The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1891-11-09
Protection and Labor.

Protection and Labor.
One of the most remarkable illus
trations of the bearing protection has
upon labor is revealed in the terrible
condition of the miners at Oxford
Furnace, a village situated in the iron
regions of Warren County. Iron is
one of the best protected interests in
this much-protected country, and
protection, say the Republicans, is for
the benefit of the working man. Yet
with all the added protection of the
Mckinley bill the condition of IRON
workers has been growing worse, until
now the men employed at Oxford
Furnace are actually in a state of
starvation. This is the result Of a
lookout"
The men had been doing five
'heats" a day, but there was not
enough profit in that for the million
aire mine owners, and the task was
increased to six ''heats" a day. When
it is considered that five heats" re-
quired the men to labor from two
o'clock in the afternoon until four
o'clock the following morning, it will
be seen that the addition of another
cheat" was a matter of grave
men who gave fourteen hours
for a days work should be
required to give one-ffth more-that
they should work sixteen hours and
forty-eight minutes for a day, with no
increase of wages. They were given
a day to consider the matter when
they decided to refuse, though they
offer to do five heats extra during the
week as a compromise. This the
owners refused to accept, and a ''lock-
out" was ordered.
There are other grievances. too.
The best wages these men ear
carr is $12 a week, and this for night
work. The men who work during the
day get less. But we will take the
maximum. What is 80 a day for pro-
tected %labor-the best protected in
dustry in the country, be it remem-
bered-where the least protected arti-
sal gets So. so a day and others So. so? 1t
is simply a farce to pretend that these
iron-workers are protected--except as
when the lion protects the lamb,
which is when the lion and the lamb
lie down together, with the lamb in
side.
And to make the matter still worse
these men never get any money.
They are provided with houses by the
company-as an evidence of the bene-
ficent care of protection, probably
and ''stores" at which they may buy
goods on credit. The company runs
the stores, as we'll as the houses, and
fixes the prices, the result being that
at the end of the first month the work
man is in debt to the company. And
from that time on his nose is kept
down to the grindstone.
One man, who has worked for the
company twenty-six years, told a re-
porter that in all that time, though he
had worked steadily and faithfully,
lie had never seen a dollar in cash,
and was heavily in debt to the com-
pany.
All this is bad enough, but a perusal
of the III of the men composing
the company, makes it still worse.
They are all Republicans, members
of the party that protects" the
American workingmen and makes
his life an elysium. They
are all rich, too. One
OF them is John l. Blair, who is re-
puted to be sixty times a millionaire;
another is Sam. Sloan, the Morris and
Essex railroad magnate: a third, B. &.
Clark, and a fourth Theodore Stur-
ges. These are some of the men who
own these Oxford Furnace mines and
works men whose wealth is known to
every one.
What is set forth here only shadows
the facts. To realize the situation one
must needs go to Oxford Furnace. The
condition of these protected laborers
almost oeggars des cription. And yet
it is but a few days ago that Repub-
lican orators were going about War
rem county telling the iron-workers of
the great benefits protection had con
ferred upon them and co~unselling
them to vote for the 'Grand Old
Party" And a year hence they will
be doing the thing again.
KANSAS Republicans are already