The daily Nome industrial worker., 1916-11-20
GLASSES.

GLASSES.
 Many good people scout the notion that there is any such dis tinction as that of class in the United States. They proclaim the political equality that prevails, ana they dwell upon the alleged equality before the law. They quote from the Declaration of Independence and refer to constitutional rights as showing that equality is something more than a sentimental tigment of the imagination.
 None the less there are classes here; the question of caste Is not modern introduction at that. The classes as such is an economic dis tipction, not a political or legal one.
 But any person that has carefully followed the facts of history knows well enough that here economic equality does not prevail. there can be neither political nor legal equal itv in the true sense.
 That society in the United States can he divided into two classes, that of employers and employees, econ omic divisions which do not admit of any questioning, will surely be granted. but so many will not be found 10 agree that on account or that division into two classes, there is also a political and legal inequ2l- ity arising.
 :. ..Ao4 z !ss. , society is founded as t0' all tts ns1utIons on an ecOno- mic basis. Political manifestations are manifestations of the economic activities and more often than not of the economic activities of the eco nomically powerful.
 It is a truiSm that government IS day by day becoming more an ad- iunct of business for business men. Such questions as the tarif, consul lar representations, fisca! pohcles' taxation, agricultural aids, protec- tion against adulteration, mining bureaus, geological surveys, coast surveys, departments of commerce and the like take up at least four fifths of the administrative activ- ities. Practically all the eXtra-terri- torial activities of government are connected with trade or finance or the United States The troubles in Nicaragua. in Guatemala in Costa Rica and so on, arose from financial activities which demanded govern men, alliance for their perfection.
 Almost all the diplomatic crises which arose with reference to the European situation have arisen by reason of the trade and financial ac- tivities of the United States in the war zone, and although the indus tries concerned with thcGa activities may have been relatively small. they Occunied no such relatively small part of government functions.
 Society as at present constituted is not concerned with any such pure ly abstract questions as good gov ernment, human welfare, social pro- gross. community happiness or the ike. These are questions which receive official attention only in so far as attending to them aids in the unhampered progress of business. Otherwise they will be relegated to the back ground where they can oc- cupy the fatuous attention of noisy theoreticians.
 All reforms that are ad- yocated are advocated because of an ulterior motive, and that is the welfare ultimately Of business enterprise. The many later day progressive measures are intro- duaed that business may be itself improved
 Most people laughed to scorn the crazy humanitarianism of Henry Ford when he paid his employees !, the minimum of five dollars day. But Ford had worked out that pro blem long before he had introduced the reform, and saw, he himself ad- mits, that it would pay. Guy E. Mills tells the story of the superin- tendent who complained to Ford of the ingratitude of Polish employee The Sup had gone to the Pole and ! t,.la tSad h iIaa ba aXino Sucl l