Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1905-01-04

fronted the factory worker many
years ago, and those who have looked
most carefully into his condition as
seen in the lands where modern in
dustry has entered are beginning to
agree that the cause of his suffering
is to be found in the fact that while
the tools with which he worked are
capable of producing much more
than those his father used, he is de-
prived of his increased product be-
cause he no longer owns these tools,
and hence can produce nothing of
his own accord, but must sell him
self to those who do own these tools.
1t is pointed out that these tools"
having become great, complex ma
chimes requiring the cooperation of
many workes to run them, they can
not be owned individually. Hence
it is necessary that this ownership be
in common, and this can best be Sc
cured through the union of the work
ers into political party having this
end in view. This is the position of
the Socialists, and has now been ac-
cepted by millions of workers scat
tered through every nation on the
globe and forming today the largest
political party the world has ever
known and one that is marching on
to certain victory.
But although Socialism has thus
come to be looked upon as the gos-
pei of better day to the wage-la-
borer, few claimed that it carried
any message to the farmer. Indeed,
its enemies always offered as their
strongest argument against it the
claim that it could not meet the
problem of agriculture. 1t was ar
gued that farming would never form
a great concentrated industry, and
hence that it must always be con-
Quoted by a multitude of small, in
dividual farm owners. Many were
the wordy battles INDUCED in over
the question as to whether farms
were increasing OF decreasing in size
and as to whether the large or the
small farms were the best organized
method of conducting agriculture.
When the great bonanza farms" of
the west began to be broken up
some of the Socialists seemed to
think that the battle was lost and
that a special solution would have
to be found for the troubles of the
farmer.
Now it just begins to be seen that
they were all looking in the wrong
direction, and a closer examination
shows that at the bottom the same
laws prevail on the farm as in the
factory, and that consequently the
same problems are appearing and
the same remedy must be applied.
If this position is to be understood
it will be necessary to recall briefly
the main features of the great
change that has taken place in in
dustry during the last century. The
first thing that strikes us is the fact
that the tools of production have
become very much larger and more
Complex, and that the resulting pro-
duct has been immensely increased,
while the share of the laboref has
remained at about the same point.
The size of the market reached by
each factory has grown continually
larger with the cheapening of pro-
duetion and improvement of COM
munication. This has caused con-
centration of ownership until today
almost the entire productive power
of the world has been concentrated
in the hands of few for whose ben
eft the many must work.
Now the only question is, has a
similar process taken place in agri-
culture1 And at first appearance
there is a tendency to answer no,
and if this concentration is to be
sought in land ownership it would
be hard to deny this position. But