Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1904-02-10
pleasures that should accompany

wealth is essential to nations pros
porous growth and intellectual develop
ment, and that distribution Is brought
about by the labor union more than by
any other agency Of our civilization.
1.-The labor union, with it's good
prices for good work. enables the
father to keep his children in school
instead Of sending them to the factory.
Thus it adds to the intelligence and
health OF the future generation, besides
increasing prosperity in the present.
And the dignity that comes of the
union mans independence IS in har-
mony with our American ideals of life
and government. The industrial un-
rest of recent times has not been due to
the extortionate demands by labor
although the laber union has been
made the scapegoat of many an in
competent and many get rich quick
schemer. The workman's increased
pay has come about necessarily to meet
the added cost of living. Government
statistics show that the cost of life's
necessities haa increased Is to 80 per
cent. The price of labor has not in
creased in proportion to that.
The trusts are chiefly responsible
for this increase in the cost of living.
An important and able business man
of New England said to me the other
day that it is becoming almost i'm
possible for legitimate business to
succeed owing to the demands of the
trusts on the one hand and labor on
the other.
II replied, what believed to be OBJ
viously true. that he was paving tribute
to the trusts in both cases. One tribute
he pays directly to the trusts through
the increased cost of trust products.
The other he pays to those same trusts
Indirectly through the intermediary Of
the wOrkingman. who simply hands over
his increased pay to the trusts in pay
ment Of the increased cost of food and
other necessaries.
1t is. of course, true that the de.
mands of trades union are not always
Just or wise. The unions are made up
of human beings with ordinary human
weaknesses. But the unions at least
ask pay for labor which they actually
perform, for service actually rendered.
They do not demand extortionate prices
for the products of others. And yet the
unions are subjected to moro harsh
criticism than the trusts. For instance,
in my business, the producing of news
papers, there came s.mult aneOusly two
demands.
1.-The trust demanded an increased
price for paper and one of the unions
demanded an increased price for labor
A number of my brother newspaper
owners gathered In my Office and sug-
gested a union of newspapers to pre-
vent an increase in the wages of the
workers. asked them why it would not
be better to combine to prevent the
trust from getting its arbitrary increase
in the price of paper. But [ could not
interest them in that. They seemed to
think it all right for great trust to
ask for more money arbitrari!y--but all
wrong for men that work to ask for
more money to meet the constantly
increasing cost of living"
what about the money question,
Mr.. Hearst?"
Here again the trust Issue comes to
the front. By increasing the cost of
life's necessities the trusts have de
crease the purchasing power of every
dollar that the workman earns. The
gold democrats, therefore, il they are
sincere, should be in hearty opposition
to the trust. Their chief objection to
free silver, you remember, was their
dread that it would diminish the value
of the dollar and decrease constantly
the purchasing power of wages. What
has become of that tender sol:citude
concerning the workers dollar?
The decrease in the purchasing
power OF wages can be brought about
just as effectively through increased
cost Of living as through the diminish
ed value of the dollar.
''Personally. l have supported the
democratic party because am demo
crat and for other reasons than the
free coinage of silver. But those
gentlemen who bolted the party and
who were SO particularly concerned
about the welfare of the laborer when
it was proposed to make money more
plentiful should be equally concerned
now that they see as an accomplished
fact an increase In the price of life's
necessities and decrease In the