fellow workmen from obtaining any real industrial independence. They it is who bring about the result that the most disagreeable and dangerous classes of labor remain the poorest paid; and as long as they are permitted to have their full effects upon the labor situation, progress to a higher standard of living is miserably slow and always suffers a severe setback during a period of hard times. From any comprehensive point of view union and not non-union labor represents the independence of the laborer, because under existing conditions such independence must be bought by association. Worthy individuals will sometimes be sacrificed by this process of association; but every process of industrial organization or change, even one in a constructive direction, necessarily involves individual cases of injustice.

Hence it is that the policy of so-called impartiality is both. impracticable and inexpedient. The politician who solemnly declares that he believes in the right of the laboring man to organize, and that labor unions are deserving of approval, but that he also believes in the right of the individual laborer to eschew unionism whenever it suits his individual purpose or lack of purpose, — such familiar declarations constitute merely one more illustration of our traditional habit of "having it both ways." It is always possible to have it both ways, in case the two ways do not come into conflict; but where they do conflict in fact and in theory, the sensible man must make his choice. The labor question will never be advanced towards solution by proclaiming it to be a matter of antagonistic individual rights. It involves a fundamental public interest the interest which a democracy must necessarily take in the economic welfare of its own citizens; and this interest demands that a decisive preference be shown for labor organization. The labor unions are perfectly right in believing that all who are not for them are against them, and that a state which was really "impartial" would be adopting a hypocritical method of retarding the laborer from improving his condition. The unions deserve frank and loyal support; and until they obtain it, they will remain, as they are at present, merely a class or

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ganization for the purpose of extorting from the political and economic authorities the maximum of their special interests.

The labor unions should be granted their justifiable demand for recognition, partly because only by means of recognition can an effective fight be made against their unjustifiable demands. The large American employer of labor, and the whole official politico-economic system, is placed upon the defensive by a refusal frankly to prefer unionism. Union labor is allowed to conquer at the sword's point a preferential treatment which should never have been refused; and the consequence is that its victory, so far as it is victorious, is that of an industrial faction. The large employer and the state are disqualified from insisting on their essential and justifiable interests in respect to the organization of labor, because they have rejected a demand essential to the interest of the laborer. They have remained consistently on the defensive; and a merely defensive policy in warfare is a losing policy. Every battle the unions win is a clear gain. Every fight which they lose means merely a temporary suspension of their aggressive tactics. They lose nothing by it but a part of their equipment and prestige, which can be restored by a short period of inaction and accumulation. A few generations more of this sort of warfare will leave the unions in substantial possession of the whole area of conflict; and their victory may well turn their heads so completely that its effects will be intolerable and disastrous.

The alternative policy would consist in a combination of conciliation and aggressive warfare. The spokesman of a constructive national policy in respect to the organization of labor would address the unions in some such words as these: "Yes! You are perfectly right in demanding recognition, and in demanding that none but union labor be employed in industrial work. That demand will be granted, but only on definite terms. You should not expect an employer to recognize a union which establishes conditions and rules of labor inimical to a desirable measure of individual economic distinction and independence. Your recognition, that is, must depend upon conformity to another set of conditions, imposed in the interest of efficiency and

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individual economic independence. In this respect you will be treated precisely as large corporations are treated. The state will recognize the kind of union which in contributing to the interest of its members contributes also to the general economic interest. On the other hand, it will not only refuse to recognize a union whose rules and methods are inimical to the public economic interest, but it will aggressively and relentlessly fight such unions. Employment will be denied to laborers who belong to unions of that character. In trades where such unions are dominant, counter-unions will be organized, and the members of these counter-unions alone will have any chance of obtaining work. In this way the organization of labor, like the organization of capital, may gradually be fitted into a nationalized economic system."

The conditions to which a "good" labor union ought to conform are more easily definable than the conditions to which a "good" trust ought to conform. In the first place the union should have the right to demand a minimum wage and a minimum working day. This minimum would vary, of course, in different trades, in different branches of the same trade, and in different parts of the country; and it might vary, also, at different industrial seasons. It would be reached by collective bargaining between the organizations of the employer and those of the employee. The unions would be expected to make the best terms that they could; and under the circumstances they ought to be able to make terms as good as trade conditions would allow. These agreements would be absolute within the limits contained in the bond. The employer should not have to keep on his pay-roll any man who in his opinion was not worth the money; but if any man was employed, he could not be obliged to work for less than for a certain sum. in return for such a privileged position, the unions would have On the other hand, to abandon a number of rules upon which they now insist. Collective bargaining should establish the minimum amount of work and pay; but the maximum of work and pay should be left to individual arrangement. An employer should be able to give a peculiarly able or energetic laborer as much more than

the minimum wage as in his opinion the man was worth; and men might be permitted to work over time, provided they were paid for the over time one and one-half or two times as much as they were paid for an ordinary working hour. The agreement between the employers and the union should also provide for the terms upon which men would be admitted into the union. The employer, if he employed only union men, should have a right to demand that the supply of labor should not be artificially restricted, and that he could depend upon procuring as much labor as the growth of his business might require. Finally in all skilled trades there should obviously be some connection between the unions and the trade schools; and it might be in this respect that the union would enter into closest relations with the state. The state would have a manifest interest in making the instruction in these schools of the very best, and in furnishing it free to as many apprentices as the trade agreement permitted.

DIRECT PRESIDENTIAL NOMINATIONS 1

AFTER the tariff the currency, after the currency the trusts, after the trusts - the Presidential primary. In his address to Congress last December President Wilson urged "the prompt enactment of legislation which will provide for primary elections throughout the country at which the voters of the several parties may choose their nominees for the Presidency without the intervention of nominating conventions." There are indications that Mr. Wilson expects this to be the next big task which he will urge Congress to undertake.

The proposal for the direct nomination of candidates for the Presidency is based upon solid grounds.

It is a logical development. The direct primary has for fifteen years been making steady and irresistible progress from state to state. In only one state was a direct primary law ever repealed, and there it was promptly reenacted. Thirty-seven

1 Independent, February 23, 1914. Reprinted by permission.

governors are to-day nominated at the direct primary. If a governor, why not a president? The extension of the direct primary to the nation is irrefutably logical.

It is democracy. It is trite to say that the very core of that great entity, the American republic, is the free, unhampered, absolute rule of the people or it would be trite if it were not so profoundly true. When "we, the People of the United States" did "ordain and establish" the Constitution of the United States, the matter was settled once for all. Whenever in our political processes we allow ourselves to be led away from the complete and untrammeled rule of the people, we are false to our national ideals. The direct primary is a means for facilitating popular rule. Where it has been used, it has helped to preserve and develop popular rule. It is democracy.

It is an instrument of representative government. It is one of the favorite grounds of criticism of the direct primary that since ours is a representative government and not a pure democracy, we must apply the methods of representative government to the selection of party candidates as well as to the business of government. Since we do not legislate by town-meeting, we ought not to nominate candidates by town-meeting. This argument, frequently advanced and hotly defended, is the result of loose thinking. The direct primary is not a denial of representative government, it is the best way to attain it.

There are two essential elements in representative government -the one negative, the other positive. The first is that the people do not govern directly. This is the negative essential, the most emphasized, but the least important. The other essential is that those who do govern represent the people. They are not autocrats, carrying out their own will; they are not despots, however benevolent, imposing upon the people, however graciously and altruistically, what they decide that they should have. They are representatives. Their power is not their own, it belongs to the people. The will they wield as a sceptre is not their own, it is the will of the people. It matters not a bit how much the people may have divested themselves of the duty of direct government; if those who govern do not