When they have learned enough to begin by _voting_, then we
shall have to look out. But if they keep on fighting, and always putting
themselves in the wrong and getting the worst of it, perhaps we can fix
the voting so we needn't be any more afraid of that than we are of the
fighting. It's astonishing how short-sighted they are. They, have no
conception of any cure for their grievances except more wages and fewer
hours."
"But," I asked, "do you really think they have any just grievances?"
"Of course not, as a business man," said the banker. "If I were a
working-man, I should probably think differently. But we will suppose, for
the sake of argument, that their day is too long and their pay is too
short. How do they go about to better themselves? They strike. Well, a
strike is a fight, and in a fight, nowadays, it is always skill and money
that win. The working-men can't stop till they have put themselves outside
of the public sympathy which the newspapers say is so potent in their
behalf; I never saw that it did them the least good. They begin by
boycotting, and breaking the heads of the men who want to work. They
destroy property, and they interfere with business--the two absolutely
sacred things in the American religion.
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