The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-12-20
THE COAL DIFFICULTIES.

A
The careful letters we have recently pub
lished from the coal regions show clearly just
what the chief cause of trouble is between
the mine-owners and their hands. The supply
of coal is considerably in excess of the de-
mand, and prices can only be kept at a
paying figure by artificial means The
miDe-owners purpose to restore the COM
mercial balance by lowering wages when
ever the price falls below certain point-in
other words, to let the price of coal govern
the price of labor. The hands, on the con-
trary insist that low prices shall be met by
a restriction of the supply-that is to say,
that wages shall be kept up by creating O
stringent market. This they purpose doing
through their labor organizations, by enforcing
general suspension of work whenever the
wholesale price of coal falls below a
certain figure, and also by limiting the
amount of work which a miner may do in a
day-miners being paid not by time but by
the carload. Now here are two powerful in
terests in direct antagonism, and each has so
much right on its side that a reconciliation
seems almost impossible. The miner may
reasonably urge that cheap coal does not sem
sibly diminish for him the cost of Ii ring, or
make dollar worth any more loaves of bread
or yards of cloth; and it is a selfish policy, at
variance with all American principles to de-
grade the workingman by keeping down the
value of his work. The operators, on the con-
trary, declare that it is simply question
whether they shall stop work three months in
the year and then pay high wages the other
at such rates that they may distri-
butte over the whole year the same
amount of wages which by the other plan
they would pay in nine months. When a
colliery suspends production its expenses do
not stop. The pumps must work day and
night or the mine will be flooded; the ma
chinery needs constant care; the men, too,
are demoralized by idleness; and it is, upon
the whole, generally cheaper for a company
to sell coal at small loss than to suspend
work There are two possible solutions of this
difficulty. One is to diminish the cost of
preparing the coal at the mine; the other is
TO stimulate the demand. American inge-
nuity may yet devise several methods of
saving in the COST The breaking machinery
may be improved; all the mechanical appli-
snces of the mine, the arrangements
for ventilation, drainage, and hosting,
may perhaps be simplifed. The cost of
transportation may be reduced by improve
ments in railroads, andsa stupendous economy
may be effected whenever somebody is fortu-
nate enough to discover a method Of utilizing
the great heaps of "dust" which now repre-
sent SO much waste and cause so much en-
barrassment to every mine-owner. But
meanwhile an enlightened protection for
American industry will open new markets for
coal, and foster those manufacturing enter
prises upon which the prosperity of the
miner SO intimately depends. When the iron
and steel, the cotton and woollen stuffs which
we now bring from across the ocean are
made within reach of our own mines, we
shall have no more complaint of an excessive
supply of coal.