Woman under socialism. Bebel August

institution of the State is, accordingly, the necessary result of a social order, that, standing upon the higher plane of the subdivision of labor, is broken up into a large number of occupations, animated by different, frequently conflicting, interests, and hence has the oppression of the weaker for a consequence. This fact was recognized even by an Arabian tribe, the Nabateans, who, according to Diodorus, established the regulation not to sow, not to plant, to drink no wine, and to build no houses, but to live in tents, because if those things were done, they could be easily compelled to obey by a superior power (the power of the State). Likewise among the Rachebites, the descendants of the father-in-law of Moses, there existed similar prescriptions.17 Aye, the whole Mosaic system of laws is aimed at preventing the Jews from moving out of an agricultural state, because otherwise, so the legislators feared, their democratic-communistic society would go under. Hence the selection of the "Promised Land" in a region bounded, on one side, by a not very accessible mountain range, the Lebanon; on the other side, South and East, by but slightly fertile stretches of land, partly by deserts; – a region, accordingly, that rendered isolation possible. Hence came the keeping of the Jews away from the sea, which favored commerce, colonization and the accumulation of wealth; hence the rigid laws concerning seclusion from other peoples, the severe regulations against foreign marriages, the poor laws, the agrarian laws, the jubileum, – all of them provisions calculated to prevent the accumulation of great wealth by the individual. The Jewish people were to be kept in permanent disability ever to become the builders of a real State. Hence it happens that the tribal organization, which rested upon the gentile order, remained in force with them till its complete dissolution, and continues to affect them even now.

      It seems that the Latin tribes, which took a hand in the founding of Rome, had long passed beyond the stage of the mother-right. Hence Rome was built from the start as a State. The women that they needed they captured, as the legend tells us, from the tribe of the Sabines, and they called themselves after their Sabine wives, – Quirites. Even in later years, the Roman citizens were addressed in the Forum as Quirites. "Populus Romanus" stood for the free population of Rome in general; but "Populus Romanus quiritium" expressed the ancestry and quality of the Roman citizen. The Roman gens was of father-right stamp. The children inherited as consanguineous heirs; if there were no children, the relatives of the male line inherited; were none of these in existence, then the property reverted to the gens. By marriage, woman lost her right to inherit her father's property and that of his brothers. She had stepped out of her gens: neither she nor her children could inherit from her father or his brothers: otherwise the inheritance would be lost to the paternal gens. The division in gentes, phratries and tribes constituted in Rome for centuries the foundation of the military organization, and also of the exercise of the rights of citizenship. But with the decay of the paternal gentes and the decline of their significance, conditions shaped themselves more favorably for woman. She could not only inherit, but had the right to administer her own fortune. She was, accordingly, far more favorably situated than her Greek sister. The freer position that, despite all legal impediments, she gradually knew how to conquer, caused the elder Cato, born 234 before our reckoning, to complain: "If, after the example of his ancestors, every head of a family kept his wife in proper subjection, we would not have so much public bother with the whole sex."18

      So long as the father lived, he held in Rome the guardianship over his daughter, even if she were married, unless he appointed another guardian himself. When the father died, the nearest male of kin, even though declared unqualified as an agnate, came in as guardian. The guardian had the right at any time to transfer the guardianship to any third person that he pleased. Accordingly, before the law, the Roman woman had no will of her own.

      The nuptial forms were various, and in the course of centuries underwent manifold alterations. The most solemn nuptials were celebrated before the High Priest, in the presence of at least ten witnesses. At the occasion, the bridal pair, in token of their union, partook together from a cake made of flour, salt and water. As will be noticed, a ceremony is here celebrated, that bears great resemblance to the breaking of the sacramental wafer at the Christian communion. A second form of nuptials consisted in possession. The marriage was considered accomplished if, with the consent of her father or guardian, a woman lived with the chosen man a whole year under one roof. A third form of nuptials was a sort of mutual purchase, both sides exchanging coins, and the promise to be man and wife. Already at the time of Cicero19 free divorce for both sides was generally established; it was even debated whether the announcement of the divorce was necessary. The "lex Julia de adulteriis," however, prescribed that the divorce was to be solemnly proclaimed. This decree was made for the reason that women, who committed adultery, and were summoned to answer the charge, often claimed to have been divorced. Justinian, the Christian20 forbade free divorce, unless both sides desired to retire to a monastery. His successor, Justinian II, however, found himself obliged to allow it again.

      With the growing power and rising wealth of Rome, mad-brained vices and excesses took the place of the former severity of manners. Rome became the center from which debauchery, riotous luxury and sensuous refinements radiated over the whole of the then civilized world. The excesses took – especially during the time of the Emperors, and, to a great extent, through the Emperors themselves – forms that only insanity could suggest. Men and women vied with one another in vice. The number of houses of prostitution became ever larger, and, hand in hand with these, the "Greek love" (pederasty) spread itself ever more among the male population. At times, the number of young men in Rome who prostituted themselves was larger than that of the female prostitutes.

      "The hetairae appeared, surrounded by their admirers, in great pomp on the streets, promenades, the circus and theatres, often carried by negroes upon litters, where, holding a mirror in their hands, and sparkling with ornaments and precious stones, they lay outstretched, nude, fan-carrying slaves standing by them, and surrounded by a swarm of boys, eunuchs and flute-players; grotesque dwarfs closed the procession."

      These excesses assumed such proportions in the Roman Empire that they became a danger to the Empire itself. The example of the men was followed by the women. There were women, Seneca reports, who counted the years, not as was the usage, after the consuls, but after the number of their husbands. Adultery was general; and, in order that the women might escape the severe punishments prescribed for the offense, they, and among them the leading dames of Rome, caused themselves to be entered in the registers of the Aediles as prostitutes.

      Hand in hand with these excesses, civil wars and the latifundia system, celibacy and childlessness increased in such measure that the number of Roman citizens and of patricians ran down considerably. Hence in the year 16 B. C., Augustus issued the so-called Julian Law,21 which offered prizes for the birth of children, and imposed penalties for celibacy upon the Roman citizens and patricians. He who had children had precedence in rank over the childless and unmarried. Bachelors could accept no inheritance, except from their own nearest kin. The childless could only inherit one-half; the rest fell to the State. Women, who could be taxed with adultery, had to surrender one-half of their dower to the abused husband. Thereupon there were men who married out of speculation on the adultery of their wives. This caused Plutarch to observe: "The Romans marry, not to obtain heirs, but to inherit."

      Still later the Julian Law was made severer. Tiberius decreed that no woman, whose grandfather, father or husband had been or still was a Roman Knight, could prostitute herself for money. Married women, who caused themselves to be entered in the registers of prostitutes, were condemned to banishment from Italy as adulteresses. Of course, there were no such punishments for the men. Moreover, as Juvenal reports, even the murder of husbands by poison was a frequent occurrence in the Rome of his day – the first half of the first century before Christ.

      CHAPTER II.

      UNDER CHRISTIANITY

      The opposite of polygamy, – as we have learned to know it among Oriental peoples, and as it still exists among them, but owing to the number of available women and the cost of their support, can be indulged in only by the privileged and the rich – is polyandry. The latter exists mainly among the highland

17

Joh. David Michaelis, "Mosaisches Recht," Reutlingen, 1793.

18

Karl Heinzen, "Ueber die Rechte und Stellung der Frauen."

19

Born 106 before our reckoning.

20

He lived from 527 to 565 of our reckoning.

21

Augustus, the son of Caesar by adoption, was of the Julian gens, hence the title "Julian" law.