Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-10-23
CAPITAL AND LABOR.
NJ. ID. Boruck's Views on Capital and La
r-Ernressinns WnrtI,u of TT, nn..I,r

Boruck referred TO some topics OF troad in
terest, and, under the text capital and
Labor" presented some striking and
forcible views, that are presented here
with as worthy of the consideration of
thoughtful citizens:
Men are not all equally rich, equally
strong equally learned or equally compe
tent, but it is matter of sincere congrau-
lation to US as American citizens that IN
der our form of government, there is an
equality designed TO compensate men for
all other inequalities, namely equality of
rights. Every man has the right to be the
equal of every other man. The govern
mental institutions which place any class
of men under the incubus of any disad-
vantage or disability, necessarily confers
immunities and special privileges upon
some other class. 1t is the duty of govern
ment to establish equality of opportunity
to unfetter all men in the race of life. Gov
eminent cannot favor capital as against
labor, without committing an act of des-
potism nor is the outrage upon civil
liberty less violent if the favoritism is re-
versed, and capital is placed under legal
disabilities and disadvantages with respect
to labor So far as Government may inhu-
ence the distribution of wealth, it can do so
only subject to the great underlying princi-
pie so clearly enunciated in the Declaration
of Independence-that men are endowed
with inalienable rights, and that to secure
these rights Governments are instituted.
Here is the only perfect standard of legisla-
ton involving the control of individual ac-
ton. Men have right to the exercise of
their full capacities. 1t is the natural and
inaIienable light of any man, through in
dustry and economy, coupled with enter
prise and capacity, TO accumulate wealth
honestly. Whoever seeks to equalize the
results of energy and industry, so that at
last wealth will be equally distributed
among men, must first equalize the natural
capacities of men.
This doctrine of the inalienable rights of
men is the key to our government sys-
tenn. Without it obsolutism, under our
form OF government, is just as practicable
and as possible as under any other. 1t is a
doctrine that leaves broad realm of action
free from governmental interference, and
guarantees the weaker elements of society
against the worst forms of oppression
Prior to the adoption of the American Con-
stitution, and the government established
by it, all governments were those Of
force only. Government was something
abstract and apart from the people gov
erned. 1t was an external force acting
upon the governed. The founders of this
republic, endowed with wisdom ap-
preaching inspiration, believed a govern
ment of the people, by the people and for
the people, to be practicable. They started
upon the great fundamental idea that the
creator of man had endowed each creature
with certain inalienable rights, and that to
secure the full exercise of these rights
governments were instituted, and that all
rightful authority, therefore, in the gov
ernment was derived from the consent of
the governed. Adherence to this doctrine
is the only safety to the weaker classes of
society. The powers of government are
forever welded by the strong elements
within it. Capital is by far more nearly
able to take care of itself than labor, and
the natural tendency to absolutism, in
herent in all governments, will be greatly
augmented as soon as we depart from this
g;eat conception.
1t is needless to remind you that all ele-
ments of absolutism in governments result
in oppression of the weak, whether that
weakness be in the direction of capacity of
inherent intellectual force, or of impover-
ishment as to property.
The relation of employer and employe
is, and should remain. a purely voluntary
one. Each individual has the right to en-
gage his services in all legitimate occupa-
lions to whonsoeyer he chooses, and each
individual employer has natural right to
employ the services OF any whom he may
choose. 70 declare that any man shall
work for another whom he might not vol
unfairly choose to serve, is to reduce the
employe 10 a condition of involuntary
servitude; and equally, on the other hand,
to declare that employers shall not be
equally free in their choice when the sery-
ices Of employees are TO be engaged, is an
interference with an inalienable right, the
destruction of which endangers the whole
fabric of our institutions Whenever any
single class seizes upon government and
wields and controls its over in the inter
est Of that class republican government
has been subverted and tyranny established.
Labor agitators have almost uniformly
committed the great error by supposing
that labor had something to gain by so
welding and directing the powers OF Gov
ernment that the employed class shall be
placed at an advantage, and the employer
at a disadvantage, and thus equalize the
fates of men. All such have not mastered
the primitive problems which underlie
civil liberty. The slightest partiality in
favor of any single class. the forcible seiz-
ure of the powers of Government, and their
exercise in the hands of any individual
class, is departure from the great doctrine
of the inalenable rights of men, and the
great duty of government to conserve those
rights, which will widen by encouragement
to the eventual destruction of all equality
of rights, and the ultimate establishment
of despotiSm and an abSolutism under a
republican form.
Whoever encourages the class of opinion
among men, which, if crystallized into leg
islation would result in a system of laws
inimical to the perfect equality of every
class before the law, is invoking a result
fraught with more danger to the weak than
to the strong. That this dangerous ten
dency has been greatly energized in recent
times is painfully apparent to every stu
dent of current history and for evidence
that labor agitators and the leaders of dis
tinctive labor movements have unWisely
encouraged the hope that there resides in
government the inherent power to equally
distribute .the wealth of the world among
men, and place thrift, industry and econ
omy under disabilities, l have only to ap-
peal to your observation of very recent
events. In accepting the nomination for
the great Office of Mayor of New York
city, Henry George said to the laboriDg
men of New York If elected, | will
listen to the complaint of the rich man as
patiently as | would to that of the poor
man; but" he added, with much signifi-
canoe, "the rich man will have more rea-
son to complain under my administration
than the poor man,"
Such expressions may possess q soothing
sound TO the ears of the non-capitalist
classes, but no doctrine could be greater
menace to the liberties Of this country than
that enunciated by the great economist.
Here is a man asking to have placed in his
hands the power of official station. T.
his conception society is divided into two
great classes-those who have accumulated
property, and those who have not. BY
virtue of the right each individual has to
acquire all he may honestly and legih-
mately the difference of the capacities OF
men have expressed themselves by dis
parity of possession. Mr.. George asks that
official power shall be placed in his hands,
and declares in advance of its receipt
that to the extent he will WELD mu-
nicipal power in the great metropolis OF
this country, those who have accumulated
property shall have greater reason TO
complain of his official acis than those
who have not. Pested by any well estab-
lished maxim of governmental science,
declarations like these are fraught with
more danger TO the class he pretends to
favor than to the class he assumes to OF
pose. The promise that the governmental
powers to be placed in his hands shall be
welded for one class as against another is
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