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Show Communism and Socialism. Communism and socialism atv based on the same principle. They contemplate contem-plate the abolition of private property, at least so far as the means of production pro-duction are concerned. Enth agree that the land, the forests, the mines, the workshops, the railroads should be the property of all instead of individuals. There the differences of opinion as to the exact extent to which the abolition of private ownership should be carried. car-ried. ' Communism is the older word for the principle. Sixty years ago there was.-much was.-much said about communism and little, if anything, about socialism. Today; there are many socialists and few com munists. Of the numerous communities established at different- times in this country practically all are dead. There is no disagreement between communists and socialists as to vital principles, but there is a radical difference differ-ence in the manner of putting them in operation. It has been the theory and the practice for those who held com-munuistic com-munuistic theories to found separate communities where men could regulate their lives in accordance with those theories. That was the method pursued by Fourier, Robert Dale Owen and others. That is not the method of the socialist. social-ist. He is not content to withdraw from the world and build up a little socialist so-cialist settlement where the land and other means of production may be owned in common. Some of the American Amer-ican communists went into the wilderness, wilder-ness, bought land and made it fertile with their labor. The socialist will have none of that. He resorts to political agitation to impose his theories upon a nation and to confiscate for bis benefit means of production which owe their productiveness to the labor of others. If socialism were to win the day communism com-munism vould be inaugurated, but it would be enforced communism, not the voluntary kind of Fourier. The communards com-munards of Paris in 1871 Avere not communists com-munists of the old type. They were more properly revolutionary socialists trying to secure political ends. The genuine communist is a harmless kind of dreamer. The socialist is the dangerous man of action. |