rches will
lay the matter to heart and secure regular and increased collections,
and if benevolent friends of these struggling races will bear them in
remembrance by special contributions, an uplift of hope and help will be
given where now they are threatened with discouragement in their great
conflict with poverty, ignorance and race prejudice.
* * * * *
CAPITAL AND LABOR.
Capital and labor are twin brothers, but they have been alienated almost
from childhood, and the strife between them waxes warmer and warmer,
and, like all other vexed questions, will never be settled till it is
settled right.
There are various forms of these troubles--now in the coal mines, now on
the railroads, and now in the shops--but there are aspects of the
struggle which put on national traits and overthrow empires. The French
Revolution was a struggle between capital and labor. The capitalists
were the aristocracy, and they monopolized also intelligence and power.
With these advantages they ground down labor till patience was changed
to implacable rage, and the reaction brought forth the most serious and
terrible massacres recorded in history.
Our great civil war of 1861-65 developed one aspect of the conflict
between capital and labor. The slaveholders were the capitalists, and
with them also were the intelligence and power. These levers were used
to crush down the laborer into the severest form of slavery known among
men. Labor was patient, but large sympathy was developed in the North in
favor of the slave. This alone would not have brought on the war.
Southern capitalists gloried in their power, and, accustomed to absolute
domination over their slaves, assumed the same attitude of superiority
over their fellow-citizens of the North. They ruled in Congress,
dominated over the press and the pulpit, and, ambitious to extend their
dominion, demanded larger territory for the extension of the slave
system. When this was refused, they set up an independent standard and
brought on the war. The end was disastrous to the South. The capitalists
were well-nigh ruined and the slaves were set free.
On this same plain, growing out of the embers of that same conflict,
another and almost as threatening a struggle is rising up before us. The
white race in the South still largely controls capital, intelligence and
power, and these forces are again used to hinder the impoverished
laborer. The white man holds office
|