59 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



physical entity, which is not the relation of the labor-supply to the 

 general market and demand, but is a result of " the want or suffering 

 of the community." To overcome this entity he would revolutionize 

 trade and production, abolish profit, and base every transaction on its 

 cost in labor, without regard to the results of that labor. 



Now, as I understand supply and demand in the market, they are 

 not dead-weights of matter, like a rock crushing my finger; they are 

 forces like the gravitation controlling the rock, and which I must 

 recognize if I would keep my finger whole and escape mental distress. 

 These forces affect laborers and capitalists, producers and consumers 

 alike, and they are the strongest influence in fixing market-prices. In 

 fiict, we may consider them the only forces present and active when 

 the selling price is fixed. All other forces must have been transmuted 

 before price can be fixed. It is not easy to comprehend these forces, 

 for Prof. Cairns, while saying * " demand and supply are essentially 

 the same phenomena regarded from different points of view, conse- 

 quently general demand cannot increase or diminish except in con- 

 stant relation with general supply," yet says also they are " not inde- 

 pendent economic forces." Mr. Mill says : ^ 



"Demand and supply the quantity demanded and the quantity supplied 

 will be made equal. If unequal at any moment competition equalizes them, and 

 the manner in which this is done is by an adjustment of the value." 



Yet every merchant knows that competition is only one of many 

 elements which enter into an " equation " of supply and demand. I 

 dwell on this, not to show the differences of professional economists, 

 but to illustrate the subtlety of these controlling influences of the mar- 

 ket-price of labor and commodities. These influences are quite be- 

 yond the comprehension of a trades-union as such. We may say a 

 powerful union would employ a leader of great capacity, who would 

 construe these influences properly ; but the very process which made 

 him a union-leader would unfit him for a judge of the markets. A 

 general can lead an army to victory ; but generals, as a class, have 

 been poor judges of national policy, in war or peace. The union- 

 leader may extort an advance of wages through the force of his fol- 

 lowers. But this advance in price must be converted into permanent 

 exchange value in order to be of benefit to the laborer. One possible 

 element of this value is the very labor of the unionists themselves 

 while they were striking for the advance; or the advance may have 

 carried the products out of relation to all other values. The only 

 solvents of these delicate problems are the principles of supply and 

 demand I have stated. They must be interjDreted by social agents 

 with the highest faculties and the best power of discrimination. If 

 society proves one of these men and finds him trustworthy, it must 



' " Principles of Political Econmy," p. 42. 



^ "Political Economy," vol. i., p. 551, American edition. 



