New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1871-04-20
Tyranny Among LabOrers.

| In our last issue we took occasion to demon
strate the unrepublican spirit OF communism
To-day our attention is drawn to a kindred sub
| ject, by the disturbances in the Pennsylvania
coal regions, namely the tyranny exercised
| by trade unions and workingmen's associations.
The miners have determined to strike for big cher
wages and stopped work in order to compel the
operators to comply with their demands. This
they have an undisputable right to do, no mat
ter how much the consumers in the whole coun-
try may be annoyed by their cutting off the
| supply of an indispensable article but not
satisfied with exercising this right TO its full
extent they have resorted to violence in order to
! drive from work the laborers in the few mines
| yet in operation. BlOodshed has been the re.
| suit, and Governor GEARY has called out the
| military forces of the State. Certainly, every
man is entitled to the highest remuneration that
| he can command and if the laborers of any
branch Of trade choose to combine and to
obligate themselves mutually not to work for less
than the wages agreed upon among them, they
only act in necessary selfprotectOn and self
defense against oppression on the part of their
employers. Far different it is, however. when
for less and, as is almost invariably done
wherever strike is in progress, to prevent
them by force. Such proceedings are not only
illegal, but in fragrant contradiction with the
principle of equal rights and liberty. AS wrong
as it would be for one man or any class of men
to compel others to work for wages they DO not
deem sufficient, just as much it is an en-
croachment upon the hts Of Others an abuse
of the weak by the strong, when a powerful
organization undertakes to prevent any one
from working who is not a member of their as
ISOLATION, or when they refuse admission to a
colored man, yet will not allow him to take his
chance, wherever he can, outside of their
ranks The ntolerable tyranny exercised by the
Crispins in Massachusetts, which finally led to
the introduction of Chinese labor, was one of
the most striking illustrations of the illiberal,
| truly unrepublican spirit which animates such
associations. Not satisfied with fixing their
wages, they assumed to dictate to their en-
plOyers the laborers of which nation and from
which locality were to be employed or prescribed
They even went SO far as to prescribe the quail
ity Of the articles to be manufactured. This is
about as absurd, as oppressive as if a farmer
were to be dictated by his neighbors or his hired
men which kinds of crops he is allowed to raise
and which are forbidden for the season, how
many acres must be sOwn with wheat and corn,
and how many must be planted with potatoes
One m ght just as we'll dictate to literary man
whether he is to write poetry or prose, novel
or drama We know that the life of the laborer
is not an easy one, and our sympathies are
naturally with him but by such lawless action
the weight of wrong is only reversed but not
removed, one wrong is substituted for another.
Most of the leaders of the workingmen's as
ISOLATION make war on capital and denounce
it as the chief cause of the poverty of the labor
ing classes many of them are more or less
adherents of communism. The disproportionate
distribution of wealth certainly is one of those
evils which puzzle the greatest national econo-
mists but those who merely denounce capital
and want to abolish it, are rather fighting a
symptom, a consequence, than cause. We
think that real pauperism, wherever it is found,
institutions first of all, to monarchism with
all the evils and wrongs attending it. A glance
on Europe reveals the fact that there is not one
country but what is more or less cursed with
monarchsm, feudalism, serfdom, priest rule,
privileged classes, and inequalities of every de
scription. The soil was owned from times almost
immemorabe by the few, who often exercised an
almost unrestrained arbitrary power over the
welfare and even the lives Of the many. All
high Offices all positions of honor being in the
hands Of the privileged classes it was only
necessary consequence that the masses of the
people, deprived of representation, debarred
from owning the soil they were compelled to
till for others, shut out from instruction and
enlightenment, and consequently without the
shadow Of hope to work their way up, should
be reduced to abject degradation aud poverty.
1t is true that many of these abuses have dis
appeared in the course Of tme though their
remnants are left here and there in the shape
Of deficient representation, prerogatves of
certain classes, and the like. And even where
there is perfect equality before the law now.a-
days, it cannot undo the consequences of the
accumulated wrongs perpetrated through many
centuries. The soil, wealth, and political
power Of country, to q large extent, remain
in the same hands, and with them the means
for indirect oppression and liberty will always