New-York tribune., 1903-08-30
THE MENACE OF SAM PARKS.

The penalties of progress have become COM
mOnplace. Few features of our civilization are
more obvious. Oil lamps were an improvement
upon candles, but they sometimes exploded,
as candles did not. Gas was an improvement
upon oil, but a disaster to the central works
would leave the whole city in darkness, as 1t
could not be left under oil light. The electric
light is an improvement upon gas, but the pos
sibility OF wholesale interference is far greater
Electric cars are a great improvement over
horsecars, but they are also much more liable
to complete blockades. In like manner our i'm
proved business methods and social organiza-
tions involve with themselves penalties and
dangers The factory system was an improve
ment upon the OLD system of cottage industries,
but under it the wage question was much ag-
gravated and mOn0polies began to arise. There
is doubtless much virtue, at least the po-
tentiality Of good, in combinations of capital
and of labor, but he must be blind who does
not perceive in them also a potential and in
deed actual menace.
For years we have heard the changes rung
upon the evils of organized capital-that is, OF
monopOles or trusts. Such combinations, we
have been told, used for the oppression of
labor, for the destruction Of competition and for
the spolation of the public. We may concede
that to a certain extent they are susceptible of
have been so used. But now another revela-
ton is made to u.s. by the Sam" Parks case
and some others, namely, Of the potentiality of
organized labor for precisely such evil deeds.
Here is system Of eXtortiOn, of the levying
of blackmail, OF the suppression of competition,
not by fairly meeting and beating it, but by
secretly assassinating it. The walking dele
gate may extort tribute from the business man
under threat Of a strike, just as a Bulgarian
or an Albanian brigand may extort ransom
from his captive under threat of murder An un-
scrupulous employer may hire a walking dele
gate to cripple a competitor by ordering a
strike just feudal baron used to hire
mercenaries to harry his neighbors Recent rev
elatons have shown that such things have
actually been done, and ominously suggest the
possibility Of their being done upon a much
greater scale.
The indictment does not lie against all labor
organizations. Perhaps not one workman in a
thousand knew what Parks was doing or ap-
proves such conduct. We are glad to believe
that blackmail, extortion and oppression are
as abhorrent to the members of labor unions as
to most other men. But there is the peril in
the system. 1t is gross abuse of the system,
no doubt But the system is susceptible of such
abuse and we are afraid that as at present con-
Quoted 1t is peculiarly susceptible Of it. Such
abuse is the thing which union members need
most to guard against, perhaps by largely re-
forming the whole union system. 1t has well
been said that the power to order a strike is a
greater power than should be vested in any
one man. Certainly the wrong use of that
power brings more discredit upon organized
labor than almost anything else can do. with
a strike for higher wages or shorter days or
better conditions. the public may and sometimes
does sympathize. A strike ordered for the ex-
tortion Of blackmail it can regard with nothing
but adherence. 1t should not be necessary 10
point out how grievously such performances as
those Of Parks east suspicion upon strikes in
general, or how radically incumbent it is upon
unionists who have the welfare of unionism at
heart to place their ORGANIZATIONS entirely above
the reach OF such suspicion.