The morning star and Catholic messenger., 1876-09-24
SKILLED LABOR,

One OF the questions suggested by the pre-.
sent movement in Chicago on the part of the
lumbermen and brickmskers to secure higher
| remuneration for their labors, is the duty OF
parents and guardians in choosing . profession
or calling for their yonng men and boys. The
strike during the past week has brought to
light the fact that the vast maiority of ouI
artizans and skilled laborers belong to the
foreign born population and this fact has set
| ns thinking. It reminds US that the Yankees
and native Americans generally are like that
Mr.. O'Brady who confessed TO Lever that he
hadn't the JANUS for work." Not that they
lack the disposition to employ themselves at
some pay ing amusement or other-for other
people il the world more busily do nothing
and mako money but they have o constitu-
tional objection to engaging in any employ.
mept thas involves even q moderate share OF
| clination for hard work in their children aud
the result is, the latter are either permitted to
grow up without having acquired any useful
| call and left to live on their wits as sharp
| E-1eS1iioners "a well as they can, or they are
educated" into some of the learned proEes.
siops. Hence, we scarcely ever meet full
grown American who is not o lawyer, or o ply.
sician, or q broker, or real estate agent. or o
bounty jumper, or some other PROFESSIONAL p
who declines to earn his bread in the sweat of
his brow.
And we regret to see that 80 many Of our
people, who acquire . competence 10 this
country, attempt to follow in tie footsteps of
these people with regard to the disposition of
their children. We, as people, are possessed
OF ae strong hankering after "resps otabilitY"
as the Americans are or could be, and we, too,
often crafty it at our children's expense. We
would not be understood as advisin parents to
withhold from their ohildreo any particular
training or education simply because it might
tend to elevate them in the social scale, aud
raise them above what "snobs absurdIy call
their station in hfe." On the contrary moth.
Ing is more gratifying than the sight Of poor
man struggling to provide good education for
his son to ut him fer some of the learned pro-
the boys natural tastes and
talents incline that way. What we do object |
to Is, that disposition on the part of fathers |
and mothers to force their chidren's minds into |
for which they are wholly untitled by |
inclination-to make clergymen, doc |
tors and lawyers of boys who possess the ply |
sical conformation and mental qualities that |
eminently fit them for succesefui Shoemakors,
and brioklayers. Every parent, rich |
or poor, should study carefully the natural en-
do owments and inclinations of his children, and |
should make blacksmith of him who shows an |
inclination to WELD q hammer, and q lawyer of
the cumming young rogue who manifests pro-
oensity to cheat his brothers and sisters. If
people would see the result of the opposite
,ourse, they have only to study professional
ife in any Of our large cities where the briefess
'arristers and unemployed surgeons who
struggle through genteel' existence on q
mailer income than that of q common labOrer
,utnumber those who have been moderately
by Q hundred to one. There 10 no
bject, TO our mind, more pitiable than an out
t-elbow lawyer or physician who is unable to ;
Ind work for his hands or his head, and not !
veil fitted to do duty either way.-WesteTH
,athoiic |.