Chapter IV
Speech in Springfield, O.
A COLD HALL BUT A GOOD AUDIENCE – FUTILITY OF ATTEMPTING TO REMEDY AN EFFECT WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING ITS CAUSE- EXISTING INSTITUTIONS BASED ON FORCE –ORIGIN OF PRIVATE PROPERTY TRACED TO CONQUESTS IN THE MIDDLE AGES- MACHINERY –DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM IN THE PAST DECADE- THE MIDDLE CLASS FORCED INTO THE RANKS OF THE WAGE-SLAVES.
Taken from a Springfield Capitalistic Paper of February 26, 1886.
A crowd of several hundred people gathered at the Mikado skating rink last night to hear the Socialist, Parsons, of Chicago, deliver an address on the subject of labor and capital. He was introduced at half-past 7 o' clock by the Chairman A. E. Poling, and spoke doe three hours, although the hall was cold as a dead man's feet. He opened his remarks with a gentile reminder that the hall was cold, but said he hoped to warm up his hearers before he got through.
He spoke in substance as follows:
"I am not here to win the applause or the approval of the audience so much as to perform my duty at a serious time in the history of this country and civilization, and to lay before them for calm and deliberate consideration matters that affect their prosperity, happiness, and very existence. This meeting is composed mainly, if not entirely, of working men and women. There must be something of interest that will bring a crowd like this on such as night as this. Your interest in this is only an indication of the great spirit of unrest and discontent that is spreading throughout the four corners of the world. We are to consider tonight the difference between the capitalists of this country and the working
|
