New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1889-07-15
INDUSTRY NOT CHRISTfANIZED

Many forms OF Wr0Dgd0lng ana the penalueS
which they incur are illustrated by the great
struggle at the Carnegie works, near Pitts
burg. For the issue at any one establishment
is in a measure determined, not only by the
demands there made on either SIDE but by the
relations between other employers and workers
in the same region, and by all the past rela-
tons of employers and workers there. The
long strikes of the past have left their i'm
preston upon all that happens in the Pittsburg
region, and the associations Of manufacturers
and of worllingmen, and the riot and deStruc-
ton of property in 1877, and the repeated
strikes and deeds of violence in the Mononga-
hela mines and about the ConnellsVille coke
works
The worst feature of the case is that, by
numerous importations under contracts to fill
the places of strikers, it has come to pass that
a large proportion of the workers in that region
are foreigners, unacquainted with American
institutions and ideas, and little influenced by
American opinion. TO such workers strike
means resort to viOlence-an organized des-
perate and lawless attempt to prevent any other
workers from doing the work that the strikers
refuse The men at Homestead their wives
and children, show fierce determination to
make it impossible for anybody else to work in
place of the old hands. But that spirit, how
ever lawleSs and unjust is perfectly natural for
workers of foreign birth and training, some of
whom have been brought to this country under
contracts to take the places of other strikers.
Perhaps they were then met with the violence
which they now exhibit toward all newcomers.
The law was not enforced or respected then,
and they do not expect it to be enforced now.
These events have inevitably given shape and
color to every struggle between employers and
employed in the Pittsburg district Whether
many of the workers in the Carnegie mills were
thus imported or not, the temper and purpose
of all are unavoidably influenced by events
with which all are familiar. Even the most
coi,siderate and reasonable employers have
great difficulty in such an atmosphere of strife
and violence in dealing with men who remem-
Der great wrongs and bloody deeds in the past.
The employers at the Homestead works pro-
posed new sliding scale, which was in effect,
they frankly admitted, a considerable reduction
in wages, but they claimed that it was neceS-
sary to place wages more nearly on level with
those paid elsewhere. 1t is well known that
the organization of iron workers at Pittsburg
has secured wages altogether out Of harmony
with those paid at the East, or at other works
with which Pittsbmg has to compete.
Whether the proposed reduction was just
and reasonable could be determined only by
free invitation to other American workers. But
the strikers remembered that thousands of for
egners, perhaps some of their own number,
had been brought into that region to ill the
places of other strikers. They feared that the
question this time would be settled in this way.
1t is not a proper mode Of settlement. Whether
free American workers of certain grades OF
skill are willing to accept certain wages is
question not to be decided by importing in
their stead ignorant and degraded labOrers
frum other lands, who have never known
American life or American laws. 1t does not
appear in this case that the employers had any
idea of bringing workers from other countries,
thing now forbidden by law, and they, in
fact, advertised widely for hands in this cou-
try. But it was not strange that the workers
should expect that to be done which had been
done so often in the same region.
Thus violent resistance to employment of new
hands at the Homestead works is natural fruit
of many struggles and many wrongs in the
past-wrongs on both sides, unfortunately,
which neither public opinion nor the laws have
suficed to prevent Importation Of foreign
workers on one side, lawless violence on the
other, have produced state of suspicion, dis
trust and bitter feeling, which contrasts most
painfully with the harmony and mutual con-
fdence attained at such centres Of industry as
Johnstown in Pennsylvania, or Willimantic or
South Manchester in Connecticut. But the first
requisite at Pittsburg is to enforce the laws
impartally and strictly-not only the law which
prohibits importation of contract labor, but as
well the law which guarantees the freedom Of
the individual laborer and prohibits violence.