The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-10-01
POINTERS FOR LABOR UNIONS.

gate to the Housesmiths' and Bridge
mems Union of New York City, is only
one of numerous similar instances
which have been made public in the
United States within the last year.
1t seems that, during seven years,
this man had called about five thousand
strikes and had awaited himself of ev-
cry opportunity to extort money from
employers. The charges against him
were outcroppings of system of pecu-
lation and tyranny, of which the gen.
eral public, and especially unionized
wage-e learners, We're the victims. One
poor woman, the wife of a unionized
mechanic, wrote to Assistant District
Attorney Rand of New York:
Sam Parks and his crimes are not
so much in taking the money offered
him or asking for that money from
some one who had it, but his most
cruel, british act lies in taking the
| bread out of the mouths of the work.
man and his family. My life as well
as my poor, dependent children, are
| but few of the many that suffer
through him."
| The case of Richard Carvel has been
| thoroughly exploited. The strikes of
| 1901 in San Francisco furnished other
| and painful instances of shameful We
| nality. But perhaps the most con-
| spicuous example was that of Lawrence
Murphy, of New York, former treas
urer of the Journeymen Stonecutter's
Union, who was convicted and sent to
| the state prison for embezzling about
| twelve thousand dollars of the funds
confided to his charge. His defense
was that the money did not belong to
the union because it had been extorted
from employers, and notably from an
! organization called the Stonecutters
| Association of Brooklyn, and, worst
| of all, that numerous members of the
union, who We're not walking delegates,
| shared the spoils.
| These disclosures were forcibly illus
trated by pictorial representation of
| a grinning skull in Leslie's Weekly,
with the motto, cit means DEATH" and
of them the New York Staats-Zeitung,
| a friend of legitimate labor combina-
lions. said:
1.-The public now knows that organ
| lied labor is too often abused by worth
| less fellows, who stir up dissension and
profit by the confusion. The tyranny
that today prevails in these circles, the
insolent manner of the walking dele
gate, have gone too far for the Amer
lean people,
1t is evident that the day Of the
despotic control of the unions is near
ing its close. But many of the unions,
existing for legitimate objects, will
survive, and the criminal elements,
feeding on fraud and violence, will be
wage-earners, skilled and unskilled,
however small a proportion they bear
to the whole population, are indus
trious, honest, amenable to reason, and
| have no affinity with crime. The
| trouble with them is that they have
been treated as automata and bound
| by iron-clad obligations, which reduced
| their individual power and influence,
The prosecutions in New York and the
decided stand of the Federal Govern
ment, through President Roosevelt,
have opened their eyes and aroused
|
| ton, under the Constitution and the
| laws.
| There are union leaders, such as Sar-
gent and Mitchell, and some of the
better officers on the Pacific coast, who
| command respect and are not to be
classed with Ed. Rosenberg and other
| demagogues of that ilk. There are
many substantial citizens, however
euphemistic they may be, who believe
that the better class Of unions in the
United States are prepared nationally
to consider any moderate proposition
that may be advanced, and that, pri-
brought home to them, irresistible
pressure could be concentrated at
Washington that would insure sup
ply of plantation labor, such as this
Territory imperatively needs.
There are a few truths that every
intelligent man, familiar with the his
; tory and condition of these Islands
: must concede. Their political destiny
is fixed, and schemes for the restora
ton of the monarchy or the Hawaiian
Republic are puerile and reasonable
: They possess many resources, the mos
+ | important of which is the sugar plan
tations. These plantations could b.
multiplied in number and largely in
/ creased in area, side by side with diver
Y sifed farming. The necessary capita
: is here, but the laborers are wanting
n Our tropical situation cannot be chang