Los Angeles daily herald., 1888-07-05
TARIFF AND LABOR.
what a Workingman Has to Say
nm the Republican Position.

what a WorkinEman Has to Say
ON the Republican Position.
EprroRs HERALD: am a workingman
and am sick of all this political .slush
about "protection to labor" This hypo-
critical cry is never heard except when
election time is approaching. The tariff
does not make rates of wages. If wages
were made high by tariff there is not
manufacturer in the land that would not
declare for Free Trade. Any man, not
q born idiot, knows that so long as nat
ural resources are monopolized by few
persons, as at present, wages will be reg
ulated by the law of supply and demand.
A residence of fifteen years in Pennsyl-
yania has convinced me that all this So
licitude for the dear workingman by
politicians and manufacturers is arrant
hypocrisy If they we're really sincere
there would not have been so many
strikes and lockouts, nor would there be
such distress aud poverty. Pennsylvania
reaps more benefit from the tar
iff than does any other State OF the
Union, and it contains more and meaner
monopolies and has had more labor
troubles than any two Of the other States.
The monopolists of Pennsylvania
have a regularly organized police
force to keep in subjection their
ragged and hungry workers. One of
the largest iron and steel estab-
lishments in the country is at Braddocks,
PENNSYLVANIA, and it is to-day being
guarded against it's striking employees
by heavily armed Pinkerton detectives,
while its chief proorietor, Mr.. Carnegie,
is travelling in Europe with Mr.. Blaine,
the great advocate of Protection to
American Labor" who has done more to
aid selfish and unpatriotic men to form
themselves into blood-sucking combina-
tions to place fictitious values on the
necessaries of life, than any other man.
Men like Mr.. S. F. Spencer may ingeni-
ously make it appear that Protection"
is a good thing, and so it is; but we want
protection to flesh and blood instead of
the protection that enables the few to
oppress the many, and that violates
every theory of our government. There
is practical side to this question-one
that does not need the aid of lawyer to
make it plain. In proof of this will
relate an incident in the life of one
of our protected" laborers. He is
per week. Two years ago, his wife from
lack of proper food and decent surround
ings fell sicx. He could not afford to hire
q nurse. He had four children,
but not one of them was old enough to
be of much service. He was compelled
to do the family washing, rising at
O'Clock to begin his domestic task, that
he might be ready for his toll at the
mill. When the clothes were dry the
little children managed 10 get them to
the bed with table and irons, and the
sick mother propped herself up and
ironed them. Soon the mother died.
The father got everything together that
he could pawn and bought lot to bury
his wife in, and a kind-hearted under
taker buried her, trusting to luck for his
pay. And yet this man is working on
goods protected to the extent of sixty per
cent.
A few days after this poor woman was
protected" to her grave / saw the
millionaire mill-owner for whom her
husband worked out riding in his ele-
CANT equipage with his liveried servants.
It is just such as this that is causing
working people to question the justice Of
God and to turn Anarchists and bomb
throwers. Mr.. Spencer is working hard
to delude working men into voting for
the continuation of high tariff; but
they are thinking as they never
thought before. Mr.. Spencer dare not
meet, in public discussion, some OF the
horny-handed in this city and repeat his
medieval falsities on the tariff question.
They will soon show him that the United
States has the cheapest labor of any
civilized country on the globe; and that
during the past twenty-five years, we
have produced more beggars, tramps and
criminals than any people of like num-
bers on this rolling sphere.
In conclusion, | would like to ask Mr.
Spencer how it is that wages in England
had increased over fifty per cent. since
the adoption of free trade; also why is
not China and Japan flooding England
with the products of their cheap labor !;
it that all over England can be found
American manufactured goods for sale in
competition with English goods?
GEO. B. TELFArR.