Part 7
2. These monopolists of money assume that pauper labor, so-called, is the cheapest labor in the world; and that therefore each nation, in order to compete with the pauper labor of all other nations, must itself have "cheap labor." In fact, "cheap labor" is, with them, the great _sine qua non_ of all national industry. To compete with "cheap labor," say they, we must have "cheap labor." This is, with them, a self-evident proposition. And this demand for "cheap labor" means, of course, that the laboring classes, in this country, must be kept, as nearly as possible, on a level with the so-called pauper labor of all other countries.
Thus their whole scheme of national industry is made to depend upon "cheap labor." And to secure "cheap labor," they hold it to be indispensable that the laborers shall be kept constantly either in actual pauperism, or on the verge of pauperism. And, in this country, they know of no way of keeping the laborers on the verge of pauperism, but by retaining in their (the monopolists') own hands such a monopoly of money as will put it out of the power of the laborers to hire money, and do business for themselves; and thus compel them, by the alternative of starvation, to sell their labor to the monopolists of money at such prices as will enable them (the monopolists) to manufacture goods in competition with the so-called pauper laborers of all other countries.
Let it be repeated--as a vital proposition--that the whole industrial programme of these monopolists rests upon, and implies, such a degree of poverty, on the part of the laboring classes, as will put their labor in direct competition with the so-called pauper labor of all other countries. So long as they (the monopolists) can perpetuate this extreme poverty of the laboring classes, in this country, they feel safe against all foreign competition; for, in all other things than "cheap labor," we have advantages equal to those of any other nation.
Furthermore, this extreme poverty, in which the laborers are to be kept, necessarily implies that they are to receive no larger share of the proceeds of their own labor, than is necessary to keep them in a condition to labor. It implies that their industry--which is really the national industry--is not to be carried on at all for their own benefit, but only for the benefit of their employers, the monopolists of money. It implies that the laborers are to be mere tools and machines in the hands of their employers; that they are to be kept simply in running order, like other machinery; but that, beyond this, they are to have no more rights, and no more interests, in the products of their labor, than have the wheels, spindles, and other machinery, with which the work is done.
In short, this whole programme implies that the laborers--the real producers of wealth--are not to be considered at all as human beings, having rights and interests of their own; but only as tools and machines, to be owned, used, and consumed in producing such wealth as their employers--the monopolists of money--may desire for their own subsistence and pleasure.
What, then, is the remedy? Plainly it is to abolish the monopoly of money. Liberate all this loanable capital--promissory notes--that is now lying idle, and we liberate all labor, and furnish to all laborers all the capital they need for their industries. We shall then have no longer, all over the earth, the competition of pauper labor with pauper labor, but only the competition of free labor with free labor. And from this competition of free labor with free labor, no people on earth have anything to fear, but all peoples have everything to hope.
And why have all peoples everything to hope from the competition of free labor with free labor? Because when every human being, who labors at all, has, as nearly as possible, all the fruits of his labor, and all the capital that is necessary to make his labor most effective, he has all needed inducements to the best use of both his brains and his muscles, his head and his hands. He applies both his head and his hands to his work. He not only acquires, as far as possible, for his own use, all the scientific discoveries and mechanical inventions, that are made by others, but he himself makes scientific discoveries and mechanical inventions. He thus multiplies indefinitely his powers of production. And the more each one produces of his own particular commodity, the more he can buy of every other man's products, and the more he can pay for them.
With freedom in money, the scientific discoveries and mechanical inventions, made in each country, will not only be used to the utmost in that country, but will be carried into all other countries. And these discoveries and inventions, given by each country to every other, and received by each country from every other, will be of infinitely more value than all the material commodities that will be exchanged between these countries.
In this way each country contributes to the wealth of every other, and the whole human race are enriched by the increased power and stimulus given to each man's labor of body and mind.
But it is to be kept constantly in mind, that there can be no such thing as free labor, unless there be freedom in money; that is, unless everybody, who can furnish money, shall be at liberty to do so. Plainly labor cannot be free, unless the laborers are free to hire all the money capital that is necessary for their industries. And they cannot be free to hire all this money capital, unless all who can lend it to them, shall be at liberty to do so.
In short, labor cannot be free, unless each laborer is free to hire all the capital--money capital, as well as all other capital--that he honestly can hire; free to buy, wherever he can buy, all the raw material he needs for his labor; and free to sell, wherever he can sell, all the products of his labor. Therefore labor cannot be free, unless we have freedom in money, and free trade with all mankind.
We can now understand the situation. In the most civilized nations--such as Western Europe and the United States--labor is utterly crippled, robbed, and enslaved by the monopoly of money; and also, in some of these countries, by the monopoly of land. In nearly or quite all the other countries of the world, labor is not only robbed and enslaved, but to a great extent paralyzed, by the monopoly of land, and by what may properly be called the utter absence of money. There is, consequently, in these latter countries, almost literally, no diversity of industry, no science, no skill, no invention, no machinery, no manufactures, no production, and no wealth; but everywhere miserable poverty, ignorance, servitude, and wretchedness.
In this country, and in Western Europe, where the uses of money are known, there is no excuse to be offered for the monopoly of money. It is maintained, in each of these countries, by a small knot of tyrants and robbers, who have got control of the governments, and use their power principally to maintain this monopoly; understanding, as they do, that this one monopoly of money gives them a substantially absolute control of all other men's property and labor.
But not satisfied with this substantially absolute control of all other men's property and labor, the monopolists of money, _in this country_,--feigning great pity for their laborers, but really seeking only to make their monopoly more profitable to themselves,--cry out for protection against the competition of the pauper labor of all other countries; when they alone, _and such as they_, are the direct cause of all the pauper labor in the world. But for them, and others like them, there would be neither poverty, ignorance, nor servitude on the face of the earth.
But to all that has now been said, the advocates of the monopoly of money will say that, if all the material property of the country were permitted to be represented by promissory notes, and these promissory notes were permitted to be lent, bought, and sold as money, the laborers would not be able to hire them, for the reason that they could not give the necessary security for repayment.
But let those who would say this, tell us why it is that, in order to prevent men from loaning their promissory notes, for circulation as money, it has always been necessary for governments to prohibit it, either by penal enactments, or prohibitory taxation. These penal enactments and prohibitory taxation are acknowledgments that, but for them, the notes would be loaned to any extent that would be profitable to the lenders. What this extent would be, nothing but experience of freedom can determine. But freedom would doubtless give us ten, twenty, most likely fifty, times as much money as we have now, if so much could be kept in circulation. And laborers would at least have ten, twenty, or fifty times better chances for hiring capital, than they have now. And, furthermore, all labor and property would have ten, twenty, or fifty times better chances of bringing their full value in the market, than they have now.
But in the space that is allowable in this letter, it is impossible to say all, or nearly all, of what might be said, to show the justice, the utility, or the necessity, for perfect freedom in the matters of money and international trade. To pursue these topics further would exclude other matters of great importance, as showing how the government acts the part of robber and tyrant in all its legislation on contracts; and that the whole purpose of all its acts is that the earnings of the many may be put into the pockets of the few.
SECTION XVII.
Although, as has already been said, the constitution is a paper that nobody ever signed, that few persons have ever read, and that the great body of the people never saw; and that has, consequently, no more claim to be the supreme law of the land, or to have any authority whatever, than has any other paper, that nobody ever signed, that few persons ever read, and that the great body of the people never saw; and although it purports to authorize a government, in which the lawmakers, judges, and executive officers are all to be secured against any responsibility whatever _to the people_, whose liberty and rights are at stake; and although this government is kept in operation only by votes given in secret (by secret ballot), and in a way to save the voters from all personal responsibility for the acts of their agents--the lawmakers, judges, etc.; and although the whole affair is so audacious a fraud and usurpation, that no people could be expected to agree to it, or ought to submit to it, for a moment; yet, inasmuch as the constitution declares itself to have been ordained and established by the people of the United States, for the maintenance of liberty and justice for themselves and their posterity; and inasmuch as all its supporters--that is, the voters, lawmakers, judges, etc.--profess to derive all their authority from it; and inasmuch as all lawmakers, and all judicial and executive officers, both national and State, swear to support it; and inasmuch as they claim the right to kill, and are evidently determined to kill, and esteem it the highest glory to kill, all who do not submit to its authority; we might reasonably expect that, from motives of common decency, if from no other, those who profess to administer it, would pay some deference to its commands, _at least in those particular cases where it explicitly forbids any violation of the natural rights of the people_.
Especially might we expect that the judiciary--whose courts claim to be courts of justice--and who profess to be authorized and sworn to expose and condemn all such violations of individual rights as the constitution itself expressly forbids--would, in spite of all their official dependence on, and responsibility to, the lawmakers, have sufficient respect for their personal characters, and the opinions of the world, to induce them to pay some regard to all those parts of the constitution that expressly require any rights of the people to be held inviolable.
If the judicial tribunals cannot be expected to do justice, even in those cases where the constitution expressly commands them to do it, and where they have solemnly sworn to do it, it is plain that they have sunk to the lowest depths of servility and corruption, and can be expected to do nothing but serve the purposes of robbers and tyrants.
But how futile have been all expectations of justice from the judiciary, may be seen in the conduct of the courts--and especially in that of the so-called Supreme Court of the United States--in regard to men's natural right to make their own contracts.
Although the State lawmakers have, more frequently than the national lawmakers, made laws in violation of men's natural right to make their own contracts, yet all laws, State and national, having for their object the destruction of that right, have always, without a single exception, I think, received the sanction of the Supreme Court of the United States. And having been sanctioned by that court, they have been, as a matter of course, sanctioned by all the other courts, State and national. And this work has gone on, until, if these courts are to be believed, nothing at all is left of men's natural right to make their own contracts.
That such is the truth, I now propose to prove.
And, first, as to the State governments.
The constitution of the United States (_Art. 1, Sec. 10_) declares that:
No State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts.
This provision does not designate what contracts have, and what have not, an "obligation." But it clearly presupposes, implies, assumes, and asserts that there are contracts that _have_ an "obligation." Any State law, therefore, which declares that such contracts shall have _no obligation_, is plainly in conflict with this provision of the constitution of the United States.
This provision, also, by implying that there _are_ contracts, that _have_ an "obligation," _necessarily implies that men have a right to enter into them_; for if men had no right to enter into the contracts, the contracts themselves could have no "obligation."
This provision, then, of the constitution of the United States, not only implies that there are contracts that _have_ an obligation, _but it also implies that the people have the right to enter into all such contracts, and have the benefit of them_. And "_any_" State "_law_," conflicting with either of these implications, is necessarily unconstitutional and void.
Furthermore, the language of this provision of the constitution, to wit, "the obligation [singular] of contracts" [plural], implies _that there is one and the same "obligation" to all "contracts" whatsoever, that have any legal obligation at all_. And there obviously must be some one principle, that gives validity to all contracts alike, that have any validity.
The law, then, of this whole country, as established by the constitution of the United States, is, that all contracts whatsoever, in which this one principle of validity, or "obligation," is found, shall be held valid; and that the States shall impose no restraint whatever upon the people's entering into all such contracts.
All, therefore, that courts have to do, in order to determine whether any particular contract, or class of contracts, are valid, and _whether the people have a right to enter into them_, is simply to determine whether the contracts themselves have, or have not, this one principle of validity, or "obligation," which the constitution of the United States declares shall not be impaired.
State legislation can obviously have nothing to do with the solution of this question. It can neither create, nor destroy, that "obligation of contracts," which the constitution forbids it to impair. It can neither give, nor take away, the right to enter into any contract whatever, that has that "obligation."
On the supposition, then, that the constitution of the United States is, what it declares itself to be, _viz._, "the supreme law of the land, ... anything in the constitutions or laws of the States to the contrary notwithstanding," this provision against "any" State "law impairing the obligation of contracts," is so explicit, and so authoritative, that the legislatures and courts of the States have no color of authority for violating it. And the Supreme Court of the United States has had no color of authority or justification for suffering it to be violated.
This provision is certainly one of the most important--perhaps the most important--of all the provisions of the constitution of the United States, _as protective of the natural rights of the people to make their own contracts, or provide for their own welfare_.
Yet it has been constantly trampled under foot, by the State legislatures, by all manner of laws, declaring who may, and who may not, make certain contracts; and what shall, and what shall not, be "the obligation" of particular contracts; thus setting at defiance all ideas of justice, of natural rights, and equal rights; conferring monopolies and privileges upon particular individuals, and imposing the most arbitrary and destructive restraints and penalties upon others; all with a view of putting, as far as possible, all wealth into the hands of the few, and imposing poverty and servitude upon the great body of the people.
And yet all these enormities have gone on for nearly a hundred years, and have been sanctioned, not only by all the State courts, but also by the Supreme Court of the United States.
And what color of excuse have any of these courts offered for thus upholding all these violations of justice, of men's natural rights, and even of that constitution which they had all sworn to support?
They have offered only this: _They have all said they did not know what "the obligation of contracts" was_!
Well, suppose, for the sake of the argument, that they have not known what "the obligation of contracts" was, what, then, was their duty? Plainly this, to neither enforce, nor annul, any contract whatever, until they should have discovered what "the obligation of contracts" was.
Clearly they could have no right to either enforce, or annul, any contract whatever, until they should have ascertained whether it had any "obligation," and, if any, what that "obligation" was.
If these courts really do not know--as perhaps they do not--what "the obligation of contracts" is, they deserve nothing but contempt for their ignorance. If they _do_ know what "the obligation of contracts" is, and yet sanction the almost literally innumerable laws that violate it, they deserve nothing but detestation for their villainy.
And until they shall suspend all their judgments for either enforcing, or annulling, contracts, or, on the other hand, shall ascertain what "the obligation of contracts" is, and sweep away all State laws that impair it, they will deserve both contempt for their ignorance, and detestation for their crimes.
Individual Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States have, at least in one instance, in 1827 (_Ogden vs. Saunders_, 12 Wheaton 213), attempted to give a definition of "the obligation of contracts." But there was great disagreement among them; and no one definition secured the assent of the whole court, _or even of a majority_. Since then, so far as I know, that court has never attempted to give a definition. And, so far as the opinion of that court is concerned, the question is as unsettled now, as it was sixty years ago. And the opinions of the Supreme Courts of the States are equally unsettled with those of the Supreme Court of the United States. The consequence is, that "the obligation of contracts"--the principle on which the real validity, or invalidity, of all contracts whatsoever depends--is practically unknown, or at least unrecognized, by a single court, either of the States, or of the United States. And, as a result, every species of absurd, corrupt, and robber legislation goes on unrestrained, as it always has done.
What, now, is the reason why not one of these courts has ever so far given its attention to the subject as to have discovered what "the obligation of contracts" is? What that principle is, I repeat, which they have all sworn to sustain, and on which the real validity, or invalidity, of every contract on which they ever adjudicate, depends? Why is it that they have all gone on sanctioning and enforcing all the nakedly iniquitous laws, by which men's natural right to make their own contracts has been trampled under foot?
Surely it is not because they do not know that all men have a natural right to make their own contracts; for they know _that_, as well as they know that all men have a natural right to live, to breathe, to move, to speak, to hear, to see, or to do anything whatever for the support of their lives, or the promotion of their happiness.
Why, then, is it, that they strike down this right, without ceremony, and without compunction, whenever they are commanded to do so by the lawmakers? It is because, and solely because, they are so servile, slavish, degraded, and corrupt, as to act habitually on the principle, that justice and men's natural rights are matters of no importance, in comparison with the commands of the impudent and tyrannical lawmakers, on whom they are dependent for their offices and their salaries. It is because, and solely because, they, like the judges under all other irresponsible and tyrannical governments, are part and parcel of a conspiracy for robbing and enslaving the great body of the people, to gratify the luxury and pride of a few. It is because, and solely because, they do not recognize our governments, State or national, as institutions designed simply to maintain justice, or to protect all men in the enjoyment of all their natural rights; but only as institutions designed to accomplish such objects as irresponsible cabals of lawmakers may agree upon.
In proof of all this, I give the following.
Previous to 1824, two cases had come up from the State courts, to the Supreme Court of the United States, involving the question whether a State law, _invalidating some particular contract_, came within the constitutional prohibition of "any law impairing the obligation of contracts."
One of these cases was that of _Fletcher vs. Peck_, (6 _Cranch_ 87), in the year 1810. In this case the court held simply that a grant of land, once made by the legislature of Georgia, could not be rescinded by a subsequent legislature.
But no general definition of "the obligation of contracts" was given.
Again, in the year 1819, in the case of _Dartmouth College vs. Woodward_ (4 _Wheaton_ 518), the court held that a charter, granted to Dartmouth College, by the king of England, before the Revolution, was a contract; and that a law of New Hampshire, annulling, or materially altering, the charter, without the consent of the trustees, was a "law impairing the obligation" of _that_ contract.
But, in this case, as in that of _Fletcher vs. Peck_, the court gave no general definition of "the obligation of contracts."
But in the year 1824, and again in 1827, in the case of _Ogden vs. Saunders_ (12 _Wheaton_ 213) the question was, whether an insolvent law of the State of New York, which discharged a debtor from a debt, _contracted after the passage of the law_, or, as the courts would say, "_contracted under the law_"--on his giving up his property to be distributed among his creditors--was a "law impairing the obligation of contracts?"
To the correct decision of this case, it seemed indispensable that the court should give a comprehensive, precise, and _universal_ definition of "the obligation of contracts"; one by which it might forever after be known what was, and what was not, that "obligation of contracts," which the State governments were forbidden to "impair" by "_any law_" whatever.