The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-07-18
The strike in the Coal Regions.

and trfling demonstration, and as movement
OF deep significance. The truth seems to be
that nearly every oollery in Schuylkill county
has suspended operations, that work has
ceased in nearly all the mines Of the Lehigh
district, and that at last advices serious Efforts
were being made to compel a similar suspen-
sion in Luzerne county. There appears
to be general disposition among
the day laborers Of all the districts referred to
to demand, for eight hours labor, the same
wages they have heretofore received for ten
hours toll, and an equally frm determination
on the part of employers to resist this exac-
ton. The active spirits in the movement,
however, are alleged to be bands of msn from
Sohuylkill county, who, not content with
oeasing operations themselves, have marched
from oolliery to colliery, and to districts in
the adjoining counties, compelling all laborers
to cease work. Sometimes they only
request workmen to join the strike, but on
other occasions they issue psremptory orders
threatening to enforce them at all hazards if
they are not at once implicitly obeyed. In
nearly all the districts visited the workmen
apparently felt too much sympathy with the
movement to ofsr any active resistance, even
when their numbers were large enough to do
SO with fair prospect OF success, but some
laborers appear to have been compelled by
sheer force to quit work. The Schuylkill
county strikers were not content with sus-
pending operations in coal mines. They were
equally active in preventing laborers engaged
in other pursuits, in fOundries, furnaces, and
railroad shops from continuing their usual
avocations and in one instance, at Mauch
Chunk, they obliged men engaged in building
church to cease work. That the strike has
already exercised very serious influence in
diminishing the production OF coal is clearly
shown by the large reduction in the amount
transported last week from the Schuylktll
and Lehigh coal regions, as compared with the
shipments for the corresponding period of last
year, and next week will probably show a still
greater decline.
The eight hour law passed at the last session
OF the Legislature, which was the immediate
pretext of these demonstrations, only applies
to labor by the day, aud this is usually the
simplest and rudest form OF toll, requiring but
little knowledge or training, as skilled work
month, or paid according to the amount of
work they actually perform. 1t is said that
in the coal region, of three classes OF laborers,
Viz.:-miners, leaders and drivers, and out
side laborers, it is only the latter who actively
participate in the present movement. Their
strike is even more injurious to the compare
lively skillful workmen employed as
miners and as leaders and drivers
than to the proprietors of the
coal mines as some of the latter anticipate in
increased prices for coal compensation for
the present arrangements. 1t therefore ap-
pears that the most ignorant and compare
lively useless class of raw labOrers are the
main agents in causing the present difficulty.
Their places could be easily supplied by any
other PERSONS who possess bone and muscle
with the will to use them, and We shall not be
surprised if the present strike in the coal re-
gions terminates in the discontinue of these
agitstors. Their dem and is on its face unju
II they wish to avail themselves of the pro-
visions Of the law reducing the period of day
labor to eight hours, they have no right to de-
mand the wages heretofore given for ten
hours labor, in the absence Of any cogent
reasons for such advance, and none appear to
have been adduced. N7ither have they
a right, morally or legally, to enforce
the system of terrorism they have esta-
blished, and to prevent hundreds of
Industrious workmen from endeavoring, by
the sweat of their brows, to earn their daily
bread. 1t is monstrous that a comparatively
small body Of ignorant rioters should be- per-
nitted to inAict such serious injuries upon
their more skilful fellow workmen, upon the
coal operators, upon the most important in
dustries of the State, and, incidentally, upon
the whole country, and especially upon the
poor of the great cities, by increasing the
price of one of the necessities OF life. Strikes,
like all other popular demonstrations, may be
good, bad, or indifferent, according to the
motives which prompt them, and the mode in
which they are conducted. This is emphati-
cally bad strike, without single redeeming
feature. 1t Is manifestly not caused by the
stereotyped pretext of ths pressure of high
prices, for the strikers do not aim to secure
high wages; they only seek to retain the old
compensation for less service than they have
heretofore rendered. And in their selfish
struggle to attain this end, they have disre-
garded the welfare of the communities in
which they reside and the requirements of
the law.
The Attack Upon the Funding Bill,
THK recent attack of the New York Herald
upon Mr.. Sherman's Funding Bill, which was