The White Pine news. [volume] (Treasure City, Nev.) 1868-1906, 1894-07-21


Ex-master Workman Powderly tells
vast ordience at Prohibition Park
Staten Island, that strikes seldom do
good, and never accomplish the ulti-
mate purpose for which they are in
stituted, and that the future hope of
the laboring man lies not in ruinous
strikes, but in arbitration. He says:
GA strike never did and never can
accomplish any good. Although pub
lie report has credited me with order
ing 800 strikers, l never ordered one
in my life. There was never strike
among the knights of Labor while I
was at the head of the organization
against which l did not use all my
power. All of them were caused by
influences over which l had no con-
troll. :"
There was marked air of expect
ancy in the audience when Mr.. Pow
derby took up the subject of railroad
strikes. There was interest in what
he would say about the present big
railroad trouble.
A railroad strike, he declared, was
the most serious that could occur, as
it affected the whole country. The
only way to prevent them was by gov
eminent ownership of railways, which
the speaker also advocated for tele-
graph lines. Until such time, how
ever, arbitration was the proper means
of settling differences when interested
persons could not agree; then call on
disinterested persons and abide by
their decision.
81 repeat" said Mr.. Powderly,
''that strike never accomplished any
good, and for a verifcation of this
assertion I ask you to watch and see
what the outcome of the great strike
now existing in the West will be.
Some blame Pullman, others blame
Debs; but they are not wholly to blame.
The fault goes farther back, to the
errors underlying the American labor
system. +"
While deploring the recent coal mi
ners strike, and urging that it was
mistake, the speaker spoke in high
praise of the miners
Gin all my experience. " said he,
&c have never observed a more in
dustrious, reliable set of workmen
than the coal miners of Pennsylvania.
And before you censure them too
harshly for the stand they have taken,
unwise though it may have been, in
their efforts to get better wages, just
try to think, if you can, what it means
to support wife and six children on
SO cents day."
He fired shot at the coal barons
when he said that he never had be-
lieved that a few men, sitting in their
offices in New York, should say by
the stroke of pen whether or not the
public should keep warm in the Win
ter He put himself on record in favor
of restricting immigration, holding
that most of the ills under which
mechanics and operatives suffered
were due to the unchecked tide.
Asked why the labor interests of
this country had not instituted Boards
of Arbitration and Cancellation such
as exist in England, Mr., Poverty re-
piled that the experiment had been
tried here with failure. The reason
was that while in England there were
only Englishmen to deal with, in this
country there were representatives of
all nations, who brought their jealous
les with them. 1t was bad enough,
he said, when there were only Eng
lishmen, Irishmen, Germans and
Americans here, but with the addition
during recent years of Italians, Hun
garians and Russians the idea of hav
one body to arbitrate their differences
with employers was impossible at this
time. He believed, however, that the
time would come when there would
be such board in America. He said
that while he was chief of the Knights
of Labor more than three hundred
strikes were settled by arbitration.
DE-. Prices Cream Baking Powder
Worlds Fair Highest Award.
TRIPLE MURDER NEAR LOVE-