Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1909-01-19
BY WILLS j. ABBOT.

By WILLS j. ABBOT.
So long as labor shall be regarded as
q commodity. to be sold in the market
at the highest figure and bought there
in at the lowest possible price, so long
will labor leaders be receiving SEN
fences to serve in jail
The infictiun of penitentiary term
service ON Samuel Gompers, John
Mitchell and Frank Morrison by JUS
tice Wright in the District of Column
bia court, in my opinion, is an event
ranking in Importance with such epoch
making judicial findings as the bred
Scott decision. and the course pursued
by Gompers ct al. in this case may be
classed with the Boston tea party in
its inevitable effect on public opinion.
Two vital phases must be kept in
mind. One is the economic proposition
stated in the opening paragraph In
this letter, and the other is the distinc-
ton between two classes of illegal acts
acts which are wrong per Sc, or ''in
themselves" wrong In their very es-
sence, and acts which are made wrong
only because men legislate them into
legal wrongs.
The distressing thing is that because
our boosted civilization continues to
regard labor as thing to be bought
and sold exactly as coal or mutton Is
sold it should be possible for a re-
spectacle court to enunciate an opin-
ion and issue decree such as were
put forth by Justice Wright.
Labor's Fundamental Rights.
We we'll may disregard the technical
TEXTURES of this controversy and avoid
becoming involved in entangling dis
cussions Of legal bubbles and court
pronunciamentos.
On the contrary, let us state the sit
uation thuswise:
Labor is the outgo frcm human
heart, brain. blood and necessity. La
Dor is absolutely as essential to indus
trial operations as is capitalistic su-
pervision.
Thus far no dissent from the en-
ployer But what as to this-that labor
possesses fundamentally an inherent
right in the outgo from industry ex-
actly as does supervisory capital and
that the latter merely is the custodian
Of the property involved in industry?
Upon this rock We'll advanced and
dox economist will continue to argue
that the laboring man must be consid-
cred by the employer precisely as a
part of the business machinery of the
institution, his product to be bought
at the lowest price.
The orthodox labor thinker, too, will
not depart far from the same concep-
ton, for he will argue the output OF
the laboring man to be thing he must
merely strive to sell at the very high.
est figure he can obtain In the market.
Back of this Buck Stove and Range
Gompers ct al. matter, then, is fun
damental fallacy partaken Of by bott
parties in the main.
However, because MIR. Gompers anC
Mr.. Mitchell and Mr.. Morrison have
bravely marched to new ground, be
cause they sense the true nature OF the
issue, indeed because they realize thai
1t is a social revolution and not merely
q lawsuit in which they are engaged
they have slightly, perhaps considera
bly,, impinged on the court made Law
of the land. and consequently thu
court imposes a sentence technical.
on the ground of contempt of court
but really because Gompers ct al. ar
leading a reform which eventual.
must be won, and the court takes th
'stand still" view Of the situation.
Courts the Ruling Power.
Divestng oneself of all prejudices,
will be inevitable that one will sc
that were the Wright view, backed q
1t is by the federal supreme court,
be applied in all departments of on
social activities Jail sentences woul
be imposed for multitude of act
which were million miles from tt
thought Of the lawmakers when the
framed existing statutes.
And shall not hesitate to affirI
emphatically, too. that the people
these United States are living under
system of judicial government whic
makes the court the de facto powe
notwithstanding the legislature is pr
sumed to be-
The deplorable part of the who
matter is that, after these years of a
itation for civic reform and establis
ment Of greater respect for law, tt
only net result achieved should be Il
sending to Jail of three gallant tigl
ars of labors battles, while rich MI
20 as welcome guests into the very {
fetal residences of our highest mag
trates fresh from their Wall street c
ploitation Of federal statutes open
defed.
Is it not strange that men who ha
broken every law against restraint
trade in upbuilding business go fire
while men who battle for recognize
Of llu,a.n hearts and brains and neet
AID hopes among the labor hosts go
Jail?
y, / desire to bring out the contra
sharply. AID am not forgetting th'