, and every step by which "private capitalism"
is replaced by State action is such an advance, while these advances are
to be secured chiefly through a Socialist Party. In a word, the
Socialist Party is to ask support because it can accomplish more than
other parties for social reform under capitalism, which at the present
period means "State Socialism."

For while "reformist" Socialists are taking a position nearly identical
with that of the non-Socialist reformers, the latter are coming to adopt
a political policy almost identical with that of the reformist
Socialists. I have noted that one of America's leading economists
advises all reformers, whether they are Socialists or not, to join the
Socialist Party. Since both "reformist" Socialists and "Socialistic"
reformers are interested in labor legislation, public ownership,
democratic political reforms, graduated taxation, and the governmental
appropriation of the unearned increment in land, why should they not
walk side by side for a very considerable distance behind "a somewhat
red banner," and "without troubling themselves about the unlike
goals"--as Professor John Bates Clark recommends? The phrases of
Socialism have become so popular that their popularity constitutes its
chief danger. At a time when so many professed anti-Socialists are
agreeing with the New York _Independent_ that, though it is easy to have
too much Socialism, at least "we want _more_" than we have, it becomes
exceedingly difficult for non-Socialists to learn what Socialism is and
to distinguish it from innumerable reform movements.

Less than a decade ago the pros and cons of Socialism were much
debated. Now it is usually only a question of Socialism sooner or later,
more or less. Socialism a century or two hence, or in supposed
installments of a fraction of a per cent, is an almost universally
popular idea. For the Socialists this necessitates a revolutionary
change in their tactics, literature, and habit of thought. They were
formerly forced to fight those who could not find words strong enough to
express their hostility; they are rapidly being compelled to give their
chief attention to those who claim to be friends. The day of mere
repression is drawing to a close, the day of cajolery is at hand.

Liebknecht saw what was happening years ago, and, in one of the most
widely circulated pamphlets the Socialists have ever published (_No
Compromise_), issued an impressive warning to the movement: