Of course, in labor controversies it was not always possible to champion
the cause of the workers, because in many cases strikes were called
which were utterly unwarranted and were fought by methods which cannot
be too harshly condemned. No straightforward man can believe, and no
fearless man will assert, that a trade union is always right. That
man is an unworthy public servant who by speech or silence, by direct
statement or cowardly evasion, invariably throws the weight of his
influence on the side of the trade union, whether it is right or wrong.
It has occasionally been my duty to give utterance to the feelings of
all right thinking men by expressing the most emphatic disapproval of
unwise or even immoral notions by representatives of labor. The man is
no true democrat, and if an American, is unworthy of the traditions
of his country who, in problems calling for the exercise of a moral
judgment, fails to take his stand on conduct and not on class. There are
good and bad wage-workers just as there are good and bad employers, and
good and bad men of small means and of large means alike.
But a willingness to do equal and exact justice to all citizens,
irrespective of race, creed, section or economic interest and position,
does not imply a failure to recognize the enormous economic, political
and moral possibilities of the trade union.
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