Page:Upbuilders by Lincoln Steffens.djvu/312



They are doing well; they may do better; but they may do something that Mr. Spreckels would not have done. Mr. Langdon may become jealous of his prerogatives; the mayor may adopt a policy that is repugnant to Mr. Spreckels, and yet not criminal. Mr. Spreckels will see then that he can’t, and that he shouldn’t, carry out his ideas, no matter how good they are, except in a legal office where he has himself the power and is, in his own person, responsible to the other citizens of the city, who should be free to elect or defeat him.

That means going to the people, yes, but Mr. Spreckels has learned something about the people. When I first met and heard him talk about “business,” I said:

“But, Mr. Spreckels, business won’t help you. You’ll find, if you go far enough into this political corruption, that business graft is at the bottom of it. And when you touch that, your own class, the business men of San Francisco, will go back on you.”

He smiled; he knew all that. But what, he didn’t know, and what I saw him find out when his own class did go back on him, was that the people, yes, even Labour, would listen. Organ- ized Labour, led by the same kind of selfish grafters that lead Organized Capital, held off