"So much for the political agitations which had for their ostensible object the improvement of the economic condition of the great masses of the people. Yet they did much good as a means of educating the more intelligent into a better understanding of the situation, and revealed the apparently utter hopelessness of ever being able to secure necessary reforms by political action, as no matter how pure at first might be the objects of a political party, just as soon as it was successful, and offices were in sight, the work of corruption set in and its principles became subordinate in the minds of its leaders, to the more profitable occupation of office seeking. "But other more potent factors than political agitation, were at work among the masses in the shape of great industrial organizations of farmers and wage-workers. These organizations as a rule were strictly non-political. The farmers sought to secure higher prices for the products of the farm without any regard for the interests of the millions of wage-workers and others upon whom they depended for a market. Another object of the farmers was to reduce their cost of living by securing lower prices on their implements and other supplies. By concentrating their trade and taking advantage of the competition between dealers they often succeeded in securing very much reduced prices on goods, and this furnished what was regarded as a legitimate excuse for reducing the wages of the employes engaged in their manufacture. This reduction of wages crippled the market for farm products and offended both the employer and the workmen, so in the end the farmers defeated themselves and succeeded in arraying all other classes of people against them. "But it was the wage-workers who suffered the most from the great oligarchy of wealth which had been established in the name of the people for the express purpose of exacting profits from the industrial classes. They organized Trade Unions which ultimately federated into one great national organization with a view to securing higher wages and fewer hours of labor without any regard to the interests of the consumers of their products. The number of workmen in these Trade Unions were at all times but a small fraction of the multitude which depended upon wages. As a rule the purposes and methods of these labor organizations were in practice, if not in theory, based upon the same false principles that characterized the industrial despotism against which they were protesting. Selfishness was a distinguishing characteristic and a fatal defect. The skilled workman who had employment, cared but little for the non-Union workman of his own craft except as a possible competitor for his job, and nothing whatever for the great masses of common laborers who were so numerous and so poor that organization could do them no good as a means of maintaining wages. The union workman recognized no interest in common with the unemployed outside of his own fraternity.