Norfolk day book. [volume] (Norfolk and Portsmouth Va.) 1868-1880, 1869-09-21
The Trades Union Congress

Congress papers were read on the losses
and miseries of strikes and lock.outs,
but no remedy was suggested. The
spirit of the Congress evidently was to
"organize and fight" To bind labor
together so that capital shall not carry
the day. A delegate Of the English
Trade Societies is coming to this coun-
try to see what the working men are
doing, and whether they are ready to
enter into great international league
with the workingmen Of Great Britain
and the Continent to secure the rights
of labor. Mr.. Connolly is the delegate.
and one of the objects of his investiga-
ton will be the effect of the American
Tariff on the interest of labor.
This Tariff question is so intimately
bound up with the interest Of labor and
bears so heavily upon the workingmen
that it is becoming one of the principle
subjects of discussion in their Unions,
Congresses and Conventions.
One of the most striking papers read
before the Congress was from the pen OF
the editor of the "Beehive" on the "Dis-
organization of Labor" He said:
"The trade of England, or of any
other country, depends mainly upon
the following considerations: Upon
the position toward it of the great thor
oughfares of the world; upon its climate
upon the cheapness and abundance of
it's raw materials; upon the amount of
its burden of pauperism, and the
amount and incidence of its local and
imperial taxation; upon the presence Of
labor and capital in due proportions,
and the relations-legal, social and
ACKNOWLEDGMENT them; upon the civ
ilization and requirements of other ma
tions; upon the health, strength and
mental and moral character of the
workmen; upon its freedom, industrial,
intellectual and religious; and the mo-
raj is that, if we see trade leaving us
through the absence Of any of these, we
must minimise our loss on that one,
and strengthen our position as to the
others. For instance, in England we
cannot make more land, nor can we
hold an unlimited population; but we
can make the most of the men by cdu-
cation and !ft-restraint, and of the land
by freedom and right use. u 1T
England is not the natural centre of
the worlds trade.
'On the contrary, its natural future
centers at the Suez and Panama, and
the progress of the steam navigation,
and such enterprises as the American
Pacific Railway and the Suez canal tend
directly to lessen some of our artificial
advantages Before steam navigation
American ships had to cross the Allan
even for the South American voyage, and
this disadvantage to them and advan-
tage to us ran for centuries through our
respective histories. Steam now saves
them some ten thousand miles out and
home on the voyage in question. Their
Pacific railway will divert further traffic,
while the Suez canal, always opposed
by England, put Marseilles between
Southampton and the East, and liberals
ly gives to France long odds. In Eng
land the national industry and intellect,
notwithstanding their stupendous de-
velopment, are powerless to resist pau
perism. Our three familiar demons,
war, waste and taxation, consume sum
much greater than the aggregate income
of all the workingmen in the kingdom,
estimated at ESQ year for each man.
The army of industry must declare war
against the cause of this pauperism and
crime.
THE producers are not 25 per cent. of
the population. Criminals and paupers
must live, and while all property falls
in value, labor falls first and most. Our
object is not so much to show in detail
the admitted enormity and danger of
certain OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES we
must meet and master, as to show that
it is of such character that we must
sit as vigilance committee against it;
we must sit as a vigilance committee
against common enemy; we must
stamp it out and get it under. The
problem of the age and of ell the future
is the organization, of labor and demo-
cracy against all their enemies, whether
within or without-an organization OF
all who work, of every class against all
who do not work, or who spoil work
an organization of all the creative and
governing classes against those who
only consume and obstruct, against all
waste, against all unnecessary profits,
authorizations, or interference between
the manufacturer and the consumer
There must be an organization against
the beer house and the gin palace; for
they destroy all we want to save, and
save all we want destroyed. They are
the cause of pauperism, insanity, bad
trade low wages, destruction of raw
material, and Of capital, of health, intel
lect, character.
We shall not dwell on figures, or pot
ter over blue books--the evils of Excess
slve drink are infinite. If the army Of
labor is to conquer, drink must be sub
ject to martial law; must we say be
watched by vigilance committees Of
those whom it seeks to destroy? Pom
der this one tremendous fact-the lead
ing fact of all that you will hear during
this conference.-the leading fact in the
economy and existence of Great Britain
Every year upward of e228,000,000|
are spent by the British nation on in
toxicating drink. Spent we say-how
much of it is wasted I? How little there
Is of it that is not wasted ? And this
in the land of established churches.
This calculation is patent to the world;
any man can verify the figure. 1t
consists of money spent in drink; of
IL i IL