New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1886-04-18
EPEEDOM OF LABOR.

Freedom has been the boast of the United
States since Independence was achieved.
Freedom of labor is the grandest result OF the
great civil war; Men all free, and equal in
rights. labor all free, and equal in rights and
lawful opportunities. make this country what
il is. These alone are enough to make this laud
the refuge of all who suffer or are oppressed.
But some who have been subjected to oppres-
sion all their lives, when they reach a free
country where all have equal rights, do not
know what to do with their freedom. In poll
ties they are apt to mistake freedom for license
to tyrannize over others. In labor they are apt
to employ the unjust, cruel and brutal methods
to which laborers have resorted for their de-
fence in overcrOwded lands where the laws
afford no equal justice for rich and poor alike.
To be free, they imagine embraces the right to
domineer over somebody else. So they bring
to this country the strike and the boycott and
organizations to deprive other workingmen OF
their bread and means IF livelihood who do not
please to subject themselves to rules which
associations make. This is not freedom, but
slavery of labor. II threatens not only social
order but that very freedom and equality OF
rights which make this country a refuge for the
oppressed. Having gained for themselves the
blessings which the Republic bestOws these
mistaken men would poison the very fountain
Of blessings for themselves and others in Their
| ignorance of the free institutions which they
enjoy. Few men of American birth and tain
| ing are found in the ranks of cOercOnsts and
| boycOtters. Nearly all are men who have not
yet learned what freedom means and how to
enjoy it.
| So they would exclude others from immigrat-
| ing hither lest the labor market should be over
crowded They are ignoran, that the untold
resources of this land yet undev elODed offer
profitable employment to working population
many times as great as we now have. The mar
row prejudices of a cramped and crowded life
abroad still confine their minds. SO they
would prevent the training Of apprentices for
the trades, hoping to secure monopoly of labor
in particular branches for those who have
gained admission thereto already. They are
! ignorant that in the rapid growth OF land like
this men and boys are needed and employed
without training in the new towns and States If
only they can begin to do the necessary work.
| SO unions are created and unonists try to
force ont of employment everywhere the men
who do not JOIN them. They cannot compre-
| bend the fact that, against 100000 persons
| enrolled IN laDOr organizations, tncre are
$4,000, 900 in this country who are not SO
enrolled, who want no organizations to dictate
to them or to make their bargains for them
who will tolerate no tyranny from any quarter
and who have exactly as much right to labor
where they please and as they please as the
foremost Knight of Labor in the land.
ORGANIZATION is welcomed in this country, as
is every other agency by which the interests
of labor may be advanced, so long as it does not
assail the freedom of other laborers who are not
organized. But the instant their freedom is
assailed, whether by the use Of force or terror
ism to support strikes, or by excluding from
work men not members of unions, or by the
boycott or other foreign methods hostile to
American institutions, then suddenly the
organization finds itself frowned upon by the
vast majority of American citizens Then the
power of the law is turned against it, Then
public opinion brushes it. Then it goes down,
as did the Molly Maguires and other organza-
tons of like character, detested as an attempt to
establish form of slavery on American soil
The question for Knights of Labor is whether
that organization has started on the same down
| ward road