clear case of a strife in which
ultimate success is a complete test of the justifiability of the course
of those who made the strife. If the men win an advance, it proves that
they ought to have made it. If they do not win, it proves that they
were wrong to strike. If they strike with the market in their favor,
they win. If they strike with the market against them, they fail. It is
in human nature that a man whose income is increased is happy and
satisfied, although, if he demanded it, he might perhaps at that very
moment get more. A man whose income is lessened is displeased and
irritated, and he is more likely to strike then, when it may be in
vain. Strikes in industry are not nearly so peculiar a phenomenon as
they are often thought to be. Buyers strike when they refuse to buy
commodities of which the price has risen. Either the price remains
high, and they permanently learn to do without the commodity, or the
price is lowered, and they buy again. Tenants strike when house rents
rise too high for them. They seek smaller houses or parts of houses
until there is a complete readjustment. Borrowers strike when the rates
for capital are so high that they cannot employ it to advantage and pay
those rates. Laborers may strike and emigrate, or, in this country,
take to the land. This kind of strike is a regular application of
legitimate means, and is sure to succeed. Of course, strikes with
violence against employers or other employes are not to be discussed at
all.

Trades-unions, then, are right and useful, and it may be that they are
necessary. They may do much by way of true economic means to raise
wages. They are useful to spread information, to maintain _esprit de
corps_, to elevate the public opinion of the class. They have been
greatly abused in the past. In this country they are in constant danger
of being used by political schemers--a fact which does more than
anything else to disparage them in the eyes of the best workmen. The
economic notions most in favor in the trades-unions are erroneous,
although not more so than those which find favor in the counting-room.
A man who believes that he can raise wages by doing bad work, wasting
time, allowing material to be wasted, and giving generally the least
possible service in the allotted time, is not to be distinguished from
the man who says that wages can be raised by putting protective taxes
on all clothing, furniture, crockery, bedding, books, fuel, utensils,
and too