River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1894-04-26
400. 600 Idle Men Active.

lil0dStl vi
condition of the country at the pres
ent time is anomalous. Millions of
men are out of work, whose idleness
is enforced, occasioned by circumstan-
ces over which they have no control,
but the 100000 who are IDLE and
ACTIVE are just at this time attract
ing special attention in consequence
OF the peculiar situation called into
existence. In any nation but the
United States, 1.-The land of the free
and the home of the brave" the as
pect would be con4idered SD alarming
as to threaten the stability of the
government and the institutions of
the country. But here we look upon
these stupendous aggregations, or
combinations, with little apprchen-
sion of evil consequences. In this
country every man claims the priyi
lege of expressing his convictions on
any and all subjects when and where
he pleases. The freedom thus exer-
cised usually acts as safety-valve for
discomfort which soon expends itself
and the individual reverts 10 his nor
NAL attitude of quiet and industry.
The industrial army of common
wealers marching ON Washington, it
is claimed. are not, tramps in the or
binary acceptation of the term, shift
less and lawless dead beats, but well
disposed men ont of work, three
fourths of whom are native Ameri-
cans. They are simply having an
outing" picnic, and claim that
they have right to go to Washing
ton or ITO grass" ana no man shall
say nay as long as they interfere with
no ones property or liberty,
Lit is not from the character of the
individuals composing the common
veal army that danger neeG be appre-
hended since as class they seem to
be fairly well disposed, few instances
of a lawless nature having been re-
ported thus far. The demands of the
leaders in the movement have been so
preposterous and wild that instead of
creating alarm they have only been
treated with universal ridicule. The
idea of a crank's marshaling a hun
dred thousand tatterdemalipns before
the doors of the capitol peTemptorily
demanding of congress the prompt
delivery of five hundred million dol
lars is thought to be absurd enough
To make the brazen Statue of Liberty
over the dome to look down on the
scene with a sardonic grin. But these
populistic leaders, Coxey and Kelley,
are the craziest kind Of political
cranks, ana Gov. Waite seems TO
evince in his communication TO the
press little better Judgment.
The strikes on the Great Northern
railway, and the immense number of
men who have recently quit work
simultaneously in the coal fields are
apparently combinations of workmen
trying to force their employers TO pay
higher wages. These differences be-
tween capital and labor will probably
be settled amicably by compromise or
arbitration.
There is however an element of
danger i'm the lawless character of a
class of coal miners, that ignorant
foreign class that knows nothing of
the English language or American
institutions. There are many thous-
ands of these people in this industry
who should have been excluded from
the United States. They are men
ace to the country as far as their
numbers can be a menace, for they
have nothing in common with the
genius of our institutions. But If any
danger threatens life or property from
these com binations of men, more or
less determined and desperate, we
have firm reliance in the conservative
character and firmness of those in au-
thOrity in either of the two great
political parties to see that peace is