Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1903-02-19
ORGANIZED LABOR
THE PORTLAND OREGONIAN ON
LABOR ORGANIZATION.
The Leading Republican Paper Of the North
west Sizes up the Question in UnequvocaI
Language. The Law Must be Observed
by All Combinations Capital and Labor
Alike.

II the anthracite inquiry has accom-
plished and is to accomplish nothing
more than the present exhaustive discus
on at Philadelphia. it will perhaps be
worth all it cost in bringing the contro.
versy out into the light of day, where
intelligent criticism can deal with it and
where public opinion can take shape as
TO its attitude toward the embattled mas
ters and men. President Baer's long
and in many respects adni. able speech
is a concession to public opinion very far
removed from the laconic utterance
"nothing to arbitrate," and his remarks
TEEN with testimony that the questions
OF labor and capital are at last correctly
apprehended by capital as matters OF
public concern and not mere details OF
private business to be adjusted in secret
with no accountability from either side
to society en- masse. Very pregnant and
engaging is this passage from President
Baer's address:
"In general, no one denies the right CT
men to organize for any lawful purpose,
but the right to organize and the power
OF the organization when organized must
still be governed and controlled by the
general law OF the land under which our
individual and property rights are pro.
tected. We concede to organized labor
the same rights that we claim for organ
lied capital. Both must keep within the
law. There cannot be one law for citi-
zens and corporations and another for
labor organizations"
Our main purpose is to point out the
fact that the status OF organized labor
toward the law is yet in a fluid state
and cannot be appealed to as some thing
fixed and known. But the quoted pass
age needs a footnote or two to remove
it's possibly unin'ended fallacies. One
is that citizens and corporations belong
in one class and labor organizations in
another class. Citizens are not to be set
apart from either labor's or capitals
camp. Observe also that Mr.. Baer must
be guilty OF conscious or unconscious
mental reservation when he extends to
organized labor and the same rights he
claims for organized capital for it is an
anxiom with the operators that the
delegation of power to agents enjoyed by
the officers Of coal corporations is mad
Missile when exercised by agents
delegated power from the wori,men.
Few miners have ever talked with the
owners OF the mines for whom Mr.. Baer
is walking delegate; but the operators
find it improper to recognize the officers
OF the miners labor trust.
Mr.. Baer says that the general law
OF the land must govern organized labor
Now it is perfectly clear that the only
law he has i'm mind is the law against
violence, and the only aspect OF organ
lied labor which he admits to his purview
is its occasional outbreak. The law OF
the land does include riots, but it in
cludes other things that might be men
ticned-for example, the law OF Pennsyl-
vana against the company store and
that section of the constitution of Penn
sylyania which forbids railroads to own
coal mines. To say that there cannot be
one law for corporations and another for
labor organizations may mean simply
that corporation must not get up in the
night and sandbag nonunion miner
which would not seriously inconvenience
either the corporation itself or its gentle
manly officials in Philadelphia. The
laws controlling trusts will not serve to
suppress lawless strikers. nor viii, the
law against disorderly conduct reach
conspiracies in restraint OF trade. The
law of the land is more comprehensive
than Mr.. Baer seems to apprehend.
But what is the law of the land con-
corning labor organizations? Well, it is
very largely yet indeterminate. The law
in its complete sense is not statutes alone.
1t is composite of common law, Roman,
Teutcnic, English; OF statutory enact
ments; OF judicial rulings, and OF public
opinion. The source of law is experience.
American life, like every growing ma
tional life, is full OF institutions, in juris'
prudence as in everything else, that are
in formative period. The status Of
these institutions in society is in state
OF fiux. We do not know what the law
Of the land is until the jury comes in OF
the United States supreme court hands
down its opinion, or the returns are
counted in November. There is the Law
Of the automobile, and Of the trolley, and
OF the sky-scraper, and Of fuel oil, and oil
wireless telegraphy, and Of debts owed
by Latin America to Europe. and q
presidential interference with labor