Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1884-12-31
Thirty Cents per Dozen for Making Shirts.

The shirt manufacturers Of the North,
says the Lynchburg Advance, are among
the loudest in their demand for contin-
uance of the present high tariff, claiming
that it protects the American laborer
against foreign competition, yet it is pub
lished that New York Shirt Manufactur-
ing Company pays thirty cents per dozen
for making their garments. Can there be
any reduction of this price? Can there be
any greater and more absolute slavery
than women and children toiling night and
day at these starvation rates? These peo-
pie cannot, by the most arduous and pro-
longed efforts, make more than barely
enough to keep soul and body together
making shirts at thirty cents per dozen.
Egyptian bondage, Southern slavery, could
not be worse. and we do not believe was as
bad. The negro slaves were required to
work, but they were given comfortable
houses, clothes, and good, wholesome food,
and when sick the interest of the master
guaranteed to them the attention Of ply
stefan, and we know when sick they did
nothing until fully restored. The cabin OF
the Southern ''mammy" was a picture Of
comfort compared to cellars, Aheds and
garrets inhabited by the poor labbr class
in the large cities. We could enlarge upon
this point, showing the suffering of South
ern slavery was not to be compared
with the trials enduredby factory
hands in the North. The high
tariff compels this unfortunate class to pay
more for all the necessaries of life. At
thirty cents per dozen for shirts, where
does the incidental expenses come from,
such as doctors fees at $2.00 and $500 per
visit? Where does the wherewithal to pur-
chase medicine, with often more than 100
per cent. tax, come from, when these
starvelings, when well, make only enough
to keep the wolf from their doors. The
truth of the whole. matter is, that when
able, sewing women of New York and 9TH
or cities stand up nobly at as low wages as
can be paid any class of labor, and when
stricken down by disease, would starve and
| die in their rags we're it not for the many
charitable institutions Of the country.
Talk Of pauper labor coming in competi-
ton with the high priced labor Of this
country. So far as these women are con-
cerned, let it come; it can do them NO harm
There is no law to make people work for
nothing, and these shirt-makers, cutting
and sewing garments at q cents each, are
the realizations of Hoods poem:
| with fingers weary and worn,
| With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomaEly rags
Plying her needle and thread
! Stitch, stitch. stitch.
| II poverty hunger and dirt,
| And still with voice of dolorous pitch,
She sung the song of the shirt
| 60 men with sisters dear
-, man with mothers and wives
| tits notlinen you are wearing out;
But human creatures lives
Stitch Stich stitch
| In poverty, hunger and dirt,
| Sewing a once with double thread.
! A shroud IS we'll as shirt :"
| Work, work, work.
| Ny labor never flags,
And what are its wages-a he'd OF straw,
A crust of bread and rags.
| No greater taisity has ever been pro-
| claimed than the arguments of protection,
that the high tariff, benefits labor. If it
were SO manufacturers would be low tariff
men. The working class in all countries,
are ground down to the lowest notch, with
occasionally a few exceptions. We want
to see the men WIG throw The pick, ham
iner, and tie women who eat ttcir daily
bread by the sweat of their brow, receive
their just proportion Of tbs profits they
make, and We believe that this can most
speedily and successfully be accomplished
| by tariff revision and reform.
/
George Walker, committed suicide re-
county, by shooting himself in the head.
Ee was a younger brother of the Rev. W.
W. Walker, who was distinguished in the
political campaigns of 1859 and 1878. Mr..
Walker was a fine Confederate soldier and
lost leg at the ba tiles around Richmond
in 1862. He was ever afterwards sufferer
from the severe wound. He was mem
Der Of the House of Delegates from West
moreland county in 1869 and enjoyed
large acquaintance after the term of his
service ended he practiced law a short
while in Lexington and also in Alexandria,
but Of late years had resided among his
friends in the Northern Neck. He was
member from the first district of Virginia
of the National Democratic Convention,
which nominated Cleveland and Hendricks.
He was a noble man and greatly esteemed
for his fine bearing and generous nature.
1t is sad to think of such man commit
ing suicide, but the explanation given,
that he was probably driven to the fatal
act by physical suffering from an Old
wound, greatly palites the deed, as he was
probably hardly responsible for his actions.
The Board of Trustees of the Union
Theological Seminary have decided to place
a tablet in the chapel to the memory Of DR..
Rice the founder of the Seminary. The
Inscription for this mural tablet has been
prepared by Rev. D. NJ. Smith, D. D., L.
L. D., the oldest professor of the faculty.
IItlreade thus:
'In memory of Rev. John Holt Rice, D.
D., born in Bedford county, Va, Novem-
bef 20, TIT; tutor in Harnden-Sydney
College, 1797-1S04, pastor of Cub-Creek
church, 1S04-1S12; pastor of First church,
Richmond, 1612-1623; Professor of Theol
ogy in Union Seminary, 1898 to his death,
September 8, 1881; eminent aud efficient
in every Office. This Seminary, founded
by his labors, in his lasting monument"
The Alexandria Gazette says: "Nearly
seven hundred divorce suits are in progress
in the courts of Chicago, and more than
that number in Philadelphia. And yet it
is in these cities, and in New England, where
the ratio of divorce to marriage is even
greater, that the Mormons are the most
| ahuan1 Tho ~, oP