when we are continually assured that there is a new and better way of doing anything, it is only reasonable to ask if anyone has tried it before. "the proof of the pudding is in the eating," and if some one has eaten such a pudding before us, we may be saved from using up good materials in a bad concoction. until now the attention of historians has been so fixed upon the great military autocracy of rome, that the growth of trade unionism and socialism under that government has been overlooked. here we will trace and put together such facts as seem curiously parallel to the growth of modern unionism; and which, when they outstep our present position, may serve to show what further developments may be expected by us.
the first great step, which bore centuries of bitter results, was the favouring of the townsman as against the countryman. the voter in rome could push laws to his own advantage in the hurly-burly of the public assembly, while the countryman was working hard in his furrow miles away. the conquered provinces were a great temptation; they had to yield tribute, grain came pouring into rome, and why should not this abundance benefit the citizen by being sold at a low price? they forgot the countryman. his toil29 was none the less because carthage or sicily or egypt were being plundered. but his pay was much the less if his produce lost its market value. the cheap corn of gracchus was the knell of the honest agriculturist, as professor oman has pointed out. the only remedy was to try to cheapen production in italy. this was done by giving up the small farmer altogether, and running only big estates by slave-labour, the human machine which was to rome what machinery is to us. this staved off the evil somewhat. but soon the townsman demanded more and more, and at last free doles of corn were given to him, and agriculture became impossible in italy. what tribute-corn did to italy, cheap transport has done to england. the townsman is always favoured at the cost of the countryman, and the country is being depopulated. not only cheap bread, but doles of every kind—hospitals, wash-houses, music, games, libraries—all are given to the townsman, while the countryman cannot possibly share in such doles. a large policy of equivalent benefits to the countryman would be the only corrective to this one-sided and deleterious favouritism. but the votes carry it, as they did in rome.
in the earlier part of the second century, under trajan, two little statements show what was going on. a guild or trade union of firemen in asia minor wished to be incorporated: but the emperor forbade, because such trade guilds became political centres. there must have been some experience of such movement for it to be anticipated. the other statement is that the more able and wealthy men avoided entering the guild of permanent aldermen, or30 curia, because of the burdens which were thrown upon them. a century later, about 230 a.d., all trades were organised into corporations or trades unions, recognised by the government, instead of being only private societies as before. this seems to have been a compulsory unionism; but there was some difference in class between this trades unionism and our own. in rome the trades were in the hands of smaller men, and not of large firms and companies as much as with us; and on the other hand the mere mechanic was usually a slave, this slave labour being economically the equivalent of machinery in our time. hence the roman trades unions were small employers of the status of our plumbers or upholsterers, more than, as with us, a large mass of crude labour organised against all capital. they were trade unions, rather than unions of the mechanics as against the managers. the compulsory entry of all the master employers into a union would no doubt be a step very welcome to modern unionism; and the compulsory extension of it, so as to leave no free labour, would be an ideal condition, in which picketing would be quite superseded by legal compulsion to join the union. the differences therefore were mainly such as our trades unions would desire, and aim at in future; in short unionism by 230 a.d. was more developed than it is at present with us.
but here came in a very difficult question, which is before us also whenever unionism becomes dominant in any trade. it is all very well to let unions pillage capital, or even pillage each other, but can they be allowed to pillage the poor? this at once clashes with the favouring of the proletariat. it has already31 raised an acute difficulty in england. the bricklayers' union cannot be competed with from abroad, except very slightly by means of imported wooden houses. hence this union has been able to close its grip firmly on the throat of the public; it has raised wages, and it has cut down work from eight hundred or nine hundred bricks laid daily to two hundred and seventy or three hundred and thirty in different standards now. by raising the cost of labour to about three times the amount, the cost of building as a whole must be nearly doubled. the dearness of lodging of the poor is really due to the remorseless extortion of the bricklayers, abetted by the extravagant building regulations locally in force in their interest, to increase the expenditure on a building. in the country there is disgraceful overcrowding for lack of cottage accommodation, and in towns miserable rooms fetch high rents. the ground-landlord, who is so much abused, has little to do with this; for ground-rents are seldom more than a tenth of the house rent and taxes. if all land were confiscated to-morrow it would not lower most rentals more than a fraction. if the bricklayers' union and all its results were abolished, rentals would descend to nearly half the present amounts.
if we were to meet this difficulty in the way that rome dealt with it, the government would give the bricklayers' union an absolute monopoly of building, on condition that dwellings under a certain value were charged at a third of the cost of labour, that is on the old terms of a full day's work fifty years ago, leaving all later profits to be gained from the wealthier classes. in the present straits about housing it is by32 no means certain that this would not be a popular course.
in rome the grain importers and the bakers were the two trades which touched the proletariat most closely. and early in the third century these, and probably other essential trades, were organised as monopolist unions, on condition that the union was bound over to do a certain amount of work for the poor at a nominal rate. thus the wastrel was favoured and protected, with his right to maintenance; and all profits of the business were to be made from work done for those who could afford to pay for it. this is unquestionably an ideal toward which a great deal of social legislation is tending at present. railway companies and tramways are bound to carry workmen at nominal rates, while all their profits are to be earned from wealth. so far has this burden been imposed, that the construction of one railway line at least has been prevented by the heavy toll of cheap transport which was demanded before sanctioning it.
if the trade is not in the hands of a single firm for a whole district, like a railway company, there arises the problem, how is the burden of cheap work for the poor to be distributed over the constituent firms? this was solved in rome by the union, which was the sole body recognised in law. each member of the union was assessed by his union, on the basis of both his capital and his trade returns, and he had to do so much of the cheap work in proportion. hence the wealth of each firm determined the amount of their proletariat taxation. if they could withdraw temporarily part of the capital from the business, their33 assessment would be lighter. hence to each person the aim was to work with the smallest amount of capital, and to remove from the business all spare capital, and invest it elsewhere. this naturally resulted in business being badly worked. the difficulty was met by the law that all capital once in the business could never be withdrawn; and all profits—and, later, all acquired wealth—must be kept in the business, so that the richer firms should do their full share of proletariat service. the results of these logical developments of unionism and help to the proletariat, were that many withdrew altogether from unions, retiring on a small competence rather than live under such a burden, and that there was a general decline of commerce and of industry.
property having thus become the gauge of responsibility in the union, the only way to prevent desertions was to declare that the property was attached to the union permanently, and whosoever acquired it did so under the implied covenant of supplying the share of union work out of it. the result of this law was that no one with capital would join a trade union, as their whole property became attached to the union; and poor persons were not desired on unions, as they could not take up a share of the proletariat service. this condition was met by the law forcibly enrolling capitalists in the unions, and demanding their personal service as well as the use of their capital.
by 270 a.d. aurelian had made unionism compulsory for life so as to prevent the able men from withdrawing, to better themselves by free work individually. he also gave a wine dole, and gave34 bread in place of corn, to save the wastrel the trouble of baking. in the fourth century every member, and all his sons, and all his property, belonged inalienably to the trades union. by 369 a.d. all property however acquired belonged to the union.
yet still men would leave all they had to get out of the hateful bondage, and so the unpopular trades—such as the moneyers in 380 a.d. and the bakers in 408—were recruited by requiring that everyone who married the daughter of a unionist must join his father-in-law's business. and thus "the empire was an immense gaol where all worked not according to taste but by force," as waltzing remarks in his great work corporations professionnelles, where the foregoing facts are stated.
there was but one end possible to this accumulation of move upon move, on the false basis of compulsory trade unionism, and work under cost for the proletariat. the whole system was so destructive of character and of wealth that it ruined the empire. slavery was by no means the destruction of rome, it flourished in the centuries when the government was strongest, and diminished in advance of the social decay. vice was by no means the destruction of rome, it was worst when rome was most powerful and was lessened in the decline. the one movement which grew steadily as rome declined, and which was intimately connected with every stage of that decline, was the compulsion of labour and the maintenance of the wastrel as a burden on society. it was that which pulled down the greatest political organism, by the crushing of initiative and character,35 and by the steady drain on all forms of wealth. the free goth was the welcome deliverer from social bondage. this growth of trade unionism has been followed here as a whole, without stopping to note other effects of the same type of mind, which are also very instructive to us. we now turn back to look at some earlier developments.
the empire had a long age of internal peace, from the accession of vespasian to the rise of severus, comprising four or five generations. men had forgotten in italy and the provinces what war meant, as the only troubles had been frontier fighting. they ceased to value the strength of unity, and the importance of keeping the empire bound together. the sayings attributed to gallienus in the middle of the third century cannot be looked on as merely wild vagaries, contrary to all the public opinion around him. had no one else advocated the subdivision of the empire, he would never have continued to jest about not needing the produce of gaul or of syria. such phrases must have been familiar among a little-italy party, of whom gallienus was the agent and mouthpiece. and such a situation will help to explain his conduct regarding the captivity of valerian his father in persia. a glance at old valerian shows him to have been a rigid gentleman of the old school, like galba or nerva. and, when he was captured, the little-italy party who had hold of gallienus were relieved rather than otherwise. had george iii been captured by the french, probably george iv and charles james fox would not have been very anxious for his return.
the policy of the party seems to have been to36 encourage each province to start a separate government under its local ruler, in touch with the roman government, but with recognised independence. britain was separated, and was only reunited to the empire at later times for short periods; postumus, victorinus, tetricus, carausius, allectus, constantius, magnentius, magnus maximus, jovinus, all ruled without any check from italy. syria was separated with such good will that the coinage for zenobia was struck at the imperial mint in alexandria. in all, nineteen independent rulers are enumerated in this reign; and no attempt was made to reunite the provinces. there were gains in such a course; the heavy charge on italy of keeping a great army was lessened; the risks of civil war seemed to be reduced, when each province was not tempted to set up its own ruler for the whole empire; and local feelings and variations could have free scope. it might be thought that three centuries of rule had fitted the provinces to hold their own in the world, and to be ruled independently. the result of the experiment in devolution, or home rule all round, was a time of such anarchy, misery and loss, as had not been known since a unified civilisation had existed in those lands.
after the immediate catastrophes had been somewhat rectified by succeeding emperors, aurelian took up the great task of reuniting the whole empire. he carried this out victoriously; tetricus from gaul and zenobia from syria adorned his triumph. but rome was bitter at such a policy. a furious rebellion broke out, nominally called the revolt of the mint; that it was a great social movement was seen by gibbon,37 though he confesses that it is mysterious how three senators, most of the senatorial families, and multitudes of minor people were involved in it. the fighting was so severe that five thousand of aurelian's trained army were killed. that the mint workmen took part in it is certain: but probably the mint was adopted as headquarters of the movement owing to its strength. all this shows that, so far from the great victories making aurelian popular in rome, they were most bitterly opposed. the only ground for this must be that a very strong party clung to the little-italy policy, and hated aurelian in consequence. this movement gives good ground for interpreting the policy of gallienus in the way we have done above, as being a great party policy and not merely an imperial freak.
within less than a generation later came the vast socialist decree of diocletian, regulating all prices and wages throughout the empire. a maximum value was fixed for every kind of food—grain, wine, oil, meat, fish, vegetables and fruit. hence such food would never be produced where the natural conditions prevented a profit within this maximum price; nor would it be transported beyond the distance within which the maximum yielded a profit. whole districts must have been cut off from different kinds of supply by such legislation. meanwhile the wages of labourers, of artizans, and of professions were all equally regulated, so that the best men could never have their superior ability rewarded. the prices of skins and leather, of all clothing, and of jewellery were likewise defined.
the consequence must have been that the losses in38 bad years of supply, owing to weather and other circumstances, must have fallen wholly on the producer, who might be ruined by the whole brunt of the loss, instead of being partly compensated by a rise in prices which taxed the whole body of users. no wonder that after such a law the whole empire plunged ever deeper into poverty and confusion. the coinage depreciated even more rapidly than before; and the economic distress of such a fixed system with a falling currency must have been overwhelming. such were the results of one of the great socialistic attempts to remedy the course of events by artificial legislation.
we thus see how by the establishment of unionism, the feeding of paupers, the devolution of the empire, and the legislation on prices and wages, the socialistic policy brought to naught the greatest social organism that had yet appeared in the world.
