All-Round Reform
Harry F. Levett
[Reprinted from Land & Liberty, 1957]
It was not until 1935 that I found in Progress and Poverty
the answer to our economic problems. Fifteen years earlier I had been
adversely affected by the then prevailing depression. However, being
then only a boy, I had not questioned my elders' opinions that
business depressions are unavoidable and "just happen " and
must therefore be accepted more or less as "Acts of God."
In 1927 I went to the United States where for two years I enjoyed the
"boundless prosperity" of that country. In 1929, depression
hit the world. For the next two years I read and listened to the
opinions of the top men in the business and the financial world. One
after the other they prophesied revivals and upturns of business, next
month, in the spring, after the summer, etc., etc. Finally I came to
the sad conclusion that their views and ideas on this subject were no
better than mine.
When I was again in Cape Town, in 1935, 1 came across by chance an
Everyman's Library edition of Progress and Poverty. I had read
so many books and magazines and newspaper articles purporting to
explain depressions and booms in business, that I skimmed rapidly
through Progress and Poverty expecting that it, too, would
fail to give a satisfactory explanation. In the course of my skimming
I found none of the factual errors, faulty logic, contradictions, and
so forth, which had caused my dissatisfaction with the other books.
Therefore, I immediately re-read it with the deliberate intention of
finding the flaws. My search was fruitless; I was unable to find even
a misprint!
Soon after having thus completely satisfied myself that Progress
and Poverty field the answer to the perplexing problems of
depressions, etc., I read in the Cape Town papers one or two short
news items reporting the activities of a group led by (then Advocate
-- now Judge) Frank A. W. Lucas. On moving to Johannesburg early in
1936, I associated myself with this group. finding, in the process,
friendships that have endured.
A problem immediately arose. The economic justice of the principles
set forth by Henry George was self-evident and incontrovertible. The
problem was -- as it is still, for me and everyone else -- how to get
economic justice embodied in and upheld by the law of the land. I was
led on to reflect that even in supposedly democratic countries, the
party in power was frequently in office on a minority of votes. My
conversations and researches brought me inevitably to the necessity
for proportional representation by the single transferable vote in
multi-member constituencies. I now have the opinion that this system
of election for all public authorities, from village management boards
up to the state legislature, is an essential if any major progressive
reform is to be obtained by democratic means - the possibility of a
whole-hearted Georgeist becoming a dictator seems very remote. And I
hold to this opinion even though both the Republic of Ireland and the
State of Tasmania use Proportional Representation and yet fail to take
any action to inaugurate a system of economic justice within their
respective spheres.
My next step was to consider the land as such: the necessity for
re-afforestation in many areas, the advance of the deserts in all
parts of the world, wide-spread erosion from wind and water, the
creation of dust-bowls, the loss of fertility, etc. Books have been
written, and groups exist in many countries, dealing with these
problems. However, few of the authors or group members appear to grasp
the full implications of the economics of these problems. They all
advocate, rightly, I think, that the governments concerned should take
prompt and largescale action by spending the taxpayers' money for
planting trees, building dams, and the like. What they fail to see is
that the erection of a dam, for instance, with taxpayers' money merely
enables some small group of landowners to derive the economic benefit.
All the taxpayers get is the moral satisfaction that they have done
something to save our soil" or, more correctly, some individual
landowner's soil.
If these earnest and patriotic people would realise that their soil
conservation and water conservation plans would be financially more
feasible and economically more just if the land values (inevitably
increased by any successful conservation scheme) were to bear the
burden, they would be ardent supporters of the principles set out by
Henry George.
The absurd state of the present economic system is fully shown in the
Cape Province where the local authorities levy rates on improvements.
In times of drought the local authorities plead with the occupiers of
land to use less water from the mains, even sometimes imposing
penalties for its use and forbidding the use of water at all certain
hours of the day. Yet if a public-spirited landowner adds tanks to his
house and builds dams in his fields in a noble attempt to use
rain-water or surplus water instead of water from the mains, the local
authority increases the valuation of the property, and he has to pay
higher rates.
Next my researches into the land question brought me to the question
of health. There are increasing numbers of people in many countries
who see that bad agricultural practices, such as mono-culture and
excessive use of artificial fertilisers, are lowering the humus
content and the actual fertility of the soil. Plants and animals
(including mankind) fed from soil of low humus content are unhealthy.
The food we eat does not have the nutritive qualities it should have
Even "fresh" fruit has probably been sprayed several times
with some insecticide (injurious to mankind as well a poisonous to
insects), and the tree on which it grew has been similarly sprayed
with poison repeatedly.
Too many "health food" groups fail to realise that farmers
are forced to produce as much as possible (even in peace-time) in the
shortest possible time, regardless of vital quality. They are driven
by the existing system of taxing commodities and incomes instead of
site values.
It is little use advising people that their health depends on "fresh
fruit and vegetables straight from your own garden" when the
present systems of land-tenure and taxation prevent most people from
having any sort of garden. Nevertheless, the Health Food" groups
are thinking on the right lines, as is demonstrated by the many
advertisements for medicines for stomachs, bladders, kidneys, livers,
etc. They should support the economic reform which would make it
possible for more people to get fresh fruit from their own gardens.
Another group which should have no difficulty in grasping the
essential justice of the basic principles set forth by Henry George is
the consumer Co-operative movement. In Britain this is very large and
financially well-organised, but it barely exists in South Africa. It
is the merest step from realising that the profits of production and
distribution should be returned to the consumers, to realising that
the site values created by the growth of population should also be
returned to the consumers " or users of the land.
Thus, we have three important groups, each one becoming more
important as time passes -- the "Save the Soil," the "Health
Food," and the "Consumer Co-operation" groups-each of
which has to advance just a little farther if it is to obtain
fulfilment of its objects. (Of course, I am well aware that some
individuals in each group have already taken the step.)
For my part, I am convinced that each of the reforms I have mentioned
is necessary. Healthy food is essential, and so is the arrest of soil
erosion and the advance of deserts. An increase in consumer
co-operation, if perhaps not quite an essential, is certainly high]y
desirable if our "civilisation" is to survive. But the basic
reform which would enable these objectives to be achieved is an
alteration of existing taxation and land-tenure laws so as to bring
them into line with the principles so convincingly set forth in Progress
and Poverty.
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