class. Thus it thinks itself authorized and even obliged to place the soldiers, officially or semi-officially, as beasts of burden at the disposal of employers, particularly the junkers, who use the soldiers to supply that want of farm hands which has been caused by the inhuman exploitation and brutal treatment of the farm laborers.
To send soldiers to help with the harvest is a practice as constantly met with as it is detrimental and inimical to the interests of labor. It reveals, like the system of soldier-servants,[1] the whole mischievous and stupid humbug behind the arguments which are used by those monomaniacs of the goose-step and the parade drill to show the purely military necessity of a long period of military service, and awakens not very flattering reminiscences of the company system of the time before the crash of Jena. More complicated are the numerous cases in which the post office and the railroad management temporarily employ soldiers at times of heavy traffic, but they should also be mentioned in this connection.
- ↑ The practice of officers of engaging private soldiers as domestics. [Translator.]
