Waterbury Democrat., 1903-02-12
PRESIDENT BAER DREW THE CROWD

clusively for them, there could be not
 objection to dealing with him, but hes represents an organization having for{ its object some utopian scheme of uni formity in wages and conditions in the mining of coal all over the United States, and, instead thereof of consid-
 ering only the questions at issue be-
 tween our employees and ourselves. he Eis considering general proposition
 which relates to all the coal miners ir the United States.
 To limit tho right of exertion of work IS to limit production. It is not only Na wrong done to the individual.
 put IT lssa violation of sound econonic
 'flnciples, and therefore an injury to socleIv The ultimate effect of re- z sIflcung production, so as to diucne sHfpioyment and increase wages must
 pc 70 Keep on dividing the wage fund ~ oICeil as new men seek employment. mere must be n limit to am incrpas sfs oi wages, but there can be no limit ot!
 the increase of wOrkmen The pro- cess must inevitably lead to the de- s.rnctlon or the industry, or the reduce lion OI the wages of every man tO N x sun barely sufficient to sustain lifeI
 Wages can only increase when e3ch .iiuivluual IS left free to exert himself 10 ms fullest capacity, thereby creat-
 lng wealth, which in turn gives new eInployment-create demand for coYn-a
 moditles and demand for wor lnNsen ", produce them. Only in this way cafn
 the wage fund be increased.
 1 IT we are over-anxious zeout the
 effect of the mere possibilities of mon ! opoly. what must be the measure If
 anxiety as to placing the control 5f the fuel of the country iii one organiza- ton, and that, too an organixation
 without capital or responsibility We are not left to conjectures. The
 Facts are before us. The United Mine I Workers have created monster mon opoly. They did shut up the anthra- cite mines for more than five months. They taxed the bituminous miners and all laborers over whom organized la-
 Dor had control, to support the strike. The owners of bituminous mines. some in self-defense, others in the hope of gain, contributed to the strike fund. With what result? The price of both anthracite and bituminous coal more than doubled. The supply was inad- equate. The public was suffering, not only from a high priced from q
 scarcity of coal. Industrial opera l lions closed down. and men were l thrown out of employment. All over
 the land, except in the districts that
 could be supplied by the great anthra- cite coal companies, the poor. the hon- l est workman, and the well to do salf~s fered for wnnt of fuel.
 l The records show that an honest effort was made to convince the Unit- ] ed Mine Workers that their demands
 were unjust. Who now will say, in. I the light of the testimony, that the de-
 mands for an uniform rate of wages
 extending all over the anthracite re- l gions was reasonable? The difference
 in conditions between the anthracite operations and the bituminous opera tions were clearly pointed out to these
 labor leaders.
 We met them, as they requested,
 before the National Civic Federation
 and discussed the whole situation. At l the suggestion of the Civic Federation l a committee of our employees and op- orators was appointed to further con-
 sider the subject and report to a meet l ing of the federation, to be called by l it's chairman. l MT Baer then read the letter from President Mitchell suggesting that the I questions at issue be submitted to 2 l committee of five of the industrial bu- l reau of the national civic federation. l With regard to this Mfr Baer said:
 Human ingenuity could not devise q proposition more unfair. It proposed.
 an arbitration board to be selected by the industrial branch of the national civic federation. The industrial branch 1 of that federation is composed of tlieN leading labor leaders of the United l States There is not a single represen~ l tative of the anthracite mine owners
 on it. The sarne individual branch had utterly failed in the conferences we al- ready lad with it. Y
 MT Baer gave a comprehensive ac- count of the difficulties and expense en- l tailed in the production of anthracite l coal. Concerning the wages he ex-s pressed the belief that the evidence on | the wage question justifies the position l of the operators He said further: .s1. The tetsimony clearly shows that | the wages now paid are fair wages l that they compare most favorably with | the general wages of the country, and l that men willing to work honestly and exert themselves. do earn annually sums in excess of the average
 70 The fact that there is an excess
 of labor in the anthracite regions coIi- 1 firms our theory that the wages are all ready high as compared with the gem eral wage scale of the country, because everyone knows that labor is attract-H ed to the place where wages are high- est.
 B. If the wages are again advanced, then instead of diminishing the exist ing excess of workmen, it will be in-
 creased by new workmen coming to this field. Something has been said
 about the operators importing foreign CTS. I never heard of it before; these foreigners come here because of the
 reports made by the men already here of the improved conditions, and they will continue to come so long as such exceptional advantages are offered.
 The demand for an eight-hour day is only another form of increasing the cost of production. 1t must be appar-
 ent to everyone that restricting breaker operations to eight hours per day must.
 necessarily limit the output of the col-S