WEALTH and WAGE by William N. Glenn

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Nov 23, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 46.

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WEALTH and WAGE

By William N. Glenn

LABOR’S EFFORT TO BE FREE

BY WILLIAM N. GLENN

As shown in former articles, labor gradually became enslaved to capital because so many men failed to appreciate the landed capital which the Creator designed for all. They forsook their God-given estate, preferring to expend their labor in connection with other men’s capital, receiving immediate return in wages.

The slavery has been a long and bitter one, because men have continued to choose that manner of earning a living until it seems to the masses that there is no other way. There have been many efforts to obtain freedom, but they have failed because men did not understand the root cause of the situation. They have thought only of some coercive measure—some means of compelling capital to divide the profits derived from superior business instinct, or even from ill-gotten gain.

We have on record but one really successful effort to set free a people whose labor had been segregated from their natural capital—their own land. That effort was successful because it was conducted on the only legitimate principle—a reunion of individual labor, or family labor, with individual or family ownership of landed capital. That effort was devised by the Creator Himself, and was carried out under His direction, after the people had expressed a willingness to be led by Him. Whenever an oppressed people or an oppressed class unitedly place their cause in the hands of the almighty Deliverer, and follow in the line of His plan, freedom will surely be their reward.

A Successful Experiment.

In order to bring the family of Jacob into a better understanding of their dependence upon Him, and to bring the name and power and mercy of the true God before the world, an extended famine drove Jacob and his family away from their own land into Egypt, whence Joseph had preceded them through the cruelty of his brethren. Here they were obliged to work the land owned by others, and this state of dependency gradually descended into a condition of the most tyrannical slavery.

At last the Lord undertook to better the condition of these oppressed laborers, and it is well to note the principle of the movement. The Leader did not demand higher wages for the laborers, nor a share of the profits, nor shorter hours; but He did declare their right to quit the job, and go somewhere else. There was considerable violence used, but it was all in defense of their right to quit. The Lord sustained that right to the end; and delivered His people. There was no assertion of a right to hold the work on their own terms, or to hinder others from taking their places. The only right asserted and maintained at such terrible cost to the employer, was the right to quit. The purpose was to go back to the land that God had bequeathed to them hundreds of years before, and there unite their own labor with their own capital, and be free.

True, there were obstacles in the way—in this sinful world there always are difficulties to overcome in the path of right. There was the Red Sea to cross, without bridge or boat, there were the government troops behind them, determined to break the strike and compel the strikers to go back to work; and beyond was the desert, which betokened only starvation, and would surely discourage many and incline them to a desire to return to work on the old terms. But the great Leader saw beyond all this the "promised land," with a proper union of labor with capital.

Futile Efforts to Settle the Question.

Now no question is ever settled until it is settled on correct principles. And so long as men seek only to earn their livelihood by wage-earning from the capital of others, they are subject to the disposition of the capitalist employer. The exceptions to this rule are mere matters of circumstance, and are therefore but temporary at best. So long as the tendency to forsake the cultivation of the soil prevails, and the rising generation is educated only for wage-earning positions, the masses become more and more dependent upon the capital class. So long as the efforts to free the laboring class contemplate only coercive measures—schemes for placing employees in enforced control of the business and property of their employers, relief can be only partial, only here and there an exception to the rule, and therefore only temporary.

A few men of wealth and a few associations have sought to alleviate the condition of poor wage-earners by placing them on land of their own. These efforts have been partially successful, and might have been much more so but for the impatient lack of perseverance on the part of the people themselves. The scripture says "the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it," but men brought up to working for wages, getting their pittance every week or month, or other short period, are poorly fitted for any business that requires patience in waiting returns. So the general idea of the dependent laboring classes for bettering their condition is a compulsory raise of wages and shortening of working hours. While this theory prevails, conditions will not materially change; and, as the tendency is to a greater neglect of the God-given land-capital, it will all the more fall into the hands of the few land-monopolists, and the wage-earning classes become more and more dependent. So long as labor contemplates only an exalted position under existing unnatural conditions, efforts to be free must necessarily end in eventual failure, bitterness, and strife.

The True and Ultimate Freedom.

The slavery of labor, like all other slavery, can be abolished only through allegiance to the Word and way of God. "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." "The meek shall inherit the earth," is His promise. What earth?—"The heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. . . . Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." Herein will be the "promised land," wherein the laborer, who entrusts his cause to the care of the great Deliverer, will find himself restored to peace and plenty, with everlasting life. This is the only successful effort through which the oppressed may find permanent freedom.