Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1886-09-24
SENATOR EOMUNDSS ADDRESS
Delivered ON she Occasion OF che state
Fair at lurIIngton, sept. I0th.
Mr.. President, Ladies and Gentlemen

ubllNtItu III Nhb tNthlhkf hhh ~ IAhSo "hoAN
the audience can listen without distraction,
makes il practicable for speaker to ask you
TO consider attenuvely some topics that al
though outside Of the direct and immediate
domain of farming, manufacturing and the
mechanic arts which combine to make up al
most entirely the sum Of the production and
wealth Of country, are nevertheless essen.
tial elements in the great social problem Of
promoting the true prosperity of each aud all
the members Of all the producing classes of
our country.
In these classes do not include those who
make it their business to SOW dscord and
stimulate dissensions between those who
have acquired property, and those who have
saved nothing and can subsist only by the
employments of daily labor, aud between
whom it is necessary to the welfare Of both
there should exist kind feeling and &C opera
ton at all times. The freedom which every
one 30 much prizes for himself can only be
real and lasting while it il 70 exercised AZ
not to invade the equal freedom aud private
f,ights of every other person. The pay due
TO the wage worker every night for bis day \
labor, is in eveFy sense just as much capital
as the thousands that have osen before &C
cumulated by himself OF some other person,
and he has precisely the same interest in it
aud its protection by law aud its increase, AZ
have the holders of all Other property. The
power to earn money by work Ii also most
substantial capital, but like other capital it
can only be made productive by being put to
use in some advantageous way. The true
mission, therefore, Of u community, or ma
tion, that loves justice and desires peace and
the general welfare, il to 80 adjust aud har-
monte its producing and industrial opera
tons as to find the b, ut uSes for both it's ac
cumuated capital, whether in lands, person
al things, or money, and the working power
OF its citizens. Neither eau prosper without
the other, while the adjusted cooperation OF
both il sure, in a country Of great aud varied
natural resources like ours, to result in the
steady increase of the wealth and happiness
OF all It's people, excepting the small proper
ton who fail to prosper through their own
fault or misfortune.
Among the problems, then, of ths farmer,
the manufacturer, the artisan and the wage
worker and perhaps the most important of
any is that of dversifyng productions
mauufac, ures and industrial employments,
30 that every natural resource OF Tia couutry
shall be drawn upon, and the accumulated
stock Of properly OF every kind utilized, and
all its working fOTcs employed at rrmuuerat-
ing prices. aside from the mere subsi tence
of the farmer and his family, there will be
no be- Il, fit in abundant crops unless be can
sell his surplus to some one Who il able 10
pay fair price for it. But no one eau so
buy unless IN the end, when the products Of
the earth aud the shops come to the consum-
ers Of them, they are able to take aud pay
for them. To do this they must earn the
means, not by raising or making the same
things, but by producing other things that In
their turn are wanted 10y those who no not
produce them. This familiar and common
place statement illustrates, | think, the whole
theory Of the productive and industrial pros
perity Of nations. IL all the able bodied
men in the United States devoted Themselves
to farming there would be comparatively no
body to buy the products of the farm, and il
in like manner all we're to make clothes there
would be nobody to buy and 70 of wagons,
shoes and indeed every species OF the pro
duciions of labor or skill. It is perfectly
clear then that the farmer is necessary to
the manufacturer and to the miner aud the
lAborer, aud in equal degree they each snd
all are necessary to him and that the COO din
alton and Ct operation of all for the welfare
OF all 10y the utmost diversity of production
aud employ ent, and by observing the just
relations OF prices among all are indispeuss
BILE to the progress and prosperity OF the
community. To attain these bent fcent ends
az nearly as possible, human experience has
shown, / think, that in country of varied
and abundant natural resources fertile lands,
wide variations Of latitude and climate, mines
of all metals, Goals, forests, water power, a
country free from legal monOpolles, aud
bound by its national and state constitutions
to equal taxation and the security Of equa
personal rights-home markets and home
consumption are the sure and only constant
reliance. Undoubtedly foreign markets are
extremely desirable for the sale of the sur.
plus productions OF everything that cannot
in the ordinary course Of things be consumed
at home but for a country situated AS our
is, they cannot be r. Ii, upon with any safe
ty as the principal avenues Of reaching pay
ing consumers Of our productions.
1t may be considered maxim in the eco
uomics of industry and production, that just
in proportion to the number Of consumers OF
customers, will ready sales at just and re-
muneIat We prices be obtained and 10 il
there be only few and distant customers the
general certainty of fair return for the in
vestments Of property, skill and labor be
comes an uncertainty controlled by thous
and circumstances over which the producers
and the laborers in production have no con
troll and little influence. These evident, AND
indeed almost self-evident consideration
point, as you can readily see, to the one con
clusion one that il not and hope and be
lieve will not be thought political in any par
| ty sense-that the policy of American
| legislation and the Efforts of American law
mskers-who are really the people Ought
| to be directed to the utmt st development oil
every variety of AmerJan production aud
| so, to the improvement Of the condition Of
the American laborer, and the Amt rican EN-
ployer of labor of every kind by giving that
labor full employment aud ad quate reward
and to the employer ready and steady mar
| kets. This done, while it will be source oil
gain and profit to every material int Of
the land owner and the capitalist, there viii
D., be also larger and nObler advancement oil
those portions of society which are now sc
often the victims OF discomfort aud suffering
and which so often, in unwise and misguided
efforts to redress grievances, make progress
back ward, and Aud themselves at the end Of
a struggle with those who employ labor, in 4
worse condition than before. The constant
y employed and well paid laborer will be
come himself man of accommodating capita
the force of labor transposed into things
He will become a land holder; his wife anC
children-of the first of whom he ought t
have one, aud of the second many-wil
abide in bis own house. II will see that thu
liberty of the laboriug mao is not only tn,
liberty to "strike, ~ the phrase il, but tina
it is the equal liberty not to strike if he doe
not wish to, and the liberty to work on il
peace ard safety if he thinks it for his inter
est to do so, while others may choose, a
they have the perfect right to do, not to worl
upon the terms proposed. Hs will learI
that violence against the administration o
law, or unlawful coercion of any kind, ex
erted towards other working men or to
wards employers, ara crimes of the graves
character against all labor and the welfare o
laboring men, upon whom the Gonst quenos
of such things always finally fall more heaYi
ly than on any other classes OF society, Jus
as the heaviest of the evils of extensive bust
ness failures generally fall most largely upol
the great body of industrial workers. Tn
stopped mandatory brings want and dis
tress to hundred families of operatives Il
one of the employers. The broken saving
bank creates misery in a thousand familie
of the poor, while 1t embsrrasses the famil
les OF its large creditor little II at all, Th'
sudden depreciation OF money showers ruiz
upon the laboring man and the man Of SINAI
wealth, while in mOst cases the wealthy enC
powerful manage to lose little, If they do no
really profit by the general disaster Al
these things being understood, property ant
labor should find their true and peFmsnep
interests to be indssoluble, aud that he, t.
whatever class he may belong, who promote
strife between them, il the enemy of both.
That is in the business sense, repeat, tn
most perfect society in which capital and la
Dor cooperate on equal terms in production
and in which the sources of the supply TO
both production aud consumption are near a
| NIaN 10 FF.st,