On every side men are being discharged and machines are being invented to take their places. When the great factory shuts down, the workers who inhabited it and gave it life, as thoughts do the brain, go away and it stands there like an empty skull. A few workmen, by the force of habit, gather about the closed doors and broken windows and talk about distress, the price of food and the coming winter. They are convinced that they have not had their share of what their labor created. They feel certain that the machines inside were not their friends. They look at the mansion of the employeer and think of the places where they live. They have saved nothing--nothing but themselves. The employeer seems to have enough. Even when employeers fail, when they become bankrupt, they are far better off than the laborers ever were. Their worst is better than the toilers' best. The capitalist comes forward with his specific. He tells the workingman that he must be economical--and yet, under the present system, economy would only lessen wages. Under the great law of supply and demand every saving, frugal, self-denying workingman is unconsciously doing what little he can to reduce the compensation of himself and his fellows. The slaves who did not wish to run away helped fasten chains on those who did. So the saving mechanic is a certificate that wages are high enough. Does the great law demand that every worker live on the least possible amount of bread? Is it his fate to work one day, that he may get enough food to be able to work another? Is that to be his only hope--that and death? Capital has always claimed and still claims the right to combine. Manufacturers meet and determine upon prices, even in spite of the great law of supply and demand. Have the laborers the same right to consult and combine? The rich meet in the bank, the clubhouse, or parlor. Workingmen, when they combine, gather in the street. All the organized forces of society are against them. Capital has the army and the navy, the legislative, the judicial, and the executive departments. When the rich combine, it is for the purpose of "exchanging ideas." When the poor combine, it is a "conspiracy." If they act in concert, if they really do something, it is a "mob." If they defend themselves, it is "treason." How is it that the rich control the departments of government? In this country the political power is equally divided among the men. There are certainly more poor than there are rich. Why should the rich control? Why should not the laborers combine for the purpose of controlling the executive, legislative, and judicial departments? Will they ever find how powerful they are?