“For many years my wife, who loves a garden, worked at making one with the help of two boys who used to come after school hours and one Saturdays. These boys came out of working-class homes, and were going to public schools and acquiring the psychology there officially imparted. My wife, curious about this, used to ask them questions, and incidentally would try to explain to them about Socialism, and their own interests in the working class. … They both bought second-hand Ford cars out of their earnings as gardeners; and one day one of them remarked to my wife: ‘Mrs. Sinclair, it is a crime the way the rich people in this city drive cars. They don’t pay any attention to traffic signals. They just drive right through.’ Said my wife, with a touch of mischief, ‘Why don’t you follow them and have one of them arrested?’ She expected the boy to answer that they would just tear up the ticket; and this would give her an opportunity to get in a touch of Socialism. But instead the boy replied: ‘No, I don’t want to have them arrested; when I grow up I am going to be rich too, and then I can drive as I please.‘”
Upton Sinclair, The Way Out, 1933, pp. 97-98 (linked on MetaFilter)
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