The Gem worker and the Idaho labor herald. (Boise, Idaho) 1914-1917, 1916-03-09


thru the railroad rebate (Which is
given just as freely to-day as at any,
time in the past notwithstanding the
sweet-sounding denials by railroad
owners and the large capitalists who
are benefited by them) has in most in
stances been so steered that monop-
oily has coerced small capitalistic units
into the support politically of its main
contentious not only over labor but
over the field of this uno ganized and
unprivileged capital.
Banking, transportation and mon
opolistic privileges in land and all
natural resources has given monopo-
listc capital such an advantage that
il has practically swept from the
field all competition in these lines,
leaving for the weaker and inorganic
ed elements of capital the less profit
able fields of endeavor while at the
same time holding them in coercive
support of political servants who sup
port monopoly first and capital after
ward, but opposing at all times the
forces of organized labor, who have
steadily spread their field and per-
fected their lines of defense
The fact that monpolistic capital
has been enabled to coerce the COM
petitive rival into upholding a self
destructive principle to the latter has
tended to create confusion in the
minds of many organided laborers
which makes them overlook the fact
that their greatest enemy is monop-
oily and that the legitimate capitalist
in competitive industry is in many
insances a brother victim.
Low wages, oppression and vio-
lence are in most all instances to be
found in those industries which are
monopolized. Where the principle OF
competition is free and untrammeled
between rival capitalists there is a
growing in dependence upon the part
of workers in those fields where they
have the advantage of choosing an
empiover In the monopolistie field
there is only one directing force to
whom the laborer is subject and who
fixes the wage.
The almost complete monopoliza-
tion of the field of industry has left
the laborer nothing but the power OF
cooperation in his fighting for a
just recompense
But it is very doubtful if private
monopoly will ever be broken up thru
a disintregating process and a return
TO the old order of competition be
tween contending units notwithstand
in gthe fact that the monopoly anc
trust is spurious instead of an ar
tifcial growth To return to the OLE
order is not the way of the world
Bad as has been the truts it has beer
an evolutionary process in the ad
vance toward universal organization
The very oppression of the grea
monopolists toward competitive cap
ital and labor, for the purpose of alb
sorbing the former and robbing out
right the latter, has stimulated
movement between the small capital
ist and the laborer, bring them close
together and doing much TO sprea
the general advance toward universe
cooperation upon all factors in hu
man activity.
Private monopoly in public utilit
will be the first to be evolved int
public monopoly When this be
comes a reality the spurious monor
oily that has not its foot somewher
in control of natural resource will ia
OF its own weight There have bee
many partial monopolists built Il
simply thru the process Of raiiroa
favoritism and the workings of III
scientific patent laws but these al
of small moment as compared wit
the great monopolies in public resoul
ces now in private hands All privai
monopoliesmust be destroyed but tf
first essential movement of impor
ance must be in theose great arterit
Of commerce which rest upon the lam
But there is no doubt in the worl
hut what the. people of this countr
+. will be masters Of the situation will
i II the next generation and that II