The Labor enquirer., 1884-03-08

place ne can und IL ne Is QrlVeu W Tue
place he goes to. Rot-gut? Yesl But
he can't do any better. It's the best he
can get for his money. True, he has,
during the week, turned out work to the
community worth $50, but he only re-
ceiyed $8. Who has the rest? The
man who can afford to be extrayagaRt-
who can spend hundred dollar bills
where the poor man spends dimes OF
pennies.
What an unjust and narrow view to
take of the question
Do not take from the laborer the pipe
of tobacco nor the mug of beer, which
he honestly earned, sunless you take
from the rich pauper the sparkling cham
payne or the fragrant cigar, which he has
not earned. The laborer's eternal ten
sion of toll must sometimes be relaxed
and the seyerer the toll, the more the
need of relaxation.
{ The workingman's right to spend his
dimes is the last mark of freedom. Clad
in the habiliments of a slave; housed in
the hut of slave; fed with the food of
a slave; and almost marked with the
brand of slave, he takes the poor PRIV
ilege of forgetting for moment his serf-
dom :; Of drowning for an hour the sor-
rows Of the past, and the desperation OF
the future to feel himself free man,
just for one short evening, at the end of
a long, dreary, painful week of toll. Rob
him of that right; bind him to the
drudgery and pain Of neyer-ending labor,
without relaxation, with no hope Of re-
lief, and he sinks below the level of the
slave. 49,. r-.:.-... 49,.
Below the level of the slave2 Aye
The slave knows not care. His wife and
his children are no burden upon him.
Their lives do not depend on his labor.
They are. cared for whether he shall
work or not. But before the working
mans eyes are the pallid faces and starv-
ing means of his dear ones. The, exist
ence of all that he loves hangs on slen
der thread The weeks earnings barely
exc out the week's,expenses. The next
week he may be sick; or he may be
thrown out of work. And the last
penny, and the last loaf will be gone.
But the wife and children will be there,
starving before his eyes, and he utterly
unable to help them. And the rent-eater
will be there, grasping, greedy and
heartless. No wonder we have crimi-
nails. No wonder men grow tired of
work. Indeed, the workingman is often
worse off than the slave. What little
freedom he has he pays fearful price
for.
I do not say he ought to drink or
smoke. And perhaps the money WHICH
he spends in that way could be better
spent. But the immutable law Of capi-
ital isthat the worker, whether he be a
slave or freeman, shall be allowed, as
his portion of the product, only the
means of existence. And if the free
workman of to-day shall be able to exist
without this relaxation, the money which
he uses for that purpose will no longer
be given him.
The remedy does not lie in preaching
fruga lity and temperance to the work
ingman. 1t lies in. relieving his bur
dens, 30 that he may have chance to
hope, chance to live for the future, a
chance for recreation in the woods and
parks in the day time, and not in the
saloons at night.
1t is unjust to charge the laboring
class with being rude and boorish, coarse
and unrefned. After they have carried
for few generations the brunts and
burdens of society, they certainly owe
no courtesies. to their oppressors and
have few for each other. Destroy mans
independence and selfrespect; wound
his honor bend his pride; deprive him
of hope, and give him no stimulant but
kicks, and no food but crusts; no oppor-
tunity for education no hours for recre-
alton and rest; and he will surely lose
his better instincts, his sense of honor
and of Justice, and will. degenerate to
the level of the brutes. The rich are re-
sponsible for the degradation of the poor.
They have robbed and outraged them ;
they have made them criminals and
brutes they have shackled and enslaved
them. And not from the mouths of the
rich should come one word of protest or
condemnation at the turbulence, the vi
olence or criminality of the poor.
Crime is as rampant to-day as in the
days of the fercest barbarians. 1t is be-
cause the religions and the laws have
dealt with the crime and not with the
cause. The proper way to prevent crime
is to do away with the incentive for it
If a man has no motive to commit crime
he is not likely to become a criminal
1t is this everlasting NAV Of the rich
which, not content with enough and
plenty, must take the meat from the ta'
bles and the fire from the stoves of the
poor, which makestrime: 1t is robbery
it is taking property and money without
moral right. Human law cannot make
right that which is naturally wrong.
A man with $l,0OO,OoO, under the pres
ent system, can rmake whole. communi