The San Francisco call., 1896-08-25
Relations of the Two Great Par
ties to the Toilers of
the Land.
THE LEADERS COMPARED.
The Future Prosperity of the Country
Is in the Keeping of the
Workingman.

There are in the United States fifteen
millions of men and women who earn
their living by working for wages as dis
tinguished from salaries, and it is the
existence of this great wage-earning class
which makes the maintenance of society
problem. So long as this great body of
men and women are employed steadily
and at good wages they and those de-
pendent upon them are large consumers
of the product of factory and farm, and
this makes the factory prosperous, the
farm prosperous and every department OF
business prosperous, for the wages OF
working men and women are poured at
once into the channels of trade, making
money abundant and business good. 1t
used to be said that when the farmer is
prosperous everybody is prosperous" but
it has more recently been discovered that
when the laborer is not prosperous no one
is prosperous and that the cause of labor
is the cause of all.
1t will be remembered that in the par
able of the householder, when the pro-
prietor came out to the gate at the
eleventh hour and inquired, ''Why stand
We here all the day idle?'' the answer he
received was, because no man hath hired
u.s. and from that day until now there
has ever been the same answer to the
same question. If there are idle people 1t
is because there is no one to employ them,
and therefore in order that there may be
work for those who want something to do
there must be something for the employers
of labor to do also. When there is nothing
that capital can do to make money there
is nothing that the laborer can do to earn
money, and again the "cause of one is the
cause of alP'-the cause of the laborer is
the cause of the employer, and the cause
of both becomes the cause of the Republi-
can party. Those parties and politicians
which profess great friendliness to labor
and hostility to capital are demagogues.
They champion labor's cause only that
they may get Iabor's votes. If there is to
be work to do there must be some one to
furnish that work, and if there is no one
to hire labor then labor stands all the
day idle, business is dull, money tight,
prices are low and labor troubles convulse
the social system.
A ship sails out of the Golden Gate
bound for Liverpool and it carries away
5000 tons of wheat grown in the San
Joaquin Valley. The labor cost of pro-
ducing ton of wheat in the San Joaquin
Vail. V is about as follows: Flowing, 30
cents harvesting, so cents; hauling to
board cars, 81 30. This wheat when
placed on board ship at Port Costa will be
worth about SIS per ton and the 3000-ton
cargo will be worth $54 900. Of this only
So, 900 will have been paid to farm labor
and $50, 100 will go to other American in.
terests among which is the labor attend
ant upon hauling to Port Costa by rail and
loading aboard ship, for which services so
cents per ton may reasonably be allowed,
half to the railroad men and half to the
longshorem en-. This brings the total sum
paid to American labor out of the product
of 5000 tons of wheat up to $500. All the
rest-$49, 800 goes to other interests. live
estimate days work on California farm
to be worth 81, then that cargo of wheat
sent out of the Golden Gate represented
5400 days. work done in America and
whose product is to be exchanged for the
product of days works done in some other
country.
Suppose that this cargo of American
wheat is taken to Sydney or Melbourne
and is there exchanged for secured Aus
traIian wool. Of the cost of producing
secured wool, baled and compressed ready
for shipment, so per cent goes to labor,
and therefore the exchange, otherwise fair
and a good bargain for both countries,
would nevertheless mean $43, 200 paid to
Australian labor in producing the wool
against $500 paid to American labor in
the production OF the wheat; 43, 200 days
work done in Australia at dollar day
and only 5400 done in America, and ye {
ree-traders would have workingmen
believe that such an exchange is no injus-
tice to American laborl
Or, suppose that this cargo of wheat
we're sent to England instead of to Austria
liza, and there exchanged for Bessemer
pigiron. The total labor cost of producing
ton of pigiron at an ordinary English
furnace is So 60 and a ton of pigiron at
the furnace will be worth about as much
as ton of wheat on the cars at any inte-
rior station in the San Joaquin Valley,
therefore our cargo of California wheat
will exchange for cargo of pigiron ton
for ton. But in the production of that
3o00-ton cargo of English pigiron there
was paid out $4,000 to English labor.
whereas in the production of 5000 tons OF
California wheat and putting it on board
the cars in the San Joaquin Valley there
was paid to American labor only $1,000, a
Inference of $4,000. The production of
he wheat gave the American workmen
5000 days work at a dollar day. The