The Labor enquirer. [volume], July 24, 1886, Image 1

About The Labor enquirer. [volume] (Denver, Colo.) 1882-1888

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VOLUME VI-NO. 30.
RETROSPECTION.
Looking Back Over 110 Years
of Life Under the
Declaration. *
Where Are the “Inalienable and
Self-Evident Rights” of
the People i
A View of the Mocking Misery of
America’s J-ons Taken From a
Fourth of July Platform.
From Unknown Knight (Lincoln, Nebr.).
The following speech was delivered on
the evening of Jnly 6, at Government
square, bv J. R. Buchanan, editor of The
Labor Enquires, of Denver. As a great
deal of comment has been made on it,
and a number of our citizens failed to
hear it, we give it entire:
Are we a race of hypocrites ; or only
foolish children, who shout and dance
at an empty pyrotechnic exhibition?
Are we crafty asses disguised in lion’s
skins? or are we only enraptured urchins
following the band wagon?
One hundred and ten years ago, a band
of noble and brave men wrote, signed
and issued to the world, a document, the
like of which had never before been
known ; a document which immortalized
the names of its makers and made the
thrones of the world tremble as with an
earthquake—tremble as t hev had never
trembled before. -
To-day we celebrate the anniversary
of that act. Do we celebrate it with
the spirit and the understanding ? Have
we so honored the deed of the men of
’76; have we so guarded the legacy they
have left us, that we can with honest
tongues sing their praises to-day ? What
have we done with the talents they left
us? Let us see:
From a thousand platforms was read
yesterday that document, written by
Thomas Jefferson, and signed by the
representatives of the United States, on
Julv 4, 1776—the Declaration of Inde
pendence. It was applauded and songs
were sung in its praise. It is important
that we know what this wonderfal man
ifesto, that so concerns the people, con
tains. What says it? What are its
declarations and propositions ? Its fun
damental proposition is as follows :
“We hold these truths to be self-evi
dent : That all mbs are created equal ;
-that tfcwgr endowetrtry kberr creator
with certain inalienable rights, that
among these are u», liberty and the
pursuit of happiness. That to secure
these rights governments are instituted
among men, deriving their just powers
from the consent of the governed ; that
when any government becomes destruct
ive of these ends, it is the right and dntr
of the people to alter or abolish it”
That is the gist of fhe declarat ion. It is
Justice ! Reason! Truth I It is the logic
of intelligent existence ! Now, let us
see what it means.
It means that so clear —so plain—
so absolutely undeniable are the princi
ples recorded that they are self-evident.
Mark the language of the document:
“We hold these troths to be self-evi
dent.” That : s to say they need no ar
gument to establish their verity; no
man will dare question them ; no man
will argue against them.
The first of these self-evident truths
is,—“That all men are created equal.”
That is, that the creator endowed all
with an equal right to the inheritance
of the earth and all the materia! re
sources of the earth, to all the advan
tages of invention, and civilization.
That no lord, king, capitalist, banker,
broker, lawyer, or his child, has any
higher right than the poorest man or
his offspring to these natural bounties
or the accumulated knowledge of past
ages. If all men are created with equal
rights then no man has the right to en
dow his children with wealth wrung from
the people. If oar institutions permit one
child to be born amid wealth and lux
ury while another is ushered into life
midst poverty and misery; if one re
ceives without any effort upon his part,
ail the advantages of civilization and
culture, while another is condemned to
begin life’s struggle surrounded by ig
norance and squalor; if one babe be
sent supperlese to Bed while another
spews on silk, then all men are not born
equal, and we are hourly giving the he
to the sentiment of the declaration we
pretend to be so proud of. If we fully
believe the sentiment, then we most
honestly recognize that logically there
can be no just title to wealth, save that
oestowed bv the fact that It ha 3 been
honestly earned by its possessor.
The second truth contained in the
document is that God endowed all men
auheir birth with certain inalienable
rights. Remember that it declares that
these rights are inalienable; that is, that
they cannot be taken awav, not even by
the owner’s consent or will; they are a
birthright which cannot be sold, because
no one has a right to purchase them,
they are attached to every man; they
are the result of his condition, and no
■aw, no king, no thief can take them
from him. You may say this is ansurd ;
hat it destroys the ‘ individuality of
man that it interferes with the r ght
of man to do what ne pleases with his
own. You argue from the hypoth sis
easily overthrown when yon presume
that anything is "his own.” Man briws
nothing into the world when he cona^
THE LABOR ENQUIRER.
—and takes nothing when he departs.
He is simply endowed with the right to
use what is here, and if he misuses it,
he infringes the rights of future men.
If the father betrays his trust, then his
offspring, then his children are cheated
and are not born the equals of other
men. If he be robbed of his rights,
then the thief has stolen from the nn
born. ;
The rights with which all men are
equally endowed are not all specified in
the document. That is proved by the
use of the phrase “and among these
rights are,” etc. Bat from those enu
merated it is easy to deduct a principle,
and, conforming to it, discover and estab
lish every right of man.
The first right named is the right to
life. Every human being, therefore,
has the right to life —“inalienable” and
“self-evident.” And the right to life
carries with it the right to the means of
living; the things required to main
tain life. Consequently every man has
the right to the things necessary to sus
tain life. This conclusion is one of pure
logic and absolute truth. Every man
having the “self-evident” and “inaliena
ble” right to the means of living, has the
right to the full product of his labor ap
plied to the resources placed at his hand
by his Creator, He has the right to his
proportionate share of all the natnral
advantages of the land, air and* water,
and his proportionate equal share of all
the means of life discovered or created
by past dead generations, which have
been appropriated bv the robbers and
tyrants of the world.
The second right is the right to liberty.
That is that each man has -a “self-evi
dent” and “inalienable” right to liberty.
By this is meant that every man shall
have liberty to do what may best
contribute to his comfort and happiness,
so long as he does not infringe npon the
rights of another. That each man shall
be politically, economically and re
ligiously free. Tnat no man shall have
the right to enslave his fellow man —in
chattel or wages slavery. That no man
can be forced to labor for others, either
by the actual whip of the slave-driver,
nor by the more terrible knout of com
petitive industry wielded by grasping
capitalism. He cannot be compelled to
worship some ghostly god invented by
his masters; he cannot be compelled to
serve in tyrants’ armies to shed his
blood in contest with his own kind at
the dictates of jealous mouarchs or spec
ulating patriots. In lact he is entitled
to liberty in thought, speech and action,
in the fullest, completest sense, each lib
erty only ceasing when it trenches on
thy ground where thefHbe.ty of another
begins.
The third right is broader and greater
still. In fact it is the quintessence of
all the rights of man. It is the “inalien
able,” “self-evident” right to the pursuit
of happiness. This does not mean the
right to chase after happiness; bnt the
right to enjoy it —the equal right to be
happy. This implies the right -to the
things essential to happiness, and brings
os back, if yon please, to a contempla
tion of the rights we have already con
sidered.
The most significant words in the
declaration, which I recommend to your
careful consideration in your calmer
moments, are those which tell us in
trumpet tones that governments are in
stituted solely to secure these rights to
us, and that when it fails to do that it is
our right and duty to alter or abolish
that government.
I ask yon now, as we celebrate the an
niversary of the day when Jefferson,
the loftiest man of the nation, panned
the words I have quoted—l ask you now,
men and women of the United States,
how have the words been —how are
they observed ? Is it the substance or
the shadow that you have to-day ? Is
the Declaration of Independence with
yon a fact or a memory ? Look aroand
this land and answer. Look over this
country which was wont to be the cradle
of liberty and equality, and tell me if
the hopes of Jefferson, Paine, Franklin
and Patrick Henry have been fulfilled.
Wipe the dust from your eyes and gaze
up m the structure of modern society
and tell me if it is in harmony with the
foundation laid 110 years ago. View
this society of princes and paupers and
then reply. See the prisons, the alms
houses, the hovels, and mark in contrast
the pinnacled palaces that frown down,
as the castles of the robbers of old, upon
the common people, and tell me if the
“self-evident” truths of old have not
been trampled upder the iron heels of
Greed and Oppression!
Behold in the glare of sunlight the
daughter of the republican nobility, in
silks and laces and gleaming jewels, re
clining upon velvet cushions, surronnded
bv the perfumes of sweet flowers. Then
observe in the shado w of the splendid
emporiums of trade, the crouching
forms of the poor, the thief, the beggar,
the prostitute—squalid, hungry, misera
ble ; and tell me where is your boasted
equality.
Stand with me beside that heavily
burdened grain warehouse in Buffalo
and look/upon the dead and emaciated
forma of a mother aijd her two little
e-iarve<| children ; turn from the groan
ing tame and sideboard of the booker or
railrofd king and contemplate t|e han
ger iathe laborer’s house or/sewing
womtn’s attic, andAhen tell mS where
is the equal right /£> the meaWs of life .
Look upon the Another in hei comfort
able, happy home, surrounded by her
well-fed, well-clothed, laughing, singing
children ; look until your eyes are filled
with the tears of sympathetic pleasure.
DENVER, COLORADO, SATURDAY, JULY 24. 1886.
Then turn and gaze until they are dry
and baked with pain at the half naked,
famishing child which togs at the
sunken breast of its starring mother—
she who has been robbed of an * inalien
able” right, and now prays that death
may take herself and child. Look npon
these two every-day pictures, and say
where is the equal right to be happy!
Sainted Henry ! I cry to thee! Were it
not better that a few braye and holy men
should have died upon the gibbet in the
olden time than that we should have
lived to endure this misery, and witness
this mockery ?
Far be it from me to sav one word that
would be distorted into disrespect to the
memory of or ingratitude to the fathers
of the Revolution; the grand heroes
who said to the kings of the world : the
days of your ill-gotten pawer, the days
of your oppressions and brutalities are
come to an end ; who said to the poor
and down-trodden, the men of Banker
Hill and Lexington, “we bring you a
message, a message written by the hand
of God, its words are a magic trinity—
you ark free !” No! when I shall forg9t
or fail to honor Adams, Lee, Jefferson,
Carroll, Hopkins, Sherman, Franklin,
Hancock, and all the patriots of 1776 k
may memory cease for me. I have stood
in old Independence Hall, at Philadel
phia, have caressed the old bell whose
iron tongue spoke out the startling sen
tence against tyranny and told the world
America was free, and my heart has
swelled within me and my eyes have
filled with tears, when I thought how the
breach which had torn the old
bell from crown to lip was like
the chasm that has arisen between
the hopes of the long ago. and
the realities of the present. And I said
to the bell: “You are dethroned ; your
voice no longer makes the music that
charms —another more modern singer
occupies yonr place in the belfry, and
you have been torn from your proud
estate to become an object of curiosity
to the idle and flippant, who remember
nothing of the grand song you sang when
in the olden time fifty-six workingmen
burst assunder the shackles of the new
world.”
I have traversed the old battle field
aroand aboat Trenton, and I have
thought of the deeds of bravery and sac
rifice which it seemed to me had sancti
fied the ground; but hallowed as it
should be it has not escaped the evil
spirit of the age, the claw of the specula
tor has been laid upon it; the iron of the
shark has schnrged it. What is there
then that remains to ns, in its simple
parity, of the sentiments *nil deeds we
profete to celebrate and to-day 7
Nothing. >3
Go to the i,000,000 vagabonds who to
day tramp, tramp, tramp the land over
in search of the opportunity to procure
the means of subsistence and find it not,
and ask them where are their “inalien
able rightsask them why they are
driven from place to place, why they are
hanted as mad-dogs by the police of a
bloated aristocracy in the “land of the
free and the home of the bravein a
country which once boasted that it was a
refuge for the plundered and oppressed
of all nations. Go to the little hunery
and ragged archins who plod like cattle
in the Hells Mills of New England and
the mines of Pennsylvania' that they
may prolong an existence destined to
end in starvation, and ask them where
is their inalienable right to pursue hap
piness ; ask them why they are not
within the great free schools of oar mod
ern Christian civilization. Ask them if
they do not know that Christ blessed
little children and said “that of such is
the kingdom of heaven,” and if they do
not think they are rather haggard and
dirty looking subjects of which to make
angels ?
Go to the street cafr driver, working
sixteen hours a day./for a bare subsist
ence, whose lot is ten-fold more inhu
man than ihat of the animal he-drives,
and whose body is put as a target for the
poverty-stricken cteperate tramp, that
his masters may declare large dividends
and live in palaces. Go to him I sav,
and ask what of/ the inalienable right
declared to be his and written in the
blood 6f freedom’s martyrs more than
100 years ago ? / Go to the widows and
orphans of thp men shot down at East
St. Louis, at McCormick’s and at the
mines of Illinois by the hirelings of ty
rants and robbers and ask them where
is the life which Jefferson said was the
inalienable right with which all men
were endowed bv their Creator? Look
through the bars into monopoly’s
prisons in the south west.—in Texas and
Kansas —aiid tell me what of liberty,
what of the right of tree speech ; what of
tl|e rightjto protest agaiast injustice and
tyranny i
Think of the thousands who have
been driven fn»m their native soil bv
the merciless encroachments of railroad
and land syndicates and wonder what
has become of the right to the means of
life supposed to be guaranteed by the
declaration of the right to life. Go ask
all these victims, and a million others ;
think on these terrible records and
scenes and a million more, and then ask
yourself, I asked ■¥au__ifl- begin
niag-of-titie address : “Are we worship
ing today the substance or the shadow V’
Then, weary and disgusted as you will
be, move on to Washington ; enter the
capital; g* into the halls of congress, and
ask the men who sit there this question:
“Sirs, tell me I beseech you, why are
governments instituted ? Are they for
the purpose, as our magna charter says,
of securing the governed in the rights
with which all men are endowed by
“WHO WOULD BE FREE HIMSELF MUST STRIKE THE BLOW!’*
~~ * * -, . >—■ ;>►* • ■ . *
their Creator ? Or are they for the pur
pose of protecting the privileges of the
powerful few at the sacrifice of the rights
of the many ?” They will tell you, hyp
pocritee and traitors that they are, that
governments are instituted for the pur
poses laid down in the declaration to
which von have referred.
Then ask them for an account of their
stewardship. Ask them to point yon to
one act of any consequence performed
by the representatives of your govern
ment in the years which has been
in accord with these principles. Let
them tarn over the records of aided land
steals, illicitly purchased charters, con
niving with bond-sharks, political ras
caliif, bleeding of the honest work era
and reckless and licentious expenditure
of the people’s wealth. Bring out the
whole horrible record of bribery and
corrtfrdion; of recklessness and treach
ery. Learn of the robbery of the widow
and orphan, the washerwoman, the la
borer, the mechanic, the plowman ; then
ask once more of these sleek, easy-going,
laissez faire men at the head; “Why
are governments instituted among
men V
Go to the ash pile, the rag man, the
lumber room and contemplate what re
gains of the ocean of documents closely
signed by the citizens of the United
States —documents which have been for
years praying for the protection and
amelioration of an oppressed and un
happy people, and then ask yohr sena
tors and representatives what they have
done wfiji the right of petition which
was established fhr you through the de
votion and labors of John Quincy
Adams In 1836. Ask them what has
been done with the right to amend or
alter the constitution when the needs of
the people demanded it, and why you
always have, “It is unconstitutional”
flung in your facs when you ask for sub
stantial relief from your sufferings.
(This query might also be propounded
to that chief tool of monopoly—the su
preme bench of the United States],
When yon have asked the questions
that will naturally occur to you if you
are in earnest in your inquiry, then see
if you can find one man in the capital
who remembers that George Washing
ton said, when he came to sign the con
stitution (which, by the way, was not m
conformisy with the Declaration of In
dependence, and was opposed by such
patriots as Jefferson, Paine and Henry,
and which was not adopted by all the
states until three years after it was
drafted) see if any of them remember
that Georgf Washington sail], while he
tion the probability is that never again
will an opportunity be offered to cancel
another in peace—the next will be
drawn in blood!” And this from the
father of his coantry, when the wounds
of the Revolution were still bleeding.
Was there not a warning in these words?
Were not the most important amend
ments to that constitution, without
which it crave the lie to the Declaration,
drawn in blood, in the blood of 1,000,000
men, which flowed throngh four years of
the most terrible civil war? Have the
words no warning yet unfulfilled ? We
shall see.
What is the matter with the country
to-day, when men who have never been
known to concern themselves until
lately about the material affairs of the
1 people, are writing startling articles for
the magazines and are delivering as
tounding lectures npon such subjects as
“The Danger Ahead,” “The Spectre of
the Nineteenth Century,” “Whither Are
We Drifting,” and the like ? Figures are
dry, I know, and statistics are not inter
esting to all audiences and, as a-rule, I
deal as little as possible in them; but it
seems necessary now that I should devi
ate from my usual custom, f>r the pur
pose of showing why I have no sympa
thy with the twaddle that is talked by
the ordinary Fourth of July orator and
also that none may say that I have sim
ply growled in general terms without
showing one reason for my discontent.
I have asserted that the principles of
‘the Declaration of Independence have
been trampled under foot in the mad
race for wealth and that the producers
have been robbed by the upholders of
our present economic and industrial
system; now let us, for a few moments
look at the cold facts, as presented by
statistics, statistics whieh are well au
thenticated :
The increase in the wealth ( of the
coantry for the thirty years, from )SSO to
1880 was $1,197 per head, notwithstand
ing the rapid increase of population.
The total increase in the aggregate
wealth of the country for the same pe
riod was $41,820,000,000. All this in
crease was due to the hand of labor.
Now where is it alt ? ■ Surely not in the
possession of the laborers, who are poorer
now than in 1850. Up until as late as
1866 there was not a tramp in the land ;
in 1878 the country swarmed with them,
and every year sees the number of these
poor, helpless and wretched creatures
increasing at an enormous rate. You
ask me where is this wealth. Well 9,-
000,000,000 and over of it is in the hands
of nine railroad corporations; as much
more is in the possession of the bankers,
and the remainder has been gobbled tip
by land sharks, cattle kings, ditch com
panies and “protected” manufacturers.
During the last twenty years the re
publican leaders and their democratic
allies —the two great parties which have
taken it npon themselves to care for the
coantry and the people whom Jefferson
declared shoald -forever be their own
masters and government —these two rep
resentative wings of our free republican
institutions have daring the past twenty
years, I say, created two gigantic mo
nopolies—one of money and the other of
transportation. To one it gave fall con
trol of the financial exchange, with a
government-endorsed money subsidy
of $560,000,000, and an open letter of
credit for an unlimited amount. To the
other it gave $60,000,000 in money and
266,000,000 acres of the public domain,
the people’s heritage, the chief means of
maintaining that life, to which we are
told all men have an equal inalienable
right
In 1884 the railroads collected from
the people of the United States the sum
of $770,356,716. The net profits, after
paying all expenses, for damages, re
pairs, extensions, additions to rolling
stock, etc., besides nearly $300,000,000,
interest on bonded debt, was, $310,682,-
877. The last item amounts to an oat
and oat steal, as the interest on the
bonds, which belong to themselves is all
they are entitled to, even under the
present system, for the use of their capi
tal. This is where part of your wealth
has gone. If I should give you the fig
ures of the banks they would show yon
a record ten times as black. It takes
considerable of yonr nation’s wealth to
pay the Vanderbilt estate an income of
$1,500 per hour.
And what are you going to do,
can yap do aboat it ? Appeal to con
gress ? Ask the government for help ?
Listen to what a committee of the
United States senate said in a report in
1874: “There are to-day four men rep
resenting fonr trank lines between Chi
cago and New York who possess and not
anfrequently exercise powers which the
congress of the United States would not
venture to exertaud congress gave
them this power and at that very time
was supporting them in it. But the re
port continues : “They (these four men)
may at any time, by a single jtroke of
the pen, reduce the value of property in
this country by hundreds of millions of
dollars.” And the man who protests
against this sort of thing is called a
cranky and it is quite a common thing
lately for him to be hunted down by the
sienth hounds of the robbers, hacked by
the government, and thrown into
prison.
These railroad and money kings own
your congress, your executive and your
judiciary, and yon are slaves. The la
borer may still own his body, but his
time, his energies and his manhood are
in chains. He can no more command
the reward of his toll, nor cont-ffifhX
product of his labor than hiau
toother iu a bonthelin bondage. ; vt thti
rate by which fortunes bees' aCCT j>
mulated during the past two decades U
score of monopolists will hold all the
wealth of the nation ere many years;
the rule of the system being that
“whales eat big fish; big fish eat and lit
tle fish eat —mud.” And the next gen
eration instead of inheriting liberty will
find fastened upon itself -the chains of
absolute bondage.
With this system, crime, insanity, sui
cide, pauperism, and all their kindred
ills increase proportionately with the
accumulation of wealth into the hands
of a few. Others than “labor agi’ators”
begin to see these things. Says Rev.
Dr. Talmage: “The society of this na
tion is out of joint. While some men
have more than they desei ve, others do
not get what belongs to them. If things
go on as they are now going all the
troubles of Ireland will be here, but in
worse shape.”
Rev. Dr. Pullman said: “The really
dangerous classes are behind rosewood
doors and under frescoed ceilings.”
And thousands of the thinking men of
our country, who have been Bilent so
long are speaking in this strain with he
roic earnestness to-day. What say you,
workingmen, what say you at this time
when we commemorate a grand and
glorious epoch in the history of our
country? We are traveling the road
traversed by Rome and Greece, and all
the other nations of the past, and we
shall share their fate unless we do some
thing which they did not. This is true
or all historv is a lie.
What shall we do ? That is the ques
tion. Well, first, let us throw off all hy
pocrisy ; let us atop trying to humbug
the world and cease deceiving ourselves
by pretending that we are free people;
let us stop shouting of an equality which
we know naught of. Instead of boast
ing, loud-mouthed that we are the de
scendants of thejnen of ’76, let us under
stand their memory has been traduced,
their deeds forgotten aud tueir princi
ples trampled in the mire of a corrupt,
money-making, man killing, soul-damn
ing age.
The people must act while they yet
have a remnant of freedom left, and the
necessary preliminaries to action are or
ganization and e location —organ zation,
because there must be combination and
method in, the action; education, be
cause it Is necessary to know what we
want and how most effectually to secure
it at the least possible cost. Now in the
matter of education, it has been truly
said that the first thing needed in the
true education of the people in their
rights and duties is that they unlearn a
great many things which are now a part
of themselves. We have false notions of
property, of so-called vested rights, of
personal superiority. We have national
prejudices, from which spring a sense
less and empty thing we call patriotism,
and crafty politicians play npon all these
strings and lull us to sleep while they
pick opr pockets. For instance, witness
theJjombast aboat “loyalty to the old
flag” which has been dealt ont by the
professional orator at this annual na
tional celeb^dion.
No man loves the American flag more
than I, and no man’s heart thrills more
than mine it-flcats in the breeze;
but I have a contempt, a bitter hatred
for the political traffic which is carried
on nnder it. This same flag which has
commanded respect from all countries
of the world, has been the shield under
which the most horrible of crimes have
been committed, crimes greater than
that when it was fired upon at Snmter.
Men who fonght for the flag at Gettys
burg and who kissed it in victory dirty
and ballet-ridden at Appomatox have
since been butchered In its name *» the
dictation of bond-holders and land
nrilteTT Slough, Califefnia,
Seattle, vVashington Territory and Eas*.
St.~Louis. The old flag floats from the
roofs of legislative halls, state and na
tional, where for twenty years or more
the rights of the people, who have
fonght in the trenches to maintain its
supremacy, have been bartered and sold
to tneir enemies. If yon raise yonr
voice against the traitors who have be
trayed yon, the cry is that you are strik
ing at the government and the much
abused aud misused flag is unfurled in
your face. ’
Now what I would have you unlearn
in this particular is, that all that is done
under and in the name of your flag is
sacred—-ail the flags in Christendom
cannot make a wrong deed right. If
yon love your flag then resolve that it
shall no longer be used as a cloak to hide
the rascality of politicians and hirelings
of capitalism. If you care aught for
your government then declare to-day
that it shall be yours in fact as well as in
name and that the usurper and betray
ers shall step down and out, or be palled
down bv the wronged people.
Another absurd idea which is held by
many of our people to-day is, that a man
who was born in a foreign country is not
as good, is not entitled to the* same re
spect and rights as he of American birth.
I care not how unpopular such a senti
ment may b'e, or how it may raise the ire
of the narrow-minded, still I say to you,
in the language of the Declaration of In
dependence, that “all men are born
equal,” no matter in what country they
may have first seen the light. Do yon
not see how ridiculous is the contrary
idea? Do you not aee tnat every man
who expresses an opinion opposite to
this insults the memory of his ancestors
even if he can trace his genealogy hack
to the Mayflower—and many of?those
who bold this foolish prejudice qh, not
have to go farther back than iheirljrand
parenta to find their family tree rooted
in foreign soil.
My friends itls the tyrant of Europe,
the robber off America who are inter
ested in puffing you up with what they
call national (pride and patriotism. The
spoliation of the poor of the new and
the old worlfl is carried on upon much
the same plain; and the struggle which
is upon you is not one of races, but it is
a class war—the workers, who are poor,
upon the one hand, and the idlers, who
are rich, upo l the other. And you are
fools and wil be lost if you longer allow
your despoil! rs to array you one against
the other bee lose you were not all bora
in one land. 1 The cause of the poor of
Ireland, Engljand, Germany, France and
all other lands is yours as your cause is
theirs. Thp struggle of the Russian
Nihilist agaipst autocracy and tyranny
is your struggle, else you are not true to
the precepts land principles of ’76. Then
let us join hands across the waters, so to
speak, let us wipe out boundary lines,
and let this be pur motto henceforth ;
“The world is my country; to do good
my religion.] This is the first step to
ward the organization which is neces
sary to success.
I might discusi at length the religious
prejudice of the time (which, thank God,
is growing smaller and smaller), and
there are other phases in the matter of
prejudices which are kept alive by our
enemies to keep us apart, but you can
think for- yourselves upon them, and I
will not take your time now by going
over the whoWground.
But remember, the hour has come
when we must draw closer to each other.
There must be a union of the laborer,
the mechanic, the farmer, the clerk, the
small merchant, and the honest men of
the professional classes. Our interests
are identical; we most stand together,
or fall apart. Remember the words of
one of the signers of the Declaration :
“Now we must hang together; or we
will hang separately.”
I jwitt HDw e&seose any ..special pi an
of olganiaatien—it will noi; be expected
we in us t combhie*intelligently, if
we would save the liberties the last rem
nants of which are slipping from us, and
I sav to you “not to be a slave is to dare
and do.”
In educating the first text book we
need is the Declaration of Independ
ence ; that tells us what our rights and
duties are, and the methods by which
we can regain and protect them will
naturally evolve from an .honest ani
thoughtful consideration of oar situation
from the standpoint of the principles
therein laid doa n. It also tells us that
when a government becomes destructive
of certain ends it is the right and duty
of the people to alter or abolish that
government, and to erect a new one, lay
ing its foundations upon such princi
ples as shall seem best calculated to pro
tect their rights. The principles upon
[Continued on (earth page.]
PRICE FIVE CENTS.
TWO SIDES.
The Document Issued by Dis
trict Assembly 24,
of Chicago,
And the Answer by A. R. Par
sons, From Behind the
Bastile Bars.
Two Sides of a Prominent Question
Presented for the CarefU Con.
snraratlon of the 'PnhUe.
[As a great deal has been said about
the connection of A. R. Parsons with
the Knights of Labor, and considerable
stress has been laid upon the utterances
of the Chicago press npon the question,
I give below two extracts from JShe Chi
cago Herald, which are self-explaining.
Some friends doubted that The Equlrir
would print the mattei; bat that’s where
they were mistaken. This paper believes
in fairness, and any man, woman or
child with a just cause can get a hearing
in its columns,— Ed. Enquirer.]
The following was reported in district
assembly No. 24, Knights of Labor, by
the committe on publication and legisla
tion Friday night, pursuant to a resolu
tion introduced June IS by George
Rodgers. The statement, together with
the accompanying ~ resolution, was
adopted by the district assembly, and
ordered published:
*■ “In view of the endeavors being made
by divers persons to place the Knights
of Labor of Chicago in a position of sym
pathy and affiliation with Anarchists
and the followers of the red flag, it has
been thought best by district assembly
No. 24 to issue this statement:
"First of all, the Knights of Labor are
an organization of peace. The order has
its aims and its objects for the better
ment of the condition of its members;
but it is only by peaceful agitation, ar
gument and arbitration that it hopes to
attain them. Nothing else is taught in
the national, district or local assemblies
of the order than peaceful revolution,
accompanied by the justice and eqaity
of the demands of the order npon that *
public opinion which is the basis of oar
government. District assembly No. 24
has over 100 assemblies and 20,000 mem
bers. Not a single charge of violence
hasTbrten sustained against a member
daeiug the troablons times of early sum
mbi t and not s/Wtrike has occurred an- y
derlthe orders of the district, while
scores ofhfSiplent difficulties between
employers and employes have been sat
isfactorily arbitrated.
“It ought to be plain to every right
minded citizen that there can be no
sympathy or affiliation between such an
organization and a body of men who,
while publicly proclaiming themselves
at war with society, advocate what they
call ‘social war,’ but what is in reality
violence and murder. This class of per
sons, flaunting themselves as the friends
and representatives of the labor element
of the citv, have done the working peo
ple of Chicago more injury and have
proved a greater block in the way of
progress than all other causes combined.
They have been the first to foment
trouble and the first to retire from it
From a well-founded hatred of organ
ized labor they Save worked unceasingly
to break it down, and they are to-day
its worst enemies. Not only can there
be no sympathy, affiliation or co-opera
tion between the Knights of Labor and
Anarchists, but your committee believes
that no Knight who fulfills bis pledges
can hold and publicly proclaim the doc
trines of Anarchism. It is believed
that the good of the order will be sub
served if the Anarchists now unfortu
nately holding memberships in the or
der were forced outside its ranks, where
they could no longer violate its privi
leges by advocating riot and murder,
and that the doors of the order should
be hereafter closed against all followers
of the red flag. To make this recom
mendation effective, the following stand
ing resolution is respectfully presented.
It does not touch Socialism as a theory
of government, but deals only with An
archists and Anarchism
Resoly, d, That »a case a member of
any local ass&moly attached to district
assembly No. 24 should publicly advo
cate or avow his belief in what is coni
monly known as Anarchism, the local
assembly shall, if the charge is legally
substantiated, expel the member so
charged. If it is proved that any candi
date for admission into the order is a be
liever in what is known as Anarchism,
it shall be a permanent bar to his ad
mission. A violation of this resolution
shall subject the offending assembly to
the penalties prescribed in the constitn
tntion Respectfully submitted,
H. J. Carr, Chairman Committee.
F. J. Veth, Secretary.
Anarchist Parsons, from his retreat in
the county jail, is a keen observer of the
events transpiring in tne w irld without
qim. He reads the newspapers dilli
gently every day and makes copious
notee, particularly on all matters relating
to the existing differences betwee n cap
ital and labor.
The appended commnnication was
prepared by him as a reply to a recent
statement pat forth nnder the name of
district assembly No. 24 of the Knights
of Labor of this city :
[Continued on fourth page.]