Labor is prior to...

[CCA]

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"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."
Abraham Lincoln
From:
Abraham Lincoln (New York: Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1954), p. 271

Discuss

 

[Xanikk999]

Labor is not independent of capital unless its slave labor. And even then slaves arent free labor (you have to feed them).

So i really dont know where good ol abe was going with that one..

 

[Norton II]

Lincoln isn't entirely correct here. Labor is prior to capital (for the very reason he states) but is not necessarily independent of it. Labor is generally much more productive when it makes use of capital than when it does not, so capital increases the value of labor.

 

[CCA]

It seems to me from reading this book that Lincoln was developing somewhat socialist tendencies.
Had he survived the assasination perhaps under his direction the Republican Party would be the party of the working classes.(oh the irony!)

 

[Norton II]

If Lincoln had survived and become a socialist, how long do you think the Republican Party would have remained under his direction? Not very long, I'd expect, given that the GOP was the party of mercantilism and subsidies for big business. More likely would have been a split within the party that would have let the Democrats regain power.