The Portland daily press., 1886-04-19

cause they do not belong to the Empire Pro-
tective Association. Is there an Intelligent
workingman in the country who believes
that strike for such cause as that will
benefit labor? Instead of being movement
to emaneipate the laboring man it is moye
ment to enslave him. 1t is practically say
ing that a certain set of men shall enjoy
monopoly of the work in this country, and
that men who do not belong to that set shall
starve. In strike to maintain such posi-
ton as that the strikers become the oppres-
sors and the employers are the defenders of
freedom and fair play. The impolicy as well
as the immortality of such strike must
be patent to every workingman of brains.
1t is this Kind Of strike that the PRESS
condemns and will continue to condemn
with the full conviction that in doing so it
is doing substantial service to the laboring
man and is keeping him out of q position
into which every capitalist who has no
kindly feelings for him would like to see him
put himself.
1t will continue, tso, to condemn the boy
colt as barbarism unworthy of the Ameri-
can workingman. The boycott is an attempt
to starye man into submission. The boy
cotter says to the boycotted, s'Do as we want
you to or we will compel the groceryman to re-
fuse to sell you groceries, the tailor to sell you
clothes, the shoemaker to sell you boots, IN
deed, we will deprive you of the necessarles
of life" 1t seems to us it would be just as
legitimate to present shot gun at MS head
and compel his submission on the threat to
blow his brains out if he refused. we be-
lieve the boycott is not only moral CRIME
but legal crime as well, and that everybody
who resorts to it can be punished severely
by the law of the land and that he ought to
be- No workingman can be benefited IN the
long run by recourse to such means. Even
if the law does not step in, public opinion
will and insist on retaliation in kind.
No truer Drawer words have been spoken
to the laboring man recently than were spoken
a few days ago by Senator Hawley of Con-
necticut on the floor of the United States
Senate. The whole speech is replete with wis
dom and common sense, in cheerful contrast
with the demagogism which we frequently
hear preached nowadays by men who know
better We wish we could publish all of
it, but must be content with one para
graph. Said the Connecticut Senator speak
ing of the lawlessness that sometimes follows
in the wake of strike:
There are times when would be with the labor
ing man for strike ana / would strike to the end
of the contest woHld not work sixteen hours a
day for any man with half an hour for my dinner
| would strike; would organize; / would work
for better day, but would not permit the thieves
OF the city OF New York to rush out when l was
striking to destroy the property of the company
from which expected to get my living; and If the
sheriff could not do anything with them, if they
lice. would have the sheriff do what | saw done
in New York once myself, call out the old Seventh
Regiment and shoot the defiant wrongdoers down
il they could not be made to yield in any way.
| would do that for the sake of the laborers them
selves, and would tell the aborers to-day just as
l am telling it to you. You cannot deceive them
by any other kind Of talk.