62 66 bridges were burned, and railroads torn up within her limits; and we were many days, at one time, without the ability to bring a single regiment over her soil to the capital. Now her bridges and railroads are repaired and open to the Government; she already gives seven regiments to the cause of the Union, and none to the enemy; and her people, at a regular election, have sustained the Union by a larger majority and a larger aggregate vote than they ever before gave to any candidate or any question. Kentucky, too, for some time in doubt, is now decidedly, and I think unchangeably, ranged on the side of the Union. Missouri is comparatively quiet, and I believe cannot again be overrun by the insurrectionists. These three States of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri, neither of which would promise a single soldier at first, have now an aggregate of not less than 40,000 in the field for the Union; while of their citizens, certainly not more than a third of that number, and they of doubtful whereabouts and doubtful existence, are in arms against it. After CAPITAL AND LABOUR. 63 a somewhat bloody struggle of months, winter closes on the Union people of Western Virginia, leaving them masters of their own country." The President concluded by insisting, as in his former message, on the Secession being 'largely, if not exclusively, a war upon the first principle of popular Government-the rights of the people." And here follows a most interesting development of his views-conceived, indeed, from the stand-point of a Western Americanon the relation between capital and labour : "There is one point, with its connections, not so hackneyed as most others, to which I ask a brief attention. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above labour, in the structure of Government. It is assumed that labour is available only in connection with capital; that nobody labours unless somebody else, owning capital, somehow by the use of it induces him to labour. This assumed, it is next considered whether it is best that capital shall hire labourers, and thus induce them to work by their own con 64 FIRST "ANNUAL" MESSAGE: sent, or buy them, and drive them to it without their consent. Having proceeded so far, it is naturally concluded that all labourers are either hired labourers, or what we call slaves. And further, it is assumed that whoever is once a hired labourer, is fixed in that condition for life. Both these assumptions are false, and all inferences from them are groundless. "Labour is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labour, and could never have existed if labour had not first existed. Labour is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labour and capital, producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labour of the community exists within that relation. A few men own capital, and those few avoid labour themselves, and, with their capital, hire or buy another few to labour for them. A large. majority belong to neither class-neither work HOW THE FREE LABOURER RISES. 65 for others, nor have others working for them. In most of the Southern States, a majority of the whole people, of all colours, are neither slaves nor masters; while in the Northern a large majority are neither hirers nor hired. . . Again, as has already been said, there is not of necessity any such thing as the free hired labourer being fixed to that condition for life. Many independent men everywhere in those States, a few years back in their lives, were hired labourers. The prudent, penniless beginner in the world labours for wages for a while, saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land for himself, then labours for himself another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him. This is the just, and generous, and prosperous system, which opens the way to all, gives hope to all, and consequent energy, and progress, and improvement of condition to all. No men living are more worthy to be trusted than those who toil up from poverty-none less inclined to take or touch aught which they have not honestly F 66 MR. LINCOLN'S FIRST DOLLAR. earned. Let them beware of surrendering a political power which they already possess, and which, if surrendered, will surely be used to close the door of advancement against such as they, and to fix new disabilities and burdens upon them, till all of liberty be lost." Mr. Lincoln does not seem to have asked himself whether the God-given thews and sinews, with which the white man labours and the black, are not in fact a "capital" which must precede all labour. But if we read his reasoning on the subject by his experience, it really means this:-'I, Abraham Lincoln, who stand here as President of these United States, began life as a hired labourer. What capital I have, I made by my labour.* If I * One morning, in the Executive Chamber, there were present a number of gentlemen, among them Mr. Seward. A point in the conversation suggesting the thought, Mr. Lincoln said :— "Seward, you never heard, did you, how I earned my first dollar?" "No," said Mr. Seward. "Well," replied he, "I was about eighteen years of |