The Cordova daily times., 1923-03-08
THE MIDDLE CLASS

l Charles P. Steinmetz made a speech at the Boston Chamber of Commerce which all read CTS will do well to ponder. He spoke with great moderation, very dispassionately and so concisely that his speech is model of it's kind. The burden of it was that what he calls the "middle class''-by which he explains that he means ''the mass of small producers, distributors or otherwise industrially inde- pendent people of moderate means'' - was being wiped out by industrial corporations. Mr. Steinmetz went further and laid it down as clear that if this progressive tendency to eliminate the small independent producers and distributors continued, it would spell disaster, and would mean Ca segregation into few rich capitalists and mass of radical and possibly revolutionary proletarians."
 To put it simply, Mr. Steinmetz said that if American continues to speed up production and what many call efficiency indefinitely, its population will consist of few rich men and a very great many revolutionary proetar- ians. It may be possible that in the United States there does not exist at present that combination of Paradise and Cockagne that some would have us believe. but have to point out two thoughts called up by what this very able man said to the Boston Chamber of Commerce. The first, that one might say that he had somewhat limited the definiation of l the American middle class and, second, tha4 he had overlooked or omitted those moral and political questions that are raised in such a book as Mr. John Corbin's ''The Return of the Middle Glass;
 l Mr. Steinmetz is too careful thinker to 1 limit the middle class to small producers and distributors, and indeed adds to his definition bv including Enthusiastically independent people of moderate means,' but are not sure that 1 he has enough emphasized that such are very numerous, if by them he means those who do do regret that he did not point out, as he could do so we'll, how much the moral weight of not work in the various industries, and we their presence benefits the Commonwealth We say this because the ''mddle class' American in great many cases is bralnworker, and in addition to this possesses certain mental and moral traditions which he puts into prac- tice and which are great contrast to those possessed bv what their champions call the ''proletariat'
 Having a great deal of machinery handled by great many people making great quantl- ties of goods for great many people to buy does not of itself constitute the kingdom of Heaven and whatever our personal wishes may be in the premises, we cannot entirely leave 1Tno klnSOOm out Ol SlSIl Here It IS IH1I IHC threatened extinction of the middle class. as Mir. Corbin points out, has the gravest danger for that United States conception, which men still profess to be the best. In suppressing and atrophying the energy and livelihood of the middle people industrially and financially. Americans have at the same time made just SO many moral factors of no account. The i'm migrant of today has taken the place of that "middle c7ass'' but he does not fill it, and he will not fill it. Mr. Corbin says in his sec ond chapter. 'the well-known cost of living is, for the most part, only high wages come home i to roost,' and then says that these are the "buck'' passed by the capitalist and the wage earner to the middle class The of that class is overlooked and not particularly we'll liked by either proletarian or capitalist. Both know that in certain respects they are not his equals He cherishes moral, political and social traditions and principles which one has never known and the other finds inconvenient for business, around which has never hung q gardland of 'tservice.''
 But flourish for the time as may labor and proletariat, men will still ask the question as they have before on the demise of so many stately governments-how profitable may 1t be b State consciously to eliminate a body of people all of whose thoughts are not bent on the qualification of material desires?