The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1875-04-15
THE MANIA FOR STRIKES.
The Innocent People who Suffer by Them
---Some Reflections on Strikes in General.

The Innocent People who suffer by Them
One of the most interesting facts in
the history of the long period of depres-
sion and disaster through which the
business community has been passing,
says the New York Times, is the num-
Der of strikes that have taken place.
These illustrate very forcibly the unsat-
isfactory condition of the relations be-
tween employers and employed. At a
time when the interests of both classes
are, in reality, peculiarly connected, and
when it is not only desirable but neces-
sary for both that there should be the
least possible friction, the employed have
felt impelled to resort to the most ex-
treme of all measures to protect them
selves from their share of the general
distress. The consequence, in nearly
every case, has been that they have not
only failed in carrying out the immedi-
ate purpose of their coercive measures,
but they have inflicted great injury on
their employers, on themselves, and on
thousands who were involuntarily and
helplessly involved with them. It is
estimated that the strike of the Pitts
burgh puddlers, some seventeen hun
dred in number, compelled the idleness
of nearly twenty thousand laborers, and
produced loss in the business of ten
millions of dollars. Supposing that this
estimate is an exaggerated one-of which
we have no certain knowledge-it must
still be obvious that the loss to innocent
persons must have been very great. The
strike in the coal mines along the line
of the Reading railroad is case still
more remarkable. This began on the
1st of January. Is is still in force. 1t
has already reduced many families to
the verge of starvation. 1t must either
fail of its immediate purpose, or it must
produce an advance in the price of coal,
that will satisfy the operators that they
can afford to comply with the terms of
the strikers. In the former case, the
loss in wages will be very great, but will
only cover q small part of the loss ac-
tuaily inflicted. The strike has been SO
strict and general, thatin many collieries
the operators have been unable to pro-
cure the labor necessary to keep their
mines free from water, or to protect
them against the injury, which is not
only immensely expensive but very dan
gerous. 1t will cost large sums of money,
and, in all probability, a number of
human lives, to bring these mines into a
condition where general labor can be
resumed in them at any price.
If the strikers succeed, not only the
difference they claim in wages, but the
cost of these repairs will have to be
borne by the consumers. Who are the
consumers9 Directly or indirectly, they
are laborers like the miners themselves.
Every dollar added to the price of the
manufacturer coal, must, in the present
condition of business, be mostly deduct
ed from the wages of labor. Demand
for manufactured goods is dull; competi,
oogb is seaste at 9n d@tty aetye Iena bnt dtSoSpsr@te
wages, and if this is resisted in the coal
mines, the difference must be made up
elsewhere. How certainly this is the
case can be seen from the returns of the
coal trade itself. The supply sent for
ward this year is less by more than half q
million tons (573, 222) than it was last
year, which is a falling off of nearly
twelve per cent. This is an approxi
mate indication of the falling off in the
demand for labor in manufactures, but
that has been greater rather than les'
than here indicated, because the severe
winter has increased the domestic con
sumption of coal, and SO far compensated
for the reduced consumption in manu-
factures.
We need not here recite the strikes
that have taken place in other trades
during the past winter. Our readers ar,
sufficiently familiar with them. AS
rule they have been failures, and tn
authors of them have suffered severely
We wish that we were able to say tina
they alone had suffered. These strike
show, as we have remarked, how yer,
crude, unsatisfactory, and costly are tn
relations of labor and capital. Instea,
of cooperation there is practical wal
1t may be, and intelligent men kno'
that it is true, that labor and capital hav
at bottom a common interest, and tha
there is common policy which thos
who control both could proftably pul
sue. But on the surface and for th
present, nothing but continual, irritf
ting, costly conflict seems to be possible
There is, of course, the encouragin
reflection in this case that the experienc
of all parties to the conflict tends to ult
mate harmony. The first condition {
that harmony is that it shall be plain O
both sides that self-interest demands i
and the only way in which this can b
: accomplished is by experience. Di
cussion, based on recognized facts, wi
go great ways, but the chief insiru
) ton must come in the time-honore
school, In this light it cannot be d
+ MED that the recent strikes may prov
lessons as valuable as they have bee
expensive.