The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1897-07-24
The Coal Miners Strike.

The Philadelphia American, 8
paper which is edited by Wharton
Barker, a banker who believes in free
coinage and a tariff that will bene6,
the workingman, not the trusts,
says of the coal miners strike:
yet, We repeat, if ever man had cause ia
strike, the coal miners Of to day have tina,
cause. BY cuts in the rate of pay and by
enforced idIeness, their wages have been
so reduced as to bring them to extreme
poverty. We lately had q report, made by
an investigating committee of the Legis-
lature of Pennsylvania, to the effect that
the average earnings of the miners OF
Pennsy lvania were in the neighborhood
Of but 81 week. In the coal fields OF
lllipois, the average weekly earnings of
miner are given at but 81, out of which
they are expected to pay rent and support
their homes. That they must 60 hungry
is plain. So they have been driven to
desperation. Might as we'll starve strik
ing for living wages as starve at grinding
toll, is their feeling, and so their resort
to strike into which they have been
spurred By the magnifed reports Of in
dustrial revivals aud minimized reports
of industrial shut downs catered up by
metropolitan press reports, that have
given rise to false hopes, .'
1--WE have spoken of the average wage
of the Pennsylvania miner as but 81 q
week. But this is greater wage than the
average miner in reality receives. Added
to his loss of income through wage cuts
and enforced idieness, is the loss in the
purchasing power of Als scanty wage
through the despicable practice of paying
him his wage, not in money, but in orders
on the company stores. And at these
stores exOrlitant prices, exorbitant as
compared to prices ruling in other stores,
are charged tor supplies. And these ex.
or6itant prices, the miner, paid in store
orders, must pay, for his store orders,
commonly pieces of metal, call for 40
many cents worth of goods ut the com.
pany stores, aud absolutely worthless at
all other stores. So We have through this
practive of payment in store orders, u
virtual cut 10 the wages Of miners below
that nomina'!y paid, and because of this
practice all the more reason has the miner
to strike for an increase of wages.
I'm the circular calling ont the miners
on strike, the National Executive Board
of the United Mine Workers makes this
significant assertion: The signs Of the
TINE. as pointed OFT by the press and by
the testimony of men versed in public
affairs, are that business is. reVviuE, that
an upward tendency in prices Of all com
mOdities is apparent In the general
business revival and industrial inp prove
ment which - earnestly proclaimed we
ought to share, and it We do not attempt
to share we shall be false to ourselves
and those dependent upon u.s.
'And who, other than the heartless
task. master, wilt gainsay this2 Surely if
there has been, revivsl in industry the
wage Garner should share in it. The
promised revival, the promised prosperity
IS surely NOT alo1e for the employer, it
has been promised to the wage Garner no
ess than to the employer. And 40, now
that we are told the promised prosperity |
IS at hand, the coal miners insist on shar- |
ngit. A4d if the promised prosperity il
,ot at band. if it has not come. he is not
% be harshTy judged for demanding to
share in that which is q. myth. yet which
ae hes beeq. told is Il fact. Especially il
I unjust for the metropolitan papers that
rave Insisted on The presence OF prosper
ty to so judge him. Yet they do judge
lin. and condemn hip. condemn him for
lePa4ding q share IN that which does
rot exist, yet which they have told him
loes exist, condemn him for following
heir fsise teashings:"