The fundamental difference between the powers of extensive, quick and improved production possessed by American manufacturers, on the one hand, and by British manufacturers on the other, is that, by comparison, the latter are now, and have been for a good many years, under the heel of the trade unions. In almost every branch of British manufactures the trade unions prescribe, not only the rate of wages and the hours of labor, but also the amount of work to be performed by a given workman in a given time, and the kind of machinery to be used. Instead of opening a career to energy, assiduity and talent, the whole system of British industry, as organized by the trade unions, is adjusted to a low average capacity of diligence and of intelligence. Far from being encouraged, a vigorous or a specially skillful workman is discouraged from turning out more than the average amount of product during the fixed hours of labor, as also for working overtime for extra pay. Improvements in machinery intended to economize time or labor are eyed with suspicion and can be introduced only after long delay and with the utmost difficulty. In England, as compared with the United States, the inventor finds no incentive. The result is that now the British manufacturer is unable to vie with his American competitor in branches of industry where rapidity of execution is essential, or where the employment of the latest mechanical devices is indispensable to the cheapness or the perfection of a product. It is indisputable that American labor associations are organized on the same fundamental principle which actuates the trade unions of Great Britain. That is to say, their aims, demands and regulations are based on the primary assumption that the whole industrial system should steadily keep in view the interests, not of employers, nor of workmen exceptionally gifted in intellect or character, but those of the great mass of operatives possessed only of average physical, mental and moral qualities. The inevitable outcome of such a system, where it is carried out with a completeness now approached in Great Britain, is a reduction of a nation’s industry to a dead level of achievement to a status of Chinese stagnation with respect both to quality and quantity. Such would be the drear and hopeless prospect which would confront our manufacturers, should our labor associations gain the nearly absolute mastery of industrial conditions which the trade unions have managed to acquire in the United Kingdom.