q88 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 con- 

 stitution of the facts might be changed, and the whole result might 

 be ameliorated, never occurs to him. The whole afiair 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 be- 

 lieves 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 pro- 

 pitiate than to oppose. Among the concessions which may in consequence be 

 obtained by unionists, the most material are those which aflfect the remunera- 

 tion 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 remu- 

 neration having been artificially caused, furnishes no reason why, in the great 

 majority of cases, that increase should not be lasting. . . . Such being the eflfi- 

 cacy 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 addi- 

 tional 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 econo- 

 mists and men of afiairs. He says, on page 108 : 



" The price of labor is determined, not by supply and demand, which never 

 determined tlie price of any thing, nor yet by competition, which generally de- 

 termines 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 di- 

 rection. 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, po- 

 litical and social, as well as economical. Mr. Warren was an earnest 

 man, who has had and now has a great influence in forming the opin- 

 ions of laborers and labor-agitators in this country. He says in his 

 pamphlet on "True Civilization" (pages 41, 64, 100) : 



