Can there be a greater iniquity in the world than the iniquity that proceeds from the abnormal system of dividogenesure?
No! No nation in human history has seen an iniquity that can be compared with the results of dividogenesure as they are at present, for it now deprives men of their |DIVIDOGENESURE IS A FOUNTAIN OF GREAT EVILS.| fruits of toil to the utmost degree; it deprives them of their energy, of their rights, and of their property; it deceives them by the medium of exchange of commodities and products; it makes them economic slaves of the very few masters or throws them out of the region of the slavery into the region of resourceless starvation and degeneration; it concentrates masses of the people’s wealth into a few hands, leaving millions of families without income in despair and casts them out of the rentable homes; it drags them into the courts, throws them into prisons, drives them into penitentiaries, fits them for and chases them into the lunatic and insane asylums. And not only this, but nearly all causes of murders, of parricides, of infanticides, etc., and of the suicides perpetrated by the people, can indirectly be traced to the abnormal system of dividogenesure, which most fundamentally conditions almost all national, social and private crimes, because sound life always depends upon sound economic basis of a nation.
The system of dividogenesure, however, is pernicious not only to the tens of millions of the propertyless people alone, but it has |IT COMPRISES THE PROPERTIED EMPLOYEES.| enslaved millions of families that have homes and have other little properties not bearing direct incomes for subsistence. These families therefore are also compelled to be in gainful pursuits under the same conditions with the landless and homeless. And Mr. Carroll D. Wright, onesided and severely criticised, wrote about some of them as the American bread-winners, as follows:
“Bread-winners in 1870 engaged in supporting themselves were 12,505,923, or 32.43 per cent” of the population. “The bread-winners in 1880 were 17,392,099, or 34.67 per cent of the total population” of that time. “The bread-winners in 1890 were 22,735,661, or 36.31 per cent.” By “bread-winners” he meant “wage earners, salary receivers ... or any one who was engaged in gainful pursuit,” including “proprietors of whatever grade or description, and all professional persons.”[[68]]
I must here make a diversion to examine this author’s argument.
For the purpose of proving that the poor, the producers of wealth, were getting better off from 1870 to 1890 by their gainful pursuits, Mr. Wright has placed in the |MR. C. D. WRIGHT.| same class individuals of incomparable description, and, by making averages upon equally incomparable basis of their gains, logically arrived at the false conclusion that the wages in general had risen during that period of time. And hence, he added that “the rich are growing richer and the poor are getting better off.” He thus arrived at the same nominal conclusion at which Mr. Shearman has arrived in making nearly 56-millions of individuals appear to be in possession of $209 each.[[69]] And it is exactly in the same way Mr. Wright himself made the per capita wealth in the United States, as a whole, amount to $1,036 for every inhabitant of the nation. The rules of arithmetic are accurate in every calculation. But the nominal distribution of wealth has never made the millions of the people better off; and it has never altered the fact, that in 1890 we had nearly 34-millions of them without property; and we had a little over 7-millions of other individuals owning more than 55½-billion dollars worth of wealth.[[70]] Whereas, at the same time, there were more than 27-millions of individuals whose aggregate wealth was only $825-millions, which is but $30 to each person.[[71]]
This little diversion from our main thought once more testifies that the increase of the 42-billion dollars worth of wealth which accrued from 1865 to 1890 did not in the least raise the wages of those producers of the wealth who were compelled even to lose their own properties. On the contrary, while the salaries and incomes of some professional persons had decidedly increased, the wages in general had fallen, as we shall see later on. Consequently, the tens of millions of the creators of that wealth appeared to be all the worse off, as we have seen on pp. [85], [86].
And when Mr. Wright adds “that the transportation has been so perfected,” during the same time, “as to bring to the door of the |THE PROPERTYLESS HAVE NEITHER DOOR NOR WINDOW.| poor man and the rich the results of industry of far away people” in order that they may buy them from different monopolists; this sentence really sounds like a mockery to the 34-millions of individuals who had in 1890 neither their own door nor even window, and who were absolutely dependent upon chances for a semi-income under the oppressive dividogenesure.
But as to how many people were engaged in the gainful pursuits and how many of them were entirely subject to the system of dividogenesure, we can better know from the researches of Prof. Mayo Smith. He says as follows:
“Persons in gainful pursuits, United States 1890, by classes of occupations, in ten years of age and over, were 47,413,559. Out of them |PROF. MAYO SMITH.| 24,352,659 were males and 23,060,900 were females.” After this statement he innumerates their respective occupations and adds “That 9,013,201 persons were in gainful pursuits in agriculture, fisheries and mining, and that 8,333,692 of these last are males and 679,509 are females.”[[72]] So that out of 62,622,250 inhabitants of the country 47,413,559 individuals of 10 years of age and upwards were engaged in the gainful pursuits.