The above comments, based on the drift of political practice during the past decade and a half, may be taken for what they are worth.  Predictions are precarious.  The average American will be inclined to regard the program of the new British Labour Party as the embodiment of what he vaguely calls Socialism, and to him the very word is repugnant.  Although he may never have heard of Marx, it is the Marxian conception that comes to his mind, and this implies coercion, a government that constantly interferes with his personal liberty, that compels him to tasks for which he has no relish.  But your American, and your Englishman, for that matter, is inherently an individualist he wants as little government as is compatible with any government at all.  And the descendants of the continental Europeans who flock to our shores are Anglo-Saxonized, also become by environment and education individualists.  The great importance of preserving this individualism, this spirit in our citizens of self-reliance, this suspicion against too much interference with personal liberty, must at once be admitted.  And any scheme for a social order that tends to eliminate and destroy it should by Americans be summarily rejected.

The question of supreme interest to us, therefore, is whether the social order implied in the British program is mainly in the nature of a development of, or a break with, the Anglo-Saxon democratic tradition.  The program is derived from an English source.  It is based on what is known as modern social science, which has as its ultimate sanction the nature of the human mind as revealed by psychology.  A consideration of the principles underlying this proposed social order may prove that it is essentially—­if perhaps paradoxically—­individualistic, a logical evolution of institutions which had their origin in the Magna Charta.  Our Declaration of Independence proclaimed that every citizen had the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” which means the opportunity to achieve the greatest self-development and self-realization.  The theory is that each citizen shall find his place, according to his gifts and abilities, and be satisfied therewith.  We may discover that this is precisely what social science, in an industrial age, and by spiritualizing human effort, aims to achieve.  We may find that the appearance of such a program as that of the British Labour Party, supported as it is by an imposing proportion of the population of the United Kingdom, marks a further step, not only in the advance of social science and democracy, but also of Christianity.

I mention Christianity, not for controversial or apologetic reasons, but because it has been the leaven of our western civilization ever since the fall of the Roman Empire.  Its constant influence has been to soften and spiritualize individual and national relationships.  The bitter controversies, wars, and persecutions which have raged in its name are utterly alien to its being.  And that the present war is now being fought by the Allies in the hope of putting an end to war, and is thus in the true spirit of Christianity, marks an incomparable advance.