ILLUSTRATION THE ARMIES OF LABOR From a Thistle Print of the mural painting Frontispiece THE ARMIES OF LABOR CHAPTER I THE BACKGROUND THREE momentous things symbolize the era that begins its cycle with the memorable year of 1776: the Declaration of Independence, the steam engine, and Adam Smith's book, The Wealth of Nations. The Declaration gave birth to a new nation, whose millions of acres of free land were to shift the economic equilibrium of the world; the engine multiplied man's productivity a thousandfold and uprooted in a generation the customs of centuries; the book gave to statesmen a new view of economic affairs and profoundly influenced the course of international trade relations. The American people, as they faced the approaching age with the experiences of the race behind them, fashioned many of their institutions |