The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1896-02-02
SLIGHTLY SUGGESTIVE.


pen may lay his mind to finance, To
necessary public debt, 10 executive
agrandiZement or 10 the many other
questions real and make-belieye, but
| his thoughts ever return TO the crisis
| in the affairs of capital and labor.
| That is the question of the hour. The
artificial scarcity Of our currency has
no doubt hurried the matter TO head,
| but the cause lay somewhere beneath
and would in time have marked its
| effect. In all the important quarrelS
| between employers and their men, re-
| sulting in StOppage of work, the state
| has taken but one view of the case
| that the work must go on, not that the
men must be taken back to work;
aliens have been brought in by the sell
fish employers; the state has marShaled
its troops; the aliens have been hooted,
stoned, maltreated, killed; the troops
have fired into the crowd, and have al
most always killed a woman and not
unfreQuently woman and her babe.
This has had the effect Of settling the
| disorder. The work has proceeded,
and the state having made exiles out of
citizens. This has happened in most
of the state of our Union.
Each time that the employers and
employees quarrel and the matter is
settled by law TO suit the employers,
there in an added number of converts
to the belief that the social system
must be changed. This idea compre-
bends so much which is terrifying that
the man of conservative nature and
convictions recoils in horror from any
such forecast But his horror only
adds 10 the dangers Of the times, for
in that horror we have the opposing
force that would make the social re-
adjustment all the more difficult. The
question very naturally arises how
long can this purhlind method of deal
ing with the reasonable demands of
labor be endured, and that other Ques-
tons of equal significance, why should
the statute always take the part of
the employer, right or wrong?
VIII there ever be permanent peace
so long as that kind of laws shall be
all the law we have? 1t is not within
the possibility of belief that there can
be any such peace during the cOntin-
uance Of any such state Of things. The
very aliens who come TO the aid of the
employers are the ringleaderS of the
next onset against peace and property.
Now the law should first inquire into
the generalShip of the army of in
dustry. If a general or two We're
roundly punished when he or they had
erred, there would be renaissance of
law and order. In law for ages, the
Warkman has been the only possible
offender against industry. The hirer
could do no wrong. This came from
the poverty of the world. But the
world has grown rich through the use
OF machines. Labor and not capital
is now the more important factor. The
old adjustment Of the ever-arising DIFF
ficulties is no adjustment at all There
must be u change, and men may either
accept il with bloodshed or without
The envy Of man has been aroused.
He can make more than he could in
former centuries, and ne is determined
10 have more. The generals of the
great industries say the hired man
shall have no more. The law says they
are right. But the law must be chang
ed or it will surely be trampled under
foot We can have our own republic
or we can have its successor just as
we choose; but with either we viii
have 4 law that viii inquire as freely
into the action of labor.
The present law and the present re
public may not have gone 10 their ut
most limit in supporting Carnegie.
Pullman and others. but. If they have
not yet reached that bound, they VIII
soon arrive there The present idea Of
the law i doomed. The legal indus
trial dic1um that the employer can do
no wrong i today without moral force. /
When work may cease at any time
the public deSideratum is Tot that The
work per So should resume, but tina
the men should resume their work
Any other arrangement should be He
gal