Rogue River courier. (Grants Pass, Or.) 1886-1927, 1908-04-10

part time, or under limitations as tC
hours and conditions. there Is . tire.
mendous waste 10 earnings. capacity
and productive enerRy. The whole
fabric of industry ooatracts. There
is less money to be spent by the
workers aud consequently less bust
ness to bs done to supply the wants
they can afford. A family makes one
bag of flour go where two we're used
before; the old clothes are made over
instead of having new ones bought.
Multiply this by eighty million
and you can see what it means to
have the nation economics. Add the
distrust natorally produced among
those who have the money TO invest,
and there 10 coordination of forces
at work with cumulative effect, tile
result Of which 1t is hard to fore
cast. Earnings decrease because Of
the slackeuing volume Of business |;
capital becomes timid and rates for
monev high, aud there is corresp ond-
ingly less to be paid for the labor
necessary to carry out the work that
we have before us. The question of
whether wages will decrease does not
depend upon my attitude or the atti-
tude of any other manager Of industry
toward labor. 1t depends upon
whether we are going to have the
money to pay labor to do the work
that we ought to do.
81 believe that things will right
themselves when people have had
chance to understand the situation,
provided that we eliminate the self
seeker. What We have got to have In
political and in bosiness life is the
man who is willing to work for others
aud doesn't undertake to move the
pieces on the chess board solely with
view to what he thinks to be his
own interest. If you ask me when
believe an equilibrium will be reached
and confidence restored, / say frankly
that don't know. The patient is now
undoubtedly under treatment that will
prove effcacious in the end, but the
question still remains whether the
disease may not prove very serious
before the corrective treatment gets
the upper hand.
Where Railroad Men Have Failed.
MIND, do not lay all the blame
on the public, or even on the politi-
clans. The railroad men themselves
are to blame for great deal OF what
has happened and they ought to recog-
nize 1t at this time, when they have
their own worries with them. II the
railroad men of the United States had
learned to trust each other years ago
q great deal of what has been suffered
would have been avoided. There
Was time when they had the right
to make agreements covering traffic
aud rates, but what was the RESULT
An agreement was hardly made before
somebody whom 1t bound issued an
order violating its provisions. That
sort of thing was the root Of destruc-
tive competition. and subjected the
railroads to much of the trouble that
they have suffered since In being
made the victims of any one who
wanted to build an unnecessary COM
petitive line for the purpose Of sell.
ing it out.
~ am not opposed to railroad
regulation. provided it is coupled
with railroad protection. Long ago
expressed the view that regulation
even to the point of allowing the
Interstate Commerce Commission to
fix the rates, was not to be oombstted,
provided the government would allow
the roads to make agreements with
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