The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1878-07-24

Shylocks and sharks, had managed to contract
the currency to the extent of 81 ,069, 65S, 1853.
This accomplished and labor troubles COM
menced. Labor-employing machinery stood
still. Laborers were turned upon the street
without money, without food, and without
even remote prospect of lettering their
conditions. From $5076 per capita in 1866
the radical party had reduced it to $17.4S in
1873, and then came the crash--a tidal wave
of adversity-a cyclone of such fury that it
has struck down more than forty thousand
I business firms, with liabilities amount
ing to a billion and a quarter OF
dollars. Every failure deprived some work
ingman of employment Every Industrial
institution that had it's machinery silenced
by contraction sent men and women out to
find employment elsewhere. Contraction
went on failures continued, and at last, as
had been foreseen and foretold, the country
is full of forced id.ers-men, women and
children-who plead for work, but there is
none to be obtained. Senator Conkhng, of
New York, not long since, in discussing labor
topics. said:
In no country can wealth ever be created by
/ sleight of hand, or in any way save only by
labor. 1t can never be created by political
parties, or by legislation. All that laws can do
Is to help or hinder in its work. In every age
| product of human toll. It must be ploughed
/ out of the ground, blasted out of the mine,
| loom, pounded out of the anvil. Production
lies at the bottom OF all commerce and traffic
The world recognizes the truth of Senator
COnkling's utterances upon the subject of
labor, and the time is not distant when the
facts will, to a greater extent than hitherto,
influence legislation. The New York Bulle-
tin, one of the most substantial and conserv-
alive business journals in the country. in an
article captioned Competition and Com
'munism," says that "the workingmen OBJ
| ject to the employment of labor at its mar
'ket value and have combined to determine
the rates of wages irrespective of what EN-
I 'ployers can properly afford to pay. This
union system having virtually failed, a
! 'workingmens party is starting into exist
'ence, largely based upon a denial of the
| rights of property, demanding that the
industry and trade of the country shall be
conducted as one vast cooperative organiz-
/ 'ment, and providing for the employment
! of all labor at evenly remunerative rates."
eve also" says the Bulletin, find move
'ment identical IN principle in some of the
larger organizations of capital"
The railroads combine and pool their bust
ness, the Western Union telegraph company
effects pooling of interests with the At
lantic and Pacific for the purpose of exact
| ing higher prices, and the Bulletin con-
I cludes that "the communism of capital and
/ the communism of labor alike undertake to
defeat the operation of the one law of So
'ciety by which nature constantly seeks to
! maintain a just equilibrium of social in
'terests and forces" and this position is
strengthened by comments as follows:
The railroad companies and the coal COM
| panies, for instance, confessedly have at Ieast
! twice as much capital In their business a. Is
really required by. the work TO be done by
| them. That capital was, for the most part, in
| vested when prices were inflated to double
their normal standard. The community gen.
1 orally have had TO submit TO the consequences
OF the shrinkage of values that has occurred
during the prevailing great reaction. These
! combined corporations, however, seek to
evade the common depreciation by pledging
themselves to each other not to render their
I services to the community except upon terms
] Wnlcn Will Nlelu Il falf return upon tnelr enOf-
mously inflated capital. Their property has
/ shrunk in actual value just much as any
other; and there is not to-day railroad or a
| mine that could not be provided for one-half
the sum at which those properties are capital
lied. But the companies claim the right to
l earn interest upon the old capitalize
ton, or, i'm other words upon double
the present actual value of their properties.
Now, tins is a gross injustice, which can not
| to point out in detail the ways in which its
defeat will be effected; but its failure is not
charged for any commodity or service than
the buyer can afford to pay the demand is cur
tailed and toe seller suffers. That is one PEN
atty OF such wrongs. When the community
see one portion combining to defeat a fair re-
1 ciproclty In their exchanges a feeling of in
Justice arises, which seeks expression through
attempts at repression and retaliation. AL
I ready these combinations of corporate capital
are raising discomfort among the working
| aud mercantile classes of the country which
appears likely to lind early expression i'm laws
i.E posing restrictions upon our large corpora
tions that may infiict upon them 1rreparable
| injury, If not absolute wrong; while they are
| infusing agrarian tendencies into our politics
which disturb confidence in all employments
OF capital.
1t is the large corporations that are pro-
tected while labor is depressed, but the peo-
pie are beginning to understand the work
ings of capital to combine for its protection
and to increase its earnings. Labor is doing
no more and Notwithstanding, as the Bulle-
tin declares. that "the great obstacle to the
complete working out of the process of re-
adjustment that set in with the panic of
1873 is that the administrators OF thousands
ofmillions of corporate capital are interpos-
ing these communIstic distractions to the
healthful operation of free CON-
petition" we believe that the
rights and necessities of labor will be
respected. That champions will step TO the
front in congress and demand that labor
she'll have a fair show with capital. And
since contracting the currency was the chief
cause in bringing the labor troubles upon
the country, the democracy demand that
expansion shall take place 10 the exten
| demanded by the sound business interests of
the country.
APOGEE AND PERIGEE.