Page:Carl Sandburg - You and Your Job (1910).pdf/26

26 The workingmen of our country, too, are waking up to the game that is being played on them. A workingman's party, the Socialist party, is in the field. This party is run by workingmen. It is not like the old parties. It is honest and open about what it wants. You know right where it stands.

We want to get higher wages and lower hours. We want to give all the help we can to the labor unions. We want government pensions for old and worn-out workers. We want the government to pay sick and accident insurance to workingmen. We want to abolish child labor and put every boy and girl in school who ought to be in school. We want to stop the trade in poisoned and adulterated food. We want free text-books and every possible advantage in our public school system. We want to get for each man the full product of his labor. We want the government to stand back of every man and say: "You have a right to a job, always and at all times, and if you want to work you shall have work, and at good, living wages. If the capitalists will not provide, the government must."

The men who run the government now run it for the rich people and people who never do any useful work, either with hand or brain. They have got you workingmen divided. Some of you are Republicans. Some of you are Democrats. Nobody can explain the difference between the two—because there is no difference. You get jokes and speeches, free beer and torch-light processions before election day, but after