Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1894-07-18

vass, and yet they boast that they will
elect their candidate in this district, in
which their party is in a minority.
Freedom of Contract.
The question of the freedom of con-
tract as involved In the present strike,
as the New York Jolt7 nal Of Commerce
says, affects the interests of every en-
ployer of labor, and every person who
wishes to find a market for his services.
Whatever the merits of the controversy
between the Pullman Company and its
employees, the company declares that
it cannot afford to pay more than a
certain rate of wages; that it alone
can determine this question. and that
it can better afford to close its shops
than surrender this free right. Then
the sympathetic strike is invoked and
organizations of railroad and other en-
ployes are called upon to assist in
coercing a company, in whose affairs
they have no concern, to employ men
against its will.
There is absolutely no limit to the
Generalization of business that would
result from concession to such an as
sumption The freedom to employ
whom the employer pleases and on
what terms he can, would be at an
end The natural basis of agreement
between employer and employee would
give place to an entirely arbitrary
system under which the employer
would never have any means of know
ing what would be demanded of him,
or what the consequences of refusal
to comply.
Surrender to the sympathetic strike,
even though counseled by Governors
and clergymen, and deemed advisable
by certain easy-going people who do
not look far in the direction of ulti-
mate results, would cause infinitely
could possibly avert. The basis of
agreement between employer and em-
ploye must be the mutus lily of inter-
est the fact that one desires certain
services and cannot obtain them else
where on more favorable terms, while
the other wants employment and is
not able to secure better compensation
elsewhere for his services. Each must
be free to consult his own interests and
to employ or accept employment at his
own pleasure.
The attempt to compel company to
employ men for whom it has no use, or
at higher rates than it can secure any
profit from their services, is as imprac-
ticable as to compel men to render
services to employers whom they do
not wish to serve and when they can
obtain better employment elsewhere.
If it is to be asserted as matter of
public policy that employers can be
compelled to retain men in their en-
ployment involuntarily and to con-
tinue manufacturing or other opera
tions at rates of wages that do not al
low them a profit, then in the same
spirit of subordination of private to
public interests, employees will have to
accept some measure of dictation as to
the conditions under which they must
work or may be permitted to stop
working; and the whole system of in
dustrial and commercial freedom will
be at an end. Either private interest
must be left to determine the con-
ditions on which men will be employed
and enterprises carried on, or else pub
lie policy must be made the test and
a socialistic system of servitude in
voked to determine the terms on which
the necessary services of production
and transportation are to be performed.
The South and the Negro.
1t is an admitted fact, says the
Lynchburg Ad0dnce, that the South
has suffered less from the financial de-
preston than any other section of the
Union. 1t is also a matter of public
notoriety that the great coal strike
hurt the South less than other regions.
1t is true also that the railroad strike
now on has not yet affected Southern
railroads to any great extent. 1t is
not forgotten that Coxey found no re-
cru1ts for the so-called industrial
army in the southern States.
These facts speak trumpet-tongued
to the world in praise of the South and
her people, white and black. True,
there have been occasional lynchings
for particular crime, but there has
been no organized and concerted effort
to defy the laws and reform society by
destructive methods. The South is to-
day the home of peace and law and
order.
How shall we account for the singu-
lar exemption of the South from the
evils that so sadly affiict the North and
West? 1t occurs to US that the presence
of the negro here partly explains this
exemption. The negro laborers are
patient, good natured, easily managed,
and in business matters they contide in
their white neighbors and employers.
The Southern whites know the nature
of the negroes. They know their good
points and their weak points, and they
treat them not only with Justice. but
kindness. The negroes are a light
hearted people, disposed to enjoy the
present, careless of the future. The
labor agitator does not find in them
good material for his purpose. While
they are doing well they are not going
to strike in order to do better. They
have learned from their white neigh
bors to respect law and to obey the
lawfully constituted authorities.
On account of the presence of the
negroes in the Southern States, Huns,
and Stays and Dagoes have given us
the go-by, therefore the white popula.
tion of the South is homogeneous
The few immigrants that have come to
us have been easily absorbed and
caught the prevailing tone of South.