The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-01-12

conscious than any OF the others. IT Is
not aware of itself. 1t does not know
1t is the prey of demagogues and of
propagandas, Labor appeals to it say
ing:
You, too are a worker for wages
Your interests are mine. Government
ownership and government control,
everything that will break monopoly
and lower the cost of living. Is to your
interest as we'll as to mine. Join me,
and we will run the country"
But capital also addresses the poor
salaried man by way of the other ear.
You are the child of opportunity"
ii tells him. What you want is un-
restricted opportunity, unrestricted
freedom for personal initiative in
making money. Thus you can make
your fortune just as I have made
mine.''
The poor salaried man doesn't
know which to believe. But one thing
is being borne in upon his conscious
ness and with painful clarity. If the
cost of living doesn't fall, or if 1t
keeps on rising. he will not be able
to exist at all. He begins to see that
to hammer down prices is his only
salvation. How is he going to do it ?
In one way the interests of the SAL
aried man and of the professional
differ from those of the laborer He
cannot go on strike with. effect "Di-
rect dCllOn QcS1SUeu 10 increase MS
reward is not of much good to him.
Collective bargaining with employers
is out of the question. And this for
several reasons. He works at too
many different things and under too
many different arrangements. The
| coal miners can strike and hold up the
whole country because the coal mines
are absolutely dependent upon them.
and because all of them are working
for the operators on substantially the
same terms The same is true of the
railroad men. the steel men. and a
host of others, But what would a
strike of bookkeepers come to, for ex-
| ample? Or of travelling statesmen?
1t takes a strong minority to defy
the majority. That is what the DO
licemen found out when they tried to
strike. The country simply wouldn't
let them strike. The newspaper re-
porters found out the same thing when
they tried to organize unions. Neither
the public nor the publishers would
stand for it, and perhaps rightly.
The middle class, then, to give it its
proper name, cannot work in unison
to raise its wages. as the laboring class
can. But it can work in unison to re-
| duce the cost of living, which Is SIM
| ply chopping off the same log at the
| other end In its methods of making
I a living it is too diverse to act in
unison. but in its method of buying
| necessities it is perfectly unified. All
of us face the problem of getting
enough to eat and to wear and a place
to live for the ever-dwindling stipend
We cannot act together to regulate
the amount we receive. but we can ACT
together to regulate the amount we
will spend. TO a surprising extent
Housewives boycotts and organiza-
tons of tenants in New York, local
and sporadic efforts tho they were
have shown the power of consumers
acting together. So have cooperative
stores which have -flourished here and
there. 1t would seem that the white
| collar class in this country with its
unions in imitation of labor unions. is
| on the wrong tack. and that the Mid
die Glass union of England, formed
/ for the purpose of influencing 1egisla-
| ton to lower the cost of living. is or
| the right tack. In a word, the CO.
| operative movement among consuffl-
| ers seems to be the solution OF the
| ever-more- pressing difficulty of the
middle class IF this movement wopfd
spread, if it should attain to a national
| organization. the middle class could
take its place with labor and capital
as force in controlling the distribu-
| ton of the things by which we live.