The labor argus. [volume] (Charleston, W. Va.) 1906-1915, 1911-08-24
What Human Life Depends On.

a z
and higher human development pos
sible. To produce, food, clothing
or shelter, lane and machinery are
needed Land alone does not satis-l
~ human needs. Human labor
creates machinery and applies it to
the land for the production of raw
material and food. Whoever has con-
troll of land and machinery controls
human labor, and with it human
life and liberty.
The Cause of Glass Rule.
Today the machinery and the
minority. SO long as machinery Is
land used for Industrial urposes are
owned by a rapidly decreasing
simple and easily handled by one
man, its owner cannot dominate the
sources of life of others. But when
machinery becomes more complex
and expensive, and requires for its
operation the organized effort OF
many.workers, it's influence reaches
over wide circles of life. The owners
of such machinery become the domi-
nant class.
Men Are Made Slaves.
: In proportion as the number of
such machine owner compared to all
% ueIi tuStS luelT power
the nation and in the world in
'creases. They bring eve large mas
SEES Of working people under their
control, reducing them to the point
where muscle and brain are their
only productive property. Millions
of formerly self-employing workers
thus become the helpless wage slaves
of industrial masters.
Ruling Glass as Parasites.
AS the economic power of the rul-
ing class grows it becomes less use
.ful in the life OF the nation. All
the useful work of the nation falls
upon the shoulders of the class
whose only property is its manual
and mental labor power-the wage
worker-or of the class who have
but little land and little effective
machinery outside OF their labor
power-.the small traders and small
farmers. The ruling minority Is
steadily becoming useless and para
site.
The Glass Struggle.
a bitter struggle over the division
OF the products of labor is waged be-
tween the exploiting p]ropertied
classes on the one han and the ex
plolting propertyless class on the
other. In his struggle the wage
working class cannot expect adequate
relief from any reform of the present
order ut the hand Of the dominant
lass.
Inc wage workers are, therefore,
the most antagonists of the ruling
Grass. They suffer most from the
curse OF class rule. The fact that
4 rev capitalists are permitted to
control all the country's Industrial
resources and social tools for their
individual profit, and to make tho
production of the necessaries of life
the object of competitive private ell
terprise and speculation is at the
bottom of all the social evils of our
time.
O,crproduction and IdIcncss.
IN spite of the organization of
trusts, pools and combinations, the
capitalists are powerless to regulate
production for social ends. Indus
tries are largely conducted in n
painless manner. Through periods
OF feverish activity the strength and
health of the workers are merciless-
1y used up, and during periods of Ell.
forced idleness the workers are freq
nently reduced to starvation.
me climaNes of this system of pro-
auction are the regularly recurring
industrials ~depressions and crises
which ~paralyze the nation every ir-
teen or twenty years.
Labor's Exploitation.
The capitalist class, in it's mad
race. for profits. is bound to exploit
the worker to the very limit of
their endurance and to sacrifice Their
physical, moral and mental welfare
10 It's own Unsuitable greed. Capital
ism keeps the masses of workin gmcn
In poverty, restitution, physical on
haustion and ignorance. 1t drags
their wives from their homes to the
mill and factory. 1t snatches their
children from the Fairgrounds AMI
SCHOOLS and srinds their slen.Ier
bodies and uniformed minds into .old
dollars 1t d~isfigures. mains and
Kills hundreds os thousands of woik.
1ngmen annually in mines. on rail-
roads and in factories. It drives
millions of workers into the ranks
of the unemployed and forces large
of them into
Vagrancy and all forms of crime and
vice.
Power of Corruption.
TO maintain their rule over their
fellow men, the capitalists must keep
IN their pay all organs CO the publ.
powers, public mind and public con-