Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy

and the establishment of a republic. By some of theseprofessed advocates of justice, the political institutions ofthe United States arc lleld up to us as models of perfection;and me are told that it is only under such a form ofgovernment that true liberty and equality of rights can beenjoyed. But an csamination of tlic subject will convinceus, that if the worlting classes of the United Kingdomshould obtain any or all of the political changes just mentioned,they mould remain in almost tile same condition ofpoverty and ignorance and misery as tltcy are at present.Indeed, all history proves, by tl~c unfailing test of expcriencc,that such would be tile c;ise. Let us turn to therecords of former ages-let us looli at either ancient ormotlcrn rcpul)lics-at all nations, in all times-anrl i~lq~iircif, under any of their varied forms of government andsystems of religion, equal rights and cciu;~l 1:itr.s were everenjoyerl ! They never were, for such equality is utterlyincompatible with inequality of possessions :mtl the gradationof classes-and this state of society ltas al~rrnys prcvailed.Equality and inequality cannot, from their nature,be reconciled.The possession of political power by a people, althoughin accordance with the principle of that equality whichall good men wish to see establishetl and enjoyed,does not of itself constitute the equality of rights; foralthough no equality of rights can be enjoyed by a nationwithout the accompaniment of universal suffrage, yetuniversal suffrage is ncitlrer necessarily accoln1)aniecI with,nor productive of, equal rights. Equal politicill power andequal rights are by no means synonymous terms. Thereis between them all the ditl'erence that can exist betweenzi thing and the ~irord 1)y whicl~ it is reprcsentetl.In considering governmental institutions, we must alwaysjudge of their utility by the effccts wf1ic11 arc seenin connectioll with them, as \r-e judge of their justness bythe principles on which they are established. If the institutionsfounded on the acl