The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-06-04
INDIVIDUALISM THE BASIS
OF OUR PRESENT SOCIAL AND
POLITICAL SYSTEM.
THE VANISHING OF THE hANDICRAfTSMAN
The Trust Fictitious Creature Without Soul
But Endowed With Earthly immortal
ity Incapable of Crme:and
Yet Robber.
(New York Journal.)

(New York .Iournal)
''The tools to him who can use chem" 4"
said Napoleon.
Them as has, gits,'' says the Arkaa-
sas man.
Every one for himself, and the devil
century.
Root, hog, or die" says nature.
"To him that hath shall be given, and
| from him that hath not shall be taken
away even that which he scpmeth to
have" says God.
"All men are created equal" says the
Declaration of Independence. But they
are not. any more than horses are. The
hip p-shotten. sway-backed, lop-eared
street car steed was not created equal
to Ormond, the king of the turf, who
cannot be bought for a quarter of a
million. Nor Richard Croker ID Daniel
Shakespeare.
| Since Adam left Eden, if he did, this
has been a tough world for the most of
| its inhabitants. Not one came into
it of his own accord. and few would
have come at all had they been consult
ed. Fewer still would remain were they
|sure of anything better somewhere else
! All being endowed with aspirations for
Happiness. multitudes find wretchedness,
poverty and disease their only inherit
ance. Our credentials bear the same
sign and seal. but some are born to
honor and some to dishonor. Some lie
in lilies and roses and walk ON velvet.
-I,;
rags and sleep in doorways, and stain
hinty paths with bloody feet. All de-
sire to succeed, but few reach the goal.
There is too much whining and squeal-
| ing in these degenerate days. Brave
mem take their medicine without either,
and endure adversely with fortitude. 1t
Iwould be sardonic to suppose that there
is to be no reparation for the elaborate
| insults of fate, sometime and somewhere
Otherwise. life would be an uninteligi-
bic, practical joke, played by being
capable only of malignant laughter at
| his victims.
| Whatever our errand or mission on
this planet, it has long been evident to
the impartial critic that we are not
here for recreation, and that the brother
hood of man up to this time, as applied
to human affairs, is like a phrase drawn
out of Il hat Carnage and pillage con-
tinue popular, and while in theory our
government has for its ayowed object the
greatest good of the greatest number,
with most of us the greatest number
continues to be number one.
Equality of condition, of endowment,
of possession, has never existed, and the
ldivergences now are wider than ever be-
>
crease rather than diminish seems likely,
and we must face the consequences.
1t is apparanet also that whatever
progress has been made hitherto is due
wholly to the effort of individuals
States make no inventions. Nations
write no poems or dramas. Society is
rich or strong or pure only as the in
ldividuals of which it is composed are
wealthy and powerful and virtuous.
Battles are won or lost as the individual
soldiers are intrepid or timid. The
Decalogue, that statute enacted in the
parliament Of the skies and promulgated
amid the thunders of Sinai, has no effect
upon the race except as its precepts are
|obeyed by the individuals to whom they
are addressed.
SO our social and political system rests
ION individualism: the highest develop
ment of the individual as the unit of
the State: and. as the correlative of this.
the equality of all men before equal
laws. and equality of opportunity, so
that all shall have an equal chance in
this harum- m-scarum. helter-skelter Scrim-
image which we call life. No man can
ask more than this, and none should
be content with less than this. Every
arena must he open. Any citizen can
enter the ring if he wishes. If he is
put to sleep the first round. he can turn
TO some vocation for which he is batter
Iqualifed. The Legislature can pass no
llaw making him equal to Fitzsimmons.
That would be unjust to Bob, who is as
much entitled to fair play as the weak
est mannikin of them ALL
Aware of the incompatibility of
feudalism and liberty, of the dangers of
unrestricted accumulation of wealth, not
lonly to the individual but society, and
|of hereditary limitation of property. our
lpOlitical ancestors abolished prmogen-
ture and entail, supposing that in this
lway they had provided for the destruc-
tion of great estates and for the free
distribution of capital in each genera
tion.
They did not foresee the invention of
corporations and trusts. fictitious crea-
lures, without souls and yet endowed
with earthly immortality-legal monsters