This was written a hundred and twelve years ago. In the intervening century, the endless search for profit at all cost has changed the climate. A century ago only the rich could buy a cool wind, and soon that will be true again. Making this lost text more relevant now than the day it was published.
Blisteringly it swept over the country, leaving a trail of cracked heads and parched throats in its progress. Torturing, invaliding, and killing it kept its course, and when its tail had been chased out of sight by the first rain cloud we, the people of the United States, rejoiced and brought ice cream soda and promptly turned to think of something else.
Yet in New York City alone over one hundred and fifty people died of this hot wave; and the death of thousands more in hospitals and on the street was hastened by the devilling of the sun and the black sleepless nights. And almost without exception, every man, woman, and child that paid the upmost penalty belonged to the working class. Newport and Bar Harbor have no death roll. Those who died were the men and women who bore the burden of the day along the sweltering pavements or who fretted in cramped chocking tenements.
Truly, a philosopher would say, either the rich are better able to stand hot weather than the poor or else the rich are able to purchase cool winds. Both statement are true. The rich are better able to stand hot weather than the poor: baths and good food and a decent quantity of rest have preserved their bodies. They can cope with the extremes of sunshine. But finer than that---they don't have to. They can choose. Climate is at that man's disposal who has the price of the proper railway ticket.
Thus, it is that the rich save them-selves and the poor perish. And it is so quite reasonable that this should be so, because the poor accept it all complacently. If they do not object, who should.
For the most part, the rich are the idlers and the poor are the workers of the world.
The idlers go to the seashore on swift trains: the workers build the trains and stoke them and provide the iron rails on which they run; and then the workers go back to the city of rabbit hutches.
The idlers have learned that it is possible to be comfortable and healthy in summer: the workers have learned that it is God's will for a certain number of their fellows to be stricken down with the heat.
The workers print the ballots of the world. The workers vote the ballots of the world. And they vote the idlers again and again into power.
The idlers give nothing and expect all.
The workers give all and expect nothing.
How beautiful is the self-sacrifice of the workers. Who says there are no saints today? The workers are saints, lacking only halo and wings.
God bless the patient workers who bend their backs so meekly in this age of self-seeking. But would it not be refreshing to see and feel a new kind of heat wave sweep the country? A mental heat wave kindling a blaze of revolt, burning the workers white-hot to resent the cruelty of our outgrown system of society.
* From 'The Masses' A monthly magazine devoted to the interests of the working people. August 1911