Omaha daily bee., 1897-11-04
L,wLEss OPPRESSION OF LApon.
Tho Law Invoked by Those who Per-
sistcntiy violate IL.
Tg,,a.

ours is a government Of law. and the
safety Of person and property and the sue
cess of business enterprise depend upon
obedience to law by all classes and condi-
tions OF our people, and this obedience to
law must not be enforced with varied rigor
upon varied classes. The humble and power
less are made to obey the laws or are pun
ished for lawlessness and the opuleut aud
powerful. who have property to protect and
business interests dependent upon social
order, should give high example OF faithful
obedience to all the mandates OF the law.
There has been much unrest in labor cir
cles in our mining regions for some time
past and II recently eliminated In the fear
full tragedy at Lattimer, where number
Of striking miners paid the penalty OF their
lives for disobedience to the law, and the
lives thus sacrificed were taken by the
sheritf and his deputies, who were SUM-
moncd by the law to protect the property
of employers and tho rights OF worklngmen
to make their own contracts When en-
ployers summon the law to suppress law
lessness among their employees and proceed
to the extremity of taking life in the name
of the law such employers must be clean
handed in their obedience to law II they
would be justified, or even excused, before
the law aud the world.
The laws of this state require employers
such as those in the anthnlcite coal regions
to pay the wages of their employees twice
a month and to pay in money. They also
forbid employers to own what are known as
company stores or to be In any way di-
rectly or Indirectly interested In them or to
exercise any control over the expenditures of
their employees in procuring the necessaries
OF life.
These laws are plain, free from all am
bigLity und are well understood by every en-
poyer in the state and are also well under
stood by even the most ignorant alien who
works in the mines in that region. They
know when their employers disregard the
law and when they have such high example
OF lawlessness 1t Is only natural that they
should be inspired to lawlessness themselves.
Desiring to present the facts fully and
fairly as to the respect exhibited by the
employers in the anthracite region for the
laws regulating the rights of their employees
to wages ana expenditures, an intelligent cor
respondent, thoroughly familiar with all the
relations of labor to capital in this state, was
assigned the duty of giving the true condi-
tions which exist in that section as to the
rights of employees to eNpend their money
as they shall choose without endangering
their situations. Hugh Roe ODonnell has
performed this duty and while his name is
we'll known as identified with the interests
of labor it will be admitted that his report
is stngularly free from passion or prejudice
and is confined to careful presentation of
facts and figures as he has found them.
Heretofore there have been many state
ments published and some in very exagger-
ated form, charging that the employers of
the anthracite region deliberately and sys-
tematioally violated the law intended to pro-
teCt employees in the payment and eXpendi-
ture of their wages. but as a rule these pub
llcatiOns have been confined to generalties.
Mr.. ODonnell gives time, place and circum-
stance, and presents copies of bills rendered
at different collieries with the fatal X mark
that conveys to the workngman the notice
that he has faied to expend as much of his
wages at the companys store and for other
purposes in which the employer is inter
ested as is necessary to assure him permanent
employment.
Thlt there are honorable exceptions to this
lawless oppression of labor we are glad to
state, but it is the truth that a very large
number Of the employers of miners in the
anthracite region are guilty of intentional
and studied lawleSsness to oppress their en-
poyes and literally defraud them out of
large percentage of their earnings Consid
ering the different conditions of intelligent
and generally financially Independent en-
poyers and the often ignorant and generally
dependent miners this lawlessness ON the
part of employers is tenfold more criminal
than any Of the common eruptions of vo-
lence resulting from misguided labor strikes
The law that is violated by the employers
Of miners is difficult to execute. they are
guilty of lawlesSness as rule by indrection,
although actually guilty OF violating both
the letter and the spirit of the law itself.
The method of procedure against them
who suffer this lawless oppression feel that
the law is strong e0ough to restrain or punish
them, but not strong enough to restrain or
punish their employers.
1t is objectionable and equally unwise
from a mere business standpoint, for the
employers OF the anthracite coal region TO
refuse to pay their employees properly or to
attempt to regulate their expenditures for
the necessities of life. The miner is humau;
however intelligent or however ignorant he
X w ha iS in1n yhon
he is cheated and he is fretted and
gradually misled to wrongs against himself
and into lawessness by what he knows to
be the lawlessuess Of his employers.
The safety of person ana property and the
success of mining operations in the anthracite
region, as elsewhere, must depend upon
absolute obedience to the law by both en-
poyer and employed, and until employers
set the eXamole of reverence for law they
must not complain II their less intelligent
and less responsible employees initiate their
awlessness in violence. Let employer and
employed of all classes and conditions under