PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
PAPERS ON LABOR AND CAPITAL.
The National Labor Convention lately held in Cincinnati was called for the special purpose of beginning an organization having in view the next Presidential canvass. It had taken the means of obtaining the views of a number of the most prominent public men, letters enunciating which views were duly presented before the convention. That of Governor Geary, of Pennsylvania, appears to have occupied the position of most prominency, and to have been regarded with peculiar and unanimous favor. The views presented by him are such as were sure to find favor with the representatives of labor, and so far he stands A No. 1 as the prospective candidate for the Presidency of the National Labor party.
It has been very evident for the last year that the old parties had lost their power of inspiration over the people. The Democratic party sold itself out to slavery and virtually died when slavery died. A party may exist called Democratic, but it will be upon new issues and must take new departures. The hard conservatism that attaches to it from its former practices does not suit the spirit of the eighth decade of the nineteenth century. The rank and file that have so long blindly followed wherever their leaders commanded are becoming imbued with this spirit, and they begin to realize that they have been mere automatons that have been moved with no acquiescent will of their own. Newspapers have become too commonly read. That the blind should be led necessitates the continuous condition of blindness. So, too, with, the understanding. What have the masses known of the essence of the issues that have formed the platform of the political parties for the lastfifty years? When war came, as the result of a blind course on the part of politicians, the masses began to open their eyes to the fact that they had been unwittingly betrayed into a most dangerous and fearful condition, wherein it became necessary to cut each other’s throats. Since the close of the war they have not only kept their eyes open to the full extent the war opened them, but they have also opened their understanding and for the first time fully realize that they are indeed freemen; and to become conscious that heretofore they have been so only in name. Awaking as they have from the delusion so long hugged to their hearts, it will not be strange if they do some inconsiderate and short-sighted things.
It is the duty of all who have the true interest of the whole people at heart to warn them of all the extremes they are likely to contend for, and to suggest permanent practical methods, which shall spring from principles that will apply at all times to all men—and women. The Republican party being composed of somewhat different elements is disintegrated from different action of the same causes; with the destruction of slavery and the reconstruction of the country its strength was expended. All people who were opposed to slavery had concentrated in the Republican party, because of the similarity of sentiment upon this single question; this settled, they find themselves without a common rallying idea; they differ as widely upon the old and common topics among themselves as they differ from those who do not belong to the party and never did. Place and power are the sole things that hold the Republican party together at all; these gone it will be gone.
It is just at this time that new parties are demanded, and they are sure to arise. The conditions are all favorable. It remains for wise counsels to prevail in the formation and departure of these, to insure them something more than death with the accomplishment of one of their central ideas, which destiny fell to the lot of the Republican party. Unquestionably there will be a Labor party in the next canvass. We are sorry it is denominated the Labor party, because it should be something more than a Labor party, and because this is a direct challenge to capital, and it will very probably result in arraying these two interests in an antagonism which will be but a repetition of the slavery antagonism. No party built upon a specific idea, looking in a single direction, can ever attain to even the promise of permanency; and it is for this reason we say we are sorry to see a party sectionalizing itself at the very outset of its attempting a general movement toward organization.
It seems, also, a little premature that an organization calling itself a Labor organization, should at the outset put itself upon the record against the freedom of labor, let it come from whence it may, and be of whatever nature it may. This policy is short-sighted, and will prove a stumbling-block to the party, though for the time Chinese emigration may serve for a rallying-cry. All assertions that the Chinese emigrants can be reduced to a system of slavery among us are humbuggery of the first water. There is no law to prevent a person contracting with a hundred American workmen at the best terms he can. It is quite certain there is no law to prevent him from employing Irishmen, Germans or even Chinese upon the same terms. And if it is done, and labor is thereby obtained cheaper than the citizens of this country desire to furnish it, the laboring class must not lay the charge to the capitalist who accomplishes it, but to the imperfections of our social and financial systems which make such resorts possible. Then, instead of committing this new national organization against any form of legal labor, its managers should have proposed remedies for the existing imperfections in our systems.
We are no special advocate of the introduction of Chinese or any other labor into this country; neither are we desirous of advocating any policy that will conflict with the interests of any laborer, but we are advocates, and always expect to be, of justice and equity to all people everywhere, because the time has come in the ages when we must begin to remember that we are all brothers under the sun, and that he or she who does not recognize and act upon this universal truth will, sooner or later, be obliged to learn it at the cost of dear experience. We expect to be found advocating very many of the principles laid down in the platform of the Labor party, and could wish that we may find nothing there adverse to the principles which are of general application. We desire to see the Labor interest advanced to the right and position of equality with capital, and we shall put forth our best endeavors to assist in this most just movement. At the same time we shall not commit ourselves to sustain or advocate anything that we conceive will be ultimately injurious to the true interests of humanity, or any part of it, therefore we shall at all times point out what we regard as errors in whatsoever this new party may endeavor to carry out. At the same time we shall, perhaps, be among its firmest and truest advocates. The best friends are those who show us our faults and sustain us in the right.
New York, September 3, 1870.
New York, September 3, 1870.
New York, September 3, 1870.
New York, September 3, 1870.