The Labor enquirer., 1885-01-31
A MILLIONAIRE
Who Takes His Stand Upon Socialistic
Principles, Even If He Has to
Stand Alone.

The young millionaire, Courtlandt
Palmer, of New York, said, at the Man
haitian Liberal club, a few nights ago,
II am far more of Socialist than Mr..
Carnegie. My subject is the rich and
the poor, for believe that this is the
coming issue in politics.
II do not wish to play the part of an
alarmist; Du6 still, 1 do not hesitate to
raise the cry, BREAKERS AHEAD! have
read in Carlyle's history of the French
Revolution that, on the very night of
the storming of the Bastille. Louis XVI,
with his lords and ladies, was dancing
in the Orangerie, one of the beautiful
apartments of his palace. The French
Revolution was itself indeed war be-
tween the rich and the poor, the privi-
legged and the oppressed, between au-
tocracy and democracy. And so long as
Bastilles of special privilege exist, the
times must always come when the Door
will rise IN deadly attack against them.
But, through night to light , amid
the storm We fancy may be ahead of us.
l see the rising sun of new era.
"That social revolution is upon the
world is hardly to be doubted.
Here Mr.. Palmer spoke of the rumb-
lings in Russia. Austria, Germany,
France, Ireland and England, and then,
| turning to the United States, he said j
"This same question of Socialism-the
ques. ion between the rich and the poor
has also undoubtedly come here, and
has come to stay 1t is seen in such
movements as the Anti-Monopoly
League, the farmers alllanee, the Green
back labor party, and, above all, in the
Trades unions, which are finally begin,
ming to organize, not simply to put them
selves against capital, but for combined
political action.
THAT this coming revolution may be
peaceful here is fully and confidently to
be hoped-peaceful through. the power
of the ballot. Unless, indeed, it is
peaceful, the revolution will accomplish
nothing Unless the people are sufi-
GENTLY intelligent and organized to carry
out what they desire through free
speech, free press and free suffrage; they
would never be able to retain the fruits
of their victory. The old combinations
would occur again, and would NOW them
down as regular troops .dislodge unorgan-
lied militia, or as Cortbz, with his hand
full of trained Spaniards, routed the mil
lions of Mexico.
81 demand here a party established
upon the Declaration of Independence
which assert0 the right to life, liberty
and the pursuit of happiness. But what
is life if we are deprived of the necessi-
ties of life? What is liberty if l have
not liberty to gain those necessities
What the pursuit of happiness when it
| becomes hollow moCkery? The freest
government says Daniel Webster
cannot long endure where the ten
dency of the law is to create a rapid
accumulation of property in the hands
of few and to render the masses of the
people poor and dependent'
"The fundamental question is well put
in one of the planks of the Anti-Monop-
Foly League thus: 'We believe in the
rights of the many as against the privi-
leges of the few; and it seems to me the
history of the world is condensed into
that one sentence. Another plank in the
league is this: Labor and capital allies,
not enemies ! and this istrue, they are
essential one to the other. But the
more vital question is: Are laborers
and capitalists allies or enemies? l be-
lieve they are not allies, and cannot be.
They are competing one with the other
they are both striving for the same
place, and they would both grasp the
same lucre. The result is, in my judg-
ment the domination of the few; it is
the consequence of competition based on
selishness | grant that advantages
have come from competition, as they
came also from slavery. But it is a game
of grab. 1t is but. The transfer Of war
from the battle field to the counter, with
all the tricks and all the ambuscades of
war In the mental and moral world.
it is simply law of massacre. We see
capitalist contending against capitalist,
each endeavoring to control the business,
and underbid, or, if possible, bankrupt
his brother merchant. Competition is a
fleeing process, in which the rich cut
their own throats it is boomerang they
throw which returns to wound them
selves: 1t turns out to be Franken-
stein that deyastates and devours. La
bOrer likewise pits himself against
labOrer-each driving the other to the
lowest point of starvation wages. And,
in the same way, the capitalist, in his
mad race to succeed, is also forced to
drive the laborer to the last limit of live
lihood. We often see as the result, that
the wife, the mother, the child, is COM
PEELED to tend machinery in factory as
we'll as the father; the father himself is
thus forced to come into connection
even with those who are near and dear
to him and the whole family becomes
engaged at the price that should be paid
to the head of it alone. Mothers and