Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1872-03-22
Capital and Labor
BY HENRY WARD BEECHER

Rev. HENRY WARD BEEcuER-Respecte'
SIR will you please to state, through
the Ledger, the. duty due to capital and la
Dor that is, are they not duly bound to res
poet each others rights? and if labor work,
for one hundred dollars a month, payable eve
ry fifteen days, has capital the honest RICH,
to keep labor six days without his pay, aftei
being due? and I think you will oblige &
vast number of its readers. Please accepI
the highest regards of a
FELLow-LABoRER.
Men talk of labor and capital as if they
were two essentially different things. They
are in fact essentially one. If a man builds
a factory, puts in machinery, buys raw ma
terial puts in workmen, be is said to have
INFESTED his capital. The whoze establish
naent IS capital. If it pays the whole ex-
pense Of running, including materials, wear
and tear, and wages, and then has some.
thing over and above. that surplus is called
earnings. 1t is regarded as fresh capital
Now a man is a grand mandatory
His head furnishes power bis hands and
feet and muscles are machinery. Every
man is in himself capital. If it costs to run
the machine all that it earns, he will never
have surplus capital. If he lives on one
half of his earnings, then his invested CAPT.
tal-that is, his bodily organization-pro.
duces so much surplus capital.
A day-laborer who saves three dollars a
week is a capitalist. If he puts his savings
into a horse and dray. or into a chest of
tools, or into a candy shop, he ~re,invests ;
and now his capital is, primarily. his own
productive force-that is. himself; and Sec
ondarially, these new means of carrying on
business. Every step By which he rise,
from poverty to competence is in the direc-
ton of augmented capital.
Every prosperous working.man is proof
to himself that there is no need of conflict
between labor ana capital.
But suppose a mar to have gained by in
dustry enough money to buy two horses
and two drays? He cannot drive both of
them himself. He hires a man. Now he
is not only a laborer, but an employer.
If his business increase till he owns TWEEN
ty or thirty teams, all his time will be need
ed to superintend them he will do head
work, and hire the haud-woyk.
In each step upward bis relations to his
laborers are just and bene6cient. The in
terests are reciprocal. There is no myste.
ry or completely about it: All the talk
about the normal and abnormal relations of
capital to labor is needless. Capital may
undertake to do things prejudicial to the
oommon veal, and require to be restrained,
and SO just as much may labor,
AS to the precise questions asked by orr
correspondent, they are almost too plain to
require al S Of course the employer
should keep his agreements, and pay at the
time provided Labor, on the other hand,
should keep its agreements, and render fair
s posa car su lssy R1oss5 of Value.
Payments to laboriog men should be at
short intervals, especially when men have
families dependent upon them. 1t is better
to pay in money than in goods or orders
The temptation to make double profits on
Inferior goods leads selfish men to take ad-
vantage of their ''hands." Although a pay
ment by orders may secure better goods
sometimes than the men would buy for cash,
yet, on the other hand, it leads to careless
ness and shiftless management in the family.
1t is the interest of every employer that his
men should be intelligent, thrifty, and good
managers in the household. 1t is his inter
est, even if he works by no higher princi-
pie, to deal justly, promptly and literally
with all his wOrkmen,