they demand that the citizens have as direct a voice as possible, first in the
election of all public officers, secondly in the framing of the laws, and thirdly in the management of the many industrial departments of the proposed government.
By the citizens' collective owning of the different things enumerated is meant that they would own them just as the citizens of the United States, as a body, to-day own the post-offices, arsenals, navy and public lands. Of course, collective ownership does not imply that, after the state should have taken over the things referred to, each citizen would be entitled to an equal share of them as his own private property, to be used by him according to his desires.
The management of the property of the Socialist state and the remuneration for labor would not be in the hands of private individuals acting independently, but would be subject to the will of the majority of the citizens.
By the principal means of production, transportation and communication is meant any instrument of production, transportation or communication that would be used for purposes of exploitation, in other words, for making profit through the employment of hired labor. To illustrate this, several examples will be given. Mines, factories and mills of all kinds, large business houses and stores, together with those farms whose owners would employ hired labor for the production of goods to be sold at profit, would all be looked upon as being among the principal means of production. On the other hand, a sewing-machine used for family needs would not be included in the list.
There are many Socialists who have held that their intended state would allow the private ownership of very small farms, provided that the products were raised without the employment of farm hands. But it seems likely that such a plan of private ownership would not be tolerated under a Socialist government, for, first of all, a very large number of