Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1860-07-20
Capital Owning Labor.


[From the n. Y. Evening Post
Mr.. Herschel v Johuson was very unfor
tunate person for Mr. Douglas to select as his
second in command in the coming campaign
Without much original force, with no great
popularity at the South, and almost unknown
at the North and West, his name, in any
event, could give but little strength to the
ticket. Alexander Stephens of Georgia, or
Andrew johnson of Tennessee, are men of
greater caliber and have much wider reputa
ton, and if they could have been induced to
serve with Douglas, might have frightened the
prospects of his almost forlorn hope little.
But Mr.. johnson, when his opinions shall
be fully made known and eanvassed, is likely
to prove dead weight to cause which is al
ways so heavy that it drags along the ground.
He is not merely Pro-Slavery man, holding
to all the peculiar notions of his region, but
he is an extreme Pro-Savery man, who iusti-
fies the institution on its merits, and who
would gladly give it an unlimited extension.-
Indeed, if Mr.. Johnson has not been misrep-
resented by the reporters of his speeches, he is
so ardently in love with the form of society
which prevails at the South, that he would ap-
ply it in other communities. During a speech
which he made on the 18th of September,
1856, at Philadelphia, he defended that system
in this wise
1--WE believe capital should own labor; is
there any doubt that there must be a aboring
class everywhere? In all countries and un-
der every form of social organization there
must be laboring class-a class of men who
get their living by the sweat of their brow !;
and then there must be another class that con-
troIs and directs the capital of the country"
/ This philosophy, it will be perceived, does
not restrict the owning of the laborer by the
capitalist to any special class of laborers. Mr..
johnson does not speak of races at all lie
does not say that the negro workman only
should be the property of the white man of
wealth but he lays down a general PROPOSE
ton which includes all classes of laborers.-
There must be, he argues, in every condition
of society," class of laborers, a class that
earn their bread by the sweat of their brow,
and there must De a class of capitalists but
the true relation between these is not the re-
lation which obtains in Europe and the North
ern States of this Union, but the relation
which obtains on the cotton and rice planta-
tions. Capital ought to own labor everywhere
to render the services of either effective That
is the doctrine.
1t will not commend Mr.. Douglas to the la
boring masses of the North, that his confeder-
ate entertains opinions which would reduce
them to Il level with slaves. The hardy fish
ermen of New England, who gather the rich
| harvests of the seas the mechanics of our
great cities mainly built by their hands, and
the yeomanry of the Great West, who con-
vert the soil of the prairies into the subsist-
ence of nations, have formed other opinions Of
the dignity and worth of their vocations. They
do not regard themselves as mere machines en-
gagged in the task Of production. They make
difference between their own labor and that
of the cattle upon their farms. Labor, in
their estimation, and in its true sense, is a
high social junction, connected not only with
the prosperity, but with the peace and very
existence of society. The great triumphs Of
civilization have been effected by lis means,
aud those who perform it properly take their
places i'll the gratitude Of mankind, among the
number of the worlds benelactors.
Nothing demonstrates more clearly the de-
basing effects of the slave institution than its
power to warp the minds of those who live 10y
it, into the narrowest prejndices. All the re-.
cords of history show that the astonishing
progress Of modern nations is due to the
emancipation Of labor from the old restric-
tions Of serfdom and slavery. All the wri-
ters on the course of. civilization concur in the
deduction, and glorify free industry as the
principal source of those immcn material
and moral advances which distinguish Europe
from Asia. and our age from the age of Gurih
and W;lniba. Net in the face of this testimo-
ny, in the face of truths so paIpaLlc that no
schooboy would risk his reputation by deny
ing them, we find gentleman respectable
enough to be nominated as IL candidate for the
Vice Presidency of the United States. pro-
posing Il return to condition of things OK
plaled in Europe nearly five hundred years
ago. What intelligence as a legislator. what
philosophy statesman, is to be expected
from such an ohscurant?