It is furthermore to be remarked concerning these aged out-of-works that pride and unwillingness to take work outside of their trades have also been causes of their bankruptcy. The same is true, to some extent, of all sorts of unemployed men, young and old, but it is particularly true of "gay-cats" who have passed their thirty-fifth year. I have known them to tramp and beg for months rather than accept employment which they considered beneath their training and intelligence.
It has been a revelation to me to associate with these men and see how determined they are that the employing class shall have no opportunity to say: "Ah, ha! we told you so!" Many of them have given up their positions in a pet, and taken to the "road," with the idea that if they cannot get what they want they will make the world lodge and feed them for nothing. To bring out clearly their point of view, I will describe a man whom I travelled with in Illinois. He had been without employment for over eight months when I met him, and had just passed his forty-second year. He expected to get work again before long, and was passing the time away, until the position was ready for him, travelling up and down the Illinois Central Railroad. He was a carpenter by profession, and claimed that for over five years he had never worked at any other occupation, when he worked at all.
"I put in three hard years learnin' to be a carpenter," he said, "an' I ain't goin' to learn another trade now. For awhile I used to take all kinds o' jobs when I got hard up, but I've got over that. It's carpenterin' or nothin' with me from now on. You got to put your foot down in this country or you won't get on at all.
"If I was married 'n' had kids, o' course I'd have to crawl 'n' take what I could get, but, seein' I ain't, I'm goin' to be just as stuck up as any other man that's got somethin' to sell. That's what all men like us in this country ought to do. The rich have got it into their heads that they can have us when they want us, 'n' kick us out when they don't want us, 'n' that's what they've been doin' with the most of us. They ain't goin' to play with me any more, though. Ten years ago I was better off than I am now, 'n' I'd be in good shape to-day if it hadn't been for one o' them trusts."
"Are you not at all to blame for your present condition?" I asked, knowing that the man was fond of whiskey. He thought a moment, and then admitted that he might have squandered less money on "booze," but he believed that he was entitled to the "fun" that "booze" brings.
"'Course we workingmen drink," he explained, "'n' a lot of us gets on our uppers, but ain't we got as much right to get drunk 'n' have a good time as the rich? I'm runnin' my own life. When I want work I'll work, 'n' when I don't I won't. What we men need is more independence. What the devil 'ud become o' the world if we refused to work? Couldn't go on at all. That's what I keep tellin' my carpenter pals. 'Don't take nothin' outside o' your trade,' I tell 'em, 'n' then the blokes with no trades'll have a better chance.' But you know how it is,—you might as well tell the most of 'em not to eat. I have had a little sense knocked into me. You don't catch me workin' outside o' my trade. I'd rather bum."
And, unless he got the job he expected, he is probably still "on the road."
Enough, perhaps, has already been said to indicate the general trend of the philosophy of the "gay-cats," but this account of them will fail to do them justice if I do not quote them in regard to such matters as government, religion, and democracy. It has never been my privilege to hear them contribute anything particularly valuable to a better understanding of the questions they discuss, but it seems fitting to report upon some of their conclaves, if only to show how they pass away much of their time. They have an unconquerable desire to express themselves on all occasions and on all subjects, and it is no exaggeration to say that two-thirds of their day passes in talk.
In regard to the government under which we live, the favourite expression used to characterise it was the word "fake."
"Republic!" I heard a man exclaim one day; "this ain't no republic. It's run by the few just as much as Russia is. There ain't no real republic in existence. You and I are just as much slaves as the negroes were."