Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-07-22
TOO MUCH DEMAGOGUE.
What is the Matter with the Workingmen OF
This Country?-They Have Power but Don't
New York Herald.

Use It
! New York Herald.
Mr.. Terence V. Powderly, IN the OFF,
cia1 organ of the Knights of Labor, tells
the wage earners some wholesome but
! disagreeable truths.
| They have failed, he says, because
/ they have not stuck together
He calls upon them to go to the ballot
| box as one man, with the assurance that
they can get what they want If they go
| the right way to work
AT the same time he denounces dyna-
mite and all forms of violence as the
policy of fool.
What you cam get by means of the
polling booth-that is the substance of
his lecture-isn It worth having.
Powderly has a level head But to
tell the truth he has lot Of +, threason-
able and unreRsoning fellows to deal
with. Some time they may acquire
common sense, but it is the one thing
they lack at the present moment.
They have heretofore conducted sort
of guerilla warfare and pursued
the tactics of brutality rather
than of diplomacy. Shaking their
fists in, the worlds face and hurting
cObble stones have not won the public
sympathy. On the contrary they have
thrown the whole organization into seri-
Gus disfavor and imperilled its existence.
The Knights are weaker to-day than they
were two years ago, and they have only,
themselves to blame.
Oftentimes they have been in the right
but their methods have been so obstrep-
erously wrong that they have been igno-
mIniOusly beaten. An organization
VI q MS IN % fU
has mighty small chance of success, even
when its cause is just. Brickbats and
bullets are not convincing arguments
these days.
When the workingmen get through
with their stupidity they viii do some
thing. Until then corporations, can
Cypress them as much as they please. and
they will remain as helpless as they are
now.
The Herald has given them good ad-
vice from the beginning, but they suffer
from big-head and think they know
everything.
The working classes can hold the bal
ance of power in almost any election; but
they are like Jumbo-a huge, unwieldy
creature who doesn't know his own
strength. Poor Jumbo was maltreated by
his keeper, who drove the prod into him
until he roared. But it all ended in q
roar If he had had sense enough he
could have knocked his keeper over the
ropes. Being nothing but an elephant,
however, he let the fellow prod him as
much as ne pleased.
WoTkingmen may bemoan their lot,
but so long as they have the remedy in
their own hands and fail to use it, Gym
pathy is misplaced. Acrid speeches
won t save them; harangues against mo-
nopolies are simply the believing of fog
horn.
When they know how to act together
they will accomplish something til!
them
There are Iaborers' votes enough in
New York state to control the legislature
and dictate measures of relief. If pres
ent laws discriminate against them they
can have new laws made. BY getting
together and keeping together they can
change the complexion of affairs and
compel the legislature to do them justice.
But their ranks are full OF demagogues
and jobbers. Petty factional jealousies
are the blood poison in the body of
Knights which weakens and destroys their
influence. They roar like Jumbo when
the monopol1st prods them, but nothing
more
POWderly IS right. Ihe ballot boX Is
the enginery of revolution, and until the
wage earners of the country recognize
that fact and govern themselves accord
ingly they win accomplish no results
whatever.
We should like TO seq compact and
powerful workingman s party. 1t could
do deal of good. But there Is no such
thing now, and viii not be until laborers.
cgat eeOSa anOupb IN I1se fine rioht means
to accomplish a really great purpose.