The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 08 (of 12): Dresden Edition—InterviewsIngersoll, Robert Green
Religion
The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 08 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Interviews
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
_Answer_. The Knights of Labor will probably occupy substantially
the same position as other laborers and other mechanics. If they
clearly see that the policy advocated by the Republican party is
to their interest, that it will give them better wages than the
policy advocated by the Democrats, then they will undoubtedly
support our ticket. There is more or less irritation between
employers and employed. All men engaged in manufacturing and
neither good nor generous. Many of them get work for as little as
possible, and sell its product for all they can get. It is impossible
to adopt a policy that will not by such people be abused. Many of
them would like to see the working man toil for twelve hours or
fourteen or sixteen in each day. Many of them wonder why they need
sleep or food, and are perfectly astonished when they ask for pay.
In some instances, undoubtedly, the working men will vote against
their own interests simply to get even with such employers.
Some laboring men have been so robbed, so tyrannized over, that
they would be perfectly willing to feel for the pillars and take
a certain delight in a destruction that brought ruin even to
themselves. Such manufacturers, however, I believe to be in a
minority, and the laboring men, under the policy of free trade,
would be far more in their power. When wages fall below a certain
point, then comes degradation, loss of manhood, serfdom and slavery.
If any man has the right to vote for his own interests, certainly
the man who labors is that man, and every working man having in
his will a part of the sovereignty of this nation, having within
him a part of the lawmaking power, should have the intelligence
and courage to vote for his own interests; he should vote for good
wages; he should vote for a policy that would enable him to lay
something by for the winter of his life, that would enable him to
earn enough to educate his children, enough to give him a home and
a fireside.
He need not do this in anger or for revenge, but because it is
just, because it is right, and because the working people are in
a majority. They ought to control the world, because they have
made the world what it is. They have given everything there is of
value. Labor plows every field, builds every house, fashions
everything of use, and when that labor is guided by intelligence
the world is prosperous.
He who thinks good thoughts is a laborer--one of the greatest.
The man who invented the reaper will be harvesting the fields for
thousands of years to come. If labor is abused in this country
the laborers have it within their power to defend themselves.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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