Explore "The Servile State" by Hilaire Belloc on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The manifestation of the servile state in law or proposals of law will fall into two sorts -- (a) Laws or proposals of law compelling the proletariat to work -- (b) Financial operations riveting the grip of capitalists more strongly upon society -- As to (a), we find it already at work in measures such as the Insurance Act and proposals such as compulsory arbitration, the enforcement of trades union bargains and the erection of "labour colonies," etc., for the "unemployable" -- As to the second, we find that so-called "municipal" or "socialist" experiments in acquiring the means of production have already increased and are continually increasing the dependence of society upon the capitalist.
In this last division of my book I deal with the actual appearance of the servile state in certain laws and proposals now familiar to the industrial society of modern England. These are the patent objects, "laws and projects of laws," which lend stuff to my argument, and show that it is based not upon a mere deduction, but upon an observation of things.