Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1896-08-03
SELF PROTECTION FOR LABOR
n. Y. Journal.

Everybody knows, said the impress
siye Mr.. Mckinley, discoursing 10
delegation of wage workers, that Re
publican Congress and a Republican ad-
ministration will enact such tariff
law as shall protect adequately Amer
can labor.
Time was that the American work
iugmen was yisbly impressed by prom
ises of this sort. But thirty years OF
protection. unaccompan.ed by any rise
in wages .raceable TO the tariIf, has
been for him a liberal education. He
has seen. TOO. that the lowest wages
paid are those paid in the projected
industries; that the men mos active IN
importing alien labor 10 deDress tho
wages and lower the standard Of living
of the American workingmen are the
very ones who 90 to Washington 10
Plead for more and higher protection,
that the dignity Of American labor my
be maintained.
The wage worker in the United
States has learned, if he be Cbservant
aAd thoughtful, that the protection he
needs s self-protection. In proportion
organized, their wages have been in
creased or maintained q, reasOnab'
figures. No amount OF tariff protec-
ton has succeeded n keeping wages
up when the employers were able u
break the power of the organization.
Mr.. Andrew Carnegie, one of the most
loquacious prophets of the theory of
protecting labor by taxing consumers,
has given also the most conspicuous
example OF an employers denial 10
labor Of the right TO protect itself.
Behind Mckinley stand all the men
Of the Carnegie type. Henry c. Payne,
his Western manager, vas one Of tho
receivers Of the Northern Pacific raj
way, and helped to force the strike
which Debs won and from which grew
the American Railway Union. As pres
ident of a Milwaukee street railway to-
day. he is opposing a strike which is
approved by a vast majority of the cit
liens. II : his policy TO deny TO the
employees the right TO combine in I'M
ions, to deny to them in short, the
right Of self-protect!on.
The record Cf Mark Hanna as a foe
to organized labor s widely notorious
As a member of the eXecrabie Spring
Valley Coal Company. he took part in
that systematic effort for the crush
ing and spoiiat.on Of his employees,
which was widely condemned through
cut the middle West as strike OF
miili0naires against miners Never
did the eX,ort.ons of the company or
pluck me- store have such Caring
illustration as at Spring Valley Never
was the fraud of selling lots to miners
on partial payments, and then closing
the m.nes so that the unfortunate pur-
chasers lost both their homes and the
money paid for them, so remor1elessiy
pracrsed. To no other spot in these
Omitted States has degraded ald pau
perized labor from Southern Europe
been imported so largely TO Gust Amer
leans from ,heir places. To-day SNC'ng
Valley. for its memories, is s;ancl IN
the n0strils of the people Of iilinos,
and because Of :ts lOrdes OF Huns and
Slavs a constant menace tC Jle peace
Of the State.
When men OF the type most DANGER
our to the prosperity and the dignity
OF American labor stand as McKinley's
sponsors and political managers il is
IDLE to regard his proJesjationS Of a!iec-
ton for The workingman as other than
mere political buncombe. The ancient
saw. a man s known by the com
pany he keeps" is Of positive apDl.ca-
ton in this campaign.