One of the special pleaders for business
dishonesty, in a recent speech, in denouncing the Administration for
enforcing the law against the huge and corrupt corporations which
have defied the law, also denounced it for endeavoring to secure
a far-reaching law making employers liable for injuries to their
employees. It is meet and fit that the apologists for corrupt wealth
should oppose every effort to relieve weak and helpless people from
crushing misfortune brought upon them by injury in the business from
which they gain a bare livelihood and their employers fortunes. It is
hypocritical baseness to speak of a girl who works in a factory where
the dangerous machinery is unprotected as having the "right" freely
to contract to expose herself to dangers to life and limb. She has
no alternative but to suffer want or else to expose herself to such
dangers, and when she loses a hand or is otherwise maimed or disfigured
for life it is a moral wrong that the burden of the risk necessarily
incidental to the business should be placed with crushing weight upon
her weak shoulders and the man who has profited by her work escape
scot-free. This is what our opponents advocate, and it is proper that
they should advocate it, for it rounds out their advocacy of those most
dangerous members of the criminal class, the criminals of vast wealth,
the men who can afford best to pay for such championship in the press
and on the stump.
Pages:
734
735
736
737
738
739
740
741
742
743
744
745
746
747
748
749
750
751
752
753
754
755
756
757
758