The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-02-14
FEBKuAKr H. 1891

deserves credit for one thing at least. He
has measured and weighed the entire
philosophy and practice of so-callad polit-
ical economy in this single brief sentence !:
vlolable rights the former to employ whom
he can and for what he can, and the latter
to respond when he can"
1t IS just this definition of respective and
"inviolable rights" that disgraces our civ
ilization, letters Christianity and renders
inconsistent, If not ridiculous, the Christ
ian teachers who defend it with Bible
statements. The rights of the employer
involve the power-through wealth, which
can wait-tc control supply and demand.
The syndicates do not hesitate to take
advantage of this .inviolable right" by
suspending work and discharging help
when they plcase-not only enhancing the
price and cost OF their products to con-
sumers, but increasing the supply and
cheapening the wages of labor.
Added 70 this dual power of the rich
syndicate over the poor laborer--a power
which creates, or controls, both supply and
demands the control of the circulating
medium which is growing more limited
under the direction of the gold standard
formed for the express purpose of subiu-
eating labor. the wage-workcr becomes a
beggar for work at any price and on any
terms that capital may invent and dictate.
He simply, as Bishop Newman puts it,
and the bishop must have been specially
inspired to unconsciously tell the whole
truth in this instance--had the solitary
fright to respond when he cam"
When he can" Of course, means when
he is out of job and physically able TO
work, we'll knowing that if he fails to re-
spond there are plenty to rush into the va
cant place, on any terms, and leave the
hesitating party to starve or tramp, to
nI nrffv fnvt x<xf
olable rights" and to thank the Lord that
poverty, competency and affluence are
the three financial conditions Of man, in
each of which there may be sainthood, /"
and to each of which our political econ
omy" says: 1.-THE social classes owe moth
ing to each other"
Bishop Newman is naturally man of
an awakened conscience and strong sense
Of justice. His mistake lay in his ambition
to be a bishop. And since his election to
that office he has sometimes acted the role
of the right man in the wrong place. He
was chosen chiefly because of his wide per-
sonal acquaintance and influence with
millionaircs.
His medley of bad logic, conflicting
statement, and false gospel which have
endeavored to review, is the inevitable re-
suit of trying to serve God and Mammon
at the same time-an enterprise as diff
cult now as it was eighteen hundred years
ago. Just now the Methodist church, as
never before in all its history, is reaching
out in every direction for temporal power
and conquest. And it is gaining its object
through the accumulation of wealth.
by exercising the divine gift for the ac-
QUESTION of property" and at the neces-
sary cost Of spiritual consciousness and
character.
The church is astride of Bishop Newman
and blindly urging him on, in the very
face of the angel of Justice, that stands
across his path with drawn sword to
against the sin of exalting the Golden
Calf above the Lamb of God. Alas for
poor, blind, tempted Baalam! Alas for the
trembling, hesitating ass that sees more
clearly than its tyrannical rider, whom it
vainiy endeavors to turn back from an
unholy crusade against the cause Of the
Nazarene, as represented in the struggle,
toll and travail of humanity for new and
higher birth. JAMES G. CLARK.