the aspiration toward equal citizenship became the keynote of labor's
earliest political movement. The issue was drawn primarily between the
rich and the poor, not between the functional classes, employers and
employes. While the workmen took good care to exclude from their ranks
"persons not living by some useful occupation, such as bankers, brokers,
rich men, etc.," they did not draw the line on employers as such, master
workmen and independent "producers."

The workingmen's bill of complaints, as set forth in the Philadelphia
_Mechanic's Free Press_ and other labor papers, clearly marks off the
movement as a rebellion by the class of newly enfranchised wage earners
against conditions which made them feel degraded in their own eyes as
full fledged citizens of the commonwealth.

The complaints were of different sorts but revolved around the charge
of the usurpation of government by an "aristocracy." Incontrovertible
proof of this charge was found in special legislation chartering banks
and other corporations. The banks were indicted upon two counts. First,
the unstable bank paper money defrauded the wage earner of a
considerable portion of the purchasing power of his wages. Second, banks
restricted competition and shut off avenues for the "man on the make."
The latter accusation may be understood only if we keep in mind that
this was a period when bank credits began to play an essential part in
the conduct of industry; that with the extension of the market into the
States and territories South and West, with the resulting delay in
collections, business could be carried on only by those who enjoyed
credit facilities at the banks. Now, as credit generally follows access
to the market, it was inevitable that the beneficiary of the banking
system should not be the master or journeyman but the merchant for whom
both worked.[4] To the uninitiated, however, this arrangement could only
appear in the light of a huge conspiracy entered into by the chartered
monopolies, the banks, and the unchartered monopolist, the merchant, to
shut out the possible competition by the master and journeyman. The
grievance appeared all the more serious since all banks were chartered
by special enactments of the legislature, which thus appeared as an
accomplice in the conspiracy.

In addition to giving active help to the rich, the workingmen argued,
the government was too callous to the suffering of the poor and pointed
to the practice of impriso