Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1882-08-11
L1BOR AND CAPITAL.

The most serious drawback to the pros
perity of this country is the annual conflict
between labor and capital.
Every summer strikes are organized at all
the leading labor centres For the most
part they are engendered by designing
demagogues and Disconnected spirits, who
do not desire to work themselves, and dis
like TO see any one else work. Workmen
often have grievances, but the remedy is
not in strike. 1t is seldom that an en-
ployer is found who will not accede to all
just demands made upon him by those
whom he employs, provided the demand is
made at the prope, time and in a proper
spirit
The employer is not the monster OF
tyranny which he is too often pictured by
the worthless agitator, nor does he always
enjoy the comfort and peace which the
laborcr supposes. For all he enjoys he
must give large price. 1t is true that he
can sleep in better bed than the laboring
man, but his sleep is seldom as sweet and
refreshing. The laborer may not have 50
much or such luxurious food, but he enjoys
what he has. He may not have so much
money, but he is not bored to death by
beggars, nor buttonholed at every corner
for benevolent purposes.
Some fools imagine the employer and
capitalist is an idler. The fact is he is gen.
orally the hardest laborer. He is using up
the very best power a man possesses-his
nervous force. In trying to make money,
and, what is just as hard, in trying to keep
it, he finds himself at night exceedingly cx-
hausted in brain vitality, and he lies down to
sleep, but still to think and to be worried
with his business affairs.
Again, what would the country be with
out capital and the capitalists to build its
railroads and develop its resources If COM
plant is made that some men have accu-
mulated great fortunes, only have patience
and the time will come when it will be re-
distributed. Nothing which is heaped up can
long remain 80, especially in this country,
and soon we find that every great fortune
is scattered to the four winds. The labor
ing man must learn to submit to the newt
able. He cannot be made rich by law.
His own energy and brain must win him
fortune, if he wins it at all. There can be no
distinction made for any class of men. The
law of supply and demand is sometimes a
hard one, but it must operate, and there is
no way to get around it.
1t is the duty of every laborer to elevate
himself out of the position of an unsklled
laborer. We believe in all men endcavoring
to better their condition all they can, and it
is only human nature to try to get the best
compensation for their labor they can. If
they did not do this the monopoly for which
they work would undoubtedly become tyr
annical. We fully recognize the fact that in
the rush to get rich there is not much Chris
tan charity or kindness for the wants of the
poor laborer, but we are firmly convinced
that the rights Of the laboring man can be
better enforced, and are more likely to be
obtained, by making only just demands, and
by leaving all difficulties and disputes TO be
decided by impartial arbitrator than by
strikes. Violence is always to be deplored.
| A wider diffusion of the Christian spirit
"do as you would be done by"-will solve
the problem. Men who have gathered into
their Golfers the products of honest toll must
not ignore the cry of the poor, the widow
and the orphan.
Capital and labor should not be arrayed
against each other. They should not be
antagonistic. The rich man should be the
first to yield to the necessities Of the poor
he can afford to do it, The poor man can
not. The capitalist cannot succeed without
the laborer, one is dependent upon the other.
Then let the laborer be consistent in his
demands, and let the rich man be the first TO
aid him. When this disposition prevails on
both sides the mission Of the agitator and
demagogue will be gone, and contentment
and prosperity will be general