Workmen's advocate. (New Haven, Conn.) 1883-1891, 1889-10-05
THE VOICE OF MADISON.
BY PROF. DANIEL DE LEON.

The following extracts are from an
article in the August number of the
Nationalist
madison accepted the natural law
touching the capacity of the earth
to yield, under civilized cultivation.
subsistence for a large surplus of con-
sumers beyond those who own the soil,
or other equivalent property. He real
lied the great lengths to which improve
ments in agriculture, and other labor
saving arts were tending, and measured
their effect upon the production of
wealth. the laws of increasing popula-
ton with the increasing productivity of
labor were no secret to him; he sue
cumbed to no hallucination on the score
of the freedom of our political institu-
tons; and, finally, gauging the effect of
the individual system OF production, or
competitive struggle for existence, he
drew from these combined premises, and
declared the conclusions, that the class
of the properties in the United States
would increase from generation to gen.
Grafton; that, from being a minority, it
would eventually swell into majority;
that it would be reduced to lower and
lower wages, affording the bare necessi-
ties of life; and that, thus gradually
sinking in the scale of happiness and
well being, the large majority of the
people of this country would finally
touch the point where they would be
not only without property, but eren
acithoM the hope Of acquiring 1t.
ut was, then, no lmmutable state of
happiness, but a steady progress towards
poverty that this eminent Revolution
airy Father, for one, foresaw and fore
told as the inevitable sequel of the forces
at work under the economic system that
lay at the foundation of the country.
All the causes he enumerates as pro-
ductive, by their combined agencies, of
a majority of hopeless poor have been
at work among us with an intensity be-
yond his forecast. The pitiable stage
when the masses of the people would
be not only without property, but with
out even the hope Of acquiring it. Mad
ison calculated would be reached by the
| United States before the nation num-
| bered population greater than that OF
England or France. Our population
now is double that of either, and Madi
sons gloomy prophecy is accordingly
realized by us in it's deepest colors. Our
property holders have become an actual
ever-decreasing minority; the properti-
less are to-day the overwhelming ma
| jority; the wages of these have declined
until they afford the bare means for a
pinched subsistence; chance or intrigue,
cautious crime or toadying may, but nc
degree of honest toll can any longer,
under the prevailing system, insure
property or the just rewards of Their
labor to the myriad wealth-producing
workers with brain and Drawn; the few
among them with whom the spark
of hope still glimmers, hold to a straw
that must soon disabuse them; with
most all hope in this direction is totally
extinct; starvation, plus work, is Great
ing by the thousands the genus tramp
which prefers starvation minus work
and, as the certain consequence OF
grinding poverty and its concomitan
extravagant wealth, immortality, as wei
as corruption, is rampant among the
people and breaks out in the govern
ment Not, then, by reason of any de
generation, not by reason of any de
parture from, but closely adhering tt
the lines laid down by the Revolution
airy Fathers, have the people reached
the present shocking state against which
the Nationalist movement is enlisted
The vulnerable point was the competitive
system of production which the Ameri
can revolution left extant. The presen
conditions are its logical result.
col lA Iri1 4 Il
another Revolutionary Father, had ut
tered the sentence, that where tht
working poor were paid in return fol
their labor only as much money a.
would buy them the necessaries of life
their condition was identical with tina
of the slave, who received those necessa
ries at short hand; the former might b.
called 'freemen,' the latter slaves,
but the difference was imaginary only
Madison grasped the bearing of this pro
found thought in all its fulness. As hi
own reasoning revealed to him thu
eventual destituton of the MASSES, tn
conclusion was self-evident that thei
condition would become virtually tina
of slavery. A minority of slaves nigh
be kept under bat large majority
and that made up of the races to which
the world owes its progress, Madison real
lied would not long submit to the gal
ling yoke. Accordingly, he deserted il
the not distant future a serious conhic
between the class with and the elias
without property; the fatal collapse o
the system of suffrage he had helped t,
rear, and consequently, the distinct out
lines of a grave national problem
THE question of suffrage brough
Madison unconsciously face to fac
with the social question. His talen
saved him from falling into reaction
airy plan, or even resorting to a tempo