the laborer.  They have remained consistently on the defensive; and a merely defensive policy in warfare is a losing policy.  Every battle the unions win is a clear gain.  Every fight which they lose means merely a temporary suspension of their aggressive tactics.  They lose nothing by it but a part of their equipment and prestige, which can be restored by a short period of inaction and accumulation.  A few generations more of this sort of warfare will leave the unions in substantial possession of the whole area of conflict; and their victory may well turn their heads so completely that its effects will be intolerable and disastrous.

The alternative policy would consist in a combination of conciliation and aggressive warfare.  The spokesman of a constructive national policy in respect to the organization of labor would address the unions in some such words as these:  “Yes!  You are perfectly right in demanding recognition, and in demanding that none but union labor be employed in industrial work.  That demand will be granted, but only on definite terms.  You should not expect an employer to recognize a union which establishes conditions and rules of labor inimical to a desirable measure of individual economic distinction and independence.  Your recognition, that is, must depend upon conformity to another set of conditions, imposed in the interest of efficiency and individual economic independence.  In this respect you will be treated precisely as large corporations are treated.  The state will recognize the kind of union which in contributing to the interest of its members contributes also to the general economic interest.  On the other hand, it will not only refuse to recognize a union whose rules and methods are inimical to the public economic interest, but it will aggressively and relentlessly fight such unions.  Employment will be denied to laborers who belong to unions of that character.  In trades where such unions are dominant, counter-unions will be organized, and the members of these counter-unions alone will have any chance of obtaining work.  In this way the organization of labor like the organization of capital may gradually be fitted into a nationalized economic system.”

The conditions to which a “good” labor union ought to conform are more easily definable than the conditions to which a “good” trust ought to conform.  In the first place the union should have the right to demand a minimum wage and a minimum working day.  This minimum would vary, of course, in different trades, in different branches of the same trade, and in different parts of the country; and it might vary, also, at different industrial seasons.  It would be reached by collective bargaining between the organizations of the employer and those of the employee.  The unions would be expected to make the best terms that they could; and under the circumstances they ought to be able to make terms as good as trade conditions would allow.  These agreements would