General Background
The decades 1850-1900 were momentous in the history of Europe
and the USA. Here are the principal developments:
- Slave trade & slave labour
The trans-Atlantic slave trade immensely enriched countries like Britain and the
USA. It was finally banned in 1834 in the British empire. However, slavery
continued within the US until 1865 and in Brazil until around 1888.
- Industrial
Revolution & Capitalism
Industry was growing and with it wage employment.
Production was rising through mechanization in farming, mining, textile
manufacture. The rail network was expanding. Laissez-faire capitalism was taking
off, especially in the US. Corporations were becoming powerful and it became
crucial to protect private property rights. Around 1880, the US Supreme Court
invested corporations with ‘personality’. A legal artifice was constructed to
make them ‘juridical persons’ to entitle them to hold property in perpetuity.
- European Mass Migration
The Europeans were moving out of Europe in their
millions and planting themselves in foreign lands. The indigenous people were
forcibly displaced (massacred if necessary) and their most fertile lands taken
over. Already by 1860, the Euro population in the US had reached 31 million and
rising rapidly. Some 2.5 million Europeans had settled in South America, a
million in South Africa and over a million British in Australia and New Zealand.
How poorer and crowded Europe would be without this mass migration and
massive land grab.
- Territorial Expansion and Colonial Conquest
The capitalists launched a wave of
military interventions in a global quest for markets and materials. The Berlin
Conference (1885) actually gave the go ahead for European imperial states to
carve up Africa’s territory among themselves. Already by then, these states
claimed possession of two-thirds of the earth’s landmass.
- Seminal Theories &
Tracts
The products of the Enlightenment were evident in scientific advance,
exploration and new theories and ideologies. Original tracts appeared, including
the Communist Manifesto by Marx & Engels (1848), Darwin’s Origin of Species in
1859 and Marx’s Das Kapital (1867). Marx died in 1883 and an English edition
appeared in 1887. Scholars were united in their belief that European
civilisation sprang solely from the genius of the ancient Greeks (hellenomania)
and European values came to be regarded as inherently superior. Theories of
racial superiority soon followed, together with Eurocentric interpretations of
other societies (orientalism).
Church & Property
Over the centuries, the Catholic Church
has ensured its survival by siding with the ruling classes. Popes had
insisted on crowning and dethroning European royalty. As a result, the
Church was rewarded with vast lands in Europe by royal patrons and in
Latin America by the Christian conquerors. Like corporations, the Church
invented a legal fiction to make itself a ‘juridical person’ with right to property and
this right was enshrined in Canon Law. Then came the backlash. The leaders
behind the Protestant Reformation were the first to seize church lands. The
French revolutionaries did likewise, declaring them to be national goods. Then
in 1848, nationalist fervour swept across Italy and a republic was proclaimed in
1849. The new government stripped the pope of his secular powers and confiscated
some of the church lands. In 1860 the Kingdom was Italy was founded and all the
papal states were annexed. In 1870 Rome became the capital of Italy and the pope
was confined to a small patch in the Vatican. Pope IX would not resign himself
to his diminished position and in self pity proclaimed himself the ‘Prisoner of
the Vatican’ (See Digest #9.3).
Pope Leo XIII’s writings
As usual with all
previous popes, Leo was preoccupied with Europe and addressed himself to the
European elites. He authored scores of official documents (encyclicals) which
may be grouped as follows:
- devotional (rosary, Sacred Heart, St Joseph, etc);
- welfare of various national churches in Europe;
- concern for Italian migrants
to the US;
- attack on Freemasonry, socialism, Protestants;
- slavery & problems of overseas missions;
- workers’ rights.
It was the first time that a pope had
seriously addressed social questions. It was in response to modernist thinking and the
rise of capitalist ideology. More than one encyclical condemned socialism
outright but there was none written against capitalist excesses. Colonial wars,
territorial conquest and unequal treaties were in full swing at the time round
the globe but there was no encyclical rebuking or restraining European
imperialists against land grab, colonial brutality and naked aggression. For
example, in 1885 King Leopold of Belgium had taken personal possession of the
Congo region and hundreds of thousands of natives were forced to collect ivory,
hardwood products and rubber for Belgium’s benefit. Penalities were severe
including the severing of hands. Massacres were not uncommon. Pope Leo did have
diplomatic dealings with Belgium but there is no record that he officially
condemned King Leopold’s atrocities.
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