Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1850-1854, 1853-05-27
LAb0R---PRESENT CONDITKON---FU-
TURE PROSPECTS.

any time during the past fifteen wears, when
labor was in more general demand through !
out the United States than now. This re- |
mark is perhaps equally true in respect to the
condition of labor in Europe The spirit of
public improvement and gigantic enterprise,
pervades at the present time the civilized ma.
tions of the world. Never was there time
in this country, when there were SO many
magnificent schemes and plans projected; in
volving such vast OUTLAWS of wealth. and re-
curing such immense expenditures of man.
ual labor. The human intellect is taxed to
its utmost limit in devising enterprises of
surprising grandeur: deserts once deemed
impossible, mountain barriers, intervening
seas and oceans are overcome by the tireless
energies of the age. BY the power of labor
directed by the determined skill of intellect,
new highways of commerce are continually
being opened up, over which the teeming
millions of our race pass in ceaseless tide.
The present is day of uncommon de-
mands upon labor; the physical elements of
the nation are in requsition to level hills,
tunnel through mountains fill up valleys, and
by such gigantic appliances, bring distant
states and nations into comparative close prox-
unity with each other. 1t is attributable to
this general demand for labor, that the price
for almost every kind of agricultural product
has been increased. Labor being otherwise
proftably employed, the farmer necessarily
tills his lands and gathers his harvests at a
greater expense; the cost of most the neces-
saries of life, is consequently increased. The
laborer therefore, while he receives higher
wages than in past years, finds his expenses
of living considerably enhanced. Still with
the present prices, the working classes, gene
rally, in our country, were perhaps never do
ing better.
But question of serious concernment arr
ses, will this condition of things last? viii
these vast expenditures of capital upon pub
lie a.-d private enterprises continue, and will
the demands for labor in the direction here
indicated hold out If not, then what must
be the inevitable result? Probably at no
time during the last twenty years in this
: country, were there so great a number of ia
miles dependent upon employees as now
The number throughout the free states, whose
, reliance for bread is upon acages, is unusual
1 ly large. Thousands have turned away from
: the cultivation of the soil, as means of sup
port, to work for wages; other thousands
would have acquired homestead on our
, wide unsettled domain, but for the demand
r for labor elsewhere When the time comes
as it surely will, when the now numberless
public and private enterprises shall be sus-
pended at least for season, what will be the
condition of the multitudes whose present
and future support is based upon the expec-
tation of being employed? Revulsions in
trade, are not only matters of history but are
the results of causes as certain as those which
produce the ebbing and flowing of tides
That reactions, suspensions of great underta-
kings and checks upon commercial prosperi-
ty, are incident to the general business of the
, country, is abundantly proven from the his
tory of the past. That events of this kind
will sooner or later transpire again, no reflect
ing man will deny. The influx of gold, the
multiplication of banks, and the great appa-
f rent increase Of capital, will not stay the pc
Rod of reaction, but may tend to render the
oppression of labor more severe. The con-
dition of million of inhabitants whose reli-
ance is on the wages paid by employers for
labor, cut off from their accustomed support
, and thrown upon their own resources, must
/ of necessity be one of embarrassment, per-
; plexity and distress. Although no observer
of passing events, however shrewd and dis
corning, can determine the precise time when
the calamity shall come; yet come it will.
These words are not to create unnecessary
alarm and dlstrust; but the laboring men
the men who toll for wages and who are elated
with the pecuniary inducements held out in
various parts of the country to work for en-
ployers, should take heed in time Every
dollar saved above self support or the neces-
sary support of a family, should be appropri-
ated to the purchase of homestead. Let
every laboring man become possessor of a
portion of the soil-if it be but an acre. In
times of commercial adversely, when busin-
ess is stagnated, when the pulsations of trade
cease their activities, and when labor is thrown
out Of employment, no refuge is SO safe from
disaster, as spot of tilable land which the
, laboring man can call his own. The rich
and the poor all classes and professions, are
dependent upon the products of the soil for
subsistence. The laboring man who relies
upon employers to gain the means of sup
port for family depends upon an uncertain
, tapura R,t if no bo .I,o o,,-,,or &c n -. -.