The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1871-06-01
THE QUESTION OF THE HOUR.
From the New York Telegraph
HOW SHALL LABOR BE RENDERED MOST
PRoDuCTIvE2

HOW SHALL LABOR DE RENDERED MOST
PRODUCTIVE?
Undoubtedly the great question of the
future with us, after we have succeeded in
planting the constitution once more on
solid ground, will be that of labor. How
to prevent wages from falling below the
living point or the zero of the labor Their
mometer2 How to make employment
easily fndable at all times and seasons
are forms of the workingman's political
questions, to which an effective answer re-
qures be to given.
TO DIMINISH POVERTY.
To diminish the pressure of poverty
upon a sober population, to provide sufi-
GENTLY paid work for every arm and for
the greatest number of arms an encourage
ing marriage law could possibly produce,
easily accessible highways between labor
and capital, inexpensive labor removing
machinery, 'cheap trains across the ocean,"
the constant development and multiplica-
ton of labor markets, and the active cir
culation of money in reproductive chan
nels, are indispensable.
THE TRUE SOURCE OF WEALTH IN A NATION.
The possession of gold mine may be
of no value to the owner, because of his
inability to find capital and skilled labor
to make it productive. Unwise laws may
render parents unable to support and in
struct their offspring. But every we'll
managed civilized nation possesses the
means of making every child born within
its borders profitable instrument in de-
veloping national wealth and strength.
To neglect to use such means is sometimes
justified on the plausible but uctenable
ground that the assumption by the nation
of the duties Of bad or unfortunate parents
would induce parents in general to become
neglectful and wicked. But wise educa-
tional laws would in the end have no such
effect, but the opposite.
No nation can be in thoroughly thirty
ing condition unless it is constantly adding
to its population, and, like the bees, peri
odically casting off young and vigorous
hives of humanity. In a healthy state of
society, the birth-rate should greatly ex-
coed the death-rate, and this excess repre-
sents the amount of surplus labor or living
wealth the nation has available for repro
ductive employment, for export and for
manufacturing purposes.
An increase Of population is only an evil
when nation lacks brains. knowledge
ought to produce wise laws, and, while
an acre of waste land or waste sea exists,
wise laws ought to multiply productive la
Dor fields as rapidly as population. One
: of our gravest errors, arising from the
want Of an efficient parent or owner for
neglected children, consists in not rearing
the human article most in demand. Good
wives are wanted, but with 100000 sur
plus females, we have apparently none tc
spare good domestic servants are wanted
everywhere, we have few to offer stout
hearts and strong muscles are in demand
for the article is scarce.
THE QUESTION OF WAGES.
When we come to consider the question o.
remuneration for labor, we find insufficient
wages is constitutional malady, local
manifestation of general disease requi
ring general treatment as well as local ap-
plication and individual attention. A trade
strike is purely local remedy, and there
fore performs but a secondary part
whether for good or for evil, in connection
with the complaint.
1t is chiefly by the operation of wist
general laws that wages can be kept
abreast or ahead of the living point
What, for example, would workingmer
gain by an advance of wages if their en-
ployers, who make the laws, imposed sucl
duty on imports as would double thu
price of food, clothing and house rent
Instead of fighting in detached bands
against the individual holders of capital
trades unions would better secure the per.
manent elevation of the working classes
and the ultimate comfort of their individ
ual members by combining together as {
nation of wage-earning men for the pur
pose of securing political power