Charles City intelligencer. [volume] (Charles City, Floyd County, Iowa) 1864-1866, 1866-02-01

The Glenwood Opinion {Iowa), no.
ticing our statement that twelve hun
dred workmen We're recently discharg-
ed from the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and
that many of them would have great
difficulty in readily finding other EN-.
ployments, thus forcibly comments
"How happens it that, here in the West. all
our productive and industrial pursuits must
continue TO be crippled and retarded for want
of labor, while in New York appeals to chari.
i, ty are constantly made for the workingmen
in these days of newspapers and kilograms, we
cannot understand LII we have an overplus
of pork or beef to-day. business New York
knows il and acts upon it to morrow; and il
calico fell a cent per yard yesterday in New
York, business Iowa knew it before breakfast
this morning: and thus prices adjust them
selves Immediately. But laboring New York,
il seems, must shiver and freeze and appeal to
charity for help to fill the mouths and warm
the feet OF hungry and freezing families i'm to-
tai ignorance Of the fact that industrial Iowa
is suffering correspondnely for the want of
that very labor Ii Is Characteristic of West
ern people To be independent but il we have
one class of people more independent than
onother, il Is the laborer-the man who has
skill and muscle to hire Ii is notorious here
that for years labor has been scarce and high.
and especially has il been so for the past year
Houses could not be built in town nor barnes
| in the country for want of mechanics to do
the work. Three to five dollars per day for
carpenters, brick masons, plasterers &c. which
was freely offered. failed to obtain the nec,s-
sary labor, with Western low prices for hog
and hominy Two dollars a day for field
hands and boarded failed to obtain men
enough to crib our immense crops of corn, and
enough of that precious article now stands in
the held, the prey of winter weather and wild
game, in Mills county alone, To feed and fat
ten all the starving laborers in New York.
Again we ask, why viii not the labor of the
country, like its business affairs, adjust itself
more readily Is ii for the want Of informa-
tion Then let those who contribute TO stop
the mouths of hungry laborers in the East
give half that amount to spread the news
among the twelve hundred discharged laborers
that five thousand families can come to West
ern Iowa next spring, where homes cost COM
paratively nottingham 60 to work on farms
or in shops-and from the start can bid def.
ance to want, and be the most independent
people We have, and by industry and frugality
place them on the list of employers s-not em-
ployed That would not only relieve such of
the burdens of the poor. but add millions to
the wealth of the West"
Il
1t is deplorable fact that the La
boring Glass aoM crowd into the cities,
where they are not wanted, rather than
go where their labor is in eager de-
mand. Day by day are we entreated
for " something to do" by persons who
thus insist on living where such as
they are in excess, and mistakenly
suppose it in our power to assist them
in so doing. There are to-day at least
zoe, 900 people living in this city and
its suburbs who are not wanted here.
yet who would be useful and welcome
in the newer and less densely peopled
sections of our country. Yet, were
they where they ought to be today,
they would begin to drift back to the
over-peopled cities tomorrow. Thus
they conspire to starve each other, and
will not be pursuaded to do otherwise.
Thousands of these insist that Capi.
tai oppresses Labor, compels it to work
too many hours per day, and robs it of
half its earnings yet they insist on
subjecting themselves continually to
these very expressions. We gave