Little Falls weekly transcript. (Little Falls, Morrison Co., Minn.) 1894-19??, 1894-07-13
"a SERMON ON STRIKES

- 0AAAO4IA N/-kN .S*-ktSikJ-A -AOA-1A4lky
BUCHANAN HAS a TURN sAT'sA "PRO-
FEssioNAL AGtTAToR.
"a Chicago Clergyman WHO Needs PAM
phlet on PoIiticM Economy and = United
States History Right Hand Of Fellowship
Extended ~ Railway Convention.
!, There are SO many preachers, profess
Srs and editors ready to seize every op-
portunity to denonnce the strike that I
feel about once In SO often like saying
something in its defense It has. occur
red to me that we have again to thank
the slandered and abused strike for
|arousing the peuplet0 a5realization that
something is wrong with our Industrial
affairs. Ex-Governor Beaver said in a
speech before the Republican state con-
ivention Of Pennsylvania short time
ago that all other questions pale into in
significance before the industrial ques-
ton in this country at present; that it
is labor and not tariff we have to deal
with. Public speakers and writers, bar
ring the chumps and the scoundrels who
are subsidized, are saying practically
the same thing. Why this awakening
ito the realization Of q great truth?
Strikes. Ask one Of these gentlemen
why he thinks something lis wrong,
and the first thing he will say will be,
''Why, just look ut the strikes all over
the country"
, While some are yet SO much in the,
dark as to believe the strikes are the
whole of the wrong, those who think
know that strikes are the effects and
not the causes, and those who do think,
to that extent at least, are becoming
very numerous. When that truth once
gets into mans brain, it stays there
$50 you can see that strikes serve grand
purpose which is not generally placed
ito their credit. They make the people
think. want to say right here that
some Of the preachers who have been
lately talking about strikes didn't think
long enough before expressing them
selves. If it wasn't painful sight to
see such bunglers occupying exalted
places, one could laugh at some Of the
'idiotic breaks made by gentlemen who
write D. D. after their names I have
read score or so of this class recently,
but will call attention to one as q fair
sample.
Rev. Frank M. Bristol of Chicago
Methodist church preached sermon Oh
SO
Here is the way he started out:
Labor has a universal sway. heavenly ORR
gin and a glorious history. Through every
realm of life in every age and world labor
moves on on angel shod with strength. robcd
with beauty, crowned with light. In his foot
steps and beneath his spreading, shining wings
springs up every blessing, every good. Labor
finds a friend in our free institutions, and it
knows that the flag above is an emblem of its
emancipation from the abuses of tyranny and
"a pledge of its dignity and honor. Capital is
another angelic minister of benefcence, CO.
worker with labor in civilizing the world. It
lis crime against civilization, against humani-
ty. for selfish men to create hostility between
the great forces. Each is dependent on the
other; each must furnish the condi tions for the
others benefcent operation. They must re-
main In harmonious relations the one to the
other, or human progress ceases and the ills of
life begin to multiply. -
How's that for fireworks? It's dollars
to doughnuts that when fellow opens
up in that style he doesn't know much
about the facts in the case or has knife
up his sleeve. Rev. Bristol did the 60
ing ''up like rocket and down like
stick" act to perfection.
The gentleman may know all about
labor moving around on angels with
strong shoes on (the angels with the
shoes) and all that sort of thing, but
when it comes to strikes, although they
were the subject of his sermon, he is, to
draw it mildly, unreliable. Here's the
stick after the powdered end exploded:
Talk about the poverty, hunger and ill paid
condition of labor when it can afford to go on
ia million dollar strike, when it can afford to
lie idle at an expense of from $4,000 to $4,000
q day! If there ever was time when a strike
could be justified, certainly this is not the
time. When thousands are praying for work,
when many capitalists are losing money by
the employment Of labor at any price and are
willing to lose money rather than to make la
Dor suffer hunger, it is no time for professional
agitators to advocate strikes or Tor the labor
ers and citizens to throw down their tools
and voluntarily quit work by the thousands
Strikes which compel laboring men to quit
work are tyrannies. Associations which advo-
cate and sanction any interference with tho
personal rights and liberties Of our humblest
,workingman under the American flag are un-
American, undemocratic, oppressive and law
defying. AS rule, strikes are failure. They
do not correct the evils complained Of They
do not redress the imagined or real wrongs
and the laborer is the greatest loser and suf-
ferer in the end. - ~.',@. &% 49,.
y Talkabout strikes being failures when
they have called forth such eloquenco
and wisdom as we have here from tho
mouth Of Rev. Frank M. Bristol. No,
no! There probably was never a better
strike for a raise Of salary than that
very sermon, and hope it was a win
ner: 'sThe laborer is worthy Of his
hire''-hirer in this case.
Passing by the display Of ignorance
and the touching reference to the
kind hearted plutocrats who lose money
rather than make labor suffer, let Us see
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