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017 - Capitalism and Socialism · Labor and Freedom

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  Speaker 1: Capitalism and Socialism by Eugene V. Debs. This LibriVox recording
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  Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Campaign Speech Lyceum Theater, Fergus Falls, Minnesota,
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  Speaker 1: August twenty seventh, nineteen twelve. Friends and fellow workers, the
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  Speaker 1: spirit of our time is revolutionary and growing more so
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  Speaker 1: every day. A new social order is struggling into existence.
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  Speaker 1: The old economic foundation of society is breaking up, and
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  Speaker 1: the social fabric is beginning to totter. The capitalist system
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  Speaker 1: is doomed. The signs of change confront us upon every hand.
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  Speaker 1: Social changes are preceded by agitation and unrest among the masses.
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  Speaker 1: We are today in the transition between the decaying capitalism
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  Speaker 1: and growing socialism. The old system is being shaken to
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  Speaker 1: its foundations by the forces underlying it, and its passing
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  Speaker 1: is but a question of time. The new system that
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  Speaker 1: is to succeed the old is developing within the old,
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  Speaker 1: and its outline is clearly revealed in the spirit of
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  Speaker 1: mutualism and its cooperative manifestations. For countless ages, the world
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  Speaker 1: has been a vast battlefield, and the struggle for existence
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  Speaker 1: a perpetual conflict. Primitive people were compelled to fight nature
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  Speaker 1: to extort from her the means of livelihood. Since the
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  Speaker 1: forces of nature have been conquered and nations have become civilized,
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  Speaker 1: the struggle of men is no longer to overcome nature,
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  Speaker 1: but with one another for existence. In this struggle, which
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  Speaker 1: is appealed to the basist and not to the best
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  Speaker 1: in man, the cunning few have triumph, and now have
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  Speaker 1: the masses at their mercy. These few are closely allied
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  Speaker 1: in their economic mastery, as they are also when their
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  Speaker 1: control of the political machinery, their money, and their mercenaries controlled.
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  Speaker 1: The Republican Convention at Chicago wrote its platform and dictated
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  Speaker 1: its nominees, and the same is true of the Democratic
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  Speaker 1: Convention at Baltimore. As for the so called Progressive Convention,
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  Speaker 1: it is sufficient to say that there is no attempt
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  Speaker 1: to conceal the fact that it was financed and controlled
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  Speaker 1: by three conspicuous representatives of the plutocracy which largely owns
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  Speaker 1: and rules the land. Political parties are responsive to the
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  Speaker 1: interests of those who finance them. This is the infallible
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  Speaker 1: test of their character and apply to the Republican, Democratic
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  Speaker 1: and Progressive parties. These parties stand forth as the several
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  Speaker 1: political expressions of the several divisions of the capitalist class.
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  Speaker 1: The funds of all these parties are furnished by the
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  Speaker 1: capitalist class for the reason, and only for the reason,
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  Speaker 1: that they represent the interest of that class. Professional politicians
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  Speaker 1: of whatever party are very much alike, and in one
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  Speaker 1: respected least, they are like working men. They serve the
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  Speaker 1: interests of their masters, and for the same reason, the
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  Speaker 1: patriotism of professional politicians is reflected in the material interests
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  Speaker 1: of the master class. And this fact has become so
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  Speaker 1: oh apparent that their noisy theatrics have lost their magic
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  Speaker 1: and now excite but the scorn and derision of intelligent
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  Speaker 1: working men and women. The Republican, Democratic, and Progressive conventions
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  Speaker 1: were composed in the main and controlled entirely by professional
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  Speaker 1: politicians in the service of the ruling class. There were
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  Speaker 1: no working men and no working women at the Republican Convention,
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  Speaker 1: the Democratic Convention, or the Progressive Convention. These were clearly
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  Speaker 1: not working class conventions. Ladies and gentlemen of leisure were
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  Speaker 1: in evidence at the Mall wage slaves would not have
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  Speaker 1: been tolerated in their company. They represented the wealth and
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  Speaker 1: culture and refinement of society, and they were there to
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  Speaker 1: applaud and smile approval upon the professional politicians and patriots
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  Speaker 1: who were doing their work. But there was a fourth
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  Speaker 1: convention held this year which did not attract the wealthy
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  Speaker 1: and leisure classes. It was a convention great in purpose,
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  Speaker 1: though not big in numbers. This convention was held at
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  Speaker 1: Indianapolis and represented the working class. The delegates who composed
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  Speaker 1: this convention were chosen by the workers and paid by
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  Speaker 1: the workers to represent the interest of the workers and
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  Speaker 1: to clear the way for the workers in the present campaign.
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  Speaker 1: The Socialist Convention was the only democratic convention and the
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  Speaker 1: only progressive convention held this year, the only convention that
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  Speaker 1: represented a due's paying party membership and whose acts, before
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  Speaker 1: becoming effective, must be ratified by a wres referendum vote
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  Speaker 1: of the party. The Socialist Party is the only party
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  Speaker 1: in this campaign that stands against the present system and
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  Speaker 1: for the rule of the people, the only party that
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  Speaker 1: boldly avows itself the party of the working class and
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  Speaker 1: its purpose the overthrow of wage slavery. So long as
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  Speaker 1: the present system of capitalism prevails and the few are
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  Speaker 1: allowed to own the nation's industries, the toiling masses will
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  Speaker 1: be struggling in the hell of poverty as they are today.
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  Speaker 1: To tell them that juggling with the tariff will change
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  Speaker 1: this beastly and disgraceful condition is to insult their intelligence.
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  Speaker 1: The professional politicians who have been harping upon this string
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  Speaker 1: since infant industries have become giant monopolies no better. Their
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  Speaker 1: stock in trade is the credulity of the masses. The
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  Speaker 1: exploited wage slaves of free trade England and of the
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  Speaker 1: highly protected United States are the victims of the same capitalism.
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  Speaker 1: In England, the politicians tell them they are suffering because
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  Speaker 1: they have no protective tariff, and in the United States
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  Speaker 1: they tell them that the tariff is the cause of
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  Speaker 1: their poverty. And this is the kind of a confidence
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  Speaker 1: game the professional politicians have been playing with the workers
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  Speaker 1: of all nations all these years. To keep them in
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  Speaker 1: subjection by playing upon their ignorance is the rule that
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  Speaker 1: governs their campaign for votes among the workers. The issues
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  Speaker 1: upon which they keep the workers divided into hostile camps
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  Speaker 1: are of their own making. Since the foundations of the government,
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  Speaker 1: one or the other of these capitalist parties has been
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  Speaker 1: in power, and under their administration, the working and producing
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  Speaker 1: millions have been reduced to poverty and slavery. Professor Scott
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  Speaker 1: Nearing has shown in his work on the wages of
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  Speaker 1: American workers that half of the adult males of the
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  Speaker 1: United States are earning less than five hundred dollars, that
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  Speaker 1: three quarters of them are earning less than six hundred
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  Speaker 1: dollars a year, that nine tenths of them are receiving
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  Speaker 1: less than nine hundred dollars a year, while ten percent
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  Speaker 1: only receive more than that figure. Professor Neering also shows
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  Speaker 1: the starvation wages for which women are compelled to work
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  Speaker 1: in the present system. One fifth of the whole number
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  Speaker 1: of women workers receive less than two hundred dollars per year,
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  Speaker 1: three fifths receive less than three hundred and twenty five dollars,
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  Speaker 1: nine tenths receive less than five hundred dollars. Only one
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  Speaker 1: twentieth of the women employed are paid more than six
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  Speaker 1: hundred dollars a year. These figures bear out the report
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  Speaker 1: of the Chicago Vice Commission to the effect that the
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  Speaker 1: low wages of women and girls go hand in hand
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  Speaker 1: with prostitution. Despite all attempts to control the white slave traffic,
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  Speaker 1: which is now organized as one of the great profit
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  Speaker 1: extorting trusts along with the rest of the trusts. Prostitution,
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  Speaker 1: like a terrible cancer, is eating out the very heart
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  Speaker 1: of our civilization. And then the presence of this appalling condition,
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  Speaker 1: the professional politicians prattle about tariff revision and indulge in
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  Speaker 1: silly twaddle about currency refores and regulation of the trusts.
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  Speaker 1: The Socialist Party is absolutely the only party which faces
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  Speaker 1: conditions as they are, and declares unhesitatingly that it has
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  Speaker 1: a definite and concrete plan and program for dealing with
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  Speaker 1: these conditions. The Socialist Party as the party of the
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  Speaker 1: exploited workers in the mills and mines, on the railways
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  Speaker 1: and on the farms, the workers of both sexes and
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  Speaker 1: all races and colors, the working class, in a word,
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  Speaker 1: constituting a great majority of the people, and in fact
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  Speaker 1: the people, demands that the nation's industries shall be taken
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  Speaker 1: over by the nation, and that the nation's workers shall
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  Speaker 1: operate them for the benefit of the whole people. Private
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  Speaker 1: ownership and competition have had their day. The Socialist parties
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  Speaker 1: stand for social ownership and cooperation. The one is capitalism,
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  Speaker 1: the other socialism. The one industrial despotism, the other industrial democracy.
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  Speaker 1: The Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties all stand for private
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  Speaker 1: ownership and competition. The Socialist Party alone stands for social
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  Speaker 1: ownership and cooperation. The Republican, Democrat and Progressive parties believe
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  Speaker 1: in regulating the trusts. The Socialist Party believes in owning
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  Speaker 1: them so that all the people may get the benefit
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  Speaker 1: of them, instead of a few being made plutocrats and
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  Speaker 1: the masses impoverished. The Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties uphold
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  Speaker 1: the wage system. The Socialist Party demands its overthrow. It
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  Speaker 1: is under the wage system that the two twenty two
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  Speaker 1: thousand operatives in the cotton and woolen mills at Lawrence, Massachusetts,
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  Speaker 1: have been compelled to work or slave rather, according to
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  Speaker 1: Commissioner Neil, for an average of eight dollars and seventy
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  Speaker 1: six cents per family. To earn this average wage, according
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  Speaker 1: to the Commissioner's official report, requires the combined service of father, mother,
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  Speaker 1: and three children. This is slavery with a vengeance. The
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  Speaker 1: mill is a sweahole, the hovel a breeding pin home.
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  Speaker 1: There is none, and there never will be under the
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  Speaker 1: wage system. What have the Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties
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  Speaker 1: to offer the wage slaves of Lawrence to the wage
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  Speaker 1: slaves of the steel trust, to the wage slaves of
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  Speaker 1: the mines, to the wage slaves of the lumber and
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  Speaker 1: turpentine camps of the South, the wage slaves of the railroad,
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  Speaker 1: the millions of them male and female, black and white,
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  Speaker 1: and yellow and brown, who produce all this nation's wealth,
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  Speaker 1: support its government, and conserve its civilization, and without whom
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  Speaker 1: industry would be paralyzed and the nation helpless. What I ask,
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  Speaker 1: has any of these capitalist parties, or all of them combined,
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  Speaker 1: for the working and producing class in this campaign? Nothing,
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  Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. These parties are bidding stronger than ever for
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  Speaker 1: the labor vote this year. That vote is now not
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  Speaker 1: so easily delivered as in the past. The competition for
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  Speaker 1: the votes of the wage workers is the distinguishing feature
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  Speaker 1: of the present campaign. Thousands of workers are now doing
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  Speaker 1: their own thinking. They have discovered that workers are as
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  Speaker 1: much out of place in a capitalist party as capitalists
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  Speaker 1: are in a worker's party. They have also found that
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  Speaker 1: politics express class interests, and that the interests of those
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  Speaker 1: who make the wealth and those who take it are
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  Speaker 1: not identical. That is where the socialist Party comes in
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  Speaker 1: and where the workers come in the Socialist Party. The
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  Speaker 1: working class is in politics. This year. It has always
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  Speaker 1: been in politics for its master. This year it is
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  Speaker 1: in politics for itself. The most promising fact in the
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  Speaker 1: world today is the fact that labour is organizing its power,
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  Speaker 1: its economic power and its political power. The workers who
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  Speaker 1: have made the world and who support the world are
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  Speaker 1: preparing to take possession of the world. This is the
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  Speaker 1: meaning of socialism and is what the Socialist Party stands for.
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  Speaker 1: In this campaign, we demand the machinery of production in
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  Speaker 1: the name of the workers, and the control of society
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  Speaker 1: in the name of the people. We demand the abolition
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  Speaker 1: of capitalism and wage slavery and the surrender of the
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  Speaker 1: capitalist class. We demand the complete enfranchisement of women and
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  Speaker 1: the equal rights of all the people, regardless of race, color, creed,
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  Speaker 1: or nationality. We demand that child labor shall cease once
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  Speaker 1: and forever, and that all children born into the world
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  Speaker 1: shall have equal opportunity to grow up, to be educated,
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  Speaker 1: to have healthy bodies and trained minds, and to develop
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  Speaker 1: and freely express the best there is in them in mental,
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  Speaker 1: moral and physical achievement. Demand complete control of industry by
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  Speaker 1: the workers. We demand all the wealth they produce for
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  Speaker 1: their own enjoyment, and we demand the earth for all
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  Speaker 1: the people. End of capitalism and socialism, end of labor
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  Speaker 1: and freedom by Eugene V. Debs