Dispossessing the poor, Part IV-Let them eat less cake

Before I expand this series into Appalachia, I want to look closer at some of the prevailing arguments by 18th century philosophers about labor and wealth.

Most educated people in England and her colonies, by then, were in agreement there were different LEVELS of society leading toward true “civilization.” In that narrative, people were first hunter-gatherers, or “savages.” Then they moved up to nomadic herdsmen, or “barbarians.” Thirdly, they became sedentary farmers, or agrarians. Finally, as the pinnacle and perfect endpoint, they became urban, civilized, modern people who sell everything they make and live on money rather than barter or the work of their own hands. People who “use the earth properly” by extracting every single thing of “value” from it, to be turned into money. People “stuck” at that third level of agrarianism, whoever they were, were considered “backward” and in need of civilizing. A century later, even Karl Marx subscribed to this thinking on “levels of society” and “civilization.” He differed from the capitalists he critiqued in that he believed that the workers should seize control of the “means of production.”

Let’s pause a moment to narrow the definition of capitalists. In a capitalist system, some people accumulate enough resources, or capital, that they can invest that capital into profit-generating enterprises. Money IS capital, or it can be used to buy other things that are capital (real estate, factories, equipment, etc.). A person with capital owns a business, but it is usually hired workers who do the actual labor. Marx said that the capitalist should be cut out of the equation, because he doesn’t physically do anything, and the workers should be cooperative owners of the land/factories/etc. and benefit fully and equally from the profit. My point here is that Marx, too, disapproved of the single, self-sufficient farmer as not participating and cooperating fully with “civilization.”

Adam Smith was a Scottish economist who wrote an earth-shattering book, in 1776, called “Wealth of Nations.” Even if you’ve never read it, you’re familiar with many of its ideas: laissez-faire, or government keeping its hand out of business and not overly regulating it, and the “invisible hand of the market” which would correct itself on its own if everyone involved is seeking their own self-interests, which would actually serve to balance things out. It served as the beginning of a change away from mercantilism and toward industrial capitalism. The book had a big influence on what I call “Founding Fathers: The Young Generation,” leaders who were IN the Revolution but were far younger than Revolutionary leaders like Washington, Adams, or Jefferson. Mainly, Alexander Hamilton (who loved the idea of industrial capitalism) and James Madison (who loved the idea of checks and balances).

But even Smith agreed that, without some measures from government, the laborers themselves would be miserable and become “stupid and ignorant” in their menial role. Many people of the time, though, agreed with Smith’s fellow Scottish economist James Steuart, who maintained that suffering and even a high mortality rate for laborers was a good thing, because it culled the weak ones and forced the others to work harder than ever to stay alive, thus generating more profit for those at the top. By no means should small farmers be allowed to own their own farms, because that was an unnatural state in which servants were masters. Peasants are naturally lazy, Steuart and his ilk said (because they stopped working when they had enough); only HUNGER was a strong enough tool to make them work to the maximum. This line of reasoning is similar to the Social Darwinism movement of a century later.

Stop and think about that in modern terms. A large segment of current society believes poor people are lazy and should work harder; their kids should not get free lunch at school; their families should not get SNAP/food stamps; they are not quite “like us.”

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.