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' girls 'who were educated for American citizenship in American schools;
and they will never understand that the men and women, the boys and
girls, who will work for them are essentially the same as they are, with
just as good blood running in their veins possibly better.
Now it isiot the fault of the Field boys. They have had nothing at
all to do with their destiny. It is no fault of theirs that they were born
the grandsons of Marshall Field the merchant prince instead of the grand
sons of a rag-picker.
Their grandfather ,has been dead over eight years, yet he planned the
citizenship of these grandsons when they were mere boys. He planned it
all out that they should become employers of vthousands of men and
women, of department store clerks, of street railway conductors, motor
men, superintendents, cashiers and managers, of telephone operators, line
men, foremen, superintendents and managers, of steam railway engineers,
conductors, firemen, switchmen, brakemen, telegraph operators, super
intendents, passenger agents, managers, presidents; and of machinists,
blacksmhs, painters, carpenters, car-builders, bricklayers, lawyers,, real
estate agents, electricians and bank presidents.
Their ideas of right and wrong and of social justice yes, even of
Christianity will be warped by their education and training, jusfc-as the
point of view and outlook of John JJ. Rockefeller, Jr., has been warped un
til he believes he is leading a Christian life when he makes war on women
and children in HIS coal fields of Colorado.
What chance have the sons of the Rockefellers, the Fields, the Ar
mours, the McCormicks, to become democratic citizens of this democratic
republic. What chance have they to become real MEN among men?
I read with some Interest, and more pity, th'estories in the Chicago
newspapers about how the third Cyrus McCormick was starting in at the
bottom working for the International Harvester Co. at $25 a week; and
also of his approaching marriage to some society belle as a great society
event in. Chicago.
But that is fiction. He isn't starting at the bottom. He CAN'T start
at the bottom. He was born at the .top. He doesn't have to work in order
to live. He doesn't have to live on that $25 a week and won't live on it.
He CAN'T live the life he has been trained to live, on any such sum. Yet
he will probably become in time one 'of the toasters of the harvester trust
and a member of Chicago's smell Casino Club.
What he read or was told at college may help him to philosophize '
about the poverty of the poor, and he may contribute to charity which
is one way the rich have of attempting to square themselves with God
but he can't understand starvation because he doesn't FEEL starvation;
he can't understand poverty because he was born rich and can get the best
of food, drink, clothing and shelter without WORKING FOR IT.
It will be mentally impossible for him to understand the rights and
wrongs of the working class.
That's what I mean when I say I pity those who are born to the mastef
class, for they must go through life ignorant of life in its deepest meaning,
masters in a world they can't understand.
The compensation for such a situation is the law of compensation it
self. Comparatively, the children of the ultra-rich are few, and they slough'
off gradually. The .family that the builder of a great fortune builds up
soon .peters out and passes from memory, while the poor multiply -and re-
plenish the earth,
x ' Chicago breeds along Halsted street and rots-on'heridantroad.' """'i
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