The new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1876-1904, 1897-05-22
~wAGES MUST COME DOWN.
SAYS SENATOR ELKINS In AN
INTERVIEW.
Now Says That 1t Takes Something
More Than coincidence" to Bring
About Good Times-strange Talk

More Than "C0n1idence" TO Bring
About Good Times-strange Talk
But the senator tells the Truth.
Senator Stephen b. Elkins was in
terviewed by George Alfred Townsend
t"Gath.") After a preliminary Skin
mish with Senator Elkins, Mr.. Town
send writes:
"Mr. Elkins, how is the coal trade?n
"a coal rate war, for the first time
is declared all over the east. 1t en-
braces the Norfork and Western, the
Chesapeake and Ohio, Baltimore and
Ohio. Pennsylvania and Beech Creek
railroads, all soft coal carriers
"What caused the coal rate wars
"The entrance of new coal fields
into the market, and over production
was the consequence. Such railroads
as went into receivers hands, like the
n. and w. and were recognized, hav-
ing little else but coal to carry, broke
out against the pool. AS a hundred
American railroads are bankrupt,
their bonds virtually their only stock,
they are bound to haul for all they are
worth. The Norfork and Western
is now largely owned in France. Bit
luminous coal, therefore, which | mine
at the head waters of the Potomac,
runs four hundred miles, or to Phila-
delphia, for SO cents a ton. We get
but mill and a half to two mills a
ton per mile, whereas it was of old
contended that one cent per ton per
| 10. h. n fab
Soft coal is put down beside steamers
and vessels for little over 81 per ton.
| This is ruinous, but such is the fact. y
"Yod think wages must go DOWN."
'.Inevitably, as everything else has
gone down. Wage earners do not wish
to see it or believe 1t, but 1t is so. In
the article Of COAL wages is about all.
Coal yields no royalty; the railroad
gets one cent for hauling ton Of coal
five miles, for one hundred miles
twenty cents; less than coal shovelers
get for putting ton of coal into your
chute from the cart. Wages in Amer
lea stand against any revival of bust
ness
OF the new tariff he said: at
comes too late. The time for tariff is
over Then he went back to rail-
reading and said: "Had we become
possessed of the G. & O, canal when
we bid for it from the state (but the
courts of Maryland gave it to the Bal
timore and Ohio railroad) we would
now have double track railroad from
our bituminous mine into the city of
Washington, with a branch completed
to Baltimore. This branch was to run
through Hagerstown, We have built
1913 miles into the Allegheny submits
or 152 miles from Cumberland. Our
bonds amount to three millions, and
we earn twelve hundred thousand
gross year, leaving us about $125,-
600 annual surplus. This has been
the work of twenty years, and it gives
a reasonable idea Of the coal bust
ness.
.s1s the black labor settled in the
mines?n
"Firmly. 1t is not as effective as
white labor, but it does not combine
and conspire, and the colored man
spends all he makes while the Italian
and Pole sends every cent out of the
country"
II sent dispatch for one dollar and
a half a word to the Amazon river yes
terday; when | arrive in New York i
shall get the answer. The dispatch
goes to Southampton, Lisbon, Rio, and
the Amazon. One such dispatch /
sent cost me 81, 400: it specified all
the parts of contracts for ships.
recently paid $40, 900 for cipher tel
egraph code which will save ME $l2, :
900 year.
The whole interview was very in
| tereSting.