he outgrowth of
the conflicting interests of large and small capitalists.

The Republican and Democratic parties are alike threatened with
destruction. Their day of usefulness is past and they among them who see
the handwriting on the wall and call themselves "Progressives" and
"Insurgents," are struggling in vain to adjust these old parties to the
new conditions.

_Two Economic Classes._

Broadly speaking, there are but two economic classes and the ultimate
struggle will narrow down to two political parties. To the extent that
the workers unite in their own party, the Socialist party, the
capitalists, large and small, are driven into one and the same party.
This has happened already in a number of local instances, notably in the
City of Milwaukee. Here there is no longer a Republican or Democratic
party. These have merged in the same party and it is a capitalist party,
by whatever name it may be known.

Temporarily this united capitalist party, composed of the two old ones,
may stem the tide of Socialist advance, but nothing more clearly reveals
the capitalist class character of the Republican and Democratic parties
to their own undoing and the undoing of the capitalist system they
represent.

The great capitalists are all conservatives, "standpatters"; they have a
strangle-hold upon the situation with no intention of relaxing their
grip. Taft and Roosevelt are their candidates. It may be objected that
Roosevelt is a "Progressive." That is sheer buncombe. Roosevelt was
president almost eight years and his record is known. When he was in
office and had the power, he did none of the things, nor attempted to do
any of the things he is now talking about so wildly. On the contrary, a
more servile functionary to the trusts than Theodore Roosevelt never sat
in the presidential chair.

_La Follette vs. Roosevelt._

Senator La Follette now makes substantially this same charge against
Roosevelt, but by some strange oversight the senator did not discover
that Roosevelt's presidential record was a trust record until after
Roosevelt threw him down in the "Progressive" scramble for the
Republican nomination.

When Senator La Follette supposed he had Roosevelt's backing, he
pronounced him "the greatest man in the world," and it was only after he
fell victim to Roosevelt's duplicity that he made the discovery that
Roosevelt had always been the tool of the trusts and the enemy of the
people.

_Test of Parties._

Th