, because of the
natural increase of an originally small popula-
tion. They were under the impression that
at their time, in the eighteenth century, it had
taken place many centuries previous, and they
naively deduced the existing class aggi'oup-
ment from the assumed conditions of that long-
past point of time. It never entered their
heads to work out their problem ; and with few
exceptions their error has been copied by soci-
ologists, historians and economists. It is
only quite recently that my figures were
worked out, and they are truly astounding.*
* Franz Oppenheimer, Theorie der Beinen und Politischen
(Ekonomie. Berlin, 1912. — Translator.
THEORIES OF THE STATE 11
We can determine with approximate ac-
curacy the amount of land of average fertility
in the temperate zone, and also what amount
is sufficient to enable a family of peasants to
exist comfortably, or how much such a family
can work with its own forces, without en-
gaging outside help or permanent farm serv-
ants. At the time of the migration of the bar-
barians (350 to 750 A. D.), the lot of each
able-bodied man was about thirty morgen
(equal to twenty acres) on average lands, on
very good ground only ten to fifteen morgen
(equal to seven or ten acres) , four morgen be-
ing equal to one hectare. Of this land, at
least a third, and sometimes a half, was left un-
cultivated each year. The remainder of the
fifteen to twenty morgen sufficed to feed and
fatten into giants the immense famihes of these
child-producing Germans, and this in spite of
the primitive technique, whereby at least half
the productive capacity of a day was lost.
Let us assume that, in these modern times,
thirty morgen (equal to twenty acres) for the
average peasant suffices to support a family.
12 THE STATE
We have then assumed a block of land suffi-
ciently large to meet any objection. Modern
Germany, populated as it is, contains an agri-
cultural area of thirty-four million hectares
(equal to eighty-four million, fifteen thousand,
four hundred and eighty acres ) . The agricul-
tural population, including farm laborers and
their families, amounts to seventeen million;
so that, assuming five persons to a family and
an equal division of the farm lands, each
family would have ten hectares (equal to
twenty-five acres). In other words, not even
in the Germany of our own day would the
point have been reached where, according to
the theories of the adherents of natural law,
differentiation into classes would begin.
Apply the same process to countries less
densely settled, such, for example, as the Dan-
ube States, Turkey, Hungary and Russia, and
still more astounding results will appear. As
a matter of fact, there are still on the earth's
surface, seventy-three biUion, two hundred
million hectares (equal to one hundred eighty
billion, eight hundred eighty million and four
THEORIES OF THE STATE 13
hundred sixteen thousand acres) ; dividing into
the first amount the number of human beings
of all professions whatever, viz., one billion,
eight hundred million, every family of five
persons could possess about thirty morgen
(equal to eighteen and a half acres), and still
leave about two-thirds of the planet unoccu-
pied.
If, therefore, purely economic causes are
ever to bring about a differentiation into
classes by the growth of a propertyless labor-
ing class, the time has not yet arrived; and
the critical point at which ownership of land
will cause a natural scarcity is thrust into the
dim future — if indeed it ever can arrive.
As a matter of fact, however, for centuries
past, in all parts of the world, we have had a
class-state, with possessing classes on top and
a propertyless laboring class at the bottom,
even when population was much less dense
than it is to-day. Now it is true that the class-
state can arise only where all fertile acreage
has been occupied completely ; and since I have
shown that even at the present time, all the
14 THE STATE
ground is not occupied economically, this must
mean that it has been preempted politically.
Since land could not have acquired "natural
scarcity," the scarcity must have been "legal."
This means that the land has been preempted
by a ruling class against its subject class, and
settlement prevented. Therefore the State,
as a class-state, can have originated in no other
way than through conquest and subjugation.
This view, the so-called "sociologic idea of
the state," as the following will show, is sup-
ported in ample manner by well-known his-
torical facts. And yet most modern histo-
rians have rejected it, holding that both groups,
amalgamated by war into one State, before
that time had, each for itself formed a "State."
As there is no method of obtaining historical
proof to the contrary, since the beginnings of
human history are unknown, we should arrive
at a verdict of "not proven," were it not that,
deductively, there is the absolute certainty
that the State, as history shows it, the class-
state, could not have come about except
through warlike subjugation. The mass of
THEORIES OF THE STATE 15
evidence shows that our simple calculation ex-
cludes any other result.
THE SOCIOLOGICAL IDEA OF THE STATE
To the originally, purely sociological, idea
of the State, I have added the economic phase
and formulated it as follows:
What, then, is the State as a sociological
concept? The State, completely in its gene-
sis, essentially and almost completely during
the first stages of its existence, is a social insti-
tution, forced by a victorious group of men on
a defeated group, with the sole purpose of reg-
ulating the dominion of the victorious group
over the vanquished, and securing itself against
revolt from within and attacks from abroad.
Teleologically, this dominion had no other
purpose than the economic exploitation of the
vanquished by the victors.
No primitive state known to history orig-
inated in any other manner.^ Wherever a re-
liable tradition reports otherwise, either it
concerns the amalgamation of two fully de-
veloped primitive states into one body of more
^
6 THE STATE
complete organization; or else it is an adapta-
tion to men of the fable of the sheep which
made a bear their king in order to be protected
against the wolf. But even in this latter case,
the form and content of the State became pre-
ciselj'' the same as in those states where nothing
intervened, and which became immediately
"wolf states."
The little history learned in our school-days
suffices to prove this generic doctrine. Every-
where we find some warlike tribe of wild men
breaking through the boundaries of some less
warlike people, setthng down as nobility and
founding its State. In Mesopotamia, wave
follows wave, state follows state — Babylon-
ians, Amoritans, Assyrians, Arabs, Medes,
Persians, Macedonians, Parthians, Mongols,
Seldshuks, Tartars, Turks ; on the Nile, Hyk-
sos, Nubians, Persians, Greeks, Romans,
Arabs, Turks; in Greece, the Doric States are
typical examples; in Italy, Romans, Ostro-
goths, Lombards, Franks, Germans; in Spain,
Carthaginians, Visigoths, Arabs; in Gaul,
Romans, Franks, Burgundians, Normans: in
THEORIES OF THE STATE 17
Britain, Saxons, Normans. In India wave
upon wave of wild warlike clans has flooded
over the country even to the islands of the In-
dian Ocean. So also is it with China. In the
European colonies, we find the selfsame type,
wherever a settled element of the population
has been found, as for example, in South
America and Mexico. Where that element is
lacking, where only roving huntsmen are
found, who may be exterminated but not sub-
jugated, the conquerors resort to the device of
importing from afar masses of men to be ex-
ploited, to be subject perpetually to forced
labor, and thus the slave trade arises.
An apparent exception is found only in
those European colonies in which it is forbid-
den to replace the lack of a domiciled indige-
nous population by the importation of slaves.
One of these colonies, the United States of
America, is among the most powerful state-
formations in all history. The exception
there found is to be explained by this, that the
mass of men to be exploited and worked with-
out cessation imports itself, by emigration in
18 THE STATE
great hordes from primitive states or from
those in higher stages of development in which
exploitation has become unbearable, while lib-
erty of movement has been attained. In this
case, one may speak of an infection from afar
with "statehood" brought in by the infected of
foreign lands. Where, however, in such col-
onies, immigTation is very limited, either be-
cause of excessive distances and the conse-
quent high charges for moving from home, or
because of regulations hmiting the immigra-
tion, we perceive an approximation to the final
end of the development of the State, which we
nowadays recognize as the necessary outcome
and finale, but for which we have not yet found
a scientific terminology. Here again, in the
dialectic development, a change in the quantity
is bound up with a change of the quality.
The old form is filled with new contents. We
still find a "State" in so far as it represents the
tense regulation, secured by external force,
whereby is secured the social living together of
large bodies of men; but it is no longer the
"State" in its older sense. It is no longer the
THEORIES OF THE STATE 19
instrument of political domination and eco-
nomic exploitation of one social group by an-
other; it is no longer a "State of Classes." It
rather resembles a condition which appears to
have come about through a "social contract."
This stage is approached by the Australian
Colonies, excepting Queensland, which after
the feudal manner still exploits the half en-
slaved Kanakas. It is almost attained in New
Zealand.
So long as there is no general assent as to
the origin and essence of states historically
known or as to the sociological meaning of the
word "State," it would be futile to attempt to
force into use a new name for these most ad-
vanced commonwealths. They will continue
to be called "states" in spite of all protests,
especially because of the pleasure of using
confusing concepts. For the purpose of this
study, however, we propose to employ a new
concept, a different verbal lever, and shall
speak of the result of the new process as a
"Freemen's Citizenship."
This summary survey of the states of the
20 THE STATE
past and present should, if space permitted, be
supplemented by an examination of the facts
offered by the study of races, and of those
states which are not treated in our falsely
called "Universal History." On this point, the
assurance may be accepted that here again our
general rule is valid without exception.
Everywhere, whether in the Malay Archipel-
ago, or in the "great sociological laboratory of
Africa," at all places on this planet where the
development of tribes has at all attained a
higher form, the State grew from the subjuga-
tion of one group of men by another. Its basic
justification, its raison d'etre, was and is the
economic exploitation of those subjugated.
The summary review thus far made may
serve as proof of the basic premise of this
sketch. The pathfinder, to whom, before all
others, we are indebted for this line of investi-
gation is Professor Ludwig Gumplowicz of
Graz, jurist and sociologist, who crowned a
brave life by a brave self -chosen death. We
can, then, in sharp outlines, follow in the suf-
ferings of himianity the path which the State
THEORIES OF THE STATE 21
has pursued in its progress through the ages.
This we propose now to trace from the primi-
tive state founded on conquest to the "free-
men's citizenship."
CHAPTER II
THE GENESIS OF THE STATE
One single force impels all life ; one force de-
veloped it, from the single cell, the particle of
albmnen floating about in the warm ocean of
prehistoric time, up to the vertebrates, and then
to man. This one force, according to Lippert,
is the tendency to provide for life, bifurcated
into "hunger and love.'* With man, however,
philosophy also enters into the play of these
forces, in order hereafter, together with "hun-
ger and love, to hold together the structure of
the world of men." To be sure, this philos-
ophy, this "idea" of Schopenhauer's, is at its
source nothing else than a creature of the pro-
vision for life called by him "will." It is an
organ of orientation in the world, an arm in the
struggle for existence. Yet in spite of this,
we shall come to know the desire for caus-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 23
ation as a self-acting force, and of social
facts as cooperators in the sociological pro-
cess of development. In the beginning of
human society, and as it gradually develops,
this tendency pushes itself forward in various
bizarre ideas called "superstition." These are
based on purely logical conclusions from
incomplete observations concerning air and
water, earth aiid fire, animals and plants, which
seem endowed with a throng of spirits both
kindly and malevolent. One may say that in
the most recent modern times, at a stage at-
tained only by very few races, there arises also
the younger daughter of the desire for causa-
tion, namely science, as a logical result of com-
plete observation of facts; science, now re-
quired to exterminate widely branched-out
superstition, which, with innumerable threads,
has rooted itself in the very soul of mankind.
But, however powerfully, especially in the
moment of "ecstasy," " superstition may have
influenced history, however powerfully, even in
ordinary times, it may have cooperated in the
development of human communal life, the prin-
24 THE STATE
cipal force of development is still to be found
in the necessities of life, which force man to
acquire for himself and for his family nourish-
ment, clothing and housing. This remains,
therefore, the "economic" impulse. A socio-
logical — and that means a socio-psychological
— investigation of the development of history
can, therefore, not progress otherwise than by
following out the methods by which economic
needs have been satisfied in their gradual un-
folding, and by taking heed of the influences of
the causation impulse at its proper place.
(a) POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC MEANS
There are two fundamentally opposed
means whereby man, requiring sustenance, is
impelled to obtain the necessary means for sat-
isfying his desires. These are work and rob-
bery, one's own labor and the forcible appro-
priation of the labor of others. Robbery!
Forcible appropriation! These words convey
to us ideas of crime and the penitentiary, since
we are the contemporaries of a developed civi-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 25
lization, specifically based on the inviolability
of property. And this tang is not lost when
we are convinced that land and sea robbery is
the primitive relation of life, just as the war-
riors' trade — which also for a long time is only
organized mass robbery — constitutes the most
respected of occupations. Both because of
this, and also on account of the need of having,
in the further development of this study, terse,
clear, sharply opposing terms for these very
important contrasts, I propose in the following '
discussion to call one's own labor and the
equivalent exchange of one's own labor for the
labor of others, the "economic means" for the
satisfaction of needs, while the unrequited ap-
propriation of the labor of others will be called
the "political means."
The idea is not altogether new ; philosophers
of history have at all times found this contra-
diction and have tried to formulate it. But no
one of these formula has carried the premise to
its complete logical end. At no place is it
clearly shown that the contradiction consists
26 THE STATE
only in the means by which the identical pur-
pose J the acquisition of economic objects of con-
sumption, is to be obtained. Yet this is the
critical point of the reasoning. In the case of
a thinker of the rank of Karl Marx, one mav
observe what confusion is brought about when
economic purpose and economic means are not
strictly differentiated. All those errors, which
in the end led Marx's splendid theory so far
away from truth, were grounded in the lack of
clear differentiation between the means of eco-
nomic satisfaction of needs and its end. This
led him to designate slavery as an "economic
category," and force as an "economic force" —
half truths which are far more dangerous than
total untruths, since their discovery is more dif-
ficult, and false conclusions from them are in-
evitable.
On the other hand, our own sharp differenti-
ation between the two means toward the same
end, will help us to avoid any such confusion.
This will be our key to an understanding of the
development, the essence, and the purpose of
the State ; and since all universal history here-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 27
tofore has been only the history of states, to an
understanding of universal history as well.
All world history, from primitive times up to
our own civilization, presents a single phase,
a contest namely between the economic and
the political means ; and it can present only this
phase mitil we have achieved free citizenship.
(b) PEOPLES WITHOUT A STATE: HUNTSMEN
AND GRUBBERS
The state is an organization of the politi-
cal means. No state, therefore, can come into
being until the economic means has created a
definite number of objects for the satisfac-
tion of needs, which objects may be taken
away or appropriated by warlike robbery.
For that reason, primitive huntsmen are with-
out a state ; and even the more highly developed
huntsmen become parts of a state structure
only when they find in their neighborhood an
evolved economic organization which they can
subjugate. But primitive huntsmen live in
practical anarchy.
28 THE STATE
Grosse says concerning primitive huntsmen
in general:
" There are no essential differences of for-
tune among them, and thus a principal source
for the origin of differences in station is lack-
ing. Generally, all grown men within the
tribe enjoy equal rights. The older men,
thanks to their greater experience, have a cer-
tain authority; but no one feels himself bound
to render them obedience. Where in some
cases chiefs are recognized — as with the Boto-
kude, the Central Calif ornians, the Wedda and
the Mincopie — their power is extremely
limited. The chieftain has no means of en-
forcing his wishes against the will of the rest.
Most tribes of hunters, however, have no chief-
tain. The entire society of the males still
forms a homogeneous undifferentiated mass,
in which only those individuals achieve prom-
inence who are believed to possess magical
powers." ^
Here, then, there scarcely exists a spark
of "statehood," even in the sense of ordinary
GENESIS OF THE STATE 29
theories of the state, still less in the sense
of the correct "sociologic idea of the state."
The social structure of primitive peasants
has hardly more resemblance to a state than
has the horde of huntsmen. Where the peas-
ant, working the ground with a grub, is living
in liberty, there is as yet no "state." The
plow is always the mark of a higher economic
condition which occurs only in a state ; that is to
say, in a system of plantation work carried on
by subjugated servants.^ The grubbers live
isolated from one another, scattered over the
country in separated curtilages, perhaps in vil-
lages, split up because of quarrels about dis-
trict or farm boundaries. In the best cases,
they live in feebly organized associations, bound
together by oath, attached only loosely by the
tie which the consciousness of the same descent
and speech and the same belief imposes upon
them. They unite perhaps once a year in the
common celebration of renowned ancestors or
of the tribal god. There is no ruling authority
over the whole mass; the various chieftains of
a village, or possibly of a district, may have
30 THE STATE
more or less influence in their circumscribed
spheres, this depending usually upon their per-
sonal qualities, and especially upon the magical
powers attributed to them. Cunow describes
the Peruvian peasants before the incursion of
the Incas as follows : "An unregulated living
side by side of many independent, mutually
warring tribes, who again were split up into
more or less autonomous territorial unions, held
together by ties of kinship." ^ One may say
that all the primitive peasants of the old and
new world were of this type.
In such a state of society, it is hardly con-
ceivable that a warlike organization could
come about for purposes of attack. It is
sufficiently difficult to mobilize the clan, or
still more the tribe, for common defense. The
peasant is always lacking in mobility. He is
as attached to the ground as the plants he culti-
vates. As a matter of fact, the working of
his field makes him "bound to the soil" {glehce
adscriptus) , even though, in the absence of law,
he has freedom of movement. What purpose,
moreover, would a looting expedition effect in
GENESIS OF THE STATE 31
a country, which throughout its extent is oc-
cupied only by grubbing peasants ? The peas-
ant can carry oif from the peasant nothing
which he does not already own. In a condition
of society marked by superfluity of agricul-
tural land, each individual contributes only a
little work to its extensive cultivation. Each
occupies as much territory as he needs. More
would be superfluous. Its acquisition would
be lost labor, even were its owner able to con-
serve for any length of time the grain products
thus secured. Under primitive conditions,
however, this spoils rapidly by reason of change
of atmosphere, ants, or other agencies. Ac-
cording to Ratzel, the Central African peas-
ant must convert the superfluous portion of his
crops into beer as quickly as possible in order
not to lose it entirely!
For all these reasons, primitive peasants are
totally lacking in that warlike desire to take the
ofl*ensive which is the distinguishing mark of
hmiters and herdsmen : war can not better their
condition. And this peaceable attitude is
strengthened by the fact that the occupation of
32 THE STATE
the peasant does not make him an efficient war-
rior. It is true his muscles are strong and he
has powers of endurance, but he is sluggish
of movement and slow to come to a determina-
tion, while huntsmen and nomads by their
methods of living develop speed of motion and
swiftness of action. For this reason, the prim-
itive peasant is usually of a more gentle dis-
position than they.*
To sum up: within the economic and social
conditions of the peasant districts, one finds
no differentiation working for the higher
forms of integration. There exists neither the
impulse nor the possibility for the warlike sub-
jection of neighbors. No "State" can there-
* This ps3"chological contradiction, though often expressly
stated, is not the absolute rule, Grosse, Forms of the Family,
says (page 137): "Some historians of civilization place the
peasant in opposition to the warlike nomads, claiming that
the peasants are peace-loving peoples. In fact one can not
state that their economic life leads them to wars, or educates
them for it, as can be said of stock raisers. Nevertheless, one
finds within the scope of this form of cultivation a mass of
the most warlike and cruel peoples to be found anywhere.
The wild cannibals of the Bismarck archipelago, the blood-
lusting Vitians, the butchers of men of Dahome and Ashanti
— they all cultivate the 'peaceable' acres; and if other peas-
ants are not quite as bad, it seems that the kindly disposition
<ii the vast mass appears to be, at least, questionable."
GENESIS OF THE STATE 33
fore arise; and, as a matter of fact, none ever
has arisen from such social conditions. Had
there been no impulse from without, from
groups of men nourished in a different man-
ner, the primitive grubber would never have
discovered the State.
(c) PtlOPLES PRECEDING THE STATE:
HERDSMEN AND VIKINGS
Herdsmen, on the contrary, even though
isolated, have developed a whole series of the
elements of statehood; and in the tribes which
have progressed further, they have developed
this in its totality, with the single exception
of the last point of identification which com-
pletes the state in its modern sense, that is to
say, with exception only of the definitive occu-
pation of a circumscribed territory.
One of these elements is an economic one.
Even without the intervention of extra-eco-
nomic force, there may still develop among
herdsmen a sufficiently marked differentiation
of property and income. Assuming that, at
the start, there was complete equality in the
34 THE STATE
number of cattle, yet within a short time, the
one man may be richer and the other poorer.
An especially clever breeder will see his herd
increase rapidly, while an especially careful
watchman and bold hunter will preserve his
from decimation by beasts of prey. The ele-
ment of luck also affects the result. One of
these herders finds an especially good grazing
ground and healthful watering places; the
other one loses his entire stock through
pestilence, or through a snowfall or a sand-
storm.
Distinctions in fortune quickly bring about
class distinctions. The herdsman who has lost
all must hire himself to the rich man ; and sink-
ing thus under the other, beconje dependent on
him. Wherever herdsmen live, from all three
parts of the ancient world, we find the same
story. Meitzen reports of the Lapps, nomadic
in Norway: "Three hundred reindeer sufficed
for one family; who owned only a hundred
must enter the service of the richer, whose
herds ran up to a thousand head." ^ The same
writer, speaking of the Central Asiatic No-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 35
mads, says: "A family required three hun-
dred head of cattle for comfort; one hundred
head is poverty, followed by a life of debt.
The servant must cultivate the lands of the
lord." ^ Ratzel reports concerning the Hot-
tentots of Africa a form of "commendatio" :
"The poor man endeavors to hire himself to the
rich man, his only object being to obtain cat-
tle." ^ Laveleye, who reports the same cir-
cumstances from Ireland, traces the origin and
the name of the feudal system (systeme
feodal) to the loaning of cattle by the rich to
the poor members of the tribe; accordingly, a
*'fee-od" (owning of cattle) was the first feud
whereby so long as the debt existed the mag-
nate bound the small owner to himself as "his
man."
We can only hint at the methods whereby,
even in peaceable associations of herdsmen, this
economic and consequent social differentiation
may have been furthered by the connection of
the patriarchate with the offices of supreme and
sacrificial priesthood if the wase old men used
cleverly the superstition of their clan associ-
36 THE STATE
ates. But this differentiation, so long as it is
unaffected by the political means, operates
within very modest bounds. Cleverness and
efficiency are not hereditary with any degree
of certainty. The largest herd will be split
up if many heirs grow up in one tent, and for-
tune is tricky. In our own day, the richest
man among the Lapps of Sweden, in the short-
est possible time, has been reduced to such com-
plete poverty that the government has had to
support him. All these causes bring it about
that the original condition of economic and
social equality is always approximately re-
stored. "The more peaceable, aboriginal, and
genuine the nomad is, the smaller are the tan-
gible differences of possession. It is touching
to note the pleasure with which an old prince
of the Tsaidam Mongols accepts his tribute or
gift, consisting of a handful of tobacco, a piece
of sugar, and twenty-five kopeks." ®
This equality is destroyed permanently and
in greater degree by the political means.
"Where war is carried on and booty acquired,
greater differences arise, which find their ex-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 37
pression in the ownership of slaves, women,
arms and spirited momits." ^^
The ownership of slaves! The nomad is the
inventor of slavery, and thereby has created the
seedling of the state, the first economic ex-
ploitation of man by man.
The huntsman carries on wars and takes
captives. But he does not make them slaves;
either he kills them, or else he adopts them into
the tribe. Slaves would be of no use to him.
The booty of the chase can be stowed away
even less than grain can be "capitalized."
The idea of using a human being as a labor
motor could only come about on an economic
plane on which a body of wealth has developed,
call it capital, which can be increased only with
the assistance of dependent labor forces.
This stage is first reached by the herdsmen.
The forces of one family, lacking outside as-
sistance, suffice to hold together a herd of very
limited size, and to protect it from attacks of
beasts of prey or human enemies. Until the
pohtical means is brought into play, auxiliary
forces are found very sparingly; such as the
38 THE STATE
poorer members of the clan already mentioned,
together with runaways from foreign tribes,
who are f omid all over the world as protected
dependents in the suite of the greater owners
of herds." In some cases, an entire poor clan
of herdsmen enters, half freely, into the service
of some rich tribe. "Entire peoples take posi-
tions corresponding to their relative wealth.
Thus the Tungusen, who are very poor, try to
live near the settlements of the Tschuktsches,
because they find occupation as herdsmen of
the reindeer belonging to the wealthy Tschu-
ktsches; they are paid in reindeer. And the
subjection of the Ural-Samojedes by the Sir-
jaenes came about through the gradual occu-
pation of their pasturing grounds." ^^
Excepting, however, the last named case,
which is already very state-like, the few exist-
ing labor forces, without capital, are not suf-
ficient to permit the clan to keep very large
herds. Furthermore, methods of herding
themselves compel division. For a pasture
may not, as they say in the Swiss Alps, be
"overpushed," that is to say, have too many
GENESIS OF THE STATE 39
cattle on it. The danger of losing the entire
stock is reduced by the measure in which it is
distributed over various pastures. For cattle
plagues, storms, etc., can affect only a part;
while even the enemy from abroad can not drive
off all at once. For that reason, the Hereros,
for example, "find every well-to-do owner
forced to keep, besides the main herd, several
other subsidiary herds. Younger brothers or
other near relatives, or in want of these, tried
old servants, watch them." ^^
For that reason, the developed nomad spares
his captured enemy ; he can use him as a slave
on his pasture. We may note this transition
from killing to enslaving in a customary rite
of the Scythians: they offered up at their
places of sacrifice one out of every hundred
captured enemies. Lippert, who reports this,
sees in it "the beginning of a limitation, and
the reason thereof is evidently to be found in
the value which a captured enemy has acquired
by becoming the servant of a tribal herds-
man." ''
With the introduction of slaves into the tri-
40 THE STATE
bal economy of the herdsmen, the state, in its
essential elements, is completed, except that it
has not as yet acquired a definitely circum-
scribed territorial limit. The state has thus
the form of dominion, and its economic basis
is the exploitation of human labor. Hence-
forth, economic differentiation and the forma-
tion of social classes progress rapidly. The
herds of the great, wisely divided and better
guarded by numerous armed servants than
those of the simple freemen, as a rule, main-
tain themselves at their original number:
thev also increase faster than those of the free-
men, since they are augmented by the greater
share in the booty which the rich receive, cor-
responding to the number of warriors (slaves)
which these place in the field.
Likewise, the office of supreme priest cre-
ates an ever-widening cleft which divides the
numbers of the clan, all formerly equals; until
finally a genuine nobility, the rich descendants
of the rich patriarchs, is placed in juxtaposi-
tion to the ordinary freemen. "The redskins
have also in their progressive organization de-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 41
veloped no nobility and no slavery,* and in
this their organization distinguishes itself most
essentially from those of the old world. Both
arise from the development of the patriarchate
of stock-raising people." ^^
Thus we find, with all developed tribes of
herdsmen, a social separation into three dis-
tinct classes: nobility ("head of the house of
his fathers" in the biblical phrase), common
freemen and slaves. According to Mommsen,
"all Indo- Germanic people have slaveiy as a
jural institution." ^^ This applies to the
Arians and the Semites of Asia and Africa as
well as to the Hamites. Among all the Fulbe
of the Sahara, "society is divided into princes,
chieftains, commons and slaves." ^^ And we
find the same facts everywhere, as a matter of
course, wherever slavery is legally established,
as among the Hova ^^ and their Polynesian
kinsmen, the "Sea Nomads." Human psy-
chology under similar circumstances brings
* This statement of I.ippert is not quite correct. The higher
developed domiciled huntsmen and fishermen of Northwest
America have both nobles and slaves.
42 THE STATE
about like conditions, independent of color or
race.
Thus the herdsman gradually becomes ac-
customed to earning his livelihood tlirough war-
fare, and to the exploitation of men as servile
labor motors. And one must admit that his
entire mode of life impels him to make more
and more use of the "political means."
He is physically stronger and just as adroit
and determined as the primitive huntsman,
whose food supply is too irregular to permit
him to attain his greatest natural physical de-
velopment. The herdsman can, in all cases,
grow to his full stature, since he has uninter-
rupted nourishment in the milk of his herds
and an unfailing supply of meat. This is
shown in the Arian horse nomad, no less than
in the herdsman of Asia and Africa, e. g., the
Zulu. Secondly, tribes of herdsmen increase
faster than hordes of hunters. This is so, not
only because the adults can obtain much more
nourishment from a given territorj'-, but still
more because possession of the milk of animals
shortens the period of nursing for the mothers,
GENESIS OF THE STATE 43
and consequently permits a greater number of
children to be born and to grow to maturity.
As a consequence, the pastures and steppes of
the old world became inexhaustible fountains,
which periodically burst their confines letting
loose inundations of humanity, so that they
came to be called the "vaginae gentium/^
Moreover we find a much larger number of
armed warriors among herdsmen than among
hunters. Each one of these herdsmen is
stronger individually, and yet all of them to-
gether are at least as mobile as is a horde of
huntsmen; while the camel and horse riders
among them are incomparably more mobile.
This greater mass of the best individual ele-
ments is held together by an organization only
possible under the sgis of a slave-holding
patriarchate accustomed to rule, an organiza-
tion prepared and developed by its occupation,
and therefore superior to that of the young
warriors of the huntsmen sworn to the service
of one chief.
Hunters, it may be observed, work best alone
or in small groups. Herdsmen, on the other
44 THE STATE
hand, move to the best advantage in a great
train, in which each individual is best pro-
tected; and which is in every sense an armed
expedition, where every stopping place be-
comes an armed camp. Thus there is de-
veloped a science of tactical maneuvers, strict
subordination, and firm discipline. "One does
not make a mistake," as Ratzel says, "if one
accounts as the disciplinary forces in the life
of the nomads the order of the tents which, in
the same form, exists since most ancient times.
Every one and everything here has a definite,
traditional place ; hence the speed and order in
setting up and in breaking camp, in establish-
ment and in rearrangement. It is unheard
of that any one without orders, or without the
most pressing reason, should change his place.
Thanks to this strict discipline, the tents can
be packed up and loaded away within the space
of an hour." ^^
The same tried order, handed down from
untold ages, regulates the warlike march of
the tribe of herdsmen while on the hunt, in war
and in peaceable wandering. Thus they be-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 45
come professional fighters, irresistible until
the state develops higher and mightier or-
ganizations. Herdsman and warrior become
identical concepts. Ratzel's statement con-
cerning the Central Asiatic Nomads applies
to them all: "The nomad is, as herdsman, an
economic, as warrior, a political concept. It
is easy for him to turn from any activit)^ to
that of the warrior and robber. Everything
in life has for him a pacific and war-like, an
honest and robber-like, side; according to cir-
cumstances, the one or the other of these phases
appears uppermost. Even fishing and navi-
gation, at the hands of the East Caspian
Turkomans, developed into piracy. . . . The
activities of the apparently pacific existence
as a herdsman determine those of the warrior;
the pastoral crook becomes a fighting imple-
ment. In the fall, when the horses return
strengthened from the pasture and the second
cropping of the sheep is completed, the nomads*
minds turn to some feud or robbing expedition
(Baranta, literally, to make cattle, to lift cat-
tle), adjourned to that time. This is an ex-
46 THE STATE
pression of the right of self help, which in con-
tentions over points of law, or in quarrels af-
fecting dignity, or in blood feuds, seeks both
requital and surety in the most valuable things
that the enemy possesses, namely, the animals
of his herd. Young men who have not been
on a haranta must first acquire the name hatir,
hero, and thus earn the claim to honor and re-
spect. The pleasure of ownership joined to
the desire for adventure develops the triple
descending gradation of avenger, hero and
robber." ^^
An identical development takes place with
the sea nomads, the "Vikings," as with the land
nomads. This is quite natural, since in the
most important cases noted in the history of
mankind, sea nomads are simply land nomads
taking to the sea.
We have noted above one of the innumer-
able examples which indicate that the herds-
man does not long hesitate to use for maraud-
ing expeditions, instead of the horse or the
"ship of the desert," the "horses of the sea.'*
This case is exemplified by the East Caspian
GENESIS OF THE STATE 47,
Turkomans. ^^ Another example is furnished
by the Scythians: "From the moment when
they learn from their neighbors the art of navi-
gating the seas, these wandering herdsmen,
whom Homer {Iliad, XIII, 3) calls 'respected
horsemen, milk-eaters and poor, the most just
of men,' change into daring navigators like
their Baltic and Scandinavian brethren.
Strabo (Cas., 301) complains: 'Since they
have ventured on the sea, carrying on piracy
and murdering foreigners, they have become
worse; and associating with many peoples,
they adopt their petty trading and spendthrift
habits.' " ^^
If the Phoenicians really were "Semites,"
they furnish an additional example of incom-
parable importance of the transformation of
land into "sea Bedouins," i. e., warlike rob-
bers; and the same is probably true for the
majority of the numerous peoples who looted
the rich countries around the Mediterranean,
whether from the coast of Asia Minor, Dal-
matia, or from the North African shore.
These begin from the earliest times, as we see
48 THE STATE
from the Egyptian monuments (the Greeks
were not admitted into Egypt ),-^ and con-
tinue to the present day: e. g., the Riff pirates.
The North African "Moors," an amalgama-
tion of Arabs and of Berbers, both originally
land nomads, are perhaps the most celebrated
example of this change.
There are cases in which sea nomads — that
is to say, sea robbers — arise immediately
from fishermen, with no intermediate herdsman
stage. We have already examined the causes
which give the herdsmen their superiority over
the peasantry: the relatively numerous popu-
lation of the horde, combined with an activity
which develops courage and quick resolution
in the individual, and educates the mass as a
whole to tense discipline. All this applies also
to fishermen dwelhng on the sea. Rich fishing
grounds permit a considerable density of popu-
lation, as is shown in the case of the North-
west Indians (Tlinkit, etc.) ; these permit also
the keeping of slaves, since the slave earns
more by fishing than his keep amounts to.
GENESIS OF THE STATE 49
Thus we find, here alone among the redskins,
slavery developed as an institution; and we
find, therefore, along with it, peraianent
economic differences among the freemen, which
result in a sort of plutocracy similar to that
noted among herdsmen. Here, as there, the
habit of command over slaves produces the
habit of rule and a taste for the "political
means." This is favored by the tense disci-
pline developed in navigation. "Not the
least advantage of fishing in common is found
in the discipline of the crews. They must
render implicit obedience to a leader chosen in
each of the larger fishing boats, since every suc-
cess depends upon obedience. The command
of a ship afterward facilitates the com-
mand of the state. We are accustomed to
reckon the Solomon Islanders as complete sav-
ages, and yet their life is subject to one solitary
element, which combines their forces, namelv,
navigation." ^* If the Northwest Indians did
not become such celebrated sea robbers as their
likes in the old world, this is due to the fact
50 THE STATE
that the neighborhoods within their reach had
developed no rich civiHzation ; but all more de-
veloped fishermen carry on piracy.
For this reason, the Vikings have the same
capacity to choose the political means as the
basis of their economic existence as have the
cattle raiders; and similarly they have been
founders of states on a large scale. Here-
after, we shall distinguish the states founded
by them as "sea states," while the states
founded by herdsmen — and in the new world
by hunters — will be called "land states." Sea
states will be treated extensively when we dis-
cuss the consequences of the developed feudal
state. As long, however, as we are discussing
the development of the state, and the primitive
feudal state, we must limit ourselves to the
consideration of the land state and leave the
sea state out of account. This treatment is
convenient, since in all essential things the sea
state has the same characteristics, but its de-
velopment can not be followed through the
various typical stages as can the development
of the land state.
GENESIS OF THE STATE 51
(d) THE GENESIS OF THE STATE
The hordes of huntsmen are mcomparably
weaker, both in numbers and in the strength of
the single fighters, than are the herdsmen with
whom they occasionally brush. Naturally
they can not withstand the impact. They flee
to the highlands and mountains, where the
herdsmen have no inclination to follow them,
not only because of the physical hardships in-
volved, but also because their cattle do not find
pasturage there ; or else they enter into a form
of cliental relation, as happened often in
Africa, especially in very ancient times.
When the Hyksos invaded Egypt, such de-
pendent huntsmen followed them. The hunts-
men usually pay for protection an inconsider-
able tribute in the form of spoils of the chase,
and are used for reconnoitering and watching.
But the huntsman, being a "practical anar-
chist," often invites his own destruction rather
than submit to regular labor. For these rea-
sons, no "state" ever arose from such contact.
The peasants fight as undisciplined levies.
52 THE STATE
and with their single combatants undisciplined ;
so that, in the long run, even though they are
strong in numbers, they are no more able than
are the hunters to withstand the charge of
the heavily armed herdsmen. But the peas-
antry do not flee. The peasant is attached to
his ground, and has been used to regular work.
He remains, yields to subjection, and pays
tribute to his conqueror; that is the genesis of
the land states in the old world.
In the new world, where the larger herding
animals, cattle, horses, camels, were not indig-
enous, we find that instead of the herdsman
the hunter is the conqueror of the peasant,
because of his infinitely superior adroitness in
the use of arms and in military discipline. "In
the old world we found that the contrast of
herdsmen and peasants developed civilization;
in the new world the contrast is between the
sedentary and the roving tribes. Th.e Tol-
tecks, devoted to agriculture, fought wild
tribes (with a highly developed military
organization) breaking in from the north, as
endlessly as did Iran with Turan." ^^
GENESIS OF THE STATE 53
This applies not only to Peru and Mexico,
but to all America, a strong ground for the
opinion that the fundamental basis of civiliza-
tion is the same all over the world, its develop-
ment being consistent and regular under the
most varied economic and geographical condi-
tions. Wherever opportunity offers, and man
possesses the power, he prefers poMtical to
economic means for the presei*vation of his
life. And perhaps this is true not alone of
man, for, according to Maeterlinck's Life of
the Bees, a swarm which has once made the
experiment of obtaining honey from a foreign
hive, by robbery instead of by tedious building,
is thenceforth spoiled for the "economic
means." From working bees, robber bees have
developed.
Leaving out of account the state formations
of the new world, which have no great signifi-
cance in universal history, the cause of the
genesis of all states is the contrast between
peasants and herdsmen, between laborers and
robbers, between bottom lands and prairies.
RatzeL regarding sociology from the geo-
54 THE STATE
graphical view-point, expresses this cleverly:
"It must be remembered that nomads do not
always destroy the opposing civilization of the
settled folk. This applies not only to tribes,
but also to states, even to those of some might.
The war-like character of the nomads is a
great factor in the creation of states. It finds
expression in the immense nations of Asia con-
trolled by nomad dynasties and nomad armies,
such as Persia, ruled by the Turks; China,
conquered and governed by the Mongols and
Manchus; and in the Mongol and Radjaputa
states of India, as well as in the states on
the border of the Soudan, where the amal-
gamation of the formerly hostile elements has
not yet developed so far, although they are
joined together by mutual benefit. In no
place is it shown so clearly as here on the
border of the nomad and peasant peoples, that
the great workings of the impulse making for
civilization on the part of the nomads are not
the result of civilizing activity, but of war-like
exploits at first detrimental to pacific work.
Their importance lies in the capacity of the
GENESIS OF THE STATE 65
nomads to hold together the sedentary races
who otherwise would easily fall apart. This,
however, does not exclude their learning much
from their subjects. . . . Yet all these in-
dustrious and clever folk did not have and
could not have the will and the power to rule,
.the mihtary spirit, and the sense for the order
and subordination that befits a state. For this
reason, the desert-born lords of the Soudan rule
over their negro folk just as the Manchus rule
.their Chinese subjects. This takes place pur-
suant to a law, valid from Timbuctoo to
Pekin, whereby advantageous state formations
arise in rich peasant lands adjoining a wide
prairie; where a high material culture of
.sedentary peoples is violently subjugated to
the service of prairie dwellers having energy,
war-like capacity, and desire to rule." ^^
In the genesis of the state, from the subjec-
-tion of a peasant folk by a tribe of herdsmen or
by sea nomads, six stages may be distinguished.
In the following discussion it should not be
assumed that the actual historical develop-
ment must, in each particular case, climb the
56 THE STATE
entire scale step by step. Although, even
here, the argument does not depend upon bare
theoretical construction, since every particular
stage is found in numerous examples, both in
the world's history and in ethnology, and there
are states which have apparently progressed
through them all. But there are many more
.which have skipped one or more of these stages.
The first stage comprises robbery and kill-
ing in border fights, endless combats broken
neither by peace nor by armistice. It is
marked by killing of men, carrying away of
children and women, looting of herds, and
burning of dwellings. Even if the offenders
are defeated at first, they return in stronger
and stronger bodies, impelled by the duty of
blood feud. Sometimes the peasant group
may assemble, may organize its militia, and
perhaps temporarily defeat the nimble enemy;
but mobilization is too slow and supplies to be
brought into the desert too costly for the peas-
ants. The peasants' militia does not, as does
the enemy, carry its stock of food — its herds —
with it into the field. In Southwest Africa the
GENESIS OF THE STATE 57
Germans recently experienced the difficulties
which a well-disciplined and superior force,
equipped with a supply train, with a railway
reaching back to its base of supply, and with
the miUions of the German Empire behind it,
may have with a handful of herdsmen war-
riors, who were able to give the Germans a
decided setback. In the case of primitive
levies, this difficulty is increased by the narrow
spirit of the peasant, who considers only his
own neighborhood, and by the fact that while
the war is going on the lands are uncultivated.
Therefore, in such cases, in the long run, the
small but compact and easily mobilized body
constantly defeats the greater disjointed mass,
as the panther triumphs over the buffalo.
This is the first stage in the formation of
.states. The state may remain stationary at
this point for centuries, for a thousand years.
The following is a thoroughly characteristic
example :
"Every range of a Turkoman tribe formerly
bordered upon a wide belt which might be
designated as its 'looting district/ Every-
58 THE STATE
thing north and east of Chorassan, though
nominally under Persian dominion, has for
decades belonged more to the Turkomans,
Jomudes, Goklenes, and other tribes of the
bordering plains, than to the Persians. The
Tekinzes, in a similar manner, looted all the
stretches from Kiwa to Bokhara, until other
Turkoman tribes were successfully rounded
up either by force or by corruption to act as
a buffer. Numberless further instances can
be found in the history of the chain of oases
which extends between Eastern and Western
Asia directly through the steppes of its cen-
tral part, where since ancient times the
Chinese have exercised a predominant influ-
ence through their possession of all important
strategic centers, such as the Oasis of Chami.
The nomads, breaking through from north
and south, constantly tried to land on these
islands of fertile ground, which to them must
have appeared like Islands of the Blessed.
And every horde, whether laden down with
booty or fleeing after defeat, was protected by
the plains. Although the most immediate
GENESIS OF THE STATE 50
threats were averted by the continued weaken-
ing of the Mongols, and the actual dominion of
Thibet, yet the last insurrection of the Dun-
ganes showed how easily the waves of a mobile
tribe break over these islands of civilization.
Only after the destruction of the nomads, im-
possible as long as there are open plains in
Central Asia, can their existence be definitely
secured." ^'^
The entire history of the old world is replete
with well-known instances of mass expeditions,
which must be assigned to the first stage of
state development, inasmuch as they were
intent, not upon conquest, but directly on loot-
ing. Western Europe suffered through these
expeditions at the hands of the Celts, Germans,
Huns, Avars, Arabs, Magyars, Tartars, Mon-
golians and Turks by land; while the Vikings
and the Saracens harassed it on the waterways.
These hordes inundated entire continents far
beyond the hmits of their accustomed looting
ground. They disappeared, returned, were
absorbed, and left behind them onlv wasted
lands. In many cases, however, they advanced
60 THE STATE
in some part of the inundated district directly
to the sixth and last stage of state formation,
in cases namely, where they established a per-
manent dominion over the peasant population.
Ratzel describes these mass migrations ex-
cellently in the following:
"The expeditions of the great hordes of
nomads contrast with this movement, drop by
drop and step by step, since they overflow
with tremendous power, especially Central
Asia and all neighboring countries. The
nomads of this district, as of Arabia and
Northern Africa, unite mobility in their way of
life with an organization holding together their
entire mass for one single object. It seems to
be a characteristic of the nomads that they
easily develop despotic power and far-reach-
ing might from the patriarchal cohesion of the
tribe. Mass governments thereby come into
being, which compare with other movements
among men in the same way that swollen
streams compare with the steady but diffused
flow of a tributary. The history of China,
India, and Persia, no less than that of Europe,
GENESIS OF THE STATE 61
shows their historical importance. Just as
they moved about on their ranges with their
wives and children, slaves and carts, herds and
all their paraphernaha, so they inundated the
borderlands. While this ballast may have de-
prived them of speed it increased their mo-
mentum. The frightened inhabitants were
driven before them, and like a wave they rolled
over the conquered countries, absorbing their
wealth. Since they carried everything with
them, their new abodes were equipped with all
their possessions, and thus their final settle-
ments were of an ethnograj)hic importance.
After this manner, the Magyars flooded Hun-
gary, the Manchus invaded China, the Turks,
the countries from Persia to the Adriatic." ^^
What has been said here of Hamites, Sem-
ites and Mongolians, may be said also, at least
in part, of the Arian tribes of herdsmen. It
applies also to the true negroes, at least to
those who live entirely from their herds:
"The mobile, warlike tribes of the Kafirs pos-
sess a power of expansion which needs only
an enticing object in order to attain violent
62 THE STATE
effects and to overturn the ethnologic relations
of vast districts. Eastern Africa offers such
an object. Here the climate did not forbid
stock raising, as in the countries of the interior,
and did not paralyze from the start, the power
of impact of the nomads, while nevertheless
numerous peaceable agricultural peoples found
room for their development. Wandering
tribes of Kafirs poured like devastating
streams into the fruitful lands of the Zambesi,
and up to the highlands between the Tan-
ganyika and the coast. Here they met the
advance guard of the Watusi, a wave of
Hamite eruption, coming from the north.
The former inhabitants of these districts were
either exterminated, or as serfs cultivated the
lands which they formerly owned ; or they still
continued to fight ; or again, they remained un-
disturbed in settlements left on one side by the
stream of conquest." ^^
All this has taken place before our eyes.
Some of it is still going on. During many
thousands of years it has "jarred all Eastern
Africa from the Zambesi to the Mediter-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 63
ranean." The incursion of the Hyksos,
whereby for over five hundred years Egypt
was subject to the shepherd tribes of the east-
ern and northern deserts — "kinsmen of the
peoples who up to the present day herd their
stock between the Nile and the Red Sea" ^^ — ■
is the first authenticated foundation of a state.
These states were followed by many others
both in the country of the Nile itself, and
farther southward, as far as the Empire of
Muata Jamvo on the southern rim of the cen-
tral Congo district, which Portuguese traders
in Angola reported as early as the end of the
sixteenth century, and down to the Empire
of Uganda, which only in our own day has
finally succumbed to the superior military or-
ganization of Europe. "Desert land and
civilization never lie peaceably alongside one
another ; but their battles are all alike and full
of repetitions." ^^
"Alike and full of repetitions" ! That may
be said of universal history on its basic lines.
The human ego in its fundamental aspect is
much the same all the world over. It acts uni-
64 THE STATE
formly, in obedience to the same influences of
its environment, with races of all colors, in all
parts of the earth, in the tropics as in the tem-
perate zones. One must step back far enough
and choose a point of view so high that the
variegated aspect of the details does not hide
the great movements of the mass. In such a
case, our eye misses the "mode" of fighting,
wandering, laboring humanity, while its "sub-
stance," ever similar, ever new, ever enduring
through change, reveals itself under uniform
laws.
Gradually, from this first stage, there de-
velops the second, in which the peasant,
through thousands of unsuccessful attempts at
revolt, has accepted his fate and has ceased
every resistance. About this time, it begins
to dawn on the consciousness of the wild herds-
man that a murdered peasant can no longer
plow, and that a fruit tree hacked down will
no longer bear. In his own interest, then,
wherever it is possible, he lets the peasant live
and the tree stand. The expedition of the
herdsmen comes just as before, every member
GENESIS OF THE STATE 65
"bristling with arms, but no longer intending
nor expecting war and violent appropriation.
The raiders burn and kill only so far as is
necessary to enforce a wholesome respect, or
to break an isolated resistance. But in gen-
eral, principally in accordance with a develop-
ing customary right — the first germ of the
development of all public law — the herdsman
now appropriates only the surplus of the peas-
ant. That is to say, he leaves the peasant his
house, his gear and his provisions up to the
next crop.* The herdsman in the first stage
is like the bear, who for the purpose of robbing
the beehive, destroys it. In the second stage
he is like the bee-keeper, who leaves the bees
enough honey to carry them through the
winter.
Great is the progress between the first stage
and the second. Long is the forward step,
* Ratzel, 1. c. II, page 393, in speaking of the Arabs says:
"The difficulty of nourishing slaves makes it impossible to
keep them. Vast populations are kept in subjection and de-
prived of everj^thing beyond the necessaries for maintaining
lif& They turn entire oases into demesne lands, visited at the
harvest time in order to rob the inhabitants; a domination
characteristic of the desert."
66 THE STATE
both economically and politically. In the be-
ginning, as we have seen, the acquisition by
the tribe of herdsmen was purely an occupy-
ing one. Regardless of consequences, they de-
stroyed the source of future wealth for the en-
joyment of the moment. Henceforth the ac-
quisition becomes economical, because all
economy is based on wise housekeeping, or in
other words, on restraining the enjoyment of
the moment in view of the needs of the future.
The herdsman has learned to "capitalize." It
is a vast step forward in politics when an ut-
terly strange human being, prey heretofore
like the wild animals, obtains a value and is
recognized as a source of wealth. Although
this is the beginning of all slavery, subjuga-
tion, and exploitation, it is at the same time
the genesis of a higher form of society, that
reaches out beyond the family based upon
blood relationship. We saw how, between the
robbers and the robbed, the first threads of a
jural relation were spun across the cleft which
separated those who had heretofore been only
*'mortal enemies." The peasant thus obtains
GENESIS OF THE STATE 67
a semblance of right to the bare necessaries of
life; so that it comes to be regarded as wrong
to kill an unresisting man or to strip him of
everything.
And better than this, gradually more deli-
cate and softer threads are woven into a net
very thin as yet, but which, nevertheless, brings
about more human relations than the cus-
tomary arrangement of the division of spoils.
Since the herdsmen no longer meet the peas-
ants in combat only, they are likely now to
grant a respectful request, or to remedy a well
grounded grievance. "The categorical im-
perative" of equity, "Do to others as you
would have them do unto you," had heretofore
ruled the herdsmen only in their dealings with
their own tribesmen and kind. Now for the
first time it begins to speak, shyly whispering
in behalf of those who are alien to blood re-
lationship. In this, we find the germ of that
magnificent process of external amalgamation
which, out of small hordes, has formed nations
and unions of nations ; and which, in the future
is to give life to the concept of "humanity."
68 THE STATE
We find also the germ of the internal unifica^
tion of tribes once separated, from which, in
place of the hatred of "barbarians," will come
the all comprising love of hmnanity, of Chris-
tianity and Buddhism.
The moment when first the conqueror-
spared his victim in order permanently to ex-
ploit him in productive work, was of incom-
parable historical importance. It gave birth
to nation and state, to right and the higher
economics, with all the developments and rami-
fications which have grown and which will
hereafter grow out of them. The root of
everything human reaches down into the dark
soil of the animal — love and art, no less than
state, justice and economics.
Still another tendency knots yet more closely
these psychic relations. To return to the com-
parison of the herdsman and the bear, there are
in the desert, beside the bear who guards the
bees, other bears who also lust after honey.
But our tribe of herdsmen blocks their way,
and protects its beehives by force of arms.
The peasants become accustomed, when dan-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 69
ger threatens, to call on the herdsmen, whom
they no longer regard as robbers and murder-
ers, but as protectors and saviors. Imagine
the joy of the peasants when the returning
band of avengers brings back to the village the
looted women and children, with the enemies'
heads or scalps. These ties are no longer
threads, but strong and knotted bands.
Here is one of the principal forces of that
''integration," whereby in the further develop-
ment, those originally not of the same blood,
and often enough of different groups speak-
ing different languages, will in the end be
welded together into one people, with one
speech, one custom, and one feeling of nation-
ality. This unity grows by degrees from com-
mon suffering and need, common victory
and defeat, common rejoicing and common
sorrow. A new and vast domain is open when
master and slave serve the same interests ; then
arises a stream of sympathy, a sense of com-
mon service. Both sides apprehend, and
gradually recognize, each other's common hu-
manity. Gradually the points of similarity
70 THE STATE
are sensed, in place of the differences in build
and apparel, of language and religion, which
had heretofore brought about only antipathy
and hatred. Gradually they learn to under-
stand one another, first through a common
speech, and then through a common mental
habit. The net of the psychical inter-rela-
tions becomes stronger.
In this second stage of the formation of
states, the ground work, in its essentials, has
been mapped out. 'No further step can be
compared in importance to the transition
whereby the bear becomes a bee-keeper. For
this reason, short references must suffice.
The third stage arrives when the "surplus"
obtained by the peasantry is brought by them
regularly to the tents of the herdsmen as "trib-
ute," a regulation which affords to both
parties self-evident and considerable advan-
tages. By this means, the peasantry is re-
lieved entirely from the little irregularities
connected with the former method of taxation,
such as a few men knocked on the head, women
violated, or farmhouses burned down. The
GENESIS OF THE STATE 71
herdsmen on the other hand, need no longer
apply to this "business" any "expense" and
labor, to use a mercantile expression ; and they
devote the time and energy thus set free to-
ward an "extension of the works," in other
words, to subjugating other peasants.
This form of tribute is found in many well-
known instances in history: Huns, Magyars,
Tartars, Turks, have derived their largest in-
come from their European tributes. Some-
times the character of the tribute paid by the
subjects to their master is more or less blurred,
and the act assumes the guise of payment for
protection, or indeed, of a subvention. The
tale is well known whereby Attila was pic-
tured by the weakling emperor at Constanti-
nople as a vassal prince; while the tribute he
paid to the Hun appeared as a fee.
The fourth stage, once more, is of very great
importance, since it adds the decisive factor in
the development of the state, as we are accus-
tomed to see it, namely, the union on one strip
of land of both ethnic groups.* (It is well
* There is apparently in the case of the Fulbe, a transition
72 THE STATE
known that no jural definition of a state can
be arrived at without the concept of state terri-
tory.) From now on, the relation of the two
groups, which was originally international,
gradually becomes more and more intra-
national.
This territorial union may be caused by
foreign influences. It may be that stronger
hordes have crowded the herdsmen forward, or
that their increase in population has reached
the limit set by the nutritive capacity of the
steppes or prairies; it may be that a great
cattle plague has forced the herdsmen to ex-
stage between the first three stages and the fourth, in which
dominion is exercised half internationally and half intra-
nationally. According to Ratzel (1. c. II, page 419):
"Like a cuttle-fish, the conquering race stretches niunerous
arms hither and thither among the terrified aborigines, whose
lack of cohesion afi'ords plenty of gaps. Thus the Fulbe
are slowly flowing into the Benue countries and quite grad-
ually permeating them. Later observers have thus quite rightly
abstained from assigning definite boundaries. There are many
scattered Fulbe localities which look to a particular place as
their center and as the center of their power. Thus Muri
is the capital of the numerous Fulbe settlements scattered
about the Middle Benue, and the position of Gola is similar
in the Adamawa district. As yet there are no proper king-
doms with defined frontiers against each other and against
independent tribes. Even these capitals are in other respects
still far from being firmly settled."
GENESIS OF THE STATE 73
change the unhmited scope of the prairies for
the narrows of some river valley. In general,
however, internal causes alone suffice to bring
it about that the herdsmen stay in the neigh-
borhood of their peasants. The duty of pro-
tecting their tributaries against other "bears"
forces them to keep a levy of young warriors in
the neighborhood of their subjects; and this
is at the same time an excellent measure of de-
fense since it prevents the peasants from giv-
ing way to a desire to break their bonds, or to
let some other herdsmen become their over-
lords. This latter occurrence is by no means
rare, since, if tradition is correct, it is the means
whereby the sons of Rurik came to Russia.
As yet the local juxtaposition does not mean
a state community in its narrowest sense; that
is to say, a unital organization.
In case the herdsmen are dealing with ut-
terly unwarlike subjects, they carry on their
nomad life, peaceably wandering up and down
and herding their cattle among their perioike
and helots. This is the case with the light-
colored Wahuma,^^ "the handsomest men of
74 THE STATE
the world" (Kandt), in Central Africa, or the
Tuareg clan of the Hadanara of the Asgars,
"who have taken up their seats among the Im-
rad and have become wandering freebooters.
These Imrad are the serving class of the As-
gars, who live on them, although the Imrad
could put into the field ten times as many war-
riors; the situation is analogous to that of the
Spartans in relation to their Helots." ^^ The
same may be said of the Teda among the
neighboring Borku: "Just as the land is di-
vided into a semi-desert supporting the no-
mads, and gardens with date groves, so the
population is divided between nomads and set-
tled folk. Although about equal in number,
ten to twelve thousand altogether, it goes with-
out saying that these latter are subject to the
others." ^^
And the same applies to the entire group of
herdsmen known as the Galla Masi and Wa-
huma. "Although differences in possessions
are considerable, they have few slaves, as a
serving class. These are represented by
peoples of a lower caste, who live separate and
GENESIS OF THE STATE 75
apart from them. It is herdsmanship which is
the basis of the family, of the state, and along
with these of the principle of political evolu-
tion. In this wide territory, between Scehoa
and its southernmost boundaries, on the one
hand, and Zanzibar on the other, there is found
no strong political power, in spite of the highly
developed social articulation." ^^
In case the country is not adapted to herd-
ing cattle on a large scale — as was universally
the case in Western Europe — or where a less
unwarlike population might make attempts at
insurrection, the crowd of lords becomes more
or less permanently settled, taking either steep
places or strategically important points for
their camps, castles, or towns. From these
centers, they control their "subjects," mainly
for the purpose of gathering their tribute, pay-
ing no attention to them in other respects.
They let them administer their affairs, carry
on their religious worship, settle their disputes,
and adjust their methods of internal economy.
Their autochthonous constitution, their local
officials, are, in fact, not interfered ^vith.
76 THE STATE
If Frants Buhl reports correctly, that was
the beginning of the rule of the Israelites in
Canaan.^^ Abyssinia, that great military
force, though at the first glance it may appear
to be a fully developed state, does not, how-
ever, seem to have advanced beyond the fourth
stage. At least Ratzel states: "The prin-
cipal care of the Abyssinians consists in the
tribute, in which they follow the method of
oriental monarchs in olden and modern times,
which is not to interfere with the internal man-
agement and administration of justice of their
subject peoples." ^"^
The best example of the fourth stage is
found in the situation in ancient Mexico before
the Spanish conquest: "The confederation
under the leadership of the Mexicans had
somewhat more progressive ideas of conquest.
Only those tribes were wiped out that offered
resistance. In other cases, the vanquished
were merely plundered, and then required to
pay tribute. The defeated tribe governed it-
self just as before, through its own officials.
It was different in Peru, where the formation
GENESIS OF THE STATE 77
of a compact empire followed the first attack.
In Mexico, intimidation and exploitation were
the only aims of the conquest. And so it came
about that the so-called Empire of Mexico at
the time of the conquest represented merely a
group of intimidated Indian tribes, whose fed-
eration with one another was prevented by
their fear of plundering expeditions from some
unassailable fort in their midst." ^^ It will be
observed that one can not speak of this as a
state in any proper sense. Ratzel shows this
in the note following the above : "It is certain
that the various points held in subjection by
the warriors of Montezuma were separated
from one another by stretches of territory not
yet conquered. A condition very like the rule
of the Hova in Madagascar. One would not
say that scattering a few garrisons, or better
still, military colonies, over the land, is a mark
of absolute dominion, since these colonies, with
great trouble, maintain a strip of a few miles
in subjection." ^^
The logic of events presses quickly from the
fourth to the fifth stage, and fashions almost
78 THE STATE
completely the full state. Quarrels arise be-
tween neighboring villages or clans, which the
lords no longer permit to be fought out, since
by this the capacity of the peasants for service
would be impaired. The lords assume the
right to arbitrate, and in case of need, to en-
force their judgment. In the end, it happens
that at each "court" of the village king or chief
of the clan there is an official deputy who ex-
ercises the power, while the chiefs are per-
mitted to retain the appearance of authority.
The state of the Incas shows, in a primitive
condition, a typical example of this arrange-
ment.
Here we find the Incas united at Cuzco
where they had their patrimonial lands and
dwellings.*^ A representative of the Incas, the
Tucricuc, however, resided in every district at
the court of the native chieftain. He " had
supervision over all affairs of his district; he
raised the troops, superintended the delivery
of the tribute, ordered the forced labor on
roads and bridges, superintended the adminis-
GENESIS OF THE STATE 79
tration of justice, and in short supervised
everything in his district." ^^
The same institutions which have been de-
veloped by American huntsmen and Semite
shepherds are found also among African
herdsmen. In Ashanti, the system of the Tuc-
ricuc has been developed in a typical fashion ; *^
and the Dualla have established for their sub-
jects living in segregated villages "an institu-
tion based on conquest midway between a
feudal system and slavery." ^^ The same
author reports that the Barotse have a consti-
tution corresponding to the earliest stage of
the mediaeval feudal organization : "Their vil-
lages are ... as a rule surrounded by a cir-
cle of hamlets where their serfs live. These
till the fields of their lords in the immediate
neighborhood, grow grain, or herd the
cattle." ^^ The only thing that is not typical
here consists in this, that the lords do not live
in isolated castles or halls, but are settled in
villages among their subjects.
It is only a very small step from the Incas to
80 THE STATE
the Dorians in Lacedasmon, Messenia, or
Crete; and no greater distance separates the
Fulbe, Dualla and Barotse from the compar-
atively rigidly organized feudal states of the
African Negi'o Empires of Uganda, Unyoro,
etc. ; and the corresponding feudal empires of
Eastern and Western Europe and of all Asia.
In all places, the same results are brought
about by force of the same socio-psychological
causes. The necessity of keeping the subjects
in order and at the same time of maintaining
them at their full capacity for labor, leads step
by step from the fifth to the sixth stage, in
which the state, by acquiring full intra-nation-
ality and by the evolution of "Nationality," is
developed in every sense. The need becomes
more and more frequent to interfere, to allay
difficulties, to punish, or to coerce obedience;
and thus develop the habit of rule and the
usages of government. The two groups, sep-
arated, to begin with, and then united on one
territory, are at first merely laid alongside one
another, then are scattered through one an-
other like a mechanical mixture, as the term is
GENESIS OF THE STATE 81
used in chemistry, until gradually they become
more and more of a "chemical combination."
They intermingle, unite, amalgamate to unity,
in customs and habits, in speech and worship.
Soon the bonds of relationship unite the upper
and the lower strata. In nearly all cases the
master class picks the handsomest virgins from
the subject races for its concubines. A race
of bastards thus develops, sometimes taken
into the ruling class, sometimes rejected, and
then because of the blood of the masters in
their veins, becoming the born leaders of the
subject race. In form and in content the
primitive state is completed.
CHAPTER III
THE PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE
(a) THE FORM OF DOMINION
Its form is domination; the dominion of a
small warlike minority, interrelated and
closely allied, over a definitely bounded terri-
tory and its cultivators. Gradually, custom
develops some form of law in accordance with
which this dominion is exercised. This law
regulates the rights of primacy and the claims
of the lords, and the duty of obedience and of
service on the part of the subjects, in such wise
that the capacity of the peasants for render-
ing service is not impaired. This word, praes-
tationsfaehigkeit, dates from the reforms of
Frederick the Great. The "bee-keepership,"
therefore, is governed by the law of custom.
The duty of paying and working on the part.
of the peasants corresponds to the duty of pre-
ss
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 83
tection on the part of the lords, who ward off
exactions of their own companions, as well as
defend the peasants from the attacks of for-
eign enemies.
Although this is one part of the content of
the state concept, there is another, which in the
beginning is of much greater magnitude; the
idea of economic exploitation, the political
means for the satisfaction of needs. The
peasant surrenders a portion of the product of
his labor, without any equivalent service in re-
turn. ''In the beginning was the ground
rent''
The forms under which the ground rent is
collected or consumed vary. In some cases,
the lords, as a closed union or community, are
settled in some fortified camp and consume as
communists the tribute of their peasantry.
This is the situation in the state of the Inca.
In some cases, each individual warrior-noble
has a definite strip of land assigned to him : but
generally the produce of this is still, as in
Sparta, consumed in the "syssitia," by class
associates and companions in arms. In some
84 THE STATE
cases, the landed nobility scatters over the
entire territory, each man housed with his
following in his fortified castle, and consum-
ing, each for himself, the produce of his do-
minion or lands. As yet these nobles have not
become landlords, in the sense that they ad-
minister their property. Each of them re-
ceives tribute from the labor of his dependents,
whom he neither guides nor supervises. This
is the type of the mediseval dominion in the
lands of the Germanic nobility. Finally, the
knight becomes the owner and administrator
of the knight's fee.* His former serfs de-
velop into the laborers on his plantation, and
the tribute now appears as the profit of the
entrepreneur. This is the type of the earliest
capitalist enterprise of modern times, the ex-
ploitation of large territories in the lands east
of the Elbe, formerly occupied by Slavs and
* Rittergutshesitz is the ultimate molecule of the Ger-
man feudal system, a non-urban territory, approximating the
concept of knight's fee in the Angevin fiscal legislation; in
modern Germanic law, the possession of an acreage, alienable
only as an entity, and by recent legislation, alienable to non-
nobles, but subject to and capable oi certain exceptions in
law not inhering in other forms of real estate. — Translator.
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 85
later colonized by Germans. Numerous tran-
sitions lead from one stage to the other.
But always, in its essence, is the "State" the
same. Its purpose, in every case, is found to
be the political means for the satisfaction of
needs. At first, its method is by exacting a
ground rent, so long as there exists no trade
activity the products of which can be appro-
priated. Its form, in every case, is that of
dominion, whereby exploitation is regarded as
"justice," maintained as a "constitution," in-
sisted on strictly, and in case of need en-
forced with cruelty. And yet, in these ways,
the absolute right of the conqueror becomes
narrowed within the confines of law, for
the sake of permitting the continuous acquisi-
tion of ground rents. The duty of furnishing
supplies on the part of the subjects is limited
by their right to maintain themselves in good
condition. The right of taxation on the part
of the lords is supplemented by their duty to
afford protection within and without the state
— security under the law and defense of the
frontier.
86 THE STATE
At this point, the primitive state is com-
pletely developed in all its essentials. It has
passed the embryonic condition; v^^hatever fol-
lows can be only phenomena of growth.
As compared with unions of families, the
state represents, doubtless, a much higher
species ; since the state embraces a greater mass
of men, in closer articulation, more capable
of conquering nature and of warding off
enemies. It changes the half playful occupa-
tions of men into strict methodic labor, and
thus brings untold misery to innumerable gen-
erations yet unborn. Henceforth, these must
eat their bread in the sweat of their brow,
since the golden age of the free community of
blood relations has been followed by the iron
rule of state dominion. But the state, by dis-
covering labor in its proper sense, starts in this
world that force which alone can bring about
the golden age on a much higher plane of eth-
ical relation and of happiness for all. The
state, to use Schiller's words, destroys the un-
tutored happiness of the people while they
were children, in order to bring them along
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 87
a sad path of suffering to the conscious happi-
ness of maturity.
A higher species ! Paul von Lilienf eld, one
of the principal advocates of the view that so-
ciety is an organism of a higher kind, has
pointed out that in this respect an especially
striking parallel can be di'awn between ordi-
nary organisms and this super-organism. All
higher beings propagate sexually; lower be-
ings asexually, by partition, by budding and
sometimes by conjugation. We have shown
that simple partition corresponds exactly to
the growth and the further development of the
association based on blood relationship, which
existed before the state. This grows until it
becomes too large for cohesion ; it then loses its
unity, divides, and the separate hordes, if they
associate at all, remain in a very loose connec-
tion, without any sort of closer articulation.
The amalgamation of exogamic groups is com-
parable to conjugation.
The state, however, comes into being
through seooual propagation. All bisexual
propagation is accomplished by the following
88 THE STATE
process : The male element, a small, very act-
ive, mobile, vibrating cell — the spermatozoon
— searches out a large inactive cell without
mobility of its own — the ovum, or female prin-
ciple — enters and fuses with it. From this
process, there results an immense growth ; that
is to say, a wonderful differentiation with
simultaneous integration. The inactive peas-
antry, bound by nature to their fields, is the
ovum, the mobile tribe of herdsmen the sper-
matozoon, of this sociologic act of fecundation ;
and its resultant is the ripening of a higher so-
cial organism more fully differentiated in its
organs, and much more complete in its integra-
tions. It is easy to find further parallels.
One may compare the border feuds to the
manner in which innumerable spermatozoa
swarm about the ovum until finally one, the
strongest or most fortunate, discovers and con-
quers the micropyle. One may compare the
almost magical attraction which the ovum has
for the spermatozoon, to the no less magical
power by which the herdsmen from the steppes
are drawn into the cultivated plains.
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 89
But all this is no proof for the "organism."
The problem, however, has been pointed out.
(b) THE INTEGRATION
We have followed the genesis of the state,
from its second stage onward, in its objective
growth as a political and jural form with eco-
nomic content. But it is far more important
to examine its subjective growth, its socio-
psychological "differentiation and integra-
tion," since all sociology is nearly always social
psychology. First, then, let us discuss inte-
gration.
We saw in the second stage, as set forth
above, how the net of psychical relations be-
comes ever tighter and closer enmeshed, as the
economic amalgamation advances. The two
dialects become one language; or one of the
two, often of an entirely different stock from
the other, becomes extinct. This, in some
cases, is the language of the victors, but
more frequently that of the vanquished.
Both cults amalgamate to one religion, in
which the tribal god of the conquerors is
90 THE STATE
adored as the principal divinity, while the
old gods of the vanquished become either
his servants, or, as demons or devils, his adver-
saries. The bodily type tends to assimilate,
through the influence of the same climate and
similar mode of living. Where a strong dif-
ference between the types existed or is main-
tained,*^ the bastards, to a certain extent, fill
the gap — so that, in spite of the still existing
ethnic contrast, everybody, more and more, be-
gins to feel that the type of the enemies beyond
the border is more strange, more "foreign"
than is the new co-national type. Lords and
subjects view one another as "we," at least as
concerns the enemy beyond the border ; and at
length the memory of the diiferent origin
completely disappears. The conquerors are
held to be the sons of the old gods. This, in
many cases, they literally are, since these gods
are nothing but the souls of their ancestors
raised to godhead by apotheosis.
Since the new "states" are much more ag-
gressive than the former communities bound
together by mere blood relationship, the feeling
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 91
of being different from the foreigner be^^ond
the borders, growing in frequent feuds and
wars, becomes stronger and stronger among
those within the "realm of peace." And in the
same measure there grows among them the
feehng of belonging to another; so that the
spirit of fraternity and of equity, which for-
merly existed only within the horde and which
never ceased to hold sway within the associa-
tion of nobles, takes root everywhere, and more
and more finds its place in the relations be-
tween the lords and their subjects.
At first these relations are manifested only
in infrequent cases: equity and fraternity are
allowed only such play as is consistent with the
right to use the political means ; but that much
is granted. A far stronger bond of psychical
community between high and low, more potent
than any success against foreign invasion, is
woven by legal protection against the aggres-
sion of the mighty. ^'Justitia fundainentum
regnorum/' When, pursuant to their own
ideals of justice, the aristocrats as a social
group execute one of their own class for
92 THE STATE
murder or robbery, for having exceeded the
bounds of permitted exploitation, the thanks
and the joy of the subjects are even more heart-
felt than after victory over ahen foes.
These, then, are the principal lines of de-
velopment of the psychical integration. Com-
mon interest in maintaining order and law and
peace produce a strong feeling of solidarity,
which may be called "a consciousness of be-
longing to the same state."
(c) THE differentiation: group theories
AND GROUP PSYCHOLOGY
On the other hand, as in all organic growth,
there develops pari passu a psychic differenti-
ation just as powerful. The interests of the
group produce strong group feelings; the
upper and lower strata develop a "class con-
sciousness" corresponding to their pecuhar in-
terests.
The separate interest of the master group
is served by maintaining intact the imposed
law of political means ; such interest makes for
"conservatism." The interest of the subject
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 93
group, on the contrary, points to the removal
of the prevaiHng rule, to the substitution for
it of a new rule, the law of equality for all in-
habitants of the state, and makes for "liberal-
ism" and revolution.
Herein lies the tap root of all class and
party psychology. Hence there develop, in
accordance with definite psychological laws,
those incomparably mighty forms of thought
which, as "class theories," through thousands of
years of struggle guide and justify every so-
cial contest in the consciousness of contempor-
aries.
"When the will speaks reason has to be
silent," says Schopenhauer, or as Ludwig
Gumplowicz states the same idea, "Man acts
in accordance with laws of nature, as an after-
thought he thinks humanly." Man's will
being strictly "determined," he must act ac-
cording to the pressure which the surrounding
world exerts upon him; and the same law is
valid for every community of men: groups,
classes, and the state itself. They "flow from
the plane of higher economic and social pres-
94 THE STATE
sure to that of lower pressure, along the line
of least resistance." But every individual and
each community of men believe themselves free
agents; and therefore, by an unescapable
psychical law they are forced to consider the
path they are traversing as a freely chosen
means, and the point toward which they are
driven as a freely chosen end. And since man
is a rational and ethical being, that is, a social
entity, he is obliged to justify before reason
and morality the method and the objective
point of his movement, and to take account of
the social consciousness of his time.
So long as the relations of both groups were
simply those of internationally opposed border
enemies, the exercise of the political means
called for no justification, because a man of
alien blood had no rights. As soon, however,
as the psychic integration develops, in any de-
gree, the community feeling of state conscious-
ness, as soon as the bond servant acquires
"rights," and the consciousness of essential
equality percolates through the mass, the polit-
ical means requires a system of justification;
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 95
and there arises in the ruling class the group
theory of "legitimacy."
Everywhere, the upholders of legitimacy
justify dominion and exploitation with similar
anthropological and theological reasoning.
The master group, since it recognizes bravery
and warlike efficiency as the only virtues of a
man, declares itself, the victors, — and from its
standpoint quite correctly — to be the more ef-
ficient, the better "race." This point of view
is the more intensified, the lower the subject
race is reduced by hard labor and low fare.
And since the tribal god of the ruling group
has become the supreme god in the new amal-
gamated state religion, this religion declares —
and again from its view-point quite correctly —
that the constitution of the state has been de-
creed by heaven, that it is "tabu," and that
interference with it is sacrilege. In con-
sequence, therefore, of a simple logical inver-
sion, the exploited or subject group is re-
garded as an essentially inferior race, as un-
ruly, tricky, lazy, cowardly and utterly incap-
able of self-rule or self-defense, so that any up-
96 THE STATE
rising against the imposed dominion must nec-
essarily appear as a revolt against God Him-
self and against His moral ordinances. For
these reasons, the dominant group at all times
stands in closest union with the priesthood,
which, in its highest positions, at least, nearly
always recruits itself from their sons, sharing
their political rights and economic privileges.
This has been, and is at this day, the class
theory of the ruling group; nothing has been
taken from it, not an item has been added to it.
Even the very modern argument by which, for
example, the landed nobility of old France and
of modern Prussia attempted to put out of
court the claims of the peasantry to the owner-
ship of lands, on the allegation that they had
owned the land from time immemorial, while
their peasants had only been granted a life
tenure therein, — is reproduced among the Wa-
huma, of Africa,^^ and probably could be
shown in many other instances.
Like their class theory, their class psy-
chology has been, and is, at all times the same.
Its most important characteristic, the "aristo-
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 97
crat's pride," shows itself in contempt for the
lower laboring strata. This is so inherent,
that herdsmen, even after they have lost their
herds and become economically dependent, still
retain their pride as former lords: "Even the
Galla, who have been despoiled of their wealth
of herds by the Somali north of the Tana, and
who thus have become watchers of other men's
herds, and even in some cases along the Sabaki
become peasants, still look wdth contempt upon
the peasant Watokomo, who are subject to
them and resemble the SuaheU. But their at-
titude is quite different toward their tributary
hunting peoples, namely, the Waboni, the
Wassanai, and the Walangulo (Ariangulo)
who resemble the Galla." ^'
The following description of the Tibbu
applies, as though it had been originally told
of them, to Walter Havenaught and the rest of
the poor knights who, in the crusades, looked
for booty and lordly domain. It applies no
less to many a noble fighting cock from Ger-
many east of the Elbe, and to many a ragged
Polish gentleman. "They are men full of self-
98 THE STATE
consciousness. They may be beggars, but
they are no pariahs. Many a people under
these circumstances would be thoroughly
miserable and depressed; the Tibbu have steel
in their nature. They are splendidly fitted
to be robbers, warriors, and rulers. Even their
system of robbery is imposing, although it is
base as a jackal's. These ragged Tibbus,
fighting against extreme poverty and con-
stantly on the verge of starvation, raise the
most impudent claims with apparent or real
belief in their validity. The right of the
jackal, which regards the possessions of a
stranger as conmion property, is the protec-
tion of greedy men against want. The inse-
curity of an all but perpetual state of war
brings it about that life becomes an insistent
challenge, and at the same time the reward of
extortion! " ^^ This phenomenon is in nowise
limited to Eastern Africa, for it is said of the
Abyssinian soldier : " Thus equipped he
comes along. Proudly he looks down on
every one : his is the land, and for him the peas-
ant must work." ^®
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 99
Deeply as the aristocrat at all times despises
the economic means and the peasants who em-
ploy it, he admits frankly his reliance on the
political means. Honest war and "honest
thievery" * are his occupation as a lord, are his
good right. His right — except pver those who
belong to the same clique — extends just as far
as his power. One finds this high praise of the
political means nowhere so well stated as in
the well-known Doric drinking song:
"I have great treasures; the spear and the sword;
Wherewith to guard my body, the bull hide shield
well tried.
With these I can plough, and harvest my crop, «
With these I can garner the sweet grape wine.
By them I bear the name 'Lord' with my serfs.
"But these never dare to bear spear and sword.
Still less the guard of the body, the bull hide shield
well tried.
They lie at my feet stretched out on the ground,
My hand is licked by them as by hounds,
I am their Persian king — terrifying them by my
name." '"
In these wanton lines is expressed the pride
* Compare this with the prevalent justification of "honest
graft" in municipal or political contracts. — Translator.
100 THE STATE
of warlike lords. The following verses, taken
from an entirely different phase of civilization,
show that the robber still has part in the war-
rior in spite of Christianity, the Peace of God,
and the Holy Roman Empire of the German
Nation. These lines also praise the political
means, but in its most crude form, simple rob-
bery:
"Would you eke out your life, my young noble squire,
Follow then my teaching, upon your horse and join
the gang!
Take to the greenwood, when the peasant comes up,
Run him down quickly, grab him then by the collar.
Rejoice in your heart, taking from him whatever he has.
Unharness his horses and get you away ! " °^
"Unless," as Sombart adds, "he preferred
to hunt nobler game and to relieve merchants
of their valuable consignments. The nobles
carried on robbery as a natural method of sup-
plementing their earnings, extending it more
and more as the income from their property no
longer sufficed to pay for the increasing de-
mands of daily consumption and luxury. The
system of freebooting was considered a
thoroughly honorable occupation, since it met
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 101
the demand of the essence of chivahy, that
every one should appropriate whatever was
within reach of his spear point or of the blade
of his sword. The nobles learned freebooting
as the cobbler was brought up to his trade.
The ballad has put this in merry wise :
"To pillage, to rob, that is no shame.
The best in the land do quite the same."
Besides this principal point of the "squire-
archical" psychology, a second distinguishing
mark scarcely less characteristic is found in the
piety of these folk whether it be of conviction
or merely strongly accentuated in public.
It seems as though the same social ideas
always force identical characteristics on the rul-
ing class. This is illustrated by the form un-
der which God, in their view, appears as their
special National God and preponderatingly as
a God of War. Although they profess God
as the creator of all men, even of their enemies,
and since Christianity, as the God of Love, this
does not counteract the force with which class
interests formulate their appropriate ideol-
ogy.
102 THE STATE
In order to complete the sketch of the psy-
chology of the ruling class, we must not forget
the tendency to squander, easily understood
in those "ignorant of the taste of toil," which
appears sometimes in a higher form as gen-
erosity; nor must we forget, as their supreme
trait, that death-despising bravery, which is
called forth by the coercion imposed on a mi-
nority, their need to defend their rights at any
time with arms, and which is favored by a free-
dom from all labor which permits the develop-
ment of the body in hunting, sport and feuds.
Its caricature is combativeness, and a super-
sensitiveness to personal honor, which degen-
erates into madness.
At this point a small digression: Caesar
found the Celts just at that stage of their de-
velopment, in which the nobles had obtained
dominion over their fellow clansmen. Since
that time, his classic narrative has stood as a
norm — their class psychology appears as the
race psychology of all Celts. Not even
Mommsen escaped this error. The result is
that now, in every book on universal history or
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 103
sociology, one may read the palpable error, re-
peated until contradiction is of no avail, al-
though a mere glance would have sufficed to
show that all peoples of all races, in the same
stage of their development, have showed the
same characteristics; in Europe, Thessalians,
Apulians, Campanians, Germans, Poles, etc.
Meanwhile the Celts, and specifically the
French, in different stages of their develop-
ment, have showed quite different traits of
character. The psychology belongs to the
stage of development, not to the race !
Whenever, on the other hand, the rehgious
sanctions of the "state" are weak, or become so,
there develops as a group theory on the part of
the subjects, the concept, either clear or
blurred, of Natural Law. The lower class re-
gards the race pride and the assumed superior-
ity of the nobles as presumptuous, claims to
be of as good race and blood as the ruling
class — and from their standpoint again quite
correctly, since according to their views, labor,
efficiency and order are accounted the only
virtues. They are skeptical also as to the re-
104 THE STATE
ligion which is the helper of their adversaries;
and are as firmly convinced as are the nobles of
the directly opposite opinion, namely, that the
privileges of the master group violate law as
well as reason. Later development is not able
to add any essential point to the factors origi-
nally given.
Under the influence of these ideas, now
clearly, now obscurely brought out, the two
groups henceforth fight out their battles, each
for its own interests. The young state would
be burst apart under the strain of such centrif-
ugal forces, were it not for the centripetal
pull of common interests, of the still more
powerful state-consciousness. The pressure
of foreigners from without, of common ene-
mies, overcomes the inner strain of conflict-
ing class interests. An example may be found
in the tale of the secession of the "Plebs" and
the successful mission of Menenius Agrippa.
And so the young state would, like a planet,
swing through all eternity in its predetermined
orbit, in accordance with the parallelogram of
forces, were it not that it and its surrounding
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 105
world is changed and developed until it pro-
duces new external and inner energies.
(d) THE PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE OF HIGHER
GRADE
Crowth in itself conditions important
changes ; and the young state must grow. The
same forces that brought it into being, urge
its extension, require it to grasp more power.
Even were such a young state "sated,' as
many a modern state claims to be, it would
still be forced to stretch and grow under
penalty of extinction. Under primitive social
conditions Goethe's lines apply with absolute
truth: "You must rise or fall, conquer or
yield, be hammer or anvil.'*
States are maintained in accordance with
the same principles that called them into being.
The primitive state is the creation of warlike
robbery; and only by warlike robbery can it be
preserved.
The economic want of the master group has
no limits ; no man is sufficiently rich to satisfy
his desires. The political means are turned on
106 THE STATE
new groups of peasants not yet subjected, or
new coasts yet unpilf ered are sought out. The
primitive state expands, until a collision takes
place on the edge of the "sphere of interests"
of another primitive state, which itself origi-
nated in precisely the same way. Then we
have for the first time, in place of the war-
like robbery heretofore carried on, true war
in its narrower sense, since henceforth equally
organized and disciplined masses are hurled at
one another.
The object of the contest remains always
the same, the produce of the economic means
of the working classes, such as loot, tribute,
taxes and ground rent; but the contest no
longer takes place between a group intent on
exploiting and another mass to be exploited,
but between two master groups for che pos-
session of the entire booty.
The final result of the conflict, in nearly all
instances, is the amalgamation of both primi-
tive states into a gi-eater. This in turn,
naturally and by force of the same causes,
reaches beyond its borders, devours its smaller
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 107
neighbors, and is perhaps in its turn devoured
by some greater state.
The subjected laboring group may not take
much interest in the final issue of these con-
tests for the mastery; it is a matter of indif-
ference whether it pays tribute to one or the
other set of lords. Their chief interest lies in
the course of the particular fight, which is,
in any case, paid for with their own hides.
Therefore, except in cases of gross ill treat-
ment and exploitation, the lower classes are
rightly governed by their "state-consciousness"
when, with all their might they aid their
hereditary master group in times of war. For
if their master group is vanquished, the sub-
jects suffer most severely from the utter
devastation of war. They fight literally for
wife and children, for home and hearth, when
they fight to prevent the rule of foreign mas-
ters. '
The master group is involved completely
in the issue of this fight for dominion. In ex-
treme cases, it may be completely extermi-
nated, as were the local nobility of the Ger-
108 THE STATE
manic tribes in the Prankish Empire. Nearly
as bad, if not worse, is the prospect of being
thrust into the group of the serfs. Some-
times a well-timed treaty of peace preserves
their social position as master groups of sub-
ordinate rank: e. g., the Saxon nobility in
Norman England, or the Suppans in Ger-
man territory taken from the Slavs. In other
cases, where the forces are about equal, the
two groups amalgamate into one master group
with equal rights, which forms a nobility whose
members intermarry. This, for instance, was
the situation in the Slavic Territories, where
isolated Wendish chieftains were treated as
the equals of the Germans, or in mediaeval
Rome, in the case of prominent families from
the Alban Hills and Tuscany.
In this new "primitive feudal state of higher
grade," as we shall call it, the ruling group
may, therefore, disintegrate into a number of
more or less powerful and privileged strata.
The organization may show many varieties
because of the well-known fact, that often the
master group separates into two subordinated
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 109
economic and social layers, developed as we
saw them in the herdsmen stage: the owners
of large herds and of many slaves, and the or-
dinary freemen. Possibly the less complete
differentiation into social ranks in the states
created by huntsmen in the new world, is to
be assigned to the circumstance that in the
absence of herds, the concomitants of that
form of ownership, and the original separation
into classes, were not introduced into the state.
We shall, later, see what force was exerted on
the political and economic development of
states in the old world by the differences in
rank and property of the two strata of rulers.
Similarly, as in the case of the ruling group,
a corresponding process of differentiation di-
vides the subject group in the "primitive feudal
state of a higher grade" into various strata
more or less despised and compelled to render
service. It is only necessary to recall the very
marked difference in the social and jural posi-
tion occupied by the peasantry in the Doric
States, Lacedgemon and Crete, and among
the Thessalians, where the perioiki had clear
110 THE STATE
rights of possession and fairly well protected
political rights, while the helots, in the latter
case the penestai, were almost unprotected in
life and property. Among the old Saxons also
we find a class, the liti, intermediate between
the common freemen and the serfs.^^ These
examples could be multiplied ; apparently they
are caused by the same tendencies that brought
about the differentiation among the nobility
mentioned above. When two primitive feudal
states amalgamate, their social layers stratify
in a variety of Avays, which to a certain extent
are comparable to the combinations resulting
from mixing together two packs of cards.
It is certain that this mechanical mixture
caused by political forces, influences the de-
velopment of castes, that is to say, of hereditary
professions, which at the same time form a
hierarchy of social classes. "Castes are
usually, if not always, consequences of con-
quest and subjugation by foreigners." ^^ Al-
though this problem has not been completely
solved, it may be said that the formation of
castes has been very strongly influenced by
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 111
economic and religious factors. It is prob-
able that castes came about in some such way
as this: state-forming forces penetrated into
existing economic organizations, and vocations
underwent adaptation, and then became petri-
fied under the influence of religious concepts,
which, however, may also have influenced
their original formation. This seems to fol-
low from the fact that even as between man
and woman there exist certain separations of
vocation, which, so to say, are taboo and im-
passable. Thus among all huntsmen, tilling
the ground is woman's work, while among
many African shepherds, as soon as the ox-
plow is used, agriculture becomes man's
work, and then women may not, under pain
of sacrilege, use the domestic cattle.*
It is likely that such religious concepts may
have brought it about that a vocation became
hereditary, and then compulsorily hereditary,
especially where a tribe or a village carried on
* Similarly there are North Asiatic tribes of huntsmen,
where women are definitely forbidden to touch the hunting
gear or to cross a hunting trail. — Ratzel I, page 65(k
112 THE STATE
a particular craft. This happens with all
tribes in a state of nature, where intercourse
is easily possible, especially in the case of
islanders. When some such group has been
conquered by another tribe, the subjects, with
their developed hereditary vocations, tend to
form within the new state entity a pure
"caste." Their caste position depends partly
upon the esteem they had heretofore enjoyed
among their own people, and partly upon the
advantage which their vocation affords their
new masters. If, as was often the case, waves
of conquest followed one another in series, the
formation of castes might be multiplied, espe-
cially if in the meantime economic develop-
ment had worked out many vocational classes.
This development is probably best seen in
the group of smiths, who, in nearly all cases,
have occupied a peculiar position, half feared
and half despised. In Africa especially, since
the beginning of time, we find tribes of expert
smiths, as followers and dependents of shep-
herd tribes. The Hyksos brought such tribes
with them into the Nile country, and perhaps
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 113
owed their decisive victory to arms made by
them; and until recent times the Dinka kept
the iron working Djur in a sort of subject re-
lation. The same applied also to the nomads
of the Sahara; while our northern sagas are
filled with the tribal contrast to the "dwarfs"
and the fear of their magical powers. All the
elements were at hand in a developed state
for the formation of sharply diiFerentiated
castes.^*
How the cooperation of religious concepts
affects the beginning of these formations may
be well illustrated by an example from Poly-
nesia. Here, "although many natives have
the ability to do ship-building, only one privi-
leged class may exercise the craft, so closely is
the interest of the states and the societies
bound up in this art. All over the archipelago
formerly, and to this day in Fiji, the carpen-
ters, who are almost exclusively ship-builders,
form a special caste, bear the high sounding
title of 'the king's workmen,' and enjoy the
prerogative of having their own chieftains.
. . . Everything is done in accordance with
114 THE STATE
ancient tradition ; the laying the keel, the com-
pletion of the ship, and the launching, all
take place amidst religious ceremonies and
feasts." '^
Where superstition has been strongly de-
veloped, a genuine system of castes may come
about, based partly on economic and partly
on ethnic foundations. In Polynesia, for ex-
ample, the articulation of the classes, through
the operation of the taboo, has brought about
a state of affairs very like a most thorough-
going caste system.^® Similar results may be
seen in Southern Arabia.^^ It is unnecessary
at this place to enlarge on the important place
which religion had in the origin and mainte-
nance of separate castes in ancient Egypt and
in modern India.*
These are the elements of the primitive
feudal state of higher grade. They are more
manifold and more numerous than in the lower
* Besides, it seems that the rigidity of the Indian caste-sys-
tem is not so harsh in practise. The guild seems as often to
break through the barriers of caste as the converse. — Ratzd
II, page 596.
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 115
primitive state; but in both, legal constitution
and political-economic distributon are funda-
mentally the same. The products of the
economic means are still the object of the group
struggle. This remains now as ever the mov-
ing impulse of the domestic policy of the state,
while the political means continues now as ever
to constitute the moving impulse of its foreign
policy in attack or in defense. Identical
group theories continue to justify, both for
the upper classes and the lower, the objects
and means of external and domestic struggles.
But the development can not remain sta-
tionary. Growth diif ers from mere increase
in bulk; growth means a constantly heighten-
ing differentiation and integration.
The farther the primitive feudal state ex-
tends its dominion, the more numerous its sub-
jects, and the denser its population, the more
there develops a political-economic division of
labor, which calls forth new needs and new
means of supplying them; and the more there
come into sharp contrasts the distinctions of
116 THE STATE
economic, and consequently of social, class
strata, in accordance with what I have called
the "law of the agglomeration about existing
nuclei of wealth." This growing differentia-
tion becomes decisive for the further develop-
ment of the primitive feudal state, and still
more for its conclusion.
This conclusion is not meant to be, in any
sense, the physical end of such a state. We
do not mean the death of a state, whereby such
a feudal state of the higher type disappears,
in consequence of conflict with a more power-
ful state, either on the same or on a higher
plane of development, as was the case of the
Mogul states of India or of Uganda in their
conflicts with Great Britain. Neither does it
mean such a stagnation as that into which
Persia and Turkey have fallen, which repre-
sents for a time only a pause in development,
since these comitries, either of their own force
or by foreign conquest, must soon be pushed
on the way of their destiny. Neither have we
meant the rigidity of the gigantic Chinese Em-
pire, which can last only so long as foreign
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 117
powers refrain from forcing its mysterious
gates.*
The outcome here spoken of means the
further development of the primitive feudal
state, a matter of importance to our under-
standing of universal history as a process.
The principal lines of development into which
this issue branches off are twofold and of
fundamentally different character. But this
polar opposition is conditioned hy a like con-
trast between two sorts of economic wealth
each of which increases in accordance with the
^''^law of agglomeration about existing nuclei'*
In the one case, it is movable property; in
the other, landed property. Here it is the
capital of commerce, there property in land,
* Had we the space, a detailed exposition of this exceptional
development of a feudal state would be tempting. China
would be well worth a more detailed discussion, since, in many
aspects it has approached the condition of "free citizenship"
more closely than any people of Western Europe. China
has overcome the consequences of the feudal system more thor-
oughly than we Europeans have; and has made, early in its
development, the great property interests in the land harm-
less, so that their bastard offspring, capitalism, hardly came
into being; while in addition, it has worked out to a consid-
erable degree the problems of cooperative production and of
cooperative distribution.
118 THE STATE
accumulating in the hands of a smaller and
smaller nimiber, and thereby overturning radi-
cally the articulation of classes, and with it the
whole State.
The maritime State is the scene of the de-
velopment of movable wealth; the territorial
State is the embodiment of the development of
landed property. The final issue of the first
is capitalistic exploitation by slavery, the out-
come of the latter is, first of all, the developed
fetidal State.
Capitalistic exploitation by slavery, the
typical result of the development of the so-
called "antique States" on the INIediterranean,
does not end in the death of states, which is of
no importance, but in the death of peoples, be-
cause of the consumption of population. In
the pedigree of the historical development of
the State, it forms a side branch, from which
no further immediate growth can take place.
The developed feudal State, however, repre-
sents the principal branch, the continuation of
the trunk; and is therefore the origin for the
PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE 119
further growth of the State. Thence it has
developed into the State governed by feudal
systems ; into absolutism ; into the modern con-
stitutional State; and if we are right in our
prognosis, it will become a "free citizenship."
So long as the trunk grew only in one di-
rection, i. e., to include the primitive feudal
State of higher grade, our sketch of its growth
and development could and did comprise both
forms. Henceforth, after the bifurcation,
our story branches and follow^s each branch to
its last twig.
We begin, then, with the maritime states,
although they are not the older form. On
the contrary, as far back as the dawn of his-
tory clears the fog of prehistoric existence,
the first strong states were formed as terri-
torial states, which then, by their owti powers,
attained the scale of developed feudal States.
But beyond this stage, at least as regards those
States most interesting to our culture, most of
them either remained stationary or fell into
the power of maritime states; and then, in-
120 THE STATE
fected with the deadly poison of capitalistic
exploitation through slavery, were destroyed
by the same plague.
The further progress of the expanded feudal
states of higher grade could take place only
after the maritime states had run their course :
mighty forms of domination and statescraft
these became, and they subsequently influenced
and furthered the conformation of the terri-
torial states that grew from their ruins.
For that reason the story of the fate of mari-
time states must be first traced, as these are
the introduction to the higher forms of state
life. After first tracing the lateral branch,
we shall then return to the starting point, the
primitive feudal State, follow the main trunk
to the development of the modern constitu-
tional State, and anticipating actual history,
sketch the "free citizenship" of the future.
CHAPTER IV
THE MARITIME STATE
The course of life and the path of suffering
of the State founded by sea nomads, as has
been stated above, is determined by com-
mercial capital; just as that of the territorial
State is determined by capital vested in realty ;
and, we may add, that of the modern consti-
tutional State by productive capital. The
sea nomad, however, did not invent trade or
merchandising, fairs or markets or cities ; these
preexisted, and since they served his purpose,
were now developed to suit his interests. All
these institutions, serving the economic means,
the barter for equivalents, had long since been
discovered.
Here for the first time in our survey we find
the economic means not the object of exploita-
tion by the political means, but as a cooperating
agent in originating the State, one might
131
122 THE STATE
call it the "chain" passing into the "lift"
created by the feudal state to bring forth a
more elaborate structure. The genesis of the
maritime State would not be thoroughly in-
telligible, were we not to premise a statement
concerning traffic and interchange of wares in
prehistoric times. Furthermore, no prognosis
of the modern state is complete, which does
not take into account the independently
formed economic means of aboriginal barter.
(a) TRAFFIC IN PEEHISTORIC TIMES
The psychological explanation of barter has
brought forth the theory of the marginal util-
ity, its greatest merit. According to this
theory, the subjective valuation of any eco-
nomic good decreases in proportion to the num-
ber of objects of the same kind possessed by the
same owner. When even two proprietors meet,
each having a number of similar articles, they
will gladly barter, provided political means are
barred, i. e., if both parts are apparently
equally strong and well-armed, or in the very
early stage, are within the sacred circle of re-
MARITIME STATE 123
lationship. By barter, each one receives prop-
erty of very high subjective value, in place of
property of very low subjective value, so that
both parties are gainers in the transaction.
The desire of primitive people for bartering
must be stronger than that of cultured ones.
For at this stage man does not value his own
goods, but covets the things belonging to
strangers, and is hardly affected by calculated
economic considerations.
On the other hand, we must not forget that
there are primitive peoples for whom barter
has no attraction whatever. "Cook tells of
tribes in Polynesia, with whom no intercourse
was possible, since presents made absolutely
no impression on them, and were afterward
thrown away; everything shown them they re-
garded with indifference, and with no desire
to own it, while with their own things they
would not part ; in fact, they had no conception
of either trade or barter." ^^ So Westermarck
is of the opinion that "barter and traffic are
comparatively late inventions." In this he
stands in opposition to Peschel, who would
124. THE STATE
have it that man in the earliest known stage
of development engaged in barter. Wester-
marck states that there is no proof "that the
cave-dwellers of Perigord from the reindeer
period obtained their rock-crystals, their shells
from the Atlantic, and the horns of the Saiga
antelope from (modern) Poland by way of
barter." ^»
In spite of these exceptions, which admit
other explanations — perhaps the natives feared
sorcery — the history of primitive peoples shows
that the desire to trade and barter is a uni-
versal human characteristic. It can, however,
take effect only when these primitive men on
meeting with strangers are offered new en-
ticing objects, since in the immediate circle of
their own blood kinsmen every one has the
same kinds of property, and in their natural
communism, on the average about the same
amount.
Yet even then, barter, the beginning of all
regular trading, can take place only when the
meeting with foreigners is a peaceable one.
But is there any possibility for peaceable meet-
MARITIME STATE 125
mg with foreigners? Is not primitive man,
through his entire life, and especially at the
period when barter begins, still under the ap-
prehension that every one of a different horde
is an enemy to be feared as the wolf?
After trade is developed, it is, as a rule,
strongly influenced by the "political means,"
"trade generally follows robbery." ^^ But its
first beginnings are chiefly the result of the
economic means, the outcome of pacific, not
warlike, intercourse.
The international relations of primitive
huntsmen with one another must not be con-
fused with those existing either between the
huntsmen or herdsmen and their peasants, or
amongst the herdsmen themselves. There
are, undoubtedly, blood-feuds, or feuds be-
cause of looted women, or possibly because of
violation of the districts set aside for hunting
grounds; but these lack that strong incentive,
which is the consequence of avarice alone, of
the desire to despoil other men of the products
of their labor. Therefore, the "wars" of prim-
itive huntsmen are scarcely real wars, but
126 THE STATE
rather scuffles and single combats, carried on
frequently — as are the German student duels
— according to an established ceremonial, and
prolonged only up to the point of incapacity to
fight, as one might say, "until claret has been
drawn." ®^ These tribes, numerically very
weak, wisely limit bloodshed to the indispensa-
ble amount — e. g., in case of a blood vendetta
feud — and thus avoid starting new vendetta
blood feuds.
For this reason, pacific relations with their
neighbors on an equal economic scale are much
stronger, and also freer from the incentive to
use poHtical means, both among huntsmen and
among primitive peasants, than among herds-
men. There are numerous examples where
the former meet peaceably to exploit natural
resources in common. "While yet in primi-
tive stages of civilization, great masses of
people gather together, from time to time, at
places where useful objects may be found.
The Indians of a large part of America made
regular pilgrimages to the flint grounds;
others assembled annually at harvest time at
MARITIME STATE 127
the Zizania swamps of the lakes of the North-
west. The Australians, living scattered in the
Barku district, assemble from all directions for
the harvest festivals at the swamp beds of
the corn bearing Marsiliacae. When the
bonga-bonga trees in Queensland produce a
superabundant crop, and a greater store is on
hand than the tribe can consume, foreign tribes
are permitted to share therein." ^^ "Various
tribes agree on the common ownership of defi-
nite strips of territory, and likewise of the
quarries of phonolite for hatchets." ^* Nu-
merous Australian tribes have common con-
sultations and sessions of the elders for judg-
ment. In these, the remainder of the poj)ula-
tion form the bystanders, a custom similar to
the Germanic ''JJmstand" in the primitive folk-
moot.^^
It is but natural that such meetings should
bring about barter. Perhaps this explains the
origin of those "weekly fairs held by the Ne-
groes of Central Africa in the midst of the
primseval forest under special arrangements
for the peace," ®" and likewise the great fairs.
128 THE STATE
said to be very ancient, of the fur hunters of
the extreme north of the Tschuktsche.
All these things presuppose the development
of pacific forms of intercourse between neigh-
boring groups. These forms are to be found
almost universally. They could very easily be
developed at this period, since the discovery
had not yet been made that men can be utilized
as labor motors. At this stage, the stranger is
treated as an enemy only in doubtful cases.
If he comes with apparently peaceable intent,
he is treated as a friend. Therefore, a whole
code of public law ceremonies grew up, in-
tended to demonstrate the pacific intent of the
newcomer.* One puts aside one's arms and
shows one's unarmed hand, or one sends her-
alds in advance, who are always inviolable.
It is clear that these forms represent some
kind of claim to hospitality, and in fact it is by
this guest-right that peaceful trade is first
* In this category must be reckoned the salutation, still
in use in some parts, "Peace Be With You." It is expressive
of the perversity of Tolstoi's later years that he misappre-
hends this characteristic mark of a time when vi^ar was the
normal state of affairs, as the remnant of a golden age of
peace. The Importance of the Russian Revolution (German
translation by A. Hess, p. 17).
MARITIME STATE 129
made possible. The exchange of guest-gifts
precedes, and appears to introduce, barter
proper. It becomes, therefore, important to
investigate the source of hospitality.
Westermarck, in his recent monumental
work (1907), Origin and Development of
Moral Concepts^^ states that the custom of
hospitality results from two causes, curiosity
for news from the stranger from afar, and still
more from the fear that the stranger may he
endowed with powers of sorcery, imputed to
him just because he is a stranger.* In the
Bible, hospitality is recommended for the rea-
son that one can not know that the stranger
may not be an angel. The superstitious race
fears his curse (the Erinys of the Greeks)
and hastens to propitiate the stranger. Hav-
ing been accepted as a guest he is inviola-
ble and enjoys the sacred right of the blood-
related group, and is regarded as belonging to
* This may account for the use made of old women as
heralds. They are doubly available for that purpose, since
they are worthless for warfare, and are supposed to be en-
dowed with specific powers of sorcery (Westermarck), even
more than old men, who also are treated cautiously, since they
may soon become "ghosts."
130 THE STATE
it during his stay. Therefore he partakes of
the benefits of the aboriginal communism
reigning in the group, and shares its property.
The host demands and receives whatever he
claims, the stranger obtains in turn what he
asks for. When the peaceable intercourse be-
comes more frequent, the mutual giving of
guest-presents may develop into a trading
arrangement, because the trader gladly re-
turns to the spot where he found good enter-
tainment and a profitable exchange and where
he is protected by the laws of hospitality, in-
stead of seeking new places, where, often with
danger to his life, he would first have to acquire
the right to hospitality.
The existence of an "international" division
of labor is, of course, presupposed before the
development of a regular trade relation can
begin. Such a division of labor exists much
earlier and to a greater extent than is gen-
erally believed. "It is quite erroneous to sup-
pose that the division of labor takes place only
on a high scale of economic development.
There are in the interior of Africa villages of
MARITIME STATE 131
iron-smiths, nay, of such as only turn out dart-
knives ; New Guinea has its villages of potters,
North America its arrow-head makers." ^*
From such specialties there develops trade,
whether through roving merchants, or by gifts
to one's hosts, or by peace-gifts from tribe to
tribe. In North America, the Kaddu trade
in bows. "Obsidian was universally employed
for arrow heads and knives; on the Yellow-
stone, on the Snake River, in New Mexico, but
especially in Mexico. Thence the precious
article was distributed all over the entire
country as far as Ohio and Tennessee, a dis-
tance of nearly two thousand miles." '^^
According to Vierkandt: "From the
purely home-made products of primitive peo-
ples, there results a system of trade totally
distinct from that prevailing under modern
conditions. . . . Each separate tribe has de-
veloped special aptitudes, leading to interex-
change. Even among the comparatively un-
civilized Indian tribes of South America, we
find such differentiations. . . . By such a
trade, products may be distributed over extra-
132 THE STATE
ordinary distances, not in any direct way
through professional traders, but through a
gradual passing along from tribe to tribe.
The origin of such a trade, as Buecher has
shown, is to be traced back to the exchange of
guest-gifts." ^^
Besides this exchange of guest-gifts, a trade
may grow from the peace offerings which ad-
versaries after a fight exchange as a sign of
reconciliation. Sartorius reports on Poly-
nesia: "After a war between different
islands, the peace offerings for each group
were something novel; and if the present and
return present pleased both parties, a repeti-
tion took place, and thus again the way for
exchange of products was opened. But, these,
in contrast to guest-gifts, were the bases of
continuing intercourse. Here, in place of the
contact of individuals, tribes and peoples met.
Women are the first object of barter; they
form the connecting link between strange
tribes, and according to evidence from many
sources, women are exchanged for cattle." ^^
We meet here an object of trade, exchange-
MARITIME STATE 133
able even without "international division of
labor." And it appears as though the ex-
change of women had, in many ways, smoothed
the way for the traffic in merchandise, as
though it had been the first step toward the
peaceable integration of tribes, which accom-
panied the warlike integration of the formation
of the State. Lippert, however, believes that
the peaceful eoccliange of fire antedates this
barter."^^ Conceding that this custom is very
ancient, he can nevertheless trace it only from
rudiments of observances and of law ; and since
proof is no longer accessible, we shall not pur-
sue the question further in this place.
On the other hand, the exchange of women
is observed universally, and doubtless exerts an
extraordinarily strong influence in the de-
velopment of peaceable intercourse between
neighboring tribes, and in the preparation for
barter of merchandise. The story of the Sa-
bine women, who threw themselves between
their brothers and their husbands, as these were
about to engage in battle, must have hQan an
actuality in a thousand instances in the course
134 THE STATE
of the development of the human race. All
over the world, the marriage of near relatives
is considered an outrage, as "incest," for
reasons not within the scope of this book/*
This directs the sexual longing toward the
women of neighboring tribes, and thus makes
the loot of women a part of the primary inter-
tribal relations ; and in nearly all cases, unless
strong f eehngs of race counteract it, the violent
carrying off of women is gradually commuted
to barter and purchase, the custom resulting
from the relative undesirability of the women
of one's own blood in comparison to the wives
to be had from other tribes.
Where division of labor made at all possible
the exchange of goods, the relations among the
various tribes would thereafter be made serv-
iceable to it; the exogamic groups gradually
become accustomed regularly to meet on a
peaceful basis. The peace, originally protect-
ing the horde of blood relations, thereafter
comes to be extended over a wider circle. One
example from numberless instances: "Each
of the two Camerun tribes has its own 'bush
MARITIME STATE 135
countries,' places where its own tribesmen
trade, and where, by intermarriage, they have
relatives. Here also exogamy shows its tribe-
linking power."
These are the principal lines of growth of
peaceful barter and traffic; from the right to
hospitality and the exchange of women, per-
haps also from the exchange of fire, to the
trade in commodities. In addition to this,
markets and fairs, and perhaps also traders,
were almost uniformly regarded as being under
the protection of a god who preserved peace
and avenged its violation. Thus we have
brought the fundamentals of this most impor-
tant sociological factor to the point where the
political means enters as a cause to disturb, re-
arrange, and then to develop and affect the
creations of the economic means.
(b) TRADE AND THE PRIMITIVE STATE
There are two very important reasons why
the robber-warrior should not unduly interfere
with such markets and fairs as he may find
within his conquered domain.
136 THE STATE
The first, which is extra-economic, is the
superstitious fear that the godhead will avenge
a breach of the peace. The second, which is
economic, and probably is the more important
— and I think I am the first to point out this
connection — is that the conquerors can not well
do without the markets.
The booty of the primitive victors consists
of much property which is unavailable for their
immediate use and consumption. Since valu-
able articles at that period exist in but few
forms, while these few occur in large quantity,
the "marginal utility" of any one kind is held
very low. This applies especially to the most
important product of the political means,
slaves. Let us first take up the case of the
herdsman: his need of slaves is limited by the
size of his herds ; he is very likely to exchange
his surplus for other objects of greater value to
him: for salt, ornaments, arms, metals, woven
materials, utensils, etc. For that reason, the
herdsman is not only at all times a robber, al-
ways in addition he is a merchant and trader
and he protects trade.
MARITIME STATE 137
He protects trade coming his way in order
to exchange his loot against the products of
another civilization — from the earliest times,
nomads have convoyed the caravans passing
through their steppes or deserts in considera-
tion of protection money^ — but he also protects
trade even in places conquered by him in pre-
historic times. Quite the same sort of consid-
eration which influenced the herdsmen to
change from bear stage to bee-keeper stage,
must have influenced them to maintain and
protect ancient markets and fairs. One
single looting, in this case, would mean killing
the hen that lays the golden eggs. It is more
profitable to preserve the market and rather to
extend the prevailing peace over it, since there
is not only the profit to be had from an ex-
change of foreign wares against loot, but also
the protection money, the lords' toll, to be col-
lected. For that reason princes of feudal
states of every stage of development extended
over markets, highways and merchants, their
especial protection, the "king's peace," often
indeed reserving to themselves the monopoly
138 THE STATE
of foreign trade. Everywhere we see them
busily engaged in calling into being new fairs
and cities by the grant of protection and im-
munity.
This interest in the system of fairs and mar-
kets makes it thoroughly credible that tribes
of herdsmen respected existing market places
in their sphere of influence to such an extent
that they suspended the exertion of the politi-
cal means so completely as not even to exer-
cise "dominion" over them. The story told by
Herodotus is inherently probable, though he
was astonished that the Argippseans had a
sacred market amidst the lawless Scythian
herdsmen, and that their unarmed inhabitants
were effectively protected through the hal-
lowed peace of their market place. Many sim-
ilar phenomena make this the more easily be-
lievable.
"No one dare harm them, since they are con-
sidered holy; and yet they have no arms ; but it
is they who allay the quarrels of their neigh-
bors, and whoever has escaped to them as a
MARITIME STATE 139
runaway may not be touched by any other
man." "'^ Similar instances are found fre-
quently: "It is always the same story of the
Argippgeans, the story of the 'holy,' 'unarmed,'
*just,' bartering, and strife-settling tribelet in
the midst of a Bedouin-like, nomadic popula-
tion." "'" Care may be taken as an example of
a higher type. Strabo says of its inhabitants :
"The Greeks thought highly of their bravery
and justice, because although powerful in a
great degree, they abstained from robbery."
Mommsen, who quotes this passage, adds:
"This does not exclude piracy, which was en-
gaged in by the merchants of Caere as well as
by all other merchants, but rather that Ceere
was a sort of free harbor for the Phoenicians as
for the Greeks." '^
Cffire is not like the fair of the Argippgeans,
a market place in the interior of a district of
land nomads, but is in the midst of a domain of
sea nomads, a port endowed with its own peace.
This is one of those typical formations whose
importance, in my estimation, has not been ap-
140 THE STATE
preciated at its real value. They have, it
seems to me, exercised a mighty influence on
the genesis of maritime states.
Those reasons by which we saw the land no-
mads forced to preserve, if not to create,
market places, must with even more intensity,
have coerced the sea nomads to similar de-
meanor. For the transportation of loot, espe-
cially of herds and of slaves, is difficult and
dangerous on the trails across the desert or the
steppes: the slow progress invites pursuit.
But with war-canoe and "'dragon-ship" this
transportation is easy and safe. For that rea-
son, the Viking is even much more a trader
and merchant than is the herdsman. As is
said in Faust, "War, Commerce, and Piracy
are inseparable."
(c) THE GENESIS OF THE MARITIME STATE
In many cases, I believe, trade in the loot of
piracy is the origin of those cities around which,
as political centers, the city-states of the an-
tique or Mediterranean civilization grew up;
while in very many other cases, the same trade
MARITIME STATE 141
cooperated to bring them to the same point of
political development.
These harbor markets developed from prob-
ably two general types : they grew up either as
piratical fortresses directly and intentionally
placed in hostile territory, or else as "merchant
colonies" based on treaty rights in the harbors
of foreign primitive or developed feudal states.
Of the first type, we have a number of im-
portant examples from ancient history which
correspond exactly to the fourth stage of our
scheme, where an armed colony of pirates
plants itself down at a commercially and stra-
tegically defendable point on the seacoast of a
foreign state. The most notable instance is
Carthage; and in like manner, the Greek sea
nomads, lonians, Dorians and Achaans, set-
tled in their sea castles on the Adriatic and
Tyrrhenian coasts of Southern Italy, on the
islands of these seas, and on the gulfs of South-
ern Gaul. Phoenicians, Etruscans,* Greeks,
* Whether the Etruscans were immigrants into Italy by land
who took up piracy after having made war successfully on
land, or whether as sea nomads they had already settled the
142 THE STATE
and according to modern investigation, Cari-
ans, all about the Mediterranean, founded their
*'States" after the same type, with identical
class division into masters and servile peas-
antry of the neighboring territory J ^
Some of these states on the coast developed
into feudal states of the type of the territorial
states; and the master class then became a
landed aristocracy. The factors in this change
were: first, geographical conditions, lack of
good harbors, and a wide stretch of hinterland
cultivated by peaceful peasants ; and secondly,
very probably, the acquired organization into
classes taken with them from their original
homes. In many cases, they were fugitive
nobles, the vanquished of domestic feuds, or
younger sons, sometimes an entire generation
of youth of both sexes, who thus started "on
the viking," and having at home had lands and
serfs, as petty lords, they again sought in for-
eign lands what they regarded as their due.
The occupation of England by the Anglo-
country along the sea named after them, has not been deter-
mined.
MARITIME STATE 143
Saxons, and of Southern Italy by the Nor-
mans, are examples of this method; so too are
the Spanish and Portuguese colonizations of
Mexico and of South America. The Achaean
colonies of Greater Greece in Southern Italy
furnish additional and very important in-
stances of this development of territorial feu-
dal states by sea nomads: "This Achsean
League of cities was a true colonization. The
cities were without harbors — Croton only had
a fair roadstead — and were without any trade
of their own; the Sybarite could boast of his
growing gray in his water town between his
home bridges, while buying and selling were
carried on by Milesians and Etruscans. On
the other hand, the Greeks in this region not
only controlled the fringe of the shore, but
ruled from sea to sea ; . . . the native agricul-
tural inhabitants were forced into a relation of
clientage or serfdom, and were required to
work the farms of their masters or to pay trib-
ute to them." ^" It is probable that most of
the Doric colonies in Crete were similarly or-
ganized.
144 THE STATE
But in the course of universal history these
^'territorial states," whether they arose more
or less frequently, did not acquire any such
importance as did those maritime cities which
devoted their principal energies to commerce
and to privateering. Mommsen contrasts in
distinct and well chosen sentences the Acheean
landed squire with the "royal merchants" of
the Greek Colonies in Southern Italy: "In
no way did they spurn agriculture or the in-
crease of ten-itory; the Greeks were not satis-
fied, at least not after they became powerful, to
remain within the confined space of a fortified
commercial factory in the midst of the country
of the barbarians, as the Phoenicians had done.
Their cities were founded primarily and ex-
clusively for purposes of trade, and unlike the
Achaean colonies, were universally situated at
the best harbors and landing places." ®^ We
are certain, in the case of the Ionic colonies,
and may well assume it for the other cases, that
the founders of these cities were not landed
squires, but seafaring merchants.
But such maritime states or cities, in the
MARITIME STATE 145
strict sense, came into being not only through
warhke conquest, but also through peaceable
beginnings, by a more or less mixed penetror
tion padfique.
Where, however, the Vikings did not meet
peaceable peasants, but feudal states in the
primitive stage, willing to fight, they offered
and accepted terms of peace and settled down
as colonies of merchants.
We know of such cases from every part of
the world, in harbors and on markets held on
shore. To take the instances with which Ger-
mans are most conversant, there are the settle-
ments of North German merchants in
countries along the German ocean and the
Baltic Sea, the German Steel Yard in London,
the Hansa in Sweden and Norway, on the
Island of Schonen, and in Russia, at Novgo-
rod. In Wilna, the capital of the Grand
Dukes of Lithuania, there was such a colony;
and the Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice is an-
other example of a similar institution. The
strangers in nearly every instance settle down
as a compact mass, subject to their own laws
146 THE STATE
and their own jurisdiction. They often ac-
quire great political influence, sometimes ex-
tending to dominion over the state. One
would think the following tale of Ratzel, con-
cerning the coast and islands of the Indian
Ocean, were a contemporaneous narrative of
the Phoenician or Greek invasion of the Med-
iterranean at about 1,000 B. C: "Whole na-
tions have, so to say, been liquefied by trade,
especially the proverbially clever, zealous, om-
nipresent Malays of Simiatra; as well as the
treacherous Bugi of Celebes. These can be
met with at every place from Singapore to
New Guinea. Latterly, especially in Borneo,
they have immigrated in masses on the call of
the Borneo chieftains. Their influence was so
strong that they were permitted to govern
themselves according to their own laws, and
they felt themselves so strong that repeatedly
they attempted to achieve independence. The
Achinese formerly occupied a similar position.
Malacca had been made the principal mart by
Malays from Sumatra, and after its decline,
Achin became the most frequented harbor of
MARITIME STATE 147
this distant east, especially for the first quarter
of the seventeenth century, the pivotal period
of the development of that corner of the
world." ^^ The following, from among num-
berless instances, demonstrate the universality
of this form of settlement: "In Urga, where
they politically dominate, the merchants are
crowded together into a separate Chinese
Town." ^^ In the Jewish States there were
"small colonies of foreign merchants and me-
chanics, set apart in distinct quarters of the
cities. Here, under the king's protection, they
could live according to their own religious cus-
toms." ^* We may also compare with this,
First Kings XX, 34. "King Omri of Ephraim
was forced by the military success of his oppo-
nent, the King of Damascus, to grant to the
Aramaic merchants the use of certain parts of
the city of Samaria, where under royal protec-
tion they could trade. Later, when the turn of
war favored his successor, Ahab, the latter de-
manded the same privilege for the Ephraimitic
merchants in Damascus." ^^ "The inhabitants
of Italy, wherever they were, held together as
148 THE STATE
solid and organized masses, the soldiers as le-
gionaries, the merchants of all large cities as
corporations; while the Roman citizens domi-
ciled or dwelling in the various provincial cir-
cuits, were organized as a 'convention of
Roman citizens' with their own communal gov-
ernment." ^^ We may recall the mediaeval
Ghettos, which, before the great persecution of
the Jews in the IVIiddle Ages, were similar
merchant colonies. The settlements of Euro-
peans in the ports of strong foreign empires
at the present time show similar corporate or-
ganizations, having their own constitution and
(consular) jurisdiction. China, Turkey and
Morocco must continue to bear this mark of
inferiority, while recently Japan has been able
to rid herself of that badge.
The most interesting point about these col-
onies, at least for our study, consists in their
general tendency to extend their political
influence into complete domination. And
there is good reason for this. Merchants have
a mass of movable wealth, which is likely to be
used as a decisive factor in the political up-
MARITIME STATE 149
heavals constantly disturbing all feudal states,
be it in international wars between two neigh-
boring states, or in intra-national fights, such
as wars of succession. In addition to this
the colonists, in many cases, may rely on
the power of their home state, basing their
claim on ties of blood and on uncommonly
strong commercial interests; while there is
besides, the fact that in many cases they
have in their warlike sailor-folk and their nu-
merous slaves an effective and compact force
of their own, capable of accomplishing much
in a limited sphere.
The following story of the role played by
Arab merchants in East Africa appears to me
to show a historical type heretofore not suffi-
ciently appreciated: "When Speke, as the
first European, made this trip in 1857, the
Arabs were merchants, living as aliens in the
land. When in 1861 he passed the same way,
the Arabs resembled great landed proprietors
with rich estates and were waging war with
the native territorial ruler. This process, re-
peatedly found in many other regions in the
150 THE STATE
interior of Africa, is the necessary consequence
of the balance of power. The foreign mer-
chants, be they Arabs or Suaheli, ask the privi-
lege of transit and pay tribute for it; they
establish warehouses, which the chiefs favor,
as these seem both to satisfy their vanity and
to extend their connections ; then incurring the
suspicion, oppression and persecution of the
chiefs, the merchants refuse to pay the rack
tolls and dues, which have grown with their
increased prosperity. At last, in one of the
inevitable fights for the succession, the Arabs
take the side of one pretender if he is pliable
enough, and are thus brought into internal
quarrels of the country and take part in the
often endless wars." ^"^
This political activity of the merchant deni-
zens (metoikoi) is a constantly recurring type.
"In Borneo there developed from the settle-
ments of Chinese gold diggers separate
states." ^® Properly speaking, the entire his-
tory of colonization by Europeans is a series
of examples of the law that, with any superior
force, the factories and larger settlements of
MARITIME STATE 151
foreigners tend to grow into domination, unless
they approximate to the primal type of simple
piracy, such as the Spanish and Portuguese
conquests, or the East India Companies, both
the English and the Dutch. "There lies a
robber state beside the ocean, between the
Rhine and the Scheldt," are the accusing words
of the Dutch Multatuli. All East Asiatic,
American and African colonies of all Euro-
pean peoples arose as one or the other of these
two types.
But the aliens do not always obtain uncon-
ditional mastery. Sometimes the host state
is too strong, and the newcomers remain politi-
cally powerless but protected aliens; as, for
example, the Germans in England. Some-
times the host state, although subjugated, be-
comes strong enough to shake off the foreign
domination ; so, for instance, Sweden drove out
the Hanseats who had imposed on her their
sovereignty. In some cases, a conqueror over-
comes both merchants and host state, and
subjugates both; as happened to the republics
of Novgorod and Pskov, when the Russians
152 THE STATE
annexed them. In many cases, however, the
rich foreigners and the domestic nobihty amal-
gamate into one group of rulers, following the
type of the formation of territorial states, in
which we saw this take place whenever two
about equally strong groups of rulers came
into conflict. It seems to me that this last
named situation is the most probable assump-
tion for the genesis of the most important city
states of antiquity, for the Greek maritime
cities, and for Rome.
Of Greek history, to use the terms of Kurt
Breysig, we know only the "Middle Ages,"
of Roman history, only its "Modern Times."
For the matters that preceded, we must be
extremely careful in drawing deductions from
fancied analogies. But it seems to me that
enough facts are proved and admitted to per-
mit the conclusion that Athens, Corinth,
Mycenae, Rome, etc., became states in the man-
ner already set forth. And this would follow,
even if the data from all known demography
and general history were not of such universal
validity as to permit the conclusion in itself.
MARITIME STATE 153
We know accurately from the names of
places (Salamis: Island of Peace, equivalent
to Market-Island), from the names of heroes,
from monuments, and from immediate tradi-
tion, that in many Greek harbors there existed
Phoenician factories, while the hinterland was
occupied by small feudal states with the typ-
ical articulation of nobles, common freemen,
and slaves. It can not seriously be disputed
that the development of the city states was
powerfully advanced by foreign influences;
and this is true, though no specific evidence can
be adduced to show that any of the Phoenician,
or of the still more powerful Carian merchants
were either allowed to intermarry with the
families of the resident nobility, or were made
full citizens, or finally even became princes.
The same applies to Rome, concerning which
Mommsen, a cautious author, states: "Rome
owes its importance, if not its origin, to these
commercial and strategic relations. Evidence
of this is found in many traces of far greater
value than the tales of historical novels pre-
tending to be authentic. Take an instance of
154 THE STATE
the primaeval relations existing between Rome
and Csere, which was for Etruria what Rome
was for Latium, and thereafter was its nearest
neighbor and commercial friend ; or the micom-
mon importance attributed to the bridge over
Tiber and the bridge building (Pontifex Maxi-
mus) in every part of the Roman State; or
the galley in the municipal coat of arms. To
this source may be traced the primitive Roman
harbor dues to which, from early times, only
those goods were subject which were intended
for sale (promercale) and not what entered
the harbor of Ostia, for the proper use of the
charterer (usuarium) , and which constituted
therefore an impost on trade. For that reason
we find the comparatively early use of minted
money, and the commercial treaties of states
oversea with Rome. In this sense, then,
Rome may, as the story of its origin states,
have been rather a created than a developed
city, and among the Latin cities rather the
youngest than the eldest." ^^
It would require the work of a lifetime of
historical research to investigate these possi-
MARITIME STATE 155
bilities, or rather these probabilities; and then
to write the constitutional history of these pre-
eminently important city states, and to draw
thence the very necessary conclusions. It
seems to me that along this path there would
be found much information on many an
obscure question, such as the Etruscan do-
minion in Rome, or the origin of the rich fami-
lies of Plebeians, or concerning the Athenian
metoihoi, and many other problems.
Here we can only follow the thread which
holds out the hope of leading us through the
labyrinth of historical tradition to the issue.
(d) ESSENCE AND ISSUE OF THE MARITIME
STATES
All these are true "States" in the sociologic
sense, whether they arose from the fortresses
of sea-robbers, or from harbors of original land
nomads as merchant colonies which obtained
dominion or which amalgamated with the dom-
inating group of the host people. For they
are nothing but the organization of the politi-
cal means, their form is domination, their con-
156 THE STATE
tent the economic exploitation of the subject
by the master group.
So far as the principle is concerned, they
are not to be diiFerentiated from the States
founded by land nomads; and yet they have
taken a different form, both from internal and
external reasons, and show a different psy-
chology of classes.
One must not believe that class feeling was
at all different in these and in the territorial
states. Here as there the master class looks
down with the same contempt on the subjects,
on the ^'Rantuses," on the "man with, the blue
fingernails," as the German patrician in the
Middle Ages looked on a being with whom,
even when free born, no intermarriage or
social intercourse was permitted. Little in-
deed does the class theory of the xaXo-
xdyadde (well-born) or of the patricians
(children of ancestors) differ from that of the
country squires. But other circumstances
here bring about differences, consonant,
naturally, with class interests. In any district
ruled by merchants, highway robbery can not
MARITIME STATE 15T
be tolerated, and therefore it is considered, e.
g., among the maritime Greeks, a vulgar
crime. The tale of Theseus would not in a
territorial state have been pointed against
the highwaymen. On the other hand, "piracy
was regarded by them, in most remote times, as
a trade nowise dishonorable ... of which
ample proof may be found in the Homeric
poems ; while at a much later period Polycrates
had organized a well developed robber-state
on the Island of Samos." "In the Corpus
Juris, mention is made of a law of Solon in
which the association of pirates (inc Xt'tav oi-^ofievoc)
is recognized as a permissible company." ^^
But quite apart from such details, men-
tioned only because they serve to cast a clear
light on the growth of the "ideologic super-
structure," * the basic conditions of existence
of maritime states, utterly different from those
of territorial states, called into being two ex-
ceedingly important phenomena, which are of
* How characteristic of these relations it is that Great
Britain, the only "maritime state" of Europe, even at this
present day will not surrender the right to arm privateers.
158 THE STATE
universal historical importance, viz., the
growth of a democratic constitution, whereby
the gigantic contest between the sultanism of
the Orient and the civic freedom of the West
was to be fought out (according to Mommsen
the true content of universal history) ; and in
the second place the development of capital-
istic slave-work, which in the end was to anni-
hilate all these states.
Let us first consider the inner or socio-psy-
chological causes of this contrast between the
territorial and the maritime state.
States are maintained by the same principle
from which they arise. Conquest of land and
populations is the ratio essendi of a territorial
state; and by the repeated conquest of lands
and populations it must grow, until its natural
growth is checked by mountain ranges, desert,
or ocean, or its sociological bounds are de-
termined by contact with other states of its
own kind, which it can not subjugate. The
maritime state, on the other hand, came into
being from piracy and trade; and through
these two means, it must strive to extend its
MARITIME STATE 159
power. For this purpose, no extended terri-
tory need be absolutely subjected to its sway.
There is no need to carry its development be-
yond the first five stages. The maritime states
rarely, and only when compelled, proceed be-
yond the fifth stage, and attain to complete
intra-nationality and amalgamation. Usually,
it is enough if other sea nomads and traders
are kept away, if the monopoly of robbery and
trade is secured, and if the "subjects" are kept
quiet by forts and garrisons. Important
places of production are, of course, actually
"dominated"; and this applies especially to
mines, to a few fertile grain belts, to woods
with good lumber, to salt works, and to im-
portant fisheries. Domination here, there-
fore, means permanent administration, by
making the subjects work these for the ruling
class. It is only later in the development, that
there arises a taste for "lands and serfs" and
large domains for the ruling class beyond the
confines of the narrow and original limits of
the State. This happens when the maritime
state by the incorporation of subjugated terri-
160 THE STATE
tories has become a mixture of the territorial
and the maritime forms. But even in that case,
and in contradistinction to territorial states,
large landed properties are merely a source
of money rentals, and are in nearly all cases
administered as absentee-property. This we
find in Carthage and in the later Roman Em-
pire.
The interests of the master class, which in
the maritime state as well as in every other
state, governs according to its own advantage,
are different from those in the territorial state.
In the latter the feudal territorial magnate is
powerful because of his ownership of lands and
people; while conversely, the patrician of the
maritime city is powerful because of his wealth.
The territorial magnate can dominate his
*'State" only by the number of men-at-arms
maintained by him, and in order to have as
many of these as possible, he must increase his
territory as much as possible. The patrician,
on the other hand, can control his "state" only
by movable wealth, with which he can hire
strong arms or bribe weak souls; such wealth
MARITIME STATE 161
is won faster by piracy and by trade than by
land wars and the possession of large estates
in distant territories. Furthermore, in order
thoroughly to use such property, he would be
obliged to leave his city to settle down on it,
and to become a regular squire; because in a
period when money has not yet become gen-
eral, where a profitable division of labor be-
tween town and country has not yet come
about, the exploitation of large estates can
only be carried on by actually consuming their
products, and absentee ownership as a source
of income is inconceivable. Thus far, how-
ever, we have not reached that portion of the
development. We are still examining primi-
tive conditions. 'No patrician of any city state
would, at this time, think of leaving his lively
rich home, in order to bury himself among bar-
barians, and thus with one move cut himself
off in his state from any political role. All his
economic, social and political interests impel
him with one accord toward maritime ventures.
Not landed property, but movable capital, is
the sinew of his hfe.
162 THE STATE
These were the moving causes of the actions
of the master class in the maritime cities; and
even where geographical conditions permitted
an extensive expansion beyond the adjoining
hinterland of these cities, they turned the
weight of effort toward sea-power rather than
toward territorial growth. Even in the case
of Carthage, its colossal territory was of far
less importance to it than its maritime in-
terests. Primarily it conquered Sicily and
Corsica more in order to check the competition
of the Greek and Etruscan traders than for
the sake of owning these islands; it extended
its territories toward the Lybians largely to
insure the security of its other home posses-
sions ; and finally, when it conquered Spain, its
ultimate reason was the need of owning the
mines. The history of the Hansa shows many
points of similarity to the above. The major-
ity of these maritime cities, moreover, were not
capable of subjugating a large district. Even
had there been the will to conquer, there were
extraneous, geographical conditions that hin-
dered. All along the Mediterranean, with the
MARITIME STATE 163
exception of some few places, the coastal plain
is extremely narrow, a small strip fenced off
by high mountain ranges. That was one
cause which prevented most of the states
grouped about some trading harbor from grow-
ing to anything like the size we should nat-
urally assume to be probable; while in the
open country, ruled by herdsmen, and this very
early, immense realms came into being. The
second cause for the small begumings of these
states is found in this, that the Mnterland
whether in the hills or on the few plains of the
Mediterranean was occupied by warlike tribes.
These tribesmen, either hunters or warlike
herdsmen, or else primitive feudal states of the
same master race as the sea nomads, were not
likely to be subjugated without a severe con-
test. Thus in Greece the interior was saved
from the maritime states.
For these reasons the maritime State, even
when most developed, always remains central-
ized, one is tempted to say centered, on its
trading harbor; while the territorial State,
strongly decentralized from the start, for a
164 THE STATE
long time continues to develop as it expands
a still more pronounced decentralization.
Later, we shall see how this is affected by the
adoption of those forms of government and of
economic achievement which first were per-
fected in the "city-state," and which thus
obtained the strength to counteract the centrif-
ugal forces, and to build up the central organ-
ization which is characteristic of our modern
states. This is the first great contrast between
the two forms of the State.
No less decisive is the second point of con-
trast, whereby the territorial State remains
tied up to natural economies as opposed to
money economies, toward which the maritime
State quickly turns. This contrast grows
also out of the basic conditions of their ex-
istence.
Wherever a State lives in natural economy,
money is a superfluous luxury — so superfluous
that an economy developed to the use of money
retrogrades again into a system of payments
in kind as soon as the community drops back
into the primitive form. Thus after Charle-
MARITIME STATE 165
magne had issued good coins, the economic
situation expelled them. Neustria — not to
mention Austrasia — under the stress of the
migration of the peoples reverted to payment in
kind. Such a system can well do without
money as a standard of values, since it is with-
out any developed intercourse and traffic. The
lord's tenants furnish as tribute those things
that the lord and his followers consume imme-
diately; while his ornaments, fine fabrics, dam-
ascened anms, or rare horses, salt, etc., are
procured in exchange with wandering mer-
chants for slaves, wax, furs and other products
of a warlike economic system of exchange in
kind.
In city life, at any advanced stage of de-
velopment, it is impossible to exist without a
common measure of values. The free me-
chanic in a city can not, except in rare cases,
find some other craftsman in need of the spe-
cial thing which he produces, prepared to con-
sume it immediately. Then, too, in cities
the inevitable retail trade in food products,
where every one must purchase nearly every-
166 THE STATE
thing required, makes the use of coined
money quite inevitable. It is impossible
to conduct trade in its more limited sense,
not between merchant and customers, but
between merchant and merchant, without hav-
ing a common measure of value. Imagine
the case of a trader entering a port with a
cargo of slaves, wishiug to take cloth as a re-
turn cargo, and finding a cloth merchant who
at the time may not want slaves but iron, or
cattle, or furs. To accomplish this exchange,
at least a dozen intermediate trades would
have to take place before the object could be
achieved. That can be avoided only if there
exists some one commodity desired by all. In
the system of payment in kind of the terri-
torial states this may be taken by cattle or
horses, since they may be used by any one at
some time; but the ship owner can not load
with cattle as a means of payment, and
thus gold and silver become recognized as
"money."
From centralization and from the use of
money, which are the necessary properties of
MARITIME STATE 167
the maritime or the dty State, as we shall here-
after call it, its fate follows of necessity.
The psychology of the townsman, and espe-
cially of the dweller in the maritime com-
mercial city, is radically different from that
of the countryman. His point of view is freer
and more inclusive, even though it be more
superficial ; he is livelier, because more impres-
sions strike him in a day than a peasant in a
year. He becomes used to constant changes
and news, and thus is always novarum rerum
cupidus. He is more remote from nature and
less dependent on it than is the peasant, and
therefore he has less fear of "ghosts." One
consequence of this is that an underling in a
city State is less apt to regard the "taboo" reg-
ulations imposed on him by the first and second
estates of rulers. And as he is compelled to
hve in compact masses with his fellow subjects,
he early finds his strength in numbers, so that
he becomes more unruly and seditious than the
serf who lives in such isolation that he never
becomes conscious of the mass to which he be-
longs and ever remains under the impression
168 THE STATE
that his overlord with his followers would have
the upper hand in every fight.
This in itself brings about an ever progres-
sive dissolution of the rigid system of subordi-
nated groups first created by the feudal state.
In Greece the territorial states alone were able
to keep their subjects for a long time in a state
of subjection; Sparta its Helots, Thessaly its
Penestce. In all the city States, on the other
hand, we early find an uprising of the prole-
tariat against which the master class was un-
able to oppose an effective resistance.
The economic situation tends toward the
same result as the conditions of settlement.
Movable wealth had far less stability than
landed property : the sea is tricky, and the for-
tunes of maritime war and piracy not less so.
The rich man of to-day may lose all by a turn
of Fortune's wheel; while the poorest man
may, by the same swing, land on top. But in
a commonwealth based entirely on possessions,
loss of fortune brings with it loss of rank and
of "class," just as the converse takes place.
The rich Plebeian becomes the leader of the
MARITIME STATE 169
mass of the people in their constitutional fight
for equal rights and places all his fortune at
risk in that struggle. The position of the pa-
tricians becomes untenable ; when coerced they
have ever conceded the claims of the lower
class. As soon as the first rich Plebeian has
been taken into their ranks, the right of rule
by birth, defended as a holy institution, has for-
ever become impossible. Henceforth it fol-
lows that what is fair for one is fair for the
other; and the aristocratic rule is followed first
by the plutocratic, then by the democratic,
finally by the ochlocratic regime, until either
foreign conquest or the "tyranny" of some
"Savior of the Sword" rescues the community
from chaos.
This end affects not only the State, but in
most cases its inhabitants so profoundly that
one may speak of a literal death of the peojjles,
caused by the capitalistic exploitation of slave
labor. This latter is a social institution inevi-
tably bound to exist in every state founded on
piracy and maritime ventures and thus coming
to use money as a means of exchange. In the
170 THE STATE
primitive stages of feudalism, whence it was
derived, slavery was harmless, as is true in all
economic systems based on exchange and use
in kind, only to become an ulcerating cancer,
utterly destructive of the entire life of the
State as soon as it is exploited by the "capi-
talist" method, i. e., as soon as slave labor is
applied, not to be used in a system of a feudal
payment in kind, but to supply a market pay-
ing in money.
Numberless slaves are brought into the
country by piracy, privateering, or by the com-
mercial wars. The wealth of their owners per-
mits them to work the ground more intensively,
and the owners of realty within the confines
of the city limits draw ever increasing revenues
from their possessions, and become more and
more greedy of land. The small freeholder in
the country, overburdened by the taxes and
military service of wars waged in the interests
of this great merchant class, sinks into debt,
becomes a slave for debt, or migrates into the
city as a pauper. But even so there is no hope
for him, since the removal of the peasants has
MARITIME STATE 171
damaged the craftsmen and small traders, for
the peasants were wont to purchase in the city,
while the great estates, constantly increasing
by the removal of the peasantry, supply their
own needs by their own slave products. The
evil attacks other parts of the body politic.
The remaining trades are gradually usurped
by masters exploiting slave labor, which is
cheaper than free labor. The middle class
thus goes to pieces; and a pauper, good-for-
nothing mob, a genuine "bob-tail proletariat"
comes into being, which, by reason of the dem-
ocratic constituton achieved in the interim, is
the sovereign of the commonwealth. The full
course, political as well as military, is then a
mere question of time. It may take place
without a foreign invasion; which, however,
usually sets in, when by reason of the physical
breakdown caused by the immense depopula-
tion, by the consumption of the people in its
literal sense, the final stage is attained. This
is the end of all these states. Within the scope
of this treatise we can not dilate on this phase.
Only one city State was able to maintain it-
172 THE STATE
self througliout the centuries, because it was
the ultimate conqueror of all the others, and
because it was enabled to counteract the con-
sumption of population by the only method of
sanitation possible ; by extensive recreations of
middle class populations, both in cities and in
country districts, as well as by vast coloniza-
tions of peasants on lands taken from the
vanquished.
The Roman Empire was that state. But
even this gigantic organism finally succumbed
to the consumption of population, caused by
capitalistic slave exploitation. In the interval,
however, it had created the first imperium^ i. e.,
the first tensely centralized state on a large
scale, and had overcome and amalgamated all
territorial states of both the Mediterranean
shores and its neighboring countries, and had
thereby for all time set before the world the
model of such an organized dominion. In ad-
dition to this it had developed the organization
of cities and of the system of money economy
to such an extent that they never were utterly
destroyed, even in the turmoil of the barbarian
MARITIME STATE 173
migration. In consequence of this, the feudal
territorial states that occupied the territory of
the former Roman Empire either directly or
indirectly received those new impulses which
were to carry them beyond the condition of the
normal primitive feudal State,
CHAPTER V
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE FEUDAL STATE
(a) THE GENESIS OF LANDED PROPERTY
We now return, as stated above, to that
point where the primitive feudal State gave
rise to the city State as an offshoot, to follow
the upward growth of the main branch. As
the destiny of the city State was determined by
the agglomeration of that form of wealth about
which the State swung in its orbit, so the fate
of the territorial State is conditioned by that
agglomeration of wealth which in turn controls
its orbit, the ownership of landed property.
In the preceding, we followed the economic
differentiation in the case of the shepherd
tribes, and showed that even here the law of the
agglomeration about existing nuclei of wealth
begins to assert its efficacy, as soon as the polit-
ical means comes into play, be it in the form
174
FEUDAL STATE 175
of wars for booty or still more in the form of
slavery. We saw that the tribe had differen-
tiated nobles and common freemen, beneath
whom slaves, being without any political
rights, are subordinated as a third class.
This differentiation of wealth is introduced
into the primitive state, and sharpens very
markedly the contrast of social rank. It be-
comes still more accentuated by settlement,
whereby private ownership in lands is created.
Doubtless there existed even at the time when
the primitive feudal state came into being,
great differences in the amount of lands pos-
sessed by individuals, especially if within the
tribe of herdsmen the separation had been
strongly marked between the prince-like
owners of large herds and many slaves, and the
poorer common freemen. These princes
occupy more land than do the small freemen.
At first, this happens quite harmlessly, and
without a trace of any consciousness of the fact
that extended possession of land will become
the means of a considerable increase of social
power and of wealth. Of this, there is at this
176 THE STATE
time no question, since at this stage the com-
mon freemen would have been powerful
enough to prevent the formation of extended
landed estates had they known that it would
eventually do them harm. But no one could
have foreseen this possibility. Lands, in the
condition in which we are observing them, have
no value. For that reason the object and the
spoils of the contest were not the possession of
landSj but of the land and its peasants^, the lat-
ter being bound to the soil (glebce adscripti of
our later law) as labor substrat and labor mo-
tors, from the conjunction of which there
grows the object of the political means, viz.,
ground rent.
Every one is at liberty to take as much of
the uncultivated land existing in masses as he
needs and will or can cultivate. It is quite as
unlikely that any one would care to measure
ojBf for another parts of an apparently limitless
supply, as that any one would apportion the
supply of atmospheric air.
The princes of the noble clans, probably
from the start, pursuant to the usage of the
FEUDAL STATE 177
tribe of herdsmen, receive more "lands and
peasants" than do the conmion freemen. That
is their right as prmces, because of their posi-
tion as patriarchs, war lords, and captains
maintaining their warlike suites of half-free
persons, of servants, of clients, or of refugees.
This probably amounts to a considerable dif-
ference in the primitive amounts of land owner-
ship. But this is not all. The princes need a
larger surface of the "land without peasants'^
than do the common freemen, because thev
bring with them their servants and slaves.
These have, however, no standing at law, and
are incapable, according to the universal con-
cepts of folk law, of acquiring title to landed
property. Since, however, they must have
land in order to live, their master takes it for
them, so as to settle them thereon. In conse-
quence of this, the richer the prince of the no-
mad tribe the more powerful the territorial
magnate becomes.
But this means that wealth, and with it
social rank, is consolidated more firmly and
more durably than in the stage of herdsman
178 THE STATE
ownership. For the greatest herds may be
lost, but landed property is indestructible ; and
men bound to labor, bringing forth rentals, re-
produce their kind even after the most terrible
slaughter, even should they not be obtainable
full grown in slave hunts.
About this fixed nucleus of wealth, property
begins to agglomerate with increasing rapidity.
Harmless as was the first occupation, men must
soon recognize the fact that rental increases
with the number of slaves one can settle on the
unoccupied lands. Henceforth, the external
policy of the feudal state is no longer directed
toward the acquisition of land and peasants^
but rather of peasants without land, to be car-
ried off home as serfs, and there to be colonized
anew. When the entire state carries on the
war or the robbing expedition, the nobles
obtain the lion's share. Very often, however,
they go off on their own account, followed only
by their suites, and then the common freeman,
staying at home, receives no share in the loot.
Thus the vicious circle constantly tends rapidly
to enlarge with the increasing wealth of the
FEUDAL STATE 17&
lands owned by the nobles. The more slaves a
noble has, the more rental he can obtain.
With this, in turn, he can maintain a warlike
following, composed of servants, of lazy free-
men, and of refugees. With their help, he
can, in turn, drive in so many more slaves, to
increase his rentals.
This process takes place, even where some
central power exists, which, pursuant to the
general law of the people, has the right to dis-
pose of uncultivated lands ; while it is, in many
cases, not only by sufferance, but often by the
express sanction of that authority. As long as
the feudal magnate remains the submissive vas-
sal of the crown, it lies in the king's interest to
make him as strong as possible. By this means
his military suite, to be placed at the disposal
of the crown in times of war, is correspond-
ingly increased. We shall adduce only one il-
lustration to show that the necessary conse-
quence in universal history is not confined to
the well-known effect in the feudal states of
Western Europe, but follows from these prem-
ises even under totally different surroundings :
180 THE STATE
"The principal service in Fiji consisted in war
duty; and if the outcome was successful it
meant new grants of lands, including therein
the denizens, as slaves, and thus led to the as-
sumption of new obligations." ^^
This accumulation of landed property in
ever mcreasing quantity in the hands of the
landed nobility brings the primitive feudal
state of a higher stage to the "finished feudal
state" with a complete scale of feudal ranks.
Reference to a previous work by the author,
based on a study of the sources, will show the
same causal connection for German lands ; ^^
and in that publication it was pointed out that
in all the instances noted a process takes place,
identical in its principal lines of development.
It is only on this line of reasoning that one can
explain the fact, to take Japan as an example,
that its feudal system developed into the pre-
cise details which are well known to the stu-
dents of European history, although Japan is
inhabited by a race fundamentally di£Ferent
from the Arians; and besides (a strong argu-
ment against giving too great weight to the
FEUDAL STATE 181
materialistic view of history) the process of
agriculture is on a totally different technical
basis, since the Japanese are not cultivators
M^ith the plow, but with the hoe.
In this instance, as throughout this book, it
is not the fortune of a single people that is in-
vestigated; it is rather the object of the author
to narrate the typical development, the uni-
versal consequences, of the same basic traits of
mankind wherever they are placed. Presup-
posing a knowledge of the two most magnifi-
cent examples of the expanded feudal state,
Western Europe and Japan, we shall, in gen-
eral, limit ourselves to cases less well known,
and so far as possible give the preference to
material taken from ethnography, rather than
from history in its more restricted sense.
The process now to be narrated is a change,
gradually consummated but fimdamentally
revolutionary, of the political and social articu-
lation of the primitive feudal state : the central
authority loses its political power to the terri-
torial nobility, the common freeman sinks from
Ms status, while the ''subject" mounts.
182 THE STATE
(b) THE CENTRAL POWER IN THE PRIMITIVE
FEUDAL STATE
The patriarch of a tribe of herdsmen, though
endowed with the authority which flows from
his war-lordship and sacerdotal functions, gen-
erally has no despotic powers. The same may
be said of the "king" of a small settled com-
munity, where, generally speaking, he would
exercise very limited command. On the other
hand, as soon as some military genius manages
to fuse together numerous tribes of herdsmen
into one powerful mass of warriors, despotic
centralized power is the direct, inevitable con-
sequence.^^ As soon as war exists, the truth of
the Homeric
O'jx dyadrj noXuxocpavcrj, el' xoipavoQ iazo)
is admitted by the most unruly tribes, and be-
comes a fact to be acted on. The free primi-
tive huntsmen render to their elected chief un-
conditioned obedience, while on the war-path;
* "The rule of the many is not a good thing, over the manj^
there should be one king."
FEUDAL STATE 183
the free Cossacks of the Ukraine, recognizing
no authority in times of peace, submit to their
hetmanfs power of life and death in times of
war. This obedience toward their war-lord is
a trait common to every genuine warrior
psychology.
The leaders of the great migrations of no-
mads are all powerful despots : Attila, Omar,
Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Mosilikatse,
Ketchwayo. Similarly, we find that whenever
a mighty territorial state has come into being
as the result of the welding together of a num-
ber of primitive feudal states, there existed in
the beginning a strong central authority. Ex-
amples of this may be seen in the case of S ar-
gon Cyrus, Chlodowech, Charlemagne, Boles-
law the Red. Sometimes, especially as long
as the main state has not yet reached its geo-
graphical or sociologic bounds, the centralized
authority is maintained intact in the hands of a
series of strong monarchs, which degenerates,
in some instances, to the maddest despotism
and insanity of some of the Caesars : especially
do we find flagrant examples of this in JMeso-
184 THE STATE
potamia and in Africa. We shall merely
touch on this phase : the more so, as it has little
general effect on the final development of the
forms of government. This point should,
however, be stated, that the development of the
form of government of a despotism depends
in the main, on what the sacerdotal status of
the rulers may be, in addition to their position
as war-lords, and whether or not they hold the
monopoly of trade as an additional regalian
right.
The combination of Caesar and Pope tends
in all cases to develop the extreme forms of des-
potism; while the partition of spiritual and
temporal functions brings it about that their
exponents mutually check and counterbalance
one another. A characteristic example may
be found in the conditions prevailing among
the Malay states of the East Indian Archipel-
ago, genuine "maritime states," whose genesis
is an exact counterpart of that of the Greek
maritime states. Generally speaking, the
prince has just as little power among these, as,
shall we say, the king at the opening of the his-
FEUDAL STATE 185
tory of the Attic states. The chieftains of the
clans (in Sulu the Dato, in Achin the Pang-
lima), as in the case of Athens, have the real
power. But where, "as in Tobah, religious
motives endow the rulers with the position of
a Pope in miniature, an entirely different
phase is found. The Panglima then depend
entirely on the Rajah, and are merely of-
ficials." ^^ To refer to a well-known fact,
when the aristocrats and chiefs of the clans in
Athens and in Rome abolished the kingdom,
they preserved at least the old tithj and
granted its use to a dignitary otherwise politi-
cally impotent, in order that the gods might
have their offerings presented in the accus-
tomed manner. For the same reason, in many
cases, the descendant of the former tribal king
is preserved as a dignitary, otherwise totally
powerless, while the actual power of govern-
ment has long since been transferred to some
war chief ; as in the later Merovingian Empire,
the Carolingian Mayors of the palace (Major-
domus) ruled alongside a "long locked king,"
rea^ ciinitus, of the race of ^lerowech, so, in
186 THE STATE
Japan, the Sliogun ruled beside the Mikado,
and in the Empire of the Incas, the commander
of the Inca beside the Huillcauma, who had
been gradually limited to his sacerdotal func-
tions.* ^^
In addition to the office of supreme pontiff,
the power of the head of the state is frequently
increased enormously by the trading mo-
nopoly, a function exercised by the primitive
chieftains as a natural consequence of the
peaceful barter of guest-gifts. Such a trade
monopoly, for example, was exercised by King
Solomon ; and latterly by the Roman Emperor
Friedrich Il.f ''
As a rule, the negro chieftains are "monopo-
lists of trading" ;^^ as is the King of Sulu.®^
Among the Galla, wherever the supremacy of
a head chief is acknowledged, he becomes "as
* In Egypt we find a similar state of affairs, beside the
bigoted Amenhotep IV., the Majordomus of the palace
Haremheb, who "managed to unite in his hands the highest
military and administrative functions of the empire, until he
exercised the powers of a regent of the state." Schneider,
Civilization and Thought of the Ancient Egyptians. Leipzig,
1907, page 23.
tCf. Acta Imperii, or Huillard-BrehoUes, H. D. Fred. II.
— Translator.
FEUDAL STATE 187
a matter of course, the tradesman for his tribe ;
since none of his subjects is allowed to trade
with strangers directly." ^^ Among the Ba-
rotse and Mabunda, the king is "according to
the strict interpretation of the law, the only
trader of his country." ^^^
Ratzel notes, in telling language, the im-
portance of this factor: "In addition to his
witchcraft, the chief increases his power by a
monopoly of trading. Since the chief is the
sole intermediary in trade, everything desired
by his subjects passes through his hands, and
he becomes the donor of all longed-for gifts,
the fulfiller of the fondest wishes. In such a
system, there lie certainly the possibilities of
great power." ^^^ If, in conquered districts,
where the power of government is apt to be
more tensely exercised, there is added the mo-
nopoly of trade, the royal power may become
very great.
It may be stated as a general rule, that even
in the apparently most extreme cases of despot-
ism, no monarchical absolutism exists. The
ruler may, undeterred by fear of punislmient,
188 THE STATE
rage against his subject class; but he is checked
in no small degree by his feudal followers.
Ratzel, in speaking of the subject generally,
remarks: "The so-called 'court assemblage'
of African or of ancient American chiefs is
probably always a council. . . . Although we
meet with traces of absolutism with all peoples
on a low scale, even where the form of govern-
ment is republican, the cause of absolutism is
not in the strength of either the state or of the
chieftain, but in the moral weakness of the in-
dividual, who succumbs without any effective
resistance to the powers wielded over him." ^^^
The kingdom of the Zulu is a limited despot-
ism, in which very powerful ministers of state
(Induna) share the power; with other Caffir
tribes it is a council, sometimes dominating
both people and chieftains."^ In spite of this
control "under Tshaka every sneezing or
hawking in the presence of the tyrant, as well
as every lack of tears at the death of some royal
kinsman, was punished with death." "^ The
same limitation applies to the West African
kingdoms of Dahomy and Ashanti, notorious
FEUDAL STATE 189
because of their frightful barbarities. "In
spite of the waste of human life, in war, slave
trade, and human sacrifices, there existed at no
place absolute despotism. . . . Bowditch re-
marks on the similarity of the system prevail-
ing in Ashanti, with its ranks and orders, with
the old Persian system as described by He-
rodotus." ''^
One must be very careful, and this may
again be insisted upon, not to confuse despot-
ism with absolutism. Even in the feudal states
of Western Europe, the rulers exercised, in
many cases, power of life and death, free from
the trammels of law; but nevertheless such a
ruler was impotent as against his "magnates."
So long as he does not interfere with the priv-
ileges of the classes, he need not restrain his
cruelty, and he may even occasionally sacrifice
one of the great men ; but woe to him were he
to dare to touch the economic privileges of his
magnates. It is possible to study this very
characteristic phase, completely free, from the
standpoint of law, and yet closely hemmed in
by poHtical checks, in the great East African
190 THE STATE
empires: "The government of Waganda and
Wanyoro is, in theory, based on the rule of the
king over the whole territory ; but in reality this
is only the semblance of government, since, as a
matter of fact, the lands belong to the supreme
chieftains of the empire. It was they who rep-
resented the popular opposition to foreign in-
fluences, in the time of Mtesa; and Muanga
did not dare, for fear of them, to carry out any
innovations. Although the kingship is limited
in reality, yet in form it occupies an imposing
position in unessentials. The ruler is absolute
master over the lives and limbs of his subjects,
the mass of the people, and feels himself re-
strained only in the narrowest circle of the
chief courtiers," ^"^^
Precisely the same statement applies to the
inhabitants of Oceania, to mention the last of
the great societies that created states : "At no
place does one find an entire absence of a rep-
resentative mediation between prince and peo-
ple. . . . The aristocratic principle corrects
the patriarchal. Therefore, the extremes of
despotism depend more on class and caste
FEUDAL STATE 191
pressure than on the overpowering will of any
individual" '''
(c) THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL DISINTEGRA-
TION OF THE PRIMITIVE FEUDAL STATE
Space forbids our detailing the innumerable
shadings under which the patriarchal-aristo-
cratic (in some cases plutocratic) mixture of
form of government in the primitive feudal
state is shown in either an ethnographic, his-
torical or juristic survey. This is likewise of
the greatest importance for the subsequent de-
velopment.
It is indifferent how much power the ruler
may have had at the beginning, an inevitable
fate breaks down his power in a short while;
and does this, one may say, the faster, the
greater that power was, i. e., the larger the
territory of the primitive feudal state of higher
grade.
Taking into account the process already set
forth, which, through the occupation and set-
tlement of unused lands by means of newly
acquu'cd slaves, made for the increase of power
192 THE STATE
of the separate nobles, a result came about
which might prove uncomfortable for the cen-
tral power. Mommsen in speaking of the
Celts says : "When in a clan numbering about
eighty thousand armed men, a single chieftain
could appear at convocation with ten thousand
followers, exclusive of his serfs and debtors, it
becomes clear that such a noble was rather an
independent prince than a mere citizen of his
clan." ^^^ And the same may apply to the
"Heiu" of the Somali, where a great landed
proprietor maintained hundreds of families in
dependence on his lands, "so that conditions
in Somaliland tend to recall those existing
in mediseval Europe during feudal times." ^^^
Although such a preponderance of isolated
territorial magnates can come about in the feu-
dal state of low development, it nevertheless
reaches its culmination in the feudal state of
higher grade, the great feudal state; this hap-
pens by reason of the increased power given
to the landlords by the bestowal of public of-
ficial functions.
The more the state expands, the more must
FEUDAL STATE 193
official power be delegated by the central gov-
ernment to its representatives on the borders
and marches, who are constantly threatened by
wars and insurrectionary outbreaks. In order
to preserve his bailiwick in safety for the state,
such an official must be endowed with supreme
military powers, joined with the functions of
the highest administrative officials. Even
should he not require a large number of civil
employees, he still must have a permanent mili-
tary force. And how is he to pay these men?
With one possible exception, to be noted here-
after, there are no taxes which flow into the
treasury of the central government and then
are poured back again over the land, since
these presuppose an economic development
existing only where money is employed. But
in communities having a system of payments
in kind, such as these "territorial states" all are,
there are no taxes payable in money. For that
reason, the central government has no alter-
native but to turn over to the counts, or border
wardens, or satraps, the income of its territo-
rial jurisdiction. Such an official, then, re-
194 THE STATE
ceives the dues of the subjects, determines
when and where forced labor is to be rendered,
receives the deodands, fees and penalties pay-
able in cattle, etc. ; and in consideration of these
must maintain the armed force, place definite
numbers of armed men at the disposal of the
central government, build and maintain high-
ways and bridges, feed and stable the ruler and
his following, or his "royal messengers," and
finally, furnish a definite "Sergeantry" consist-
ing of highly valuable goods, easily transported
to the court, such as horses, cattle, slaves, pre-
cious metals, wines, etc.
In other words, he receives an immensely
large fief for his services. If previously he
was not, he now becomes the greatest man in
his country, though before he probably was the
most powerful landlord in his official district.
He will hereafter do exactly what his equals
in rank are doing, although they may not have
his official position; that is to say, he will, only
on a larger scale, continue to settle new lands
with ever newly recruited serfs. By this he
increases his military strength; and this must
FEUDAL STATE 195
be wished for and aided by the central govern-
ment. For it is the fate of these states, that
they must fatten those very local powers, that
are to engulf them.
Conditions arise which enable the warden
of the marches to impose the terms of his mili-
tary assistance, especially in the inevitable
feuds which arise over the right of succession
to the central government. Thereby he ob-
tains further valuable concessions, especially
the formal acknowledgment of the heritability
of his official fief, so that office and lands come
to be held by an identical tenure. By this
means, he gradually becomes almost independ-
ent of the central authority, and the complaint
of the Russian peasant, "The sky is high up
and the Tsar is far off," tends to become of uni-
versal application. Take this characteristic ex-
ample from Africa: "The empire of Lunda is
an absolute feudal state. The chieftains (Mu-
ata, Mona, Muene) are permitted independent
action in all internal affairs, so long as it
pleases the Muata Jamvo. Usually, the great
chieftains, living afar, send their caravans with
196 THE STATE
their tribute once a year to the Mussumba ; but
those living at too great a distance, sometimes
for long periods omit making any payments of
their tribute; while similar chiefs in the neigh-
borhood of the capital forward tribute many
times a year." "°
Nothing can show more plainly than this re-
port, how, because of inadequate means of
transportation, extent of distance becomes po-
litically effective in these states loosely held
together and in a state of payment in kind.
One is tempted to say that the independence
of the feudal masters grows in proportion to
the square of their distance from the seat of the
central authority. The crown must pay more
and more for their services, and must gradually
confirm them in all the sovereign powers of the
state, or else permit their usurpation of these
powers after they have seized them one after
the other. Such are heritability of fiefs, tolls
on highways and commerce, (in a later stage
the right of coinage) , high and low justice, the
right to exact for private gain the public
duties of repair of ways and bridges (the old
FEUDAL STATE 197
English trinodis necessitas) and the disposal
of the military services of the freemen of the
country.
By these means, the powerful frontier
wardens gradually attain an ever greater, and
finally a complete, de facto independence, even
though the formal bond of feudal suzerainty
may for a long time apparently keep together
the newly developed principalities. The
reader, of course, recalls instances of these typ-
ical transitions; all mediaeval history is one
chain of them; not only the Merovingian and
Carolingian Empires, not only Germany, but
also France, Italy, Spain, Poland, Bohemia,
Hungary, as well as Japan and China,^^^ have
passed through this process of decomposition,
not only once, but repeatedly. And this is no
less true of the feudal states of Mesopotamia:
great empires follow each other, acquire power,
burst asunder time after time, and again are
re-united. In the case of Persia, we are ex-
pressly told: "Separate states and provinces,
by a successful revolt, obtained freedom for a
longer or shorter time, and the 'great king'
198 THE STATE
at Susa did not always have the power to
force them to return to their obedience; in
other states, the satraps or warHke chieftains
ruled arbitrarily, carrying on the government
faithlessly and violently, either as independent
rulers or tributary under-kings of the king of
kings. The Persian world-empire went to its
disintegration an agglomeration of states and
lands, without any general law, without or-
dered administration, without uniform judicial
system, without order and enforcement of law,
and without possibility of help." "^
A similar fate overtook its neighbor in the
valley of the Nile: "Princes spring from
the families of the usurpers, free landlords, who
pay land-taxes to nobody but to the king, and
rule over certain strips of land, or districts.
These district princes govern a territory spe-
cifically set apart as pertaining to their official
position, and separate from their family pos-
sessions.
"Later successful warlike operations, per-
haps filling in the gap between the Ancient and
the Middle (Egyptian) Empire, together with
FEUDAL STATE 199
the gathering in of captives of the wars, who
could he utilized as labor motors, brought a
more stringent exploitation of the subjects, a
definite determination of the tributes. Dur-
ing the Middle Empire, the power of the
princes of the clans rose to an enormous height,
they maintained great courts, imitating the
splendor of the royal establishment." ^^^
"With the decline of the royal authority dur-
ing a period of decay, the higher officials use
their power for personal aims, in order to make
their offices hereditary within their fami-
lies." * ^^*
But the operation of this historical law is
*Maspero says, New Light on Ancient Egypt, pp. 218-9:
"Until then, in fact, the high priest had been chosen and nomi-
nated by the king; from the time of Rameses III. he was al-
ways chosen from the same family, and the son succeeded his
father on the pontifical throne. From that time events marched
quicldy. The Theban mortmain was doubled with a veritable
seigniorial fief, which its masters increased by marriages with
the heirs of neighboring fiefs, by continual bequests from one
branch of the family to the other, and by the placing of cadets
of each generation at the head of the clergy of certain second-
ary toxons. The official protocol of the offices filled by their
wives shows that a century or a century and a half after
Rameses III., almost the whole of the Thebaid, about a third
of the Egyptian territory was in the hands of the High Priest
of Ammon and of his family." — Translator's Note {and italics).
200 THE STATE
not restricted to the "historical" peoples. In
speaking of the feudal states of India, Ratzel
states: "Even beyond Radshistan, the nobles
often enjoyed a great measure of independ-
ence, so that even in Haiderabad, after the
Nizam had acquired the sole rule over the
country, the Umara or Nabobs maintained
troops of their own, independently of the army
of the Nizam. These smaller feudatories did
not comply with the increased demands of
modern times as regards the administration of
Indian states as often as did the greater
princes." ^^^
In Africa finally, great feudal states come
and pass away, as do bubbles arising and burst-
ing from the stream of eternally similar
phenomena. The powerful Ashanti empire,
within one and a half centuries, has shriveled
to less than one-fifth of its territory; ^^^ and
many of the empires that the Portuguese en-
countered have since disappeared without
leaving a trace of their existence. And yet
these were strong feudal powers: "Stately
and cruel negro empires, such as Benin^
FEUDAL STATE 201
Dahomy or Ashanti, resemble in many respects
ancient Peru or Mexico, having in their
vicinity poHtically disorganized tribes. The
hereditary nobility of the Mfumus, sharply
separated from the rest of the state, had mainly
the administration of the districts, and to-
gether with the more transitory nobility of
service, formed in Loango strong pillars of
the ruler and his house." ^^^
But whenever such a state, once powerful,
has split into a number of territorial states
either de facto or juristically independent, the
former process begins anew. The great state
gobbles up the smaller ones, until a new em-
pire has arisen. "The greatest territorial
magnates later become emperors," says Meit-
zen laconically of Germany.^^^ But even this
great demesne vanishes, split up by the need
of equipping warlike vassals with fiefs. "The
Kings soon found that they had donated
away all their belongings; their great territo-
rial possessions in the Delta had melted away,"
says Schneider (1. c. page 38) of the Pharaohs
pf the sixth dynasty. The same causes
202 THE STATE
brought about like effects in the Prankish Em-
pire among both Merovingians and Carolin-
gians ; and later in Germany in the case of the
Saxon and Hohenstaufen Emperors."^ Ad-
ditional references are unnecessary, as every
one is familiar with these instances.
In a subsequent part of this treatise, we
shall examine into the causes that finally
liberated the primitive feudal state from this
witch's curse, this circling from agglomeration
to disintegration without end. Our present
task is to take up the social side of the process,
as we have already taken up the historical
phase of it. It changes the articulation of
classes in the most decisive manner.
The common freemen, the lower strata of
the dominating group, are struck with over-
powering force. They sink into bondsmen-
ship. Their decay must go along with that of
the central power; since both, allied one might
say, by nature, are menaced simultaneously
by the expanding power of the great territorial
lords. The crown controls the landed mag-
nate so long as the levy of the common free-
FEUDAL STATE 203
men of the district is a superior force to his
guards, to his "following." But a fatal need,
already set forth, impels the crown to deliver
over the peasants to the landed lordling, and
from the moment when the county levy has
become weaker than his guards, the free i^eas-
ants are lost. Where the sovereign powers ot
the state are delegated to the territorial mag-
nate, i. e., where he has developed more or less
into an independent lord of the region, the over-
throw of the liberties of the peasants is carried
out, at least in part, under the color of law,
by forcing excessive military services, which
ruin the peasants, and which are required the
more often as the dynastic interests of the
territorial lord require new lands and new
peasants, or by abusing the right to compulsory
labor, or by turning the administration of pub-
lic justice into military oppression.
The common freemen, however, receive the
final blow either by the formal delegation or by
the usurpation of the most important powers
of the crown, the disposition of unoccupied
lands or "commons." Originally, this land be-
204 THE STATE
longed to all the "folk" in common; i. e., to the
freemen for common use; but in accordance
with an original custom, probably universal,
the patriarch enjoys disposal of it. This right
of disposition passes to the territorial
magnate with the remaining royal privi-
leges — and thus he has obtained the power
to strangle any few remaining freemen. He
now declares all unoccupied lands his property,
and forbids their settlement by free peasants,
while those only are permitted access who
recognize his superior lordship ; i. e., who have
commended themselves to him, or are his serfs.
That is the last nail in the coffin of the com-
mon freemen. Heretofore their equality of
possessions has been in some way guaranteed.
Even if a peasant had twelve sons, his patri-
mony was not split up, because eleven of them
broke new hides of land in the commons of
the community, or else in the general land not
yet distributed to other villages. That is
henceforth impossible; hides tend to divide
where large families grow up, others are
united when heir and heiress marry: hence-
FEUDAL STATE 205
forth there come into existence "laborers," re-
cruited from the owners of half, a quarter, or
even an eighth of a hide who help work a larger
area. Thus the free peasantry splits into rich
and poor ; this begins to loosen the bond which
hitherto had made the bundle of arrows un-
breakable. When, therefore, some comrade is
overwhelmed by the exactions of the lord and
has become his liegeman, or if bond peasants
are settled among the original owners, either
to occupy some hide vacated by the extinction
of the family or fallen into the hands of the
lord because of the indebtedness of its occu-
pant, then every social cohesion is loosened;
and the peasantry, split apart by class and by
economic contrasts, is handed over without
power of resistance to the magnate.
On the other hand, the result is the same
where the magnate has no usurped regalian
powers of the state. In such cases, open
force and shameless violation of rights ac-
complish the same ends. The ruler, far off
and impotent, bound to rely on the good will
and help of the violators of law and order, has
206 THE STATE
neither the power nor the opportunity of inter-
ference.
There is hardly any need of adducing in-
stances. The free peasantry of Germany were
put through the process of expropriation and
declassification at least three times. Once it
happened in Celtic times. ^^^ The second over-
throw of the free peasants of the old German
Empire took place in the ninth and tenth
centuries. The third tragedy of the same form
began with the fifteenth century, in the coun-
tries formerly Slavic, which they had conquered
and colonized.^^^ The peasants fared worse
in those lands, in the "republics of nobles,"
where there was no monarchical central au-
thority, whose community of interests with
their subjects tended to deprive oppression of
its worse features. The Celts in the Gaul of
Caesar's time are one of the earliest examples.
Here "the great families exercised an eco-
nomic, military and political preponderance.
They monopolized the leases of the lucrative
rights of the state. They forced the common
freemen, overwhelmed by the taxes which they
FEUDAL STATE 207
had themselves imposed, to borrow of them, and
then, first as their debtors, afterward legally
as their serfs, to surrender then- liberty. For
their own advantage they developed the sys-
tem of followers : i. e., the privilege of the no-
bility to have about them a mass of armed serv-
ants in their pay, called ambacti, with whose
aid they formed a state within a state. Rely-
ing on these, their own men-at-arms, they de-
fied the lawful authorities and the levies of the
freemen, and thus were able to burst asunder
the commonwealth. . . . The only protection
to be found was in the relation of serfdom,
where personal duty and interest required the
lord to protect his clients and to avenge an}^
wrong to his men. Since the state no longer
had the power to protect the freemen, these in
growing numbers became the vassals of some
powerful noble." ^^^ We find these identical
conditions fifteen hundred years later in Kur-
land, Livonia, in Swedish Pomerania, in East-
ern Holstein, in Mecklenburg, and especially
in Poland. In the German territories the
petty nobles subjugated their peasantry, while
208 THE STATE
in Poland their prey was the formerly free and
noble Schlachziz. "Universal history is mo-
notonous," says Ratzel. The same procedure
overthrew the peasantry of ancient Egypt:
"After a warlike intermezzo, there follows a
period in the history of the Middle Empire,
which brings about a deterioration of the posi-
tion of the peasantry in Lower Egypt. The
number of landlords decreases, while their ter-
ritorial growth and power increases. The
tribute of the peasants is hereafter determined
by an exact assessment on their estates, and
definitely fixed by a sort of Doomsday Book.
Because of this pressure, many peasants soon
enter the lord's court or the cities of the local
rulers, and take employment there either as
servants, mechanics, or even as overseers in the
economic organization of these manors or
courts. In common with any available cap-
tives, they contribute to the extension of the
prince's estates, and to further the general ex-
pulsion of the peasantry from their hold-
ings." ^28
The example of the Roman Empire shows.
FEUDAL STATE 209
as nothing else can, how inevitable this process
becomes. When we first meet Rome in history
the conception of serfdom or bondage has al-
ready been forgotten. When the "modern
period" of Rome opens, only slavery is known.
And yet, within fifteen centuries, the free
peasantry again sink into economic depend-
ence, after Rome has become an overextended,
unwieldy empire, whose border districts have
more and more dissolved from the central con-
trol. The great landed proprietors, having
been endowed with the lower justice and police
administration on their own estates have "re-
duced their servants, who may originally have
been free proprietors of the ^ager privatus
vecUgalis' to a state of servitude, and have
thus developed a sort of actual glehce adscrip-
tus, within the boundaries of their 'immuni-
ties.' " ^^^ The invading Germans found this
feudal order worked out in Gaul and the other
provinces. At this particular time, the im-
mense difference formerly existing between
slaves and free settlers (coloni) had been com-
pletely obliterated, first in their economic posi-
210 THE STATE
tion, and then, naturally, in their constitutional
rights.
Wherever the common freemen sink into
political and economic dependence on the great
territorial magnates, when, in other words,
they become bound either to the court or to
the lands, the social group formerly subject
to them tend in a corresponding measure to
improve their status. Both layers tend to
meet half-way, to approximate their position,
and finally to amalgamate. The observations
just made concerning the free settlers and the
agricultural slaves of the later Roman Empire
hold true everywhere. Thus in Germany,
freemen and serfs together formed, when
fused, the economic and legally unital
group of Grundholde, or men bound to the
soil.^2^
The elevation of the former "subjects,"
hereafter for the sake of brevity to be called
"plebs," flows from the same source as the de-
basement of the freeman, and arises by the
same necessity from the very foundations on
which these states are themselves erected, viz..
FEUDAL STATE 211
the agglomeration of the landed property in
ever fewer hands.
The plebs are the natural opponents of the
central government — since that is their con-
queror and tax imposer; while they naturally
oppose the common freemen, who despise them
and oppress them politically, besides crowding
them back economically. The great magnate
also is the natural opponent of the central gov-
ernment — an impediment in his path toward
complete independence, and he is at the same
time also a natural enemy of the common free-
men, who in turn not only support the central
government; but also block with their posses-
sions his path toward territorial dominion,
while with their claims to equality of political
rights they annoy his princely pride. Since
the political and social interests of the terri-
torial princes and of the plebs coincide, they
must become allies ; the prince can attain com-
plete indei)endence only if, in his fight for
power against the crown and the common free-
men, he controls reliable warriors and acquies-
cent taxpayers; the plebs can only then be
212 THE STATE
freed from their pariah-like declassification,
both economically and socially, if the hated
and proud common freemen are brought down
to their level.
This is the second time that we have noted
the identity of interest between the princes and
their subjects. The first time we found a
weakly developed solidarity in our second stage
of state formation. This causes the semi-sov-
ereign prince to treat his dependent tenants as
kindly as he ill-treats the free peasants of his
territory; in consequence, they will fight the
more willingly for him and contribute taxes,
while the more readily will the oppressed free-
men succumb to the pressure, especially as their
share of political power in the state, coincident
with the decUne of the central power, has be-
come only a meaningless phrase. In some
cases, as in Germany toward the end of the
tenth century, this was done with full con-
sciousness of its effects ^^® — some prince exer-
cises a particularly "mild" rule, in order to
draw the subjects of a neighboring potentate
into his lands, and thus to increase his own
FEUDAL STATE 213
strength in war and taxation, and to weaken
his opponent's. The plebs come to possess,
both legally and actually, constantly increas-
ing rights, enlarged privileges of the law of
ownership, perhaps self-government in com-
mon affairs, and their own administration of
justice; thus they rise in the same degree
as the common freemen sink, until the two
classes meet and they are amalgamated into
one body on approximately the same jin-al
and economic plane. Half serfs, half subjects
of a state, they represent a characteristic for-
mation of the feudal state, which does not as
yet recognize any clear distinction between
public and private law; in its turn an immedi-
ate consequence of its own historical genesis,
the dominion in the form of a state for the sake
of economic private rights.
(d) THE ETHNIC AMALGAMATION
The juristic and social amalgamation of the
degraded freemen and the uplifted plebs
henceforth inevitably tends toward ethnic in-
terpenetration. While at first the subject
214 THE STATE
peoples were not allowed either to intermarry
or to have social intercourse with the freemen,
now no such obstacles can be maintained; in
any single village the social class is no longer
determined by descent from the ruling race,
but rather by wealth. And the case may fre-
quently arise where the pure-blooded descend-
ant of the warrior herdsman must earn his liv-
ing as a field hand in the hire of the equally
pure-blooded descendant of the former serfs.
The social group of the subjects is now com-
posed of a part of the former ethnic master
group and a part of the former subject group.
We say from a part only, because the other
part has by this time been amalgamated with
the other part of the old ethnic master group
into a unital social class. In other words, a
part of the plebs has not only attained the posi-
tion to which the mass of the common freemen
have sunk, but has climbed far beyond it, in
that it has been completely received into the
dominating group, which in the meantime, has
not only risen enormously, but has been as
greatly diminished in numbers.
FEUDAL STATE 215
And that, too, is a universal process found
in all history; because everywhere it follows
with equally compelling force from the very
premises of feudal dominion. The primus
inter pares^ whether the holder of the central
power or some local potentate, taking the rank
of a prince, requires more supple tools for his
domkiion than are to be found am^ong his
"peers." The latter represent a class whom
he must put down if he wants to rise — and that
is and must be the aim of every one, since in
this stage aiming for power is identical with
the aim of self-preservation. In this effort he
is opposed by his obnoxious and stiff-necked
cousins and by his petty nobles — and for this
reason, we find at every court, from that of the
sovereign king of a mighty feudal empire down
to the lord of what is hardly more than a big
estate, men of insignificant descent as con-
fidential officials alongside representatives of
the master group, who in many cases under
the mask of otficials of the prince, as a matter
of fact, are "ephors," sharers of the power of
the prince as the plenipotentiaries of their
216 THE STATE
group. Let us but recall the Induna at the
court of the Barxtu kings. There is no won-
der, then, that the prince rather places con-
fidence in his own men than in these annoying
and pretentious advisers, in men whose posi-
tion is indissolubly bound up with his own, and
who would be ruined by his fall.*
Here, too, historical references are nearly
superfluous. Every one is familiar with the
fact that at the courts of the western Euro-
pean feudal kingdoms, besides the relatives of
the king and some noble vassals, there were
also elements from the lower groups, occupy-
ing high positions, clerics and great warriors
of the plebeian class. Among the immediate
following of Charlemagne all the races and
peoples of his empire were represented. Also
in the tales of Theodoric the Goth in the
Dietrich Saga of the Niehelungen Lied, this
* One of the most notable instances may be found in the
case of Markward of Annweiler, Marquis of Ancona and Duke
of Ravenna, seneschal of Henry VI., who after the death
of the Emperor Henry VI. disputed the power of the Regent
Constance acting for her son, Frederick II. (See Boehmer-
Ficker, Regesta Imperii, V, vol. 1, No. 511. v, ad. annum
lldl.)— Translator.
FEUDAL STATE 217
rise of brave sons of the subject races finds
its reflection. In addition to these, there fol-
low some less well-knovm instances.
In Egypt, as far back as the Old Empire,
there is found alongside the royal officials of
the feudal nobility, who are the descendants of
the Shepherd conquerors, administering their
districts as representatives of the crown, with
plenary powers as deputies, "a mass of court
officials trusted with determined functions of
government." It "originated with the serv-
ants employed at the courts of the princes,
such as prisoners of war, refugees etc."' ^^^
The fable of Joseph shows a state of affairs
known at that time to be a usual occurrence, of
the rise of a slave to the position of an all
powerful minister of state. At the present
day such a career is within the realm of possi-
bility at any oriental court, such as Persia,
Turkey, or Morocco, etc. In the case of old
Marshal Derflinger, in the time of Friedrich
Wilhelm I., the Great Elector, at a much
later date, we have an example from the transi-
tion of the developed feudal state to a more
218 THE STATE
modern form of the state, which might be mul-
tiplied by the examples of innumerable other
brave swordsmen.
Let us add a few instances from the peoples
"disregarded by history." Ratzel tells of the
realm of Bornu: "The freemen have not lost
the consciousness of their free descent, in con-
trast with the slaves of the sheik; but the rulers
place more confidence in their slaves than in
their own kinsmen and free associates of their
tribe. They can count on the devotion of the
former. Not only positions at court, but the
defense of the country was from ancient times
preferably confided to slaves. The brothers
of the prince, as well as the more ambitious or
more efficient sons, are objects of suspicion;
and while the most important places at court
are in the hands of slaves, the princes are put
at posts far from the seat of government.
Their salaries are paid from the incomes of the
offices and the taxes from the provinces." ^^^
Among the Fulbe "society is divided into
princes, chieftains, commons and slaves. The
slaves of the king play a great role as soldiers
FEUDAL STATE 219
and officials, and may hope for the highest
offices in the state."^^®
This nobiHty of the court's creation may,
in certain cases, be admitted to the great im-
perial offices, so that according to the method
stated above, it may achieve the sovereignty
over a territory. In the developed feudal
state, it represents the high nobility; and
usually manages to preserve its rank, even
when some more powerful neighbor has
mediatized it by incorporating the state. The
Frankish higher nobility certainly contains
such elements from the original lower group ;^^^
and since from its blood the entire upper
nobility of the European civilized states has
been descended at least in direct line by
marriage, we find an ethnic amalgamation,
both in the present day group of subjects and
in the highest order of the ruling class. And
the same applies to Egypt: "With the sink-
ing of the royal authority in the time of the
decay, the higher officials abuse their power for
personal ends, to make their offices hereditary
in their families, and thereby to call into exist-
220 THE STATE
ence an official nobility not differentiated from
the rest of the population." ^^^
And finally, the same process, from the same
causes, takes hold of the present middle class,
the lower stratum of the master class,
the officials and officers of the great feudato-
ries. At first there still exists a social dif-
ference between, on the one hand, the free vas-
sals, the subfeudatories of the great landlord,
kinsmen, younger sons of other noble families,
impoverished associates from the same district,
in isolated cases freebom sons of peasants, free
refugees and professional ruffians of free
descent ; and on the other, if the term may be
allowed, the subalterns of the guards of
plebeian descent. But lack of freedom ad-
vances, while freedom sinks in social value;
and here too the ruler places more reliance on
his creatures than on his peers. Here also,
sooner or later, the process of amalgamation
becomes complete. In Germany, as late as
1085, the non-free nobility of the court ranks
between ''servi et litones" while a century
afterward it is placed with the "liheri et
FEUDAL STATE 221
nohilesf' In the course of the thirteenth cen-
tury, it has been completely absorbed, along
with the free vassals, into the nobility by
chivalry. The two orders in the meantime
tend to become equal economically; both
have subinfeudations, fiefs on the obligation of
service in warfare, and the service feuds of the
bondsmen; while all the fiefs of the "minister-
ials" or sergeants have in the meantime become
as heritable as are those of the free vassals, as
much so as are the patrimonies of the few sur-
viving smaller territorial lords belonging to
the original nobility, who may still have escaped
the grasp of the great territorial principalities.
In ways quite analogous to this the develop-
ment went on in all other feudal states of
Western Europe; while its exact counterpart
is found in the extremest Orient on the edge of
the Eurasian continent, in Japan. The daimio
are the higher nobility; the samurai, the
chivalry, the nobility of the sword.
(e) THE DEVELOPED FEUDAL STATE
With this the feudal state has reached its
pinnacle. It forms, politically and socially, a
222 THE STATE
hierarchy of numerous strata; of which, in all
cases, the lower is bound to render service to
the next above it, and the superior is bound to
render protection to the one below. The
pyramid rests on the laboring population, of
whom the major part are as yet peasants; the
surplus of their labor, the ground rental, the
entire "surplus value" of the economic means
is used to support the upper strata of society.
This ground rent from the majority of estates
is turned over to the small holders of fiefs, ex-
cept where these estates are still in the im-
mediate possession of the prince or of the
crown and have not as yet been granted as
fiefs. The holders of them are bound in re-
turn to provide the stipulated mihtary service,
and also, in certain cases, to render labor of
an economic value. The larger vassal is in
turn bound to serve the great tenants of the
crown ; who in their turn are, at least at strict
law, under similar obligation toward the bearer
of the central power; while emperor, king,
sultan, shah, or Pharaoh in their turn, are re-
garded as the vassals of the tribal god. Thus
FEUDAL STATE 223
there starts from the fields, whose peasantry
support and nourish all, and mounts up to the
"king of heaven" an artificially graded order
of ranks, which constricts so absolutely all the
life of the state, that according to custom and
law neither a bit of land nor a man can be un-
derstood unless within its fold. Since all
rights originally created for the common free-
men have either been resumed by the state, or
else have been distorted by the victorious
princes of territories, it comes about that a per-
son not in some feudal relation to some su-
perior must in fact be "without the law," be
without claim for protection or justice, i. e.,
be outside the scope of that power which alone
affords justice. Therefore the rule, nulle
terre sans seigneur, appearing to us at first
blush as an ebullition of feudal arrogance, is as
a matter of fact the codification of an existing
new state of law, or at the very least the clear-
ing away of some archaic remnants, no longer
to be tolerated, of the completely discarded
primitive feudal state.
Those philosophers of history who pretend
224 THE STATE
to explain every historic development from the
quality of "races," give as the center of their
strategic position the alleged fact, that only
the Germans, thanks to their superior "politi-
cal capacity," have managed to raise the ar-
tistic edifice of the developed feudal state.
Some of the vigor of this argument has de-
parted, since the conviction began to dawn on
them that in Japan, the Mongol race had ac-
complished this identical result. No one can
tell what the negro races might have done, had
not the irruption of stronger civilizations
barred their way, and yet Uganda does not
differ very greatly from the empires of the
Carolingians or of Boleslaw the Red, except
that men did not have in Uganda any "values
of tradition" of mediaeval culture: and these
values were not any merit of the Germanic
races, but a gift wherewith fortune endowed
them.
Shifting the discussion from the negro to
the "Semites," we find the charge made that
this race has absolutely no capacity for the
formation of states. And yet we find, thou-
FEUDAL STATE 225
sands of years ago, this same feudal system de-
veloped, by Semites, if the founders of the
Egyptian kingdom were Semites. One would
think the following description of Thurnwald
were taken from the period of the Hohen-
staufen emperors; "Whoever entered the
following of some powerful one, was thereafter
protected by him as though he had been the
head of the family. This relation . . .
betokens a fiduciary relation similar to vas-
salage. This relation of protection in return
for allegiance tends to become the basis of the
organization of all Egyptian society. It is
the basis of the relations of the feudal lord to
his sergeants and peasants, as it is that of the
Pharaoh to his officials. The cohesion of the
individuals in groups subject to common pro-
tecting lords, is founded on this view, even up
to the apex of the pyramid, to the king him-
self regarded as 'the vicar of his ancestors,' as
the vassal of the gods on earth. . . . Whoso-
ever stands without this social grasp, a 'man
without a master,' is without the pale of pro-
tection and therefore without the law." ^^^
226 THE STATE
The hypothesis of the endowment of any
particular race has not been used by us, and
we have no need of it. As Herbert Spencer
says, it is the stupidest of all imaginable at-
tempts to construct a philosophy of history.
The first characteristic of the developed
feudal state is the manifold gradation of
ranks built up into the one pyramid of mu-
tual dependence. Its second distinctive mark
is the amalgamation of the ethnic groups,
originally separated.
The consciousness formerly existent of dif-
ference of races has disappeared completely.
There remains only the difference of classes.
Henceforth we shall deal only with social
classes, and no longer with ethnic groups.
The social contrast is the only ruling factor
in the life of the state. Consistently with
this the ethnic group consciousness changes to
a class consciousness, the theories of the group,
to the theories of the class. Yet they do
not thereby change in the least their essence.
The new dominating classes are just as full of
their divine right as was the former master
FEUDAL STATE 227
group, and it soon is seen that the new no-
bility of the sword manages to forget, quickly
and thoroughly, its descent from the van-
quished group ; while the former freemen now
declassed, or the former petty nobles sunk in
the social scale, henceforth swear just as firmly
bv "natural law" as did formerly only the sub-
jected tribes.
The developed feudal state is, in its es-
sentials, exactly the same thing as it was when
yet in the second stage of slate formation. Its
form is that of dominion, its reason for being,
the political exploitation of the economic
means, limited by public law, which compels
the master class to give the correlative pro-
tection, and which guarantees to the lower class
the right of being protected, to the extent that
they are kept working and paying taxes, that
they may fulfil their duty to their masters. In
its essentials government has not changed, it
has only been disposed in more grades; and
the same applies to the exploitation, or as the
economic theory puts it, "the distribution"
of wealth.
228 THE STATE
Just as formerly, so now, the internal policy
of these states swings in that orbit prescribed
by the parallelogram of the centrifugal thrust
of the former group contests, now class wars,
counteracted by the centripetal pull of the
common interests. Just as formerly, so now,
its foreign policy is determined by the striv-
ing of its master class for new lands and serfs,
a thrust for extension caused at the same time
by the still existing need of self-preservation.
Although differentiated much more minutely,
and integrated much more powerfully, the de-
veloped feudal state is in the end nothing more
than the primitive state arrived at its maturity.
CHAPTER VI
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL
STATE
If we understand the outcome of the feudal
state, in the sense given above, as further or-
ganic development either forward or backward
conditioned by the power of inner forces, but
not as a physical termination, brought about
or conditioned by outside forces, then we may
say that the outcome of the feudal state is de-
termined essentially by the independent de-
velopment of social institutions called into be-
ing by the economic means.
Such influences may come also from with-
out, from foreign states which, thanks to a
more advanced economic development, pos-
sess a more tensely centralized power, a better
military organization, and a greater forward
thrust. We have touched on some of these
phases. The independent development of the
229
230 THE STATE
Mediterranean feudal states was abruptly
stopped by their collision with those maritime
states, which were on a much higher plane of
economic growth and wealth, and more cen-
tralized, such as Carthage, and more espe-
cially Rome. The destruction of the Persian
Empire by Alexander the Great may be in-
stanced in this connection, since Macedonia
had at that time appropriated the economic
advances of the Hellenic maritime states.
The best example within modern times is the
foreign influence in the case of Japan, whose
development was shortened in an almost in-
credible manner by the military and peaceful
impulses of Western European civilization.
In the space of barely one generation it
covered the road from a fully matured feudal
state to the completely developed modern con-
stitutional state.
It seems to me that we have only to deal
with an abbreviation of the process of develop-
ment. As far as we can see — though hence-
forth historical evidence becomes meager, and
there are scarcely any examples from ethnog-
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 231
raphy — the rule may be stated that forces
from within, even without strong foreign in-
fluences, lead the matured feudal state, with
strict logical consistency, on the same path to
the identical conclusion.
The creators of the economic means con-
trolling this advance are the cities and their
system of money economy, which gradually su-
persedes the system of natural economy, and
thereby dislocates the axis about which the
whole life of the state swings; in place of
landed property, mobile capital gradually be-
comes preponderant.
(a) THE EMANCIPATION OF THE PEASANTRY
All this follows as a natural consequence
of the basic premise of the feudal state. The
more the great private landlords become a
landed nobihty, the more in the same measure
must the feudal system of natural economy
break to pieces. The more great landed
property rights become vested in and nur-
tured by the princes of territorial states, the
more is the feudal system based on payments
232 THE STATE
in kind bound to disintegrate; one may say-
that the two keep step in this develop-
ment.
So long as the ownership of great estates is
comparatively limited, the primitive principle
of the bee-keeper, allowing his peasants barely
enough for subsistence, can be carried out.
When, however, these expand into territorial
dimensions, and include, as is regularly the
case, accretions of land which are the results of
successful warfare, or by the rehnquishment
and subinfeudation through heritage or politi-
cal marriages of smaller land owners, scattered
widely about the country and far from the
master's original domains, then the poHcy of
the bee-keeper can no longer be carried out.
Unless, therefore, the territorial magnate
means to keep in his pay an immense mass of
overseers, which would be both expensive and
poHtically unwise, he would have to impose
on his peasants some fixed tribute, partly
rental and partly tax. The economic need of
an administrative reform unites, therefore,
with the political necessity, to elevate the
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 233
*'plebs," in the way which has already been
discussed.
The more the territorial magnate ceases to
be a private landlord, the more exclusively he
tends to become a subject of public law, viz.,
prince of a territory, the more the solidarity
mentioned above, between prince and people
grows. We saw that some few magnates
even as far back as the period of transition
from great landed estates to principalities,
found it to their greatest interest to carry on
a "mild" government. This accomplished the
result, not only of educating their plebs to a
more virile consciousness toward the state, but
also had the effect of making it easy for the
few remaining common freemen to give up
their political rights in return for protection;
while it was still more important, in that it de-
prived their neighbors and rivals of their pre-
cious human material. When the territorial
prince has finally reached complete de facto
independence, his self interest must prompt
him steadfastly to persevere in the path thus
begun. Should he, however, again invest his
234 THE STATE
bailiffs or officers with lands and peasants, he
will still have the most pressing political in-
terest to see to it that his subjects are not de-
livered over to them without restraint. In or-
der to retain his control, the prince will limit
the right of the "knights" to incomes from
lands to definite payments in kind and limited
forced labor, reserving to himself that required
in the public interests, such as forced labor on
highways or on bridges. We shall soon come
to see that the circumstance that in all de-
veloped feudal states the peasants have at least
two masters claiming service, is decisive for
their later rise.
For all these reasons, the services to be re-
quired of peasants in a developed feudal state
must in some fashion be limited. Henceforth,
all surplus belongs to him free from the con-
trol of the landlord. With this change, the
character of landed property has been utterly
revolutionized. Heretofore the landlord, as
of right, was entitled to the entire revenue sav-
ing only what was absolutely necessary to per-
mit his peasants to subsist and continue their
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 235
brood; while hereafter, the total product of
his work, as of right, belongs to the peasant,
saving only a fixed charge for his landlord as
ground rent. The possession of vast landed
estates has developed into (manorial) rights.
This comijletes the second important step
taken by humanity toward its goal. The
first step was taken when man made the
transition from the stage of bear to that of
the bee-keeper, and thereby discovered slavery;
this step abolishes slavery. Laboring human-
ity, heretofore only an object of the law, now
for the first time becomes an entity capable
of enjoying rights. The labor motor, with-
out rights, belonging to its master, and with-
out effective guarantees of life and limb, has
now become the taxpaying subject of some
prince. Henceforth the economic means, now
for the first time assured of its success,
develops its forces quite differently. The
peasant works with incomparably more in-
dustry and care, obtains more than he needs,
and thereby calls into being the "city" in the
economic sense of the term, viz., the industrial
286 THE STATE
city. The surplus produced by the peasantry
calls into being a demand for objects not pro-
duced in the peasant economy; while at the
same time, the more intensive agriculture
brings about a reduction of those industrial
by-products heretofore worked out by the
peasant house industry.
Since agriculture and cattle-raising absorb
in ever increasing degrees the energies of the
rural family, it becomes possible and neces-
sary to divide labor between original produc-
tion and manufacture; the village tends to be-
come primarily the place of the former, the
industrial city comes into being as the seat of
the latter.
(b) THE GENESIS OF THE INDUSTRIAL STATE
Let there be no misunderstanding: we do
not maintain that the city comes thus into be-
ing, but only the industrial city. There has
been in existence the real historical city, to be
found in every developed feudal state. Such
cities came into being either because of a purely
political means, as a stronghold,^^^ or by the
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 237
cooperation of the political with economic
means, as a market place, or because of some
religious need, as the environs of some temple.*
Wherever such a city in the historical sense
exists in the neighborhood, the newly arising
industrial city tends to grow up about it;
otherwise it develops spontaneously from the
existing and matured division of labor. As a
rule, it will in its turn grow into a stronghold
and have its own places of worship.
These are but accidental historical admix-
tures. In its strict economic sense "city"
means the place of the economic means, or the
exchange and interchange for equivalent
values between rural production and manu-
facture. This corresponds to the common use
of language, by which a stronghold however
great, an agglomeration of temples, cloisters
* "Every place of worship gathers about it dwellings of the
priests, schools, and rest-houses for pilgrims." — Ratzel, 1. c. II.,
p. 575.
Naturally, every place toward which great pilgrimages pro-
ceed becomes an extended trade center. We may see the re-
membrances thereof in the fact that the great wholesale mar-
kets, held at stated times in Northern Europe, are called
Messen from the religious ceremony.
238 THE STATE
and places of pilgrimage however extensive,
were they conceivable without any place for
exchange, would be designated after their ex-
ternal characteristics as *'like a city" or "re-
sembling a city."
Although there may have been few changes
in the exterior of the historical city, there has
taken place an internal revolution on a mag-
nificent scale. The industrial city is directly
opposed to the state. As the state is the de-
veloped pohtical means, so the industrial city
is the developed economic means. The great
contest filling universal history, nay its very
meaning, henceforth takes place between city
and state.
The city as an economic, political body un-
dermines the feudal system with political and
economic arms. With the first the city
forces, with the second it lures, their power
away from the feudal master class.
This process takes place in the field of poli-
tics by the interference of the city, now a
center of its own powers, in the political
mechanism of the developed feudal state, be-
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 239
tween the central power and the local terri-
torial magnates and their subjects. The cities
are the strongholds and the dwelling places of
warlike men, as well as depots of material for
carrying on war (arms, etc.) ; and later they
become central supply reservoirs for money
used in the contests between the central gov-
ernment and the growing territorial princes,
or between these in their internecine wars.
Thus they are important strategic points or
valuable allies; and may by far-sighted policy
acquire important rights.
As a rule, the cities take the part of the
crown in fights against the feudal nobles, from
social reasons, because the landed nobles re-
fuse to recognize the social equality, demanded
as of right by their more wealthy citizens;
from political reasons, because the central gov-
ernment, thanks to the solidarity between
prince and people, is more apt to be influenced
by common interests than is the territorial
magnate, who serves only his private interests ;
and finally from economic reasons, because
city life can prosper only in peace and safety.
X
240 THE STATE
The practises of chivalry, such as club law, and
private warfare, and the knights' practise of
looting caravans are irreconcilable with the
economic means; and therefore, the cities are
faithful allies of the guardians of peace and
justice, first to the emperor, later on, to the
sovereign territorial prince; and when the
armed citizenship breaks and pillages some
robber baron's fortress, the tiny drop reflects
the identical process happening in the ocean
of history.
In order successfully to carry this political
role the city must attract as many citizens as
possible, an endeavor also forced on it by
purely economic considerations, since both di-
visions of labor and wealth increase with in-
creased citizenship. Therefore cities favor
immigration with all their powers; and once
more show in this the polar contrast of their
essential difference from the feudal landlords.
The new citizens thus attracted into the cities
are withdrawn from the feudal estates, which
are thereby weakened in power of taxation and
military defense in proportion as the cities are
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 241
strengthened. The city becomes a mighty-
competitor at the auction, wherein the serf is
knocked down to the highest bidder, to the
one, that is to say, who offers the most rights.
The city offers the peasant co7iiplete liberty,
and in some cases house and courtyard. The
principle, "city air frees the peasant" is suc-
cessfully fought out; and the central govern-
ment, pleased to strengthen the cities and to
weaken the turbulent nobles, usually confirms
by charter the newly acquired rights.
The third great move in the progress of uni-
versal history is to be seen in the discovery
of the honor of free labor; or better in its re-
discovery, it having been lost sight of since
those far-off times in which the free huntsman
and the subjugated primitive tiller enjoyed
the results of their labor. As yet the peasant
bears the mark of the pariah and liis rights are
little respected. But in the wall-gu-t, well-
defended city, the citizen holds his head high.
He is a freeman in every sense of the word,
free even at law% since we find in the grants of
rights to many early enfranchised cities
9A2 THE STATE
(Ville-franche) the provision that a serf re-
siding therein "a year and a day" undisturbed
by his master's claim is to be deemed free.
Within the city walls there are still various
ranks and grades of political status. At first
the old settlers, the men of rank equal with
the nobles of the sui'rounding country, the
ancient freemen of the burgh, refuse to the
newcomers, usually poor artisans or huck-
sters, the right of sharing in the government.
But, as we saw in the case of the maritime
cities, such gradations of rank can not be main-
tained within a business community. The ma-
jority, intelligent, skeptical, closely organized
and compact, forces the concession of equal
rights. The only difference is that the con-
test is longer in a developed feudal state, be-
cause now the fight concerns not only the par-
ties at interest. The great territorial mag-
nates of the neighborhood and the princes hin-
der the full development of the forces by their
interference. In the maritime states of the
ancient world, there was no tertius gaudens
who could derive any profit from the contests
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 243
within the city, since outside the cities there
existed no system of powerful feudal lords.
These then, are the political arms of the
cities in their contest with the feudal state : al-
liances with the crown, direct attack, and the
enticing away of the serfs of the feudal lords
into the enfranchising air of the city. Its eco-
nomic weapons are no less effective, the change
from payments in kind to the system of money
as a means of exchange is inseparably con-
nected with civic methods, is the means
whereby the method of payment in kind is ut-
terly destroyed, and with it the feudal state.
(c) THE INFLUENCES OF MONEY ECONOMY
The sociological process set into motion by
the system of money economy is so well known
and its mechanics are so generally recognized,
that a few suggestions will suffice.
Here, as in the case of the maritime states,
the consequence of the invading money system
is that the central government becomes almost
omnipotent, while the local powers are reduced
to complete impotence.
2U THE STATE
Dominion is not an end in itself, but merely
the means of the rulers to their essential ob-
ject, the enjoyment without labor of articles
of consumption as many and as valuable as
possible. During the prevalence of the sys-
tem of natural economy there is no other way
of obtaining them save by dominion; the ward-
ens of the marches and the territorial princes
obtain their wealth by their political power.
The more peasants who are owned, the greater
is the military power and the larger the scope
of the territory subjected, and thus the greater
are the revenues. As soon, however, as the
products of agriculture are exchangeable for
enticing wares, it becomes more rational for
every one primarily a private man, i. e., for
every feudal lord not a territorial prince — and
this now includes the knights — to decrease as
far as possible the number of peasants, and to
leave only such small numbers as can with the
utmost labor turn out the greatest product
from the land, and to leave these as little as
possible. The net product of the real estate,
thus tremendously increased, is now taken to
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 245
the markets and sold for goods, and is no
longer used to keep a fencible body of guards.
Having dissolved this following, the knight
becomes simply the manager of a knight's
fee.* With this event, as with one blow,
the central power, that of king or territorial
prince, is without a rival for the dominion, and
has become politically omnipotent. The un-
ruly vassals, who formerly made the weak
kings tremble, after a short attempt at joint
rule during the time of the government of the
feudal estates, have changed into the supple
courtiers, begging favors at the hands of some
absolute monarch, like Louis XIV. And he
furthermore has become their last resort, since
the military power, now solely exercised by
him as the paymaster of the forces, alone can
protect them from the ever-immanent revolt
of their tenants, ground to the bone. While
in the time of natural economy the crown was
in nearly every instance allied ^vith peasants
and cities against nobility, we now have the
* See reference as to the meaning of Bitter gutshesitz, ante,
page 84. — Trcmslutor.
246 THE STATE
union of the absolute kings, born from the
feudal state, with their nobility, against the
representatives of the economic means.
Since the days of Adam Smith it has been
customary to state this fundamental revolu-
tion in some such form, as though the foolish
nobles had sold their birthright for a mess of
pottage, when they traded their dominion for
foolish articles of luxury. No view can be
more erroneous. Individuals often err in the
safe-guarding of their interests : a class for any
prolonged period never is in error.
The fact of the matter is, that the system
of money payments strengthened the central
power so mightily and immediately, that even
without the interposition of the agrarian up-
heaval, any resistance of the landed nobility
would have been senseless. As is shown in
the history of antiquity, the army of a cen-
tral government, financially strong, is always
superior to feudal levies. Money permits the
armament of peasant sons, and the drilling of
them into professional soldiers, whose solid or-
ganization is always superior to the loose con-
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 247
federation of an armed mass of knights.
Besides, at this stage, the central government
could also count on the aid of the well-armed
squares of the urban guilds.
Gunpowder did the rest in Western Eu-
rope. Firearms, however, are a product that
can be turned out only in the industrial estab-
lishments of a wealthy city. Because of these
technical military reasons, even that feudal
landlord who might not care for the newly
established luxuries and who might only be
desirous of maintaining or increasing his in-
dependent position, must subject his terri-
tories to the same agrarian revolution; since,
in order to be strong, he now before all else
must have money, which in the new order of
things, has become the nervus rerum, either to
buy arms or to engage mercenaries. A
second capitalistic wholesale undertaking,
therefore, has come into being through the
system of payments in money; besides the
wholesale management of landed estates, war
is carried on as a great business enterprise —
the condottieri appear on the stage. The mar-
248 THE STATE
ket is full of material for armies of merce-
naries, the discharged guards of the feudal
lords and the young peasants whose lands have
been taken up by the lords.
There are instances where some petty noble
may mount to the throne of some territorial
principality, as happened many a time in
Italy, and as was accomplished by Albrecht
Wallenstein, even as late as the period of the
Thirty Years' War. But that is a matter of
individual fate, not affecting the final result.
The local powers disappear from the contest
of political forces as independent centers of
authority and retain the remnant of their
former influence only so long as they serve the
princes as a source of supplies; that is, the
state composed of its feudal estates.
The infinite increase in the power of the
crown is then enhanced by a second creation
of the system of payment in money, by
officialdom. We have told in detail of the
vicious circle which forced the feudal state into
a cul-de-sac between agglomeration and dis-
solution, as long as its bailiffs had to be paid
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 249
with "lands and peasants" and thereby were
nursed into potential rivals of their creator.
With the advent of payments in money, the
vicious circle is broken. Henceforth the cen-
tral government carries on its functions
through paid employees, permanently de-
pendent on their paymaster.^^^ Henceforth
there is possible a permanently established,
tensely centralized government, and empires
come into being, such as had not existed since
the developed maritime states of antiquity,
which also were founded on the payments in
money.
This revolution of the political mechanism
was everywhere put into motion by the de-
velopment of the money economy — with but
one exception, as far as I can see, viz., Egypt.
Here, according to the statement of experts,
no definite information is to be had, and it
seems that the system of money exchanges ap-
pears as a matured institution only m Greek
times. Until that time, the tribute of the
peasants was paid in kind;*^® and yet we find,
shortly after the expulsion of the Shepherd
250 THE STATE
Kings, during the New Empire {circa six-
teenth century B. C), that the absolutism of
the kings was fully developed: "The military
power is upheld by foreign mercenaries, the
administration is carried on by a centralized
body of officials dependent on the royal
favor, while the feudal aristocracy has disap-
peared/' ^"
It may seem that this exception proves the
rule. Egypt is a country of exceptional
geographic conformation. Jammed into a
narrow compass, between mountains and the
desert, a natural highway, the River Nile,
traverses its entire length, and permits the
transportation of bulky freight with much
greater facility than the finest road. And
this highway made it easy for the Pharaoh to
assemble the taxes of all his districts in his own
storehouses, the so-called "houses" ^^^ and
from them to supply his garrisons and civil
emploj^ees with the products themselves in
natura. For that reason Egypt, after it has
once become unified into an empire, stays cen-
tralized, until foreign powers extinguish its
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 251
life as a "state." "This circumstance is the
source of the enormous and plenary power ex-
ercised by the Pharaoh where payments are
still made in kind ; the exclusive and immediate
control of the objects of daily consumption
are in his hand. The ruler distributes to his
employees only such quantities of the entire
mass of goods as appears to him good and
proper; and since the articles of luxury are
nearly all exclusively in his hands, he enjoys
on this account also an extraordinary pleni-
tude of power." ^^^
With this one exception, where a mighty
force executes the task, the power of circu-
lating money seems in all cases to have dis-
solved the feudal state.
The cost of the revolution fell on peasants
and cities. When peace is made, the crown
and the petty nobles mutually sacrifice the
peasantry, dividing them, so to say, into two
ideal halves; the crown grants to the nobility
the major part of the peasants' common lands,
and the greatest part of their working powers
that are not yet expropriated; the nobility
252 THE STATE
concedes to the crown the right of recruiting
and of taxing both peasantry and cities. The
peasant, who had grown wealthy in freedom,
sinks back into poverty and therefore into
social inferiority. The former feudal powers
now unite as allies to subjugate the cities, ex-
cept where, as in Upper Italy, these become
feudal central powers themselves. (And even
in that case they for the most part all fall into
the power of captains of mercenaries, con-
dottieri.) The power of attack of the ad-
versaries has become stronger, the power of
the cities has diminished. For with the decay
of the peasantry, their purchase power di-
minishes and with it the prosperity of the
cities, based thereon. The small cities in the
country stagnate and become poorer, and be-
ing now incapable of defense, fall a prey to the
absolutist rule of the territorial princes; the
larger cities, where the demand for the luxuries
of the nobles has brought into being a strong
trading element, spht up into social groups and
thus fritter away their political strength.
The immigration now pouring into their walls
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 253
is composed of discharged and broken mercen-
aries, dispossessed peasants, pauperized me-
chanics from the smaller towns; it is in other
words a proletarian immigration. For the
first time there appears, in the terminology of
Karl Marx, the "free laborer," in masses, com-
peting with his own class in the labor markets
of the cities. And again, the "law of agglom-
eration" enters to form effective class and
property distinctions, and thus to tear apart
the civic population. Wild fights take place
in the cities between the classes ; through which
the territorial prince, in nearly every instance,
again succeeds in gaining control. The only
cities that can permanently escape the deadly
embrace of the prince's power are the few gen-
uine "maritime states," or "city states."
As in the case of the maritime states, the
pivot of the state's life has again shifted over to
another place. Instead of circling about wealth
vested in landed estates, it now turns about
capitalized wealth, because in the meantime
property in real estate has itself become "capi-
tal." Why is it that the development does
254 THE STATE
notj as in the case of the maritime states^ open
out into the capitalistic expropriation of slave
labor?
There are two controlling reasons, one in-
ternal, the other external. The external rea-
son is to be found in this, that slave hunting on
a profitable scale is scarcely possible at this
time in any part of the world, since nearly all
countries within reach are also organized as
strong states. Wherever it is possible, as for
instance, in the American colonies of the West
European powers, it develops at once.
The external reason may be found in the cir-
cumstance that the peasant of the interior
countries, in contrast to the conditions prevail-
ing in the maritime states, is subject, not to one
master, but to at least two * persons entitled
to his service, his j)rince and his landlord.
Both resist any attempt to diminish their peas-
ants' capacity for service, since this is essential
to their interests. Especially strong princes
did much for their peasants, e. g., those of
* In mediaeval Germany the peasants pay tribute in many
cases not only to the landlord and to the territorial prince, but
also to the provost and to the bailiflf.
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 255
Brandenburg-Prussia. For this reason, the
peasants, although exploited miserably, yet re-
tained their personal liberty and their stand-
ing as subjects endowed with personal rights
in all states where the feudal system had been
fully developed when the system of payments
in money replaced that of payments in kind.
The evidence that this explanation is correct
may be found in the relations of those states
which were gripped by the system of exchange
in money, before the feudal system had be-
come worked out.
This applies especially to those districts of
Germany formerly occupied by Slavs, but
particularly to Poland. In these districts, the
feudal system had not yet been worked out as
thoroughly as in the regions where the demand
for grain products in the great western indus-
trial centers had changed the nobles, the
subjects of public law, into the owners of a
Rittergut* the subjects of private economic in-
terests. In these districts, the peasants were
subject to the duty of rendering service only to
* See foot-note on page 84.
256 THE STATE
one master, who was both their liege lord and
landlord; and because of that, there came into
being the republics of nobles mentioned above,
which, as far as the pressure of their more pro-
gressed neighbors would permit, tended to ap-
proach the capitalistic system of exploiting of
slave labor.^^'^
The following is so well known that it can
be stated briefly. The system of exchange by
means of money matures into capitalism, and
brings into being new classes in juxtaposition
to the landowners; the capitalist demands
equal rights with the formerly privileged
orders, and finally obtains them by revolution-
izing the lower plebs. In this attack on the
sacredly established order of things, the cap-
itahsts unite with the lower classes, naturally
under the banner of "natural law." But as
soon as the victory has been achieved, the class
based on movable wealth, the so-called middle
class, turns its arms on the lower classes, makes
peace with its former opponents, and invokes in
its reactionary fight on the proletarians, its late
allies, the theory of legitimacy, or makes use
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 257
of an evil mixture of arguments based partly
on legitimacy and partly on pseudo-liberalism.
In this manner the state has gradually ma-
tured from the primitive robber state, through
the stages of the developed feudal state,
through absolutism, to the modern constitu-
tional state.
(d) THE MODERN CONSTITUTIONAL STATE
Let us give the mechanics and kinetics of
the modern state a moment's time.
In principle, it is the same entity as the
primitive robber state or the developed feudal
state. There has been added, however, one
new element — officialdom, which at least will
have this object, that in the contest of the va-
rious classes, it will represent the common in-
terests of the state as a whole. In how far this
purpose is subserved we shall investigate in an-
other place. Let us at this time study the state
in respect to those characteristics which it has
brought over from its youthful stages.
Its form still continues to be domination, its
content still remains the exploitation of the
258 THE STATE
economic means. The latter continues to be
limited by public law, which on the one hand
protects the traditional "distribution" of the
total products of the nation ; while on the other
it attempts to maintain at their full efficiency
the taxpayers and those bound to render serv-
ice. The internal policy of the state continues
to revolve in the path prescribed for it by the
parallelogram of the centrifugal force of class
contests and the centripetal impulse of the com-
mon interests in the state ; and its foreign pol-
icy continues to be determined by the interests
of the master class, now comprising besides the
landed also the moneyed interests.
In principle, there are now, as before, only
two classes to be distinguished: one a ruling
class, which acquires more of the total product
of the labor of the people — the economic means
— than it has contributed, and a subject class,
which obtains less of the resultant wealth than
it has contributed. Each of these classes, in
turn, depending on the degree of economic de-
velopment, is divided into more or fewer sub-
classes or strata, which grade off according to
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 259
the fortune or misfortune of their economic
standards.
Among highly developed states there is
found introduced between the two principal
classes a transitional class, which also may be
subdivided into various strata. Its members
are bound to render service to the upper class,
while they are entitled to receive service from
the classes below them. To illustrate with an
example, we find in the ruling class in modern
Germany at least three strata. First come
the great landed magnates, who at the same
time are the principal shareholders in the
larger industrial imdertakings and mining com-
panies: next stand the captains of industry
and the "bankocrats," who also in many cases
have become owners of great estates. In con-
sequence of this they quickly amalgamate with
the first layer. Such, for example, are the
Princes Fugger, who were formerly bankers of
Augsburg, and the Counts of Donnersmarck,
owners of extensive mines in Silesia. And
finally there are the petty country nobles, whom
we shall hereafter term junker or "squires."
260 THE STATE
The subject class, at all events, consists of petty-
peasants, agricultural laborers, factory and
mine hands, with small artisans and subordi-
nate officials. The "middle classes" are the
classes of the transition: composed of the
owners of large and medium-sized farms, the
small manufacturers, and the best paid me-
chanics, besides those rich "bourgeois," such as
Jews, who have not become rich enough to over-
come certain traditional difficulties which op-
pose their arrival at the stage of intermarriage
with the upper class. All these render unre-
quited service to the upper class, and receive
unrequited service from the lower classes.
This determines the result which occurs either
to the stratum as a whole or to the individuals
in it; that is to say, either a complete accept-
ance into the upper class, or an absolute sink-
ing into the lower class. Of the (German)
transitional classes, the large farmers and the
manufacturers of average wealth have risen,
while the majority of artisans have descended
to the lower classes. We have thus arrived at
the kinetics of classes.
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 261
The interests of every class set in motion an
actual body of associated forces, which impel
it with a definite momentum toward the attain-
ment of a definite goal. All classes whatever
have the same goal; viz., the total result of the
productive labor of all the denizens of a given
state. Efvery class attempts to obtain as large
a share as possible of the national production ;
and since all strive for identically the same ob-
ject, the class contest results. This contest of
classes is the content of all history of states,
except in so far as the interest of the state as
a whole produces common actions. These we
may at this point disregard, since they have
been given undue prominence by the traditional
method of historical study, and lead to one-
sided views. Historically this class contest is
shown to be a party fight. A party is origi-
nally and in its essence nothing save an or-
ganized representation of a class. Wherever
a class, by reason of social differentiation, has
split up into numerous sub-classes with varied
separate interests, the party claiming to repre-
sent it disintegrates at the earliest opportunity
262 THE STATE
into a mass of tiny parties, and these will either
be allies or mortal enemies according to the de-
gree of divergence of the class interests.
Where on the other hand a former class con-
trast has disappeared by social diiFerentiation,
the two former parties amalgamate in a short
time into a new party. As an example of the
first case we may recall the splitting off of the
artisans and Anti-Semite parties from the
party of German Liberalism, as a consequence
of the fact that the first represented descend-
ing groups, while the latter represented ascend-
ing ones. A characteristic example of the
second category may be found in the political
amalgamation which bound together into the
farmers' union the petty landed squires of the
East Elbian country with West Elbian rich
peasants on large plantations. Since the petty
squire sinks and the farmer rises, they meet
half-way. All party policy can have but one
meaning, viz., to procure for the class repre-
sented as great a share as is possible of the total
national production. In other words, the pre-
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 263
ferred classes intend to maintain their share, at
the very least, at the ancient scale, and if pos-
sible, to increase it toward such a maximum
as shall permit the exploited classes just a bare
existence, to keep them fit to do their work,
just as in the bee-keeper stages. Their object
is to confiscate the entire surplus product of the
economic means, a surplus which increases
enormously as population becomes more dense
and division of labor more specialized. On the
other hand, the group of exploited classes
would like to reduce their tribute to the zero-
point, and to consume the entire product them-
selves ; and the transitional classes work as much
as possible toward the reduction of their tribute
to the upper classes, while at the same time they
strive to increase their unrequited income from
the classes underneath.
This is the aim and the content of all party
contests. The ruling class conducts this fight
with all those means which its acquired do-
minion has handed down to it. In conse-
quence of this, the ruling class sees to it that
264 THE STATE
legislation is framed in its interest and to serve
its purj)ose — class legislation. These laws are
then applied in such wise that the blunted back
of the sword of justice is turned upward, while
its sharpened edge is turned downward — class
justice. The governing class in every state
uses the administration of the state in the in-
terest of those belonging to it under a twofold
aspect. In the first place it reserves to its
adherents all prominent places and all offices
of influence and of profit, in the army, in the
superior branches of government service, and
in places on the bench; and secondly, by these
very agencies, it directs the entire policy of the
state, causes its class-politics to bring about
commercial wars, colonial policies, protective
tariff's, legislation in some degree improving
the conditions of the laboring classes, electoral
reform policies, etc. As long as the nobles
ruled the state, they exploited it as they would
have managed an estate; when the bourgeoisie
obtain the mastery, the state is exploited as
though it were a factory. And the class-re-
ligion covers all defects, as long as they can be
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 265
endured, with its "don't touch the foundation
of society."
There still exist in the public law a number
of political privileges and economic strategic
positions, which favor the master class : such as,
in Prussia, a system of voting which gives the
plutocrats an undue advantage over the less
favored classes, a limitation of the constitu-
tional rights of free assembly, regulations for
servants, etc. For that reason, the constitu-
tional fight, carried on over thousands of years
and dominating the life of the state, is still un-
completed. The fight for improved conditions
of life, another phase of the party and class
struggle, usually takes place in the halls of
legislative bodies, but often it is carried on by
means of demonstrations in the streets, by gen-
eral strikes, or by open outbreaks.
But the plebs have finally and definitely
learned that these remnants of feudal strategic
centers, do not, except in belated instances,
constitute the final stronghold of their op-
ponents. It is not in political, but rather in
economic conditions that the cause must be
266 THE STATE
sought, which has brought it about that even in
the modern constitutional state, the "distribu-
tion of wealth" has not been changed in princi-
ple. Just as in feudal times, the great mass of
men live in bitter poverty; even under the
best conditions, they have the meager neces-
sities of life, earned by hard, crushing, stupe-
fying forced labor, no longer exacted by right
of political exploitation, but just as eiFectively
forced from the laborers by their economic
needs. And just as before in the un-reformed
days, the narrow minority, a new master class,
a conglomerate of holders of ancient privileges
and of newly rich, gathers in the tribute, now
grown to immensity; and not only does not
render any service therefor, but flaunts its
wealth in the face of labor by riotous living.
The class contest henceforth is devoted more
and more to these economic causes, based on
vicious systems of distribution; and it takes
shape in a hand-to-hand fight between ex-
ploiters and proletariat, carried on by strikes,
cooperative societies and trades unions. The
economic organization first forces recognition,
and then equal rights ; then it leads and finally
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 267
controls the political destinies of the labor
party. In the end therefore the trade union
controls the party. Thus far the development
of the state has progressed in Great Britain
and in the United States.
Were it not that there has been added to the
modern state an entirely new element, its
officialdom, the constitutional state, though
more finely differentiated and more power-
fully integrated, would, so far as form and
content go, be little different from its proto-
types.
As a matter of prmciple, the state officials,
paid from the funds of the state, are removed
from the economic fights of conflicting inter-
ests; and therefore it is rightly considered un-
becoming for any one in the service of the
government to be taking part in any money
making undertaking, and in no well ordered
bureaucracy is it tolerated. Were it possible
ever thoroughly to realize the principle, and
did not every official, even the best of them,
bring with him that concept of the state held by
the class from which he originated, one would
find in officialdom, as a matter of fact, that
268 THE STATE
moderating and order making force, removed
from the conflict of class interests, whereby the
state might be led toward its new goal. It
would become the fulcrum of Archimedes
whence the world of the state might be moved.
But the principle, we are sorry to say, can
not be carried out completely; and further-
more, the officials do not cease being real men,
do not become mere abstractions without class-
consciousness. This may be quite apart from
the fact that, in Europe at least, a participa-
tion in a definite form of undertakings — viz.,
handling large landed estates — is regarded as
a favorable means of getting on in the service
of the state, and will continue to be so as long
as the landed nobility prej)onderates. In con-
sequence of this, many officials on the Con-
tinent, and one may even say the most influ-
ential officials, are subject to pressure by
enormous economic interests; and are uncon-
sciously, and often against their will, brought
into the class contests.
There are factors, such as extra allowances
made by either fathers or fathers-in-law, or
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 269
hereditary estates, and affinity to the persons
in control of the landed and moneyed interest
or allied with them, whereby the solidarity of
interest among the ruling class is if anything
increased from the fact that these officials,
practically without exception, are taken from
a class with whom since their boyhood days
they have been on terms of intimacy. Were
there, however, no such unity of economic in-
terests the demeanor of the officials would be
influenced entirely by the pure interests of the
state.
For this reason, as a rule, the most efficient,
most objective and most impartial set of
officials is found in poor states. Prussia, for
example, was formerly indebted to its poverty
for that incomparable body of officials who
handled it through all its troubles. These em-
ployees of the state were actually, in conso-
nance with the rule laid down above, dissociated
completely from all interests in money making,
directly or indirectly.
This ideal body of officials is a rare occur-
rence in the more wealthy states. The pluto-
270 THE STATE
cratic development draws the individual more
and more into its vortex, robbing him of his ob-
jectivity and of his impartiality. And yet the
officials continue to fulfil the duty which the
modern state requires of them, to preserve the
interests of the state as opposed to the inter-
ests of any class. And this interest is pre-
served by them, even though against their will,
or at least without clear consciousness of the
fact, in such manner that the economic means,
which called the bureaucracy into being, is in
the end advanced on its tedious path of vic-
tory, as against the political means. No one
doubts that the officials carry on class politics,
prescribed for them by the constellation of
forces operating in the state; and to that ex-
tent, they certainly do represent the master
class from which they sprang. But they do
ameliorate the bitterness of the struggle, by op-
posing the extremists in either camp, and by
advocating amendments to existing law, when
the social development has become ripened for
their enactment, without waiting until the con-
test over these has become acute. Where an
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 271
efficient race of princes governs, whose mo-
mentary representative adopts the policy of
King Frederick, which was to regard himself
only as "the first servant of the state," what has
been said above applies to him in an increased
degree, all the more so as his interests, as the
permanent beneficiary of the continued exist-
ence of the state, would before all else prompt
him to strengthen the centripetal forces and to
weaken the centrifugal powers. In the course
of the preceding we have in many instances
noted the natural solidarity between prince
and people, as an historic force of great value.
In the completed constitutional state, in which
the monarch in but an infinitesimally small de-
gree is a subject of private economic interests,
he tends to be almost completely "an official."
This community of interests is emphasized here
much more strongly than in either the feudal
state or the despotically governed state, where
the dominion, at least for one-half its extent, is
based on the private economic interests of the
prince.
Even in a constitutional state, the outer f ornv
272 THE STATE
of government is not the decisive factor; the
fight of the classes is carried on and leads to
the same result in a republic as in a monarchy.
In spite of this, it must be admitted that there
is more probability, that, other things being
equal, the curve of development of the state in
a monarchy vt^ill be more sweeping, with less
secondary incurvity, because the prince is less
affected by momentary losses of popularity, is
not so sensitive to momentary gusts of disap-
proval, as is a president elected for a short
term of years, and he can therefore shape his
policies for longer periods of time.
We must not fail to mention a special form
of officialdom, the scientific staffs of the uni-
versities, whose influence on the upward de-
velopment of the state must not be underesti-
mated. Not only is this a creation of the
economic means, as were the officials them-
selves, but it at the same time represents an
historical force, the need of causality, which
we found heretofore only as an ally of the con-
quering state. We saw that this need created
superstition while the state was on a primitive
CONSTITUTIONAL STATE 273
stage; its bastard, the taboo, we found in all
cases to be an effective means of control by
the master class. From these same needs then,
science was developed, attacking and destroy-
ing superstition, and thereby assisting in
preparation of the path of evolution. That is
the incalculable historical service of science and
especially of the universities.
CHAPTER VII
THE TENDENCY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE
STATE
We have endeavored to discover the de-
velopment of the state from its most remote
past up to present times, following its course
like an explorer, from its source down the
streams to its effluence in the plains. Broad
and powerfully its waves roll by, until it dis-
appears into the mist of the horizon, into un-
explored and, for the present-day observer, un-
discoverable regions.
Just as broadly and powerfully the stream of
history — and until the present day all history
has been the history of states — rolls past our
view, and the course thereof is covered by the
blanketing fogs of the future. Shall we dare
to set up hypotheses concerning the future
course, until "with unrestrained joy he sinks
into the arms of his waiting, expectant father" ?
274
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 275
(Goethe's Prometheus.) Is it possible to es-
tablish a scientifically founded prognosis in
regard to the future development of the state ?
I believe in this possibility. The tend-
ency ^" of state development unmistakably
leads to one point: seen in its essentials the
state will cease to be the "developed political
means" and will become "a freemen's citizen-
ship." In other words, its outer shell will
remain in essentials the form which was de-
veloped in the constitutional state, under which
the administration will be carried on by an
officialdom. But the content of the states here-
tofore known will have changed its vital ele-
ment by the disappearance of the economic ex-
ploitation of one class by another. And since
the state will, by this, come to be without either
classes or class interests, the bureaucracy of
the future will truly have attained that ideal
of the impartial guardian of the common in-
terests, which nowadays it laboriously at-
tempts to reach. The "state" of the future
will be "society" guided by self-government.
Libraries full of books have been written
276 THE STATE
on the delimitation of the concepts "state" and
"society." The problem, however, from our
point of view has an easy solution. The
"state" is the fully developed political means,
society the fully developed economic means.
Heretofore state and society were indissolubly
intertwined: in the "freemen's citizenship,"
there will be no "state" but only "society."
This prognosis of the future development of
the state contains by inclusion all of those fa-
mous formulae, whereby, the great philosophical
historians have endeavored to determine the
"resulting value" of universal history. It con-
tains the "progress from warlike activity to
peaceful labor" of St. Simon, as well as
Hegel's "development from slavery to free-
dom"; the "evolution of humanity" of Herder,
as well as "the penetration of reason through
nature" of Schleiermacher.
Our times have lost the glad optimism of the
classical and of the humanist writers ; sociologic
pessimism rules the spirit of these latter days.
The prognosis here stated can not as yet claim
to have many adherents. Not only do the per-
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 277
sons obtaining the profits of dominion, thanks
to their obsession by their class spirit, regard
it as an incredible concept ; those belonging to
the subjugated class as well regard it with the
utmost skepticism. It is true that the pro-
letarian theory, as a matter of principle, pre-
dicts identically the same result. But the ad-
herents of that theory do not believe it possible
by the path of evolution but only through revo-
lution. It is then thought of as a picture of a
"society" varying in all respects from that
evolved by the progress of history; in other
words, as an organization of the economic
means, as a system of economics without com-
petition and market, as collectivism. The an-
archistic theory makes form and content of the
"state" as inseparable as heads and tails of the
coin; no "government" without exploitation!
It would therefore smash both the form and
the content of the state, and thus bring on a
condition of anarchy, even if thereby all the
economic advantages of a division of labor
should have to be sacrificed. Even so great
a thinker as the late Ludwig Gumplowicz, who
278 THE STATE
first laid the foundation on which the present
theorj'^ of the state has been developed, is a
sociological pessimist; and from the same rea-
sons as are the anarchists, whom he combated
so violently. He too regards as eternally in-
separable form and content, government and
class-exploitation; since he however, and I
think correctly, does not consider it possible
that many people may live together without
some coercive force vested in some government,
he declares the class-state to be an "immanent"
and not only an historical category.
Only a small fraction of social liberals, or of
liberal socialists, believe in the evolution of a
society without class dominion and class ex-
ploitation which shall guarantee to the indi-
vidual, besides political, also economic liberty
of movement, within of course the limitations
of the economic means. That was the credo
of the old social liberalism, of pre-Manchester
days, enunciated by Quesnay and especially
by Adam Smith, and again taken up in mod-
ern times by Henry George and Theodore
Hertzka.
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 279
This prognosis may be substantiated in two
ways, one through history and philosophy, the
other by poHtical economy, as a tendency of the
development of the state, and as a tendency of
the evolution of economics, both clearly tend-
ing toward one point.
The tendency of the development of the
state was shown in the preceding as a steady
and victorious combat of economic means
against political means. We saw that, in the
beginning, the right to the economic means,
the right to equality and to peace, was re-
stricted to the tiny circle of the horde
bound together by ties of blood, an en-
dowment from pre-human conditions of so-
ciety ;^*^ while without the limits of this isle of
peace raged the typhoon of the political means.
But we saw expanding more and more the cir-
cles from which the laws of peace crowded out
their adversary, and everywhere we saw their
advance connected with the advance of the
economic means, of the barter of groups for
equivalents, amongst one another. The first
exchange may have been the exchange of fire.
280 THE STATE
then the barter of women, and finally the ex-
change of goods, the domain of peace con-
stantly extending its borders. It protected the
market places, then the streets leading to them,
and finally it protected the merchants traveling
on these streets.
In the course of this discussion it was shown
how the "state" absorbed and developed these
organizations making for peace, and how in
consequence these drive back ever further right
based on mere might. Merchants* law be-
comes city law; the industrial city, the de-
veloped economic means, undermines the feudal
state, the developed political means; and
finally the civic population, in open fight, an-
nihilates the political remnants of the feudal
state, and re-conquers for the entire population
of the state freedom and right to equality,
urban law becomes pubhc law and finally in-
ternational law.
Furthermore, on no horizon can be seen any
force now capable of resisting effectively this
heretofore efficient tendency. On the con-
trary, the interference of the past, which tem-
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 281
porarily blocked the process, is obviously
becoming weaker and weaker. The interna-
tional relations of commerce and trade acquired
among the nations a preponderating impor-
tance over the diminishing warlike and politi-
cal relations; and in the intra-national sphere,
by reason of the same process of economic de-
velopment, movable capital, the creation of the
right to peace, preponderates in ever increasing
measure over landed property rights, the crea-
tion of the right of war. At the same time
superstition more and more loses its influence.
And therefore one is justified in concluding
that the tendency so marked will work out to
its logical end, excluding the political means
and all its works, until the complete victory of
the economic means is attained.
But it may be objected that in the modern
constitutional state all the more prominent
remnants of the antique law of war have al-
ready been chiseled out.
On the contrary, there survives a considera-
ble remnant of these institutions, masked it is
true in economic garb, and apparently no
282 THE STATE
longer a legal privilege but only economic
right, the ownership of large estates — the first
creation and the last stronghold of the 'political
means. Its mask has preserved it from under-
going the fate of all other feudal creations.
And yet this last remnant of the right of war
is doubtless the last unique obstacle in the path-
way of humanity; and doubtless the develop-
ment of economics is on its way to destroy it.
To substantiate these remarks I must refer
the reader to other books, wherein I have given
the detailed evidence of the above and can not
in the space allotted here repeat it at large.^*^
I can only re-state the principal points made
in these books.
There is no difference in principle between
the distribution of the total products of the
economic means among the separate classes of
a constitutional state, the so-called "capitalistic
distribution," from that prevailing in the feudal
state.
All the more important economic schools
coincide in finding the cause in this, that the
supply of "free" laborers (i. e., according to
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 288
Karl Marx politically free and economically
without capital) perpetually exceeds the de-
mand, and that hence there exists "the social
relation of capital." There "are constantly
two laborers running after one master for
work, and lowering, for one another, the
wages"; and therefore the "surplus value" re-
mains with the capitalist class, while the laborer
never gets a chance to form capital for himself
and to become an employer.
Whence comes this surplus supply of free
laborers ?
The explanation of the "bourgeois" theory,
according to which this surplus supply is
caused by the overproduction of children by
proletarian parents, is based on a logical
fallacy, and is contradicted by all known
facts."*
The explanation of the proletarian theory
according to which the capitalistic process of
production itself produces the "free laborers,"
by setting up again and again new labor-saving
machines, is also based on a logical fallacy and
is likewise contradicted by all known facts. "'^
284 THE STATE
The evidence of all facts shows rather, and
the conclusion may be deduced without fear of
contradiction, that the oversupply of "free la-
borers" is descended from the right of holding
landed property in large estates; and that emi-
gration into towns and oversea from these
landed properties are the causes of the capital-
istic distribution.
Doubtless there is a growing tendency in
economic development whereby the ruin of vast
landed estates will be accomplished. The sys-
tem is their bleeding to death, without hope of
salvation, caused by the freedom of the former
serfs — the necessary consequence of the de-
velopment of the cities. As soon as the peas-
ants had obtained the right of moving about
without their landlords' passport (German
Freizuegigheit) , there developed the chance
of escape from the countries which formerly
oppressed them. The system of emigration
created "the competition from oversea," to-
gether with the fall, on the Continent, of prices
for farm products, and made necessary per-
petually rising wages. By these two factors
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 285
ground rent is reduced from two sides, and
must gradually sink to the zero point, since
here too no counterforce is to be recognized
whereby the process might be diverted. ^^^
Thus the system of vast territorial estates falls
apart. When, however, it has disappeared,
there can be no oversupply of "free laborers."
On the contrary "two masters will run after
one laborer and must raise the price on them-
selves." There will be no "surplus value" for
the capitalist class, because the laborer himself
can form capital and himself become an em-
ployer. By this the last remaining vestige of
the political means will have been destroyed,
and economic means alone will exercise sway.
The content of such a society is the "pure eco-
nomics" ^^^ of the equivalent exchange of com-
modities against commodities, or of labor force
against commodities, and the political form of
this society will be the "freemen's citizenship."
This theoretical deduction is moreover con-
firmed by the experience of history. Wher-
ever there existed a society in which vast es-
tates did not exist to draw an increasing rental,
286 THE STATE
there "pure economics" existed, and society
approximated the form of the state to that of
the "freemen's citizenship."
Such a community was found in the Ger-
many of the four centuries ^^^ from about A. D.
1000, when the primitive system of vast estates
was developed into the socially harmless do-
minion over vast territories, until about the
year 1400, when the newly arisen great prop-
erties, created by the political means, the rob-
ber wars in the countries formerly Slavic, shut
the settlers from the westward out of lands
eastward of the Elbe/^** Such a community
was the Mormon state of Utah, which has not
been greatly changed in this respect, where a
wise land legislation permitted only small and
moderate sized farm holdings/^*^ Such a com-
munity was to be found in the city and county
of Vineland, Iowa, U. S. A.,^^^ as long as every
settler could obtain land, without increment of
rent. Such a commonwealth is, beyond all
others, New Zealand, whose government favors
with all its power the possession of small and
middle-sized holdinsrs of land, while at the same
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 28T
time it narrows and dissolves, by all means at
its command the great landed properties, which
by the way, owing to lack of surplus laborers,
are almost incapable of producing rentals.^^^
In all these cases there is an astoundingly
equalized well-being, not perhaps mechanically
equal; but there is no wealth. Because well-
being is the control over articles of consump-
tion, while wealth is the dominio7i over
mankind. In no such cases are the means of
production, "capital," "producing any surplus
values"; there are no "free laborers" and no
capitalism, and the political form of these com-
munities approximates very closely to a "free-
men's citizenship," and tends to approximate
it more and more, so far as the pressure of
the surrounding states, organized from and
based on the laws of war, permit its develop-
ment. The "state" decomposes, or else in
new countries such as Utah or New Zealand,
it returns to a rudimentary stage of develop-
ment; while the free self-determination of
free men, scarcely acquainted with a class fight,
constantly tends to pierce through ever more
288 THE STATE
thoroughly. Thus in the German Empire
there was a parallel development between the
political rise of the unions of the imperial free
cities, the decline of the feudal states, the
emancipation of the crafts, then still com-
prising the entire "plebs" of the cities, and
the decay of the patrician control of the city
government. This beneficent development
was stopped by the erection of new primitive
feudal states on the easterly border of the
former German Empire, and thus the economic
blossom of German culture was ruined. Who-
ever believes in a conscious purpose in history
may say that the human race was again re-
quired to pass through another school of suf-
fering before it could be redeemed. The
Middle Ages had discovered the system of free
labor, but had not developed it to its full ca-
pacity or efficiency. It was reserved for the
new slavery of capitalism to discover and de-
velop the incomparably more efficient system of
cooperating labor, the division of labor in the
workshops, in order to crown man as the ruler
of natural forces, as king of the planet.
DEVELOPMENT OF STATE 289
Slavery of antiquity and of modern capitalism
was once necessary; now it has become super-
fluous. According to the story, every free
citizen of Athens disposed of five human
slaves ; but we have supplied to our fellow citi-
zens of modern society a vast mass of enslaved
power, slaves of steel, that do not suffer in cre-
ating values. Since then we have ripened
toward a civilization as much higher than the
civilization of the time of Pericles, as the popu-
lation, power and riches of the modern com-
munities exceeds those of the tiny state of
Athens.
Athens was doomed to dissolution — by rea-
son of slavery as an economic institution, by
reason of the political means. Having once
entered that pathway, there was no outlet ex-
cept death to the population. Our path will
lead to life.
The same conclusion is found by either the
historical-philosophical view, which took into
account the tendency of the development of the
state, or the study of political economy, which
regards the tendency of economic develop-
290 THE STATE
merit; viz., that the economic means wins along
the whole line, while the political means dis-
appears from the life of society, in that one of
its creations, which is most ancient and most
tenacious of life ; capitalism decays with large
landed estates and ground rentals.
This has been the path of suffering and of
salvation of humanity, its Golgotha and its
resurrection into an eternal kingdom — from
war to peace, from the hostile splitting up of
the hordes to the peaceful unity of mankind,
from brutality to humanity, from the exploit-
ing State of robbery to the Freemen's Citizen-
ship.
NOTES
NOTES
1. "History is unable to demonstrate any one people,
wherein the first traces of division of labor and of agri-
culture do not coincide with such agricultural exploita-
tions, wherein the efforts of labor were not apportioned
to one and the fruits of labor were not appropriated by
some one else, wherein, in other words, the division of
labor had not developed itself as the subjection of one
set under the others." — Robertus-Jagetzow, Illumination
on the social question, second edition. Berlin, 1890, p.
124. (Cf. Immigration and Labor. The economic
aspects of European Immigration to the United States,
by Dr. Isaac A. Hourwich. Putnam's, N. Y., 1912. —
Translator.^
2. Achelis, Die Ekstase in ihrer kulturellen Bedeu-
tung, vol. 1 of Kulturprobleme der Gegenwart, Berlin,
1902.
3. Grosse, Formen der Familie. Freiburg and Leip-
zig, 1896, p. 39.
4. Ratzel, Vollcerkunde. Second Edition. Leipzig
and Wien, 1894-5, II, p. 372.
5. Die Soziale V erf as sung des Inhareidis. Stutt^
gart, 1896, p. 51.
6. Siedlung und Agrarwesen der Westgermanen, etc.
Berlin, 1895, I, p. 273.
7. 1. c. I, p. 138.
8. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 702.
^3
294. THE STATE
9. Ratzel, 1. c. 11, p. 555.
10. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 555.
11. For example with the Ovambo according to Ratzel,
1. c. II, p. 214, who in part "seem to be found in slave-
like status," and according to Laveleye among the an-
cient Irish (FuidMrs).
12. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 648.
IS. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 99.
14. Lippert, Kulturgeschichte der Menschheit. Stutt-
gart, 1886, II, p. 302.
15. Lippert, 1. c. II, p. 522.
16. Romische Geschichte. Sixth Edition. Berlin,
1874, I, p. 17.
17. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 518.
18. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 425.
19. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 545.
20. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 390-1.
21. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. S90-1.
22. Lippert, 1. c. I, p. 471.
23. Kulischer, "The history of the development of in-
terest from capital." Jahrbiicher fur National CETcon-
omie. Ill series, vol. 18, p. 318, Jena, 1899: (Says
Strabo: "Plunderers and from the scant supplies of
their native land covetous of the lands of others.")
24. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 123.
25. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 591.
26. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 370.
27. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 390-1.
28. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 388-9.
29. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 103-04.
80. Thurnwald, Staat und Wirtschaft im altem
Mgypten. Zeitschrift fiir Soz. Wissenchaft, vol. 4
1901, pp. 700-01,
NOTES 295
31. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 404-05. (Gumplowicz, Ras-
senkampf, p. 264: "Egypt, rich and self-sufficient,
says Ranke, invited the avarice of neighboring tribes,
who served other gods. Under the name of the Shep-
herd peoples, foreign dynasts and foreign tribes ruled
Egypt for centuries.
"Truly, the summary of universal history could not
be begun with more characteristic words than those of
Ranke. For in the words applied to Egypt the quintes-
sence of the whole history of mankind is summed up." —
Translator.)
32. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 165.
33. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 485.
34. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 480.
35. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 165.
36. Buhl, Soziale Verhaltnisse der Israeliten, p. 13.
37. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 455.
SB. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 628.
39. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 625.
40. Cieza de Leon, "Seg. parte de la cr6nica del
Peru." P. 75, cit. by Cunow, Inkareich (p. 62, note 1).
41. Cunow, 1. c. p. 61.
42. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 346.
43. Ratzel, 1. c. II, pp. 36-7.
44. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 221. (Cf. remarks by Hon.
A. J. Sabath, M. C, Sociological Argument on Work-
man's Compensation Bill, p. 498, Senate Document
338, Sixty-second Congress, Second Session, Volume I.
See also Congressional Record for March 1, 1913, Sixty-
second Congress, Third Session, pp. 4503, 4529, et
seq. — Translator.)
45. "Among the Wahuma women occupy a higher posi-
296 THE STATE
tion than among the negroes, and are watched carefully
by their men. This makes mixed marriages difficult.
The mass of the Waganda even to-day would not have
remained a genuine negro tribe 'of dark chocolate colored
skin and short wool hair' were it not that the two peoples
are strictly opposed to one another as peasants and herds-
men, rulers and subjects, as despised and honored, in
spite of the relations entered into among the upper
classes. In this peculiar position, they represent a
typical phenomenon, which is found repeated at many
other points," — Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 177.
46. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 178.
47. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 198.
48. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 476.
49. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 453.
50. Kopp, Griechische Staatsaltertiimer, 2, Aufi.
Berlin, 1893, p. 23.
51. Uhland, Alte hoch und niederdeutsche Volkslieder
I (1844), p. 339 cited by Sombart: Der moderne Kapi-
talismus, Leipzig, 1902, I, pp. 384-5.
52. Inama-Sternegg, Deutsche Wirtsch.-Gesch. I,
Leipzig, 1879, p. 59.
53. Wester mar ck. History of Human Marriage, Lon-
don, 1891, p. 368.
54. Cf. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 81.
55. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 156.
56. Ratzel, 1. c. I, pp. 259-60.
57. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 434.
58. I. Kulischer, 1. c, p. 31 7? where other examples
may be found.
59. Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, p.
NOTES 297
400, which contains a number of ethnographical ex-
amples.
60. Westermarck, 1. c, p. 546.
61. Cf. Ratzel, 1. c. I, pp. 318, 540.
62. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 106.
63. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 335.
64. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 346.
65. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 347.
66. Buecher, Entstehung der Volkswirtschaft, Second
Edition, Tubingen, 1898, p. 301.
67. Cf., Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 271, speaking of the
islanders of the Pacific Ocean: "Intercourse from tribe
to tribe is carried on by inviolable heralds, preferably old
women. These act also as intermediary agents in
trades." See also page 317 for the same practises among
the Australians.
68. German Translation by L. Katscher. Leipzig,
1907.
69. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 81.
70. Ratzel, 1. c. I, pp. 478-9.
71. A. Vierkandt, Die wirtschaftlichen Verhaltnisse
der Naturvolker. Zeitschrift fiir Sozialwissenschaft,
II, pp. 177-8.
72. Kulischer, 1. c. pp. 320-1.
73. Lippert, 1. c. I, p. 266, et s^q.
74. Cf. Westermarck, History of Human Marriage.
75. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 27-
76. Herodotus IV, 23, cited by Lippert, 1. e. I, p.
459.
77. Lippert, 1. c. II, p. 170.
78. Mommsen, 1. c. I, p. 139.
79. Similar conditions may be observed among the
298 THE STATE
islanders near India. Here the Malays are vikings.
"Colonization is an important factor, as conquest and
settlement oversea . . . reminding one of the great
role played in ancient Hellas by the roving tribes. . . .
Every strip of coast line shows foreign elements, who
enter uncalled for and in most instances spreading dam-
age among the natives. The right of conquest was
granted by the rulers of Tornate to noble dynasts, who
later on became semi-sovereign viceroys on the islands of
Buru, Serang, etc."
80. Mommsen, 1. c. I, p. 132.
81. Mommsen, 1. c. I, p. 134.
82. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 160.
83. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 558.
84. Buhl, 1. c, p. 48.
85. Buhl, 1. c, pp. 78-79.
86. Mommsen, 1. c. II, p. 406.
87. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 191; of. also pp. 207-8.
88. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 363.
89. Mommsen, 1. c, p. 46.
90. Both cited by Kulischer, 1. c, p. 319, from:
Buechsenschuetz, Besitz und Erwerb im grieschischen
Altertumj and Goldschmidt, History of the Law of Com-
merce.
91. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 263.
92. F. Oppenheimer's Grossgrundeigentum und soziale
Frage. Book Two, Chapter I. Berlin, 1898.
93. Nomadism is exceptionally characterized by the
facility with which, from patriarchal conditions, despotic
functions are developed with most far-reaching powers.
Ratzel, 1. c. Vol. II, pp. 388-9.
94. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 408.
NOTES 299
95. Cunow, 1. c. pp. 66-7. Similarly among the in-
habitants of the Malay Islands numerous examples are
found in Radak (Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 267).
96. Buhl, 1. c, p. 17.
97. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 66.
98. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 118.
99. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 167.
100. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 218.
101. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 125.
102. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 124.
103. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 118.
104. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 125.
105. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 346.
106. Ratzel, I. c. II, p. 245.
107. Ratzel, 1. c. I, pp. 267-8.
108. Mommsen, 1. c. Ill, pp. 234-5.
109. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 167.
1 10. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 229.
111. Ratzel, 1. c. I, p. 128.
112. Weber's Weltgeschichte, III, p. 163.
113. Thurnwald, 1. c, pp. 702-3.
114. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 712; cf. Schneider, Kultur
und Denken der alien Mgypter, Leipzig, 1907, p- 38.
115. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 599.
116. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 362.
117. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 344.
118. Meitzen, 1. c. II, p. 633.
119. Inama-Sternegg, 1. c. I, pp. 140-1.
120. Mommsen, 1. c. V, p. 84.
121. Cf. the detailed exposition of this in F. Oppen-
heimer's Grossgrundeigentnm und die soziale Frage,
Book II, Chap. 3.
300 THE STATE
122. Mommsen, 1. c. Ill, pp. 234-5.
123. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 771.
124. Meitzen, 1. c. I, pp. 362f.
125. Inama-Sternegg, 1. c. I, pp. 373, 386.
126. Cf. F. Oppenheimer's Grossgrundeigentum, p.
272.
127. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 706.
128. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 503.
129. Ratzel, 1. c. II, p. 518.
130. Meitzen, 1. c. I, p. 579: "At the time of the
compilation of the Lex Salica, the ancient racial nobility
had been reduced to common freemen or else had been
annihilated. The officials, on the other hand, are rated
at threefold wergeld, 600 solidi, and if one be 'puer
regis' 300 solidi."
131. Thurnwald, 1. c. p. 712.
132. Inama-Sternegg, 1. c. II, p. 61.
133. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 705.
134. "The larger camps of the army of the Rhine
obtained their municipal annexes partly through army
suttlers and camp followers, and particularly through
the veterans, who after the completion of their services
remained in their accustomed quarters. Thus there
arose distinct from the military quarters proper, a dis-
tinct town of cabins {Canabce). In all parts of the
Empire, and especially in the various Germanias, there
arose in the course of time, from these camps of the
legionaries, and particularly from the headquarter sta-
tions, cities in the modern sense." — Mommsen, 1. c. V,
p. 153.
135. Eisenhardt, Gesch. der National Oekonomie, p.
9: "Aided by the new and more liquid means of pay-
NOTES 301
ment in cash, it became possible to call into being a new
and more independent establishment of soldiers and of
officials. As they were paid only periodically it became
impossible for them to make themselves independent (as
the feudatories had done) and then to turn on their pay-
master."
136. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 773.
137. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 699.
138. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 709.
139. Thurnwald, 1. c, p. 711.
140. Cf. with this F. Oppenheimer's Gross grundeigen-
tum etc.. Book II, Chap. 3.
141. "Tendency, i. e., a law, whose absolute exe-
cution is checked by countervailing circumstances, or
is by them retarded, or weakened." Marx, Kapital, vol.
Ill, p. 215.
142. Cf. the excellent work of Peter Kropotkin, Mu-
tual Aid in its Development.
143. Cf. F, Oppenheimer, Die Siedlungsgenossen-
schaft etc., Berlin, 1896, and his Grossgrundeigentum
und soziale Frage, Berlin, 1898.
144. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Bevolkerungsgesetz des
T. R. Malthus. Darstellung und Kritik, Berlin— Bern,
1901.
145. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Grundgesetz der Marxschen,
Gesellscliaftslehre, Darstellung und Kritik, Berlin, 1903.
146. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Grundgesetz der Marxschen
Gesellschaftslehre, Part IV., particularlj', the twelfth
chapter: "Tendency of the Capitalistic Development."
147. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Grossgrundeigentum und
soziale Frage, Berlin, 1898. Book I, Chapter 2, Sec-
tion 3, "Philosophy of the Social Body," pp. 57 et aeq.
302 THE STATE
148. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Grossgrundeigentum, Book
II, Chap. 2, Sec. 3, p. 322.
149. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Grossgrundeigentum, Book
II, Chap. S, Sec. 4, especially pp. 423 et seq.
150. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, "Die Utopia als Tatsache,"
Zeitschrift fur Sozial-Wissenschaft, 1899, Vol. II, pp.
190 et seq.
151. Cf. F. Oppenheimer, Siedlungsgenossenschaft,
pp. 477 et seq.
152. Cf. Andre Siegfried, La democratie en Nouvelle
Zelande, Paris, 1904.
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