Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-07-08
Our IndusrrInI Problcm.
From Charles Francis Adams, Jr's, Fourth of July
Address.

while but single town in the province con
| tanned above 500 souls. To-day-and this
marks well the change-the majority dwell in
communities of at least 10 900 each while
| twcnty-four cities and towns contain more than
one-half of the inhabitants of the common
| wealth, one-siXth of all of whom are citizens OF
| Boston. Instead of the yeoman, sailor Face,
| living in the open air and in close contact with
| nature, we have become a manufacturing com.
| munity, whose teeming population, crowded
| into heated shops and noisy mills tends inces-
| sanity the busy loom, or feeds the hungry tur-
| mace. Whether we will or not, therefore, this
| grave problem is presented before us: a SYSTEM
of government, the growth of one form of social
and industrial being, is TO be preserved in an
other and wholly different form; the traditions
of scattered race of yoemen and fishermen are
TO be kept in vigorous life in an artisan com.
munity which is swarming to cities.
Herein, as take it, lies for us the political
| significance of thal labor question which is
| yearly assuming such increased proportions. 1t
Is, III TACT, the blind, unconscious effort of Il new
social and industrial organization to adapt to IFS
| needs the forms and traditions of another time.
| And vet, unless greatly err, think il will be
| found that the social and political organization
| which we inherited from our fathers depended
| for its successful working upon two essential
prluclpfeS, and upon two alone. These were n
| universal, practical, haTd-headed education, not
only in the knowledge taught in schools, but in
| that derived from an active contact with men
| and public affairs; and next, and more impor-
tant still, was the happy distribution of prop
erty, which gave to the vast majority of citizens
| that dignity of proprietorship, which is the
| strongest guaranty of social and political sta
/ bllity These weTe-these are the solid corner
stones OF our edifce. While they rest unds-
turbed, the building cannot fall.
OI the first there is no need to speak. Massa-
ehusetts is fully and finally committed to the
| cause OF univerSal-if need be, Of compulsory
education. Popular opinion and public and
private wealth are ever ready to respond when
that chord is struck. 1t is but necessary to
point out defectS-whether existing deficiencies
or possible development not yet attaned-and
already the work of reform is more than half
accomplished. Whenever and wherever a real
need exists for common schools or high schools
or normal schools, for academies or universities
for truant schools or industrial schools or public
libraries, we may rest assured that not in our
generation at least will the commonwealth long
be wanting TO its record. More in this respect
she cannot do. The grand old practical college
OF the public life is vanishing with the memory
oil town meeting days The active contact with
nature and with men, that teaching which no
course OF lectures nor instruction from a normal
school can at all replace, is inconsistent with
the present modes of life. These grave defici.
encies neither legislation nor public spirit can
again make good. 1t remains for us TO supply
their place as best we may through the poor
machinery of our schools, which we can vet
control; nor, if this is done, need we fear the
grand result. people trained in youth to the
quick reception of new ideas may wander
greatly from Its path, but is never wholly lost.
When we pass on, however, to that other es.
sentla element TO all real social or political sta
bility, which is found only in the general CON
tentment OF the great mass of those for whose
well-being all government exists, our horizon is
not wholly free from clouds They hang, in
deed, lightly over the present, but it is the haze
oil to-day which betokens the storm OF to-mOr-
row, The rapid increase of manufacturing pros
perlty has hitherto implied the no less rapid in
crease OF operative want, and a commonwealth
founded on manufactures is as yet a house
built on the sand. 1t thus becomes a necessity
OF our continued existence that the sense of pro-
pretorship, the dignity of ownership-that only
lmmoyable basis of free instituuons-should
somehow orin some way be widely disseminated
through all classes in our state. This, however,
can spring only from consciousness in the
great mass of the people that they individually
have an interest in the vested accommodations of
the whole. Our future commonwealth is not to
be governed by those who have a stake in the
soil, and it is therefore incumbent upon us to
extend the saving dignity which encompasses
the land owner to the operatives as well-it
must belong to him who tends the loom no less
than to him who follows the pillow. Our COM
monwealth can only be governed by all of her
children, absolutely equal before the law, and
that they may govern well, all should give their
hostages to fortune
This is our latest problem A new social sys-
TEN demands of us nothing less than an indus
trlal reorganization, lest it result in political
decay. The lines of division in our community
must become horizontal; but to prevent their
becoming SO, 1t is necessary that labor and cap
ital should be partners, that they may not be
De enemies or. that failing, it is necessary
that Ithe laborers should own their own
capital, and not the capitalists, labor, This
in tlta flf
II IS not given us yet to see how this great
result IS to come about, but we can rest
assured that it will not come about through
any bombardment Of rhetorical epigrams
nor yet through the noisy resolutions Of
strikes; it will not come to US through political
action, nor yet through the passage of multitu-
dinous laws intended to regulate the hours of
human toll, or the value of human labor, or the
demand for wealth: all these are but the barren
product OF that spirit of political tampering
winch has been described as the odious vice Of
restless and unstable minds. Not our rener-
alton, nor many succeeding ones will see the
millennium created by an act of Legislature, and
ushered into being by the club of a constable
Far otherwise; the industrial and social reorgan.
lzaton essential TO our future, like all lar-reach-
ing social movements, can only result from the
combined and quiet action of an intelligent and
determined people, attending in their own way
10 their daily work, and coldly disregarding all
short cuts and royal roads to their prom.
ised land 1t must be the result OF the
deep ground-swell of steady purpose,
and will never originate in the frothy
eddies of an idle rhetoric Germany has al
ready taught us one lesson; England is teach.
ing us another Both lessons come to us as the
sun, small voice of reason aud hope making
ITSELF heard amid the noisy and proftless tumult
o. passion. In those countries, a few among
tne owners oil labor have at last learned to CO.
operate, as well as to combine Are, then. the
labors of Germany and of Great Britain-those
, wnoni we SO constantly refer TO in our vile po-
Iitlcal gargon as THE pauper labor of Europe."
are they more intelligent or determined than
those OF Massachuseits2 Few at least, here,
15 cate 70 MAINTAIN IT. Are they better en-
dowed with means with which 10 further tbpir
experlments3 cannot say; but with ono hun
dred ana sixty millions of wealth boarded in tbe
savings banks of the commonwealth our noe
pie should have sufficiency of capital. Vet
the intelligent, sell-relaDt, determined children
OF Massachusetts hang backward in this orent
WORK, while Others in less fortunate lands press
10 the front. Nevertheless, the work will vel
DE accomplished, and what the savings bank
now is 10 the laboring class of Massachusetts
that and much more will the mill and the work
shop be in the future. Here, and here alone
ark Of salvation.
An immutable law, wiser than any recorded
upon human statute book, has decreed that
every people may in course of time regulate its
own destiny. No human power external 10
themselves can assist them greatly, and none
can permanently retard them. To each eommu.
my there ultimately comes. through govern.
i inSnt or Notwithstanding government, such an
iduustIlal ana social system as they themselves
~ mahe. The future Of Massachusetts rests
~ tne na9as OF the mass Of her citizens, who
i Hy% capwa tGse,her 10 towns as their fathers
I u apuit III tue country. IL is for them to
decide for her and for themselves whether tbcv
VIII hereafter be dependents AZ The doors Of
corporations and suppliants al the bor III me
legislature, or whether they will stand M in the
inc honest dignity Of independent manhood and
einancipate themselves Capital is selfish ana
hard indeed deceased to be so ii would not io,
exist u does not deal in sentiment; by the law
OF Jus being, against which 1t Is childish 10 d".
claim, II buys where it can buy for least, and