Without equality, rule of law and justice can’t prevail

The first step which needs to be taken towards the creation of a welfare state is the introduction of the concept of economic equality among the people of the state. Rule of law and justice simply cannot be provided to the people who are divided into two parts, one filthy rich and the other extremely poverty-stricken. Nobody gives economic equality to anybody on a silver platter. It has to be earned through a long struggle.
Socrates was, perhaps, the first philosopher, who as back as 400 years BC, said all persons are equal. They come naked to this world and return to grave in the same state so why should one discriminate among them during their short stay in this mundane world on the planet earth?This sermon of his grated on the ears of powers that be in Athens who admonished him saying he was poisoning the minds of the Greek youth through this sermon and, moreover, he was forgetting that five fingers of the hand aren’t equal in length ?Socrates was asked either to stop preaching or leave Athens. He was told that in case he didn’t leave Athens he would have to drink hemlock. He refused to leave Athens and instead drank the poison. By doing so he immortalised himself in history.
Whatever little rights the labourers of factories have been enjoying now weren’t given to them by the monied class of their own volition. They were earned by them after a long struggle of labourers in Chicago in which many labourers sacrificed their lives. The factory owners were so cruel that they used to make them work for 15 hours out of 24 hours and in case they were physically incapacitated with injuries caused to them by machines they were shown the door without providing them with any compensation . In the same manner the pregnant women labourers weren’t given maternity leave.
The countries like France which adopted the concept of equality, fraternity and freedom as the cornerstone of their constitution have made the lives of their citizens comfortable. Unless we follow their example a majority of our people who groan under poverty would continue to languish in abject poverty.