Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 84.djvu/467

Rh complaint by the lower grades of workers against the reward paid to those in the higher grades is as absurd as would be a complaint by raw Muscovado sugar because refined sugar brings a higher price.

The asserted power of capital is little better than a nightmare. There can be no federation of capital comparable with the existing federation of labor. The acquirement of capital, that is the saving of a part of one's income or wages, demands much personal independence and self-control, an individuality which makes impossible such slave-like obedience as prevails in labor unions. A monopoly, except through ownership of patents, can not exist in this land. The field for capital is wide open and if any man or corporation prove that a business is profitable, competitors appear quickly, demanding a share. The dwindling proportion of trade controlled by the United States Steel Company, by the American Sugar Refining Company as well as the bitter competition between manufacturers of tobacco amply confirm this statement. Capital constantly combines against capital. The fruit raisers of California unite against the transportation companies to secure unremunerative freight rates, as though the railroads are to blame because the orange and lemon groves are 4,000 miles from the Atlantic seaboard. The tobacco farmers of Kentucky combine against the manufacturers to increase the price of raw materials and enforce their mandates after the most approved trade-union methods; makers of heavy, bulky goods, in order to secure space cheaply, put their factories in out of the way places, but they denounce the transportation companies as robbers because these desire a fair remuneration for special construction and service. The sluggish capitalist, as shopkeeper or manufacturer, rails against his energetic competitor and finds prompt encouragement from politicians, who would tax the efficient man out of business and would leave the community at the mercy of inefficient managers, wedded to antique and expensive methods of production.

On the other hand, combination of labor is no mere possibility; it is an accomplished fact. Labor unions, though controlling only a small proportion of the hand-workers, have succeeded by compact organization in terrorizing office seekers and office lovers, so that legislative bodies grant their demands with little apparent reluctance—and this in spite of the fact that, in some portions of the country, the membership of great unions is largely alien. Compensation laws are enacted freely and are wholly against the "capitalist," who pays the wages to workingmen and the construction placed upon these laws almost invariably favors the employee. Such laws, unquestionably, have solid foundation in justice. An employer must have care for his servants who, too often, are helpless against careless fellow-workers. The employer should enforce discipline and should discharge at once the negligent, incompetent or disobedient employee as a source of danger to persons as well as to property. If he retain such employees, he is himself negligent and should pay the full