The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1896-09-14
WHOOPING-UP DAY
OUT AT CANTON

ors and no more consumers, the cheaper
Will be the products.
what increases the price of any prod.
uct is that many people want 1t and ear
only get it by paying IA better price than
some one else is willing to give. The more
people who want AN article, the better
price it will command. The more people
who want your labor. the better wages
you will receive. (Applause) If there is
one days labor for sixteen workinGmel
you would not get as good wages as thouSh
there were sixteen days work for one
workingman. daughter and continued
applause.) And that is the sort of l6 to
we want in the United States. (Applause,)
''The changes in the prices of agricul-
tural products or any other commodity
which have been cheapened in the produc-
ton by improved machinery and more
competitive fields with greater produc-
zion, does not prove that gold has al
vaneed in value, but simply that such $, n
wheat even at the present low price, VIII
buy more American commodities than the
same quantity would have bought thirty
or forty years ago
THE ITEM OF WAGES.
"Ah, gentlemen, are not the wages paid
labor rather than the ever-changing mar
ket price of commodities, the best and
most logical test? Is not the labor Of man,
rather than the thing which his labor ere
ates, the real test? Have the wages paid
to labor since 1879, as measured by gold,
ueCieaseu. NAppiduse.) iHat IL the Siu
cial uqcstion.
I'VE resumed specie payments on a gold
basis on Jan. |, 1879. Since that time
wages and salaries have not declined, nut
have risen. In 1850 the number of cnl-
ployeS in the manufacturing establish
ments of the United States, men and
youths, was 2,7s20No, aggregating in wages
Ssh,3l5.coO, or an average of 1874, per cap
ita. In 1880. ten years after resumption,
the number of wage earners was i,7l2. G22,
and their aggregate earnings were 2,2s3,-
2lS.529. or s4S per capita. This showing
would clearly indicate that the gold basis
has not injured labor.
Here was an increase from 1890 to 1S91
of nearly 90 per cent. This increase in
the wages OF labor is further sustained by
the report of the committee of the United
States senate, made by senator's of both
political parties which in 1892 investigated
the subject of wages and prices. The
committee reported that in twenty-one Sc
lected Siustrics wages were in money 20
per cent. higher in 1850 than in 1860, and GO
per ccrit higher in 1880 than in 1860. and the
prices Of staple articles had fallen be-
tween $50 and 1890 in some instances one
third In other words: There never had
been q time in our history when work was
so abundant or when wages We're so high,
whether measured by the currency in
which they wer paid or by their power to
supply the neccssaries and comforts of
life Applause)
That's what you left in 1892. Is there
workingman in the United States who
does not want that condition back again ?
Continued applause) Since 1860 wages
nave advanced Sia per cent, according to
the table of the senate committee. The
wages paid in 1850 were when we had the
free and unlimited coinage of silver and
thirteen years before the suspension of
the free coinage of silver. In 1890, accord
ing to the census, the occupations of per-
sons over 10 years of age numbered H.
Se6, 100. This great army, Of which you
are a part. constituting more than one
a for W 4
and are paid in money measured by gold
that is, when you have work daughter
anu aplause)--or money as good as gold
You have had no other kind of money
since 1879, and the working people of no
other country of the world have any bet
ter money. These are the toiling masses
who were the most prosperous in 1892 of
any working people in the world and more
prosperous than they ever had been be-
fore. The cheapcning of commodities
comes from the introduction and appli-
cation of lahor-saying machinery, both on
the farm and in the factory There is
scarcely any branch of production which
does not turn out more commodities per
hour of labor than in 1873.
at would be just as reasonable and just
as conclusive to say that the suspension
of the free coinage of silver in 1873 re-
duced the price of steel rails from $l2o per
ton to so or $50 per ton, the price now
prevailing, rs to say that that act reduced
the price of wheat The price of wheat is
which is eternal. Gold has not made long
crops or short crops, high prices or low
prices. Gold has not opened M the wheat
fields of Russia, India, or the Argentine
Republic, nor Will free silver destroy them.
GOLD NOT a CURSE.
Gold has not kept up the freight rate
for the agricultural producer and the stop
page of free coinage in 1873 has not ad-
vanced It. In 1873 the average freight rate
on grain by lake and rail from Chicago to
New York was 26.s per bushel. In 1895
1t was SO cents per bushel. our working
people have bought the necessaries and
comforts of life cheaper for themselves
and families during all these years since
1873 and down TO 1892 They We're getting
better wages. paid in gold for their labor
than ever before. In the United States
everything has been cheapened but men.
and as nearly as | can ascertain it, in
free silver countries. such as Mexico, Cen
tral America and South America, man
alone has been cheapenod, everything he
buys having steadily increased with con-
stant fluctuations by the steady decrease
in the price of silver.
with the gold basis and the protective
tariff from 1919 to 1893 the worllingmen
of this country were never so steadily en-
ploycd; they never before received such
good wages; they never before We're paid
in better money: and their wages never
before bought as many of the nccessar-
les, comforts and luxures of life. CAP
plause ana hurrahs for McKinleyJ
''lf a gold standard deprived the Amer
lean toiler of single days work. or his
family Of n single comfort. or reduced his
wages, or made life harder for him,
should be against it. tApplause) AS it
does not and as II promtes the general
prosperity and upholds the national credit
and honor, | am for 1t und shall steadily
favor it so long as | believe 1t is truly
beneficial and advantageous to our coun-
try, cloud and continued applause)
''The Hon. John h. Carlisle the dis
tingulshed Democrat who is at present
secretary of the treasury, on April 10, 1896,
addressed the workngmen of Chicago in
q speech of great power and eloquence.
Among other things, he said: The value
of the silver dollar under free coinage will
fluctuate from day to day. moving up and
down with the rise and fall of the com
mercial price of bullion contained In it, as
the Mexican dollar does now; and the
premium on the gold dollar would, Of
course. fiuctuate to the same extent. thus
afrording an opportunity to bullion brOk-
ers and spectators TO buy and sell it at Z
proft. 1t would cease to be used as
money because no man would pay his
debts in gold dollars worth 100 cents, when
the Law permitted him TO pay them in sill
yer dollars worth only II or % cents each.'
The sudden withdrawal says Mr.
Carlisle. .of $620,0O0.000 of gold from the
currency in the country would undoubted-
ly produce financial and Industrial dis
turbance for more disastrous to the inter-
est of labor than has ever been expcri-
enced In our history; and no man who has
particle of sympathy for working men
and working women and their dependent
families can contemplate the possibility
of such calmity without feeling that it
was his duty, whether he occupies pri-
vate or pablo station, to employ every
honorable means at his command 10 avert
'These are the words Of trlth and SOBER
ness, and | commend them to the working
men of Homestead tappiausep and the en-
tire country everywhere as well entitled
10 their most serious and earnest consider
alton.
Gentlemen, have always been. as you
know, in favor of protective tariff cloud
and continued applause) ! have adyo-
Gated It and believed in 1t because
thought 1t was necessary to protect the
American workingman against the cheap
er labor of the Old World. (Vociferous
cheering) Applying that great principle
! am iii favor of protecting today tine
iaboring man of the United States against