The record-union., 1899-09-24

that they forget the miseries OF SIX
years ago? Do they forget the bread
riots, the poverty, the squalld want,
even of those able and anxious 10
work? Surely the country has had
enough of tariff tinkering by the op-
ponents of a protective tarlfT. Inc
second great remedy they propose for
trusts is the free coinage OF silver at
16 to 1.-The coinage of Ascent dollar.
They actually propose to the people
that, If the trusts deprive certain men
of part of their earnings, or throw a
certain body of men out of employment,
this shall be remedied by decreeing
that the men who still have employ
ment shall be paid 4S cents on the dol
lar for the work they do.
THE utter unsettlement of values
consequent upon a complete upsettlnB
of our financial system would give a
great opportunity for gain to every un-
scrupulous speculator in the country,
and probably the people who would
suffer the least from it would be the
very people who by combination have
created the greatest trusts The big
capitalist, a large share of whose ex-
penseS takes the form of wages, would
be compensated to some extent Tor Ills
losses in other directions by the shrink
ing of the amount he would have to
pay our for wages; but the man VINO
received these wages would not be
compensated in any way. If the wage
workers act with wisdom and with
forethought, if they show far-sighted
prudence in their combinations. indus
trial and political, their ultimate well
fare is assured.
I'm the long run only the American
Workingman can hurt himself. What
ever is really for his welfare, for his
permanent and ultimate welfare, is for
the welfare of the community. And OF
all ways most surely to interfere with
his material welfare, tampering with
the currency in which he is paid, is the
surest The banker, the manufacturer,
the rich merchant, the large land
owner, could get along after fashion
under the scourge of free coinage, but
the laboring man could not. The
laboring man would go down on the
| level where you find him in countries
where silver is the standard metal.
THE two remedies our opponents
propose-altering the tariff and debas-
IIlS Tie cuII61tEy--cOuiu nave ID pug
sible effect in aBating the evils of the
trusts, and could hurt those who profit
by the trusts only to the extent that
| they hurt every member of the Ameri-
can business community, from the cap
italist to the day laborer.
For a number of years the Demo-
cratic party in New York State has
posed as the especial enemy of CO.
| operate wealth, and in it's platforms has
denounced monopolies, trusts, rich cor
porations and the like, and bid
strongly for tlie5 vote of the working
man. Yet during the time that the
| Democrats were in power not one eff
| fective law was put upon the statute
| books to carry out the threats they
made. We came in bent upon doing
what in us lay to tighten to some ex-
| tent the burden of injustice, to make
conditions a little fairer, a little more
equal The inheritance tax, the cor
poration tax, the franchise tax are one
and all our handiwork. They repre-
sent the first great attempt that has
been made in New York State to meet
the new conditions caused by the up
growing of great corporations, the ex-
ploitation of municipal franchises. In
each instance. and especially in passing
the franchise tax we had to face the
| opposition of the great and wealthy
corporations. We disregarded their op-
position because we thought them
wrong, just as fearlessly as we would
have championed them, if we had
thought them right.
I'VE abolished the contract labor
| system; we established inspection of
| factories and the Bureau of Labor Sta
tistics; the eight hour law, the law pro-
viding for the abolition of sweat shops
| in short, every labor measure has
| been initiated and put through by us.
The Board of Mediation and Arbitra-
| tion has for the first time become live
| factor in the settlement of labor trou-
| bles; sweat shops are controlled; the
eight hour law is enforced. In our
/ State convicts do not compete with free
| labor, and the Bureau of Labor Statis-
tics and the Factory Inspectors De-
| partment work practically hand in
hand with the foremost representatives
| of the wage workers to do all that can
/ be done in the interests of labor. What
| is true of New York is true of the rest
of the country, and what is true of
| labor legislation and of the control OF
corporations will be true of trusts. We
| seek to ameliorate and curb abuses,
and not to destroy what may be useful.
| Our opponents take refuge in destruc-
| ton only and not a few of the laws
| they propose against trusts, if put on
| the statute books, would destroy the
right of labor unions to exist, or of
1 Ir,y aoI1 ~ n orr ia hand To-
gether We shall do all in our power
to destroy anything that upholds mo-
nopoly; that artificially lowers wages,
or artificially increases prices, or puts
it in the hands of one man, or one set
of men, to become absolute in any
branch of business.
Our opponents throughout the ma
| ton, and in particular here in Ohio,
! propose as method of attacking trusts
to meddle with the tariff, which would
mean economic disaster to the masses,
and to debase the coinage, which in ad-
dition to even more frightful economic
disaster, would mean national dis
honor. When they come to the second
plank in their platform, the question
| of expansion, they advocate the dis
honor of the American arms, and the
| trailing of the American flag in the
dust They place themselves outside the
rank of proper party opponents and
make themselves merely the enemies
| of the nation as a whole, as already by
their action on the currency they have
shown themselves to be the enemies of
| honesty within the nation.
The other day Ohio sent to New
York prophet of Mr.. Bryan's new dis