Mr. Baker's Lecture.

Under the auspices of the Department of Economics Mr. Ray Stannard Baker, of the editorial staff of McClure's Magazine, last night delivered a lecture in Sever 11 on "Trade Unionism and Politics."

Beginning with a review of the present status of the labor problem, the speaker pointed out some notable tendencies of the past few years, showing that at present we have in this country in many industrial centres "an approximate monopoly of capital facing an approximate monopoly of labor." The result, said Mr. Baker, is either a deadlock of industry, or an evil development of "trade conspiracies" in which, as neither employer nor trade unions are willing to submit, the people are inevitably robbed.

But the public, which, after all, is stronger than any of its parts, will not long permit two factions to stop industry. Compulsion, which must come from the government, must finally be used to bring the two parties to terms. The conflict, therefore, immediately becomes a political affair in which dishonest means are often used to win the favor of the officers of the law. To conciliate these two great industrial forces of labor and capital, organized as monopolies with a perfection never before reached, is a momentous problem which will well serve as the test of a democracy.