Passage 1 is “The Liberty of the People,” presented by Theodore Roosevelt during the 1912 presidential campaign on September 22nd, 1912. Passage 2 is “On Labor,” presented by Woodrow Wilson on September 24th, 1912. Roosevelt is the leader of the “new party,” or “third party,” that Wilson mentions.
Passage 1
The difference between Mr. Wilson and myself is
fundamental. The other day in a speech at Sioux Falls, Mr.
Wilson stated his position when he said that the history of
government, the history of liberty, was the history of the
limitation of governmental power. This is true as an academic
statement of history in the past. It is not true as a statement
affecting the present. It is true of the history of medieval
Europe. It is not true of the history of 20th Century America.
In the days when all governmental power existed
exclusively in the King or in the baronage, and when the
people had no shred of that power in their own hand, then it
undoubtedly was true that the history of liberty was the history
of the limitation of the governmental power of the outsiders
who possessed that power. But today, the people have actually
or potentially the entire governmental power. It is theirs to use
and to exercise if they choose to use and to exercise it. It offers
the only adequate instrument with which they can work for the
betterment, for the uplifting, of the masses of our people.
The liberty of which Mr. Wilson speaks today means merely
the liberty of some great trust magnate to do that which he is
not entitled to do. It means merely the liberty of some factory
owner to work haggard women over hours for under pay and
himself to pocket the proceeds. It means the liberty of the
factory owner who crowds his operatives into some crazy
deathtrap on a top floor, where if fire starts the slaughter is
immense. It means the liberty of the big factory owner who is
conscienceless and unscrupulous, to work his men and women
under conditions which eat into their lives like an acid. It
means the liberty of even less conscientious factory owners to
make their money out of the toil, the labor, of little children.
Men of this stamp are the men whose liberty would be
preserved by Mr. Wilson. Men of this stamp are the men whose
liberty would be preserved by the limitation of governmental
power.
We propose, on the contrary, to extend governmental power
in order to secure the liberty of the wage-workers, of the men
and women who toil in industry, to save the liberty of the
oppressed from the oppressor. Mr. Wilson stands for the liberty
of the oppressor to oppress; we stand for the limitation of his
liberty thus to oppress those who are weaker than himself.
Passage 2
To look at the politics of the day from the viewpoint of the
laboring man is not to suggest that there is one view proper to
him, another to the employer, another to the capitalist, another
to the professional man, but merely that the life of the country
as a whole may be looked at from various points of view and
yet be viewed as a whole. The whole business of politics is to
bring classes together, upon a platform of accommodation and
common interest. In a political campaign the voters are called
upon to choose between parties and leaders. Parties and
platforms and candidates should be frankly put under
examination to see what they will yield us by way of progress,
and there are a great many questions which the working man
may legitimately ask and press until he gets a definite answer.
The predictions of the leader of the new party are as
alarming as the predictions of the various stand-patters*. He
declares that he is not troubled by the fact that a very large
amount of money is taken out of the pockets of the general
taxpayer and put into the pockets of particular classes of
protected manufacturers, but that his concern is that so little of
this money gets into the pockets of the laboring man, and so
large a proportion of it into the pockets of the employer. I have
searched his program very thoroughly for an indication of what
he expects to do in order to see to it that a larger proportion of
this prize money gets into the pay envelope, and I have found
only one suggestion. There is a plank in the program which
speaks of establishing a minimum or a living wage for women
workers, and I suppose that we may assume that the principle is
not in the long run meant to be confined in its application to
women only. Perhaps we are justified in assuming that the third
party looks forward to the general establishment, by law, of a
minimum wage.
It is very likely, I take it for granted, that if a minimum
wage were established by law, the great majority of employers
would take occasion to bring their wage scale as nearly as
might be down to the level of that minimum, and it would be
very awkward for the working man to resist that process
successfully, because it would be dangerous to strike against
the authority of the federal government. Moreover, most of his
employers, at any rate practically all of the most powerful of
them, would be wards and protégés of that very government
which is the master of us all, for no part of this program can be
discussed intelligently without remembering that monopoly as
handled by it is not to be prevented, but accepted and
regulated.
When you have thought the whole thing out, therefore, you
will find that the program of the new party legalizes monopoly
and of necessity subordinates working men to them, and to the
plans made by the government both with regard to employment
and with regard to wages. Take the thing as a whole and it
looks strangely like economic mastery over the very lives and
fortunes of those who do the daily work of the nation, and all
this under the overwhelming power and sovereignty of the
national government. What most of us are fighting for is to
break up this very partnership between big business and the
government.
*Stand-patter: a person who refuses to consider or accept change.
Passage 1
The difference between Mr. Wilson and myself is
fundamental. The other day in a speech at Sioux Falls, Mr.
Wilson stated his position when he said that the history of
government, the history of liberty, was the history of the
limitation of governmental power. This is true as an academic
statement of history in the past. It is not true as a statement
affecting the present. It is true of the history of medieval
Europe. It is not true of the history of 20th Century America.
In the days when all governmental power existed
exclusively in the King or in the baronage, and when the
people had no shred of that power in their own hand, then it
undoubtedly was true that the history of liberty was the history
of the limitation of the governmental power of the outsiders
who possessed that power. But today, the people have actually
or potentially the entire governmental power. It is theirs to use
and to exercise if they choose to use and to exercise it. It offers
the only adequate instrument with which they can work for the
betterment, for the uplifting, of the masses of our people.
The liberty of which Mr. Wilson speaks today means merely
the liberty of some great trust magnate to do that which he is
not entitled to do. It means merely the liberty of some factory
owner to work haggard women over hours for under pay and
himself to pocket the proceeds. It means the liberty of the
factory owner who crowds his operatives into some crazy
deathtrap on a top floor, where if fire starts the slaughter is
immense. It means the liberty of the big factory owner who is
conscienceless and unscrupulous, to work his men and women
under conditions which eat into their lives like an acid. It
means the liberty of even less conscientious factory owners to
make their money out of the toil, the labor, of little children.
Men of this stamp are the men whose liberty would be
preserved by Mr. Wilson. Men of this stamp are the men whose
liberty would be preserved by the limitation of governmental
power.
We propose, on the contrary, to extend governmental power
in order to secure the liberty of the wage-workers, of the men
and women who toil in industry, to save the liberty of the
oppressed from the oppressor. Mr. Wilson stands for the liberty
of the oppressor to oppress; we stand for the limitation of his
liberty thus to oppress those who are weaker than himself.
Passage 2
To look at the politics of the day from the viewpoint of the
laboring man is not to suggest that there is one view proper to
him, another to the employer, another to the capitalist, another
to the professional man, but merely that the life of the country
as a whole may be looked at from various points of view and
yet be viewed as a whole. The whole business of politics is to
bring classes together, upon a platform of accommodation and
common interest. In a political campaign the voters are called
upon to choose between parties and leaders. Parties and
platforms and candidates should be frankly put under
examination to see what they will yield us by way of progress,
and there are a great many questions which the working man
may legitimately ask and press until he gets a definite answer.
The predictions of the leader of the new party are as
alarming as the predictions of the various stand-patters*. He
declares that he is not troubled by the fact that a very large
amount of money is taken out of the pockets of the general
taxpayer and put into the pockets of particular classes of
protected manufacturers, but that his concern is that so little of
this money gets into the pockets of the laboring man, and so
large a proportion of it into the pockets of the employer. I have
searched his program very thoroughly for an indication of what
he expects to do in order to see to it that a larger proportion of
this prize money gets into the pay envelope, and I have found
only one suggestion. There is a plank in the program which
speaks of establishing a minimum or a living wage for women
workers, and I suppose that we may assume that the principle is
not in the long run meant to be confined in its application to
women only. Perhaps we are justified in assuming that the third
party looks forward to the general establishment, by law, of a
minimum wage.
It is very likely, I take it for granted, that if a minimum
wage were established by law, the great majority of employers
would take occasion to bring their wage scale as nearly as
might be down to the level of that minimum, and it would be
very awkward for the working man to resist that process
successfully, because it would be dangerous to strike against
the authority of the federal government. Moreover, most of his
employers, at any rate practically all of the most powerful of
them, would be wards and protégés of that very government
which is the master of us all, for no part of this program can be
discussed intelligently without remembering that monopoly as
handled by it is not to be prevented, but accepted and
regulated.
When you have thought the whole thing out, therefore, you
will find that the program of the new party legalizes monopoly
and of necessity subordinates working men to them, and to the
plans made by the government both with regard to employment
and with regard to wages. Take the thing as a whole and it
looks strangely like economic mastery over the very lives and
fortunes of those who do the daily work of the nation, and all
this under the overwhelming power and sovereignty of the
national government. What most of us are fighting for is to
break up this very partnership between big business and the
government.
*Stand-patter: a person who refuses to consider or accept change.