Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-10-01
EMANCIPATION OF LABOR.
Rev. Huntington Delivers a Lecture to
workmen-Labor Troubles to be Ended
Through Trade Unions.

Rev. Huntington Delivers Lecture to
Workmen-I.abor Troubles to be Ended
Through Trade Unions.
Rev. ]. o. S. Huntington, of New York,
lectured in Odd Fellows Hall, South
Eighteenth street, last night, on "Emanci-
patton Of Labor, Labor Troubles and Their
Remedy" He was introduced by DR..
Miller, and previous to the lecture the Guild
House Church Club sang.
Rev. Hunter began by propounding the
query why it was that in the nineteenth
century, when the forces of nature had been
so largely subjected by man to do his work,
the masses were in state of almost alb
iect misery, and then went back to the
fourteenth century to show that notwith-
standing their subjection to the barons,
serfs were in some respects in better plight
than the mass of laborers are TO-DAY.
He then followed the history of labor
down to the present time. He said courage
is winning the day through the trade union.
The lecturer gave these organizations a
slight rap by remarking that they failed to
reach the lowest class OF labor where relief
was the most needed, and traced an aristo-
cratic tendency ia them, citing the fact
that the guild clubs of the olden time were
now very aristocratic and composed of some
of the haughtiest people in England. Con-
tinuing he said:
But there is growing consciousness that
labor has some rights as shown by the
result of the great strike that has just
succeeded in London. The victory is more
important than any since that achieved by
the martyrdom of Watt Tyler. But you
must not allow sect to mar unity of efforts.
Sect hasn't worked well in religion. While
/ believe in theory don't in sect. France
and Germany glaring at each other with
bloodshot eyes, are kept from devouring
each other bv the international feeling that
permeates the masses. Their suppression
and the conduct of foreign war cannot be
maintained at the same time.
The land question is of the greatest I'M
portance. Both labor and land must be
free Slave labor did not pay and the
South now knows it, and the slavery of land
is equally disastrous. Labor is still en-
shaved because land is enslaved.
The lecturer drew a fancy sketch
of how Adam looked about him and noted
land on which he could make living by
working one day in the week, and he
turned away from all poorer soil and fenced
some of that one-day-a-week quality for
his own use. Next day a second Adam came
along and he exempted some more until
when the last one came to make his claim
nothing was left but the refuse, when the
pre-emptors graciously allowed the last
corners to work one day for them (the pre-
emptors) on their land and one day for
themselves, and the first choosers were able
to live without work, and thus formed an
aristocracy. To the remainder the exhorta-
ton was, "Go West, young man." The
right of the pursuit of happiness includes
the right to the use of land. We are said
to be entitled to life, liberty and the pur-
suit of happiness but under the present
system some have all the happiness and the
rest all the pursuit.
How are you to get your share? by divi-
sion? Not at all. Take the value of the
poorest wild land and the most productive
on your business streets and equalize them
BY taxation. The lecturer said the cry of
crank or of Henry Georgeism was no an
swer. The applicati n of the Golden Rule
is the solution. 1t is not Henry Georgeism,
bnt Christianity"
That Rev. Huntington was pretty gen.
orally Endorsed was testified to by the fire.
quent loud and long bursts of applause.