Washington Gladden

“ In our own country we have given, in theory, the most unreserved expression to the principle of political democracy; the principle is yet but imperfectly worked out here, as everywhere, and we have much exacting business upon our hands in completing and developing our democratic institutions—work that will call for a great deal of patience and toil and self-denial; but we believe, most of us, in the principle; we have committed ourselves to it, and we expect, by means of it, to unify the diverse races now thronging upon this continent and to make of them a strong, free, self-governing people. ”

“ Now, it is a melancholy fact that a good many of our well-to-do and not evil-minded citizens are getting tired of the responsibilities of democracy; they find that it is a strenuous business, and they would fain be rid of it. They would rather give their days to gain and their nights to pleasure than to shoulder the task of governing this republic. Some of them talk very pessimistically about the future of popular government, and even hint now and then at the beneficence of a dictatorship. Such men are not likely to welcome the suggestion of the extension of democracy to the industrial realm. ”

“ There is no other way, I repeat, under the pressure of the stupendous combinations of capital, to rescue labor from degradation except by the firm organization of labor. There is no salvation for our democracy under the wage system but in this concerted resistance of the wage-workers. That they are prone to abuse their power has been fully admitted, and we all know how impossible are some of their methods, and how needful it sometimes is to resist and defeat their aggressions. ”

“ So shall we realize our democracy. It has never been anything more than the skeleton of a democracy; so long as industry is feudalistic it cannot be. But when the common man is emancipated and called into partnership by the captain of industry, we shall have a real democracy. No superhuman vision is needed to discern the fact that the confusions and corruptions of our political democracy are largely due to the disorganizing influence of this industrial feudalism, in constant contact with it, and continually thrusting its alien conceptions and ideals into the political arena. ”

“ The employer's reason for an open shop is his need of a force near at hand to fight the union; when he makes the union his ally instead of his enemy, non-unionism becomes both to him and to his men a negligible quantity. The man who takes up a purpose of this kind, whether he is proprietor or general manager, cannot be guaranteed an easy job. It will not be possible for him to turn it over to subordinates; he will have to keep close to it himself. It will call for labor, for self-control, for faith in men, for all the best qualities of mind and heart. ”

“ Suppose that he goes out among the men and says to them, what Baldwin would have said: "Certainly, men, you must organize. I mean to treat you fairly, but I do not want you to be dependent on my favor; I insist that you shall have the power to stand for your own rights. And I want all the men in this shop to join this union. No man will curry favor with me by staying out of it. I am going to be friends with the union, and I expect the union to be my friend. This is not my business, not your business, it is our business. ”

“ It is not, however, necessary to assume that the democratization of industry will prove any serious obstruction to the healthy growth of business. If the trade unions have often shown themselves to be tyrannical and greedy, we must remember that they have been fighting, thus far, in an arena where belligerent rights were denied them; it is not to be wondered at that they have sometimes taken unfair advantages. When their rights are fully recognized, better conduct may be looked for. So long as they are treated as enemies it is not logical to ask them to behave as friends. ”

“ Democracy is precisely the kind of government which requires of its citizens the largest amount of gratuitous service. We can have the best government in the world with such citizens as are now upon our soil; but only when men of intelligence and force face the responsibilities of citizenship, and give time and toil and patience to the work of training and guiding the voters. Good government under any system is a costly product, and under a democracy the cost must be paid by the entire body of competent citizens. ”

“ If anything is clearly written in the book of destiny, so far as its pages have thus far been turned over, it is that democracy is going to complete itself. That process has been moving steadily forward during the past century, and it is not likely to be arrested. Feudalism has made its last stand in the industrial realm, but it is not probable that it can hold that fortress. The prevalence of the large system of industry will not be suffered to degrade our wage-workers to the condition of serfs. ”

“ If the capitalist manager's one thousand or ten thousand employees unite in presenting their demands, they may succeed in getting some attention to them. By union and organization they may keep themselves from being reduced to a position of dependence and servitude, and may establish their right to a share in the wealth created by their labor and a voice in the distribution of the product of industry. ”

“ Out of these circumstances very naturally grows the assumption, on the part of the employer, that the right as well as the power to fix the laborer's wages belongs exclusively to him. When, therefore, any man or any body of men proposes to have something to say about it, he indignantly resents this proposal; he calls it interfering with his business. What he says to them is precisely this: "It is none of your business what wages you shall receive; it is my business to tell you how much you can have, and I cannot permit any one to dictate to me about my business." ”

“ The great fact of the age is Democracy, the coronation of the common man. For the past hundred years he has been steadily coming to his own. Not only in the republics, the United States and France and Switzerland, not only in free England and her colonies, but in all the states described as monarchical, the enfranchisement of the common man has been going forward. ”

“ The power that men need to make them men must be given to them even though they may sometimes abuse it. That is the principle of democracy; and the time has come when the principle of democracy must be unreservedly accepted and unflinchingly applied to the organization of our industries. The common man, the workingman, must be a freeman. ”

“ The employer who refuses to recognize the right of his men to have anything to say about wages or hours of labor does not always have an easy and quiet time of it. Troubles of a pretty serious nature do arise, even under such management. Are not the frictions and collisions and losses of the autocratic regime quite as injurious as any that would be likely to arise under a more friendly arrangement?
The man who thinks it would be difficult to lead his employees in the peaceful paths of productive industry may well consider whether it is any easier to drive them. ”

“ Industrial democracy means giving the wage-workers, through collective bargaining, a voice in the determination of their share in the joint product. It does not mean the domination of the business by the men and the subjugation of the employer, though this is the employer's apprehension, and this is the notion that sometimes gets into the workingman's head. ”

“ WHAT is commonly called the Labor Question is something more than a problem of economic organization; it deals with all that is most fundamental in the life of the commonwealth. It challenges the postulates of our political science; the answer to it involves the validity of the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence and the permanency of the Constitution of the United States. To answer it in one way means the surrender of popular government; to answer it in another way means the fulfillment and completion of democracy. ”

“ I shall stand for my rights if you are mean and unreasonable, and you will stand for yours if you think I am unjust, but if we must fight we will stand on the level and fight fair. I hope that there will be no fighting. ”

“ We give even the wild creatures a chance for their lives; and so long as the industrial struggle continues, the chivalrous employer will not insist that his employees shall go into the contest with their hands tied behind them.
Beyond this question of personal honor between employer and employee is one that touches very deeply the foundations of our social structure. "If capital refuses to labor what capital asks and takes for itself, what are the final consequences of that injustice? How, in the long run, is labor to take this defeat of what it believes to be its rights? ”

“ It is well, therefore, for our captains of industry to consider carefully what may be involved in their refusal to recognize or tolerate the only method by which the workingman can assert and maintain his rights. It is a perilous thing, as history shows, to deny the manhood of the common man. ”

“ Some dissatisfaction on the part of the men has shown itself, and it becomes known to the employer that steps are being taken for the organization of a union. At once his displeasure is manifested. He feels that the action is hostile to his interest; his entire attitude toward it is unfriendly from the start. It becomes well understood among the men that those who join the union are exposing themselves to the ill will of the employer; that those who refuse to join may expect his favor. ”

“ The existence of a considerable revolt against democracy in our American citizenship is a fact to be reckoned with. It is not a matter of wonder. Many of these people are living a life which in all its features is at war with the first principles of democracy. They could hardly be expected to maintain their faith in a social theory which all their practice flouts.
There are many others whose lives are simpler, but who are beginning to shrink from the burdens which democracy imposes. Most of us have been inclined to assume that democracy was a sort of automatic device ”

“ The people who think that popular government is a delusion, that our public school system is a curse, and that what we want is an American House of Lords to overawe and hold in check the insurgent democracy, may be met with here and there in the resorts frequented by the new rich. ”

“ This means, of course, the recognition of a partnership of the men in the business by which they earn their livelihood •, their employer has invested his money in it, and they have invested their lives; they are entitled to such recognition. When this right is recognized, they are not any longer subjects; they are fellow-citizens and freemen; the common man has come to his own in the industrial realm; our democracy has completed itself. ”

“ We have among us not a few lords of privilege who have been practicing feudalism long enough to lose their faith in democracy. Men who mount to affluence in a decade or two are quite apt to acquire contempt for those who earn their daily bread by manual labor. ”

“ When industry is fairly democratized, it will be much easier to reform our politics.
The relinquishment of autocratic power is not apt to be a welcome suggestion; the cases are few in which it is surrendered without a deadly struggle. But within the last generation we have seen the feudal rulers of Japan resigning their power and entering heartily into the life of the commonwealth, with great honor to themselves and great profit to their nation. ”

“ Keir Hardie, with your labor organizations, and we do not believe that you really want to do any such thing. You are going to stand by our side with power in the industrial realm to assert and maintain your rights^as men. and with a sense of justice in your breasts which will enable you fully to recognize the rights of your capitalist employer; and we are going to work together, all classes—men of capital, men of organizing talent, men of skill, men of brains and men of brawn—to build a real commonwealth. ”

“ If the employing class should put itself in opposition to this movement for the emancipation of the working class, the employing class would cease to exist; the wage system would be destroyed; industry would be reorganized on a new basis. ”

“ The labor question will be speedily settled when such a spirit of justice and fair play, such a recognition of the elemental rights of manhood, gets possession of the hearts of employers. Of the habit of mind which cannot concede so much as this one can say nothing better than that it is unsportsmanlike. ”

“ If power is to be denied to all who abuse it, most of us will have to go powerless for the rest of our days. If those who have most abused it are to be the first to be deprived of it, then I say deliberately that there are ten reasons for prohibiting corporations where there is one for prohibiting trade unions. ”

“ The Emperor of Germany, who declares that he rules by the will of God, nevertheless is compelled to ask the common man for the revenues by which he rules; even the Czar of Russia and the Sultan of Turkey have been compelled to stoop to him, and the lords of political privilege everywhere have discovered that there is no stability for the throne that is not " broad-based upon the people's will." ”

“ Popular government is everywhere in the ascendant, and not only is government of the people, by the people, for the people, not going to perish from the earth, it is going to possess the earth, and that at no distant day. ”

“ But as soon as we have made up our minds to be just it will be easier to be patient and firm. We can stand up against other people's wrongs much more successfully when they know that we are ready to concede and maintain their rights. ”

“ The workingmen found out, a good while ago, that the only possible way of preserving and enforcing their right of contract in the sale of their labor was by uniting together and insisting on collective bargaining with their employers. ”