nevertheless a Divine commandment that if a man will not work he shall not eat. 2 Thess. 3:10. If a man, therefore, for any reason whatever, refuses to work when he is able to work, and there is work to do, he deserves to starve; and whoever assists or encourages him in his idleness is encouraging disobedience to God.
I know the plea that is often made by laborers: "We would like to work; we have no personal grievance, and we have opposed the proposition to strike; but the strike has been declared, and we are obliged to stop work."
This shows the wickedness of the whole thing, more than anything else. If trades unions were for the purpose
--of encouraging laborers,
--of instructing them in their trades;
--of assisting them to secure work,
--and helping them when they are ill,
they would be useful;
but the fact that they tyrannies over laborers, and enslave them, 
and terrorize them, shows that they are wholly bad.
--We are not now making any plea for capitalists, as against laborers. They can take care of themselves, and need no help from us, although I must bear testimony that all attacks upon them, whether by word or deed, are wicked, no matter how oppressive they may be; but the great objection to modern trades unions, aside from the moral aspect of the case, is that they are the greatest enemies of the working man. Laboring men have suffered more from them than from oppressive employers.
A labor monopoly is worse than a money monopoly.
The man who says that he is compelled to stop work against his will is as much a slave as the one who against his will is driven to his work by the lash of the overseer. Only in the latter case the man has been captured and sold; and so is not responsible for his condition, while in the former. The man has voluntarily placed himself in a state of servitude. Such slavery is utterly incompatible with Christianity; for "he that is called in the Lord, being a servant, is the Lord's free man." 1 Cor. 7:22." E.J. Waggoner
