Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1888-03-08
lEHiGh'S TERMS.

PaternaI Letter from the Lehigh Coni -
Navigation Company to It's Former EN-
ploycs-
PHILADELPHIA March 2.-Some of the
former employees of the Lehigh Coal &
Navigation Company, having requested
from the officials a statement of the terms
upon which work will be resumed at the
mines, the following reply, signed by
President j. S. Harris, was issued yester-
day, and will be posted at the company's
mines:
The Lehigh Coal s. Navigation Company Is
asked by certain men who desire employment
to state upon what conditions it will resume
work at its coliieTies. 1t answers that. owing
to the long suspension Of mining. it can not at
once produce coal on as large scale as hereto
fore employ many men, but it is willing
to get its mines ready to resume work and to
give employment to men and boys as fast as it
can profitably do 1t will employ all persons
who may be sufficiently skilled in the various
branches of work to be done without
regard to whether they may hereto
fore have been in its service or not.
retaining, of course such persons as are now
at work in their present positions so long as
their services shall be satisfactory to the COM
pany. 1t has no feeling in regard to the great
majority of men who were formerly in its
employ except those of sorrow that they were
misled, and of sympathy for themselves and
their wives and children, and will be glad to
see them again at work, but it will not promise
employment to persons who in the past have
abused the positions held by them to create
dissenson between the company and its work.
men, or who have attempted to incite 10 vio-
lence or intimidation toward those who desired
to work. 1t realizes that such disturbers have
heretofore done their utmost to iniure il and
its workmen, and that they will probably do so
again, if opportunity shall be given them.
The company expects to continue its accus-
toned Justice kindness EnnwiYp
that this is righteous thing to do, and trust
ing that in due time its workmen will come to
see that they have no better friends than their
employers. II Will, as in the past, consider
questions OF compensation that may b pre-
sented to it by its employees, and will stiN make
proper allowances when exceptionally 6.hicuit
work shall call for temporary special !r!tef in
contract rates: but the experience OF eleven
years shows that it can not possibly giTe its
workmen q larger share of the money realized
from sales of coal: for, after deductng from this
sum the small royalty of ten cents per I'll on
all coal larger than buckwheat coal, and the
actual depreciation in value of its i'm.
provements from decay Of the structures and
exhaustion of the mine openings, it has not in
the best year since it resumed control of its
mines in 1877. made profit of twenty-five and
q half cents ton and in the worst year it paid
all that renamed for wages and supplies, and
made no profit at all. 1t, therefore. can not af.
ford to, and ii will not, change the basis OF
wages, nor the rule by which the compensation
of its inside men is deduced from the price at
which Lehigh coal may sell from time to time
at Ports Johnston and Elizabethport.
Although the return for its large investment
in coal lands and coal improvements is not such
as it is fairly entitled to receive it is willing
for the present to continue its operations with.
out insisting that the rates of payment for labor
shall be reduced, but it finds it entirely impos.
iible to increase them.
[Signedl ]. s. HARRIS President.