The state chronicle. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1883-1893, 1886-04-08
GRAND MASTER POWDERLY.
HE e. iEAT RESPONSIBILITY
THAT RESTS PON HIM.
Our New l0rk Core >poHdent Reviews
the La bor Que~tion--N hat l. TO be the
ReSuifI
special Cor STATE CuRoSlcLE.

NEW YORK March 1-The recent CON
fcreuccs held here between Master Work
man Powderly Of the knights Of Labor and
JAY Gould have shown-as a good many
events before had shown that this man
/ POwderiy carries one of he leVcest heads
! that is seen above the crowd He is very
broad and "a very conservative man, as
far removed as Hyperion from Satyr from
the kind of man that has too often hitherto
had the management of labor unions or
4 worked consplcuously for the Improvement
\ Of the working mans condition. He IS
n the supreme executive authority of an
organization that includes more than half
a million men, and he has (Or, to be more
accurate, seems to have a power greater
than the power of the President or of any
! living monarch. He can by a ten-line
telegram cause any railroad TO stop oper-
alton, any great industry making.
for instance, or type-setting, or anything
else. The great association Is magnlti
Gently organized, and has its hand on every
spot where the great industries of the
country Except agriculture are centercd.
1t requires a very broad and level headed
man to keep perfectly calm with such
| power this III his hands; and to be wise
when provoked o take revenge; to with
| hold the impatience Of his own camp when
they seem COR really have reason for i'm
patient action. Yet this man keeps per
fcctly cool. Hei perhaps the most effective
worker for temperance that is now alive;
for the knights, largely through his intlu
ence, have kept that provision of their law
which fOrbIds admission to the order of
| the worlds workers of any man who makes
money by the liquor traffic. That Is an
| official condemnation of grOg by half a
million working men, which is worth sew
eral volumes of temperance sermons
| Nait n ba oh 4 ril- nil ba
strike and boycott the boycott, is his doc
| trine Although Mr.. Powderly runs from
one end of the country to the other, and
has on his shoulders the prodigious prob
| lem of settling or trying to settle more dis
! putcs than any other living man, and has
a weight of official cares that the Presi-
| dent himself hardly has match for, he
receives the exceedingly modest salary of
500 year. The man is as sincerely
working for a cause-and a good cause
! as any great man before him ever worked;
and that is for the upbuildng of the labor
| ing class. His patience, his broad view,
! his coolnesS and conservatism are such
| rebuke to the more or less lmpetuOus pro
| feSSOnal laborIng mems friends and
| advocates the bowling scoundrels of
| little sense stId less honesty-as to be
making the professional labor advocate
fool III the public eye. The upbuilding
! of the working classes is in this mans life
and ideas a real thing-not thing to make
money by, or to get notorlety from, or to
| 90 to Congress or to the Legislature on.
There is no more distinct tendency, no
| higher duty, no broader purpose in all
modern life than that which makes for the
stoadying and uplifting of the wagewor
ker. The social machinery Of which we
all form part is wrong III good many
Of its gearings. The man who conscien-
tiously does a full day Of productive work
has a moral right to a proper share Of his
production of wealth But be does not
always get it. Until a few weeks ago, for
instance, there were drivers and cOnduc-
tors of street-cars in this city and in Brook
lyn who We're compelled to work 16 hours
a day, and that, too, for an ordinary days
wages. y man can't do that and last
The business of running streetcar is
wrong somewhere if it has to be done at
the cost of mems lives. Where it was
wrong was not hard to find out. Most of
the lines paid very large dividends and
their stock was quoted very high III market
In other words, the business was very
profitable Like most other kinds Of use
ful service to society, this was well paid
for by society. OF course the less the eX-
pense account could be made the greater
the net profit would be. So it come about
by gradual lengthening of hours and
changes of schedule that the men who were
employed by the company were made
slaves. 4 man who has to work Is hours
a day has no time to give to his family,
hardly time to eat, hardly time to sleep.
He has no time for social Improvement or
pleasure or growth, or for anything that
makes life sweet. And no man has right
to make another man a slave. There is q
great deal, then in the labor problem
m n mo han WI h9
seen only its disturbances and observed
only the insane schemes and efforts of
foolish LEADERS are aware of or are willing
to admit. There is no other fact SO cheer
full and significant in our history as the
rise Of the working people-as a class
| from mean food, bad houses, bad or ugly
| clothing, few privileges and few chances,
to the position now held by the great mass
OF honest and industrious men who earn
their bread by making horns in their hands
| or by worrying their brains, for very
nearly all alike are wage workers in the
| same boat The difference in the condition
OF the common people chats we alb few
generations ago and now is told with in
| terestlng and striking illustrations in Nc
Masters History of the people of the
| United States" The difference between
our condltion-in point of comfort and
| pleasure to be got from our sojourn in this
| NtiiC VI tttIS"tllU DHc COl1ulllOu OIL men
| even one generation ago is a very great
| difference. The state of society toward
which the whole world moves-this Wes-
tern hemisphere in particular is the con
tlnual lifting up of the mass of folks; not
by pulling down the upper ten thousand
IN comfort and opportunity, for such pull
| ing down IN itself never lifts up ANYBODY
else, But if it did lift up greater mum
Der of other people permanently, then pull
| 'em down We are all socialists in the best
sense of the word-except the ancients
! You are bound either to be a socialists lin
| the best sense not an anarchist but Dem
ocrat or an egotist. If you think you are
a good deal better than other folks. then
YOU are not a socialist The chances are
that you are egregiously mistaken. But
if YOU think that though You are as good
! as other folks you can't lay claim to being
any better than they are, then the proper
place for your sympathy is with every man
who by honest and fair means is trying to
make better place for himself in life than
he was born to, or has yet achieved. That's
my reason for wanting an Industrial
School in North Carolina, If a boy in the
State wishes to learn Latin he can go to
Chapel Hill through the benefcence of the
State) and be taught by Professor Winston
until he becomes an accomplished Ieatinist.
But if a boy wishes to learn how to build
a hOuSe-if he is a negro bOy he can 90 to