The Labor enquirer., 1886-11-06
Human Bodies Made Articles
of Merchandise TO
be Crushed
In Shylock's Gold Hopper and
Laid at the Feet
of the
Moloeh Of Greed-Modern GiviIiza-
tion is Hollow and
Cruel Sham.

4 D u
When Swift, in 1929, gave forth hi
Modest Proposal" to an astounded na
tion, neither he nor those to whom il
was addressed were in the least likely
to imagine that its re publication, we'll
nigh two centuries afterwards, would
find substantially the same state of af
fairs in existence. In despite of the in
ducement offered. that whoever could
find out a fair, cheap and easy method
of making these children sound. useful
members of the commonwealth would
deserve as we'll of the + ublic as to have
his statue set up for preseryer of the
nation" neither the mordant satire oi
Swift nor the enthusiastic work of a
myriad others have prevented two more
miserable hundreds of years from hav-
ing elapsed without appreciable pro-
gress in the happiness of the proletariat
Progress in some sort has been
achieved; but if viewed relatively to the
higher standard of living and the in
crease of productive power, it will be
found that the mass of the people are as
badly off as when, in a grim travesty of
the orthodox economical preachment,
the sardonic Dean of St. Patrick's
grsvelY proposed to utilize the surplus
childrin of the laboring classes as food
for those able to pay for it. Il grant
this food will be somewhat dear, and
therefore very proper for landlords,
who, as they have already devoured
most of the barents, seem to have the
best title to the children"
We are 80 we'll accustomed to human
bodies being articles of merchandise
piecemeal, that it is difficult for the
average man, not Socialist, to see that
the whole of our present commercial
system is based upon the buving and
selling of men and women for the profit
or pleasure of the purchaser as literally
as though they were bought In open
market to be actually eaten. The pri-
vate ownership of land and all other
means of production-the MONOPOLY of
the means of life-class-control of the
material resources of the community
places the proletaire at the mercv of his
masters, for thev own all that is requi-
site for his livelihood and compel him
to purchase at their price the privilege
of access to it. Owning nothing but his
body and the strength of it, his body
must he sell to buy his bread. And the
price of it? Bitter bread and hard
life, and no lack of trouble wlthal!
To make another's life their own, to
wiring from him all that makes life
happy or even tolerable, to intensity his
misery and toll BY adding theirs thereto
the power to do these things is given
to those who are landlords or capitalists
by the present system. Through their
control over everything necessary to life,
they can compel the workers to sell
whatsoever power or portion of their
bodies ministers to greed or lust at the
price of bare subsistence.
The landlord for access to Ibis" land
takes toll and calls it rent; the capitalist
for acc IS to "his" machinery takes toll
and GALES 1t profit, the shareholder for
the use of "his" capital takes toll and
calls it interest. Besides these forms of
blackmail, forclbly exacted, there are q
hundred others that are obtained from
the workers by chicanerY and fraud
Every product Of labor consumed by
one who does not labor means thai
someone somewhere has been robbed
Whoever consumes the product of an
other mans labor without rendering
him an equivalent in return is taking
| from that other some part of the enjoy
ment of life legitimateIy due to him-ie
lessen ng his happiness and his life in
exact proportion.
Out of the mass of the unskilled labor
ers in field or town there are few who
receive more than an average wage o
E1 per week-not many who can obtair
that. Assuming that one is steadily
employed, and paid, for fiftvtwo week.
per year, and that fer fifty years-a wilc
hypothesis indeed for a lifetime of toi
he will have received, all told, $4,000
Agricultural laborers are, in the create
part of the country, paid from los. t.
1Ss. weekly-13s. per week regularly 70
fifty wears at the end makes 81 ,69C
The life-work of the labor-class collec
lively is represented by the wealth o
the nation but the return for it is com
paratiyely so insignificant that there ar
few outside the ranks of the laborer
who are content to receive their indl
yidual life-reward in a single yeal
Taking the standard set for US by th
present system-measuring all things b.
money-the laborer has for his toll les
endowment in his life than many
lounger and parasite squanders in
year.
Involved and complex as our presen
system is. 1t is no marvel that so man
fail to see the mutual murder and de
grading cannibalism that are Its mail
supports, masked and hidden from th
ordinary eye by thousand convention