The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1873-04-24

artisans and rustlcs conclude that, consid-
cred individually and in combination, those
above them are personally bad--selfish, or
tyrannical, in special degrees. 1t never
occurs to them that the evils they complain
of result from the average human nature
of our age. And yet, were it not for the
class-bias, they would see, in their dealings
with one another, plenty of proofs that the
iniustices they suffer are certainly not
greater, and possibly less, than they would
be were the higher social functions dis
charged by individuals taken from among
themselves. The simple fact, notorious
enough, that working-mGn, who save
money and become masters, are not more
considerate than usual toward those they
employ, but often the contrary, might
alone convince them OF this. On all sides
there is ample evidence having kindred
meaning. Let them inquire about the
life in every kitchen where there are sew
eral servants, and they will find quarrels
about supremacy, tyrannes over juniors
who. are made to do more than
their proper work, throwings of
blame from one to another, and the
many forms of misconduct caused by
want of right feeling and very often the
evils growing up in one OF these small groups
are greater than the evils peryadng socie-
ty at large. The doings in workshops too,
illustrate in various ways the ill-treatment
Of artisans by one another. Hiding the
tools and spelling the work of those who
do not conform to their unreasonable GUS
toms, prove how little individual freedom
is respected among them. And still more
conspicuously is this proved by the inter-
nal governments of their trade-combinations
Not to dwell on the occasional killing of
men among them, who assert their rights
to sell their labor as they please, or on the
frequent acts of violence and intimidation
committed by those on strike against those
who undertake the work they have refused,
it suffices to cite the depotism exercised by
trade-union officers. The daily acts of
these make it manifest that the ruling Or
CARNATIONS formed by working-men inhict
on them grievances as great as, ii not
greater than, those which the organization
of society at large inflicts. When the
heads of combination he has joined forbid
a collier to work more than three days in
week--when he is limited to certain ''get"
in that space of time-when he dares not
accept from his employer an increasing boz
nus for every extra day he works-when,
as reason for declining, he says that he
should be made miserable by his comrades,
and that even his wife would not be spok-
en- to !; it becomes clear that he and the
rest have made for themselves tyranny
worse than the tyrannies complained Of,
Did he look at the facts apart from class
bias, the skillful artisan, who in a given
time can do more than his fellows, but who
dares not do it because he would be
"sent to Coventry" by them, and who
consequently cannot reap the benefit of
his superior powers, would see that he is
thus aggressed upon by his fellows more
seriously than by acts of Parliament or
combinations of capitalists. And he would
further see that the sentiment of justice in
his own class is certainly not greater than
in the classes he thinks so uniust.-Her-
bert Spencer, in Popular Science Monthly
for May. r@