Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1886-03-18
Who Are LaborerS.

The mason, the bricklayer, the ma
chinist, and those who find employ
ment for skilled labor or muscular
power, are not more workingmen
than those who earn their daily
bread in variety of ways not COM
monty classed as labor. The condi-
tons involved in considering the
rights of one class may differ from
the conditions that affect another
class, but the broad principles are
the same in all lite-sustaining con-
Germs and pursuits, and such is the
INTERPOLATION of interests one class
can not be disturbed without all
classes feeling the influence.
According to the statistics of 1880,
there are in the United States over
1892 900 persons occupied with
one or another kind of labor. This
is the total of work-people, but they
are not all workingmen in the
narrow sense of the term as it is
used by those who have specific in
terests to conserve, or who imagine
the problem of life bears upon select
ed employments only. Of this vast
number Of toilers, 7,67o,4oo are
engaged with agricultural pursuits,
4,o74,2oo are in professional and
personal service, $4,000 are in
trade and transportation service,
3,S37,ooo are in manufacturing, me-
chanical trades, and mining service.
According to those who regard
workingmen to be artiicers, mechan-
les, tradewo workers, ETC., there are but
5,647,2oo workingmen in the United
States; and yet in addition to these
there are ll,744,6oo who live by
daily toll, by the exercise of their
muscle, their intelligence, or their
particular ability who are dependent
on what they earn for the support of
themselves and families, and who
occupy the same relation to capital
that the other 100000 odd workers
do.
When it comes to question of
right it may be asked if the interests
OF the 100000 are not quite as
great and important, quite as deserv
ing of regard as the interests of the
100000? BY what species oflogic
is it determined that the lesser num-
Der has the greater right to dictate
terms, or to insist on privilege or to
enforce obligations, in the respective
provinces of general society and
operating capital? In the economic
system the man who turns a
lathe, or works a drill, or lays a
brick, is of no more consequence
than the man who holds pillow, or
wields an ak, or keeps a set of books.
1t is no better to make shoe, or
twist cigar, or cast a wheel, than
it is to reap field, shear sheep, or
do any other Legitimate duty by
means of which the community is
benefited or served.
The mere banding together of
men in the formation of protective
societies does not increase their
rights or multiply their privileges,
though it may augment their ability
to enforce existing rights. But
there is difference between enforc-
ing actual obligations and arbitrarily
decreeing what shall constitute obll-
cations; and coercive measures bas-
ed on an extra-judicial decree are apt
to operate to the damage of interests
equally important with those they
seek to benefit. All branches are
coordinate in the general govern
ment since every form of labor for
which there is demand is essential
to the preservation of some vital
element of the common order.
When any set or class of workmen
attempt to act obstructively for their
own advantage they infringe the
rights Of others; and it is by no
means certain that the enforcement
of their desires by violence tends to
their good in the long run. If the
100000 agriculturists should refuse
to till the ground, sow seed, or gath
er crops unless certain absolute con-
cessions were made them, the injury
to the public would be none the less
great because it would be distributed
among all classes. 1t would be a
real and perceptible injury if their
terms were not acceded to. But
even if their demand were met it is
not difficult to understand how the
advantage to them might be made
an indirect tax upon the community
in the increased cost to the consumer
OF all products handled by the mark
ct or middle-men. The same inilu-
ences hold good in all other depart
ments of supply and demand.
Nothing is more certain than that
values adjust themselves, and when
there is successful attempt to main
tain labor at high price when
other values are deteriorating, it is
absolutely certain that the balance
will be struck'in some other direction.
The result of it all is that coercion
must give way to arbitration, an
arbitration intelligent enough to
determine what lies beyond the
horizon of the narrow issue. When
100000 workingmen understand
that there are over 100000 work.
ing people influenced by the fluctua'
tons Of trade and industry they will
arrive at better appreciation Of hu'
man rights, and reason will take the
place of brute force in settling diff
ticulties that arise.