"Isn't it? Haven't I seen the tenement child sewing on the buttons to pants, and coughing fit to send her in a few years to heaven—for if those babies that have no chance in this world don't have one in the next, there's no God."
"And I've seen things, too, Kitty. I've known a good many families that were down and out, and it's always been one person of the lot who's been to blame. If every one did his share, kept sober, worked hard and saved money, he would get out of the tenement. When the family doesn't do better, when it keeps staying in the dirt, it's because there's a father perhaps who only works three days in the week and gets drunk the other three, or there's a son who can't find the right job, a round peg in a square hole. There's somebody who doesn't do right and keeps the family back."
"And do you mean to say that rich folk aren't like that?" Kathleen was growing very angry. "And yet I'm noticing they're not starved for it."
"If they're rich it's because they're industrious. My grandfather used to tell me that America was the land of opportunity, and that it rested with the individual whether or not he made a success."
"Oh!" Kathleen rose. She looked as though she could personally assault the little man. He in the meantime had resumed his pipe and was talking in a pleasant, matter-of-fact tone.
"Of course, I'm not denying, Kitty, that there are wrong things that ought to be remedied. That case in the South, now. It's very hard. Of course, the children should have schooling, and if the Blair Bill for federal aid to education hadn't been killed, they would be having it to-day. My grandfather used to say that this put back the South fifty years. But given an education, it's a fair field and no favor for the growing boy in the United States."
"I don't know how far back your Mr. Blair and his education may be, but he can't be as far back as you are, Billy, with your fair field. Fair indeed, with two per cent of the people controlling the wealth of the country!"
"Those figures are exaggerated."
"Indeed, they are! It should be one per cent and it will be that soon."
"But suppose for argument that it is. Don't they control it for good?"