Labor And Capital
Performed by William H. Taft
Recorded October 1, 1912
Organization has become a feature
of modern life. The organization of capital has reduced
the cost of production and has, therefore, contributed
greatly to the material prosperity of the world. Organization
of labor has undoubtedly bettered the condition and
raised the wages of labor. But in the power which
organization has placed in the hands of particular
individuals, it will be unreasonable to expect that
there should not be temptations to abuse and oppression.
When these are yielded to for the few as compared
with the many exposed to them, and the law is violated,
it’s no reason for hysteria or a destruction
of the whole social order. It’s no reason for
giving up the system of private property or forbidding
the formation of corporation or preventing the organization
of trade unions. It's no ground for the advocacy of
socialism. We must take up the abuses in the good
old Anglo-Saxon way, adjust our statutory remedies
to the fitness of the thing, place our confidence
in the public servants who show themselves alive to
public needs, and courageous and energetic enough
to prosecute the offenders to conviction. We must
not paralyze their efforts by loudly suggested suspicion
of their good faith until there is some just foundation
for such suspicion. It’s too often the custom
to characterize a man as a corporation man or an anti-corporation
man, or a labor man or an anti-labor man--this is
unjust, for most men in American public life are neither
and wear no livery. It will indeed be an evil day
in this country when the servants of the people are
not generally admitted to be impartial between rich
and poor, recognizing the value of organization of
labor and capital but favoring a policy which will
banish the abuses and oppression of organization in
whatever entry. The truth is that 9/10ths of the people
of this country are neither in favor of a poor man
because he is poor, or a rich man because he’s
rich. They’re in favor of all of the people and
the extending of an equal protection of the law to
all people. They’re in favor of protecting the
rights of the corporation or labor organization, as
representing only a number of people united together
for a common and lawful object, exactly as they would
protect the rights of the individual. And on the other
hand, they are in favor of protecting the rights of
the individual against the organization, whether of
capital or labor, whenever it uses its aggregation
of power for unjust competition or unjust interference
with the rights of the less powerful individual.