Speech #570104024

Now. I say that the statement made by the gentleman from Iowa. and which has been inferentially attempted to be confirmed by the gentleman from Illinois . who spoke a little while ago upon another amendment. that this side of the House has ever taken any other position than that of favoring such a restriction as to the immigration of laboring classes into this country as would restrict it to such persons as were competent to become intelligent American citizens. or that we have ever taken any other position than that labor is a coordinate branch of individual enterprise in this country. which ought to be independently recognized by Congress. is not correct. The position occupied by that side of the House and by the Republican party at large upon this issue is one of alternate cajolery and contempt for the laboring classes and one of consistent duplicity and deceit in dealing with their vital interests. They may deny that there is any sort of antagonism between organized and incorporated capital and organized labor. and they may seek by vague. generic definitions of labor. as including all classes of industries. to reason away and theorize out of existence the significant facts that they are dealing with. but they can not by speculation and sophistry destroy the status that is recognized by everybody as it exists in the controversy between syndicated capital and organized labor.