124 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



proves of the exemption of church property 

 from taxation, in so far as the practice is 

 grounded on a belief that the interests of 

 public order will thereby be subserved." 



I do not see why you should say this. 

 There is nothing in my article to justify it. 

 That article was written, not to discuss 

 church exemption, but to define and illus- 

 trate socialism. Church exemption was 

 only referred to so far as to answer the in- 

 quiry, Is it socialistic ? Now, my definition 

 of a socialistic measure say, a legislative 

 act makes the motive and the objective a 

 part of the act, equally with the positive 

 provisions thereof; and by that definition, 

 the exemption of church property from tax- 

 ation, with a view to the promotion of good 

 order, the reforming of vice and violence, 

 the security of property, is not socialistic. 

 It may be unwise; it may be monstrously 

 foolish. On that point I had nothing to 

 say, because I was writing on socialism. 

 You express ,l surprise" that I should men- 

 tion the argument in favor of church ex- 

 emption, without denouncing it as hollow, 

 unscientific, and a manifest begging of the 

 question. Pardon me for suggesting that, 

 whatever may be true of journals of art or 

 theology, a journal maintained in the inter- 

 ests of science should encourage writers in 

 sticking to their subjects, for the time be- 

 ing, and not going off erratically to discuss 

 much less, to denounce views which re- 

 gard matters wholly outside their chosen 

 field of inquiry. Having decided that the 

 measure in question was not socialistic, I 

 had nothing more to do with it in an arti- 

 cle on socialism. 



It was perfectly competent to " The 

 Popular Science Monthly" to reject my defi- 

 nition of socialism ; but it should not blame 

 me for adhering closely to that definition, 

 when once adopted. Respectfully, yours, 

 Francis A. Walker. 

 Boston, March 18, 1887. 



"We publish the above letter as a matter 

 of simple justice to its author. It seems 



that we put a wrong construction on that 

 portion of his article in the January " Scrib- 

 ner" dealing with the question of the non- 

 taxation of church property. All we can 

 say is that we gave his article a tolerably 

 attentive reading at the time, and under- 

 stood him to give at least an implied ap- 

 proval of the policy of non-taxation, pro- 

 vided only the claim made for it that it was 

 favorable to the preservation of public or- 

 der was urged in good faith. We are now 

 asked to observe that all he said was that 

 the policy in question the proviso in ques- 

 tion holding good could not properly be 

 described as socialistic. We accept the 

 correction ; but we think that so practiced 

 a writer as General Walker might have 

 guarded more effectually against misappre- 

 hension if he had tried- These were his 

 exact words: 



" The prevention of violence and crime 

 is the proper function of the state, accord- 

 ing to the lowest views that can be taken of 

 it ; and, if a certain amount of encourage- 

 ment and assistance is extended to religious 

 bodies genuinely in this interest, no inva- 

 sion of individual initiative and enterprise 

 can properly be complained of." 



Our correspondent thinks that it would 

 have been highly unscientific on his part to 

 have dropped so much as a hint as to the 

 completely unverified character of the claim 

 supposed to be put forward on behalf of 

 the policy referred to. It strikes us that 

 the case is one in which Science might have 

 sacrificed a little of its dignity for the sake 

 of a public benefit. However that may be, 

 we are glad to have it on record that Gen- 

 era W r alker does not commit himself in 

 any manner, or to any extent, to the doc- 

 trine that church property ought to be ex- 

 empt from taxation. It is more important 

 and satisfactory to know this than to know 

 that he does not regard the doctrine as a 

 socialistic one ; especially when we consider 

 how little difference it makes, from General 

 Walker's point of view, whether a doctrine 

 is socialistic or not. Editor. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



ST A TE ED UCA TIOK. 



'\ \TE publish elsewhere a letter call- 

 V V ing in question the opinion ex- 

 pressed in these columns last month 

 that education was properly a matter 

 for the family rather than for the state 

 for private enterprise rather than for 

 governmental control. The arguments 

 used by our correspondent have, we 



need hardly say, long been familiar to 

 us ; and therefore their restatement 

 does not affect our conclusions on the 

 question at issue. It is, however, due 

 to our correspondent, and perhaps also 

 to our readers, to deal briefly with some 

 of the points raised in his letter. 



He says that the alternative to state 

 education is the " laissez-faire, or go-as- 



