■ .^^MESONEAd i III 
 
 i«i;;!ii:!i::;*i;
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Commodore ^ron ^cCandless
 
 The 
 
 Workers in American History 
 
 By JAMES ONEAL 
 
 THIRD EDITION 
 
 REVISED and ENLARGED 
 
 1912 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 THE NATIONAL RIP-SAW 
 ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI
 
 TO THE WORKERS OF AMERICA 
 
 who are now besieged by the Pow^ers 
 that Prey, in the hope that this small 
 volume w^ill reveal to them how present 
 tyrannies came to be and how they 
 may be overthrown.
 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1912 
 By JAMES ONEAL 
 
 555
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Preface Page 
 
 I. The European Background 15 
 
 II. Land Conquests in America 23 
 
 III. White Slavery in the Colonies 45 
 
 IV. The White Slave Trade 74 
 
 V. Rebellions of the Poor 96 
 
 VI. General Status of the Workers 118 
 
 VII. Causes of the American Revolution 139 
 
 VIII. The Constitutional Convention, A Con- 
 spiracy 164 
 
 IX. The Period of Struggle 196 
 
 X. Conclusion 221
 
 PREFACE 
 
 IN sending forth this revised and enlarged edition of "The 
 Workers in American History," the writer believes a few 
 words of explanation here will not be out of place. Two 
 editions have been sold within a year, and during this 
 period I have had many requests for a cloth-bound copy of 
 the book. Many have also suggested an additional chapter, 
 devoted largely to the struggles and achievements of the 
 working people during the first half-century of the republic. 
 I am adopting both suggestions in this edition, and readers 
 of the first and second editions will recognize an expansion 
 of each chapter, except the first, a citation of many more 
 authorities, and the addition of another chapter. 
 
 My viewpoint may be expressed in the words of William 
 B. Weeden, in his "Economic and Social History of New 
 England" (vol. i, p. 22). "Our generation," he writes, 
 "rather avoids the narration of statecraft, the mere descrip- 
 tion of combat and wars, the tortuous evolution of dogmatic 
 belief. It craves the actual doings of individual men and 
 women, or the intimate life of families and social communi- 
 ties. Individuals, families and communities forge out their 
 lives and their life into certain material forms we call 
 economic. The man forms his household ; that in turn forms 
 the state." 
 
 Few histories today give the reader any adequate idea of 
 how the toilers lived, struggled and died in America. The 
 toiling masses, though constituting the bulk of the popula-
 
 8 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 tion, are hardly mentioned ; their social and economic life are 
 concealed, while a few "great men" are paraded before the 
 reader. Timid or servile scholarship shrinks at revealing 
 the truth and contents itself with devoting pages to telling 
 of the courtship of Miles Standish, John Smith's attach- 
 ment for Pocahontas, or giving details of the duel between 
 Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. These, together with 
 spectacular descriptions of battles, accounts of intrigues, 
 alliances and quarrels of politicians and public men, largely 
 go to make up the matter that the reader absorbs. So far as 
 the actual life of the people is concerned, how the}' lived, 
 their dress, their manners, their morals and economic life, 
 the reader is left in the dark. The result is a distorted con- 
 ception of history, presenting a few "great men" standing 
 in the foreground and shaping events and molding society 
 according as they willed it. 
 
 However, the economic life of the people is now being 
 written by scores of writers who realize that the unpleasant 
 phases of American history have, in the main, been passed 
 over. According to Alfred M. Heston, in his interesting 
 monograph, "Slavery and Servitude in New Jersey" (p. 22), 
 the historian, Bancroft, admitted to James Davie Butler that 
 in speaking of felons among the settlers of America, "he 
 had been very economical in dispensing the truths he had 
 discovered." In other words, one of the foremost American 
 historians confesses that one of the brutal phases of working- 
 class life in the colonies was not given a candid and impar- 
 tial treatment. Writing of Massachusetts historians, Weeden 
 also complains (vol. 11, p. 550) that "it has been too much 
 the fashion to exalt provincial generations into a sweet com- 
 pany of frost-bitten angels, oppressed and a little warped 
 out of their skyward tendencies."
 
 THE WORKERS IX AMERICAN HISTORY 9 
 
 Finally, there is the example of Booker T. Washington, 
 the negro educator, who in 1909 wrote in the first volume of 
 his "Story of the Negro" (p. 108), that he "never had the 
 least idea until I began to investigate the subject that any 
 human being except the Indian and negro had ever been 
 bought and sold, and in other respects treated as property 
 in America." Mr. Washington had only a short time before 
 picked up a facsimile of an old Baltimore newspaper, the 
 Maryland Journal, and read an advertisement regarding a 
 fugitive Irish indentured servant, and learned that there 
 were other slaves in the American colonies besides the Indian 
 and negro. His historical reading had never conveyed this 
 important information. These instances indicate that sin- 
 ister influences have played their part in suppressing knowl- 
 edge of some phases of American social and economic life, 
 and that American history has seldom had a candid and 
 unbiased treatment. 
 
 Now the object of this book is to "place in the hands of 
 workingmen, and those who are in sympathy with their 
 ideals, information that is indispensable for a proper under- 
 standing of the problems of today. Some of the statements 
 made in the following pages will come as a shock to those 
 who have absorbed the current views of American history, 
 and yet no important assertion is made without reference to 
 standard authorities. The references will serve as a guide 
 to those who would like to consult the original sources or 
 pursue their investigations further. Most of the works 
 quoted may be found in any fairly well-equipped public 
 library. 
 
 We may briefly summarize the important factors or 
 events that led to the control of government and wealth
 
 10 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 productive sources by a small class, and their relation to the 
 workers, past and present, as follows: 
 
 1. The discovery of America followed by the landing 
 of a horde of adventurers drawn by the lure of gold. 
 
 2. The confiscation of immense tracts of land by for- 
 eign princes who gave them to favorites, including in the 
 grants extensive powers of rulership over these domains. 
 
 3. Luring beggared workers of Europe to the New 
 World with deceptive promises and selling them into tem- 
 porary slavery on their arrival. Kidnaping whites in Eu- 
 rope and raiding Africa for blacks and selling both in 
 America. 
 
 4. Enactment by the land aristocracy of penal codes 
 and fugitive slave laws applying to black and white slaves. 
 
 5. Withholding political privileges from all those not 
 belonging to the property-owning classes. 
 
 6. Breaking of ties binding the American aristocracy to 
 their brethren of the Old World through the American 
 Revolution. 
 
 7. The Constitutional Convention, a secret conspira- 
 tory body and counter-revolution against poor debtors, rep- 
 resenting a usurping minority of aristocrats, who secured 
 by force, fraud and deception a strong government giving 
 them more efficient legislative, police and military power 
 over the workers. 
 
 8. This ruling class later dividing into the owners of 
 blacks in the South and sweaters of whites in the North, 
 resulting in a struggle that ended by extending the sway 
 of the Northern exploiters to the gulf and to both seas. 
 
 9. The rise of the labor movement in the first quar- 
 ter of the nineteenth century gradually extending its organ-
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY II 
 
 ization until today the most advanced of this army challenge 
 the masters of America for control of its wealth-producing 
 and governing powers. 
 
 lo. The future triumph of the workers by conquering 
 the governing and wealth-producing powers and managing 
 them for the common good of all. 
 
 The last stage mentioned is given a very brief treatment 
 in the last chapter as it is more familiar to the readers of 
 social and economic works, and to give it adequate consid- 
 eration would make this book a larger one than the author 
 planned. 
 
 The writer may here anticipate some criticisms that 
 may be made regarding what is said of Penn, Washington, 
 Hamilton, Madison and other "heroic" figures in American 
 history. Those who profit by the miserable mismanage- 
 ment of society today use the "great men" of the past as a 
 valuable asset in appeals for support of their rule. The dis- 
 torted "history" which our school books present has also 
 given us some historical traditions that have no basis in fact. 
 To topple both over and present these men and these tradi- 
 tions in their true perspective is a service in behalf of the 
 sweated millions of today. In this connection we may here 
 quote what Wendell Phillips said of Webster, in 1853, as it 
 applies to this hero worship which is so much cultivated by 
 the masters who rule: 
 
 "We seek only to be honest men, and speak the same 
 of the dead as of the living. If the graves that hide their 
 bodies could swallow also the evil they have done and the 
 example they leave, we might enjoy at least the luxury of 
 forgetting them. But the evil that men do lives after them, 
 and example acquires tenfold authority when it speaks 
 from the grave. How shall we make way against the over-
 
 12 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 whelming weight of some colossal reputation, if we do not 
 turn from the idolatrous present, and appeal to the human 
 race? saying to your idols of today, 'Here we are de- 
 feated; but we will write our judgment with the iron pen 
 of a century to come, and it shall never be forgotten that 
 you were false in your generation to the claims of the 
 slave.' .... We warn the living that we have ter- 
 rible memories, and that their sins are never to be forgotten. 
 We will gibbet the name of every apostate so black and 
 high that his children's children shall blush to bear it."^ 
 
 Of course, we do not hold individuals responsible for 
 social or economic evils, but when "great men" profit by 
 oppressive institutions or by their acts add to the abuses 
 and grievances of the workers, we protest against placing 
 them on pedestals to be worshiped as many of them are. 
 They are products of their age and environment and natur- 
 ally followed courses dictated by their material gains. Their 
 incomes were derived from holding labor in subjection, 
 whether white or black, and establishing laws that enabled 
 them to enforce their class domination against tlie protests 
 of the laborers. 
 
 I have in this edition, as in the others, allowed competent 
 authorities to speak as often as possible in the following 
 pages. To do this I have encountered the same difficulty 
 mentioned in the smaller work — how to avoid making the 
 book a larger one than I send out. The larger book, how- 
 ever, enables me to present sufficient material to indicate 
 some of the main outlines and important institutions that 
 form the background of civilization in America. 
 
 The writer again wishes to emphasize that he makes no 
 pretense at literary style and any criticism from this point 
 
 iPhillips, "Speeches, Lectures and Addresses," Vol. I. pp. 114-115.
 
 TIIK WORKERS IX AMERICAN IIISTORV I3 
 
 of view will be lost on him. His observation has been that 
 many writers today pen beautiful inanities in flowing English 
 that charm and soothe jaded idlers or suspend the thinking 
 faculties of workingmen. Empty platitudes and "blessed 
 words" are their stock in trade. The writer has no wish to 
 indulge in them. He has tried to deal with some forgotten 
 or suppressed facts of American history, and if what he has 
 written arms thinking workingmen with some knowledge 
 that will render them immune to the arts of vulgar poli- 
 ticians, he will feel repaid for the labor of writing this small 
 volume. 
 
 Terre Haute, Indiana, November, 1911. JAMES ONEAL.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I5 
 
 Chapter I 
 
 The European Background 
 
 To understand the history of America it is necessary 
 to review briefly the main events in Europe which had a 
 marked influence in shaping our destiny here. Masses of 
 men do not emigrate to another continent merely for the 
 love of adventure, especially when such emigration implies 
 a hazardous sea voyage and the hardships of a wilderness 
 inhabited by savage tribes. Influences more effective and 
 less romantic brought hordes of workingmen to people 
 the New World ; influences that make one of the blackest 
 pages in history, for they include the crucifixion and spolia- 
 tion of a wealth-producing class. They led not only to the 
 forcible exportation of pauperized workers, but inaugurated 
 a slave traffic in white laborers that included kidnaping of 
 men, women and children in European ports and selling 
 them into temporary slavery in every American colony. 
 
 We may trace the beginning of this process with the 
 year 1348, when the Black Death swept over Europe. It is 
 estimated that fully one-third of the population perished 
 of the plague. With the scarcity of laborers wages natur- 
 ally began to rise. They rose thirty and even fifty per cent. 
 Parliament, under the control of the ruling class, attempted 
 to interfere with the "law of supply and demand."' The 
 famous Statute of Laborers provided that wages should be 
 the same as two years before the plague, but the laborers 
 succeeded in evading the law. The scarcity of laborers 
 made higher wages inevitable and the employer connived
 
 l6 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 with the laborer to violate the statutes as he considered 
 himself fortunate to have any laborers at all. Conditions 
 for the workers became so improved that this period came 
 to be known, in England, as the Golden Age of Labor, an 
 age when the highest well-being known to the poor was en- 
 joyed. The old chroniclers frequently refer to it as "Merrie 
 England." From the point of view of the hours worked 
 and the purchasing power of the wages received, the in- 
 come of these workers was the highest ever realized. Pro- 
 fessor Rogers asserts that "The artisan who is demanding 
 at this time an eight-hour day in the building trades is 
 simply striving to recover what his ancestors worked by 
 four or five years centuries ago.'' The highest point 
 reached was in the closing years of the fifteenth century. 
 The sixteenth century brought with it the Reformation and 
 the beginning of a series of acts that robbed the laborers 
 of their advantages and forcibly transformed them into 
 beggars and outcasts.^ 
 
 The Catholic church was proprietor of a great part of 
 the land of Great Britain. In fact, "The Church had 
 become the largest land owner in all Western Christendom, 
 nearly one-third of all the land in Germany, France and 
 England belonging to her."- The suppression of the mon- 
 asteries, which had been a refuge for the laborers in times 
 of distress, threw masses of them on the market, helpless 
 and dependent. The Reformation brought with it pillage 
 and spoliation of church property. The estates of the 
 church were given away to favorites of the court or sold 
 to speculators who drove away the tenants. Seizure after 
 seizure of lands was made. It was the beginning of an 
 
 iSee Rogers, "Six Centuries of Work and Wages." 
 2l<'autsky, "Communism in Central Europe in the Time of the 
 Reformation," p. 30.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I7 
 
 era of conquest which was to have the New World as its 
 greatest prize. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centu- 
 ries Parhament continued the process of pauperizing the 
 masses by enclosing the common lands which had been at 
 the disposal of the poor. These acts simply legalized the 
 thefts, the ruling classes merely voting to themselves what 
 they wanted. 
 
 There was the further process known as "the clear- 
 ing of estates' which extended into the nineteenth century. 
 Marx gives one classic example where the Duchess 
 of Sutherland, in the tirst quarter of the nineteenth cen- 
 tury, with the aid of British soldiers, rooted out 15,000 
 people and took possession of nearly 800,000 acres of land 
 and transformed them into a sheepwalk. The good lady 
 later entertained Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of "Uncle 
 Tom's Cabin," by way of showing her sympathy with the 
 abolition movement in America ! 
 
 This driving of the workers off the land to wander 
 as vagabonds on the highways had its counterpart in other 
 countries. In 1452 "A similar though less influential part 
 was played in many districts of Bohemia by the fishponds 
 constructed by the landlords. If, as Thomas More said, 
 the sheep ate up the peasants of England, those of Bohe- 
 mia were equally devoured by carp."^ 
 
 The ruling class, having reduced the workers to beg- 
 gars and outcasts, began the bloody legislation on which 
 rests many of the fortunes of British "gentlemen" today. 
 A few examples from English history will suffice. A stat- 
 ute of Henry VIII in 1530 provided that beggars old and 
 unable to work should receive a license. Whipping and 
 imprisonment were provided for the able-bodied. They 
 
 3lbid. p. 77.
 
 16 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 were to be "tied to the cart-tail and whipped till the blood 
 streams down their bodies, then to swear on oath to go 
 back to their birth place" and work. The oath they could 
 not keep as the lands were confiscated and manufacture, 
 then in its infancy, could not employ them. "For the 
 second arrest for vagabondage the whipping is to be re- 
 peated and half the ear sliced off; but for the third relapse 
 the offender is to be executed as a hardened criminal and 
 an enemy of the common weal." The baptism of blood 
 and fire continues, for a statute of Edward VT, nineteen 
 years later (1549) gives power to the masters to enslave 
 any worker whom they denounce as an idler. The master 
 may force him to any work with whip or chains. If the 
 worker absents himself for a fortnight he is to be branded 
 on the forehead with a letter S and be a slave for life. 
 The master can sell him or bequeath him to others. If 
 the slave revolts he is to be executed. Anyone can take 
 away the children of vagabonds and keep them as appren- 
 tices. Similar laws were enacted in France, Holland, and 
 the Netherlands. Organizations of laborers to improve their 
 conditions were, in England, outlawed from the fourteenth 
 century to 1825. The break-up of Feudalism and the 
 Reformation, coming in the name of "freedom of con- 
 science," released all the vilest passions of the dormant 
 commercial classes who started their career of conquest 
 and plunder with the methods briefly outlined above. They 
 brought a scourge to the back of the laborer. The gener- 
 ation that came after the Golden Age was a landless, pau- 
 perized, vagabond host of beggars, crowding the highways 
 of England, branded with irons for their poverty by the 
 class that had reduced them to want, and "Merrie Eng- 
 land" became only a memory.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY ^9 
 
 Luther incarnated the interests of this pitiless ruHng 
 class. "He resisted every attempt of the lower classes to 
 derive material benefit from the Reformation, by favor- 
 ing each step taken by the Princes in this direction. They 
 were to become the owners of the Church property, not 
 the peasants. 'It is not our business to attack the mon- 
 asteries,' he writes (1524), 'but to draw hearts away from 
 them. When, then, churches and monasteries are lying 
 deserted, let the reigning princes do with them what they 
 please.' "^ 
 
 It is not our purpose to attack' Protestantism or its 
 opponent, but merely to show that the "liberty" the former 
 brought into the world was not for the workers. Their 
 liberty, like their "salvation," was relegated to the "other 
 world." Luther's crusade was the championship of a new 
 ruling class that wished to throw off the old feudal restric- 
 tions. It stood for a new ruling class and its opponent de- 
 fended an old one. "The religious reformation of the 
 sixteenth century was not the cause, but the effect, of the 
 social reformation that followed upon the shifting of the 
 economic center from the manor to the city. And that was 
 preceded by the rise of navigation and the discovery of the 
 New World and new trade routes, which indicate the 
 rise of manufacture."^ 
 
 In France the reduction of the workers to beggary is 
 a grim record of horrors. The frightful poverty of the 
 peasants and laborers reached a depth perhaps unknown 
 to any other country. Taine quotes La Bruyere who wrote 
 in 1689: "Certain savage-looking beings, male and female, 
 are seen in the country, black, livid, and sunburnt, and 
 belonging to the soil which they dig and grub with invin- 
 
 4lbid, p. 128. 
 
 sDietzgen, "Philosophical Essays," p. 87.
 
 20 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 cible stubbornness. They seem capable of articulation, 
 and, when they stand erect, they display human lineaments. 
 They are, in fact, men. They retire at night into their 
 dens where they live on black bread, water and roots. 
 They . . . should not be in want of the bread they 
 have planted." Taine adds: "They continue in want of 
 it during twenty-five years after this and die in herds. I 
 estimate that in 171 5 more than one-third of the popula- 
 tion, six millions, perished with hunger and of destitution."^ 
 
 By 1727 many live on the grass in the fields, which 
 provokes St. Simon to declare that "The first king in Eu- 
 rope is great simply by being a king of beggars of all con- 
 ditions." Another writer in 1739 mentions three famine 
 insurrections. The Bishop of Chartres told the king that 
 "the famine and the mortality were such that men ate 
 grass like sheep and died like so many flies." Two years 
 later one town of four thousand people has eighteen hun- 
 dred poor. "The clothes of the poor are seized and the last 
 measure of flour, the latches on their doors," etc."^ 
 
 In Germany the thirty years' war, 1618-48, wrought 
 terrible havoc, the peasants and laborers being reduced 
 to conditions of suflfering that words cannot exaggerate. 
 Whole provinces were laid waste and transformed into 
 deserts. "Friend could not be distinguished from foe. and 
 men would wrest from their starving neighbors a crust 
 of bread. It has been recorded that not even human flesh 
 was sacred, that the gallows, and church-yards were put 
 under guard to protect them against theft by desperate, 
 famine-stricken people. Incredible as it may seem, in some 
 instances even murder and cannibalism were resorted to. 
 
 aTalne, "The Ancient Regime," p. 329. 
 TIbid, Book V, Chap. I.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 21 
 
 The neighborhood of the city of Worms . . . now af- 
 forded cover for a group of beggars, who fell upon pas- 
 sers-by and devoured their bodies for sustenance."^ 
 
 The wars waged by Louis XIV on the Rhenish Pala- 
 tinate, in 1674 and 1688, devastated that beautiful country 
 to such an extent that it required two generations to re- 
 store it to its normal condition. Cities and villages were 
 burnt, thousands were beggared, and lands were confis- 
 cated by the French king. Famine and pestilence were 
 added to the other miseries of the unfortunate inhabit- 
 ants. The invasions seemed to follow a settled policy. Tlie 
 people would no sooner recover from one than another 
 would follow, with the customary pillage of crops and 
 thefts of property. One French army gave seeds to the 
 farmers for another harvest after having robbed the dis- 
 trict.^ The peasants, filled with despair, ceased to till the 
 soil which only increased the general wretchedness. They 
 were saddled with heavy taxes "levied to support an ex- 
 travagant court that hunted, feasted and reveled until 
 bankruptcy or revolution put an end to their riotous liv- 
 ing."^" 
 
 All this made the victims an easy prey to the emigra- 
 tion agents of William Penn who were in Germany en- 
 gaged in an enthusiastic crusade in behalf of emigration 
 to Pennsylvania. Penn had also won the admiration of 
 Queen Anne, who was interested in his colonization plans 
 so that "systematic effort was made to induce them (the 
 Germans) to come to England in order to be shipped to 
 America. Thus in the years 1708 and 1709 more than 
 thirty thousand Germans crossed the Channel, and were 
 
 sFaust, ''The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, p. 56. 
 nibid, p. 58. 
 lolbid, p. 59.
 
 22 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 soon afterward brought in English ships to New York and 
 the Carolinas, but, above all, to Pennsylvania."^^ 
 
 It will be seen from this brief survey that all Europe 
 was undergoing changes that transformed the peasants 
 and laborers into homeless vagrants. Crowding the high- 
 ways of every country, evicted from the common lands, 
 their numbers constantly increasing, reduced to famine in 
 France, cannibalism in Germany and starving outcasts in 
 England, they turned eager eyes toward the New World. 
 A virgin continent awaited them, a land that would serve 
 as a basis for winning the peace and comfort which they 
 had been denied at home. But their pleasant dreams were 
 to be shattered. They did not know or suspect that the 
 ruling classes would even coin their dreams into yellow 
 gold, or that their wretched plight only served as another 
 means of further enrichment for their home exploiters and 
 for another type that awaited them on the shores of the 
 Atlantic in the New World. These victims of class rule 
 were destined to form the basis of a slave trade to recu- 
 perate the broken fortunes of a host of adventurers who 
 carried them into a species of slavery on American soil 
 that was, in some respects, as galling as that which they 
 left behind. The character of this white slave trade and 
 the servitude that was to be their lot will be described in 
 a future chapter of this work. 
 
 iiFiske, "Dutch and Quaker Colonies," Vol. IT, pp. 350-351.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 2^ 
 
 Chapter II 
 
 Land Conquests in America 
 
 A glamour of romance has grown up about the persons 
 and deeds of navigators hke Cohimbus, so that today they 
 seem to tower above the rest of humanity in courage, endur- 
 ance of hardships and sacrifice for ideals. They are regarded 
 as disinterested pioneers prompted by the highest motives 
 and inspired with the lofty desire of carrying civilization to 
 barbarian peoples. Nothing is farther from the truth than 
 this. "It is but a survival of the barbarian past to regard 
 great historic names, not only as brilliant leaders, but also as 
 demigods, though such opinions are still prevalent among 
 many learned as well as ignorant ment.''^ Columbus was 
 only one of a number of navigators who were seeking a new 
 trade route to India. The march of the Mohammedan 
 hordes to the north out of Asia Minor had been going on for 
 more than two centuries, when finally in the middle of the 
 fifteenth century Constantinople fell into their hands and 
 blocked the trade routes to India. 
 
 Goods from the East had for centuries reached Europe 
 by one of the three general routes through Asia. The most 
 southern was a sea route, except for its last few stages, 
 extending from China, Japan and the Malay Archipelago to 
 the Straits of Malacca. Indian and Arabian traders met the 
 Chinese there, the former transporting their goods and trad- 
 ing at ports along the Malabar Coast to Ormuzin in the 
 
 iDietzgen, "Philosophical Essays," p. 104.
 
 24 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Persian Gulf. One line extended across the Arabian Gulf 
 to the Red Sea, where merchandise was frequently carried 
 by caravan to the Nile and shipped down that river to Cairo 
 and Alexandria. 
 
 North of this ran another route, along which goods 
 from the west coast of India reached the Persian Gulf and 
 sailed north, touching a line of ports along the coast. These 
 ports in turn were terminals of caravan routes from the 
 interior of Persia and Northern India. One branch ascended 
 the Tigris to Bagdad, then by land to Tabriz, then westward 
 to the Black Sea or the Mediterranean. Another branch 
 crossed the desert from Bassorah by camels to ports on the 
 Mediterranean. 
 
 North of these routes w^as still another, having its 
 source in the provinces of China and extending to the Cas- 
 pian Sea. This route joined smaller ones running north from 
 the interior of India. North of this main route was one run- 
 ning parallel to it until both formed a junction at Yarkand, 
 in Turkestan. 
 
 "Along these devious and dangerous routes, by junks, 
 by strange Oriental craft, by river-boats, by caravans of 
 camels, trains of mules, in wagons, on horses, or on human 
 shoulders, the products of the East were brought within 
 reach of the merchants of the West." The streams of mer- 
 chandise carried along these routes to the shores of the 
 Mediterranean and the Black Sea were met by Italians from 
 Pisa, Venice, or Genoa ; Spaniards from Barcelona and 
 Valencia, and others from Narbonne, Marseilles and Montpe- 
 lier. The Germans crossed the Alps and took back with 
 them goods for Germany, France and the cities of the 
 Netherlands, while the merchants of the Hanseatic League 
 carried supplies to England and the Baltic countries.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 25 
 
 This traffic reached back for centuries and over these 
 mediaeval trade-routes were shipped the luxuries of the 
 East to the ruling classes of the West. These luxuries con- 
 sisted of spices, drugs, dyes, perfumes, precious stones, silks, 
 rugs, metal goods and fabrics. It was "the most extensive, 
 and the most lucrative trade known to Europe." 
 
 About 1300 these routes began to be disturbed by the 
 rise of the Ottoman Turks in the interior of Asia Minor. 
 Within two centuries they conquered the countries on the 
 eastern and southern borders of the Mediterranean, those 
 clustering around the Black and Aegean Seas. The ports 
 of northern Egypt, of Syria, Asia Minor, and those of the 
 Black and Aegean Seas were controlled by the fierce 
 Mohammedans and the ancient trade-routes from East to 
 West were effectually blocked. The Turks "added to the 
 Moslem contempt for the Christian the warrior's contempt 
 for the mere merchant." Trade and culture had little attrac- 
 tion for them. With the fall of Constantinople in 1453 the 
 transport of luxuries over the old routes was practically at 
 an end. The demand for these goods in European markets 
 could no longer be satisfied in the old way, and this provided 
 the incentive for the eager search for new trade-routes to 
 the Indies.^ 
 
 The merchant traders had to seek new routes for their 
 merchandise, and it was while seeking a westward route that 
 Columbus made his discovery. So the lure of profits, not 
 the love of adventure, was the primal cause of the navigators 
 venturing out into unknown seas. 
 
 Events that followed the landing of the white man on 
 the American continent also confirm this view. The era of 
 
 liSee Cheyney, "The European Background of American History," 
 Chap. II, for maps of these trade routes and a general discussion of 
 the subject.
 
 26 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 colonization is an era of conquest, pillage, enslavement and 
 robbery, the victims being the Indians and the great mass 
 of pauperized workers crowding European shores. Colum- 
 bus himself bears testimony to the sordid motives that 
 guided his policies in the New World. Writing of the natives 
 of one of the Bahama group of islands he informs the king 
 that "Their conversation is the sweetest imaginable; their 
 faces always smiling; and so gentle and so affectionate are 
 they that I swear to your highness there is not a better people 
 in the world."^ Yet in his memorial of the second voyage 
 to the Indies, dated January 30, 1494, and addressed to Fer- 
 dinand and Isabella, Columbus called attention to the pros- 
 pects for gold in the island and to the Indians as a good 
 source of slave labor. He asks for "cattle, provisions and 
 other articles" which may be "sold at moderate prices for 
 account of the bearers; and the latter might be paid with 
 slaves, taken from among the Caribbees, who are a wild people 
 fit for any work, . . . who will be better than any 
 other kind of slaves."* The advice did not fall on deaf ears. 
 Commencing in 1509 "the Spaniards almost depopulated the 
 islands; 40,000 of these innocent aborigines were carried 
 away to a wretched death in the mines of Cuba."" What 
 glorious work for a "Christian navigator" whose virtues are 
 sung in every schoolroom in America ! 
 
 However, in colonizing new countries, a ruling class is 
 face to face with a problem that forces this conquest of bar- 
 barous peoples. The capitalist system can only gain a foot- 
 hold in any new country by compulsory labor of one form or 
 another. In the home countries the ruling classes are in 
 possession of institutions based on thousands of years of 
 
 SThwaites, "The Colonies," p. 239. 
 401d South Leaflets, No. 71. 
 5Thwaites. "The Colonies," p. 239.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 2^ 
 
 history. Land and other forms of production are in the 
 hands of the ruHng classes, and there is no alternative for 
 the workers but to work and produce surplus incomes for 
 others. Custom, tradition, the schoolmaster and the church 
 have in the meantime played their part in making these work- 
 ers resigned to their fate, either as one that is the decree of 
 an all-wise Providence, or of natural laws which to oppose 
 would be folly. Their fathers had been poor, law and religion 
 sanctioned it, and every educational agency had so perverted 
 their perception of their interests that they not only accepted 
 their fate, but shed their blood in behalf of those who lived 
 on their toil. The workers were conquered, intellectually and 
 morally. 
 
 But in new countries the institutions of class rule are 
 absent. What exists is a virgin island or continent with 
 natural resources awaiting the skill of men to transform 
 them into the forms that serve the wants of mankind. The 
 rivers and lakes, forests and harbors, fields and deposits 
 lack the basic character of civilization: that is, they are not 
 the property of a class. Hence, if wealth is to be accumu- 
 lated in such countries the possessor thereof must acquire it 
 by toil. If accumulation through ownership is to be realized 
 — and this is the "ideal" of capitalist society — the land must 
 be seized and thus, by abolishing self-employment, enforced 
 labor will be secured. "Law and order," with all its acces- 
 sories, such as police, judges, armies, etc., will naturally fol- 
 low to guard the conquest against the protests of the prop- 
 ertyless. This has been the historic process in every new 
 country, including America. 
 
 It is not surprising, therefore, that advance agents of 
 the merchant fleecers of Europe, like Columbus, facing the 
 alternative of either working themselves or enslaving others,
 
 28 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 should choose the latter course. Besides, they left the Old 
 World with other visions than a life of hardship and wealth 
 acquired by hazardous toil. "Most of them were adventur- 
 ers, who had embarked with no other expectation than that 
 of getting together a fortune as speedily as possible in the 
 Golden Indies. . . . From the first moment of their 
 landing in Hispaniola they indulged the most wanton license 
 in regard to the unoffending natives, who in the simplicity 
 of their hearts received the white men as messengers from 
 heaven. In less than four years . . . one-third of its 
 population, amounting probably to several hundred thou- 
 sands, were sacrificed ! Such were the melancholy auspices 
 under which the intercourse was opened between the civiHzed 
 white man and the simple natives of the Western world. '"^ 
 The adventurers' thirst for gold prompted Winsor to char- 
 acterize Columbus as "the man who was ambitious to be- 
 come the first slave-driver of the New World."' 
 
 Unless the worker is enslaved or the masters make it 
 difficult for him to have access to natural resources he will 
 occupy the land, which costs nothing, rather than hire 
 out to others and produce a surplus for them. If the capi- 
 talist could export all his institutions to the colonies, if he 
 could call into existence almost over night private possession 
 of resources and have police and military power to enforce 
 obedience, he could start with what he calls "free labor" — 
 that is, labor dependent on him in the beginning. This being 
 impossible, all the twaddle about "free labor," which his intel- 
 lectual police chant, is abandoned and the land is forcibly 
 taken and slavery is introduced. These economic difficulties 
 that faced the merchant adventurers in colonizing the New 
 
 ePrescott, "Ferdinand and Isabella," Vol. II, Chap. XII. 
 "Winsor, "Life of Columbus," Chap. XII.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 29 
 
 World, started them on their career of plunder. "The dis- 
 covery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, 
 enslavement, and entombment in mines of the aboriginal 
 population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the 
 East Indies, the turning of Africa into a warren for the com- 
 mercial hunting of blackskins, signalized the rosy dawn of 
 the era of capitalist production."^ 
 
 The rulers of the Old World solved the question of con- 
 quering the New and securing slave labor in a characteristic 
 fashion. They simply granted great tracts of land to broken- 
 down court favorites and adventurers, transported their help- 
 less paupers as slaves to America, and early in the seven- 
 teenth century began to raid Africa, transforming that 
 country into a bloody shambles to secure further supplies of 
 slave labor. We will notice the land policy first. It was easy 
 to deprive the workers of the soil and make them dependent 
 by giving the land outright to chartered companies of specu- 
 lators. The charters usually gave exclusive powers of sov- 
 ereignty over the domains within the royal grants, and 
 rendered workmen dependent vassals. Most of the colonies 
 were settled by these chartered monopolies. Just as the 
 English ruling class confiscated the common lands and 
 enclosed vast estates and transformed the laborers into vaga- 
 bonds, so the land was taken from beneath the feet of the 
 workers here. Many of the fortunes of settlement times 
 came from these monopolies. The first charter of Virginia, 
 granted by King James in 1606, may be cited as an example 
 of the exclusive powers and privileges given to these adven- 
 turers. 
 
 This grant included an extensive domain along the 
 Atlantic coast for over two hundred miles and inland one 
 
 sMarx, "Capital," Vol. I, p. 479, Humbolt Edition.
 
 30 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 hundred miles, as well as the islands within one hundred 
 miles of the coast. The grant provided that the adven- 
 turers should have "all the lands, woods, soil, grounds, 
 havens, ports, rivers, mines, marshes, waters, fishings, com- 
 modities, and hereditaments whatsoever." It further pro- 
 vided that no others would be permitted "to plant or inhabit 
 behind, or on the back side of them, toward the main land, 
 without the express license or consent of the Council of that 
 Colony." They are granted the right to fortify their terri- 
 tory ; to resist and expel on sea or land any person or persons 
 who attempt to inhabit their domains or to annoy them in 
 any way. They are empowered to confiscate any person or 
 persons, ship or ships, vessels, goods and other furniture, 
 which shall be found trading or trafficking in any harbor, 
 creek or place within the limits of the plantation until they 
 pay two and a half upon every hundred of anything by them 
 trafficked, bought or sold. The loot realized from this legal- 
 ized piracy went to the adventurers for the first twenty-one 
 years ; after that they sent it to the king. They were also 
 exempted from paying any duties levied by the home govern- 
 ment.® Corporate privileges more sweeping than these can 
 scarcely be imagined. 
 
 The empire of these favorites extended from the mouth 
 of the Hudson river to the southern boundary of North 
 Carolina. John Smith catalogues those going to Virginia as 
 "poor gentlemen, tradesmen, serving-men, and libertines." 
 The workers, of course, were not included in the grant of 
 privileges, as they invariably came as bond slaves of the 
 "idle and dissolute adventurers, attracted solely by the hope 
 of speedy fortune."^" These had no intention of staying in 
 
 nBryce. "The American Commonwealth," Abridged Edition, Ap- 
 pendix I. 
 
 loLodge, "History of the English Colonies in America," p. 66.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 3I 
 
 the New World and share in the task of clearing the wil- 
 derness and making civilization possible. They left their 
 wives and children at home in the expectation of returning 
 soon with sufficient wealth to live a life of ease. The com- 
 pany was simply a commercial corporation, the main object 
 of its existence being to swell the incomes of the share- 
 holders. Much is said by historians regarding the religious 
 ideals which they assume inspired many to come to America. 
 But whatever religious motives may have possessed the rul- 
 ing classes and the adventurers it is certain that these served 
 as a convenient shield for the visions of plunder that dom- 
 inated their lives. Thirteen years after the founding of the 
 colony a Dutch ship sailed into Jamestown and sold the first 
 black slaves to Virginia planters. The same year, 1619, young 
 girls were shipped from England and sold as wives in James- 
 town for 120 pounds of tobacco, or about $80 each. A load 
 of convicts also came and were sold into servitude. In 1692 
 an incident occurred that throws some light on the holy 
 aspirations of the land conquerors. "When a delegation from 
 \''irginia were soliciting a charter for the College of William 
 and Mary, on the ground that a higher education was neces- 
 sary as a step towards the salvation of souls by the clergy, 
 he (Attorney General Seymour) blurted out: 'Souls! Damn 
 your souls ! grow tobacco !' "^^ 
 
 The "adventurers" who "founded Virginia" never saw 
 the American coast. They remained in England and invested 
 their money in the venture, while others known as "plant- 
 ers" went as colonists. The history of the corporation is 
 one of swindle and plunder. Many of the planters were 
 defrauded of their proceeds of the venture. Many were in- 
 
 iiThwaites, "The Colonies," pp. 103-104.
 
 2^2 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ducecl to go to Virginia from England by deceptive adver- 
 tisements that promised rich rewards, which were never 
 fulfilled. A large number became mere company hirelings 
 and others tenants. After 1610, one governor established a 
 military system by which workmen were driven in squads 
 to their daily tasks, and severely punished for disobedience. 
 "A persistent neglect of labor was to be punished by galley 
 service from one to three years. Penal servitude was also 
 instituted; for 'petty offenses' they worked 'as slaves in 
 irons for a term of years.' " The victims claimed that there 
 were whippings, hangings, shootings and breaking on the 
 wheel. 
 
 The administration of the colony resembled a prison 
 regime. One authority asserts that the colonist "was kept by 
 force in the colony, and could have no communication with 
 his friends in England. His letters were intercepted by the 
 Company and could be destroyed if they contained anything 
 to the Company's discredit. He was completely at the mercy 
 of the edicts of arbitrary governors, and was forced to accept 
 whatever abridgment of his rights and contract seemed good 
 to the Governor and the Company. His true position was 
 that of a common servant working in the interest of a com- 
 mercial company. . . . His conduct was regulated by 
 corporal punishment or more extreme measures. He could 
 be hired out by the Company to private persons, or by the 
 Governor for his personal advantage."^^ 
 
 So Virginia, based on conquest and tyranny, gradually 
 developed into a class aristocracy that survived the Revolu- 
 tion of 1776, an aristocracy composed of an idle, fox-chasing, 
 gambling, drinking, ruling class ; served by black and white 
 
 i2BalIagh, "White Servitude in the Colony of Virginia," Johns 
 Hopkins University Studies, Chap. I.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 33 
 
 servile labor, controlling church and state, establishing cus- 
 toms, forming current opinions and ruling all classes below 
 it; a society that had little to command our admiration and 
 still less to elicit the praise of historians. 
 
 In 1 68 1 Charles II gave William Penn a proprietary 
 charter of 40,000 square miles in America to liquidate a claim 
 Penn's father, an admiral in the British navy, held against 
 the government. It was a habit in those days for British 
 kings to pay debts or extend royal favors to friends by exten- 
 sive grants of land, and these grants sometimes included land 
 already given to other Englishmen. These conflicting grants 
 frequently caused endless quarreling between rival claimants. 
 It was an easy method of paying debts or advancing royal 
 favorites. It cost kings nothing and only placed the poor, 
 who emigrated to the New World, into the hands of the land 
 kings. Penn proved to be one of the world's greatest land 
 speculators and a promoter of trade in white slaves on a 
 colossal scale, as we shall see in another chapter. Although 
 the rule of Penn was mild compared with the Southern col- 
 onies, the conditions under which the vagrant poor made 
 the voyage to the colony were in some respects more inhu- 
 man than that which developed with the black slave trade.^' 
 In 1682 a pamphlet, the authorship of which is ascribed 
 to Penn, appeared. This was followed by many others, all 
 of them being distributed throughout Europe, but especially 
 in Germany. One authority passes the following judgment 
 on the first document mentioned: "The scheme here pro- 
 posed is to induce men of wealth to take up large tracts of 
 land, and to encourage those of little or no means to settle 
 thereon for the benefit of the rich."'^* The pamphlet was 
 
 isSee chapter on The White Slave Trade. 
 
 i4Karl Frederick Geiser, "Redemptioners and Indentured Servants 
 In Pennsylvania," p. 10. 
 
 3
 
 34 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 carefully written and the terms of settlement for the poor 
 stated in language that would appeal to them. The emigrant 
 was given to understand that here was a rare opportunity to 
 escape the oppression of the Old World and win economic 
 independence. "The dark side of colonial life — subduing the 
 forest, the constant fear of savages, the want of facilities 
 incident to a sparse population — was not represented to them 
 in the mass of literature which advertised the new colonies. 
 For unfavorable reports were carefully suppressed by those 
 whose interests lay in the settlement and growth of the col- 
 ony."^^ 
 
 To further stimulate immigration, agents were sent 
 abroad to induce people to go to America. These were often 
 in the employ of ship captains, the latter promoting the 
 scheme because of the large profits in it. The agents were 
 known as "Neulanders" (Newlanders), who received a com- 
 mission for every one they induced to make the voyage. 
 They resorted to many tricks and devices to increase their 
 incomes. They dressed well and paraded gaudy jewelry to 
 impress their victims with the belief that gold and opulence 
 were easily obtained in America. Letters entrusted to the 
 Neulanders to friends in Europe were opened, and if they 
 contained the truth as to conditions in the colonies they 
 were rewritten by the sharks. Abbe Raynal, writing of these 
 infamous practices, said : "Simple men seduced by these 
 magnificent promises blindly follow these infamous brokers 
 engaged in this scandalous commerce."^^ 
 
 The drain on the population of Germany became large 
 enough to rouse the resentment of the ruling classes who 
 feared an undersupply of laborers and a rise in wages as 
 a consequence. Literature giving a more accurate account 
 
 islbid, p. 12. 
 
 leQuoted by Geiser, p. 19.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 35 
 
 of conditions in America was spread broadcast and laws 
 passed prohibiting the trade of the emigration agents. A 
 colonial newspaper in 1751 contained the following an- 
 nouncement: "The Elector Palatine has issued a com- 
 mand that no Neulanders are to be tolerated in the whole 
 of the Palatinate ; that if captured they shall be thrown into 
 prison."^'' But mandates of princes or other rulers only 
 succeeded in forcing the agents to work in secrecy, and lit- 
 erature continued to be circulated by them. One pamphlet 
 states that cows roam on excellent pasturage the entire year, 
 honey is found in hollow trees, there are wild turkeys in 
 flocks of five hundred, and geese in two hundred. Buffaloes 
 place their heads through cabin windows, bears are smaller 
 and herd with swine, while the alligator is harmless and its 
 lail is good for food !^^ With such tricks and deceptions 
 thousands were lured to the colonies and embarked on a 
 voyage that made them thank their God the moment they 
 were free of the white-slaver ship captains. 
 
 New Netherlands (later New York) was perhaps the 
 nearest approach to the establishment of a feudal regime in 
 America, and remnants of the feudal privileges granted early 
 in the seventeenth century survived the first quarter of the 
 nineteenth century. This province, like Virginia, became a 
 class aristocracy, though, unlike the latter, black slaves did 
 not play any large part in its history. New Netherlands 
 constituted the section of land that the ruling class of Hol- 
 land, through its States General, took for itself. The Dutch 
 West India Company, a chartered corporation of Holland, 
 decided in 1629 to give "any member of the company found- 
 ing a colony of fifty persons the right to an estate with a 
 river frontage of sixteen miles, and of otherwise indefinite 
 
 iTFaust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, p. 62. 
 isibid, p. 64.
 
 36 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 extent, while with these estates went every sort of feudal 
 right, including manorial courts and the privilege of trading 
 within the dominions of the company."^^ The title was made 
 perpetual and the monopoly of trade exclusive except that in 
 furs. ... In these grants the resources of wealth and 
 political power are given with a stroke of the pen to the 
 proprietors. It required no iron collar about the neck of 
 the worker to emphasize his status as a serf under these 
 grants. Out of these little land kingdoms sprang a powerful 
 landed class with mighty estates along the banks of the Hud- 
 son, surrounding themselves with courts in imitation of the 
 ruling princes of the Old World. 
 
 Six years later still greater privileges are granted to 
 the adventurers. Anyone establishing a colony of forty-eight 
 adults is given six years to pay. No one could approach 
 within eight miles of the grant without the proprietor's con- 
 sent. "He and he only was the court with summary powers 
 which were harshly or capriciously exercised. Not 
 only did he impose sentence for violation of laws, but he, 
 himself, ordained those laws. . . . He had full author- 
 ity to appoint officers and magistrates and enact laws. And 
 finally he had the power of policing his domain."^" 
 
 The only redress the workers on these domains had was 
 to appeal to the New Netherlands Council, but the adven- 
 turers generally succeeded in avoiding this by binding the 
 settlers before starting out not to exercise this right.-^ 
 It is not surprising, therefore, that the land kings "encased 
 themselves in an environment of pomp and awe. Like so 
 many petty monarchs each had his distinct flag and insignia ; 
 each fortified his domain with fortresses, armed with cannon 
 
 loLrodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 286. 
 
 2oMyers, "History of the Great American Fortunes," Vol. I, p. 16. 
 
 2iThwaites, "The Colonies," p. 199.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 37 
 
 and manned by his paid soldiery."-- Neither are we sur- 
 prised that any man. or woman servant could not leave the 
 master if the latter violated the terms of the contract, or 
 that the master "forced his tenants to sign covenants that 
 they should trade in nothing than the produce of the manor ; 
 that they should trade nowhere else but at his store; that 
 they should grind their flour at his mill, and buy bread at 
 his bakery, lumber at his sawmills and liquor at his brew- 
 ery."23 
 
 This work of seizing the land as fast as the laborers 
 could be shipped to America placed the latter as securely in 
 the grasp of a colonial ruling class as the evictions from the 
 common lands in Europe did the workers there. In addition 
 to the confiscation was the bond slavery of thousands en- 
 forced by the voyage to the colonies. We reserve the dis- 
 cussion of this white slavery for another chapter. It remains 
 for us to briefly consider a few of the other royal grants 
 that established broken libertines, adventurers, and specu- 
 lators as masters over the workers. 
 
 In 1629 Charles I granted to Lord Baltimore and his 
 heirs the present state of Maryland, and a large part of what 
 is now the state of Delaware, His son succeeded to his 
 titles on his death. "The proprietor could declare war, make 
 peace, appoint all officers, including judges, rule by martial 
 law, pardon criminals and confer titles."^* The Maryland 
 grant was another "business enterprise." To get workers 
 for the colony the purchase of land was not encouraged down 
 to 1682. Land was given in proportion to the number of 
 white slaves imported into the colony by adventurers. The 
 
 22Myers, p. 21. 
 
 23ibid, p. 46. See also Thwaites, p. 199, and Lodge, "History of the 
 English Colonies," p. 327. 
 
 24Thwaites, "The Colonies," p. 82.
 
 38 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 first adventurers were allowed 2,000 acres for a yearly rent 
 of 400 pounds of wheat for every five servants imported, 
 100 acres for less than five servants at a yearly rent of 20 
 pounds of wheat, and fifty acres for those importing children 
 less than sixteen years of age. Those who came later received 
 half as much land and the rent was increased from 400 to 
 600 pounds of wheat. The labor of white slaves formed a 
 lucrative commerce in their transportation and "regular con- 
 tractors began to import them to sell to the planters and 
 themselves receive the certificates for the lands. "^" 
 
 Maryland society later became similar to Virginia, 
 though it may be said that the ruling class of both colonies 
 did not make any pretensions of democracy such as the 
 Puritan aristocracy of New England did. In Maryland 
 there was a savage law code against the black slaves, while 
 the white slaves included imported convicts who worked on 
 the roads in gangs, loaded with irons, and were frequently 
 employed in building houses for the great planters. The 
 other white slaves were kidnaped in Europe, a "business" 
 which we will discuss later. Those who made the voyage to 
 Maryland of their own accord were usually the victims of 
 the emigration agents, who falsified the contracts and added 
 to the terms of servitude.^^ 
 
 The Maryland clergy aped and served the ruling class 
 with a degree of servility perhaps unequaled in any other 
 colony. It was no uncommon thing for them to be found 
 drunk or to extort marriage fees from the poor and refusing 
 to go on with the ceremony until their demands were 
 granted. They "set decency and public opinion at defiance. 
 They hunted, raced horses, drank, gambled, and were the 
 
 25See McCormac, "White Servitude in Maryland," Johns Hopkins 
 University Studies, Chap. 2. 
 
 zeLodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 126.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 39 
 
 boon companions of the wealthy planters. . . . They 
 became a by-word in the other colonies, and every itinerant 
 clergyman who was a low fellow and a disgrace to his pro- 
 fession passed under the cant name of a 'Maryland par- 
 son.' "'" With land and political power in the hands of a 
 few slave masters and a rotten clergy to chant their praises, 
 there was little hope for the workers of Maryland, even if 
 large numbers of them were not in a species of slavery yet 
 to be discussed. 
 
 In 1629 Charles I granted North Carolina to his attor- 
 ney general, as "the province of Carolana," on condition that 
 he should colonize it within a reasonable time. The condi- 
 tion was not complied with, but settlers, who by 1663 had 
 purchased land from Indians, were robbed by Charles II, who 
 gave the territory to eight royal favorites, "gentlemen who 
 had done him inestimable services." The following year the 
 speculators secured a new charter, which granted to them 
 additional land, which included the southern half of what 
 is now the United States and which was intended to extend 
 as far west as the Pacific.-* This colony developed the most 
 atrocious type of slavery, a type that scarcely had a redeem- 
 ing feature. The cultivation of rice and indigo in the swamp 
 lands of the colony proved deadly to white men, so that 
 early in the eighteenth century the demand for black slaves 
 was enormous. By 1765 they numbered more than 100,000. 
 In one year the slave would produce more rice than sufficed 
 to pay his value. In other words, it became profitable to 
 work the slaves to death. The rich planters did not live on 
 the plantations in the swamps, but retired to Charleston, 
 leaving overseers in charge. The slaves became prematurely 
 
 27Ibid, p. 123. 
 28lbid, p. 125.
 
 40 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 old, presenting a marked contrast to the slaves of the other 
 colonies. In Charleston the masters lived a life of ease, at- 
 tended by slaves, drinking, gambling, and attending dinners, 
 balls and concerts. Their lives were dissipated and drunk- 
 enness in that climate usually brought early death. "Their 
 mortality was so marked that the women, who contented 
 themselves with . . . water . . . always mar- 
 ried two or three times.""^ 
 
 These chartered companies of rich freebooters played 
 an important part in settling North America. About fifty 
 or sixt)'^ of them were chartered by England, Holland, 
 France, Denmark and Sweden, all of them being inspired by 
 the prospect of fortunes to be secured from the traffic.^" In 
 many cases they held almost feudal powers, and were thinly 
 disguised plundering expeditions, operating under the sanc- 
 tion of law. They were "primarily commercial bodies seek- 
 ing dividends, and only secondarily colonization societies 
 sending over settlers."^^ When Marx said that capital came 
 into the world "dripping with blood and dirt, from every 
 pore," the statement was as true of its origin here as in 
 Europe. 
 
 The examples of wholesale confiscation of land in 
 America suffice to show the methods employed to establish 
 an aristocracy of wealth and to render poor immigrants from 
 the Old World dependent on the land kings. The first forms 
 of capital, instead of being based on "thrift," "industry," and 
 hard work, were accumulated through theft, piracy and 
 fraud. The former theory is taught in the schools and the 
 latter by history. The schoolmasters and historians have 
 
 29lbid, p. 185. See also Thwaites, "The Colonies," p. 99. 
 soSee Cheyney, "The European Background of American History," 
 Chap. VII, for a list of these corporations. 
 
 siLodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 165.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 4I 
 
 employed such skill in telling of the past that the land con- 
 quests do not linger even as a memory with the laborers 
 today. It was not so in the beginning of the nineteenth cen- 
 tury. The first great labor movement in America, beginning 
 in the first quarter of the last century, had not forgotten the 
 methods of the colonial masters in enslaving the workers. 
 For example, the Workingmen's Party, in New York, in 
 1829, declared "that the first appropriation of the soil by the 
 state to private and exclusive possession was eminently bar- 
 barous and unjust. That it was substantially feudal in char- 
 acter, inasmuch as those who received enormous and unequal 
 possessions were lords, and those who received little or noth- 
 ing were vassals."^- The workers of today have forgotten 
 this historical truth which their fathers proclaimed nearly a 
 century ago. 
 
 The confiscation of land did not stop with the original 
 charter grants. It was continued by royal governors sent to 
 America by the rulers of Europe. As fast as the frontier 
 was pushed westward, land was given by governors to spec- 
 ulators or sold to them, or the Indians were given whiskey 
 and when they recovered from their stupor found they had 
 been traded or cheated out of their lands. One authority says : 
 "Broken-down court favorites considered an appointment to 
 the colonies as governor a means of retrieving fallen for- 
 tunes, and made little attempt to conceal their sordid purpose. 
 The members of the council were often admitted to a share 
 of the spoils, and official morality was much of the time in a 
 low condition. "^^ Colonel Fletcher, one governor of New 
 York, was a conspicuous example of these grafters. Gov- 
 ernor Bellomont, in 1700, one of the few honest governors 
 of that time, repeatedly wrote to the Lords of Trade in Lon- 
 
 32Myers, "History of the Great American Fortunes," Vol. I, p. 172. 
 33Thwaites, "Tlie Colonies," p. 110.
 
 42 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 don calling attention to Fletcher's acts. Fletcher "was in 
 league with the pirates who infested the coast, openly sold 
 them licenses, and is even said to have shared their spoils; 
 while at the same time he plundered the revenue and connived 
 at smuggling and every sort of illicit trade.""* He also gave 
 great tracts of land away for trifling sums. In 1698 Bello- 
 mont charged Fletcher with having embraced a notorious 
 pirate who had returned from India with plunder; that he 
 sold protections commonly rated at $100 per man ; that pro- 
 tections were publicly offered for sale at these rates, and that 
 other officials shared in the graft.^^ 
 
 By the middle of the eighteenth century land speculat- 
 ing companies came into existence. The Ohio company, of 
 which George Washington became a prominent member, 
 was organized in 1749. King George generously gave 
 these speculators 500,000 acres, on which they were to 
 plant one hundred families and maintain a fort.'^ In 1787, 
 while Washington was presiding over the secret constitu- 
 tional convention at Philadelphia, the agent of the company, 
 Manasseh Cutler, a preacher ( !), was in New York "steer- 
 ing" through Congress what McMaster calls "the first great 
 'land job' of the republic." This steal was accomplished 
 with all the arts of the professional lobbyist, many members 
 of Congress sharing in the spoil. Five millions of acres of 
 land were disposed of at two-thirds of a dollar per acre, but 
 as payments were made in depreciated currency, the real 
 price was not far from eight or nine cents per acre.^'' While 
 Washington was serving his first term the same corporation, 
 
 34Lodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 301. 
 
 35Hart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, pp. 
 245-246. 
 
 36Th-waites, "The Colonies," p. 283. 
 
 37McMaster, in his "History of the People of the United States," 
 Vol. I, pp. 507-513, gives a very interesting account of the entire trans- 
 action.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 43 
 
 in 1792, secured another concession of nearly one million 
 acres, paying for it in certificates of public debt and army 
 land warrants purchased at a heavy discount.'® Enormous 
 profits were made by the speculators. They constituted a 
 strong element of the ruling class during the colonial period 
 and long after the Revolution. We shall later see a land 
 and navigation corporation initiating a movement that 
 resulted in the meeting of a constitutional convention behind 
 closed doors at Philadelphia. 
 
 Land grants and steals in behalf of adventurers and 
 speculators have continued down to the present day. It 
 would be tiresome to review the different methods by which 
 wholesale thefts of land have been accomplished, and par- 
 ticularly with the rise of railway corporations. That these 
 thefts have not ceased is evident from the Ballinger-Pinchot 
 controversy now^^ disturbing the dull routine of Congress. 
 Most of the railway companies have either stolen great tracts 
 of land or had their agents in legislative bodies vote land to 
 them. The same is true of land speculators and other groups 
 of "public spirited" pilferers. 
 
 We have briefly traced the causes that led to the dis- 
 covery and settlement of America and found them to lie in 
 the commercial interests of the ruling classes of Europe. 
 The rise of the Ottoman Turks blocked the trade-routes 
 over which had flowed for centuries the costly foods, drugs, 
 jewels and other luxuries that gave ease and comfort to 
 manor lords, princes, kings, and others of the ruling classes. 
 Then came the feverish search for new routes by water, 
 the fact that the earth is round having become generally ac- 
 cepted among educated men at that time. The discovery 
 
 38Myers, "History of the Great American Fortunes," Vol. II, p. 16. 
 39March, 1910.
 
 44 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 made by Columbus followed in its natural order. The news 
 of a vast continent to the West naturally conjured dreams 
 of gold and conquest, and the chartered corporations, 
 clothed with all the powers of government and sharing 
 their plunder with kings and emperors, were a logical se- 
 quence of the preceding events.*" 
 
 Commerce and profits are the guiding motives of ruling 
 classes since the passing of feudal society, and these mo- 
 tives guided the "statesmanship" of the powerful men who 
 landed in America, representing, as they did, commercial 
 corporations financed in the European countries. Enough 
 has been said to show that, in the main, since the white 
 man landed on American shores, the natural resources of 
 this country have been appropriated by ruling classes and 
 their kin because they had the power to take them. Pos- 
 sessing political power and excluding the workers from the 
 franchise, it was easy for the wealthy classes to legalize 
 their methods and enforce their conquests with the civil, po- 
 lice and military powers which control of government gives. 
 It now remains for us to consider the character of the white 
 servitude established by the colonial rulers and the "fathers" 
 of our country. 
 
 40We have quoted a number of authorities to vindicate this Judg- 
 ment. The following will also be interesting to the reader: "Of South 
 Carolina, the first settlement was founded by the proprietors, and re- 
 sembled in its origin an investment of capital by a company of land 
 jobbers, who furnished the emigrants with the means of embarking for 
 America, established on its shores their own commercial agent, and 
 undertook for themselves the management of all commercial trans- 
 actions."— Bancroft, "History of the United State," Vol. 11, p. 166.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 45 
 
 Chapter III 
 
 White Slavery in the Colonies 
 
 Marx has said that "A great deal of capital, which ap- 
 pears today in the United States without any certificate 
 of birth, was yesterday, in England, the capitalized blood 
 of children."^ The same holds true of men and women of 
 other countries of Europe. By the beginning of the seven- 
 teenth century the beggared population of England became 
 a "problem" to the ruling class. The extension of the 
 wool trade gave added stimulus to the eviction of the 
 poor from the land and transforming great estates of fer- 
 tile soil into sheep pastures. The gulf between the plun- 
 derers and their victims widened and the desperate pov- 
 erty of the latter increased the fear of labor revolts. "Col- 
 onization was thought by many to be the only means of 
 obtaining permanent relief from the pressing political and 
 economic dangers of pauperism."^ But even this pauper- 
 ism was not permitted to be an unprofitable by-product of 
 land thefts. The American colonies were regarded as a 
 convenient dumping ground for these unfortunates, so that 
 between the years 1661 and 1668 various proposals were 
 made to the king and council to constitute an office for 
 transporting to the plantations all vagrants, rogues and idle 
 persons that could give no account of themselves, felons 
 who had the benefit of clergy, and such as were convicted 
 
 iMarx, "Capital," p. 479. Humbolt Edition. 
 2Thwaites, "The Colonies," p. 65.
 
 46 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 of petty larceny — such persons to be transported to the 
 nearest seaport and to serve four years if over twenty 
 years of age, and seven years if under twenty. It was poor 
 wretches Hke these in England, Germany and other coun- 
 tries who were seized upon to provide white slave labor 
 for the colonies. 
 
 This cheap, servile labor was essential to the society 
 planted by the corporations in the New World. Trans- 
 ported laborers could not be held to their tasks of producing 
 wealth for others unless prevented by force from producing 
 for themselves. The natural resources were corporate prop- 
 erty before the workers touched the Atlantic Coast, while 
 their beggared condition forced them to sell themselves to 
 pay their cost of transportation across the seas. 
 
 There were several classes of these slaves and perhaps 
 the best general description of their servitude is given by 
 the historian, McMaster. After describing the status of the 
 black slaves he says : 
 
 "One step above these slaves were the convict bond- 
 servants, or men and women in a state of temporary in- 
 voluntary servitude. These people were either political 
 offenders or felon convicts. Those guilty of political of- 
 fenses, as the Scots taken in battle in 1650, the prisoners 
 captured at the battle of Worcester in 165 1. Monmouth's 
 men, 1685, the Scots concerned in the uprising of 1678, the 
 Jacobins of 1716, the Scots who went out in 1745, were, 
 of course, of this class of offenders ; and during that period, 
 between 1650 and 1745, as many as four thousand are 
 known to have been sent over to this country. 
 
 "The felons formed the great source of supply, and 
 had been sent over in very considerable numbers from 
 the earliest days of colonization. . . . One historian
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 47 
 
 of Maryland declares that up to the Revolution twenty 
 thousand came to that colony and half of them after 1750. 
 Another authority . . . asserts that between 1715 and 
 I775> ten thousand felons were exported from the Old 
 Bailey Prison in London. 
 
 "But the indentured servant and redemptioner did not 
 cease to come when the colonies became the United States. 
 Speaking generally, the indentured servants were men, 
 women and even children, who, unable to pay their pas- 
 sage, signed a contract called an indenture^ before leaving 
 the Old World. This indenture bound the owner or master 
 of the ship to transport them to America, and bound the 
 emigrant after arrival in America to serve the owner, or 
 their assigns, for a certain number of years. On reaching 
 port the owner or master, whose servants they then became, 
 sold them for their passage to the highest bidder, or for zvhat 
 he could get. 
 
 "The redemptioner, on the other hand, was an immi- 
 grant who signed no indenture before embarking, but agreed 
 with the shipping merchant that after reaching America he 
 should be given a certain time (generally a month) in 
 which to find somebody to redeem him by paying the 
 passage money, or freight, as it was called. Should he 
 fail to find a redeemer within a specified time, the ship cap- 
 tain was at liberty to sell him to the highest bidder. . . . 
 
 "When a ship laden with one to three hundred such 
 persons arrived, we will say at Philadelphia, the immigrants, 
 arranged in a long line, were marched at once to a magis- 
 trate and forced to take an oath of allegiance to the king or, 
 later, to the United States, and then marched back to the 
 
 3The name comes from the practice of tearing the contract into 
 two halves, with jagged edges; the master kept one and the slave 
 the other. 1 a [
 
 48 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ship to be sold. If a purchaser was not forthcoming 
 they were frequently sold to speculators*^ who 
 drove them, chained together, sometimes through the coun- 
 try, from farm to farm, in search of a purchaser. 
 
 "The contract signed, the newcomer became in the eyes 
 of the law a slave, and in both the civil and criminal code 
 was classed with negro slaves and Indians. None could 
 marry without consent of the master or mistress under pen- 
 alty of an addition of one year's service to the time set forth 
 in the indenture. They were worked hard, were dressed in 
 the cast-off clothes of their owners, and might he flogged as 
 often as the master or mistress thought necessary. 
 Father, mother and children could be sold to different 
 buyers."^ 
 
 The only difference between these white slaves, sold 
 in American ports, and the blacks was that the slavery of 
 the whites was limited and the blacks were slaves for life. 
 The white slaves were sold in all the colonies, though New 
 England's supply was smaller than the middle and southern 
 colonies. It may be said with truth that both black and 
 white slaves formed the basis of the landed aristocracy 
 of the colonies befdre and long after the Revolution. Yet 
 this fact is suppressed by most historians in order that 
 historic figures, who witnessed the auction of white la- 
 borers without a protest, and some of whom were inter- 
 ested in the traffic, might be glorified. It was a modified 
 
 4These dealers in white slaves were known as "soul drivers" and 
 were cordially hated by the workers throughout the colonies. 
 
 sMcMaster, "The Acquisition of the Political, Social and Industrial 
 Rights of Man in America," pp. 32-35. This book is a scholarly sum- 
 mary of the economic, social and political status of the workers from 
 the Revolution to the middle of the nineteenth century. If the facts 
 given by the author were generally known by workingmen they would 
 revolutionize the popular conception of American history. It seems, 
 therefore, more than a coincidence that the book, published in 1903, 
 has been limited to 500 copies!
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 49 
 
 form of chattel slavery and admirably served the purposes 
 of the classes who confiscated the land or inherited it from 
 those who did. With the resources of life in their hands 
 and whites and blacks held in servitude, the ruling classes 
 had all the advantages that the masters of any age might 
 wish. 
 
 But we have not exhausted our review of the life of 
 these forgotten white slaves in quoting McMaster's excel- 
 lent summary. The oldest document recognizing the exist- 
 ence of Harvard college is a pamphlet entitled "New 
 England's First Fruits." It is dated "Boston, Sept. 26, 
 1642," and gives an account of the experience and needs of 
 the settlers. One of their appeals to Englishmen is to stir 
 up "some well-minded to cloath and transport over poore 
 children, Boyes and Girles, which may be a great mercy to 
 their bodies and soules."® It would thus seem that New 
 England "democracy" was alive to the value of bond-labor. 
 It also becam.e the fashion to place paupers up at public 
 auction in Boston and other New England towns and sell 
 them to the lowest bidder for their support.' New Jersey^ 
 followed this simple Puritan plan as did New York,'* where 
 their children were also sold as apprentices. New England 
 "democracy" found its way over into Pennsylvania and 
 blessed the workers there with its presence. We are in- 
 formed that in this colony "The class of indentured servants 
 was not recruited from immigrants alone. The courts of 
 this period (1684) and for many years after, frequently 
 sentenced freemen to be sold into servitude for a period of 
 years in order to liquidate fines or other debts. . . .; 
 
 eOld South Leaflets, No. 51. 
 
 TLodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 441. 
 
 sibid, p. 276. 
 
 slbld, p. 327.
 
 50 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 orphan children were brought to the court to be 'adjudged,' 
 there being on one occasion, in the Chester county court, in 
 1697, thirty-three zuhose terms of service were fixed by the 
 court:"^" It was New England "democracy" that also set 
 the fashion in punishing offenders with whipping, branding, 
 cropping, mutilation, the pillory and the stocks. 
 
 To be sure that "democracy" was securely established 
 in Massachusetts the colonial legislature, in 1641, adopted 
 a "Body of Liberties" among which there was a provision 
 that "There shall be no bond slaverie ( !) Villinage of Cap- 
 tivitie amongst us unless it be lawfull captives taken in just 
 warres, and such strangers as willingly ( ! !) selle themselves 
 or are sold to us." To clinch the "liberties" the poor were 
 enjoying the death penalty was provided for any who con- 
 spired or attempted rebellion against "our frame of politic 
 or government fundamentallie."" It would certainly be a 
 dull-witted fellow who could not appreciate these "liber- 
 ties." 
 
 The fact that white servitude was not as general in 
 New England as in the colonies to the South, does not 
 necessarily mean that "free labor" was allowed to reap the 
 reward of high wages that usually comes of a scarcity of 
 labor. The Puritan aristocracy met this scarcity by iixitig 
 wages by law. As early as 1633 Massachusetts Bay colony 
 adopted a statute commanding that carpenters, sawyers, 
 masons, bricklayers, tilers, joiners, wheelwrights, mowers 
 and other workmen were not to receive more than two 
 shillings per day, each paying his own board, or if furnished 
 with living they might receive fourteen pence per day. The 
 constable and two others associated with him was to fix 
 
 loGeiser, "Redemptioners and Indentured Servants in Pennsylva- 
 nia," p. 28. 
 
 iiTliwaites, "The Colonies," pp. 138-139.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 5I 
 
 the rates of pay of inferior workmen in tlie same occupa- 
 tions. Other classes of workmen also had their wages fixed 
 by law. An employer who paid more than the legal rates, 
 as he would be tempted to do during a brisk demand for 
 labor, or the workman who accepted wages higher than 
 the legal rate, were both subjected to penalties for violating 
 the law. Lest these regulations might provoke the workers 
 to refuse to work at all the "virtues" of thrift and industry 
 were encouraged by providing that there should be no idle- 
 ness, and the workman who indulged in this peculiar privi- 
 lege of the aristocracy was subjected to a penalty fixed by 
 law. 
 
 One year after the passage of this act there was an 
 increase in the demand for labor and the clause penalizing 
 the employers for paying wages higher than the legal rates 
 was repealed. The towns were then authorized to appoint a 
 board of three men to fix wages when the employers and 
 workmen failed to agree. As the workers had no political 
 power it is evident that the town boards always represented 
 the masters and any interference was seldom to their disad- 
 vantage. While the employers were exempt from penalties 
 for violating the act the workmen continued to be fined. 
 The law was later repealed, but another took its place in 
 1636 giving towns jurisdiction in fixing wages. But in 1640 
 prices collapsed and there was danger of the workers reap- 
 ing some benefits from the lower prices. The colonial 
 legislature then went over the heads of the towns and com- 
 manded the workmen to reduce wages to correspond zt'itJi 
 reduced prices and those who failed to respond were fined 
 as usual.^^ 
 
 Massachusetts at the same time bound out criminals 
 
 i2See Carroll D. Wright's "Industrial Evolution of the United 
 States," Chap. IX.
 
 52 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 to labor as apprentices. The whipping post was in frequent 
 use to punish servants, and when whipped the term of servi- 
 tude was doubled. The towns also legislated in the matter 
 of wages, Dorchester, for example, in 1641 orders common 
 laborers to work for certain rates during the year, the first 
 period, March to August, for 28d. a day; the second, 
 August to October, I5d. a day; the third, October to Decem- 
 ber, 1 2d. a day, and the fourth, December to March, i5d. 
 a day.^^ Connecticut also fixed the wages of workmen in 
 1641. Workingmen were also subject to compulsory serv- 
 ice for the towns or for private employers, the impressment 
 being enforced as though it were a military duty. The 
 laborers were worked at regular harvest wages fixed by 
 statute. 
 
 The fining of laborers for evading the statutes and 
 allowing the employer to go free was frequent. "The con- 
 trast in treatment of employer and employed, in the attempt 
 to fine one and not the other for the same offense, reflects 
 the notion of the time regarding labor."^* Blessed Puritan 
 Paradise, where Deacon Tenpercent robbed his laborers by 
 statute law and broke the same law with impunity ! 
 
 Work was plenty in New England and laborers were 
 not sufficient to serve the needs of the employing class. 
 The real wage was low as "the workingman was obliged 
 to pay comparatively high prices"^^ for everything. Agri- 
 cultural laborers received wages from 1752 to 1760 averag- 
 ing thirty-one cents per day; butchers in 1780 were paid 
 thirty-three and carpenters fifty-two cents. On the eve 
 
 isWeeden, "Economic and Social History of New England," Vol. I, 
 p. 173. See also Channing and Hart, "American History Leaflets," No. 
 31. January, 1901. 
 
 i4Weeden, "Economic and Social History of New England," Vol. I, 
 pp. 82-83. 
 
 loWright, "Industrial Evolution of the United States," p. 110.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 53 
 
 of the Revolution (1774) the wages in the colonies were 
 about seven shillings, a sum less than two dollars per week, 
 and "on such a pittance it was only by the strictest economy 
 that a mechanic kept his children from starvation and him- 
 self from jail/'^'^ 
 
 Although black and white slave labor were not abun- 
 dant in New England, the policy of fixing wages by law gave 
 the ruling classes all the cheap labor they desired. These 
 facts compel one conservative historian to admit that "An 
 aristocracy unquestionably existed in New England from 
 the beginning, always possessing great power, and fully 
 recognized, "^^ Yet Carroll D. Wright asserts that "The 
 colonists secured one thing which the workingman appre- 
 ciated. They were free (?) men ; they were not tied to the 
 soil ; such servitude which had wrought great evil under the 
 feudal system being utterly forbidden. "^^ He also regards 
 this legislation as a sort of mania rather than an example 
 of class rule by the wealthy. Yet this mania for keeping 
 down the wages of the workers through the agency of 
 courts, constables, fines and foul prisons did not extend to a 
 like regulation of the incomes of the wealthy classes. On 
 this point the aristocracy was perfectly "sane." But this 
 fact has no significance for the late labor commissioner of 
 the United States. 
 
 What has been said of "free labor" in New England is 
 true in large measure of the same class of workmen in the 
 other colonies. We have dwelt upon it at some length 
 because of the persistent advertising of New England as 
 "the cradle of democracy in America." We shall later see 
 
 leMcMaster, "ITistory of the People of the United States." Vol. 
 I, p. 9<;. 
 
 iTLodge, "riistorv of the English Colonies," p. 442. 
 
 isWright, "The industrial Evolution of the United States," p. 113.
 
 54 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 these Puritan upstarts engaging in the slave trade while 
 denouncing slavery ; developing smuggling as a fine art, and 
 establishing vile prisons for poor laborers unable to pay 
 their debts. For the present we return to a consideration 
 of the unfortunate white laborers who were bought and sold 
 in the colonies. 
 
 There is abundant evidence to show that the life of the 
 indentured slaves was hard and cruel. In fact, some of the 
 legislation applying to them recalls the bloody legislation 
 against the poor in the Old World. There are, of course, 
 some works that have come down to us that give a favorable 
 picture of the life of these slaves, but in most cases these 
 works were written by those interested in the white slave 
 trade or their agents and are, therefore, untrustworthy. 
 Lucy Maynard Salmon in her excellent book^^ mentions a 
 number of these works. The fact that today glowing ac- 
 counts are sent by ship agents and capitalist firms to Euro- 
 pean countries advertising alleged opportunities in America, 
 indicates that modern sweaters are merely following the 
 example of the Puritan slavers of two centuries ago. 
 
 The laws directed against disobedience and misde- 
 meanors of white slaves were rigorous. Those calling for 
 the severest punishments were generally offenses against 
 property — the god of capitalist civilization. In Virginia, in 
 1610, pilfering on the part of launderers, laundresses, 
 bakers, cooks and dressers of fish is punished with whip- 
 ping and imprisonment ; for purloining flour and meal given 
 out for baking purposes, offenders have their ears sliced off ; 
 for the second offense a year imprisonment and for the third 
 offense, three years. This brutal treatment produced a reac- 
 
 i9"Domestic Service." In the third chapter the auther gives an 
 interesting digest of laws in the colonies applying to white slaves.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 55 
 
 tion and by 1700 laws were being enacted prescribing limits 
 to the punishment allowed and in some cases providing pen- 
 alties for violation of the acts. The laws included better 
 provision for their food, clothing, shelter and medical 
 attendance ; against bodily maiming, whipping without the 
 consent of the proper authorities and other regulations 
 which throw considerable light on the treatment they were 
 subjected to. 
 
 Fugitive slave laws as applied to these slaves were a 
 part of the legislation in all colonies. The laws generally 
 provided penalties for both fugitives and those who gave 
 them shelter or aided them in any way to escape. The pen- 
 alty for fugitives generally included an addition to their 
 terms of servitude which varied in each colony. Advertise- 
 ments appear in all the colonial newspapers. The following, 
 from the Virginia Gazette (Williamsburg), July 14, 1737, 
 may be cited as an example of hundreds : 
 
 "Ran away some time in June last from William Pierce 
 of Nansemond county, near Mr. Theophilus Pugh's, mer- 
 chant ; a convict servant woman, named Winifred Thomas. 
 She is Welsh woman, short, black hair'd and young ; marked 
 on the inside of her right arm with gunpowder W. T. and 
 the date of the year underneath. She knits and spins, and 
 is supposed to be gone by the way of Cureatuck and Roan- 
 oke inlet. Whoever brings her to her master shall be paid 
 a pistole besides what the law allows, paid by William 
 Pierce.""^ 
 
 It will be noted that this woman serf had her initials 
 and the date when she was purchased branded on her right 
 arm. 
 
 2o"DocumeTitary History of American IndustrLal Society," Vol. L 
 p. 346.
 
 56 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Virginia had an elaborate code fixing the status of 
 white slaves and some features were shocking in the ex- 
 treme. Among the large number of laborers who left 
 Europe were individuals who had acquired a good education 
 and were fully competent teachers. These had either failed 
 in higher pursuits or being convicted of some offense had 
 been shipped to Virginia and sold as convicts. It was not 
 unusual, therefore, for a wealthy planter to purchase an 
 educated man as a teacher for his children. They were sub- 
 jected to corporal punishment the same as other servants. 
 The number of lashes was administered in installments of 
 ten strokes at different intervals, thus rendering the punish- 
 ment doubly excruciating.^^ 
 
 One of the common offenses in the 17th century was 
 bastardy, due in part to the degraded character of many 
 servants, men and women, who came or were shipped to the 
 colony, and the fact that many of the women were at the 
 mercy of their masters and forced to enter into illicit rela- 
 tions with them. Masters also opposed marriage among the 
 women servants as this often meant an interruption of their 
 work through confinement and the birth and care of chil- 
 dren, while the death of a mother meant the loss of the sum 
 invested in her. Their indentures often rendered it difficult 
 to marry. "Many of this class of women were exposed to 
 improper advances on their masters' part, as they were, by 
 their situation, very much in the power of these masters, 
 who, if inclined to licentiousness, would not be slow to use 
 it." The work in the fields and barns and associations after 
 their hours of labor also rendered them easy victims of the 
 lowest class of brutalized laborers and masters. 
 
 Numerous laws were passed to punish the crime of 
 
 2iBruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. I, p. 621.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 57 
 
 bastardy. Anthony Delmasse and Jane Butterfield were 
 each given thirty lashes in 1642 for this crime and separated 
 until legally united. The punishment of women offenders 
 was generally more severe than for men, the latter gen- 
 erally escaping by paying a fine or some other form of pun- 
 ishment. Sometimes the man was only required to appear 
 before the parish church and confess his sin, while the 
 woman was given a brutal whipping. In 1649 a woman was 
 given fourteen lashes, while the father of her child was 
 sentenced to build a bridge across a creek. 
 
 "After the middle of the century, the offense of 
 bastardy became more frequent than ever, owing to the 
 rapid increase in the number of female domestic and agri- 
 cultural servants, who were imported into the colony." In 
 1663 fourteen cases were tried in one county at one session 
 of court, and in 1688 at least three servant women of one 
 master gave birth to illegitimate children.-^ 
 
 One important duty of the church wardens was to see 
 that the parish was saved from expense in cases of bastardy. 
 When a female servant gave birth to a child, the father of 
 which was her master, they were authorized to sell her for 
 a period of two years, the sum being paid in tobacco to the 
 parish. Sometimes they compelled the father to give bond 
 that the child would not become a charge of the parish dur- 
 ing the servitude of the mother. Sometimes when masters 
 were fined for this offense the violated mothers were re- 
 required to repay their masters by an extension of their 
 terms of servitude. 
 
 Near the close of the century, church wardens were 
 empowered to bind out illegitimate boys until they were 
 thirty years old. Their power to enforce this with regard to 
 
 22Bruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. I, Chap. V.
 
 58 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 orphan children until they were twenty years old was also 
 frequently exercised. Poor children, whose parents were 
 unable to provide for them properly, were also bound out 
 for a long term of years. "^ 
 
 One historian affirms that "By the acts giving the mas- 
 ter additions of time for the birth of a bastard child to his 
 servant, a premium was actually put upon immorality, and 
 there appears to have been masters base enough to take 
 advantage of it."-* 
 
 The frequency of runaways brought about the pass 
 system by which persons leaving the colony were required 
 to secure g pass. Other punishments, such as whipping, 
 branding on the cheek with the letter R, increasing the 
 terms of servitude from two to seven years, sometimes 
 served in irons, were provided for those who were taken up 
 as runaways.-^ 
 
 There was always the temptation for masters to harbor 
 runaway slaves because of the scarcity of labor and each 
 colony prescribed penalties — generally fines — for offenders. 
 Maryland punished slaves, who aided fugitives, with lashes, 
 not to exceed thirty-nine, on the bare back. The colonial 
 legislatures also provided standing rewards, some payable 
 in cash, others in cloth or tobacco, to those who aided in 
 the capture of runaways. Fugitive and disobedient serv- 
 ants, as they were usually called, suffered humiliating cor- 
 poral punishment prescribed by law. This generally took 
 the form of public whipping, the number of lashes being 
 prescribed as in the case of North Carolina where the jus- 
 tice of the peace directs the constable to give strokes "not 
 
 23lbid, Vol. I, Chap. IX. Prof. Bruce's work is a great achievement 
 and contains a mass of information bearing on the status of servants. 
 24Ballagh, "Wliite Servitude in the Colony of Virginia," p. 79. 
 2nlbid, pp. 54-57, passim.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 59 
 
 exceeding the number of thirty-nine, well laid on, on the 
 back of such runaway." Bartering with white slaves or 
 buying from them is a crime punished with fines or whip- 
 ping or both. Other harsh laws were enacted tending to 
 make more secure the servitude of these unfortunates. 
 
 The attempt in North Carolina to establish a feudal 
 system rendered the workers subject to manor lords who 
 could not leave the master's land without written permission. 
 Here the laws regarding bastardy were similar to Virginia's, 
 the offending masters who violated their female servants 
 generally escaping punishment while the mother was sold 
 and the money went into the coffers of the church. An act 
 of 1 74 1 stated that "Whereas many women servants are 
 begotten with child by freemen or servants, to the great 
 prejudice of their master or mistress whom they serve," etc. 
 The language indicates that seduction of girls was not an 
 unusual thing.^° 
 
 We have already mentioned that these bond slaves 
 worked on the highways of i\'Iaryland in chains and that 
 little discrimination was made in the treatment of men and 
 women. In this colony they were generally worked without 
 mercy. A document written in 1679 states that "The serv- 
 ants and negroes (in Maryland), after they have worn 
 themselves down the whole day, and gone home to rest, have 
 yet to grind and pound the grain, which is generally maize, 
 for their masters and all their families as well as them- 
 selves, and all the negroes to eat."^'^ Working under such 
 harsh conditions it is not surprising that runaways were 
 numerous. In fact, they became so frequent that it became 
 hazardous for anyone to venture on a journey, especially if 
 
 26Bassett, "Slavery and Servitude in the Colony of North Carolina," 
 Johns Hopkins University Studies, Chap. "V. 
 
 27Hart, "Source Book of American History," p. 50.
 
 6o THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 poorly clothed, as it was the custom of sheriffs to lock such 
 suspicious characters up. They were then advertised in the 
 papers and in some cases, if no owner was found within a 
 certain time, were sold to defray their charges."^ Benjamin 
 Franklin tells somewhere in his Autobiography of his fear 
 of being jailed as a runaway during his memorable walk 
 from Boston to Philadelphia where he became famous. 
 
 For a time Maryland made desertion by a servant pun- 
 ishable with death, and those aiding fugitives were subject 
 to the same penalty. This law was superseded a few years 
 later by one which provided that fugitives should serve 
 double the time of their absence and pay the costs and dam- 
 ages by servitude. The pass system was also adopted and 
 some of the colonies entered into agreements for the return 
 of fugitive servants. Maryland offered standing rewards 
 to the people of other colonies for the capture of runaways 
 and a captured freeman who could not pay the costs was 
 sold into servitude.-^ Some of the more degraded type of 
 women servants in Maryland contracted marriages with 
 slaves and a law of 1664 required that such women shouM 
 serve their masters during the life of their husbands, while 
 the children of such marriages became slaves for life. "In- 
 stead of preventing such marriages, this law enabled 
 avaricious and unprincipled masters to convert many of their 
 servants into slaves."^** 
 
 The ruling classes of the colonies were interested in 
 uniform laws for recovering fugitives, but found it difficult 
 for the various colonies to co-operate in their apprehension. 
 To aid in making better defense against the Indians and to 
 
 28See Hart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," pp. 299- 
 300, where advertisements of colonial newspapers are given. 
 29McCarmac, "White Servitude in Maryland," Chap. V. 
 solbid. Chap. VI.
 
 THE WORKERS IX AMERICAN HISTORY 6l 
 
 assist each other in the capture of runaway servants, a con- 
 federation of the New England colonies was formed in 
 1643. Section 8 of the Articles of Confederation provided 
 a uniform fugitive slave law for all the colonies to aid in 
 recovering zvhite runazvays for their ozvners. The section 
 reads as follows : 
 
 "It is agreed that if any servant run away from his 
 master into any other of these jurisdictions, that in such 
 case, upon the certificate of one magistrate in the jurisdic- 
 tion out of which the said servant fled, or upon other due 
 proof, the said servant shall be delivered, either to his 
 master or any other that pursues and brings such certificate 
 of proof."" 
 
 We shall later see a similar clause in the Constitution 
 of the United States which we have every reason to believe 
 applied to white as well as black slaves. 
 
 There is abundant testimony to indicate that the aris- 
 tocracy in many respects not only regarded some classes 
 of white slaves as beneath the blacks, but that the latter 
 also, in some cases, felt a sense of superiority. One author- 
 ity says : "The negro slave might take a certain sort of 
 pride in belonging to the grand establishment of a powerful 
 or wealthy master, and from this point of view society 
 might be said to have a place for him, even though he pos- 
 sessed no legal rights. There was no such haven of security 
 for the mean whites. If the negro was like a Sudra, they 
 were simply Pariahs,"^^ Again, speaking of the whites, the 
 same writer says: "Their lives were in theory protected 
 by law, but where an indented servant came to hi«^ death 
 from prolonged ill-usage, or from excessive punishment, or 
 
 3iBryce, "The American Commonwealth," Abridged Edition, Ap- 
 pendix III. 
 
 32Fiske, "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," Vol. II, p. 189.
 
 62 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 even from sudden violence, it was not easy to get a verdict 
 against the master.""^ 
 
 In Pennsylvania fugitives received five days' additional 
 servitude for every day of absence by flight and were 
 whipped for theft at the cart-tail. A severe penalty was 
 also provided for marrying without the master's consent, 
 and women having illegitimate children were punished by 
 adding more days to their time of service. White slaves 
 were also recruited from the offenders who could not pay 
 ■fines and zuere sold into servitude.^*^ 
 
 For trifling offenses the masters were able to prolong 
 the period of servitude fixed in the indentures which ren- 
 dered the lives of white slaves miserable in the extreme. 
 Loosely drawn indentures also placed them at the mercy 
 of the owners. This was particularly true of Virginia, 
 the "Mother of Presidents," where they were also "coarsely 
 clothed, and fed upon meal and water sweetened with 
 molasses; and were frequently punished with great bar- 
 barity."^^ In Virginia and Maryland the redemptioners 
 outnumbered the negro slaves until the latter part of the 
 seventeenth century, and the traffic in them continued well 
 into the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Virginia, 
 like Massachusetts, made provi^sion against revolt of its 
 serfs early in the history of the colony. "Not only to speak 
 evil of the king, but even to vilify the London company, 
 was a treasonable offense, to be punished with death."^^ 
 
 sslbid, p. 178. Prof. McCormac (White Servitude in Maryland, p. 
 65) dissents from tliis judgment of Fiske and states "that the master 
 [in Maryland] was not always found guilty of murder," and cites a 
 case where a master, charged with the murder of his servant, was 
 fined 300 pounds of tobacco for "unreasonable and unchristianlike pun- 
 ishment" of his servant. The jury found death was due to other 
 causes. As the administration of justice was as much a class institu- 
 tion as other institutions of the state, the acquittal of guilty masters 
 is no refutation of Fislte's statement. 
 
 34Lodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 245. 
 
 ar.Ibid, p. 70. 
 
 soFiske, "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," Vol. II, pp. 164-165.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAxNT HISTORY 63 
 
 In South Carolina the white slaves were mostly re- 
 demptioners. The masters were at liberty to whip them ; 
 no one was allowed to trade with them and their travel 
 was limited. When their terms expired they were soon 
 lost among the small farmers and poor whites. In North 
 Carolina corporal punishment was frequently resorted to, 
 and if the bond slave ran away he had to serve a double 
 term when caught. "If a woman servant gave birth to an 
 illegitimate child she was to serve an additional term, and 
 if the master was the father, then she zvas sold by the church 
 wardens for the public benefit:"^' 
 
 In Georgia the slave code was similar to North Car- 
 olina and Virginia. The white slaves of Georgia and other 
 colonies frequently escaped to the Spanish border and led 
 a wild, barbarous life, repaying their former masters with 
 brigandage and robbery. When these vagabonds were 
 captured whipping, branding irons, and the pillory were 
 employed to teach them the error of their ways. But the 
 Georgia border continued to be a turbulent section even 
 after the Revolution. It was from these white bond slaves 
 that the mass of "poor whites" in the mountain districts of 
 the South were recruited. Owing to the existence of negro 
 slavery, to work for a living became a badge of shame and 
 the "poor whites," long after the redemptionist and in- 
 dentured system disappeared, were still regarded as mud- 
 sills by the slave-owning aristocracy and were shunned as 
 though they were beasts. In fact, before the Civil War, it 
 was no unusual thing for a slave owner to hire out his 
 negroes to other employers for terms much higher than 
 zvhat the poor ivhites could get. A few examples will suf- 
 fice. "Sober, energetic white men, engaged in agricultural 
 
 37Lodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 155.
 
 64 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 pursuits at $84 per annum — including board ; slaves . . . 
 who performed little more than half the amount of labor 
 
 were hired out on adjoining farms at an average 
 of $115 per annum, including board, clothing and medical 
 attendance. Free white men and slaves were in the employ 
 of the North Carolina Railroad company ; the former 
 
 received only $12 per month each ; the masters of 
 the latter received $16 per month for every slave so em- 
 ployed."^^ White girls, as domestics, received $10 per an- 
 num and board while slaves, for the same service, were 
 hired out for $65 to $70 per year, including board, cloth- 
 ing and medical attendance. Many of these "free" whites 
 passed through life without ever owning so much as five 
 dollars. "Thousands of them die at an advanced age, as 
 ignorant of the common alphabet as if it had never been 
 invented. All are more or less impressed with a belief in 
 witches, ghosts and supernatural sigris."^^ Such was the 
 legacy bequeathed to the nineteenth century by the "fa- 
 thers'" of the American government. 
 
 It may not be amiss here to state that many men who 
 were prominent in the Revolution profited from this system 
 of servile white labor. For example, George Washington, 
 in 1774, wrote a ship captain expressing his desire for a 
 supply of servants to place on his Ohio lands. He writes of 
 his desire to import them at his expense, "where they are 
 unable to transport themselves, into the Potomac river, and 
 from hence to the Ohio ; to have them, in the first case, en- 
 
 38Helper, "The Impending Crisis of the South," p. 3S0. This boolt, 
 the work of a Southerner, was written a few years before the Civil war 
 to show the superiority of wage labor over slave labor. It had a great 
 deal of influence in forming opinion regarding slavery. A tragic coin- 
 cidence is that Helper, after having played such an important part in 
 giving capitalism a free field for development in America, was unable 
 to succeed under the new regime and, in April, 1909, blew his brains 
 out in Washington, D. C! 
 
 39lbid, p. 380.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 05 
 
 gaged to me under indenture, in the second, by some other 
 contract equally valid, to become tenants upon the terms 
 hereafter mentioned." The terms suggested are that the 
 slaves jointly hind themselves to reimburse Washington for 
 any losses he might sustain by deaths or accidents.*'^ This 
 proposed toll of death or disease was probably suggested 
 by the inhuman practices of the ship captains engaged in 
 the white slave trade, which is reviewed in the next chapter. 
 The most grasping of modern sweaters could not ask for 
 more iron-clad terms from his victims than those suggested 
 by the "father of his country." 
 
 Before Benjamin Franklin became an advocate of pop- 
 ular views in the Constitutional Convention, he was not 
 averse to "turning an honest penny" by speculating in the 
 traffic of servant contracts. Some masters in moving from 
 one colony to another, or for other reasons, sold the unex- 
 pired indentures of their servants for what they could get 
 for them. This gave rise to an internal trade in these con- 
 tracts and speculators bought them up and sold them for 
 such profits as the market conditions would permit. Frank- 
 lin, when proprietor of the "Pennsylvania Gazette," occa- 
 sionally purchased slaves or the time of redemptioners and 
 advertised them for sale in his paper. "Likely negro 
 wenches" were advertised for sale in the same columns with 
 white boys and girls and sometimes, when the trade was not 
 brisk, they were sold at public auction." Later in life 
 Franklin became opposed to slavery and was active in the 
 agitation against it. 
 
 It may come as a surprise to some that Booker T. 
 
 40See Hart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, 
 where the letter is reproduced. 
 
 4iHeston, "Slavery and Servitude in New Jersey." On pages 24-25 
 Heston gives a list of such advertisements from Franklin's paper. 
 
 5
 
 (£ THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Washington, one of the leaders of the negro race, offers 
 consolation to his people for the slavery they endured by 
 assuring them that the white man sold his ozvn people in 
 America as ivell as the blacks. Not only this, but he em- 
 phasizes the historical fact that white servitude prevailed in 
 the colonies before the first black slaver sailed into James- 
 town, Virginia, in 1619. He further points out, what is no 
 doubt true, that "it seems probable if the negro had not 
 been discovered and brought to this country as a laborer the 
 system of white servitude would have lasted in this country 
 a great deal longer than it actually did"*- The negro, be- 
 cause of his powers of endurance, became a more efficient 
 and profitable slave than the white worker and, naturally, 
 in time displaced the white slaves. 
 
 Many tragic as well as humorous incidents accom- 
 panied the system of white servitude. One authority relates 
 how one "soul driver" in Pennsylvania was tricked by a 
 shrewd Irish redemptioner he was trying to sell. The serv- 
 ant "by a little management, contrived to be the last of the 
 flock that remained unsold, and traveled about with his 
 owner without companions. One night they lodged at a 
 tavern, and in the morning, the young fellow who was an 
 Irishman, rose early and sold his master to the landlord, 
 pocketed the money, and marched oft". Previously, however, 
 to his going, he used the precaution to tell the purchaser 
 that his servant, although tolerably clever in other respects, 
 was rather saucy and a little given to lying — that he even 
 had presumption enough at times to endeavor to pass for 
 master, and that he might possibly represent himself so to 
 him. By the time mine host was undeceived, the son of 
 
 42See Washington, "The Story of the Negro," Vol. 1, Chap. VI.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 67 
 
 Erin had gained such a start as rendered pursuit useless."'*^ 
 
 One gentleman in the city of Philadelphia wanted to 
 buy an old couple for house servants. An old man, his wife, 
 and daughter were offered, and after paying the price he 
 discovered he had bought his father, mother and sister!** 
 
 Generally speaking the white slaves remained in pov- 
 erty, after they worked out their terms of service. The 
 system being devised to serve the material interests of land 
 speculators, rich planters and others of the employing class, 
 had little in it to stimulate ambition to be something in the 
 world. The period of slavery, carrying with it the shame 
 and humiliation of a subject class, left most of them dull 
 and shiftless when they were released. Many of them 
 formed the historical source of the "poor whites" of the 
 South,*^ a melancholy class of workers who still form a part 
 of the population of the Southern states, and of which we 
 will have more to say in another chapter. Out of their suf- 
 ferings and those of the blacks arose the aristocracy of 
 Southern planters, the New York land kings, and the fish- 
 ing, commercial and slave-trading aristocracy of New 
 England. A few of the slaves became distinguished. George 
 Taylor, a Pennsylvania redemptioner, was one of the signers 
 of the Declaration of Independence. Matthew Thornton, a 
 signer from New Hampshire, also belonged to this class, as 
 did Charles Thomas, secretary of Congress during the 
 Revolution, and General Sullivan, a commander in the 
 Revolutionary war.*" 
 
 Prof. Marion Dexter Learned of the Universitv of 
 
 43Geiser, "Redemptioners and Indentured Servants in Pennsyl- 
 vania," p. 54. 
 
 44lbid, p. 55. 
 
 45Bassett, "Slavery and Servitude in the Colonv of North Carolina," 
 p. 85. 
 
 46Geiser, "Redemptioners," p. 109.
 
 68 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Pennsylvania in his book, "Abraham Lincoln — An Ameri- 
 can Migration — Family English, Not German," traces Lin- 
 coln's genealogy back to Samuel Lincoln, who sailed from 
 London, April i8, 1637, as the servant of Francis Lawes. 
 Samuel Lincoln, the white serf, was the great-great-great- 
 great-grandfather of Abraham who fell a victim to the 
 slave power.*'' 
 
 During the American Revolution the white slaves as 
 well as the blacks were a source of dread to those sections 
 of the aristocracy who were active in the movement for 
 separation from Great Britain. There was the constant 
 fear that during these turbulent times the slaves would 
 desert their owners and fight with the British. The officers 
 of the British army were not slow to take advantage of the 
 situation and offer inducements to the servile population to 
 join in the sruggle to subdue the colonial masters. Lord 
 Dunmore, governor of Virginia, in 1775, published a 
 proclamation declaring martial law and proclaimed freedom 
 "to all indentured servants, negroes or others appertaining 
 to rebels" who would "join for the reducing of the colony 
 to a proper sense of its duty." Washington received this 
 news with alarm and referring to Dunmore, wrote "that 
 man . . . will be the most formidable enemy of 
 America if some expedient cannot be hit upon to convince 
 the servants and slaves of the impotency of his designs."*^ 
 
 No doubt many took advantage of the British offer of 
 freedom, but thousands also joined the American forces 
 to escape the service of their masters, believing that inde- 
 pendence would also bring freedom. A law of Virginia 
 was enacted — perhaps to counteract the effect of Dun- 
 
 47See review in the "New York Times Saturday Review," Feb- 
 ruary 12, 1910. 
 
 48Geiser, "Redemptioners," pp. 100-101.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 69 
 
 more's proclamation — providing that all white servants 
 would be freed who enlisted in the Revolutionary army,'"* 
 It was the farmers, laborers and bond slaves who made up 
 the bulk of the fighting forces under Washington and his 
 generals. Ida M. Tarbell, in her story of "The American 
 Woman,"^*^ tells of a "bound girl," Deborah Sampson Gan- 
 nett, who used the first money she earned at teaching to 
 buy cloth with which she made herself a suit of men's cloth- 
 ing and enlisted in the army under the name of Robert 
 Shurtleff. Wounded twice, her sex was not discovered until 
 the Yorktown campaign, when she was seized with brain 
 fever. She was later voted a pension by Congress. 
 
 The Revolution brought few changes for the better 
 for white slaves. The traffic in them continued and the 
 laws afifecting them remained on the whole about the same. 
 What few laws were enacted making the lives of the unfor- 
 tunates less wretched were not initiated by the men who 
 were mouthing phrases about "liberty," but by charitable 
 societies of Germans and other nationalities whose experi- 
 ence and observation revealed the sufferings their enslaved 
 countrymen were forced to endure. As early as 1764 the 
 Germans of Philadelphia organized the first of a number 
 of societies in the seacoast cities to improve the lot of re- 
 demptioners. By constant agitation they succeeded in abol- 
 ishing some atrocious abuses that had developed with the 
 traffic.^^ One writer^^ mentions the sale of one German 
 Swiss and two French Swiss from a ship in Philadelphia 
 in August, 1817. Another^^ asserts that the sale of re- 
 
 49L,ecky, "The American Revolution." p. 285. 
 r.o"The American Magazine," November, 1909. 
 
 BiFaust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, pp. 
 71-73. 
 
 52Salmon, "Domestic Service," p. 20. 
 53Faust, p. 72.
 
 70 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 demptioners was abolished in 1820. Still another states 
 that though the system was declining, "the German redemp- 
 tioners are mentioned in statutes of Pennsylvania as late as 
 1818, and the registry of redemptioners at Philadelphia 
 shows that the last servant was bound in 1831."°* 
 
 In other words, a half century had passed into history 
 since the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, 
 which declared "all men are free and equal," and yet the 
 purchase of zvhite flesh had not become extinct. 
 
 The general character of this white bond service may 
 be seen from the following, written in 1770 by William 
 Eddis, an English traveler in America and for eight years 
 a resident: 
 
 "Negroes," he writes, "being a property for life, the 
 death of slaves, in the prime of youth or strength, is a 
 iraterial loss to the proprietor; they are, therefore, almost 
 in every instance, under more comfortable circumstances 
 than the miserable European (immigrant) over whom the 
 rigid planter exercises an inflexible severity. They are 
 strained to the utmost to perform their allotted labour; and, 
 from a prepossession, in many cases too justly founded, 
 they are supposed to be receiving only the just reward which 
 is due to repeated offenses. There are doubtless many ex- 
 ceptions to this observation, yet, generally speaking, they 
 groan beneath a worse than Egyptian bondage. By 
 attempting to lighten the intolerable burthen, they often 
 render it more insupportable. For real or imaginary causes, 
 these frequently attempt to escape, but very few are suc- 
 cessful ; the country being intersected with rivers, and the 
 utmost vigilance observed in detecting persons under sus- 
 picious circumstances, who, when apprehended, are com- 
 
 .'i'lGeiser, "Redemptioners," p. 42.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY yi 
 
 mitted to close confinement, advertised and delivered to 
 their respective masters, . . . The unhappy culprit is 
 doomed to a severe chastisement; and a prolongation of 
 servitude is decreed in full proportion to expenses incurred, 
 and supposed inconveniences resulting from a desertion of 
 duty.""" 
 
 This general subjection of white immigrant laborers, 
 together with the kidnaped blacks, was a factor second in 
 importance to the conquest of natural resources in making 
 a ruling class possible. Both gave wealth, power and influ- 
 ence to an aristocracy in all the colonies and, together with 
 political privileges based on the ownership of property, 
 placed the governing powers in the hands of the masters 
 so that the legislation of the colonial period reflects the 
 property interests that ruled. Cheap slave labor was essen- 
 tial to the continuance of class rule until the control of 
 natural resources had extended far enough to permit the 
 system of indentured service to die. With such control the 
 masters could gradually release white slaves in a market 
 fairly well stocked with "free laborers" compelled to com- 
 pete with each other for employment. 
 
 Of course, there was the western frontier for the op- 
 pressed to move to, but here also there were two factors 
 at work, after the passing of indentured service as well as 
 before it, which made the free lands of the West largely a 
 myth of the historians. One was the continued confiscation 
 or acquirement by fraud or bribery of the western lands by 
 land speculators and land corporations and the consequent 
 exploitation of the more daring and rebellious who ad- 
 vanced into the wilderness. The second was the policy of 
 
 ri5"Documentarv History of American Industrial Society," Vol. I, 
 pp. 343-344.
 
 'J2 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 the colonial rulers in dealing with the Indians. The frontier 
 settlements were continually exposed to attacks by Indians 
 and massacres frequently took place. The aristocracy con- 
 trolling the legislatures, before and after the Revolution, 
 seldom provided the military protection these settlements 
 required. In 1794 the settlers at Lexington, Kentucky, 
 adopted revolutionary resolutions, declaring that "the pro- 
 tection of the frontier was a duty of the United States 
 government."^^ Early in the same year a debate in Congress 
 disclosed the miserable wages paid even those who engaged 
 in protecting the frontier. "Each private at that time 
 received every four weeks, as compensation for the hunger 
 and privations he suffered at the frontier posts, a sum not so 
 great as is now paid for three days of toil. His hire was 
 three dollars a month."^'' 
 
 This wretched remuneration was calculated to discour- 
 age enlistments for frontier duty. The "free laborer," 
 therefore, had the alternative of staying within reach of the 
 masters and working for them, or moving out into the 
 forests to incur the danger of massacre by savage foes. 
 In other words, the ruling classes preferred to see the poor 
 man scalped than to allow him to escape from serving for 
 wages that scarcely guaranteed subsistence. This frontier 
 policy was one cause of "Bacon's Rebellion" in 1676, which 
 we will consider in another chapter. 
 
 The conquest of land and laborers, together with this 
 military policy, made the triumph of the ruling classes 
 nearly complete. Before leaving the subject it is necessary 
 
 56Faust, "The German Element in the United States," "Vol. I, p. 379. 
 57McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. II. 
 p. 178.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 'JZ 
 
 to review the horrors of the white slave trade to the colo- 
 nies, a trade that began before the slavers brought negroes 
 to America and one as atrocious as the commerce in these 
 African aborigines. 

 
 74 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Chapter IV 
 
 The White Slave Trade 
 
 "The history of our colonization is the history of the 
 crimes of Europe."^ By "Europe" the American historian 
 means the ruHng classes of Europe, for the serfs and artisans 
 of the European countries certainly had no share in the 
 crimes that accompanied the settlement of the colonies, but 
 were the victims of these crimes. 
 
 Few people today know or even suspect that a slave 
 trade in white men, transported to America, reached large 
 proportions in our early history. It is one of those unpleas- 
 ant facts which historians prefer to dwell on briefly or not at 
 all, so that he who wishes to know the extent and character 
 of this commerce must consult a dreary mass of historical 
 documents, and even then must piece together the fragments 
 of information which his research reveals. And yet any 
 view of our history, including the colonial era and the half 
 century that followed independence, that do3s not include a 
 knowledge of the gains of this traffic ; the sufferings of the 
 victims in the voyage to America ; the methods employed to 
 induce them to emigrate ; the brutality of the slavers who 
 engaged in it, and the servitude the workers endured in 
 America, is a view as distorted as though one were to 
 describe the wealthy residence section of New York today 
 and hand this view on to posterity as a faithful picture of 
 present civilization. This latter view would leave out of 
 
 iBancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. IT, p. 251.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 75 
 
 consideration the East Side with its milhons in tenement 
 hells and sweatshops, the bread lines, the unemployed, and 
 the hand-to-mouth existence that other multitudes are forced 
 to live. 
 
 The historian is invariably a man whose associations 
 and environment have formed an aristocratic type of mind 
 which shrinks from revealing anything that reflects dis- 
 credit on the "great men" of the past. The past must be 
 vindicated in the interests of the class that today possesses 
 resources originally secured by force, fraud and the servi- 
 tude of workingmen. And it must be confessed that the 
 writer who would tell the whole truth would pay the penalty 
 by having his work killed by the literary police who pass 
 judgment on literature. It, therefore, happens that in addi- 
 tion to the habits, associations and training which give a 
 conservative cast to the mind of the historian, there is the 
 safeguard that he will not become "sensational," — that is to 
 say, truthful — because of the penalty his folly would invite. 
 Hence the history of colonial society has been written with 
 one chapter usually left out, and that one more important 
 than the silly gossip of some "statesman" or the love affairs 
 of a colonial flirt. 
 
 In considering the slave trade it has been the fashion to 
 dwell entirely on the traffic in negroes, and as this traffic at 
 one time or another was indulged in by the ruling classes 
 of most modern nations, no special discredit attaches to 
 America and its rulers. In fact, one may easily find graphic 
 descriptions of the horrors of this trade. It is certainly 
 revolting to know of the slave raids in Africa by men 
 trained for their work ; of the crowding of vessels with 
 slaves to the limit of their capacity ; how the stronger 
 strangled the weaker to get more air; how the stench from
 
 76 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 below was so great that the slavers could not stand near 
 the hatchways; how the steaming bodies of the dead were 
 constantly cast into the sea; or the wretched spectacle of 
 the half-starved survivors — frequently only one-third of 
 those who embarked — who were finally sold to Southern 
 planters. We may even recoil from the inhumanity that 
 prompted slavers to chain an entire cargo of these unfor- 
 tunates to an iron cable and with a blow of an ax send 
 them to the bottom of the sea.^ 
 
 But atrocious as these practices were it is doubtful 
 whether they were not equaled by the practices of the men 
 who engaged in the business of transporting white slaves 
 from European countries to America, The demand for 
 servile labor in a sparsely settled country and the struggle 
 to share in the large profits growing out of the traffic, made 
 abuses inevitable. The gains of the trade took the curse 
 ofif, for "it takes men a weary while to learn the wickedness 
 of anything that puts gold in their purses." (Fiske.) For- 
 tunately for the ship captains and speculators, as we have 
 seen, the economic changes taking place in Europe provided 
 them a large supply of helpless poor to draw upon. 
 
 The London company of adventurers who settled Vir- 
 ginia was eager to employ child labor in developing the 
 
 2"Ethiopia, Her Gloom and Glory," pp. 82-83. This is an interest- 
 ing series of lectures delivered by David Cliristy for the Colonization 
 Society before the Civil War. The author regarded the slavery ques- 
 tion as the old conflict between "evil and good," or as a consequence 
 of "the Fall of Man." Yet the lectures are brilliant in their portrayal 
 of the economic basis of slavery and emancipation. For example, Brit- 
 ish emancipation in the West Indies instead of inducing the negroes to 
 work long hours for wages resulted in them working only three or four 
 days in the week, and only five or six hours each day, just enough to 
 supply their simple wants. The rest of the time they spent under shade 
 trees. Christy remarks that "they have no stimulant to perform an 
 adequate amount of labor." In other words, to supply his own wants 
 is not "adeauate." The proper "stimulant" was later provided with 
 capitalist production when both blacks and whites sold themselves daily 
 for wages and produced surplus incomes for British exploiters in addi- 
 tion to their own subsidence.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 'J'J 
 
 resources of the colony. In 1619 its records acknowledge 
 the arrival of one hundred children, "save such as dyed on 
 the waie," and another hundred, twelve years old or over, 
 is asked for. In 1627 many ships arrived, bringing fourteen 
 and fifteen hundred children kidnaped by "spirits"^ in Euro- 
 pean ports, and a few years later they send a request to 
 London for another supply of "friendless boyes and girles."* 
 In England Bristol was one of the last cities to give up the 
 traffic in white children sold in American colonies. This 
 city for several hundred years remained a white slave mar- 
 ket, Avhere it was "no uncommon thing to behold young girls 
 exposed for sale."^ By 1664 the kidnaping had increased 
 to such proportions that the committee for foreign planta- 
 tions interfered, and an office was created with the duty of 
 "keeping a record of all persons going to America as serv- 
 ants, and the statement that they had voluntarily left Eng- 
 land." A penalty of death was later provided for kidnaping, 
 yet "ten thousand persons were annually kidnaped after the 
 passage of the act."^ 
 
 Paupers were turned over to corporations, prisons were 
 emptied, and convicts were reprieved to supply the demands 
 of those engaged in the trade.'^ Servants shipped at an 
 expense of eight or ten pounds were sometimes sold for 
 forty, fifty, or sixty pounds, and even higher rates. "Like 
 negroes, they were to be purchased on shipboard, as men 
 
 3The term had its origin in the skill and cunning employed by the 
 kidnapers who "spirited" away their victims. Ship captains would send 
 their crews ashore to steal children and, in many cases, adults, who 
 were sold in America. These "spirits" were a source of terror to the 
 poor in those ports which the slavers visited. 
 
 4Abbott, "Women in Industry," pp. 332-333. 
 
 tiWashington, "The Story of the Negro," Vol. I, p. 111. 
 
 eSalmon, "Domestic Service," p. 22. See also Fiske, "Old Vir- 
 ginia and Her Neighbors," Vol. H, p. 177; Thwaites, "The Colonies," 
 p. 74, and Geiser, "Redemptioners," p. 21. 
 
 TCheyney, "European Background of American History," p. 169.
 
 78 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 buy horses at a fair."^ In England men of high positions 
 at the court scrambled for a share in the profits to be secured 
 from the trade in prisoners of war. The mayor of Bristol 
 and other officials terrorized petty offenders into praying 
 for transportation; they "were then divided among mem- 
 bers of the court."^ This traffic proved more profitable than 
 the slave trade. So profitable, in fact, that those engaged in 
 it were able to evade, or even suspend, the law which in 
 1670 provided the death penalty for kidnaping. One au- 
 thority states that the offense was treated with "remarkable 
 leniency by the courts." Under the Civil Law it would 
 have been punished with death, but we meet with petty fines 
 of a few shillings, even when the 'spirit' confessed the crime, 
 and in one case only I2d., a few hours in the pillory, or im- 
 prisonment till the fine was paid seems to have been consid- 
 ered by the judges a sufficient atonement. The Session Rolls 
 of Middlesex show that a large number of the cases were 
 not even brought to trial, though true bills had been brought 
 against the offenders."^" 
 
 The practice of forcible exportation of poor wretches 
 was taken advantage of by wealthy persons. Those belong- 
 ing to the upper classes and having family skeletons to 
 conceal or inheritances to secure or some criminal scheme 
 to advance, had objectionable members of their class or 
 family seized and transported to America and sold.^^ A 
 niece of Daniel Defoe, the English author, left England in 
 1 718, and having no money to pay her passage, was sold by 
 the ship captain at Philadelphia and later married a relative 
 of her owner.^^ 
 
 sBancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. I, p. 175. 
 Dibid, Vol. I, p. 176; Vol. II, p. 251. 
 
 loBallagh, "White Servitude in the Colony of Virginia," p. 38, foot 
 note. 
 
 iiSalmon, "Domestic Service," p. 21. 
 
 i2Heston, "Slavery and Servitude in New Jersey," p. 27.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORV 79 
 
 We have already mentioned the Neulanders and their 
 work in Europe in stimulating emigration. Though they 
 circulated stories of opportunities to be had in America they 
 were invariably failures themselves, and took up slave-hunt- 
 ing as a profession. Advertising of various kinds was dis- 
 tributed broadcast and the emigration from Germany 
 threatened to depopulate the provinces. The Neulanders 
 received a commission for every person they persuaded to 
 emigrate, generally three florins or a ducat in Holland, 
 while the merchant in Philadelphia sold them for sixty or 
 eighty florins each in proportion to the debt incurred by 
 the emigrant on the voyage. One Scotchman, in the middle 
 of the eighteenth century, tells of his being kidnaped and, 
 after a six months' voyage, being sold into seven years' 
 servitude at Philadelphia for sixteen pounds.^^ From 1682 
 to 1804 the proportion of white slaves to the whole number 
 of immigrants to Pennsylvania steadily increased, till they 
 constituted tzvo-thirds during the last nineteen years.^* This 
 enormous exodus from Germany and Holland is suggestive 
 of the work of the emigrant hunters in these countries. 
 
 These agents came mainly from Pennsylvania as rep- 
 resentatives of William Penn or land speculators who had 
 secured land from the immense domains he possessed. 
 Early in the eighteenth century the migration from Rotter- 
 dam and then to London reached enormous proportions. 
 Five thousand arrived in the latter city during May and 
 June, 1709. This number was doubled by August and two 
 months later thirteen thousand were in London. Still the 
 stream of deluded pauperized poor swelled. So great was 
 the exodus that it became a serious problem to feed them 
 
 isGeiser, "Redemptioners," pp. 20-21. 
 I41bid, p. 41.
 
 80 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 while waiting for ships to transport them to America. "Star- 
 vation staring the needy Palatines in the face, England for 
 months provided them with food. Having no homes, they 
 were sheltered in barns, empty dwellings, warehouses, 
 and a thousand tents taken from the army stores. The 
 queen allowed each ninepence per day for subsistence, and 
 such lodgings as could best be obtained. The paupers of 
 London grew envious of the provision made for the for- 
 eigners, and filed complaints against such exceptional treat- 
 ment."^^ 
 
 The great numbers congregated in London were trans- 
 ported to Ireland, Louisiana and other places, while Gov- 
 ernor Hunter of New York contrived to have three or four 
 thousand sent to that colony. Over half of them died of the 
 overcrowding and disease of the ship. Some were placed 
 upon the great Livingston estate, where the exploitation was 
 so severe that they deserted. Some secured land of the 
 Indians, but after planting crops were informed by the 
 Governor that their titles were void and that they must pay 
 for them. A few submitted and the rest again pushed into 
 the wilderness.^^ This process of invalidating titles by 
 grafting governors and collecting fees for reissues was a 
 chronic evil throughout the colonial period in New York, 
 and six or seven years were sufficient for a governor to 
 become wealthy by these practices. 
 
 The atrocities which developed with the transportation 
 of emigrants would be incredible were it not for the unim- 
 peachable evidence collected in a few works. We have 
 shown the kidnaping of blacks in Africa duplicated by the 
 
 isFaust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, pp. 
 77-78. 
 
 leFisher, "Men, Women and Manners in Colonial Times," Vol. II, 
 pp. 104-105.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 8l 
 
 kidnaping of whites in Europe. The overcrowding of ships 
 in the African slave trade, with its consequent horrors of 
 epidemics of scurvy and small pox, deaths by starvation, 
 smothering and violence, also had their counterpart in the 
 white slave trade of American ship masters with Europe. 
 In fact, some of the details of this traffic are sickening and 
 are scarcely exceeded in cruelty by the deeds of barbarous 
 peoples who lack the culture of civilization. The death of 
 a black slave on the voyage to America meant a distinct 
 loss to the slaver; but death did not always rob the ship 
 captain of his profits on the white slave trade. The white 
 slavers managed to collect a toll of death by providing that 
 "surviving relatives of those who died at sea after the ves- 
 sel had made more than one-half of the journey, ivere held 
 responsible for the debts of the deceased."^'' 
 
 Not all those who left Europe did so with the intention 
 of serving a period of years in the colonies to pay for their 
 passage. Many of them, after many sacrifices, saved suf- 
 ficient sums to pay the expense of the voyage. But ship 
 captains, co-operating with Neulanders, contrived methods 
 by which they robbed emigrants of their money and sold 
 them into servitude to pay debts contracted on the voyage. 
 In the journey from their homes to the ships tolls, fees and 
 duties were exacted on their baggage. The baggage itself, 
 often containing money or valuables, was either stolen or 
 sent by another boat leaving the emigrant at the mercy of 
 the ship master. Enormous prices were also charged for 
 meals so that the poor wretches thus swindled were sold on 
 their arrival in America to pay for debts forced upon them. 
 Even those whose funds were not exhausted by these prac- 
 tices had no guarantee that they would not be sold. "The 
 
 iTGeiser, "Redemptioners," pp. 53-54.
 
 82 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 iveU-to-do would liave to pay for those zvho could not, or 
 be themselves sold as redemptioners. This arrangement 
 protected the captain against loss, in case a large number of 
 redemptioners died on the way, and also gave him an ex- 
 cuse for extortions. The Germans of Philadelpha at- 
 tempted to legislate against these abuses, beginning in 1750, 
 but were for a long time unsuccessful, because of the pres- 
 ence in high places of influential grafters heavily interested 
 in the profits of immigrant transportation."^^ It may be 
 said in passing, in that day the payment of fare did not 
 include board, and as the immigrant's provisions were often 
 with his baggage, the theft of these left him at the mercy 
 of his exploiters. 
 
 However, this robbery, bad as it is, is humane com- 
 pared with the terrible experience of these unfortunates on 
 board the ships. Here the wretchedness growing out of 
 the avarice of the slavers runs the gamut of human suf- 
 fering. The large profits to be obtained from the traffic led 
 to overcrowding. Almshouses and prisons were emptied to 
 secure human merchandise for American employers. "The 
 crowded exportation of Irish Catholics," Brancroft writes, 
 "was a frequent event, and was attended by aggravations 
 hardly inferior to the usual atrocities of the African slave 
 trade. "^'' Starvation and death from thirst were common 
 occurrences. Shipwrecks were also frequent and reports 
 of these were suppressed in Europe. Two thousand died 
 in one year of diseases resulting from overcrowding. One 
 ship sailing in 1730 with 150 emigrants, had only 13 sur- 
 vivors. Another sailed in 1745 with 400 Germans, of 
 whom only 50 lived to see America. Still another bearing 
 
 isFaust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, p. 
 69. See also Geiser, "Redemptioners," p. 43. 
 
 i9Quoted by Washington, "The Story of the Negro," Vol. I, p. 110.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 83 
 
 1,500 lost 1,100 from deaths on the voyage. Children sel- 
 dom survived the journey ; "many a time parents are com- 
 pelled to see their children die of hunger, thirst or sickness, 
 and then see them cast into the water. Few women in con- 
 finement escaped with their lives ; many a mother is cast 
 into the water with her child."-'^ 
 
 The space allotted to the emigrants on board ship ac- 
 counts for the frightful mortality from disease. Emigrant 
 ships sailing from Holland packed their passengers in a 
 space two feet wide and six feet long. The rations served 
 are small and poor ; the drinking water is black, thick and 
 full of worms ; spoiled biscuits, full of red worms and 
 spider's nests, are served to the starving. Hunger on one 
 boat drove the starving men to break into the food apart- 
 ment for which all the passengers were punished. The men 
 received no bread and the women only one biscuit. Twenty 
 men, women and children died of hunger. "The hunger 
 was so great on board that all the bones about the ship 
 . were pounded with a hammer and eaten ; and 
 what is more lamentable, some of the deceased persons, 
 not many hours before their death, crawled on their hands 
 and feet to the captain, and begged him for God's sake, to 
 give them a mouthful of bread or a drop of water to keep 
 them from perishing, but their supplications were in vain ; 
 he most obstinately refused, and thus did they perish."^^ 
 Mittleberger, a German traveler, mentions "thirty-two chil- 
 dren in our ship, all of whom were thrown in the sea. 
 Children who have not yet had the measles or 
 small pox generally get them on board the ship, and mostly 
 
 20Faust, "The German Element," Vol. I, pp. 70-71. See also 
 Geiser, "Redemptioners" (p. 48), for account of deaths from starvation 
 and disease. 
 
 2iGelser, "Redemptioners," p. 49, quoting Mittleberger, a German 
 traveler -who wrote in 1750.
 
 84 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 die of them . . . sometimes whole families die in 
 quick succession; so that often many dead persons lie in 
 the berths beside the living ones, when contagious diseases 
 have broken out. . . ."^^ 
 
 When these slave ships landed at Philadelphia or other 
 ports the scenes were pathetic in the extreme. The immi- 
 grants are examined before the ship casts anchor. Those 
 not paying their passage are advertised in the newspapers 
 for sale. Unmarried people of both sexes find ready buy- 
 ers. Old married people, widows and the feeble, are a drug 
 on the market, unless they have healthy children who as- 
 sume the debts of the parents, which extends the period of 
 their servitude. But "the sick are frequently detained 
 beyond the period of recovery, when a release would fre- 
 quently have saved them."^^ When land is sighted the 
 wretches crowd the deck and weep and sing and pray and 
 praise God. But the rejoicings soon cease and give way 
 to cries of despair because "parents must sell and trade 
 away their children like so many cattle."^* Batches of 
 twenty-five and fifty are purchased by the hated "soul driv- 
 ers" and retailed to wealthy farmers. This auction of 
 white flesh is a common occurrence in Philadelphia and 
 excites no more comment than the sale of hogs. 
 
 To see loved ones sold with the possibility of never 
 seeing them again was dreadful ; but to remain in the 
 clutches of the slavers seemed a worse evil than to be sold. 
 To escape the ship captain and forget the tragedies of the 
 voyage was the consuming desire of the victims. In fact, 
 many felt disappointed if not purchased. William Eddis, 
 
 22Geiser, p. 60. 
 
 23Faust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, pp. 
 66-67. 
 
 24Geiser, "Redemptioners," p. 52.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 85 
 
 an English traveler who boarded a white slave ship in 
 Philadelphia forty-one years after the adoption of the Dec- 
 laration of Independence (1817), describes an incident of 
 this kind. "As we ascended the side of the hulk," he writes, 
 "a most revolting scene of want and misery presented itself. 
 The eye involuntarily turned for some relief from the hor- 
 rible picture of human suffering which this living sepulchre 
 aftorded. Mr enquired if there were any shoemak- 
 ers on board. The captain advanced; his appearance be- 
 spoke his office, he was an American, tall, determined, and 
 with an eye that flashed with Algerine cruelty. He called in 
 the Dutch language for shoemakers, and never can I forget 
 the scene which followed. The poor fellows came running 
 tip zvith unspeakable delight, no doubt anticipating a relief 
 from their loathsome dungeon. Their clothes, if rags de- 
 serve that denomination, actually perfumed the air. Some 
 were without shirts, others had this article of dress, but of 
 a quality as coarse as the worst packing cloth. . 
 When they saw at our departure that we had not purchased, 
 their countenances fell to that standard of stupid gloom 
 which seemed to place them a link below rational beings."^° 
 As though the frightful conditions of the voyage were 
 not sufficient to break the spirit of the victims of the slave 
 trade, corporal punishment was administered for many of- 
 fenses. Just how widespread this practice was cannot be 
 determined with certainty, but that it prevailed there can 
 be no doubt. John Harrower, a redemptioner, kept a diary 
 from 1773 to 1776. He relates, among other things, the 
 experience of a servant, Daniel Turner, who returned to the 
 ship drunk, and for using abusive language toward two 
 officers he was horsewhipped, "put in irons and thumb- 
 
 25Quoted by Geiser. p. 57.
 
 86 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 screwed." One hour later he was released from the screws, 
 taken out of the irons and bound and gagged for the re- 
 mainder of the night.-'' 
 
 The diseases contracted on the voyage by those whose 
 destination was Philadelphia alarmed the inhabitants of 
 that city. On the recommendation of Governor Thomas 
 of Pennsylvania in 1742, an act was passed providing for 
 the purchase of a site for a pest-house. Laws had been 
 passed at an earlier period prohibiting the landing of con- 
 victs, lunatics and those infected with contagious diseases, 
 but ship captains managed to smuggle these classes ashore 
 during the night. Ship masters also acquired the habit of 
 confiscating the property of the dead. 
 
 , The pest-house law remained a dead letter, for seven 
 years later a petition is presented to the assembly asserting, 
 among other things, "that for want of suitable buildings 
 and other conveniences, the sick had been induced to wan- 
 der from one place to another, without care, and to the 
 manifest danger of the inhabitants." From this we would 
 judge that the "grafters in high places" were still on good 
 terms with the slavers and shared in the latter's spoils. 
 More acts were passed, but were easily evaded or not en- 
 forced. 'Tn the act of 1749, for example, which was pri- 
 marily intended to prevent the importation of passengers 
 in too great numbers in a single vessel by specifying the 
 space that each passenger should have, no provision was 
 made for the height of each berth. Vessels zvere still 
 crowded as much as before the act was passed. To comply 
 with the two dimensions specified by law, the berths were 
 so constructed as to reduce the former height, thus giving 
 
 26"Documentary History of American Industrial Society," Vol. I, 
 368.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 87 
 
 no increase in the number of cubic feet per capita. On the 
 whole the conditions through the middle of the century 
 were bad. The increase of immigration brought with it an 
 increase of disorder. The sick were neglected; contracts 
 made in Europe betiveen importers and passengers zvere 
 disregarded; immigrants zvere sold into service to pay the 
 fare of friends or relatives ivho had died on the journey; 
 husband, zuife and children zvere still separated by being 
 sold to different masters: passengers zvere robbed of their 
 baggage on landing, and held and treated as prisoners until 
 sold."^' 
 
 As stated in a previous chapter the Revolution brougnt 
 few changes in legislation to improve the lot of imported 
 servants and, in Pennsylvania, "not until a law was passed 
 preventing imprisonment for debt did the merchants and 
 importers lose their grip on this most lucrative traffic."-^ 
 And improved conditions in debtors' prisons did not take 
 place till 1814. A law of Pennsylvania in 1794, passed 
 ostensibly to provide food, clothing and shelter to the poor 
 in the debtors' prison in Philadelphia, granted only seven 
 cents a day for food for each prisoner !^® 
 
 Such was the white slave trade to America from the 
 earliest days of colonization down to a period which closed 
 with the election of the seventh president of the United 
 States. Only the superiority of the negro as an agricul- 
 tural slave and the gradual cheapening of wage labor finally 
 put an end to indentured servitude and the slave traffic 
 based upon it. One may search the resolutions, platforms, 
 or declarations of the Federalist and anti-Federalist or other 
 
 27Geiser, "Redemptioners," p. 64. 
 28Ibid, p. 70. 
 
 2nMcMaster, "The Acfiuisition of the Political, Social and Industrial 
 Rights of Man in America," p. 51.
 
 88 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 parties down to the administration of President Jackson, 
 when the system of indentured service finally disappeared, 
 at least in the North, and he will look in vain for any de- 
 nunciation of the atrocities reviewed in this chapter and the 
 one preceding it. Only one party even mentioned it. This 
 was a remnant of the almost dead Federalist party of Wash- 
 ington and Adams, which met in Hartford, Connecticut, in 
 December, 1814. Among the resolutions adopted by the 
 convention is a demand for a constitutional amendment 
 providing that "Representatives and direct taxes shall be 
 apportioned among the several states which may be included 
 in this Union, according to their respective numbers of free 
 persons, including those bound to serve for a term of years 
 and excluding Indians not taxed, and all other persons."'" 
 
 Like the aristocrats who met in the constitutional con- 
 vention twenty-seven years before, these gentlemen re- 
 garded the white slaves only as living merchandise to esti- 
 mate the share of political power to be apportioned among 
 the property owners of that time. For it must not be for- 
 gotten that property qualifications for the suffrage in the 
 states excluded the mass of workers from the privilege of 
 voting. 
 
 But the system did not entirely disappear at this time. 
 Peonage or the debt system of servitude still prevailing in 
 some of the Southern states is one heritage of it. As we 
 shall see later, it was also resorted to in many of the Cen- 
 tral States almost to the time of the Civil War by owners 
 of negroes to avoid coming in conflict with the federal pro- 
 hibition of slavery in that section. In some of the Southern 
 states it existed with scarcely any modifications at all 
 
 :!ORaynolds, "National Platforms and Political History," p. 12, Chi- 
 cago, 1896.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 89 
 
 down to the rebellion. In many of the Northern states of 
 the Mississippi Valley the indentured codes were drawn 
 upon as models for selling various offenders for limited 
 terms of servitude when they were unable to pay lines. 
 
 When William Henry Harrison was a candidate for 
 President in 1840, his opponents published broadcast his 
 action in 1807 when as Governor of Indiana Territory, he 
 approved the act of that year which provided for the sale 
 of those unable to pay fines or the costs of suits at law. 
 Also when a member of the Ohio legislature in 1821 he 
 voted for an act, one section of which provided that "when 
 any person shall be imprisoned, either upon execution or 
 otherwise, for non-payment of a fine or costs, or both, it 
 shall be lawful for the Sheriff of the county to sell out 
 such person as a servant to any person within this State, 
 who will pay the whole amount due, for the shortest period 
 of service."^^ 
 
 In Georgia a code was compiled by Howell Cobb and 
 adopted by the General Assembly in 1859. The section on 
 Indentured Servants was, according to its preamble, to 
 settle the question as to whether contracts signed in Euro- 
 pean countries would be recognized as binding in Georgia 
 when presented by masters or ship captains having a 
 batch of servants for sale. The act provided that the terms 
 and conditions of such indentures should be recognized 
 and fulfilled under Georgia laws. Should a servant fail 
 to carry out the contract the master could bring him before 
 any three justices of a county who decided the issue and 
 had power to bind the servant. The justices were empow- 
 ered to decide the ages of the servants brought before 
 
 3iMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. VI, 
 p. 574.
 
 yO THE WORKERS IX AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 them and the terms they were to serve. The act further 
 provided for the care of servants, against immoderate cor- 
 rection, and cautioned against zvhipping them naked until 
 master and servant had been heard by the justices. Serv- 
 ants could make complaint of ill-treatment before any 
 justice who, "if he finds cause," may bind the master over 
 until the complaint is heard before the Inferior Court. The 
 court was given discretion to "adjudge, order and appoint 
 what shall be necessary and proper, as well with respect to 
 the diet, lodging, clothing and excessive labor, as to the 
 correction of the servant or servants, complaining." If the 
 court or the three justices decided that a servant's com- 
 plaint was unfounded the "moderate punishment" of thirty- 
 nine lashes was ordered by the court. Should the servant 
 absent himself from his owner's service, the court was au- 
 thorized to bind the servant "for such absence, a term, not 
 exceeding four days for every day's absence, more than the 
 time he or she were originally indented for, by an order, 
 entered as aforesaid, on the court books." 
 
 It is clear enough that the negro slave had every real 
 advantage of his white brother in servitude, except in the 
 duration of servitude. And even as to the duration of 
 servitude the law itself, as it must have been administered 
 by the class in power, contained no substantial guarantee 
 for the servant. One section provides what might virtually 
 lead to the quadrupling and indefinite extension of the term 
 of service. Any poor alien, independent of whether he had 
 paid his passage or promised to indent himself, could be 
 very easily, and doubtless often was, enslaved by the ship's 
 master upon arrival, and sold to some planter. The naked 
 word of the friendless and penniless alien could not have 
 gone far against the word of a jolly, sociable ship captain
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 9I 
 
 in a court composed of planter squires, themselves always 
 in the market for cheap human flesh, and themselves often 
 the convivial chums and hosts of the jolly captain himself, 
 when he chanced into a Georgia port. The whole act, 
 looked at from the servant's point of view, is full of what 
 we moderns call "jokers." 
 
 The servant who haled his master into court for 
 redress of any grievance, was certain to have wound up 
 with the statutory "thirty-nine lashes," except in such rare 
 cases as that of an extremely unpopular master. Any one 
 who knows anything of human nature and of the relative 
 influence of landed and powerful landed gentry on one 
 hand, and of ignorant, penniless aliens on the other, with 
 the magistrates empowered to construe this act and the 
 contracts, or pretended contracts, named, must know that 
 this act opened the doors of Georgia to a most aggravated 
 species of piracy in the bodies of men and women, to con- 
 tinue as long as there was any profit in the purchase of 
 such labor on this side of the sea.^^ 
 
 In the states north of Georgia the system assumed 
 various guises. A traveler in 1819-20 mentions an adver- 
 tisement in the "Aurora," of Philadelphia, issue of March 
 25, 1820, in which blacks are listed for sale, together with 
 white boys and girls whose ages ranged from eight to thir- 
 teen years. ^^ Another traveler in Ohio about the same time 
 mentions children of poor families who are bound out to 
 employers ; boys to the age of twenty-one, and girls to 
 
 321 wish to express my indebtedness to Mr. C. D. Rivers of Sum- 
 merville, Georgia, for the text of this Georgia code. The comment and 
 analysis of its provisions are also his with the exception of a few 
 slight changes that I have made. 
 
 3.'!Welby, "English Settlements," in Early Western Travels, edited 
 by Reuben Gold Thwaites, Vol. XII, p. 306.
 
 92 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 eighteen.-'* Writing from Jeffersonville, Indiana, in 1819, 
 he observes that "Runaway apprentices, slaves and wives 
 are frequently advertised.""' The constitutional convention 
 of Virginia, which met in 1829, based the suffrage on prop- 
 erty qualilications, and apportioned representatives in Con- 
 gress according to population defined as all free persons, 
 including those bound to service, and three-fifths of the 
 slaves.^" A decade before this period Virginia hired out 
 vagrants for the best terms that could be secured, and those 
 who ran away were dealt with as runaway servants. In 
 Georgia and Alabama vagabonds and disorderly persons 
 were sold, or if a buyer was not found, they were whipped. 
 Louisiana imprisoned vagrants from six months to three 
 years or the sheriffs bound them out for like terms. Mis- 
 souri sold them for six months at public auction.^' In 
 Maryland those unable to pay fines were held thirty days 
 in jail, and if, during that time, security for payment of 
 the fine within six months was not provided, the sheriff sold 
 the prisoner at auction for a term not exceeding one year. 
 This act also became a law in the District of Columbia, and 
 was still in force in 1840.^^ Poverty was still a crime in 
 most of the states, and our early "statesmen" transformed 
 its victims into private convicts for budding capitalists. 
 
 A curious by-product of indentured servitude was the 
 adoption of the s)'stem by slave owners in the territory north- 
 west of the River Ohio. The Ordinance of 1787 providing 
 for the government of this territory was, as stated in an- 
 
 34Flint, "Letters From America." Elar. West. Trav., Vol. IX, p. 123. 
 aslbid, p. 167. 
 
 38McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. V, 
 p. 393. 
 
 STMcMaster, Ibid, Vol. VI, pp. 582-83. 
 «8lbld.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 93 
 
 Other chapter, "tlie first great land job of the Republic."'" 
 Article \'I of the Ordinance provided that "There shall be 
 neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said terri- 
 tory." Among the first laws adopted by the government 
 of the Northwest Territory was one providing that when 
 certain offenders were unable to pay fines the sheriff, by 
 direction of the court, could bind such offenders to labor 
 for a term not exceeding seven years, to any person who 
 would pay the fine.*" 
 
 But this bore on workers regardless of their color. 
 While Indiana was a part of the Northwest Territory, three 
 attempts were made to repeal the sixth Article of the Or- 
 dinance. On January 12, 1796, Illinois slave owners 
 adopted a petition urging Congress to repeal or modify the 
 Article, stating as their reasons that it was retroactive and 
 contrary to "a fundamental principle of natural justice;" 
 that wage labor was too costly and "hands" were not abun- 
 dant enough to supply the demand. Throwing reason and 
 logic to the winds they even asked, if Congress denied the 
 petition, that Congress declare that the Article meant that 
 when slaves are imported into the territory they became 
 free, "but were still bound to serve their owners for life !"*^ 
 
 Wh.-r Indiana became a territory the legislature in 
 1805 passed a measure for introducing slavery by indenture 
 by permitting slaves over fifteen years of age to be im- 
 ported and to sign contracts for service to masters within 
 thirty days. Provisions were also made for holding the 
 children of slaves by indentures, and by this system slaves 
 
 39See Poole, "Dr. Cutler and the Ordinance of 1787." in North 
 American Review, April, 1876. This article is generally conceded to 
 be the most accurate account of the origin of the Ordinance. 
 
 40Dillon, "History of Indiana," p. 234. 
 
 4iDunn, "Indiana, A Redemption From Slavery," pp. 285-286.
 
 94 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 were held for many years after Indiana became a state.*^ 
 In 1806 the legislature enacted that the time of service of 
 indented slaves could be levied upon and sold as personal 
 property. Police regulations were also enacted that re- 
 sembled the slave codes of Virginia and other Southern 
 states.*^ The struggle between those who opposed and 
 those who favored indenturing negroes was a constant 
 issue in the politics of Indiana, and by 1830 there were four 
 more slaves in the one town of Vincennes than in all In- 
 diana in 1800! During all this time there was no efifort 
 in Congress to nullify the indenture laws or to enforce 
 Article VI." 
 
 Illinois repeated the same experience and had the same 
 struggles. Most of the settlers "purchased slaves when 
 very young in order to secure the longest legal terms of 
 service. Not satisfied with that, they registered them for 
 periods of servitude far in excess of the legal limit, many 
 being booked to serve from forty to sixty, and even ninety- 
 nine years."*^ Long after the adoption of the Illinois con- 
 stitution in 1818 blacks were held in servitude and bills of 
 sale are still preserved dated as late as 1848.*® 
 
 It is needless to say that the courts handed down many 
 "learned" opinions upholding the violation of Article VI. 
 In this way indentured servitude served as an agreeable 
 substitute for chattel slavery. The collar that held the 
 white thrall for several centuries in America was trans- 
 
 42lbid, pp. 329-330. 
 
 43lbid, p. 349. 
 
 44lbid, Chap. XII. 
 4.=)Harris, "Negro Servitude in Illinois," p. 11. 
 
 46lbid, p. 52. See also Parrish, "Historic Illinois," Chap. XXII, and 
 Turner, "Rise of the New West," p. 150. Slave owners in Texas, 
 while that state was under Mexican rule, followed the same method in 
 evading a law of Mexico forbidding slavery. Negroes were often bound 
 to serve 99 vears. — "Documentary History of American Industrial So- 
 ciety," Vol. II, p. 251.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 95 
 
 ferred to the necks of the blacks in the Mississippi Valley, 
 and was worn by them down to the middle of the last 
 century in violation of the plainest provision of a Federal 
 organic law. There is nothing strange about it, as the sys- 
 tem served the interests of the classes who profited by it, 
 and they took care, as a ruling class always has, to see that 
 all the governing machinery was in their hands and that 
 laws were enforced, ignored or interpreted according to 
 their will. 
 
 X
 
 96 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Chapter V 
 
 Rebellions of the Poor 
 
 It need occasion no surprise if the economic, social 
 and political status of the working people in our early his- 
 tory provoked revolts of both individuals and masses of the 
 poor. Their lot on the whole was a desperate one, and 
 though rebellion generally brought savage retaliation, this 
 knowledge did not deter them from hazarding an occa- 
 sional blow at their exploiters. Deprived of education and 
 lacking knowledge of the powers they had to contend with, 
 these revolts " were generally ineffective in securing any 
 changes for the better until the dawn of the nineteenth 
 century. The rebellions included all classes of workers, 
 such as the indentured servants, the redemptioners, the 
 black slaves, the so-called "free laborers," poor farmers 
 and, in some cases, small shop keepers and petty trades- 
 men who felt the heavy burden of taxation imposed by 
 grafting colonial governors and their fellow pilferers. 
 Where masses of these rebelled they always lacked any 
 definite plan of action. They were blind uprisings striking 
 against economic, political and social rulers and the latter, 
 possessing the coercive powers of government, were able to 
 suppress them. 
 
 The intolerable conditions of the blacks provoked at 
 least twenty-five rebellions of these slaves in the United 
 States before the American Revolution. The fear of these 
 slave insurrections gave rise to the atrocious slave codes
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 97 
 
 of the Southern states. Rebellions on the slave ships were 
 put down by applying the thumb-screws, chaining slaves 
 together, or shooting down the leaders and casting the dead 
 into the sea. To reduce the danger of revolts slaves were 
 generally prohibited from meeting together without a white 
 man being present, or to leave the plantation without a 
 permit. A free man could lash disobedient slaves and 
 could kill them if they struck in self-defense. To take the 
 life of a slave was no crime. Some offenses were puni.shed 
 by cropping the ears or branding the cheek ; cutting off the 
 right hand, severing the head from the trunk, dismem- 
 bering the body and hanging the pieces up to public view.^ 
 One rebellious slave in the Bermudas had his right hand 
 chopped off at the wrist and the bleeding stump thrust 
 into boiling pitch. After suffering excruciating agony he 
 was immersed and burned to death. 
 
 During Governor Hunter's administration of New 
 York in 1712, a party of negroes, armed with guns, knives 
 and hatchets, fired a building and shot and slashed those 
 who ran to the spot. Soldiers captured the slaves and 
 twenty-one were executed. "One was broken on the wheel, 
 and several were burned alive at the stake, while the rest 
 were hanged."^ In 1774 a revolt in Georgia was sup- 
 pressed and two leaders burned at the stake after having 
 murdered four and injured as many more. About one 
 thousand blacks revolted in Virginia in 1800 and marched 
 on the city of Richmond. A swollen stream interfered 
 with their march ; the leaders were captured and executed. 
 The rebellion, under the leadership of Nat Turner, in the 
 same state in 183 1, terrorized the haughty planters. Local 
 
 iMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. IT, 
 p. 19. 
 
 2Fiske, "Dutch and Quaker Colonies," Vol. II, p. 288. 
 
 7
 
 98 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 militia co-operating with United States troops crushed the 
 uprising after the blacks had killed sixty white people. 
 Twleve of them were sold out of the state and twenty, 
 including Turner, were hanged. 
 
 In 1792 the slave insurrection under Toussaint 
 
 L'Ouverture took place in St. Domingo. As this rebellion 
 was the most notable one of the blacks and had consider- 
 able influence on the agitation against slavery, we will 
 notice it here. The island had a population of 30,000 
 whites, 30,000 mulattoes, and 500,000 slaves. Sugar culture 
 killed the slaves off so rapidly that 25,000 negroes were 
 imported annually. The mulattoes were children of the 
 slave owners and their fathers, as a rule, did not forget 
 them because their mothers were slaves. The mulattoes 
 were given everything but their fathers' names ; given 
 wealth, plantations, slaves and many of them were even 
 sent to Paris to acquire an education. But these mulattoes 
 were politically and socially ostracised. 
 
 St. Domingo was a colony of France. When the Rev- 
 olution broke in that country and the words "liberty, equal- 
 ity and fraternity" floated across the seas, the white masters 
 heard them with fear, the mulattoes with joy and the blacks 
 with indifference. The mulattoes pledged their support 
 to the Revolution and sent 6,000,000 frances. The French 
 national assembly issued a decree proclaiming that all "free 
 born citizens are free before the law," and sent a repre- 
 sentative to the island with the message. The white slave 
 holders possessing the political power, laid the message on 
 the table, broke the body of the Frenchman on the wheel 
 arid ordered the four quarters of his body hung up in four 
 of the principal cities. 
 
 This led to the insurrection under the leadership of
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 99 
 
 Toussaint L'Ouverture, a black negro born in slavery and 
 by Wendell Phillips credited with being the noblest of his 
 race. He displayed a generosity, courage and military 
 genius that astounded the whites, and the rebellion lasted 
 more than ten years. Toussaint proclaimed religious free- 
 dom for all and preserved the property of the whites, who 
 left the island, and gave it back to them on their return. 
 But that "personification of national murder," Napoleon 
 the Great, was thrown to the surface by the froth of the 
 French Revolution and sent an army to suppress the blacks 
 and reduce them to slavery. The island was laid waste with 
 sword and fire, but the French were forced to employ bribery 
 and treachery to subdue the blacks. Toussaint was betrayed, 
 sent to France, starved to death in an icy tomb by Napoleon 
 and after unspeakable butchery of the blacks they were 
 again enslaved.^ The insurrection terrorized the slave 
 holders of America and supplied a convenient argument 
 against the advocates of emancipation. 
 
 In Virginia the convicts transported to that colony were 
 chiefly political offenders ; the number of common criminals 
 was never large. Among these were those who were driven 
 to petty crimes of poverty. In 1663 an insurrection was 
 plotted by white slaves who felt their sufferings keenly and 
 the insolence of the towering planters was not calculated to 
 reconcile them to their hard lot. However, they formed no 
 definite plans for their revolt which was easily suppressed.* 
 
 An act of the Assembly in 1640 held every master of a 
 family responsible for each of its members' military service, 
 the family including servants but not blacks. Each white 
 
 sThis uprising gave Wendell Phillips a theme for one of his most 
 powerful orations. The address is printed in the first volume of his 
 "Speeches, Lectures and Addresses," Lee and Shepard, Boston, 1902. 
 
 4Bancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. II, pp. 192-193.
 
 lOO THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 slave looked forward to the time when he would be free 
 and had not the same temptation to rebel as the blacks. The 
 latter were naturally immune from military service as they 
 might turn their experience to use for their own account. 
 
 As servants increased in number the fear of white re- 
 bellions increased so that by 1672 only such indentured 
 whites were admitted to military duty whose terms had 
 nearly expired, the masters reasoning that whites whose 
 terms would soon expire would not hazard their future by 
 giving support to any revolts. When Governor Nicholson 
 proposed in 1699 that all agricultural servants should be 
 taught to bear arms the House of Burgesses replied that it 
 would be a hardship to the planters to have their servants 
 subject to the call of militia officers, especially at times when 
 they were sorely needed in the tobacco fields and that the 
 policy was a dangerous one. "The Burgesses closed with the 
 statement that it was difficult to control their white laborers 
 when unarmed ; and that, if they were armed and permitted 
 to attend musters, they might be tempted to seek to obtain 
 their freedom by slaying their masters."^ 
 
 Throughout the colonial period this fear of an uprising 
 of the servile whites was a source of uneasiness to the ruling 
 class. Fear of foreign invasion always aroused appre- 
 hension that the enslaved whites would rise and strike a 
 blow for their own freedom during an invasion. 
 
 The servants at this period numbered as many as the 
 freemen while many of the poorer classes of freemen "were 
 heavily burdened with debt contracted in the effort to earn 
 
 oBruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. 11, p. 7.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY lOI 
 
 a livelihood by cultivating tobacco on a poor soil."" Should 
 these two elements join in a rebellion at such a moment 
 the consequences for the aristocracy would not be pleasant 
 to contemplate. 
 
 In this colony a rebellion of poor whites took place in 
 1676 that startled the planter aristocracy. Roughly speaking 
 there were four classes in the colony ; the great planters be- 
 low tidewater on the main rivers, who lived in luxury and 
 possessed the governing power ; the middle class of small 
 planters and farmers who aped the manners of the ruling 
 class ; the poor whites and indentured slaves, and the blacks. 
 The frontier was peopled by the poorer classes of farmers 
 and frequent Indian raids had destroyed crops and many 
 families were massacred. The terrible massacres in which 
 the outlying settlements suffered most in 1622 and 1644 
 were still remembered with terror by the settlers. Appeals 
 for protection repeatedly made to Governor Berkeley, one of 
 the many colonial grafters of that time, met with little 
 encouragement. Berkeley was interested in the fur trade 
 with the Indians, who were making war on the settlers, and 
 to recruit sufficient militia to protect the latter would have 
 endangered Berkeley's profits in the traffic. This was one 
 powerful grievance that led to what has come to be known 
 as "Bacon's Rebellion." 
 
 But there were other long-standing grievances. One 
 was the Long Assembly, which remained in session fourteen 
 years without a single dissolution, and became callous, cor- 
 
 elbid, Vol. II, p. 200. The novel of Mary Johnson, "Prisoners of 
 Hope," is a tale of colonial Virginia and deserves to rank high as a 
 faithful picture of the life of the white servants and the aristocratic 
 society built upon their labor. The terror of the ruling families over 
 an impending revolt of the convicts, Oliverians, indented servants, and 
 redemptioners is also drawn with power. The novel is a better his- 
 tory of the life and institutions of the time than many histories that 
 Include Virginia.
 
 102 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 rupt and insolent in the exercise of its power. One writer 
 asserts that "The series of wrongful acts leading up to the 
 rebellion of 1676 were among the most exasperating that 
 any section of the American people have ever been called 
 upon to endure for the same length of time. Restrictive 
 navigation laws; measures for affording Burgesses very 
 high remuneration without relieving the counties of addi- 
 tional expense on that score; the continuation of the same 
 Assembly for fourteen years because Berkeley had found its 
 members to be submissive and ready instruments for his 
 purposes; the concentration of all the offices and all the 
 power in the hands of a few possessing no legal claim to 
 such privileges; the persecution of religious sects; the sub- 
 ordination of the whole community, threatened with Indian 
 invasion, to the interests of the Governor in the fur trade, 
 a trade which would have been destroyed by a vigorous 
 campaign against the savages,"^ all these grievances had 
 been accumulating for years. 
 
 The Assembly that met in 1662 was a self -perpetuating 
 one, being prorogued from session to session, until it sat 
 for fourteen years. The counties were burdened with 
 enormous taxation to pay the excessive salaries which the 
 members of the Assembly voted to themselves. This op- 
 pression spread through the whole framework of Virginia 
 society and won for the haughty aristocracy the deep hatred 
 of nearly all classes below it. The revolt which followed 
 the Indian raids would have culminated without them in 
 time.^ In 1670 increased property qualifications for the 
 franchise increased the discontent among the poorer classes. 
 All these factors contributed to what has come to be known 
 as "Bacon's Rebellion." 
 
 TBruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," "Vol. II, p. 264. 
 sibid, p. 493.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY IO3 
 
 Nathaniel Bacon was a young man of 28 and a de- 
 scendant of the great Lord Bacon. He was a land owner, 
 a member of the council, a pursuasive speaker and sympa- 
 thetic with the struggles of the poor. His land was in the 
 zone of the warring Indians and he asked for a commission 
 against them. Governor Berkeley refused the commission, 
 for to grant it would have been a confession of weakness 
 and error of judgment that would have increased the con- 
 tempt in which he was held. Receiving the Governor's 
 evasive answer, Bacon took the field at the head of the dis- 
 tressed settlers. Having defeated the Indians he was 
 arrested on his return to Jamestown, but after giving prom- 
 ise of good behaviour, was released. 
 
 In the elections to the House of Burgesses which 
 shortly followed, many ignored the property qualifications 
 and voted. Bacon was unanimously elected a burgess from 
 his county, and the Assembly elected Thomas Godwin as 
 Speaker, who was regarded by the aristocracy as a friend of 
 the "rebellion and treason which distracted Virginia." 
 Bacon was appointed commander-in-chief of the forces and 
 the town was boisterous with joy over the event. Under 
 his leadership the house restored the old basis for the suf- 
 frage, some trade monopolies were overthrown, two magis- 
 trates were disfranchised for misconduct in office, false 
 returns of sheriffs were guarded against, the powers of the 
 church aristocracy were limited, and some of the governor's 
 fees curtailed. These measures bore the stamp of Bacon's 
 popular principles and were enacted over the opposition of 
 the aristocratic members of the house, and Bacon was cor- 
 dially hated by Berkeley and the aristocracy. 
 
 In the meantime his enemies plotted for his overthrow, 
 and fearing that his life was in danger, the rebel left James-
 
 I04 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 town. "It vexes me to the heart," said Bacon, "that while 
 I am hunting the wolves and tigers that destroy our lambs, 
 I should myself be pursued as a savage." He asks, have 
 not the ruling classes "devoured the common treasury? 
 What arts, what sciences, what schools of learning have 
 they promoted?"^ 
 
 Encouraged by popular approval Bacon proceeded 
 against the Indians, while Berkeley withdrew beyond the 
 Chesapeake, and by promises of plunder endeavored to col- 
 lect an army, "men of a base and cowardly disposition, 
 allured by the passion for plunder."^** He returned to 
 Jamestown in a few days. 
 
 He then charged the governor with having imposed 
 unjust taxes "for the advancement of private favorites 
 and other sinister ends," for "having rendered contemptible 
 the majesty of justice, of advancing . . . scandalous 
 and ignorant favorites," for having assumed "the monopoly 
 of the beaver trade," and failure to "give protection against 
 the assaults of the Indians." He also denounced the aris- 
 tocracy, the "juggling parasites whose tottering fortunes 
 have been repaired at the public charge." These charges 
 committed Bacon to open revolt against the governor and 
 the ruling class. 
 
 He again entered the field against the Indians and on 
 the return march the rebels burned Jamestown. But his 
 radical utterances and general policy frightened some of 
 his well-to-do followers, who deserted him — a treachery for 
 which the middle class is noted in all countries and at all 
 times. The poorer classes were left to form the ranks of 
 his small force and the struggle assumed the character of 
 
 9Bancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. II, p. 223. 
 lolbid, p. 226.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY IO5 
 
 a class war with all the elements of the aristocracy arrayed 
 against the rebels. Shortly after the burning of James- 
 town, while marching north, Bacon fell a victim of malarial 
 fever. His death brought the collapse of the rebellion, 
 though small groups held out for some time. Berkeley 
 punished the rebels with such ferocity as to call forth the 
 protest of the king, who said, "the old fool has put to death 
 more people in that naked country than I did here for the 
 murder of my father."^^ 
 
 Berkeley justified the executions by his right to pro- 
 claim martial law, although when he exercised it resistance 
 had ceased and the "real reason for which the power had 
 been originally granted was no longer in operation. "^- 
 Fearing that juries would acquit the rebels courts-martial 
 hurried them to death. Women and children were driven 
 from home and compelled to rely on charity. Of those who 
 went to trial none escaped death. The Assembly was 
 finally forced to interfere and voted an address "that the 
 governor would spill no more blood.^^ In fact, the fore- 
 most historian of Virginia asserts that "it is doubtful if any 
 of them (the rebels) were tried at all by the only civil court 
 having the power to inflict punishment for their supposed 
 treason. The unfortunate Drummond, for instance, seems 
 to have been ordered to execution only a few hours after 
 his arrest; and there were other cases quite as summary 
 which reflect an equal degree of shame and disgrace on 
 Berkeley's memory."^* 
 
 It was the leading families who had large estates and 
 
 iiFiske, "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," Vol. II, p. 95. See also 
 Thwaites, "The Colonies," pp. 78-79. 
 
 i2Bruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. 11, p. 321. 
 isBancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. II, p. 232. 
 i4Bruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. I, pp. 674-675.
 
 I06 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 made up the wealthy aristocracy of Virginia that supported 
 the grafting governor in the rebelHon. This class had grad- 
 ually usurped powers in the government and restricted the 
 privileges of the poorer classes. A great section of the pop- 
 ulation was also in the direst poverty so that the economic 
 and political conditions favoring revolt were abundant. Wil- 
 liam Sherwood, who later became attorney general of Vir- 
 ginia, referred to the rebels as "ye scum of the country. ' 
 A member of the council says that Bacon "gathers about 
 him a Rabble of the basest sort of people, whose Condicion 
 was such, as by a change could not admitt of worse, 
 .who for ye ease of the poore will have noe taxes 
 paied, . . . but would have all magistracie & Govern- 
 m'nt taken away & Sett up one themselves, & to make their 
 Good Intentions more manifest stick not to talk openly of 
 sharing men's estates among themselves." 
 
 This testimony comes from the aristocrats, and indi- 
 cates that they regarded the rebellion as a revolt of the 
 poorer classes to secure equality of political rights and 
 economic opportunities. The rebels are even charged with 
 having communistic aspirations — with the desire "of shar- 
 ing men's estates" in common. It is probable that Bacon 
 may have had a communistic program in mind. It would 
 have served to unite the poor against the landed aristocracy. 
 They also knew that early in the history of Virginia the 
 planting of corn, clearing the wilderness, fortifying the 
 settlement and work in general was performed, for a time, 
 on a communistic basis. The charge against Bacon then 
 was that he promised a return to this early stage in the his- 
 tory of the colony. 
 
 Bacon was driven to this radicalism in order to hold 
 the loyalty of the poor after the desertion of the better-
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY IO7 
 
 situated elements and also because of the knowledge that 
 should he fail he would probably be hanged or shot. The 
 causes of the revolt are well summarized by the historian 
 Fiske. 
 
 "The years preceding the rebellion," he writes, "were 
 such as are commonly called 'hard times.' People felt poor 
 and saw fortunes made by corrupt officials; the fault was 
 with the Navigation Act and with the debauched civil 
 service of Charles II and Berkeley. Besides these troubles, 
 which were common to all, the poorer people felt oppressed 
 by taxation, in regard to which they were not consulted 
 and for which they seemed to get no service in return. 
 The distribution of taxation by polls, equal amounts for 
 rich and poor, was resented as a cruel injustice. The sub- 
 ject of taxation was clearly connected with the Indian 
 troubles, for people paid large sums for military defense 
 and nevertheless saw their houses burned and their fami- 
 lies massacred."^® We have seen in a previous chapter that 
 lack of protection for the frontier was generally the policy 
 of the colonial rulers, and Bacon's Rebellion is a noted 
 example of the discontent this policy provoked. Had Bacon 
 proved successful he would have become noted as a pioneer 
 in the struggle for popular rule. Of Bacon's Assembly we 
 may say, in the words of Prof. Bruce, that "Had the theatre 
 upon which this Assembly met been that of a nation instead 
 of that of a small colony in a remote part of the world, its 
 spirit and its measures would long ago have won an ex- 
 traordinary fame in history, and the legislators themselves 
 would have enjoyed a universal reputation as among the 
 wisest and most patriotic who have been called on to pass 
 laws in a great crisis."^® 
 
 isFiske, "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," Vol. II, p. 105. 
 leBruce, "Institutional History of Virginia," Vol. U, p. 494.
 
 I08 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Many refugees of Bacon's Rebellion fled to North 
 Carolina, where they found a safe asylum from the blood 
 lust of Berkeley. Here the population was also seething 
 with revolt because of the Navigation Act, restriction of 
 political privileges, and tyrannical administration of the 
 colony. The leader of the rebellion was John Culpepper, 
 held by the royalists as meriting "hanging, for endeavoring 
 to set the poor people to plundering the rich." One coun- 
 sellor joined the rebellion, while the rest, with President 
 Miller, were imprisoned. 
 
 Culpepper had the support of the poor and uneducated 
 majority, and accepted a commission to England to present 
 the grievances of the colonists. Miller escaped to England 
 and enlisted the support of the mercantile cities, and Cul- 
 pepper was arrested for high treason just as he was embark- 
 ing from America. A trial resulted in his acquittal by an 
 English jury. Governor Sothel, who succeeded to that 
 position after the restoration of peace, was another of the 
 many colonial grafters of that time. "From among many as 
 infamous as himself, historians have selected him as the 
 most infamous." He swindled the proprietaries and ex- 
 ploited the settlers through excessive fees for five years 
 when he was deposed by his outraged victims.^'' 
 
 In Maryland similar acts of tyranny were developing 
 popular discord and the news of Bacon's Rebellion encour- 
 aged the populace in trying to abolish abuses. During the ab- 
 sence of Lord Baltimore the Assembly responded to popular 
 demands by extending the franchise, but Lord Baltimore on 
 his return annulled the popular measure. Dire poverty was 
 the lot of many and not only rebellion, but independence, 
 was planned. The unrest was aggravated by the dominant 
 
 iTBancroft, "History of the United States," Vol. U, Chap. XHt.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY IO9 
 
 religious creed of the Catholics. Though rebellion or mu- 
 tinous speeches were punishable by whipping, boring the 
 tongue, imprisonment, or death, the discontent increased, 
 and in 1689 the insurgents usurped the government. 
 
 The next revolt of importance was that of Leisler's 
 Rebellion in New York twelve years after Bacon's Rebellion 
 in Virginia. As already noted New York was the nearest 
 approach to the establishment of feudalism in America. The 
 sweeping powers and privileges given the manor lords 
 created discontent from the beginning of colonization. Their 
 descendants claimed feudal rights well into the nineteenth 
 century and on the great Van Rensselaer estate an attempt 
 to collect long arrears of rents developed an anti-rent move- 
 ment (1839-1846) which resulted in bloody riots.^^ 
 
 Coupled with the existence of an overbearing, wealthy, 
 ruling class, was the usual administration of grafting gov- 
 ernors. Fletcher, we have seen, had a close alliance with 
 the pirates and shared in their loot. The pirates were un- 
 derselling the regular merchants, which added this class to 
 the mass of the discontented. This pirate commerce was 
 enormous and for a time New York resembled an oriental 
 city. "For a dozen years or more the streets of New York 
 might have reminded one of Teheran or Bassora, with their 
 shops displaying rugs of Anatolia or Daghestan, tables of 
 carved teak-wood, vases of hammered brass or silver, Bag- 
 dad portieres, fans of ivory or sandalwood, soft shawls of 
 myriad gorgeous hues and white crape."^^ 
 
 The landed aristocracy shared some of their power 
 with rich fur traders, lawyers and officials. At the bottom 
 of society were the small farmers, sailors, shipwrights. 
 
 isThwaites, "The Colonies," p. 199. 
 
 lOFiske, "Dutch and Quaker Colonies," Vol. IT, p. 225.
 
 no THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 artisans and indentured slaves who were viewed with con- 
 tempt by the aristocracy. 
 
 Jacob Leisler, who gave his name to the rebelHon, was 
 a German of humble origin, born at Frankfort-on-the-Main. 
 He had married a daughter of a rich family, but was not 
 accepted on terms of equality with the ruling class. He 
 was lacking in the education and polish that distinguished 
 the wealthy idlers. His sympathy with the poor was ex- 
 pressed in deeds. In 1689 he bought a piece of land for 
 Huguenots, and at another time when a poor Huguenot 
 family were to be sold as redemptioners, he delivered them 
 from servitude by paying their passage money.-" He was 
 admired by the poor for his honesty and unselfishness, 
 which made him the logical leader of the discontent that had 
 been long gathering in the city. 
 
 King James H had consolidated New England, New 
 York and New Jersey under Governor Andros. The latter 
 went to New England, leaving Francis Nicholson as lieu- 
 tenant governor, when news came of the flight of King 
 James and the landing of William of Orange in England. 
 Nicholson withheld the news and Leisler, hearing of the 
 event, made it public. The latter also refused to pay duty 
 on a cargo of wine on the ground that the collector was 
 a Catholic, and since King James' flight no legal govern- 
 ment existed in New York. There was also the popular 
 belief that Governor Nicholson had gone over to Louis 
 XIV, and an invasion by a French fleet was feared. 
 
 An insolent remark of the governor released the pent- 
 up forces of revolt. A militia company, representing the 
 popular party, seized the fort and Leisler, after repeated 
 
 20Faust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, p. 14,
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY III 
 
 solicitations, took command. A committee of public safety, 
 elected by popular vote, turned the aristocratic govern- 
 ment out and proclaimed Jacob Leisler commander-in-chief 
 of the fort and city. At another election the aristocracy 
 was completely routed and Leisler was proclaimed supreme 
 commander of the province. The defeated masters en- 
 deavored to stir up discord. "The name of Leisler was 
 dragged through the mire. He was branded as a tyrant, 
 usurper, demagogue, even as a Papist and Jacobite, by the 
 very persons who had proved their disloyalty to the new 
 dynasty."-^ 
 
 The aristocrats tried to kidnap the popular commander, 
 but failed and three of them were themselves imprisoned. 
 Leisler held power for several years during which the first 
 American congress of the colonies met in New York at his 
 call in May, 1690. But his rule was not to endure long. 
 Discontent over taxes, the refusal of William to recognize 
 his agent, the timidity and lack of concerted plans of his 
 followers, the plotting and bitter antagonism of his enemies, 
 contributed to his overthrow. The arrival of Governor 
 Sloughter was followed by the seizure of Leisler and his 
 son-in-law, Milborne. ''A sham trial was instituted, in which 
 Sloughter appointed Leisler's personal enemies as his 
 judges."" The councilors arrested with him were released; 
 Leisler was charged with rebellion, confiscation of property, 
 and the illegal levying of taxes. He and Milborne refused 
 to defend themselves against the charges and both were sen- 
 tenced to death. Both were hanged May 16, 1691, near the 
 present site of the World building in Park Row. 
 
 Sloughter was reluctant to sign the death warrant and 
 
 21Ibid, pp. 17-18. 
 22lbid, p. 23.
 
 112 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 tradition has it that at a wedding feast of one of the aris- 
 tocrats, the governor was induced to sign the paper while 
 drunk. Leisler made a pathetic speech just before the 
 bandage was applied to his eyes, and thus died one of the 
 early popular revolts against class rule in America. 
 
 A later governor. Lord Bellomont, a man of demo- 
 cratic tastes, who detested the landed parasites, declared 
 the execution of Leisler and Milborne was a judicial mur- 
 der and their estates were restored to their heirs. Though 
 the leaders of the rebellion were removed the Leisler party 
 was active for some years and was instrumental in secur- 
 ing the removal of the notorious Fletcher, whose career we 
 have had occasion to mention a number of times.^^ 
 
 Maladministration in North Carolina in the latter part 
 of the eighteenth century provoked the revolt known as the 
 War of the Regulators. Power had been concentrated in 
 the hands of the Governor and a few prominent men. Graft- 
 ing "rings" controlled the spoils of office in the western 
 counties and excessive taxes plundered the farmers of the 
 back country. Scarcity of money made it difficult for them 
 to pay their taxes, and the collectors frequently refused to 
 extend time for payment and seized property for less than 
 its value. "The Regulators charged that officers played into 
 each other's hands for this purpose, and there were men in 
 
 23Fiske, "Dutch and Quaker Colonies," Vol. II, pp. 183-228, and 
 Appendix I. Also Faust, "The German Element in the United States," 
 Vol. I, pp. 13-25. Edwin Lassetter Bynner's novel, "The Begum's 
 Daughter," is a story of Leisler's Rebellion, but presents Leisler as 
 a tyrannical fool. The basis of the revolt, the tyranny of the land 
 kings, the shameless grafting of public officials, the oppression of the 
 poor classes and small shopkeepers, is almost entirely concealed and 
 Van Cortlandt, a scion of one of the wealthy families, is made the 
 hero of the story. Fisher in his "Men, Women and Manners in Co- 
 lonial Times," (pp. 80-84), also gives an unfavorable account of the 
 rebellion.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY II3 
 
 Hillsborough who made large sums by dealing in such busi- 
 ness."^* 
 
 The sheriffs were dishonest and were charged with hav- 
 ing "embezzled more than one-half of the public money 
 ordered to be raised and collected by them." In 1770 the 
 official grafters were in arrears more than 66,000 pounds. 
 
 A service for which the law provided a fixed fee was 
 also divided into two or more services and a fee demanded 
 for each. The courts were believed to be implicated by 
 their delay of cases, thus increasing costs. The lack of 
 courts in the back country, necessitating a journey of from 
 thirty to sixty miles, was another grievance, and the post- 
 poned cases of one court were about one thousand in 1766. 
 Many of these victimized workers, after the revolt was sup- 
 pressed at the battle of Alamance, in 1771, moved on into 
 the wilderness while many of their exploiters became prom- 
 inent as leaders in the war of independence. The survivors 
 of the revolt who stayed in North Carolina either remained 
 aloof from the war or openly supported the British as 
 against the ruling classes. ^'^ 
 
 The records regarding revolts of indentured whites 
 are scanty, but that they took place is certain. The white 
 bondman, like the black slave, frequently acting under the 
 spur of brutal treatment, would murder his master. One 
 redemptioner who was hung in chains in Virginia, in Au- 
 gust, 1678, for murdering his owner, mistress and her maid, 
 has left a pathetic autobiography telling of the treatment he 
 
 24Howard, "Preliminaries of the Revolution," p. 223, quoting Bas- 
 sett. 
 
 25lbid, Chap. XIII. Paul Leicester Ford's novel, "Janice Meredith," 
 not only portrays white servitude during the revolutionarj' period, hut 
 also the fluctuating character of sentiment at that time, favoring the 
 rebels one day and opposing the next. This is humorously portrayed 
 in the publican who changed the sign on his tavern from George in 
 to George Washington and back again as the fortunes of war dictated.
 
 Il4 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 received and how he came to the resolution to kill his tor- 
 mentors.^® 
 
 Bernard Romans' "Concise Natural History of East 
 and West Florida" (New York, 1776), records a rebellion 
 of white slaves about 35 miles south of St. Augustine, on 
 St. John's river. The writer asserts that the settlement 
 was famous "on account of the cruel methods of settling it, 
 which made it the daily topic of conversation for a long 
 time in this and the neighboring provinces." 
 
 "About 1,500 people, men, women and children," he 
 writes, "were deluded away from their native country, 
 where they lived at home in the plentiful cornfields and 
 vineyards of Greece and Italy, to this place, where, instead 
 of plenty, they found want in its last degree, instead of 
 promised fields, a dreary wilderness ; instead of a grateful, 
 fertile soil, a barren arid sand ; and in addition to their 
 misery, were obliged to indent themselves, their wives and 
 children for many years, to a man who had the most san- 
 guine expectations of transplanting Bashawship from the 
 Levant. The better to effect his purpose, he gi anted them 
 a pitiful portion of land for ten years, upon the plan of 
 the feudal system ; this being improved and just rendered 
 fit for cultivation, at the end of that term it reverts to 
 the original grantor, and the grantee may, if he chooses, 
 begin a new state of vassalage for ten years more. Many 
 were denied even such grants as these, and were obliged 
 to work in the manner of negroes, a task in the field ; their 
 provisions were at the best times only a quart of maize 
 per day, and tzvo ounces of pork per week ; this might have 
 sufficed with the help of fish which abounds in this lagoon. 
 
 26See "A Documentary History of American Industrial Society," 
 Tol. I.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY II5 
 
 but they were denied the liberty of fishing, and lest they 
 should not labor enough, inhuman taskmasters were set 
 over them, and instead of allowing each family to do with 
 their homely fare as they pleased, they were forced to join 
 altogether in one mess, and at the beat of a vile drum, to 
 come to one common copper, from whence their homany 
 (hominy) was ladled ont to them; even this coarse and 
 scanty meal was through careless management rendered 
 still more coarse. 
 
 "O Florida! were this the only instance of similar 
 barbarity which thou hast seen, we might draw a veil over 
 these scenes of horror; but Rolles Town, Mount Royal 
 and three or four others of less note have seen too many 
 wretches fall victims to hunger and ill usage, and that at 
 a period of life when health and strength generally main- 
 tain the human frame in its greatest vigor, and seem to 
 insure longevity. Rolles Town in particular has been the 
 sepulchre of above four hundred such victims." 
 
 He then relates the story of an insurrection of these 
 slaves "which the great ones stile rebellion." The poor 
 wretches driven to despair in 1769, by these intolerable 
 conditions, entered some provision stores and seized some 
 boats lying in the harbor. Like the other revolts we have 
 reviewed, the rebels acted without any careful planning and 
 the leadership fell to an Italian whose reputation was iiot 
 of the best. While hiding in the harbor a regiment of 
 troops arrived to whom they surrendered, with the excep- 
 tion of one boat, which escaped to the Florida Keys. 
 Romans, the historian of the affair, was one of the grand 
 jury to investigate the rebellion, and states "we only found 
 five bills." One was found against a rebel who had maimed 
 one Cutter, "who had been made a justice of the pe:.ce,
 
 ]l6 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 with no other view than to enable him to execute his bar- 
 barities to a larger extent." Here, as in Pennsylvania, we 
 find "grafters in high places" interested in this white slav- 
 ery. A number of the rebels were executed, one for killing 
 a cow: 
 
 The jury room was crowded v/ith masters whose 
 scowls indicated the sentences they wanted. But the jury 
 seemed more lenient than the aristocratic slavers expected 
 for we are informed that it "disappointed the expectations 
 of more than one great man. Governor Grant pardoned 
 two, and a third who was obliged to he the executioner of 
 the remaining two." We feel some elation to be informed 
 that the grafting justice of the peace "some time after died 
 a lingering death, having experienced, besides his wounds, 
 the terrors of a coward in power, overtaken by ven- 
 geance."^^ 
 
 Shays' Rebellion after the Revolution had such an im- 
 portant influence in determining the acts of the Constitu- 
 tional Convention that we will consider it in another chapter. 
 Social upheavals and class wars have played their part in 
 shaping American history from its beginning. These revolts 
 are generally stigmatized in popular histories and often 
 regarded as unreasoning outbursts of passion, sometimes 
 fomented by agitators and demagogues. We have seen that 
 all of them had their justification in some economic griev- 
 ance, and often a long series of unbearable injustices. 
 Whether we call them rebellions, insurrections, strikes, 
 revolts or civil wars, matters little. That they incarnated 
 the spirit of rebellion against colonial slavers and rulers is 
 of interest to us. The subject classes that are capable of 
 
 27Se« "A Documentary History of American Industrial Society,' 
 Vol. I, for Romans' account of the insurrection.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY II7 
 
 turning on those who profit by their subjection — and do 
 turn — are worthy of our admiration and esteem. // is tliis 
 spirit of revolt among the poor, not the intrigues and "states- 
 manship" of the "great men" of the past, that zve regard as 
 glorious in American history. 
 
 We shall see in another chapter how one rebellion 
 drove the ruling classes to Philadelphia, in 1787, to estab- 
 lish a "strong government" in behalf of property and thus 
 complete the conquest of economic resources and political 
 power by these classes.
 
 Il8 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Chapter VI 
 
 General Status of the Workers 
 
 In reviewing the general economic and social condi- 
 tions of the workers we are aware that it would be a false 
 judgment to base our estimate on twentieth century stand- 
 ards. The degree of material comfort possible before 
 the age of machinery was necessarily less than now. The 
 capacity for producing wealth was small owing to the 
 crude forms of production that prevailed. Yet with this 
 reservation only one with a bias favoring aristocracy can 
 give the appreciative view of the past that is usually found 
 in the school books and histories. It is no exaggeration 
 to say that the society of colonial times, and long after the 
 Revolution, regarded labor as a badge of shame. It was 
 because of this view held by the wealthy classes that all the 
 colonies, and later the states, withheld the franchise from 
 those not possessing a certain amount of property. The 
 possession of property was a passport to the "best society" 
 and enabled the holder to share in political and other privi- 
 leges. If a poor farmer or laborer by some stroke of good 
 fortune came into possession of wealth, it removed the 
 social and economic curse under which he previously lived. 
 
 Massachusetts, in 1691, restricted the franchise to pos- 
 sessors of an estate of freehold in land or other estate to 
 the value of 40 pounds per annum. A Maryland law 
 (1681) limited the suffrage to those having freeholds of 
 fifty acres or other property worth 40 pounds. In New
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY II9 
 
 Jersey (1688) it was 200 acres of land or 50 pounds. New 
 York (1665) provided for town meetings and election of 
 a constable and eight overseers by a "plurality of the voices 
 of the freeholders." In 1680 an assembly was formed 
 composed of eighteen deputies elected by freeholders. In 
 Connecticut (1639) the governor and six magistrates were 
 to be elected by a majority of the freemen. In Virginia 
 the suffrage had been restricted to freemen, but in 1670 it 
 was further restricted to "such as by their estates, real or 
 personal!, have interest enough to tye them to the endeavor 
 of the publique good."^ This law was one of the causes 
 contributing to Bacon's Rebellion. 
 
 In South Carolina (1765) members of the assembly 
 must own 500 acres of land and ten slaves or possess 1,000 
 pounds in land, houses and other propert)^ In Georgia 
 delegates to the assembly are required to own 500 acres of 
 land and suffrage was restricted to those who owned 50 
 acres or a town lot. In North Carolina one must own land 
 to hold office, and only freeholders could vote. "This sys- 
 tem was ingrafted on the constitution adopted when North 
 Carolina became a state, and by which senators were 
 obliged to own 300 acres of land, and representatives 100, 
 while the suffrage was restricted to freeholders of 50 
 acres."^ 
 
 The Declaration of Independence and the triumph of 
 the Revolution brought few changes in the property quali- 
 fications for the franchise. Nearly all the state constitu- 
 tions adopted at this time repeated the assertion of the 
 Declaration that "all men are created equal," but "an exam- 
 ination of these state constitutions reveals the fact that in 
 
 iSee Thwaites, "The Colonies." 
 
 2Lodge, "History of the English Colonies," p. 149.
 
 I20 THE WORKERS IX AMERICAN HISTORV 
 
 their formation very little regard was paid to the self-evi- 
 dent truths, and that the very men who were loudly assert- 
 ing the political equality of man went on and set up gov- 
 ernments under which political equality had no existence."^ 
 The suffrage laws in the states after the Revolution confirm 
 this judgment. Massachusetts required the voter to have 
 an income of three pounds a year from a freehold estate or 
 personal estate worth sixty pounds. In Connecticut he 
 must have a similar income of seven dollars or real estate 
 worth $134. In New Jersey his real estsate must be worth 
 fifty pounds, and Maryland the same, or personal property 
 of thirty pounds. In Virginia he must own "twenty-five 
 acres of land, properly planted, with a house thereon at 
 least twelve feet square on the foundation," or fifty acres of 
 wild land or a town lot. In South Carolina he must be a 
 free white man owning fifty acres or a town lot. 
 
 To hold office the property qualifications were still 
 higher, ranging from 100 pounds to 500, or land or slaves, 
 and generally including a belief in the Christian religion. 
 Everywhere the basis of office holding and the suffrage 
 was property. "It was indeed true that all governments 
 derived their just powers from the consent of the governed; 
 yet under these early state constitutions, none but tax-pay- 
 ing, property-owning men could give that consent from 
 which government derives its just powers. . . . The 
 poor man counted for nothing. He was governed, but not 
 with his consent, by his property-owning Christian neigh- 
 bors. ... In short, the broad doctrine that govern- 
 ments derive their just powers from the consent of the 
 governed, was not accepted by the 'Fathers.' "* 
 
 aMcMaster, "The Acquisition of the Political, Social and Ittdus- 
 trial Rights of Man in America," p. 15. 
 4lbid, pp. 18-21.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 121 
 
 Exclusion of masses of workingmen from the ballot 
 continued till the middle of the nineteenth century and in 
 1842 it caused an armed uprising in Rhode Island, known 
 as "Dorr's Rebellion." This revolt temporarily seated 
 Thomas Dorr in the governor's chair, but he was finally 
 ousted, the rebellion put down with troops, and a price 
 was placed on the head of the fugitive governor. He was 
 captured and sentenced to prison for life for the "crime" 
 of endeavoring to establish popular rule. In 1845 ^ lit)" 
 eration" governor was elected, Dorr was set free, and the 
 clerk of the supreme court was ordered to write across the 
 record of his sentence the words "REVERSED AND AN- 
 NULLED BY ORDER OF THE GENERAL ASSEM- 
 BLY."= 
 
 A study of the official declarations of the dominant 
 political parties down to this time reveals the fact that all 
 of them zvere silent regarding this policy of disfranchise- 
 ment. In fact, their spokesmen opposed extension of suf- 
 frage to the poor. Daniel Webster, for example, in the 
 Massachusetts Constitutional convention (1820) made the 
 most powerful argument against universal suffrage.® In 
 the New York convention (1821) Chancellor Kent, op- 
 posing universal suffrage, said: "This democratic principle 
 cannot be contemplated without terror. . . . Univer- 
 sal suffrage jeopardizes property and puts in into the power 
 of the poor and the profligate to control the affluent. 
 The poor man's interest is ahvays in opposition to 
 his duty, and it is too much to expect of human nature 
 that interest will not be consulted."'^ This expresses the 
 philosophy of class rule nicely. It is the "poor man's duty" 
 
 sibid, pp. 111-122. 
 
 eibid, p. 82. 
 Tibid. pp. 70-71.
 
 122 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 to serve the ruling class, but his "interest is always in 
 opposition to his duty." If the worker should neglect his 
 "duty" and follow the urge of his interest, as a rational 
 human being should, what would become of the "gentlemen 
 of substance" who live on his sweat and blood ? 
 
 But the colonial masters did not rely on their class 
 laws alone to insure their supremacy. They were skilled 
 in the use of the most brutal practices at elections. This 
 was necessary as there was always more or less antagonism 
 between them and the more fortunate of the poor classes 
 who managed to qualify for the suffrage. For example, at 
 the annual election for members of the Pennsylvania assem- 
 bly in 1742, a large number of sailors in Philadelphia were 
 armed with clubs by one faction and assaulted opposing 
 voters and election officials. When the ground was cleared 
 several were carried off dead. This was repeated a number 
 of times when an investigation showed that the sailors were 
 hired by party leaders.* A quaint letter is still preserved 
 in which a politician of the same state, in 1765, advises that 
 his party clique go to the polls with clubs and, if necessary, 
 "thrash the sheriff, every inspector, Quaker and Mennonist 
 to a jelly."^ 
 
 A debate in Congress in 1790 preserves some interest- 
 ing information regarding elections in the Southern states. 
 In Virginia the voters of an entire county generally voted 
 at one courthouse. One candidate had a brother com- 
 manding federal troops who voted them for his aspiring 
 relative. A congressman asserted that at his own election 
 500 of his partisans were armed with clubs and that force 
 was a common thing at the polls. "A gentleman from 
 
 RHart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, pp. 
 85-86. 
 
 9Hart, "Source Book of American History," pp. 126-128.
 
 TPIE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I23 
 
 South Carolina affected to be much surprised at this ; but 
 was promptly reminded that at his own election a riot had 
 occurred, that it had occurred in a church, and that a 
 magistrate began it by knocking down a voter and dragging 
 him into the road."^*^ The closer we get to the patriot 
 "Fathers" the less do they resemble the portraits usually 
 given us. 
 
 We have seen that the wages paid in 1774, about two 
 dollars per week, scarcely enabled the workers to keep out 
 of jail. Their food and clothing were naturally abomina- 
 ble and many modern conveniences were, of course, un- 
 known. The worker "rarely tasted fresh meat as often as 
 once in a week, and paid for it a much higher price than 
 his posterity. ... A pair of yellow buckskin or 
 leather breeches, a checked shirt, a red flannel jacket, a 
 rusty felt hat cocked up at the corners, shoes of neat's-skin 
 set off with huge buckles of brass, and a leather apron, com- 
 prised his scanty wardrobe. The leather he smeared with 
 grease to keep it soft and flexible."" The sons generally 
 began life where the fathers ended it. 
 
 The Puritan society of New England was based on an 
 aristocracy that found expression in every phase of social 
 life ; in manners, habits, customs, morals, religion and dress. 
 Connecticut in 1676 enacted a statute providing that "what 
 persons soever shall wear gold or silver lace, or gold or 
 silver buttons, silk ribbons or other superfluous trimmings" 
 shall be assessed at 150 pound estate, but one clause of the 
 act exempted magistrates, their wives and children and mil- 
 itary commissioned officers, or "such whose quality and 
 estate have been above the ordinary degree though now de- 
 
 loMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. 11, 
 pp. 14-15. 
 
 iilbid. Vol. I, pp. 96-97.
 
 124 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 cayed."^- This act was intended to mark the distinction 
 between families of wealth and the poor classes by the 
 clothing they wore. Servants and other workmen wore 
 jackets and breeches of serge, linen shirts, worsted stockings 
 and beaver hats. Their diet consisted of salt pork, baked 
 beans, Indian pudding, parched corn, "barley fire-cake" and 
 other rough food. 
 
 In the churches "Balustrades, with small columns of 
 varied pattern, kept the nobility of the owner from the too 
 close approach of the vulgar." Those who ruled in the 
 church were always careful to seat the congregation accord- 
 ing to class or social rank, and should some blundering of- 
 ficial bring common clay too close to superior blood a con- 
 troversy was sure to result. Equality could not be tolerated 
 in God's meeting house, and "whoever construes early New 
 England thus will comprehend little of its essence." Even 
 in laying out towns the division of the inhabitants into 
 ranks and classes was common, and fines were sometimes 
 graded for offenses according to the rank of the ofifenders.^^ 
 
 Indentured servants worked under rigorous laws and 
 discipline for bad conduct was very severe. Their unex- 
 pired terms of service were listed in inventories and were 
 subject to barter and sale, while "Debtors were half civil 
 trespassers and half slaves. They were sold for servants 
 for terms of years. . . . One of the most painful 
 signs of the times is visible in the Massachusetts statute of 
 1683 to prevent any from selling themselves into servitude 
 for one debt in order to avoid other debts. We can hardly 
 
 i2Weecien, "Social and Economic History of New England," Vol. I, 
 pp. 288-2S9. In 1653 two women were charged with wearing silk hoods 
 and scarfs, but on proving that their husbands were worth 200 pounds 
 each, they were released. Another was also discharged "upon testi- 
 mony of her being brought up above the ordinary ranke." — p. -227. 
 
 i3lbid. Vol. I, pp. 279-281, passim.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 1 25 
 
 coHceive or imagine the grinding pressure these poor delin- 
 quents must have endured."^* 
 
 The planting, rotting, breaking, dressing, spinning, 
 weaving, and bleaching of flax was an important part of the 
 labor of most families. The spinning wheel was an impor- 
 tant equipment of each household and young girls made 
 many garments in anticipation of the day they would be- 
 come brides. Spinning was the women's occupation, the 
 whir of the wheel being usually accompanied with the songs 
 of the operatives. 
 
 A curious custom grew up on the New England bor- 
 der. The log huts on the frontier usually consisted of one 
 room and a loft. The whole family generally slept on the 
 floor, the warmth of their bodies lying close together being 
 necessary to ward off the cold in winter. This gave rise to 
 a custom known as "bundling," whereby a stranger or 
 traveler taken in over night slept with the father, mother, 
 sons and daughters the same as though a member of the 
 family. The young man who came to woo the daughter 
 thought nothing of lying on the floor under cover with her, 
 but the custom gave rise to evil consequences and after a 
 heated controversy the practice was abandoned in the clos- 
 ing years of the i8th century. ^^ 
 
 Each plantation in the Southern colonies was largely 
 a small community of itself, employing mechanics, carpen- 
 ters, coopers and laborers. Each was a little social and 
 industrial world consisting of from one to five hundred 
 people. Washington's plantation at Mt. Vernon, Virginia, 
 was a type. He had a blacksmith shop, wood burners to 
 
 i4Ibid, Vol. I, pp. 274-275. See also Fisher, "Men, Women and 
 Manners in Colonial Times," Vol. I, pp. 208-209. 
 
 isFisher, "Men, Women and Manners in Colonial Times," Vol. I, 
 Chap. II.
 
 126 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 supply charcoal, brickmakers, carpenters, masons, a flour 
 mill, coopers and a schooner to carry produce to market. 
 He also employed shoemakers and conducted a weaving 
 establishment.^® Chastellux, a French traveler, frequently 
 comments on the masses of the poor and poverty-stricken 
 people he saw in Virginia, some clothed in rags and living in 
 wretched huts. They were indolent and without hope, a 
 result of the degradation that slave labor gave to all forms 
 of useful effort, and from them came many of the "poor 
 whites" of the South today.^^ 
 
 Maryland maintained the class distinctions that were 
 observed everywhere. Annapolis was the center of the col- 
 ony where the planters gathered and reveled in lavish hos- 
 pitality. Part of the river front was reserved for the 
 residences and gardens of the wealthy class, and here the 
 class distinctions found expression in the streets. "When 
 the gentlemen were masquerading in their quarter, the com- 
 mon people were not even permitted to be in the streets of 
 it."^« 
 
 Throughout colonial society the barbarous criminal 
 codes were borrowed from the countries of Europe and 
 bore heavily on the unfortunates convicted of petty as well 
 as serious crimes. The list of crimes punishable by death 
 was in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island, lo; 
 in New York, i6 ; Virginia and later Kentucky, 27 ; in 
 Pennsylvania, 20 on first conviction, and on a second con- 
 viction all except larceny were capital crimes. 
 
 The colonies generally revised their constitutions after 
 1776, yet New Hampshire branded burglars with a B on 
 
 lelbid, pp. 83-84. See also "Documentary History of American In- 
 dustrial Society," Vol. n, p. 321. 
 iTlbid, pp. 101-102. 
 islbid. Vol. n, p. 206.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 1 27 
 
 the right hand for the lirst offense, on the left for the sec- 
 ond offense and on the forehead if committed on Sunday. 
 
 Massachusetts branded an F on the forehead of the 
 forger of a bank-bill ; a B on both cheeks for the second 
 offense of burglary ; a T on both cheeks for the second con- 
 viction of larceny, and M on the forehead for manslaughter. 
 The perjurer could be fined, pilloried or whipped; the thief 
 branded for a second offense and sentenced to hard labor 
 for life in chains; the forger was whipped, his ears cropped, 
 and he imprisoned ; the counterfeiter had one ear cut off, 
 was given forty lashes on the march to the gallows, and 
 made to stand one hour with the rope over it. 
 
 In Connecticut the perjurer stood for an hour with 
 his ears nailed to the pillory when unable to pay a fine. He 
 who married a sister-in-law was punished with the wife 
 with forty lashes on the bare back and forced to wear a 
 letter I sewed on the outside of arm or back. 
 
 Delaware followed the English law and employed the 
 branding irons, too. M stood for manslaughter and T for 
 felony. 
 
 In North Carolina the perjurer, after having his ears 
 nailed to the pillory, was released at the expiration of an 
 hour by having them cut from his head. 
 
 All counties in Maryland were required to have brand- 
 ing irons: S for seditious libeler; F for forger; T on the 
 left hand for thief; R on the shoulder for a vagabond or 
 rogue. The mutilations, brandings and whipping continued 
 for a half century after the Declaration of Independence.^* 
 
 For minor offenses that did not merit the death penalty 
 branding, whipping, cropping the ears, standing on the pil- 
 
 loMcMaster, in American Historical Review, Vol. II, article en- 
 titled "Old Standards of Public Morals."
 
 128 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 lory, sitting in the stocks, or ducking were the common pun- 
 ishments. Paupers who received aid of the pubhc authori- 
 ties, their wives and children, must wear on their sleeve 
 the letter P. These practices continued well into the nine- 
 teenth century.-*' 
 
 In New England the Puritan aristocracy regretted to 
 see the children of the workers at play in the fields and 
 constantly enacted laws to secure their labor power. As 
 early as 1641 Plymouth ordered that those receiving relief 
 from the towns and having children the township shall put 
 the latter to work. Boston in 1672 ordered certain persons 
 to place their children out as indentured servants. // 
 parents refuse the town officials are ordered to place the 
 children "with such masters as they shall provide." In 1682 
 a workhouse was ordered built to employ children who 
 "shamefully spend their time in the streets." In Connecti- 
 cut children at play are often bound out to serve masters ; 
 boys to the age of 21, and girls to the age of 18, or till 
 they marry. A law of the general court of Massachusetts, 
 in 1643, makes it lawful for the constable to whip run- 
 away bound boys. The "uplift movement" continues dur- 
 ing the next century, for Boston in 1720 appointed a com- 
 mittee who recommended that twenty spinning wheels be 
 provided "for such children as should be sent from the 
 almshouse." Fifty years later Mr. William Molineux of 
 Boston asks the legislature to assist him in his plan for 
 "manufacturing the children's labour into wearing ap- 
 parel" and "employing young females from eight years 
 old and upzvard." Before the close of the century manu- 
 facturing was developed and a French traveler protests 
 
 20McMaster, "The Acquisition of the Political, Social and Indus- 
 trial Rights of Man in America," pp. 36-40, passim.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I29 
 
 that "men congratulate themselves upon making early 
 martyrs of these innocent creatures, for is it not a torment 
 to these poor little beings . . . to be a whole day and 
 almost every day of their lives employed at the same work, 
 in an obscure and infected prison P"^^ New England, espe- 
 cially Massachusetts, was a hothouse for the "immortal 
 truths" of the Declaration and other gush mouthed by 
 Adams, Gerry and other "patriots." The sweating of 
 women and children became a marked feature of New 
 England "democracy" after the Revolution. 
 
 "The Body of Liberties," enacted by Massachusetts 
 in 1641, which we have already noticed, seemed to have 
 little reference to the men, women and children of the 
 poor. With wages fixed by law, most of the men disfran- 
 chised, paupers auctioned off in the streets and children 
 placed at the disposal of master employers, there was little 
 in "The Body of Liberties" for the working people to 
 enthuse over. Within sixteen years after the adoption of 
 this code the Quakers felt its blessings. It was enacted that 
 banished Quakers who returned should have their ears 
 lopped off, and for the third offense should have their 
 tongues pierced with red-hot irons. The following year 
 the death penalty was substituted and four Quakers were 
 hung on Boston Common within two years. In 1660 the 
 death penalty was repealed and the gentle Ppritans con- 
 tented themselves with flogging their erring brothers. -- 
 
 The "sombre theology of New England," where the 
 "atmosphere was black with sermons." produced the dreary 
 Puritan Sunday. To run on Sunday or to walk in one's 
 garden, to cook, travel, make beds, sweep house, cut hair 
 
 2iSee Abbott, "Women in Industry," Appendix A. 
 22Thwaites, "The Colonies," p. 1G6.
 
 130 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 or shave was to break the law. The mother who kissed her 
 child on Sunday or on fasting day offended God and man. 
 Dancing, card-playing, or making mince pies were unlawful, 
 while only the drum, trumpet and jewsharp were permitted 
 as musical instruments.^^ The minister was the source of 
 all knowledge, the Sabbath began with sundown on Satur- 
 day, the tithing man collected fees, the constable arrested 
 the ungodly if they remained away and reported them if 
 they were merry. In short, it was a time when it was im- 
 pious to be happy and a virtue to be morose. 
 
 We may pause here a moment and by way of contrast 
 contemplate the lucrative commerce of Puritan merchants 
 and shippers in the trade in rum and slaves, which is dwelt 
 on more at length in another chapter. 
 
 A still had been erected in Boston as early as 17 14, 
 and a large business in distilling rum developed by 1735. 
 Molasses and poor sugar were transformed into rum at 
 Boston, Newport and other seaport towns and exchanged 
 for negroes by these merchants, who in turn sold the 
 blacks for handsome profits. Mixing the rum with water 
 was not uncommon. Captain Potter, about 1764, orders 
 that his rum be watered as much as possible, and to sell 
 by short measure at every opportunity. "All society was 
 fouled in this lust ; it was influenced by the passion for 
 wealth ; it was callous to the wrongs of imported savage 
 or displaced barbarian. . . . Cool, shrewd, sagacious 
 merchants vied with punctillious, dogmatic priests in pro- 
 moting this prostitution of industry."^* 
 
 Peter Faneuil, who founded Faneuil Hall, was one of 
 
 23Weeden, "Social and Economic History of New England," Vol. I, 
 p. 223. 
 
 24lbid, Vol. II, pp. 459-472, passim.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I3I 
 
 those who engaged in this trade which, together with sys- 
 tematic smugghng, enabled him to accumulate a large for- 
 tune. He smuggled goods from Spain and shipped brandy 
 in false casks as rum. These Puritan smugglers and law- 
 breakers who enforced rigid discipline for the workers of 
 their time and held them as inferior beings in church and 
 society, pocketed their gains from smuggling and the slave 
 trade and consoled themselves with the belief that they were 
 engaged in "God's work" of bringing the Africans within 
 reach of a "gospel dispensation." 
 
 "They rolled the whites of their eyes and uttered pious 
 ejaculations as they scanned their ledgers and wrote 
 instructions for turning rum into 'Slops' or human souls 
 immaterially. After attending to such matters these 're- 
 spectable' men take leave of their captain, and 'conclude 
 with committing you to the almighty Disposer of all 
 events.' The profanity of sailors is grateful music to ears 
 compelled to listen to the prayers of such damnable hypo- 
 crites."25 
 
 Perhaps the debtors' prison was the most atrocious in- 
 stitution provided for the unfortunate of colonial times, 
 and this, like restricted suffrage and indentured service, 
 survived well into the first half of the nineteenth century. 
 The administration of these prisons and the treatment ac- 
 corded working-men reads like a chapter from Stepniak's 
 "Russia Under the Czars." In fact, one gets the impres- 
 sion that the Russian jailers must have become acquainted 
 with the cruelty of prison regime in our early history and 
 adopted some practices of the "Fathers." McMaster's ac- 
 count of these prisons is a sickening one, and we cannot do 
 better than give it here. 
 
 25lbid, p. 836.
 
 132 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 "There is indeed scarce a scrap of information," he 
 writes, "bearing upon the subject extant which does not 
 go to prove beyond question that the generation which 
 witnessed the Revolution was less merciful and tender- 
 hearted than the generation which witnessed the Civil War. 
 Our ancestors, it is true, put up a just cry of horror at 
 the brutal treatment of their captive countrymen in the 
 (British) prison ships and hulks. . . . Yet even then 
 the face of the land was dotted with prisons where deeds 
 of cruelty were done, in comparison with which the foul- 
 est acts committed in the hulks sink to a contemptible in- 
 significance. For more than fifty years after the peace 
 there was in Connecticut an underground prison which 
 surpassed in horrors the Black Hole of Calcutta. This den, 
 known as the Newgate prison, was in an old worked-out 
 copper mine in the hills near Granby. There in little pens 
 of wood from thirty to one hundred culprits were immured, 
 their feet made fast to iron bars, and their necks chained 
 to beams in the roof. The darkness was intense ; the caves 
 reeked with filth ; vermin abounded ; water trickled from 
 the roof and oozed from the sides of the caverns ; huge 
 masses of earth were constantly falling off. In the damp- 
 ness and the filth the clothing of the prisoners grezv mouldy 
 and rotted away, and their limbs became stiff with rheu- 
 matism. The Newgate prison was perhaps the worst in 
 the country, yet in every county were jails such as would 
 now be thought unfit places of habitation for the vilest 
 and most loathsome of beasts. . . . Not a ray of light 
 ever penetrated them. In jails in Massachusetts the cells 
 were so small that the prisoners were lodged in hammocks 
 swung one over the other. In Philadelphia the keeps were 
 eighteen by twenty feet, and so crowded that at night each
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I33 
 
 prisoner had a space of six feet by two to lie down in. 
 
 "Into such pits and dungeons all classes of offenders 
 of both sexes were indiscriminately thrust. It is, there- 
 fore, not at all surprising that they became seminaries of 
 every conceivable form of vice, and centres of the most 
 disgusting diseases. Prostitutes plied their calling openly 
 in the presence of men and women of decent station, and 
 guilty of no crime but an inability to pay their debts. . . . 
 
 "No crime known to the law brought as many to the 
 jails as the crime of debt, and the class most likely to get 
 into debt was the most defenseless and dependent, the 
 great body of servants, of artisans, and of laborers, those, 
 in short, who depended on their daily wages for their daily 
 bread. One hundred years ago the laborer zvho fell from 
 a scaffold or lay sick of a fever ivas sure to be seized by 
 the sheriff the moment he recovered, and be carried to jail 
 for the bill of a feiv dollars zvhich had been run np during 
 his illness at the huckster's or the tavern. 
 
 "Men confined as witnesses were compelled to mingle 
 with the forger besmeared with the filth of the pillory, 
 and the fornicator streaming with blood from the whipping 
 post, while here and there among the throng were culprits 
 whose ears had been cropped, or whose arms, fresh from 
 the branding iron, emitted the stench of scorched flesh. 
 The treadmill was always going. The pillory 
 and the stocks were never empty. The shears, the branding 
 iron, and the lash were never idle for a day. In Philadel- 
 phia the wheel-barrow men still went about the streets in 
 gangs, or appeared with huge clogs and chains hung to 
 their necks. 
 
 "The misery of the unfortunate creatures cooped up 
 in the cells, even in the most humanely kept prisons, sur-
 
 134 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 passes in horror anything" ever recorded in liction. No 
 attendance was provided for the sick. No clothes were 
 distributed to the naked. Such a thing as a bed was rarely 
 seen, and this soon became so foul with insects that the 
 owner dispensed with it gladly. Many of the inmates of 
 the prisons passed years without so much as washing them- 
 selves. Their hair grew long. Their bodies were covered 
 with scabs and lice, and emitted a horrible stench. Their 
 clothing rotted from their backs and exposed their bodies 
 tormented with all manner of skin diseases and a yellow 
 flesh cracking open zvith filth."-^ 
 
 One grows sick at the recital of these horrors and the 
 fist clenches when we reflect that vulgar politicians gather 
 dupes every Fourth of July to extol the glories of the 
 "patriots" and the Revolution, when these horrors con- 
 tinued for fifty years after the adoption of the Declara- 
 tion of Independence. And here again the dominant po- 
 litical parties in the early days of the republic were silent 
 regarding these atrocities. So were the "statesmen" who 
 formulated the policies of the parties and determined the 
 issues of the campaigns. Not until the rise of the labor 
 movement Jn the first quarter of the nineteenth century 
 did the "statesmen" take cognizance of this system of 
 imprisoning poor men for debt and allowing them to rot 
 of neglect and disease. The politicians began to stir then 
 because the independent political action of the workers 
 threatened some of their jobs. 
 
 The debtors' prisons were provided expressly for poor 
 men. Murderers and counterfeiters had their wants gen- 
 erally provided for by the state, but unless the poor debtor 
 
 2G]VfoMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. 
 I. pp. 98-101.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 1 35 
 
 was provided for by friends or charitable societies, he was 
 left to rot in . his rags. The low wages paid necessarily 
 increased this class of "criminals" and they were helpless 
 to defend themselves. When they did organize to improve 
 their lot with the opening years of the nineteenth century, 
 they ivere frequently tried for conspiracy and jailed.^'' 
 
 The numbers in debtors' prisons and the magnitude 
 of their "crimes" are of interest to their descendants of 
 today. In i8i6 there were 1,984 debtors imprisoned in 
 New York City, of whom 1,129 owed less than fifty dollars 
 and 729 owed less than twenty-five dollars each. "Every 
 one of them would have starved to death but for the kind- 
 ness of the humane society." One man in Vermont owed 
 a firm of two, fifty-four cents. By dividing the debt the vic- 
 tim was imprisoned on two counts of twenty-seven cents 
 each. The costs piled up a total of $14.54, for which he 
 was held responsible. In Boston — "the cradle of liberty !" 
 — between 1820 and 1822, 3,492 debtors were jailed which 
 affected 10,000 human beings. One woman was taken 
 from her home and two children for a debt of $3.60. One 
 man was imprisoned thirty years and a fund of $3,000 was 
 raised "to pay the jail fees and costs that had accumulated 
 during the long period of confinement/' In Philadelphia 
 — "the city of brotherly love!" — in 1828, 1,085 debtors 
 were jailed ; their total debts were $25,409 ; amount re- 
 covered by creditors, $295 ; cost of maintaining the prison, 
 $285,000! In 1831 the same city held forty debtors owing 
 a total of $23. "One man ozved two cents, another seventy- 
 two cents." This penalizing of poverty began to disappear 
 in response to the early labor agitation, the last states to 
 
 27See Chapter IX.
 
 136 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 abolish it being Connecticut in 1837, Louisiana in 1840, 
 Missouri in 1845, Alabama in 1848.-^ 
 
 The laws and the legal practices of the time were ad- 
 mirably arranged so that only the poor man owing a 
 small sum should go to jail, while the wealthy man owing 
 a larger amount was either not liable, or could get a stay 
 of execution, or with good legal talent could avoid con- 
 viction. An old law of Pennsylvania gave magistrates 
 jurisdiction without appeal in cases of debt under forty 
 shillings, or $5.33. "When the debt exceeded that sum the 
 debtor was entitled to a stay of execution. But no such 
 privilege was accorded the wretch zvho owed a sixpence 
 or a shilling. . . ."^° Law and its enforcement could 
 not be better calculated to render the rich immune and to 
 jail the helpless and dependent. 
 
 The federal government admirably expressed this at- 
 titude of leniency toward the capitalist class. It followed 
 the policy of remitting tariff duties to the trading class 
 for periods of ten, twelve and eighteen months. This gave 
 wealthy traders and shippers the free use of government 
 money. John Jacob Astor, a successful swindler and 
 founder of the Astor fortune, had a loan of over $5,000,- 
 000 from this source. Sometimes these traders would fail 
 — one house failed owing the government $3,000,000 — but 
 in no case were these capitalists imprisoned for debt, though 
 they never paid a cent they owed.^'' This happened fre- 
 quently during the first quarter of the nineteenth century. 
 
 This review of the status of workingmen reveals at 
 
 28McMaster, "The Acquisition of the Political, Social and Industrial 
 Rights of Man in America," pp. 63-66. 
 
 29lbid, p. 50. 
 
 soMyers, "History of the Great American Fortunes," Vol. I, pp. 
 79-80.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I37 
 
 least the fact that civilization in America, from settlement 
 times down to a period within the memory of some still 
 living, has been an unbroken development of aristocracy 
 and class privileges. Some features of this development, 
 notably white slavery, the white slave trade, and debtors' 
 prisons, will come as a surprise to those who have been led 
 to look on the past as a "Golden Age" and its prominent 
 men as heroic tigures. Our examination also shows that 
 the American Revolution, coming in the name of "equality 
 of rights," constituted no break in the forms of class rule 
 and the institutions based on fraud and conquest. These 
 facts serve as a forceful comment on the advice of some 
 men whose cry is "back to Jefferson" or "back to the 
 Fathers." To gb back to that age — a feat by the way as 
 difficult as the repeal of the law of gravitation — would be 
 to revive a servitude and a slave trade in blacks and whites, 
 with their accompanying political subjection, which the pro- 
 gress of a century has abolished. 
 
 It would he to surrender the achievements of the zvork- 
 ing class since that time, for it zvas the zuorkers of brawn 
 and brain, through organisation, sacrifice and martyrdom, 
 that abolished the debtors' prison, zvon the franchise, abol- 
 ished conspiracy lazvs and zvon the right to associate to- 
 gether for the common good of their class. 
 
 The same is true of negro slavery. It was an obscure 
 workingman, William Lloyd Garrison, who, on the first 
 day of the year 1831, issued a little sheet, nine by four- 
 teen inches, The Liberator, making a demand which after 
 some thirty years of hesitation, compromise and betrayal, 
 the "statesmen" had to carry into execution in the exigency 
 of a civil war. It was humble men like Garrison or those 
 like Wendell Phillips, deserting his class and deserted by
 
 138 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 it, allowing no article cursed with the slave system 
 to cross his threshold ;^^ facing hissing mobs organized by 
 the "pillars of society," and refusing allegiance to a con- 
 stitution that was "a league with death and a covenant with 
 hell" — these men lashed the "statesmen" on to the over- 
 throw of black servitude. These men, and the unknown 
 pioneers of the labor movement, forced the issue on the 
 evils we have discussed while Washington, Madison, Clay, 
 Calhoun, Webster, Buchanan and others were either silent, 
 or apologized for, or defended the institutions of their class 
 regime. 
 
 3iSears, "Wendell Phillips, Orator and Agitator," p. 365.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I39 
 
 Chapter VII 
 
 Causes of the American Revolution 
 
 Our survey of historical conditions in the colonies 
 gives us a fairly accurate idea of the society out of which 
 came the movement that resulted in breaking the ties of 
 dependence on Great Britain. If our account is a correct 
 one, we can only retain the general belief that the Ameri- 
 can Revolution was a popular uprising of the whole people 
 by assuming that there was a sudden change of heart on 
 the part of the great planters, the traders in black and 
 white slaves, and other sections of the aristocracy. But 
 this assumption is shattered by the facts which our in- 
 vestigation has revealed; namely, that the political dis- 
 franchisement of the workers, the auction of indentured 
 whites and the traffic in them, the horrors of the debtors' 
 prisons, and conspiracy laws against organizations of labor, 
 survived long after the Revolution was fought and zvon. 
 
 This consideration also disposes of the historical tra- 
 ditions that are taught children in the schools and suggests 
 that another explanation must be found for the causes of 
 the American Revolution. Fortunately, evidence exists in 
 abundance to show that it ivas a revolt of the aristocracy 
 fought by the zvorkers under the delusion that the grandilo- 
 quent phrases of the Declaration of Independence implied 
 greater opportunities and liberties for the long-suffering 
 laborers. This war, like most wars in history, was " a rich 
 man's war and a poor man's fight." Ruling classes always
 
 140 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 represent a minority of society and they never, as a whole, 
 risk their lives on the battlefield. Unless they can get their 
 slaves to fight for them, wars are impossible. The work- 
 ers have, thus far, fought the battles of every class but 
 their own. To induce them to do so it is necessary to dis- 
 guise the real issue under glittering phrases like those of 
 the Declaration, which asserts that "all men are created 
 equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain 
 inalienable rights," etc. Such statements are calculated to 
 stir the blood of men who are regarded by their masters 
 as unequal and who are deprived of the rights declared 
 to be malienable. 
 
 But the civilization of that day was such a shameless 
 and naked system of class domination that the Revolution, 
 as we shall see, was far from being a popular or unani- 
 mous uprising, and so suspicious were the workers of the 
 real designs of the leaders that, with all the pleadings of 
 the latter, great difficulty was encountered in getting enough 
 enlistments in the Continental army to present a fighting 
 force to the British invaders. Many who did enlist did 
 so only after promises of certain rewards. But even 
 promised rewards did not prevent constant desertions, 
 which provoked the despair of Washington revealed by him 
 in his correspondence with Congress and with personal 
 friends. 
 
 The causes of the Revolution may be traced to the 
 attitude of the ruling classes of Great Britain toward the 
 colonies. From the time of the discovery of America these 
 classes regarded the New World as a place of investment. 
 As early as 165 1 a navigation act was passed forbidding 
 importation of goods into England except in English ships, 
 or ships of the colony exporting the goods, and another
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORV I4I 
 
 act provided that no goods should be shipped to countries 
 other than England and her colonies. This aroused the 
 resentment of the trading classes of the colonies and gave 
 a strong impulse to smuggling which later became a profit- 
 able calling for many of these traders. 
 
 More drastic laws were passed one hundred years 
 later. In 1750 Parliament passed acts prohibiting the erec- 
 tion of any mill or engine for slitting or rolling iron, or 
 any plating forge or any steel furnace. Hatters were not 
 allowed to take more than two apprentices at a time or 
 any for more than seven years. It was made illegal to 
 manufacture hats or woolens in one colony and sell in an- 
 other. These laws were generally violated by resorting to 
 smuggling.^ 
 
 In 1764 further laws were enacted restricting com- 
 merce and manufacture. The imposition of duties aroused 
 the ire of the commercial class, but the method of punish- 
 ing violation of the acts increased discontent. The smug- 
 gler was tried in the courts of admiralty and deprived of 
 trial by jury. The judge, who was a creature of the crown, 
 was paid out of the fines which he himself assessed and 
 so had every reason to convict upon the slightest evidence. 
 The wealthy smugglers were thus the victims of a repres- 
 sive policy, the spirit of which they rigidly observed in 
 their treatment of the poor classes. It may be said, too, 
 that the British government was forced to abolish trial by 
 jury and substitute admiralty courts because the wealthy 
 smugglers exercised such power, influence and terrorism 
 that fezu juries dared to convict them. 
 
 iThe English ruling- class acted in accord with the mercantile 
 theory which regarded colonies as markets for the products of the 
 home country for which the colonies were expected to supply the raw 
 materials. — Howard, "Preliminaries of the Revolution," pp. 51-62, pas- 
 aim.
 
 142 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 In spite of the growing discontent of the influential 
 classes, the British government continued its policy. Navi- 
 gation laws closed colonial ports against foreign vessels 
 and allowed them to only export to other British colonies. 
 Duties were also levied on trade between the colonies. 
 The British capitalists, sweating fortunes out of their zvork- 
 ing class victims, zvanted no competitors in the colonies to 
 challenge their commerce on the seas. American employers 
 and traders wanted the unrestricted opportunities to ex- 
 ploit their workers zvhich British capitalists were enjoy- 
 ing. It was a quarrel between two ruling classes divided 
 by a vast expanse of water, and each envying the oppor- 
 tunities of the other. Commerce, ship building, industry 
 and agriculture had developed to such an extent at the 
 dawn of the Revolution that these acts of Parliament be- 
 came a serious menace to the incomes of the colonial 
 masters. 
 
 Smuggling was developed to a fine art. A pamphlet 
 written in 1774^ asserts that nearly all merchants were 
 smugglers and perjurers and "that such a system was ruin- 
 ing the morals of the country."^ In fact, smuggling be- 
 came so popular with merchants and shippers that they lost 
 all sense of gratitude toward Great Britain when France 
 was endeavoring to annex the colonies to Canada — an event 
 which the colonial aristocracy dreaded. While Great Brit- 
 ain was spending large sums in defending the colonies 
 against French aggression, "it was found that the French 
 fleets, the French garrisons, and the French West India 
 islands, were systematically supplied with large quantities 
 of provisions by the New England colonies. . . . The 
 smuggling was even defended with a wonderful cynicism on 
 
 2Fisher, "True History of the Revolution," p. 42.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I43 
 
 the ground that it was good policy to make as much money 
 as possible out of the enemy."* The enormous extent of 
 this illicit trade with the enemy is shown by the fact that 
 the total revenue collected in the colonial custom houses 
 amounted to between i,ooo and 2,000 pounds a year, and 
 the cost of collecting this revenue was between 7,000 and 
 8,000 pounds.* The colonial merchants with French or 
 Dutch passports and sometimes under flags of truce traded 
 with the enemy. They eased their consciences with the 
 excuse that if they were to contribute their share toward the 
 defense the money must come from this illegal trade.^ 
 
 Writing of the period immediately preceding the Revo- 
 lution, Weeden asserts that "Information given against 
 smugglers engaged in evading the revenue would cause a 
 riot, and one informant at Newbury was tarred and feath- 
 ered. An importer at Newport had sworn to his cargo of 
 molasses at 50 hhds. The count showed more than 80, 
 though some had been landed already. The cargo was 
 seized, but a mob in disguise came at night and took away 
 all the cargo except the 50 hhds., which had been regularly 
 entered. Vessels were generally brought into port after 
 dark, their cargoes being discharged and secreted under 
 cover of the friendly night."® To add to this ingratitude, 
 the French were no sooner expelled from Canada till the 
 smuggling traders openly joined in the chorus for separa- 
 tion from their protector. 
 
 Buckle's judgment of the vices of smuggling and the 
 general tendency of this traffic, though directed against the 
 
 sLecky, "The American Revolution," p. 47. 
 4lbid, p. 52. 
 
 BHoward, "Preliminaries of the Revolution," p. 71. 
 eWeeden, "Economic and Social History of New England," Vol. 11, 
 p. 762.
 
 144 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 European type, applies to these revolutionary "patriots." 
 He says "they contaminated the surrounding population; 
 introduced into peaceful villages vices formerly unknown; 
 caused the ruin of entire families; spread, wherever they 
 came, drunkenness, theft and dissoluteness ; and familiar- 
 ized their associates with those coarse and swinish de- 
 baucheries which were the natural habits of so vagrant and 
 lawless a life."'^ 
 
 The Boston Tea Party, which has inspired so much 
 patriotic oratory, can be traced to the practice of smuggling. 
 The tax on tea made it very profitable for smugglers to 
 deal in this commodity. The trade in tea was largely in 
 the hands of the East India company, a chartered corpora- 
 tion of Great Britain. John Elancock and other tea mer- 
 chants had smuggled large quantities of tea into Boston 
 and were doing a large business. In the meantime the 
 financial afifairs of the East India company became very 
 precarious. Its stock was depreciating and it was feared 
 that the collapse of the company would bring on a panic 
 in England. There were 17,000,000 pounds of the East 
 India company's tea in British warehouses for which 
 there was no demand, because of the large quantities smug- 
 gled into the colonies from Holland. Parliament decided 
 to repeal the tax on tea and the New England smugglers 
 became panic stricken. But the masses of the people "were 
 pleased at the prospect of drinking tea at less expense 
 than ever." The repeal of the tax meant that the East 
 India company would be able to sell tea at much smaller 
 prices than Hancock and his fellow smugglers could. Their 
 profits ivotild not only he lost, hut their tea zvould rot on 
 their hands. Competition zvith the British corporation 
 
 "Buckle, "History of Civilization," Chap. V.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I45 
 
 ivould bankrupt them. After comparing notes Hancock, 
 known in Boston as the "Prince of Smugglers/' with his 
 fellow outlaws disguised as Indians, boarded their rival's 
 ships and threw the dreaded tea into the harbor.^ In other 
 words, if the 'glorious Tea Party" is to be commended, 
 Rockefeller should be praised for burning rival refineries. 
 
 Smuggling, of course, was not confined to tea alone, 
 for in all forms of trade it "proved a sure road to wealth. 
 In every town prominent characters could be pointed out, 
 who, when the states were under British rule, had con- 
 stantly stowed away in their cellars and attics goods they 
 would have been loath to have the officers of the customs 
 to see. . . .Of this trade Boston was long the center, 
 and many a merchant of high repute did not disdain to 
 engage in it. Thus, on the very day when the farmers and 
 ploughmen of Middlesex drove the British out of Lexing- 
 ton, John Hancock was to have stood trial for defrauding 
 the customs. "'' 
 
 One historian^*' speaks of the "moral grandeur" of the 
 Boston Tea Party and regards it as an "effort to defend 
 the eternal principles of natural justice." This is eternal 
 nonsense. Just what is "eternal" in the profits of tea 
 smugglers and their rival exploiters, the coiner of eloquent 
 phrases leaves unexplained. 
 
 sFisher, "True History of the American Revolution," pp. 105-106; 
 "Old South Leaflets," No. 68; Wilson, "A History of the American Peo- 
 ple," Vol. n, Chapter U. 
 
 aMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. I, 
 p. 63. 
 
 loFiske, "The American Revolution," p. 92. "Hobbes and the 
 philosophers," writes Paul Lafargue, "who speak of natural right, nat- 
 ural religion, natural philosophy, are lending to Dame Nature their 
 notions of right, religion and philosophy, which are anything but nat- 
 ural. What should we say of the mathematician who should attribute 
 to nature his concepts of the metric system and should philosophize 
 on the natural meter and millimeter?" — -Lafargue, "Social and Philo- 
 sophical Studies," p. 117, footnote. 
 
 10
 
 146 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Other influential "pillars" of society were added to 
 the forces demanding separation from Great Britain when 
 that government laid a tax on rum and molasses. This 
 act aroused the Puritan slavers of New England, whose 
 "eternal principles" and profits were based on the slave 
 trade in negroes. "If the infamy of holding slaves belongs 
 to the South," writes McMaster, "the greater infamy of 
 supplying slaves must be shared by England and the North. 
 While the states were yet colonies, to buy negroes and sell 
 them into slavery had become a source of profit to the in- 
 habitants of many New England towns. . . . Molas- 
 ses brought from Jamaica was turned to rum ; the rum dis- 
 patched to Africa bought negroes ; the negroes, carried to 
 Jamaica or the Southern ports, were exchanged for molas- 
 ses, which, in turn, taken back to New England was quickly 
 made into rum."^^ This trade was seriously hampered by 
 the tax mentioned as it decreased the profits of the slavers. 
 The rum was a delicacy also much prized by ministers of 
 God.^^ This traffic had developed early in the history of 
 the colonies and the slave owners of the South pointed to 
 it as an example of the hypocrisy of New England which 
 denounced slavery. In 1736 Colonel William Byrd, of Vir- 
 ginia, wrote to the Earl of Egmont the following sarcastic 
 letter regarding the pretensions of New England "de- 
 mocracy": "Your Lordp's (Lordship's) opinion concerning 
 Rum and Negroes is certainly very just, and your excluding 
 both from your colony of Georgia will be very happy ; tho' 
 with respect to Rum, the Saints of New England I fear 
 will find out some trick to evade your Act of Parliament."^^ 
 
 iiMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. 
 II, pp. 15-16. 
 
 i2Thwaitep, "The Colonies," p. 185. 
 
 isHart, "Source Book of American History," pp. 119-120.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I47 
 
 The British molasses act passed in 1733 laid a heavy 
 tax on West India imports into the colonies from foreign 
 countries, and seven years later the agent of Rhode Island 
 in London was representing the opposition to the act.^* The 
 act was intended to revive the stagnant trade of the British 
 West Indies and discourage trade with French and Dutch 
 rivals.^^ 
 
 In 1764 the Sugar Act was renewed and the duty on 
 molasses reduced with the expectation that the smaller rate 
 would produce a revenue. Committees of correspondence 
 became active in opposition to the act. The old act levied a 
 duty of 6d. per gallon on molasses imported from ports 
 other than British, which, if collected, was practically pro- 
 hibitive. Smuggling brought both molasses and sugar in 
 free, but the act irritated those engaged in the great com- 
 merce in rum and negroes. The act "swept away the foun- 
 dations of trade and threatened the whole economic struc- 
 ture of New England."^® 
 
 The distilleries of Boston and other parts of the New 
 England coast, especially Newport, Rhode Island, became 
 great in number. There were twenty-two stills in this 
 town and Massachusetts distilled I5,cxx) hogsheads annu- 
 ally." Rhode Island had 150 vessels engaged in the trade 
 and rum was the main article exchanged for slaves in 
 Africa. This wretched commerce is hardly compatible with 
 the sentiment that "all men are created equal," etc. The 
 combination of smugglers and slave traders in New England 
 
 i4Weeden, "Economic and Social History of New England," Vol. 
 II, pp. 583-584. 
 
 isGreene, "Provincial America," p. 179. 
 
 leweeden. Vol. II, p. 753. A Boston town meeting in 1764 pre- 
 pared instructions, written by Samuel Adams, advising its representa- 
 tives to oppose enforcement of the molasses act. — Howard, "Prelimin- 
 aries of the Revolution," p. 110. 
 
 iTDuBois, "Suppression of the Slave Trade," pp. 27-28-29.
 
 148 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 exercised considerable influence in forming opinion favora- 
 ble to independence. 
 
 In October, 1774, the Continental Congress, seeming to 
 appreciate the contradiction in their professions respecting 
 liberty and the traffic in slaves and wishing to appear well 
 before the world, passed an act declaring, "We will neither 
 import nor purchase any slave imported after the first day 
 of December next." But it is notorious that the slavers con- 
 tinued their business and it was thirteen years before Mas- 
 sachusetts passed an act prohibiting it.^^ In the same year 
 Rhode Island passed an act prohibiting importation of 
 slaves. The preamble stated that the inhabitants would be 
 inconsistent to hold slaves while fighting for liberties them- 
 selves, and then inserted a clause providing "that nothing 
 in this act shall extend, or be deemed to extend," to the 
 slave trade.^^ Prohibiting slavery and legalizing the slave 
 trade harmonized with the interests of the dealers in slaves 
 and rum. 
 
 The same juggling is witnessed in adopting the Decla- 
 ration of Independence. The original draft contained a 
 clause charging King George with waging "cruel war 
 against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights 
 of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who 
 never offended him, captivating and carrying them into 
 slavery into another hemisphere or to incur miserable death 
 in their transportation thither." The Southern delegates 
 united with many of the Northern delegates in striking out 
 the clause. Jefferson, writing of this act, says that "our 
 Northern brethren . . . felt a little tender under these 
 censures ; for tho' their people have very few slaves them- 
 
 isibid, p. 45. 
 lolbid, p. 36.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I49 
 
 selves, yet they had been very considerable carriers of them 
 to others."'*^ 
 
 The Southern planters, though slower to endorse sep- 
 aration, also joined for motives no more creditable than 
 those actuating the Northern traffickers in slaves and their 
 colleagues, the merchant smugglers. Many of these plant- 
 ers were in debt to British merchants and saw in the Revo- 
 lution an opportunity to repudiate their debts. A century 
 before the Revolution the Southern planters were often 
 deeply in debt to British merchants, owing to the credit sys- 
 ten of transacting business and the long delays in exchange 
 between the two countries. In 1732 Parliament passed an 
 act to protect British merchants, to whom were due many 
 debts owing by colonial merchants. "British merchants 
 . . . complained of legal obstacles in the collection of 
 debts due them in America." The act provided that debts 
 due to British merchants "might be proved by testimony 
 taken in England" and making colonial real estate liable to 
 seizure for payment.^^ 
 
 A manifesto was issued in Charleston, South Carolina, 
 in 1774, which stated that "The planters are greatly in ar- 
 rears to the merchants; a stoppage of importation (of 
 slaves) would give them all an opportunity to extricate 
 themselves from debt."^^ 
 
 Wendell Phillips in a speech delivered in Boston. 
 1861, summed up the motives of both planter and merchant 
 in demanding independence. With all of his admiration for 
 the revolutionary leaders he was conscious of the material 
 
 20Hart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, p. 539. 
 
 2iGreeTie, "Provincial America," p. 180. In Glasgow "not less than 
 half a million of money was due by the colonists of Maryland and 
 Virginia alone to its merchants." — Howard, "Preliminaries of the Rev- 
 olution," pp. 162-163. 
 
 22DuBois, "Suppression of the Slave Trade," p. 44.
 
 150 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 interests that prompted the activity of the two classes men- 
 tioned. He declared : "It is not always . . . ideas or 
 moral principles that push the world forward. Selfish inter- 
 ests play a large part in the work. Our Revolution of 1776 
 succeeded because trade and wealth joined hands with prin- 
 ciple and enthusiasm — a union rare in the history of revolu- 
 tions. Northern merchants fretted at England's refusal to 
 allow them direct trade zvith Holland and the West Indies. 
 Virginia planters, heavily mortgaged, luelcomed anything 
 that zuould postpone payment of their debts. . . . So 
 merchant and planter joined heartily . . . to get inde- 
 pendence. To merchant independence meant only direct 
 trade — to planter cheating his creditors."^^ 
 
 The home government also endeavored to restrict set- 
 tlement along the coast, as the farther into the interior the 
 immigrants went the more difficult it was to tax them and 
 to retain their loyalty. But this policy also interfered with 
 the plans of land speculators whose incomes were derived 
 from luring men into the wilderness. The more people the 
 speculators could induce to go West, the more profits they 
 could make from their land deals. Washington, Hamilton 
 and Morris were interested in land speculation. Washing- 
 ton had good reasons for being a rebel, as he had surveyed 
 lands outside the royal grant and in exceeding the powers 
 of his commission was liable to prosecution as a law 
 breaker.^* 
 
 The king's proclamation of 1763 had forbidden gov- 
 ernors to "grant warrant of survey'' or patents for lands 
 beyond the sources of rivers that fiow into the Atlantic and 
 prohibiting private persons from purchasing or settling on 
 
 23Phillips, "Speeches, Lectures and Addresses," Vol. I, p. 373. 
 24Simons, "Class Struggles In America," p. 18.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 15I 
 
 these reserved lands under a heavy penalty. The object of 
 this action, according to the Earl of Hillsborough, was to 
 confine the population to the coast lands under the watchful 
 eyes of the ruling class and to keep them "within reach of 
 the trade and commerce" of Great Britain."^ 
 
 One may easily understand how this act and the numer- 
 ous acts against manufacturing and commerce aroused the 
 land speculating, trading and manufacturing classes. But 
 one more act had a vital influence in provoking the resent- 
 ment of all those who held indentured servants and those 
 engaged in the servant trade. This was the Stamp Act of 
 1765, and so far as the writer knows no historian has point- 
 ed out how the enforcement of this act threatened the entire 
 system of indentured service. 
 
 This act affected the gains of those interested in the 
 traffic, either as dealers in or owners of servants. The act 
 provided that the full sums of money or other considera- 
 tions agreed upon between masters and servants should be 
 correctly entered on indentures and the date of signing be 
 given. The penalty for violation of this provision was a 
 forfeit of double the sum or other considerations agreed 
 upon. Masters or mistresses could be sued at any time dur- 
 ing the term specified in indentures for violation of this law, 
 and such violation rendered such indentures void. If mas- 
 ters or mistresses failed to pay the stamp duties on inden- 
 tures within a specified time then the servants could pay 
 double the duty, and in case the master or mistress did not 
 repay the servant within three months on demand, the 
 servant could sue for recovery of the amount. The pay- 
 ment of double duty by servants also released them from all 
 obligations specified in the indentures ; they were "dis- 
 
 25Howard, "Preliminaries of the Revolution," pp. 229-230.
 
 152 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 charged from all actions, penalties, forfeitures and dam- 
 ages for not serving the time for which they were respec- 
 tively bound, contracted for or agreed to serve." x\ny 
 printer, stationer or other persons who sold indentures 
 without adding a warning clause stating that they must bear 
 date of execution and the terms agreed upon; that the duty 
 on them was paid and a receipt given on the back of inden- 
 tures by the distributor of stamps, or his substitute, was 
 liable to prosecution and to forfeit the sum of ten pounds.^® 
 
 The act struck at the entire system of indentured serv- 
 ice and the traffic based upon it. Investments in servants 
 became more hazardous and returns from their labor were 
 not as certain. The "soul drivers" and ship masters en- 
 gaged in the servant trade could not but feel resentful that 
 their incomes were jeopardized by this act of Parliament. 
 Not that its enforcement would overthrow this servitude. 
 But it did place obstacles in the way of falsifying inden- 
 tures ; it taxed the system ; it gave opportunity for many 
 servants to be released from service when their owners 
 evaded the duties placed on indentures ; and had its influence 
 in transforming masters, who held white laborers in servi- 
 tude, into rebels. Yet this important fact is almost entirely 
 ignored by writers seeking causes for the Revolution. 
 
 The great mass of laborers, artisans and small farmers 
 were indifferent to the agitation for liberty and independ- 
 ence. The redemptioner was a bond slave and knew that 
 it made no difference whether he was a subject of the Brit- 
 ish crown or of the home exploiters. The "free" laborer 
 did not enthuse, for the laws that fixed his status as an 
 underling and providing imprisonment for debt were being 
 
 26See Hart and Channing, "American History Leaflets," No. 21, 
 May, 1895, for a full text of the Stamp Act.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I53 
 
 enforced by the very "patriots" who were talking so glibly 
 about independence. The slaves, of course, were dumb, un- 
 able to speak for themselves, and nothing in the Revolu- 
 tion held out any promise of release for them. The small 
 farmers, too, were on the whole indifferent, for taxes fell 
 heavily on their shoulders and the high prices of living and 
 excessive rates of interest made them suspicious of the 
 coast merchants and money lenders. The lot of the toilers 
 of every class was not to be envied, and though having little 
 chance to secure an education, their experience with the 
 wealthy classes taught them to beware when the masters 
 came bearing gifts. 
 
 Yet it was necessary to draw fighters for the Revolu- 
 tion from the ranks of the subjected population if a struggle 
 was to be waged at all. This was not an easy task, but it 
 was accomplished nevertheless. Those who have today seen 
 poor wretches half clothed, unemployed, liable to eviction 
 for non-payment of rent and dodging the collector of a 
 grocer's bill, and patiently listened to one of these cheerful 
 idiots while he proved the existence of "prosperity," can 
 understand how the reasoning powers of men can be com- 
 pletely suspended under the influence of interested dema- 
 gogues. The Declaration of Independence, though it does 
 not mention a single distinct working class grievance, by 
 its eloquent phrases deluded large numbers into the belief 
 that a new era was dawning for them. But this was not a 
 unanimous sentiment by any means — either of the poor or 
 the wealthy classes. John Adams wrote that "New York 
 and Pennsylvania were so nearly divided, if their propen- 
 sity was not against us, that if New England on one side 
 and Virginia on the other had not kept them in awe, they 
 would have joined the British." In another letter he de-
 
 154 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 clares, "on mature deliberation I conclude . . . that 
 more than one-third of influential characters were against 
 it."-^ 
 
 In fact, the Revolution was the work of an aggressive 
 minority "who succeeded in committing an undecided and 
 fluctuating majority to courses for which they had little 
 love, and leading them step by step to a position from which 
 it was impossible to recede."^* Nor did the "patriots" rely 
 on persuasion alone. Tlw more effective arguments of tar 
 and feathers, physical assault, the boycott and exile were 
 employed against those who regarded the claims of the 
 smugglers and slavers with suspicion or openly opposed 
 them. It is interesting to note in this connection that the 
 robed tools of capitalist power in the courts today have out- 
 lawed the peaceful forms of boycott sometimes used by 
 labor unions. 
 
 The wide extent and character of the violence em- 
 ployed by Samuel Adams and other rebels is instructive. 
 "Men were ridden and tossed on fence rails ; were gagged 
 and bound for days at a time ; pelted with stones ; fastened 
 in rooms where there was a fire with the chimney stopped 
 on top ; advertised as public enemies, so that they would be 
 cut oflf from all dealing with their neighbors. They had 
 bullets shot into their bedrooms ; money or valuable plate 
 extorted to save them from violence. . . . Their houses 
 and ships were burnt; they were compelled to pay the 
 guards who watched them in their houses ; and when carted 
 about for the mob to stare at and abuse they were com- 
 pelled to pay something at every town."^® 
 
 27Faust, "The German Element in the United States," Vol. I, p. 289. 
 
 28Lecky, "The American Revolution," p. 224. 
 
 29Flsher, "True History of the American Resolution," p. 168.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I55 
 
 This reads more like a drunken riot than the acts of 
 men believing in the "inalienable rights of man." Chief 
 Justice and Lieutenant Governor Hutchinson of Massa- 
 chusetts, who was born in America, was eminent as a his- 
 torian, had opposed the restrictive acts against commerce 
 and the Stamp Act, became disgusted with these rioters. 
 He paid for his opposition in the memorable Hutchinson 
 Riot in Boston, August 26, 1765. Josiah Quincy, Jr., writes 
 of the mob besieging Hutchinson's house, the latter barely 
 escaping serious injury or death. The rioters gutted the 
 house and destroyed nearly everything of value, including 
 some records and rare documents of great value to his- 
 torians. These were irreparable losses to Hutchinson, who 
 was occupied in writing a history of New England. He was 
 a pathetic figure when he entered court next day with tears 
 in his eyes and clothed in garments, part of which he was 
 compelled to borrow.^" The "patriots" evidently had their 
 share in contributing to us the practice of lynch law which 
 disgraces the United States today. 
 
 Among the favored classes who refused support to the 
 Revolution may be mentioned the following: 
 
 The official class holding various positions in the civil, 
 military and naval services of the government. 
 
 Colonial politicians who believed the Revolution could 
 not succeed and who expected their loyalty to be rewarded 
 by offices and titles and the confiscated estates of the rebels, 
 who would be either exiled or hung. 
 
 Commercial men having tangible property and consid- 
 erable to lose, who would rather bear the restrictive acts of 
 Parliament than to stake all on the Revolution. 
 
 soHart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, pp. 
 398-399.
 
 156 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Professional men such as clergymen, physicians, law- 
 yers and teachers, a clear majority of whom seem to have 
 been against the ultimate measures of the Revolution. 
 
 Those of no particular classification, who by habit or 
 training were conservative and opposed any change in the 
 established regime.^^ 
 
 One agency established to promote the agitation was 
 the secret "committees of correspondence," which enabled 
 the agitators to keep in communication with each other. 
 Much of the violence had its source in these secret groups. 
 The Continental Congress was not a body whose members 
 were elected by popular vote. The delegates sent by Con- 
 necticut, New York and Maryland were chose by these 
 committees.^- The legislatures that sent delegates were all 
 representative of property for, as we have seen, the work- 
 ers without property were disfranchised. The committees 
 were "always in session and no governor could dissolve or 
 prorogue" them.^^ They watched the movements of their 
 opponents, exchanged information, boycotted their enemies 
 and drove Tories to Canada or England. 
 
 By silencing their enemies through terrorism, or exil- 
 ing them to Canada or New York, which was largely Tory 
 in sentiment ; by constant appeals to patriotism, threats, 
 promises of the rewards and glorious future to be realized, 
 sufficient numbers of adventurers, politicians and poor far- 
 mers were induced to enlist and present the appearance of 
 a fighting force against Great Britain. Though pictures of 
 the revolutionary army generally present its recruits in neat 
 uniforms, in reality they resembled a "Coxy Army" more 
 
 3iSmith, "The Spirit of American Government," pp. 15-16. 
 32Fisher, "True History of the American Revolution," p. 123. 
 33Fiske, "Tlie American Revolution," p. 79.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 1 57 
 
 than anything else. Washington's soldiers were a ragged, 
 ill-equipped, undisciplined crowd of men, many of whom 
 enlisted half-heartedly and in every defeat there were de- 
 sertions. During the terrible winter at Valley Forge, when 
 they nearly starved or froze, the farmers in surrounding 
 territory daily carted provisions to the British army in Phil- 
 adelphia. Washington's scanty rations that winter were 
 partly secured by scouting parties capturing these supplies. 
 The army was not a large one — about 25,000 men at one 
 time, but the number frequently declined to ten, six and 
 even four thousand. 
 
 An interesting fact generally ignored by American his- 
 torians is that Lord Howe, commander of the British forces, 
 was a member of the Whig party, which sympathized with 
 the revolutionists and defended them in British politics. 
 Howe conducted his campaign to the entire satisfaction of 
 Washington and his generals. The British general delayed 
 and feasted in New York and Philadelphia, giving ample 
 opportunity for the rebel forces to make the best of their 
 precarious situation. Hozve could have annihilated the 
 rebels at Bunker Hill, Long Island, Brandywine, and espe- 
 cially at Valley Forge, had he any intention of doing so. 
 When he was recalled Parliament investigated his peculiar 
 conduct and only influential friends saved him from punish- 
 ment.^* 
 
 A horde of adventurers, petty grafters and other de- 
 signing men fished in the troubled w^aters of the Revolution 
 and followed in the wake of the armies to pick up what loot 
 they could. "Among the enterprising men who had thrown 
 themselves into the first movement of the Revolution were 
 
 34See Fisher, "True History of the American Revolution," for maps 
 of the battles and an extended discussion of Howe's campaign.
 
 158 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 many of broken fortunes and doubtful antecedents, many 
 ardent speculators, many clever and unscrupulous adven- 
 turers. Such men found in . . . the sudden fluctua- 
 tions of the currency ... a new and sinister interest 
 in the continuance of the struggle." One adventurer be- 
 came a brigadier general and paid debts amounting to 
 nearly 8,000 pounds with 1,000 pounds of gold and silver. 
 Noah Webster observed that "The first visible effect of an 
 augmentation of the medium and the consequent fluctuation 
 of value was a host of jockeys, who followed a species of 
 commerce, and subsisted on the ignorance and honesty of 
 the country people ; or, in other words, upon the difference 
 in the value of the currency in different places. Perhaps 
 we may safely estimate that not less than 20,000 men in 
 America left honest callings and applied themselves to this 
 knavish traffic."^^ 
 
 The army itself was demoralized by these and other 
 similar practices and it became difficult to maintain dis- 
 cipline. As an aid in this direction offending soldiers were 
 given one hundred lashes or more on the naked back while 
 tied to a tree. The whip was formed of "several knotted 
 cords, which sometimes cut through the skin at every 
 stroke." Some disobedient soldiers were punished "at sev- 
 eral different times, a certain number of stripes repeated at 
 intervals of two or three days, in which case the wounds 
 are in a state of inflammation, and the skin rendered more 
 sensibly tender ; and the terror of the punishment is greatly 
 aggravated. "^^ 
 
 One other consideration we have to offer as among the 
 contributing causes of the Revolution. The acts restricting 
 
 snijecky, "The American Revolution," pp. 292-293. 
 36Hart, "American History Told by Contemporaries," Vol. II, pp. 
 493-494.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 1 59 
 
 commerce and manufactures were aimed, as we have seen, 
 by the British ruling class against the colonial ruling class. 
 This was sufficient to arouse the resentment of the latter 
 and drive most of them to revolt. But our colonial manu- 
 facturers were also aware of the great advantages which 
 their British brethren possessed in the new machinery that 
 Arkwright and others were inventing across the sea. Ma- 
 chines for carding and spinning were fast displacing the old 
 hand processes in making cloth. The small skill required 
 to operate these machines enabled the British factory lords 
 to sweat large numbers of women and children. To guard 
 this advantage the British Parliament passed acts prohibit- 
 ing the exportation of machines, plans or models of ma- 
 chines or any tools used in cotton or linen manufacture, 
 under penalty of 200 pounds. Even the possession of them 
 for export rendered the offender liable to arrest. Watt was 
 also making his first improvements on Newcomen's engine. 
 
 These inventions brought with them the crucifixion of 
 men, women and children of the working class. Children 
 from seven to twelve and fourteen years of age were 
 worked fourteen and sixteen hours per day under brutal 
 taskmasters. Women frequently fainted at machines or gave 
 birth to children on factory floors. The workhouses and 
 almshouses of London and Birmingham and other cities 
 were raided for children, idiots being taken with the rest. 
 The factories became torture chambers and in some cases 
 places of murder, with the child slaves as victims. 
 
 Every ship and every mail that came to America 
 brought news of these events and stimulated the desire to 
 apply the new processes here. But British acts stood in 
 the way and we have already noted the efforts of the colo- 
 nial masters to make child labor profitable. Although the
 
 l6o THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 colonial appetite for child labor was whetted by the indus- 
 trial changes in England, it was not till 1789 that the new 
 machinery was secured. In that year Samuel Slater, "The 
 Father of American Manufactures," established the first 
 cotton mill in this country, in Rhode Island, and all of his 
 employes ivcrc children between seven and twelve years of 
 age.'-'' From that time the profitable exploitation of chil- 
 dren became one of the "inalienable rights of man." Fur- 
 thermore, the second act of the first United States Congress 
 was for the "encouragement and the protection of manu- 
 facturers" by levying a protective tariff,^^ and Hamilton, in 
 his famous "Report on Manufactures," urged that "women 
 and children are rendered more useful by manufacturing 
 establishments than they otherivise zvould bt."^^ The 
 "Fathers" were not slow to follow their British kin's ex- 
 ample after they had settled their temporary quarrel, and 
 were free to take the child from the cradle and the woman 
 from the home. 
 
 From the foregoing review it will be seen that the mer- 
 chant smugglers, the New England slavers, the land specu- 
 lators, the Southern planters, the money lenders and a host 
 of adventurers with itching palms were interested in 
 fomenting the agitation for independence. When the Dec- 
 laration of Independence passes from eloquent phrases to 
 an enumeration of grievances these are seen to be ills that 
 affected some one of these classes. The tyranny of George 
 III is denounced ; he has taken away their charters, hired 
 Indians in the war, denied them trial by jury, restricted 
 their commerce and industry, kidnaped their citizens on the 
 
 37Abbott, "Women in Industry," p. 44. 
 
 38Wright, "The Industrial Evolution of the United States," p. 118. 
 
 39Abbott, "Women in Industry," p. 50.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY l6l 
 
 high seas, quartered armed troops among them, and in gen- 
 eral denied them the 'liberties" of British subjects. 
 
 The poor classes, composed of poor farmers, the 
 pioneers on the frontier, the bond and chattel slaves, the 
 laborers and artisans, could have drav/n up an indictment 
 against these "patriots" and included in it the following 
 charges : 
 
 // Britain kipiiaps .Imerican sailors in time of zvar, 
 you kidnap us in Europe in times of peace and sell us, our 
 zvives and children, into slavery; if Britain hires the Indian 
 as a soldier, you allozv the savage to scalp us on the frontier; 
 if Britain suppresses your commerce, you suppress our right 
 to associate and deprive us of the franchise; if Britain im- 
 prisons your sailors in her ships, you imprison us for debt 
 and allozv us to rot in rags and filth; if Britain has taken 
 azvay your charters zve knozv zvhen you had them you en- 
 acted fugitive lazvs for us zvhen zve tried to escape your 
 clutches: if you suffer from British tyranny zve suffer he- 
 cause you give us no lien on the products of our labor and 
 frequently cheat us out of our miserable zvages; zvhen zve 
 are driven to steal bread you place us in the pillory, or brand 
 us zjvith irons, zvhile in your lazv code you class the zvhite 
 indentured slave, the conquered Indian and the enslaved 
 black as merchandise to be bought and sold like cattle. Your 
 declaration is a class declaration. So is ours. Only zve 
 represent the toiling masses of these colonies on zvhose skill, 
 labor and sacrifice your pre-eminence and rule have been 
 esfablisJied. 
 
 Such a declaration coming from the masses of the poor 
 
 would have been based on facts and would set in bold relief 
 
 the class character of the struggle for independence. That 
 
 it is a true estimate of the historical conditions of that time 
 
 11
 
 l62 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 will become apparent in the next chapter, where we will 
 consider the treatment accorded the workers after having 
 fought the battles of the interested and ruling classes of that 
 time. 
 
 That there were men who favored independence from 
 the best of motives no one will deny. That the Revolution 
 was necessary, that it was in accord with human progress, 
 that it overthrew barriers to the further development of so- 
 ciety, are also conceded truths. But that it was a spontane- 
 ous uprising of all the people, that it was a glorious vindica- 
 tion of the "rights of man," that it was waged by demi- 
 gods having no sinister ends in view and no unworthy mo- 
 tives to conceal, all this is contradicted by the facts and es- 
 pecially by events that followed when peace was declared. 
 Fundamentally it was a struggle between two ruling classes 
 whose interests clashed. The British masters displayed poor 
 judgment in dealing with their fellow masters on this side 
 of the sea. The laws directed against colonial shippers and 
 manufacturers were the essence of folly. They could have 
 no other result than revolution, for these laws touched the 
 hearts — or incomes, which is the same thing — of our colo- 
 nial ruling class. When the purse of the exploiter or aris- 
 tocrat is threatened with depletion all the furies of private 
 gain rage within him. All his views of life and hope of the 
 future are gauged by the condition of his money till. 
 Threaten that and he becomes a rebel ; fill it and he remains 
 an enthusiastic supporter of the established regime, a de- 
 voted adherent of the vilest practices, a stout defender of 
 institutions that drain wealth from the unpaid toil of 
 others and pours it into his purse. His interests were 
 bound to the revolutionary cause ; the triumph of his class 
 meant progress until the twentieth century, when changed
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 163 
 
 conditions make his rule a menace to society and a danger 
 to civilization. As the British ruler gave way to him, so he 
 today must give way to the wealth producing classes who 
 now stand as the incarnation of further progress.
 
 164 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Chapter VIII 
 
 The Constitutional Convention, 
 a Conspiracy 
 
 "It is not too much to say," writes the historian, Fiske, 
 "that the period of five years following the peace of 1783 
 was the most critical moment in all the history of the 
 American people."^ It ivas a critical period — for the smug- 
 glers, speculators, slavers and others of the privileged 
 classes, for it seemed to these that the great landed empire, 
 tremendous resources and power which the Revolution gave 
 them all hung in the balance and with strong possibility 
 that the insurgent poor would secure these advantages for 
 themselves. The workers by their heroism and sacrifices 
 at Bunker Hill and Yorktown; by their sufferings during 
 the terrible winter at Valley Forge had won the Revolution 
 and were certainly entitled to the fruits of victory or, at 
 least, deserved exceptional consideration. 
 
 But the last shot had scarcely been fired till these veter- 
 ans, retracing their weary steps homeward, were confronted 
 with a terrible situation. It is doubtful whether history 
 affords another such example of the shameless ingratitude 
 and contemptible greed displayed by a ruling class toward 
 its benefactors that the "Fathers" displayed toward the poor 
 veterans of the war. The farmers and laborers found that 
 while they were at the front risking their lives in the strug- 
 
 iFiske, "The Critical Period of American History," p. 55.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 165 
 
 gle the -wealthy classes were confiscating their little farms 
 and household goods for debts contracted during the war 
 and imprisoning thousands for debt. The rebellion which 
 this process of confiscation provoked constitutes the "criti- 
 cal period" referred to by Fiske. With this historian, as 
 with most others, the poor rebels are viewed as a senseless 
 mob of fanatics for not submitting quietly to the wholesale 
 confiscation without protest.. 
 
 The war, like all wars, left the country devastated and 
 impoverished and tiie distress was frightful in all the states. 
 In Vermont "One-half the community was totally bankrupt; 
 the other half was plunged in the depths of poverty. The 
 year which had elapsed since the affair at Yorktown had 
 not brought all the blessings that had been foretold."^ A large 
 part of the country had been laid waste ; commerce was all 
 but suspended and Great Britain still maintained the policy 
 of commercial antagonism toward her late colonies. "What 
 wealth there was lay in the hands of a few score men. The 
 disparity of condition between a laborer and a Charles Car- 
 roll or a George Washington was probably greater than ex- 
 ists today between a laborer and a Carnegie. Employment 
 was scarce ; the circulating medium fluctuated in value ; the 
 workman had no security for his pay, and was frequently 
 defrauded. Wages were paid quarterly, semi-annually or 
 annually. If the workman bought goods on credit, the 
 debtors' prison yawned for him; and, if he was imprisoned, 
 his food and comforts had to be supplied by private char- 
 ity."^ The wage of common laborers had fallen to fifty 
 cents a day. Knox writing to Washington in 1786 informed 
 
 2McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. I, 
 p. 348. 
 
 3W. J. Ghent, "The American Workman's Golden Age," "The 
 Forum," August, 1901.
 
 1 66 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 him that many of the discontented pay little or no taxes; 
 "they feel at once their own poverty compared with the 
 opulent," and are ready to use force.* 
 
 Thousands were scarcely able to keep clothes on their 
 backs or to provide their families with the most common 
 necessities. The money was in the hands of the rich and 
 high rates of interest made it impossible for the leather- 
 breeched mechanic or the debt-ridden farmer to borrow. 
 The sheriffs were selling the poor farmers' property for 
 debts and they endeavored to evade the seizures by hiding 
 furniture or other goods, driving cattle to a neighbor's 
 pasture, or making houses and small farms over to relatives. 
 The debtors' prisons were glutted with victims. In New 
 Hampshire "It was then the fashion, ... as indeed it 
 was everywhere, to lock men up in jail the moment they 
 were so unfortunate as to owe their fellows a sixpence or a 
 shilling. Had this law been rigorously executed in the au- 
 tumn of 1785, it is probable that not far from two-thirds of 
 the community ivould have been in prisons."^ 
 
 Each colony came out of the Revolution as an independ- 
 ent state, its loyalty to Congress being dependent on its own 
 will. Under the Articles of Confederation, which had cre- 
 ated the Congress, the war had been fought to a successful 
 issue. It had raised armies, contracted loans and levied 
 taxes, but it had no power to compel the affiliation or loyalty 
 of the states. It was a product of military necessity hastily 
 called into existence, yet in spite of its imperfections it had 
 survived the stormy period of war. "It could ask for money 
 but not compel payment ; it could enter into treaties but not 
 
 4McLaughlin, "The Confederation and the Constitution," pp. 150- 
 155. 
 
 sMcMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. I, 
 p. 343.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 167 
 
 enforce their stipulations; it could provide for raising of 
 armies but not fill their ranks; it could borrow money but 
 take no proper measures for repayment ; it could advise and 
 recommend but not command."® 
 
 It had one legislative body, the Congress, with no sen- 
 ate, supreme court or president to veto its acts. After the 
 war the states, controlled by the property owners, proceeded 
 with legislation regardless of their neighbors. Each regu- 
 lated commerce and levied duties in its own interests. If 
 one state had endeavored to close her ports to English 
 goods all the others would profit by her sacrifice. British 
 ports were still closed against American merchants unless 
 they patronized English ships. Thirteen different forms of 
 legislation, more or less conflicting, produced anarchy and 
 division. The ruling classes were more or less divided in 
 their scramble for spoils and their opposing jealousies and 
 interests may be seen from the following: 
 
 "The commerce which Massachusetts found it to her 
 interest to encourage, Virginia found it to her interest to 
 restrict. New York would not protect the trade in indigo 
 and pitch. South Carolina cared nothing for the success 
 of the fur interests. New England derived great revenues 
 from lumber, oil and potashes; Pennsylvania from corn 
 and grain, and were in nowise concerned as to the pros- 
 perity of the trade of their neighbors. Articles which 
 Connecticut and New Jersey excluded from their ports by 
 heavy tonnage duties entered New York with scarcely any 
 other charges than light money."^ 
 
 All this is evidence of the eagerness of each section 
 of the wealthy classes to profit out of existing conditions 
 
 eMcLaugrhlin, "The Confederation and the Constitution," p. 501. 
 TMcMaster, "History," Vol. 1, p. 207.
 
 l68 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 without any regard to the interests of their class as a whole. 
 That this is not a biased judgment may be shown by com- 
 petent authorities. "There was everywhere," says Wilson, 
 "the same jealous spirit, the same striving for every petty 
 advantage, the same alert and aggressive selfiishness."'^ Von 
 Hoist is even more positive. "The acquisitions of the war," 
 he writes, "were looked upon as so much booty, of which 
 each state endeavored to secure the lion's share, without the 
 least regard for the well-being or honor of the whole. In 
 several instances, those who were zvilling to sell even the 
 honor of their ozvn state showed a bolder front and grew 
 noisier in the hope of increasing their ozvn personal share 
 of the booty and of seeing it turned as soon as possible into 
 jingling gold."^ 
 
 But the necessity for unity and a strong centralized 
 government in behalf of the wealthy classes was soon re- 
 vealed to them by a specter that appeared in the midst of 
 their petty jealousies and scrambles for spoils. The army 
 was restless for its pay and the government's finances were 
 at a low ebb. A number of companies were on the verge 
 of mutiny ; one drove Congress out of Philadelphia and an- 
 other threatened uprising of veterans required the influence 
 of Washington to quell. In fact, by 1790 Great Britain had 
 distributed about $16,000,000 among about 4,000 of her 
 loyalists, which "seems to have been much more ample than 
 that which the ragged soldiers of our Revolutionary army 
 ever received from Congress. "^° But the real specter was 
 the growing discontent of the poor farmers and laborers 
 who failed to secure all the blessings the Revolution had 
 
 sWoodrow Wilson, "History of the American People," Vol. Ill, p. 54. 
 9Von Hoist, "Constitutional History of the United States," Vol. I, 
 40. 
 loFiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 130.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 169 
 
 promised. Their frightful poverty drove them to despera- 
 tion. Their "inalienable right to life'' was a sham; their 
 "liberty" was imprisonment for debt; their "pursuit of hap- 
 piness" a phantom.^' 
 
 From Massachusetts, Rhode Island, \'ermont, New 
 Hampshire and other states, alarming news came of the 
 growing restlessness among the poor. Mass meetings were 
 being held, petitions circulated and demands made of legis- 
 latures for measures of relief. Debts had been contracted 
 in depreciated currency and the wealthy classes were de- 
 manding payment in gold. Naturally, the poor debtors de- 
 manded paper currency and just as naturally their exploit- 
 ers opposed it. The more paper that was issued the more 
 demoralized the currency became. Historians have gone 
 into hysterics in denouncing this demand of debtors for 
 cheap money, but the fact, which we have referred to be- 
 fore, that JVashington and other land speculators bought 
 up millions of this cheap paper and palmed it ojf on the 
 government for great tracts of land, is generally passed 
 over in silence or commended as an example of "farsighted 
 thrift."^- 
 
 In some states men were on the march to the seats of 
 county or state governments, many of them armed and de- 
 termined that the glorious promises should be in some meas- 
 
 iiMcLaughlin, "The Confederation and the Constitution," p. 140. 
 A French traveler in Rliode Island mentions idle men standing with 
 folded arms at street corners; houses in ruins; grass growing in the 
 streets; windows stuffed with rags, and discontent everywhere. — p. 150. 
 
 i2The following may be cited as an example: Prominent officers 
 of the army organized the Ohio Company, a land speculating company, 
 in 1786. "The money script of the confederation was bought up and 
 used for the purchase of land in the new public domain. Subscrip- 
 tions and systematic corporate action began to make the settlement an 
 enterprise of forethought and associated effort, like the settlement of 
 the first colonies themselves." Wilson, "History of the American Peo- 
 ple," Vol. Ill, p. 53. "Enterprise and forethought!" What tender 
 discrimination in favor of the financial "jockeys" and speculators that 
 Noah Webster declaimed against!
 
 170 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ure fulfilled. Lawyers were hated and despised for their 
 part in confiscating wealth in payment of debts. They were 
 overwhelmed with cases and the courts could not try half 
 of them.^'^ The debtors exercised considerable influence in 
 a number of states and in Rhode Island half a million dol- 
 lars in script were issued which began to depreciate. Prices 
 rose rapidly. The city merchants were raising prices and 
 poor farmers saw in this an effort to defeat paper money. 
 A law was rushed through the legislature commanding 
 every one to accept paper as an equivalent of gold. Viola- 
 tions of the act were subject to a fine of $500 and loss of 
 the right of suffrage. The city merchants closed their shops 
 and the farmers decided not to send any produce to the 
 cities. They tried to sell in Boston and New York, but met 
 opposition in these cities. Their apples rotted and they 
 burned corn for fuel. The farmers were threatened with 
 force and town meetings were held in all parts of the state 
 to consider the grave situation. Farmers became bankrupt, 
 merchants left the state, and the only thing certain was uni- 
 versal uncertainty. 
 
 The drum sounded in New Hampshire and several 
 hundred men armed with muskets, swords and staves en- 
 tered Exeter where the general court was sitting. They 
 demanded a release from taxes and an issue of paper 
 money. The lower house wavered, but the senate standing 
 firm, the rebels were routed the next day. 
 
 In Vermont demands were made that attorneys be ex- 
 pelled from the courts, that debts be cancelled and threats 
 made that if relief measures were not passed force would 
 be employed. Several hundred men were in the saddle and 
 
 i3McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. 
 I, p. 302.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I7I 
 
 the courthouse at Rutland was surrounded with armed men 
 led by Thomas Lee. He had fought with distinction in the 
 Revolution, had risen to the rank of colonel, and on his 
 arrival home had been thrown into prison for debt. De- 
 mands were made of the judges and after a few clashes 
 with troops the rebels were dispersed.^* 
 
 But the most alarming rebellion took place in Massa- 
 chusetts, a revolt that took six months to suppress and one 
 that sobered the ruling classes in their scramble for wealth. 
 The farmers were in dire distress, for their corn rotted on 
 the ground. Money was scarce and they were reduced to 
 the expedient of barter. Thousands signed pledges to re- 
 sist any court that attempted to take their property and to 
 resist the public sale of goods that had been taken to pay 
 debts. Courts were invaded by large bodies of armed men 
 and forced to suspend. Daniel Shays, an officer in the Con- 
 tinental army, who had fought at Bunker Hill, was chosen 
 leader and the revolt grew to large proportions. The legis- 
 lature was not in session ; there were no funds to pay troops 
 to put down the revolt, but "a number of wealthy gentle- 
 men" advanced sufficient funds for the purpose}^ 
 
 The rebellion became so powerful and menacing that 
 it attracted the attention of Congress. That body gave a 
 neat exhibition of "back stairs politics" that has become 
 memorable in the secret history of the United States. Con- 
 gress feared that the insurgents would capture the national 
 
 i4For an exhaustive account of these disturbances and "Shays' 
 Rebellion," which follows, see McMaster, Vol. I, Chap. HI, and Fiske, 
 "Critical Period of American History," Chap. V. 
 
 The novel of the late Edward Bellamy, entitled "The Duke of 
 Stockbridge," is a romance of Shays' Rebellion and is a faithful por- 
 trayal of the social and economic cqnditions of the time. The vile 
 debtors' prisons are painted with shocking realism and are shown to 
 have a marked influence in goading the workers to rebel against 
 their exploiters. 
 
 isMcMaster, Vol. I, p. 319.
 
 172 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 arsenal at Springfield, where there were at least 450 tons 
 of military stores, including bayonets, cannon, powder, shot 
 and shell. The arsenal was in the midst of the discontented 
 population and Secretary of War Knox was directed by 
 Congress to go to Springfield and take such measures as he 
 might deem necessary to protect it. Before he arrived the 
 rebels had already confronted Major General Shepard's 
 troops, "many of them men of much substance both in 
 zvealth and character."^^ Shays appeared at the time for 
 assembling the court and a conference resulted in an agree- 
 ment that both sides should disband. Knox was left in the 
 dilemma of protecting the arsenal, which was a difficult 
 task, for the mere knowledge that the state was collecting 
 troops would provoke an immediate attack from the rebels. 
 On the other hand, Governor Bowdoin could not ask for 
 federal forces and Congress could not recruit them openly 
 without warning the rebels. The insurgents, though not 
 active, were masters of the situation. 
 
 Knox reported the situation to Congress and the matter 
 was referred to a committee. The committee recommended 
 an increase in the army of 1,340 non-commissioned officers 
 and privates. This would make the total force 2,040. The 
 report, and resolutions accompanying it, was adopted. One 
 would expect that the resolutions would refer to the trou- 
 bles in Massachusetts, but instead of this they zvere filled 
 with startling reports of alleged preparations for war being 
 made by several Indian nations. This report was intended 
 for popular consumption and a shield to cover the real in- 
 tentions of Congress. 
 
 The following day a secret report zvas presented by 
 
 iGArticle entitled "Shays' Rebellion," "Harper's Magazine," Vol. 
 XXIV, p. 65G.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I73 
 
 the same committee and adopted by Congress. This one 
 dealt frankly with Shays' rebellion, mentioned the perilous 
 position of the arsenal, stated that "particular circum- 
 stances'' prevented the governor and council from asking 
 for aid in a formal manner, that troops must be raised, 
 but that the insurrection must not be mentioned as a rea- 
 son for raising them and that the Indians zvonld serve as a 
 pretext. 
 
 Congress unanimously adopted a proposal of the treas- 
 ury department that a requisition of $530,000 in specie be 
 laid in due quotas on the states. "On the credit of this 
 requisition a loan of $500,000, bearing interest at six per 
 cent, might at once be opened." To stimulate subscriptions 
 to the loan Congress "ivarned the zvealthy men of Nezv Eng- 
 land to contribute generously, unless they wished to see the 
 nezv recruits mutiny for lack of pay and go over to the in- 
 surgents." GENERAL LINCOLN PERSONALLY SO- 
 LICITED SUBSCRIPTIONS FROM THE WEALTHY 
 MEN OF BOSTON AND OTHER TOWNS, "TELL- 
 ING THE CONTRIBUTORS THAT IT WAS SIMPLY 
 A QUESTION OF ADVANCING A PART OF THEIR 
 PROPERTY IN ORDER TO SAVE THE REST !" 
 
 The secret journals of Congress contain the following 
 expression of fear of mutiny and trust in moneyed men : 
 Congress thought that it "would not hazard the perilous 
 step of putting arms into the hands of men whose fidelity 
 must in some degree depend on the faithful payment of 
 their wages, had they not the fullest confidence . . . 
 of the most liberal exertions of the money holders in the 
 state of Massachusetts and the other states in filling the 
 loans authorized by the resolve of this date."^^ 
 
 iTMcLaughlin, "The Confederation and the Constitution," p. 165.
 
 174 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 On October 22d, Knox notified Governor Bowdoin oi 
 the quota of troops required of Massachusetts and the gov- 
 ernor, in transmitting the information to the general court, 
 enlarged on the dangers of an Indian war. But the fol- 
 lowers of Shays throughout the state suspected the troops 
 were meant for them and not the Indians. As Gerry wrote 
 to King: "Some of the country members laugh and say 
 the Indian war is only a political one to obtain a standing 
 army." However, the troops were secured by the money 
 advanced by rich men, some of whom enlisted to crush the 
 rebellion. Attacks and counter attacks were made extend- 
 ing over six months before the revolt was crushed. The 
 rebels had no funds or provisions and in the final rout some 
 were frozen to death and others died of hunger and ex- 
 posure. A price was placed on Shays' head and a large 
 number arrested, of whom 300 were pardoned, 14 sentenced 
 to death, eight of these being pardoned and the remainder 
 reprieved conditionally.^" As a fitting climax to this his- 
 toric drama the city of Boston, a few years ago, erected a 
 memorial tablet in memory of Daniel Shays ! 
 
 Just as in Bacon's Rebellion more than 100 years before, 
 the followers of Shays were charged by the wealthy classes 
 with being communists prompted with the desire to over- 
 throw all authority and property. This recalls a brilliant 
 passage in the "Communist Manifesto" of Marx and En- 
 gels. "Where is the party in opposition?" they ask, "that 
 has not been decried as communistic by its opponents in 
 power? Where the opposition that has not hurled back 
 the branding reproach of Communism, against the more 
 
 isFor an account of the secret action of Congress see an article 
 by Joseph Parlter Warren in the "American Historical Review," Vol. 
 XI. His article is based on the "Secret Journals of Congiess" now 
 being published by the United States government. Fiske and Mc- 
 Laughlin also make an incidental reference to this secret juggling.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I75 
 
 advanced opposition parties, as well as against its reaction- 
 ary adversaries?" 
 
 These rebellions taught the ruling classes that their 
 supremacy was not secure and that a strong unified govern- 
 ment was necessary to prevent the capture of the state 
 governments by those of the debtor class who were still 
 able to qualify for the sulTrage. The Continental Congress 
 was nearly dead and there appeared no legal method to 
 secure the changes the ruling classes wanted. But just as 
 the rulers in settlement times did not hesitate at fraud, force 
 and confiscation to secure the natural resources, so the 
 "Fathers" did not hesitate to employ the same means to 
 attain their ends. Besides, they were confident that Shays 
 had "intended, if possible, to seize the capital, take posses- 
 sion of the archives, and proclaim a provisional govern- 
 ment."^*^ Nor was this the only danger that filled the 
 wealthy "patriots" with dread, "For the progress of the in- 
 surrection in the autumn in Vermont, New Hampshire and 
 Massachusetts, as well as the troubles in Rhode Island," 
 aroused the fear "that the insurgents in these states might 
 join forces, and in some way kindle a flame that zvould run 
 through the land."-^ Samuel Adams, who had led tar and 
 feather parties in Boston, expressed the vengeance felt by 
 the wealthy when, as president of the Massachusetts sen- 
 ate, he said : "The man who dares to rebel against the laws 
 of a republic ( !) ought to suffer death. "^^ In other words, 
 it was glorious to oppose a foreign ruling class, but a crime 
 to rebel against the domestic type. 
 
 All the leading authorities agree that these rebellions, 
 and particularly the one in Massachusetts, had a great in- 
 
 i9"Harper's Magazine," XXTV, p. 658. 
 
 aoFiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 185. 
 
 2ilbld, p. 184.
 
 176 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 fluence in driving the "Fathers" to the Constitutional con- 
 vention which assembled in Philadelphia in 1787. This 
 gathering had no more power to give a new constitution 
 to the United States than an old maid's sewing circle had. 
 For a long time there had been some dispute between 
 Maryland and Virginia as to the regulation of trade on 
 the i'otomac river. In 1785 Washington "became president 
 of a company for extending the navigation of the Potomac 
 and James rivers;"-- and commissioners of the two states 
 who met in March at Alexandria, adjourned to Mount \'er- 
 non, Washington's home, at his request. Washington was 
 not a delegate, but his corporation had pressed the naviga- 
 tion questions on the attention of the two states and he was 
 admitted to the conference.-" Out of this meeting held in 
 response to the corporation's activity, came a series of 
 meetings to consider the commercial interests of the states. 
 
 James Madison then "steered" a resolution through 
 the Virginia house which, when reported by the Committee 
 on Commerce, urged all states to send commissioners to a 
 convention in Philadelphia "to provide efTectually for the 
 commercial interests of the United States." The conven- 
 tion was endorsed by Congress which, in a resolution 
 adopted February 21, 1787, limited the convention's busi- 
 ness to "the sole and express purpose of revising the Arti- 
 cles of Confederation." It is well to remember these in- 
 structions and note how the men who accepted them ob- 
 served them when they took up their work. Article 13 of 
 the Articles provided that no alteration could be made 
 unless "afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every 
 
 22Fiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 213. 
 23Wilson, "History of the American People," Vol. in, p. 61.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 17/ 
 
 State." We shall note how the "Fathers" observed this 
 provision also. 
 
 On assembling in Philadelphia in May the delegates 
 closed the doors of the convention to the outside world, 
 made it a secret body, and threw their instructions in the 
 waste basket. "It was plain from the first days of the con- 
 vention that a goodly number of the delegates — and among 
 them many of the most distinguished men — would not limit 
 themselves to a literal interpretation of their powers."-* 
 Fiske regards this violation of instructions as a "fortunate 
 circumstance,''-^ as indeed it was, for only by such treach- 
 ery could the delegates frame the scheme of government 
 which they had in mind. They were there to establish a 
 government that would suppress poor debtors' revolts and 
 enthrone property more securely. Washington had already 
 expressed his panic in a letter to Secretary of War Knox. 
 "There are combustibles," he wrote, "in every state to which 
 a spark might set fire."-^ Violation of instructions was, 
 therefore, preferable to the possibility of debtors' control 
 of the states. 
 
 There were fifty- five delegates present, all of them dis- 
 tinguished for wealth or family. The convention was 
 pledged to secrecy and the rules provided that no member 
 should consult with the outside world or take any record 
 from the official minutes without unanimous consent. For 
 four months the delegates met and discussed, but the peo- 
 ple, eagerly waiting to hear what was transpiring, could get 
 no word of what was said or done. In fact, "just what 
 was said and done in this secret conclave was not revealed 
 
 24Von Hoist, "Constitutional History of the United States." Vol. 
 I, p. 50. 
 
 25Fiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 98. 
 26Von Hoist, p. 46. 
 
 12
 
 178 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 until fifty years had passed, and the aged James Madison, 
 the last survivor who sat there, had been gathered to his 
 fathers."'^'' 
 
 The reason why the proceedings were not made public 
 till a half century later is apparent. If the debt-ridden 
 masses knew what the speakers had said behind closed 
 doors it is more than probable that drums would have 
 again called them forth to unseat the usurping aristocrats. 
 So fearful were some that the official minutes might be- 
 come public that the suggestion was made to destroy 
 them!-^ But this act of vandalism was averted by placing 
 the proceedings in the hands of Washington, who presided 
 over the convention, "subject to the order of Congress, if 
 ever formed under the constitution." 
 
 Madison's "Journal of the Constitutional Convention" 
 is our chief source of information regarding the proceed- 
 ings, and as he was aggressive in every move to eliminate 
 the masses from any share in controlling the government, 
 we may be sure that he endeavored to place himself and 
 colleagues in as favorable light as possible. He informs his 
 readers that he took notes because of the value he knew 
 they would be to future generations. His "Journal" is filled 
 with speeches expressing contempt for the aspirations of 
 the masses and he reports himself uttering like sentiments. 
 
 The first thing that strikes us in his record is the fact 
 that Randolph presented a plan of government that com- 
 pletely abolished the old Confederation and was in plain 
 violation of instructions which limited the delegates to a 
 revision of the Articles only. Attention was repeatedly 
 
 27Fiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 229. 
 28]VTadison, "Journal of tlie Constitutional Convention," Vol. II, 
 p. 748.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I79 
 
 called to this violation by Patterson of New Jersey, and 
 others. The usual answer to this was to point to Shays' 
 Rebellion and the terror of working class rule. Those hav- 
 ing some qualms of conscience were silenced by this dread 
 and the secret conspiratory work went on. 
 
 The convention was far from being harmonious, as 
 each interest fought hard for its "rights." But one com- 
 mon purpose was expressed by the overwhelming majority 
 of the speakers. This was that the masses should be ex- 
 cluded as much as possible from any control of the govern- 
 ment. Some of them spoke as though the workers did not 
 exist at all. Madison, in reviewing the classes to be pro- 
 vided for, could only find the following: "The three prin- 
 ciple classes into which our citizens are divisible were the 
 landed, the commercial and the manufacturing."^'' Work- 
 ingmen are not worth mentioning except as vandals, for 
 later he says : "In future time, a great majority of the peo- 
 ple will not only he without landed hut any other sort of 
 property. These will combine, under the influence of their 
 common situation — in which case the rights of property 
 and the public liberty will not be secure in their hands. "^° 
 
 Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, agrees with Mad- 
 ison that the workers are not worth considering, but enumer- 
 ates the three worthy classes as the professional, the landed 
 and the commercial.^^ Madison also warns his fellow aris- 
 tocrats that "There will be, particularly, the distinction be- 
 tween rich and poor. . . . An increase in population 
 will of necessity increase the proportion of those who will 
 labor under all the hardships of life, and secretly sigh for 
 
 29lbid, p. 440. 
 solbid, p. 470. 
 3ilbid, Vol. I, p. 234.
 
 l80 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 a more equal distribution of its blessings."^- Therefore, we 
 must have a government that will thwart these aspirations 
 of the poor. 
 
 Dickenson, of Delaware, also considers property own- 
 ers "as the best guardians of liberty; and the restriction 
 of the right (of suffrage) to them as a necessary defense 
 against the dangerous influence of those multitudes with- 
 out property and without principle (!), with which our 
 country, like all others, will in time abound. "^^ Pinckney 
 advises that the qualification for President should be not 
 less than $100,000, "half of that sum for the judges and 
 in like proportion for congressmen."^* Gouverneur Mor- 
 ris, a descendant of Jacob Leisler, the New York rebel of 
 the century before, is opposed to paying senators. "They 
 will pay themselves, if they can." (What a prophetic vis- 
 ion he had!) "If they cannot, they will be rich, and can 
 do without it." (Aldrich and Guggenheim stand up !) "Of 
 such the second branch ought to consist."^^ (And it does, 
 so rest in peace!) 
 
 Oliver Ellsworth, of Massachusetts, is a prophet also. 
 He makes the following prediction regarding wage labor 
 and chattel labor: "Let us not intermeddle. As popula- 
 tion increases, poor laborers ivill he so plenty as to render 
 slaves useless. Slavery, in time, will not be a speck in our 
 country."^*' What would this convention be without a rep- 
 resentative of New England "democracy?" Alexander 
 Hamilton, the god of the Republican party and the source 
 of all its wisdom, declaims "against the vices (mark you!) 
 
 32rbid, p. 243. 
 33lbid, Vol. II, p. 468. 
 34lbid, p. 494. 
 35lbld, Vol. I, p. 285. 
 selbid, Vol. n, p. 580.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY l8l 
 
 of democracy. , . . Let one branch of the legislature 
 hold their places for life, or at least, during good behavior. 
 Let the executive, also, be for life."^^ 
 
 But it would be tedious to dwell on the frank utter- 
 ances of these men who spoke their sentiments in secret 
 conclave, well knowing their victims could not hear. Dur- 
 ing the four months' session only one man mentioned the 
 workers as being worthy of having the franchise. The 
 man who has this distinction is Benjamin Franklin, and his 
 plea was listened to in silence and passed without comment. 
 His extreme age and feebleness made it impossible for him 
 to speak often and he frequently wrote his speeches and 
 had one of his colleagues, Wilson, read them to the dele- 
 gates. On August 7th he had listened for hours as speaker 
 after speaker urged control of the government by property 
 holders. He arose from his seat and without any prepara- 
 tion spoke in part as follows: 
 
 "It is of great consequence that we should not depress 
 the virtue and public spirit of our common people ; of which 
 they displayed a great deal during the war, and which con- 
 tributed principally to the favorable issue of it. . . . 
 He was persuaded, also, that such a restriction as was pro- 
 posed would give great uneasiness in the populous states. 
 The sons of a substantial farmer, not being themselves free- 
 holders, would not be pleased at being disfranchised, and 
 there are a great many persons of that description."^^ 
 Three days later he again listened to speeches urging con- 
 trol by property and again made his plea for the workers 
 without property. Franklin's two speeches are the only 
 
 37lbid, Vol. I, pp. 182-183. 
 SSIbid, Vol. II, p. 471.
 
 y 
 
 182 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 pleas made in behalf of popular suffrage in the convention. 
 Not one delegate endorsed his views. 
 
 It would seem that shame, even in the absence of a 
 belief in the principle, would have prompted these 
 "Fathers" to give some heed to the claims of the poor who, 
 as Franklin said, "contributed principally to the favorable 
 issue" of the war. But they were lost to all sense of shame 
 or even gratitude. Even Wilson, a delegate from Frank- 
 lin's state who held many popular views, was not willing to 
 assist in battering down the property qualifications that 
 existed in all the states, though eleven years had passed 
 since it was declared that "all men are free and equal." 
 Section 2 of Article i, as adopted, provided for the auto- 
 matic exclusion of the mass of workers from the suffrage 
 by accepting the property qualifications of the states. By 
 its adoption "no man could vote for a member of the house 
 who could not vote for a member of the most numerous 
 branch of his state legislature, and all the restrictions im- 
 posed on suffrage by the constitutions of the states were 
 thus reimposed by the Constitution of the United States. "^^ 
 There were many times when the discussions became 
 heated; many times when the delegates seemed hopelessly 
 divided ; but on this one question of allowing the workers 
 to remain excluded from the suffrage, they were unan- 
 imous. 
 
 The general plan of the delegates consisted of a repu- 
 diation of instructions, overthrow of the Articles of Con- 
 federation, and establishment of a stronger government 
 by the aristocracy. This required the secrecy which they 
 provided for. Their scheme of government was to have 
 
 39McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. Ill, 
 p. 140.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 183 
 
 one legislative department elected direct by the qualified 
 voters, to "inspire confidence" in the scheme, as one speaker 
 expressed it, and a Senate, Executive and Supreme Court 
 removed from popular control and having power to check 
 the Congress. To buttress this by making it almost impossi- 
 ble to amend the constitution was their aim. Prof. J. Allen 
 Smith asserts that "In 1900 one forty-fourth of the popu- 
 lation distributed so as to constitute a majority in the twelve 
 smallest states could defeat any proposed amendment."*^ 
 
 It is interesting to note that the courts now exercising 
 the power to set aside laws enacted by Congress were 
 denied this power even by these aristocrats. Madison and 
 Wilson urged a clause giving this power to the Supreme 
 Court and President as a council of revision and the sugges- 
 tion zvas voted down four times. Yet the courts today ex- 
 ercise this power expressly withheld from them by this nega- 
 tive vote. 
 
 The constitution as finally agreed on was not a unani- 
 mous choice. A number refused to sign it for various rea- 
 sons. Some signed reluctantly ; others refused, holding that 
 certain interests were not protected enough or that others 
 received undue consideration. Section 3 of Article 4 con- 
 tained a fugitive slave clause applying to white slaves as 
 well as negroes. This clause is still seen in printed copies 
 and reads as follows: 
 
 "No person held to service or labor in one state, under 
 the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in conse- 
 quence of any lazv or regulation therein, be discharged from 
 such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of 
 the party to zvhom such service or labor may be due." 
 
 40Smith, "The Spirit of American Government," p. 46.
 
 184' THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 This clause shows that the "Fathers" were wilHng to 
 invade state rights in the function of slave catcher, but not 
 to invade them in the matter of suffrage for the working 
 people. This legalized hunt of whites and blacks, extend- 
 ing over several centuries and embodied in various legal 
 codes, had been so ingrained in the philosophy of the aris- 
 tocrats who gave us the constitution that they could not 
 refrain from bequeathing it to the nineteenth century. Of 
 course, their material interests were the urge behind them. 
 
 That our view of these men and the character of the 
 government they organized is correct has been shown by 
 the testimony of the framers themselves. No less an 
 authority than Woodrow Wilson, late conservative presi- 
 dent of Princeton University, endorses this claim. "The 
 government had," he writes, "been originated and organ- 
 ized upon the initiative and primarily in the interest of the 
 mercantile and wealthy classes. Originally conceived as an 
 effort to accommodate commercial disputes between the 
 states, it had been urged to adoption by a minority, under 
 the concerted leadership of able men representing a ruling 
 class."*^ This is quite in contrast with the assertion of that 
 great bluffer, Gladstone, who said, "The American Consti- 
 tution is the most wonderful work ever struck ofif at a 
 given time by the brain and purpose of man." We can only 
 consider it wonderful in the sense that it is the most re- 
 markable instance in history of a document having all the 
 essentials of a charter of aristocracy, being viewed by a 
 gaping multitude as a guarantee of popular rule. But the 
 reception accorded this "wonderful document" by large 
 
 4iQuoted by Smith, "The Spirit of American Government," p. 52. 
 "The delegates believed that society existed for the preservation of 
 property." — McLaughlin. "The Confederation and the Constitution," p. 
 255.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 185 
 
 numbers of people was far from reassuring to the conspira- 
 tors. Bitter criticism came from the dependent classes, 
 though it found much favor with the wealthy. Hamilton, 
 Madison and others feared that their four months of 
 treachery would go for nothing. This in spite of the fact 
 that the Constitution was not to be submitted to the quali- 
 fied voters, but to state conventions which the aristocracy 
 would have good chances of controlling. 
 
 The constitution as submitted was a series of com- 
 promises and "bargains" agreed on between the different 
 sections of the wealthy classes. "The fear in which the lit- 
 tle states stood of the great secured the compromise giving 
 representation to states. The hatred felt by the slave states 
 for the free caused the second compromise, giving repre- 
 sensation to slaves. The jealousy between states agricul- 
 tural and states commercial brought about the third com- 
 promise on the slave trade and commerce."^^ 
 
 The convention had violated its instructions; it "had 
 drafted nothing less than a new constitution — no mere 
 amendment or series of amendments to the Articles of 
 Confederation ; a radically new scheme of government and 
 of union — which must stand or fall upon its own merits."'*^ 
 Events which followed the submission of the constitution 
 to the state conventions showed that its partisans had no 
 intention whatever of allowing it to "stand or fall upon its 
 own merits." On the contrary, knowing that its "merits" 
 appealed only to the wealthy classes, trickery, bribery, force 
 and deception were employed to secure its adoption, and 
 even then it was not carried by a majority vote. The 
 
 42McMaster, "With The Fathers," p. 121. See also Fiske, "Critical 
 Period of American History," pp. 267-268. 
 
 43Wilson, "History of the American People," Vol. Ill, pp. 70-71.
 
 l86 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 wealthy classes had an advantage in the restricted fran- 
 chise, but they added two more weapons to their armory. 
 These were gerrymandering the districts against the poorer 
 classes who could vote, and the publication of "The Fed- 
 eralist," employing in this all the arts of sophistry and de- 
 ception to win converts for the constitution. In an illumi- 
 nating chapter, entitled "The Political Depravity of the 
 Fathers," Professor McMaster writes of the methods used 
 to convince voters of the "merits" of public questions at 
 that time. "A very little study of long forgotten politics," 
 he says, "will suffice to show that in filibustering and ger- 
 rymandering, in stealing governorships and legislatures, in 
 using force at the polls, in colonizing and in distributing 
 patronage, . . . in all the frauds and tricks that go to 
 make up the zvorst form of politics, the men who founded 
 our state and national governments were always our equals, 
 and often our masters."'^* 
 
 The "worst form of politics" became a valuable asset 
 in demonstrating the "merits" of the constitution. One or 
 two examples will suffice. The Boston Gazette came out 
 with one issue headed in large capitals charging "BRI- 
 BERY AND CORRUPTION!!!" It charged that large 
 sums of money were brought from another state, con- 
 tributed by the wealthy to buy support for the constitution. 
 Fiske concedes that "there was probably a grain of truth 
 in it,"*^ In Pennsylvania the opposition to the "New Roof," 
 as the constitution was called, was very strong. The con- 
 vention met to consider it in November, 1787, and two 
 young men, one a reporter for the Pennsylvania Herald, 
 volunteered to take down the proceedings. The reporter's 
 
 44McMaster, "With The Fathers," p. 71. 
 
 45Fiske, "Critical Period of American History," p. 328.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 187 
 
 account of the debate began to appear in the Herald while 
 the other young man solicited subscriptions for a volume 
 of the debates he intended to publish. The debate was ap- 
 parently going very hard with the Federalists, who sup- 
 ported the constitution, and the Herald's reports were re- 
 printed in other states to the dismay of the conspirators. 
 The Federalists then bought the paper and suppressed the 
 reports. The other young man was bought and when his 
 book appeared it contained but two speeches delivered by 
 warm supporters of the constitution!^^ 
 
 "The Federalist," on the other hand, appeared from 
 time to time with well written essays by Madison, Hamil- 
 ton and Jay, which appeared in the New York Packet and 
 other papers. In these essays the schemers changed front. 
 In the secret convention they avow their contempt and fear 
 of the masses and of popular rule. In "The Federalist" 
 they appear as champions and defenders of both and offer 
 the constitution as the best guarantee of popular liberty. 
 It is amusing to note, in this connection, that these essays 
 are drummed into the heads of guileless youths in American 
 universities by the intellectual policemen who guard the 
 "higher learning" of today. 
 
 There were 85 of these essays; 51 written by Hamil- 
 ton, 29 by Madison and 5 by Jay. It was a scholarly publi- 
 cation and the authors presented the constitution in the 
 most favorable light. They well knew that the official jour- 
 nals of the convention containing a record of their real sen- 
 timents were beyond the scrutiny of the eager multitudes. 
 In the convention, as we have seen, they were born aristo- 
 crats speaking boldly in behalf of the wealthy ; in the Fed- 
 
 46McMaster, "With The Fathers," pp. 74-75.
 
 1 86 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 eralist they are advocates of democracy. No one could 
 confront the articles in the federalist with the speeches de- 
 livered behind closed doors. Yet McMaster suspends all 
 candid judgment when he says "That the work (of the Fed- 
 eralist) is a true statement of what the framers of that in- 
 strument meant it to be cannot be doubted."*^ 
 
 A few extracts from this publication contrasted with 
 the speeches delivered in the "Dark Conclave," as the con- 
 stitutional convention came to be known, will satisfy any 
 candid reader as to whether these men were honest in their 
 appeals or were only political demagogues. M^adison, who 
 in the secret convention said that "the rights of property 
 and the public liberty will not be secure in their (the 
 workers') hands," now writes in the Federalist as follows: 
 
 "The first question that offers itself is, whether the 
 general form and aspect of the government be strictly re- 
 publican. It is evident that no other form would be recon- 
 cilable with the genius of the people of America; with the 
 principles of the Revolution; or with the honorable ( !) de- 
 termination which animates every votary of freedom (!!) 
 to rest all our political experiments on the capacity of man- 
 kind for self-government."*^ The answer to his own en- 
 quiry is that the constitution is everything that the "votaries 
 of freedom" could wish to expect, and he elaborates on 
 this assertion in 51 essays, drawing on the experience and 
 history of ancient and modern republics, to convince his 
 readers. The question is, was Madison lying in the Feder- 
 alist or in the secret convention at Philadelphia? 
 
 Hamilton, who in the convention urged that the Senate 
 
 47McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. I, 
 p. 484. 
 
 48The Federalist, No. 38.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 189 
 
 and President be elected for life and who repeatedly avowed 
 his contempt for the "vices of democracy," now sends forth 
 this appeal: "The fabric of American empire ought to rest 
 on the solid basis of the consent of the people. The streams 
 of national power ought to flow immediately from that pure 
 original fountain of all legitimate authority !"*^ Was Ham- 
 ilton a convert to "vices" he hated or was he still the adroit 
 adventurer and frank monarchist of the "Dark Conclave?" 
 
 Later on he becomes virtuously indignant at the 
 charges made that the convention was a conspiracy and 
 that he and others were not presenting their honest views. 
 In the closing number of the Federalist he writes: "The 
 charge of a conspiracy against the liberties of the people, 
 which has been indiscriminately brought against the advo- 
 cates of the plan, has something in it too wanton and too 
 malignant not to excite the indignation of every man who 
 feels in his own bosom a refutation (!) of the calumny. 
 . , . And the unwarrantable concealments (!!) and mis- 
 representations ( ! ! !) which have been in various ways prac- 
 ticed to keep the truth (!!!!) from the public eye have been 
 of a nature to demand the reprobation of all honest 
 men."5<' 
 
 To this sophistry we may reply in the cutting words of 
 Professor Smith: "The evidence now accessible to stu- 
 dents of the American Constitution proves that the charges 
 oi" 'concealments and misrepresentations' made with this 
 show of righteous indignation against the opponents of 
 the constitution might have justly been made against Ham- 
 ilton himself. But knowing that the views expressed in the 
 
 49The Federalist, No. 44. 
 50The Federalist, No. 85.
 
 190 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Federal Convention were not public property, he could 
 safely give to the press this 'refutation of the calumny/ "^^ 
 
 However, the scholarly attainments of the treacherous 
 pleaders and the ingenious arguments which they employed 
 in defense of the constitution ; the advantage which they 
 possessed in the fact that the mass of the workers had no 
 vote; together with the employment of force and bribery, 
 all these had their effect in carrying the day for the usurp- 
 ing minority. These, and these alone, constituted the "mer- 
 its" of th'^ constitution. 
 
 Opponents of the document had a powerful argument 
 in pointing out the important fact that the "votaries of 
 freedom" had omitted any provisions for the freedom of 
 the press, freedom of speech and assemblage, the right of 
 petition, and the right of trial by jury. This had such 
 effect that the Federalists made it known that if the consti- 
 tution was adoped the First Congress would submit amend- 
 ments including these popular guarantees. This became 
 also a powerful bid for support. The Federalists were finally 
 able to carry the constitution by small majorities in the 
 state conventions. But even this was only a partial victory, 
 for only six states adopted it without any qualifications, 
 while the remaining seven in adopting it recommended 
 amendments ranging from four by South Carolina to thirty- 
 two by New York. 
 
 It was adopted by a minority vote. There are abundant 
 authorities who affirm this judgment. Owing to the re- 
 strictions placed on the suffrage only those possessing prop- 
 erty had a voice in choosing delegates to the state conven- 
 tions that considered the instrument. McMaster affirms 
 
 5iSmith, "The Spirit of American Government," pp. 77-78.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I9I 
 
 that many farmers' sons, wandering teachers and lawyers 
 beginning practice were fortunate if they could vote at the 
 age of twenty-eight. ''Of the mass of unskilled laborers — 
 the men who dug ditches, carried loads, or in harvest time 
 helped the farmer gather in his hay and grain — it is safe to 
 say that very few, if any, ever in the course of their lives 
 cast a vote.""^ In fact, "There were probably not more than 
 120,000 men who had the right to vote out of all the four 
 million inhabitants enumerated in the first census (1790)."^^ 
 
 The vote cast in the states shows the division between 
 the wealthy class and those of moderate means ; the former 
 •favoring, the latter opposing, the constitution. "All who 
 possessed estates, who were engaged in traffic, or held any 
 of the final settlements and depreciation certificates, felt 
 safe."^* On the other hand, the constitution "was opposed 
 by the men who lived remote from the centers of popula- 
 tion and the stronger currents of trade, ... by men 
 who were more likely to be debtors than to be creditors.""^ 
 
 Fisher, speaking of Massachusetts, asserts that out of 
 every four or five adult males only one was a freeman; 
 "and this disfranchised majority, which included from 
 three-fourths to four-fifths of the able-bodied men of the 
 colony, had no more part or lot in the government than the 
 women and children. "^^ Professor Francis Norton Thorpe 
 also states that the "freemen of America a century ago com- 
 prised about one-fifteenth of the whole population."" 
 
 52McMaster, "With The Fathers," pp. 163-164. 
 
 53Wilson, "History of the American People," Vol. Ill, pp. 120-121. 
 
 54McMaster, "History of the People of the United States," Vol. I, 
 p. 399. 
 
 ssWilson, "History of the American People," Vol. Ill, pp. 79-80. 
 See also his map showing clearly the distribution of the vote along 
 tllGSG linGs. 
 
 r>6Fisher, "Men, Women and Manners in Colonial Times," Vol. I, 
 p. 132. 
 
 57Thorpe, "Magazine of American History." Vol. XVIII, p. 131.
 
 192 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 The Struggle over the constitution developed two 
 clearly marked divisions; one comprising the Federalists 
 who supported it, and one of the Anti-Federalists who op- 
 posed it. With one exception the former party in all the 
 states was made up of the various sections of the ruling 
 class, while the latter was composed of the poor classes who 
 managed to qualify for the suffrage.^^ The opposition to 
 the constitution was located in those sections where hard 
 and painful, but useful toil was the chief distinction of 
 their inhabitants. It included the "debtor and paper money 
 region and one peculiarly sensitive to taxation. It included 
 factious Rhode Island, the Shays' region in Massachusetts 
 and the center of a similiar movement in New Hampshire." 
 It found its most ardent supporters in the commercial cen- 
 ters of all the colonies ; "the areas of intercourse and wealth 
 carried the constitution. "^° 
 
 Henry Knox wrote to Washington in 1788 that in 
 Massachusetts the "property and ability" of the state fa- 
 vored the constitution and opposed to it were Shays' sym- 
 pathizers, constituting four-fifths of the opposition. Mad- 
 ison mentions eighteen or twenty delegates in the Massa- 
 chusetts convention who were in Shays' army and were op- 
 posed to the constitution.®" 
 
 In Rhode Island, "as in Massachusetts, the wealthy and 
 commercial classes united to favor the constitution, as op- 
 posed to the interior agricultural class who believed among 
 
 581 am indebted to the librarian of the University of Wisconsin for 
 the privilege of consulting Orrin Grant Libby's invaluable monograph, 
 "The Geographical Distribution of the Vote of the Thirteen States on 
 the Federal Constitution, 1787-8." His examination of the records of 
 the vote in the conventions on the Constitution is exhaustive and gen- 
 erally conceded as authoritative. My account of the vote in the states 
 is a summary of Mr. Libby's conclusions. 
 
 r.oLibby, pp. 46-49. 
 
 eolbid, p. 13.
 
 Tllli: WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I93 
 
 Other things, in paper money issues."^ Here the debtor 
 class predominated and opposition to the constitution made 
 it the last state to come into the union. 
 
 New Jersey desired the regulation of commerce to be 
 assumed by the federal government and fretted under the 
 imposts levied by New York and Pennsylvania. What op- 
 position prevailed came from the debtor and paper money 
 regions. *'- 
 
 In Connecticut the opposition was very weak, but came 
 from sections of the state that contained the debtor classes 
 and those who sympathized with Shays' Rebellion.*'^ 
 
 In Pennsylvania "The paper money and debt factions 
 of 1786 quite largely joined the Anti-Federalists of 1788."*'* 
 
 Eighty per cent of tidewater Virginia, containing the 
 monied and commercial interests, supported the constitu- 
 tion. The interior, composed of small farmers, voted 74 
 per cent against. The West Virginia district, which lay 
 in the Shenandoah Valley with a thickly settled and im- 
 portant commercial interest, voted 97 per cent for while 
 the back country of Kentucky voted 90 per cent against.*'^ 
 
 Georgia gave a speedy endorsement to the constitution 
 because of its exposed situation as the Southern frontier 
 state. A strong government was regarded as necessary to 
 cope with the Indians on the border and to assist in reclaim- 
 ing fugitive slaves who continually crossed the Spanish 
 line and escaped.®'' 
 
 The six towns represented in the North Corolina con- 
 vention were all Federal but one, and three of them be- 
 
 eilbid, p. 17. 
 62lbid, p. 61. 
 C3lbid, pp. 57-58. 
 64lbid, p. 64. 
 65lbid, pp. 34-35. 
 66Ibid, p. 45. 
 
 13
 
 194 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 longed to counties otherwise Anti-Federal. Here as in the 
 other states the commercial sections were generally Federal 
 strongholds while the interior was Anti-Federal.*'^ 
 
 South Carolina presented the usual division between 
 the wealthy commercial district along the coast — particu- 
 larly the city of Charleston — and the back country of farm- 
 ers and frontiersmen. Long before the Revolution the 
 indolent aristocracy of this city incurred the antagonism of 
 the democracy of the interior which found expression in 
 the struggle over the constitution. The coast region stood 
 88 per cent for the constitution, the middle region being 
 almost evenly divided, while the upper region stood 80 per 
 cent against it.®^ 
 
 New York furnishes the one exception to this general 
 division of the vote. The interior counties of this state 
 were opposed to the constitution, although the two cities of 
 Albany and Hudson favored it but did not send delegates 
 to the state convention. New York City and county were 
 strongly Federal but the state as a whole was strongly Anti- 
 Federal owing to the preponderence of power held by the 
 land kings along the banks of the Hudson and the Mohawk. 
 This landed aristocracy controlled the government, collect- 
 ed duties on goods going to other states through New York 
 ports, and would have to surrender this privilege if the state 
 entered the union. Its ruling classes believed that New York 
 could stand alone as an independent state and in opposing 
 the constitution were following what appeared to be their 
 material interests. This x\nti-Federal aristocracy consti- 
 
 67lbid, pp. 41-42. 
 68lbid, pp. 43-44.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 195 
 
 tutes the one exception to the general truth that the 
 wealthy classes urged and fought for the constitution."^ 
 
 This brief survey of the vote on the constitution clearly 
 shows the interests opposing and the interests favoring it. 
 It is also clear that the Constitional Convention was a con- 
 spiracy and the constitution a new charter making more 
 secure the position of the ruling classes of that day. Both 
 were a counter-revolution against poor debtors driven mad 
 by the treatment they received after fighting the battles of 
 the property-owning classes in the war. The constitution 
 gave the ruling classes possession of a strong government 
 and efficient police and military power to enact their interests 
 into laws to be obeyed by all. It remains for us to also 
 observe that at no time in our history has the Constitution 
 of the United States been ratified by a majority vote of the 
 people. It was, it is, and it will remain, until changed, the 
 machinery by which an idle owning class makes all classes 
 below it serve it as dependents. 
 
 69lbid, Chap. I. See also McLaughlin, "The Confederation and the 
 Constitution," p. 306.
 
 196 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Chapter IX 
 
 The Period of Struggle 
 
 We have traced the development of the working-class 
 over three centuries and it remains for us to briefly consider 
 the development which followed the adoption of the constitu- 
 tion. The new government placed the privileged classes 
 firmly in the saddle and the new century brought with it a 
 desertion of the sea-coast states that has continued down to 
 recent times. The more daring moved out into the wilder- 
 ness of Tennessee or drifted down the Ohio to Kentucky to 
 escape "from a barren country loaded with taxes and im- 
 poverished with debts," as one pioneer Avrote from the Falls 
 of the Ohio in 1785.^ The advance guard with rifie and 
 powder horn pushed their way along the courses of rivers, 
 building blockhouses, clearing the forests for cultivation, and 
 leaving pools of settlers behind to grow into villages, towns 
 and cities. 
 
 John Bradbury, an English traveler, noticed what many 
 later travelers observed, that emigrants lacking the stamina 
 for enduring the hardships of clearing the wilderness always 
 found opportunity for buying out the backwoodsman's clear- 
 ing. The latter found the frontier with its hardships, adven- 
 ture and primitive freedom more attractive than the civiliza- 
 tion creeping at his heels. The clearing which he sold 
 generally consisted of a log house, a small orchard, and from 
 
 iMcLaughlin, "The Confederation and the Constitution," p. 95.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I97 
 
 ten to forty acres enclosed and partly cleared." It is this 
 fleeing host of workers across a continent that constitutes a 
 phase of American history that is unknown to any other na- 
 tion. The moving frontier absorbed the European or the 
 worker of the Atlantic Coast states and transformed him 
 into a communist, a barbarian, a hunter or a savage accord- 
 ing to the place he occupied in the advancing line. If it was 
 the farthest outpost jetting into the wilderness, he was likely 
 to be transformed into something akin to the savage in his 
 mode of life. If he was a recruit farther back in the line of 
 advance he may have formed one of the groups of com- 
 munist settlers who, through mutual aid, raised each other's 
 log huts, cleared each other's land, husked corn in common 
 and largely lived a communist life. 
 
 Of the transformations that the environment of the 
 frontier wrought in the habits, customs and morals of civ- 
 ilized man, Prof. Turner says: 
 
 "The wilderness masters the colonist. It finds him a 
 European in dress, industries, tools, modes of travel, and 
 thought. It takes iiim from the railroad car and puts him 
 in the birch canoe. It strips off the garments of civiliza- 
 tion, and arrays him in the hunting shirt and the moccasin. 
 It puts him in the log cabin of the Cherokee and Iroquois 
 and runs an Indian palisade around him. Before long he 
 has gone to planting Indian corn and plowing with a sharp 
 stick ; he shouts the war cry and takes the scalp in orthodox 
 Indian fashion. In short, at the frontier the environment 
 is at first too strong for the man. He must accept the con- 
 
 2Bradbury, "Travels in the Interior of America in the Years 1809, 
 1810 and 1811," p. 291.
 
 198 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ditions which it furnishes, or perish, and so he fits himself 
 into the Indian clearings and follows the Indian trails."^ 
 
 As the development of the child, from conception to 
 birth, repeats the history of living things from the lowest 
 forms of life to man, so this westward migration of the 
 people reproduced much of the social history of mankind 
 from savagery to modern capitalism. 
 
 "The advance guard of hunters, trappers, fishermen, 
 scouts and Indian fighters reproduced with remarkable 
 fidelity the social stage of savagery. They lived in rude 
 shelters built of logs or of prairie sod, found their food and 
 clothing by the chase, gathered around personal leaders, 
 were often lawless, brutal and quarrelsome, though more 
 frequently they displayed the even more characteristically 
 savage traits of taciturn silence and fatalistic courage. 
 ."* Following these came the first settlers, who 
 stopped long enough to make the first clearings, only to 
 move on and repeat this experience as the next wave of 
 approaching population reached them. They combined mu- 
 tual assistance in farming and hut-building, with hunting 
 and fishing, to maintain existence. Following them came 
 the nomadic stage of herdsmen and cowboys, crossing the 
 continent in its order wherever the land permitted. Fol- 
 lowing this stage came the first permanent settlements, 
 bringing with them the infant phases of capitalism which 
 were to develop into the hideous cities with their dirt, dis- 
 ease, slums, and merciless robbery of the workers.^ 
 
 3P. J. Turner, "The Significance of the Frontier in American His- 
 tory," International Socialist Review, December, 1905. 
 
 4Simons, "Social Forces in American History," Chap. XII. I am 
 indebted to Comrade Simons for the privilege of reading the manu- 
 script of his book. His work is a well-balanced study of economic and 
 social forces that have determined the course of American history 
 and is indispensable to those who wish to understand the "how" and 
 "why" of many important events and institutions. 
 
 Bibid.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY I99 
 
 The accounts of early western travelers are filled with 
 interesting descriptions of this moving horde of people and 
 the life they lived in each stage. Andre Michaux, a French 
 traveler, in 1793-96, mentions the almost complete reversion 
 of his countrymen to savagery at the French settlement of 
 Kaskaskia, Illinois. Most of the settlers were clothed like 
 savages and their huts were in ruins. "They wear no 
 breeches but pass between their thighs a piece of cloth 
 which is kept in place before and behind above 
 the hips by a belt."*' In the rough, border life of these 
 people gambling and fighting are prominent vices. Hands, 
 teeth, knees, head and feet are used in fighting. The old 
 Virginia custom of "gouging" each other's eyes out by the 
 skillful use of thumb and finger is a common practice. An- 
 other traveler in 1807-09 observes that "the backswoods- 
 men, as the first emigrants from the eastward of the Alle- 
 gheny mountains are called, are very similar in their habits 
 and manners to the aborigines, only perhaps more prodigal 
 and more careless of life, . . . Their cabins are not 
 better than wigwams."^ 
 
 Money cannot purchase necessary help. An employ- 
 ing class with a well-stocked "labor market" was to come 
 later. Mutual aid is the rule. On an appointed day the 
 neighbors assemble and divide into parties to each of which 
 is assigned a duty. Bradbury often witnessed a cabin rais- 
 ing. "One party," he writes, "cuts down the trees, another 
 lops and cuts them to proper lengths, a third is furnished 
 with horses and oxen, and drags them to the spot designed 
 for the site of the house; another party is employed in 
 making shingles to cover the roof, and at light all the ma- 
 
 p-Andre Michaux's Travels; "Early Western Travels," Vol. Ill, p. 70. 
 TCuming's Tour, "Early Western Travels," Vol. TV, p. 137.
 
 200 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 terials are ready upon the spot ; and on the night of the 
 next day, he and his family sleep in their new habitation.'"*^ 
 This communal help is known as a "frolic." There are 
 frolics to reap the wheat, to clear the woods and hew logs 
 into lengths, and for picking cotton. There also also sewing 
 and quilting frolics for making clothing in the households." 
 The frontier is the best example of the influence of en- 
 vironment in transforming character, shaping institutions, 
 forming habits and customs and determining the type of 
 society in general. 
 
 Back in the sea-coast states the poverty of the masses 
 was pressing this mass of people through the wilderness by 
 sending a constant stream of recruits into the rear ranks. 
 Early in the last century Bradbury observed many farms 
 abandoned in Virginia. He was informed that in i8 months 
 15,000 wagons containing emigrants passed one New York 
 bridge to the West. Wagoners carry beds, cooking utensils 
 and food. Many wander afoot and some stop at taverns if 
 able to pay.^** Another traveler in Pennsylvania about the 
 same time mentions a "singular party of travelers — a man 
 with his wife and ten children. The eldest of the progeny 
 had the youngest tied on his back ; and the father pushed 
 a wheelbarrow, containing the movables of the family." 
 They are leaving New Jersey and their destination is Ohio. 
 Farther on a young woman is passed, "carrying a sucking 
 child in her arms, and leading a very little one by the 
 hand."^^ Arriving at Pittsburg or Wheeling the emigrants 
 float down the Ohio in flat-bottomed "arks," carrying three 
 or four families who locate close to a town or disappear 
 
 sBradbury, "Travels," p. 293. 
 
 oWood's "English Prairie," Ear. West. Trav. Vol. X, p. 300. 
 
 loBradbury, "Travels," pp. 310-17. 
 
 iiFlint, "Letters from America," Ear. West. Trav. Vol. IX, p. Ti.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 20I 
 
 in the wilderness. At Pittsburg sharks are waiting to 
 sell cheap, defective barks that may sink when striking 
 obstructions and endanger the lives of the occupants.^- 
 
 In 1811 one Pennsylvania town witnessed the pass- 
 ing of 236 wagons in one month bound for Ohio. By 1814 
 the poor were deserting the East in such numbers as to 
 arouse fears that it would be depopulated. Residents of 
 New York State affirmed that they had never seen such 
 a migration westward. The population of Ohio, Indiana 
 and Kentucky increased rapidly, while Virginia seriously 
 thought of legislation to check its emigration. Villages on 
 the Ohio that were scarcely more than a cluster of huts 
 grew into flourishing towns within a few years. One 
 family of eight walked from Maine to Pennsylvania drag- 
 ging children and goods in a handcart. By 181 7 some 
 cities of the East ceased to grow, so great was the deser- 
 tion of the seaboard states by the poor.^" 
 
 In 1820 Flint writes of having seen upwards of 1,500 
 men out of work during the previous eleven months. 
 Newspapers and private letters agree that wages at Phil- 
 adelphia and at other points had decreased to twenty cents 
 per day and board. Great numbers are encamped in open 
 fields near Baltimore. Wages are low along the Ohio and 
 paid in depreciated paper. Some boarding houses refuse 
 it and the laborers fire a decayed log and sleep by it at 
 night. A Cincinnati paper advertised a place for receiv- 
 ing old clothes for the poor and cast-ofif shoes for chil- 
 dren. Contracts are let in the western country for board- 
 
 i2lbid, p. 94. 
 
 i3McMaster, "History of the People of the United States." Vol. IV, 
 pp. 388-9. By 1821 the official classes were so alarmed by the increase 
 of pauperism and crime that some demanded a return to the whipping 
 post, the pillory and gallows. The treadmill was introduced in many 
 prisons and was used for years as a "correction" for poverty. — Ibid, 
 pp. 546-7.
 
 202 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ing the poor who are farmed out to employers.^* Poverty 
 filled the debtors' prisons and one congressman, in 1829, 
 protests against the spectacle of a constable selling a 
 woman at public auction for debt under the authority of 
 Congress.^^ 
 
 By 1833 thousands were leaving New England and 
 following a route bordering the lakes. The revolutions of 
 1848 in Europe sent tens of thousands and was further 
 stimulated by transportation agencies interested in immi- 
 gration. The terrible famine in Ireland where thousands 
 dropped of hunger in the streets and fields brought fleeing 
 Irishmen in droves." In 1843 hundreds were gathered at 
 the Missouri ferries and by 1847 between four and five 
 thousand were crossing.^^ The emigrants of 1849 were 
 similar to the masses who made their way across the Al- 
 leghenies in the early part of the century, some on foot 
 carrying babies in their arms and barefooted children 
 trudging behind, while others made their way in the prairie 
 schooner. Often the sufiferings of the emigrants were 
 greater than the westward movement had ever experi- 
 enced.^® 
 
 While the workers were deserting the seacoast states 
 and seeking economic independence, a peculiar by-product 
 of colonial exploitation had already formed in the moun- 
 tain regions of the South. The mountain whites inhabited 
 the Appalachian chain from western Virginia to northern 
 Alabama. Crowded back by the movement of population, 
 they wandered into remote regions and became isolated 
 from the outside world. Their development became ar- 
 
 i4Flint, "LetteTS from America," pp. 226-9. 
 inMcMaster, "History," Vol. V, pp. 224-5. 
 leMcMaster, "History," Vol. VII, pp. 222-3. 
 iTPaxon, "The Last American Frontier," p. 76. 
 islbid, pp. 113-4.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 203 
 
 rested at a period identical with the colonial era,; their 
 manners, customs, songs and speech belong to this period. 
 Living in rude huts, having large families, using the sim- 
 ple implements of the barbarian beyond the frontier, they 
 vegetated in ignorance of the great current of progress 
 that was sweeping beyond them." 
 
 The life of the mountain whites is so like the life of 
 the people of the seventeenth century that an observer 
 has given them the name of "Our contemporary ances- 
 tors."-" In some parts the spinning wheel is still in use 
 and there are instances of a sheep trotting about in the 
 early morning and a mountaineer wearing its pelt at 
 night, it having been sheared, spun, woven, dyed, cut, 
 made and fitted in that one day. They still sin,; the old 
 Elizabethan ballads which are handed down from grand- 
 mother to child. ^^ The lowest layers live in rude cabins 
 with scanty supplies of food. Most of them are illiterate 
 and many have negro or Indian blood in their veins. A 
 mixture of corn meal, salt and water baked on hot coals 
 with what game they shoot or trap make up their living. 
 Ignorant preachers shout the terrors of hell-fire till sin- 
 ners "get religion," while the men chew enormous quanti- 
 ties of tobacco and the women "dip snuff." Bathing is a 
 lost art and a garment once put on stays there until it is 
 worn out. They are proud and generous and share their 
 simple comforts with strangers with the pomp of princes. 
 
 The lowland whites lie east of this region and are 
 largely composed of descendants of the poorer classes and 
 released servants of earlier days. These "poor whites" 
 still form a large element in the population of the South- 
 
 i9McMaster, "History," Vol. VTI, pp. 236-7. 
 20Hart, "The Southern South," p. 30. 
 2ilbid, pp. 30-32.
 
 204 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ern states. Twenty years before the Civil War Frances 
 Anne Kemble observed them in Georgia. "They are hard- 
 ly protected," she writes, "from the weather by the rude 
 shelters they frame for themselves in the midst of these 
 dreary woods. Their food is chiefly supplied by shooting 
 the wild fowl and venison, and stealing from the cultivat- 
 ed patches of the plantations nearest at hand. Their 
 clothes hang about them in filthy tatters, and the combined 
 squalor and fierceness of their appearance is really fright- 
 ful."" They were and are a legitimate product of the sys- 
 tem of slave labor which made the performance of useful 
 labor by white men a disgrace. They believe themselves a 
 part of the ruling whites and share the latter's hatred of 
 the "nigger." The ruling class fosters this hatred of the 
 blacks by the poor whites and rules and robs both. 
 
 The ruling and poor whites regarded labor as a dis- 
 tinct function of the negro, while the poor white often sunk 
 to depths of poverty, as a result of his refusal to work, 
 that the negro never knew. Flint observed a curious ex- 
 ample of this in 1818. "Certain kinds of labor," he writes, 
 "are despised as being the work of slaves. Shoe blacking 
 and, in some instances, family manufactures, are of this 
 class of laborers ; and it is thus that in some of the small 
 towns on the north side of the Ohio, the mechanic and 
 laborer are to be seen drawing water at the wells ; their 
 wives and daughters not condescending to services that are 
 looked upon to be opprobrious. It was for the same rea- 
 son that, on one occasion, some paupers in a poorhouse at 
 Cincinnati refused to carry water for their own use."-' 
 The hatred borne the negro in the South by the white 
 
 22Kemble, "Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation in 
 1838-1839," p. 76. 
 
 23Flint, "Letters from America," Ear. West. Trav. Vol. IX, p. 218.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 205 
 
 workers has been intensified by the fact that the Civil War 
 placed blacks and whites in the same labor market and 
 the white now insists on the privilege of being exploited. 
 To be thrust into the same market and be compelled to 
 serve the white masters violates the old conception that 
 work belongs exclusively to the blacks.-* 
 
 The poor whites of the lowlands are known as "Tar 
 Heels" in North Carolina, "Sand Killers" in South Caro- 
 lina, "Crackers" in Georgia, "Clay Eaters" in Alabama, 
 "Red Necks" in Arkansas, "Hill Billies" in Mississippi, 
 and "Mean Whites," "White Trash" and "No 'Count" 
 everywhere.-^ They are held in contempt by the politi- 
 cians and ruling whites, who stimulate their hatred of the 
 negro in order to rule both. 
 
 While the moving population was sending the workers 
 westward in quest of better conditions those left in the 
 cities were engaging in the struggle for the "inalienable 
 rights" that the Declaration proclaimed and the Constitu- 
 tional Convention denied. A study of the demands made 
 by the workers at this time shows that they were always 
 advancing proposals and outlining plans for every popular 
 liberty that has come down to us. They represented the 
 only statesmanship that was of value at this period while 
 the men in public life were enlisted in the service of some 
 section of the ruling class. The issues that confronted the 
 workers were public education, imprisonment for debt, the 
 militia system, mechanics' liens, equal taxation, cheaper 
 legal procedure, abolition of conspiracy laws against labor 
 organizations, child labor and opposition to chartered 
 banks and monopolies. 
 
 24Baker, "Following the Color Line," p. 85. 
 2r.Hart, "The Southern South," p. 38.
 
 206 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 The workers were often cheated out of their scanty 
 wages by absconding contractors or paid in worthless 
 script or depreciated money. The hours of labor were 
 from daylight till dark; the debtors' prisons still swal- 
 lowed thousands; what few free schools existed carried 
 with them the stigma of pauperism for the worker's child ; 
 the compulsory militia system, permitting the rich to es- 
 cape service by paying a small fine, left the worker no 
 choice between service and imprisonment.^" Labor organi- 
 zations were prosecuted under old English laws as con- 
 spiracies; the children of the poor were being drawn into 
 the factories and property qualifications excluded the mass 
 of workers from voting. All this driftwood floating down 
 from the past had to be removed by the working class and 
 the workers set about the task before them. 
 
 Not only was the press of that day opposed to any 
 changes but the politicians were either indiflferent or hos- 
 tile, while employers' associations were formed to oppose 
 the workers' demands.-" The workers defended their gen- 
 eral position and demands with a skill and logic that is 
 hardly equalled by the unions today and some passages in 
 their official utterances show that they perceived the char- 
 acter of capitalist society as a system that enabled a few 
 to live ofif of unpaid labor. As early as 1828 the Me- 
 chanics Union of Philadelphia declared in its preamble: 
 "Do not all the streams of wealth which flow in every di- 
 rection and are emptied into and absorbed by the coffers of 
 the unproductive, exclusively take their rise in the bones, 
 marrow, and muscles of the industrious classes? In re- 
 
 26Documentary History of American Industrial Society, Vol. V, In- 
 troduction. 
 
 27See resolutions adopted by master carpenters in Philadelphia, 
 1827, Ibid, pp. 81-82.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 20/ 
 
 turn for which, exclusive of a bare subsistence, . 
 they receive not a thing !"-^ 
 
 One of the first and foremost demands was for the 
 pubHc school and free education. As an institution the 
 common school had no existence and agitation for it met 
 the vigorous opposition of the ruling classes. From 1809 
 to 1835 the laws of Pennsylvania provided that only those 
 who took oath that they could not send their children to 
 private pay schools should be allowed to send them to the 
 public schools. The public schools were regarded as pau- 
 per institutions, a stigma of shame being attached to chil- 
 dren who attended them. In Delaware and Maryland the 
 schools were little better and were frequently taught by 
 redemptioners and indentured servants. Schools were 
 often in the hands of ignorant, brutal and immoral teach- 
 ers and school funds were often embezzled or neglected. 
 The workers attacked the schools and by 1S34 there were 
 200,000 children out of school in Pennsylvania. In Sep- 
 tember of that year the State provided for tax-supported 
 schools and three months later petitions for repeal of the 
 act were received from 38 counties out of 51 and only a 
 hard struggle saved the bill.^^ 
 
 A Workingmen's Committee of Philadelphia in 1829 
 drew a model outline for a system of free education that 
 would be a credit to experienced educators.^" In all the 
 working class journals of that time and for many years 
 after free education and the public school are prominent 
 demands. The opposition to them read like the anti- 
 Socialist arguments of today. The National Gazette, of 
 Philadelphia, in a number of editorials in 1830, ridiculed 
 
 28DOC. Hist. Vol. V, p. 85. 
 
 2aMcMaster, "History," Vol. V. pp. 361-2; Vol. VII, pp. 160-1. 
 
 soDoc. Hist. Vol. V, pp. 94-107.
 
 208 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 the public school as an impractical dream and as class leg- 
 islation. This paper regarded it as "incompatible with the 
 very organization and being of civil society." It affirms 
 that the public school would place a premium on idleness. 
 "A scheme of universal equal education . . . could 
 not be used with any degree of equality of profit, unless 
 the dispositions and circumstances of parents and children 
 were nearly the same ; to accomplish which phenomenon, 
 in a nation of many millions, engaged in a great variety of 
 pursuits, would be beyond human power."" Thus spoke 
 the "educated" classes in the first quarter of the nineteenth 
 century. The public school as we know it came in time 
 and it is only in recent years that historians concede that 
 it is a monument to the genius and struggles of the work- 
 ers during the first half-century of the republic. 
 
 By 1825 the development of industry called into exist- 
 ence a mass of trades unknown to the colonial period. 
 Mill hands, mechanics, engineers, printers, increased with 
 the economic changes so that a definite class of wage work- 
 ers, marked by feelings, interests, habits and life that are 
 typical of capitalist production, was forming. This was 
 also the formative period of working class organizations 
 and labor unions were organized in many of the larger 
 cities.^- The workers at this period were fortunate to re- 
 ceive 75c for 12 hours' work. Many were glad to work 
 for "37c and even for 25c a day in winter who in spring 
 and summer could earn 62 J/ c or perhaps 87^ c by toiling 
 14 hours." These wages drove children to beg or steal ; 
 girls crowded houses of shame to such an extent that such 
 houses were pulled down in a number of cities.^^ In the 
 
 31D0C. Hist. Vol. V, pp. 107-112. 
 .•i2McMaster, "History," Vol. V, pp. 84-8.5. 
 33lbid, pp. 121-2.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 209 
 
 states bordering the Ohio wages were higher owing to the 
 scarcity of population.^* 
 
 The old grievances persisted in the centers of popula- 
 tion. In 1827 the Prison Discipline Society at Boston 
 mentions one lunatic incarcerated in a cell for nine years 
 with a wreath of rags around his body. Filthy straw was 
 his bed while bench and chair were unknown. Lunatics 
 were neglected, caged in small, dark cells, while one stuffed 
 cracks with hay to keep out the cold. Philadelphia, New 
 York, Baltimore, Washington and other cities presented 
 similar conditions and were often described as places of 
 filth, vice and immorality. 
 
 Thirty years of the new century passed before any 
 modification of the penal codes in the states took place. 
 Cropping the ears, the use of branding irons, lashing of- 
 fenders, exposure in the stocks and imprisonment for debt 
 were only slightly modified. By 1833 it was estimated that 
 75,000 debtors were jailed each year; 10,000 were in New 
 York; 7,000 in Pennsylvania, and 3,000 each in Massachu- 
 setts and Maryland. Thirty-two prisons in 1830 report 
 2,841 debtors imprisoned for sums less than $20.^^ 
 
 It is necessary to go back to the opening years of the 
 century in tracing other phases of the period of struggle. 
 Attempts to organize and improve the conditions under 
 which the workers had labored for centuries provoked re- 
 taliation from the master employers. The first struggle 
 of the working class was to win the right to struggle — the 
 right to organize unmolested and acquire by their own 
 efforts some measure of freedom which the Revolution 
 denied them. 
 
 34Hulme's "Journal," Ear. West. Trav. Vol. X, p. 75. 
 35McMaster, "History," Vol. VI, pp. 97-99. 
 
 14
 
 210 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 The iirst section of the labor army to feel the blows 
 of the capitalist "votaries of freedom" was the sailors in 
 New York, in 1802. At this period the hours of labor 
 were generally from sunrise to sunset. At Albany the 
 wages were forty cents per day and in Pennsylvania six 
 dollars per month in summer and five in winter. The 
 average wages were about $65 per year, including board. 
 Out of this sum the workers were expected to feed and 
 clothe their families. The sailors at New York who were 
 receiving $10 per month struck for fourteen. They 
 marched through the city persuading others to join them, 
 when the constables were sent in pursuit, broke the strike, 
 and jailed the leader.^^ So ended the first strike in 
 America. 
 
 The next struggle was at Philadelphia, in 1806, where 
 the cordwainers were indicted for conspiracy for attempt- 
 ing to raise their wages. It was the first of many trials of 
 this kind extending over a period of forty years, and it is 
 interesting to note that the prosecutions were usually based 
 on the common law of England zvhich included the bloody 
 legislation against the disinherited mentioned in our first 
 chapter. 
 
 The cordwainers were boot and shoemakers and the 
 evidence brought out in the trial showed they had organ- 
 ized to protect themselves against the master employers 
 who had organized to advance their common interests. 
 Organizations of the masters, however, were never indicted 
 for conspiracy. In this first conspiracy case the jury was 
 composed almost entirely of small business men and shop- 
 keepers as follows: three grocers, two innkeepers, a mer- 
 chant, a tobacconist, a tavern-keeper, a hatter, a bottler, a 
 
 seMcMaster, "History," Vol. II, pp. 617-18.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 211 
 
 watchmaker and a "taylor." A shoemaker was drawn as 
 one of the jurors and rejected because of his occupation. 
 The strikers were charged with unlawfully assembling to 
 "unjustly and corruptly conspire, combine, confederate and 
 agree together that none of them, the said conspirators, 
 would work for any master . . . who 
 would employ any artificer, workman or journeyman 
 . who should thereafter infringe or break" the 
 unlawful rules and orders of the boot and shoemakers. 
 
 The most important testimony presented by the prose- 
 cution was that given by a member who secretly scabbed 
 on the union while serving on the strike committee. Dur- 
 ing the progress of his testimony a disturbance is heard 
 in the court room. A striker is brought forward and fined 
 ten dollars for contempt of court. He had said "A scab 
 is shelter for lice." The offender pays the fine and "jus- 
 tice" is appeased. 
 
 A master employer is called to the witness stand. 
 "Have the masters a society?" he is asked. Not at all. 
 ". . . they may sometimes meet together, but they 
 keep no accounts of their proceedings, they may meet as 
 people meet before an election, to consult on the affairs of 
 the moment, but nothing regular." Is there anything more 
 innocent than this? Nothing more harmless. Their coun- 
 sel argue that the masters are prompted by patriotic mo- 
 tives and regard for the public weal in prosecuting this 
 unlawful conspiracy. The "public" sits in the jury box as 
 "impartial" judges of the evidence. 
 
 Counsel for the defense riddles the patriotic claims of 
 the prosecution. "We are told that this prosecution is 
 brought forward from public motives," but "when you 
 see a formidable band of masters attending on the trial of
 
 212 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 this cause; . . . and when you see further, that it is 
 not taken up by any of their customers, it will require 
 strong arguments to convince you it is done out of pure 
 patriotic motives." He goes to the heart of the matter. 
 "It is nothing more or less than this," he exclaims, "wheth- 
 er the wealthy master shoemakers . . . shall charge 
 you and me what price they please for our boots and shoes, 
 and at the same time have the privilege of fixing the wages 
 of the poor journeymen they happen to employ." This 
 sounds like a counter-charge of conspiracy, but its logic 
 does not appeal to the "public." It is decidedly "unrea- 
 sonable" and the real conspirators are the men who toil. 
 The verdict reads: "We find the defendants guilty of a 
 combination to raise their wages." They are fined eight 
 dollars each with costs of the suit and are committed till 
 paid.^^ The convicted men opened a boot and shoe ware- 
 house appealing to "public liberality to save themselves 
 and families from abject poverty. "^^ 
 
 In short, the Revolution had simply bequeathed to the 
 workers, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the 
 barbarous conspiracy code of England enacted a century 
 or two before! And these prosecutions for conspiracy 
 continued in Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, 
 Maryland, and other states, and not till the first half of the 
 century had passed into history did the workers establish 
 the labor union as a legal institution of their class.^** What 
 a commentary on the pretensions and glittering promises 
 of the leading men of the Revolution! 
 
 37See "A Documentary History of American Industrial Society," 
 Vol. Ill, for a stenographic report of the trial. 
 
 ssMcMaster, "Acquisition of the Political, Social and Industrial 
 Rights of Man in America," p. 58. 
 
 30See "Documentary History of American Industrial Society," Vols, 
 ni, IV and Supplement to Vol. IV for proceedings of numerous con- 
 spiracy trials from 1806 to 1842.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 2I3 
 
 At least twenty- four organizations of workingmen 
 were organized from 1800 to 1810, including masons, 
 bricklayers, shipwrights, printers, cordwainers and oth- 
 ers.*" These steadily increased in spite of prosecutions for 
 conspiracy and the first quarter of the century had hardly 
 passed until the workers were planning to take political 
 action to abolish the grievances already mentioned. The 
 federal and state governments were carefully nursing man- 
 ufactures with tariffs, bounties, subsidies, land grants and 
 other forms of legislation. The experiment of Samuel 
 Slater in Rhode Island with machinery and child labor was 
 soon followed in other states. The period between 1815 
 and 1830 witnessed a general employment of women and 
 children in the factories and Hamilton's wish to exploit 
 them was realized. 
 
 By 1 83 1 some of the factories became torture cham- 
 bers similar to those that gave British capitalists their 
 blood-stained fortunes some decades before. ''Women and 
 children in the factories . . ." says one writer, 
 "were frequently beaten with cowhides and otherwise mal- 
 treated. An instance was shown of a deaf and dumb boy 
 receiving a hundred lashes from his neck to his feet; and 
 another of the breaking of the leg of an eleven-year-old 
 girl by a club thrown at her by an employer."*^ 
 
 Massachusetts "democracy," with its old trade-mark, 
 also appears with the rise of the factory system. Corpora- 
 tion boarding houses and corporation churches became ad- 
 juncts to the factories and employes could only get work 
 by signing contracts that rigidly bound them to the sweat- 
 ers of labor. The Lowell Manufacturing Company's rules, 
 1 830- 1 840, provided that all employes must board at the 
 
 4oMcMaster, "History," Vol. HI, p. 511. 
 
 4iW. J. Ghent, in "The Forum," August, 1901.
 
 214 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 company house and observe its minute regulations; all 
 must go to church and must work twelve months unless 
 two weeks' notice of intention to quit is given. Other 
 detail regulations are considered part of the contract. 
 
 During the same period the Cocheco Manufacturing 
 Company, at Dover, New Hampshire, has contracts with its 
 '"hands" by which the latter agree not to join any labor 
 organization and if they do they forfeit the wages due 
 them ; they agree to accept such wages "as the company 
 may see fit to pay"; they are subject to fines; two cents 
 per week are deducted for a sick fund; they agree not to 
 leave the employ of the company without giving two weeks' 
 notice, and if they do they forfeit t\yo weeks' pay, and if 
 discharged they are not entitled to their wages until two 
 weeks after discharge*- The employes of these factories 
 were nearly all girls. Corporation paternalism became 
 rampant. The girls not only slept in company houses, but 
 patronized company stores. Some corporations maintained 
 churches, paid the preacher's salary, collected pew rents 
 from the operatives, and held out fixed sums from their 
 wages for the welfare of their souls! Six and eight girls 
 frequently occupied the same bed chamber and the hours 
 of labor varied from twelve in summer to fourteen in 
 winter.*^ 
 
 All these grievances required political action to abolish 
 them and by 1829 the Workingmen's party of New York 
 was organized and by the following year it was widespread 
 throughout the state. Robert Dale Owen and Frances 
 Wright, or "Fanny" Wright as she was popularly known, 
 both took up the cause of the workers. Owen had already 
 
 42Abbott, "Women in Industry," Appendices II and III. 
 43lbid, Chap. Vn.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 215 
 
 attacked the capitalist order of things, including in his in- 
 dictment religion and marriage resting on a property basis. 
 A series of debates between Owen and Alexander Camp- 
 bell in Cincinnati, in April, 1829, had made the former's 
 views widely known.** This gave the opposition its oppor- 
 tunity. The press that yawped the praises of the dominant 
 class now served the latter well. The new party became 
 the 'Tnfidel Ticket"; the "rights of property, religion and 
 order" were in danger; the "mob" threatened the founda- 
 tions of society. In short, it was a rehash of the panic- 
 stricken cry of the plunderers during Bacon's Rebellion, 
 in 1676, Shays' Rebellion following the Revolution, and the 
 same is heard today, with some variations, hurled against 
 the modern Socialist movement. The plunderer is always 
 the first to hide behind religion, morality and property 
 when his victims rise to redress past and present wrongs. 
 The polls, by law, were open for three days and the 
 result of the first day's poll indicated a triumph for the 
 ticket. The forces of "law, order and religion" rallied, 
 following denunciations by the press, and only one candi- 
 date of the workers was elected and the press urged the 
 legislature to unseat him. Some of the unions in Phila- 
 delphia and New York were intimidated by the cry against 
 Fanny Wright and repudiated her doctrines and those of 
 Owen.*^ 
 
 The platform of these workingmen shows that they 
 understood the character of their wrongs and their his- 
 torical origin. They declare capitalist society to be "con- 
 structed radically wrong" and point out that thousands 
 are in "deep distress and poverty, dependent upon a few 
 
 44"The Evidences of Christianity; A Debate," Cincinnati, 1852. 
 45McMaster, "History," Vol. V, pp. 102-3; Doc. Hist. Amer. Indus. 
 Soc, Vol. V, pp. 141-5.
 
 2l6 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 among us for their daily subsistence" who are made "enor- 
 mously rich." A "civil revolution" at the ballot box is 
 urged until some degree of equality is obtained. Equal 
 access to the soil is demanded; abolition of imprisonment 
 for debt; a single legislative chamber; repeal of class legis- 
 lation; the taxation of church property and the property 
 of priests; a lien law and other demands. They close by 
 asserting "that past experience teaches that we have noth- 
 ing to hope from the aristocratic orders of society; and 
 that our only course to pursue is to send men of our own 
 description, if we can, to the legislature at Albany."*® 
 
 Some forty or fifty labor papers came into existence 
 demanding economic, social and political changes in the 
 established regime.*^ These papers were on the whole 
 more advanced and aggressive than the pitiful, conserva- 
 tive, apologizing, labor press of today. In some cities the 
 independent political action of the workers showed sur- 
 prising strength. In Albany, New York, in 1830, the work- 
 ers carried four wards out of five and in Troy won an- 
 other victory. In Philadelphia and other cities they also 
 exercised considerable influence. The independent move- 
 ment finally died because its active men were not sufficient- 
 ly clear regarding the problems that faced them and were 
 the prey of professional politicians, their promises and 
 alliances. Yet the workers did great work while their 
 descendants of today in the labor unions are allowing the 
 courts to strip them of the weapons their fathers won. 
 Courts now plunder union treasuries and the private purses 
 of members ; they have outlawed the boycott and legalized 
 the blacklist; prohibited aid by sympathetic unions; jailed 
 
 46DOC. Hist. Amer. Indus. Soc, Vol. V, pp. 149-154. 
 47See Doc. Hist. Amer. Indus. Soc, Vols. V, VI, for photographs 
 and lists of these papers.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 21/ 
 
 men for free speech, and in general, declared only such 
 unions legal that contain spineless, unresisting men, who 
 ask nothing, resent nothing and get nothing. 
 
 As early as 1830 Frances Wright wrote in the "Free 
 Enquirer" that "What distinguishes the present from every 
 other struggle in which the human race has been engaged, 
 is, that the present is, evidently, openly and acknowledged- 
 ly, a war of class, and that this war is universal."'*^ Sim- 
 ilar declarations of the class struggle may be found in the 
 early labor journals of America at least twenty years be- 
 fore Marx and Engles proclaimed it in Europe in the 
 "Communist Manifesto" of 1847. The political successes 
 of the working class parties in the cities and the election 
 of Ely Moore to Congress from New York in 1834 brought 
 concessions from the dominant parties. Imprisonment for 
 debt was abolished in Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsyl- 
 vania, Indiana and Tennessee in 1842 and in Missouri the 
 following year, while a bill in the same year (1843) was 
 defeated in the Michigan Senate.^^ Many states were also 
 enacting lien laws and the common school, open to rich 
 and poor alike, came into existence in spite of the disasters 
 predicted. In 1840 President Van Buren proclaimed the 
 ten-hour day on public works. Two years later the revolt 
 in Rhode Island known as "Dorr's Rebellion" wrested the 
 suffrage from the ruling classes. Conspiracy trials were 
 becoming less frequent and most of the popular demands 
 of the working class were being enacted into law. The 
 ruling political parties were silent on all these measures 
 but granted them through fear of an uprising of the work- 
 ers. The workingmen were getting results from a relent- 
 
 48DOC. Hist., Vol. V, p. 178. 
 49McMaster, "History," Vol. VII, p. 153.
 
 2l8 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 less criticism of the sham "rights" that the Revolution had 
 brought. 
 
 At the same time it must be admitted that the ruling 
 classes felt more inclined to grant many concessions in pro- 
 portion as the factory system extended and machinery and 
 immigration gave them an overstocked labor market to 
 draw upon. A higher standard of intelligence is required 
 for machine production than for unskilled manual labor 
 and this fact played a part in modifying the opposition to 
 the public school and other demands of the workers. The 
 question of slavery was also becoming more acute and the 
 more shrewd retainers of the ruling classes in the Northern 
 states saw an advantage in extending the suffrage to the 
 workers. By skillful appeals to, and patriotic pleadings 
 with, a ballot-armed working class, this additional voting 
 power could be used against the Southern slavers who had 
 largely controlled the departments of government since its 
 organization. The Southern masters shared this control 
 with the Northern masters but always insisting that the 
 slave-owning interest should be paramount. 
 
 Yet it remains a fact that what elements of popular 
 rule, culture, economic and social progress that have come 
 down to us have their origin in the struggles, demands 
 and sacrifices of the workingmen during the first half 
 century of the Republic. The passing of the barbar- 
 ous penal codes, of conspiracy trials, and other ancient 
 abuses are also due to the persistent struggle of the work- 
 ers of that period. The records of that struggle, their of- 
 ficial journals, the proceedings of their organizations and 
 fragmentary accounts in contemporary newspapers form 
 an interesting contrast with the public press of their op- 
 ponents. A study of the latter will show that the wealth,
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 2ig 
 
 brains and culture of the time were enlisted in behalf of 
 the old wrongs which were finally given up only when they 
 could no longer be retained. Yet history has not given 
 credit to the working class for its achievements and its 
 struggles are hardly known.^° 
 
 The period of struggle is still with the laborers, but its 
 objective is clearer and more sharply defined. The work- 
 ers of the last century were engaged in the struggle of 
 clearing society of the colonial privileges that the nine- 
 teenth century inherited, removing the obstacles to the de- 
 velopment of unity and acquiring weapons that would en- 
 able them to contest for a better life as civilized human 
 beings. They won this status for their sons, handing to 
 the latter the public school, freedom of speech, press and 
 assemblage; manhood sufifrage and the right to organize 
 as a class. Our task is to see that these weapons are not 
 taken away and to use them to the best advantage of the 
 working class. 
 
 The westward movement of the people has ended on 
 the shores of the Pacific and in the ice floes of northern 
 Alaska. Capitalist development has followed the workers 
 to the Pacific Coast and is creeping after the fugitives who 
 sought escape near the Arctic Circle. It is even hunting 
 out the mountain folk of the South, slowly destroying 
 their primitive simplicity as the railroad, telegraph and 
 factory system invade their retreats. It is also transform- 
 
 soMcMaster, in his "Acquisition of the Political, Social and In- 
 dustrial Rights of Man in America," gives many facts regarding this 
 long working class struggle, yet in spite of the conclusions the facts 
 suggest, he continually refers to the modification or passing of each 
 abuse as the working out of the theory of the "Rights of Man." Had 
 the parties of the ruling classes formulated the popular demands it 
 is doubtful whether the historian would have credited them to the 
 working out of a "theory" that developed in the bourgeois mind of a 
 centurj^ before. It requires some courage to state the facts, but it re- 
 quires more to draw conclusions that contradict the fables and fiction 
 with which American history abounds.
 
 220 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ing the Southern tier of states into an image of the sweat- 
 shop North and the bankruptcy of the Southern politicians 
 is beginning to penetrate the minds of Southern workers. 
 The mountain folk and stranded "poor whites" are coming 
 under the control of the monstrous industrial system that 
 enslaves the sellers of labor power and from this develop- 
 ment will come the solidarity and class unity that will re- 
 lease the workers from class rule in all its forms.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 221 
 
 Chapter X 
 
 Conclusion 
 
 From the beginning of the RepubHc there was a fun- 
 damental antagonism between capitaHst North and planter 
 South that was to terminate in one of the bloodiest wars 
 of the century. The first half-century consisted of a truce 
 between the two, though it was an armed truce in the 
 sense that each was alert in defense of its interests. The 
 official classes of the North would not tolerate any discus- 
 sion of the "peculiar institution" of the South. In the 
 words of Wendell Phillips the North was "choked with 
 cotton dust" from the slave plantations. Every traveler 
 who came to America was astounded at the anomaly of 
 slavery on the one hand and the boasting of "our free in- 
 stitutions" on the other. 
 
 In the early forties a distinguished Englishman came 
 to our shores and came in contact with the "Great Republic 
 of the Western World." When he returned home he wrote 
 of what he saw and instantly the journalistic police squirt- 
 ed their venom on the great man's head. The great heart 
 of Dickens revolted when he contemplated "the miserable 
 aristocracy spawned of a false republic" and the public 
 opinion that "knotted the lash, heated the branding iron, 
 loaded the rifle, and shielded the murderer" of the slave. 
 The vulgar brawlers in Congress, agents of planter or capi- 
 talist, filled him with disgust. Congress had "sat calmly 
 by, and heard a man, one of themselves, with oaths which
 
 222 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 beggars in their drink reject, threaten to cut another's 
 throat from ear to ear." And what of the Inalienable 
 Rights of Man? Why, "there are many kinds of hunters 
 engaged in the Pursuit of Happiness, and they go various- 
 ly armed. It is the Inalienable Right of some among tjjem 
 to take the field after their happiness equipped with cap 
 and cartwhip, stocks and iron collar, and to shout their 
 view halloa! (always in praise of Liberty) to the music of 
 clanking chains and bloody stripes."' 
 
 And what of the press of that day? It is a "monster 
 of depravity; when any private excellence is safe from its 
 attacks; when . . . any tie of social decency and 
 honor is held in the least regard; when any man in that 
 Free Country has freedom of opinion, and presumes to 
 speak for himself, . . . without humble reference to 
 a censorship which, for its rampant ignorance and base dis- 
 honesty he utterly loathes and despises in his heart; when 
 those who most acutely feel its infamy, . . . dare 
 to set their heels upon, and crush it openly, in the sight 
 of all men ; then I will believe . . . men are return- 
 ing to their manly senses. But while that press has its evil 
 eye in every house, and its black hand in every appoint- 
 ment in the state, . . . while, with ribald slander for 
 its only stock in trade, it is the standard literature of an 
 enormous class, ... so long must the evil it works 
 be plainly visible in the Republic"^ 
 
 Dickens did not "understand the genius of American 
 institutions" and to this day many exploiters find it impos- 
 sible to forgive the great English author for the lashing he 
 gave the ruling classes seventy years ago. 
 
 The slavery question swallowed up every other ques- 
 
 iDickens, "American Notes."
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 223 
 
 tion as the crucial hour of final struggle approached. In 
 Congress nearly every debate brought forth the antagon- 
 ism and the representatives of the slavers were by no 
 means at a disadvantage when contrasting the condition of 
 the chattel with the wage slave. Senator J. H. Hammond 
 of South Carolina, in the United States Senate, March 4, 
 1858, said: 
 
 "The Senator from New York said yesterday that the 
 whole world had abolished slavery. Ay, the name, but 
 not the thing, all the powers of the earth cannot abolish it. 
 God only can do it when he repeals the fiat, 'the poor ye 
 always have with you'; for the man who lives by daily 
 labor, and scarcely lives at that, and who has to put out 
 his labor in the market and take the best he can get for it ; 
 in short, your whole hireling class of manual laborers and 
 'operatives,' as you call them, are essentially slaves. The 
 difference between us is, that our slaves are hired for life, 
 and well compensated; there is no starvation, no begging, 
 no want of employment among our people, and not too 
 much employment either. Yours are hired by the day, not 
 cared for, and scantily compensated. . . . Yours 
 are white, of your own race ; you are brothers of one blood. 
 They are your equals in natural endowment of intellect, 
 and they feel galled by their degradation. ... If they 
 knew the tremendous secret, that the ballot-box is stronger 
 than 'an army with banners,' and could combine, where 
 would you be? Your society would be reconstructed, your 
 government overthrown, your property divided."" 
 
 Down to the Civil War the exploiters of blacks con- 
 trolled nearly every President and Congress, but the North- 
 ern masters gathered strength with the development of 
 
 2Quoted by Arthur W. Calhoun in "The Florida Beacon," Nov. 3, 
 1911.
 
 224 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 machinery and the factory system and the extension of 
 both over a larger area. The Civil War swept the slave 
 system into oblivion and the Northern capitalist had a free 
 field to the Gulf for sweating wage labor, "While the war 
 was waged for political purposes, ... it was in 
 reality a great labor movement — not so intended, but so in 
 result; for divested of all political significance, . 
 it was a war of economic forces, . . . for the South 
 had existed under a form of labor entirely antagonistic to 
 that existing at the North."^ 
 
 The rise of the Republican party with the issue of 
 slavery was soon followed by some of the biggest steals 
 and "jobs." Many of our millionaires secured their "start" 
 by swindling contracts in arms, tents, rations, and sup- 
 plies, while a whole brood of financial kings developed in 
 a short time. Having "freed the negro" a group of these 
 saviours organized the "Freedman's Bank" and after col- 
 lecting the pennies of the blacks it "failed," owing them over 
 $3,000,000. A committee of Congress reported that the 
 books showed a settled purpose to confuse the accounts so 
 as to make them unintelligible. They were mutilated, some 
 leaves were cut out, false entries were made and some 
 leaves pasted firmly together.* 
 
 The Southern states had been ravaged by sword and 
 fire and its civilization practically destroyed. The over- 
 whelming mass of the people were reduced to beggary. 
 One great family was so dispersed and reduced to poverty 
 that only one remained to "peddle tea by the pound and 
 molasses by the quart, on a corner of the old homestead, 
 to the former slaves of the family."^ 
 
 3Wright, "Industrial Evolution of the United States," p. 152. 
 4Fleming, "Docume-ntary History of Reconstruction," Vol. I, pp. 
 389-392, passim. 
 5lbid, p. 17.
 
 TPIE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 225 
 
 Despite the frightful economic conditions the recon- 
 struction governments piled up enormous debts. The South 
 Carolina government, for example, cost $1,326,589 for eight 
 years, while the total cost for the 78 years previous was 
 only $609,000. The Republican "statesmen" established a 
 bar adjoining the Senate and drank the choicest liquors at 
 the expense of the wretched population. They charged 
 everything in the way of personal enjoyment to the state, 
 and in the items were most anything from stoves and 
 buckets to saws and coffee-mills.*^ 
 
 While the negro was being "freed" these statesmen 
 went back to the indentured and vagrancy codes of the col- 
 onies for laws fixing the status of the blacks. They were 
 taken up as runaways, rogues, or vagabonds and fined or 
 bound out to masters. The South Carolina code regulated 
 the details of the servant's life by fixing the hours of labor 
 for outdoor service from sunrise to sunset; outlined the la- 
 bor to be performed from the time of rising until the serv- 
 ant retired at night; gave power to the master to deduct 
 fines from the wages of disobedient servants, and stipulated 
 the form of contract between masters and servants.'^ 
 
 In the meantime the increasing consciousness of class 
 interests displayed by the workers in the North was almost 
 blotted out in the slavery issue and it required another gen- 
 eration after the Civil War before it could be revived. The 
 panic of 1857 also gave the labor organizations a blow and 
 the war following a few years later gave no opportunity 
 for organization or agitation. The approach of war found 
 the unions opposed to it. They felt that division along sec- 
 tional lines delayed the coming of the solidarity of all work- 
 
 elbid, Vol. IT, pp. 60-69, passim. 
 7lbid, Vol. I. pp. 283-310. 
 
 15
 
 226 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ers North and South. The workers were finally drawn 
 into the war and their activity was practically suspended 
 during hostilities. One union in Philadelphia adjourned 
 and enlisted "until either the union is safe or we are 
 whipped."^ Not until June, 1863, was there a revival of 
 the labor press. In that month Jonathan C. Fincher began 
 the publication of "Fincher's Trade's Review" at Philadel- 
 phia, and within a few years many local papers were being- 
 published. Ira Steward, a Boston machinist, began his agi- 
 tation for the eight-hour day at this period, and in 1866 the 
 National Labor Union placed this demand at the head of 
 its program. Wherever unions held public meetings they 
 were denounced by the press and their proceedings ridi- 
 culed and distorted. The favorite epithets of the editorial 
 writers were "Communists," "Socialists," "Molly Ma- 
 guires," "blood-and-thunder spouters," etc. In short, the 
 unions still had the task of battering down the prejudices 
 fostered by a brood of journalists whose views found ap- 
 proval in the official world of capital.^ 
 
 It is not our purpose to trace the further evolution of 
 the workers' struggles through the Knights of Labor and 
 the eight-hour movement that resulted in the judicial lynch- 
 ing in 1886; nor the decline of the Knights and the rise of 
 the American Federation of Labor, as they are more famil- 
 iar to the reader and the limits of this chapter will not per- 
 mit it. It is sufficient to say that many of the privileges 
 won by the early labor organizations are being attacked by 
 the ruling class and its agents who would restore the old 
 regime if they could. 
 
 Twenty-five years ago Ward McAllister asserted that 
 there were about 400 families in America who constituted 
 
 sPowderly, "Thirty Years of Labor," pp. 46-57. 
 9Ibid, pp. 72-3.
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 227 
 
 a superior class, an aristocracy. His figures may be wrong, 
 but it is certain that since the Civil War the controlling 
 group of capitalists who own the powers of wealth produc- 
 tion have diminished in numbers while their power over 
 the lives of the workers is as great as any ruling class that 
 ever lived. Ten years ago James J. Hill and Charles M. 
 Schwab officially announced that the big capitalists would 
 not only rule but that the lesser capitalists must be regard- 
 ed as parasites who are doomed to disappear. Hill predict- 
 ed the disappearance of the "wasteful system which would 
 maintain a horde of middlemen." He refers to the many 
 officers and stockholders of small railroads whose "useful- 
 ness has ceased." Throughout his carefully prepared arti- 
 cle he announces the doom of the small capitalist and small 
 business and the absorption of the latter by the giant indus- 
 trial combines of today." The progress of concentration 
 is confirming these predictions, but whether the working 
 class will permit a towering business empire to dominate 
 their lives remains to be seen. 
 
 The Civil War merged the negro and the white laborer 
 into the one class of wage workers, both selling and having 
 nothing to sell but their muscles, tissues and blood in order 
 to live. The capitalist class has also come into possession 
 of the greatest powers of wealth-production the world has 
 ever known and these have been organized into powerful 
 combines all more or less related to each other in interest 
 and constituting one mighty ruling class of owners, con- 
 trolling government and press, school and platform, and 
 shaping all institutions to accord with their interests. 
 Judges, legislators, presidents and governors represent, by 
 class or family relationship or association, this all-powerful 
 
 loSee a remarkable series of articles in the "North American Re- 
 view" for May, 1901.
 
 228 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 ruling class and do its will. Each state with its govern- 
 ing powers is the private domain of the controlling com- 
 bines within its borders, while the naked and shameless de- 
 bauchery of their political agents are revealed in every 
 investigation of city and state. 
 
 The capitalist system of production has at the same 
 time been developing the crisis that must sweep it out of 
 existence like other historic forms of class rule. The rul- 
 ing class is unable to prevent the breakdown of the colossal 
 powers in its hands; the collapse comes every ten or fif- 
 teen years in the form of an industrial crisis, the last one 
 always more terrible in the suffering and ruin it brings 
 than the one preceding it. Millions are beggared for lack 
 of opportunity to place bread and meat on their tables. 
 Though millions sufifer for lack of opportunity to operate 
 the machinery, the owners stand in the background pos- 
 sessing judge, policeman and soldier and with these com- 
 mand the laborers, "hands off !" Unable to manage industry 
 itself the capitalist class will not permit the laborers to 
 enter the factories and relieve their distress. 
 
 The opportunities of employment are not owned or 
 managed with regard to human welfare. They are sim- 
 ply agencies for the enrichment of idle capitalists, most 
 of whom never saw the factories they own. When the 
 workers produce more than the owners can sell or the 
 workers buy, the plants are closed and society becomes a 
 stockade; the workers are penned within sight of the bil- 
 lions they produce; within reach of the machinery to pro- 
 duce billions more, and yet are barred from both. 
 
 Even during times of so-called "prosperity" capitalist 
 society is, in the words of Professor Ely, "an imperfect 
 social organism. It moves forward, creaking, and groan-
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 229 
 
 ing and splashes the blood of its victims over us all. Our 
 food, our clothing, our shelter, all our wealth, is covered 
 with stains and clots of blood." The upstart parvenue 
 rich, whose ancestors stole their original accumulations, 
 draw the children of the workers within their factory hells 
 and sweat gold from their tender, helpless little bodies. 
 Their fathers and mothers also sell their labor power for 
 a pittance. The waking hours of the worker are devoted 
 to securing food for his family, and working under such 
 conditions that often deprive him of the bodily vigor, lei- 
 sure and comfort of the cave-man of the primitive world. 
 Millions live in chronic pauperism and slowly rot and die 
 because of lack of nourishment. Protests and strikes of 
 laborers are met with clubs, jails and injunctions, or 
 silenced with the soldier's bullet. All life, all progress, all 
 institutions, are held and shaped to serve the wishes of a 
 class that is no more necessary or useful to society today 
 than the idiot who rules the unhappy people of Spain. 
 
 This is the civilization that four centuries of progress 
 and achievement in America has given us, and just as our 
 review of the past century has shown that the political 
 parties of that time never at any time mentioned the real 
 issues that concerned the workers, so the dominant parties 
 today have no message for them. The reason for this is 
 apparent. These parties, past and present, are the parties 
 of the ruling classes. Their appeals are based on "patri- 
 otism," "morality," "the flag," and other vapid claptrap. 
 They are incapable of understanding that "Love and busi- 
 ness and family and religion and art and patriotism are 
 nothing but shadows of words when a man's starving." 
 
 They are bankrupt. They are worse. No one can 
 say worse of them than many who have been with them.
 
 230 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 learned of their foul practices and witnessed their crimes. 
 Every election they participate in is a disgrace to the 
 human family. Every such occasion brings them into close 
 alliance with the thug and the pimp, and the unfortunate, 
 rotting degenerates clinging to the lowest layers of society. 
 These come forth from their holes and cellars in every 
 American city and are "rounded up" with funds provided 
 by bankers, merchants, capitalists and other "pillars of 
 society." Thuggery, "booze," and boodle are a necessary 
 part of their work. S. S. McClure, of "McClure's Maga- 
 zine," says that in American cities we have "government 
 by criminals." Judge Ben B. Lindsey's story^^ of the 
 criminals ruling Denver and Colorado — composing both 
 political parties, the business men, bankers, capitalists, and 
 even some clergymen — of their destruction of boys and 
 girls and other infamies that almost stagger belief, shows 
 the degradation and debauchery of capitalist rule. 
 
 This is a natural legacy of the past. From the history 
 of class rule in America nothing better could be expected. 
 But the end is drawing near and the curtain is about to 
 rise on a better and nobler stage of history. The devel- 
 opment of the factory system and the concentration of 
 industries draw large masses of workers into workshops 
 working for the same masters, under the same rules and 
 under the same common conditions of servitude. The 
 machine enters the factory and under their very eyes ab- 
 sorbs their skill and throws hosts of them out of employ- 
 ment. Out of their common servitude comes a conscious- 
 ness of unity and fellowship in the struggle for bread. 
 This solidarity finds its first expression in the trades union 
 where the workers unite to give battle to those who live on 
 
 iiLindsey and CHiggins, "The Beast."
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 23 1 
 
 their sweat and blood. The workers are forced to unite 
 or go down in defeat as a servile, cringing, degraded class. 
 Pressure from above molds them into a closer unity and 
 class consciousness is born of their contact with each other. 
 
 However, when they leave the factory on strike they 
 find that the capitalist has summoned the judge to post an 
 injunction on the factory gates; the mayor to provide him 
 with clubs; the governor to provide him with bayonets 
 and the president to give him Federal soldiers. All these 
 officials obey his commands. The workers have united in 
 the factory and divided at the polls, giving their ballots to 
 one or the other of two parties controlled by the owners of 
 the factory. The party in turn gives its owners the police 
 and military powers necessary to beat the insurgent work- 
 ers into submission. The class struggle, ever present in 
 capitalist society, is revealed in all its brutality, and broken 
 heads and weltering bodies attest its grim reality. Unity 
 at the ballot box to secure possession of the legislative, 
 judicial, police and military powers is also revealed and 
 independent Socialist politics is born. 
 
 Socialism, having for its object the industrial and po- 
 litical unity of workingmen, will, when triumphant, restore 
 the magnificent resources of America to the workers from 
 whom they were stolen in the first place. It will transfer 
 to the people all the mills, mines, factories, railways, and 
 all the other powers of wealth-production and distribution 
 to be publicly owned, operated and managed by all in the 
 interest and for the common good of all. Capitalist own- 
 ership for capitalist enrichment will be replaced by com- 
 mon ownership in behalf of the useful wealth producers. 
 
 The machine and factory system are both the social 
 achievements of all the workers of the past and present.
 
 232 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 Each generation has improved the wealth-productive pow- 
 ers of their time and passed them on to their children who 
 performed a like service for the race. These powers in- 
 carnate the blood and tears and genius of all the workers 
 that have gone before, and to allow a few idle capitalists 
 and stock gamblers to possess them and juggle with the 
 happiness of millions is a crime against the human race. 
 
 Class ownership must give way to the next Revolution, 
 the revolution that will place the workers in possession of 
 the governing and industrial powers of today. Co-opera- 
 tive labor in the factories must be supplemented with co- 
 operative ownership and control. Capitalist society itself 
 has developed the framework of the new Socialist society. 
 We do not have to build, but transform. Co-operative 
 social production is displacing individual hand methods in 
 all fields of industry. The owners are simply gamblers on 
 the toil of the workers. Owning sugar stock today they 
 trade it for steel tomorrow ; for railway stock the next 
 day, and for other stock the next, and so on without end. 
 They never know the plants the stocks represent, or the 
 process of producing the given commodities within them. 
 As gamblers or idle owners sailing the seas they perform 
 no service of use to mankind. They must go the way of 
 the baron of the crags and the Roman masters when they 
 no longer serve society in a useful capacity. 
 
 The response the workers get for their demand is the 
 response every ruling class in history has given to the 
 demands of its victims. "You will overthrow morality, 
 break up the family, destroy religion," and all the other 
 institutions of today. Yet the capitalist class drags all 
 these in the muck and mire and makes a wretched botch 
 of everything it touches. The thinking worker laughs at
 
 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 233 
 
 these pretenses and adds to the number of those who pre- 
 pare to topple over the vulgar parvenues and the servile 
 parrots who sing their praises. 
 
 The modern Socialist can well stand erect knowing 
 that the Socialist movement has gathered to itself the schol- 
 arship, learning, science and philosophy of the nineteenth 
 and twentieth centuries. In no political gatherings outside 
 of the Socialist movement are the writings of the great 
 philosophers and scientists discussed and appreciated. This 
 movement represents not only the next political, social and 
 industrial advance of mankind, but it also preserves the 
 culture and learning of our time. What use have capi- 
 talist parties for the names or writings of Marx, Engels, 
 Huxley, Darwin, Tolstoy, London, Buckle, Ibsen, and the 
 host of others that have enriched the literature of the 
 world? The Socialist movement will hand this rich legacy 
 on to the people of the future while its enemies will only 
 leave the memory of the evil they have done and merit the 
 contempt of mankind. 
 
 The final fruition of the workers' struggles in Amer- 
 ica is not hard to predict. Blunder as we may, go down 
 in deieat as often as we will ; betrayed by some, deserted 
 by others, and our advance retarded by the timid and fal- 
 tering, the hour will come when the working class with its 
 new ideals — the greatest known in history — will stand on 
 the summit of the modern world. They will clear the 
 swamps and cesspools of society that remind us of the 
 past and place the governing powers in the hands of all. 
 Possession of these by all and for all will incarnate in all 
 eur institutions the fellowship that today is only found
 
 234 THE WORKERS IN AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 in its ripest form among the long-suffering, organized 
 working class. They will transform every factory into a 
 palace of art and every workshop into a studio where 
 
 ''ALL WILL BE JOY-SMITHS AND THEIR 
 TASK SHALL BE TO BEAT OUT LAUGHTER 
 FROM THE RINGING ANVIL OF LIFE."
 
 I
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNT '