The power of Greeley’s influence in the early history of the Socialist movement in America, when hate and persecution were aroused by the mere mention of it, has never yet been fairly recognized. He has been called “our later Franklin” and deserves the title. Parton, the biographer of Greeley, said: “The subject of Greeley’s oratory is one alone; it is ever the same; the object of his public life is single. It is the ‘_Emancipation of Labor_,’ its emancipation from ignorance, vice, servitude, insecurity, poverty. This is his chosen, only theme, whether he speaks from the platform or writes for the Tribune.” Horace Greeley was in the true sense a _Labor Leader_. He was the first president of Typographical Union No. 6 of New York City and took advanced ground on every question that affected the working class. There was nothing conservative about the views of Greeley on the labor question. He was, above all else, radical and progressive, that is to say, revolutionary, and the labor leaders of today could with credit to themselves and benefit to their organizations study his character and writings and follow his example. The upheaval in Europe in 1848 forced many of the radicals and Socialists into exile; and the general tide that set in toward the western world bore many of these restless spirits to our shores; and no sooner were they landed before they began to sow the revolutionary seed and organize the propaganda they had been compelled to abandon on the other side. The German Socialists who came over were the very men needed here at that time. They were trained and disciplined in the “old guard”; they had the rugged bearing and fearlessness of army veterans and they knew no such word as discouragement or failure. Among these sturdy agitators William Weitling bore a conspicuous part in preparing the way for organization and for action along political lines. From this time the propaganda became more active and also clearer and more definite in character. The movement was gradually evolving from the haze of communism that clung to it through all its early years and was beginning to take form as an independent political organization with the central object of conquering the powers of government as a means of emancipating the working class from wage-slavery. Labor unions, turner bunds and singing societies were organized all through the fifties, all tending in the same direction, and though not all pronounced, having substantially the same end in view.