CABET, kft'bte. ETIENNE (1788-1856). A French Communist, born January 1, 1788, at Dijon. Cabet was a true product of the intel lectual and social reconstruetionists of the era of the Revolution. Ile was educated as a lawyer, beeame an efficient Government official as Procureur-Oen6ral in Corsica, representing the Government of Louis Philippe, after having headed an insurrectionary committee and par ticipated actively in the July Revolution of 1830. In 1831 he tank his seat with the extreme Radi cals in the Chamber of Deputies as representa tive from C4te d'Or. His Radicalism and his revolutionary denunciations aroused the active opposition of the Government, which gave him the choice between two years' imprisonment and live years of exile. Ile chose the latter, and lived in England studying and thinking out his social philosophy, and finally accepting commu nism as the only solution of the problems pre sented by excessive wealth and excessive poverty side by side in modern society. He returned to France in 1839, and published Voyage en Icarie, a popular romance, setting forth his new commu nistic ideas, which won followers by thethousands and drove its author to take steps to realize his Utopia. In 1841 he revived the Populaire (orig litany founded by him in 1333), which was widely read by French workingmen, and from 1843 to 1347 he printed an Icarian almanac, a number of controversial pamphlets, a book on Christianity (Le rrai ehristianisme suivant Jesus Christ), which makes out Christ's mis sion to be to establish social equality, and contrasts primitive Christianity with modern ecclesiasticism to the disparagement of the latter, and a popular history of the French Revolutions front 1780 to 1830, in five volumes. In 1847 there were probably 400,000 adherents of the Icarian school, and Cabet turned his attention to a project for a real Icarian colony in America. Influenced by Owen he took a large tract of land in Texas, and sixty-nine men entered into a social contract, making Cabet the director-in-chief for the first ten years, and embarked from Havre, February 3, 1643, to take up land on the Red River in Texas. Cabet came later at the head of a second and smaller band. Texas did not prove to be the Utopia looked for, and, ravaged by disease, about one-third of the colonists re turned to France. while the remainder went
to Nauvoo in Hancock County, Ill., on a beauti ful bend of the 3lississippi River, where the :Mormons had made a prosperous town .before public opinion had driven them to Utah. The new community at Nanvoo prospered, but the location was regarded only as a temporary abid ing-place, and Govermnent land was acquired as early as 1852 in southwestern Iowa with a view to removing the community thither, which re moval was finally accomplished in 1860 after a split in the community at Nauvoo, part going to Cheltenham. near Saint Louis. Cabet died sud denly of apoplexy in Saint Louis. November 8, 1356. a broken-hearted and disappointed man. He was the inspirer of modern communism at its best, and a writer of more literary merit and moral worth than the calumny which contem poraneous writers in France succeeded in weav ing about his name would lead us to believe.
The failure of the Cheltenham colony, to which faction Cabet belonged, and which therefore was recognized in France as the true Icaria, came quickly, and the subsequent history of the Ica rian community in Adams County. Iowa. was a record of struggle with debt until 1863. when war prices gave their agricultural products excep tional values. This temporary relief was fol lowed by years of privation, declining numbers, and vanishing hopes. Another split Occurred in 1870 between the younger and older members of the community, resulting in a division of the property. the younger element retaining the title and old habitat, while the 'party of the elders' accepted. with a bonus of $1500. the eastern divi sion of the land. and organized a 'New Icarian Community' about one mile distant from the original village. Consult Shaw. learia : a Study in Communistic History (New York, 1884). See COMM uxisat.
CABINDA, 101-bo7n'dn5, or KABINDA. A sea port town of Portuguese West Africa, situated in latitude 5° 30' S., and longitude 12° 10' E., north of the estuary of the Congo (Slap: Congo. et•., II 4). Since the introduction of a high tariff in Congo Free State. Cabinda has increased its commeree considerably. The name Cabinda is also applied to the entire portion of Portuguese West Africa situated north of the Congo.