The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1904-06-18
| HOW LABOR SUFFERS
FROM CONCENTRATION
Of THE WEALTHY
Robert Fleming Discusses Some of
the Unfortunate Conditions.

Plundering Scheners and Trustms1<.
ers Combine Their Resources in An
Effort to Reap Big Profits, and the
Workingman Is Made To Contribute
to the Wealth and Aegrandizement
Of These "Captains Of Industry"
Extract from Robt. F1eming's Depraved
1, finance and Remedy for Trusts and
Trustmakers:
Every piece of plundering by which
schemers obtain vast riches for MOTH
ing is so much wrong done to every
member of society, and to the we'll
being of the nation, in which every
American is concerned, whether he will
or not Every misappropriation of the
country's riches is disorganization of
human forces, whereby not only the
innocent and confinding are pillaged,
but the workers and producers of the
nation are made poorer, and put un-
der industrial enslavement, and the
plunderers are made more depraved
and degraded, although they are en-
riched
When a country's resources are
small, its people must struggle to live.
When country's resources are large
like Russia, and when nearly all have
been grasped by the imperial family
and the mobiles, the people must be
poor, and must struggle to live. When
a counlrys resources are great and
rich like the United States, and near
| ly have been grapsed by a few, using
bogus capital and charging it as real
| money, all Americans must face higher
prices; and millions must face lower
wages, in order to make up the differ
ence; other millions must retrench and
economics; other millions must suffer
privation and want; and children and
women must be called in to do the
work of the men, because they are
cheaper. The Russian peasant, like the
American, is bled at every footstep,
but not by Trusts. He is punished in
! the vilest form by the officials of the
Russian government. When the Of
| ficials purchase supplies for the gov
ernment, they obtain three roubles Of
money with every rouble of purchase,
and all must be included in the bill,
although only one rouble's worth is
delivered. This is as debasing to the
officials as it is oppressive to the Rus
sia peasants who have to make it up.
| But it Is not more vile or base than
4 the charging Of four d dollarss of bogus
lcapita to every liar. Of .reaI apitaIs
i as so Zen don
States to grasp the country VS. resources,
and as was done in the making Of the
Steel Trust and the other trusts. BY
this atrocious method the American,
| iJY1 SeS
plundered more than the Russian
peasant. For this same work Whit
| taker Wright was sentenced in England
to serve seven years. penal servitude,
because the law authorities there have
not been purchased or demoralized.
The resources of a country are of
vital Importance to all the people. They
are its wealth. The wealth of coun-
try consists Of it's railroads, industries,
mines, lands, buildings, farms, forests,
fisheries, ships, etc. These are as nec-
essary for existence and we'll being as
air to breathe. When a country's re-
sources are charged with debts, or
when they are put in pawn, the people
must be deprived and harassed, in or
DER to provide the yearly charges for
the debt, like man who owes money,
and must provide the interest regular
1y, and always be confronted with his
debt. When man is in debt he is
not free: he is more or less the slave
of his debt. This is not so apparent,
but it is equally true, that when a
country is in debt the people of that
country are not free, and all Of them
are more or less the slaves of the debt,
1f In
they must work more and receive less:
they must spend less and use less, be-
cause some of their money has to be
paid regularly for the debt
All the resources, or wealth, of the
United States have been valued at $780,
900, 100000. In the year 1900, II cents
Of every one Of all these dollars were
in the possession Of few, and very
large portion was obtained, not by in
dustry, or the honest trading Of equi-
valents, whereby something was done
for the good of society, but by schem-
ing jugglers, who have charged bogus
capital stock and mortgage bonds as
real money upon the country's re-
sources, and fixed them under per-
petual debts, for thousands of millions
of dollars, and scampered off with the
proceeds.
This atrocious system, whereby
thousands of millions of dollars have
been alienated for nothing from the
American people, was started when
railroads were first constructed, when
every nefarious method was allowed
and often participated in, by the gov-
| ernment. It was developed. in the
creation of the Standard Oil Company;
it was amplified and perfected by Jay
Gould; and now it is an established
custom of the, country reveled in by
lawyers, and the perpetrators are now
called Captains Of Industry when the
volume Of the plunder is enormous. It
is seen in its most matured form In
the charging Of more than a thousand
million dollars of bogus capital an real
money, and putting nearly all the steel
industry Of the country under Its con-