LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Received JAN 16 1893' '■ 
 
 Accessions No. STonioicf . Class No. 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Archive 
 , in 2007 with funding from 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/articlesdiscussiOOtrumrich 
 
'tjhiveksitv; 
 
VHEELBARR0V 
 
 ARTICLES AND DISCUSSIONS 
 
 LABOR QUESTION 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 The Controversy with Mr. Lyman J. Gage on the Ethics of the 
 
 Board of Trade ; and also the Controversy with Mr. 
 
 Hugh 0. Pentecost, and others, on the 
 
 Single Tax Question. 
 
 f f 
 
 [UKIVBRSITT] 
 
 THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING COMPANY, 
 
 169 LaSalle Street, 
 
 1890. 
 

 5^cnr(o(o 
 
TO 
 
 EDAVARD C. HEGELEK, ESQ., 
 
 OF LA SALLE, ILL., 
 THIS LITTLE BOOK IS DEDICATED 
 
 AS A MARK OF 
 
 RESPECT AND ESTEEM, 
 BY HIS FRIEND 
 
 WHEELBARROW. 
 
. PUBLISHERS' PREFACE. 
 
 The articles of this book were written by a man who worked 
 for years and years, his early childhood not excluded, as an un- 
 skilled laborer. With pickaxe, shovel, and wheelbarrow he helped 
 to lay the first foundations of several railroads in this country. So 
 he knows from experience the sufferings and hardships working- 
 men have to endure. His buoyant genius struggled against the 
 odds, the restrictions, the impediments of his position ; and by wisely 
 applied exertion he grew in importance as a man, he came to the 
 front as a character who dared to stand up for his ideals of freedom 
 and equal right. Honors were then bestowed upon him : he was 
 elected to represent his fellow-citizens in the legislature of his State, 
 and in war he rose to the rank of General. He worked no longer 
 with the wheelbarrow, but with his brains ; he was powerful as an 
 orator and wielded his pen with ability and vigor. But greater 
 than his genius is the honesty of his aspirations, the nobility of his 
 ideals, the broadness of his views. While aspiring to more intel- 
 lectual and higher work, his sympathies with the laboring classes 
 never waned. 
 
 Wheelbarrow, however, is not a demagogue. His articles are 
 not written in an incendiary spirit. They are sustained by a moral 
 purport. He does not preach hatred of class and has no intention 
 to destroy the order of society. He stands upon the principle of 
 justice, and thus he does not attempt to benefit the laborer by de- 
 
• 6 PUBLISHERS' PREFACE. 
 
 trading from the employer. Not by pulling down those who rise 
 above the average man can we hope to progress, but by lifting the 
 average man to a higher existence, by teaching him how to rise 
 and how to work for an amelioration of his condition. 
 
 Wheelbarrow is no defender of one-sided theories, no believer 
 in Utopian millenniums. He is a man of practical life ; he knows 
 there is no panacea for all the evils that flesh is heir to ; he knows 
 there is no royal road of progress, for progress can be accom- 
 plished only by honest work and endeavor. 
 
 The present volume contains the matured fruit of his manhood, 
 his inmost self, his soul of soul. We hope that the little book wil 
 do a great missionary work and contribute towards a peaceful solu- 
 tion of the labor problem. 
 
A (U/^ Z-JH^ /C^ 
 
 ^-^u.^^ ^L,.-..-^ if^^j^ ^^^^Lt^^-J^ 
 
 
 
f 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Autobiography 1 1 
 
 Signing the Document 43 
 
 Live and not let Live 49 
 
 The Laokoon of Labor 54 
 
 Making Scarcity 58 
 
 Competition in Trades 65 
 
 To Arms ! 71 
 
 Monopoly on Strike 77 
 
 Give us a King 82 
 
 Convict Labor. 89 
 
 Chopping Sand 94 
 
 Honest and Dishonest Wages 98 
 
 Payment in Promises to Pay 104 
 
 The Workingman's Dollar iii 
 
 The Paper Dollar , 117 
 
 The Shrinkage of Values 123 
 
 Monetary Problems. A Series of Questions Addressed to 
 
 ' ' Wheelbarrow " 1 28 
 
 Wheelbarrow in Reply 129 
 
 The Poets of Liberty and Labor : — 
 
 Gerald Massey 137 
 
 Robert Burns 145 
 
 Thomas Hood ; 155 
 
 Henry George and Land Taxation 163 
 
 Words and Work 169 
 
 Jim The Inventor 175 
 
 Economic Conferences. 1 179 
 
 Economic Conferences. II. Banking and the Social System 189 
 
 Economic Conferences. Ill 198 
 
lo TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Ethics of The Board of Trade. A Controversy with 
 Mr. Lyman J. Gage. 
 
 Making Br^ad Dear. By Wheelbarrow 211 
 
 Corners and the Board of Trade. A Criticism of Wheel- 
 barrow's Essay " Making Bread Dear." By a Sympa- 
 thizer (Lyman J. Gage) 216 
 
 Making Bread Cheap. An Answer to the Criticism of 
 
 "a Sympathizer," by Wheelbarrow 223 
 
 The two Sides of the Question. A Rejoinder to Wheel- 
 barrow on "Making Bread Dear," by a Sympathizer 
 
 (Lyman J. Gage) 232 
 
 The Single Tax Question. Letters written in the Contro- 
 versy upon that Subject 241 
 
 The Source of Poverty. A Reply by Wheelbarrow to 
 
 Mr. L.'s Criticism 243 
 
 Is the Single Tax the Sole Cure ? Reply to Mr. S. L. . 252 
 
 Who makes the ' ' Land Value " of a Farm ?...', 256 
 
 Natural Opportunities 260 
 
 The Single Tax and Georgeism 262 
 
 Mr. Pentecost and Georgeism 266 
 
 Confiscation 270 
 
 Private Property in Land 273 
 
 The Coming Fight for Confiscation 276 
 
 The Right of Eminent Domain 281 
 
 Land Values and Paper Titles 284 
 
 Production and Land-Ownership 290 
 
 Cheapen Land by Taxing it 293 
 
 Users of Land, and Owners of Land '. 295 
 
 The Cut-worm and the Weevil 299 
 
^^ OF THB ^ 
 
 IVBESIT71 
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 
 
 A S to where and when I was born? Well, ''it was 
 many and many a year ago in the Kingdom by the 
 Sea"; in that Babylon where pictures of human life are 
 •seen in strongest light and shade \ where opposite ex- 
 tremes menace each other forever, and where Dives 
 and Lazarus exhibit the most glaring antithesis in this 
 world. There I passed my childhood and my youth, 
 and there at a very early age I entered the ranks of 
 labor. 
 
 In entering this world, as in other ventures, much 
 depends on getting a good start. If a human life be- 
 gins in uncertainty and dispute, its journey will very 
 likely be hilly, rough, and full of controvers)^ It is a 
 perilous thing for a man to be born at midnight, liter- 
 ally between two days, so that he can never have a 
 birthday, nor tell how old he is. Besides, think of the 
 evil auguries connected with low twelve, ' '■ when church- 
 yards yawn," when disembodied spirits walk the earth 
 for punishment, when mischief broods in the time, and 
 elfish goblins hide in careless babies who trespass 
 into the world at that unlucky hour. 
 
 Before I was ten minutes old I found myself in 
 
1 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 trouble about my birthday, and on that important 
 question my parents were divided in opinion. My 
 mother voted for the 30th, but my father thought I 
 was born on the 31st. The doctor, who had oppor- 
 tunely looked at his watch, was invited to settle the 
 question, and he unsettled it forever. He decided 
 that I was not born either on the 30th or on the 31st, 
 but on the very instant of midnight, and consequently 
 not properly born at all. 
 
 That question being satisfactorily unsettled, a new 
 debate arose concerning the place where I was born. 
 It so happened that the dividing line between the par- 
 ishes of St. Margaret and St. John run through my 
 father's house and lengthwise along my mother's bed, 
 so the disputatious genie who had taken charge of my 
 destiny pretended to be anxious about my parish, a 
 matter in which I never took any interest whatever. 
 After embroiling the whole neighborhood for several 
 days, it was agreed that the controversy be referred 
 to the respective rectors of St. Margaret's and St. 
 John's parishes ; and the tradition states, although I 
 don't believe it, that they very sensibly tossed up a 
 shilling to decide it. The story goes that the rector of 
 St. John won the toss, and at once decided that I was 
 born in the other parish. In this way he relieved him- 
 self of all responsibility on my account, and threw the 
 whole burthen of me upon St. Margaret. 
 
 When the entry belonging to me in the baptismal 
 register came to be written, it was determined by the 
 
A UTOBIOGRAPHY, 1 3 
 
 rector that the date of my birth must be settled. So he 
 decided that as it was always Friday night until Sat- 
 urday morning, and as there could not be two twelve 
 o'clock's in one night, therefore I was born on Friday, 
 the 30th, and so it was writ in the baptismal register 
 with his own hand, where I have seen it with my own 
 eyes. I wish he had strained a point and made it the 
 31st, because it is luckier to be born on Saturday 
 morning than on Friday night, and I believe that if he 
 could conscientiously have decided for Saturday, it 
 would have been luckier for me. 
 
 Listening when a child to those family-legends, my 
 curiosity was aroused, and when I grew up to man- 
 hood, I was driven by that same genie to go and ex- 
 amine the record for myself. I was courteoTisly in- 
 troduced to the baptismal register, and there I found 
 that I was officially born on the 30th of December, in 
 the parish of St. Margaret, in the city of Westminster. 
 This was quieting enough, but I was shocked like 
 Robinson Crusoe at the footprint in the sand, when I 
 discovered that this record threw a doubt upon my 
 name. 
 
 Of course, born in such a doubtful way, the strings 
 of my life were tangled into hard knots which could 
 never be untied. The new puzzle was made in this 
 way : My father's name was Mark, and my uncle's 
 name was Matthew, so it was appointed that I should 
 be called Mark, Matthew ; but as this would have been 
 an inversion of the apostolic order, something like the 
 
14 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 Lord's prayer backwards, it was finally determined 
 that I should be called Matthew, Mark. ''Too much 
 honor, Cromwell, too much honor," for any baby born 
 in the humbler walks of life, as the rector properly 
 thought, for he clipped the name and wrote it simply 
 Mark in the baptismal register. He thought one 
 saint of eminence was enough for any poor man's 
 child, as I myself agree; but my father was deceived; 
 he thought that I was Matthew, Mark; and I have 
 been traveling along for nearly a lifetime, falsely pre- 
 tending to own two patron saints, when one is more 
 than I deserve. Without an explanation it looks as if I 
 had purloined an extra saint for double patronage, a 
 piece of i*eligious larceny of which I am entirely inno- 
 cent. 
 
 It is not wonderful that a boy started on a journey 
 through the world amid contentions about the date of 
 his birth, the place where he was born, and destined 
 never to know his own name, should have a checkered 
 career, embarrassed and impeded by contradictions, 
 
 doubts, discords, anej defii^ls. 
 
 * 
 
 My father and mother were both religious people, 
 and although they belonged to opposite and contra- 
 dictory" sects, -th^t'cifcumstance never, made any dis- 
 cord in their "dom.e'stic lives. Their moral doctrines 
 were exactly alike, and they traveled along together in 
 the very same path of duty. Their 1-ives never devi- 
 ated a hair's breadth from the straight lines of truthj 
 
A UTOBTOGRAPHY. 1 5 
 
 honesty, and charity. My mother was as divine as 
 mortals ever get to be, and her faith rose above all 
 troubles. My father was less courageous, although he 
 was as brave as most men are ; yet he could not bear 
 adversity with the same calm, patient, uncomplaining 
 spirit. He was above all things an honest man. I do 
 not think that any combination of disasters could have 
 swerved him from his integrity. 
 
 In lay father's code, cheating was not only a vice 
 but a meanness. Lying was not only an act of sin but 
 an act of cowardice ; cheating and lying were both un- 
 manly. I believe he would rather have died than give 
 short weight or measure, or falsely represent the qual- 
 ity or value of an article. In all this he was upheld 
 and supported by my mother as by some superior 
 moral power. 
 
 My* father was doing a very fair business in a mer- 
 cantile way, until he ventured a little farther than 
 prudence warranted. This brings me to the first 
 thing I can remember in this world ; and the sombre 
 cloud of it has darkened my whole life, and still darkens 
 it. I was about three years old ; it was -night time and 
 I was sitting on the bed. I remember the fire in the 
 grate, the candle on the table, and everything in the 
 room. Two men came in ; I see them now as plainly 
 as I saw them then, two stout men in heavy coats. 
 They read a paper to my father, and my mother be- 
 gan to cry. Then my father put on his overcoat, and 
 after kissing my mother and me walked out with the 
 
1 6 WHEELS A RR O W. 
 
 men. Then my mother flung herself weeping on the 
 bed, folded me in her arms and said, ** They have 
 taken papa to prison." My father had been arrested 
 for debt. 
 
 Next morning a neighbor came with a wagon and 
 took me and my mother to see my father in prison. 
 It was about three miles away on the other side of the 
 river. This is my first recollection of London, yet I 
 vividly remember it. I see again the crowds of peo- 
 ple, the houses, the bridges, the river j and most viv- 
 idly of all, the obelisk in the borough. The prison 
 was the old historic Marshalsea, damned by Charles 
 Dickens to everlasting fame in the story of ^' Little 
 Dorritt." I remember my father leading me by the 
 hand up the long stone-paved courtyard up to the 
 '* Snuggery," where he ordered some refreshment for 
 my mother and me. 
 
 My father was not long imprisoned in the Mar- 
 shalsea, and he would not have been there at all ex- 
 cept for the harshness of one creditor. All the others 
 were willing to grant him time to extricate himself 
 from his embarrassments, but this one man was inex- 
 orable. My mother managed to borrow money enough 
 to pay him off, and the other creditors were made 
 whole out of the assets of the business. My parents 
 sacrificed everything to pay every man his claim 
 to the last penny, and then began the world again 
 with nothing but stout hearts and willing hands. 
 The consequence of all this, was that the rest of my 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 17 
 
 childhood and youth was spent in poverty, and a life 
 that might have amounted to something was twisted 
 out of all proportion to its original destiny. Many a 
 time I have heard my father and mother discussing 
 the oppressive conduct of that one unrelenting cred- 
 itor, but never with any bitterness or hatred. They 
 seemed to regard him as an unwitting agent of mis- 
 fortune, as a cat, or a dog, or a gale of wind might 
 be ; and sometimes I think that perhaps this is the 
 proper way to think of all our enemies. 
 
 Imprisonment for debt no longer dishonors the 
 jurisprudence of England. The Marshalsea is gone. 
 There has not been left one stone upon another that 
 has not been thrown down ; but the pain of its tor- 
 ments will continue from generation to generation. I 
 saw it again a few days ago in a ghostly ghastly sort 
 of way. I went to see a prisoner in the county jail at 
 Chicago, and there happened to be a woman at the 
 inside gate before me. When the turnkey came to 
 the gate, she inquired for somebody, and the man an- 
 swered, "You'll find him in the debtor's depart- 
 ment." Instantly I grew sick at heart. Here was 
 the Marshalsea again, and here was my mother asking 
 for my father. "Can it be possible," I said, "that 
 the cruel old barbarism of imprisonment for debt, 
 long obsolete in England, is preserved and used in 
 Illinois ? " And a few weeks ago, sixty ministers of 
 the gospel met and invited all the world to come to 
 
1 8 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 Chicago in 1892, ''to an exhibit of economic, ethical, 
 social, and religious questions." 
 
 My parents being poor, it was natural that I should 
 as early as possible help them to earn our living. At 
 thirteen I was lucky enough to get a job of work at a 
 dollar and a quarter a week, and thirteen hours 
 a day. So I graduated from school with a little read- 
 ing, writing, and ''ciphering," as we called it in those 
 days. My diploma reached scarcely up to the rule of 
 three ; indeed the four first rules were all of the 
 arithmetic that I could honestly call my own. But a 
 great education lies in the knowledge of those four 
 elementary rules. I need not say how hard, grinding, 
 and premature the labor in the days of my boyhood 
 was ; the memory of it is too bitter ; so let it pass. 
 
 At the time I speak of, the lines of caste were 
 sharply drawn in England, and I was duly instructed 
 to "Fear God, Honor the King, and be contented in 
 that station of life which it had pleased God to give 
 me." Whether I was contented or not made little 
 difference in the situation, for I soon found that the 
 laws and social customs of England were ingen- 
 iously contrived so as to prevent any escape out of 
 my allotted station. My highest ambition was to rise 
 from the grade of " laborer "to that of " mechanic," 
 but I was never permitted even to do that. In my 
 time the " lower orders " were liberally supplied with 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 19 
 
 precepts, 'but although we could not get out of our 
 station, we were not contented in it. 
 
 When the facts of our lives are considered it will 
 not be surprising that we ceased to honor the King or 
 to fear God. We became Chartists. The years of 
 my youth were the years of the Chartist movement in 
 England, and I flung myself headlong into it. Its 
 high purpose, and its delirious enthusiasm attracted 
 me. Its revolutionary promises fascinated the dis- 
 franchised and the poor. We were ready to storm 
 the Tower of London as the Frenchmen stormed the 
 Bastille. I made imitation Jacobin speeches, bom- 
 bastic as the real ones, and I wrote red poetry for the 
 Northern Star, the fiery organ of the Chartist party. 
 These things illustrate the passions, thoughts, and 
 manners of the time ; and their lesson applies to the 
 social conditions prevailing in the United States even 
 at the present day. There is a good deal of Chartism 
 here. 
 
 The inflamed oratory of the Chartists was usually 
 illustrated by a picturesque contrast between the 
 starved and degraded condition of labor in England, 
 and its dignified and prosperous condition in the 
 United States. The contrast was greater then than it 
 is now. Labor has a better chance to-day in Eng- 
 land, and a poorer chance in America than it had 
 then. Still, for all that, this country offers larger op- 
 portunities for a poor man than he can find in Eng- 
 land, or anywhere else in the old world. Looking at 
 
20 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the conditions as they existed then, it is no wonder 
 that America was the land of promise to the Irish 
 peasant and the English laborer. 
 
 One Sunday evening I was at a coffeehouse in 
 London where the Chartists used to meet and study 
 the Northern Star. The paper for that week con- 
 tained a copy of the new Constitution of Wisconsin, 
 which territory was then making preparations for ad- 
 mission as a State into the American Union. Dis- 
 cussing it, one of the party said, * Here is a land 
 where the Charter is already the law; where there is 
 plenty of work and good wages for all ; why not 
 go there?' To me the question sounded logical ; if 
 the Charter was not to be obtained in England, why 
 not go to America, where the people were all happy 
 under its encouragement and protection ! Shortly 
 after that, I was on board an emigrant ship a-sailing 
 Westward, Ho ! 
 
 It may be startling, perhaps incredible, but it is 
 nevertheless true, that in those days, a trip across the 
 Atlantic in an English emigrant ship was more dan- 
 gerous to life than to stand up in the ranks and take 
 a soldier's chances at Shiloh, at Chicamaugua, or at 
 Gettysburg. I mean this to be taken literally, and 
 without any grain of allowance whatever. The loss in 
 killed and wounded in that ship in which I sailed, 
 was greater in proportion to the numbers present than 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 21 
 
 the loss at Waterloo, at Gravelotte, or in the battles 
 around Atlanta. 
 
 It was the year of the great exodus from Ireland, 
 when I bought a steerage ticket on board the pesti- 
 lential Julius Caesar, a worm-eaten old tub bound from 
 Liverpool to Quebec. She was in the lumber trade, 
 and her scheme was to take out a cargo of emigrants, 
 and bring back a cargo of lumber. For that purpose 
 the most inferior ships that sailed the seas were con- 
 sidered good enough. There was great profit on either 
 cargo, but the shipowners were more careful of their 
 boards and shingles than of their human freight. 
 Their cruelty to passengers would in these days make 
 them liable to the penalties of manslaughter, if not 
 murder. It was murder then, but the laws did not 
 punish the shipowners for the crime. The crazy old 
 vessel was crowded with rats, a phenomenon I could 
 not understand. What pleasure or comfort they could 
 find in that ship was always a mystery to me, not to 
 mention the imminent danger of sinking, which they 
 certainly must have known. 
 
 I am happy to know that the story of that voyage 
 on the Julius Caesar, if told in all its tragic details, 
 would not be believed in this generation — a pleasant 
 sign that humanity has made a great advance in less 
 than fifty years. I will therefore describe some only 
 of the less revolting features of the trip. Although 
 the ship was not fit to carry passengers at all, and was 
 not large enough to give breathing room to a hundred 
 
2 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 persons, four hundred men, women, and children were 
 crowded into the dark, damp, and noisome dungeon 
 called the ''hold. " In mocking irony we were told that 
 the law would not permit a passenger ship to take any 
 emigrants who were not healthy and sound j therefore 
 we were all subjected to a medical inspection. Having 
 received a clean bill of health, we were allowed to sail. 
 This, although they knew that scores of us were doomed 
 to die before the voyage ended. With criminal de- 
 liberation they set us afloat, and consigned us to typhus 
 and starvation. 
 
 The passenger agents, of whom we bought our 
 tickets, had grim fun when they told us in their bluff, 
 hearty, sailor-like way, that although they expected 
 to ''make the run" in twenty-one days, we would 
 better out of abundant caution, lay in provisions for a 
 month. At that time the law required emigrant ships 
 to carry hard bread only, and this on board the Julius 
 Caesar was black, mouldy, and full of worms. Even 
 the water was ioul. Yet when our own provisions 
 were exhausted, as they soon were, this poisonous 
 bread was all the food we had. 
 
 Our cargo, for it would be gross flattery to call us 
 passengers, consisted mostly of Irish peasant farmers 
 and their families, fleeing from the famine which was 
 then ravaging Ireland. Four hundred healthy men, 
 women, and children, were consigned to the firm of 
 Typhus, Dysentery, and Co. The bill of lading was 
 commercially and scientifically made out. The ship's 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 23 
 
 manifest was evidence of a mercenary contract with 
 Death. It was not until the eighth day out that any 
 of the cargo was actually delivered according to the 
 bargain. 
 
 On the seventh day out, we met a vessel going in ; and 
 our captain roared through his trumpet to the other ship, 
 *' Report the Julius Caesar seven days out; all weU." 
 The mockery of that ''AH well" rings in my ears to 
 this day. On the next night the first of our company 
 died, a stout young fellow from Skibbereen, in Ire- 
 land. He was flung into the sea without preparation 
 or prayer. It was a sultry night, the moon shone 
 clear, and a dead calm rested on the sea. Our late 
 comrade refused to sink as he should have done. He 
 seemed inclined to stay by us, and it was several 
 minutes before he drifted away. Some of our cargo 
 said that the spirit of our friend would revisit us in a 
 storm. They said he was a Christian, and entitled to 
 a Christian burial ; and we should see what luck would 
 come of it, this burying him like a ''haythen." 
 
 My own opinion is that the heathen-funeral, if it 
 was heathen, had nothing to do with it ; but at all 
 events, a storm struck us next night such fierce and 
 angry blows that the old ship groaned like a human 
 being in pain. The sails were torn, and the masts 
 broken, while the sea poured in from above, and leaked 
 in from below. Our provisions were damaged, what 
 little there was of them, and the Typhus poison grew 
 thicker and more putrid than it was before. Then a 
 
24 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 woman died, and then a child. And so from day to 
 day the revelry of death went on. Some days death 
 never came near us ; while on others he would carry 
 off two, or three, or four. There is no drama on the 
 stage that can compare in pathos with this fifty-days 
 tragedy enacted on the Julius Caesar. 
 
 There was a rugged Englishman on board, a Cor- 
 nish miner on his way to Pennsylvania to work in the 
 mines. His mother was with him, a ministering angel, 
 always comforting the sick. She took the fever and 
 died. When we buried her in the sea the stalwart 
 Englishman went mad. 
 
 There was a peasant farmer with us from the south 
 of Ireland, accompanied by his wife and three children. 
 They were kind, respectable people, and the children 
 were good looking and good. One of them, a bright 
 little boy about seven years old, was my particular 
 playmate and pet. One day the fever struck him and 
 speedily burned him to death. We had placed him on 
 the floor underneath the hatchway for the advantage 
 of such fresh air as might thereby be obtained, while 
 his father and mother knelt in agony beside him, watch- 
 ing his throbbing pulses beating fainter and fainter, 
 until they stopped forever. The photograph of that 
 scene is imprinted on my memory ineffaceable ever- 
 more. In a few days another of the children died, 
 and then the last one. When we landed at Grosse 
 Isle, I saw the father and mother, fever-smitten and 
 delirious, swung ashore in baskets. Whether they 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 25 
 
 died or got well I never knew. Let us hope they died. 
 This virulent form of typhus was familiarly known as 
 the '^ship- fever," as if the ships were in some way 
 guilty of creating it. It was in reality the shipowners* 
 fever, and their cruelty and avarice produced it. 
 
 I think my escape from the fever was owing to 
 some little knowledge I possessed of the fresh air 
 gospel. Early in the campaign, I deserted the ''hold " 
 and took refuge with half a dozen others in the long 
 boat which was swung ''amidships" in the open air. 
 It was not a luxurious cabin, being filled with sails, 
 ropes, blocks, tackle, and miscellaneous rubbish \ and 
 although these made a hard bed to lie on, and we were 
 exposed to wind and rain, it was better than sleeping 
 in the fetid atmosphere below. Although fresh air 
 was obtained under all these disadvantages, I believe 
 that in my case it operated as an antidote to the deadly 
 ship-fever. 
 
 With impartial favor the plague stole up from 
 "between decks" and breathed upon the sailors in 
 the forecastle. It sneaked into the cabin and smote 
 the captain of the ship. When we landed, I helped 
 to swing him ashore in a basket. He was helpless as 
 the poorest of the cargo he despised. Whether he 
 lived or died I never knew. He was a stern man, a 
 good sailor, no doubt, but without any sympathy for 
 us. He never once came down into the hold to look 
 at us, nor did he ever speak to us one comforting 
 word. 
 
26 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 For fifty days fever and famine held riot on that 
 ship. On our fifty-first day out from Liverpool, we 
 cast anchor in the St. Lawrence river, and landed at 
 Grosse Isle. Sixty-two of our number had died on the 
 voyage, and were buried in the sea. It was estimated 
 that as many more died of the fever after landing. I 
 have no doubt the number was larger than that, be- 
 cause not more than twenty of our crew and cargo 
 were free from fever or disentery when we landed at 
 Grosse Isle. This was one of the tragedies attendant 
 on the great exodus from Ireland. No regiment in the 
 civil war could show such a list of killed and wounded 
 in any battle, or in any two or three battles, as our 
 little regiment could show as the result of a fifty-days 
 campaign on board the Julius Caesar. Through such 
 perils the emigrant had to pass who sought the prom- 
 ised land by means of an English emigrant ship from 
 the British Islands forty-three years ago. 
 
 What beneficent changes have come to men since 
 then ! Now the steerage passenger comes over in a 
 week or ten days ; in a big steamship, and spends his 
 time grumbling at the bread and butter, and beef ; at 
 the vegetables and soup ; at the rice, tea, coffee, 
 sugar, and soap ; and especially at the canned fruit. 
 Now the steerage passenger criticises the poultry and 
 the pudding ; and frequently complains that iced 
 cream and strawberries are not provided in the 
 **menu." 
 
 A few years ago I returned to England in a float- 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 27 
 
 ing palace, but not in the steerage this time. I oc- 
 casionally visited the steerage in an inquisitive way, 
 where I heard the grumbling, and connived at it, but 
 all the time I was thinking of the Julius Caesar. Al- 
 though the doctors assert that grumbling is injurious 
 to health, and interferes with the digestive process, 
 there were no deaths on the voyage, and no illness, 
 except sea-sickness, which, it is only fair to say, ap- 
 peared to be quite impartial between the steerage and 
 the cabin. The contrast between the steerage fare of 
 the Devonia and that of the Julius Caesar measures 
 the increase of material comforts made in the lifetime 
 of one man. A similar advance has been made in 
 other directions, but it is to be deplored that the poor 
 man has not in all other cases received such a propor- 
 tion of it as he gets on an emigrant ship. 
 
 * 
 
 Grosse Isle was the quarantine ground below Que- 
 bec. Here we got plenty to eat, and here I got my 
 first job as a roustabout. A Frenchman came down 
 with a schooner laden with lumber, to be used in 
 building sheds for the sick. He hired me and a 
 couple of others to help him unload the schooner, and 
 he paid us five dollars for the job. After staying on 
 the island for several days where the fever-stricken 
 were sifted out and sent to the sheds, the rest of us 
 were loaded on to a steamboat and taken to Quebec, 
 but the city authorities would not permit us to land. 
 In self-defense they were compelled to reject us. 
 
28 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 Quebec was crowded with plague-stricken emigrants, 
 and the fever was invading the homes of the citizens. 
 They ordered us to ''move on." The steamboat, 
 weary of us, hurried up to Montreal and dumped us 
 on to the levee. Had they rung the church bells in 
 my honor, the salutation would not have been more 
 welcome than this which I received, "Do you want a 
 job of work?" The strange question compensated me 
 for all I had undergone ; it was an invitation to imme- 
 diate independence. 
 
 This was a strange experience to me. Never be- 
 fore had any man done me the honor to solicit my 
 services, and the new world already looked bright and 
 beautiful. Men were actually walking about the levee 
 inviting the newly come emigrants to work. I saw in 
 a moment that it was only a question of health and 
 strength with me, and that I need not be hungry in 
 America. I immediately entered into negotiations 
 with the man who had given me such a cheery wel- 
 come to the new world, and the following dialogue was 
 had: What kind of work is it? Railroad? Where? 
 Longueil! Wages? Dollar a day! When? To-morrow! 
 Put my name down for a chance, and let us go. He hired 
 a few others of our company, and that evening we 
 crossed over on the ferry boat to Longueil. 
 
 Next morning I went to work. The tools and im- 
 plements of my profession were a wheelbarrow, pick- 
 axe, and shovel. These the boss generously furnished 
 out of his own capital. Some of the virus of the 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 29 
 
 Julius Caesar must have been lurking in our blood or 
 in our clothes, for the fever accompanied us over the 
 river, and in a few days five of our men were stricken 
 down, but only two of them died ; the others recovered. 
 I grew stronger all the time, and kept my job until 
 the Canadian winter made the ground like stone, and 
 I could dig no more. The lesson of all this is that 
 there was a time in America when men did not have 
 to go begging for work, because work went begging 
 for them. 
 
 This demand was not confined to the lower forms 
 of labor ; it was eager for mechanics, clerks, teachers, 
 and professional men. The range of employment was 
 almost unlimited. Having saved a little money, I 
 started on foot for Vermont, but on the road near 
 Granby in Canada, I was waylaid by a farmer who 
 wanted me to work for him. He offered me seven 
 dollars a month and board, so I took the job. Though 
 not great wages, it was more than I was worth. Un- 
 fortunately I was* incompetent for the business, and I 
 soon discovered that farm labor is "skilled labor," 
 and that it requires a special training and talent. 
 
 As soon as I went to work I found that I could not 
 even learn the trade. I could not learn to milk, to 
 chop, to pitch hay, or to do anything else. My em- 
 ployer was a patient, good-natured man, and instead 
 of scolding me, he laughed at my awkwardness. At 
 last he saw that my case was hopeless, but instead of 
 sending me away, he said, ''Here, it's no use for you 
 
30 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 to try farming, but I think I can get you a job at 
 school-teaching. This will be easier for you, and it 
 will pay better wages too." It was now my turn to 
 laugh at him. I told him that I had no learning, and 
 that I could not pretend to teach others until I had 
 some education of my own. 
 
 The state of the case was this : I had always been 
 a diligent reader, and my conversation had such an 
 intelligent appearance that people were deceived by 
 it; and they supposed I must have had some educa- 
 tion. Also, I could write a good hand, and this helped 
 the delusion. I could easily pass an examination in 
 reading and writing, but I was deficient in arithmetic. 
 Of grammar I knew nothing at all. ''No matter," 
 said my employer, ''you know enough to teach our 
 district school, and I will help you to get it." He 
 kept his word, and I got the school. To my surprise 
 I gave satisfaction, and won the reputation of knowing 
 a great deal more than I did. I was treated with un- 
 bounded hospitality. Among the happiest portions 
 of my life was the winter when I taught school and 
 "boarded round " among the hospitable settlers in the 
 backwoods of Canada. 
 
 And now for the first time I tasted the luxuries of 
 an intellectual life. My work was light, and improv- 
 ing to the mind. It was more educational to me than 
 to the pupils, and the hours were only from nine to four. 
 My evenings were my own, and I made the most of 
 them. That winter I mastered the arithmetic and 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY, 31 
 
 made myself entirely familiar with Smith's grammar, 
 which luckily was a very easy one, written in the form 
 of question and answer. 
 
 My term having expired, I resumed the march to 
 Boston. My exalted position at Granby had awakened 
 within me a new ambition, and I felt the throbbings 
 of a higher aspiration. I had been advised at Granby 
 by a friendly patron to study the law. At first I thought 
 he was jesting, but he was entirely serious, and he 
 assured me that the professions in America were not 
 as in England, the exclusive property of the rich. The 
 dream was a fascination, for I was anxious to escape 
 the drudgery of the shovel and the wheelbarrow. 
 
 School-teaching was over until the following win- 
 ter, so I had to go back to my old profession. With 
 my bundle swung across my shoulder, I traveled buoy- 
 antly along at the rate of twenty miles a day, and the 
 journey was luxurious. There was no hardship in it. 
 To a fellow who had been cooped up most of his life 
 within the walls of London, the splendid scenery of 
 a world entirely new to him was a joyous excitement 
 almost worth a journey in the Julius Caesar. It was also 
 a valuable bit of education. 
 
 I was rolling in opulence, for I had more than 
 twenty dollars in my pocket j and my meals at the farm 
 houses never cost me more than fifteen cents. Rail- 
 road building was in progress near the town of Wind- 
 sor, and there I got a job ; once more at a dollar a day; 
 but school-teaching had lifted my soul above the trade 
 
32 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 of wheeling and shoveling. I had grown fastidious, 
 and had no relish for the manners and conversation of 
 the company at the shanty where I lived. So after 
 loading my exchequer with some dollars earned on 
 the railroad, I took a walk to Boston. 
 
 In those days it was easy to get work in Boston, 
 and I soon found employment at a pork warehouse, 
 again at a dollar a day. It was better than dig- 
 ging on the railroad, for I lost no time on account of 
 rainy weather. The work was hard enough as any 
 man can testify who has handled barrels of pork, but 
 it was not continuous, like shoveling and wheeling on 
 the railroad. There was a good deal to do about the 
 warehouse that was easy and light. The skies were 
 getting brighter and brighter every day. 
 
 One day I happened to pass a building where the 
 American flag was flying, and the windows were or- 
 namented with flaming placards, inviting all patriotic 
 young men of spirit to join the army for the conquest 
 of Mexico. I have never been able to explain either 
 to myself or others why I wanted to conquer Mexico, 
 but here was excitement, adventure, and foreign travel, 
 all to be had for nothing. I put my name down on 
 the list of conquerors and before night I was a ^' boy 
 in blue." I was then shipped off to Governor's Island, 
 New York ; and from there to Mexico, in the exalted 
 rank of private in the 2nd, U. S. Artillery. 
 
 Before I had been a soldier two hours, my enthu- 
 siasm for conquering people received a shock from 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 33 
 
 which it has never since entirely recovered. I happened 
 to pick up a newspaper which contained a sarcastic 
 poem about the war. It was written by one Hosea 
 Bigelow, a poet of whom then I had never heard, but 
 of whom I am happy to say I have heard a good deal 
 since. One verse oppressed me like a nightmare, and 
 it weighs on my conscience still. This was the verse : 
 
 " If you take a sword and dror it, 
 And should stick a feller thro' ; 
 Guv'ment aint to answer for it, 
 God will send the bill to you." 
 
 I believe the sentiment of that verse is based on 
 moral truth, but I also believe that when a set of men 
 called ''Government" plunge nations into war, they 
 will have to answer for it, and that God will send the 
 bill to them. 
 
 I was rather lucky as a soldier, for in a few weeks 
 I was appointed sergeant, and shortly afterwards First 
 sergeant of my company. Through military associa- 
 tion I became well acquainted with many of the men 
 who afterward became famous as generals fighting 
 against each other in the civil war. Of course, I knew 
 nothing at that time of the ethics or the politics of the 
 war with Mexico ; but afterwards, when I came to 
 study the genius and the inspiration of it, I thought it 
 nothing to be proud of ; unless we regard the acquisi- 
 tion of California and New Mexico as a great achiev- 
 ment. This must be considered a valuable result, if 
 we leave out of the estimate the moral quality of the 
 means by which it was obtained. 
 
34 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 After my discharge from the army I worked in 
 different places and at various kinds of labor. In the 
 winter I taught school. All my spare time and all 
 my evenings were spent in studying law, and learn- 
 ing the Latin language sufficiently to understand the 
 law Latin, which I found abounded in the books. 
 Part of the time I worked at Norfolk, Virginia, and 
 there I found a kind preceptor who lent me books, 
 and gave me systematic instruction of great value. 
 
 From Norfolk I went to Richmond, and might 
 have succeeded very well there, but for an imprudent 
 habit of criticising slavery. When the Winston family 
 was murdered by a female slave, a panic struck the 
 town of Richmond, for the people thought it the signal 
 for a negro insurrection, and a search for Abolitionists 
 was immediately organized ; something like a wolf- 
 hunt. I was not curious to see the end of it, and that 
 night found me in Fredericksburg. The next morning 
 I was in Washington. From there I started westward, 
 and did not stop until I was landed safely on the free 
 soil of the western prairies. 
 
 Railroad building had not yet begun in my locality, 
 so I got a job of work in a brick-yard. Brick-yard work 
 is very hard ; much harder than hod-carrying. The 
 hardest part of hod-carrying is going up the ladder, 
 but coming down is easy enough, and the time spent 
 in carefully placing the bricks in the hod is a period of 
 comparative rest, also after dumping mortar a good 
 deal of time can be judiciously wasted in' scraping out 
 
A UTOBIOGRAPHY. 35 
 
 the hod, and sprinkling the inside of it with sand. 
 Brick-yard labor is almost continuous ; there is much 
 bending of the back, while the sodden clay is perverse, 
 inelastic, heavy, and dull. 
 
 Brick-making ends with the early frost, so in the 
 winter I taught school again. I continued the study 
 of the law, and was fortunate enough to find a gene- 
 rous lawyer who lent me books, directed rriy reading, 
 and gave me an examination every Saturday. In the 
 following spring I was admitted to the bar, after pass- 
 ing an unusually severe examination, caused by pre- 
 judice of the bar against the admission of a brick-yard 
 laborer. 
 
 Having obtained my diploma as a lawyer, I went 
 back to work in the brick-yard, that I might earn 
 money enough to take me to some other part of the 
 state, . and buy me a few books on which to build a 
 new profession. I was great sport for the other fel- 
 lows in the brick-yard, and they always called me 
 ** Counselor." With grave pleasantry the boss would 
 say: *'Will the learned counsel on the other side 
 bring more clay?" ''Will my learned friend spread 
 those bricks a little faster." '' If the counsel desires 
 more time he must make the proper affidavit." ''The 
 demurrer is overruled," with much other brick-yard 
 humor of a similar kind. I enjoyed this banter more 
 than they did, because it was based on fact, and was 
 a prophecy of better times for me. 
 
 Brick-making for that year ceased in the fall, and 
 
36 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 as I well knew it would be useless to open a law office 
 among people who had seen me working in a brick- 
 yard, I walked off to another part of the state, a hun- 
 dred miles away, and began to practice law. I got 
 along very well, and in about a year official honors 
 began to crowd upon me. I was nominated for the 
 office of district attorney, but this nomination I de- 
 clined. I did not think myself competent for such a 
 position, and besides I did not like to begin my pro- 
 fessional career in the character of an office-hunter; 
 but in spite of that, I was elected. However, I was 
 firm in my resolution, and refused to qualify. 
 
 My objection to office holding did not last long, 
 and in the fall of 1857, I was nominated on the repub- 
 lican ticket for the legislature. There were three 
 counties in the district and the pohtical battle was 
 fought all over them. After a bitter contest I was 
 elected; and in the following January I took my seat 
 as a member of the House. 
 
 I was now an American statesman, and I played 
 the part with perfect satisfaction to myself. The 
 office yielded glory and renown, but not much money; 
 for in those days the wages for a statesman was only 
 three dollars a day. This was better pay than T got 
 on the railroad, or in the brick-yard, while the work 
 was easier and more genteel. Besides, we could ad- 
 journ whenever we pleased, which was a great im- 
 provement on the old system. In the brick-yard, and 
 on the railroad, a motion to adjourn was always ''out 
 
A UTOBIOGRAPHY. 
 
 37 
 
 of order." I acquitted myself as a statesman about 
 as well as the rest of them, and my experience in the 
 legislature enlarged the circle of my acquaintance 
 with prominent men, which was of great benefit to me 
 in a professional way. 
 
 There were some comical scenes in that legislature, 
 and I herewith present a couple of specimens for the 
 information and instruction of the reader. The great 
 commercial panic occurred in 1857, and our chief 
 statesmanship consisted in passing laws to hinder and 
 prevent the collection of debts, especially debts due 
 to bloated capitalists and wholesale merchants living 
 outside the state. We needed all our money for home 
 consumption, and we did not intend that our people 
 should waste it in paying foreign debts, contracted 
 with the people of other states. We spent our time 
 in debating stay laws, appraisement laws, valuation 
 laws, laws giving defendants in civil suits the right to 
 a continuance for two or three terms of court, and 
 many similar devices. There was an old pioneer 
 farmer there who went by the name of Blackhawk, 
 and one day when some of this generous legislation 
 was under debate, he rose in his place and said : 
 *'Mr. Speaker! I would like to ax a question. If 
 this yar bill passes, will it be a criminal offense for a 
 man to pay his honest debts if he has a mind to ? " 
 The Speaker had his doubts, and the question was 
 never answered. 
 
 An active and very influential member of the House 
 
38 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 was Tom Drummond, a bright young fellow from 
 Benton County. He was killed in the war, fighting 
 bravely under Sheridan at the battle of Five Forks. 
 Tom was a fine singer, and one day, after he had 
 spent the previous night at a convivial gathering, he 
 got sleepy, and at last, dropping his head upon his 
 desk, took a nap. The House went on with its busi- 
 ness and took no notice of Tom. Waking up in the 
 afternoon, he thought he was still at the jollification, 
 and immediately began to sing in a clear loud voice 
 the melody of *'Auld Lang Syne." The members 
 looked at each other in amazement, and at last they 
 gazed at the Speaker, expecting that he would order 
 the Sergeant-at-arms to arrest the Honorable member 
 for his unparalleled breach of decorum. Instead of 
 that the Speaker listened for a moment, and then 
 bringing his gavel down heavily upon his desk, he 
 shouted : ''The House will join in the chorus." 
 
 When my legal career appeared most promising, 
 it was rudely interrupted by the outbreak of the war. 
 The attack on Fort Sumter was Treason's defiance to 
 all free government, a challenge inviting Liberty to 
 defend itself in battle. I enlisted for the war. Our com- 
 pany was made up of squads from different counties, 
 and when we all got together an election for officers 
 was held. I had the good luck to be chosen captain 
 of the company. I say good luck, although I am well 
 aware that among disinterested patriots the matter 
 of rank is not worthy of consideration, yet I frankly 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. :;9 
 
 confess that I would rather be a captain patriot, than 
 a corporal patriot. I confidentially admit that I would 
 rather get a hundred dollars a month than thirteen 
 dollars, and I would rather command than be com- 
 manded. 
 
 I served as a captain for fifteen months, first in 
 the Missouri campaign of 1861, and afterwards in the 
 army of the Tennessee. In August, 1862, I got a sudden 
 jump to the grade of Lieut. Colonel of my regiment, 
 and I was afterwards appointed Colonel of Cavalry. 
 Towards the close of the war I was promoted to the 
 riiuk of Brigadier General, and commanded a cavalry 
 brigade. As mere incidents in my own personal career 
 these matters have no interest for others, and I only 
 mention them to illustrate the variety of opportunities 
 which existed in America at that time, and the chances 
 offered the "lower orders " for promotion to a higher 
 social plane. Mine was not a singular instance. Such 
 examples were numerous in the American army. 
 
 And the same social phenomena were apparent in 
 civil affairs also. When I came home at the close of 
 the war, I was immediately elected to the office of 
 District Attorney, without any effort of mine, and 
 when General Grant became president, he appointed 
 me Collector of Internal Revenue, also without any 
 solicitation from me. I held that office during the 
 whole of his administration, and although the collection 
 of millions of dollars is a grave responsibility which 
 makes a man tumble and toss about in his bed at 
 
40 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 night, I met with no disaster and no loss. Of course 
 there was in all this, besides my effort to perform my 
 duty, an element of luck, and many better men than 
 I did not have the same good fortune. 
 
 Although the field of opportunities for the poor is 
 yet very broad in America, it is becoming more con- 
 tracted as wealth and population grow. The develop- 
 ment of caste and class among us is much to be 
 deplored. The tendency of our legislation is to clas- 
 sify the people, and to abridge the freedom of enter- 
 prise based on labor alone. Special interests are 
 rapidly becoming the special concern of statesmanship. 
 With natural resources unparalleled and inexhaustible, 
 almost at the beginning of our national career, we are 
 afflicted with labor agitations angry and inflamed ; 
 with strikes, lockouts, boycotts, and ominous premo- 
 nition of a social war. Schemes of political economy, 
 partial and unjust, advocated by one class, are met by 
 schemes of social economy, wild and fantastical, advo- 
 cated by the other. We are drifting to the policy of 
 protection for the rich, and correction for the poor. 
 We must spend more money for the education of the 
 people, and less for their punishment. And while we 
 are about it, let us not forget the importance of 
 schools for the education of the rich. 
 
 * * 
 
 Coming out of the labor struggles of my childhood, 
 
 youth, and early manhood, covered all over with 
 
 bruises and scars, and with some wounds that will 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 41 
 
 never be healed either in this world or in the world to 
 come, I may have written some words in bitterness, 
 but I do not wish to antagonize classes, nor to excite 
 animosity and revenge. I desire to harmonize all the 
 orders of society on the broad platform of mutual 
 charity and justice. I have had no other object in 
 writing these essays. 
 
43 
 
 SIGNING THE DOCUMENT. 
 
 Few men of this generation understand the mean- 
 ing of those words, and yet the time was when they 
 menaced the liberty of all the workingmen of England, 
 and the time has now come when they threaten the 
 independence of all the laborers of America. 
 
 About fifty-five years ago the workingmen of Eng- 
 land combined for their own welfare and protection into 
 a trades-union organization, something like the Trades 
 Assembly and the Knights of Labor here. So for- 
 midable did this organization become that the govern- 
 ment resolved to stamp it out, and conspiracy laws 
 were passed against it. It's too long a story to tell 
 now, but after a great deal of fining and imprisoning 
 and transporting, the contest ended in something like 
 a drawn battle — the trades-unions were not entirely 
 conquered, nor were they entirely successful. Other 
 societies came into existence, having other methods of 
 assisting labor, and the trades-unions melted into them. 
 What remained of them ceased to be very dangerous, 
 and was ''let alone." 
 
 As a protection to themselves against the trades- 
 unions, the employers of labor, or the ''masters," as 
 they were termed in England — and we might as well 
 adopt that name here, now that we have " signed the 
 document" — the masters formed themselves into a 
 counter organization, and the first thing they did was 
 to prepare an agreement for all workingmen to sign. 
 
44 
 
 WHEELBARRO W. 
 
 This was a pledge not to join the trades-unions, or any 
 similar society. The masters, on their part, pledged 
 themselves not to employ any mechanic, artisan, clerk, 
 or laborer who refused to sign this document, and they 
 agreed to discharge all workingmen now in their ser- 
 vice who should also decline to do so. This paper was 
 something like the one submitted by the telegraph 
 companies to the striking operators four or five years 
 ago. 
 
 The ''document" meant servitude and subjection. 
 It was so translated by the workingmen. They refused 
 to sign it, and were discharged by thousands from their 
 various employments. Popular sympathy at once 
 rallied to the side of labor, and so menacing became 
 the discontent, that the government was alarmed. 
 Songs containing the watchwords of the Unions were 
 sung in the streets, and the agitation became danger- 
 ous. A remarkable evidence of the stubborn freedom 
 of the English was that the men most resolute in re- 
 fusing to sign the document were not the trades-union- 
 ists, but men who had never joined the unions, but 
 had always bitterly opposed them. They said they 
 could not sign away their own liberties, nor the liber- 
 ties of their children, and they declined to give the 
 ''masters " any other reason for declining to sign. 
 
 Of course, some "signed the document," and re- 
 tained their situations, but those unfortunate men were 
 always held as tainted by a moral leprosy. Twenty years 
 afterward, and so long as that generation remained, it 
 blasted a man like a crime to say of him, " He signed 
 the document" ; indeed, men took more pains to deny 
 this accusation than to deny a charge of burglary. 
 Sometimes a man would work in a shop among a 
 hundred men, maybe for a year or more, when some 
 
SIGNING THE DOCUMENT. 45 
 
 craftsman would come along who knew him long ago, 
 and would tell that he had ''signed the document." 
 From that time his life would be uncomfortable in that 
 shop. Although no harm would be done him, he felt 
 that his shopmates all regarded him as unsound in 
 moral fiber, and no true Englishman. Boys at school 
 could not insult one another more effectually than to 
 say, ''His father signed the document. " At our school 
 more fights grew out of this insult than out of all other 
 causes put together. 
 
 And this was the end of the telegraph strike. The 
 operators all '* signed the document," and went back 
 to their work. Their offer to surrender would not be 
 accepted unless accompanied by a written abdication 
 of their independence. This abdication involved im- 
 portant consequences not only to themselves, but also 
 to all wage- workers of every degree. Not only did they 
 sign away their own birthright but that of the whole 
 great brotherhood of labor. That other masters would 
 exact the same pledge was certain, and quietly but 
 unrelentingly this encroachment upon liberty has been 
 advancing. Labor was deprived of its dignity and 
 subjugated, while monopoly and privilege were corre- 
 spondingly strengthened and exalted when the tele- 
 graph operators "signed the document." 
 
 A few months ago a young man of my acquaint- 
 ance, in the employ of a very powerful and wealthy 
 corporation of Chicago, said to me in a tone of sadness 
 and humiliation, "Well ! I have signed the document. 
 The firm required it and we all did it." I asked him 
 if there were no rebels who refused. "No," he said, 
 "not one. What could we do? Its easy to talk and 
 moralize about these things, but its not so easy to get 
 into a job as it is to get out of it. My work is hard, 
 
46 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 but the wages is fair, and if my job were advertised in 
 the papers to-night as vacant, there would be fifty men 
 after it before nine o'clock to-morrow morning ; fifty 
 men just as good as I am. Who of the million men in 
 Chicago would care a cent about me, or sympathize 
 with me for quitting my job 'on principle'? Not 
 one ! They would all call me a fool. Knowing this, I 
 signed the document." 
 
 I had no reproaches to make ; the philosophy of his 
 reasoning was too plain. This indifference to the wel- 
 fare of others is driving both humanity and divinity out 
 of our social state. Justice beating up against it has 
 to tack like a ship striving against a head wind. This 
 indifference is a dangerous thing, as we shall find out 
 some day. September 2nd was ''Labor-day" in Chi- 
 cago, and thousands of workingmen celebrated it by a 
 procession and some festivities. I walked through the 
 city, but I could not see the slightest interest in the 
 occasion outside the workingmen themselves and their 
 own families. This was not well, and the influence of 
 this neglect is evil. There ought to have been some 
 show of kindly feeling: on the oart of those who do not 
 have to toil so hard as those artisans and laborers. Do 
 the capitalists imagine that these men will not return 
 them scorn for scorn. Labor-day is a national holiday 
 in England, and it ought to be so here. Nay, capital 
 has very skillfully obtained credit for the festival ; it is 
 called "Bank Holiday." It was made national by 
 Act of Parliament through the efforts of Sir John Lub- 
 bock, a banker ; and in the vernacular of the common 
 people, the holiday is called Saint Lubbock's day. In 
 the calendar of the canonized I find a patron saint for 
 almost everything and everybody except labor and 
 laborers. Sir John Lubbock has been chosen to fill 
 
SIGNING THE DOCUMENT. 47 
 
 that vacancy, and his canonization is more valid than 
 that of many saints I know of. Few rich men realize 
 how much easier the "Labor Problem" has been 
 made in England by Saint Lubbock's day. 
 
 On the second of September, I watched the work- 
 ingmen's procession with some sadness because it did 
 not appear to be the march of light-hearted men 
 with springy feet, except when the band played the 
 Marseillaise. Then I saw good marching and a flash- 
 ing in the eyes, while some of the marchers broke into 
 song. A fiery stimulant is that Marseillaise. 
 
 While waiting for the procession, and watching the 
 busy crowds moving rapidly to and fro, I saw a police- 
 man with a prisoner in his charge. The criminal was 
 a young man with a godd face enough, save that it 
 wore a somewhat hard expression. His slouch of a 
 hat was drawn down over his eyes showing a feeling 
 of pride in him yet. He walked doggedly and almost 
 defiantly along like a prisoner of war. Nobody paid 
 the least attention to him, nor showed any concern 
 for his fate, and he returned the indifference as I could 
 see by his manner and his walk. He evidently felt that 
 in the battle between the classes and the masses, he 
 had been captured by the classes and was simply not 
 a criminal but a prisoner of war. His fellow men were 
 too busy to bother about him, and why should he care 
 about them. Between him and them there existed a 
 state of social war. 
 
 I borrow the phrase ''too busy" from the Gov- 
 ernor of Illinois, with whom I had an interview in 
 August. I was pleading with him to perform an act 
 of justice and humanity, which I knew would bring 
 upon him a storm of hostile criticism. Without con- 
 ceding or denying the justice of my prayer, he said, 
 
48 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 " How can I affront popular opinion by doing what 
 you ask? The public mind is made up." I answered, 
 "The justice of it will be seen when the matter is in- 
 vestigated." '*But," he replied, "it will not be inves- 
 tigated. Men are too busy to explore for justice. They 
 will only read the headlines of the articles denouncing 
 me for doing it. They are too busy." " Moral cow- 
 ardice," I quote his very words, "moral cowardice is 
 the failing of our people. Some of the men who join 
 with you in asking this of me, would join my enemies 
 in denouncing me for doing it." 
 
 The man who told me this was a student of pol- 
 itics and of men. He had found out that indifference 
 to the rights of others was a trait of our social char- 
 acter. It was a hard lesson to learn and I did not like 
 to learn it. I am glad to know that it is not univer- 
 sally true, for I can point out hundreds of men whose 
 generous lives give it splendid contradiction, but what 
 I saw on Monday convinced me that much of it was 
 true. How then can we expect an ambitious man, hon- 
 orably ambitious too, with a possible great future be- 
 fore him to imperil his prospects by offending public 
 sentiment ? And how can we expect a man of humble 
 station who must labor with his hands for bread, in a 
 social atmosphere of absolute indifference to him or his 
 affairs, how can we expect him to risk his job of work 
 by refusing to sign the document ? 
 
49 
 
 LIVE AND NOT LET LIVE. 
 
 This is the motto of monopoly, the creed of selfish- 
 ness, the religion of greed, and it makes no difference 
 whether it is practiced by the man of millions, or by 
 him who has no capital but his trade. 
 
 I sign my name ''Wheelbarrow," because that is 
 the implement of my handicraft, or was, when I was a 
 strong man. I was by profession a ''railroad man"; 
 my part of the railroad business was making the road- 
 bed, by the aid of a pick, a shovel, and a wheelbarrow. 
 I was a skilled workman, and had obtained the highest 
 diploma that could be got in the profession. Jemmy 
 Hill and myself worked on the same plank, and so 
 buoyant and easy did we make the trip up and down, 
 and dump the dirt into the exact spot, that we were 
 worth twenty per cent, more than any other men on 
 the job. There was a superannuated old Irishman in 
 our "gang" who had helped in building every rail- 
 road from Montreal to Minneapolis ; he had become 
 too stiff for the wheelbarrow and the pick, and was re- 
 duced to the shovel alone, which he could still handle 
 tolerably well ; his duty was to stay on top of the pile 
 and "level off" with the shovel. His work was made 
 hard or easy according to the skill of the rest. Awk- 
 ward fellows would dump their loads in a dead heap, 
 maybe a couple of feet from the place, leaving him to 
 shovel it the rest of the way, while Jemmy and I would 
 
50 • WHEELBARROW. 
 
 give the loads a flirt with the right wrist, or the left, 
 as the case might be, and scatter the dirt on the pre- 
 cise location, leaving Tim nothing to do but give it a 
 couple of taps for form's sake. One day he burst into 
 admiration at our skill, and ^aid, ''Yez could wheel 
 on a horse's rib." I show this diploma, not from van- 
 ity, but as proof that I graduated with high honors in 
 the railroad college. 
 
 You may sneer at classing dirt-shoveling with 
 '' skilled labor." A hundred dollars to one that you 
 can't wheel a 'barrow full of dirt up a plank, say at the 
 easy incline of 30 degrees, without looking at your 
 feet, and the same wager that you can't come down 
 the plank, dragging the empty 'barrow behind you, 
 without running the wheel off the track. You won't 
 take the bet? Very well ; then don't make fun of my 
 diploma until you are able to ' ' wheel on a horse's rib. " 
 
 One day a greenhorn came along and got a job in 
 our gang; he was awkward as a landlubber trying to 
 climb the top-gallantmast. He would look at his feet 
 as he went up the plank, and the wheel of the 'barrow 
 would run off; he would look at the wheel, and his feet 
 would step off ; he asked advice, but we who had 
 learned the trade had now become monopolists, and 
 refused to give any instruction; all of us except Jemmy 
 Hill; he took the fellow in hand, and showed him how 
 to walk the plank, which he obviously had no right 
 whatever to do. That night, up at the shanty where 
 we lived, my tongue swaggered a good deal, to the 
 admiration of everybody except Jemmy Hill. I gushed 
 eloquently about the wrong done us in employing 
 greenhorn wheelers and "plug" shovelers, and we 
 proposed to form ourselves into a ''brotherhood " to 
 protect ourselves against monopoly, and especially 
 
LIVE AND NOT LET LIVE. 51 
 
 making it a capital offense for one of the '' brother- 
 hood " to teach a fellow- creature how to wheel a 'bar- 
 row full of dirt up a plank. 
 
 The next day was Sunday, and Jemmy and I took 
 a walk to a favorite spot where we used to smoke our 
 pipes and gossip. The glorious St. Lawrence rolled 
 at our feet, and the sun shone bright overhead. Jemmy 
 was a young fellow from the North of Ireland, about 
 five feet nine or ten, slim, all sinew and bone, blue 
 eyes, light hair, and a fair, smooth face, beautiful as 
 a girl's. He had a soft, musical voice, and there was 
 nothing manly about him, except that he liked to 
 smoke ; but he was brave as Phil. Sheridan ; he was a 
 holy terror in a fight ; I saw him scatter a dozen fellows 
 once in a riot, like Samson used to clear out those 
 Philistines. He is president of a railroad now, and 
 rides in his own special car, in which there is always 
 a welcome berth for me. 
 
 We talked about the necessity of protecting our 
 craft from ''plug" workmen, or, rather, I did ;. Jemmy 
 merely smoked his pipe and listened. At last hepulled 
 out of his pocket a watch-charm, and handed it to me 
 to examine. The crest on it was a couple of torches, 
 one lighting the other, with this motto underneath : 
 ** My light is none the less for lighting my neighbor." 
 He explained that this was the motto of some secret 
 society that he belonged to in Belfast ; I forget the name 
 of it now, but no matter, that was the motto of it, 
 '*My light is none the less for lighting my neighbor," 
 I accepted the rebuke, and acknowledged that the 
 motto was a good one. That was many years ago, 
 but the longer I live the more I am convinced that it 
 is sound in political science and social economy. It 
 
 'TIB17JRSIT 
 
52 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 is the very antithesis of the narrow principle, -'Live 
 and not let live." 
 
 I commend it to workingmen the world over ; the 
 practice of it will make them better, happier, and 
 richer than the other principle, which cannot become 
 general without reducing the world to barbarism. 
 Had this been the motto of the telegraph brotherhood, 
 it might have saved them the humiliation of '^signing 
 the document," it might havie spared them the neces- 
 sity of the strike, and even in their failure it would 
 have secured to them the sympathy of all men whose 
 good opinion was worth having. How can we sym- 
 pathize with men in a struggle with monopoly who 
 themselves seek to become monopolists of the knowl- 
 edge that earns bread, who in the very charter of their 
 order pledge themselves to one another never to teach 
 their trade, and who seek to control the free action of 
 their brother craftsmen ? Men who would enslave 
 others easily become slaves, and the telegraphers who 
 left their keys free men and proud returned to them in 
 a month with their liberty signed away. George 
 Stephenson, the greatest engineer of modern times, 
 or perhaps of any time, was refused admission into the 
 ''order" of engineers because he was a "plug," who 
 had never served an apprenticeship. The men who 
 did that would have deprived him of his genius if they 
 could, although that genius has multiplied the com- 
 forts of man a hundred or a thousand-fold. 
 
 Men are interested not in the downfall, but in the 
 upraising of one another ; not in the poverty of any, but 
 in the riches of all ; not in the ignorance of a part, but 
 in the intelligence and wisdom of the whole. The con- 
 trary principle impairs the symmetry of the moral uni- 
 verse, whose laws are perfect and harmonious as the 
 
LIVE AJSID NOT LET LIVE. 53 
 
 laws which govern matter. Every man is interested in 
 the welfare and prosperity of every other man ; none 
 can suffer loss without all sharing in it. I cannot show 
 you where I lost a penny by the great Chicago fire, 
 and yet I know that two or three hundred million dol- 
 lars worth of property could not be blotted out of ex- 
 istence without my losing something somewhere. I 
 cannot show you that I lost a dollar by the Franco- 
 German war, and yet I -know that two great nations 
 cannot destroy tens of thousands of each other's men, 
 and tens of millions of each other's property without 
 my losing something. This world of ours is a small 
 world, and no part of it is so remote from me that 
 people can suffer loss without my sharing in that loss; 
 and conversely, mankind cannot grow richer and leave 
 me poorer, nor wiser and leave me ignorant, nor bet- 
 ter and leave me worse. That is my religion, and, in 
 the language of Ingersoll, ''Upon that rock I stand." 
 
54 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 THE LAOKOON OF LABOR. 
 
 Most of us have seen the picture of Laokoon and 
 his two sons in the embrace of the avenging serpents 
 sent to punish them for sacrilege. I think that was 
 their offense ; or perhaps it was blasphemy. It was 
 some crime against religion, and the^punishment was 
 of that exquisite cruelty that angry gods delight in. I 
 am not familiar with the legend connected with the 
 picture, but I have read that the piece of sculpture 
 from which it is taken is considered superior to every 
 other work of art in the world. I can readily believe 
 it, for even the picture shows the muscular contor- 
 tions of the strong man in his agony. But they avail 
 him nothing. His masculine sinews, hardened and 
 distended by the death struggle, only furnish a firmer 
 fulcrum for the grip of the serpents, and he and his 
 boys are crushed together. 
 
 Like Laokoon of old, the American laborer and his 
 children struggle in the coils of the strong serpents — 
 monopoly and aristocracy. Capital furnishes their 
 constrictive power, and every effort for freedom only 
 tightens the grip. We strike for higher wages, and 
 end by '' signing the document," making our slavery 
 a matter of record, and mortgaging our children ''even 
 to the third and fourth generation." On the altar of 
 "brotherhood " we immolate fraternity, and forbid the 
 cunning hands of our neighbor's boys to learn an hon- 
 est trade because we work at it. We incorporate the 
 
LAOKOON OF LABOR. 55 
 
 principle of caste into the religion of labor, and sneer 
 at the ''plug" workman while denying him the right 
 to learn. We butt our heads against stone walls, un- 
 der the delusion that the exercise toughens the brain 
 and strengthens the mind. Assailing capital we insist 
 on being paid in cheap dollars for dear work, and with 
 inverted patriotism we carry torches in the fool pa- 
 rade whose transparencies demand "high prices for 
 everything." I have a right to talk like this, because 
 a moment ago, when I went down to the shed for a 
 hod of dear coal, I saw inglorious in the corner the 
 helmet that I wore and the torch that I bore ''in the 
 last campaign," when, in company with two thousand 
 other patriots, I escorted "the orator of the occasion" 
 to the grand stand. I have "the privilege of the floor," 
 for I got a sore throat in cheering his fluent glib- gab 
 as he boasted of our great prosperity, and called upon 
 us all to vote early and often, and bring our neighbor 
 to vote for the man that made everything dear. The 
 same crusading will be done again by workingmen next 
 year, but "not for Joseph — if he knows it — not for 
 Joe." I have carried my last torch. 
 
 Before labor can be lifted up to its rightful dignity 
 every workingman and every man willing to work 
 must be made free of the " brotherhood." By helping 
 one another we all rise together ; by dragging each 
 other down we all fall together. So long as the man 
 who lays the bricks treats as his inferior the man who 
 carries them up the ladder, neither of them is free ; so 
 long as the man who drives the engine despises the 
 man who pushes the wheelbarrow, so long monopoly 
 will hold them in a common bondage. This is the 
 philosophy of all experience since man first became the 
 hired man of his brother. 
 
56 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 I once had a job of shoveling at a place called Man- 
 chester, in Virginia, just opposite Richmond. One 
 Sunday I was taking a walk with a friend in Richmond, 
 and I remarked the inequality of the negroes in the 
 streets, as indicated by their personal appearance. 
 Some were ragged, brutal-faced, and twisted out of 
 shape by premature and unnatural toil ; others were 
 well clad and evidently well fed. One bright mulatto, 
 of genteel figure and face, was clad in black broad- 
 cloth \ he wore a shiny silk-hat and carried a cane. It 
 was easy to see also that there were castes among 
 them, superiors and inferiors, and that the higher 
 orders looked with scorn upon the lower classes. I 
 thought that those finely dressed negroes were pro- 
 bably free. *'No," said my friend, '^they are all 
 slaves, but there are degrees even in slavery ; there are 
 * soft things ' there as in freedom." Next day I was 
 standing by the Washington monument, when I saw a 
 procession of negroes fastened by couples to a long 
 chain. They were marching to the shambles to be 
 sold, where I followed them to see the auction. That 
 lot of fellow-Christians brought, on an average, about 
 six dollars a pound. Among them was the bright 
 mulatto — plug hat, broadcloth and all. He was chained 
 to a vulgar looking field hand. All supercilious airs 
 were gone, and every face carried the same hopeless 
 look of despair. All distinctions were leveled in the 
 handcuffs that tightened them to a common chain. So 
 it is with the workingmen. We may build steps on 
 which to place the various crafts one above another, 
 with the laborer and his wheelbarrow at the bottom, 
 but while we are doing that concentrated capital is 
 binding us by couples to an impartial degradation. We 
 can, if we will, reverse the fate of Laokoon and 
 
LAOKOON OF LABOR. 57 
 
 strangle the serpents, but we must all work together ; 
 the trowel must not tyrannize over the hod, nor the 
 jackplane sneer at the shovel. 
 
58 WHEELBARR O IV. 
 
 MAKING SCARCITY. 
 
 Some time ago I made a few remarks upon that 
 ** competition " hobgoblin, which makes the hair of 
 workingmen stand up in fright, '*like quills upon the 
 fretful porcupine." From my boyhood, it was a ter- 
 ror to me, but it does not scare me now. As I grew 
 older I grew bolder, and at last I walked close up to 
 it and examined it. I found it was a hollow pumpkin, 
 with eyes, nose, and mouth cut in it, and stuck on a 
 stick clothed in the drapery of a white sheet. I see 
 that the President of the Federation of Trades Unions 
 has exhibited this venerable old ghost to the Senate 
 Committee on Education and Labor. Whether it 
 scared the committee or not I cannot say. Since 
 then I have noticed that some other gentleman has 
 appeared before the same committee, in company 
 with the same spectre, and demanded that convict 
 labor shall not be put in competition with the me- 
 chanic trades, but shall be exclusively devoted to the 
 business of "working on the roads." 
 
 I have tried to analyze the principle of non-com- 
 petition, as enforced by the trades unions, and so far 
 as I have been able to resolve it into its constituent 
 elements, its chief ingredients appear to be monop- 
 oly and selfishness, with some very foolish dread of 
 the evils of abundance. Take this convict labor ques- 
 tion for example* Convict labor is not opposed on 
 
MAKING SCARCITY. 59 
 
 any ground but that of '' competition." It competes 
 with outside labor, that is, it produces something, 
 and this production is the injury complained of. Let 
 us reduce the question to a concrete form. Suppose 
 that the two thousand convicts in the penitentiaries of 
 Illinois are all compelled to work at the shoemaking 
 trade, and suppose that they each make a pair of 
 shoes a day, or 62,400 pairs a year, will it be con- 
 tended that the addition of this number of shoes to 
 the common stock is an injury to the people of Illi- 
 nois ? There is no one who will claim that ; but the 
 President of the Federation will say : " It is an injury 
 to the shoemakers' trade, and therefore it ought to be 
 prevented." 
 
 Very well, then make tailors of the convicts. This 
 plan doesn't solve the difficulty either, for the tailors 
 won't agree to it, nor the tinkers, nor the tanners, nor 
 the masons, nor the carpenters, nor any other trade. 
 As the butcher, and baker, and candlestick-maker all 
 refuse to work in competition with the convicts, and 
 as none of these economists are daring enough to re- 
 quire that the convicts live in idleness, an easy solu- 
 tion of the problem is found by compelling them " to 
 work upon the roads." But really this is only shift- 
 ing the difficulty, and is no solution at all. At school 
 I have solved many a hard problem in long division, 
 which is as far as I went, by getting some other boy 
 to do the sum for me, and the President of the Feder- 
 ation adopts the same plan with the convict labor dif- 
 ficulty. He dumps it on the * laborer" class, and 
 says : '' Here, you man with the wheelbarrow, work 
 this hard sum." But I am not able to work it, be- 
 cause I find that I cannot set the convicts at any use- 
 ful employment without putting them in competition 
 
6o WHEELS A RR O W. 
 
 with somebody. They must either live in idleness at 
 the expense of the community, or they must earn 
 something to pay for their board ; to earn something 
 they must produce something, and that is an addition 
 to the aggregate wealth of the people, at which we 
 all get a nibble at last. 
 
 If adding to the wealth of a country is an injury, 
 then subtracting from that wealth must be a benefit, 
 and therefore the destruction of shoes and clotkes, and 
 houses and furniture, must be a desirable thing ; the 
 Chicago fire, instead of being a great calamity, was a 
 great blessing. This fallacy is firmly cherished by 
 workingmen ; it is the guiding principle of trades 
 unions, and is productive of want and poverty incal- 
 culable. It was instilled into me in my very child- 
 hood, and it was late when I got rid of it. I never ate 
 a meal when a boy, that was not somehow or other 
 complicated with the everlasting consideration of 
 '' work." When I got a good dinner I knew that my 
 father was ** in work " ; when the meal was scanty I 
 knew that he was ^'out of work." In our home all 
 human affairs whirled round and round the image of 
 *'work" forever. A big fire devoured a street — *' It 
 will make work," I heard my father say. A ship was 
 lost at sea laden with silk, and leather, and cloth — 
 "It will make work," said my father. A reservoir 
 broke jail and swept the heart of the town away — " It 
 will make work," my mother said ; and so all human 
 calamities were softened as blessings to me ; they 
 made work, and work made wages, and wages made 
 bread and potatoes and clothes for me. God bless the 
 shipwreck, and the fire, and the flood ; they make 
 
 " Work, work, work, till the eyes are heavy and dim, 
 And work, work, work, till the brain begins to swim." 
 
MAKING SCARCITY. 6i 
 
 Oh, comrade of the trowel, the needle, and the 
 awl ; oh, toiler at the anVil and the loom ; oh, brother 
 of the jackplane and the shovel ; oh, chivalry of toil 
 by land and sea, it is not work we need so much as 
 rest ! Let us make all the* wealth we can, and destroy 
 nothing ; let us not be jealous of each other's talent, 
 but teach each other everything we know ! Let us 
 make plenty in the land, and then let us try to shape 
 our social system and the laws so that a fairer share 
 of it will come to us after we have made it. 
 
 Last fall I picked up a newspaper and read in 
 great black headlines this alarming news : ''A Heavy 
 Frost. It spread over various sections of the North- 
 west Friday night. Early planted corn escaped with 
 little injury ; the late crop practically ruined." It re- 
 quires no great skill in political economy, as they call 
 it, to understand that the blighting of the corn crop is 
 a great calamity ; it means less food the coming win- 
 ter, and less food means less of clothes, and coal, and 
 wood. And yet tliere are a lot of workingmen who 
 would regard a blight of the hat crop, or the shoe 
 crop, or the coat crop as a blessing to labor ; but in 
 truth they are all equally injurious as the blighting of 
 the cattle and the corn. Food, and clothes, and fur- 
 niture, and all necessaries of life, are so intimately 
 related, that the blight of one is the blight of all, and 
 it means less of each to the workingman. 
 
 It is easy to prove by the doctrines of the anti- 
 competitionists that this disaster to the corn crop is a 
 good thing, because it removes from the farmers liv- 
 ing south of the frost line the competition in the corn 
 market of the farmers living north of it. And it is 
 also a good thing for the people who have old corn in 
 the bins ; but this is a narrow and selfish way to look 
 
6 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 at it, and if the doctrine be carried out to its logical 
 end it elevates to the rank, of a moral principle the 
 unnatural dogma that the prosperity of one man de- 
 pends upon the adversity of another. Once upon a 
 time I had a job of " v^ork on the roads " not far 
 from an Indian agency. The tribe had just been paid 
 off, and the Indians were trading at the store up at 
 the agency, where I happened to go for some tobacco. 
 They were buying some needles, for which the trader 
 charged them fifty cents apiece. They complained of 
 the price, but when the trader assured them that the 
 needle-maker was dead, and the needle-making indus- 
 try thereby terminated, they appeared satisfied. This 
 lying excuse for the high price of needles presented to 
 me a tough problem in economic science, and I went 
 up to the shanty to work it out. 
 
 I lighted my pipe, and tried to read the solution 
 of the problem in the clouds of smoke. The first 
 question to be answered was this : Suppose the 
 needle-maker was really dead, and his art lost for- 
 ever, would that be a good thing ? I had no tiouble 
 with this question at all. I could readily see that al- 
 though it might be a good thing for the man who hap- 
 pened to have a large stock of needles on hand, it 
 would be a bad thing for everybody else. The next 
 question was not so easy. It was this : Suppose that 
 one-half of the needle-makers in the world should die 
 to-night, would that be a good thing in an economic 
 point of view ? It took several pipes of tobacco to 
 answer this question, and I am not sure that I got it 
 right even then. The answer involved so many col- 
 laterals. It was very clear that if every needle-maker 
 was a master, and not a journeyman, those who sur- 
 vived, being relieved of competition to such a great 
 
MAKING SCARCITY. 63 
 
 extent, would make good profit out of it by raising the 
 price of needles, but the community would- still be 
 losers. But suppose that of the survivors 95 per cent, 
 were journeymen, and 5 per cent, masters, where 
 would the new profits go ? Labor being a marketable 
 thing, the masters would still want to buy it at the 
 old figures, and the jours would get but a trifling 
 raise of wages, while the increased value of needles 
 would nearly all go into the pockets of the masters. 
 But even supposing that the increased profit were 
 fairly divided between them, the community would 
 still have to pay it, and, therefore, the sudden removal 
 of so much competition in the trade would be an 
 injury, and not a benefit. Applying this rule to 
 every other trade and occupation, it appeared to me 
 that the loss of wealth, or of wealth-producing capa- 
 city, is injurious to the communit}^, that the working- 
 men cannot be benefited by such loss, and that all 
 attempts to create a scarcity of competition by crip- 
 pling talent, or forbidding the industry of anybody, 
 can only be of local or personal benefit here and there, 
 and the pursuit of such false systems of relief is a sad 
 waste of the moral strength of the workingmen. 
 
 ** Nature abhors a vacuum," is a maxim in phys- 
 ics, and in moral philosophy also. So nature tries 
 forever to preserve an equilibrium in the moral and 
 material universe. The very earthquakes and volca- 
 noes are efforts in this direction, and men can no 
 easier keep trades unbalanced than they can disturb 
 the level of the sea. Create a vacuum in any trade 
 and nature rushes in to fill it. If I should give paral- 
 ysis to every shoveler to-night, how long should I 
 enjoy my monopoly ? In a week I should see shov- 
 elers galore. The telegraph operators made a vacuum, 
 
64 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 but only for an instant ; it at once began to fill; in a 
 month the hole was almost gone. We may think we 
 have destroyed competition by excluding a brother 
 craftsman here, but he or somebody else has slipped 
 in over there, for the struggle of life goes on. We 
 must liberate labor, and exalt it by grander schemes 
 than these. 
 
65 
 
 COMPETITION IN TRADES. 
 
 A SHORT time ago the president of the Federation 
 of Trades Unions testified before the Senate Committee 
 on Labor. I see by the papers that he proposed as a 
 remedy for the alleged wrongs of journeymen me- 
 chanics, that the convicts in penitentiaries, instead of 
 working at trades within the walls, be taken out and 
 worked upon the public roads. On behalf of the 
 "knights" of the shovel and wheelbarrow I protest 
 against this plan. What right has the Federation of 
 Trades Unions to dump — I use a term suggested by 
 my profession — what right has that federation to dump 
 the whole convict "brotherhood" upon us? What 
 right has the president of it to make his class an order 
 of nobility to flaunt their airs of eminence in the faces 
 of us who labor in a lower calling, who have not 
 reached the rank of mechanics, but who must content 
 ourselves with the honorable but yet inferior desig- 
 nation, "laborers"? 
 
 The president of the Federation and his order get 
 higher wages than we laborers get ; they can better 
 afford to stand the competition of the convicts than 
 we can. We who "work upon the roads" have just 
 as much right to protection against convict picks and 
 shovels as the president of the Federation has to pro- 
 tection against convict chisels, awls, or jack-planes. 
 Will he give us some good reason why convicts should 
 be permitted to compete with some kinds of labor and 
 
66 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 not with others ? Are we to have an aristocracy of 
 trades? 
 
 I never had time to study the principles of political 
 economy, and I know nothing about the laws of social 
 science, but the facts of both have fallen upon me 
 heavy as a hammer, and upon the stern logic of those 
 facts I built my own ethics of labor in those delightful 
 moments when, having dumped the load, I leisurely 
 trolled my wheelbarrow behind me down the plank to 
 the hole in the ground where it had to be filled again. 
 Sixteen hours a day of hard work is bad schooling for 
 a boy of thirteen. In the bright days of childhood, 
 when the mind and body should grow into strength 
 and beauty, mine were being stunted and warped by 
 toil savage and unnatural. I ought to be five feet ten; 
 that's my correct stature by rights ; I am less than five 
 feet six. Toil stunted me when I was in the gristle. 
 I had no time to study books, and the principles of life 
 that I learned, such as they were, I had to gather in 
 the college of hard knocks. 
 
 After all, a man can think with considerable clear- 
 ness walking down a plank with an empty 'barrow be- 
 hind him, and I have worked out hundreds of labor 
 problems while ''walking the plank" in that way. 
 Some of my solutions I afterward threw away as in- 
 correct, and others I cling to still. The open air is a 
 good place for mental work ; a clear atmosphere makes 
 clear thought, while the inspiration of a few big 
 draughts of it into a good pair of lungs quickens the 
 mind. You don't get your full ration of oxygen in the 
 house ; out of doors you do, and that is a wholesome 
 stimulant better than wine. You can unlearn a great 
 many things, too, in the open air, and one of the use- 
 ful arts is that of unlearning. I have unlearned many 
 
COMPETITION IN TRADES. 67 
 
 of my theories about labor, and some of my doctrines 
 I have been compelled not only to change but to re- 
 verse. The effort of labor competition upon the wel- 
 fare of workingmen appears to me now in a different 
 light than it formerly did, and I am satisfied that we 
 must reverse our ancient opinion that it is desirable to 
 produce a scarcity of men, a scarcity of skill, and a 
 scarcity of production. So long as we cling to those 
 old superstitions we can never successfully assert the 
 dignity of labor. 
 
 Already they have reduced labor to a mendicant 
 condition. It begs for favors where it ought to compel 
 rights. The beggarly petition ''a fair day's wages for 
 a fair day's work, " is unworthy of straight-built, square- 
 cut men. Let us shape the laws of this land — social 
 and political — so that we may obtain a reward for our 
 labor equal to its full value. We are leveling wages 
 to the grade of alms, and our masters pay it to us like 
 the dole of charity. If we take a narrow view of hu- 
 man life our share of life's comforts will be narrow 
 and mean. We must expand the horizon of man, and 
 not contract it. What can be more degrading to labor 
 than the assumption of the Federation that the hosts 
 of workingmen in Illinois cannot stand the competi- 
 tion of a couple of thousand prisoners bungling at the 
 tasks imposed on them for punishment? The welfare 
 of the workingmen can never consist in the scarcity 
 either of talent or goods, but always in the abundance 
 of both. 
 
 Men like the president of the Federation fight the 
 beneficent law of mutual assistance under the impres- 
 sion that they are fighting competition by limiting hu- 
 man skill. So thjey foolishly resolve that all handicraft 
 shall be a monopoly; they put "mechanics" back 
 
68 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 again among the black arts, and forbid the teaching 
 of trades. Not only would they set convicts to "work- 
 ing on the roads," but all the children of the poor. I 
 have four sons, all free-born Americans, so-called, and 
 all now grown to manhood. I tried to give them 
 trades, as they respectively reached the proper age, 
 but in every instance I was forbidden to do so by the 
 laws of the trades. All four of them are now men, 
 but not one of them was permitted to learn a trade in 
 the land where they were born and which they have 
 been taught to call a land of freedom. The oldest got 
 a job as fireman on the railroad, and after a few years 
 managed to steal the trade of an engineer ; the next 
 drifted off to that undefinable country known as "the 
 mountains," and there he is wasting away his life dig- 
 ging holes in the ground searching for silver and gold. 
 The next picked up a book and taught himself the 
 shorthand trade ; he gets twice as much wages as I 
 ever got with my wheelbarrow and shovel ; the young- 
 est gets a dollar a day in a store in the humblest ca- 
 pacity, but hopes to work up in time to the grade of 
 a clerk. That all four of them didn't become hood- 
 lums and tramps is not the fault of the unions. A 
 man with a heart in him, even if he has no brains at 
 all, must see in a moment that the policy which robbed 
 those boys of the right to learn a trade cannot be 
 right, and not being right it cannot be either econom- 
 ical or wise. 
 
 One evening I was talking to that shorthand writer 
 about the strike of the telegraph operators, supposing 
 that he would probably take a deep interest in the sub- 
 ject, but he cared little about it. "I hope the opera- 
 tors will win," he said, "but I am not anxious either 
 way. It's a choice of monopolies, and I side with the 
 
COMPETITION IN TRADES. 69 
 
 weaker. The companies monopolize the profits of 
 telegraphing, the operators monopolize the art. They 
 forbid one another to teach the trade, and if their mo- 
 nopoly is beaten by the other it will be no more than 
 the big pike swallowing the little one." 
 
 I look at it that way myself, and it appears to me 
 that if the policy of shutting up one trade in order to 
 prevent competition is good for that, it must be good 
 for every other calling or profession, and all the trades 
 and occupations being closed, the people outside must 
 be either rich, or tramps, or thieves. The trades 
 having shut everybody out, have shut themselves in, 
 and having deprived a large part of the community of 
 the means of buying anything, trade diminishes, there is 
 less demand for labor, and less money to pay for it, 
 another exclusion then becomes necessary, until we 
 get back to the wigwams, where we don't need any 
 mechanics at all. We might follow the principle to 
 greater extremities yet, until at last we grub roots or 
 climb trees for a dinner, like that primeval ape from 
 whom we all have sprung. I think it is in the story of 
 Rasselas that I read an account of an ambitious man 
 who was promised by the genii the fulfillment of one 
 wish, whatever it might be. He wished that he could 
 be the only wise man in the world, and that all other 
 men might be fools. The wish was granted him, and 
 immediately afterward the people took him and said, 
 "this man's a fool," and they put him in the lunatic 
 asylum, where he remains to this day. He was a fool, 
 and so is every man a fool who thinks to grow wise on 
 his neighbor's ignorance, or rich on his neighbor's 
 poverty. 
 
 I object to the principle for another reason. It 
 fosters the spirit of caste among workingmen, and ere- 
 
70 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 ates a ragged aristocracy, the shabbiest aristocracy of 
 all. In a gang that I worked in once was an Irishman 
 named Jack Patterson ; an honest man was Jack, and 
 as true a gentleman as ever swung a pick. He had a 
 son named Dick, and how he managed it I don't know, 
 but Dick broke through the crust that excluded him 
 from the trades, and learned the art of a plasterer. 
 Being now a mechanic, he occupied a round on the 
 social ladder one step higher than we did who worked 
 with a shovel and a pick. Having attained this giddy 
 elevation Dick refused to associate any longer with his 
 father. A friend condoling with his mother on Dick's 
 unfilial conduct, the old lady replied: ''Well, Dick 
 always was a high-sperited boy \ sure, you couldn't 
 expect him to associate wid an Irish laborer." The 
 Federation of Trades Unions would make Dick Pat- 
 tersons of us all. 
 
7' 
 
 TO ARMS 
 
 I HAVE just been reading the proceedings of *'The 
 Trade and Labor Assembly," and also the resolutions 
 of *'The Cigar Maker's Progressive Union." Both 
 gatheringsdemand social and economic changes of great 
 importance, but the Cigar Makers are the more ** pro- 
 gressive " of the two. They have reached the end ol 
 rational argument, and propose to fight. Their pro- 
 gram was contained in a ''circular," the first demand 
 of which was ' ' Destruction of the existing class rule by 
 energetic, relentless, revolutionary, and international 
 action." They also adopted some resolutions, the 
 chief of which was '' that the only means through 
 which our aims, the emancipation of all mankind, can 
 be accomplished, is open rebellion of the despoiled of 
 all nations against the existing social, economic, and 
 political institutions." Those resolutions have a flavor 
 of Barnaby Rudge. They resemble the crimson doc- 
 trines proclaimed by the London apprentices, led by 
 that "relentless" warrior of the thin legs and the 
 wooden sword, Captain Sim. Tappertit. Still, for all 
 that, their language is plain, and they express a bold 
 purpose. A hater of ''class rule " all my life, I am 
 willing to fight for its destruction. Where is the 
 recruiting office ? 
 
 Although I am not certain that a "class rule" of 
 " Progressive Cigar Makers" would be any better than 
 
72 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the "class rule " we are living under now, and although 
 there is no close affinity between shoveling coal and 
 making cigars, still, I am willing to stand by the Cigar 
 Makers as brother constituents in the great confra- 
 ternity of labor. Unlike most occupations toward each 
 other, there happens to be no reciprocity of benefits 
 between the Cigar Makers and me. The favors con- 
 ferred are all from them to me, and none from me to 
 them. They are compelled to burn coal, and thus give 
 me employment, but I am not compelled to burn cigars. 
 I cannot help their trade to the amount of five cents a 
 year. I cannot afford to smoke cigars. I have to be 
 contented with a pipe of tobacco, and think myself 
 lucky to get that. My son, however, the short-hand 
 writer that I spoke of, gets twice as much wages for 
 scribbling curious pot-hooks and hieroglyphics as I ever 
 got for shoveling coal, and he can afford to smoke cigars. 
 I think he smokes more of them than is good for him, 
 but that's his own affair, not mine. If I had his wealth 
 I should probably smoke cigars as he does. Whether 
 I smoke their cigars or not makes no difference ; I am 
 as ready to fight for the rights of Cigar Makers as for 
 my own ; but, although I have sought diligently for 
 it, I have thus far been unable to find the recruiting 
 office. Where can I find the headquarters of Captain 
 Sim. Tappertit? 
 
 Brothers, unless we are ready to open the recruiting 
 office, let us not talk about fighting. By doing so we 
 expose our own weakness. We bring derision upon 
 ourselves and contempt upon our cause. That is not 
 the worst of it ; we undervalue the moral forces which 
 we hold in our own hands. We depreciate the strength 
 we have by appealing to a strength which we have not. 
 It may be rash and foolish to fight even for liberty, but 
 
TO ARMS. 
 
 73 
 
 it is brave. To talk fight without intending it is 
 equally rash and foolish, but not brave. It is neither 
 wise nor patriotic to persuade the working men that 
 their moral resources are all exhausted, and that there 
 is no reform power in the ballot, in the press, and in 
 public opinion. The statement is not true ; and the 
 men who make it present to us a dilemma of double 
 despair. Without arms, discipline, leaders, or even a 
 plan of battle, fighting is clearly hopeless. If the ballot 
 is impotent also, then we must fall back for comfort on 
 bombast and beer. We can fill ourselves with nectar 
 of the gods at five cents a glass, and boast of our in- 
 tention at some future time to paint the universe red. 
 It is all very fine to pass a string of resolutions, to 
 '* sound the tocsin," whatever that is, and summon us 
 to the fray, but the resolutors will not lead us. They 
 pretend that they can no more set a squadron in the 
 field than Michael Cassio. They invite us to go ahead 
 and do the fighting. If we win, and accomplish the 
 ** relentless" revolution, they promise to step up and 
 accept all the offices under the new government. This 
 division of labor is not fair. 
 
 Suppose that we do possess power enough to over- 
 turn one governnient, have we sufficient wisdom to 
 form another and a better one ? I have serious doubts 
 about that. I think we have a great deal to unlearn 
 before we shall be competent to establish and conduct 
 a just government. I fear that even the ^' Progressive 
 Cigar Makers " are scarcely equal to the task. At 
 the great Labor picnic I saw them with ''relentless" 
 fury destroy the stock in trade of a merchant on the 
 ground. His offense was, that he had some cigars in 
 stock which had been made by Cigar Makers who 
 were not "Progressive." For this, his property was 
 
74 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 destroyed and his life placed in jeopardy. Men, who 
 value liberty only so far as it gives them freedom to 
 oppress their fellow men, talk of building a new civili- 
 zation on the ruins of the American political and 
 social system. 
 
 For instance, in the ''circular" referred to above, 
 I find a demand of ''equal rights for all without dis- 
 tinction to sex or race," and I also read that the very 
 meeting that adopted it "protested against the em- 
 ployment of women." What sort of "equal rights" 
 will be established by a party which refuses to women 
 the equal right with men to earn an honest living? 
 The Trade and Labor Assembly also appointed a com- 
 mittee, which made a report complaining of many 
 wrongs which labor suffers in the City of Chicago, and 
 among them this : "Female labor is being largely 
 used to replace male labor in skilled occupations, 
 such as telegraphing, bookkeeping, etc." The radical 
 mistake of the labor reformers is the delusion that all 
 persons who work at the same trade are enemies, 
 snatching bread from one another. I used to think 
 that way, but now I believe that the reverse of it is 
 the true doctrine. I believe now that everybody 
 should work, that the more worker^ the more product, 
 and consequently the more comforts of life for us all. 
 
 The equal right of women to work at "skilled 
 labor " is evidence that we are emerging from that 
 social barbarism which consigned one part of them to 
 the bondage of the kitchen, another to the insipid 
 languor of the drawing room, and another to a de- 
 pendence on man's wickedness, so pitiful and so sad 
 that we fear to look upon it lest it show us the reflec- 
 tion of our own guilt, and make our consciences rebel 
 within us at the savagery of man. "Skilled labor" is 
 
TO ARMS. 75 
 
 one of the blessed agencies that shall redeem women 
 from poverty, from wash-tub slavery, and from sin. 
 It maybe said that I can talk this way because women 
 don't compete with me at shoveling coal or carrying 
 the hod. That's true; but I would talk the same 
 way if I were a skilled mechanic. If I were a tele 
 grapher or a bookkeeper, I would hold myself un- 
 manly to whine and whimper should a woman come 
 along and compete with me at the trade. Throw open 
 to women all the trades, all the offices, and all 
 the professions, and make her independent. I have 
 another theory also, and it is this : That the elevation 
 of woman can never degrade man nor her prosperity 
 injure him. 
 
 There are some things that we feel to be wrong, 
 although we may not have sufficient ability to demon- 
 strate their injustice. ' The principle of excluding per- 
 sons from learning or exercising trades I am con- 
 fident is not sound, although I may not be able to tell 
 why. I feel it because I have suffered from it. I 
 told, in a former article, how my four sons were for- 
 bidden to learn any trade in this land where they were 
 born, which their forefathers fought to establish, and 
 which their father fought to re-establish. They were 
 forbidden to learn by the laws of the trades. I feel 
 that the exclusion was unjust, and that the principle 
 of it is wrong. My daughter learned a trade in spite 
 of the doctrine, and it is now proposed that she shall 
 not exercise it. She is a bookkeeper. She is com- 
 petent, has a good situation, and although not yet 
 seventeen years old, she feels absolutely independent. 
 A lot of social reformers get themselves together in a 
 beer saloon, and "resoloot" that she ought not to be 
 guilty of earning her living at "skilled labor," on the 
 
76 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 ground that she works for less wages than a man 
 would work. How do they know? And whose busi- 
 ness is it but her own ? The fact is that she is getting 
 higher wages than some masculine bookkeepers get, 
 although less than some others. That isn't all ; there 
 are plenty of young men in town who would gladly 
 take her situation at less wages if they could get it. 
 There are hundreds of "males "who wcild readily 
 work at her desk for ten dollars a montn less than she 
 receives. The people who are so sensitive about 
 ** competition " are quite willing that she shall com- 
 pete with some poor girl as housemaid, or cook in the 
 kitchen, but they are not willing that she shall '^com- 
 pete " with a man at a desk. The most curious thing 
 about it all to me is, that those "reformers" who 
 make this fussy war on women have the nerve to talk 
 about fighting men. 
 
77 
 
 MONOPOLY ON STRIKE. 
 
 I SEE by the papers that the retail coal dealers have 
 struck. • These down-trodden and afflicted fellow-citi- 
 zens demand a raise of fifty cents a ton on coal, from 
 the first day of November, and, what is more to 
 the purpose, they are going to have it. With pious 
 gratitude they see the merciful Indian Summer fade 
 away, and they hail with hymns of gladness the snow 
 clouds coming in the North. A week ago they met at 
 the Grand Pacific Hotel, and sang the doxology of the 
 coal monopoly, *'0, ye frost and cold, O, ye ice and 
 snow. Bless ye the Lord : praise him and magnify him 
 for ever." Praise him and magnify him, an extra fifty 
 cents a ton. 
 
 It was further resolved at said meeting that any re- 
 tail coal dealer, wicked and depraved enough to sell 
 coal at a fair profit after November ist, should be boy- 
 cotted by the association, and his business destroyed. 
 A communication was read from the agents of the coal 
 monopoly and wholesale dealers, to the effect that 
 they would do the boycotting ; that they would not sell 
 coal to any abandoned profligate retailer who should 
 refuse to join the strikers, or who should decline to 
 take advantage of the icebergs created by an all-wise 
 Providence for the benefit of coal merchants. I am 
 writing this a few days before the first of Novembrr, 
 but I write in the confident assurance that the strike 
 
78 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 will be successful, and that from that day forward I 
 must pay an extra fifty cents a ton for coal. The strikes 
 of capital and monopoly never fail ; the strikes of labor 
 seldom succeed. 
 
 It is not at all certain that this w.ill be the last 
 strike of the coal dealers this winter. It is highly 
 probable, indeed, that they will strike for another fifty 
 cents a ton by the ist of December. It depends on the 
 weather. All through November they will watch with 
 greedy eyes the beaver and the squirrel. If th^ beaver 
 builds his house with extra care, and makes a thicker 
 wall than usual, or if the chipmunk lays in an extra 
 store of nuts, the coal men will decide that the winter 
 will be ''hard," and they will sanctify the augury by 
 another tax on coal. Fifty cents a ton on coal isn't 
 much when you look at it as a mere question of arith- 
 metic, a sum in simple addition ; but when you measure 
 it by a poor man's wages, and realize that it means a 
 half a day's work for him, it rises to the dignity of 
 algebra, and if you reflect that it includes the warni/ig 
 of a corresponding extortion upon all other necessaries, 
 it becomes a headaching, heartaching problem of eco- 
 nomical trigonometry that baffles Benjamin Franklin. 
 
 It makes the pews laugh at the pulpit, and the pul- 
 pit laugh at the pews as the coal dealer's prayers go 
 up to heaven, asking for an early winter and a late 
 spring. For instance, I see by last Sunday's paper 
 that the lumber dealers had a meeting the day before, 
 and resolved to strike for an extra $7. per thousand 
 feet. Their strike will be successful, too, because they 
 have the capital to make it win. As I have no money 
 either to build houses or to buy them, it looks as if the 
 strike of the lumber dealers is nothing to me. My 
 neighbor's affairs can regulate themselves ; it is enough 
 
MONO POL V ON STRIKE. 79 
 
 for me to mind my own business. I used to practice 
 that philosophy, but I think it cramps the liberal soul, 
 and shuts the generous hand. I have joined the other 
 church, and I now believe that my neighbor's affairs 
 are also mine, and that I have an interest in every- 
 thing that happens in this world. 
 
 I have an interest in the strike of the lumber dealers, 
 because I know it will be followed by a strike of the 
 nail dealers, and the brick dealers, and the glass deal- 
 ers, and the dealers in putty. Dear material means 
 less building, and that means less demand for work- 
 men, and less wages for the mechanic and the laborer. 
 This strike attacks me front and rear, because although 
 I may not feel the added price of lumber so directly as 
 I feel the extra price of coal, yet it hits me indirectly 
 in the rent I pay for the house that gives me shelter 
 from the storm. I cannot escape it any easier than I 
 can escape the changes of temperature that follow the 
 procession of the sun. 
 
 It does not equalize conditions to tell me that I 
 have the privilege to strike for higher wages. When 
 the wild geese are flying south what chance have I to 
 strike? '^The stars in their courses fight against 
 Sisera." The weather itself forbids me to strike, and 
 I shall be thankful if my employer does not strike 
 against me. What good is my old shovel to attack 
 monopoly intrenched in the Capitol? Early in the 
 war, I was part of a small force guarding a railroad 
 bridge in Missouri. Suddenly we were attacked by a 
 superior force of the enemy, who opened fire upon us 
 with a four gun battery. We had no artillery, so our 
 Colonel telegraphed to the general for instructions, 
 stating that the enemy's battery was dropping shot 
 and shell among his men, and that he had nothing with 
 
8o WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 which to reply. Instantly the answer came back, 
 '*Take the battery." This was excellent advice pro- 
 viding the battery would consent to be captured. So, 
 when Capital strikes for higher prices, the advice to 
 Labor to make a counter strike for higher wages, is 
 merely an order to **take the battery." The odds 
 against us are too great, and the battery refuses to be 
 taken. 
 
 The other day I read, with much pleasure, that the 
 output of coal for this year was greater than last year 
 by about three million tons. Left to the natural laws 
 of trade and production this would give us cheaper 
 coal this winter, and that was the reason I rejoiced. 
 The coal dealers, in order to protect themselves against 
 the calamity of this abundant output, conspire to with- 
 hold it from the poor, and taking the coal owners 
 into the plot, they actually increase the price of coal 
 when they ought to lower it, and lay an extra tax of 
 eight per cent, on every bushel of coal that the work- 
 ingman must buy. 
 
 The rich man has already discounted the extortion. 
 He has laid in his winter's supply at the summer 
 prices, but the poor man is not able to do that ; he 
 must buy his coal from week to week, as he buys his 
 bread. 
 
 As for me, it is only by force of the co-operative 
 principle that I am able to enjoy the luxury of coal at 
 all. My sons and I throw our wages all in together, 
 and one fire warms us all. Otherwise I must give up 
 either coal or bread. I shudder as I think of the long 
 winter impending over homes poorer than mine. I 
 heard a lecture once on chemistry, and the lecturer said 
 that coal was carbon sent here from the sun, that it was 
 nothing else than the sun's rays transformed by natural 
 
MONOPOLY ON STRIKE. 8i 
 
 chemistry into trees, and these again by decomposition 
 converted into coal. He said that in this way the rays 
 of the sun, shed upon the earth millions of years ago, 
 were concentrated and embalmed, to be liberated by 
 combustion into flame and heat, millions of years after- 
 wards, for the use and benefit of man. He said that not 
 a ray of sunshine that fell upon the earth was wasted, 
 but that nature had provided for the saving of it all. 
 The strike of the coal dealers to keep the dead rays of 
 the sun out of the poor man's home, only proves that 
 they would monopolize and tax the living sunshine if 
 they could. They would sell the air we breathe, the 
 green upon the grass, the perfume of the flowers, and 
 the songs of the birds ; but let us rejoice that they are 
 not able to do that yet. As the swart blacksmith, 
 Ebenezer Elliot, used to sing at his anvil, so I sing at 
 my wheelbarrow. 
 
 Beneath the might of wicked men 
 
 The poor man's worth is dying, 
 But thanks to God, in spite of them, 
 
 The lark still warbles flying. 
 
 The unbelievers tell us there is no place of future 
 punishment, but I cannot agree to that. There must 
 be a place '■ ' beyond Jordan " where fuel is cheap, where 
 sulphur can be had for nothing, and where coal dealers 
 who strike against the poor will be kept warm for ever. 
 Else there would be a gap in the moral universe where 
 a big chunk of justice had been knocked out. 
 
82 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 GIVE US A KING. 
 
 It sounds conceited to hear a poor man boast of 
 having Hved a life of luxury, and yet I make that boast. 
 I make it, I trust, with becoming modesty, but after 
 all with pride. The sentiment is not original with me; 
 I borrow it from Robert Burns, who, with much other 
 valuable instruction, taught me "the luxury of being 
 independent." Independent in soul, he meant, for 
 neither of us was ever independent in body — that is, 
 free from poverty and the threateningsof its ministers, 
 cold, hunger, and care. To be sure, I was born rich. 
 I came into the world with a large capital in the shape 
 of health and vitality to my credit in the bank, and 
 although it has been greatly wasted and impaired by 
 many follies, I feel that there is quite a fund still sub- 
 ject to my order. I have worked from dawn till dark 
 at the hardest kind of labor, with pick and shovel and 
 wheelbarrow. I have unloaded lumber from ships; 
 I have carried bricks and mortar in a hod, up, up, 
 ladder after ladder, as high as the top-gallant mast of 
 a man-of-war, and all for scanty wages, but I was 
 proud of the health and strength that enabled me to 
 do it; and the consciousness that I was a free citizen 
 whose vote was equal in power to that of the mil- 
 lionaire, made life not only worth living, but a revelry 
 of enjoyment. When the high-caste party challenged 
 the low-caste party to fight it out, I stood by my order, 
 the low-caste party, and fought it out on that line, 
 not only all summer, but for four summers, and four 
 
GIVE US A KING. 83 
 
 winters, too. When the bullets knocked me over, as 
 they sometimes did, I let the doctors patch me up 
 again, and came forward for another round. At the 
 end of the dispute it was my supreme luxury to "stand 
 up stiddy in the ranks," as the low-caste banner went 
 up and the high-caste banner came down, and I saw 
 the flag of slavery furled for ever. It is now seriously 
 proposed that I shall vote no more. 
 
 A large quantity of self-conceit was knocked out of 
 me some time ago by my favorite paper. The Chicago 
 Tribune. With surprise and consternation I saw that 
 it had gone over to the Tory party. It insisted that I 
 should be degraded, and deprived of the right to vote. 
 This, not for any crime that I had ever done, but be- 
 cause of my caste and my poverty. In the creed of 
 Toryism it is shameful to work itx a living, and pov- 
 erty is the unpardonable sin. The argument of The 
 Tribujie was contained in what is called a "lay ser- 
 mon," preached by one of its editorial writers before 
 the Chicago Philosophical Society. With high-class 
 exultation it proclaimed in big headlines that the lay 
 sermon consisted of "plain truths told in cold English." 
 The description was only half correct. The argument 
 was "cold" enough, cold and bitter as the northern 
 blast; but the "truths" of it were false, in morals, in 
 politics, and in religion. 
 
 While I was reading this lay sermon three won- 
 ders grew up in my mind. First — That any woman 
 could be " cold " enough to preach it. Secondly — What 
 sort of philosophy was taught in that Society? 
 Thirdly — What sort of philosophers belonged to it? 
 Had they possessed one spark of true philosophy they 
 would have hung down their heads in mortification to 
 hear a woman plead in the name of social science for 
 
84 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the starvation of the poor man's child. I do not hke to 
 believe that any woman ever said what I here quote 
 from the report of that lay sermon in The Tribune. 
 It is unnatural for any woman to scold at "Christian 
 charity," or any other kind of charity, especially 
 charity to little children: 
 
 Few recognize the influence of what we call "Christian 
 charity " in drawing these irresponsible men to and keeping them 
 in our cities. They gather like crows around a carrion, and indus- 
 trious people say, " O we cannot let them starve." Cannot let 
 them starve? Why not? How does their starving come to be any 
 business of yours? Oh, but you cannot let their children starve! 
 Why not? What right has any woman to be the mother of chil- 
 dren whose father refuses or neglects to provide for them? The 
 governor of this world lets innumerable creatures die of want. It 
 is by letting some die that he teaches others to live, and we have 
 no right to interfere with his arrangements. 
 
 The human soul shivers in the breeze of such 
 "cold" blasphemy as that, and again I refuse to be- 
 lieve that a woman uttered it. 
 
 I don't know that lady editor, but in the following 
 paragraph she fires very straight at me, as if she had 
 taken particular notice of me when I first walked into 
 the town: 
 
 By what rule of right does any man, entering a city with no 
 more than his clothes, assume political equality with him who has 
 dwelt there, and given time and labor to build and maintain that 
 city? 
 
 Whether this lay preacher is a large woman or a 
 small one, is uncertain, but I defy Mr. Sullivan, of 
 Boston, to hit a man harder than that. I came into 
 the city in just that way, with nothing but my clothes; 
 that is, if you call the man inside the clothes nothing. 
 "Gentlemen of the jury, do you find the prisoner 
 guilty or not guilty?" said a rural justice of the peace 
 at a recent trial. " Guiltier than a dog," replied the 
 
GIVE US A KING. 85 
 
 foreman. And that's the way I feel, "Guiltier than a 
 dog." True, I earned an honest living, but with no 
 more capital than a shovel and a wheelbarrow. I had 
 the wickedness to vote right along, year after year, 
 just the same as if I were President of the Board of 
 Trade. 
 
 Speaking of city evils, the lady editor says that the 
 remedy for them consists in the passage of "laws by 
 which no one but the owners of property shall have a 
 vote in the city government." She also says that in 
 municipal elections "no issue is involved save that of 
 levying and distributing taxes," and that "the govern- 
 ment of a city is purely a financial question." She 
 also makes the common mistake of likening a city 
 corporation to a private corporation formed for pecun- 
 iary profit, such as a railroad company, and logically 
 falls into the advocacy of the cumulative vote. She 
 would give Mr. Potter Palmer a thousand votes, and 
 me none, on the following principle: 
 
 If one owning 100 shares in a railroad has 100 votes, while he 
 who owns one share has but one vote, and he who owns no share 
 has no vote, by what rule of ethics does a man who owns no share 
 in a city vote as often or oftener than he who owns 100 shares? 
 
 Having demanded that voting in cities shall be the 
 exclusive privilege of property owners, she rails with 
 passionate eloquence against "the bald impertinence 
 which enables any poor man to claim or exercise the 
 power to control the property of his rich neighbor," 
 meaning the exercise of the right to vote. 
 
 It is a pity that the philosophers of the Philosoph- 
 ical Society did not show to the lecturer that the 
 rights of persons as well as the rights of things are in- 
 volved in city government. The lives, health, peace, 
 comfort, and security of all the people are included in 
 
86 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the city administration, and these far outweigh in so- 
 cial and political importance mere considerations of 
 property. The education of all the children is also a 
 duty laid upon the city, but this very education is, no 
 doubt, one of the wrongs against property of which 
 the preacher complains. Toryism has always protested 
 against the education of the poor. Let their children 
 grow downward and travel backward rather than make 
 education a tax upon the firm of Plutus, Croesus, Dives 
 and Company. That poor children should learn any- 
 thing at all is a '' bald impertinence," 
 
 Fortunately, the Tories are not yet in power in 
 Chicago, and our children can still go to school. My 
 little daughter in the twelfth class has already learned 
 more about the constituents of a city than this reformer 
 and her philosophers appear to know. She learned it 
 in what she calls a ''piece" which she had to recite 
 from one of the school books. She declaimed it for 
 my instruction a few nights ago, in what I suppose to 
 be the style of Henry Irving when at his best. It goes 
 something like this: 
 
 "What constitutes a State? 
 Not high raised battlement, or labored mound, 
 
 Thick wall or moated gate; 
 Not mansions proud with spires and turrets crowned; 
 
 Not banks and boards of trade, 
 Nor stock-yards, oleaginous and wide. 
 
 Where pigs to pork are made. 
 Where Bridgeport shanties waft perfume to pride. 
 
 No; men, high-minded men, 
 
 These constitute a State." 
 
 And the same rule applies to a city; the bricks and 
 mortar, the bonds and mortgages, the piles of grain 
 and the stocks of goods, the street cars and the wooden 
 pavements; all these constitute but an inferior por- 
 
GIVE US A KING, 87 
 
 tion ot Chicago. The eight hundred thousand men, 
 women and children are its greater elements, and their 
 welfare rises higher than the materialism represented 
 in taxation. Tested by the instincts of nature the po- 
 fitical morality of this lay sermon snaps like a brittle 
 thread. Over there is a tenement rookery, and close 
 beside it a millionaire's palace, filled with "all the 
 wealth of Ormus and of Ind." They are both on fire. 
 The firemen care nothing for the worthless old tene- 
 ment house, but direct all their efforts to save the 
 palace and its furniture. Now let somebody tell the 
 firemen that there is a child in the third story of the 
 rookery, and instantly they leave the palace to its fate 
 and rush to save the child. It is vain to assure 
 them that the child is a vagrant's child, and that it 
 ought to die in justice to the taxpayers. "Lay ser- 
 mons" are useless now; through the fire and the smoke 
 they go at the peril of their own lives to save the vag- 
 rant's child. As one of the heroes appears at the 
 window with it, and carries it tenderly down the lad- 
 der, ten thousand people cheer. Thus the pulsations 
 of the human heart break to pieces the mere mathe- 
 matics of life, and nature itself proclaims that the 
 poorest baby is of more consequence than brown stone 
 fronts four stories high. Here all philosophies give 
 way. 
 
 Besides all this, the workingmen not only build the 
 city, but they pay the taxes too. Do the Tories wish 
 to discuss that question? Before the debate is ended 
 they will learn more of political economy than they 
 will care to know. The man who owns that factory 
 round the corner employs four hundred men. On 
 Monday morning he shows them raw material worth 
 five thousand dollars. They put their labor on it, 
 
88 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 and when Saturday night comes, it is worth 
 thirteen thousand dollars. He pays the men five 
 thousand dollars, keeping three thousand, as his 
 own reward for brain work, care, anxiety, in- 
 terest on capital, taxes, insurance, and the risk of a 
 falling market. Will it be pretended that in this three 
 thousand dollars the workmen have not paid their own 
 taxes and their employer's too? Because the men who 
 own all the laboring muscle of the city, and all the 
 artisan talent, are permitted to vote, the Tories 
 exclaim like the fools of Israel, " Give us a king to 
 rule over us." 
 
 So long as I have the ballot I am the friend of 
 order; take it away from me and I become a revolu- 
 tionist. Toryism in America is folly. The boon that 
 The Tribune seeks would be its own destruction. If 
 it could have its way and disfranchise all the working- 
 men, the value of the fine building on the corner of 
 Madison and Dearborn would depreciate. Stocks 
 would fall, and there would be such a " shrinkage in 
 values" as this generation has not seen. The ballot 
 is the safety valve of American society. So long as I 
 have equality of rights and opportunities I will never 
 complain that my neighbor is rich while I am poor. 
 Take away the ballot from the workingmen, and in- 
 stead of a police force you would need an army to 
 preserve your privileges and your property. So long 
 as the ballot is impartial, property is safe from revo- 
 lutionary violence. The social inequalities that now 
 exist we shall struggle to remove by moral forces, and 
 the amelioration of the laws, by lifting up the poor 
 without dragging down the rich. Deprive us of our 
 moral weapon, the ballot, and we shall then try to 
 equalize conditions by the sword. 
 
89 
 
 CONVICT LABOR. 
 
 I SEE by the papers that the Trade and Labor 
 Assembly held a largely attended meeting on Sunday. 
 Judging by a report of the proceedings, the members 
 worked very hard at the wasteful industry of chopping 
 sand. Convict labor was the subject of debate. This 
 contemptible question is unworthy the dignity of a 
 Trade and Labor Assembly. Until mechanics and 
 laborers can rise to a grander theme than competition 
 with convicts, and until they can conquer their fears 
 of ^'over-production," they will accomplish nothing 
 worthy to be done, either for themselves or others. 
 By keeping down upon this lower plane, they proclaim 
 themselves a lower caste dependent upon the charity 
 of some, the extravagance of others, waste by every- 
 body, and merciful acts of the legislature forbidding 
 other people to work. They persist in limiting pro- 
 duction, because they think that scarcity is beneficial 
 to workingmen. It appears to me that this opinion 
 is a serious mistake, and that the very opposite is true. 
 
 The speakers did not agree with each other on the 
 question of convict labor. Mr. McLogan repeated the 
 old opinion that convicts- should not be allowed to work 
 at mechanical trades, but should be confined to the 
 '' building of country roads." " This plan," he said, 
 ''would recommend itself to the rural districts." In 
 a former article I showed the unfairness of this plan. 
 I showed the injusticeof giving convicts wheelbarrows 
 
90 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 and shovels, and setting them to work in competition 
 with me. I showed that if convicts must be employed 
 at useful work, they should be employed at that which 
 is most profitable, and if they must compete with 
 labor, they should compete with that labor which gets 
 the highest wages, because that is most able to stand 
 the competition. So long as knights of the wheel- 
 barrow work upon the roads, they want convicts em- 
 ployed at some other kind of labor^watchmaking, for 
 instance, or fancy needlework, anything that they 
 don't have to do. 
 
 Mr. McLogan stated that the employment of con- 
 victs upon thepublicroads was the *' English system. " 
 I doubt this. I think it is a mistake. I have traveled 
 afoot over many of the country roads in England look- 
 ing for a job, but I never saw any convicts working on 
 them. Still, this is only negative evidence, and Mr. 
 McLogan may have positive evidence the other way. 
 What of it ? Is the scheme practical for us ? If not, it 
 must be admitted that the discussion of it is a tire- 
 some chopping of sand. If what Mr. McLogan calls 
 the ^' rural districts" are to be won over to the sup- 
 port of his plan, they must be persuaded that it is 
 advantageous to them, and must be assured of an 
 equal distribution of its profits. There are probably 
 about 50,000 miles of public roads in Illinois, and 
 about 5,000 convicts, although I hope there are not so 
 many. This would give the " rural districts " one 
 convict to each ten miles of road, making it necessary, 
 therefore, to have less roads or more convicts. In 
 1862 the regiment that I belonged to was marching 
 through Tennessee, and every night when we went 
 into camp a lot of negroes had to be provided for, 
 who had left the plantations to follow the flag of 
 
CONVICT LABOR. 91 
 
 liberty. Our colonel distributed those negroes among 
 the different companies as servants — so many to each 
 mess. One evening he noticed a disturbance in the 
 camp and inquired the cause of it. <' Why," said a 
 disputant, ''our mess ain't got its full ration of nig- 
 ger." The fatal objection to Mr. McLogan's plan is 
 that it would be impossible to give each ''rural dis- 
 trict" its full ration of convicts. 
 
 Mr. George Schilling had another plan; he thought 
 *'that penitentiaries might be made self-supporting 
 by turning them into farms, whose surplus produce 
 could be used to feed the poor." The objections to 
 this plan is that it might make an "over-production" 
 of pork and potatoes, and place the convicts in com- 
 petition with the farmers. Mr. Schilling, I am sure, 
 will admit upon reflection, that he also was chopping 
 sand. If there are in the Joliet penitentiary a thou- 
 sand convicts, they ought to be able to cultivate a farm 
 of 20,000 acres. Now, in order to keep them from 
 running away, it will be necessary to chain them and 
 handcuff them. This will somewhat impair their 
 efficiency as farm hands, and the harvest home will 
 show a very small quantity of "surplus produce" to 
 be distributed among the poor. 
 
 Perhaps Mr. Schilling intends to have the farm 
 walled in ; if so, I am in favor of his plan. To put a 
 high wall around 20,000 acres of land would make a 
 good deal of " work" for brickmakers and masons. It 
 would create employment for shovelers and hod-car- 
 riers, to both of which professions I have had the 
 honor to belong. It would make a job for me, and this, 
 according to a very popular philosophy, appears to 
 be the chief business of laws and government, to give 
 a job to me, and take it away from him. 
 
92 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 Since writing the above criticism on the proceed- 
 ings of the Trade and Labor Assembly, the justice of 
 my position has been vindicated in a very instructive 
 way. The city government of Washington, impressed 
 by the wisdom of Mr. McLogan's plan, passed an or- 
 dinance to the effect that convicts must not compete 
 with the aristocracy of mechanics, but must "work 
 upon the roads." Thereupon the noble order of scav- 
 engers arose in their might, and threatened revolution. 
 They would not allow unsavory criminals to come 
 ** between the wind and their nobility." The ordi- 
 nance was repealed, and revolution averted. 
 
 I take this opportunity to explain my position on 
 the important subject of ''organized labor." I have 
 been regarded by many able and useful organs of 
 the workingmen as an opponent of Trades Unions, 
 Knights of Labor, and labor associations generally. 
 This is a mistake. I have said over and over again 
 that in the present pressure of monopoly upon labor, 
 it would be the very imbecility of resignation if work- 
 ingmen should not organize themselves in Trades- 
 Unions for their own protection. I have merely crit- 
 icized such of their laws and regulations as I thought 
 were founded on error and injustice. I am not dis- 
 couraged because the workingmen in their trades- 
 unions disagree with me in their theory of social eco- 
 nomics, if that is the correct phrase. It is not of 
 much consequence, just now, whether workingmen in 
 their associations are thinking right or wrong ; the sub- 
 lime encouragement is that they are beginning to think 
 at all. They will think right in time. 
 
 That many of the doctrines now held by the trades- 
 unions will be radically reversed by them, I have no 
 doubt whatever. The unnatural dogma that every 
 
CONVICT LABOR. 93 
 
 workingman is the '' competitor " of every other work- 
 ingman must go. It makes the death or illness of 
 every wage-worker a benefit to all the rest, a doctrine 
 which in its full development would make society a 
 hideous thing to live in. In its place must come the 
 nobler and the manlier principle that every worker is 
 the helper and the friend of every other. The trades- 
 unions will reverse the opinion that scarcity is a desir- 
 able thing, and substitute for it a belief in the blessings 
 of abundance. They will see that not ** over-produc- 
 tion," but *' under-production " means hunger to the 
 poor man's child. 
 
 Once upon a time I worked on a railroad at a place 
 called Longueil, just opposite Montreal. I had to 
 work from daylight until dark, and slept in a barn. I 
 got a dollar a day, and the shoveling was hard, for the 
 land round there was rocky and tough. One day, 
 when my muscles were very tired, I tried to sneak up 
 the plank with a light load, when the boss roared out, 
 *' Tom, fill up the 'barrow; you wouldn't put out a 
 yard of dirt in a week." Thinking the whole matter 
 over that night, I imbibed this industrial heresy, that 
 in order to my happiness the laws of society should be 
 framed, not so as to make more work for me, but less. 
 It occurred to me also that in order to have more 
 food, more clothing, more wages, and less work, I 
 ought to encourage the multiplication of all the com- 
 forts of life, and then seek by proper laws a fairer dis- 
 tribution of them, and in that heresy I expect to die. 
 
94 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 CHOPPING SAND. 
 
 I BELIEVE there is somewhere in the laws of me- 
 chanics a principle known as "waste of power." At 
 allevents, I have heard the phrase used by workingmen, 
 and although I do not understand its technical or scien- 
 tific meaning, I suppose it refers to some leak or other 
 defect in the machine or implement, in consequence of 
 which its mechanical efforts are weakened, and some of 
 its labor lost. I fear that many of the efforts of 
 workingmen to improve their condition are in the 
 wrong direction, and therefore a " waste of power." 
 
 Much effort is being used to relieve the mechanic 
 trades from the competition of convict labor. I think 
 this effort is a '^ waste of power. " Lately I pointed out 
 the unfairness of the demand that convicts be not per- 
 mitted to work at the mechanic trades, but only "on 
 the roads." As a worker "on the roads," I claimed 
 protection also from convict competition. It is gratify- 
 ing to notice that my claim has been conceded by the 
 trades as reasonable and just, for in the platform adopted 
 by the Anti- Monopoly Convention in New York, the 
 demand that convicts be compelled to " work upon the 
 roads," has been abandoned, and it is only now re- 
 quired that they be employed at such labor as will be 
 least in competition with workingmen outside. 
 
 It is plain as figures that if they are employed at 
 any useful or productive labor at all, they must com- 
 
 <c 
 
CHOPPING SAND. 95 
 
 pete with somebody, and in that case the spirit of the 
 resohition requires that they be employed at the most 
 expensive occupations ; at those trades which pay the 
 highest wages, because they can best afford to stand 
 the competition. Of course this doctrine will not be 
 admitted, and having made the circuit of every useful 
 trade and calling in the land, we bring up at last against 
 the frank position we should have maintained in the 
 beginning, namely, that convicts must be compelled 
 to work at something that produces nothing, and I 
 suggest that they be employed at chopping sand. 
 
 I have no patent on this plan ; it is not original with 
 me. I have seen it actually tried, and I knowits value. 
 Once I was employed with some other men in building 
 a house. I was bricklayer's clerk. My duty was to 
 carry up the bricks in a hod, while the bricklayer fixed 
 them with his trowel, square and true. This was be- 
 fore the hod-carrying business was prostrated by the 
 competition of the pulley and the rope, and when I 
 used to find it a healthful rest and recreation from the 
 monotony and weary iteration of the shovel and the 
 pick. One day the boss brought a young fellow with 
 him to work upon the job. He had taken him as an 
 apprentice to the bricklayer's trade ; he gave some in- 
 structions about setting the youth to work, and then 
 went away. The newcomer was not well received, 
 for it was clear as print that unless he should tumble 
 off a scaffold and break his neck, he would grow into a 
 *' competitor " at the bricklaying business with the 
 very men then working on the job. '^What shall we 
 set him at for a beginning?" said one of the men to 
 the foreman. *'Set him to chopping sand," he an- 
 swered, and that was done. 
 
 It was explained to the newcomer that the sand 
 
96 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 they were using was rather coarse, and that some of 
 a finer quality was required. A hatchet was given 
 him, a bushel or two of sand was placed in front of 
 him, and he was told to chop it up fine. He worked 
 faithfully and well, but at last he discovered that all 
 his labor was a "waste of power," that although he 
 might chop forever, the sand would remain the same. 
 Here then is the solution of the convict labor problem, 
 set the convicts to chopping sand ; this will give them 
 work enough, and the results will be the desired noth- 
 ing. How much of the workingmen's efforts to improve 
 their social condition is based on false reasoning ; how 
 much of it is a useless ''waste of power," a weary 
 chopping of sand ! 
 
 Again, if the hard labor of convicts is intended 
 merely as a punishment, nothing can be more ex- 
 quisitely refined and cruel than the labor of chopping 
 sand. To work and produce nothing is torture. The 
 divine quality of labor is proved by the pleasure its 
 product brings. Whether the profit of it comes to the 
 worker or not, it is a satisfaction to know that by his 
 work something exists that did not exist before, or 
 exists in better shape. In my childhood I knew an 
 old man for whom my father used to work. His name 
 was Andrew Martn. Poverty and hardship were his 
 lot in early life, but in hi^ old age he had become very 
 rich, partly through some lucky speculations, and 
 partly through some ''unearned increment" of some 
 town property which he had bought in an early day. 
 Riches bring to a man the luxury of eccentricity, and 
 there are some men who from lack of early education, 
 or some other aptitudes, enjoy no other luxury in old 
 age. Andrew Mann was one of these. 
 
 One day a poor man came to him for charity. 
 
CHOPPING SAND. 97 
 
 <* Why do you not go to work ? " he said ; the man 
 answered that he could not get employment. ^' I want 
 a man to turn a grindstone," said old Andrew; **you 
 can have the job if you want it, and I'll give you a 
 dollar a day." The poor man gladly accepted the 
 offer and went to work. He turned the grindstone 
 merrily under the old man's directions, but nobody 
 came to grind anything. This, of course, was none of 
 his business, and he kept on turning. At last he be- 
 came very tired, and said, */ Mr. Mann, isn't somebody 
 coming to grind something?" ^'No," said his em- 
 ployer; '^but go ahead with your work. " Like the 
 never-ending drip of water on the head, his profitless 
 toil at last became intolerable, and the poor man fairly 
 begged his tormentor to send a man to grind an axe, 
 or a chisel, or a hatchet, or anything at all that would 
 show some benefit from his toil. But the old man was 
 inexorable, and told him to grind on. At last the tor- 
 ture became insupportable, and the man threw up the 
 job. ''I don't obJLect to turning a grindstone," he 
 said, ''if I could see anything to grind, but to grind 
 away at nothing will drive me mad." If punishment 
 alone is the object of convict labor, and if it is good 
 social economics that convicts must not earn anything, 
 then let them turn barren grindstones or chop sand. 
 
98 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 HONEST AND DISHONEST WAGES. 
 
 I SAID a few days ago that although my wages had 
 nominally increased from twenty-five to fifty per cent, 
 in the last thirty years, it had not swollen in pro- 
 portion to the cost of living, and that I find it harder 
 to live now than in 1859. I acknowledge myself a little 
 confused and doubtful about it, since a great Chicago 
 editor has contradicted me in his testimony before the 
 Senate Committee on Education and Labor. He as- 
 sures me that I entirely mistake the cause of my pov- 
 erty ; that it is not because I do not get wages enough, 
 but because I don't save what I get, but squander it 
 in luxury, and tobacco, and beer. Well, if I should 
 save all of it, and never spend a cent, it would take 
 me more than a thousand years to become as rich as 
 that editor ; therefore, L prefer the evidence of my own 
 home and my own pockets to the opulent moralizing 
 of this economical philosopher. In his tenderness for 
 the workingman, he travels all the way to New York 
 to impress upon the committee the prudent maxim of 
 one Dr. Benjamin Franklin, that " a penny saved is a 
 penny earned." 
 
 This editor is one of those philanthropists who pay 
 fifty cents for a dollar's worth of work, and make up 
 the balance in good advice from Poor Richard's alma- 
 
HONEST AND DISHONEST. WAGES. 99 
 
 nac. The question is not what we do with our money, 
 but do we get what fairly belongs to us? As for beer, 
 I have never read any more glowing tributes to the 
 virtues of it than I have found in the editorial columns 
 of that very editor's newspaper. No doubt it would be 
 a good thing if all poor men would abandon beer, and 
 it might be a good thing too if all rich men would take 
 the pledge of Sir John Falstaff to "eschew sack and 
 live cleanly," but this is a matter of morals and pru- 
 dence to be decided by the freewill of each person for 
 himself, rich and poor alike. It is not a question of 
 wages. In the inventory of the great qualities of a 
 certain President of the United States I find recorded 
 his boundless capacity for champagne. I think it would 
 have been better for him if he had never drank cham- 
 pagne; but that is no affair of mine. Mr. Editor wjU 
 not be allowed to confuse the wages question with the 
 beer question, for each must be discussed on its own 
 merits, and decided by itself. 
 
 Speaking for myself, I have long since abandoned 
 the use of beer, and all other intoxicating drinks ; first, 
 because I couldn't afford to buy them, and secondly, 
 because I am stronger and healthier without them. 
 As for tobacco, I am still undecided as to whether its 
 use is hurtful or beneficial. Of course cigars are be- 
 yond my reach, but a pipe of tobacco has a soothing 
 influence upon me,* and the expense of it is nothing in 
 comparison with the solace it brings. I have a fancy 
 that to a certain extent it has the virtue of appeasing 
 hunger. No doubt a doctor could easily show me that 
 I am wrong in this opinion, but I have always noticed 
 that whenever I have abandoned the use of tobacco I 
 have been hungrier than I was before, so that I really 
 believe the cost of it is more than balanced in the sav- 
 
I oo WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 ing of bread. It may be replied to this that smoking 
 must therefore be injurious, as it weakens appetite, 
 but this is no argument in my case, because of all hu- 
 man blessings a good appetite is the smallest benefit 
 to me. I have no use for it. I can stand the expense 
 of tobacco much better than the expense of a good 
 appetite. 
 
 But I began to write about wages, and have per- 
 mitted that editor to switch me off to the side-track of 
 beer. I said that I was getting a dollar and a half a 
 day. That's what they tell me I get, but I have my 
 doubts about it. Do I really get it ? Last week I 
 earned nine dollars exactly — nine silver dollars. I 
 spent them for groceries ; did I get nine dollars' worth ? 
 I suspect that I did not. I believe I was cheated in 
 the weight of the dollars, but I am quite sure that the 
 grocer didn't cheat himself in the weight of the gro- 
 ceries, and I fear that I only got in goods the value of 
 the silver in the dollars that I paid for them. They 
 tell me that the quantity of silver in a dollar is worth 
 eighty cents in gold, and no more ; if so, then my 
 wages is only one dollar and twenty cents a day in 
 gold. This is a frightful discount, and it goes far to 
 explain the reason why my dollar and a half a day is 
 not so much to me as a dollar a day was in the olden 
 time; because the extra twenty cents is not half enough 
 to cover the extra cost of life. 
 
 I suspect that this twenty per cent, on our wages 
 is a tax upon labor, which goes all into the pockets of 
 capital — a tribute to monopoly — every dollar of which 
 is profit. I believe that this twenty per cent, furnishes 
 the capital stock of all the national banks in the coun- 
 try, and that it largely contributes to the unjust dis- 
 tribution of wealth, which is the reproach of our 
 
HONEST AND DISHONEST WAGES. loi 
 
 statesmanship, and a menace to the life of our institu- 
 tions. It widens the social difference between the 
 rich man and me until we scowl at one another — I at 
 him with envy, and he at me with fear. It is making 
 castes and class distinctions in this country that some 
 day will come together with a crash like thunder, as 
 they did in France in 1789. A dollar and a half a day 
 in silver for me, and ten thousand dollars a day in 
 gold for Mr. Vanderbilt, is illogical in a state of society 
 pretending to recognize the equality of us both ; it is 
 the illegitimate offspring of capital and polluted law. 
 I must have more and he must have less, or the 
 strained ligament that holds society together will 
 break. Not by confiscation, nor by physical violence, 
 will the change come — at least in our day — but it will 
 come that way in the next generation, unless the moral 
 forces now at work shall establish capital and labor on 
 a more friendly and equitable basis, unless our social 
 system shall be arranged on juster principles, insuring 
 a fairer division of the profits of labor between the 
 employer and the employed. 
 
 I mentioned my suspicions about the silver dollar 
 to a friend who understands monetary science better 
 than I do, and he assured me that my argument was 
 all unsound, because based on the fallacy that dollars 
 of different 'metals were of unequal value, and the 
 additional fallacy that if I should not be paid in the 
 cheaper metal I should be paid in the dearer one at 
 the same rate of wages. He told me that all dollars 
 are of equal value by decree of Congress. He proved 
 his case by the practical test of a dollar's worth of 
 sugar, which was the same in quantity, whether paid 
 for in paper, or silver, or gold. As he brought the 
 proof of his argument to actual demonstration, I was 
 
1 02 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 compelled to yield, but I was not satisfied, although 
 the concrete evidence of a dollar's worth of sugar was 
 palpable as a church or a barn. 
 
 I learn by object lessons when I learn anything at 
 all, because my mind soon tires with metaphysics and 
 abstract reasoning. In that way I tried to solve the 
 puzzle by the actual experiment of a silver dollar 
 which I paid out the other day for coffee. It was a 
 bright, good-lqoking dollar, with stars and other na- 
 tional emblems upon it to give it character, and the 
 positive statement that it might be depended upon as 
 " one dollar." If any suspicion of short weight, or 
 fraud, or adulteration attached to it, such suspicion 
 immediately vanished on the discovery that it was a 
 religious dollar, inscribed with the legend " In God We 
 Trust." Not to trust in a pious dollar such as that 
 would be to lack faith like an infidel ; but, after all, I 
 believe that it did not buy me a dollar's worth of cof- 
 fee. As I walked over to the store I said to myself : 
 "Does it make any difference whether this coin is 
 called a dollar, or a florin, or a doubloon ? Will it buy 
 me any more coffee than the worth of the silver in it ? 
 The grocer buys his coffee in Brazil, and he pays for 
 it in gold ; if this coin is worth eighty cents in gold 
 and no more, I can get eighty cents' worth of coffee 
 for it, and no more; unless the government steps in 
 and agrees to make up the difference between the value 
 of the cheap dollar and the dear one. If the eighty 
 per cent, dollar and the hundred per cent, dollar have 
 equal purchasing power, it must, be because in some 
 way or other the government promises to redeem 
 the cheaper coin. Unless this promise of redemption 
 can be found somewhere in the fiscal machinery of 
 the government, I could not possibly get more than 
 
HONEST AND DISHONEST WAGES. 103 
 
 eighty cents worth of coffee for my silver dollar. There 
 is no political economy in the world that will convince 
 me that the grocer could afford to give me any more. 
 I know that Aladdin gave a new lamp for an old one, 
 and got the best of the bargain, but that was an ex- 
 ceptional case, the only one in history. Similar good 
 luck is not likely to happen in our day. The transmu- 
 tation of metals has not been done yet, and until it is 
 done we need not expect to buy a hundred cents' worth 
 of coffee for eighty cents' worth of silver. I think I 
 am cheated in the dollars I get for my work. 
 
I04 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 PAYMENT IN PROMISES TO PAY. 
 
 It is generally conceded that a promise by one man 
 to pay another a hundred dollars is not payment, 
 but there are some persons who believe that ''Gov- 
 ernment" has the magic power to pay ten thou- 
 sand million dollars with its own promises to pay. 
 They even expand the miracle so that a citizen debtor 
 can pay his debts by the simple "tender" of one 
 of those promises of "Government." Several gentle- 
 men who believe in this impossible alchemy have 
 criticized my doctrine of dollars, with tart sarcasm 
 which reminds me of crab-apple vinegar. I will turn 
 the orther cheek to them by a few words in reply. I will 
 first notice Mr. Albert of Kentucky. 
 
 Mr. Albert abandons his former position. He ad- 
 mits that he was wrong on his law point, and he 
 changes his argument as to the work performed by 
 government in balancing the value of gold and silver 
 dollars. In his first criticism he said that the American 
 grocer could buy as much coffee in Brazil with the 
 silver dollars he receives in payment for it here as 
 with gold dollars, because "he exchanges his paper 
 or silver to the government at a nominal discount to 
 cover the transfer, and receives gold in return." Being 
 shown his mistake he now says that the government 
 "does not do it directly, but indirectly, by receiving 
 gold, silver, or paper at the same value and indis- 
 criminately for taxes and duties." "Upon this hint 
 
FA YMENT IN PROMISES TO PA V. 105 
 
 I spake," said Othello, and I think that Mr. Albert 
 spoke those words on a hint from me, but they must 
 vexatiously entangle him because in the preceding 
 sentences he impressed it upon me that '^ paper shall 
 not be accepted in payment of duties." This, he was 
 careful to remind me, is printed on the reverse side of 
 the greenbacks themselves. Mr. Albert calls my ar- 
 guments ''nebulous." No doubt they are nebulous 
 to him, and so I fear is every kind of knowledge, for 
 his brain is wrapped in clouds ; yet he frankly admits 
 that he is "a. well-informed man." 
 
 How queer it is for "a well-informed man " to say 
 that "a promise to pay without any specified time for 
 payment is of no value," and that " no^nina/ value is 
 a term unknown in political economy, for it cannot be 
 defined." I confess, as Mr. Albert kindly says, that it 
 is a subject of which I know little. I have had no 
 time to study political economy, but in the few books 
 on the ''dismal science," which it has been my priv- 
 ilege to read, the term* is often mentioned, and this 
 must be my excuse for using it. Jevons on " Money," 
 page 75, treats of the distinction between the metallic 
 value and the no??iinal value of coins. The statutes of 
 the United States frequently speak of the '^nominal 
 value" of the money we are using now. It is a pity 
 that our statesmen should have been so ignorant as to 
 speak of "nominal value" in the very laws of the 
 land. Had they consulted "a well-informed man" 
 he would have warned them that '' nojninal value is a 
 term unknown in political economy for it cannot be 
 defined." 
 
 A critic who makes those fundamental mistakes is 
 not entitled to any further reply. We cease to dis- 
 cuss the rules of rhetoric with a man as soon as we 
 
1 06 WHEELBARRO W. 
 
 discover that he has not yet mastered the alphabet ; 
 so the man who shows that he has not yet learned the 
 alphabet of finance is not entitled to the tribute of ar- 
 gument which we extend to a capable disputant. I 
 must decline therefore to notice the rest of Mr. Al- 
 bert's errors, except incidentally in my reply to that 
 comical person, Mr. J. Allen, of Wyoming Territory, 
 who has danced into the controversy looking very 
 much like little Breeches in the poem, ^'peeart, and 
 chipper, and sassy." 
 
 Once upon a time a pugnacious Arkansaw traveler 
 came suddenly upon a very exciting tournament. 
 Goaded by a love of glory, he inquired, *' Is this a free 
 fight?" They told him it was. ''Count me in," he 
 said ; and in he went. After the lapse of a minute 
 and a half, he again remarked, '' Is this a free fight ?" 
 They answered, "Yes." ''Count me out," he said, 
 and left the meeting without waiting for the benedic- 
 tion. Mr. J. Allen rushes with kindred bravery and 
 want of discretion upon a like .experience. He knows 
 little enough to say that " ' Wheelbarrow ' entirely over- 
 looks the real cause of the depreciation of silver dol- 
 lars ; it is nothing more nor less than the lack of the 
 legal tender qualification necessary to make it a bona- 
 fide dollar." He has not yet got far enough in his 
 alphabet to know that silver dollars are a legal tender, 
 and yet he has the nerve to criticize and explain the 
 American financial system. 
 
 A finance critic who does not know that the silver 
 dollars of his own country are a legal tender could 
 hardly be historically accurate, and he is not to be 
 held responsible for the following mistake : " The first 
 sixty million dollars of greenbacks issued by this gov- 
 ernment were a legal tender in the payment of all 
 
PAYMENT IN PROMISES TO PAY: 107 
 
 dues, and were in no sense based upon gold, and a 
 better money was never uttered." Now, it is a curious 
 fact that this celebrated sixty million dollars was not 
 legal tender at all. Of course, the good or bad char- 
 acter of those dollars is a matter of opinion. Mr. 
 Allen thinks "a better money was never uttered." I 
 think worse money has been uttered, but that was 
 very bad. Speaking of that famous sixty millions, the 
 American Cyclopaedia makes the following flattering 
 remarks. It says, those notes "did not enter freely 
 into circulation, and there were instances of soldiers 
 having to submit to the loss of a discount on those re- 
 ceived for pay of from four to twenty per cent, in the 
 District of Columbia." ** Better money was never 
 uttered," says Mr. Allen, although, at Washington, 
 where it was made, soldiers paid in that money for 
 defending the Capitol itself, were cheated by it from 
 four to twenty per cent. 
 
 Listen to this : '* A nickel," says Mr. Allen, "which 
 is neither gold nor silver, nor redeemable i7i either , will 
 purchase just as much coffee as five cents in silver." 
 Here, again, he reasons upside down. The nickel 
 does that just because it is redeemable. On that sub- 
 ject I find in the Revised Statutes of the United States 
 the few feeble remarks following, that is to say : 
 
 "The five-cent and three-cent copper nickel, and one-cent 
 bronze coins shall be a legal tender at their 7tominal value for 
 any amount not exceeding twenty-five cents in any one payment, and 
 
 " The Secretary of the Treasury is required to redeem in law- 
 ful money all copper, bronze, copper-nickel, and base metal 
 coinage of the United States." 
 
 The faith of the people that they will be redeemed 
 according to the promise of the law' gives them cur- 
 rency, exactly as faith gives value to milk tickets. 
 
1 08 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 This morning I was roused from slumber before day- 
 light by the milkman '' rapping, rapping at my cham- 
 ber door." I got up and let him in. He gave me a 
 quart of milk, and I gave him a paper ticket, about 
 the size of a silver dollar. At certain times I buy a 
 dollar's worth of tickets, and file them away for use 
 when wanted. These tickets are not milk, they are 
 merely securities redeemable in milk. Although they 
 are not ^^ legal tender'' I have faith in them, because 
 the dairyman has never failed to redeem them at their 
 nominal value, a pint of milk for a red ticket, and a 
 quart for a yellow one. If he should fail in business, 
 my milk tickets on hand would be like the paper money 
 of a broken government — worthless. But the metal 
 money of a country up to its full bullion value, never 
 fails. The coins of Alexander the Great have sur- 
 vived a hundred nations, and are good to-day. 
 
 The promise of redemption gives the greenbacks 
 value. This promise is not only printed on the face 
 of them, but has been solemnly written by Congress 
 in the law of March, i86g. It contradicts the asser- 
 tion that they are dollars, and this denial has been 
 enrolled among the judgments of the Supreme Court 
 of the United States. That tribunal has decided that, 
 
 " The dollar note is a promise to pay a dollar, and the dollar 
 intended is the coin dollar of the United States. These notes are 
 obligations, they bind the national faith. They are therefore 
 strictly securities." 
 
 On that principle greenbacks are exempt from 
 taxation. The Supreme Court has decided that also, 
 on the ground that they are not dollars, but merely 
 securities of the United States, and therefore not 
 taxable either by the nation, or by any city, or county, 
 or State. 
 
FA YMENT IN PROMISES TO PA V. 109 
 
 I feel like making an apology for degrading con- 
 troversy by answering the statement of Mr. Allen that 
 if the world were to demonetize gold, a gold dollar 
 would be worth only five cents, and the equally wild 
 assertion that it would be worth about fifteen cents 
 if the United States were to demonetize gold. The 
 American gold dollar contains 25.8 grains of gold. 
 According to Mr Allen the value of the metal is fifteen 
 cents, and the United States by coining it into a dollar 
 adds an extra value to it of eighty-five cents. Do I 
 not owe an apology to the reader for noticing such 
 exuberant error ? 
 
 Coinage adds the merest trifle to the value of the 
 metal coined. - This is proven by the fact that gold 
 bullion is nearly equal in value to the same quantity 
 of gold in eagles or in sovereigns. I think the four 
 hundred shekels of silver paid by Abraham for the 
 field of Machpelah were not coins, for they were 
 weighed^ not counted, and yet they were '' current 
 money with the merchant." When the sons of Abra- 
 ham passed under the dominion of Rome, and those 
 shekels bore the ' ' image and superscription " of Caesar, 
 their value relatively to the other silver round about 
 them was not changed. The coining of them simply 
 dispensed with the trouble of weighing them. The 
 *' image and superscription" merely said to the mer- 
 chants, ''You need not weigh this piece; Caesar hath 
 already weighed it, and vouches that it contains so 
 many grains of silver. " And wherever those shekels 
 are to-day, whether in shillings or in dollars, whether 
 bearing the image of Queen "Victoria, or our own 
 Goddess of Liberty, the ''image and superscription" 
 upon them only testify to their weight. Whatever 
 additional value they obtain by reason of their ''legal 
 
1 1 o WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 tender'' quality, is a dishonest value, the measure of 
 their usefulness in cheating creditors and poor men 
 out of their wages. 
 
 There is a playful innocence in Mr. Allen's fairy- 
 like vows of what he would do with gold and silver 
 had he the power. He would reverse the laws of the 
 universe, and make water run up-hill instead of down. 
 He would demolish what he calls the "idol" gold, 
 and erect a paper "idol" in its place. He would 
 make gold inferior to silver, and then "base both of 
 them upon a paper standard, making them redeemable 
 in United States Treasury Notes, and then demonetize 
 both of them." Many similar miracles he would per- 
 form b}' the same power. All this is like the boasting 
 of the poetical child, 'who delights us with airy prom- 
 ises of what impossible things he would do if he -were 
 King of France. 
 
Ill 
 
 THE WORKINGMAN'S DOLLAR. 
 
 The praiseworthy effort to prove that a pound of 
 coffee weighing sixteen ounces, and a pound of coffee 
 weighing fourteen ounces, can be made equal in value 
 by Act of Congress is still going on. I am thankful 
 to the finance teachers who have kindly taken me in 
 hand, although I fear that I shall never be able to 
 understand the '^laws of money." 1 go down meekly 
 to the foot of the class, and acknowledge myself the 
 dullest pupil in the school. I cannot yet see that the 
 silver dollars I get for my wages, each worth eighty 
 cents, are just as valuable as gold dollars worth a hun- 
 dred cents a piece, and I don't believe they are. 
 
 In a friendly criticism Mr. Albert of Kentucky gives 
 me a lesson, and he tries with patient good temper to 
 make the matter clear as mud, in this way : He 
 says — '^I would first advise * Wheelbarrow,' the next 
 time he gets hold of a greenback, to read it carefully. 
 He will find the words ^on demand,' which are a 
 distinctive feature of redeemable money, left out. Any 
 lawyer will tell him that a promise to pay, without 
 specified time of payment, is of no value." This leads 
 me to suspect that Mr. Albert is a lawyer, which gives 
 him a great advantage in the argument. It is very 
 easy for him to refer me to a lawyer for information 
 as to the legal obligation of promises to pay, but I 
 cannot afford to get knowledge in that way. As it 
 
1 1 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 would cost me a week's wages and a dollar over to 
 speak to a lawyer in Chicago, I went down to the 
 public library and got a look at some law books on 
 '* Contracts," and they all said that a promise to pay 
 without specified time for payment is a legal and moral 
 obligation to pay the amount stated, of so much 
 ^' value" that it will be enforced at law. This dis- 
 courages me at the very start because it makes me 
 doubt the wisdom of my teacher. If Mr. Albert's 
 finance is as bad as his law, I fear that his instruction 
 is of ''no value." 
 
 Speaking of the greenbacks, Mr. Albert says : ''For 
 ten years the United States made no pretensions to 
 exchange them for gold or silver, and yet they had 
 a value varying from par to fifty per cent, discount. 
 What gave them that value?" "Was it faith?" he 
 says, "or the result of some natural law?" and he 
 advises me at my leisure to "study out that conun- 
 drum." Well, I'll wrestle with it, and while I'm 
 working it, will he tackle this one : What gave them 
 the discount ? 
 
 My first guess at the conundrum is this: Faith 
 gave them value, and doubt gave them discount; just 
 as they gave value and discount to the legal tenders 
 of the Confederate States. The value and discount 
 were regulated by the chances of their payment in 
 gold, and the time of such payment. I was in several 
 battles down South, and I noticed that whenever we 
 got whipped the greenbacks got discount, and the gray- 
 backs got value, and vice versa. When Sherman took 
 Atlanta the graybacks got so much discount that they 
 have never had much value since. 
 
 The ancient assumption that a fish put into a vessel 
 of water adds nothing to the weight of the whole, is 
 
THE WORKINGMAJSI'S DOLLAR. 113 
 
 adopted by Mr. Albert, and he coolly remarks : " As to 
 the reason why the laborer's eighty cent silver dollar 
 will buy as much as the boss's one dollar gold piece ; " 
 as if that fact were proved, when it is the main point 
 in dispute. The reason, however, is pure magic ; here 
 it is : "All things have two values — the intrinsic value 
 and the exchangeable value ; money owes its value 
 to both. The government can regulate the exchange 
 value, it cannot affect the intrinsic value." That is to 
 say, that money has a real, genuine value of itself, in- 
 dependent of the government, and a false value given 
 it by Act of Congress. What Mr. Albert probably 
 means is that government gives a nominal value to 
 money, and that it circulates at that value within its 
 own dominions. All this is but an evasion of the true 
 question, which is : Ought governments to give a no- 
 minal value to money different from its real value, 
 and thus cheat all men who work for wages ? Govern- 
 ment can give an exchangeable value to the yardstick, 
 and decree that thirty inches shall be a yard, and it 
 will be so, but government can never make ten yards 
 of calico measured by the new yardstick equal in 
 length or value to ten yards measured in the old way. 
 I am confident that Mr. Albert is in a whirl of con- 
 fusion on the currency question, or he would not give 
 us whole sentences utterly destitute of meaning, like 
 this : *'The government, by affording facilities to ex- 
 change silver, paper, nickel, and copper at par, or 
 nearly so, it makes their exchangeable value equal to 
 that of gold, after it has placed its stamp upon them." 
 At par with what? "That pig," said the seller, "will 
 weigh 200 pounds on an average.^'' Does Mr. Albert 
 mean silver, nickel, copper, paper, "at par" with one 
 another, or with gold ? And if either or both, at what 
 
1 1 4 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 standard ? Ounce for ounce, or bulk for bulk ? This 
 obscure sentence is the most important in his article, 
 because he bases all his argument upon it, quaintly 
 remarking : "This explains why the silver dollar will 
 buy as much as the gold one, and also why a grocer 
 can buy as much coffee in Brazil with the silver he 
 receives in payment here." 
 
 'here is a painful headache in all that inconsequent 
 reasoning of Mr. Albert. That very miracle is just 
 what the grocer cannot perform. He cannot buy 
 coffee in Brazil and pay for it in silver dollars at par 
 with gold dollars, for the obvious reason that gold 
 dollars and silver dollars are not of equal value. In 
 the market rep®rts of the newspapers I find silver 
 quoted like wheat, or oil, or pork. Nor can the 
 government help the grocer to the value of a cent. It 
 will not even try to help him, and Mr. Albert makes 
 an inexcusable blunder when he says that the grocer 
 ' ' exchanges his paper or silver to the government, at 
 a nominal discount to cover the transfer, and receives 
 gold in return." He does nothing of the kind. The 
 government will not give gold dollars for silver dollars. 
 On the contrary, the government actually buys silver 
 in the market, at the current price, whatever it is, 
 then takes eighty cents worth of it, and stamps it, ''One 
 dollar : In God We Trust," and makes a clear profit of 
 twenty-five per cent. This profit is a tax upon the 
 wages of the workingman, who is compelled to take 
 these dollars at their apocryphal or ''exchangeable" 
 value, instead of at their real value. "To increase 
 the weight of the silver dollars," says Mr. Albert, 
 would make them "heavier to carry about." That's 
 true, but I'll try and stagger along under mine. As 
 Mr. Albert is in error as to his facts, of course his 
 
THE WORKINGMAN'S DOLLAR. 115 
 
 arguments founded on them partake of their defects, 
 and are valueless. If government can give an ''ex- 
 changeable " value to silver dollars and make them 
 equal to gold dollars, why will it not exchange one for 
 the other ? Why repudiate its own work, and dishonor 
 its own coinage ? 
 
 1 o be sure, I can go into a store and buy a dollar's 
 worth of coffee, and the grocer will give me the same 
 quantity, whether I pay him a gold, or silver, or paper 
 dollar ; but this apparent equality in value ought not 
 to deceive anybody. It is evident that where payment 
 can be made in different coins of the same denomination 
 but of different metallic values, the merchant must fix 
 the price of his goods on the presumption that he will 
 be paid for them in the cheapest currency ; if he gets 
 the dearer coins occasionally, so much the better, but 
 he cannot afford to count on them. During the war 
 the prices pf goods went up as the value of greenbacks 
 went down. It could not be otherwise ; and when I 
 take my nine dollars, which I get as wages every 
 Saturday night, and buy household comforts with it, 
 I find fifteen or twenty percent., and sometimes more 
 than that added to the price of nearly everything I buy. 
 
 If the greenback is of ''no value" because the 
 words " on demand " are left out of its promise to pay, 
 why does Mr. Albert contend that it is just as good as 
 gold ? And if it is of " no value " for any reason, why 
 should it be imposed on me as wages for my work ? 
 The value of any promise in morals, in business, or in 
 politics depends entirely on the size of the chance that 
 it will be redeemed. The value of a greenback dollar, 
 or a silver dollar, or a brass dollar, depends on the 
 chance that it will be redeemed in the dearest money 
 current in its life time, and, at present, this is gold. If 
 
1 1 6 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 silver dollars worth eighty cents apiece, and gold 
 dollars worth a hundred cents apiece appear just now 
 to circulate at mercantile par with each other in or- 
 dinary transactions, it is because there is a working 
 promise somewhere in the machinery of the govern- 
 ment to pay the twenty cents. Where is it ? Let us see. 
 Mr. Albert kindly advises me to read the green- 
 back, and I shall find the words ^'On demand" left 
 out. Will he '' change works" with me and read the 
 legend on the silver certificate, and he will find the 
 words '^on demand" left in ; but it is very careful not 
 to say, ^'dollars payable to bearer on demand," but 
 silver dollars. On the reverse side of it, that in- 
 vidious dictiilction is apologized for, and partly cured 
 in the following agreement: ''This certificate is 
 receivable for customs, taxes, and all public dues." 
 Here is the working promise to make up the difference 
 in value between the silver dollar and the gold dollar. 
 The promise appears to me to be reliable enough within 
 the sphere of the sum total of the public revenues, 
 and perhaps, a little beyond that sum ; but it is a 
 precarious reliance for the laboring man, because it is 
 liable to be broken at any time by law or by war. 
 
117 
 
 THE PAPER DOLLAR. 
 
 Mr. S., of Lincoln, California, has criticized my 
 complaint against the silver dollar. He says that I 
 offer "only one argument against continuing the coin- 
 age and use of the dollar, namely — there is not enough 
 silver in it." This, he says, ''is about the only argu- 
 ment founded on fact, advanced by any opponent of 
 the monetization of silver. Very well, the only argu- 
 ment " founded on fact " against the last half ton of 
 coal I bought was tHat it contained only seven hun- 
 dred and fifty pounds. What further argument is ne- 
 cessary ? The coal merchant gave troy weight in mis- 
 take for avoirdupois. The quality of the coal was good 
 enough. I complain not of that. So the nine silver 
 dollars I got for my week's wages were good silver, 
 but they were deficient in weight. That's all I com- 
 plain of. 
 
 The weakness of my argument, says Mr. S., "is 
 apparent upon reflecting that there is not a dollar's 
 worth of paper in a greenback or bank-note; yet 
 the paper dollar will buy as much as the gold dol- 
 lar." The weakness of this argument consists in the 
 fact that there is no such thing as a paper dollar. As 
 to the pieces of paper that travel about as dollars, I 
 will do them the justice to say that they make no 
 claim to be anything more than promissory notes. I 
 had one of them this morning : it was my only mone- 
 
1 1 8 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 tary possession in this world, and 1 squandered it at 
 the meat-market, but before parting with it I read 
 carefully the legend on it — " The United States will 
 pay to bearer one dollar." This promise I traded for 
 beef. I had no money to pay for the beef, but the 
 butcher accepted the printed promise of the United 
 States to pay for it, and I walked off with my Sunday's 
 roast. Mr. S. thinks that the " paper dollar " buys 
 beef because of its own value ; and he reveals in that 
 queer delusion the weakness of his own position. 
 
 When anybody tells Mr. S. that the reason why 
 the paper promise to pay a dollar will buy beef, is 
 because it is based on gold, and can be exchanged 
 for gold, he replies, "Is it possible that any con- 
 siderable number of those who make this reply do 
 not know that the silver dollar can also be exchanged 
 for gold, or for silver certificates, that are equal to gold 
 in purchasing power?" With shame I confess that I 
 am so ignorant as not to know that the silver dollars 
 can also be exchanged for gold ones, and I will be 
 thankful if Mr. S. will tell me where this wonderful 
 miracle is done. Do they perform it at the United 
 States Treasury ? If not, will they do it at the Mint 
 in California? If Mr. S. knows the magician who per- 
 forms this valuable alchemy, will he kindly introduce 
 me to him ? I should like to win his friendship. 
 
 " Or for silver certificates." This unlucky phrase 
 condemns Mr. S.'s argument, because if gold dollars 
 and silver dollars are of equal value, then gold certifi- 
 cates and silver certificates must also be equal for 
 similar amounts, and silver dollars could be exchanged 
 for gold certificates ; but the fact is, they can only be 
 exchanged for silver certificates, because of their in- 
 ferior value. All decrees of legislatures regulating 
 
THE PAPER DOLLAR. 119 
 
 the purchasing power of money, or the selling value 
 of goods, are void by the constitution of nature and 
 society. They are futile as the law which declares 
 how many bushels of wheat shall grow on an acre of 
 land, and how many pounds of wool a sheep shall wear 
 in his overcoat. If silver dollars and gold dollars were 
 equal, surely the Government would not make an}'^ dis- 
 tinction between them. Let Mr. S. test the Treasury, 
 and he will see his golden vision vanish. Let him 
 deposit ten thousand silver dollars with the Treasurer 
 of the United States, and ask him for a gold certificate 
 of that amount, and the very messenger boys will 
 laugh at him. Let him ask for a certificate to that 
 amount simply in dollars, without specifying the 
 metal, and the result will be the same. His certifi- 
 cate will be very careful to say that his deposit was 
 in silver dollars, and the Government will pay back 
 nothing else when the certificate is returned. 
 
 Mr. S. asks a plain, straightforward question, 
 " Does * Wheelbarrow ' believe it would be good to 
 retire the silver dollar, or would he have more sil- 
 ver put in it?" He shall have a straightforward an- 
 swer. I believe that if more silver were put in it, it 
 would do "good" — to me, and it was purely from a 
 standpoint of self-interest that my attack upon the sil- 
 ver dollar was made. As a man working for wages, I 
 confess that I am not satisfied with the weight of sil- 
 ver in the dollars I get for my labor, and I would like 
 to see the metal in the silver dollar increased until it 
 reaches the value of a dollar in gold. To tell me that 
 a silver dollar worth eighty cents will purchase as 
 much for me as a gold dollar worth a hundred cents, 
 is to trifle with my common sense ; it is like persuad- 
 ing me that fourteen ounces make as valuable a pound 
 
1 20 ' WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 of coffee as sixteen ounces, and that it is a superstition 
 to believe that there is any difference between them. 
 
 If I accept Mr. S.'s invitation to wander off with 
 him into a discussion of the good or evil policy of 
 " retiring " silver dollars, both of us will soon be 
 floundering out of our depth in the flood of jargon in- 
 vented by currency tinkers and quack statesmen to 
 bewilder a lot of dupes like Mr. S. and me. What 
 gibberish is this about "retiring" anything that is of 
 actual value to mankind ? Nature has planted the ore 
 in the earth ; men dig it out and smelt it, and refine it 
 into silver for human benefit, and immediately a lot of 
 financial marplots want to "retire " it into the moon- 
 beams, or into the nebular hypothesis, or " anywhere, 
 anywhere, out of the world." As wisely talk of " re- 
 tiring " the mountains whence it comes. As well talk 
 of "retiring " corn, or hats, or calico. The coinage of 
 silver should be unlimited, for coining is nothing more 
 than the government certificate stamped upon the piece 
 of metal to the effect that it weighs so many penny- 
 weights or grains; but it should be an hnnest coinage, 
 not eighty per cent, truth, and twenty per cent, false- 
 hood. The present Silver Coinage Act is a monument 
 of imbecility or dishonesty. If silver coinage is a good 
 thing, why limit it to four million dollars a month? 
 And if it is a bad thing why compel the government to 
 coin at least itwo millions a month? This kind of ob- 
 struction to nature's laws is ironically called states- 
 manship. 
 
 Mr. S. is kind enough to say that I am " too 
 sensible a man to wish to see silver demonetized 
 and left in circulation, as was done in 1873." He is 
 also positive that I " did not work for wages during 
 those six terrible years from 1873 to 1878, when em- 
 
THE PAPER DOLLAR. 121 
 
 ployers bought silver at from ten to fifteen cents dis- 
 count, and .paid their laborers with it at full value." 
 As to that I can only say that I did work for wages 
 during those " terrible six years," but I must confess 
 that my employers did not oppress me to such a heart- 
 less extent as to pay me in. silver dollars, because they 
 were at a premium. I never received a dollar in sil- 
 ver during the whole time, because greenback dollars 
 were cheaper than silver dollars, and my employers 
 paid me in paper. Employers on the Atlantic coast 
 were not so hard-hearted as they were on the Pacific 
 coast. They didn't impose upon their workmen the 
 cruelty of silver dollars. If they had done so, it would 
 have been better for me. Mr. S.'s illustration curi- 
 ously proves my position, that workingmen are always 
 paid in the cheapest money current at the time, and 
 if he will keep strict watch he will notice that in pro- 
 portion to the cheapness of the dollars paid them for 
 their wages, inversely and adversely is the dearness of 
 the necessaries of life which they are compelled to buy. 
 
 What will I do "if silver appreciates in value until 
 it is worth more than gold ? " Well, I will cross that 
 bridge when I come to it. But I shall never cross it, 
 because when that appreciation comes I shall be 
 treading the golden pavements of that celestial city 
 where silver is cheaper than sand. 
 
 So long as the government redeems the silver dol- 
 lar by accepting it for taxes at its face value, so long 
 it may be kept at mercantile par with a gold dollar ; 
 but whenever the government knocks that prop from 
 under it the silver dollar will fall to its bullion value ; 
 business will drop to a silver basis with a crash, and 
 the prices of everything will rise except the price of 
 labor. A depreciated currency is a continual menace 
 
1 22 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 to the working men. When I hear them clamoring to 
 be paid in cheap money for dear work, their cry sounds 
 like a vehement appeal for lower wages. 
 
123 
 
 THE SHRINKAGE OF VALUES. 
 
 I AM just now engaged in exploring the dark re- 
 cesses of monetary science, but I don't make much 
 progress. It is a mammoth cave, full of labyrinths 
 and passages. I fear that my guides are ignorant also. 
 They pretend to know all its pathways, but the lights 
 they carry only flicker in the gloomy vastness; guides 
 and followers stumble along together. To rich men, 
 the study of finance and its laws, may be of little con- 
 sequence, but to me, whose wages never exceeds $400 
 a year, it is of the highest importance that the money 
 of the country should be of good material, and strong 
 in market value. The rich man can protect hin)self 
 against its fluctuations and its changes, its expansions 
 and contractions, but I am helpless. The Secretary 
 of the Treasury never consults me as to whether he 
 shall buy bonds or sell them. The Chairman of the 
 Ways and Means Committee never waits upon me at 
 my office in the Sand Bank, to enquire whether I de- 
 sire the coinage of silver dollars to go on or stop; the 
 Judges of the Supreme Court do not care whether I 
 want the legal tender act sustained or declared un- 
 constitutional. Banking syndicates. Boards of Trade, 
 Wall Streets, Incorporated Sweat Extractors of every 
 kind, never inquire whether my dollar and-a-half a day 
 will buy me enough to eat or not. For these reasons 
 I desire to see the monetary policy of the country on 
 
124 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 a solid and scientific foundation. To me it is not a 
 matter of party expediency; it is a question of bread. 
 
 I don't know how to build a house, but I can tell 
 a good job of work when I see it. If I see a crack in 
 the wall, I suspect a bad foundation, and I know that 
 a botch has had something to do with it. When I 
 find the Secretary of the Treasury paying off the 3 per 
 cent, bonds, and further discover that the United States 
 of America has bound itself by solemn treaty with the 
 United States of Wall Street not to pay its 4 per cents, 
 until the year 1907, I know that the job was a botch, 
 and that the Congress who did the work was com- 
 posed of a lot of " plugs." Either that, or they were 
 knaves making bad laws for their own profit. 
 
 Much of the pleasure of mjr life has consisted in 
 wishing my life away. My joy of an afternoon has been 
 to see my shadow lengthen in the sun. As it grew 
 longer my time of rest grew nearer. I have been hon- 
 ester than other men, because I was compelled to be. 
 The luxury of cheating is not mine, for somebody is 
 watching me forever. I have stolen a little rest oc- 
 casionally by the fraudulent device of lighting my pipe 
 with contrary matches, which would never burn until 
 the impatient boss yelled at me, "Tom, it takes you a 
 long time to light that pipe." One day when this oc- 
 curred I seized my 'barrow, and walking down the 
 plank, I thought like this, " He will not allow me to 
 wheel up a light load; he will not permit me to clip a 
 moment of time, is he so particular to pay good money 
 for wages?" It flashed upon me all at once that he 
 always paid me in the cheapest money that was cur- 
 rent at the time, and it occurred to me also that I had 
 been howling for payment in cheaper money still. 
 The experience came full upon me the other day when, 
 
THE SHRINKAGE OF VALUES. 125 
 
 picking up a Chicago paper, I read this alarming head- 
 ing to an editorial article, " Drifting toward dear 
 money." It was evidently written by one of the stum- 
 bling guides of the mammoth cave. 
 
 What is dear money? Something dreadful certainly, 
 for "drifting" suggests a ship, helpless, and rudder- 
 less moving to its doom. My fright ended when on 
 reading the article I discovered that " dear money " 
 meant something that would buy more goods than 
 money of the cheaper sort; and when on reading fur- 
 ther I saw that "dear money" included the calamity 
 of cheap rent and clothes and fuel and bread, I shouted, 
 " Let her drift." The artificial values that have been 
 placed by bad laws upon the blessings of life, must 
 come to an honest level some time or other, and the 
 sooner the better for me. 
 
 The prime cause of this impending calamity, 
 according to this bewildered guide, is the " virtual 
 contraction of the total volume of exchangeable credit 
 caused by the steady withdrawal and cancellation of 
 about $2,000,000,000 of United States National Bonds, 
 which, in our exchanges with Europe, had performed 
 the functions of an international currency jointly with 
 gold." Occult phrases have always been the stock in 
 trade of conjurers, and this ponderous jargon about 
 " exchangeable credit," complicated and confused with 
 thousands of millions of dollars, is the device of a lost 
 guide to conceal his ignorance of the road. He did 
 not see that the bonds had been "cancelled" by pay- 
 ment, and that their vacant places had been filled by 
 actual gold money, created by the labor of the people, 
 and drawn from them by the surgical process known 
 as taxation. " Exchangeable credit" is only the reverse 
 side of a coin having "exchangeable debt" on its 
 
126 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 obverse side. A bond is only a promise to pay a debt, 
 and the credit in it and the debt in it must travel the 
 world together. 
 
 A great many fictitious attributes of goodness have 
 been given of late to these bonds. The beneficent 
 national banks have been built upon them ; they 
 furnish a convenient savings-box for widows and 
 orphans to keep their money in ; they make the 
 " coupon clippers " loyal to the government, and many 
 other miracles they do ; now we are told that they 
 make a fine article of " exchangeable credit," and '' per- 
 form the functions of an international currency." If 
 those bonds have all these virtues they are blessed 
 things, and the war that brought them is entitled to all 
 praise. I shall never believe that, for I was there from 
 the beginning to the end. It was a bloody sacrifice ; 
 and the only consolation it ever brings to me is that it 
 bought the freedom of the slave. The price was the 
 highest ever paid for freedom in this world, but then, 
 freedom is cheap at any price ; many of tlie war curses 
 are embalmed in those bonds to plague our children 
 and our grand-children for a long time to come. The 
 interest on them has been squeezed out of the laboring 
 man, and converted into usury to oppress him. For all 
 that I would not flinch a hair's breadth from either the 
 letter or the spirit of the contract, but would redeem 
 it to the last penny. I would stand up to a hard bar- 
 gain as faithfully as to an easy one. 
 
 It is complained that this appreciation of money 
 has diminished the value of real estate. The effect of 
 this disaster upon me is that I must pay less rent. It 
 is also complained that it has lowered the value of all 
 merchandise. The only way in which this "shrinkage 
 of , values" is made manifest to me is in lower prices 
 
THE SHRINKAGE OE VALUES. 127 
 
 for everything I buy. Why then should I be troubled? 
 "Because," retorts the capitalist, "it means a shrink- 
 age of wages too." I am not afraid of that. It is a 
 lying old ghost that will never scare me again. The 
 resources of the country still exist ; the necessities of 
 mankind are just the same, and the labor of men upon 
 those resources is as valuable as it ever was. There 
 is no " shrinkage of values," Bad laws made by bad 
 men in the interest of speculation, usury, and monop- 
 oly, have made an artificial increase of prices, and 
 when those prices begin to fall in obedience to the 
 claims of honest industry, extortion sets up a howl that 
 "values are shrinking." The "value" of a house 
 cannot shrink, except from physical causes, any more 
 than the walls can shrink. The rent may shrink when 
 the artificial causes that have swollen it cease to oper- 
 ate, but the honest and legitimate value of the house 
 remains the same. I think the time has come when 
 workingmen may profitably unlearn much of their old 
 economy, and reverse their opinions as to the blessings 
 of cheap money. Dear money is the rightful reward 
 of honest labor, and that money we should insist 
 upon. 
 
128 ' WHEELBARROW. 
 
 MONETARY PROBLEMS. 
 
 A SERIES OF QUESTIONS ADDRESSED TO ''WHEELBARROW.' 
 
 Mr. Wheelbarrow : 
 
 1. Is a sound financial system the greatest of superstructures 
 upon which any good government rests ? 
 
 2. Is there a shorter, as well as better, method of accounts 
 than with money as a circulating medium ? 
 
 3. Is money, as a circulating medium, other than a represen- 
 tative of value ? 
 
 4. If there be those who can expand, or contract, the volume 
 or amount of money, and they should so contract said volume or 
 amount, would, or would it not, hamper all persons engaged in ad- 
 justing their accounts with others by the use of said circulating 
 medium ? 
 
 5. If those having said circulating medium should say to those 
 needing it for the purpose of adjusting their account with their fel- 
 low, come, you must, by our law, have this circulating medium, in 
 order to adjust your account with your fellow, and while I am 
 aware you cannot ajEford to pay so much for the use of it, yet, if you 
 will pay our price, we will help you out this once, and that price 
 should be three times what the party could afford to pay, what 
 effect, if any, and more especially if the controller of the volume 
 continues so to act, will such and kindred acts have in driving the 
 buyer of it to poverty ? 
 
 6. What would you say, if there should be such persons with 
 such a power, as to its being a safe one for them to exert or use ? 
 
 7. If money be a representative of value, or short method of 
 accounts, what, if any good reason, can you give for such costly 
 representatives as silver and gold ? 
 
MONETAE Y PROBLEMS. 1 29 
 
 8. If the increase of wealth in a nation per year be repre- 
 sented by the gain yer cent, upon its principal, is, or is it not, true 
 that but the three classes, agriculture, manufacture and mining, 
 create that nation's wealth ? 
 
 9. If the remaining class, commerce or the wealth-distributers, 
 should take a greater rate than the other three get for their dis- 
 tributing process, will the one not become wealthy and the other 
 three go to poverty ? c. b, 
 
 WHEELBARROW IN REPLY. 
 
 What have I done that those questions should be 
 thrown at me ? I am innocent both of monetary sci- 
 ence and political finance. The banker's grammar is 
 very hard Greek to me. The prickly phrases that 
 bristle all over the tree of gold and silver knowledge 
 sting me like the blackberry-thorns of years and years 
 ago. I have never been initiated into the esoteric 
 mysteries of money. The occult jargon of "circulat- 
 ing medium," ''measure of value," ''double stand- 
 ard," "ratio of exchange," "elastic limit," "mini- 
 mum reserve," "multiple tender," and all the rest of 
 it, is a perpetual headache to me. I cannot tell the 
 difference between an obolus and a kobang. I know 
 no more about "Gresham's law" than Gresham did. 
 But the moral "standard" of money may be as plain 
 to me as to the banker or the statesman, perhaps 
 plainer. By that standard all "circulating mediums" 
 must be tried. 
 
 It would be easy for me to say, "give it up," and 
 thus escape those conundrums, but that is an ignoble 
 retreat, and especially where the questions include a 
 compliment, implying a belief in the inquirer that I 
 am competent to answer them. This compliment is 
 gratifying to me, and it would be ungracious not to 
 say so. When Mr. Toots was asked, "What are you 
 
1 30 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 going to do with your raw materials when they come 
 into your ports in return for your drain of gold," he 
 boldly answered, ''Cook 'em." So I will at least at- 
 tempt an answer though I may fire as wide of the 
 mark as Mr. Toots himself. 
 
 I am always a little suspicious of hypothetical 
 questions, and questions which conceal within them an 
 expression of opinion, or the statement of a fact, be- 
 cause a man unskilled in the artfulness of logic, ma}' 
 in his answer unintentionally confess the fact, or sub- 
 scribe to the opinion. It may be that I am walking 
 into an ingenious verbal trap, but whether or not, I 
 will at least be as brave as Toots. 
 
 To the first question I answer, No ! I am sure good 
 governments have superstructures greater and stronger 
 than financial systems. It appears to me that financial 
 systems are merely expedients of government. They 
 are only agencies created by government, for purposes 
 of national housekeeping. 
 
 The second question is not so clear as it might be, 
 and perhaps in trying to answer it I may be springing 
 a (iead-fall for myself, but I do not know of any shorter 
 or better way of keeping accounts than with money as 
 a circulating medium. 
 
 To the third question I answer. Yes ! It will circu- 
 late as a "medium" all round the world by force of its 
 own actual positive worth, when it cannot travel the 
 length of a street as a ''representative" of value. 
 
 I tread with caution all around the fourth question. 
 I think it conceals a trap big enough for a grizzly bear, 
 let alone Bre'r Rabbit. It begins with "volume or 
 amount of money," and ends with "said circulating 
 medium." Do "money" and "circulating medium" 
 in this question mean the same thing? However, giv- 
 
MONE TARY PR OBLEMS. 1 3 1 
 
 ing the language a liberal construction, and supposing 
 it means the metal coins, and the paper ''circulating 
 medium " known as currency, I answer in the affirmative. 
 It would work very great injury to the community if 
 any persons had the power to expand or contract the 
 volume of money, at their own will ; and among those 
 persons I include the person called ''government," the 
 most dangerous of them all. At the same time I do 
 not see how it is possible to expand money except by 
 digging it out of the ground and coining it. This kind 
 of expansion is always a public benefit, while the ex- 
 pansion of paper credits, which pass under the name 
 of money, is very likely to be an injury, especially to 
 the poor, and all who live by wages. 
 
 The fifth question I suppose refers to the rate of 
 interest for money, and suggests, again, the hard bar- 
 gain between Shylock and Antonio. I wish I knew 
 some way by which those "having said circulating 
 medium " might be induced to share it with those 
 who have none, or, at least, to lend them some of it 
 without exacting usury, but I fear I shall never dis- 
 cover the way. 
 
 The sixth question assumes that there are persons 
 who have the privilege of expanding and contracting 
 the circulating medium at will, so that by making 
 money scarce and dear, they may exact extortionate 
 usury and oppress the poor. In answer to the ques- 
 tion, I promptly say that, if there are persons pos- 
 sessed of such a dangerous power, it ought to be taken 
 from them. It is not a safe one for them to " exert or 
 use " ; at least, it is not a safe one for those who happen 
 to be scarce of "circulating medium." 
 
 The seventh question assumes that money is only 
 a representative of value, or short method of accounts. 
 
1 3 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 I think that metallic money is all that and something 
 more. It has value of itself outside and beyond its 
 money uses, and that is the reason why it has always 
 been the money paramount. It is '^ a thing of beauty 
 and a joy fotever." Silver and gold are not '' costly 
 representatives.''^ They are costly actualities, and in 
 this very costliness lies their supremacy as money. 
 
 Is it fair to demand of me good reasons for using 
 silver and gold as money? *'If reasons were plenty 
 as blackberries, I would not give you a reason on com- 
 pulsion." To demand good reasons is a species of 
 compulsion. I can only render such reasons as I have. 
 They may be good, or they may be bad. The jury, 
 the readers of The Open Court must decide. 1 might 
 answer from the books, as we answer our adversary's 
 move when we play a game of chess by letter. I find 
 by the books that the reasons for using gold and sil- 
 ver as money are their superior homogeneity, utility, 
 portability, cognizability, indestructibility, divisibility, 
 stability, and ductility. These ought to be convinc- 
 ing, but I have others. For thousands of years all 
 other kinds of money have rendered homage and con- 
 fessed allegiance to gold and silver for the privilege of 
 circulating as money at all. For ages, all other kinds 
 of money have come to gold and silver to be measured, 
 and to receive their tickets of '' ratio." Men instinc- 
 tively trust in gold as the foundation and basis of all 
 money, and as the safest of all. Their faith in other 
 money rests on gold as its ultimate redeemer, and un- 
 less that promise of redemption appear somewhere 
 about it, all token, credit, promissory, representative, 
 and substitute money stands condemned by common 
 consent. You may demonetize gold by statute, and 
 it will stalk through the marts and markets, lord para- 
 
MONETARY PROBLEMS. 133 
 
 mount of money, in defiance of the law. It is natural 
 money by the constitution of commerce, by the com- 
 mon law of the world. 
 
 The eighth question demands my surrender to the 
 combined powers known as Agriculture, Manufactures, 
 and Mining. I am not ready to give myself up. 1 
 admit that so far as human labor makes the wealth of 
 a nation those three powers give more than others to 
 the aggregate fund, but they do not contribute all. 
 Hunting, fishing, and some other human activities con- 
 tribute something, and there are agricultural products, 
 manufactured articles, and minerals whose value con- 
 sists more in the labor of those who distribute them 
 than of those who raise them, fabricate them, or dig 
 them out of the ground. For instance. Nature has 
 established coal cellars in different parts of the country 
 and filled them full of coal. Underground Pennsyl- 
 vania is one of those coal cellars. Now, the value of 
 that coal up stairs at the mouth of the pit is not only 
 what the laboring miner has given it, but also what the 
 capitalist who sunk the shaft, and the engineers who 
 contrived the means to reach the coal, have given it. 
 The value of it in Chicago is what all those together 
 and the distributers have given it by their joint exer- 
 tions, and the distributer may have furnished the larger 
 share. 
 
 To the ninth question, I answer that the hypothesis 
 appears to me to suppose an impossibility. The last 
 value of an article is the price paid for it by the con- 
 sumer, and that price includes the reward of every- 
 body who has had anything to do with it. Commerce 
 can get its own share and no more. It cannot get the 
 share of the farmer, the manufacturer, or the miner. 
 If it could, they would consume their own products, 
 
134 WHEELBARRO W. 
 
 and commerce would cease to be. Each of the ''three 
 classes" gets the price of product at the farm, the 
 shop, or the mine. The "wealth distributer" then 
 takes charge of it, and carries it to the dearest market 
 he can find. He charges ''whatever the traffic will 
 bear," and the consumer pays it all. The bridge be- 
 tween the original producer and the final consumer 
 may be long or short, and the person who carries the 
 "projuice" over it may be an extortioner, but after 
 all, he cannot get any more than the traffic will bear. 
 That the profits may be more fairly shared by the 
 other "three classes" is the object of state railroad- 
 regulations, inter-state commerce laws, and similar 
 contrivances, some of them wise and some of them 
 not. Whatever rate the wealth distributer may charge 
 for his work, it does not follow that therefore the 
 farmer, the miner, and the manufacturer must "go to 
 poverty." 
 
 It may be that there is no common agreement be- 
 tween my questioner and me as to what really consti- 
 tutes money. He may recognize many potencies as 
 money that I reject, and after all, we ma}'' be strangers 
 to each other's meaning, like two men trying to con- 
 verse together in different languages. I remember 
 long ago, when I was meandering through France, 
 how vexed I used to be at the stupidity of the French 
 people, who could not understand their own language 
 when spoken to them by me. Sd, I fear my questioner 
 may be vexed at my dullness because I do not under- 
 stand exactly v/hat he means by money. 
 
 "There are many "circulating mediums" of bad 
 character traveling about as money, and they are doing 
 a very extensive business on false pretenses. Certain 
 substitute money, having served for a time in that 
 
MONE TAR V PR OBLEMS. 1 35 
 
 capacity, declares itself real money, is recognized as 
 such, and does a great deal of mischief before it can 
 be arrested and suppressed. For this, government is 
 responsible. It has usurped prerogatives and powers 
 that belong to omnipotence alone, and with cheap 
 money it has cheated the poor man out of his wages. 
 It was a daring and arrogant usurpation when govern- 
 ments declared money to be a legal-tender in payment 
 of debts, for by doing so, they made a political stand- 
 ard of honesty, elastic, uncertain, and shifting from 
 time to time. This despotic legislation has thrown 
 the whole system of human dealing into a chaos of 
 moral confusion. Governments declare tobacco, coon- 
 skins, rum, promissory notes, and various other things 
 to be legal-tender in payment of debts, and the con- 
 sequence is, that the sense of moral obligation is weak- 
 ened among the people. 
 
 I do not mean to say that it is not within the legal 
 province of the supreme power in the state to close its 
 courts to creditors, and declare that certain coon-skins, 
 or other legal-tenders, having been offered them, their 
 debtors are free, and their debts paid j but, in the 
 dominion of morals, the act is absolutely void. There 
 justice reigns, and a debt is not paid until the moral 
 obligation it contains is cancelled. Great as this gov- 
 ernment is, it is not able to pay any man's debt by 
 statute. It may declare the debt expunged, satisfied, 
 wiped out, even ^^paid," but only the debtor can pay 
 it. The moral confusion in these cases arises from the 
 use of the wrong word, '^payment." A debtor, find- 
 ing that his debts are ''paid " by legal force, is apt to 
 think that the moral obligation, as well as the legal 
 obligation, has been discharged by the laws of his 
 country, when, in fact, the moral obligation can be 
 
136 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 discharged by himself alone. ''I owe you nothing," 
 said a dishonest debtor to his creditor, ''that note 
 was outlawed last week." In like manner, the bank- 
 rupt, having passed through the court, thinks that he 
 owes nothing and that all his debts are paid. 
 
 It was a fantastic dream of the alchemists that by 
 chemical expedients they might change the baser mate- 
 rials into gold, but it is a more irrational fanaticism 
 that believes in the power of governments' to create 
 money that will pay debts. All the resources and skill 
 of the alchemists failed, and there is no political al- 
 chemy that can perform this miracle. Right here, per- 
 haps, my questioner and I find ourselves trying to con- 
 verse together in different languages. He may mean 
 one thing by ''money" and I another. Until we can 
 reach a common understanding as to what really con- 
 stitutes money, we shall have no foundation whereon 
 to build "a sound financial system." 
 
137 
 
 THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 
 
 GERALD iM A S S E Y. 
 
 For a' that, and a' that, 
 
 It's coming yet for a' that, 
 When man to man the world o'er 
 
 Shall brothers be for a' that.— Robert Burns. 
 
 In these little tributes I speak only of those who 
 are poets to me. What rank they occupy in literature 
 is a question too profound for my limited learning, 
 and so I do not trouble myself with it. I know noth- 
 ing about the laws of taste nor the rules of criticism. 
 I suppose that Gerald Massey does not rank among 
 the poets at all ; at least I never see" or hear anything 
 of him in such reading and preaching as comes to me. 
 And yet by the sympathy of a common fate and a com- 
 mon suffering, his verses weave themselves around 
 me like a spell, and that spell is poetry to me. I am 
 not at all ashamed to say that Massey is to me one 
 of the great poets, although the confession may bring 
 upon me the ridicule of cultivated men. Homer, 
 Shakespeare, Milton, are not poets to me, except in 
 those odd places, here and there, where my mind is 
 strong enough to understand them, and where their 
 spirit is able to purify and lift up mine.. 
 
 If she be not fair to me, 
 What care I how fair she be. 
 
 Gerald Massey is a genius, twisted, gnarled, and 
 stunted by hunger and cold, and that premature toil 
 
1 38 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 which never should be laid upon a child. Although 
 his crippled wings have kept him near the ground, his 
 notes are true, and drawn from nature's own dear 
 heart. What songs he might have sung had he been 
 permitted to soar like England's bonney skylark up to 
 the gates of heaven ! He sings in a minor key, for his 
 hymns are plaintive and sad. They have struggled 
 into life out of poverty. That they are sometimes 
 angry and bitter is not to be wondered at. As he said 
 himself at a later day: ** Those verses do not ade- 
 quately express what I think and feel now ; yet they 
 express what I thought and felt then, and what thou- 
 sands besides me have thought and felt, and what 
 thousands still think and feel." He was only a boy 
 when he wrote *'The Three Voices," and without any 
 education how was he to put a nice polish on his work, 
 especially in the everlasting moaning and droning of 
 that infernal mill. The people who despise this pas- 
 sionate rally may think it very inartistic and crude, 
 but to the men who, like Massey, are grinding their 
 lives away in shops and mills and factories, it has all 
 the inspiration of poetry, and it is poetry. Here is 
 the second of ''The Three Voices." 
 
 Another voice comes from the millions that bend, 
 
 Tearfully, tearfully, tearfully ! 
 From hearts which the scourges of slavery rend. 
 
 Fearfully, fearfully, fearfully ! 
 From many a worn noble spirit that breaks, 
 
 In the world's solemn shadows adown in Life's valleys, 
 From mine, forge and loom, trumpet-tongued it awakes. 
 On the soul wherein Liberty rallies : 
 Work, work, work ! 
 Yoke fellows listen, 
 Till earnest eyes glisten : 
 'Tis the voice of the Present. It bids us, my brothers, 
 Be Freemen ; and then for the freedom of others. 
 
 Work, work, work ! 
 For the many, a holocaust long to the few, 
 
THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 139 
 
 O work while ye may ! 
 
 O work while 'tis day I * 
 
 And cling to each other united and true, 
 Work, work, work ! 
 
 There is a personal bond of sympathy between 
 Massey and me arising partly from acquaintanceship, 
 and partly from other accidents. Once when I was 
 about nineteen years old I went from London down 
 into Lancashire. I had a job of work at a place called 
 Prescott, a short distance out from Liverpool. I had 
 to make the trip on foot, for I couldn't afford the lux- 
 ury of riding. I walked forty miles the first day, and 
 rested that night at a little town called Tring, in Hert- 
 fordshire. I was on the road before daylight next 
 morning, for I wanted to make another forty miles be- 
 fore night. It was a chill, drizzly morning in Novem- 
 ber, and just as I started I met a lot of shivering, 
 hungry children going to their work at the silk factory. 
 Among these poor blights was Gerald Massey. At 
 least I have always pictured him amongst them. He 
 was born in Tring, and worked as a child in that silk 
 factory, and I shall always think that he was among 
 those children that I met that morning. That was 
 Massey's childhood, if it be not sacrilege to call such 
 misery by that beautiful name. '^ I had no childhood," 
 he writes. *' Having had to earn my own dear bread, 
 by the eternal cheapening of flesh and blood, from 
 eight years old, I never knew what childhood meant. 
 Ever since I can remember I have had the aching fear 
 of want throbbing in heart and brow." In hopeless 
 mill-slavery he sung : 
 
 Still all the day the iron wheels go onward, 
 
 Grinding life down from its mark ; 
 And the children's souls, which God is calling sunward, 
 
 Spin on blindly in the dark. 
 
1 40 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 When Massey was writing his beautiful poem 
 ''Lady Laura," the memory of his infant sufferings in 
 the silk-mill wrung from his soul a cry of anguish so 
 like a curse that we tremble at the sound of it with a 
 sort of guilty fear lest it may fall upon us. We won- 
 der whether we have done anything to deserve it, and 
 whether we are partners in that or any kindred wrong : 
 
 Pleasantly rings the chime that calls to the Bridal Hall or Kirk ; 
 
 But the devil might gloatingly pull for the peel that wakes the child to work. 
 
 "Come, little children, the mill-bell rings," and drowsily they run, 
 
 Little old men and women and human worms who have spun 
 
 The life of infancy into silk, and fed child, mother and wife, 
 
 The factory's smoke of torment with the fuel of human life. 
 
 O weird white faces, and weary bones, and whether they hurry or crawl, 
 
 You know them by the factory-stamp, they wear it one and all. 
 
 A few bursts of lyric melody that trill among the 
 domestic affections like the canary bird's music at 
 home; some martial and patriotic poems ringing like 
 the bugle-call at Balaklava ; some amorous wooing of 
 freedom all aflame with desire for the exaltation of 
 labor ; some bursts of joy and sorrow mingling in the 
 spring-time of his life, as April days are sometimes 
 made of little bits of sunshine and much rain ; and 
 then his poetic strength gave way. His intense genius 
 was exhausted in the first ecstasy of freedom, like 
 some ambitious tree that spends its life-time vigor in 
 one exuberant fruitage, and is barren evermore. For 
 twenty years Massey has done nothing great in poetry. 
 He has written books, indeed, but his harp is dumb, 
 and it is too late now to awaken its chords again. 
 
 The revolutionary storm that swept over Europe in 
 1848 found in Massey its poet laureate. He was then 
 a youth of nineteen, small, weak, but brave and ready 
 to fight, somewhat revengeful under a sense of social 
 injustice, exultant in the noise of falling thrones, and 
 hopeful that, at last, the people were coming into 
 
THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 141 
 
 power. When the reaction came and all was lost, he 
 still believed that the blood of the vanquished had not 
 been shed in vain, and that out of it would grow a 
 harvest of better laws, and victory at last. He be- 
 lieved that the men of the barricades would be avenged, 
 and that in a more triumphant day their memory would 
 be glorified in a Marseillaise hymn rolling far beyond 
 the boundaries of France, clear over Germany, Eng- 
 land, and all the lands of Europe. Here is something 
 that reads like one of the hymns of Korner : 
 
 They rose in Freedom's rare sunrise, 
 
 Like giants roused from wine ; 
 And in their hearts and in their eyes 
 
 The God leapt up divine I 
 Their souls flashed out as naked swords, 
 
 Unsheathed for fiery fate I 
 Strength went like battle with their words — 
 
 To men of Forty-eight ! 
 Hurrah 1 
 
 For the men of Forty-eight. 
 
 Some in a bloody burial sleep, 
 
 Like Greeks to glory gone, 
 But in their steps avengers leap, 
 
 With their proof armor on ; 
 And hearts beat high with dauntless trust 
 
 To triumph soon or late, 
 Though they be mouldering down in dust — 
 
 Brave men of Forty-eight ! 
 Hurrah ! 
 
 For the men of Forty-eight. 
 
 Is it kind in our mother nature to make such high- 
 strung souls as that of Gerald Massey ? To be sure they 
 enjoy the brightness of life more keenly than the rest 
 of us, but they suffer more intensely in the cold and 
 darkness of it. In his pain Massey sought sympathy 
 in the spirit world, and found it ; at least he told me so. 
 I believe that Spiritualism is unreal, a trick which some 
 of our faculties play upon the others, an unfair advan- 
 tage which the imagination takes of our desire for com- 
 
1 42 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 munion with something better than ourselves. But how 
 can I speak for him ? He has told me of happy meet- 
 ings with his dead wife, not in dreams, but in wakeful 
 day, and when she has counseled with him face to face. 
 He has told me of the happiness that comes to him in 
 his sad moments when he hears the bright voice of his 
 dead child calling him **Papa," and feels the palpable 
 weight of her as she climbs upon his knee. I can read- 
 ily believe him, for the soul that could suffer so keenly 
 at her loss might have power to bring her back. In all 
 the poetry springing out of domestic bereavement there 
 is nothing that I know of so like a flood of tears as 
 '' The Ballad of Babe Christabel." Here is a bit of it 
 picked at random, but it is all of equal beauty : 
 
 With her white hands claspt she sleepeth ; heart is husht and lips are cold; 
 
 Death shrouds up her heaven of beauty, and a weary way I go, 
 Like the sheep without a shepherd on the wintry Norland wold, 
 
 With the face of day shut out by blinding snow. 
 
 And in the kindred poem, ''The Mother's Idol 
 Broken," the same grief-strains break out of his heart 
 and flow in a deep current that purifies human life, if it 
 does not spiritualize it. There are whole pages of this 
 poem, and all the verses of it are diamonds of equal 
 brilliancy. He doesn't see Death taking his child away, 
 but only some spirits calling for it. 
 
 Our rose was but in blossom ; 
 
 Our life was but in Spring, 
 When down the solemn midnight 
 
 We heard the spirits sing : 
 " Another bud of infancy, 
 
 With holy dews impearled ;" 
 And in their hands they bore our wee 
 
 White rose of all the world 
 
 This is a curl of our poor " Splendid's " hair I 
 A sunny burst of rare and ripe young gold— 
 
 A ring of sinless gold that weds two worlds I 
 Our one thing left with her dear life in it 
 
THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 143 
 
 The domestic poems of Massey brighten every 
 home, and glorify wives and mothers. Some of them 
 in home-grandeur almost rival those of Robert Burns. 
 Here is a bit of one that might aspire to the society of 
 <'John Anderson, my Jo," which is claiming a good 
 deal : 
 
 Her dainty hand nestled in mine, rich and white, 
 
 And timid as trembling dove ; 
 And it twinkled about me, a jewel of light. 
 
 As she garnisht our feast of love ; 
 ' Twas the queenliest hand in all lady-land, 
 
 And she was a poor man's wife ! 
 O ! little ye'd think how that wee, white hand 
 
 Could dare in the battle of life. 
 
 There is no humor in Massey ; at least, none that I 
 have ever found. His poems are all passion, burning, 
 vehement passion, crowded with gorgeous imagery, so 
 crowded, indeed, as often to obstruct their sweet 
 melodious flow. He is a fervent Englishman. His 
 political anger was never turned against the mother- 
 land. It smote only the oppressors who had ravished 
 the scepter out of her hand and made it an instrument 
 of wrong. In the gloomy days of the Crimean war, 
 his heart beat high for England, and his verses thrilled 
 with the old heroic fire. How this bit makes the 
 pulses throb : 
 
 I had a gallant brother, loved at home, and dear to me — 
 I have a mourning mother, winsome wife, and children three- 
 He lies with Balaklava's dead. But let the old land call, 
 We would give our living remnant, we would follow one and all ! 
 
 I had a brother in the "■ Light Brigade " in the Cri- 
 mean war^ and maybe that's another tie between Ger- 
 ald Massey and me. I join in his song to England : 
 
 The old nursing mother's not hoary yet. 
 
 There is sap in her Saxon tree ; 
 Lo I she lifteth a bosom of glory yet, 
 
 Through her mists, to the Sun and the Sea. 
 
1 44 WHEE'LBARR O W. 
 
 Fair as the Queen of Love, fresh from the foam, 
 Or a star in a dark cloud set ; 
 
 Ye may blazon her shame— ye may leap at her name- 
 But there's life in the Old Land yet. 
 
 In the democracy of Gerald Massey the ''higher 
 classes " are the people who work for a living, the 
 ''lower classes" are the idlers who live on the sweat 
 of others. The old chivalry is abolished, and the 
 chivalry of labor takes its place. Knighthood can only 
 be. won in the field of usefulness and toil. Here is a 
 song worthy to be the anthem of the Knights of Labor 
 all over the world : 
 
 Uprouse ye now, brave brother band, 
 With honest heart and working hand. 
 We are but few, toil-tried and true, 
 Yet hearts beat high to dare and do. 
 And who would not a champion be 
 In labor's lordlier chivalry ? 
 
 O ! there are hearts that ache to see 
 The day-dawn of our victory. 
 Eyes full of heart-break with us plead. 
 And watchers weep and martyrs bleed. 
 O ! who would not a champion be 
 In labor's lordlier chivalry ? 
 
 Work, brothers mine ; work hand and brain ; 
 We'll win the Golden Age again. 
 And Love's Millennial morn shall rise 
 In happy hearts and blessed eyes. 
 Hurrah ! hurrah ! true knights are we 
 In labor's lordlier chivalry. 
 
45 
 
 THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 
 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 One of the chief tests of a great man is this, What 
 was the ethical result of him? What influence did he 
 have on social character and political morality ? Let 
 us apply this test to Robert Burns. 
 
 A few days ago the birthday of Burns was honored 
 with memorial festivities by all the people of British 
 lineage throughout the world. This poet is greeted 
 on his birthday with a loving homage such as never 
 has been offered to any other poet in this world. The 
 explanation of this pre-eminent popularity is found in 
 the universality of his genius ; it embraces all man- 
 kind. A marvellous thing, when we remember that 
 no other poet is so intensely national as Burns. He 
 was a Scotchman in every pulsation of his heart. He 
 was himself the intellectual Scotland of the i8th cen- 
 tury ; equally so as the Scotland of the i6th century 
 was the incarnate conscience of John Knox. Burns 
 is the type and model of the Scottish race in its high- 
 est development. No other man has ever stamped 
 his own individuality upon the clay of which his coun- 
 trymen are made, as Burns has impressed his person- 
 ality upon all Scotchmen. Their love and veneration 
 for him spring from gratitude and pride. He has ele- 
 vated the standard of them all. He has added a cubit 
 to the spiritual stature of every man in Scotland, 
 
146 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 from MacCallum Moore in his Highland castle to the 
 humblest peasant who tends his sheep upon the 
 mountains. 
 
 The chief elements of Burns's popularity are his 
 lyric genius, his ardent patriotism, his manly inde- 
 pendence, and his unselfish love toward all the chil- 
 dren of men. "In ease, fire, and passion," says Allan 
 Cunningham, ''he was second to none but Shakes- 
 peare." He might have added that as a lyric poet, as 
 a national song writer, he was not excelled nor equalled 
 by Shakespeare nor by any other poet that was ever 
 born. Burns had the divine gift of music in such ex- 
 cellence that he could put in tune all the different 
 instruments in the great orchestra of man, and force 
 them to vibrate in harmony. There are single songs 
 of his that make the hearts of all men throb in unison 
 together. These songs have passed out of the exclu- 
 sive ownership of Scotland ; they have become the 
 joint property of all nations in that sublime commun- 
 ism represented 
 
 In the parliament of man, 
 The federation of the world. 
 
 It was said by Emerson that Burns made a mere 
 provincial dialect classic. He did more than that ; he 
 glorified by his pathos and humor, not only the dialect 
 of Scotland, but the very weeds in her valleys, the 
 heather on her banks and braes, the hamely fare and 
 hodden gray of her peasantry, yea, the very rags of 
 her poverty. He made all of them classic as the ma- 
 jestic imagery of Milton. He poured his soul in love 
 and benediction upon his country in such exuberant 
 flood that before the end of the eighteenth century 
 it had overflowed the British Islands, and now covers 
 all the world. 
 
THE POETS OE LIBERTY AND LABOR. 147 
 
 It was patriotism in exquisite refinement that 
 caused this man, when reaping in the harvest field, to 
 turn the sickle aside and spare a thistle because it was 
 the ^* symbol dear" under which his fathers for a 
 thousand years had fought for Scottish liberty and in- 
 dependence. Only a soul in love with nature, manifest 
 in the modesty of beauty, could apologize to a moun- 
 tain-daisy which the plough struggling for bread had 
 overthrown. 
 
 There is deeper feeling still, and a closer kinsman 
 sympathy in the apology which Burns offers to a 
 mouse whose home with all its furniture and stores was 
 wrecked by that same plough in that same struggle for 
 bread. The mouse runs away in spite of the poet's 
 assurance that there is no occasion for fear. He will 
 not even wait to hear the explanation that the ruinous 
 earthquake was an accident, and that the author of it 
 was totally unaware that the mouse's home was in the 
 ploughshare's way. There is nothing so kind and 
 dignified in all the etiquette of courts as the tone and 
 language of this apology : 
 
 " I'm very sorry man's dominion 
 Has broken nature's social union, 
 And justifies that ill opinion, 
 That makes thee startle 
 At me, thy poor earth-born companion, 
 An' fellow mortal." 
 
 Only a poetic genius gifted with a knowledge of 
 the divine unity pervading all things, could have 
 made the lofty comparison expressed in the last two 
 lines oi that stanza. Only an eye, illuminated by a 
 light brighter than the light of the sun could have seen 
 the spirit thread that binds e\en men and mice 
 together in a communion of suffering, toil, pleasure, 
 duty, disappointment, and an impartial mortality. 
 
1 48 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 Here, in the words ''earth-born companion, an' fel- 
 low mortal " we find a key to the social ethics of 
 Robert Burns. We can follow this ethical thread 
 from the mouse to the sheep in ' 'Poor Maillie's Elegy ; " 
 from the sheep to the horse in the " New Year's Ad- 
 dress to the Auld Mare Maggie ;" and from the horse 
 to the human brotherhood in " Man was made to 
 mourn." 
 
 The ethics of all this tenderness to animals lies 
 chiefly in its reflex power upon the social state ; the 
 rebounding of this charity from horses and mice and 
 sheep, upon men and women and children. This poet, 
 whose barns were none of the largest, and seldom over- 
 loaded, recognized the claims of every "earth-born 
 companion, and fellow mortal " to share with him in 
 the hour of its need. That the mouse was outlawed 
 under the "habitual criminals act," as an incorrigible 
 thief, rather increased than diminished the charity of 
 Burns towards him. In fact, he says, 
 
 " I doubt na, whiles but ye may thieve, 
 What then, poor beastie ; thou maun live, 
 A daimen icker in a thrave 
 
 's a sma' request; 
 I'll get a blessing wi' the lave 
 An' never miss't." 
 
 Have we any ethical culture of a finer quality than 
 that? Have the churches any more sublime religion 
 than this philosophical socialism of Robert Burns, that 
 he who gives a share of his abundance as justice and 
 benevolence demand will get a blessing with the rest 
 of it ? Have they or we any more exalted theology 
 than this of Robert Burns : 
 
 'The heart benevolent and kind, 
 The most resembles God." 
 
THE POETS OE LIBER 7 Y AND LABOR. 149 
 
 *'The merciful man is merciful to his beast," says 
 the scripture, meaning also that kindness to animals is 
 a sign of a morally well-built man, and, let me add, of 
 a brave man. I noticed when in the cavalry that a 
 soldier who was cruel to his horse was generally a 
 coward in battle. In mathematics, the greater includes 
 the less ; in ethics the less includes the greater ; and in 
 religion too : "As ye have done it unto the /east of 
 these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." So the 
 demonstration is complete ; the man who is tender, 
 merciful, and just to his fellow mortals of the inferior 
 creation, will be considerate, just, and kind to all his 
 fellow men. 
 
 The sympathy of Burns was not limited to the uni- 
 verse of mice, or sheep, or men. It went down into 
 the infernal regions, and whispered hope into the ear 
 of the arch fiend, Satan himself; but this hope was 
 conditioned on reform. 
 
 " Then fare ye weel, auld Nickie-ben 
 
 Oh wad ye tak a thought an' men' I 
 Ye aiblins might, I dinna ken, 
 
 Still hae a stake, 
 I'm wae to think upon yon den, 
 
 E'en for your sake." 
 
 The sentiment of his "■ Address to the Deil " may 
 not be theologically orthodox, although, I think, it 
 will be orthodox in time. Our doctors of divinity and 
 our doctors of law have been much confused in their 
 divinity and their law, owing to the erroneous account 
 of the great battle fought in heaven, in the primitive 
 eternity before time was. It is a mistake that Satan 
 lost that battle; and for that mistake John Milton is 
 very much responsible. Satan won it; and that ex- 
 plains the dominion of selfishness, inequality, injus- 
 tice, avarice, lust, slavery and gibbets upon this earth. 
 
ISO 
 
 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 But although Satan won that battle, the war is not at • 
 an end. Year by year, and day by day, the reinforce- 
 ments of truth, knowledge, wisdom, philosophy, for- 
 giveness, charity, and all the powers of light are coming 
 up to the help of the Lord against the mighty, and the 
 kingdom of Satan will cease to be. I do not say that 
 it will be violently overthrown, for, aided by the poetic 
 and prophetic vision of Robert Burns, I see the coming 
 day when Satan himself will be converted and re- 
 formed; when even his principality shall be numbered 
 among the powers that make for righteousness. "Na- 
 ture's Social Union " broken by ''man's dominion," 
 will, by 'man's intellectual and moral enlightenment, 
 be restored. 
 
 The necromancy of Burns, the magnetic power by 
 which he subdues the hearts of all men, lies chiefly in 
 his eloquent songs. In these, the poet touches with 
 majestic ease and magic melody every string in the 
 diapason of human passion and emotion, from the 
 martial thunder of '* Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled " 
 to the sweetlove whisper in ''John Anderson, my Jo," 
 where virtuous old age is glorified, and where the do- 
 mestic affection of the Scottish people is made famous 
 for evermore. 
 
 In his ideal of a social democracy we find the poli- 
 tical ethics of Robert Burns. The key to it may be 
 found in that manliest of democratic songs, "A man's 
 a man for a' that." Here "sense and worth" are ex- 
 alted as the only patents of nobility that can give legit- 
 imate rank or titles to any man. In the political mor- 
 ality of this song, the man who is worth the most is the 
 man who has the most worth. It is the proud asser- 
 tion of a laborer that he is a man for all that, and it is 
 a dignified protest that shall stand forever against the 
 
THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 151 
 
 degradation of ''honest poverty. " The political econ- 
 omy of it is the right of every man that every other 
 man shall work. He must do something by hand or 
 brain useful to the community. 
 
 I have heard this song criticized according to the 
 canons of literary taste and style. I have lately read 
 a criticism of it by Matthew Arnold, an eminent man 
 indeed, but one who never came under the spell of its 
 poetry, because he never belonged to the classes rep- 
 resented in the song. Let him criticize it who has 
 toiled in the field, the factory, or the shop ; him who 
 has worked out in the weather, building houses and 
 railroads; him who has earned his honest bread up on 
 the giddy mast, or down in the dark mine. As well 
 criticize the Declaration of Independence, for its rhet- 
 oric. In fact, ''A man's a man for a' that" is the 
 American Declaration of Independence condensed into 
 the poetry of Scotland. The' inspiration and the doc- 
 trine of both productions is the equality of man. I 
 have seen the Declaration of Independence very se- 
 verely criticized not only for its diction but for its pol- 
 itics, too. I have seen fifty thousand critics in a line 
 criticizing it with shot and shell and musketry. What 
 of it? When their criticism ended, the flag born of 
 the Declaration streamed above their speechless can- 
 non, and from every star in its brilliant constellation 
 there shone upon the world the gospel of the political 
 new testament: ''All men are created equal;" "A 
 man's a man for a' that." 
 
 The personal independence of Burns gives mascu- 
 line strength and moral vigor to his poetry. It is this 
 personal trait which his countrymen try to imitate. 
 To his immortal honor be it said he founded his inde- 
 pendence on his ability to earn his bread by the labor 
 
152 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 of his hands. In the dedication of his poems to the 
 noblemen and gentlemen of the Caledonian Hunt, he 
 is careful to say that this is done only as a tribute of 
 regard, and not as a bid for patronage or favors. In 
 that dedication he uses these words, ''I was bred to 
 the plough, and am independent." Here he reverses 
 the former doctrine that independence consisted in the 
 ability to live on the labor of other men. He pro- 
 claimed the higher law of independence, the ability to 
 live on his own labor. ^' I was bred to the plough, and 
 am independent." 
 
 I complain of the amiable injustice which is con- 
 tinually done to the independent spirit of Robert 
 Burns. Loving admirers mourn the hardness of his 
 lot, and reproach his country for neglecting him. 
 ''Scotland," they say, "lavish of posthumous honors 
 to her great son, permitted him to live in poverty, and 
 die in debt. He asked for bread and he received a 
 stone." Nothing can be more untrue than that; and 
 they honor not Burns who say it. He never asked for 
 bread; he earned it. Nor did he ever in his lifetime 
 receive a stone at the hands of Scotland. Scotland 
 would not have dared to offer him help either in alms 
 or pensions. He was too proud to accept the patron- 
 age of anybody. The brave heart which in life would 
 accept no man's pity, is humiliated with gratuitous 
 pity after death. It is because Burns bore his cross 
 alone, and asked no other man to carry it for him, that 
 we honor him to-day. There is no moral majesty in 
 this world which has not at some time or other worn 
 its crown of thorn. Would Burns be a ro5^al king to- 
 day had he not had the double coronation of poverty 
 and pain? The man who makes the journey of life in 
 a palace-car, who worships from a gilt edged prayer- 
 
THE POETS OE LIBERTY AND LABOR. 153 
 
 book, and drinks his eucharistic wine from a golden 
 chalice, presents a dim and dingy appearance at St. 
 Peter's gate, because the soul of him has never been 
 polished by the friction of adversity and struggle. He 
 gets inside, of course, for I believe that every one gets 
 inside, but having no moral mark upon him, no sign 
 of the cross, he mixes with the plebian multitude and 
 is not recognized in celestial ''society." 
 
 In like manner the Holy Willies croak harsh judg- 
 ment against Burns for his indulgence in unworthy 
 appetites. I do not say that Burns was guiltless alto- 
 gether, but I do say that his vices have been exagger- 
 ated, as was necessary, in order to show them in glar- 
 ing contrast with the moral grandeur of his virtues. 
 For much of this exaggeration the poet is h mself re- 
 sponsible. In his moments of remorse, he accuses 
 himself in terms of self-reproach so eloquently keen, 
 that many even of his admirers have taken him at his 
 word. In the course of my life, it has been my hap- 
 piness to number among my intimate friends many 
 members of the Episcopalian Church, and I have often 
 been amused to hear them denounce themselves as 
 ''miserable sinners," when I knew that their lives were 
 pure, beneficent, and virtuous, that they were not sin- 
 ners at all, and that there was a house and lot re- 
 served for every one of them in the New Jerusalem. 
 I will not take them at their word, neither will I ac- 
 cept Burns's plea of guilty, extorted from him under 
 the duress of sorrow and remorse. 
 
 One day last summer, I stood with a friend gazing 
 on the statue of Schiller in Lincoln park. My friend 
 was one of the Pharisees of art, and he pointed out 
 several defects in the statue. I endured his criticisms 
 very well so long as we looked the great poet squarely 
 
154 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 in the face, but when the critic took me behind the 
 statue, and showed me that the wrinkle in the back 
 of the coat was not according to the canons of high art, 
 I lost all patience and told him that his criticism had 
 dropped into mere backbiting, and that I must beg 
 pardon of Schiller for listening to censorious remarks 
 about him, uttered behind his back. So the Pharisees 
 of poetry stand behind the image of Burns and show 
 us wrinkles in his character. There are people who 
 will not allow you to praise the splendor of the full 
 moon. If you do so, they will say that it is well for the 
 moon that only one side of her is visible to man, and 
 that if we could see the other side we might find that 
 her ladyship was no better than she ought to be. 
 
 Although much of Burns lived in the earthy fog 
 where inferior mortals dwell, his forehead was always 
 above the clouds. There, radiant in the sun, it re- 
 flected upon earth the melodious poetry of heaven. 
 Near my home is a church, with a tall spire on it 
 crowned with a gilded cross. That cross is the first 
 thing visible to me in the early morning when every- 
 thing beneath it is wrapped in fog. I can see it gleam- 
 ing in the sunshine before I can see anything else in 
 the city, several seconds indeed before I can see the 
 sun. There are the church, and the priest, and the 
 congregation, enveloped in the fogs of a Gothic super- 
 stition, but above them all I see blazing in the sun the 
 symbol of self-sacrifice, and in the brightness of it I can 
 read a promise that the mist and the fog shall be dis- 
 solved into the ether of eternal truth. So above the 
 clouds I see the forehead of Robert Burns lighted by 
 the forgiving beams of heaven, and there I see the 
 golden promise that the mists and fogs which have so 
 long obscured his greatness will all be cleared away. 
 
^55 
 
 THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 
 
 THOMAS HOOD. 
 
 How like a bonny bird of God he came, 
 
 And poured his heart in music for the poor ; 
 
 And trampled manhood heard, and claimed his crown, 
 
 And trampled womanhood sprang up ennobled ! 
 
 The world may never know the wealth it lost, 
 
 When Hood went darkling to his tearful tomb. 
 
 —Gerald Massey 
 
 There are some hearts born into this world that 
 never die. Like the great ocean, they encircle all 
 humanity, and throb forever. Upon them trampled 
 manhood and trampled womanhood fling themselves for 
 comfort when tired and sorrow-laden. There the laborer 
 finds rest, and there he picks up new courage to help 
 him in the battle for bread. Among those immortals 
 Thomas Hood stands ''crowned and glorified." Upon 
 his breast labor lays her troubles and her wrongs. Out 
 of his bosom comes an inspiration that shall some day 
 give the toilers victory. 
 
 Those thoughts came to me this morning, as I was 
 reading an account of the proceedings of the ''Trades 
 Assembly," which met last Sunday at No. 57 North 
 Clark street. I cannot exactly account for it, but some- 
 how or other, on reading Mr. McLogan's description 
 of theworkingwomen, I turned instinctively to Thomas 
 Hood, for spiritual strength. I turned for consolation 
 to the inspired writings of the prophet who sang "The 
 Song of the Shirt ; " and again I heard him say — 
 
156 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 Oh, men, with sisters dear ! 
 
 Oh, men. with Mothers and Wives \ 
 It is not linen you're wearing out, 
 
 But human creatures' lives. 
 
 I have still a hope that Mr. McLogan was mis- 
 informed, and that it is not true that ''whole families 
 have to work eleven hours a day to earn twelve dollars 
 a week." I trust that Mr. Foley was in error when he 
 said that ''the average wages of women in Chicago 
 shops and factories was only 60 cents a day." If those 
 statements are true, they reveal a profligate condition 
 of society, and the end is easy to foresee. That society 
 cannot stand. It is built on the shifty sands of in- 
 equality and injustice, where no government has ever 
 yet been safe in this world. This condition will breed 
 a social gloom, out of which we shall see growing a 
 funnel-shaped cloud reaching from earth to heaven. 
 We shall hear the roar of a whirlwind that will shake 
 our political inheritance to its foundations, and per- 
 haps destroy it. 
 
 I don't know much about poetry ; of the great poets 
 nothing at all. I cannot understand them for lack of 
 education. I can only interpret those poets that un- 
 derstand me, and there is not a line in Thomas Hood 
 that I cannot comprehend. Many of his verses seem 
 woven of threads drawn from my own life and expe- 
 rience, and I almost fancy that I wrote them. How 
 glorious it is to know something ! What a splendid 
 thing is learning ! In my sorest poverty I never envy 
 a man riches, but I have always been jealous of his 
 better education. When I was a youth I had a job of 
 work at Cambridge, in England. Here were colleges 
 all around me. In this one Milton studied ; in that 
 one Byron; in that other one Newton trained liis 
 mighty mind. Those colleges were all castles fortified 
 
THE POETS OF LIBERTY AND LABOR. 157 
 
 against me. I used to look up at the walls as I passed 
 by them, and long to get inside, that 1 might feed on 
 the learning that had developed those mighty men. I 
 used to look at the young fellows there of my own age, 
 students of the university, with an envy that I have 
 never felt in all my life toward any others of my brother 
 men. As they passed me clad in their uniforms of cap 
 and gown, I hated them with jealousy. In a fool's 
 vanity I sometimes think, even now, that perhaps I 
 might have been somebody if I could have had a chance 
 at schooling in my youth. But at thirteen I entered 
 the ranks of slavery, and there was no more school for 
 me. Perhaps it is because I cannot understand the 
 great poets, that I cherish with stronger affection those 
 who have come down to m}^ own level, and woven my 
 own sorrows into song. It may be that this is why I 
 cherish Thomas Hood. 
 
 Statements like those of the Trades Assembly, re- 
 vealing the slave-condition of the needle women of 
 London, brought from the soul of Thomas Hood that 
 indignant protest known as "The Song of the Shirt." 
 It startled men out of their guilty ease. It rang across 
 the land, filling England with alarm, as though the 
 archangel's trumpet was calling Dives to judgment. 
 Every man tried to shift the sin upon his neighbor and 
 in affected anger inquired. Who has been starving the 
 women of England ? Out of the rhyme of Thomas 
 Hood came back the answer to every monopolist, 
 ''Thou art the man." There was discomfort in the 
 mahogany pews, for, drowning the preacher's voice 
 and the roar of the great organ, was heard the shrill 
 wail of the hungry seamstress : 
 
 It's oh ! to be a slave, 
 Along with the barbarous Turk, 
 
5 8 WHEELBARR O W 
 
 Where woman has never a soul to save, 
 If this is Christian work. 
 
 With fingers weary and worn, 
 
 With eyelids heavy and red, 
 A woman sat in unwomanly rags, 
 
 Plying her needle and thread — 
 Stitch, stitch, stitch, 
 In poverty, hunger and dirt. 
 
 And still with a voice of dolorous pitch, — 
 
 Would that it's tone could reach the rich, — 
 She sang this song of the shirt. 
 
 It did reach the rich, and they tried to buy peace 
 for their consciences that winter by copious giving of 
 alms, but above all that, the voice of labor cried like 
 a storm, *'We want not charity but justice." 
 
 It is difficult to say which had the greater influence 
 upon the heart of England, the "Song of the Shirt," 
 or "The Bridge of Sighs." One was really the comple- 
 ment of the other. Together they smote the adaman- 
 tine social system like the rod of Moses on the rock of 
 Horeb, and the waters of healing gushed forth. There 
 was a stupid alderman of London, Sir Peter Laurie — 
 Dickens has satirized him in "The Chimes" — whose 
 mission it was to "put down" suicide, and whenever 
 any of the girls who jumped into the river from Wa- 
 terloo Bridge, were rescued by the boats, and brought 
 before him, he punished them by sending them to 
 prison. "I am determined to put down suicide," he 
 used to say; but he never thought of putting down the 
 social crime that made the suicide. Nor did English 
 public sentiment. It was thick and stolid as the head 
 of Sir Peter Laurie. Newspapers moralizing could 
 not arouse it, neither could the passionate denuncia- 
 tions of orators and statesmen. Then came the poet, 
 and awakened it to a higher sense of duty, and to wiser 
 plans of charity. Hood's poem appeared, and a new 
 
THE POETS OE LIBERTY AND LABOR. 159 
 
 light shone upon the bridge. By the gleam of it '^so- 
 ciety" could see itself pushing the girls into the river, 
 and in self- accusation said : "Sir Peter, you ought to 
 send us to prison, and not the girls." A more humane 
 feeling was created, which shaped itself into schemes 
 of social amelioration, and into better laws. There 
 was no more talk of "putting down" suicide by send- 
 ing girls to prison. And ever after that, when some 
 homeless and forsaken wanderer sought rest in the 
 dark waters, there was no harsh condemnation, but 
 men said with genuine sorrow — 
 
 One more unfortunate, 
 
 Weary of breath, 
 Rashly importunate. 
 
 Gone to her death. 
 
 Take her up tenderly, 
 
 Lift her with care, 
 Fashioned so slenderly, 
 
 Young and so fair. 
 ***** 
 
 Make no deep scrutiny 
 Into her mutiny, 
 
 Rash and undutiful ; 
 Past all dishonor. 
 Death has left on her 
 
 Only the beautiful. 
 
 There was not a man of healthy morals, in all the 
 town of London, who was not awakened by the elo- 
 quent reproach of the poet, a reproach memorable now 
 throughout all the English world, familiar in Melbourne 
 and Chicago, as in England — 
 
 Alas ! for the rarity 
 Of Christian charity 
 
 Under the sun ! 
 Oh ! it was pitiful ! 
 Near a whole city full 
 
 Home she had none. 
 
 And every hbertine was smitten with disgrace and 
 terror when he read — 
 
: 6o WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 In she plunged boldly, 
 No matter how coldly, 
 
 The rough river ran,- 
 Over the brink of it. 
 Picture it— think of it 
 
 Dissolute man 1 
 Lave in it, drink of it 
 
 Then, if you can 1 
 
 To hammer philosophy into shapes of beauty is the 
 calling of the poet. What a grand workman was 
 Hood ! What melodies rang out from his anvil, and 
 what sparks from his hammer flew ! What chaste and 
 lovely forms he made ! Every one of his creations 
 ministered unto virtue, and none of them could be used 
 to decorate a wrong. Like Burns, he lifted labor up, 
 and left it a step higher than he found it. His humor 
 was an overflowing well, so copious that some men used 
 to think there could not be any room in him for greater 
 poetry. And yet his wit and humor, so delightful, and 
 so pure, were but the framework to poetic jewels worthy 
 to shine in the coronet of Shakespeare. 
 
 Certes, the world did praise his glorious wit. 
 The merry jester with his cap and bells I 
 • And sooth his wit was like Ithuriel's spear : 
 
 But 'twas mere lightning from the cloud of his lire, 
 Which held at heart most rich and blessed rain. 
 
 There was an abundant English market for cant 
 when Hood was in his prime \ but though poor, and 
 troubled, and sick, he would not pander to Mammon, 
 either in church or state, and so the rich rewards of 
 soul-servility passed him by. But the poet kept his 
 gift, unsullied by hypocrisy or bribe. As he would not 
 flatter the popular beliefs, bigotry assailed him. One 
 prominent reviewer, Rae Wilson, Esq., criticized his 
 poems as having an irreligious tendency, and Hood's 
 reply left Mr. Wilson looking like a scarecrow. Such 
 banter and comedy, and fun, have rarely been united 
 
THE POETS OE LIBERTY AND LABOR. i6i 
 
 to overwhelm an assailant as they are in the *^ Ode to 
 Rae Wilson." Seldom has the uncharitable character 
 of self-assumed piety been so vividly exposed as in that 
 ode. I know nothing superior to it, except '' Holy 
 Willie's Prayer." It is full of gems like this : 
 
 Spontaneously to God should tend the soul, 
 Like the magnetic needle to the pole ; 
 
 But what were that intrinsic virtue worth, 
 Suppose some fellow with more zeal than knowledge, 
 Fresh from St. Andrew's College, 
 
 Should nail the conscious needle to the North ? 
 
 Mr. Wilson was of St. Andrew's, and Hood con- 
 tinues thus : 
 
 I will not own a notion so unholy. 
 
 As thinking that the rich by easy trips 
 May go to heaven, whereas the poor and lowly, 
 
 Must work their passage, as they do in ships. 
 
 One place there is — beneath the burial sod. 
 Where all mankind are equalized by death ; 
 
 Another place there is — the Fane of God, 
 Where all are equal who draw living breath. 
 ******** 
 
 He who can stand within that holy door. 
 With soul unbowed by that pure spirit-level. 
 
 And frame unequal laws for rich and poor, — 
 Might sit for Hell, and represent the Devil. 
 
 That lust of gold which coins the poor man's chil- 
 dren into money, hides its face from the scorn of Thomas 
 Hood. His poetic wrath scorches avarice like fire. 
 The laboring heart is drawn by the magnetism of his 
 preaching up to a healthier atmosphere, where the 
 currents of life flow purer, and where humanity sees 
 more clearly the work it has to do. Not for ever shall 
 the greed of privileged classes rob the laborer of the 
 profits of his toil. Every day the workingmen are 
 learning something new. By and by they will know 
 their duty and organize their power. Then the moral 
 force of a great cause, backed by a voting strength in- 
 
1 62 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 vincible, will put them in possession of their great 
 estate. Not by fighting, not by bombs and bullets ; 
 these are barbarism. The labor triumphs that are 
 coming will be moral victories, and even they must be 
 preceded by our conquest of ourselves. If we seek 
 justice, we must do it \ if we demand liberty, we must 
 grant it. The whole domain of handicraft must be free 
 to all the people. The right to learn a trade must be 
 conceded to every American boy ; and after he has 
 learned it, the right to work at it must not be taken 
 from him. We have much self discipline to undergo 
 yet, and the sooner we go into moral training the 
 better. The control of our own appetites must come 
 before our final victory. 
 
1 63 
 
 HENRY GEORGE AND LAND TAXATION. 
 
 What a glorious idea:, the fatherhood of God, the 
 brotherhood of man, and a millenium on earth by the 
 simple means of a single tax on land! That is the 
 promise contained in Mr. Henry George's doctrine, so 
 brilliantly set forth in his Progress and Poverty. I 
 have read the book — nay I have devoured it. There 
 was so much truth in it, and, alas! so much impossi- 
 ble fairy-land that I began to doubt. It is a most 
 fascinating work on political economy, and I am un- 
 der the spell of its eloquence still. The line of de- 
 marcation between reality and dreamland is not easily 
 drawn where both are so closely blended. 
 
 The book contains a doctrine which I learned from 
 somebody, or some book, many years ago, and which 
 still clings to me, although entangled with many mis- 
 givings. It is that of abolishing the tariff and the 
 whole system of indirect duties, and putting all taxes 
 on land. I am told that the idea was first proposed by 
 the French economists called physiocrats, who con- 
 ceived the directest way of taxation the best. They 
 compared the social growth of a nation to that of a 
 tree which derives all its sap and strength from the 
 roots. The roots are agriculture, the stem is the pop- 
 ulation, the branches are the different industries, the 
 leaves are commerce, and the blossoms are the sci- 
 ences and arts. If but the roots are sound, let nature 
 
1 64 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 take care of the rest. The leaves, the blossoms, and 
 the fruits, how distant they all appear from the roots! 
 and yet they are all in closest connection; the leaves 
 draw all their juice from the roots. There is no need 
 of protecting the leaves for the sake of the roots; and 
 even if branches are torn off by the storm, the injury 
 is not serious, and the work of restoration immediately 
 begins if the roots have not suffered. 
 
 While Mr. George's enthusiasm animates and en- 
 courages me, I think I can see a flaw in his policy. 
 I believe in the justice and practicability of land tax- 
 ation. Let land be taxed according to its value, and 
 remove the many duties on other quarters which are 
 obstacles to progress and weigh heaviest on the poor. 
 I have no other argument for my view than that it 
 seems to rfie not unjust, and not impracticable. My 
 proof would be a fair trial. I trust it will work well 
 and commend itself especially to those who start in 
 life. As land would lose in value, if burdened with 
 taxes, it would afford to a poor man a greater oppor- 
 tunity to take to farming. All machinery and other 
 products of industry would be cheaper, if the prices 
 were not, as is the case now, artificially raised, so that 
 a full dollar in the United States goes on every sev- 
 enty or sixty cents, or even less, in England and in the 
 world's market. Money would be dear, and if a little 
 dear money buys much goods, a start in life will be 
 easier in every field. 
 
 So far as land taxation, its justice and practica- 
 bility are concerned, Mr. George and I travel to- 
 gether. But almost from the beginning in Mr. 
 George's arguments our roads part. I believe that 
 a radical defect in this plan lies in the mistake that 
 a tax may be converted by political magic from a bur- 
 
HENRY GEORGE— LAND TAXATION. 165 
 
 den to a blessing. Taxes may be unwisely and un- 
 fairly levied, and the burden of them thereby in- 
 creased; but in their wisest and most virtuous form, 
 they are a burden at the best. Believing this very im- 
 portant premise of his argument to be an error, I doubt 
 the economic soundness of his conclusions. To the man 
 who buys land, it will be a boon to have it on easy 
 terms, but to the farmer who owns his farm, land tax- 
 ation will always be felt as a burden. 
 
 But there is another fundamental error. Mr. George 
 calls his book "Progress and Poverty," and denounces 
 every progress under present circumstances as driving 
 a parting wedge between the rich and the poor. Every 
 progress, he maintains, benefits the rich only, it makes 
 them richer and oppresses the poor worse than they 
 were before. This Mr. George has not proved, and 
 there is little probability that he ever will prove it, for 
 it is not true and very likely the contrary may be 
 proved most easily. Progress is always beneficial to 
 the poor as well as to the rich. A poor man would 
 consider himself wretched now if he did not enjoy cer- 
 tain comforts which were luxuries in former days. 
 
 The arguments upon which Mr. George builds his 
 system are patriotic and humane. He bases it on the 
 idea of the fatherhood of God and proclaims that the 
 earth is God's impartial gift to all the children of men. 
 "It is in the scripture. Trim," said Uncle Toby. So 
 Mr. George believes that "The earth is the Lord's 
 and the fulness thereof," and from that sublime text 
 he preaches a very old agrarian gospel in a newer 
 form of words. It is possible that our Saxon ances- 
 tors when they took possession of Britain cherished 
 similar ideas, as did the children of Israel in the time 
 of Moses. Whether they did or not, they certainly 
 
1 66 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 acted in that way; they abolished the land monopoly, 
 these of the Cananites and those of the Britons, and 
 both of them established another land monopoly of 
 their own. They took possession in the name of their 
 gods, and when the Normans invaded England they 
 also came in the name of the Lord, for the Pope had 
 blessed their leader's sword. 
 
 All these arguments from beyond the clouds are 
 of a very doubtful nature and we should not employ 
 them so long as we have other arguments which are 
 more palpable and not so sentimental. Wherever they 
 are employed I am apt to be prejudiced that there is 
 something wrong; and if the cause for which they are 
 used is not wrong, there must certainly be a lack of 
 proof or a flaw of logic in the man that argues. 
 
 Mr. George makes a difference between Land, 
 Capital and Labor. Land is the condition of our ex- 
 istence as well as of our labor. Labor creates all 
 values, and capital is as it were, stored up labor. 
 
 Mr. George points out the difference between land 
 and capital, but he loses sight of the fact that land in 
 itself and apart from labor has no value whatever. It 
 acquires value only by the application of labor. It is 
 true that an unimproved lot in the city has value, but 
 what is that value otherwise than the labor of those 
 who live there. I agree with Mr. George that that 
 value should be taxed, but even in this case it is labor 
 that is taxed, and not the land. I would not buy a 
 hundred square miles of most fertile land in Central 
 Africa for a dime if it could be had for that price, be- 
 cause it is useless; it is without value so long as there 
 is no hope to make it valuable through labor. If only 
 land should be taxed apart from improvement, many 
 lots on the lakeside of Chicago should be free of taxa- 
 
HENRY GEORGE— LAND TAXATION. 167 
 
 tion, for they consist of improvement only. The Dutch 
 people should be free from all taxation, the districts 
 where swamps have been before ought to be a forbid- 
 den ground to tax gatherers. In truth all lands under 
 cultivation are like Holland, they have been gained or 
 improved by labor and the sum total of their labor 
 value is rarely covered by their market value. If only 
 land should be taxed apart from improvement, as Mr. 
 George proposes, this would be an abolition of taxa- 
 tion altogether. 
 
 While the basis of Mr. George's theory is vague 
 and unsubstantial, the consequences which he prophe- 
 cies to follow are fantastical. It is the abolition of 
 poverty and the beginning of a millenium upon earth. 
 
 Mr. George's optimism is enviable, it is like that 
 of a child. Here he places himself in one and the 
 same line with the many other reformers that have 
 found a panacea for all evils in the world. But the 
 promises are so positive, that Dr. McGlynn says, he 
 would not hesitate, if he could, to introduce at once 
 such changes as would realize this single tax theory. 
 Does the Doctor forget that all sudden changes must 
 bring about a most dangerous crisis. Even a sudden 
 change for unmixed good may be fatal. A consump- 
 tive person has to be accustomed to good air by de- 
 grees, and a half- starved man must take his first 
 meal by small bits. Moreover, are not those who 
 have invested their capital, i. e., their stored-up labor 
 in land, entitled to be protected in their possession 
 acquired under our present system. Is it just to de- 
 prive a farmer of his farm which he has bought with 
 the toil and sweat of his or his fathers' life? 
 
 These difficulties are not insurmountable, although 
 they must for a time impede the introduction of land 
 
i68 WBRELBARRO W. 
 
 taxation. Land taxation can easily be introduced by 
 slow degrees, and a compensation may be given to 
 those who would suffer unfairly by the change. But 
 even granted that the advantages of land taxation 
 would be great, I fail to see how it can produce such 
 a glorious state of things as Mr. George hopes for. 
 
 Is he so utterly blind to the fact that poverty has 
 many sources, (of which I confess our wrong system 
 of taxation is a very important one,) and that after the 
 removal of this, there are a hundred others to fight? 
 If there is one chief source of poverty we should 
 not seek it in circumstances but in man. The 
 savage is dependent upon circumstances, but civilized 
 man should be able to govern circumstances, and use 
 all his mental and moral powers to make the best of 
 his situation by wise foresight, economy, thrift, and in- 
 dustry, instead of letting things go until circumstances 
 have improved. I know of one panacea only; it is 
 man's obedience to the moral laws. But the applica- 
 tion of this rule, simple though it sounds in its gen- 
 eralized form, is so complex that it hardly deserves 
 the name of a panacea. Land taxation even if it had in 
 its consequence all the impossible blessings it is sup- 
 posed to have according to Mr. George, would be of 
 no avail to him who believes that he is the mere 
 product of circumstances, and who does not know 
 that a man's character is the most important factor 
 among the conditions that shape his fate. If a man is 
 aware of that, he will dare to become the master of 
 the circumstances that surround him. The most ur- 
 gent step forwards is the moral elevation of man, and 
 progress is no progress unless it is accompanied by a 
 moral progress of man that makes him stronger and 
 more humane. 
 
169 
 
 WORDS AND WORK. 
 
 I had a dream which was not all a dream.— Byron. 
 
 I HAVE not been able to study many books this 
 summer, and I find once more that loafing in camp 
 weakens discipline. I now see the value of daily drill 
 although I could not see it when a soldier. I have 
 been dreaming away the summer, and so great is the 
 luxury that I have some charity for the opium eater 
 who yields to the fascination, and dreams himself to 
 idiocy and to death. The temptation is great. 
 
 What little reading I have done has been chiefly 
 devoted to the dreams of others, notably the commu- 
 nistic dream of Edward Bellamy, and the anarchistic 
 dream of Elisee Reclus. These have a brotherly like- 
 ness to each other, and a family resemblance to the 
 dreams of seers and saints and soothsayers, from the 
 trance of Balaam to Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones 
 which he conjured into men; from Belshazzar's night- 
 mare to the Apocalypse of John ; from the Utopian 
 visions of Sir Thomas More to John Bunyan's dream, 
 told in that immortal classic which sprung full-armed 
 out of a tinker's brain ; from Walhalla and Paradise 
 to the ideal Boston of Bellamy ; and from him to the 
 swarthy gipsies who prophesy for sixpence. All these 
 dreams and dreamers weave spells around emotional 
 natures. In the old slavery days before the flood I 
 
1 70 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 have seen Virginia negroes, dazzled by the gold and 
 pearl and sapphire of the Apocalypse, lift up their 
 voices in camp-meeting and sing : 
 
 " John saw the angel Gaberel 
 Sitting on a golden altar." 
 
 Considering that it was felony by the law to teach 
 those people to read, they may be excused for misun- 
 derstanding the text, and beholding the splendors of 
 liberty in the Heaven of John. Wild, weird, and im- 
 possible, as we regard it, nevertheless John had a 
 dream which was not all a dream. 
 
 Dreamers move the world only as they stimulate 
 action. Work is the way, the truth, and the life ; and 
 work for others is the most religious prayer that man 
 can pray. Wholesale philanthropy is well, but retail 
 philanthropy is better. Each can pave his way to 
 heaven by simple deeds. We may neglect the indi- 
 vidual sinner to preach comprehensive plans of salva- 
 tion until our own salvation is lost. In our zeal to 
 reform systems, we may neglect little bits of charity 
 until the gates of mercy close against ourselves. The 
 preacher who stands at the altar and invites the peo- 
 ple to come to the eucharist of bread and wine, the 
 holy communion of equal brotherhood, does well ; but 
 God's preacher is the man who bravely carries the 
 sacrament out of the sanctuary to the hovels of the 
 poor. It is well to call upon the people to come to 
 the temples and hear the word of life, but it is better 
 to carry the word of life to their houses, and a bit of 
 the bread with it. 
 
 Those doctrines were revealed unto me in a vision. 
 Most of us who have had a theological and religious 
 education have had visions of St. Peter at the gate. 
 Many of us are ashamed to acknowledge it, but it is 
 
WORDS AND WORK. 171 
 
 true for all that, especially of men like me, who are in 
 the sunset, wondering what our Heaven or otherwise is 
 to be. In all my visionary interviews with the apostolic 
 turnkey I have managed to squeeze through on doc- 
 trine, although I passed a very poor examination when 
 it came to works. In my last effort it was a close 
 debate whether I should get in or stay out. I pleaded 
 the many good things I had advocated, and the bad 
 things I had rebuked. " Yes ! " replied the venerable 
 saint, ''you have said some good things, but what 
 good things have you done ? What griefs have you 
 lifted from the hearts of your fellows ? Whose tears 
 have you dried up ? You have forgiven the enemies 
 of other people, but which of your own enemies have 
 you pardoned?" I was silent. "I shall let you 
 in," he said, '' but I cannot promise you a very good 
 position, because, my son, you must remember that 
 the man who has given a cup of cold water to a thirsty 
 soul takes higher rank in the celestial monarchy than 
 he who spent a lifetime in denouncing the mismanage- 
 ment of the water-works." I had a dream which was 
 not all a dream. 
 
 The hopeful schemes of ''Scientific "socialism and 
 " Philosophic " anarchy are only dreams of an ideal 
 state, for which an ideal people must be made. This 
 will require the slow gestation of ten thousand years. 
 I am not sure that figs will not grow on thistles after 
 proper grafting ; but the grafting must be done ; and 
 even after that must come the education of the thistle. 
 It is only the poets who can " hear the feet of angels 
 coming down to men." They do not come, unless re- 
 incarnated as a punishment, and then they are no 
 longer angels. Angels have their own affairs to attend 
 to, for there is work to do in heaven, and aspiration 
 
1 7 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 for a higher heaven still. Some day there may be a 
 people on this earth fitted to live in the anticipated 
 Boston of Mr. Bellamy, although I am not sure that 
 I should care to dwell among them any more than I 
 should like to live in a planet where the oceans have 
 no tides, and the air no storms. For all that, we 
 may by individual effort, by retail philanthropy, lift 
 ourselves and others oiit of many social evils up 
 towards the improved condition pictured in the vision. 
 Behind all my doubts and fears comes up a hope that 
 Mr. Bellamy has had a dream ^which is not all a 
 dream. 
 
 There is something fascinating in the scheme of 
 •'Philosophic" anarchy, ''life without government 
 and without law." That is the life that suits me, and 
 I find that I have been an anarchist from a boy. If a 
 slight amendment would be in order I would move the 
 following addition, "and without work." For those 
 principles I am ready to turn out and carry a torch. 
 I never had much schoohng, and what little there was 
 of it was made unprofitable by precocious anarchy. I 
 wanted to live "without law and without authority," 
 and so I ran away at every temptation to go a-swim- 
 ming, and a-skating, and a-fishing, while a band of 
 music would troll me away into the deepest cavern in 
 the mountain like the foolish children who followed 
 the pied piper of Hamelin ; and it can do so yet. There 
 is too much restraint upon me. I am altogether too 
 much bound dov/n by authority and law. It would be 
 much better if this were otherwise; better for me I 
 mean. As for my neighbors, I must frankly say that 
 it is better for them that my savage inclinations be 
 restrained. 
 
 I fear that the virtuous "Anarchism" advocated by 
 
WORDS AND WORK. 173 
 
 Reclus is an impossible state, to which present hu- 
 manity can never attain. I fear it is an ideal paradise 
 never to be enjoyed by us who live in this real world. 
 I think that Anarchism, as he desires it, is a revolution 
 that must follow, and cannot precede, a revolution of 
 human character. A state of society where all is jus- 
 tice, kindness, liberty, and love, where law and au- 
 thority are unnecessary, must be based upon an ag- 
 gregate humanity virtuous and enlightened, a general 
 and individual character purified from selfishness and 
 greed, from low ambitions and the dross of huirian 
 pride, from lust and all ignoble passions. I believe 
 that such a state is not possible in our time, nor un- 
 der the conditions of our present physical, mental, and 
 moral organization. It may come in the future, when 
 through the slow education of centuries mankind shall 
 have reached another stage of development. Mean- 
 time, '^law and authority" must both remain to pro- 
 tect the good against the bad, the weak against the 
 strong. Before we can reach the healthy table land of 
 the delectable mountain, the peaceable Anarchism of 
 Reclus, we must be relieved of that nature which now 
 enfolds us and weighs us to the ground. Poring one 
 night over ^sop's fables to relax my mind which had 
 been somewhat strained by the speculations of Reclus, 
 I fell asleep and dreamed a fable of my own. 
 
 The mud-turtles held a convention to take into con- 
 sideration the degradation and poverty of the mud- 
 turtle classes of society. Delegates attended from all 
 the mud-ponds round about, and the convention was 
 honored by the presence of some eloquent and distin- 
 guished mud-turtles from abroad. The base and grov- 
 eling condition of the mud-turtle classes was con- 
 trasted with the delightful and superior existence of 
 
1 74 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the birds of the air. One eloquent speaker said, ''We 
 aspire not to rival the eagle in the strength of his 
 wing, nor the swallow in the swiftness of his flight ; 
 we desire not the plumage of the parrot, nor his power 
 to speak in any language ; we ask not the strong toe- 
 nails of the hawk, nor the mocking-bird's gift of song ; 
 but is it right, is it just, my fellow-mud-turtles, that 
 even the ignoble buzzard should be allowed to refresh 
 himself with the pure air of the cerulean heavens, while 
 we are limited to the fever-and-ague districts of the 
 most inferior portions of the earth ? Let us arise in 
 our might and fly." The committee on resolutions 
 having adopted a platform in accordance with the tenor 
 of the above remarks, the chairman was about to put 
 the question, when a venerable mud-turtle on a back 
 log- rose and said : 
 
 "Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Conven- 
 tion — Did it ever occur to you that before we can carry 
 out the resolutions of the platform and fly like the 
 birds, we must first discard the cumbersome overcoat 
 which we are now in the habit of wearing, and adopt 
 in place of it a garment of feathers and wings?" 
 
 This fable teaches. We must fit ourselves for that 
 condition to which we aspire. 
 
175 
 
 JIM THE INVENTOR. 
 
 My friend Jim Short is a mechanic; and what is 
 more, he is a genius in mechanics. Had he been 
 simply a mechanic he might have prospered and made 
 money, but being a genius he has accumulated nothing 
 but glory, on which he will receive no dividends in 
 this world. They will all go to the multitudinous cor- 
 poration known as Homo Brothers and Co. It is a 
 surprise to Jim that this practical epoch does not use 
 genius well. It has neither time nor money to waste 
 on theoretical men. After a long and weary search, 
 Jim Short has discovered the principle of perpetual 
 motion, and he has invented a machine to utilize it for 
 the abolition of hard work. It needs only a few more 
 wheels and pulleys to make it perfect, and then the 
 social problem will be solved; we shall need no exer- 
 cise, but play. It unites the virtues of the philoso- 
 pher's stone, the elixir of life, and the Balm of Gilead. 
 It is the supreme panacea which, like Aaron's rod, shall 
 swallow all the rest. 
 
 They give no credit at the patent office, and they 
 refuse to issue patents on ideal inventions. They will 
 not accept promissory plans, models, and specifica- 
 tions latent in the inventor's brain. They insist on 
 realities made of wood, and leather, and iron. This is 
 
1 7 6 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the prosy reason why Jim has not received a patent 
 for his promise of "perpetual motion." His models 
 contain cogs, wheels, concentrics, eccentrics, and pul- 
 leys enough for twenty patents, but because they lack 
 just two trifling elements, a lever and a fulcrum, the 
 department absurdly refuses a patent, and what is 
 worse, the government declines to furnish genius with 
 money enough to supply the missing powers. The 
 people refuse faith, and the government refuses money. 
 That Jim's manifold patterns do not work is no fault 
 of his, but of the heedless government which declines 
 to render him substantial aid. His efforts being for 
 the benefit of all the people, Jim thinks that the 
 government should subsidize his genius or at least 
 encourage it with a pension, that he may pursue his ex- 
 periments above the cankering fear of poverty. Morse 
 received a subsidy for a promise of quick motion, and 
 why should not Jim receive a like stimuh^s for his 
 promise of perpetual motion? He wants a few im- 
 mediate assets and there are none in the assurance 
 that he shall be renowned in after ages like Watt and 
 Stephenson. 
 
 Jim's definition of his perpetual motion machine is 
 this: he describes it as a mechanical contrivance that 
 needs no food and works for ever. It is the one great 
 rniracle under the sun. The skeptical crowd laugh 
 kindly at poor Jim as a visionary in mechanical econ- 
 omy. They easily detect the flaw in his logic, but with 
 childish credulity they pin their own faith to inventors 
 in political economy more visionary than Jim. His 
 theory is a panacea that works in all emergencies and 
 cures everything; so is theirs. Each of them declares 
 that he has discovered the secret of perpetual motion, 
 and as soon as he can supply a lever and a fulcrum to 
 
JIM THE INVENl^OR. 177 
 
 his machine he will abolish every form of social disease. 
 Jim is not alone in fairy-land. The woods there are full 
 of dreamers fantastical as he. 
 
 Forty-five years ago, there was a social reformer in 
 England, who found "perpetual motion " in the spade. 
 His theory was to abolish the plow and divide Eng- 
 land up into four-acre farms, to be cultivated by the 
 spade alone. This would give employment to every- 
 body, and poverty would cease to be. He was correct, 
 because it is very plain that to cultivate all England 
 with the spade would require the muscle of all her 
 people. He put more than a million dollars into his 
 experiment. He bought large tracts of land, divided 
 it up into four acre farms, armed his "freeholders" 
 with spades, and set them to work. The scheme failed, 
 and the failure broke his heart. In his efforts to find 
 the missing lever, fulcrum, or whatever it was that his 
 machine wanted, he became insane, and died at last in 
 the lunatic asylum. 
 
 A very popular "perpetual motion" machine is the 
 panacea known as the single tax on land-values, which 
 is to abolish poverty. In fact the proprietary name of 
 it stamped upon the bottles, is "Anti-Poverty." All 
 other preparations for abolishing poverty are counter- 
 feit. Another inventor, of the type and quality of Jim, 
 assures me that he has discovered "perpetual motion " 
 in State Socialism, where all of us are to be absorbed 
 into that ethereal Nirvana which is called " govern- 
 ment," wherein we are to live and move and have our 
 being. Another tells me that he has found "perpetu- 
 al motion" in the principle of individualism, or an- 
 archy, where government is unknown because unne- 
 cessary; where every man is his own policeman, club- 
 bing himself over the head whenever he does wrong 
 
178 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 and continuously taking himself into custody. Another 
 assures me that he has found the great principle in 
 mutual banking and an unlimited supply of paper ten- 
 dollar pieces. When every man has a pocket full of 
 bank stock, Utopia becomes a geographical fact. When 
 we can draw on the bank for whatever amount we 
 need by simply depositing a philosopher's stone in the 
 safe, "perpetual motion" becomes a crystallized re- 
 ality. I have a friend, an editor of a newspaper,. who 
 writes me that he has found "perpetual motion" in a 
 graduated income tax by which every man is to be 
 fined in proportion to his prosperity, the fines to go to 
 the unprosperous. He does not know that this was one 
 of the resources of the French Republic, a hundred 
 years ago, by which "equality" was to be established 
 among all the people. 
 
 Jim, the inventor, is not alone in his theories of 
 "perpetual motion." He has the company of hundreds, 
 who believe that they have solved the riddle of ages, 
 and that their special inventions, if they can only get 
 them patented, will bring the millennium in. 
 
179 
 
 ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 
 
 I HAIL it as a healthy sign that the political unrest 
 created by the ''Labor" agitation has weakened the 
 division-wall between capital and labor in Chicago ; 
 and let us hope that in due time the wall will be shaken 
 down. At last some of the just and more enlightened 
 men of the wealthy class hold out their hands to the 
 laborers and say, '^ Come, let us reason together. " This 
 invitation has been accepted, and the result is an in- 
 terchange of opinions through the medium of ''Eco- 
 nomic Conferences," where all sides may be heard. 
 
 That we are in a state of social war is due largely 
 to the ignorant rich. They have made themselves a 
 caste having rights, to whom the poor are a caste owing 
 duties. The rich who are not ignorant must also bear 
 a part of the responsibility. They have wrapped them- 
 selves in pleasure, and have avoided the meetings 
 and discussions of the working men. They have aban- 
 doned the laborer to his errors, and made an enemy of 
 him who might have been a friend. They have shorn 
 the locks, and put out the eyes of Samson, but his arms 
 clasp the pillars of the temple. They have left the 
 working man to his passions and allowed him to be- 
 come the spoil of demagogues and blind leaders of the 
 blind. They refuse to meet the laborer in debate, and 
 then they reproach him for his fantastic visions of a 
 new and impossible society. They decline ^o guide 
 
1 80 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the people right and then complain because others 
 guide them wrong. 
 
 When the wild and irrational tactics of the Trades 
 Unions alarmed Great Britain fifty-five years ago, 
 Macauley warned the ignorant rich and the luxurious 
 rich that because of their neglect the poor had fallen 
 under evil guidance, and he adapted the parable of 
 Gotham to the social condition of England. The trees 
 having decided to elect a King, the vine would not ac- 
 cept the office because of its cheeriness, and the olive 
 would not because of its fatness, and the fig-tree would 
 not because of its sweetness ; so the bramble was 
 anointed King, and out of the bramble came the fire 
 that devoured the Cedars of Lebanon. 
 
 I greet these conferences as a truce to barbarian 
 methods on both sides, to the vengeance of the bomb, 
 and the vengeance of the gallows. There are moral 
 forces throbbing in the rich and poor alike, and out of 
 these forces all measures of reform must come. Phys- 
 ical and intellectual powers make changes, but only 
 moral forces make reforms. It is not true that in this 
 land we have reached the alternative between anarchy 
 in robes and anarchy in rags. 
 
 In the *^ Conference " course the opening was given 
 to the working men, and the first lecture was by Mr. 
 Geo. A. Schilling, an eloquent man and a leader in the 
 ^' order. " His theme was '* The Objects of the Knights 
 of Labor." The hall was crowded, and the audience 
 was highly charged with mental and spiritual elec- 
 tricity. The positive and negative elements of oppos- 
 ing social forces were under very active excitement, 
 while the banker and the blacksmith, the millionaire 
 and laborer jostled each other in their eagerness to 
 hear a V Knight " of the latter day crusade which is to 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. i8i 
 
 rescue the holy land from lords, rents, mortgages, and 
 monopolies, a soldier in the chivalry of labor. It re- 
 minded me that when I was a youth in England, it 
 suddenly became the fashion for earls and barons and 
 bishops to come to the Mechanics' Institutes and lecture 
 to the working men. They spoke to us with a patron- 
 izing air, and we listened with humility as became our 
 lower station. At Mr. Schilling's lecture I was glad to 
 see that neither ''order" was disposed to ask or offer 
 patronage. The genius of the occasion was democratic 
 and its influence was good. 
 
 Mr. Schilling spoke as an advocate, and yet he de- 
 clared himself opposed to some of the especial objects 
 of the order. He confessed that radical differences of 
 opinion existed among the Knights themselves as to 
 the wisdom of their own constitution in some of its 
 essential claims. He was himself an extreme individ- 
 ualist, opposed to the theory and doctrine of state 
 socialism on which the order itself was built. He would 
 restrict, and not extend the powers of government. 
 More dangerous to the order than the men within it 
 of opposite opinions, are the thousands of its members 
 who have no opinions at all. From all this it is easy 
 to predict the early dissolution of the society. In the 
 evolution of organized labor it must give way to more 
 scientific agencies; to a higher order of Knighthood 
 able to contend with the actualities of life, and to mus- 
 ter into service all the moral forces of the time. 
 
 Mr. Schilling is an enthusiast, and his argument 
 had much of the strength and some of the weakness 
 that belong to enthusiasm. Parts of it reminded me 
 of the Wendell Phillippics I heard long ago. He said, 
 " The hanging of a few agitators will not abolish pop- 
 ular discontent." This is true, because the discontent 
 
1 82 WHEELS A RR O W. 
 
 will remain so long as the reason for it remains. John 
 Ball organized the Knights of Labor in England five 
 hundred years ago. The government hung John Ball, 
 but the Knights had more necks than the government 
 had ropes, and the order in some form or other has 
 lived on to this day. The weakness of Mr. Schilling 
 was his apology for the exclusive, aristocratic, monop- 
 olistic principle which actuates the Knights of Labor. 
 It is no excuse that the working man, suffering under 
 a sense of wrong, his home forever haunted by the 
 ghost of hunger, has a right to clutch at the law of 
 self-preservation, and shut his fellow craftsmen out of 
 that part of the labor market where his own muscle is 
 offered for sale. He has no such right, and the asser- 
 tion of it has ever been the weakness of the Trades 
 Unions, and the Knights of Labor. The Exclusion 
 principle is unjust, and like every other injustice it 
 carries punishment and failure upon its wings. Labor 
 statesmanship, like all other statesmanship, must stand 
 on a moral foundation, or it will not permanently 
 stand. The objects of the Knights of Labor cannot 
 be separated from their methods, and they must all be 
 criticised together. 
 
 Among the objects of the Knights of Labor was 
 this: ''The greatest good for the greatest number," 
 and Mr. Schilling's own defense was evidence that in 
 the mathematics of the Knights the greatest number is 
 number one. It is a deceitful phrase always used to 
 cloak the tyranny of those who claim to act for '' the 
 greatest number." In political morality there is no 
 such principle, because it implies a smallest number 
 outside the Common Weal ; a smallest number entitled 
 only to the smallest good. I never see this popular 
 bit of sophistry without looking behind it for some in- 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 183 
 
 justice which it covers, and I generally find it. Slavery 
 used to be justified ^or ''the greatest good of the 
 greatest number," and in the present case the senti- 
 ment is used to excuse practices which in themselves 
 are indefensible, harsh regulations which arrest liberty, 
 which make work for one man and idleness for another, 
 which are supposed to make high wages for the 
 '' Knight," and low wages for the churl. I advise the 
 Knights to erase that false motto from their coat of 
 arms, and substitute for it ''the greatest good for all." 
 Mr. Schilling claimed, and with success, that the 
 use of machinery in the mechanic arts and the subdi- 
 vision of hard hand and brain labor into easy elements 
 had changed industrial conditions and had silently 
 worked a social revolution in 50 years ; a revolution in 
 which the working men had altogether the worst of it, 
 and whereby capital had multiplied its power ; a revo- 
 lution by which the master has become a more and 
 more intelligent energy, and the workman a more and 
 more unimportant and unintelligent hostler, harnessing 
 and unharnessing, driving and grooming the machine. 
 Of the multiplied product the greater part had gone to 
 the owner of the machine, and very little to the hostler. 
 This was not the.exact language of Mr. Schillingj but it 
 was the substance of his claim, and I think he was right. 
 Ingenious machinery has broken up several of the me- 
 chanic trades into separate bits of work, each one of 
 them requiring very little strength and very little skill. 
 Whereformerly twenty men made twenty watches, each 
 man making one, twenty girls will now make two hun- 
 dred watches in twenty separate parts. The girls sim- 
 ply tend the machines whose cunning fingers make the 
 wheels, and springs, and all the inside works with a 
 delicacy and precision that human fingers cannot imi- 
 
1 84 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 tate. The shoemaker is becoming extinct like the In- 
 dian. The shoes are made in parts by different ma- 
 chines. Furniture is made in the same way, and cabi- 
 net making will soon be among the forgotten arts. 
 This evolution of industry is the puzzle of economics, 
 the despair of politics. That this multiplied product is 
 a blessing to mankind is true. It is immensely for the 
 greatest good of the greatest number, but there is a 
 smallest number stunned and bewildered by the revo- 
 lution claiming that society has abolished its means of 
 existence, and giving back to it no compensation out of 
 the increased abundance. That society will adapt itself 
 in time to the changed conditions is true, but while so- 
 ciety is doing it two million willing hands are reaching 
 out for work and are unable to obtain it. 
 
 I know the claim is made that the increased product 
 is fairly divided, although not equally divided and that 
 the working men are getting absolutely and relatively a 
 greater share of it than capital receives. Mr. Edward 
 Atkinson asserts that the rate of wages has been increas- 
 ing absolutely in more money, and relatively in lower 
 prices for what the workman has to buy. He proves it by 
 the statistics of 60 years. His figures are fallacious, for 
 the problem is not the rate of wages and the price of pro- 
 visions to the man in work, but the puzzle is this, what is 
 the rate of wages of the man who is earning nothing ? 
 And what is the cost of provisions to the man who is not 
 getting any wages at all ? The million or two of willing 
 workers who are not able to obtain work is a factor in 
 the problem that confuses the statistics, and gives a 
 moral contradiction to the mathematical proof. Labor 
 is not prosperous wherever there is an over-production 
 of men. 
 
 While our moralists and statesmen stand baffled and 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 185 
 
 dumb in the presence of this ugly fact, is it any wonder 
 that untaught laborers blunder in their statesmanship 
 too? Is it any wonder that like the fly in the spider's 
 web they entangle themselves more and more in their 
 efforts to be free ? Must we expect more wisdom in 
 them than in their masters? More virtues too? They 
 will strug'gle for better things. They may not struggle 
 wisely, but they will not lie down. If their plans are 
 vicious help them to better plans. Society must learn 
 that moral consequences are not to be evaded, and 
 that justice must be done. Working men begin to see 
 how precarious is their bread. They begin to see how 
 «*.asy it is to 'Mock them out " whenever the ''trust " 
 they are working for, chooses to "shut down " in order 
 to make scarcity and raise prices. In the midst of the 
 ills they suffer, and the greater ills that threaten them, 
 it is folly to expect that working men will quietly lie 
 down and patiently await their doom. " I shall be made 
 into soup to-morrow," says the turtle in the restaurant 
 window to the passers-by, but we must not expect suoh 
 calm philosophy as that from the American working 
 man. 
 
 *' The Earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof"; 
 and according to the Knights of Labor it belongs to all 
 his creatures. Literally, they want the earth, and this 
 claim is endorsed by Mr. Schilling. He is opposed to 
 the private ownership of land, or as he called it the 
 monopoly of land. He contended that all the people 
 should have free access to the land, and that mines 
 ought never to be private property. He said if the 
 coal mines of Pennsylvania had not been owned by a 
 few rich barons the strikes would not have occurred. 
 Perhaps the strongest point in his lecture was this, and 
 the strength of it was due not so much to its abstract 
 
1 86 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 merit as to the fact that the avaricious combinations of 
 mine-owners increase the price of coal, while their ab- 
 solute control of the markets enables them to ** lock 
 out " the miners at any time when they want to stiffen 
 prices by making scarcity. Land ownership although 
 its abuses may be modified, can hardly be abolished. 
 Give a man free access to the land and the very day he 
 applies his labor to it, he becomes entitled to some se- 
 curity for its permanent possession, and ownership is 
 nothing more than that. Ownership of land has always 
 developed the free spirit of a people, and it may be 
 doubted whether it is possible to abolish the freehold 
 without abolishing freedom too. 
 
 Mr. Schilling was opposed to the demand of the 
 Knights of Labor that the capricious power called 
 ''Government" should own and operate all the rail- 
 roads, canals, telegraphs, banks, boats, bridges, gas 
 works, water works, express companies, and other en- 
 terprises, on the principle that government becomes 
 despotic in proportion to its power, and for the further 
 reason that government is not able to work as efficiently 
 and cheaply as private individuals can. The whole 
 question is one of expediency rather than of principle 
 and depends greatly on the conditions that surround 
 the government, and on the elements that comprise it. 
 In this country the scheme would be a good thing for 
 "the party in power." It would make the tenure of 
 office permanent, and settle the question of civil-service 
 reform. At the last presidential election all the mail 
 carriers marched in the Blaine procession. Had all 
 the railroad men and telegraph men and the rest of 
 them joined in the line, we should have seen at once 
 how hopeless would be any attempt to ' ' turn the rascals 
 out." And it is a curious phenomenon in this country 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 187 
 
 that the *' ins" are always the rascals and the ''outs" 
 the honest men. 
 
 In some respects the Knights of Labor builded bet- 
 ter than they knew, and better than they ever meant to 
 build. For instance in the demand that women shall 
 have equal rights with men for equal work. This has 
 come to mean not only the right of women to equal 
 wages, but the equal right of women to earn wages 
 wherever they can, and this meaning is given to the 
 claim by many of the Knights, perhaps by a majority of 
 them now. It was not so intended in the beginning. 
 Behind the fair face of it was concealed a sinister de- 
 sign. The intention of it was, though all the Knights 
 may not have known it, to draw the line between men 
 and women at the sewing machine, and to drive the 
 women back behind that line. It was thought that if 
 this demand for equal wages could be enforced, em- 
 ployers would say, ''well, if we must pay the same 
 wages to women as to men, we may as well have men." 
 Some of the Knights have a hope that such will be the 
 effect of it yet, but most of them are now, as a few of 
 them have always been, sincere in their claim of equality 
 for women. Besides, the women are so strongly in- 
 trenched in the professions, the clerical employments, 
 and the lighter mechanical trades, that it would be im- 
 possible to turn them out. In this, as in some other 
 things, the order has had an educational influence on its 
 members. Its successor, for it will have a successor, 
 will abandon many of its claims and dogmas as gladly 
 as men discard old boots that never fitted them. The 
 new order will be wiser and better than the old one. 
 
 The means by which the Objects of the Knights of 
 Labor are to be achieved according to Mr. Schilling, 
 are Agitation, Education, and Co-operation. I have 
 
1 88 WHEELBA RR O W. 
 
 only room for a remark on the Education plan. When 
 Mr. SchilHng was asked if the Knights included in 
 their scheme of *' education " the instruction of the 
 hand, the right of a boy to be educated in a trade, he 
 would only answer affirmatively for himself, and was 
 not willing to do so for the Knights of Labor. It is 
 well known that the Knights of Labor restrict the edu- 
 cation of the hand, which they have no more right to 
 do than they have to restrict the education of the 
 mind. They have no more right to forbid a boy to 
 learn a trade than they have to forbid him to learn 
 reading, writing, and arithmetic, for by the aid of these 
 he may some time or other compete with some Knight 
 for a job. They have no more right to sentence a boy 
 to hard labor for life with a shovel, a wheelbarrow, and 
 a hod, than they have to sentence him to hard labor in 
 the penitentiary. So long as they persist in doing it, 
 they will fail to get the sympathy of just and liberal 
 men outside the order, and they will lose the sympathy 
 of many just and liberal men inside of it. Their plat- 
 form must come to the test of the spirit-level, and all 
 its inequalities must be planed away. Otherwise the 
 order will be an obstacle in the path to liberty, a hin- 
 drance to the elevation of labor. 
 
189 
 
 ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 
 
 BANKING AND THE SOCIAL SYSTEM. 
 
 The first lecture in the '' Economic Conference " 
 course was by Mr. George A. Schilling, a working 
 man; the second by Mr. Lyman J. Gage, a banker. 
 Mr. Gage chose for his theme " Banking and the So- 
 cial System." He spoke eloquently, and in a digni- 
 fied way addressed himself to the intelligence, and 
 not the prejudices, of the congregatipn. He took an 
 optimistic view of our social future, but was fully 
 alive to the dangers of the present, manifested in 
 what he called the '' industrial revolt." He said some 
 things which required courage to say, but he made 
 no attempt to flatter his audience nor the larger con- 
 gregation outside. Claiming that the world was grow- 
 ing better, and not worse, he said : 
 
 "The rising sun of Christianity drove back the clouds of 
 pagan superstition, and brought to light the true dignity of man 
 as a moral being, and revealed a nobler deity. The Reformation 
 broke the power of a dominant religio-political church disposed 
 to hold in mental subjection those it had made free from the in- 
 fluence of pagan superstition ; and finally modern rationalism has 
 purified the reformation, and promises to free the mind from 
 bondage to spiritual tyranny of every kind." 
 
 Mr. Gage advocated' our present banking system 
 as a necessary and valuable ingredient in American 
 social organization, and in this he was rig ht, if the pre- 
 
1 90 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 vailing conditions that encompass labor, trade, and 
 capital, are natural, just, and wise. A large majority 
 of his audience, however, believe that the National 
 Banking System is an eruption on the surface of so- 
 ciety indicating impurities within, and this impression 
 Mr. Gage did not remove, although he was quite suc- 
 cessful in showing the necessity of banks to a farming, 
 manufacturing, and commercial people. He reasoned 
 thus: Exchange of products is a good thing, banking 
 facilitates exchange of products, therefore the Na- 
 tional Bank System is good. I see a fallacy in this rea- 
 soning although I may not be able to separate it from 
 the tangle of the argument. I have heard the war 
 praised by stump orators in the same way. They said 
 the National Banks provide a sound currency, because 
 the notes are secured by national bonds, which are 
 secured by national debt, made by national war. No 
 war no debt, no debt no bonds, no bonds no banks, no 
 banks no currency. I know this chain has a flaw in it 
 although it appears to be sound. 
 
 Mr. Gage, instead of defending the National Bank 
 System as a monopoly necessary to a safe currency 
 maintained that it was no monopoly at all, and he 
 gave us the dictionary meaning of the word. Work- 
 ing men care little about the etymology of a word, or 
 the Latin or the Greek of it; they regard only the fact 
 it expresses. It may be true that monopoly means 
 the '* sole power " to carry on a certain business, and 
 that National Banks have no such power because any 
 five men with fifty thousand dollars may start a Na- 
 tional Bank ; nevertheless, if the law confers upon 
 National Banks certain privileges which other banks 
 have not, then to the full extent of those privileges 
 they have what may be practically, if not grammatic- 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 191 
 
 ally, called a monopoly. I do not mean that every 
 monopoly is mischievous because it is a monopoly, it 
 may in fact be beneficial to the community, as Mr. 
 Gage is competent to show. 
 
 When Mr. Gage gave us the catalogue of powers 
 and privileges enjoyed by the National Banks, he for- 
 got to mention the most important one of all, the exclu- 
 sive right to issue currency. A prohibitory tax of ten 
 per cent, upon the circulating notes of all private banks 
 and bankers limits the issue of currency to the Na- 
 tional Banks. The reason given for this is the duty 
 of protecting the people from what is known as Wild- 
 cat banking, and I am inclined to think that the rea- 
 son is a good one. This is an important question, 
 because the prejudice of the working men against 
 the National Banks is largely built upon a misunder- 
 standing of the '^ money power," given to the banks 
 by the exclusive privileges to issue currency. Mr. 
 Gage was very successful in showing that this priv- 
 ilege is not so valuable as people think it is. His 
 figures must have surprised his audience. He said 
 that the Chicago banks with a right to issue fourteen 
 million dollars in National Bank notes, have outstand- 
 ing less than one million dollars of such notes; while 
 all the National Banks in the country, with a right to 
 issue about five hundred millions of such notes, have 
 outstanding only about one hundred and sixty-six 
 millions. 
 
 Although the title of his lecture was *' Banking 
 and the Social System," Mr. Gage did not clearly 
 show any moral agreement between the National Banks 
 and our social System as it ought to be. He spoke 
 on the social question and he spoke well, but he has 
 placed himself under the yoke of the political econ- 
 
1 92 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 omists and allowed himself to be awed by their por- 
 tentous jargon and their stately axioms. He is a vic- 
 tim of the patent medicine men who profess the '' dis- 
 mal science." They take a few accidental facts, gen- 
 eralize them into a principle, express this in a rotund 
 formula, and then impose it upon everybody as an 
 orthodox prescription. 
 
 After comparing the labor " trusts" and the cap- 
 ital '' trusts," and showing that any unnatural profits 
 made by either of them must result in drawing com- 
 petitors to the trade or business in such numbers that 
 the profits vanish, leaving the competition behind to 
 plague the investors of the trust, Mr. Gage was be- 
 trayed into the mistake of wrapping up his whole argu- 
 ment in the ponderous old formula compiled by the 
 medicine men about the rate of wages. He said, "the 
 wages of labor will rise and fall as the number of 
 wage-workers increases or diminishes in relation to 
 the existing quantity of capital. If capital increase 
 in a greater ratio than the population, wages will rise. 
 If the population increase in a faster ratio than cap- 
 ital, wages will fall. No combination can long resist 
 the silent but irresistible influence of this principle." 
 
 I think there is no such principle, and the claim 
 for it appears to have no foundation except an occa- 
 sional example. We see it verified in particular cases, 
 and erroneously think that it is of universal applica- 
 tion. I am often stunned by the heavy maxims thrown 
 at me by the economists, and before I have time to 
 recover my senses I have confessed their claim. Long 
 ago I was confused by this maxim, but when I brought 
 a little moral intelligence to bear on it, I saw that its 
 character was bad, and as it was unsound in ethics I 
 knew that it was unsound in politics too. Out of it 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 193 
 
 grows the arrogant theory of a '* surplus population," 
 the surplus being always the unemployed poor, and 
 never the unemployed rich. Out of it grows the can- 
 nibalistic doctrine that working men must eat one an- 
 other or perish. It makes every wage-worker the com- 
 petitor and the enemy of every other. It elevates war 
 to the dignity of a moral science because it kills men 
 and diminishes the number of wage-workers. Capital 
 never makes wages except for its own profit, popula- 
 tion makes wages by creating a demand for supplies. 
 Very often the wage-worker creates the capital before 
 he can draw any share of it as wages. Let us test 
 the principle by the known increase of capital in the 
 United States. 
 
 In 1884, Mr. Blaine, in a carefully prepared paper, 
 said that the capital of the United States had increased 
 from fourteen thousand million dollars in i860, to forty- 
 four thousand million dollars in 1880. An increase 
 of thirty thousand million dollars in twenty years, al- 
 though during four years of that time the wealth of the 
 nation was wasted in war, and wage-workers were 
 killed by the thousands. Does Mr. Gage believe that 
 wages increased in the ratio of increased capital, even 
 allowing that it increased at all ? His formula might 
 be correct if amended thus : '* If capital increase in a 
 greater ratio than the population, wages ought to rise." 
 His proposition fails because there is no power in so- 
 cial economics to compel men to pay high wages, but 
 population is driven by natural forces to make wages be- 
 cause men must eat, wear clothes, and live in houses. 
 To provide for its own comfortable existence population 
 sets all the wheels of industry in motion. The workers 
 create the capital, and we invent an economic contra- 
 diction when we make increased capital attendant on 
 
194 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 the diminished number of the people who produce it. 
 Men are driven to supply their own wants by labor, 
 and thus make wages for each other. The reason they 
 do not make high wages is because their energies are 
 not free ; artificial obstructions are placed in the way 
 of industrial ambition; the worker's natural resources 
 are withheld from him by law, and that '* increased 
 capital " which Mr. Gage thinks raises wages, is com- 
 bined successfully in a hundred ways for the purpose 
 of keeping wages down 
 
 Because the working men themselves have been led 
 into many follies and some crimes through their belief 
 in this doctrine, I wish to show its influence on them. 
 It did more than any other article in Labor's creed to 
 freeze up the sympathies of the English working men. 
 We were always praying for war so that ^* capital might 
 increase in a greater ratio than population." When 
 cholera swept the land we saw the triumph of the prin- 
 ciple and rejoiced. When a colliery explosion killed 
 two hundred men, although we felt actual sorrow, 
 there was mingled with our grief some abstract joy, 
 for the ratio of population to capital was lessened, and 
 we had fewer competitors in the labor market. This 
 false economics hardened our hearts and debased our 
 character. How could there be brotherhood among 
 men who believed they were taking bread from one 
 another ? I was cured of the doctrine by an old farmer 
 in Vermont, and I cheerfully advertise his recipe. 
 
 Shortly after landing in this country I got a job of 
 work in building a railroad near the town of Windsor 
 in that State, and the digging was very hard. One 
 day we were knocked off on account of rain, and I put 
 in the day doing chores for a farmer whose house was 
 close to the shanty where I lived. That night he gave 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 195 
 
 me a good supper, and after supper we sat outside on 
 the door step and "calmly smoked and jawed." I 
 felt that I was an intruder upon the United States be- 
 cause I was adding one more to the labor population, 
 and diminishing the rate of wages in that "ratio." 
 My farmer friend was polite enough to say that no apol- 
 ogies were necessary, and that the obligation was all 
 on the other side ; that in point of fact the United 
 States of America was much indebted to me for com- 
 ing. "I reckon you," he said, " as a clear gain of 
 one thousand dollars to the capital of the country." 
 This wild heresy bewildered me, and I explained to 
 him that I did not bring five cents with me to buy a 
 welcome, but he insisted that brawn and brain were 
 part of a nation's capital, and the source of all its cap- 
 ital, that population and capital must increase and 
 diminish together, and that they were not antagonistic 
 factors in fixing the rate of wages. I see now that he 
 was right, although I did not see it then ; and while 
 particular exception to his principle may be found in 
 actual business, yet I am convinced that when applied 
 to the vast aggregate of the nation including all its 
 population and all its capital, his doctrine is morally 
 and politically sound. 
 
 I follow the old man's argument as well as I can ; 
 it was something like this : A healthy young man of 
 twenty, working on the railroad, receives as wages one 
 dollar a day. Allowing for loss of time by reason of 
 rainy days and other causes, and giving him two hun- 
 dred and fifty days work in a year, he receives in ten 
 years two thousand five hundred dollars. His work is 
 worth more than that. He has certainly put three 
 thousand five hundred dollars into the railroad values of 
 the country. This is a contribution of one thousand 
 
1 96 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 dollars to the capital of the nation in ten years. This 
 rule will apply to all the other workers, and Mr. Blaine's 
 figures are evidence that the estimate is low. Admit- 
 ting that large numbers of men are a loss instead of a 
 gain, that they eat more than they earn, nevertheless, 
 when the national balance is struck the result is an 
 enormous aggregate gain. Another test is this. Every 
 generation leaves behind it something for the succeed- 
 ing one, proving that increase of population and in- 
 crease of capital are in direct proportion to each other, 
 and that the relations between them are not to be esti- 
 mated by the Inverse Rule of Three. 
 
 I once heard a judge tell a lawyer that statutes are 
 to be construed in favor of human life. This rule ex- 
 tends beyond human codes. It is the law of the 
 moral universe, and political economy cannot reverse 
 it. The doctrine quoted by Mr. Gage is in favor of 
 human death. It makes living men a dead weight 
 upon the public weal, a dangerous paradox. What 
 does Mr. Gage himself say in refutation of the doc- 
 trine ? He says this : ''With a population of sixty mil- 
 lions this country is sparsely settled, and will support 
 under good industrial condition two or three hundred 
 millions in peace and plenty." Why then moralize 
 about imprudent marriages and a redundant popula- 
 tion ? In that one sentence he surrendered himself 
 a prisoner to Mr. Schilling. If the country possesses 
 the abundant natural advantages which Mr. Gage de- 
 scribes, why are a million wage-workers out of work ? 
 If the country is '* sparsely settled," why do men jostle 
 each other and suffocate each other in the labor market ? 
 If " the treasures of mineral wealth beneath the sur- 
 face are inexhaustible," why is not their opulence de- 
 veloped ? Is it not because capital owns the key of 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 197 
 
 the underground cellar and keeps it locked from labor? 
 Mr. Gage's admission that the country is sparsely set- 
 tled while its natural resources are inexhaustible, was 
 a strong support to the claim of Mr. Schilling that 
 labor shall be given access to the surface of the earth, 
 to the forests upon it, and to the minerals below. 
 
 When Mr. Gage advocated *' co-operation indus- 
 trial and otherwise " as a social remedy, there was 
 loud applause in the pit and in the gallery, as if he 
 had just condescended to patronize one of the absolute 
 virtues such as temperance, honesty, industry or broth- 
 erly love. Perhaps the most plausible bit of sophistry 
 in the labor debate is the '^ co-operation " excuse for 
 the mistakes and offenses of *' organized capital" and 
 " organized labor." Co-operation is not a principle, it 
 never was anything but an expedient, a plan, some- 
 times wise and sometimes not; sometimes good and 
 sometimes bad. It may be virtuous or not, according 
 to its purpose and its action. What do you co-operate 
 for? is the test question that must be answered by the 
 Knights of Capital and by the Knights of Labor, and 
 upon the answer the quality and value of the co-opera- 
 tion must depend. The co-operation of the Knights of 
 Capital to develop coal mines and bring coal to Chi- 
 cago is beneficial, but the co-operation of Knights of 
 Capital to raise the price of coal is mischievous. The 
 co-operation of the Knights of Labor to raise their own 
 wages is good ; their co-operation to lower the wages 
 of other men is bad. The co-operation of the Knights 
 of Capital to boycott their workmen who refuse to 
 *^ sign the document," is tyrannical and unjust ; the 
 co-operation of the Knights of Labor to boycott the 
 craftsmen who decline to sign their document, is 
 equally tyrannical. Co-operation is good only so far 
 as its aims and methods are generous and iust. 
 
198 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 
 
 American Chartism has a very close resemblance 
 to the English article of that name, so close indeed, 
 that listening to Mr. Thomas J. Morgan, who came 
 third in the Economic Conference course, I thought 
 myself once more a boy in London cheering the labor 
 gospel at the Chartist hall in John Street. Mr. Mor- 
 gan looked like a Chartist, spoke like a Chartist, and 
 the spirit of Chartism was the magnetic string by 
 which he tied the audience together. Mr. Morgan is 
 an effective orator because he has the sincerity and 
 zeal of a fanatic. That is not the worst of it ; he is a 
 fanatic with a cause ; a fanatic with an argument writ- 
 ten in tears. 
 
 With some cleverness, Mr. Morgan captured the 
 sympathy of his audience in advance of his argument. 
 He complained that he was only five feet two inches 
 high. The crowd laughed at this, not seeing the subtle 
 charge behind it. They saw it presently when the 
 orator declared with much dramatic force that he had 
 been cheated out of his rightful stature by the rapacity 
 of capital. As he said that, I thought of the cynical 
 Gloster in the play scolding nature for a like wrong 
 done to him : 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 199 
 
 " I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion, 
 Cheated of feature by disenabling nature, 
 Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time, 
 Into this breathing world scarce half made up." 
 
 Mr. Morgan could not complain that he had been 
 cheated of feature, for his face is well enough ; and 
 what there is of him is in fair proportion, but he had 
 been cheated of stature, not by disembling nature, 
 but by unfair advantage taken of him when a child, 
 prematurely sentenced to hard labor in the factory, 
 where children's hearts are squeezed like grapes and 
 the product sold for gold. All this was mournful 
 enough, but the sympathetic pain of it was felt only by 
 the small men in the audience, men like me, cheated 
 of our stature in the same way. Not so, when he com- 
 plained of his diminutive social size^ for here he touched 
 a chord that vibrated in the hearts of all the men 
 present, who, like himself, were cheated of social 
 stature because they worked for bread. Referring to 
 the slighting way the newspapers always spoke of him, 
 he said: ''My social standing and dignity may be 
 measured by the contemptible insignificance of the 
 words 'Tommy Morgan,' and I am a type of the wage 
 class." 
 
 Although that preamble was given in a sneering 
 way as if rendering scorn for scorn, there was artful 
 pathos in it, because every working man in the house 
 was smarting under the low-caste brand stamped upon 
 him by society. Here tvas a man of character and 
 ability, of earnest convictions, and active philanthropy, 
 whom the newspapers would not allow to rise above 
 the littleness of a nickname because he worked for 
 wages, and had the daring to say things in criticism of 
 society. Notwithstanding Mr. Morgan's manly claim 
 for courtesy, it was refused him by the press ; and the 
 
200 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 next morning the newspapers deliberately repeated 
 the insult of which he had complained ; they jeered him 
 again as ''Tommy." They saw a sensitive man whom 
 they could wound, and they wounded him. I think 
 the newspaper that thus wantonly violates the laws of 
 social kindness can hardly be called a gentleman. Ed- 
 itors and writers from long habit of criticism some- 
 times forget the chivalry and charity which will not 
 wound the feelings of other men ; a chivalry which in 
 ordinary social intercourse they are careful to display. 
 It is the gentle instinct refined and polished by exercise 
 that makes a gentleman. The possessor of it may be 
 a peasant or he may be a king. He may be an editor 
 also, but in that case his nobility will be reflected in 
 his newspaper. ''The hard rain," said Rory O'More, 
 "the hard rain only cuts the body, but the hard word 
 cuts the heart." I have read that much of the cruelty 
 of the French Revolution was vengeance for ancient 
 scorn. 
 
 Mr. Morgan's pathos became sarcasm of good 
 quality when he showed the obsequious deferential 
 way in which those papers spoke of the banker, who 
 lectured in the same course on the preceding Sunday 
 night. This contrast marked with double emphasis 
 theungenerous treatment given to Mr. Morgan. There 
 are not ten rich men in Chicago outside the learned 
 professions who own as much useful knowledge as 
 Mr. Morgan owns. There are not five of them who 
 can weave that knowledge into an argument with such 
 ingenuity and skill as he can do it, and there is liter- 
 ally not one of them who can present an argument in 
 such logical shape, and with such oratorical power as 
 Mr. Morgan presented his reasons for State socialism. 
 Yet, because he is a laborer, he is not allowed the or- 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 201 
 
 dinary civilities of life, nor any designation higher 
 than ''Tommy." Of all the ills in Hamlet's catalogue, 
 ** the proud man's contumely " is the most irritating to 
 the working man. 
 
 Mr. Morgan's theme was " The labor question from 
 the standpoint of a Socialist." He built his argument 
 on a platform of statistics, the arithmetic of poverty. 
 Sophistry delights in statistics. They are plastic and 
 accommodating witnesses. Although the proverb says 
 that ''figures won't lie," they seldom come into a 
 court of investigation without being successfully im- 
 peached. That squalor abounds in all great cities is 
 confessed by everybody. It is not necessary to bring 
 witnesses to prove it. Squalor is the sediment of 
 cities. Its causes are a thousand, its cures must be as 
 many. Speculative reformers like Mr. Morgan forget 
 this. They have a patent medicine, a magic balsam 
 which cures all political and social disorders. Society 
 must be cured by that or they will not allow it to be 
 cured at all. Like the jealous physician they would 
 rather see the patient die, than cured by any other 
 "school of medicine" than their own. Mr. Morgan 
 sees misery produced by a multitude of causes, yet he 
 has but one remedy, the vague, uncertain hope and 
 promise called State Socialism ; wherein all individual 
 ambition is to cease, where no man shall grow taller 
 than his fellow, and especially not more than five feet 
 two inches high. Mr. Morgan looks and speaks like 
 a man who would stand by his principles with con- 
 sistent heroism. ' Like Sam Weller's acquaintance, 
 who shot himself to prove that muffins were whole- 
 some, Mr. Morgan would rather carry a donkey's load 
 forever than be relieved of his burthen by any other 
 methods than his own. 
 
202 WHEELBARR O W, 
 
 Men and women who reform the world by whole- 
 sale, and who scorn to help their fellow creatures by 
 any retail system, charge all human ills upon society, 
 and relieve mankind from individual guilt. Thus Mr. 
 Morgan transfers the vice of drunkenness from the 
 men who practice it to their form of government. 
 Strong drink, our most efficient poverty-maker, was 
 presented to us rather as a friend of the working man 
 than an enemy ; a useful tonic and restorative. Mr. 
 Morgan shifted intemperance from its old position, and 
 made it the effect, not the cause of poverty. This un- 
 lucky transposition will have an evil influence over the 
 men who follow his lead, and they constitute a large 
 element of the laboring population of Chicago. We 
 are grateful to the man who unloads our private faults 
 upon the public, but a better friend is he who tells us 
 to reform ourselves now without waiting for changes 
 in the law. Self-discipline is premature, says the flat- 
 terer ; wait until the State is reformed. Then will be 
 the time to curb your appetites. For the present, 
 comfort your hearts with wine. 
 
 After flattering strong drink as a tonic whose office 
 it is to raise the heart of the exhausted worker, Mr. 
 Morgan said: ^^Give the laborer a chance to get a 
 better home than a couple of rooms. Give men a rea- 
 son for living and they will not need intoxicants." 
 The applause here had a mendicant flavor about it 
 which was depressing and very sad. The man who 
 comforts himself with '* intoxicants " while waiting for 
 ** government " or some other benevolent fairy to give 
 him three rooms instead of two, will not have two 
 rooms very long. Whose duty is it to give a man 
 reasons for living ? Men must make their own reasons 
 for living, and they must not be expected to share 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. . 203 
 
 them with the rusty delinquents who think that good 
 enough reasons for living may be found in beer. Indi- 
 vidual ambition, and an active personal conscience are 
 the levers by which the working men must lift them- 
 selves. Self-reform is the true tonic of exhausted 
 labor. The man who would elevate society must raise 
 his own part of it, which is himself. A maudlin trust 
 in *' government " will accomplish nothing. "Who 
 would be free themselves, must strike the *blow. '" 
 Above all things the working men need freedom from 
 the flatterers who tell them that their vices are not 
 their own. 
 
 In like manner Mr. Morgan transferred the sin of 
 laziness from the idler to his external conditions. For 
 this he gave some reasons which society may well 
 examine. He said that idleness existed among the 
 poorer classes because "they were born tired." This 
 bolt struck its mark with the force of a cannon shot. 
 A comprehensive indictment against the existing order 
 of things was condensed into a single sentence. I 
 have often heard it said of lazy men in jest that they 
 were born tired, but Mr. Morgan uttered it seriously 
 as a physiological truth. He said the habitual ex- 
 haustion of laboring men and women was transmitted 
 to their children, and that millions of children were 
 tired at the very moment when they came into the 
 world. They inherited laziness. This is a terrible 
 charge against our present social organism, and I fear 
 that Mr. Morgan can bring much evidence to sustain 
 it. In Lord Byron's drama, " The Deformed Trans- 
 formed," Bertha says to Arnold, her deformed son : 
 " Out hunchback ! " and Arnold answers, " I was born 
 so, Mother ! " In this answer he flings the reproach for 
 his deformity back upon his parents, where indeed it 
 
204 . WHEELBARROW. 
 
 properly belonged. So, Mr. Morgan, confessing the 
 vices of his order, confronts an accusing world, and 
 retorts with bitterness, '*We were born so, Mother ! " 
 If he is correct, then is our penal code nothing but an 
 expression of legislative ignorance. Whether he is 
 correct or not, his plea of hereditary defect is entitled 
 to grave consideration. It warns us that a little be- 
 nevolent perfumery sprinkled on the decaying spots of 
 our social system will not disinfect the slums, that we 
 must go down below the surface of our industrial con- 
 ditions and wrestle with evil in the place of its origin. 
 Men in cloth, and women in silk, wholesale dealers in 
 reform, moralizing against the wind, must work more 
 and talk less. However small the cause of one man's 
 poverty, or of ten men's poverty may be, it is not be- 
 neath the dignity of any man who truly desires justice 
 to remove it if he can. 
 
 Mr. Morgan showed that in the labor-market there 
 are more sellers than buyers of human muscle and 
 brawn \ therefore strikes fail, because there are always 
 unemployed men enough to fill the vacuum created by 
 a strike. Here he threw in a word of pity and apol- 
 ogy for the '* scab." He overdid it, and showed that 
 his own order needed most the pity and the apol- 
 ogy. He said, ''These alleged idlers are the men 
 termed 'scabs.' They risk losing their lives in the 
 event of securing a job — prefer the abhorrence and de- 
 testation of their fellows rather than be without em- 
 ployment." Rather than be without liberty is the cor- 
 rect statement. It is not the fear of poverty but the 
 love of liberty that gives that courage to the " scab." 
 The so-called scabs are the nobility of labor, the hope 
 of industrial emancipation. They have been the mar- 
 tyrs of independence in all ages. They are the up- 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 205 
 
 right brave who run the risk of death, the abhorrence 
 and detestation of their fellows, rather than surrender 
 their manhood into the keeping of other men. Those 
 who threaten scabs with death, who load them with 
 detestation and abhorrence, should beware how they 
 fling contemptuous names which may rebound upon 
 themselves. The *'scab" is a free laborer; the man 
 who can be *' ordered out" or *' ordered in" by a 
 *' chief," a '* grand master," or a '* walking delegate," 
 is not. I do not speak in reproach, but in sympathy 
 for men driven by despair to bad methods of defence. 
 I have heard that it is written in the law that if two 
 shipwrecked men are clinging to a plank which will 
 only support one man, either of them may drown the 
 other, and the act is not murder ; but I do not believe 
 the working men of America are in any such extremity. 
 Necessity is the plea offered for intolerance. *' Or- 
 ganized labor " says : We have placed our freedom in 
 the hands of trustees, who promise -to prop up wages 
 for us by the persecution of all other men if necessary. 
 It is easy to preach on this and show the folly of it. 
 It is easy to censure the cruelty of it, but men who 
 live in haunted houses where the ghost of hunger sits 
 forever on the hearthstone, are very apt to be feeble in 
 philosophy and confused about moral distinctions. 
 Holding work by a precarious tenure, liable to be idle 
 any day, limited to a small ration of nature's raw ma- 
 terials out of which to make his living, with new in- 
 ventions daily cheapening skill, it is natural that the 
 mechanic, frightened by the combined adversities that 
 threaten him, clutches at any means of safety, and 
 shoves his neighbor off the plank. In Mr. Morgan's 
 own words, ''The worker, realizing by experience the 
 futility of individual resistance seeks in trades-union- 
 
2o6 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 ism the means of protection." To which I answer, 
 *''Tis true, 'tis true, 'tis pity ; and pity it is 'tis true." 
 For all this, the laborer must learn that he will never 
 win his own rights by doing wrong to others. He 
 must learn that the laws of justice are binding upon 
 him as upon all other men. Passionate critics, like 
 Mr. Morgan, feeling keenly the rich man's advantage, 
 make no allowance for the millionaire, who may be 
 the victim of his *' environment " as helpless as the 
 laborer in his. They do not see that magnanimity may 
 travel upward as well as downward, and that it is 
 equally due from the poor to the rich as from the rich 
 to the poor. It sounds odd, but few of us know how 
 much the rich need charity. 
 
 Mr. Morgan pretends that the laborer's margin of 
 comfort is so small that he has no room for self-denial, 
 and that the luxuries he is called upon to deny him- 
 self have already been denied him. He refuted this 
 last Sunday, when he led the working men of the 
 Trade and Labor assembly to resolve against drinking 
 beer for thirty days, as a punishment to the master 
 brewers who were employing non-union men. This 
 bit of self-denial Mr. Morgan approves as discipline 
 for the master brewers, but is not the self-discipline 
 of it a victory more sublime. Trade-union states- 
 manship never devised a plan for raising wages so 
 effectual as that. By it, every man in the scheme raises 
 his own wages, or saves a wasted portion of it which 
 amounts to the same thing. On Monday, Mr. Morgan 
 said, "I drink but one glass of beer a day, and I quit 
 that last night." This was a wise resolution unless 
 Mr. Morgan intended to increase his daily allowance, 
 because if the tired working man needs beer to tone 
 him up and keep him going, one glass of it per day is 
 
ECONOMIC CONFERENCES. 207 
 
 not enough, and if he does not need it, one glass is 
 evidently too much. Mr. Morgan raises his own wages 
 five cents a day. Not much indeed, but it amounts to 
 a suit of clothes a year, which to a working man is 
 considerable in this climate. 
 
 According to Mr. Morgan there are four acts in 
 the evolution drama, barbarism, feudalism, individual- 
 ism and socialism. We are now near the end of the 
 third act, and individualism has possession of the stage. 
 The arrangement is purely fanciful, and if the order 
 were inverted it would be just as true. Is not State 
 Socialism a quality of barbarism ? I don't mean a bad 
 quality, for many philosophers of high rank look upon 
 State Socialism as a redeeming virtue in the political 
 system of the Indians. Is it not error to think that 
 individualism prevails even in the United States ? 
 Here every citizen has a legislature in almost contin- 
 ual session embracing him, petting, patronizing and 
 protecting him. Sometimes two legislatures are affec- 
 tionately squeezing him at the same time, and like a 
 brace of benevolent garroters, literally *' holding him 
 up." Is it not the dream of every citizen that congress 
 has the power to make prosperity ? And many actu- 
 ally believe that Congress can make money. It is the 
 chronic state of every man in this country that he 
 '^ wants to have a law passed." What sort of indi- 
 vidualism is that ? 
 
 Mr. Morgan appears to be jealous of specific re- 
 forms. He prefers to see injustice breed injustice, 
 and wrongs multiply. He thinks that after a fruitless 
 march of calamity, the people in despair will turn to 
 State Socialism for prayer and rest. The prospect for 
 labor is not bright when leaders like Mr. Morgan 
 " hail with delight the organization of every corpora- 
 
2o8 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 tion, pool or trust that monopolizes production, com- 
 munication, distribution, transportation or exchange." 
 There is an unfortunate cabman in the lunatic asylum, 
 who, although sane on other subjects, thinks that the 
 nearest and best way to anywhere is across the great 
 desert of Arabia. In his efforts to go by that route 
 he caused his passengers much inconvenience. Mr. 
 Morgan desires to conduct the working men to a bet- 
 ter social state, but he insists on taking them there by 
 way of the Arabian desert. 
 
THE ETHICS OF THE BOAED OF TKADE. 
 
 A CONTROVERSY WITH LYMAN J. GAGE. 
 
211 
 
 MAKING BREAD DEAR. 
 
 BY WHEELBARROW. 
 
 A FEW days ago a friend lent me a copy of The 
 North American Review, in order that I might read 
 an article by Mr. Henry D. Lloyd, on " Making Bread 
 Dear." In that article Mr. Lloyd shows me the intri- 
 cate wheels, cogs, and pulleys of that ingenious ma- 
 chine by which a conspiracy of the "rich criminal 
 classes " can increase the price of bread. As my mus- 
 cle and bone have always been cheap, it is of critical 
 importance to me that bread should be cheap also. As 
 I have usually sold myself in the market for a dollar a 
 day, and from that to a dollar and a half, it has been 
 an essential condition of existence to me that the land 
 around me should be fertile, the rain upon it copious, 
 and the sunshine strong. I have prayed against the 
 late frosts in the spring, and early frosts in the fall, so 
 that the crops might be abundant, and provisions 
 cheap. My prayers have generally been answered as 
 to the crops, but flour has not been cheap, and for 
 years I have been dodging the price of bread. Some- 
 times I would sneak behind potatoes, but they were 
 perishable, and grew dear in the winter time; then I 
 hid among corn, and a good retreat it was, but the 
 children asked for sure enough bread — the Johnny 
 cake was dry. In the winter time white beans have 
 
2 1 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 been my generous friends, and often they have helped 
 me to evade the price of bread. All through the sum- 
 mer time, Nature, the bounteous mother, covers our 
 share of the earth with a carpet of grain resplendent 
 in green and gold, while bands of criminals are per- 
 mitted by the laws to discount it and corner it, to be- 
 witch it and bedevil it, that it may become costly 
 and scarce to the workingman. The guilty profit goes 
 to them, and with it they corrupt our laws in the very 
 capitol where they are made. 
 
 While one gang of food gamblers raises the price 
 of bread, another gang raises the price of meat, but 
 this concerns me little, for little of it I get. Another 
 gang raises the price of coal, another the price of oil, 
 and another the price of matches with which I light 
 my pipe. I am in the toils of monopolies that shave 
 my wages down to ''what the traffic will bear." I use 
 the slang of capital, which in my case means the low- 
 est point that flesh and blood can bear, and have 
 strength enough left to shovel. When the wages 
 comes the monopolies lay tax and tribute on it, and 
 scale a bit of unjust profit from whatever I have to 
 buy. I am helpless. I cannot get even with any one. As 
 I am the very mudsill of society, there is nobody below 
 me that I can oppress in revenge. I cannot retaliate 
 on anybody. If I try to skrimp the dirt, and wheel 
 up a light load, the boss on the bank detects the short 
 measure, and yells, "Fill up the 'barrow." Bread- 
 earners by hard labor of every degree. We are the 
 Hebrew Hercules, shorn, and in the hands of the Phi- 
 listines; we make rare sport for their holiday, but the 
 revelry of monopoly cannot last forever; the hair of 
 Samson will grow again. 
 
 I am told that high prices indicate social prosper- 
 
MAKING BREAD DEAR. 213 
 
 ity, and that they are necessary in order to make high 
 wages for me. I doubt that; I think it is untrue. For 
 many years my wages has remained in figures much 
 about the same, although its power in the market has 
 varied a great deal. Sometimes it would buy a good 
 many comforts, and at other times very few, although 
 nominally it was about the same sum. Since I first 
 worked with the wheelbarrow the population of the 
 country has doubled, while the wealth of it has 
 multiplied fourfold and more. Of that multiplied 
 wealth I get no share at all. I know of it only 
 from reading. I never felt its growth in the swell- 
 ing of my wages. The increased cost of life I know 
 by hard experience, but no proportionate recom- 
 pense in higher wages has ever come to me. Rela- 
 tively, indeed, I am sure my wages is less than it 
 was, because the higher prices make it harder for me 
 to live. Through the increased power of machinery 
 an hour's human labor now produces twice or thrice 
 as much as it did some thirty years ago, but I get no 
 benefit from that; my hours of labor remain the same. 
 I shall never again believe that high prices for every- 
 thing is a good thing for me. 
 
 When I first went to railroading, my wages was a 
 dollar a day; it is now from a dollar and a quarter to 
 a dollar and a half. To say nothing of the increased 
 wealth of the country, and the multiplied facilities for 
 producing all the comforts of life, this raise of wages 
 does not even correspond with the higher prices o£ 
 food, fuel, rent, and clothes, to say nothing of a hun- 
 dred other things. You may prove to me by what you 
 call political economy, that I am wrong in this opin- 
 ion, but I can prove to you by my household econo- 
 my that I have had no meat for dinner to-dav. and in 
 
214 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 that I know that I am right. I have not capacity suf- 
 ficient to learn the abstract principles of social science, 
 and if I even had the genius, I am too tired to exer- 
 cise it now. I learn by object lessons, like a child, 
 and I know that the home of every laborer in Chicago 
 is an object lesson, from which even our statesmen yet 
 may learn that progress sometimes travels hand in 
 hand with poverty. As I lay my touch upon the Titan 
 wrist of labor, I feel in its pulsations, the resolution 
 that they must be divorced, that the makers of pro- 
 gress shall enjoy a larger share of its beneficence, that 
 the men who flinch not from the penalty "in the sweat 
 of thy face shalt thou eat bread," must have the ra- 
 tion that their sweat has earned, and that not much 
 longer will they be cheated out of the bread, after 
 they have paid for it the full price demanded by the 
 great Creator's law. As making bread dear is morally 
 a crime, let us make it a crime by law; let us build new 
 penitentiaries to accomodate those vermin of trade 
 who make dear the food of the poor. They are the 
 lineal descendants of the sordid Egyptian speculators 
 who tried to corner all the corn in Egypt, because 
 there was a famine in the land of Canaan. 
 
 It is an impious thing to arrest the bounty of the 
 Creator on its way to the poor man's home. Men com- 
 bine to reverse the commandment "Feed the hungry," 
 they contrive by strategy to prevent the hungry from 
 being fed. "We must make the five cent loaf a little 
 smaller," said the bakers of Chicago a month or two 
 ago, when a rich forestaller had successfully performed 
 an operation on the " Board." " Or else we must reduce 
 the weight of the pound loaf to fifteen ounces." Either 
 way, it means a smaller ration for me. In defiance of 
 this visible fact, I am assured by impossible algebra 
 
MAKING BREAD DEAR. 215 
 
 and much double rule of three, that I am getting 
 richer every year by higher wages, and fatter by 
 cheaper food. Statesmen of terrapin brain tell me that 
 I cannot possibly be hungry, because the statistics 
 prove the increasing fatness of the land. I once took 
 "a seat in the gallery of the United States Senate in 
 order to hear the debate. In the arena below me was 
 a club of millionaires. To my surprise I saw that they 
 had lost the power of natural speech. They could not 
 talk; they chinked, like dollars rustled in a bag. In 
 metallic monotone they tolled me that of the joint 
 product of labor and capital the share of labor was ab- 
 solutely and relatively increasing, while the share of 
 capital was relatively decreasing. When I ask for my 
 dividends I am told that I can get them from the sta- 
 tistics. Meanwhile I hear the drone of the everlasting 
 driving-wheel furnishing power to innumerable eccen- 
 trics whose province it is to make bread dear, and la- 
 borers cheap. 
 
2 1 6 WHEELBARR O JV. 
 
 V 
 
 CORNERS AND THE BOARD OF TRADE. 
 
 A CRITICISM OF WHEELBARROW's ESSAY, " MAKING BREAD DEAR," BY 
 A SYMPATHIZER (LYMAN J. GAGE). 
 
 In Number 78 of your paper, I read an article 
 signed "Wheelbarrow." Too easily affected perhaps 
 by the unfortunate condition of my fellow-men, I was 
 greatly moved by the description given by Wheelbar- 
 row of the hard lines in which his life is set. To be 
 forever pushing a wheelbarrow at the meagre remuner- 
 ation of $1.25 per day, with a hard taskmaster stand- 
 ing near (at much higher wages per diem), forever 
 crying, " Fill up the barrow," is indeed an unhappy 
 lot. But this is only part of the picture he drew. 
 While he secures for his toil only the small wages at- 
 taching to this most common kind of human labor, 
 there is, according to him, a wicked design on the part 
 of those superior to him in position, to render his pit- 
 tance the most inadequate for his numerous wants, 
 by artificially raising the prices of those things which 
 his necessity demands. 
 
 My heart burned with indignation as I read his 
 eloquent, if somewhat ambiguous, indictment of so- 
 ciety ; for he is truly eloquent, and when I read his 
 glowing words, I wondered why he did not turn his 
 attention to the Bar, the Pulpit, or the Press, because 
 in either of these his mental gifts give promise of suc- 
 cess ; and by his own confession, pushing a wheel- 
 barrow is hard, monotonous, and unprofitable work. 
 
CORNERS AND THE BOARD OF TRADE. 217 
 
 But this reflection made the contrast between what he 
 might have been, and what he is, the more painful, 
 and served only to aggravate the wickedness of those 
 who try to oppress him. With these thoughts in mind 
 I read again his pungent article. On the second read- 
 ing, doubts arose in my mind. I asked myself the 
 question, *' Is this the statement of real fact, or is it a 
 sketch in which a fervid imagination has outrun sober 
 fact and reasonable judgment?" This I determined 
 to ascertain if possible. I took the following extracts 
 as fairly representative of his chief grievances, and 
 said : " If I find this true, I will take his statement for 
 the other specifications." 
 
 "All through the summer time, Nature, the boun- 
 "teous mother, covers our share of the earth with a 
 •' carpet of grain, resplendent in green and gold, while 
 " bands of criminals are permitted by the law to discount 
 " // and corner it, to bewitch it, and bedevil it, that it 
 " may become costly and scarce to the workingman. The 
 " guilty profit goes to them, and with it they corrupt 
 " our laws in the very capitol where they are made. 
 
 " While one gang of food gamblers raises the price 
 '' of bread, another gang raises the price of meat. * * * 
 " As making bread dear is morally a crime, let us 
 "make it a crime by law; let us build new peniten- 
 ''tiaries to accommodate those vermin of trade who 
 " make dear the food of the poor. They are the lineal 
 "descendants of the sordid Egyptian speculators who 
 " tried to corner all the corn in Egypt, because there 
 "was a famine in the land of Canaan." 
 
 Determined to be thorough in my examination of 
 the matter, I called upon a farmer friend, showed him 
 the article, and asked if the farmers were engaged in 
 the wicked combination. He replied : " I know of no 
 
2 1 8 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 combination to make wheat or flour high. I do know 
 that the price is very low — so low as to afford the far- 
 mer but little remuneration for his toil. Statistics 
 prove that the average pay to the farmer is about 82 
 cents per day, or about two-thirds of what Wheelbar- 
 row earns, and the truth is that many from the coun- 
 try are moving into the city to secure, if possible, a 
 more remunerative job, such as Wheelbarrow enjoys." 
 I then called upon a miller who I knov^ is honest. He 
 said : " There is no combination among millers. On 
 the contrary, competition is very fierce. If we get 25 
 cents per barrel for the use of our mill, and the risk 
 we take, we are satisfied. In fact we do not average 
 so much." 
 
 I had anticipated about this form of reply from 
 facts already within my knowledge, and therefore was 
 not much disappointed that in these two places — the 
 farm and the mill — Wheelbarrow's trouble did not 
 originate. 
 
 I then went to the Board of Trade. I visited a 
 man, not an operator himself, but well acquainted 
 with all the course of trade and speculation in the form 
 of cereal and other product dealt in in this market. 
 
 He read the accusation of Wheelbarrow and said : 
 
 " This kind of loose talk is hard to answer. It has 
 no real foundation in fact. The only reply possible, 
 is to set forth the real facts ; and that requires a great 
 many more words than it is necessary to use in accusing 
 a man of murder, conspiracy, or other crime. No one 
 wants to make bread dear ; no one wants to make it 
 cheap. The speculator operates to make money. He 
 buys hoping for a rise, or he sells for future delivery 
 hoping for a decline. There can be no buyer without 
 a seller, and no seller without a buyer. If the short 
 
CORI^EIiS AND THE BOARD OF TRADE. 219 
 
 seller was too numerous, grain would go down, and 
 bread would be cheap ; but the agriculturalist would 
 suffer, and if this influence continued long enough, he 
 would cease to raise wheat, when a reaction would 
 ensue, wheat would be scarce and high, and bread 
 would become dear. 
 
 " Against this influence, the speculative buyer 
 offers the only barrier. He is handicapped at the be- 
 ginning by charges and expenses from which the short 
 seller is free, /". e., if he buys and carries wheat or 
 other property, he is subjected to the cost of storaj^e, 
 interest, insurance, and the risk of deterioration in 
 quality. Both the buyer and the seller are governed 
 by their conclusions, reached from the best examina- 
 tion they can make of the present and prospective 
 quantity-of grain, as compared with the present and 
 prospective demand for it, whether for home consump- 
 tion or foreign exportation. 
 
 " One immediate effect of the operations described 
 is to make a continuous cash market for all products 
 so dealt in, and the two forces, it may be safely as- 
 serted, operate to bring the average price of wheat to 
 a fair equilibrium under the law of supply and demand. 
 At least it is true that in an open market such as 
 usually exists, the current price is an expression of the 
 agreed opinion of the world as to the fair value of the 
 article. I say world, because the world trades in our 
 market. If the price is for a moment higher than any 
 individual trader's opinion of the real price he will 
 offer for sale, and thus affect the price downward. If 
 he thinks it too low, he will buy in the market, and 
 thus influence the market upward. The opinions thus 
 backed by monied risk, are much superior to the ex 
 
220 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 parte notion of Wheelbarrow, or any other person who 
 merely stands off and looks on. 
 
 " I might go on and speak about <■ corners ' so- 
 called," my informant continued, "but perhaps I have 
 said enough." 
 
 No, I rephed, it is about corners that I especially 
 want to hear, for I suspect that there, if anywhere, 
 will be found the true occasion for Wheelbarrow's 
 severe strictures. 
 
 "Well," he said, " I will tell you all I know about 
 them. I have already spoken about an open market, 
 meaning by that a market which is under no individual's 
 or syndicate's controh Now, it occasionally happens, 
 at infrequent intervals, that some one man, or a small 
 group acting together, will take advantage of a mo- 
 ment when the actual stock of wheat or provisions in 
 store is small, and secretly buy it all. With the 
 actual property thus in possession, they will make 
 contracts of purchase with the unsuspecting seller for 
 future delivery. When the contract is due, the seller 
 must buy in what he had previously sold, but as the 
 stock is already in his adversary's hands, he can buy 
 only of him, and at his price. The short seller is thus 
 occasionally caught and put in chancery by the wily, 
 and perhaps unscrupulous, dealer, who has thus cor- 
 nered the market. 
 
 " But in the nature of things, such a condition 
 must be of short duration. The operator who has 
 cornered the market must buy all that comes. The 
 advancing price, which is its inseparable feature, brings 
 into the market the reserve from all points, and under 
 the rapidly increasing load, the cornerer usually finds 
 himself unable to continue to buy, and is at last 
 
CORNERS AND THE BOARD OF TRADE. 221 
 
 obliged to let go of his holdings, suffers enormous 
 losses, and frequently involves himself in ruin. 
 
 " Some years ago, Jim Keene, of New York, tried 
 the game. He lost two millions of dollars or more. 
 Afterward McGeoch tried it. His losses amounted to 
 millions, and he retired a ruined man. Ten years ago, 
 a Cincinnati clique tried it. They lost enormously, and 
 some of those interested are now in the penitentiary, 
 where Wheelbarrow says they belong. But those are 
 episodes. They are like raid.s in the rear of an army, 
 or piratical excursions over ordinary peaceful seas. 
 Their influence is so brief they seldom affect the price 
 of the product to the actual consumer. 
 
 "As an illustration ; in a celebrated pork corner 
 some three years ago, the price for regular delivery on 
 change rose to $35 per barrel, but the consumer could 
 buy for use or shipment to other parts of the country 
 for $14 per barrel in any quantity he desired. This is 
 a brief, but substantial statement of the fact. They 
 cannot be said to make bread dear as Wheelbarrow 
 alleges, for in a swing of months or years, their influ> 
 ence is next to nil in that direction." 
 
 Having thus exhausted the chief specification of 
 Wheelbarrow, I did not pursue the question into other 
 fields. My own mind was greatly reheved, and I have 
 thought others among your sympathizing readers 
 might be similarly affected by this perusal. 
 
 Part of Wheelbarrow's unhappiness arises from the 
 alleged fact that since '- 1 first worked with the wheel- 
 barrow * * * wealth has multiplied fourfold or more. 
 Of that multiplied wealth I get no share at all." Now, 
 he might be asked in what way he has contributed to 
 increase wealth fourfold. As a wheeler of earth, has 
 his power increased fourfold, or even doubled, over 
 
2 2 2 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 his predecessor in the same line a thousand years ago? 
 He can walk no faster, he is no stronger, and he works 
 fewer hours than his brother laborer of a century ago. 
 By what right then can he demand that he share in 
 an increase which he did not contribute to produce? 
 As a matter of fact, however, he has shared in the 
 larger productivity which society as a whole has 
 brought about. When he went to railroading, " my 
 wages was a dollar a day; it is now from a dollar and 
 a quarter to a dollar and a half." This itself is a gain 
 of from 25 to 50 per cent., and if he will take note of 
 the table of prices for the things which he consumes, 
 he will find the purchasing power of his dollars has 
 increased. 
 
 I dislike to characterize his essay in unfriendly 
 terms, but it is that kind of. writing, now so much in 
 vogue from labor agitators and would-be reformers, 
 which hurts the cause it would help, confuses the true 
 issues, obscures sound judgment, and helps to par- 
 alyze the efforts of those who would gladly aid the 
 humbler members of society to attain a better hold 
 on life. 
 
223 
 
 MAKING BREAD CHEAP. 
 
 AN ANSWER TO THE CRITICISM OF "A SYMPATHIZER' 
 BY WHEELBARROW. 
 
 In the last number of The Open Court I find a 
 formidable criticism by a *' Sympathizer " who reproves 
 me as a " would be reformer," ** paralyzing the efforts 
 of those who would gladly aid the humbler members 
 of society to attain a better hold on life." 
 
 At first I was disposed to regret my article "Mak- 
 ing Bread Dear", if the tendency of it was to such a 
 mischievous result; but on reflection I saw that it had 
 worked the other way; and I felt rather proud that it 
 had not been without a good effect on Sympathizer. 
 It did not paralyze him. It aroused him. It moved 
 him so strongly that he investigated the evils I de- 
 nounced. He examined my accusations and answered 
 them. 
 
 The first witness offered by Sympathizer for the 
 defense is a farmer, who did not know of " any com- 
 bination to make wheat or flour high." Sympathizer 
 went to the wrong farmer. He should have gone to 
 one of those grateful farmers who sent a memorial to 
 the very forestaller I complained of, thanking him for 
 raising the price of wheat by working a. " corner " in 
 which hundreds of men were "squeezed" into poverty, 
 the prime article of life bewitched, and the hunger of 
 the poor increased. I assert that any agency is im- 
 
224 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 moral which obstructs the natural ebb and flow of the 
 tide running up and down between the producer and 
 the consumer, that healthy, navigable stream which is 
 called " supply and demand." It is an immoral agency 
 that by conspiracy or cunning raises the price of bread 
 to the hod-carrier, or lowers the price of wheat to the 
 farmer. 
 
 It is a mistake that the farmer's pay is only 82 
 cents per day. Statistics may say that, but they can- 
 not prove it because it is not true. Sympathizer's 
 friend, I suppose, meant a net income of 82 cents a day 
 over and above all expenses. It must also be a mis- 
 take that farmers are moving into the city to compete 
 with shovelers. I have not yet seen any farmers who 
 desire to trade ploughs for wheelbarrows. If the 
 statement were true it would prove that agriculture 
 had become the weak, attenuated base of American 
 existence, and our social fabric would topple over, 
 splitting itself to pieces in the fall like an iceberg in 
 the sea. I admit that the farmer is much poorer 
 than he ought to be ; I admit that he is the victim 
 of numerous legalized extortions, but as he seems 
 to enjoy them, and fears that they may be lifted from 
 him, I will try to bear his poverty with resignation, 
 although I have no patience with my own. 
 
 The next witness is a miller who testified as fol- 
 lows, "There is no combination among millers. On 
 the contrary, if we get twenty-five cents per barrel for 
 the use of our mill and the risk we take we are satis- 
 fied." The honesty of millers is proverbial, but I think 
 this testimony will not stand the test of cross-exami- 
 nation. Did the witness mean that he made a barrel 
 of flour for twenty-five cents, paying his workmen out 
 of that, and also his taxes, and insurance ? " Or did he 
 
MAKING BREAD CHEAP. 11^ 
 
 mean that his profit was twenty-five cents a barrel ? 
 As to the " eombination," I fear that Sympathizer's 
 miller has not yet got the key to it. According to the 
 journals published in the milling interest, negotiations 
 have been for several months in progress looking to a 
 combination of the big millers to freeze out the little 
 ones, and abolish that "fierce competition." I have 
 no doubt that the conspiracy will eventually succeed. 
 
 The next witness was a man who testified for the 
 Board of Trade. He was not himself a member of the 
 Board but he knew all about its machinery and 
 methods. He was one of those exasperating witnesses 
 who know too much, and hoodoo the side that calls 
 them. It will be necessary now to bring on a real 
 member of the Board to contradict or explain the tes- 
 timony of Sympathizer's friend. His evidence verified 
 my complaint, and showed that the price of bread can 
 be artificially raised by "operations" on the Board of 
 Trade. Nothing can be more cold-hearted and selfish 
 than the following testimony: " The speculator operates 
 to make money. He buys hoping for a rise, or he sells 
 for future delivery hoping for a decline.'" Let Sym- 
 pathizer read that sentence carefully and he will see 
 that it springs from the ethics of the "pit" where con- 
 science is drugged and stupefied. Let him bear in mind 
 that the "speculator" spoken of "operates" on the 
 bread of the poor; I ^3.y the bread of the poor because 
 bread is literally the staff of life to the working man, 
 while it is a trifling element in the rich man's bill of 
 fare. 
 
 What is it that the speculator buys " hoping for a 
 rise? Wheat! Just think of a man wasting his religion 
 in praying for a rise in the price of wheat! This, too, 
 in a prayer sometimes three months long. ' Or to sell 
 
226 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 for future delivery hoping for a decline.'''" What a per- 
 verted moral instinct it must be that prompts a man 
 to hope that the value of an article will diminish after 
 he has sold it to his neighbor. Is it really true that 
 no man can prosper unless at the expense of others ? 
 
 The defense is as bad as the offense. Here is the 
 explanation : The speculator sold at a stated price 
 for future delivery that which he did not have, but 
 which he must buy before the day agreed on to deliver 
 it. For instance, on the first day of May, Peter sold Paul 
 one hundred thousand bushels of wheat at one dollar 
 per bushel to be delivered on the 30th day of June. Peter 
 doesn't own a bushel of wheat but has two months in 
 which to buy it. He spends the two months in pray- 
 ing that wheat may fall to seventy-five cents a bushel. 
 His prayers are granted, and he buys the hundred 
 thousand bushels of wheat for seventy-five thousand 
 dollars. He delivers them to Paul and demands and 
 receives from him a hundred thousand dollars for the 
 wheat, He cares nothing for the fact that the wheat 
 is not worth what he takes for it, nor for the further 
 fact that the twenty-five thousand dollars won by 
 Peter may be the measure of Paul's ruin. 
 
 Not only do the " operators " pray for those unnat- 
 uial prices, but they also work for them, and effect 
 them. Here is the confession of sympathizer's wit- 
 ness: "If the price is for the moment higher than any 
 individual trader's opinion of the real price, he will 
 offer for sale, and thus effect the price downward. If 
 he thinks it too low, he will buy in the market, and 
 thus influence the market upward. The opinions thus 
 backed by monied risk, are much superior to the ex 
 parte notion of Wheelbarrow, or any other person who 
 merely stands off and looks on." 
 
MAKING BREAD CHEAP, 227 
 
 I do not see the superiority of those opinions to 
 mine, for they are the very same opinions that I my- 
 self expressed. I complained that rich operators could 
 affect the market, and effect the rise or fall of wheat by the 
 aid of money. What is gambling but "opinions backed 
 by monied risk ? " That expression is a plagiarism 
 from the invitation of the man who runs the wheel of 
 fortune at the races. " Step forward, gentlemen, and 
 back your own opinions." 
 
 Manufacturing or Commercial industry "backed by 
 monied risk" is a very different thing to the specula- 
 tion on the prices of things which the seller does not 
 own and the buyer does not want ; things which are 
 not now and never will be in the possession of either 
 party, and which perhaps are not yet in existence. This 
 kind of speculation does not equalize the temperature 
 of prices, and make a fair average one month with 
 another between the producer and the consumer. In 
 a market subject to artificial derangement, the poor 
 man must always pay for a speculative margin which 
 the baker must keep on the price of bread to protect 
 him from a possible rise in flour. Every man who han- 
 dles the wheat from the time it leaves the farm until 
 it is sold in the form of bread, is compelled to insure 
 himself against a possible speculative inflation of its 
 price, and the consurner pays the insurance. 
 
 The witness did not deny that " corners " were 
 operated by rich men on the Board of Trade. He not 
 only admitted it but gave examples of its vicious and 
 gambling character. I submit my case on the testi- 
 mony of Sympathizer's witness. The details of hio 
 testimony reveal commercial business in its most 
 heartless form, where the measure of one man's gain 
 is the measure of another man's loss. In reply to 
 
2 2 8 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 the apology that " their influence is so brief, they sel- 
 dom affect the price of the product to the actual con- 
 sumer," I offer the fact that the great " corner " of 
 three months ago did actually raise the price of bread 
 in the city of Chicago. The coal barons of New York 
 who levied a tax on all consumers of coal, are well re- 
 membered still. Answer that, explain it, or excuse it 
 if you can. 
 
 Sympathiser's witness tells us that '* corners " are 
 merely " episodes." He says: "They are like raids in 
 the rear of an army or piratical excursions over ordi- 
 nary peaceful seas." What further testimony is nec- 
 essary to their amiable and benevolent character ? 
 Fancy Captain Kidd on trial for scuttling ships. Sym- 
 pathiser's friend is called in as a witness to character. 
 He testifies that he is well acquainted with the defend- 
 ant, and that he is merely an inoffensive pirate; that 
 he did not scuttle all the ships on the ocean " as he 
 sailed, as he sailed," but only a few of them; and that 
 his "influence was so brief as to not affect the price of 
 the product to the actual consumer.' 
 
 Suppose a gang of pirates should raid Lake Mich- 
 igan for a few days, plunder ships, and destroy them, 
 swoop down upon Chicago and carry off rich booty, 
 would Symnathiser comfort the victims of the raid by 
 the assurance that the influence of the pirates " is 
 next to nil" ? 
 
 Sympathizer says that I have no right to claim an 
 interest in the increase of my country's wealth, nor, I 
 suppose, in the expansion of its glory. He says that 
 as a wheeler of earth I can do no more " in that line " 
 than my predecessor did a thousand years ago. That 
 is true, and I only ask wages in proportion to the rank 
 of my wheelbarrow in the scale of productive activities. 
 
MAKING BREAD CHEAP. 229 
 
 The wealth of a country is the product of all its 
 industrial forces working together. Let us suppose 
 that of this product the wheelbarrow contributes one 
 part, the jackplane two parts, the trowel three, the 
 plough four, the yardstick five, and so on up to the 
 banker's ready reckoner, which we represent as ten. 
 In twenty years the product of them all has doubled \ 
 shall the banker's share be twenty, the merchant's ten, 
 the farmer's eight, the trowel's six, the jackplane's 
 four, and the wheelbarrow's only one. I insist that in 
 proportion to my rank in the scale of production I am 
 entitled to my share of the increase. I am a stock- 
 holder in the Bank of Industry, and I am entitled to 
 my dividends in proportion to the stock I hold. If I 
 did not wheel earth somebody else would have to do 
 it, perhaps the bricklayer, or the clerk, or the mer- 
 chant, or the banker, for wheeling of earth must be 
 done. When in the great lottery of life the duty of 
 doing it, fell to me, I bore upon my shoulders men of 
 greater skill to work at higher trades than mine. 
 Without me to stand on, they must have worked upon 
 a- lower plane. I am willing that the man who con- 
 tributes five talents to the capital stock shall receive 
 another five over and above. I envy not the hundred 
 per cent, reward to him who has contributed four, or 
 three, or two talents, but I insist that my one talent, if 
 I bury it not in the ground, but throw it into the com- 
 mon fund, shall be doubled in honor like the rest. 
 
 While other men grow up with the country must 
 I stand still ? As I cannot release myself from duty 
 to my country, neither can any other man justly de- 
 prive me of my share in its greatness and its growth. 
 You can no more justly deprive me of my share in the 
 /ncrease of national riches than of my share in the 
 
2 30 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 increase of national freedom, for which I fought in 
 many battles. Have I no inheritance in the legacy of 
 the past ? Did the great inventors and discoverers 
 leave me nothing when they died ? As well tell me 
 that Shakespere, Goethe, Plato, Newton, Bacon, left 
 me nothing, i am heir of all the men whose genius 
 has multiplied ihe moral and material riches of the 
 world. Every other man is co-heir with me in the 
 great inheritance, and every woman too. 
 
 Sympathizer kindly advises that if my Wheelbar- 
 row wages is too low, I turn my attention to the Bar, 
 the Pulpit, or the Press. This is like the physician 
 who advertised advice gratis to the poor, and when 
 they came for it, recommended them to try the climate 
 and the waters of Baden-Baden. Does Sympathizer 
 know of any wealthy congregation in want of a 
 preacher of my peculiar faith? 
 
 Let it not be thought that my censures were aimed 
 at the Board of Trade as a corporation, or at its mem- 
 bers as a class. They were aimed at certain methods 
 practiced by certain men within the privileges and op- 
 portunities of the Board, methods which are confessed 
 and condemned by Sympathizer and his witnesses. 
 Many of the most honorable, generous, and useful men 
 in this community are members of the Board of Trade; 
 men whose friendship any man may be proud to enjoy. 
 
 When I demand cheap bread, I do not wish to de- 
 prive the farmer, the miller, or the Board of Trade 
 man, or anybody who contributes to its production 
 and distribution, of his deserved reward. Everybody 
 who does work for the benefit of society is employed 
 in his own way to make bread cheap. Bread, it is 
 true, under special conditions, with a given amount of 
 labor and its machinery, cannot be cheaper than the 
 
MAKING BREAD CHEAP. 231 
 
 legitimate wages of its producers. But its price is 
 often increased by additional taxes levied upon it by 
 industrial " pirates " that intervene between the legit- 
 imate distributors. Theirs is that making bread dear 
 of which I spoke. 
 
 Let us unite against the common enemies of so- 
 ciety. Every honest calling is productive of some 
 good. It makes life easier and better. The honest 
 business of the Board of Trade, as Sympathizer ex- 
 plains, is to equalize the price of wheat and facilitate 
 its journey from the farm to the laborer in the city. 
 That appears to me to be a useful work and I can see 
 how it may tend toward "making bread cheap. From 
 what I had heard of Sympathizer's article, I expected 
 a complete refutation, but I think he strengthens my 
 position. I see clearer than ever that " makmg bread 
 dear" is a crime. 
 
232 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 THE TWO SIDES OF THE QUESTION. 
 
 A REJOINDER TO WHEELBARROW ON MAKING BREAD DEAR. 
 BY A SYMPATHIZER (LYMAN J. GAGE). 
 
 Wheelbarrow complains in his last essay about 
 the small inheritance of wealth or reward which he 
 receives from the increased productivity of society as 
 a whole. He demands higher wages. 
 
 Space will not permit any thorough consideration 
 of Wheelbarrow's complaint, but, adopting his com- 
 parisons and figures, may not the following suggestions 
 go part-way towards explaining the small share which 
 comes to him, as an individual ? He has supposed, 
 and seems to approve as reasonable, a certain relative 
 value in industries. Thus wheelbarrows as a class, he 
 says, are entitled to one part in the industrial product, 
 jackplanes two parts, the plough four parts, etc. Now 
 he supposes that in twenty years the product of them 
 all has doubled. Shall the farmer's part now be eight, 
 the jackplane's four, and the wheelbarrow's still only 
 one ? 
 
 Accepting his formula, may it not be true that 
 wheelbarrows, as a group, taken altogether, do get 
 their portion doubled, as jackplanes as a whole receive 
 their double portion ? If this be true, then the division 
 of the share coming to these groups would become 
 equitably divided among the units composing them. 
 If, therefore, the units composing the wheelbarrow 
 group increased in a faster ratio than the units com- 
 
THE TWO SIDES OE THE QUESTION. 233 
 
 posing the jackplane group, the share to the units in 
 the wheelbarrow group would be relatively less than 
 would fall to the units or individuals composing the 
 jackplane group. If all men were wheelers, there would 
 be no productivity. Neither must the wheelbarrow 
 wing of the great industrial army be too large. So- 
 ciety can afford to that group, as a division, only a cer- 
 tain share. 
 
 In fact, I believe and statistics seem to prove, that 
 the comparative increase seems to favor the lowest 
 class of workers. The unskilled laborer could in for- 
 mer ages scarcely earn his daily bread and in rare 
 cases only provide himself with a home and have a 
 family. He is comparatively best paid in a highly civ- 
 ilized society. Any increase of industrial productivity 
 will benefit all classes, but the least skilled do com- 
 paratively profit most of all. 
 
 The individuals composing a group or division, 
 if their share of the allotment be too small, must join 
 some other division, and no motive can be more ef- 
 fective than the desire to gain a larger individual share 
 of the total industrial product. This is, however, only 
 a suggestion. The question is a large one. It deserves 
 serious and continued study. 
 
 It is a hopeful sign that modern thought is becom- 
 ing engaged with it. Let us hope that through the in- 
 telligence displayed in Wheelbarrow, and the growing 
 intellectual power evident on every side among work- 
 ingmen, the great questions of our social economics 
 will find at last a just and final solution. 
 
 But let us confine our attention to the main point 
 of our discussion which is the "crime of making bread 
 dear." 
 
234 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 It is somewhat anomalous that one who has never 
 owned a bushel of wheat, nor more than one barrel of 
 flour at any one time, should find himself defending 
 speculation in bread-stuffs. But as the probability is 
 that *' Wheelbarrow " is in about the same case, we 
 both have the advantage of looking at the subject from 
 a comparatively disinterested standpoint ; and I think 
 we both desire to find the truth. 
 
 His review of my criticism is keen and searching ; 
 but if I may say so, it appears to be a little disingen- 
 uous. For instance, my ''witness" said : "The spec- 
 ulator buys hoping for a rise, or sells hoping for a de- 
 cline." Wheelbarrow thereupon attacks him, and tries 
 to impeach his character. He says: 
 
 " Nothing can be more cold-hearted and selfish than such tes- 
 timony ; it springs from the ethics of the pit. Just think of a man 
 wasting his religion in praying for a rise in wheat. This, too, in 
 a prayer sometimes three months long." 
 
 Well, I think I ought not to have exposed my wit- 
 ness to this stricture ; and perhaps I ought to have 
 stated in specific terms that a speculator rarely prays, 
 and if he does, it is as often that he prays for a decline 
 as for a rise. My witness used the word "hope" it is 
 true, when the word "belief" would have expressed the 
 facts more clearly. Let us say, then, that the specu- 
 lator buys believing that wheat will rise in price, or 
 sells believing it will fall in price, and thus save Wheel- 
 barfow from further moral pain. 
 
 Again, my "witness" did not defend corners. He 
 first explained them, and then candidly admitted that 
 they bore to the regular operators of the Board of 
 Trade about the relation that a piratical excursion 
 bears to commerce, or that the hurried raid in the rear 
 of an army bears to the regular movement of a cam- 
 
THE TWO SIDES OF THE QUESTION. 235 
 
 paign. But Wheelbarrow scolds my witness as a de- 
 fender of these objectionable, though brief, influences, 
 and this is not quite ingenuous. 
 
 Where commerce covers the sea with ships minis- 
 tering to the needs of man, experience shows that the 
 pirate may, now and again, in ships manned by men, 
 make excursions hostile to commerce ; but experience 
 shows also, that these are incidents, and that their 
 total effect is next to nil, and it is a comfort to know 
 that it is so. It is satisfactory, also, to know that 
 "corners" are in their nature brief events, incidents 
 to greater movements, and that in the sweep of time 
 their influence is comparatively unimportant. 
 
 I am ready to join with Wheelbarrow (abandoning 
 my witness if necessary) in denunciation of the kind 
 of "cornerers " who resemble pirates. But there re- 
 main the "cornerers" whose actions my witness lik- 
 ened to that of a hostile raid in the rear of an army. 
 This does not resemble piracy. It is often excusable. 
 It is frequently patriotic and praiseworthy. Wheel- 
 barrow himself says : 
 
 ' ' When I demand cheap bread, I do not wish to deprive the 
 farmer, the miller, or the Board of Trade man, or anybody who 
 contributes to its production and distribution, of his deserved re- 
 ward." 
 
 This is just and right, but if Wheelbarrow would 
 study the facts, he would find that there is frequently 
 at work an influence which, if left unchecked, would 
 rob the farmer, if no one else, of his hard earned re- 
 ward. This influence is the " short seller." Like the 
 poor, he is always with us, though more audacious. 
 An honest believer he may be that lower prices will 
 prevail, owing to his belief in increased crops, or a di- 
 minishing demand. He will sell for future delivery if 
 
236 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 anyone will buy. Like an auctioneer, he will offer it 
 down until he finds a buyer. 
 
 In former times governments perforjned the func- 
 tions of the Board of Trade equalizing the price of 
 grain by establishing storehouses, buying when the 
 price of wheat was low and selling when it was high. 
 They thereby lowered the price of bread in hard and 
 raised it in good times, thus favoring now the farmer 
 and now the consumer. A socialistic government 
 would have to do the same as did the old paternal 
 governments. Whether they would do it as well as 
 the Board of Trade does it now, remains doubtful. 
 
 Now, let us suppose a practical case — a case which 
 has more than once had real existence. 
 
 A ''rich" man on the Board of Trade, performing 
 the function of the benevolent government of former 
 times, discovers that the course of the market has 
 brought the price of wheat to a point which does not 
 yield to the farmer his "deserved reward," nor such 
 a price as to justify him ir^ future effort to raise wheat 
 on his farm, if the current price were to continue. In 
 the <^<f//^that such a state of things cannot long con- 
 tinue, this "rich" man buys. Possibly he has a warm 
 sympathy with the poor farmer, whose crop is ready to 
 market : at all events, he buys : he buys largely. Does 
 the price advance ? No, it declines. To average his 
 purchase, he doubles his first purchase at the now 
 lower price. Does it then advance? No! it declines. 
 He figures up the extent of his holding. He finds that 
 he has purchased for an early delivery nearly as much 
 as the total stock in our warehouses, but the price is 
 still falling. 
 
 He goes upon "change." A score of voices are 
 offering to sell, by the thousands, by the hundreds of 
 
THE TWO SIDES OE THE QUESTION. 237 
 
 thousands of bushels, competing with each other at 
 fractions less in price at every breath. Shall he join 
 that shouting throng, surrender his judgment, sell as 
 best he can, bear his losses the best he may. He will 
 not do so if he begins his name with an ^' H." He 
 discovers that a planned campaign has been inaugu- 
 rated by the "bears " to break the market to the lowest 
 point, and by heavy calls on him for margins, compel 
 him to let go his holdings, and sell to them at their 
 own price. 
 
 To face such a situation requires nerve and courage 
 of the highest order. If this buyer has it, and can con- 
 trol the capital necessary, he will plan a work similar 
 to that of "a raid in the rear of an enemy." He will 
 buy. He will buy all that is offered. He will control 
 or corner the market. Only thus can he protect him- 
 self. If he is successful, he teaches reckless men, — 
 men who have no regard for the farmer's "deserved 
 reward," that there is retribution for their reckless dis- 
 regard of equity. And I do not hesitate to say that, 
 under the condition I have sketched, his action con- 
 duces to the welfare of the country, and herein is pa- 
 triotic and praiseworthy. 
 
 Wheelbarrow asks — and his question possesses a 
 pathetic interest : " What is it that the speculator 
 buys?" And he answers with impressive emotion: 
 "Wheat!" 
 
 Will Wheelbarrow allow us to remain calm at all 
 his excitement ? 
 
 What is it that all buyers and sellers buy and sell? 
 If it is not wheat, it is meat, or fruit, or coal, or tools, 
 or books, or other necessities which men want and use. 
 Every article, be it made of iron or wood, may it serve 
 directly for the production of food or indirectly to the 
 
238 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 prolongation and amelioration or elevation of life is to 
 some extent " our daily bread." Man does not live 
 upon bread alone, and in a certain sense we all are 
 engaged in producing bread — life -stuff for human 
 beings — in some form, and who will deny that everybody 
 attempts to sell his part of it as dear as possible ? and 
 everybody has a right to do so. Wheelbarrow agrees 
 with me, that if anybody's work is more difficult, he 
 may have greater rewards, and the scale of wages can 
 easily be regulated by free competition. 
 
 Wheelbarrow becomes sentimental when he ob- 
 serves that some people deal in wheat, and that they 
 hope for a rise of wheat. 
 
 When Wheelbarrow delved and carried earth at a 
 railway job, he undoubtedly added his mite to the 
 general capital and was engaged in making bread 
 cheap, for the road will soon carry farmers and their 
 machines West to raise more wheat. But when Wheel- 
 barrow now demands his wages doubled, his own and 
 of course those of all wheelers of earth too, he prays 
 for making bread dear ; for higher wages must increase 
 the expenses of building railroads, and if any impro- 
 portionate increase of wages took place on a larger 
 scale, it might prevent roads to be built and thus 
 would necessarily make it impossible for many farm- 
 ers to go West, and those who live West could not 
 send their wheat East. It would tend to making bread 
 dear. 
 
 While upon the whole. Wheelbarrow, as it appears 
 to me, means what is right and just, he has one fault, 
 and that is his rhetoric. What is the use of senti- 
 mentality in economical or in any other questions ? Let 
 us come to business in plain and clear terms without 
 any verbosity and ado, and we will the quicker under- 
 
THE TWO SIDES OF THE QUESTION. 239 
 
 stand one another. Making bread cheap in the sense 
 Wheelbarrow preaches, may be well enough, but let 
 us not forget, that in a certain sense, we are entitled 
 to make it dear, just as much as Wheelbarrow is en- 
 titled to demand higher wages, if he can get them, or 
 rather — if he deserves them. 
 
 When I undertook to oppose Wheelbarrow I chiefly 
 intended to call attention to the fact that there are two 
 aspects of the question of making bread dear. Labor 
 agitators, as a rule, demand that " the bread we eat 
 must be cheap, but for the bread we make we should 
 demand the highest price," and the short-sighted, 
 credulous listeners are apt to believe him who prom- 
 ises most. They do not see that agitators preach ''yes 
 and no" in one breath, that sour and sweet at the 
 same time comes out of their mouth. 
 
 There is a modern reformer appealing with his 
 arguments to the broad masses, who promises by the 
 simple means of taxing land to its full rental value to 
 offer bread for nothing. Henry George says in " Pro- 
 gress and Poverty," that if but the landlords were 
 taxed out of existence, we would realize the ideal of 
 the communist. We shall have meals at public 
 tables for the mere asking of it, free libraries, free 
 theatres, free baths, free railroads, free street cars, 
 heat and motor power furnished in our houses at pub- 
 lic expense, etc., etc. 
 
 What is that else than offering bread gratis ? and 
 it is bread for body and soul, bread of any description. 
 But if all that can be had for the mere asking of it, who 
 will then work ? "That is just the advantage of it," 
 I am told, " wages will rise, they will rise as high as 
 they never have been, and men will not work at all 
 unless it be for the pleasure of work." 
 
240 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 An excellent prospect if it were possible ! Pray, 
 gentlemen, how can you, for any length of time, dis- 
 tribute values gratis, unless you can also create them 
 gratis? 
 
 Mr. George promises that we shall reap where we 
 did not sow and that we shall have an unlimited 
 credit in the bank of public prosperity without being 
 obliged to make any deposit. 
 
 Mr. George has a great followership and whatever 
 be the merit of his idea of land taxation, nobody seems 
 to be aware of the Utopian scheme of what constitutes 
 Georgeism proper. He promises that the bread we 
 eat shall be cheap, so cheap that it is given for the 
 mere asking of it, and the bread we make shall be dear, 
 so dear that nobody shall be able to buy it, unless he 
 pays the full price we demand. 
 
 Let us cease to be overawed by oratory. There is 
 an untruth in every exaggeration and every untruth 
 contains poison. 
 
 Let us work to produce bread, every one in his 
 way ; useful work will lead to make bread cheap. But 
 at the same time let us bear in mind that bread means 
 human labor, it means human lives. Any artificial com- 
 binations to make bread dear for the benefit of a few 
 conspirators — pirates as I called them — is to be con- 
 demned. In that I fully agree with Wheelbarrow. 
 But let us not demand that bread be too cheap, for 
 that would necessarily degrade a certain number of 
 human lives into abject poverty, and deprive them of 
 their due reward for having contributed to make 
 bread. 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION 
 
 LETTERS WRITTEN IN THE CONTROVERSY UPON 
 THAT SUBJECT. 
 
243 
 
 THE SOURCE OF POVERTY. 
 
 A REPLY BY WHEELBARROW TO MR. L.'S CRITICISM. 
 
 Thanks for allowing me to answer Mr. L.'s criticism. I 
 like to meet a critic who frankly confesses that he comprehends 
 the subject and that I do not. From such a critic I always expect 
 instruction, and seldom get it. 
 
 Is Mr. L. perfectly sure that he "comprehends" the case? 
 His illustrations indicate that he does not. True, a physician 
 finding his patient suffering from headache, indigestion, pains in 
 the side, and cold feet, might wisely say, " These are lot four dis- 
 eases, but four symptoms of one disease," and on that theory he 
 might properly prescribe a single remedy; but suppose four pa- 
 tients afflicted with different disorders, will he treat them all alike? 
 This is more nearly like the case about which we are now holding 
 a consultation, and Mr. L.'s instance does not fit. Society is 
 composed bf many persons, some of them healthy and some not. 
 The sick patients have all sorts of disorders, and the cures must 
 be as various as the causes of disease. 
 
 "Poverty," says Mr. L., " is the real disease"; and he would 
 abolish it by levying a single tax on land. He can as easily re- 
 move it with a crowbar. Whatever poverty results from land 
 monopoly will vanish when that monopoly shall cease to be; but 
 the poverty caused by the land system is only a small portion of 
 the aggregate wants and deprivations which go by the name of 
 poverty. Poverty is a consequence, like sorrow, and like sorrow 
 it comes from a thousand springs. The college of physicians was 
 once confounded by a wise man who advised the faculty to abolish 
 " sickness," instead cf attacking diphtheria, measles, and fever. 
 " Remove sickness, gentlemen! " he said, "and all the diseases 
 will disappear/* 
 
244 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 A good many years ago, I lived on the western "frontier." 
 Jerry Dodd was the only doctor in our village, and even he gradu- 
 ated in the blacksmith shop, where he picked up his medical edu- 
 cation by physicking horses. Jerry had one infallible remedy for 
 all diseases, from typhoid fever down to corns and bunions. He 
 called it "lobeely." It was the only medicine I ever took that 
 would produce sea-sickness on land. No matter what ailed us; 
 he always prescribed " lobeely;" I once had a painful felon on my 
 thumb, and Jerry made me take a stiff dose of lobeely, to remove, 
 he said, "the poverty of the blood." So I am continually meeting 
 with Jerry Dodds, who have a specific for the cure of all social and 
 political ailments, a dose of " lobeely " to remove all the poverty of 
 the people. 
 
 I can hardly be civil to the doctrine that sobriety and 
 economy reduce wages; but as I used to believe it myself, I 
 will treat it courteously. Will Mr. L. give us one instance in 
 the United States where sobriety and economy had any such effect? 
 When the temperance movement was spreading among the work- 
 ingmen of England, the brewers and publicans used to employ 
 talkers to go among us and explain that the whole scheme was got- 
 ten up by the masters to lower wages, and that whenever it should 
 become evident that we could do without beer, the value of tHe 
 beer we used to drink would be deducted from our wages. I be- 
 lieved all that for a long time, but at last I noticed that when a 
 man got his wages raised, or was promoted, he was in almost every 
 case a teetotaler. As soon as my eyes were directed tpwards the 
 actual facts, I saw in a moment that not only was the doctrine false, 
 but that the reverse of it was true. It is amazing that this mis- 
 chievous error should be revived in the United States! 
 
 When and where did Col. Ingersoll say that "the bankbook of 
 a mechanic is a certificate that wages are too high?" Col. Inger- 
 soll has said many eloquently foolish things, but I do not believe 
 he ever said anything so foolish as that. There must be a mistake 
 about the quotation. As to the kindred sentiment, that " It is not 
 men we must try to improve; it is the conditions that make men 
 what they are that must be altered," I repeat that it has been for 
 ages an obstacle to the progress of mankind. It gives us a cow- 
 ardly excuse for laziness. It enables us to shift our vices and mis- 
 takes from ourselves to our "conditions." It encourages us to 
 shirk our duty, and to desert the moral work set out for us to do. 
 We must try to improve men and their conditions too. The former 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 245 
 
 is the more important action, because improved men will improve 
 conditions long before improved conditions will improve men. I 
 do not think it well to place these two reforms in opposition to each 
 other or in contrast. They should march along step by step to- 
 gether, like two soldiers of the same file. 
 
 " A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and 
 fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and 
 wounded him, and departed, leaving him haff dead." A priest 
 and a Levite came along, both of them wholesale reformers, and 
 they said, ' ' To help this man would be beneath our dignity ; we 
 are not in the retail business. Let us alter the ' conditions ' that 
 produce thieves, and highway robbery will cease." Then came a 
 Samaritan and said, "I will gladly assist you to reform society 
 by wholesale, but while we are doing it, I do not think it beneath 
 me to do good in a retail way." So he went to the injured man, 
 "and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine; and set him 
 on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of 
 him." The itioral of this is, work for the removal of suffering 
 wherever you find it. There are many wrongs in our social and 
 political systems, each one producing its own share of poverty. By 
 removing each separate wrong we remove its quota of evil; and 
 the man who thinks he has some stuff in a bottle that will cure 
 everything, is enthusiastically wrong. It is a mistake that a 
 single tax on land will remove the poverty caused by drunkenness, 
 idleness, rheumatism, or falling among thieves. The man who 
 will do nothing to remove our social evils, but levy a single tax on 
 land, simply leaves the victim of injustice to die on the Jericho 
 road 
 
 I have no excuses to offer for the wickedness of the ' ' Coal 
 Barons," who lock up nature's coal cellars and turn the miners out. 
 If I had my way there would not be any coal barons, nor any 
 other "barons " for that matter; but without any further dwelling 
 upon that, I proceed to answer Mr. L.'s question concerning the 
 locked-out miners. " Does not Wheelbarrow see that the strictest 
 economy, the temperance of a St. John can be of no avail to those 
 unfortunate men?" Well, no, I do not see any such thing. It ap- 
 pears to me that under the circumstances temperance and economy 
 must be of great avail. It is easy to say that they have been de- 
 prived of ' 'the right to the use of the earth, " and I rather think myself 
 that they ought to have the coal mines; at least I wish they had them, 
 but would they not be coal barons then? And suppose I should go 
 
246 . WHEELBARROW. 
 
 therewith my shovel, pickaxe, and wheelbarrow, and begin digging 
 coal for a living, how long would it take them to fire me out of the 
 mine? And if I should tell them that I had a " right to the use of 
 the earth," they would say, " Yes, but not to that part of the earth 
 which your neighbor has a right to the use of." And how could I 
 answer that? Phil. Fogarty, an Irish friend of mine, was presi- 
 dent of the land league, and one day he told me that he had hired 
 a man to kill landlords. 
 
 "What do you pay him for the job?" 
 
 " I give him a hundred and sixty acres of land for every land- 
 lord he kills." 
 
 "What if he kill ten landlords?" 
 
 " Then he will get sixteen hundred acres of land." 
 
 " Why, that will make him a landlord; will it not?" 
 
 "Yes, but I have a man ready to kill him then." 
 , While Mr. L. is abolishing the ' ' conditions " which produce 
 "coal barons," let him be careful that he substitute not some new 
 " conditions " that will create new " barons." 
 
 All poverty will not be removed by sobriety and thrift, but 
 they will abolish that part of it which has been caused by improvi- 
 dence and drink. I think these propositions are self-evident, yet Mr. 
 L. thinks the result of them would be to reduce us " to a mere 
 animal existence." The man who believes that self-discipline, in- 
 dustry, economy, temperance, will reduce those who prac- 
 tice them to "a mere animal existence" probably attaches no 
 definite meaning to such phrases as, "It is not restriction, it is 
 freedom that labor needs?" " Throw open natural opportunities." 
 ' ' Put all men on equal footing in regard to natural bounties by 
 taxing to the fullest extent and for the benefit of the whole commu- 
 nity that fund which has been, created by the whole community." 
 And so on for several columns. May I ask, "What fund? and why 
 tax it at all? How can taxing a fund created by the whole commu- 
 nity be for the benefit of the whole community? All that magnil- 
 oquence reminds us of the " red-faced man " described by Dickens, 
 who used to stun the company with gong-phrases that might mean 
 anything or nothing. " What's freedom?" said the red-faced man, 
 " Not a standing army. What's a standing army? Not freedom. 
 What's general happiness? Not universal misery. Liberty aint 
 the window tax, is it? Society is bending beneath the yoke of an 
 insolent and factious oligarchy; bowed down by the domination of 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 247 
 
 cruel laws; groaning beneath tyranny and oppression on every 
 hand, at every side, and in every corner." 
 
 The man vi^ho thinks that there is a "sole cause" for 
 all the poverty, vice, misery, errors and mistakes that abound 
 in society, may call himself an "economist," and a "student 
 of natural law," but he has not been much of a "student" 
 if he has not learned that poverty occasioned by drunken- 
 ness, gambling, or even by business imprudence, is not to 
 be removed by levying a tax on land. It is quite in harmony with 
 "natural law," that such an " economist " should hug the delusion 
 that "nothing short of rebuilding our whole social structure will 
 be of any real. or lasting benefit to the masses." Why so? Is there 
 any need for such a wholesale change? "Nothing will ever cure 
 that smoky chimney," said the old lady, " except rebuilding the 
 whole house." She had studied just enough "natural law " not to 
 know that rebuilding the chimney might answer every purpose. 
 The rebuilding of "our whole social structure" would be the most 
 tremendous feat of engineering ever done by mortal man since he 
 attempted to scale heaven from the tall towers of Babel; yet there 
 are architects in every town who can furnish in a moment's notice 
 the plans and specifications by which the rebuilding may be easily 
 and successfully done. And the world is distracted by their con- 
 fusion of tongues. 
 
 Familiar and friendly as the clown in the circus, our old ac- 
 quaintance the "iron law of wages " steps into the arena and says, 
 " Here we are again," Close behind him follows the ancient antith- 
 esis known as ' ' the millionaire and tramp, the one the comple- 
 ment of the other." Those veteran bits of rhetoric have done good 
 service; they have earned retirement and a pension. Let them go. 
 The tramp is not the complement of the millionaire nor the million- 
 aire of the tramp. They are distinct social phenomena, the one 
 independent of the other, the tramp a little more independent 
 sometimes than the millionaire. There is a good deal of maudlin 
 sorrow and stumpy pathos wasted upon one specimen of the tramp, 
 and much undeserved reproach upon the other. Rarely is the 
 tramp a sign of want, or even of a scarcity of work. As a pictur- 
 esque victim of social oppression he is a healthy, rollicking fraud. 
 The stout young fellow who goes on tramp for the gypsy fun of it, 
 and because he would rather beg than work is a despicable creature 
 who ought to be kept on the stone pile; but the laborer who 
 prefers to walk from one part of the country to another, rather than 
 
248 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 ride, may be as respectable as the man in the palace-car. 
 Neither the one tramp nor the other is chargeable to the million- 
 aire. In this country the tramp i-; not the product of poverty but 
 of riches. It is not scarcity but abundance that causes the tramp 
 to blossom in the United States. The fact that a man can get " a 
 meal's vittles" for nothing, almost anywhere in America has 
 developed that contemptible jolly mendicant known as the tramp. 
 As a political argument he is an impostor. 
 
 It seems to me that the "student of natural law" utters a 
 contradiction when he says in one paragraph that the millionaire 
 and the tramp " are but creatures of the same natural forces;" and 
 then tells us in another paragraph that "nature is not concerned 
 with the making of millionaires and paupers anymore than with 
 the making of Jews and Catholics." I think they are all the pro- 
 ducts of artificial forces ; although, as to the tramp, nature 
 has had a good deal to do with producing him. Any man who has 
 had much acquaintance with nature in the woods and fields knows 
 the artful way by which she seduces boys from the schoolhouse 
 and men from the shop. The man who has never been a tramp; 
 I don't mean a mendicant, but the tramp who pays his way; the 
 man who has never been a tramp knows not what luxury is. He 
 has never quaffed the wine of life from the chalice of the Gods. 
 He has never felt the holy spirit pouring down upon him from the 
 sun. Health glows in the brown face of the tramp, and nature 
 makes for him a pic-nic and a holiday. Do you like pictures? 
 Tramp through Old England in the spring, or New England 
 in the fall, and roll past you with your own feet a landscape of 20, 
 30, 40 miles a day. How the glories of the Louvre and the Vatican 
 pale before the groupings and the colorings you will see. In his 
 gilt-edged poetry the millionaire reads about "the music of the 
 spheres," but the tramp actually hears it in that symphony of 
 praise wherein all the harmonies of nature sing together. He 
 drinks a gallon of air at a draught, and consumption and dyspepsia 
 know him not. A pleasant stroll that I can recommend for anybody 
 needmg a tonic is a twenty mile-a-day walk across the "pleasant 
 land of France," say from Dieppe, straight away to Strasburg. 
 Let us not waste any more tears on the tramp, nor any more 
 cant. 
 
 And this reminds me of " The iron law of wages," which has 
 been imported into this debate. It gives to the argument a learned 
 look, as cap and gown give an air of scholarship to an Oxford 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 249 
 
 student. ' ' The iron law of wages " is an old myth which used to 
 vex and puzzle me, but like some other ghosts it fled when I chal- 
 lenged it. I then discovered that it was unreal, like " The stuff 
 that dreams are made of." It has no more substance than the 
 wooden rule of three, or the leather law of interest. If a figure of 
 speech is needed let us call the law of wages india-rubber, which 
 it resembles. It is elastic; it swells and shrinks, and stretches and 
 bends according to the pressure and resistance of the time. It 
 changes according to the "conditions." Time, place, and circum- 
 stance; crops, climate, capital; product, strength, skill, character, 
 and a thousand other forces control and modify the law of wages, 
 if there is any law of wages other than the law of price for gro- 
 ceries, the law of getting the most sugar and the most labor for the 
 least money? 
 
 I once held the position of deputy bricklayer. I carried the 
 bricks up in a hod, while my principal set them in the wall. He 
 was a labor-orator and a good one. Did you ever hear a sailor box 
 the compass? Well, that's the way my principal used to rattle off 
 the jargon of the " dismal science." The pathetic way in which he 
 would explain the ' ' iron law of wages, " used to make us all so 
 thirsty from shedding tears, that we had to call for beer. One day 
 we had this dialogue: 
 
 "Jem," I said, "what is the iron law of wages?" 
 
 " O, Its the law which allows a working man just wages 
 enough to purchase the necessaries of life, and keep his muscles in 
 working order." 
 
 ' ' Does it cost any more to keep your muscles in working order 
 than mine? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 ' ' Then how comes it that you get three dollars a day, and I 
 only get a dollar and a quarter? " 
 
 "Well, of course, you know, skilled labor is more valuable 
 than unskilled labor in the market." 
 
 " Then the value of the article in the market has something to 
 do with the price of it? " 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 " And there is no iron law? " 
 
 "Yes, there is; for the lowest forms of labor, but not for the 
 higher." ' 
 
 ' ' This, " I said, ' ' amounts to a confession that there is no " iron 
 law of wages." 
 
250 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 Mr. L. hopes and expects too much from the land scheme of 
 Henry George. That scheme was lifted into popularity by 
 the eloquence of its advocate as much as by its own merits, 
 and in spite of its mistakes. The moral defect of it is 
 that it makes taxation a principle. It elevates taxes to the 
 rank of blessings. Taxes always deprive society of some com- 
 forts; they never can increase its wealth, any more than levy- 
 ing measles upon a special few can increase the health of all. The 
 paradox is visible in Mr. L.'s proposal to abolish poverty 
 "by abolishing all taxation upon the products of labor, and putting 
 it upon land values, taxing them to the last penny." What are 
 land values but the " products of labor!" And why confiscate land 
 values "to the last penny?" The only revenue that any govern- 
 ment can obtain by taxing land values must come from the values 
 which are the product of labor. The speculative land value of a 
 vacant lot, the anticipated profits of an uncultivated ' ' quarter sec- 
 tion," will yield nothing to the tax-gatherer, if assessed to the " last 
 penny " of its prospective worth. In this case the land and the lot 
 will simply be forfeited by the owner to the State, and if conferred 
 upon a new owner they will not yield the first penny in taxes or in 
 profits until they have been made productive by the magic touch 
 of labor. There is much in Mr. George's land scheme that ap- 
 pears to me to be correct, and some of it I advocated in a crude 
 way before Mr. George was known as an author. I think there is 
 a good deal of social relief in the principle of the single tax on 
 land, as being the least impediment to labor; but I do not see how 
 that relief can ever be greater than the sum total of the taxes re- 
 quired for the strict necessities of government. Mr. George is not 
 to be held responsible for the views of his disciples, but many of 
 them believe that under his plan every man who owns lands and 
 lots is to be fined for the offense "to the last penny" of their 
 value. 
 
 The personal questions addressed to me in Mr. L.'s last par- 
 agraph must be answered. First. " Does Wheelbarrow go down be- 
 low the surface and wrestle with evil in the place of its origin?" 
 To that I answer, yes; as well as I can; but I see a thousand ori- 
 gins of evil, and to the best of my ability I wrestle with them all. 
 I give such help as I can to every reformer, and to every reform. 
 I complain that progress is retarded because reformers will not as- 
 sist each other. " A single tax on land is the only way to relieve 
 poverty," says one. "Wrong," says another, "State Socialism is 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 
 
 251 
 
 the only cure for poverty." " Both wrong," says a third, " Money 
 reform is the one thing needful." "All wrong," says a fourth, 
 "Prohibition of the liquor traffic will remove all poverty," and so 
 on, until the relief of individual misery is looked upon as very un- 
 professional in a wholesale reformer. Whenever I see anything 
 in any man's plan that I think will remove evil either by wholesale 
 or by retail, I am his disciple. 
 
 Second. ' ' Does Wheelbarrow intend to give labor back the right 
 to the use of the earth?" To that I answer, yes; and when labor uses 
 the earth, I would not tax its product as a punishment for using it. 
 
 ■dS 17 BR SIT 7] 
 
252 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 IS THE SINGLE TAX THE SOLE CURE ? 
 
 REPLY TO MR S. L. 
 
 May I offer a few words in reply to Mr. L's latest criticism? 
 He says that he can give "many instances where economy has had 
 the effect of reducing wages," and he hopes that, 'having demon- 
 strated this," I will treat his doctrine courteously. He demonstrates 
 nothing. He simply makes two assertions, without attempting to 
 support them by any evidence whatever. The first is, that the 
 wages of cigar-makers have been lowered by "economical Bohemian 
 workmen"; and the second is, that the wages of Pennsylvania miners 
 have been lowered by "frugal and economical men from Italy and 
 Hungary." It is nut necessary to dispute these assertions because 
 the point in controversy here is not whether the wages of miners and 
 cigar-makers have been reduced, nor whether it has been reduced by 
 ' frugal and economical" Bohemians, Italians, and Hungarians, but 
 whether the reduction is caused by their economy and frugality. It 
 is quite impossible that the frugality and economy of workingmen 
 can have the effect of lowering their wages. If such a result were 
 possible, all the reasons that regulate wages would be reversed, and 
 economic science would stand on an immortal foundation. For cen- 
 turies, there have been "frugal and economical" men in every trade 
 and calling. If their prudence lowered the wages of their brother 
 craftsmen and themselves, wages would have fallen long ago to the 
 minimum necessary for existence. 
 
 Mr. L. repeats much of his former argument; and my answer to 
 that will apply to the repetitions also. I will notice a few of his later 
 statements. He admits that in his former article he misquoted Col. 
 Ingersoll but the reason was that he was a little careless, and 'quoted 
 from memory." He now gives us the quotation as amended, 
 being careful at the same time to shelter himself behind the Col- 
 onel's back. He adopts the easy stratagem of weak disputants and 
 overwhelms his adversary by taunting him with a sentiment from the 
 writings of some great or famous man. A friend of mine, who 
 worked with me on the same job, used to floor me in debate by the 
 following formula; "Oh, you differ with Henry Clay, do you? Bad 
 
J HE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 253 
 
 for Henry Clay." In like manner Mr. L. tries to be sarcastic by 
 showing "how a great lawyer, and a man of rare accomplishments is 
 liable to lose his reputation as a scholar when confronted by 'Wheel- 
 barrow's' school of political economy." In other words, "V'ou differ 
 with Ingersoll, do you? Bad for Ingersoll" The sneer is wasted 
 upon me. I have no "school" of political economy. 
 
 I admit that Col. Ingersoll is a man of rare accomplishments, but 
 nobody has ever accused him of being a great lawyer, although every- 
 body confesses that he is a brilliant advocate. He is an ornamented 
 soda-fountain, gushing, frothy, and sweet. His "reputation as a 
 scholar" is not heavy enough to hujft him, while his political economy 
 is narrow and illiberal. Last summer he proclaimed that the true 
 policy of a nation is to find out what economic scheme will injure 
 another nation and then adopt it. His code of professional ethics as 
 explained by himself, shocks the moral sense. It is beautifully wicked. 
 However, I have no controversy with Col. Ingersoll. I mentioned 
 him incidentally because Mr. L. quoted him as having said that 
 "The bank book of a mechanic is a certificate that wages are too 
 high.'"' This appeared so extravagantly foolish that I thought there 
 must have been a mistake made by Mr. L. in the quotation. He 
 now admits that there was a mistake, and that Col. Ingersoll did not 
 say what Mr. L. "quoting from memory" thought he said. Does Mr. 
 L., having found out that Col. Ingersoll did not say it, still think it 
 "an indisputable economic truth"? 
 
 Still sarcastic, Mr. L. sneers at me for ''throwing chunks of wis- 
 dom at the head of the laborer by preaching temperance, frugality, 
 and self-denial, by telling him to be good, virtuous, and economical " 
 I fear there is good reason in the sneer, and that there is much 
 waste of work in throwing chunks of wisdom at the laborer; but after 
 all, it is better than throwing chunks of unwisdom at him, by preach- 
 ing that the virtues lower wages, and that all the ills that he is heir 
 to, can be cured by the magic of a single tax on land. 
 
 Mr. L. quotes from Henry George's Standard, a catalogue of 
 impossible blessings that will come to society by taxing land-values 
 "to their y«//rt;«fKw^," and then reproaches me as follows: "This 
 simple just but radical reform, "Wheelbarrow terms 'the most tre- 
 mendous feat of engineering ever done by mortal.'" I fear Mr. L. 
 is again "quoting from memory," because my remark was directed 
 not at any plans proposed by Mr. George, but at the alarming deci- 
 sion of Mr. L., who, for the moment had let the land-tax go, and 
 said that "nothing short of rebuilding our whole social structure will 
 
254 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 be of any real or lasting benefit to the masses." Considering the 
 many thousands of years it has taken to build our social structure up 
 to its present greatness, I thought that the taking of it all apart again 
 and "rebuilding" it, would be a most tremendous feat of engineer- 
 ing. I think so still, although no doubt, there are men in New York 
 ready to "put in a bid" for the job 
 
 The quotation from Henry George about "taxing land- values to 
 their full amount," is followed by another, from Herbert Spencer, 
 beginning, "Such a doctrine is consistent, etc.," insinuating, of 
 course, the doctrine just previously quoted from Henry George. I 
 think the quotation from Herbert Spencer is worthless in this debate, 
 because Mr. L. wrenched its head off before he brought it in. The 
 doctrine that Spencer was referring to, was not given. Separated 
 from the context, which would have explained it, the beheaded quo- 
 tation is tacked on the doctrine of Henry George, concerning the 
 taxation of land-values to their full amount. This is hardly fair to 
 me. In the language of honest lago, "I like not that." I think the 
 "doctrine" that Herbert Spencer was talking about should not have 
 been suppressed and another one substituted for it, as little Buttercup 
 mixed up those children in the play. 
 
 Mr. L. kindly tries to explain to me the difference between taxing 
 land, and taxing land-values. He clears up the matter in this way: 
 "Land-values are not the product of human exertions; they are not a 
 product at all, but simply a value that attaches to land by the growth 
 of a community. The taxing of this fund made by all for the use of 
 all would not be a tax at all, but in the correct sense of the term 
 would simply be rent." This is like unravehng a tangle by tying a 
 few more double knots in it. The explanations are contradictory. 
 According to Mr L. , land values are produced by the "growth of a 
 community," and yet, he says, "they are not a product at all." A 
 communityis merely a collection of human beings and all values 
 made by the growth of a community are due to human exertions, yet, 
 he says, "Land- values are not the product of human exertions " If 
 land-values are not a product at all, they are nothing at all, and in 
 taxing them nothing is taxed. Land-values are incorporeal. They 
 are mere qualities, as intangible as black, yellow, wet, or dry. 
 Human laws have no jurisdiction over land-values separate from the 
 land, because human laws cannot bring land-values under forcible 
 subjection. If the taxes on land-values are not paid, the land itself 
 is arrested and sold, in satisfaction of the debt. 
 
 Mr. L. is himself drawn into the whirlpool of his own logic. He 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 255 
 
 spins round and round until different objects appear all alike to him. 
 Land-values, which are "not ^. product at all," become a ^'futtd made 
 by all for the use of all," and at last the tax upon this "fund" merges 
 into ''''rent ' In saying this, I do not intend the slightest reflection 
 upon Mr, L's logical ability. I think the result was inevitable. The 
 very moment we subject incorporeal "values" to the process of taxa- 
 tion, or to the burdens known as rent, we are compelled to attach 
 them to some substantial reality upon which the penalties of the law 
 may operate. All taxes are nominally upon values, but in reality 
 they are upon things. When the assessor came round last spring, he 
 asked me this question, "Have you a watch?" "Yes!" "What's the 
 value of it?" "Twenty dollars." And he made the proper entry in 
 his book. It looks like a distinction without a difference, when I am 
 told that the "value" of the watch was taxed, and not the watch 
 itself. 
 
 Mr L. brings his argument to a provoking anti-climax in the 
 last sentence of his article, where he affirms that "it is as true to-day 
 as it was a hundred years ago when the French Assembly declared 
 that 'ignorance, contempt, and neglect of human rights is the sole 
 cause of public misfortune.' " I suspect that this quotation is also 
 made "from memory," although the French National Assem.bly said 
 many things even more absurd than that, though not quite so ungram- 
 matical. "Ignorance," "Contempt," and "Neglect," are three 
 causes, and as neither of them can therefore be the sole cause, there 
 may be a mistake in the quotation, especially as none of those three 
 causes is the sole cause, according to Mr. L. He said in his former 
 article that land monopoly is the sole cause, and taxing land-values to 
 the last penny the "only remedy." After putting me to the trouble 
 of showing that there is no sole cause for public misfortune, but that 
 there are many causes for it; and after disputing with me down to the 
 very last sentence in his second article, he there abandons his own 
 sole cause, and adopts the three different sole causes which he says 
 were declared by the French National Assembly a hundred years 
 ago. 
 
 Mr. L. says that he has no "personal controversy" with me. I 
 have none with him; but as I believe him to be a man who sincerely 
 desires the reformation of our social system, I have a personal appeal 
 to make to him. I implore him to abandon the "sole cause" theory, 
 and the "only remedy" prescription A man of influence and ability 
 may do great injury to the workingmen by telling them that any 
 specific plan of reform must ^^ precede all others." In the great 
 
256 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 scheme of human progress all the moral forces work in harmony 
 together. Not any one of them has precedence over another! 
 There is no jealousy amongst them, no pushing of each other out of 
 the way. A single wrong fears nothing from a thousand rights dis- 
 puting among themselves over questions of precedence. 
 
 WHO MAKES THE " LAND-VALUE " OF A FARM? 
 
 In The Open Court for Feb. 28th, I am honored by criticisms 
 from three advocates of Mr. George's plan of taxation. Those 
 criticisms are evidently written by men competent to defend their 
 own position, and attack mine. They have the advantage of me, for 
 I have not their ability to analyze and compare the abstract properties 
 of things. I cannot separate the shadow of a tree from the tree 
 itself, nor the value of land from the land. 
 
 My critics complain that I do not correctly state Mr. George's 
 doctrine; and they kindly advise me to read him again. Well, I will 
 if they will, Mr. Williamson says that Mr. George's position is that 
 " almost all the value of land comes from the growth and labor of the 
 community, and not from the individual who legally owns the land; " 
 while his brother critic, Mr. Stephenson, says the strongest claim of 
 Mr. George is that " the value of land is entirely due to the labor of 
 the whole community. " I have placed " almost " and " entirely " in 
 italics for easier comparison. Which is Mr. George's word? Some- 
 body has made a mistake as to his position here. Either Mr. Wil- 
 liamson or Mr. Stephenson ought to read Mr. George's works again. 
 
 The variance above noticed is of no importance to the main argu- 
 ment if both statements are erroneous, as T think they are. I do not 
 know how to dissect the doctrine based upon them, but I do know 
 how to analyze a farm, because I have seen farms made, and have 
 helped to make them. Here is the process used in Illinois. 
 
 In the first place the virgin soil was communistic property; it be- 
 longed to all the people of the United States, and it was expressively 
 described as "Government" land. The experience of my old 
 acquaintance, Thomas Clark, will illustrate the subject like a book. 
 Having selected a quarter section of land in Boone County for his 
 future home; Tom Clark was immediately confronted by Mr. George's 
 law. The government said to him: " This land is the common 
 property of all the people, and before you can have it, you must pay 
 to the people the land- value of that quarter section. This is fixed at 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 257 
 
 a dollar and a quarter an acre. " Tom paid the money and took the 
 land. Then he broke forty acres at a cost of three dollars an acre. 
 His quarter section was now worth $320 in visible value. Next he 
 built a house and barn upon the land, and fenced the forty acres with 
 rails. By this time his plantation in the rough was worth about $500. 
 How much of that value was due to the labor of the " community" ? 
 Absolutely none of it; and yet this is the way "land-values" were 
 made in Illinois. The settler who furnished all the labor, and all the 
 capital, and made all the value the land possesses, is coolly described 
 by Mr, Stephenson as the " alleged " owner of the land. He is also 
 the "alleged" owner of the "alleged" fence, and the "alleged" 
 house and barn. 
 
 In the wilderness of occult economics I can easily lose my way, 
 but I get along fairly well by the aid of an object lesson so large and 
 palpable as a farm. I ask my critics how they will apply Mr. 
 George's doctrine of taxation to the farm which I have just described. 
 By much wear of muscle and sweat of brow, Tom Clark has brought 
 the whole quarter section under cultivation, and there is an orchard 
 in one corner of it. Now which of the ingredients of this farm shall 
 bear the single tax? Is it the breaking of the wild sod? Is it the 
 fence, the barn, or the apple trees? This is a fair question, and ought 
 to be fairly answered. It is never answered. It is evaded thus: 
 " We do not propose to tax any of these improvements nor the land 
 itself; we only propose to tax the land-value of the whole farm. " 
 
 In that evasion the single tax on values' theory vanishes " like 
 the feverish dream of a summer's night. " The land value of that 
 farm separate from the improvements, is nothing. I have Mr. George 
 for that. In " Protection and Free Trade. " page 291, he says, 
 " Land in itself has no value. Value rises only from human labor." 
 If so, we tax human labor when we tax land-values. Whose labor 
 made the land-value of that farm? Was it the labor of the man who 
 plowed the land, split the rails, built the house, and planted the 
 apple trees, or was it the labor of the " Community? " The commu- 
 nity did nothing; and besides, it had sold its communal right in the 
 land for a dollar and a quarter an acre. 
 
 I repeat that Mr. George loses sight of his own doctrine that land 
 of itself has no value, when he says, page 302: " Now it is evident 
 that in order to take for the use of the community, the whole income 
 arising from land, it is only necessary to abolish one after another, all 
 other taxes now levied, and to increase the tax on land-values until it 
 reaches as near as may be the /«// annual value of the land. " Now 
 
258 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 if the government takes from Clark the " full annual value" and " the 
 whole income" of his farm, whether by tax, rent, or confiscation, it 
 practically takes the whole farm and all the product of his life-time 
 industry. 
 
 It is paltering in a double sense to separate the value of that 
 farm from the farm itself. It is pure mystification to say, ' ' We tax 
 the flavor of the apples, but not the apple trees, nor the land on which 
 they grow; we tax the fragrance of the roses, but not the flowers nor 
 the garden; we tax the sweetness of the grapes, but not the vineyard 
 nor the vines. " If the tax upon the sweetness of the grapes is not 
 paid, the sweetness is not levied on, but the vineyard is arrested and 
 sold. In like manner, when the tax on land-values becomes delin- 
 quent, the land itself is taken. In the language of my critic, Mr. 
 McGill, " The owner of the improvements pays the annual value of 
 the land to the freeholder." Under Mr. George's system he would 
 pay it to the municipality. In either case he must pay it or lose his 
 improvements. 
 
 Mr. McGill says that Mr. George's experiments "are a plea for 
 the application of the ' Moral Law. ' " I do not doubt that Mr. 
 George and Mr. McGill conscientiously believe that; but I can hardly 
 imagine anything more immoral and despotic than a law which would 
 attach Mr. George's theory to the farm I have described, and take 
 from the farmers who made the farm " the whole income" of it, and 
 its " full annual value. " The farm that I have selected is not an 
 exceptional instance; it is a fair example of the manner in which 
 " land-values" have been made in Illinois and all the Western States. 
 If the answer to this is that the land-value of city lots is not made in 
 that way, I reply: Very well; then let Mr. George apply his doctrine 
 where it fits, and where the application of it can do no wrong, if there 
 is any such place, which I doubt. 
 
 Mr. Stephenson requires me to " point out the exact place in 
 Progress and Poverty where the millennium is promised by the simple 
 means of a single tax on land;" and also, "where Mr. George 
 denounces every progress, under present circumstances, as driving a 
 parting wedge between the rich and poor. " I will cheerfully do so. 
 Let Mr. Stephenson read pages 326 and 327, where Mr. George 
 describes the condition of public happiness which would result from 
 levying a simple tax on land. It is too long to quote here, but it 
 describes that social state which is usually called the millennium. 
 " We should reach the ideal of the socialist, "says Mr. George, " but 
 not through government repression." 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 259 
 
 For answer to the second question, I refer my critic to page 11, 
 where, after confessing the vast progress made in " comfort, leisure, 
 and refinement, " Mr. George says this: "In those gains the lowest 
 class do no share. " Then, further on, he says, " The new forces, 
 elevating in their nature though they be, do not act upon the social 
 fabric from underneath, but strike it at a point intermediate between 
 top and bottom. It is as though an immense wedge were being 
 forced, not underneath society, but through society. " 
 
 Personally, I think there is much truth in that statement, but I 
 believe that Mr. George's remedy would make matters worse instead 
 of better. To levy each year a tax upon Clark's farm equal to the 
 "full annual value" of it, — and to deprive him of the "whole income" 
 arising from the land, would be adding another injustice to the 
 wrongs which afflict society now. 
 
 Here is a circular explanation of Mr. George's doctrine which 
 mystifies me like a Greek oracle. Mr. Williamson says: " Now if you 
 tax the value of land you are taxing the labor of the whole conwiunity^ 
 slightly, and the natural opportunity and growth of the community; 
 but as the taxes are expended on the community^ — for the growth of 
 the community — nobody is injured, and the groivth pays for the 
 growth.^* 
 
 Isn't that chopping sand? What is the use of taxing the labor of 
 the community, slightly, to expend the taxes on the community, 
 slightly? And how does the growth of the community pay for the 
 growth of the community? I have traveled round and round this 
 proposition looking for a gate-way to its meaning, until I am giddy. 
 To tax the value of land belonging to the whole community is to im- 
 pose upon ourselves the cannon ball torture for nothing. One of our 
 punishments in the army was this: A circle was drawn on the ground 
 about 90 feet in diameter. On the outer edge of the circle, holes 
 were dug about a yard apart. In one of these holes was a 32 pound 
 cannon-ball. The delinquent had to pick up this cannon ball and drop 
 it into the next hole, and so on, round and round, for so many hours 
 a day. This was done as punishment, but Mr WilHamson wants to 
 do it for fun, by the whole community taxing the labor of the whole 
 community; the taxes to be expended on the whole community. 
 
 When Tom Clark's quarter-section belonged to the whole com- 
 munity it was never taxed at all, because there is no sense in a com- 
 munity levying taxes upon the values of its own land, and paying the 
 tax into its own treasury. I once knew a man who fined himself a 
 
26o WHEELBARROW. 
 
 dollar every time he used profane language, but he merely took it 
 out from one pocket and paid it into the other. 
 
 If Mr, Williamson means to say that taxing the land-values of 
 Tom Clark's farm taxes the labor of the whole community, I think he 
 makes a mistake. It appears to me that the taxation is levied upon 
 the labor of Clark, and the taxes ought not to be "expended on the 
 community. " 
 
 NATURAL OPPORTUNITIES. 
 
 " "I THINK there be six Richmonds in the field." I have an- 
 swered five, and now comes Mr. Doblin with new arguments. He 
 charges at an effigy of me made out of his own head, as the school- 
 boy made the ship I merely call upon him to direct his lance at 
 me, and not at my " Counterfeit presentment." Mr. Doblin makes 
 phrases, puts them into quotation marks, and then refutes their argu- 
 ment. This in itself is innocent enough, but people who do not 
 understand it may infer from the quotation marks that the phrases 
 and the sentiments are mine. 
 
 I never said ' ' Morality is a compound of foresight, economy, 
 thrift, and industry." These are useful ingredients of character, but 
 they are chiefly duties to ourseltes. They are in the moral code 
 indeed, but its more important parts prescribe the duties which we 
 owe to others, the higher obligations of '* Morality." 
 
 Mr. Doblin cuts, clips, shortens, plaits, and takes in fold after 
 fold of the spiritual garment called " morality," until it is diminished 
 to the stature of a man whom he calls Jay Gould. Then he insin- 
 uates that "Wheelbarrow " did the tailoring, and that the diminished 
 robe exactly fits my pattern of morality. I may exclaim with Cassius 
 in the play, "You wrong me every way, you wrong me Brutus ;" you 
 charge to me a superstructure which I never built, for contrasts and 
 comparisons I never thought of. 
 
 Is it not presumptuous to sit in judgment on our fellow men, 
 and tell the world that we are holier than they ? Is it not self- 
 righteous to contrast the vices of his " Jay Gould" with the shining 
 virtues of ourselves? Our moraHzers would become insolvent if that 
 "awful warning" should be called to his reward. Reserves the 
 purpose of a dummy block whereon reformers may display their 
 neighbor's fault for public reprobation. When they have it fitted on 
 the image to the worst advantage they advertise it, and exclaim, 
 "Here is a choice article of social wickedness ; see how it fits this 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 261 
 
 dummy." Not one of them will try it on himself and say, *' Behold, 
 how closely it fits me." So handy is that Wall Street curiosity to 
 ' point a moral, and adorn a tale," that I sometimes think the odium 
 cast upon him springs from envy at his vices and his luck. I fear 
 to weigh my own righteousness against the sins of any man, lest 
 when I gaze into my looking glass I see reflected there the features 
 of that man. 
 
 The ironical sentiment about contentment is put within quota- 
 tion marks as if it came from me. I am innocent of it ; but it fur- 
 nishes a text for high grade moral reprobation, which I heartily 
 approve. All I ask is that the indignant " No, sir !" be addressed to 
 the guilty person, and not to me. I am on record against content- 
 ment, if by that is meant the end of aspiration for myself, or the 
 end of work for others. Neither have I ever told poverty to gamble 
 upon what the morrow will bring forth. The odds against poverty 
 are too great. 
 
 If I ever advised poverty to be thrifty in order to " relieve the 
 hunger of yesterday," I did a foolish thing. I think I am innocent 
 of that also, although I plead guilty of advising thrift against the 
 hunger of to-morrow. I never grieved over the ' hunger of yester- 
 day " but once, and that was when I was a little boy. I was asked 
 if I would have a bit of meat pie ; I said " No," when I meant " Yes," 
 and was taken at my word. Next day I was tortured by the vision 
 of that lost meat pie. Toward night it occurred to me that it was 
 useless to weep over the hunger of yesterday, and I have never done 
 so since. It is the hunger of to-day that worries me. 
 
 I fully agree wnth .Mr. Doblin that we cannot teach morality to 
 dead men. I think with him that as a " first condition ' of success 
 in teaching, the pupils " must be alive." 
 
 As to the "spirit of the Henry George doctrine" I have no 
 quarrel with it ; " the letter killeth." It is not Mr. George's motives, 
 but his measures that I question. I am as anxious as he is to " open 
 up the natural opportunities," although I think the phrase is vague, 
 uncertain, and misleading. We differ as to the means by which to 
 " open up." Tom Kennedy and I were shovelers in the same gang. 
 We were working on a bit of railroad not far from Chambly in 
 Canada, and lodged in the house of a little Frenchman there. Tom 
 was an Irishman, who reached conclusions by the mpst illogical 
 means. One night he woke up complaining of the closeness of the 
 room. " We must have some fresh air," he said, " I'll open up the 
 windy." Instead of doing so in a Christian manner, he picked up 
 
262 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 one of my boots and flung it through the glass into the street, where 
 I found it in the morning. Tom's conclusions were all right, but his 
 way of reaching them was defective. Fresh air was a " natural op- 
 portunity " to which he was entitled, but he had no right to obtain it 
 by throwing another man's boot through a third man's window. 
 Neither has Mr. George nor Mr. Doblin. 
 
 If I should ask Mr. Doblin to " drop his preconceived ideas " in 
 favor of Mr. George's theory, long enough to study my objections to 
 It he would rightly consider my demand unreasonable. It is not 
 necessary to the candid study of any subject that a man should drop 
 his preconceived ideas concerning it ; yet Mr. Doblin, with compla- 
 cent self-esteem, demands that I drop my preconceived ideas of his 
 particular faith before I study it. This is a concession which no dis- 
 putant has a right to ask of his antagonist. A man who denied the 
 efficacy of prayer was requested by the preacher to give the matter 
 " prayerful consideration." 
 
 My preconceived ideas of taxation leaned very much toward the 
 scheme of Henry George. I am dropping some of them because the 
 study of the question leads me to doubt their wisdom and their justice. 
 For instance, in the case of Thomas Clark, the farmer whom I spoke 
 of lately, I think that society has no right to confiscate his farm 
 because some other man holds land for speculative purposes. To tax 
 it away from him by Mr. George's plan is to confiscate it. 
 
 '' The Rights of Man." What man? What are the rights of 
 Thomas Clark to the farm which he has literally planted in the 
 wilderness ? To tax the value of that farm to its full amount, the 
 whole of which value has been made by the hard labor of Clark, 
 would be a wrong for which the only excuse would be a plea of 
 political insanity. 
 
 THE SINGLE TAX AND GEORGEISM. 
 
 Mr. George made a blunder by going to England and leaving 
 his doctrine loose in the hands of his disciples. They have given it 
 so many emendations and explanations that he will hardly know it 
 when he gets home. If he could read the thirty or forty defenses of 
 it which have appeared in The Open Court he would laugh at their 
 paradoxical ingenuity. He would exclaim with that Maryland farm- 
 er, "Friends of the single-tax had better stop explaining." 
 
 The most condensed explanation of the single-tax doctrine is given 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 263 
 
 by Mr. Hugh O. Pentecost in The Open Court, No. 85. I will 
 first notice that. He says: 
 
 "If Wheelbarrow cannot separate the idea of * the value of land from the 
 land,' as he confisses, he certainly ought to understand that one piece of land has 
 more renting value than another, and he ought to understand so simple a proposi- 
 tion as \iz.\\xi% ground-rent arid nothing else paid inio the public treasury. That 
 is all there is to the ' George 7heory.' " 
 
 Very good! That simplifies the debate. Mr. Pentecost is of 
 high authority as a commentator on the gospel according to George. 
 H Mr. George left the key to his problem in the hands of any man, 
 he left it in the hands of Mr. Pentecost. I must therefore consider 
 his interpretation orthodox although it is hardly consistent with the 
 original text as written by Mr. George himself. Mr. Pentecost gives 
 us a very narrow definition of Mr. George's claim. Mr. George ex- 
 pands \\\Q. ground-rent project until it includes the confiscation of all 
 the value of all the land. This is practically the confiscation of the 
 land, and the communists of Europe and America understand it so. 
 Mr. George himself understands it so. In proof of this I quote his 
 very words, as I tind them on page 302 of "Protection or Free Trade." 
 
 " Now it is evident that, in order to take for the use of the community the 
 ivhole income aLr\%\xi%ixova.\axiA^jicst as effectually as it could betaken by for- 
 mally appropriating and letting oiit the la7id^ it is. only necessary to abolish, 
 one after another, all other taxes now levied, and to increase the tax on land 
 values till it reaches, as near as may be, the /ull annual value of the land,"* 
 
 Can confiscation be declared in plainer words than those? ,. They 
 are copied from Webster's dictionary, where Confiscation is defined 
 as "Appropriating to the public use." Why quibble over words and 
 phrases such as "single tax," "ground-rent," "land values," and similar 
 labels on the bottle, when Mr. George declares that the remedy in 
 the bottle will "take for the use of the community the whole income 
 arising from land, just as effectually as it could be taken hy formally 
 approptiating and letting out the land?" "It is only ground-rent,'' 
 says Mr. Pentecost, after the manner of Leroy Carter, a comrade of 
 mine, who was arrested for killing a pig. " Did you kill that pig?" 
 said the colonel. "No, sir," said Carter, "I did not. He came 
 smelling around the tent, so I just run my bayonet through him, and 
 he — died." It is only ground-tent, but it appropriates the land. 
 We do not propose to kill Tom Clark, we shall only just playfully run 
 him through with a bayonet. 
 
 The popularity of Mr. George's theory lies in the extravagant 
 claim he makes for its beneficence. I have been criticised for saying 
 * The italics are mine. 
 
264 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 that the millennium is included in his plan. Let us examine his 
 most recent utterance on the subject. A few weeks agfo Mr. George 
 wrote a letter to the Chicago Times, in which he said : 
 
 " The single tax reform is the most pressing. This is the one great reform 
 that by relieving industry of all burdens and preventing the monopolization of 
 the one element necessary to all production and all life, will enormously increase 
 production, will secure an equitable distribution of wealth, will solve the labor 
 question, which lies at the root of all our social and religious difificulties, will make 
 Christianity possible, will give the masses of men opportunity for more than a 
 struggle to exist, and will open the way for an advance to a far higher and grander 
 civihzation." 
 
 If that is not the millennium, what is it? Does Mr. Pentecost 
 believe that such tremendous results are to be obtained by the appli- 
 cation to society of the insignificant porous plaster which he calls 
 ground-rent ? Does he believe that his fly-blister will draw the in- 
 flammation from the body-politic, allay the social fever, solve the 
 labor question, and " make Christianity possible"? Is not Christi- 
 anity possible now ? And does it not exist in many different forms ? 
 If the full promise of Christianity has not yet been realized, will it 
 come through the diminutive device called ground- fen t? The tower- 
 ing pretensions of Mr. Henry George are brought by Mr. Pentecost 
 to an anti-climax when he declares that ground-rent paid into the 
 public treasury *' is all there is to the George Theory." All that is 
 needed now to " make Christianity possible " is a XxXXXe ground-i ent. 
 
 Mr. George ridicules the protectionists for trying to make people 
 rich by taxing them, ye^ he attempts the same impossible feat in a 
 tenfold more difiicult and exaggerated form. He actually says that 
 a single tax on land values amounting to the " whole incotne" of the 
 land and its " full annual value " would benefit the farmer. This 
 contradiction is the illusive creed of multitudes, as appears from the 
 letters in The Open Court. 
 
 Let us see how Mr, George's plan would enrich Tom Clark. He 
 would be taxed %% or $10, for his farm according to the Georgeian as- 
 sessor. But some new comers would be willing to pay more for 
 God's bounty, and Mr- Clark would be evicted. Those who can sep- 
 arate the land value from the land will perhaps tell him how he can 
 take his improvements along. You declare that Tom Clark may sell 
 his improvements. You can even force him to sell ; but you can force 
 nobody to buy them. 
 
 I agree that land values may be taxed; but I maintain that they 
 cannot be se'zed and sold in satisfaction of the taxes, any more than 
 a crack in the wall of a house can be taken in execution for the rent. 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 265 
 
 All taxes upon land values are ideal in their assessment ; they are ac- 
 tual and real in their collection. They attach to the realty, the land, 
 and if not paid, the land itself, and not the land value, is sold by the 
 sheriff. Therefore all taxes upon land values are taxes upon land. 
 To assert that they are friendly to the soil itself, is to repeat in a new 
 form the apology for the cut- worm, who merely attacks the wheat, 
 but is careful not to injure the land. 
 
 The State of New York, e. g. , must bear a very large burden of tax- 
 ation, and it is not statesmanship but sentiment which proposes to 
 obtain the money by a tax on land values irrespective of the improve- 
 ments on the land. According to the ratio of population, the State of 
 New York must pay twenty-seven million dollars annually in taxes to 
 the national government alone, although according to the ratio of 
 wealth the share of that State would greatly exceed that sum. How 
 could the money be raised by a tax on land values alone, in addition 
 to the sum necessary to defray the vast expenses of the State, County 
 and Township governments? Men live in dreamland who think to 
 benefit the New York farmer by levying all taxes upon land values, 
 and exempting from taxation all the personal property of that opulent 
 State, all the money, bonds, banks, railroads, ships, factories, stocks 
 of goods, and all buildings of every description whatsoever. There 
 is not in all dupedom a more deceitful vision than that of a farmer 
 growing rich by the exemption from taxation of all kinds of property 
 except his own. 
 
 I should like to continue but I must stop here to-day because it 
 will take me a few days of hard study to answer your Dakota corres- 
 pondent who can see no moral distinction between stealing horses, 
 and investing capital in land; and that Ohio critic who says that Mr. 
 George is not after Tom Clark, but his children; and that Chicago 
 man who desires to encourage Tom Clark in making improvements on 
 his farm by exempting everybody and everything from taxation except 
 land owners and land values; and that Massachusetts economist who 
 tells us that the abolition of poverty is only a "side issue." 
 
 Mr. Pentecost sees no difference between the proportion of land 
 taxation and Georgeism. But I see a difference. While I consider 
 the one feasible, I think that the latter is fantastical. 
 
:66 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 MR. PENTECOST AND GEORGEISM. 
 
 The Single-tax religion, which is to "solve the labor question" 
 and "make Christianity possible," has grown very thin under the 
 attenuating advocacy of Mr, Hugh O. Pentecost. With excusable 
 vanity Mr. Pentecost exults because I paid him the tribute of saying 
 that, * If Mr. George left the key to his problem in the hands of any 
 man, he l^ft it in the hands of Mr. Pentecost." I did say that, and 
 when r said it, I thought that Mr. Pentecost was a more inspired 
 and more competent apostle than he is. I cheerfully withdraw the 
 opinion, and apologize for having uttered it. I think now that Mr. 
 • George put that key into his own pocket, and carried it away with 
 him to England. Mr. Pentecost still persists in whitthng the doctrine 
 down to the common-place exaction known as ground-rent, imposed 
 and collected after the manner of Chicago in the case of the First 
 National Bank, and after the manner of New York in the case of the 
 city docks. How much has Christianity been made possible in New 
 York by the application of the Henry George theory to the city docks? 
 I am aware that Mr. Pentecost has the advantage of me in this 
 discussion because of his greater learning, and his more extensive 
 acquaintance with the subject. He is candid enough to acknowledge 
 this himself, and politely says, that Wheelbarrow " does not know 
 what he is writing about." As to himself he frankly says: "There 
 can be no doubt, then, that I know what I am talking about. If 
 any one knows what Georgeism is, I do." There is such a cheerful 
 egotism in all this, that I will not disturb the complacency of Mr. 
 Pentecost by any language of resentment. I will merely, in a re- 
 ligious way, sprinkle a few coals of fire, or a few drops of hot water 
 on his head. 
 
 Mr. Pentecost accuses me of "lamentable ignorance," but I will bear 
 the reproach with resignation if he will only be civil to himself, and 
 continue to describe himself with becoming pride as an "intelligent 
 single taxer." His opportunities have been greater than mine, and I 
 shall never be able to compete with him in the graces of controversy 
 and the eloquence of slang. I will reason with him as well as I can, 
 without wishing to "prance into the ring," to "jump on him" or to 
 pin him down." I will not call him a ^'wriggler," nor appeal from his 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 267 
 
 "high jinks," whatever they may be. In those prize-ring dialectics, 
 where he is so "intelligent," I must confess to "lamentable igno- 
 rance." That style of grammar and diction still further dilutes the 
 doctrine which Mr. Pentecost, with sectarian conceit, absurdly entitles 
 "Georgeism " The more tenderly Mr. Pentecost nurses it with 
 strong language, the weaker it grows. 
 
 i once heard a three-thimble artist at Epsom races rebuke the 
 by-standers for "wriggling" after the nimble pea instead of selecting, 
 in a straightforward way, the thimble which concealed it The re- 
 proach appeared to me to be unjust, because the wriggling eye-search 
 for the pea was due to the wriggling of the pea itself, under the three 
 thimbles manipulated by the artist. I am told that three-card monte 
 has the same peculiarities, and that it is only by ingenious mental wrig- 
 gling that the by-standers can track the Jack of Clubs, and ' pin him 
 down." Now there are three thimbles called, respectively, "single- 
 tax." "ground-rent," and "land-confiscation." Under which of them 
 is "Georgeism"? Mr. Pentecost, accomplished in what he elegantly 
 calls "illustrative tricks" and "sleight-of-hand performances," lifts 
 up the "ground-rent" thimble and exposes the pea for an instant, but 
 when the by-stander bets his money on it and lifts the thimble, he 
 finds that the pea has fled. It is then under the "single-tax" or the 
 "confiscation" thimble. The man who can follow "Georgeism" in 
 its wriggling journey under the three thimbles, must be himself a 
 "wriggler" equal in quickness to the man who moves the thimbles. 
 
 " Don't be a-frightened, ladies and gentlemen," said the pop- 
 merchant at the picnic, as the liberated corks flew out of the bottles 
 with a noise like the firing of artillery, "don't be a-frightened ; it's 
 only ginger beer." "Uon't be a-frightened," says Mr. Pentecost, "it 
 isn't confiscation ; it's only ground-rent; that's all there is to George- 
 ism " There is a melancholy deception here, in which Mr. Pentecost 
 is himself deceived. I think that land confiscation is "all there is to 
 Georgeism." It is that, or it is nothing. In this meaning of 
 ' Georgeism" lies its popularity, for "appropriating" land by govern- 
 ment gratifies the landless. It may be, as Mr. Pentecost says, that 
 "Wheelbarrow does not understand the single-tax doctrine " but Mr. 
 George understands it, and he says that "Georgeism" proposes "to 
 take for the use of the community the whole income arising from 
 land, just as effectually as it could be taken hy formally appropiiating 
 and letting out the land." I think that is confiscation. I have no 
 patent on my opinion; I adopted it from Webster, who, in defining 
 the word "confiscation" borrowed from Henry George the very Ian- 
 
268 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 guage I have quoted above. In defiance of the obvious meaning of 
 the words, Mr. Pentecost persists in saying that they express nothing 
 but ground-rent. 
 
 Having tried to show wherein the scheme is confiscation, I will 
 now try to show wherein it is «c/ ground-rent. In doing this, it be- 
 comes necessary to "wriggle" around after the nimble pea in its tor- 
 tuous windings among the intricate meanings of the words "tax" and 
 "rent." These words are used interchangeably by "intelligent single- 
 taxers," to confound the moral distinctions between "rent," which 
 government has no right to exact, and "taxes" which government has 
 the right to impose. A tax is never levied by government 
 upon its own land; rent is never drawn by government from land 
 not its own. Whatever income is received by government from its 
 own land is rent, assessed by special contract between the govern- 
 ment and the occupier of the land, as a tax never is. A tax does 
 not rest upon any special contract between the government and the 
 tax payer. Its rate and amount are fixed by the government 
 alone, at its own will. Ground-rent is a compensation rendered to 
 the owner of land by the occupier of it; and no person other than 
 the owner has any right to exact ground rent for the use of land. 
 Before government can "make Christianity possible " in the United 
 States by exacting ground-rent from land, it must first own the 
 land. 
 
 Mr. Pentecost, rather heedlessly I think, asserts that the George 
 doctrine is already applied by the city of New York to the city docks, . 
 and by the city of Chicago to the First National Bank of Chicago. 
 As to the New York matter I am not informed, but I know something 
 about the First National Bank of Chicago, and I can assure Mr. 
 Pentecost that the illustration is a very unfortunate one for him. 
 The city of Chicago gets ground-rent from the First National Bank 
 because the city owns the land on which the bank building stands. 
 This rent has been assessed by mutual agreement between the First 
 National Bank and the city of Chicago. It is rent fixed by contract, 
 and not a tax imposed by the one-sided will of the city. Time was 
 when the city owned the bank lot, and the adjoining lot. It sold the 
 adjoining lot. and therefore obtains no revenue from it except the 
 proportion of taxes levied upon it in common with other lots of equal 
 value under the revenue law. From the lot which the city owns it 
 obtains ground-rent ; from the other lot it obtains taxes. Before it 
 can obtain ground-rent from both lots the city must own them both, 
 and before it can own them both it must confiscate or buy that ad- 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 269 
 
 joining lo^ Mr Pentecost sneers at the danger of "eviction under 
 Georgeism," and innocently remarks: "The fear of eviction was 
 not before the eyes of the men v^rho built the massive buildings in 
 Chicago upon the city ground-rent plan." True enough! But why? 
 Because they had a seventy years' lease of the land. Does Mr. Pen- 
 tecost think, that men will put up "massive buildings" without ample 
 security of possession ? Does he think that men would put up "mas- 
 sive buildings" if they supposed that "Georgeism" was among the 
 possibilities of social or political change. 
 
 I do not know that Mr. Pentecost has ever been a school-teacher 
 but I suspect him, because he talks like the fretful schoolmaster 
 under whose neglect I finished my education. I had struggled up 
 to the rule of three, and half way through it, when I came to an 
 "example" which baffled me. I appealed for help to the teacher, 
 but he scolded me, and said that I was ignorant and stupid, and 
 that my efforts were all nonsense. He helped me a little with his 
 cane, but he did not show me how to do the sum, and so I graduated 
 there and then right in the middle of the rule of three. My school days 
 ended, and my child-labor began. I am still wondering how to work 
 that sum. I have long since forgiven my teacher for not showing 
 me how to do it, because I found out afterward that he did not 
 know. His reproaches were intended to conceal his own incapacity. 
 Mr. Pentecost talks exactly like my poor old schoolmaster when he 
 rebukes me thus: 
 
 "When Wheelbar.'ow says that under the George system, the land itself 
 and not the value of the land ' would be sold by the sheriff to satisfy the claims 
 of the tax-collector, he talks nonsense. How can latrd ivhich is taxed by the 
 government up to its full rental v due have any selling value.''' 
 
 The "nonsense" consists in taxing the land up to its full rental 
 value; but before exposing that, I must compliment Mr. Pentecost 
 on the dexterity with which he conjured the little pea from the "rent" 
 thimble to the "tax" thimble. It is now "taxes" and not "ground- 
 rent" that he talks about. "How can land," he asks, "which is 
 taxed by the government up to its full rental value have any selling 
 value?" In this conundrum the "intelligent single taxer" displays at 
 least a glimmer of genuine intelligence. It appears to me that such 
 land has no more selling value than the bung-hole of a barrel ; and 
 the paradox presented by the question stultifies the whole theory of 
 Henry George. Land which is taxed up to its full rental value is con- 
 fiscated and smitten barren by the law. It is barren to the owner 
 because blighted by taxes equal to its product. It is barren to the 
 
270 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 government, which has taxed it up to the confiscation point, for no 
 man will buy it thus encumbered. When I pointed out that anomaly, 
 the ' intelligemt single-taxers" told me that I did not know what I 
 was talking about, and that they only meant the rental value of the 
 land independent of the improvements The pea wriggled away 
 again. 
 
 The conundrum put by Mr. Pentecost presen-t's the distinction 
 between "rent" and "taxes." It is true that only the value ol land 
 is taxed, but although the taxation is of the abstract, the collection is 
 oi the substance. Government may tax the key-hole of a house,, but 
 the house will be liable for the tax. So, if the tax on the value of 
 land is not paid the land is answerable for the debt. If because of 
 excessive taxation, or for other reason, the land has no selling value, 
 the government buys it, or "bids it in " for the amount of taxes and 
 thus becomes the owner of the land, as the United States of America 
 became owner of the Arlington estate at Washington. Not so with de- 
 linquent rent. In this case the owner of the land resumes possession 
 of it in the last resource and evicts the tenant for non-payment of 
 the rent agreed upon. Rent is assessed by contract between two or 
 more; taxes, by the sovereign will of one. 
 
 I never said that "under the George system Tom Clark would be 
 taxed $8 or $ro on his farm." I was merely quoting the opinions of 
 some of my critics to that effect, and I was trying to show how erron- 
 eous their estimate must be, and that if all the public burdens be 
 thrown upon land values, the share of Clark must be very much 
 greater than that estimate. But what matter ? The question of 
 Clark's proportion is devoured by the larger theme, the proposition to 
 "take for the use of the community" the whole income of his farm, 
 and in this way deprive him of it altogether. The amount of Clark's 
 taxes is a trivial question in comparison with the proposal to confis- 
 cate his farm. 
 
 CONFISCATION. 
 
 The communication of Mr. Pentecost in No. 93 of The Open 
 Court is tenderly introduced as an "Explanation." I call it a 
 confession. I think I have a right to call it so, because I con- 
 ducted the cross-examination which procured it. After evading me 
 like quicksilver for about three months, Mr. Pentecost now ac- 
 knowledges that my interpretation of the vanity known as ' ' George- 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION 271 
 
 ism " was correct, and that in spite of his taunts and insinuations to 
 the contrary I did " understand the question, " and did know "what 
 I was talking about. " Not often does a witness break down under 
 cross-examination so completely as Mr. Pentecost has broken down. 
 He now says: 
 
 "Georgeism does involve the practical confiscation of land by the govern- 
 ment. In /ortn it leaves the present owner of land an owner still; but, in /act, 
 the government becomes the owner. * * * 
 
 "When a majority of the people of this country come to see that the private 
 ownership of land is a crime against humanity, as chattel slavery was a crime 
 against the negroes, then the land will be confiscated just as the slaves were 
 freed. * * * 
 
 "Wheelbarrow seems to think that if he can fix the charge of confiscation 
 upon Georgeism he has dealt it a heavy blow. On the contrary, that 's what we 
 Georgeites glory. in. We mean to utterly destroy the private ownership of land by 
 confiscating ^r(7a«^-r^«^. * * * 
 
 " Ground-rent would be all that any one would have to pay to government. 
 The land would all be confiscated— taken away from the present owners without 
 compensation, just as we now take a stolen horse away from a horse-thief or away 
 from him to whom the horse-thief sold him." 
 
 Considering how these explanations contradict those which 
 Mr. Pentecost gave us in The Open Court. Nos. 85 and gi, there 
 is droll comedy in the question: " Is there any possibility of Wheel- 
 barrow's failing to understand the thing this time?"' 
 
 To that I answer: How can I fail to understand it? The pur- 
 pose to confiscate is declared. How can any man fail to understand 
 the " Georgeites " when they say: ' We mean to utterly destroy the 
 private ownership of land "? A reference to the former numbers of 
 The Open Court will show that I always understood it so, and that 
 Mr. Pentecost did not. If he did, he concealed his understanding 
 from us by pretending that Tom Clark would be better off under 
 " Georgeism, " and that his farm would be burdened with taxes 
 amounting to little or nothing. Mr. Pentecost now declares that the 
 purpose of Georgeism is to take Tom's farm away from him entirely, 
 as if it were a stolen horse. 
 
 I earnestly call the attention of Mr. Albro and Mr. Williamson, 
 who immediately follow Mr. Pentecost to his astonishing confession; 
 and I ask them, not in taunt or triumph, but as fellow searchers 
 after truth, whether it is not a waste of arithmetic to figure up the 
 probable amount of Tom Clark's taxes, when only the form of his 
 farm is to remain to him while the fact and substance of it are to be 
 taken away? 
 
272 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 The comparisons of Mr. Pentecost are discordant and confused 
 There is no likeness between a slave and a farm, nor between the 
 emancipation of a slave and the confiscation of land The slaves 
 were not confiscated; they were freed. It is true that Gen. I^utler in 
 the early part of the war did confiscate some slaves, under the pre- 
 varication that they were "contraband of war "; a mischievous pre- 
 tense, which proved to be a sophism both in ethics and in politics. 
 About the same time I had the honor to emancipate a slave who had 
 taken refuge in my camp. I did it on grounds opposite to those 
 asumed by Gen. Butler. I refused to give the negro up, not be- 
 cause he was a chattel forfeited, but because he was a man, and 
 therefore impossible to be contraband of war. I expose the inapti- 
 tude of Mr. Pentecost's comparisons because it is the habit of social 
 reformers to press into the service of their argument the emancipation 
 of the slaves. We commit a solecism when we compare a scheme of 
 serfdom to that splendid achievement of liberty. 
 
 I use the word serfdom with deliberation because the ownership 
 of land has ever been the political distinction between a freeman and 
 a serf. The ownership of land is the sign and title of a freeman, the 
 inspiration of his patriotism. His very estate is called a freeholding, 
 or a freehold, and he himself is called a free-holder. Every tenure 
 below the grade of a freehold is politically " base" and I am in- 
 formed that it is technically so in law. "To confiscate all the farms 
 in the United States, and to compel the farmers to hold their lands as 
 tenants at will to " Government " would substitute a base tenure for a 
 free tenure; it would practically reduce farming to a menial business, 
 and farmers all to serfdom. Fancy the ragged condition of American 
 freedom when all the farms and all the town lots in the country are 
 confiscated by the government and thrown into politics. Imagine the 
 confiscation done in 1889, The farms are all owned by the govern- 
 ment and the letting them out begins. Would a Democrat get a lease 
 if a Republican wanted it? Not one. The corruption growing out of 
 such a system would breed Chaos. The spirit of freedom may die out 
 everywhere else, but on the hearthstone of the freehold the fires of 
 liberty burn forever. It is a perverted philanthropy which seeks to 
 improve society by abolishing the freehold. 
 
 Again Mr. Pentecost invites me to read * ' Progress and Pov- 
 erty. " There is kindly patronage in the invitation, and I gratefully 
 accept it, although I think that the weakest debater on any subject is 
 the shiftless disputant, who, when he has had enough of the contro- 
 versy throws a whole book at his adversary, and tells him to read 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 273 
 
 that. However, I will read it once more to please Mr, Pentecost, and 
 while I am about it, will Mr. Pentecost gratify me by reading Sir 
 Thomas More's Utopia, and a few chapters in Don Quixote. 
 
 PRIVATE PROPERTY IN LAND. 
 
 Having had a job of work to do in another part of the State, 
 I am in arrears to the critics who testify against me in Nos 96 and 
 97. I beg a little space that I may pay to all of them the respect of 
 a reply. 
 
 Mr. Lynch makes a strong case, and the Object-lesson he pre- 
 sents is valuable. It shows how unfairly taxation may be appor- 
 tioned between the resident owner of a town lot, and the non-resident 
 owner of the adjoining lot, who holds it for speculation only. In this 
 inequality lies the popularity of Mr. George's doctrine. I think this 
 wrong can easily be righted by fairer methods of assessment, but 
 "will Mr. Lynch explain how it can possibly be cured by sweeping 
 both lots into the gulf of confiscation ? 
 
 Mr. William C. Wood of Gloversville, N. Y., overwhelms me 
 with the portentous warning that I h^ve " raised up a mightier ad- 
 versary than Mr. George— the combined legal and judicial talent of 
 the civilized world." This reads like the challenge of the circus bills 
 which I see on the fence across the street, a style of literary composi 
 tion greatly affected in these days, and which I have always admired. 
 It gives a piquancy to the double chestnuts of the clown, and the 
 double somersaults of the man who jumps over eight horses and an 
 elephant. I enjoy a friendly wrestle in The Open Cv)URT with men 
 of my own caliber, or with men a trifle heavier than I am, but I do 
 not care to try a fall with ** the combined legal and judicial talent of 
 the civilized world." I think it is hardly fair to bring such a com- 
 bination against me. However, as Mr. Samuel Weller said on his 
 way to the swarry, "I'll try and bear up agin such a reg'lar knock 
 down o' talent." I will do the best I can. 
 
 Mr. Wood confines himself to massive law, and he gives au- 
 thority to his legal argument by adding M. D. to his name, as if the 
 discussion were a mere matter of measles or lumbago. A doctor 
 prescribing law is like a lawyer prescribing physic. To rely on either 
 prescription is hazardous " The cobbler to his last " is an old prov- 
 erb — I forget the Latin of it. Indeed, I never knew it, but the phi- 
 losophy of it is good in any language, and will keep in any climate. 
 To be sure a blacksmith may make a watch, but he is liable to leave 
 
2 7 4 WHEELBARtl O W. 
 
 out some important wheels necessary to its perfect mechanism. A 
 doctor may draw a tooth, and still not be able to draw a bill in 
 chancery because he is liable to leave out some important wheels 
 essential to the perfect mechanism of the bill. When I want a patch 
 put on my boot I go to a cobbler ; when I want a fever cured I go 
 to a doctor ; and when I want a bit of law, I go to a lawyer for it, 
 if I can afford to do so. It costs more than the jurisprudence I get 
 from the tinker, albeit he is a wise man among kettles, but it is 
 cheaper even at the higher price. For these reasons, not feeling com- 
 petent to contradict the law of land as asserted and expounded by 
 Dr. Wood, I consulted a lawyer, and he told me that Dr. Wood was 
 wrong on every point for which misfortune, being a doctor and not 
 a lawyer he is not at all to blame. My legal adviser, not having 
 time to attend to the matter, told me to consult a New York lawyer 
 by the name of Kent, and I did so. 
 
 Without any legal assistance I could see at a glance that some of 
 Dr. Wood's law was error. For instance, this : " No man absolutely 
 owns land. He may hold, it is true, an estate in the land. This 
 estate consists of three things : The right of possession, the right of 
 enjoyment, and the right of disposition." I could see in a moment 
 that this curious bit of law came out of the surgery, because my 
 landlord, the man who owns the house in which I live, has not the 
 right of possession. He is owner of the house and lot, but the right 
 of possession is in me. He has given me a lease of the place for one 
 year. From this I think that several men may own several estates in 
 the same piece of land, according to the quantity of interest that 
 each man hath therein. T may incidentally mention that Blackstone 
 agrees with me in this, which is a fortunate thing for Blackstone. 
 
 With praiseworthy self-confidence Dr. Wood expresses his medi- 
 cal opinion that even such right in land as a man may have is ' ' sub- 
 ject to the right of the State to alter or defeat it." I did not need 
 legal advice on this part of the subject, because I remembered that 
 this "right of the State" is expressly denied by the American con- 
 stitution, wherein it is declared that " private property shall not be 
 taken for public use without just compensation." Here the right of 
 the citizen to own land, even as against the State, is recognized and 
 protected by the organic law. So long as the constitution remains as 
 it is now, the State has no right to " alter or defeat " the estate of 
 ownership which a man may have in his land. I also remembered 
 that once I ' " entered " a forty-acre tract in Iowa, for which I paid 
 the government fifty dollars. In return for the money I received a 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 275 
 
 patent from the United States transferring the estate from the govern- 
 ment to me, and my heirs and assigns forever. There was nothing 
 ^said in the deed about the right of the government to resume the 
 title to the land, and to confiscate it after scooping my fifty dollars 
 into the treasury. My ownership of the forty acres was complete as 
 soon as I received the patent, and that ownership was made secure to 
 me by the Constitution of the United States. 
 
 Dr. Wood, in the dogmatic style which professional men employ, 
 asserts that " absolute private property in land has no legal existence 
 and is an impossibility, being incompatible with civil government." I 
 offer as evidence against that statement one of the most conspicuous 
 facts in civilization, the government of the United States under 
 which men actually enjoy the right of absolute private property in 
 land. I find in the United States, compatible with private property 
 in land, a very good quality of civil government. It is not perfect 
 by any means but comparatively speaking, it is a fair article of gov- 
 ernment as governm'ents go. It is quite certain from this evidence 
 that absolute private properly in land has a legal existence in the 
 United States, and is not incompatible with civil government ; but 
 it is not at all cprtain that civil government of the best quality could 
 exist without the right of private property in land. 
 
 I am somewhat acquainted with real estate having dug and 
 wheeled a good deal of it, but I am not quite so familiar with the 
 law of land as I am with the weight of it on a shovel. I therefore 
 make the following statements on the authority of my legal adviser. 
 Chancellor Kent, of New York He once wrote a book entitled 
 ** Commentaries on American Law," I think that was the name of it, 
 and speaking of land-ownership in the United States, he says : 
 
 " Though the law in some of the United States discriminates between an 
 estate in free and pure allodium and an estate in fee-simple absolute, these 
 estates mean essentially the same thing ; and the terms may be used indiscrimi- 
 nately to describe the most ample and perfect interest which can be owned in 
 land. The words se'zin and Jee have always been so used in New York whether 
 the subject was lands granted before or after the Revolution; though by the act of 
 i7.':<7, the forrtier were declared to be held by free and common socage, and the 
 latter in free and pure allodium. 
 
 " The New York Revised Statutes have abolished the distinction, by declar- 
 ing that all lands within the State, are allodial^ and the entire absolute property 
 invested in the owners, according to the nature of their respective estates." 
 
 In order to ascertain the meantng of "allodium," which I 
 thought must be some kind of metal, I searched in Webster's dic- 
 tionary, and there I found the following definition of the word: 
 
276 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 "Allodium land which is the absolute property of the owner ; real 
 estate held in absolute independence, without being subject to any 
 rent, service, or acknowledgment to a superior " This is about as- 
 plain as print can make it, and it must be quite a revelation to Dr. 
 Wood that all laAds in his own State are allodial, and the entire, 
 absolute property invested in the owners. It is to be regretted that 
 Dr. Wood neglected to examine the subject a little before writing his 
 commentaries on the law of real estate, because they are so "incom- 
 patible" with those of Chancellor Kent, and so curiously at variance 
 with the Revised Statutes of New York. The law of New York 
 making all the lands allodial is the law of all the .States, and on this 
 matter Chancellor Kent makes the following remark : 
 
 "In many of the States there were never any marks of feudal tenure, and in 
 all of them the ownership of land is essentially free and independent." 
 
 Dr. Wood tells us he is aware that the State has treated land as 
 though it were actually private property. Chancellor Kent has now 
 told him the reason why. The State treats land as though it were 
 actually private property, because it actually is private property, 
 declared to be so by the law, and protected as private property by 
 the Constitution of the United States. From all this it appears that 
 it is r5r Wood who is combating " the combined legal and judicial 
 talent of the civilized world." 
 
 THE COMING FIGHT FOR CONFISCATION. 
 
 In No. 97 of The Open Court 1 am confronted by three new 
 adversaries who reinforce my critics like the historic "men in buck- 
 ram. " I regret that these disputants exhibit personal feeUng, and 
 show some signs of irritation. Peevish personalities weaken an argu- 
 ment, and they show some debility of thought. I will reply to them, 
 so far as I am able to do so, in their order. 
 
 Mr. William Camm begins by contradicting some statements 
 made by Mr. Pentecost in his controversy with me. I take no interest 
 in that, believing with Mr. Camm that Mr. Pentecost " is amply able 
 to manage his own cause." I will answer Mr. Camm, and in doing 
 so, I must compliment him on his refined phraseology. There is 
 such delicate courtesy in saying to a man during a friendly conversa- 
 tion with him, "Had you thought beyond the end of your nose." 
 People whose thoughts are worth anything think behind and a little 
 above the nose, a habit which I fear is not practiced by Mr. Camm. 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 277 
 
 When he shall have acquired that habit he will not say "the man 
 with longest purse knocks the persimmon," nor will he talk about 
 "hunting for a mare's nest in words that may be synonyms." 
 
 Mr, Camm, in his elegant way, referring to my proposition that 
 the ownership of land has ever been the political distinction between 
 a freeman and a serf, says: "Such a proposition is so shallow and so 
 transparent that the man who holds it ought never to touch Mr. P. '5 
 glove nor that of any other man who has 'seen the cat.'" I am 
 glad that my propositions are "transparent," for Mr. Camm's are not 
 very clear, nor could clearness be expected of a man who gets 
 enlightenment from the sight of a cat. How did the mere sight of that 
 cat inoculate Mr. Camm with feline wisdom? It is not easy to reason 
 intelHgently with men who, in the inflammation of self-conceit, can 
 boast for lack of argument, that they know all about it because they 
 "have seen the cat"; yet people thus mentally infirm, have the nerve 
 to overturn and reconstruct the whole social and poHtical constitution 
 of the United States. 
 
 "What the individual requires with land," says Mr. Camm, 
 "is secure possession, not ownership." What is ownership but 
 security of possession? To secure a farmer in the possession of 
 his land, the laws of the United States confer upon him the absolute 
 right and title to it, so that no man may molest him in his quiet pos- 
 session of his farm. His right of ownership is made perfectly secure 
 to him by the constitution of the State and by the constitution of the 
 United States. Not even the government itself can trespass upon 
 him. It cannot even run a highway across his land for public uses 
 without paying hifti "just compensation." What security of pos- 
 session will a man have under the single-tax or confiscation plan, 
 which Mr. Camm, very innocently says, "means the same thing 
 in this connection." 
 
 Mr. Camm informs us how bravely he "led men to battle and to 
 death fighting for the emancipation of the chattel slaves and now that 
 our heads are growing gray, he would to heaven we could fall 
 in to emancipate the industrial slaves— our own children." There is 
 a little fustian in the style of that sentence, arising probably from too 
 much looking at cats, but we can forgive that, in gratitude for the 
 valorous deeds done by Mr. Camm. I am rather proud of Mr Camm 
 for leading his men to battle, because there were so many other com- 
 manders who folloxved their men in, and at a very healthy distance. 
 I also congratulate Mr. Camm that, although he led his men "to 
 death," he managed to preserve himself. Like Captain Sir John 
 
2 78 WHEELBARR O W, 
 
 Falstaff, of martial renown, he led his men "where they could 
 be well peppered," and* like Sir John, he was not peppered him- 
 self. 
 
 Mr. Camm, with the old bravery bubbling in his veins, wants to 
 "fall in" again, and fight more battles, "to emancipate the industrial 
 slaves." When I carelessly used the word "serf" in describing the 
 landless, Mr. Camm was offended, and rebuked me for it. He, him- 
 self now calls them "slaves." and wants to fight for them. He once 
 fought for emancipation, and now he wants to fight for confiscation. 
 I can assure him that there never was a finer field for his valor than is 
 presented in the United States to-day. Let him open hie recruiting 
 office at once. Before the farmers of this country will submit to the 
 confiscation of their lands, there will be the liveliest fight that has 
 ever been seen upon this earth. I advise Mr. Camm to beat the long 
 roll and "fall in" without further delay. 
 
 Mr. J. K. Rudyard comes next. He, too, in poverty of reasons, 
 flings in his little personalities after this fashion: "Wheelbarrow 
 still in wordy warfare makes it hard to believe that he finds any real 
 difficulty in comprehending the George theory. There may be a men- 
 tal aberration which corresponds with color-blindness. If Wheel- 
 barrow is thus afflicted he deserves sympathy, but uncharitable people 
 will dismiss his case with the remark that none are so blind as those 
 who will not see," Mr. Rudyard, of course, classifies himself among 
 the "uncharitable people," and speaks in their style. For the 
 opinions of uncharitable people I care very little; they are as a rule, 
 neither sensible nor kind. Only the opinions of charitable people are 
 of any value to me. 
 
 I do not think it can be fairly said that I have ever had any diffi- 
 culty in comprehending the "George theory." I have taken Mr. 
 George at his word, and given his language its accepted meaning. If 
 it has an occult meaning known only to those who have "seen 
 the cat," I may have some difficulty in understanding him. It sur- 
 prises me that so many of Mr. George's disciples fail to comprehend 
 him; for instance, Mr. Rudyard, who, while quoting from Book VIII, 
 Chap II, "Progress and Poverty," is so wilfully blind that he will 
 not see the "George theory" as it is proclaimed in that very chapter. 
 
 If, as Mr. Rudyard so courteously says, "It is all so simple and 
 straightforward that a fool need not err therein," why does Mr. Rud- 
 yard err therein? Why does he quote from Chap II just enough to 
 hide, and not enough to explain the "George theory?" 
 
 "I thank thee, Jew, for giving me that word," s^id Crati&no to 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 279 
 
 Shylock. and I thank Mr. Rudyard for giving me Book VIII, Chap. 
 II, "Progress and Poverty." In that chapter, Mr. George declares 
 the injustice of private property in land, and then he shows us 
 the "straightforward" way in which he proposes to abolish it. Why 
 was Mr. Rudyard so wilfully blind that he would not see the follow- 
 ing choice bits in Chapter II: 
 
 "We have seen that private property in land has no warrant in justice, 
 but stands condemned as the denial of natural right. 
 
 '•We should satisfy the law of justice, we should meet all economic require- 
 ments, by at one stroke abolishing all private titles, declaring all land public 
 property, and letting it out to the highest bidders in lots to suit, under such con- 
 ditions as would sacredly guard the private right to improvements " 
 
 I think a man who can read and write must be wilfully blind if he 
 will not see the intent and purpose of that language. The qualifying 
 clause at the end of the last sentence is pure deception like the saving 
 clauses in a party platform. What can any honest man think of the 
 following "straightforward" method by which Mr. George proposes to 
 abolish all private titles "at one stroke:" 
 
 "I do not propose either to purchase or to confiscate private property in land. 
 The first would be unjust, the second needless Let the individuals who now 
 hold it still retain, if they want to, possession of what they are pleased to call their 
 land. Let them continue to call it their land. Let them buy and sell, and be- 
 queath and devise it. We may safely leave them the shell, if we take the kernel. 
 It is not necessary to confiscate land; it is only necessary tc confiscate rent. * 
 
 Here the "straightforward" plan begins with a juggle of words, 
 a distinction without a difference between the confiscation of land, 
 and the confiscation of rent. Is it "straightforward" statesmanship 
 which proposes to take the kernel of a man's fortune from him, 
 and leave him only the shell of it, which is nothing? This leger- 
 demain is conspicuous all through Chap. II, Book VII', "Progress 
 and Poverty." In that same chapter, Mr. George, after showing to 
 his disciples the deadfall or trap into which the farmers are to be de- 
 coyed by incantations and conjurations about the abolishing of all 
 taxation except the taxation of land values, says: 
 
 "That is the first step, upon which the practical struggle must be made. 
 When the hare is once caught and killed, cooking him will follow as a matter of 
 course." 
 
 Certainly, as a matter of course. And the farmer, who is so 
 
 blind that he will not see the hook within the bait, who will stupidly 
 
 walk into the trap, deserves to be 'caught and killed." I hope that 
 
 Mr. George when he catches him will gook him, and cook him well, 
 
 * The italics are by Mr. George, 
 
28o WHEELBARR O W, 
 
 even as Molly Bell did cook Bob Ridley's possum. I hope that Mr. 
 George will use him 
 
 "To make a fry, and to make a stew, 
 And a roast, and a bo'l, and a barbecue." 
 
 Reading in Book VIII, Chap. II, '"Progress and Poverty," the 
 "straightforward" means by which private property in land is to be 
 destroyed, and noticing the very large number of men who are cap- 
 tured by the "melancholy deception," I exclaim with Shakespeare: 
 
 "Is't possible the spells of George should juggle men 
 Into such strange mockeries?" 
 
 As to Mr. F. Hess, he takes it out in scolding, and he wanders 
 away from the question to talk about matters which are not in the 
 debate. There is a little oil of vitriol in the sarcasm about "Lord 
 Wheelbarrow" who has offended Mr. Hess by adopting gold dollars 
 as the standard measure of all values. I have never done so. I 
 have merely asked that my wages be paid in gold dollars because 
 they are dear money, and I prefer to be paid in that. I hav6 been 
 cheated so much and so often by "cheap money" for dear work, that 
 I have wished that some law might be passed requiring that laborers 
 be paid in the dearest money current at the time. 
 
 Mr. Hess complains because I have "not a word to say about 
 the practical confiscation of small freeholds such as Thomas Clark's 
 under our present usurious system of taxation and sales for delin- 
 quent taxes." Well, the reason why I did not speak about it was, 
 that I was talking about something else; but if confiscating Tom 
 Clark's farm for non-payment of taxes is an act of injustice, what 
 does Mr. Hess think of Mr. George's proposition to confiscate every 
 man's farm for non-payment of taxes amounting to ' 'the whole income 
 and Vne full amtual value of the land''? 
 
 I do not know of any "Irish evictions" here in "free America." 
 I know of some American evictions here, and T think they ought not 
 to be allowed quite so easily as they are; but how will it be under Mr. 
 George's system, when every farmer will be evicted at the bidding of 
 "the highest bidder" for the use and occupation of the farm? I wish 
 that no man could be evicted from his home. Mr. George's plan will 
 evict everybody. Under his system the American home would be 
 abolished. 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 281 
 
 THE RIGHT OF EMINENT DOMAIN. 
 
 Dr. Wood, replying to my remarks about that bit of law which 
 I thought came " out of the surgery," says, " The surgeon copied it 
 verbatim from 'The Limitations of Police Power,' by Christopher G. 
 Tiedeman, professor of jurisprudence at the University of Missouri." 
 In that statement Dr. Wood makes an important mistake. He must 
 have copied from his own memory, and not from Professor Tiede- 
 man's book. Here is what Professor Tiedeman says: 
 
 " An estate has, in respect to the real property, the three elements, the right 
 of possession, the right of enjoyment, and the right of disposition, su ject to the 
 right of the State to defeat it, and appropriate it to the publ'c use^ or /or the pub- 
 lic good.'''' * 
 
 Dr. Wood carelessly omitted the words in italics, and substituted 
 for them the following words, ''''and subject to the right of the State to 
 tax it." He also re-inforced the word '''defeat" by the word "alter" 
 which is not in the original text. Of course, a writer is not bound to 
 quote all that his authority says, but he ought not to halt in the mid- 
 dle of a sentence, and leave out its qualifying and explanatory clause, 
 especially when, as in this case, the very essence of the statement is 
 in the omitted words. This shows the danger of making a "verba- 
 tim " copy from memory, instead of book. 
 
 Dr. Wood makes another mistake when he quotes Professor 
 Tiedeman as saying, that an estate consists of three things, the right 
 of possession, the right of enjoyment, and the. right of disposition. 
 Professor Tiedeman could hardly have said anything so comically 
 "absurd." It would be as if a man should say, "A dollar consists of 
 three things, weight, color, and size." These qualities may be ele- 
 ments of a dollar, as the rights of possession, enjoyment, and dis- 
 position may be elements of an estate in land. Even as Professor 
 Tiedeman made it, the statement is incorrect, because a man may 
 have an estate in land without either of the " elements " known as the 
 right of possession or the right of distribution. 
 
 Dr. Wood says: 
 "The statement that absolute private property in land has no legal existence, 
 that as against the State no man absolutely owns land, but that land is always sub- 
 ject to administration by the State is justified at length by Sheldon Amos, Exami- 
 ner at the Inns of Court, London, and may be found in his work on the Science of 
 Law." 
 
282 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 That is another mistake; and I fear Dr. Wood has again trusted 
 to his memory. It must have been some other book that betrayed 
 him into error. I do not know what Mr. Amos " examines " at the 
 Inns of Court in London, probably the wines and liquors, which, I 
 am told, are very good at the inns of London. "Examiner at the 
 Inns" is, no doubt, a refined expansion of the plebeian word "gan- 
 ger," as we speak it in this country. I do not admit his claims to 
 legal rank, nor his right to speak as a judicial authority, but I do 
 recognize his right to publish an essay on the Science of Law, and 
 his further right to be quoted correctly, or not at all. His views and 
 opinions ought to be fairly quoted or let alone. Mr. Amos's views 
 are in strong contrast and opposition to those ascribed to him by Dr. 
 Wood. Mr. Amos tries to show not only the moral dignity, but also 
 the social value and the political necessity of private property in land. 
 I will make a few extracts from his essay on the "Science of Law," 
 and I will be very careful to copy him "'verbatim." 
 
 " One of the most important steps out of savagery into civilization is marked 
 by the fact that security of tenure depends upon some further condition than the 
 mere ci cumstSnce of possession." Page 151. 
 
 " The moral aspirations and needs of individual man are scarcely less signal y 
 sustained and gratified by ownership than the material.'" Page 155. 
 
 '•It is obvious, that, apart from the possibility of ownership, the position of 
 man, as a moral being, is pitiable, and even contemptible in the extreme.'' 
 Page 155. 
 
 " Nor is it merely that the absence of ownership prevents the most precious 
 qualities and elements of human nature from being properly cultured and de- 
 veloped. It prevents those qualities and elements from so much ase.xistingat all." 
 Page 15-. 
 
 '• From the above considerations it will be seen what is the meaning of the 
 favorite view of the great school of German jurists, to the effect that ownership 
 increases man's power {Ve7-in6gen) or physical and moral capacity." Page 157. 
 
 And much more of the same character, wherein the civilizing and 
 refining influence of private property in land is "justified at length." 
 It is true that Mr. Amos asserts the power of the State to correct the 
 abuses of land-ownership, but he claims that the right of private 
 property in land is a very necessity of the State, of more importance 
 to its welfare than it is to the welfare of the land-owner himself. 
 
 Dr. Wood takes a very heavy fall when he drops from the clouds 
 of State ownership to the hard ground of "eminent domain." The 
 right of eminent doman is not founded on ownership but on the 
 political right of sovereignty, and it applies to persons, and personal 
 property, as well as to land. It may take anything for public uses, 
 and even the citi?en himself, ^s was done by the United States during 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 283 
 
 the war. The State does not take the citizen or his horses or his cat- 
 tle, nor levy taxes by any right of ownership, but by right of eminent 
 dominion or domain. On this subject. Judge Cooley, referring to the 
 mistake that the right of eminent domain is based on ownership, says: 
 
 " More accurately it is the right which exists in every sovereignty, to control 
 and regulate those rights of a public nature which pertain to its citizens in com- 
 mon and to appropriate and control individual property for the public benefit, as 
 the public safety, necessity, convenience, or welfare may demand." — Cooley on 
 Constitutional Limitations, page 524. 
 
 The right of eminent domain is recognized in the Constitution of 
 the United States, but limited so as to exclude the doctrine of State- 
 ownership. The citizen is called the ''owner" of the land and the 
 government cannot deprive him of it except for public uses, and even 
 then it must pay him ' Just compensation." Chancellor Kent sa}:>: 
 
 " The right of eminent domain or i iherent sovereign power gives to the legis- 
 lature the control ofprivate property for public uses, and for public uses only." — 
 Kent's Commentaries, Vol 11,239. 
 
 I am criticised for using the phrase ''absolute private property in 
 land," and I am solemnly reminded that rt3j^/w/^ ownership cannot exist 
 where the State has the right to confiscate for taxes. This criticism is 
 a metaphysical doubt, not an argument. We are told by men learned 
 in philosophy that .the "absolute" cannot exist in this world. This 
 may be ideally true for anything I know to the contrary, but we are 
 dealing with actualities, and must use such words as express the facts 
 of life. I am not responsible for the word "absolute." I found it 
 in familiar use by the '* combined legal and judicial talent of the civ- 
 ilized world." "Fee-simple absolute" has been a law phrase for 
 centuries. Chancellor Kent says : 
 
 " The title to land is essentially allodial and every tenant in fee-simple has an 
 absolute and perfect title."— Kent's C ommentaries, Vol. Ill, 4SS. 
 
 Even Webster, in his definition of allodium describes it as "land 
 which is the absolute property of the owner." The explanation is 
 easy; the law used the strongest words it could find in order to give 
 emphasis to the right of private ownership, and in order to deny the 
 claim of ownership in the State. 
 
 What amazes me more than anything else in the controversy is 
 the statement of Dr. Wood, that he " was well aware that the lands 
 of the State of New York were declared allodial." How a citizen of 
 New York, well aware of that fact, could rise in his place and deny 
 the existence of private ownership is a puzzle that I fear will never 
 be explained, 
 
284 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 I think that Dr. Wood has correctly quoted Professor Tiedeman 
 in the following extract: " Surely, the right of eminent domain can 
 rest only upon the claim that the State is the absolute owner of all 
 lands situate within its dominions." This is nothing but the private 
 opinion of Professor Tiedeman, and is of no more value than any 
 other man's opinion, because it has no judicial authority to support it. 
 As well say that the right of eminent domain over horses and cows 
 rests upon the claim that the State is the absolute owner of all the live 
 stock within its dominions. 
 
 The doctrine of State-ownership is merely a tradition still run- 
 ning along under the momentum of the Norman conquest. It has no 
 longer any vitality even in the law of England. Blackstone calls it a 
 " fiction," and Chancellor Kent remarks: " The King is by fiction 
 of law the great lord paramount and supreme proprietor of all the 
 lands in the kingdom." The fiction is practically obsolete in England, 
 and it has been expressly abolished in America. Even Dr. Wood's 
 authority, Mr. Amos, "Examiner at the Inns " says: 
 
 'On the other hand the Brown, from whom lands are sometimes held by a 
 tenure involving nothing more than the performance of some ancient service, is 
 not considered as owner 0/ the lands'^ 
 
 And the learned author of the article "Real Estate," in the En- 
 cyclopedia Britannica, says: 
 
 '•The law of real estate in the United States is the law of England modified 
 to suit a diffe ent state of circumstances. The main point of difference is that in 
 the United Stites, the occupiers of land are generally wholly or in ^zxX. owners 
 and not tenants ^ as in England." 
 
 I have not written on the legal aspects of this question from my 
 own learning or authority, because I am not competent to do that, 
 but 1 have quoted the decisions and opinions of men who hold the 
 highest rank as jurists in this country, men who have no social specu- 
 lations to advance, and who explain to us the law as it actually is, 
 and not as they may think it ought to be. From these authorities, I 
 think, it is very clear that private property in land has a legal exist- 
 ence ill the United States, and that the right ot eminent domain does 
 not include the State-ownership of land. 
 
 LAND VALUES AND PAPER TITLES. 
 
 In The Open Court for August 15th, I am assailed by three 
 more soldiers of the " new crusade." They spring out of the ground 
 like the clansmen of Roderick Dhu. These are more formidable than 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 285 
 
 some of the others; they are stronger, and better armed. For answer 
 to these new antagonists T will take a few texts from the law and the 
 prophets of the new revolution. 
 
 "Private property in land has no warrant in justice." 
 
 ' We should meet all economic requiremt-nts by at one stroke abolishing all 
 private titles declanng all land public prop ^r^y and letting it out to the highest 
 bidders " — Henry George, "Progress and Poverty." Book VIII, Ch. 2. 
 
 "Now it is evident that, in order to take for the use of the government the 
 whole income arising from land just as effectively as it could be taken dy form- 
 ally appropriating and letting out the land, it is only necessary to abolish, one 
 after another, all other taxes now levied, and to increase the taxes on land -values 
 till it reaches as near as may be the full annual value oj the land.'^— Henry 
 George, "Protection or Free Trade." P. 302. 
 
 ''Georgeism does involve the practical confiscation of land by the government. 
 In ybrm it leaves the present owner of land an owner still; but in fact^ the gov- 
 ernment becomes the owner " — Hugh O. Pentecost, Thk Open Court, No. 9-). 
 
 "We mean to destroy the private ownership of land by confiscating ground 
 rent.'" — Hugh O. Pentecost, The Open Court, No. 94. 
 
 I present those texts in order to show that Mr. Albro's very in- 
 structive and intelligent article has little application to " Georgeism," 
 but is explanatory of an entirely different scheme of change. Mr. 
 Albro's plan would not destroy the private ownership of land. It 
 would strengthen private ownership by relieving the land-owner from 
 some of the burdens of taxation. It must have been thus presented 
 ^to the farmers at the meeting to which Mr. Albro refers, or they never 
 would have approved the plan. 
 
 I am strengthened in that opinion by the estimate those farmers 
 made of the taxes which, under Mr. Albro's plan, would fall upon a 
 New Yoric farm worth $15,000. I say Mr. Albro's plan, because it 
 has no resemblance to the plan of Mr. Hen-ry George, except in this, 
 that all other taxation is to cease. The estimate made by Mr. Albro, 
 and agreed upon by the meeting as "about right," was $150, or one 
 per cent, on the value of the farm. This in lieu of all other taxes, 
 would be a light and easy burden. It would not be "the wkole 
 income, and ihc full annual value of the land." It would not make 
 the government owner "in fact " of the farm. It would not give the 
 " I'erner' of the farm to the public, and leave the "s/iell" to the 
 owner. It would secure to the farmer the ownership of his farm not 
 only in form but in fact. This is not what Mr. George desires. He 
 insists that ^//private titles shall be abolished "at one stroke." 
 
 There is much guesswork and fanciful specu ation concerning 
 the "relation between land-values and population." The variations 
 are so many that nothing positive or even reliable is to be had upon 
 
286 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 that subject. It cannot be true that the farmers and land-owners of 
 this country owe $600 to each and every other person. ' I cannot be- 
 lieve that each person's ' existence" adds f 600 to the value of land in 
 the United States I think that whatever value my "existence" gives 
 to the farmer's land, is fully compensated by the value of the farmer's 
 "existence" to me. I think it very likely that the "existence" of 
 some people adds value to land, but I am sure that the "existence" of 
 some other people diminishes that value. How much does the 'ex- 
 istence" of criminals, idlers, and sports add to the value of land? 
 Nothing, and yet they count equally with worthy citizens in the pop- 
 ulation. It is not a man's existence but his work that benefits the 
 community. Not for being, but for doing, is man entitled to any- 
 thing. I wish that Mr. Albro would explain himself a little further. 
 
 "Tricycle" is bright, witty, illogical, and incautious. When I 
 advised Mr. Pentecost to read Don Quixote, I wondered whether any- 
 body would snap at the bait, compare me to the Don, and laugh at 
 me for fighting windmills Sure enough, Tricycle took the fly like a 
 hungry salmon. He compares my controversy to "that doughty 
 hero's celebrated battle with the windmills, which he mistook for 
 giants." Well, I did not mistake my critics for giants, and if I 
 thought them 'windmills," I preferred that somebody else should call 
 them so. 
 
 Let me assure Tricycle that I never was " haunted by the idea" 
 that under the single-tax Tom Clark's farm would be taken away 
 from him. I knew how wildly irrational and unjust was the scheme 
 of Henry George to take it away from hi!n, either by the "single-tax" 
 deception, or by the bolder plan of confiscation. I have never been 
 " haunted " by any fear of Mr. George's impossible revolution. It 
 will never come. 
 
 Tricycle thinks it strange that I cannot see " that the single tax 
 would leave Tom Clark in absolute possession of his farm." I think 
 it strange that Tricycle cannot see the contrary after reading in the 
 text what Mr. George means by the expression "single-tax." In ad- 
 dition to what I have quoted at the beginning of this reply, I will now 
 give Mr. George's latest utterance on the subject printed in a recent 
 number of The Standard: 
 
 " Although the right of private property in land is not the present practical 
 question in connection with the single tax, it is involved and should be understood 
 by all who undertake to promote or antagonize the movement." 
 
 Here Mr. George confesses that the very right of Tom Clark 
 to his farm is involved in the single-tax question, and yet Tricycle 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 287 
 
 thinks it strange that 1 cannot see that the single-tax " would leave 
 Tom in the absolute possession of his farm. " 
 
 It is a pity that a writer so keen as Tricycle should be so defi- 
 cient in the logical faculty as to see no difference between the man 
 who recognizes private property in land and the man who does not; 
 between a wish to increase the number of land-owners and a- scheme 
 to deprive every man of his land. I desire to increase the number of 
 the landed, and diminish the number of the landless, while Mr. 
 George declares that every man must be landless. By a most illogi- 
 cal contradiction Tricycle asserts that this would make all men land- 
 owners. As well say that the confiscation of all the cattle in the country 
 would give every man milk for his coffee. It is false reasoning that 
 leads a man to say the destruction of land-ownership would make all 
 men land -owners. 
 
 Mr. Theodore P. Perkins, suspicious that the doctrine of Henry 
 George is indefensible, drops him altogether, and says: " It is not so 
 important to know what Mr. George or any one else meant by certain 
 phrases, as it is to know what is a just land system, and how we are 
 to get it." This is a new departure, and a very sensible one too, but 
 it reflects not on me. For months my critics have been pounding me 
 with Henry George; they have been explaining what they call 
 " Georgeism;" they have been advising me to read his works that I 
 might correctly understand him They have beeen dogmatizing like 
 sectarians, and with a good deal of self-righteousness have described 
 themselves as " Georgeites." Now I am gravely told by ' -r. Perkins 
 that it is not important to know what Mr. George meant by what he 
 said. Mr. Perkins cannot switch the George doctrine on to the side 
 track, because he thinks it has been damaged in the collision. 
 " Georgeism" so-called, not by me, but by the sect of Henry George, 
 is the theme of this debate. It cannot be hustled out of the way by 
 Mr. Perkins, because he has had enough of it. I most heartily agree 
 with Mr. Perkins that it is not important what Mr. George or any one 
 else means. The subject itself is a grander theme than the opinions of 
 any man. When I see the obsequious deference which my critics pay 
 to Henry George and "Georgeism," I offer them the advice which 
 Jefferson gave to his nephew, Peter Carr: " Never believe nor re- 
 ject anything because any other person rejected or believed it." 
 
 Mr. Perkins is a robust antagonist, A man of ability, who thinks 
 for himself, who knows that he is honest and believes that he is right 
 in his opinions, is not to be easily disposed of. He is much stronger 
 than the man who confesses himself the disciple of another, and is 
 
288 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 therefore embarrassed by the eccentricities and the inconsistencies of 
 his master and apostle. It is Mr. Theodore Perkins who must be 
 answered now, and not Mr. Henry George. 
 
 Mr. Perkins emphatically says that it is not just that land should 
 have an "owner" but he claims that man should have " the privilege 
 of peaceably occupying land for use." This peaceable occupation, 
 he says, "is a right." If so, this "right" ought to be made secure, 
 and its highest security is ownership. On that security depends the 
 whole theory and practice of agriculture, the strength and foundation 
 of all the other arts and sciences. When this security is denied 
 and the land is made common property, agriculture ceases, and hunt- 
 ing takes its place. Mr. Perkins insists that the privilege of peace- 
 ably occupying land for use is a "right," but the red savages of 
 America, who anticipated Mr. George by many centuries, deny this 
 right entirely. They say that no man has a right to appropriate the 
 land or any portion of it for his own peaceable occupation, because 
 the Great Spirit gave it as the common property of all. 
 
 There is a good quality of moralizing in the reflections of Mr. 
 Perkins on the abuses of land-ownership, and the wickedness of 
 private property in land, but he converts it all into pure sentiment 
 when he says : " It is true that every man has a right to as much 
 control over land as is needful for his use and enjoyment of it, and 
 for the security of the fruits of his labor." Very well, what is this 
 right to control but ownership ? If a man has the right to control a 
 piece of land, every other man's infringement upon it is a trespass. 
 Mr. Perkins qualifies his concession by denying that this right exists 
 after death. I think his position here is weak, both in morals and in 
 politics. What sort of civilization is it wherein a man has no induce- 
 ment to* work for his children ? What sort of savagery would result 
 should every man's property be scrambled for at the moment of his 
 death? Where would be "the security of the fruits of his labor," 
 if a farmer could not share those fruits with his family, and leave 
 them to his family at his death ? 
 
 The privilege of controlling land which the owner is not using, 
 is a wrong, says Mr. Perkins ; so that the right or wrong of land- 
 owning shrinks to the narrow measure of use. " The question is," 
 remarks Mr. Perkins, "how shall we get rid of the unjust privileges 
 without letting go the rights?" Why, we must reach them by the 
 serpentine road that winds around Robin Hood's barn. Here is the 
 scheme of Mr. Perkins : First, " In the case of unimproved land, 
 to refuse governmental assistance to the holders of paper titles against 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 289 
 
 would-be settlers, meanwhile protecting such settlers from the 
 interference of the owner or his agents." 
 
 Let us examine that anomaly for a moment. Government gives 
 a man a patent to a piece of land, and when the trespasser invades 
 it, the government dishonors its own deed and protects the trespasser 
 against the "interference" of the owner. But, suppose there are 
 eight or ten "would-be settlers," all jumping the claim at the 
 same time ; shall their disputes be settled by bloodshed, or by the 
 courts? If by the courts, the decision in favor of one or the other of 
 them becomes enrolled on the records of the courts, and that record 
 becomes another "paper title," which the courts, according to the 
 land scheme of Mr. Perkins, are bound to dishonor in behalf of some 
 new would be settler, who has made another trespass upon the land, 
 and so on forever. A " paper title," whether it is a deed, a patent, 
 or a judicial decree is only evidence of title, and under any civilized 
 land system that evidence must exist on paper somewhere, before 
 any man can be safe in the enjoyment of " the right of occupying 
 land for use." This is Mr. Perkins' first step to chaos. 
 
 And the second is like unto it. "In the case of improved lands, 
 to refuse government assistance to the holders of paper titles against 
 the owners of the improvements on the land." But, what if the 
 owner of the paper title is also the owner of the improvements on the 
 land, and a trespasser comes and pitches him into the road ? His 
 " paper title " being of no value in the courts he can only obtain 
 redress by proving that he made the improvements on the land. This 
 might be a difficult thing to do, and suppose he did not make the im- 
 provements himself, but bought them of the man who did make 
 them, his proof of this must be the paper title called a deed, which, 
 according to Mr. Perkins, the government must not recognize, for 
 his third step to chaos is this : " To refuse to record warranty deeds, 
 or to enforce the provisions peculiar to them ;" and the fourth is this: 
 " To refuse to enforce any conditions in deeds eld or new." 
 
 And to make confusion worse confounded: "In general, to 
 assume that occupancy and use give thp best title, and to refuse to 
 consider any suits at law for the purchase money or rent of land, 
 apart from, or over and above, the value of the improvements on it." 
 This would be to make all men " infants" by declaring them incapa- 
 ble of making contracts The seller and the buyer of a farm would 
 not be allowed to agree upon its value if any part of the purchase 
 money remained unpaid. The debt could not be secured by mort- 
 gage, because that would be a " paper title " which the courts must 
 
2 go WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 not recognize. It could not be evidenced by a note for the same 
 reason. The parties to the sale would not be bound by their own 
 agreement, and the whole neighborhood must be called in to decide 
 upon the value of the improvements on the land, every man making a 
 different estimate, and holding an opinion different from the others. 
 This reaction toward the ancient barbarism out of which society 
 has been evolved through the travail of many centuries, is innocently 
 called by Mr. Perkins a " reform." It would be a return to the 
 land system of the savages. 
 
 PRODUCTION AND LAND-OWNERSHIP. 
 
 Dr. Wood returns to the charge in No. io6 of The Open Court, 
 with a criticism entitled "Wheelbarrow's Heresy;" and reasoning 
 inversely, as his habit seems to be, pretends to see some "George 
 Theory" in my article on "Convict Labor." By the orthodox tone 
 of Dr. Wood, I recognize a controversial friend who used to say: 
 "I differ with you in this matter, and that puts' you prima facie in 
 the wrong." 
 
 Because I claim that every man should work in order that our 
 comforts may be multiplied. Dr. Wood concludes that by that claim I 
 testify to t'.ie wisdom of his way of reaching the result. This begs the 
 question, for the dispute between us is about the means to accomplish 
 the desired end. Dr. Wood assumes that because I wish to see a suf- 
 ferer cured of typhoid fever, I must therefore favor the remedies pre- 
 scribed by Dr. Wood, when, in fact, I may believe that his treatment 
 of the case will make the patient worse instead of better. 
 
 Dr. Wood appears to think it "no trouble to show goods," and 
 he spreads upon the counter a lot of remnants which have been in 
 stock for ages, such as " comforts and necessities are drawn from the 
 great storehouse of nature;" "by labor acting upon raw material 
 wealth is produced;" "without access to the raw materials furnished 
 by the earth, labor must cease to exist;" and much Bunsbeyism of 
 the same sort. I am ponderously told that after inspecting those rem- 
 nants I shall be " forced to admit that the right to live, the right to 
 labor and produce being granted, it also follows that the right to land 
 upon which to labor and to live is self-evident." 
 
 I am not sure that I have "the right to live," any more than the 
 sheep which I slay for food; but I am certain that I have "the right 
 to labor," and I must do my fellow-men the justice to say they have 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 291 
 
 never abridged that right. In fact, they have never been jealous when 
 I have enjoyed the right of working twelve, fourteen, or sixteen hours 
 a day. "The right to labor," in my case, has been too generously 
 g'ven. 
 
 Was it by inadvertence or design that Dr. Wood, while insisting 
 upon my right "to live, to labor, and to produce," omitted to men- 
 tion my right to ^ze/w,? If he answers that the "right to land upon 
 which to labor and to live," includes the rest, I reply that it does not. 
 The negro slaves had the right to land on which to live and labor. It 
 was a worthless right. What I contend for is the right to land upon 
 which to labor and to live, to own and to enjoy. The "George 
 Theory" denies me the right to own. 
 
 " God has made man a land animal," says Dr. Wood, " incapa- 
 ble of existing elsewhere, and an all-wise intelligence would never 
 have subjected man to certain conditions without at the same time 
 furnishing him with the right and means of compliance." How does 
 Dr. Wood know all that ? Is he a Doctor of Divinity too ? I do not 
 venture upon the theology of the question, for I do not understand it, 
 but admitting that Dr. Wood knows all about it, he proves too much. 
 If God has made man a land animal, has he not made the deer a land 
 animal also? And what right has one land animal to deprive another 
 land animal of land ? Every other land animal asserts the same inherit- 
 ance from God. The water animals all make the same claim to the sea. 
 One claim is as good as the other. God made the sea, says the whale, 
 for me. Who shall contradict him? Are not all the "conditions" of 
 his argument there ? 
 
 The buffalo claims that the land animal, man, has tortured and 
 disfigured the land with plows, and harrows and spades, instead of 
 leaving it undefiled and beautiful as it came from the hand of God. 
 He says, the "all-wise intelligence made these plains and covered 
 them with grass for me. He has adapted me to grazing conditions 
 and supplied the grass. He would not do that without furnishing me 
 the right of enjoyment." The red Indian land animal denies that, and 
 asserts that God made the plains as hunting-grounds for him, and 
 furnished the game in the shape of buffalo. The Caucasian land 
 animal denies the rights of both, and says that the fertility of the soil 
 proves that God made the land for the man who has sense enough to 
 plow it and plant it with cabbages and corn. We are on perilous 
 ground when we explain the purposes of God. 
 
 In the early settlement of Iowa there lived on the Boone River in 
 what is now called Webster County, a frontiersman named Allen. I 
 
292 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 knew him well, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most exquisite 
 fancy. He was a brave, kind, hospitable, honest man, and like Nim- 
 rod "a mighty hunter before the Lord." He had a wife to corres- 
 pond, a mother in Israel blessed in the memory of all travelers who 
 have stopped at her house on their way forward and backward across 
 that part of Iowa. We had to stop there, for it was the only place to 
 stop between the Iowa River and the Des Moines. Mrs. Allen carried 
 a sensitive religious conscience into everything, even into cookery. 
 In that virtue she excelled all other women. I do not think that any 
 other woman ever knew how to cook a venison steak, and cook it 
 right; while the recollection of her crab-apple sauce is a perpetual 
 feast to me. 
 
 My work in those days caused me to travel a good deal across 
 that country, and I often stopped at Allen's, where I was always wel- 
 comed with three cheers; no flip-flap shake of the hand, and a formal 
 ' Glad to see you," but three actual cheers that shook the leaves off 
 the trees in "Allen's Grove." And then the best of everything, fish, 
 venison, and such butter and cream as the city millionaire cannot buy 
 for money. I dare not mention the size and flavor of the vegetables, 
 because if I should mention them, I should not be believed. Allen 
 was a devout man, and gave thanks to God in a frank, sincere and 
 manly way. Always before retiring for the night the household united 
 with him in prayer, and this is what he prayed: * Oh Lord, we thank 
 thee that thou hast cast our lot in this howling wilderness; we thank 
 thee that, although the buff'alo is getting scarce, the elk is abundant on 
 the prairie, and the deer tollable plenty in the timber; we thank thee 
 for the Boone River meandering through the grove; we thank thee 
 for stocking it with fish of good quality, and that we have no trouble 
 in getting a mess of pickerel or black bass, and occasionally a trout." 
 Here was a land animal who religiously believed that all other land 
 animals, and water animals for that matter were created merely to be 
 his prey; but the elk, the deer, the pickerel, and the trout were of a 
 diff"erent opinion, and might reasonably claim the benefit of the argu- 
 ment from adaptation. 
 
 It is a melancholy delusion that by abolishing the private owner- 
 ship of land, production will be increased, and the comforts of life 
 multiplied. The opposite result must follow, and for that reason I 
 oppose the fantastic speculation called the "George Theory." It is 
 merely a claim refuted by the history of centuries and by all the facts 
 of civilization. Without the right or hope of ownership there is no 
 stimulus to production. Where individual reward is denied, individual 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 293 
 
 exertion ceases. Men will not cultivate land without security of ten- 
 ure, and the best security is ownership. This is the supreme inspira- 
 tion of agriculture. To increase production. I desire to increase the 
 number of land owners instead of abolishing land-owners altogether. 
 Mr. George's design is a reaction towar 1 the pri.nitive state of man. 
 
 It is not new. It was the law for thouaands of years, and it is yet 
 the law among the barbarous tribes in Africa, America, and Australia. 
 It yielded slowly to the law of evolution, but it yielded, and its,resur- 
 rection is impossible. By this law the hunter gives way to the shep- 
 herd, and the shepherd yields to the plowman. Man developed 
 from the savage state where all the lands and animals were owned in 
 common, to the pastoral state, where flocks and herds were private 
 property, and from the pastoral state to the higher civilization of agri- 
 culture, wherein the title to the very land itself was given to the 
 farmer as an inducement for him to cultivate the soil. 
 
 From game to sheep was a great advance, from a forest of doubt- 
 ful food to a land flowing with milk and honey, was a beneficent emi- 
 gration. The phrase poetically pictures a land rich in grass for cattle, 
 and flowers for bees. Only a pastoral people could appreciate its value. 
 From a land of milk and honey to a land of corn, and wine, and oil, 
 was a more beneficent emigration still. It was an advance to agricul- 
 ture and the private ownership of land. This law of evolution is visi- 
 ble in the allegory of Cain and Abel. Abel was a " keeper of sheep," 
 but Cain was a " tiller of the ground." Pasturage is overcome by till- 
 age. It is the law. The man who can earn his dinner from a yard of 
 land must have the land in preference to him who requires for his 
 dinner a territory long and wide as a sheep's ramble, or a stretch of 
 land equal to the reach of an arrow from his bow. The scheme of 
 confiscation as advanced by Henry George and his disciples, if 
 seriously attempted, would countermarch humanity, and turn man- 
 kind from progress backward toward poverty. 
 
 CHEAPEN LAND BY TAXING IT. 
 
 In The Open Court, No. 107, Mr. J. G. Malcolm wraps up a 
 conundrum in a very comical paradox, and then hurls it at me. 
 Presuming that Mr. Malcolm is not jesting with me but inquiring in 
 good faith, I will answer him. He calls upon me to "explain why 
 it is that to tax anything else but land makes it higher-priced ; but to tax 
 land makes it cheaper, and the higher it is taxed the cheaper it be- 
 
294 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 comes?" The fallacy here is concealed in the assumption that the 
 tax is a burden in one case and a benefit in the other. The truth 
 is that the tax is a burthen in both cases, the manner of its mischief 
 being differently shown. 
 
 A tax upon land operates as a bligjit in proportion to the seventy 
 of the tax. It cheapens land as Canada thistles cheapen it, by mak- 
 ing it less valuable, and harder to enjoy. Ten years ago a plague of 
 locusts fell upon Northwestern Iowa. In despair the farmers of that 
 region sold their farms for a trifle and fled from the plague. The 
 locusts were a blessing because they cheapened land. The single- 
 tax plague woifld cheapen land just as the grasshoppers did. It is a 
 mistake that we can benefit the general community by tormenting 
 land with any form of barrenness, tax, or blight. 
 
 Another fallacy concealed in the conundrum is that land and 
 personal effects, as merchandise, have the same character, as for in- 
 stance, cloth and land, when the true comparison is .between the 
 product of the loom and the product of the land. We may make 
 land less desirable or " cheaper" by taxing it, but the man who cul- 
 tivates it must add his extra taxes to the price of wheat and pork or 
 he must perish. Unless he can get his taxes back by the sale of his 
 produce, he must abandon the land, and if we make the single tax 
 high enough, we can make the land so cheap as to be worth nothing. 
 We may levy this single- tax on sheep, and the effect will be to make 
 sheep-raising so precarious as to cheapen sheep, but the sheep-raiser 
 must lay his tax-burden on to the wool he sells, and the weaver who 
 pays it in the higher price of wool must lay it on to cloth ; and so on 
 until it falls at last upon the man who buys a coat, the final product 
 of the sheep and of the loom. Either that, or it will tax all sheep- 
 owning out of existence, as Mr. George and his disciples propose to 
 tax land-owning out of the world. 
 
 What matters it, whether land is cheap or dear if men are not 
 permitted to own it ? In Mr. George's Utopia men are forbidden to 
 own land, aud consequently can have no object in buying. The 
 single-tax artifice is used by Mr. Malcolm, although he ought to 
 know by this time that it has no place in Mr. George's theory, except 
 as a means by which to confiscate all the lands in the country. Mr. 
 George says the end he seeks* is the abolition of private property in 
 land ; the single-tax contrivance he declares is only the means to 
 that end. The substance of the plan is confiscation, the single-tax 
 the form. 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 295 
 
 USERS OF LAND, AND OWNERS OF LAND. 
 
 Dr. Wood comes back again and says that he and "Wheel- 
 barrow" are getting together very rapidly I am glad to hear it. He 
 is not the first of my critics to see the error of his doctrine. Mr. 
 Pentecost, who censured me for doubting the efficacy of the single- 
 tax expedient, now denounces it himself. In a recent number of the 
 Twentieth Century he proclaimed the single-tax to be a "humbug 
 and a farce." I never said anything about it so severe as that. I 
 have called it a "deception," but without implying that its advocates 
 have any intention to deceive, for I do not think they have. They 
 and their disciples are all innocent victims of the same philanthropic 
 delusion. Persons who compare Dr. Wood's last criticism with 
 his first one, will see what a great advance he has made in the 
 knowledge and understanding of land, and man's relation to it. He 
 will soon discover the impossibility of making all men land owners by 
 the inverse process of abolishing land ownership. National owner- 
 ship of all the postoffices does not make me a postmaster, neither will 
 government land ownership make me a land owner, I think it 
 would be very unjust if every man should own the land that one man 
 tills. I think that he alone should own it. More than that, I think 
 his land should bear its fair proportion of the public taxes according 
 to its value, and no more. 
 
 Dr. Wood reproaches me that I have as yet "advanced no 
 remedy except objections to other people's remedies." I am not 
 quite certain, but I think that statement is correct. I have not yet 
 received my diploma as a Doctor of Politics and I am afraid that if 
 I should go to mixing "remedies," I should not succeed any better 
 than Dr. Wood. I fear that like him I should provide another bane 
 instead of an antidote. Besides, a man may criticise the plans of 
 others without thereby assuming any obligation to furnish better 
 plans. Last month I attended a Scotch picnic, and had great sport 
 in watching the athletic games. The prize for the longest running 
 jump brought out many competitors. The best jump was made by 
 a sinewy fellow who cleared 19 feet 11 inches. I happened to 
 say to a friend that it wasn't a great jump, when a bystander, a 
 friend of the jumper, turned sharply upon me, and said: "Well, go 
 
296 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 and beat it or shut up." I thoflght him very rude, because I was not 
 bound to beat it before criticising the achievement. And in like 
 manner, all sorts of botch work claims immunity by demanding that 
 its critic shall do better or say nothing. 
 
 Can anything be more useless than a scheme to deprive the 
 farmer of his land, and then "leave him secure in his possession and 
 use of it?" I want to give him that security by making him the 
 owner of the land. I desire to see men owners and not renters of 
 the soil We perpetrate a solecism, grotesque and palpable when we 
 confiscate a farm in order to make the farmer "secure in his posses- 
 sion and use of it." 
 
 Dr. Wood says: "In order to increase production I desire to 
 increase the number of land users." Very well! But no man can or 
 will use land to its greatest capacity of production unless he is the 
 actual owner of the soil No man with a title below the rank of 
 ownership can afford to cultivate his land to the best advantage. He 
 cannot afford to plant orchards and vineyards, dig wells, build 
 houses, barns, windmills, buy reapers, mowers, threshing machines, 
 or even make his fences permanent and strong. He cannot even 
 afford to manure the land. In proportion to the strength of his title 
 will he develop the resources of his farm. 
 
 Mr. Theodore Perkins rather ungraciously rejects the compli- 
 ments I paid him a couple of weeks ago and therefore I must take 
 them back. He sneers at my "smart way of putting things," but I 
 will not repine; nor will I return evil for evil. I will not retort upon 
 him, nor charge him with saying anything smart. I will cheerfully 
 testify to his innocence in that regard He kindly advises me to 
 ' think more and publish less." No doubt, Mr. Perkins thinks ten 
 times more than I do, which perhaps will explain the diluted charac- 
 ter of his thought. Quality, not quantity, is the test of thought. 
 Better think right for a minute, then wrong for an hour. 
 
 Mr. Perkins is apparently anxious to abandon his own ptemises 
 for some other ground of controversy more favorable for him. I 
 decline to go with him, nor can I permit him to coax me or provoke 
 me into a false position. I cannot accept his challenge to defend the 
 abuses of land ownership and the extortions of the landlord system 
 I would make things better instead of worse, and therefore I oppose 
 the scheme of Mr. George and his disciples to deprive the American 
 farmer of independence, and reduce him to the condition of a vassal 
 and a tenant. I wish to make every tiller of the soil a free man, the 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 297 
 
 owner oi the land he plows. The "single lax" apostles desire to 
 make him a serf, the dependent villain of the State. 
 
 Mr. Perkins thinks that, Scully's Illinois tenants would be more 
 successful farmers if they did not have to pay two-thirds of their 
 crops as rent. I doubt that Scully's tenants pay two-thirds of their 
 crops as rent; but if they do, they are better off than they would be 
 under the landlord that Mr. George desires to put over them. Hear 
 him again: 
 
 "Now it is evident that in order to take for the use of the community the -whole 
 income arising from land, just as effectually as it could be taken by formally ap- 
 propriating and letting out the land, it is only necessary to abolish, one after 
 the other, all other taxes now levied, and increase the tax on land values until it 
 reaches, as near as may be, the full annual value of the land^ 
 
 The mythical "Scully," even by the exaggerated statement of 
 Mr. Perkins, would only take two-thirds of the products of the land, 
 while the beneficent "single-tax" landlord would take the whole 
 income of it, and levy rent amounting to \.\\q full anmial value of the 
 land. I present again this project of despotism because my critics 
 tenderly step around it on tip-toe, as if' afraid of waking it. They 
 try to conjure it out of sight by the "single tax device " which is 
 elastic enough to stretch from a mild and gentle method of taxation 
 to a sinister plan for confiscating every farm within the dominion of 
 the American republic. 
 
 Mr. Perkins says that I misrepresented his statement concerning 
 the postmorteftt rights of a man in land and its products. If so, I am 
 sorry for it. I would not willingly misrepresent the position of an 
 adversary. In this case I must have failed, ro understand the state- 
 ment made by Mr. Perkins, but he will admit that it might easily be 
 misunderstood. I ask him to read it again. Here it is: "It is true 
 that every man has a right to as much control over land as is needful 
 for his use and enjoyment of it, and for the security of the fruits of 
 his labor. It is not true that this right exists after his death " If 
 that is not what Mr. Perkins meant, he is misrepresented by himself 
 and not by me. His own language led me astray. What makes a 
 farmer feel secure in the right to "the fruits of his labor?" He is 
 stimulated in his work and comforted by the knowledge that his right 
 will be continued in his widow and his children. This law is of the 
 highest social value; it is the moral strength of life; it makes man 
 and his work immortal, so far as anything can be immortal on this 
 earth. When Mr. Perkins declared that a man's right to his home 
 and the "fruits of his labor" ceased at his death I was justified in 
 
298 WHEELBARROW. 
 
 asking those questions about the widow and the children. Every 
 man who plants corn in the spring knows that he may die before 
 harvest, but he is animated by the thought that in case of his death 
 his folks may gather the crop. The Third Reader used to have a 
 story like this, "An old man was planting an apple tree A fool 
 came along and said, ' What foolishness is this! You will never live 
 to eat apples from that tree ' 'I know it,' said the old man, 'but 
 my children may.' " 
 
 I would confirm the right which Mr. Perkins grants by making 
 the user of the land the owner of the land. In what other way can 
 the " right to control " be made so effective as by ownership? The 
 very best lease is an inferior security. It gives the lessee a limited 
 " control over land," but a control qualified by time, and hampered 
 by tributes and terms. 
 
 Mr. Perkins condescendingly assumes that his readers "know 
 some things." He could hardly have assumed that when he wrote his 
 curious reflections on "paper titles." It is not necessary to repeat 
 my answer to that part of his former article but I think it has had 
 some influence in modifying the opinions of Mr- Perkins. He now 
 appears to be willing to recognize a " paper " bill of sale, a " paper" 
 note, a " paper " mortgage on improvements, and a "paper" quit 
 claim deed. He thinks it very likely that I never heard of quitclaim 
 deeds. Yes, I have heard of them ; I saw one a few years ago, and 
 I was told that it would pass the interest of the grantor just as 
 effectually as a warranty deed made on parchment of the finest quality. 
 " Title to improvements," says Mr. Perkins, " could be conveyed by 
 bill of sale as well as by deed." If so, it is a " paper title" just as 
 good as a deed, and ought to come under the same condemnation. 
 Say, for instance, a bill of sale to an orchard, a vineyard, a mill- 
 dam, or a well. 
 
 Did Mr. Perkins assume that his readers ' knew some things " 
 when he was telling them about the queer inhabitants of the Kingdom 
 of Nahant, "who, when they buy land, omit to record the deed, pre- 
 ferring to get a title by simple occupation" ? What do those strange 
 people take deeds for, except as evidence of title? And why should a 
 native of Nahant risk his title for twenty years, when he can estab- 
 lish it in twenty minutes by simply recording his deed? 
 
 Mr. Perkins can hardly expect that his readers will assume that 
 he " knows some things," when he tells them that "in the older States, 
 if the holder of a title deed neglects to assert his legal privileges, 
 twenty years' possession of the land gives any other man a perfect 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 299 
 
 title, despite the deed.". That must be in the State of Nahant. If 
 Mr. Perkins will look a little deeper into that matter, he will find that 
 the "twenty years' possession" must be of a certain legal character, 
 havinfi certain qualities outside the mere possession; and he will find 
 that a twenty years' trespass gives no title at all. His readers will be 
 still more doubtful about his knowledge of "some things," when he 
 tells them that title to some of the " best land in Boston was gained 
 thus by a 'squatter' within the present century." Such chimney-corner 
 legends are hardly within the scope of serious debate. 
 
 THE CUT-WORM AND THE WETEVIL. 
 
 In The Open Court for Oct. 3d, Mr. W. J. Atkinson asks me 
 a few questions. Quoting my assertion that "without the right or 
 hope of ownership there is no stimulus to production," he inquires, 
 "Ownership in what? In the instrument of production or in the arti- 
 cle produced ?^' To that I answer. In both, if possible, in order to 
 make more certain the future enjoyment of the product. If a pro- 
 ducer does not own the instrument of production, he must pay rent 
 for the use of it, or he must become the hired man of the owner. As 
 a hired laborer, I discovered long ago that the man who works for 
 wages at any instrument of production, will, as a rule, get less 
 product out of it thin he would get if he owned the instrument. 
 The man who pays rent for an instrument of production, will gt t all 
 he can out of it, but he has no interest in its welfare, nor does he care 
 to preserve or increase its productive power beyond the time for which 
 he has hired it. 
 
 This rule attaches more closely to land than to many other things 
 because land refuses to do business except on long credit. It will not 
 pay its laborers for months, and sometimes it makes them wait long 
 years for their wages He who breaks the virgin soil must wait until 
 the second year for a crop of wheat; he must wait ten years for a 
 crop of apples. No tenant with a short lease will ever plant an 
 orchard, repair the fences, or manure the land. It may be true that 
 God made the land, but man makes the farm; and the most produc- 
 tive farm is made by the man who owns the land he plows. I want 
 the farmer to own this instrument of production, that he may be sure 
 of the "article produced." It is true, as Mr. Atkinson fays, that a 
 large part of the production of the country comes from leased lands, 
 
300 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 but it is also true that a larger product would be had, if the tenants 
 who hire those lands, were owners of the soil. 
 
 Mr. Atkinson thinks that my maxim in reference to individual 
 exertion and individual reward is broken, when the tax-gatherer calls 
 and says, "Mr. Wheelbarrow, because you have been industrious, 
 and Mr. Bicycle idle, your taxes are heavy and his light." Mr. At- 
 kinson means to show by this that the taxation of labor's product 
 lessens the incentive to exertion, and encourages idleness. The moral 
 of the parable fails, because all taxes must come out of the products 
 of industry. All the product of the nation's idleness will not yield 
 ten dollars' worth of taxes in a year. The whole statesmanship of 
 the question lies in fair and equitable assessment, so that one indus- 
 try shall not pay taxes and another escape taxation. If idleness could 
 yield revenue, it would be wise to levy all taxation upon idleness, and 
 exempt industry altogether; but, unfortunately, idleness is not a 
 tax-payer. No matter how we may contrive or disguise taxation, 
 whatever cash revenue is obtained by it, must come out of the 
 "product of industry.' We can as easily get revenue out of moon- 
 beams as out of abstract "values," separate from the substance which 
 industry has made. 
 
 Continuing the catechism, Mr. Atkinson asks this question: 
 "Would it not be better to say, henceforth, if a man desires to erect 
 a building, we will not fine him for it?" I Answer, Yes! I think it 
 would be very foolish and unjust to fine a man for building a house, 
 and I have never yet heard of such a practice in any civilized commu- 
 nity. What Mr. Atkinson means is that the taxation of a house is a 
 fine for building it, and he further insinuates that the taxation of per- 
 sonal property is a fine imposed upon "thrift, energy, industry, and 
 enterprise." Mr Atkinson would not fine a man for being rich; I would 
 not fine a man for being poor. If taxes are fines, they must be paid 
 by one or the other, and I prefer that the rich man pay them. I do 
 not think that money, stocks, bonds, ships, railroads, factories, mer- 
 chandise, street-cars, jewelry, plate, carriages, and horses, ought to 
 be exempt from taxation, because they happen to be the visible signs 
 of thrift. They should all bear a fair proportion of the public ex- 
 penses, because without the public protection they could not exist 
 at all. 
 
 I offer in evidence here a couple of hard facts in the form of 
 houses. Just round the corner are two lots of the same size, one 
 exactly opposite the other. They are of precisely the same value. 
 The owner of one of them is Mr. North, a bookkeeper, who has 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION. 301 
 
 managed by thrift and industry to build a frame house worth twenty- 
 five hundred dollars, and his furniture is worth about five hundred 
 dollars. The owner of the other lot, Mr. South, has built a house 
 upon it worth forty thousand dollars, and his furniture, stable, horses, 
 and carriages, are worth eight thousand dollars more. Besides all 
 this, he is worth a million dollars in bank stock, money, and mer 
 chandise, Mr. Atkinson and Mr. Henry George require that Mr. 
 North and Mr. South shall be taxed alike, and contribute equal sums 
 to the public treasury. I think such an apportionment would be 
 unjust, and if attempted by the law, intolerable. In order to avoid 
 fining the rich man for being rich, Mr. Atkinson proposes to fine the 
 poor man for being poor. This impossible scheme of injustice he 
 innocently thinks would bring about "the reign of common sense in 
 taxation." He also thinks that the tribute levied on Mr. North would 
 not be a tax on "the product of labor." How is the man to pay it, 
 except by the product of his labor? 
 
 Close on the trail of Mr. Atkinson comes Mr. W. E. Brockaw 
 in No. Ill of The Open Court. He takes for a text this quotation 
 from an article of mine, "Men will not cultivate land without security 
 of tenure, and the best security is ownership. Without the right or 
 hope of ownership, there is no stimulus to production " Then he 
 says: 
 
 "It is strange how men came to erect such fine buildings on the school lands 
 of Chicago without any stimulus ' Without the 'hope of ownership ' and there- 
 fore with no 'stimulus to production,' men pay the City of Chicago hundreds of 
 thousands of dollars ground-rent for the mere privilege of producmg " 
 
 I answered that argument three months ago, when it was offered 
 in The Open Court by Mr. Pentecost. I will only repeat this part 
 of what I said then. The owners of those "fine buildings" took very 
 good care to obtain "security of tenure" before they laid a brick. 
 They took a seventy-years' lease of the lots. In other words, they 
 became owners of the lots for a term of seventy years. The long 
 lease was the "stimulus" to build. Last spring a citizen of Chicago 
 contracted to build a magnificent hotel on a lot for which he had a 
 three years' lease. He had hardly begun to lay the foundation, when, 
 as might have been expected, he was taken to the lunatic asylum, and 
 there he is yet. Did Mr. Brockaw ever see a man fit to be at large, 
 erecting "fine buildings" without ample security of tenure? 
 
 I congratulate myself that Mr. Brockaw almost recognizes the 
 contrast which I pointed out between the civilizing influence of per- 
 sonal land-ownership, and the Red Indian system of land commu- 
 
302 WHEELBARR O W. 
 
 nism. He now says, "Individual /^j'j^jj/^w of land everywhere marks 
 the advance of civilization. Common or communal possession of land 
 everywhere marks the savage." This attempt to make a distinction 
 between possession and orunership scarcely affects the principle for 
 which I contend. When it is conceded that individual title to the 
 possession of land is an essential element of civilization, the rest of 
 my claim will soon be conceded also; because in that case the strong- 
 est and most durable right of possession must be the best; and that 
 is possession by right of ownership. 
 
 The attempt to make the right of possession and the right of 
 ownership antagonistic and hostile principles in a civilization where 
 one of them is absolutely necessary, ' is an impossible task, because 
 the right of possession is itself a qualified right of ownership. 
 There is no difference between a right of possession and a right of 
 ownership except in duration and degree. If a man has the exclu- 
 sive individual right to the use and possession of a farm for ten years, 
 he is the owner against all the world until the expiration of that time. 
 We invert the rules of reason when we say that "although individual 
 possession is necessary to social development, individual ownership of 
 land is wrong in principle." 
 
 Mr. Brockaw tells us that Herbert Spencer and others have writ- 
 ten "with a force of logic which is overwhelming against the right of 
 individual ownership of the resources of nature," and then in great 
 astonishment he inquires, "Why have their unanswerable arguments 
 had so little effect?" My guess at the conundrum is this, because 
 they were not unanswerable; and for a like reason the overwhelming 
 logic did not overwhelm, Mr. Brockaw answers thus, "Because they 
 saw no way to harmonize the right of individual possession with the 
 %vrong of individual ownership." A very sensible reason when we 
 consider the opposite qualities of right and wrong, and how hard it 
 is to bring them into harmony. I advise Mr. Brockaw not to try 
 where Herbert Spencer failed; if he did fail, of which I am not sure, 
 because I hardly think that he has ever tried to harmonize the right oi 
 one thing with the tvrong of something else. To harmonize the right 
 of possession and the right of ownership is easy enough; and if it is 
 conceded that either is right in principle, the other cannot in princi- 
 ple be wrong. If it is wrong in principle to own land for a hundred 
 years, it is wrong to own it for ten years or for one year. 
 
 Mr. Brockaw's premises come to an untimely and inconsequent 
 end in the curious admission that "A nation of homes— ^.m^W inde- 
 pendent holdings — is generally believed to be the best." Have 
 
THE SINGLE TAX QUESTION, 303 
 
 I not been contending for independent homes? and have I not been 
 criticised and rebuked for doing so by Mr. Brockaw and other de- 
 fenders of the single-tax philosophy? Is it not the declared purpose 
 of Mr. George and his followers to abolish all "independent hold- 
 ings" by the scheme of the "single-tax," so that there shall not be 
 any such thing as an independent home in the United States? Mr. 
 Brockaw insists that no man shall have an 'independent holding" but 
 that every holder of land shall be a tenant; and he reasons as if rent 
 were a natural incident attaching to land like grass, when in fact it is 
 an unnatural infliction resulting from an artificial social state 
 
 Mr. Brockaw, still believing that rent is "native to the manor 
 born," and racy of the soil, says, "The tenant might as well pay his 
 rent to the government as to an individual." Certainly, but it is bet- 
 ter for him to be free from rent entirely; better for him to have a 
 'home," an "independent" holding than a dependent holding, for 
 which he must do homage and pay rent to his neighbor, or to the 
 government. If the farmer every year must lose a portion of his 
 crop, it may make no difference to him whether the weevil or the cut- 
 worm gets it, but it is not necessary that either of thfe pests should 
 have it; and in the matter of rent, so far as the farmer is concerned, 
 the private landlord and the public landlord are to him as the 
 cut-worm and the weevil. 
 
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