The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1902-06-05

n N tN1ENDiAh1 paper, WHIcti
~ has long been sowing in this
4 y community the seeds of class
prejudice, strife and strikes. tC
the injury Of all permanent values, in
cluding its own, takes excited eXcep-
tion to our statement of yesterday that
'if the union is to survive as potent
factor in the industrial life of the an
thracite region it will be with it's char
acter changed from a property threat
ening to an educational. insurance and
beneficial institution returning to its
membership for dues eXacted some
thing more than the privations of reck-
less strikes. which injure all concerned
except possibly the salaried leaders,
This paper says that the miners
union is not a property threatening or
ganization; and we wish that this
statement We're fully corroborated by
the facts, for if it were the load of ap-
prehension now resting upon the bust
ness life of our valley would imme-
diately disappear. Yet in every issue
of the aforesaid paper there is news, Of
ten conspicuously headlined, of efforts
to force a breaking of the unions writ
ten contracts with the soft coal opera
tors, threat to property whose bale
full influence extends over every Ameri-
can industry and constitutes the chief
cloud on our otherwise prosperous ma
tonal industrial horizon. Not threaten
property? How else can the calling out
of mine pumpmen be construed? The
men called out had no grievances. They
wanted to work. Their families wanted
them to work. In an overwhelming
majority of instances, if conditions in
and around Scranton furnish a safe
criterion. the men who left the engines
and pumps at the unions orders did so
reluctantly, under pressure which they
felt unable or unwilling to resist. Their
legal right to quit work and let the
mines flood is rndeniabe: nobody chal-
lenges it. But there was complete
absence of moral right, under the cir
cumstances. 1t was an action right
cously condemned by the best opinion
of the country, including that of thous-
ands of the most substantial miners
themselves
We are not seeking controversy in
this matter, but what we said yesterday
we repeat today, for, whether popular
or not, it is gospel truth. Labor unions
have, indeed, come to stay; and when
they benefit labor by contributing to
the general welfare; when their ener-
gies so to make better workingmen and
hotter n nn fnr l,ar IN,
illness or other need and to help the
widowed and the orphaned in the hour
of bereavement, then they have our
fullest approval and support, for on
those lines they can do a great work
But when they set forth to interfere
with personal liberty, to practice boy
cotting, to conspire in restraint of trade
or to rule or ruin, then they must be
taught their errors, and he is no true
friend of the worliingman who contin-
ually goads him ON to commit mistakes
or teaches that he is infallible On the
contrary, such a man, be he politician
Or editor Is labors worst enemy and
morally largely responsible for much of
the suffering caused by strikes and the
evils ethat go with them,
Forthree or more years this commune
ity has been sorely and unnecessarily
vexed by one labor agitation after an
other.f mostly worked up by outsiders
whose principal interest was the salary
they received or the notoriety that went
with making trouble, Our people have
grown tired and sick of this kind of
thing. They want to see 1t stopped, for
a gensration. They regretfully recog-
nize that it can be stopped in just one
way; by a fight to a finish. They are
prepared for such an ordeal and for
the peace and better understanding all
around which are sure to follow and
anything short of a complete settlement
would simply prolong the friction and
postpone without averting the harsher
inevitable.