The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1892-09-23
THE LESSON OF The HOUR.
IL is No Use to Contend Against the Law
The Thing to do Is to Change the


That the differences between the en-
ployers of labor and the employed are
increasing as time advances must be
clear to all who pretend to keep pace
with current events. The association
of laboring men in the various labor
organizations, with view to the bet
ter protection of the interests of those
who toll, is natural result OF the
gradual encroachments upon the rights
and profits of labor growing out of the
concentration of capital and the organ
izatioa of those who control it. 1t
must be apparent, however, to the most
casual observer, that the means thus
far employed by organized labor have
not been productive OF results as salts
factory as could be desired While un-
doubtedly much good has come from or
ganization in many ways, and especial
ly in the way of educational benefits,
there is evidently disappointment in
regard to the attainment of much that
has been anticipated.
Very evidently organized capital seeks
nothing short of the absolute destruc-
ton of all labor organizations. They
stand in the way of that complete con-
troll of labor which has unquestionably
been determined upon. To the thought
full observer this has been apparent for
some time, and it has been clearly in
dicated in the labor troubles of recent
date. While organized resistance to
the encroachments of capital is more
potent than individual resistance, it is
evident that the method must be
changed if it is ever to be entirely sue
cessful. The strike and the boycott
have, at best, achieved only doubtful
success. All the powers of so-called
civil government are at the disposal of
capital in all such contests. The tele-
graph system and the daily press are
employed to disseminate false impress
sions among the people, always to the
prejudice of labor. Every possible
agency and instrumentality is brought
to the service of capital. The idle
hordes, which it has been a part of
our public policy to produce and main
tain, are always available from which
to recruit substitutes for strikers, and
nearly all such contests result either in
the submission of the union men to less
favorable conditions than they former
~ enjoyed, or in their entire displace-
ment by men who are not affiliated with
any labor organization. It must be
granted, therefore, that such methods
are decidedly unsatisfactory in their re-
suits.
At Homestead, the men are locked
out because they refused to comply
with the unjust demands of the Carne-
gle company and place themselves COM
pletely at the mercy of such a heartless
tyrant as manager Frick, and their
places are being filed, very slowly, to
be sure, but with persistant deter
mination that promises ultimate sue
cess.
In case of the switchmen's strike at
Buffalo, N. Y, the outcome is the same.
The ultimate triumph of the corpora
ton was never a matter of serious
doubt.
In Tennessee is presented another
phase of the labor problem. The en-
ployment of convicts there supercedes
free labor and robs the families of
honest men Of their daily bread. But
there seems to be more in this convict
labor system than appears upon the
surface. Senator Thomas G.. Plat,
president of the Tennessee Coal & Iron
Co., in recent interview respecting
this system, said:
Zone of the chief reasons which first
induced the company to take up the
system was the great chance which it
seemed to present for overcoming
strikes. For some years after we began
+1n of To- HOY.
we were right in calculating that the
free laborers would be loath to enter
upon strikes when they saw that the
company was amply provided with con-
vict labor, and as I am one that does
not approve of the convict system, /
don't mind saying that for many years
the company found this an effective
club to be held over the heads of the
free laborers."
Think of this for moment. A
wealthy mining company whose presi
dent has been honored by seat in the
United States senate, employing peni-
tertiary convicts at cheap rates with
the idea that free 1aborers, seeing the
company was amply provided with
convict labor, would be loath to enter
upon Strikes" and holding this fact as
CLUB over the heads of honest men
to terrorize them into the most abiect
submission.
But it is unnecessary to detail special
instances of the encroachments of
capital upon the rights of labor, or the
unsatisfactory results of past or present
methods of resistance. Nothing has
yet been attempted by the great body
of organized laborers intended to change
the conditions that render strikes and
lock-outs possible. It must begin to
dawn upon the minds of laboring men
that this is the only practical solution of
the labor problem. Everything else is
mereley Of temporary benefit, even if
successful AS long as these conditions
exist, there is no hope or possibility of
permanent relief
How is this change to be effected?
The conditions have grown up under
system of class legislation and class
favoritism for which existing political
parties are responsible, and which they
manifest no disposition to remedy; and
if laboring men would make their
organizations effectual for the per-
manent betterment of their condition,
they should utilize them politically for
the overthrow of parties that propose
no practical plan of relief, and in
support of a party that is pledged to