Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1871-03-07
The Coal Business.
Memorial 10 the Pennsylvania LegisIa-
ture-The Operators Side of the story,
etc,

PHILADELPHIA, March 6.-The Reading rail-
road company has prepared memorial to the
legislature, reviewing at length the causes of the
present suspension of the coal mining, showing
that the workingmen's benevolent association is
solely responsible for the existing state OF facts
and declaring that the pending offer of 50. so
basis to miners from the operators is fair and
just. On the latter point the memorial contin-
ues: "That this offer is fair and just, is shown;
first, because its terms are practically the same
as those under which the men were working
when the suspension took place; second, because
the wages offered are exactly the same as those
which the working men had agreed to accept
during the entire season of 1870; third because,
while the men receive the benefit of every adj
vance in the price of COAL no matter how it may
be, they are protected by the minimum from be-
ing forced too low; fourth, because, at the
rate of wages offered, every good miner
can readily earn from four to five dol
lars per day, as can be shown from actual pay
lists of different collieries during the past two
years, a rate Of wages which exceeds the aver
age income of members of the three learned pro-
iessions in the United States, and higher than
earned by any other similar class of labor in the
world; fifth, because it is believed that three
fourths of the workingmen, if they could give
expression to their real feelings, without fear or
intimidation, would gladly accept the wages Of
fered, and go to work.
"The real question at issue between the rail-
Toau companies, the coal operators and the
manufacturers on one side, and the working
mems benevolent association on the other, is as
follows: First shall supply and demand
regulate as well the price of coal as other COM
moditles, and the public be allowed to purchase
fuel at as low prices as those who produce are
willing to sell for, even down to two dollars per
ton at Port Carbon, and four dollars per ton at
Elzabethport, or shall the workingmen's be-
nevolent association be permitted, by unlawful
combination, to keep the price always up to at
least three dollars per ton at Port Carbon and
five dollars per ton at EliZabethport; second,
Shall peaceable laboring men in the coal regions
on railroads and canals, and at our large manu-
establishments, be permitted to work
peaceably at wages entirely satisfactory to them
selves or shall they be kept in idleness, their
families in want, and the entire industry of
the whole communities paralyzed by a decree
of few misguided leaders of a secret associa-
tionP Third, shall owners of collieries who have
invested large amounts OF money in an uncer.
tain and precarious occupation be permitted
to manage and control their own business
or mast they continue in the future ms thew
have during the past year, under the dctation
of their own employees, as to when and how
they shall work their mines, whom they NAV
employ and discharge, and as to the most trivial
details of the daily routine of colliery manage.
ment."
The company further say that they have not
violated their charter by the recent advance in
tolls, which, however, will be promptly reduced
when mining is resumed, that there is no dan