The Single Tax Movement in the 1950s

Edwin J. Cooney and Marshall Crane

[Reprinted from the Henry George News, May 1952]

Edwin J. Cooney (Brooklyn, New York):

At present two schools of thought dominate the Georgist scene, although they by no means represent the heart of George's teachings.

The Chimericalists view the philosophy as a simple tax reform movement leading softly and without conflict to a new mode of life in America. These optimists feel that a perpetual I equilibrium may transpire as a result of the e George basic tax. They picture limitless opportunity and prosperity-a world leaving nothing to be desired by any man willing and able to work.

The Moss Mantle sect stand on less firm ground. They believe that with a George basic tax, corporation taxes will disappear, wide open laissez faire will become the rule of trade, money and luxury will reward the clever, no government restrictions will hamper the ingenious.

Both of these groups are infantile in their unreal dreams. They think of "prosperity" as springing from things external. They will not recognize the fundamental nature of man as a child of conflict -- conflict with the environment, with tradition, with the inner self-the conflict that is never resolved or even staticized except in death.

We do ourselves a disservice when we attempt to transmute superficialities into realities via Progress and Poverty. This work is only a direction signal in an ever changing economic complex. A solitary application of the single tax mustard plaster will not solve the economic problems that plague mankind. It is a helpful therapy, not a cure-all.

Ours is a technicalized machine age characterized by extensive subdivision of labor. In this machine pattern we gladly accept the benefits of communism in our police and fire department services. We sanction the socialism of state forest preserves, port authorities and nuclear energy research establishments. We also hail the initiative of Henry Ford, Henry Kaiser, et al.

Few Georgists believe that the consuming public as such should not be represented in government councils. Few believe that abolition of unions would do other than depress wages critically. Most will admit that organized capital, labor, the consuming public and government as administrator and public purchaser are the four primary groups that control our destinies. If we accept these concepts we believe in what is known as a "mixed economy." If we reject them we believe in an obfuscated anarchism.

There are many imperfections in a mixed economy that change for better or worse as time passes. We should, however, be practical enough to recognize the idea of continual change as a prime dominant of democracy. I believe that it is necessary for Georgists to approach contemporary problems from this enlarged, flexible and tolerant viewpoint and reject the provincial ivory-towerism that has stultified the movement with its dull weight for many years. Our great fight in Georgism then is not against "socialism" but for the enactment of the George basic tax into law. This is where the effort and elbow grease are needed. I believe that all Georgists should be members of a strong central monolithic organization and promote actively the idea of the single tax. Time is now very short. When are we going to get to work in a world over which the dark wings of tragedy loom large?

Marshall Crane (Bedford, New York):

Mr. Cooney brings up some very interesting points in his letter. For instance, what he says about the 'Moss Mantle sect" is at least partly true, I think. I have often suspected that there are a number of Georgists, so-called, who simply use the single tax as a convenient lectern from which to preach reaction. If this is true we certainly should be kept reminded of it. Every reform movement has its ragged fringes.

Some of our most earnest and most learned Georgists are apt to lean towards the Utopian -- as Mr. Cooney calls it, the Chimerical-school of thought. Dear, good souls, but-well, for some four thousand years men have been discovering at intervals that they could not reform the world just by passing laws. Henry George himself was once asked if the single tax would cure all our economic and political ills.

"No," he answered, "but freedom will."

Is the single tax then just a step on the road to freedom? I am prepared to grant that, but I insist that it is an absolutely essential step, for without freedom of the land there can be no true freedom for those who dwell upon it.

Does Mr. Cooney really regard the socialization of forest preserves and ports as new departures? Are publicly paid cops and firemen actually signs of transition to something or other? Zoroaster, Hammurabi, Moses, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Charlemagne and Henry George are just a few of the hosts who have preached the common interest of all of us, and the common responsibility of all of us where natural resources and rights of way are concerned. And if we may judge from the most primitive societies in existence today, the very earliest governments set up by men were for the purpose of protecting the lives and property of the governed. It seems very probable too that they were not concerned with interfering with the activities of the private citizen as he made his living. Surely it is stretching things a bit to claim that such "socialism" as this makes ours a "mixed economy.

If socialism were limited to the protection of the citizen and his property, then our fight would not be with socialism. But when it involves organized restriction of his right to labor, when it limits his right to use his own property for the production of wealth it does become the natural adversary of Georgists and of all who fight the good fight for freedom.

When Mr. Cooney speaks of unionization, does he mean the organization of labor for collective bargaining, or does he mean a gigantic machine, equipped by government franchise to monopolize labor? What is the exact significance of "organized capital?" This term may be found in legal works covering the various complexes of statutes which regulate incorporation in this country. It has also been used to describe the Marxist state, Hitler's Germany, international cartels and trusts.

The English Fabians of a couple of generations ago tried, with the best intentions, to "mix" socialism with freedom. Perhaps they made their brand of socialism more salable, but they certainly have finished up with their freedom sadly diminished.

It would seem that confusion in defining general principles can be a very dangerous thing. Let us first of all know clearly what we are fighting for. And let us never for an instant forget what it is that we are fighting against.