What Social Classes Owe to Each Other

+——————————————————————————————+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | The original from which this text is transcribed uses an | | unusual capitalization style which has been faithfully | | reproduced. | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in this | | text. For a complete list, please see the bottom of this | | document. | | | | With no copyright notice, the 1951 intro falls under Rule | | 5, and is therefore public domain. | | | +——————————————————————————————+

Written more than fifty years ago—in 1883—WHAT SOCIAL CLASSES OWE TO EACH OTHER is even more pertinent today than at the time of its first publication. Then the arguments and "movements" for penalizing the thrifty, energetic, and competent by placing upon them more and more of the burdens of the thriftless, lazy and incompetent, were just beginning to make headway in our country, wherein these "social reforms" now all but dominate political and so-called "social" thinking.

Among the great nations of the world today, only the United States of America champions the rights of the individual as against the state and organized pressure groups, and our faith has been dangerously weakened—watered down by a blind and essentially false and cruel sentimentalism.