CO-OPERATION IN THE UNION. 2 19 



is a cut- throat competitive game of 'get money any way 

 you can,' the structure must necessarily be the same. 

 The producers must learn that exact justice gives to every 

 producer the full fruits of his toil and nothing more. 

 Under such a system, no intelligent, moral, industrious 

 person would be very poor, and none would be very rich. 

 But the work must commence with the producers them- 

 selves. "It must be based upon principles of sound mor- 

 ality, conducted by lofty intelligence and the wheels must 

 glide in the celestial grooves. There is no place in it for 

 the bummer, self-seeker, jealous disturber or political 

 parasite. The very nature of the work to be done must 

 exclude these parasites. Genuine co-operation has no 

 attraction for them. It is the one industrial and social 

 organization whose principles, objects, aims and methods 

 should exclude the parasites. The immoral, wilfully 

 ignorant element can no more exist in a genuine co-opera- 

 tive association than can a fish live on dry land. If he 

 accidentally gets in and fails to destroy the organization, 

 he soon drops out and remains the tool and foot-ball of 

 monopoly to help enslave honest industry/* 



For various reasons, which we have not space to dis- 

 cuss here, the progress -of genuine, thorough and successful 

 co-operation will necessarily be slow. The power of 

 selfishness, greed, jealousy, envy and ignorance, which 

 induces workingmen to stand aloof from each other while 

 the combined monopolies fleece and enslave them in detail 

 will prevent that union of action which would lead to a 

 speedy eradication of monopolies of every description. 

 These evil passions must be educated and turned into new 

 channels of thought and action. 



''Co-operation is so little understood by the average 

 workingman, that it is no wonder that it is a hard matter 

 to start an enterprise of the kind among them that will 

 come to anything more than talk. Hundreds of enterprises 



