< Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 8.djvu
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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

labor, as capital, not theories, but immense and awful facts which must bruise and grind each other until they are worn into some finer social relations. The idea that some wrong principles in the first constitution of the facts might be changed, and the whole result might be ameliorated, never occurs to him. The whole affair must be fought out representatively and fairly; and, when the strongest force has manifested itself, right will prevail. He admits the many evils of trades-unionism, stating them with candor and force. But he believes the institution to be absolutely necessary. He says, on page 320:

"Laborers may, by combining, acquire an influence which, if exercised with moderation and discretion, employers will in general be willing rather to propitiate than to oppose. Among the concessions which may in consequence be obtained by unionists, the most material are those which affect the remuneration of labor, and these, it is commonly supposed, cannot, when due solely to unionist action, be of permanent operation. We have learned, however, in the course of the present chapter, that the fact of an increase in the rate of remuneration having been artificially caused, furnishes no reason why, in the great majority of cases, that increase should not be lasting.... Such being the efficacy of unionism, there is no difficulty in accounting for its popularity without resorting, in explanation of unionist loyalty, to any of those terrorist theories, the exaggerations of which have already been exposed, and on which no additional words need here be expended."

Mr. Thornton supports the extraordinary theory that an artificial rise of wages may be made into a permanent value by reconstructing the whole formula of supply and demand as it is enunciated by economists and men of affairs. He says, on page 108:

"The price of labor is determined, not by supply and demand, which never determined the price of any thing, nor yet by competition, which generally determines the price of everything else, but by combination among the masters. Competition in a small minority of cases, combination in a great majority, have appeared to be normally the determining causes of the rate of wages or price of labor."

It is not necessary to refute this theory in its relation to price and value—it refutes itself; common facts, occurring since he wrote, have nullified it. I am only stating the basis of trades-unionism in the words of its most intelligent advocate. It is interesting to compare these doctrines of Mr. Thornton with those of Josiah Warren, an American socialist, who approaches the question from the opposite direction. Mr. Warren works his theory of value, price, and supply and demand, out of the sovereignty of the individual, as he terms it; while Mr. Thornton's comes out of the historic organization of society, political and social, as well as economical. Mr. Warren was an earnest man, who has had and now has a great influence in forming the opinions of laborers and labor-agitators in this country. He says in his pamphlet on "True Civilization" (pages 41, 64, 100):

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