Workmen's advocate. (New Haven, Conn.) 1883-1891, 1890-03-01
INTELLECTUAL FORCES AT
WORK THROUGHOUT THE
COUNTRY.
Press, Pulpit and Forum deeply
Agitated by the Social Question
Issues that Must be Met-Defend-
ers Of Capitalism Hard Pressed
on All Sides.
IN NEW YORK.

Public Meeting of the American section
"A Lecture on "The Unemployed"
by Prof. De Leon.
An intelligent audience, largely com.
posed of people who never before were
seen at public meetings at the s. L. p,
filled Carpenters Hall, 16 Clinton place,
last Wednesday evening. Prof. De Leon
was the lecturer, and his subject, "rhe
Unemployed. He said in substance
1.-THE lecture delivered by Mr.. Sanial
at the last meeting of this Section con-
tanned the pregnant statement that at the
close Of the war, when the large army
of veterans was disbanded, they returned
to their homes, found their places taken
in the workshops, the capitalists en-
trenched in the possession of all the
avenues to wealth, and that then the
soldiers inaugurated new era for Ca
pitalism by furnishing the first contin-
gent of the unemployed in tangible num-
bers.
In order to understand the meaning
and mission of the unemployed in ca
pitalist development and, consequently,
in the labor movement, 1t is necessary
capitalistic production.
These characteristics are the creation
of surplus value and its restless increase.
Surplus value does not increase but at
the expense of that quantity of the pro-
ducts of labor that is returned to labor
in the shape OF wages. Owing then to
inc lEexoraDie law of its own existence,
urged by the inventive spirit of the age,
and stimulated by mutual competition
in the disposal of merchandise, capital
ism thus crowds upon the wages of the
worker. These then, by various devices,
are forced to accept an ever diminishing
share of their labor; and so if no
perturbing influence stepped in, capital
ism would run it's course by finally pla-
cling the country and all its wealth into
the hands of very few and reducing
the large majority of the people to
condition of utter dependence; G. So
ciety would return to whence it started
from. The perturbing influence does
step in, however. The increased edu.
cation of our time, the genius of the
age, produces the trade organizations,
who, through combination, resist the
encroachments of capital. Again at
this stage of the capitalistic system
new perturbing influence steps in to
counteract the effect of organization
among the wage-workers. If organiza-
ton could be perfected, it is evident
that, from at first trying to resist capt.
talist encroachment, the organized
wage-worker would commence to COM
mand larger and ever larger share of
his product and in that way finally
absorb the whole of the surplus values
and do away with the capitalist himself.
In the scheme of evolution this course
of dealing with the question was evi.
IDENTIFY not to be. What the scientific
and social reasons therefor are would be
a depression at this place. AT any rate
that had to happen which should pre-
vent that line of evolution; and it is
here that the unemployed come in to
play their stupendous role.
"Soon as the unemployed appear in
sufficient numbers the strength of organ.
lied labor begins to suffer. In proper
tion as the unemployed increase in num-
ber organized labor grows weaker and
weaker, and since one of the effects of
the pressure of capitalism upon the wage
worker is to frequently throw him out
of employment, it follows that finding
their rear and flanks unprotected, and
their own rank and file riddled and
weakened through suffering and priva-
tion, their ability to take stand even
against encroachment only is steadily
lessened. Thus the unemployed, the
coming into existence of that class in
growing numbers, marks an epoch in
our era; it gives a new start and new
impetus to the greed of the capitalist
and it fires with the fire of despair the
body of the workers who realize more
and more their precarious position. The
labor movement, the direct struggle for
existence between the workers and the
capitalists, then commences in all its
distinctness.
"The attitude of the census officers in
connection with the unemployed is,
then, by reason of the meaning of en-
forced idleness in the community, one
of great interest. The bureaus of sta
tistics of labor for years kept silent on
the matter despite all attempts to draw
from them information on the subject.
Finally in the Massachusetts, census for
1875 lengthy diagrams were given show
ing the hours of work. The object OF