"Yes, a member of the State militia can be seated in a trade council. In fact, the matter is so obvious that it ought not to be open for discussion at all.

"A man who is a wage-earner and honorably working at his trade or calling to support himself and those dependent upon him has not only the right to become a citizen soldier, but that right must be unquestioned.

"The militia-i. e., the citizen soldiery of the several States in our country

The

the wage-earners of the country. estimate generally quoted to give force to the claim that it is "monstrous tyranny for the small minority to dictate to the great majority of workers the wages, hours, and conditions of their toil" is that labor organizations contain only from eight to twelve per cent, of all wage earners. But if union containing ninety-five per cent. of the skilled workers in its craft demands better conditions it is no answer to say that the farm-hands or the washerwomen are not organized.

a

The comparison most frequently made

in trade and transportation. But among these are bankers, brokers, merchants, officia s of banks and corporations; bookkeepers, commercial travelers, agents, accountants, foremen and overseers, hucksters and pedlers, livery-stable keepers, undertakers, and miscellaneous workers, who are also unorganizable, and should be excluded from the comparison.

It is repeatedly asserted that there is no community of purpose between the union and the non-union man. The fact is that shorter hours, higher wages, and improved conditions are just

credits organized labor with a membership of about 2,400,000, which is only eight per cent, of the more than 29,000,000 persons engaged in gainful occupations in the United States in 1900. But an analysis of the gainful occupations shows the fallacy of the comparison. These 29,000,000 include: in agriculture, 10,000,000; domestic and personal service, 6,000,000; the professions, 1,200,000. Practically all of these are unorganizable and should be excluded from the comparison Included also in the 29,000,000 are the 4,700,000 engaged

as much desired by the non-union workers as by the unionists. Occasional brutal combats do not impugn this broad truth.

When the 6,000 union strikers went out at Fall River a few weeks ago they took with them 24,000 non-unionists, and the two are standing shoulder to shoulder, the families of the non-union workers being supported from the treasury of the union to the best of its ability. When John Mitchell called out his 8,000 members at the time of the anthracite-coal strike in 1900 the 140,