The Saline County journal., 1892-07-14

a DREooRA91o D0OnKRAHe.
During the past week the country
has been In . fever Of ferment over
the riot ct Homestead, Pa, IN &C.
count Of which 10 given In this pa
per. No sooner had the intelligence
Of the action Of the strikers flashed
across the country than Democratic
newspapers and stump orators from
the halls Of congress to the curb
stones In the slums, sent up . wall
that IL was all owing TO the effects
Of the Mckinley bill. or course no
reasoning Was produced to show
that such was the case, but the as
sault was merely one Of assertion.
And yet, while that city was In
possession of an unlawful band Of
strikers, the Democratic governor
OF the state Of Pennsylvania, In
order to cater to the baser aud law.
less elements Of society, refused to
lend his aid to the restoration OF
order, because, perhaps, his party
might gain . few votes thereby. The
people have had time TO see through
the gauzy scheme, and now that
governor In disgrace In all decent
eyes In forced to act. 1t was Q
boomerang and IL worked.
In Q very remote sense the protec-
tive tariff may be said to be respon.
sible for the riot at Homestead, for
were it not for the protective tariff
there would be no steel works there
they would all be In Europe,
where the rioters would have been
killed without quarter by regular
soldiers on less pretext than they
gaye. But while the Democratic
party IL so free In its depunciation,
using the Homestead riot as Q pre-.
text for its incendiary speeches,
there are few things II should not
overlook. The events Of last week
have more than Q parallel in Eng.
land within q few years past. A
protective tariff was not the cause
Of the London dock hands strike.
In Wolverhampton, one Of Eng
lands great centers OF Iron industry
the werkmen are not nearly so well
paid ss the Homestead workers
would be under the proposed scale
Of reduction. And besides all this
these same workers at Wolverhamp-
ton have within . few days elected
q Tory member Of parliament in
preference to Q Gladstonian on ae-
count Of the Tory candidate being q
protectionist.
Again, there are causes why man
ufscturers In this country should
want to lower wages In their works
which the protective tariff cannot
touch. One il the iron works OF
Alabama which are operated by
labor which has always been cheaper
than Pennsylvania labor. Yet labor
In the free-trade state of Alabama
commands q higher price than the
same class In England. Either the
wages Of the Alabama workers will
have to come up or the wages OF the
Pennsylvania workers will have to
come down, SO that both will be on
q common level, and the greatest
obstacle in the way Of the working
men equalizing the wages to their
advantage is the attitude Of the
patrician class i'm Alabama, which
suppresses with the shotgun all at
tempts at organization Of the labor
ers and skilled workmen. Now this
is not waving the bloody shirt; 1t 10
simply the honest truth. In no
country on the face OF the earth 10
there 30 much friendship for the
improved condition Of labor as In
the Republican states OF this Union,
and II Ii a fact that the same SYM
psthy 10 not manifested In the Dem
ocratic states Of the Union. Wages
are lower In free trade states than
In protective states.
Lastly, the demand for free trade,
or tariff reform, or whatever you
have a mind to call 1t, comes from
British exporters and manufac-
turers; importers Of foreign goods,
who are usually Of foreign birth
and unnaturalized; superficial poll
ticsl quacks; southern employers Of |
cheap labor; selfish people, who
from their natural born cussedness
want cheap labor. This includes
about all classes who want free
trade In America, but they will
never live to see the fruition Of their |
hopes.