A great number of these seekers after employment were constantly traversing the country, becoming in time professional vagabonds, then criminals.

'Give us work!' was the cry of an army of the unemployed at nearly all seasons, and in seasons of dullness in business this army swelled to a host so vast and desperate as to threaten the stability of the government.

Could there conceivably be a more conclusive demonstration of the imbecility of the system of private enterprise as a method for enriching a nation than the fact that, in an age of such general poverty and want of everything, capitalists had to throttle one another to find a safe chance to invest their capital and workmen rioted and burned because they could find no work to do?
"Now, Mr.West," continued Dr.Leete, "I want you to bear in mind that these points of which I have been speaking indicate only negatively the advantages of the national organization of industry by showing certain fatal defects and prodigious imbecilities of the systems of private enterprise which are not found in it.

These alone, you must admit, would pretty well explain why the nation is so much richer than in your day.

But the larger half of our advantage over you, the positive side of it, I have yet barely spoken of.