The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1837-10-03
From DR.. Channing's Letter to Mr. Clay.
THE DIGNITY OF THE LABORER.


From DR.. Canning's Letter to Nj" Clay.
THE DIGNITY OF THE LABORER.
Whoever studies modern history with any
care, must discern in it steady growing move.
ment towards one most interesting result l
mean towards the elevation of the laboring class
of society. This is not recent, accidental turn
in human affairs. We can trace its beginning in
the feudal times, and its slow advances IN subse-
quent periods, until it has become the master
movement of our age. Is it not plain, that those
who toll with their hands, and whose productive
industry is the spring of all wealth. are rising from
the condition of beasts ofburcien, to which they
were once reduced; to the consciousness, intel
ligence, sef-respect and proper happiness of
men? Is it not the strong tendency of our times
to diffuse among the many Improvements once
confined to the few? He who overlooks this has
no comprehension of the great work of Provi-
dence, or of the most signal feature OF his times
and is this an age for efforts to extend and per-
peuate an institution, the very object Of which
is to keep down the laborer, and to make him a
machine for another's qualification?
/ know it has been said in reply to such views,
that, do what we will with the laborer, Ical him
what we will, he is and must be in reality, a
slave. The doctrine has been published at the
south, that nature has made two classes, the rich
and the poor, the employer and the employed,
the capitalist and the operative and that the class
who work, are to all intents, slaves to those in
whose services they are engaged.
In report on the mail, recently offered to the
Senate of the United States, all effort was made
too Gsloua and III
condition of free laborers, for the purpose of
showing that the shades of difference between
them not very strong. Is it possible that such
reasonings escaped man who has trod the soil
of New England, and was educated at one of
her colleges? Whom did he meet at that COL
lege? The sons Of her laborers, young men,
whose hands had been hardened at the plough.
Does he not know, that the families of laborers
have furnished every department in life among
us with iustrious men, have furnished our he
roes in war, our statesmen in council, our orators
in the pulpit and at the bar, merchants, whose
enterprises embrace the whole earth? What !
the laborer of the free state a slave, and to be
ranked with the despised negro, whom the lash
drives to toll, and whose dearest rights at the
mercy of irresponsible power?
If there is firm independent spirit on earth,
it is TO be found in the man who ts the fields
of the free states, and moistens them with the
sweat of his brow. l recently heard of visiter
from the South, compassonating the operatives
of our manufactures, as in a worse condition
.,.., the slave. What carries the young woman
to the monuiac;: scry? Not generally the want of
a comfortable home, but sometimes 'he uesire OF
supplying herself with wardrobe, Which ought
to satisfy the aff1uent and oftener the desire OF
furnishing in more than decent style the home
where she is to sustain the nearest relations, and
perform the most sacred duties OF life. Gener-
ally speaking, each of these young women has
her plan of life, her hopes, and bright dreams,
her spring OF action in her own free willard
amidst toll she contrives to find seasons for in
tellectual and religious culture.
1t is common in New England for the sons of
farmers to repair to the large towns, and there
to establish themselves as domestics in families,
condition which the south will be disposed to
identify with slavery. But what brings these
Young men to the city? The hope OF earning in
shorter time sum with which to purchase
farm at home, or in the West, perhaps to become
traders; and in these vocations they not unfre-
auently rise to consideration, and what in their
place of residence is called wealth. have in
my thought an individual distinguished alike by
vigor and elevation Of mind, who began life by
hiring himself as a laborer to a farmer, and then
entered family as domestic; and now is the
honored associate of the most enlightened men,
and devotes himself to the highest subjects OF
human thought. 1t is true that much remains
to be done for the laboring class in the most
favored regions; but the intelligence already
spread through this class is an earnest OF bright
er days, Of the mosr glorious revolution in h'sto-
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