The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-03-21
Henry George ON the Labor Troubles.

The great strikes now going on all over the
country are in reality the first adequate external
indications of movement. deep and strong,
that has been going on the United States for
some years past, and that. in turn is but phase
OF movement wide as our civilization. The
new wine is beginning to ferment in the old bot
ties The struggle against chattel slavery is over.
The revolt against industrial slavery has begun.
What the Knights of Labor mean is the applca-
ton to industrial warfare Of the principle of the
massing of forces on the point of attack Their
organization IS to the trades what the trades
union is to the individual worker And its spirit
is that Of the Unity Of the interests Of labor,
spirit only beginning its work.
Whether the strikes now In progress are won
or lost can make little difference in ultimate re-
suits They are like affairs of outposts at the
beginning of q life and death struggle between
vantage, neither side can refrain from pushing
it. while neither side can be decisively beaten
that it will not rally its forces again and make
new stand. No defeat, and no series of defeats,
can now deprive labor of the consciousness of
power, and monopoly has too much at stake, and
has too long been accustomed to rule to be COLI
quered In this way into more than hollow truce.
Action must beget reaction, and combination
provoke counter ombnation, for there are be-
hind the combatants on either side the mightiest
of forces The spirit Of the age the rising
spirit that proclaims the equality of men, and
bids the newer of wood and the drawer Of water
aspire to the full estate of a freeman, meets
economic conditions that tend to grind the
masses into hard and hopeless servitude.
1t is idle to cry peace where there is no peace,
and to imagine that the preaching Of moderation
can only avail when the strongest of passions
are aroused. These strikes mean war; and that
civil war; not a war between organized States
like that whose epoch has with us just closed,
bat war between organized factions within the
State, which ranges neighbor against neighbor
and draws lines of battle in city streets. 1t is
the blouse of Have" and the blouse of Want
that are coming into collision. and they every
where iostle each other To be sure this is as yet
only q negative war, which resorts to blockade
and not to bombshell but it is still war in spirit
And when passions are reused and men are mar
shaled, the negative may q into the positive,
and q struggle Of endurance change to a strug-
gle of physical force, with any accident.
Unpleasant as all this may be to those who
care little for any injustice so that the public
peace is not disturbed, and unexpected as it may
Ue to those who have imagined that in giving
men the ballot without regard to race, color or
previous condition of servitude," we have vind-
Gated the Declaration Of Independence, and that
republican institutions and common schools have
settled all social questions, it is the inevitable
result of conditions which, in the midst of ''over.
production" condemn men to biting want. and
amid millions of acres Of untitled land make the
mere Hleave to toll" a thing to be struggled for
And he who would prevent destructive strife, it
is for him to set himself to discover what may
be at the bottom the cause of this Great masses
Of men do not combine into widespread organi-
cation, they do not enter into contests that in
volve sacrifice and privation, unless impelled by
strong motives and under the spur of deep in
justice That there is at the foundation of our
apparent as the sun at MONDAY. And no mat
ter what the political institutions, society can
not be safely based upon injustice
HENRY GEORGE.