in large part
due to him, and that is a real service which cannot be too highly
esteemed.

But the warmth with which I recognize this service must not prevent us
from stating the question with critical clearness: "Are the
Schulze-Delitzsch associations for credit and for raw materials, and
are the consumers' leagues able to accomplish the improvement of the
situation of the working class?"

The answer to this question must be a most decided "no." It will be
easy to show this briefly. As to the credit and raw material
associations, these both agree in that they exist only for those who
are carrying on business on their own account--that is, only for
artisan production. For the working class in the narrower sense--the
hands employed in factory production, who have no business of their
own for which they can use credit and raw materials--neither kind
of association exists. Their help can therefore reach only the artisan
producers.

But, even in this respect, please notice and impress upon your minds
two essential circumstances:

In the first place the inevitable tendency of our industrialism is to
put factory production more and more from day to day in place of
artisan production, and, in consequence, to drive the workmen of a
constantly increasing number of trades into the laboring class proper,
which finds work in the factories. England and France, which are ahead
of us in economic development, show this in a still greater degree
than Germany, which is, however, taking tremendous strides in the same
direction. Your own experience will confirm this sufficiently.

It follows from this that the Schulze-Delitzsch credit and raw
material associations, even if they could help the artisans, could be
of advantage only to a very small number of people, a number which is
constantly decreasing and tends to disappear, through the inevitable
development of our manufacturing system--people who through the
progress of our culture are, in constantly increasing numbers, forced
into the class of workingmen who are not affected by this aid. That
is, nevertheless, only the first conclusion. A second, of still
greater importance, is the following: In competition with factory
production, which is in constantly increasing scope taking the place
of small artisan production, even the artisans who remain in the
latter are in no way certain of being protected by the credit and raw
material associations. I will again cite Professor Huber as