Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-02-08
A TRAMP'S LETTER.
WRITTEN ron THE DISPATCH. ,

"A i
WRITTEN FOR THE DIsPATCH.t
ONE day last week, had a letter from
tramp. take my correspondents word
for it. That WIS the only name which he
subscribed at the end of his epistle-"A
Tramp"
can think of few experiences more prof
liable than the getting of good, long, hon
est and outspoken letter from tramp, SIX
or seven days every week. The tramp is
one of the unknown quantities in our indus
trial and social. problems. Nobody is able
to speak for him, and he himsel keeps dis
Greet, or perhaps, an ominous silence. He Is
outside of all the combinations. He belongs
to no brotherhood. He never meets to for
mulate constitution and q set of bylaws,
and to draft platform. He keeps his rights
and his wrongs quite TO himself.
Some people say that when the tramps do
organize, the Social Revolution will begin.
The tramps are the Goths and the Vandas,
who are waiting, as their counterparts in the
old days waited i'll the savage forests. to rush
out and turn the whole world INSIDE down.
There have always been tramps, because
there have always been lazy people, VINO
have preferred begging and stealing to the
more conventional and monotonous fashions
of getting a livelihood. But to-day, am
good, willing and industrious tramps, who
are outside of the mills and workshops be-
cause they are crowded out. Some people
will not believe that One of the clearest-
headed lawyers of my acquaintance said to
me the other day that every poorest man in
Pittsburg can be a capitalist if he will. The
lowest-down man in the biggest mill, by dint
of industry and perseverance and economy
and good sense can work up into position
which will enable him to become stock
holder in the establishment. l wish l could
believe that.
Work for All Willing Workers.
This matter of the eight-hour day has
at the heart of it, 1 understand, the grievance
of disproportion between the workers and
the work. There is not work enough to go
around. Let each of US, then, work'an hour
less that there may be room for our brother,
the tramp. Yet am told by employers of
industry, in whose Judgment 1 have just
cause to confide, that there is no
reason why there should be tramp in
Pittsburg. There is work enough, they say,
for every able-bodied man in this COM
munity.
wish could get at the real truth in this
tramp-question. The idea that the working
men generally have, SO far as can learn
from talking with them, is that the
employers are above all else desirous that
there should be more workers than there is
work. They want an army of the unem-
ployed to be encamped outside
the factory walls as a menace to their
own workmen. They want to be able to say
to any dissatisfied worker, every well, II
you don't like it, take your things and go.
There are twenty men outdoors who will be
glad to get your place." They thank God.
like the pious merchant quoted by MI. John
Brisben Walker in his paper on "The
Church and Poverty" that iron sells at
high figure, while labor is a drug on the mar
ket! To them it is mark of the wise and
beneficent disposition of Providence that
labor should be cheap: that there should be
more workers than there is work for them
to do; that there should be an army of hun
cry, homeless and penniless tramps.
We might as well say out the plain truth.
There is nothing gained for anybody by tell
ing lies, OF by trying to persuade ourselves
that pleasant imagination is the same thing
as practical reality. One of the great needs
On both sides is the need of mutual under
standing. If the honest workman and the
honest employer could but get together in a
fair and equal and brotherly conference,
with all the tools AMI knaves and bigots on
both sides shut out, a great deal might
be gained. Is there, or is there not, a
lack OF WOrk 1Of the nanQS OF men
willing and eager to work? Is there,
or is there not, a desire on the
part OF employers of labor to keep men
starving in reserve, in order to depress
wages? l am all the time saying to discon-
tented workingmen. who answer these two
questions in the worst way, that they do not
understand either the spirit or
the difficulties of the employer OF labor
They do not appreciate the immense COM
plexity of the problem. Nor do they realize
that, while the capitalist may not be quite
so anxious as the workman for a change in
the conditions-the capitalist having enough
to eat and to wear, and a decent house to
live in-yet the capitalist is really interested,
really has his heart in the matter, and wants |
to see a solving in the fairest way of the |
great problems of distribution. The capital |
list simply does not know what to do. And |
who does know? Why, we are not able yet, |
it seems, to agree even as to the simple facts
in the case.
From the Ecclesiastic Side.
UNDER these circumstances it is good |