in the present national campaign.
Let me say at the very threshold of this discussion that the workers have but the one issue in this campaign, the overthrow of the capitalist system and the emancipation of the working class from wage-slavery.
The capitalists may have the tariff, finance, imperialism and other dust-covered and moth-eaten issues entirely to themselves.
The rattle of these relics no longer deceives workingmen whose heads are on their own shoulders.
They know by experience and observation that the gold standard, free silver, fiat money, protective tariff, free trade, imperialism and anti-imperialism all mean capitalist rule and wage-slavery.
Their eyes are open and they can see; their brains are in operation and they can think.
The very moment a workingman begins to do his own thinking he understands the paramount issue, parts company with the capitalist politician and falls in line with his own class on the political battlefield.
The political solidarity of the working class means the death of despotism, the birth of freedom, the sunrise of civilization.
Having said this much by way of introduction I will now enter upon the actualities of my theme.