The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-11-12

l Aen&eS Our social EfhicS-RulHman Strike Was Revolt Against Indus | trial FeudaIism-WOrkme Re- | sponded To New Glass Conscious tJane Addams, Exclusive Service The l Survey Press Bureau.)
 (This was written in 1898, just af- Eter the Pullman strike annd read be- fore the Chicago Woman's Club and | the twentieth Century Club of Bos- ton. It was not published at the time | because of it's personal nature. By l chance it was written in tense as if l it were already long past" The 1 grammatical appropriateness; it has \ a message for to-day in it's powerful
 analysis of the human equation in in l dustry.l
 l Those of us who lived in Chicago 1 during the summer of 1894 were con 1 fronted by a drama which epitomized 1 IcS under which we live, for quick series of unusual events had dispelled the good nature which in happier | times envelops the ugIinees of the i'm l duStria1 situation.
 During the discussions which follow l ed the Pullman strike the defenders of the situation were broadly divided between those who held that the philan- 1 thropy of the Pullman company had been most ungratefully received and those who maintained that the s1tua- | tion was the inevitable outcome of the social consciousness developing among working people. attention of the writer was caught by the similarity of ingratitude suffered by an indulgent employer and an in- du1gent parent. King Lear came of- ten to her mind. We have all shar- ed the family relationship and our code of ethics concerning it is solne- what settled. We also bear a part in
 the industrial relationship. but our ethics concerning that are still uncer. tain. It will probably be easier to treat of the tragedy of the Pullman strike as if it were already long past when we compare it to the family tra- gedy of Lear.
 of Lear to his children was archaic and barbaric We may in later years learn to look back upon the industrial fela- tionships in which we are now placea as was the family relationship between Lear and his daughters. King Lear doubtless held the same notion or fathers duty that was held up by the other fathers of his time; but he alone had kingdoms to bestow upon
 his children. The sense or dnty neio company doubtless represents the ideal of the best of the present ern- their employees, but he alone gave the men so model town. such perrect surroundings. The magnitude of his: indulgence and failure were cores pondinng, and we are forced to chai7E leflge the ideal itself.
 It is easy to discover striking points of similarity in the tragedies of the royal father and the philanthropic president of the Pullman company The like quality of ingratitude they both suffered is at once apparent It may be said that Lear found hls fate harder to bear because he had so far exceeded the measure of fath- Jer's duty as he himself says. What, then would be the bitterness Of a man who had heaped extraordinary benefits upon those toward whom he had.~no duty recognized by common It is easy to see that the heart of Lear was cut deepest of all by the. should remember him no longer as
 a king and 'benefactor, but as a de-
 feated man. So the heart of the
 al1eled publicity which brought him to the minds of thousands as type of oppression and injustice He had
 not onIy been good to those who were
 now basely ungrateful to him, but he
 felt himself deserted by the adrn1ra-
 ton of his people
 indeed, in all manufacturing affairs
 since the industrial revolution, 1nQus-
 try is organized into a vass st. soc1af e.17
 man company socialized not only the
 factory but the form in which his
 workmen were living lie pulft ana,
 in a great measure, regulated an en-
 tire town. This might have worked
 o1,t into a successful associated eff
 fort if he had made the town a
 growth and manifestation of the wants
 and needs of the inhabitants. But,
 unfortunately, the end to be obtain
 ed became ultimately commercial and
 not ssocial, having in view the pay
 ment to the company of at least per cent The president assumed that he
 himself knew the needs of his men,
 and so far from wishing them to ex-1
 press their needs he denied to them
 the simple right of trade organize
 ton. If we may take the dictator
 iaI relation of Lear to -Cordelia as a
 typical and most dramatic example
 of the distinctively family tragedy,
 one will asserting it's authority
 wounded affection, and insisting upon
 it's selfish ends at all costs, may we
 not consider the absolute authority of
 this employer over his town a typ
 ical and dramatic example of the in
 dustriaI tragedy? One will direct
 out regard to their desires and having
 in view in the last-analyssis only com
 rnercial results2
 It shocks our ideal of family life that a man should fail to know his
 daughters heart because she awl1-
 wardly expressed her love. That a
 man should be absorbed in his own
 indignation as to lose affection in his
 anger is really no more unnatural
 then that the man who spent a mil-
 lios1 dollars on a swamp to make it
 sa nitary for his employees, should re-
 fuse to speak to them for ten minutes,
 whether they were in the right or
 wrong.
 F Lear ignored the common ancestry of Cordelia and himself. He forgot
 her royal inheritance of magnanim-
 fty and also the power of obstinacy