THE INTELLECTUAL AND THE
LABOR MOVEMENT
By George Soule
IT IS a pity there is not some other word than intellectual with which to describe the type of person about whom this pamphlet is written. "Brain-worker”" will not do; it is an ugly and meaningless term which implies that a college graduate has a better mind and employs it more than a manual laborer,. although the contrary is often the case. "Educated person" is an unwarranted assumption; not many really are educated in the true sense. "Technician" would be more accurate for some; yet, alas, how few intellectuals have technical skill of any sort!
The word is made necessary by the fact that there are some trades, largely consisting of those whose hand-tools are not heavier than a pencil or more difficult to operate than a typewriter or an adding machine, which are not yet well organized in trade-unions. The usual apprenticeship for these trades is long and expensive. This is so, however, largely through social custom rather than because such a long training is necessary to produce the average level of ability of the journeyman in question. These trades are largely recruited from the children of Mr. Babbitt and his friends. They include writers of fiction, of poetry, of criticism, of political and social articles—though not the humdrum newspaper man. They include many social workers, researchers, and officials and employees of philanthropic and liberal societies. They include some professors and teachers, And, a much larger class, they include many who do not have even so definite a trade as these, but feel vague aspirations to be of service some day in one or more of them. One trait all these persons have in common. They believe that the whole world and its problems are their province; they are not satisfied to be intellectually limited to one round of duties or to one enterprise, such as a grocery store or a family. Exhibited with proper modesty, this trait is a good one.
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