In all the schools children should be taught to work in wood and iron, to understand the construction and use of machinery, to become acquainted with the great forces that man is using to do his work. The present system of education teaches names, not things. It is as though we should spend years in learning the names of cards, without playing a game.
In this way boys would learn their aptitudes—would ascertain what they were fitted for—what they could do. It would not be a guess, or an experiment, but a demonstration. Education should increase a boy's chances for getting a living. The real good of it is to get food and roof and raiment, opportunity to develop the mind and the body and live a full and ample life.
The more real education, the less crime—and the more homes, the fewer prisons.
X.
The fear of punishment may deter some, the fear of exposure others; but there is no real reforming power in fear or punishment. Men cannot be tortured into greatness, into goodness. All this, as I said before, has been thoroughly tried. The idea that punishment was the only relief, found its limit, its infinite, in the old doctrine of eternal pain; but the believers in that dogma stated distinctly that the victims never would be, and never could be, reformed.
As men become civilized they become capable of greater pain and of greater joy. To the extent that the average man is capable of enjoying or suffering, to that extent he has sympathy with others. The average man, the more enlightened he becomes, the more apt he is to put himself in the place of another. He thinks of his prisoner, of his employee, of his tenant—and he even thinks beyond these; he thinks of the community at large. As man becomes civilized he takes more and more into consideration circumstances and conditions. He gradually loses faith in the old ideas and theories that every man can do as he wills, and in the place of the word "wills," he puts the word "must." The time comes to the intelligent man when in the place of punishments he thinks of consequences, results—that is to say, not something inflicted by some other power, but something necessarily growing out of what is done. The clearer men perceive the consequences of actions, the better they will be. Behind consequences we place no personal will, and consequently do not regard them as inflictions, or punishments. Consequences, no matter how severe they may be, create in the mind no feeling of resentment, no desire for revenge.' We do not feel bitterly toward the fire because it burns, or the frost that freezes, or the flood that overwhelms, or the sea that drowns—because we attribute to these things no motives, good or bad. So, when through the development of the intellect man perceives not only the nature, but the absolute certainty of consequences, he refrains from certain actions, and this may be called reformation through the intellect—and surely there is no better reformation than this. Some may be, and probably millions have been, reformed, through kindness, through gratitude—made better in the sunlight of charity. In the atmosphere of kindness the seeds of virtue burst into bud and flower. Cruelty, tyranny, brute force, do not and can not by any possibility better the heart of man. He who is forced upon his knees has the attitude, but never the feeling, of prayer.
I am satisfied that the discipline of the average prison hardens and degrades. It is for the most part a perpetual exhibition of arbitrary power. There is really no appeal. The cries of the convict are not heard beyond the walls. The protests die in cells, and the poor prisoner feels that the last tie between him and his fellow-men has been broken. He is kept in ignorance of the outer world. The prison is a cemetery, and his cell is a grave.
In many of the penitentiaries there are instruments of torture, and now and then a convict is murdered. Inspections and investigations go for naught, because the testimony of a convict goes for naught. He is generally prevented by fear from telling his wrongs; but if he speaks, he is not believed—he is regarded as less than a human being, and so the imprisoned remain without remedy. When the visitors are gone, the convict who has spoken is prevented from speaking again.
Every manly feeling, every effort toward real reformation, is trampled under foot, so that when the convict's time is out there is little left on which to build. He has been humiliated to the last degree, and his spirit has so long been bent by authority and fear that even the desire to stand erect has almost faded from the mind. The keepers feel that they are safe, because no matter what they do, the convict when released will not tell the story of his wrongs, for if he conceals his shame, he must also hide their guilt.
Every penitentiary should be a real reformatory. That should be the principal object for the establishment of the prison. The men in charge should be of the kindest and noblest. They should be filled with divine enthusiasm for humanity, and every means should be taken to convince the prisoner that his good is sought—that nothing is done for revenge—nothing for a display of power, and nothing for the gratification of malice. He should feel that the warden is his unselfish friend. When a convict is charged with a violation of the rules—with insubordination, or with any offence, there should be an investigation in due and proper form, giving the convict an opportunity to be heard. He should not be for one moment the victim of irresponsible power. He would then feel that he had some rights, and that some little of the human remained in him still. They should be taught things of value—instructed by competent men. Pains should be taken, not to punish, not to degrade, but to benefit and ennoble.
We know, if we know anything, that men in the penitentiaries are not altogether bad, and that many out are not altogether good; and we feel that in the brain and heart of all, there are the seeds of good and bad. We know, too, that the best are liable to fall, and it may be that the worst, under certain conditions, may be capable of grand and heroic deeds. Of one thing we may be assured—and that is, that criminals will never be reformed by being robbed, humiliated and degraded.
Ignorance, filth, and poverty are the missionaries of crime. As long as dishonorable success outranks honest effort—as long as society bows and cringes before the great thieves, there will be little ones enough to fill the jails.
XI.
All the penalties, all the punishments, are inflicted under a belief that man can do right under all circumstances—that his conduct is absolutely under his control, and that his will is a pilot that can, in spite of winds and tides, reach any port desired. All this is, in my judgment, a mistake. It is a denial of the integrity of nature. It is based upon the supernatural and miraculous, and as long as this mistake remains the corner-stone of criminal jurisprudence, reformation will be impossible.
We must take into consideration the nature of man—the facts of mind—the power of temptation—the limitations of the intellect—the force of habit—the result of heredity—the power of passion—the domination of want—the diseases of the brain—the tyranny of appetite—the cruelty of conditions—the results of association—the effects of poverty and wealth, of helplessness and power.
Until these subtle things are understood—until we know that man, in spite of all, can certainly pursue the highway of the right, society should not impoverish and degrade, should not chain and kill those who, after all, may be the helpless victims of unknown causes that are deaf and blind.
We know something of ourselves—of the average man—of his thoughts, passions, fears and aspirations—something of his sorrows and his joys, his weakness, his liability to fall—something of what he resists—the struggles, the victories and the failures of his life. We know something of the tides and currents of the mysterious sea—something of the circuits of the wayward winds—but we do not know where the wild storms are born that wreck and rend. Neither do we know in what strange realm the mists and clouds are formed that darken all the heaven of the mind, nor from whence comes the tempest of the brain in which the will to do, sudden as the lightning's flash, seizes and holds the man until the dreadful deed is done that leaves a curse upon the soul.
We do not know. Our ignorance should make us hesitate. Our weakness should make us merciful.
I cannot more fittingly close this address than by quoting the prayer of the Buddhist: "I pray thee to have pity on the vicious—thou hast already had pity on the virtuous by making them so."
To-day Messrs. Wright, Dickey, O'Connor, and Murch, of the select committee on the causes of the present depression of labor, presented the majority special report upon Chinese immigration.
These gentlemen are in great fear for the future of our most holy and perfectly authenticated religion, and have, like faithful watchmen, from the walls and towers of Zion, hastened to give the alarm. They have informed Congress that "Joss has his temple of worship in the Chinese quarters, in San Francisco. Within the walls of a dilapidated structure is exposed to the view of the faithful the god of the Chinaman, and here are his altars of worship. Here he tears up his pieces of paper; here he offers up his prayers; here he receives his religious consolations, and here is his road to the celestial land;" that "Joss is located in a long, narrow room in a building in a back alley, upon a kind of altar;" that "he is a wooden image, looking as much like an alligator as like a human being;" that the Chinese "think there is such a place as heaven;" that "all classes of Chinamen worship idols;" that "the temple is open every day at all hours;" that "the Chinese have no Sunday;" that this heathen god has "huge jaws, a big red tongue, large white teeth, a half-dozen arms, and big, fiery eyeballs. About him are placed offerings of meat and other eatables—a sacrificial offering."
*A letter to the Chicago Times, written at Washington, D. C., March 27,1880.
No wonder that these members of the committee were shocked at such an image of God, knowing as they did that the only true God was correctly described by the inspired lunatic of Patmos in the following words:
"And there sat in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; and his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp, two-edged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength."
Certainly a large mouth filled with white teeth is preferable to one used as the scabbard of a sharp, two-edged sword. Why should these gentlemen object to a god with big, fiery eyeballs, when their own Deity has eyes like a flame of fire?
Is it not a little late in the day to object to people because they sacrifice meat and other eatables to their god? We all know that for thousands of years the "real" God was exceedingly fond of roasted meat; that he loved the savor of burning flesh, and delighted in the perfume of fresh, warm blood.
The following account of the manner in which the "living God" desired that his chosen people should sacrifice, tends to show the degradation and religious blindness of the Chinese:
"Aaron therefore went unto the altar, and slew the calf of the sin offering, which was for himself. And the sons of Aaron brought the blood unto him: and he dipped his finger in the blood, and put it upon the horns of the altar, and poured out the blood at the bottom of the altar: But the fat, and the kidneys, and the caul above the liver of the sin offering, he burnt upon the altar; as the Lord commanded Moses. And the flesh and the hide he burnt with fire without the camp. And he slew the burnt offering; and Aaron's sons presented unto him the blood, which he sprinkled round about upon the altar. * * * And he brought the meat offering, and took a handful thereof, and burnt it upon the altar. * * * He slew also the bullock and the ram for a sacrifice of peace offering, which was for the people: and Aaron's sons presented unto him the blood, which he sprinkled upon the altar round about, and the fat of the bullock and of the ram, the rump, and that which covereth the inwards and the kidneys, and the caul above the liver, and they put the fat upon the breasts, and he burnt the fat upon the altar. And the breast and the right shoulder Aaron waved for a wave offering before the Lord, as Moses commanded."
If the Chinese only did something like this, we would know that they worshiped the "living" God. The idea that the supreme head of the "American system of religion" can be placated with a little meat and "ordinary eatables" is simply preposterous. He has always asked for blood, and has always asserted that without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin.
The world is also informed by these gentlemen that "the idolatry of the Chinese produces a demoralizing effect upon our American youth by bringing sacred things into disrespect, and making religion a theme of disgust and contempt."
In San Francisco there are some three hundred thousand people. Is it possible that a few Chinese can bring our "holy religion" into disgust and contempt? In that city there are fifty times as many churches as joss-houses. Scores of sermons are uttered every week; religious books and papers are plentiful as leaves in autumn, and somewhat dryer; thousands of Bibles are within the reach of all. And there, too, is the example of a Christian city.
Why should we send missionaries to China if we can not convert the heathen when they come here? When missionaries go to a foreign land, the poor, benighted people have to take their word for the blessings showered upon a Christian people; but when the heathen come here they can see for themselves. What was simply a story becomes a demonstrated fact. They come in contact with people who love their enemies. They see that in a Christian land men tell the truth; that they will not take advantage of strangers; that they are just and patient, kind and tender; that they never resort to force; that they have no prejudice on account of color, race, or religion; that they look upon mankind as brethren; that they speak of God as a universal Father, and are willing to work, and even to suffer, for the good not only of their own countrymen, but of the heathen as well. All this the Chinese see and know, and why they still cling to the religion of their country is to me a matter of amazement.
We all know that the disciples of Jesus do unto others as they would that others should do unto them, and that those of Confucius do not unto others anything that they would not that others should do unto them. Surely, such peoples ought to live together in perfect peace.
Rising with the subject, growing heated with a kind of holy indignation, these Christian representatives of a Christian people most solemnly declare that:
"Anyone who is really endowed with a correct knowledge of our religious system, which acknowledges the existence of a living God and an accountability to him, and a future state of reward and punishment, who feels that he has an apology for this abominable pagan worship is not a fit person to be ranked as a good citizen of the American Union. It is absurd to make any apology for its toleration. It must be abolished, and the sooner the decree goes forth by the power of this Government the better it will be for the interests of this land."
I take this, the earliest opportunity, to inform these gentlemen composing a majority of the committee, that we have in the United States no "religious system"; that this is a secular Government. That it has no religious creed; that it does not believe or disbelieve in a future state of reward and punishment; that it neither affirms nor denies the existence of a "living God"; and that the only god, so far as this Government is concerned, is the legally expressed will of a majority of the people. Under our flag the Chinese have the same right to worship a wooden god that you have to worship any other. The Constitution protects equally the church of Jehovah and the house of Joss. Whatever their relative positions may be in heaven, they stand upon a perfect equality in the United States.
This Government is an Infidel Government. We have a Constitution with man put in and God left out; and it is the glory of this country that we have such a Constitution.
It may be surprising to you that I have an apology for pagan worship, yet I have. And it is the same one that I have for the writers of this report. I account for both by the wordsuperstition. Why should we object to their worshiping God as they please? If the worship is improper, the protestation should come not from a committee of Congress, but from God himself. If he is satisfied that is sufficient.
Our religion can only be brought into contempt by the actions of those who profess to be governed by its teachings. This report will do more in that direction than millions of Chinese could do by burning pieces of paper before a wooden image. If you wish to impress the Chinese with the value of your religion, of what you are pleased to call "The American system," show them that Christians are better than heathens. Prove to them that what you are pleased to call the "living God" teaches higher and holier things, a grander and purer code of morals than can be found upon pagan pages. Excel these wretches in industry, in honesty, in reverence for parents, in cleanliness, in frugality; and above all by advocating the absolute liberty of human thought.
Do not trample upon these people because they have a different conception of things about which even this committee knows nothing.
Give them the same privilege you enjoy of making a God after their own fashion. And let them describe him as they will. Would you be willing to have them remain, if one of their race, thousands of years ago, had pretended to have seen God, and had written of him as follows:
"There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured: coals were kindled by it, * * * and he rode upon a cherub and did fly."
Why should you object to these people on account of their religion? Your objection has in it the spirit of hate and intolerance. Of that spirit the Inquisition was born. That spirit lighted the fagot, made the thumbscrew, put chains upon the limbs, and lashes upon the backs of men. The same spirit bought and sold, captured and kidnapped human beings; sold babes, and justified all the horrors of slavery.
Congress has nothing to do with the religion of the people. Its members are not responsible to God for the opinions of their constituents, and it may tend to the happiness of the constituents for me to state that they are in no way responsible for the religion of the members. Religion is an individual, not a national, matter. And where the nation interferes with the right of conscience, the liberties of the people are devoured by the monster superstition.
If you wish to drive out the Chinese, do not make a pretext of religion. Do not pretend that you are trying to do God a favor. Injustice in his name is doubly detestable. The assassin can not sanctify his dagger by falling on his knees, and it does not help a falsehood if it be uttered as a prayer. Religion, used to intensify the hatred of men toward men under the pretence of pleasing God, has cursed this world.
A portion of this most remarkable report is intensely religious. There is in it almost the odor of sanctity; and when reading it, one is impressed with the living piety of its authors. But on the twenty-fifth page there are a few passages that must pain the hearts of true believers.
Leaving their religious views, the members immediately betake themselves to philosophy and prediction. Listen:
"The Chinese race and the American citizen, whether native-born or one who is eligible to our naturalization laws and becomes a citizen, are in a state of antagonism. They cannot, or will not, ever meet upon common ground, and occupy together the same social level. This is impossible. The pagan and the Christian travel different paths. This one believes in a living God; and that one in a type of monsters and the worship of wood and stone. Thus in the religion of the two races of men they are as wide apart as the poles of the two hemispheres. They cannot now and never will approach the same religious altar. The Christian will not recede to barbarism, nor will the Chinese advance to the enlightened belt (whatever it is) of civilization. * * * He cannot be converted to those modern ideas of religious worship which have been accepted by Europe and which crown the American system."
Christians used to believe that through their religion all the nations of the earth were finally to be blest. In accordance with that belief missionaries have been sent to every land, and untold wealth has been expended for what has been called the spread of the gospel.
I am almost sure that I have read somewhere that "Christ died forallmen," and that "God is no respecter of persons." It was once taught that it was the duty of Christians to tell all people the "tidings of great joy." I have never believed these things myself, but have always contended that an honest merchant was the best missionary. Commerce makes friends, religion makes enemies; the one enriches and the other impoverishes; the one thrives best where the truth is told, the other where falsehoods are believed. For myself, I have but little confidence in any business or enterprise or investment that promises dividends only after the death of the stockholders.
But I am astonished that four Christian statesmen, four members of Congress, in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, who seriously object to people on account of their religious convictions, should still assert that the very religion in which they believe—and the only religion established by the "living God," head of the American system—is not adapted to the spiritual needs of one-third of the human race. It is amazing that these four gentlemen have, in the defence of the Christian religion, announced the discovery that it is wholly inadequate for the civilization of mankind; that the light of the cross can never penetrate the darkness of China; "that all the labors of the missionary, the example of the good, the exalted character of our civilization, make no impression upon the pagan life of the Chinese;" and that even the report of this committee will not tend to elevate, refine, and Christianize the yellow heathen of the Pacific coast. In the name of religion these gentlemen have denied its power, and mocked at the enthusiasm of its founder. Worse than this, they have predicted for the Chinese a future of ignorance and idolatry in this world, and, if the "American system" of religion is true, hell-fire in the next.
For the benefit of these four philosophers and prophets I will give a few extracts from the writings of Confucius, that will, in my judgment, compare favorably with the best passages of their report:
"My doctrine is that man must be true to the principles of his nature, and the benevolent exercise of them toward others.
With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and with my bended arm for a pillow, I still have joy.
Riches and honor acquired by injustice are to me but floating clouds.
The man who, in view of gain, thinks of righteousness; who, in view of danger, forgets life, and who remembers an old agreement, however far back it extends, such a man may be reckoned a complete man.
Recompense injury with justice, and kindness with kindness.
There is one word which may serve as a rule of practice for all one's life: Reciprocity is that word."
When the ancestors of the four Christian Congressmen were barbarians, when they lived in caves, gnawed bones, and worshiped dried snakes, the infamous Chinese were reading these sublime sentences of Confucius. When the forefathers of these Christian statesmen were hunting toads to get the jewels out of their heads, to be used as charms, the wretched Chinese were calculating eclipses, and measuring the circumference of the earth. When the progenitors of these representatives of the "American system of religion" were burning women charged with nursing devils, the people "incapable of being influenced by the exalted character of our civilization," were building asylums for the insane.
Neither should it be forgotten that, for thousands of years, the Chinese have honestly practiced the great principle known as Civil Service Reform—a something that even the administration of Mr. Hayes has reached only through the proxy of promise.
If we wish to prevent the immigration of the Chinese, let us reform our treaties with the vast empire from whence they came. For thousands of years the Chinese secluded themselves from the rest of the world. They did not deem the Christian nations fit to associate with. We forced ourselves upon them. We called, not with cards, but with cannon. The English battered down the door in the names of opium and Christ. This infamy was regarded as another triumph for the gospel. At last, in self-defence, the Chinese allowed Christians to touch their shores. Their wise men, their philosophers, protested, and prophesied that time would show that Christians could not be trusted. This report proves that the wise men were not only philosophers, but prophets.
Treat China as you would England. Keep a treaty while it is in force. Change it if you will, according to the laws of nations, but on no account excuse a breach of national faith by pretending that we are dishonest for God's sake.
A NEW party is struggling for recognition—a party with leaders who are not politicians, with followers who are not seekers after place. Some of those who suffer and some of those who sympathize, have combined. Those who feel that they are oppressed are organized for the purpose of redressing their wrongs. The workers for wages, and the seekers for work have uttered a protest. This party is an instrumentality for the accomplishment of certain things that are very near and very dear to the hearts of many millions.
The object to be attained is a fairer division of profits between employers and employed. There is a feeling that in some way the workers should not want—that the industrious should not be the indigent. There is a hope that men and women and children are not forever to be the victims of ignorance and want—that the tenement house is not always to be the home of the poor, or the gutter the nursery of their babes.
As yet, the methods for the accomplishment of these aims have not been agreed upon. Many theories have been advanced and none has been adopted. The question is so vast, so complex, touching human interests in so many ways, that no one has yet been great enough to furnish a solution, or, if any one has furnished a solution, no one else has been wise enough to understand it.
'The hope of the future is that this question will finally be understood. It must not be discussed in anger. If a broad and comprehensive view is to be taken, there is no place for hatred or for prejudice. Capital is not to blame. Labor is not to blame. Both have been caught in the net of circumstances. The rich are as generous as the poor would be if they should change places. Men acquire through the noblest and the tenderest instincts. They work and save not only for themselves, but for their wives and for their children. There is but little confidence in the charity of the world. The prudent man in his youth makes preparation for his age. The loving father, having struggled himself, hopes to save his children from drudgery and toil.
In every country there are classes—that is to say, the spirit of caste, and this spirit will exist until the world is truly civilized. Persons in most communities are judged not as individuals, but as members of a class. Nothing is more natural, and nothing more heartless. These lines that divide hearts on account of clothes or titles, are growing more and more indistinct, and the philanthropists, the lovers of the human race, believe that the time is coming when they will be obliterated. We may do away with kings and peasants, and yet there may still be the rich and poor, the intelligent and foolish, the beautiful and deformed, the industrious and idle, and it may be, the honest and vicious. These classifications are in the nature of things. They are produced for the most part by forces that are now beyond the control of man—but the old rule, that men are disreputable in the proportion that they are useful, will certainly be reversed. The idle lord was always held to be the superior of the industrious peasant, the devourer better than the producer, and the waster superior to the worker.
While in this country we have no titles of nobility, we have the rich and the poor—no princes, no peasants, but millionaires and mendicants. The individuals composing these classes are continually changing. The rich of to-day may be the poor of to-morrow, and the children of the poor may take their places. In this country, the children of the poor are educated substantially in the same schools with those of the rich. All read the same papers, many of the same books, and all for many years hear the same questions discussed. They are continually being educated, not only at schools, but by the press, by political campaigns, by perpetual discussions on public questions, and the result is that those who are rich in gold are often poor in thought, and many who have not whereon to lay their heads have within those heads a part of the intellectual wealth of the world.
Years ago the men of wealth were forced to contribute toward the education of the children of the poor. The support of schools by general taxation was defended on the ground that it was a means of providing for the public welfare, of perpetuating the institutions of a free country by making better men and women. This policy has been pursued until at last the schoolhouse is larger than the church, and the common people through education have become uncommon. They now know how little is really known by what are called the upper classes—how little after all is understood by kings, presidents, legislators, and men of culture. They are capable not only of understanding a few questions, but they have acquired the art of discussing those that no one understands. With the facility of politicians they can hide behind phrases, make barricades of statistics, andchevaux-de-friseof inferences and assertions. They understand the sophistries of those who have governed.
In some respects these common people are the superiors of the so-called aristocracy. While the educated have been turning their attention to the classics, to the dead languages, and the dead ideas and mistakes that they contain—while they have been giving their attention to ceramics, artistic decorations, and compulsory prayers, the common people have been compelled to learn the practical things—to become acquainted with facts—by doing the work of the world. The professor of a college is no longer a match for a master mechanic. The master mechanic not only understands principles, but their application. He knows things as they are. He has come in contact with the actual, with realities. He knows something of the adaptation of means to ends, and this is the highest and most valuable form of education. The men who make locomotives, who construct the vast engines that propel ships, necessarily know more than those who have spent their lives in conjugating Greek verbs, looking for Hebrew roots, and discussing the origin and destiny of the universe.
Intelligence increases wants. By education the necessities of the people become increased. The old wages will not supply the new wants. Man longs for a harmony between the thought within and the things without. When the soul lives in a palace the body is not satisfied with rags and patches. The glaring inequalities among men, the differences in condition, the suffering and the poverty, have appealed to the good and great of every age, and there has been in the brain of the philanthropist a dream—a hope, a prophecy, of a better day.
It was believed that tyranny was the foundation and cause of the differences between men—that the rich were all robbers and the poor all victims, and that if a society or government could be founded on equal rights and privileges, the inequalities would disappear, that all would have food and clothes and reasonable work and reasonable leisure, and that content would be found by every hearth.
There was a reliance on nature—an idea that men had interfered with the harmonious action of great principles which if left to themselves would work out universal wellbeing for the human race. Others imagined that the inequalities between men were necessary—that they were part of a divine plan, and that all would be adjusted in some other world—that the poor here would be the rich there, and the rich here might be in torture there. Heaven became the reward of the poor, of the slave, and hell their revenge.
When our Government was established it was declared that all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which were life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It was then believed that if all men had an equal opportunity, if they were allowed to make and execute their own laws, to levy their own taxes, the frightful inequalities seen in the despotisms and monarchies of the old world would entirely disappear. This was the dream of 1776. The founders of the Government knew how kings and princes and dukes and lords and barons had lived upon the labor of the peasants. They knew the history of those ages of want and crime, of luxury and suffering. But in spite of our Declaration, in spite of our Constitution, in spite of universal suffrage, the inequalities still exist. We have the kings and princes, the lords and peasants, in fact, if not in name. Monopolists, corporations, capitalists, workers for wages, have taken their places, and we are forced to admit that even universal suffrage cannot clothe and feed the world.
For thousands of years men have been talking and writing about the great law of supply and demand—and insisting that in some way this mysterious law has governed and will continue to govern the activities of the human race. It is admitted that this law is merciless—that when the demand fails, the producer, the laborer, must suffer, must perish—that the law feels neither pity nor malice—it simply acts, regardless of consequences. Under this law capital will employ the cheapest. The single man can work for less than the married. Wife and children are luxuries not to be enjoyed under this law. The ignorant have fewer wants than the educated, and for this reason can afford to work for less. The great law will give employment to the single and to the ignorant in preference to the married and intelligent. The great law has nothing to do with food or clothes, with filth or crime. It cares nothing for homes, for penitentiaries, or asylums. It simply acts—and some men triumph, some succeed, some fail, and some perish.
Others insist that the curse of the world is monopoly. And yet, as long as some men are stronger than others, as long as some are more intelligent than others, they must be, to the extent of such advantage, monopolists. Every man of genius is a monopolist.
We are told that the great remedy against monopoly—that is to say, against extortion, is free and unrestricted competition. But after all, the history of this world shows that the brutalities of competition are equaled only by those of monopoly. The successful competitor becomes a monopolist, and if competitors fail to destroy each other, the instinct of self-preservation suggests a combination. In other words, competition is a struggle between two or more persons or corporations for the purpose of determining which shall have the uninterrupted privilege of extortion.
In this country the people have had the greatest reliance on competition. If a railway company charged too much a rival road was built. As a matter of fact, we are indebted for half the railroads of the United States to the extortion of the other half, and the same may truthfully be said of telegraph lines. As a rule, while the exactions of monopoly constructed new roads and new lines, competition has either destroyed the weaker, or produced the pool which is a means of keeping both monopolies alive, or of producing a new monopoly with greater needs, supplied by methods more heartless than the old. When a rival road is built the people support the rival because the fares and freights are somewhat less. Then the old and richer monopoly inaugurates war, and the people, glorying in the benefits of competition, are absurd enough to support the old. In a little while the new company, unable to maintain the contest, left by the people at the mercy of the stronger, goes to the wall, and the triumphant monopoly proceeds to make the intelligent people pay not only the old price, but enough in addition to make up for the expenses of the contest.
Is there any remedy for this? None, except with the people themselves. When the people become intelligent enough to support the rival at a reasonable price; when they know enough to allow both roads to live; when they are intelligent enough to recognize a friend and to stand by that friend as against a known enemy, this question will be at least on the edge of a solution.
So far as I know, this course has never been pursued except in one instance, and that is the present war between the Gould and Mackay cables. The Gould system had been charging from sixty to eighty cents a word, and the Mackay system charged forty. Then the old monopoly tried to induce the rival to put the prices back to sixty. The rival refused, and thereupon the Gould combination dropped to twelve and a half, for the purpose of destroying the rival. The Mackay cable fixed the tariff at twenty-five cents, saying to its customers, "You are intelligent enough to understand what this war means. If our cables are defeated, the Gould system will go back not only to the old price, but will add enough to reimburse itself for the cost of destroying us. If you really wish for competition, if you desire a reasonable service at a reasonable rate, you will support us." Fortunately an exceedingly intelligent class of people does business by the cables. They are merchants, bankers, and brokers, dealing with large amounts, with intricate, complicated, and international questions. Of necessity, they are used to thinking for themselves. They are not dazzled into blindness by the glare of the present. They see the future. They are not duped by the sunshine of a moment or the promise of an hour. They see beyond the horizon of a penny saved. These people had intelligence enough to say, "The rival who stands between us and extortion is our friend, and our friend shall not be allowed to die."
Does not this tend to show that people must depend upon themselves, and that some questions can be settled by the intelligence of those who buy, of those who use, and that customers are not entirely helpless?
Another thing should not be forgotten, and that is this: there is the same war between monopolies that there is between individuals, and the monopolies for many years have been trying to destroy each other. They have unconsciously been working for the extinction of monopolies. These monopolies differ as individuals do. You find among them the rich and the poor, the lucky and the unfortunate, millionaires and tramps. The great monopolies have been devouring the little ones.
Only a few years ago, the railways in this country were controlled by local directors and local managers. The people along the lines were interested in the stock. As a consequence, whenever any legislation was threatened hostile to the interests of these railways, they had local friends who used their influence with legislators, governors and juries. During this time they were protected, but when the hard times came many of these companies were unable to pay their interest. They suddenly became Socialists. They cried out against their prosperous rivals. They felt like joining the Knights of Labor. They began to talk about rights and wrongs. But in spite of their cries, they have passed into the hands of the richer roads—they were seized by the great monopolies. Now the important railways are owned by persons living in large cities or in foreign countries. They have no local friends, and when the time conies, and it may come, for the General Government to say how much these companies shall charge for passengers and freight, they will have no local friends. It may be that the great mass of the people will then be on the other side. So that after all, the great corporations have been busy settling the question against themselves.
Possibly a majority of the American people believe to-day that in some way all these questions between capital and labor can be settled by constitutions, laws, and judicial decisions. Most people imagine that a statute is a sovereign specific for any evil. But while the theory has all been one way, the actual experience has been the other—just as the free traders have all the arguments and the protectionists most of the facts.
The truth is, as Mr. Buckle says, that for five hundred years all real advance in legislation has been made by repealing laws. Of one thing we must be satisfied, and that is that real monopolies have never been controlled by law, but the fact that such monopolies exist, is a demonstration that the law has been controlled. In our country, legislators are for the most part controlled by those who, by their wealth and influence, elect them. The few, in reality, cast the votes of the many, and the few influence the ones voted for by the many. Special interests, being active, secure special legislation, and the object of special legislation is to create a kind of monopoly—that is to say, to get some advantage. Chiefs, barons, priests, and kings ruled, robbed, destroyed, and duped, and their places have been taken by corporations, monopolists, and politicians. The large fish still live on the little ones, and the fine theories have as yet failed to change the condition of mankind.
Law in this country is effective only when it is the recorded will of a majority. When the zealous few get control of the Legislature, and laws are passed to prevent Sabbath-breaking, or wine-drinking, they succeed only in putting their opinions and provincial prejudices in legal phrase. There was a time when men worked from fourteen to sixteen hours a day. These hours have not been lessened, they have not been shortened by law. The law has followed and recorded, but the law is not a leader and not a prophet. It appears to be impossible to fix wages—just as impossible as to fix the values of all manufactured things, including works of art. The field is too great, the problem too complicated, for the human mind to grasp.
To fix the value of labor is to fix all values—labor being the foundation of all values. The value of labor cannot be fixed unless we understand the relations that all things bear to each other and to man. If labor were a legal tender—if a judgment for so many dollars could be discharged by so many days of labor,—and the law was that twelve hours of work should be reckoned as one day, then the law could change the hours to ten or eight, and the judgments could be paid in the shortened days. But it is easy to see that in all contracts made after the passage of such a law, the difference in hours would be taken into consideration.
We must remember that law is not a creative force. It produces nothing. It raises neither corn nor wine. The legitimate object of law is to protect the weak, to prevent violence and fraud, and to enforce honest contracts, to the end that each person may be free to do as he desires, provided only that he does not interfere with the rights of others. Our fathers tried to make people religious by law. They failed. Thousands are now trying to make people temperate in the same manner. Such efforts always have been and probably always will be failures. People who believe that an infinite God gave to the Hebrews a perfect code of laws, must admit that even this code failed to civilize the inhabitants of Palestine.
It seems impossible to make people just or charitable or industrious or agreeable or successful, by law, any more than you can make them physically perfect or mentally sound. Of course we admit that good people intend to make good laws, and that good laws faithfully and honestly executed, tend to the preservation of human rights and to the elevation of the race, but the enactment of a law not in accordance with a sentiment already existing in the minds and hearts of the people—the very people who are depended upon to enforce this law—is not a help, but a hindrance. A real law is but the expression, in an authoritative and accurate form, of the judgment and desire of the majority. As we become intelligent and kind, this intelligence and kindness find expression in law.
But how is it possible to fix the wages of every man? To fix wages is to fix prices, and a government to do this intelligently, would necessarily have to have the wisdom generally attributed to an infinite Being. It would have to supervise and fix the conditions of every exchange of commodities and the value of every conceivable thing. Many things can be accomplished by law, employeers may be held responsible for injuries to the employed. The mines can be ventilated. Children can be rescued from the deformities of toil—burdens taken from the backs of wives and mothers—houses made wholesome, food healthful—that is to say, the weak can be protected from the strong, the honest from the vicious, honest contracts can be enforced, and many rights protected.
The men who have simply strength, muscle, endurance, compete not only with other men of strength, but with the inventions of genius. What would doctors say if physicians of iron could be invented with curious cogs and wheels, so that when a certain button was touched the proper prescription would be written? How would lawyers feel if a lawyer could be invented in such a way that questions of law, being put in a kind of hopper and a crank being turned, decisions of the highest court could be prophesied without failure? And how would the ministers feel if somebody should invent a clergyman of wood that would to all intents and purposes answer the purpose?
Invention has filled the world with the competitors not only of laborers, but of mechanics—mechanics of the highest skill. To-day the ordinary laborer is for the most part a cog in a wheel. He works with the tireless—he feeds the insatiable. When the monster stops, the man is out of employment, out of bread; He has not saved anything. The machine that he fed was not feeding him, was not working for him—the invention was not for his benefit. The other day I heard a man say that it was almost impossible for thousands of good mechanics to get employment, and that, in his judgment, the Government ought to furnish work for the people. A few minutes after, I heard another say that he was selling a patent for cutting out clothes, that one of his machines could do the work of twenty tailors, and that only the week before he had sold two to a great house in New York, and that over forty cutters had been discharged.
On every side men are being discharged and machines are being invented to take their places. When the great factory shuts down, the workers who inhabited it and gave it life, as thoughts do the brain, go away and it stands there like an empty skull. A few workmen, by the force of habit, gather about the closed doors and broken windows and talk about distress, the price of food and the coming winter. They are convinced that they have not had their share of what their labor created. They feel certain that the machines inside were not their friends. They look at the mansion of the employeer and think of the places where they live. They have saved nothing—nothing but themselves. The employeer seems to have enough. Even when employeers fail, when they become bankrupt, they are far better off than the laborers ever were. Their worst is better than the toilers' best.
The capitalist comes forward with his specific. He tells the workingman that he must be economical—and yet, under the present system, economy would only lessen wages. Under the great law of supply and demand every saving, frugal, self-denying workingman is unconsciously doing what little he can to reduce the compensation of himself and his fellows. The slaves who did not wish to run away helped fasten chains on those who did. So the saving mechanic is a certificate that wages are high enough. Does the great law demand that every worker live on the least possible amount of bread? Is it his fate to work one day, that he may get enough food to be able to work another? Is that to be his only hope—that and death?
Capital has always claimed and still claims the right to combine. Manufacturers meet and determine upon prices, even in spite of the great law of supply and demand. Have the laborers the same right to consult and combine? The rich meet in the bank, the clubhouse, or parlor. Workingmen, when they combine, gather in the street. All the organized forces of society are against them. Capital has the army and the navy, the legislative, the judicial, and the executive departments. When the rich combine, it is for the purpose of "exchanging ideas." When the poor combine, it is a "conspiracy." If they act in concert, if they really do something, it is a "mob." If they defend themselves, it is "treason." How is it that the rich control the departments of government? In this country the political power is equally divided among the men. There are certainly more poor than there are rich. Why should the rich control? Why should not the laborers combine for the purpose of controlling the executive, legislative, and judicial departments? Will they ever find how powerful they are?
In every country there is a satisfied class—too satisfied to care. They are like the angels in heaven, who are never disturbed by the miseries of earth. They are too happy to be generous. This satisfied class asks no questions and answers none. They believe the world is as it should be. All reformers are simply disturbers of the peace. When they talk low, they should not be listened to; when they talk loud, they should be suppressed.
The truth is to-day what it always has been—what it always will be—those who feel are the only ones who think. A cry comes from the oppressed, from the hungry, from the down-trodden, from the unfortunate, from men who despair and from women who weep. There are times when mendicants become revolutionists—when a rag becomes a banner, under which the noblest and bravest battle for the right.
How are we to settle the unequal contest between men and machines? Will the machine finally go into partnership with the laborer? Can these forces of nature be controlled for the benefit of her suffering children? Will extravagance keep pace with ingenuity? Will the workers become intelligent enough and strong enough to be the owners of the machines? Will these giants, these Titans, shorten or lengthen the hours of labor? Will they give leisure to the industrious, or will they make the rich richer, and the poor poorer?
Is man involved in the "general scheme of things"? Is there no pity, no mercy? Can man become intelligent enough to be generous, to be just; or does the same law or fact control him that controls the animal and vegetable world? The great oak steals the sunlight from the smaller trees. The strong animals devour the weak—everything eating something else—everything at the mercy of beak and claw and hoof and tooth—of hand and club, of brain and greed—inequality, injustice, everywhere.
The poor horse standing in the street with his dray, overworked, over-whipped, and under-fed, when he sees other horses groomed to mirrors, glittering with gold and silver, scorning with proud feet the very earth, probably indulges in the usual socialistic reflections, and this same horse, worn out and old, deserted by his master, turned into the dusty road, leans his head on the topmost rail, looks at donkeys in a field of clover, and feels like a Nihilist.
In the days of savagery the strong devoured the weak—actually ate their flesh. In spite of all the laws that man has made, in spite of all advance in science, literature and art, the strong, the cunning, the heartless still live on the weak, the unfortunate, and foolish. True, they do not eat their flesh, they do not drink their blood, but they live on their labor, on their self-denial, their weariness and want. The poor man who deforms himself by toil, who labors for wife and child through all his anxious, barren, wasted life—who goes to the grave without even having had one luxury—has been the food of others. He has been devoured by his fellow-men. The poor woman living in the bare and lonely room, cheerless and fireless, sewing night and day to keep starvation from a child, is slowly being eaten by her fellow-men. When I take into consideration the agony of civilized life—the number of failures, the poverty, the anxiety, the tears, the withered hopes, the bitter realities, the hunger, the crime, the humiliation, the shame—I am almost forced to say that cannibalism, after all, is the most merciful form in which man has ever lived upon his fellow-man.
Some of the best and purest of our race have advocated what is known as Socialism. They have not only taught, but, what is much more to the purpose, have believed that a nation should be a family; that the government should take care of all its children; that it should provide work and food and clothes and education for all, and that it should divide the results of all labor equitably with all.
Seeing the inequalities among men, knowing of the destitution and crime, these men were willing to sacrifice, not only their own liberties, but the liberties of all.
Socialism seems to be one of the worst possible forms of slavery. Nothing, in my judgment, would so utterly paralyze all the forces, all the splendid ambitions and aspirations that now tend to the civilization of man. In ordinary systems of slavery there are some masters, a few are supposed to be free; but in a socialistic state all would be slaves.
If the government is to provide work it must decide for the worker what he must do. It must say who shall chisel statues, who shall paint pictures, who shall compose music, and who shall practice the professions. Is any government, or can any government, be capable of intelligently performing these countless duties? It must not only control work, it must not only decide what each shall do, but it must control expenses, because expenses bear a direct relation to products. Therefore the government must decide what the worker shall eat and wherewithal he shall be clothed; the kind of house in which he shall live; the manner in which it shall be furnished, and, if this government furnishes the work, it must decide on the days or the hours of leisure. More than this, it must fix values; it must decide not only who shall sell, but who shall buy, and the price that must be paid—and it must fix this value not simply upon the labor, but on everything that can be produced, that can be exchanged or sold.
Is it possible to conceive of a despotism beyond this?
The present condition of the world is bad enough, with its poverty and ignorance, but it is far better than it could by any possibility be under any government like the one described. There would be less hunger of the body, but not of the mind. Each man would simply be a citizen of a large penitentiary, and, as in every well regulated prison, somebody would decide what each should do. The inmates of a prison retire early; they rise with the sun; they have something to eat; they are not dissipated; they have clothes; they attend divine service; they have but little to say about their neighbors; they do not suffer from cold; their habits are excellent, and yet, no one envies their condition. Socialism destroys the family. The children belong to the state. Certain officers take the places of parents. Individuality is lost.
The human race cannot afford to exchange its liberty for any possible comfort. You remember the old fable of the fat dog that met the lean wolf in the forest. The wolf, astonished to see so prosperous an animal, inquired of the dog where he got his food, and the dog told him that there was a man who took care of him, gave him his breakfast, his dinner, and his supper with the utmost regularity, and that he had all that he could eat and very little to do. The wolf said, "Do you think this man would treat me as he does you?" The dog replied, "Yes, come along with me." So they jogged on together toward the dog's home. On the way the wolf happened to notice that some hair was worn off the dog's neck, and he said, "How did the hair become worn?" "That is," said the dog, "the mark of the collar—my master ties me at night." "Oh," said the wolf, "Are you chained? Are you deprived of your liberty? I believe I will go back. I prefer hunger."
It is impossible for any man with a good heart to be satisfied with this world as it now is. No one can truly enjoy even what he earns—what he knows to be his own, knowing that millions of his fellow-men are in misery and want. When we think of the famished we feel that it is almost heartless to eat. To meet the ragged and shivering makes one almost ashamed to be well dressed and warm—one feels as though his heart was as cold as their bodies.
In a world filled with millions and millions of acres of land waiting to be tilled, where one man can raise the food for hundreds, millions are on the edge of famine. Who can comprehend the stupidity at the bottom of this truth?
Is there to be no change? Are "the law of supply and demand," invention and science, monopoly and competition, capital and legislation always to be the enemies of those who toil?
Will the workers always be ignorant enough and stupid enough to give their earnings for the useless? Will they support millions of soldiers to kill the sons of other workingmen? Will they always build temples for ghosts and phantoms, and live in huts and dens themselves? Will they forever allow parasites with crowns, and vampires with mitres, to live upon their blood? Will they remain the slaves of the beggars they support? How long will they be controlled by friends who seek favors, and by reformers who want office? Will they always prefer famine in the city to a feast in the fields? Will they ever feel and know that they have no right to bring children into this world that they cannot support? Will they use their intelligence for themselves, or for others? Will they become wise enough to know that they cannot obtain their own liberty by destroying that of others? Will they finally see that every man has a right to choose his trade, his profession, his employment, and has the right to work when, and for whom, and for what he will? Will they finally say that the man who has had equal privileges with all others has no right to complain, or will they follow the example that has been set by their oppressors? Will they learn that force, to succeed, must have a thought behind it, and that anything done, in order that it may endure, must rest upon the corner-stone of justice?
Will they, at the command of priests, forever extinguish the spark that sheds a little light in every brain? Will they ever recognize the fact that labor, above all things, is honorable—that it is the foundation of virtue? Will they understand that beggars cannot be generous, and that every healthy man must earn the right to live? Will honest men stop taking off their hats to successful fraud? Will industry, in the presence of crowned idleness, forever fall upon its knees, and will the lips unstained by lies forever kiss the robed impostor's hand?—North American Review, March, 1887.