The Golden Age of Weird Fiction Megapack, Volume 5

by David H. Keller

  “Those are the White Collar men and women on parade. They are the great mass of the population who are highly and intensely educated; they are all dressed up intellectually, and there is no place for them to work; consequently, they are starving to death.

  “They are learned and aristocratic and proud. Possessed of a strong class consciousness, they refuse to do anything that they have not been educated to do. Can you imagine a trained physician working as a hired chauffeur? A graduate of a law school working as a ticket seller in the subway? They say that they are starving; they demand work; they cry for food; but what are we going to do with them? Civilization cannot go back. Modern methods of labor in every department are here to stay. The supply far exceeds the demand.

  “There always has been and always will be work for the manual laborer. Even in the age of the greatest mechanical advancement, the era of electricity, there is always work for the artisan—the plumber, carpenter, plasterer, structural steel worker and paper hanger. We cannot, in my business, get enough plumbers to do the work, and twenty dollars is their standard pay for a seven-hour day.”

  The Western Senator laughed as he interrupted.

  “You talk mighty well for an uneducated man, Hubler. Where did you get all this line of talk and the big words?”

  Hubler, chuckling, replied:

  “Naturally, it is not original. I am a plumber, not a sociologist, but I was interested in this White Collar question, so I hired a man by the name of Pitkin to make a survey of the problem for me, and most of the ideas he gave me I have been rehashing to you. In fact, I read a paper on the subject before the International Association of Plumbers. After Pitkin studied the matter, he became rather interested in it. He feels that we are facing a crisis by reason of the great increase of high grade intelligence, for which the nation can find no fitting employment. He said that a few years ago there were five times as many highly educated men and women as there were positions for them, and that matters are much worse now. He told me that he was frankly worried about it, because when these highly educated people failed to find satisfactory and remunerative work, they became maladjusted, developed mental disturbances, complexes, blocked activities, and finally brooded into an unhappy anxiety state and then even became insane. Those are almost his exact words. I learned part of his report verbatim. Even now I am not sure what some of the words mean, but I do know that these people make poor citizens—they are really super-mendicants and refuse to do the kind of work that needs to be done.

  “You know how I was raised, Whitesell. We were boys together. You worked and so did I. We had to work to keep from starving and freezing to death. I went a little to night school and always I have been a great reader. You went to night school at Cooper Institute, We learned a little, but always we worked with our hands; we knew what it was to be muscle tired; we were familiar with sweat.

  “I have a boy. A mighty fine fellow! I want you to meet him on this trip if you can manage to come up to the house. You ought to have a meal with the wife, anyway. I could have sent that boy to college, but I saw this White Collar trouble ahead; I saw what it was going to be earlier than most people saw it. I told Larry that his future lay in the plumbing business. Society has used plumbing since the days of Rome and it is going to keep on needing it. There will always be plumbing and more plumbing and better plumbing. So I taught him my trade. And by the Seven Sacred Caterpillars he is a fine plumber.

  “It has worked out fine for him. He is a Master Plumber. I give him fifty plunks a day for his time, and he is worth every cent of it. He works in overalls and gets his hands dirty. He has a fair income, and when he inherits my millions he will know what to do with them. He has learned the value of a dollar. He drives a Ford car, though he could get a Rolls Royce merely by asking for one. He knows that he is a plumber, and he is rather proud of being a good one. He is satisfied with his work and his chance for advancement in life. He is not nervous—but he is in love.

  “Of course, he should have fallen in love with a plumber’s daughter, but he met a young lawyer, the daughter of a doctor. He met her at some kind of a party, and fell in love with her at first sight, and after that she gave him one date. When she found out that he was nothing but a plumber, she cut him cold, just wouldn’t have anything more to do with him. The boy was so unhappy that I investigated the family. They are regular White Collar people. The father is a physician, some kind of a specialist, the mother is a college graduate and teaches Greek when she can find anyone who wants to take lessons; and the daughter, as I told you, is a lawyer. They are starving to death—simply because they are too highly educated. They do not know how to work. In spite of all their education, there is not enough income between the three to pay even the barest necessary expenses. They are dependent on charity this very minute, and yet the proud young lady refused to consider the love of my son, because she is a college graduate and he is a plumber.

  “They were in the parade today. Last year only ten thousand had the desperate courage to march and carry unemployment signs. The morning paper estimated that there would be seventy-five thousand White Collars in line today. Every one of those marchers was a college graduate; and all of them are out of work.

  “That, Whitesell, is the explanation of what you have just seen on Fifth Avenue in the proudest city of the world. You are a United States Senator. Have you any solution?”

  The Western Senator frowned as he replied:

  “You know how I became a Senator. I made my money building dams. My wife and daughter became restless and wanted social recognition; so, I bought a seat in the Senate. In fact, my business associates wanted me to go there, because they felt that our group was not being properly cared for. But first, last and all the time, I am a Western man and I still love to mix concrete. Out where I live there is a lot of work, and we never have enough men and women to do it. We could use all of those seventy-five thousand men and women. I do not see why being a college graduate should keep a man from earning a living mixing concrete or making forms or herding cattle, and a woman would make a better housewife and cook if she did have a university education. I am sure that I could find work for all these White Collar people if they would come West.”

  Hubler laughed.

  “That is the very point of the whole matter. They could support themselves here in New York if they were willing to work; but they want to do only the specialized work that they were prepared for. Do you know anything about the Simon-Binet test? It is a kind of yardstick with which to measure the intellect of a person. The superior adult, according to this test, has an intellectual quota of 130, or over. It used to be considered that one percent of the population possessed this grade of intellect. This made a superior population of 1,200,000. But these superior adults were apt to breed their kind, the universities made more, and now it is believed that there are nearly 5 percent of these extraordinary individuals, all capable of doing very fine work, and unwilling to do anything of a manual nature—and there is not enough high grade work to go around. A sociologist told me that there were three highly trained minds for every special place in our modern society. Consequently, two-thirds of our White Collars are out of employment—and are starving—not for luxuries, but for the actual necessities of life.

  “And the world does not want them at any price. The economics of labor, the standards of mass production dictate the formula, ‘NEVER GIVE TO ANY MAN WORK, WHICH A MAN OF LESS ABILITY CAN DO EQUALLY WELL, AS FAR AS THE FINISHED PRODUCT IS CONCERNED.’ Why then should they give work to a 130 percent mind at a high salary when the same work can be done by a 100 percent mind at a smaller wage? And they believe that men, who are barely able to do certain work, do it better than superior minds, because they are content and are never ambitious to improve their condition. They realize that they are at the top of the ladder, as far as their minds are concerned. It is far different with the White Collars. Unless the Government does something, the States will have to do something in order to protect their
own economic safety. Private capital is uninterested and unsympathetic. Universal Utilities are working now on the stenographic problem. Of course, they are trying to keep it quiet, but facts leak out. Unless something is done, we will find that instead of developing a race of supermen, we have formed a breed of super-paupers, highly educated mendicants. We have physicians, journalists, dentists, architects, lawyers with ragged clothes, empty stomachs, and cold and unfurnished apartments, but possessed of unlimited pride and an unwillingness to improve their own condition or to help themselves in any way. Naturally, they are poor citizens, and unpatriotic. They blame the Government for all their troubles, and do not realize that they alone are to blame. They will do all that they can to promote political unrest and even revolution.”

  “They cannot hurt the Government,” declared Senator Whitesell, in a most decided manner.

  “That may be true. You may be right, but they may become a real menace. They have the brains of the nation at their command; you have to realize that fact. Do you think that I am exaggerating facts and making conditions seem worse than they really are?”

  “I certainly do, Hubler.”

  “Then come with me on a tour of their district. They all live together, almost in a Ghetto. They have been driven to that part of the city by the low rents that prevail there. Laborers are making such high wages that they refuse to live in such tumbledown rookeries. I tell you what we can do. Let us go and visit this family that has so persistently told my son that he is not their social equal. Let’s visit the girl and see how my son’s love affair is progressing. She will probably be at home tonight with her parents, tired from the long march and exhausted with hunger. Fortunately, they do not know me personally, though I know a great deal about them from the report of the Detective Agency. Suppose we offer the entire family positions out West and see what their reaction is?”

  After a hearty supper at the Club, the two men drove in Hubler’s car to one of the oldest sections of the Bowery. The streets, houses, and stores all spoke of decay and poverty. Finally, they came to a stop before a four-story house. After climbing long flights of rickety stairs, almost equal in danger to an Alpine mountain, the two men came to the Reiswick apartment. Their reception there was dignified but extremely cool. Evidently, the White Collars had learned to look with suspicion on all visitors showing signs of wealth. However, Dr. Reiswick asked them to be seated on the only two visible chairs, while he and his wife and daughter sat on the narrow daybed.

  The situation seemed to be an awkward one, until Senator Whitesell showed the reason for the visit.

  “I am a large employer of labor, Dr. Reiswick, and I understand that you and your family might be induced to accept positions that would pay a satisfactory salary. The proposition is this: I am from the West. I want to employ an educated man who will serve as timekeeper and paymaster for a force of about two hundred day laborers. I also need a woman to look after the washing and ironing and mending of the camp. She will be in charge of about twenty Mexican women who will do the actual work. She can have an assistant, and when I talked to my friend about these three positions, he thought you might be induced to accept them. The combined salaries would be about three hundred a month, with all expenses paid.”

  He had hardly finished when Dr. Reiswick stood up. He was trembling with rage and could hardly speak.

  “Do you realize,” he demanded, “that I am a physician? A graduate of Yale? Do you understand that my wife is a graduate of Vassar and can teach Greek? And do you further know that my daughter is a graduate of Columbia? She had a scholarship granted her, and we sacrificed everything to help her gain her degree in International Law. Do you not see how insulting you are to ask us to keep time and mend and wash for Mexicans in a desert?”

  “No insult intended,” said Whitesell, soothingly. “We simply thought that you wanted to work. We had a right to think so after you appeared in the parade today.”

  “We do want to work,” answered Mrs. Reiswick, proudly. “My husband is an expert in removing tonsils. In fact, that is his specialty. No one in New York can remove tonsils better than he. I teach Greek. My daughter headed her class in International Law. We should be glad if you would give us work, but it must be the kind of work that we are trained to do, the kind that we have devoted our lives to. We should even be willing to go to a Western town, if my husband could take out tonsils and I could teach the rural people the Greek language.” Suddenly, impulsively, Jacob Hubler arose and walked over to the young lady.

  “Miss Reiswick,” he said quietly, “my son is very much interested in you. If you will permit him to see you socially, to become better acquainted with you, I will give you and your parents a chance to really work at your professions in New York, right here in the city.”

  Miss Reiswick looked puzzled.

  “Who is your son?” she asked.

  “Larry Hubler. You spent an evening with him a few months ago, but after that you refused to see him.”

  “I remember now,” she replied. “He was that interesting plumber. O, Mother dear, you remember him, do you not? You talked a little in Greek to him, and he thought it was Yiddish. Father, you will recall that you tried to explain to him your particular technique of tonsillectomy, and he was so uninterested in your lecture. Naturally, nothing could be expected of a man who had never gone to college. I am afraid,” and here she walked over to Hubler and looked him full in the face. “I am afraid that my social standing forbids any intimacy with a plumber. Undoubtedly, his parents are very ordinary people, without ambition. No doubt, you are some kind of an artisan, of some nondescript variety. The door is open, and the interview is over. Walk quietly as you go down stairs, because there are families of culture living in this house who do not like to be disturbed by day laborers.”

  There being nothing else for them to do, Senator Whitesell and Jacob Hubler walked down the steps and out to their car, swearing none too gently.

  Jacob Hubler was inclined to disregard the entire incident. He wanted to forget it and he tried his best to help his son to do the same. He was confident that Larry would soon overcome his infatuation for the beautiful young lawyer.

  When Senator Whitesell left New York for Washington, Hubler lost sight of the White Collar parade, and it was not until a few weeks later, when the newspapers were filled with the details of a proposed investigation into the question of unemployment of the educated masses, that he recalled his part in the movement that was to end in such a striking and dramatic manner.

  For he had started Senator Whitesell thinking, and to think, with that gentleman, was to act, and to act was to do so in a decisive manner. He was a power in the Senate. In fact, the financial group that he represented dominated and overshadowed the great business interests of the country. They told Whitesell what to demand, and he told the nation. This time he did his own dictating.

  His remedy was very simple.

  There was to be no unemployment in the entire nation. All over the country public works of a vital and necessary nature were to be started. A Federal Reserve Fund of three billion was to be set aside to pay for these works, and they were to be started and carried to completion, just as fast as was necessary to furnish employment to every adult male. His wage was to be sufficient to support his wife and little children. All males over eighteen were required to work, and all females over that age were either to marry or to work as domestics and housekeepers in the labor camps. Thus, all in the nation would be enabled to support themselves and provide their families with the necessaries of life.

  The Employment Bill was accompanied by an educational section, providing for the closing of many of the colleges and for the turning of others into trade schools. A careful survey was made of all of the professions, and each year only a very few of the brightest applicants were allowed to begin the study of each profession. Thus, it was definitely provided that yearly only the absolutely necessary number of doctors, dentists, journalists, architects, and teachers would be grad
uated, and each of them would have a definite position and that position would be his for the rest of his life. Thus, he would be assured of receiving an adequate income, equal at least to the income of the bricklayers, steel men, and plasterers, and plumbers in the nation.

  As soon as the details of this proposed act were published in the daily press, rioting started in all the large cities. The White Collars lost no time in making known their opinion of such legislation. With concerted action, they raided the sections of the city where the artisans lived in luxury, and many windows were broken and heads cracked before the educated masses were driven back to their dingy quarters. In some cities, the police force was inadequate, and the fire department was called upon to turn high pressure streams of water on the rioting collegians.

  Opposition made Senator Whitesell more determined than ever. He forced his bills through Congress and personally made the President see that his political future depended on his signing them. Before Congress adjourned, one of the most remarkable pieces of constructive legislation ever known became a law. Its legality was at once confirmed by a test case before the Supreme Court, and theoretically, the White Collar problem was no longer an unsolved question.