Morning journal and courier., 1886-08-31
KNIGHTS, MASS MEETING.

Rlaine,s Arguments.
 PORTLAND, Me, Aug. 3O.-Over three thousand Knights of Labor attended a mass meeting at Peaks Island to-day. Addresses were made by Frank A. Foster, of Haver- hill, and Ralph Beaumont of New York, chairman of the congressional legislative committee of the Knights of Labor. During the latter's speech he said: find the two great parties here in death struggle, as it were. I find that the kneynote of the strug- gle has been struck by the great statesman of one great party-and Maine has held many statesmen-and we shall soon hear the key note of another great party. I have right to question the words of Mir. Blaine, for he has cited the eighteen blanks of our plat form as Knights of Labor, and he has called the issues covered by those eighteen blanks 'fside issues" He has done something more than cite our platform and call our issues 'tside issues" He has acknowledged that he has no remedy to offer for the existing labor troubles. What an acknowledge ment from the statesman of thirty years experience to make! It is a confession of imbecility. He has no new ideas; he has what he calls an old nostrum, one that has been often offered to the lsboring men and women of the country, one that has been hurled at them from hundreds of platforms the old nostrum of protection-Mr. Blaine, who is protected. Two years ago, passing one of your great rivers, I saw the smoke curl up from the chimney of one of your great saw mills at 5 o'clock in the morning That evening met some of the men who worked in the mill. ] said. ''When do you go to work?" and one said: 'tWe go in at 5 o'clock in the morning." Said I, "When do you go to dinner and how much time is al- lowed youa" Said they, "At 12 o'clock, and we have sometimes twenty minutes" Said l.. mWhat h time do you next said, "What pay do you get?" Mark the reply: 'FWe get from 90c tu S1.25 per day" Said I, "Do you not know that the very lumber of your employer is protected two dollars per thousand.'' They said ''Yes." "Then why do you stand it?' ''If we do not do it they'll go across the line and bring Canadians who will" And this was in Maine, MT. Blaine, who was protecteds I went to farmhouse and asked for drink of milk. While. the woman was after it I looked around and saw a pile of woolen pants. I asked when she returned what she
 
 cents pair. I said 'sThat isn't enough" She said: 'fIt's better than nothing'' Per haps it was, but I didn't think so. There was then fifty per cent. duty on wool. MT Blaine, who was protecteda Recently l ex- amined the pay roll of the miners of the Hooking valley and there average of from sig to SIS per month; and Hook ing valley is in certain sense K. of L. ground for there were but a little time ago poor Knights asking but a little more pay and there was small army of Pinkertons things going about with an arsenal strapped upon them, who were watching those miners and yet the miners were supposed to be protected by duty of fifty cents ton upon the coal they risked their lives to mine Ca voice shameful) Perhaps more protection is needed. Perhaps not. For twenty-five years we have had this protection. MT. Blaine offers, and we have made more millionaires and more paupers than were ever made in civilized country on the earth in the same time MT. Howard is the authority for the statement that while profits have increased forty per cent. in twenty-five years wages have fallen, all things being considered, 40 per cent. Where does the protection come in. MT. Beaumont here traced the history of the Union Pacific railroad from the time when George Francis Train thought of the road down through the successive grants and right to the moment when something was actually done toward building the road and said: ''And Mr. Blaine who built the roada white labor at $2. 50 per daya No. They imported Chinese labor. They brought 15, 900 Chinamen who would work for $15 month, the company agreeing to send their bones back to China if they died. MT. Blaine, tariff or protection, which! We have paid S4S, ,000 900 interest and show re- sponsibility for $6S, 100000 and there were millions of acres never earned, the restora- ton of wkich Republicans and Democrats had alike demanded. The general as sembly Knights of Labor considered the situation. The order of Knights of Labor had spent more than $100,000 if it had not ori ginated. Why? Because of just such laws. And the national assembly appointed a con- mittee on legislation, and that committee went to Washington and obtained a tran script-a transcript, mind you, of the report of the land commissioner, showing that there were 10S, ,000, ,000 acres of land that the rail road had not earned, and which ought to be forfeited to the people.
 MT. Beaumont traced the worth of that committee to the time when almost 90,000, GOO acres were forfeited or about to be for feited, adding:
 t'And for all this the people have nobody to thank but the Knights of Labor"
 In discussing Congressman Reed MT. Beau mont said: Now I say it boldly to Democrats and Republicans alike, that there iu not man in the United States who is now lun ming for Congress whose election would be so dangerous to the labor cause that of Thomas B. Reed. It would mean that if his party carries the House 0: Representatives Thomas B. Reed will be it's speaker, and that would mean that every committee would be made up in the interest of corporations. MT. Reed did vote for the forfeiture of three million acres of almost worthless mountain land, but he was against forfeiture of an area of land greater than the State of Iowa. Jay Gould once said that in a Republican district he was Republican, in Democratic district a Democrat, but an an Erie man all the time, and I say to you, be Democrats or be Repub- licans, but be anti-co1poration men all the time.