Workmen's advocate. (New Haven, Conn.) 1883-1891, 1890-01-25
CAPITALISM.
HOW THE WAGE-WORkERS
ARE HELD IN STUPID
SLAVERY.
Mrs. Mortified, Of Boston, UnfOlds
the Anatomy of the Competitive
System in the Dissecting Room
of the s. l.. Z.

of the 5. l.. L.
At the public meeting of the Boston
American Section, S. l.. p, on Sunday,
Jan. IL, Mrs. Merriiield delivered an
original and eloquent address on the
Competitive System. She said in sub
stance:
Il think am correct in stating that all
Socialists agree in pronouncing the COM
petitive capitalistic system stupendous
system of robbery. In that system steal
ing is called profit. We have been
taught at home and in church that |
protit.taking was right. And being |
born and reared in a society that was
organized solely in the interest Of the |
rich we have considered it was priv
ilege to be plundered by them, because
it was only by submission to their plum
dering that the masses could supply
their common needs. In this helpless
condition of want and poverty they have
been compelled to compete with each
other for the chance of making a living,
and thus they have become more and
more willing slaves to their masters.
The hopeful sign that this long dreary
night of the worlds toilers is nearing
the dawn of better day, is the general
| discomfort that, like the low rumbling
of distant thunder, warns that storm is
nigh. Men and women have com
menced to question the reason and right
of idle men and women enjoying all the
comfort and luxuries that wealth can
secure, while the workers life is one of
self denial and haggard, hateful poverty.
The dullest intellects are awakening to
the fact that there is a great injustice
somehere, that the privileged class of
society, as now organized, has been
able to keep the masses in ignorance of
the causes of their misery, and conse-
quently powerless to resist the effects of
the competitive profit-taking system,
But for that darkness in the hearts and
minds of the workers the curtain would
not ring up each successive morn upon
earth's most useful men and women
toiling in ignorance, poverty and de-
spair, giving their children to be coined
into profit for the. capitalist, crowding
more and more women into prostitution
and more men into trampism and
crime That the system is one Of rob-
berry, | think none can successfully
deny. That people apparently consent
to be robbed, does not change the fact.
cit is my object to point out some of
the frauds and eXtortions through which
they have been held in stupid slavery.
Perhaps the most delusive is what is
termed free contract, privilege to
choose your master; if you have superior
skill, to displace and climb over your
brother to success, or, If SO disposed,
to underbid him and crowd Lin out
and down. This freedom to refuse the
employers offer of wages brings most
workers in short period of time to
face starvation or the poorhOuse. All
workers bear this reminder about with
them to make them docile while they
enjoy the independence of the free
contract
,
the capitalists and a great confuser
of the poor workers brain is the
- much talked about Law of Supply and
t and Demand" If all the workers were
receiving three dollars per day they
would still continue to spend all they
I earned, for most workers live up tC
| their income. Therefore that makes the
| demand on the market. Now, if wages
t were GU down one-half, the purchasing
power of ne country would be diminish
ed nearly one-half. Thus the country
would be left loaded with high price,
Q goods, costing twice as much as new
goods could be made for. The previously
made goods would be sold at a sacrifice
and their holders would have to go into
n bankruptcy or they must cut down the
wages of their employees to save them
selves. We thus see that the power Il
cut down wages destroys both the sup
: ply and demand because supply ant
e demand must always balance each other
!, Therefore, to the extent that one is Gu
. the other must ultimately be cut also
:, Hence the law of supply and demand
ultimately ends in Chinese wages, rats
/, rice, disease and degradation.
t. Another delusIon and fraud is tina
!. Capital pays LABOR We can illustrat,
the fact in this way: A capital
IS ist hires man to raise potatoes; he pro
e duces four hundred bushels; the capital
&c list gives the man one hundred bushel
- for doing the work and keeps three hun
II dred bushels himself This is the wa,
y capital Arrays pays labor, by glvini
one-fourth to the labo:er and pocketinI
. the rest. Slavery illustrates this fraut
70 more nicely. A man works and earn
+, money and buys slave; he puts TIL
y slave to work, who supports himself an
a master, and with what is left over h
" buys another slave and SO has the tw
" To work for him who snnnnrf HIM i