Workmen's advocate., 1889-12-14

that is a clue to the distress. The | centralization of wealth makes paupers and the system that makes paupers can never cure pauperism; therefore the | efforts to arrest the downward course | have proved vain. The poor create the poor-one pauper makes another-for, ! under the present system at least, he | takes for his support from those who have without bestOwing in return thus | he drags the men next above him down | to his own platform by an inevitable social law. Crime will increase, for it | is not the child of ignorance but of pov erty. For a while tAe diseased state may purge it's noxious humours, but emigration will tarry, though not till It is proven curse-it takes away the hands as well as the mouths-two hands will feed more than one mouth-insuf ticiency of labor power as applied to the soil, not insutfiCiency of the soil for the demand of the inhabitants, is the want from which we suffer; therefore, emi- grafton takes more from production than from consumption-an evil to the land whose productive powers are but half developed.
 ! Thus, while we have been extending ourselves abroad, we have been under mining ourselves at home thus, the poor have been sinking lower every year -diminutive carriatides, supporting the vast fabric of monopoly, till at last pauperism, like a blind Sampson shall pull down the pillar in the temple of the Philistines. Yet, withal, they tell us that trade is brisk-as though trade meant happiness The wheels run and the hearts break. They tell us that England is prosperous and Ireland tran quil. Yes the pulses of England are breaking fast with fever, and Ireland is tranquil with the lull of modification.
 Such is the aspect of my own land.
 But, men of America, the sad rum is germinating in yours as we'll. You are following m the wake of Tyre, Garth age, and Rome-of Venice, Spain and England.
 You are a Republic-so was Venice the mere republican form secures neither prosperity nor freedom, though essential for their existence. Political right may be enjoyed by a social slave. Political power is but defensive armor to ward class aggression. How are you using it? You are standing still while piece by piece is being loosened on your limbs. The golden curse is in your midst the land is annually being gath cred into larger masses-colOssal for, tunes are being formed-an aristocracy is being formed-an aristocracy is germ inatng-the worst aristoCracy of all that of money and of office the pomp of equlpage and furniture is spreading i; -already gay uniforus are dotting your thoroughfares; already the tramp of the mercennary is heard in your streets military glory is beginning to poison your common sense-you are aping the vices of the old monarchies-and your men of letters, who ought to be the high priests of freedom, are contamna
 ting your intellect, with the exception of some goOdly veterans, stern old republican penmen your literature hut, ter in silks, velvets, and ostrich feathers. Your authors come over here and go into ecstacies about a royal procession and court ball-they are inoculating your mind with the old venom of Europe look to it, young talents of the West better write in rough numbers and on hOmely themes, than emulate the lines of Pope or Tennyson, if turned to the seryility of courts.
 And what is the cause of all this :? Wealth is beginning to centralize. It is its nature-all other evils follow in it's wake. It should be the duty of the Government to counteract that central ization by laws having a distribvtive tendency. Whatever political rights you may enjoy, they will be nulhtied as you sink beneath the curse of wage slavery.
 Let me draw your attention to the in- ternal causes of a peoples subjugation.
 The centraizaton of wealth in the hands of few engenders luxury then class is created for the mere purpose of pandering to the luXuries of tbe rich. This class becomes dependent on the rich, and, therefore, identified with their interests. This class, again, en- , ploys another section of the people as dts dependents-takes them away from productive labor to artificial callings l; units them for hardy toil-demoralizes them-thus forms an aristocracy of , labor out of the higher paid trades the better class mechanics; and thus the interests of one portion of the people are severed from those of the remainder The better paid looks down on the less fortunate - class is thus established within class, each having its separate } interests, jealousies and objects; and an oligarchy is empowered to divide and rule. The wealth of the latter, again, enables them to hire and arm the evil min led-the ignorant, or the selfish in any numbers requisite to keep the rest in awe, under the names of soldiers and police. Beyond the pale of these lies the great bulk of the population. The condition of the latter must steadily de teriOrate-the more wealth centraliz" s the less can individual industry contend