Sequachee Valley news. (Sequachee [Sequatchie], Tenn.) 1896-1952, 1912-03-21
SPEECH OF
HON. VICTOR [. BERGER
THE SOCIALIST
tCOrrti,r4ed from last aceek.)

tIcNHhhScd JpOM fdSf VccH.l
CAUSE OF FREQUENT
RECURRENCE OF PANIcE
Now, another important considera.
ton: Since the working people do moi
receive the full value of their products
because a considerable profit is made
by the employing class on everything
the workers produce-can they be ex
pected to buy back these products
Their numerical strength makes them
the chief consumers of the country and
those on whom production mainly de-
ponds.
In this way, by the laboring people
not being able to consume enough, and
by the painless way in which product
ion is carried on in general, the So
called overproduction is created.
OF course, no matter how much or
how little the toilers of a nation
create, they always create more than
they are able to buy with their wages,
because they have never received the
full value of that production.
In this way the so-called industrial
crises originate. They have come up.
on us about once in every 90 years,
roughly speaking. since capitalist pro-
duction began its sway, Al such times
the trade and the manufacturing of a
nation come to a standstill, because
''there is too much on hand"
And the working people have to stop
work and to go ragged and hungry be-
cause there is too much on hand.
Statesmen, newspapers, lawyers,
and so-called reformers on such occas-
ions claim that it is either too much
silver OF too little silver, or lack of
confidence, or what not, that is the
cause of the industrial crisis, or pan
ic, as it is sometimes called.
But hard times are really hard only
on those whose subsistence depends on
their having work to do.
For the poor people the times are al
ways hard.
During ''hard times the wives and
daughters of the capitalists, however,
do not leave off attending balls, part
les and operas, in their silks and dia-
monds.
On the contrary, If the times are
very hard. the wealthy and charitable
people simply arrange one more amuse-
ment and call it a ''charity ball"
AS far as security of work ia con-
the workman of the present
is worse off than any Of his pre-
decessors in history. In fact, the ir-
of his employment, the fire.
luency with which he is out of work,
is the most alarming feature of the
.orkingman's condition. The toiler
If today, cannot work when he wants
or when he ought to, in order to
support himself and family. He can
work only when it is to the profit of
the employer that he should do so.
EVOLUTION OF CAPITALISM.
How all this came ahout-well, it is
imply a matter Of industrial evolu-
ion.
In the Middle Ages before capitalists
had come upon the stage of
vents, a system of small industries
revealed, and, in some few cases, has
ontinued to the present day.
This system rested on the private
wnership by the workman himself of
be means of production. The instru-
lents of labor were then paltry,
warfish and cheap; and for that very
eason, as a rule, they belonged to the ,
roducers themselves. Since the ff-
zenith century, and especially since
be power of steam was utilized. these
implements of production have
cen gradually enlarged, united and
improved, until the common tool of
ne Middle Ages, and even some of the
Instruments that were common so {
ears ago and later, have been trans
)rmed into the machines of today.
q place OF the hand loom, the spin il,
ing wheel, and the smiths hammer !
lere appeared the mechanical loom,
ne spinning machine, and the steam
ammer. Instead of the single work
Top, there appeared the factory that 6
,mbines the united labor of hundreds
nd of thousands. At the same time !
was transformed from a
,ries of Observation-Disclosures in {
a series of social and combined acts. {
The yarn, the cloth. the metal arti-
es which now come out of the facto- ,
: are the joint product of the many |
through whose hands they had !,
go successfully before being ready. !
No single person can say OF them: /
This | have made" Yet these social j,
ols and social products are treated in Z
10 same way as they we're at the time ,
hen the tool was an individual tool 1
I'd when the product was created by
individual. So the present new I
der of production remains subj ect to
70 old form of appropriation, al
.ough the new form of production J
away with the very conditions on
hich the old form was based, In
mes of old the owner of the simple
appropriated or took for his own
e his own product, while now-and =
is important to grasp this fact fully e
the owner OF. the tool, of the ma Q
inc, appropriates the work of Others. II
9 appropriates this work without a p
ry and without a verdict. q
IvATE OWNERSHIP OF HI MA o
CHINE MEANS H ExPLoITATA- v
TIoN OF THE WORKER
And so we see plainly that the priv
e ownership of the means of product
which was formerly the means OF T
the product to the producer, .
S now become the means of exploita- 9,
IN, and, consequently, of servitude. l.
The development of the tool into the n
separates the workman from y
5 product. In this way a compare :
7ely small number of capitalists OBJ
a monopoly Of the means Of pro
We are often inclined to deprecate