The labor argus. [volume] (Charleston, W. Va.) 1906-1915, 1908-12-24
Process That is Being Used by
the Greedy Gold Grabbers
toLawer Wages and Create
Poverty Among Toilers.

In these days when millions of
men are idle, we hear more and
more about wages being fixed by
"competition.'
There IS 4 great movement going
on among the great employers of
the land to lower wages: and they
call the process "competition.D
When a great crowd of men
gather at the doors OF the machine
shops or the packing houses or the
steel mill, asking in vain for work,
anG ready, under the compulsion
of want, ito take anything, it is
called competition in the labor
market.
Surajah Dowlah, a Ilindoo prince,
in war with the English, put / lG
prisoners in Il room but is fect
square and left them there. The
prisoners were Englishmcn, with
the Englishman; sporting blood
and manlinesS anG love OF fair
play, but when the air grew foul
IL this Black Hole of Calcutta, as it
is called, the prisoners began
crowding to the one window of
which air could be admitted.
They began competing as idle
laborerS are ''competing' in the
labor market today. The pushing
and crowding toward the window
because Il frcnZicd and bcastlilic
fight in which every human con-
sidelation was lost sight Of They
tore at each other with tooth and
l
the press Of crazcd human animals.
and boot heels Were stamped into
their faces as some men stood upon
them to get to the little window
1t was the browning borrow of
those horrible wars. When the
morning dawncd, only q score Of
the prisoners We're alive. The rest
of them lay ucad, stranglcd. sul1u-
Gated, trampicd down in the
"compctition of the air markets
of the Black Hole Of CalcIta.
Anyone can see that this was
not competition. but the really in
voluntary struggle OF suilocating
men for air. IT WAS 80 more COM
drowning man is competition when
he dragS down his would be res
cuerS.
The so called competition of the
labor market is as unfair. as
spurious. as brutal as that Of the
Black Hole. The employers have
the only window at which men
can get either food or clothing or
Shcltcr-the window OF employ
ment which they "give' men
The knot Of the problem lies in
monopoly of opportunity for self
employment. Men cannot employ
themselves. Other men own the
opportunities. Not the machinery
and the factory only. If the face
of nature, from which comes ali
employment, were mOnopolized
men could build their own ma
chimes and factories and operate
them -orcrativcly. But the
planet on which we live is fenced
up and owned, Our ancestors Of
only couple. of generations ago
went into the forest or out on the
prairie, when work got scarce: and
employed themselves. And we
had no strikes, no lockoits. no
were drained off into the great sea
of untenced and unmonopoIizcd
nature Men would not work
other men except for wages as high
as they could make working
for themselves. America was the
land of industrial peace, of good
wages, Of refuge for the oppressed
of all lands.
Until the opportunity for self
employment is again made free
there is no use in talking about
treating labor as capital is treated.
Laws must be made more favor.
able for labor than for capital if
anything like Il square deal is to
prevail. Would it have been fair
to make the same rules and regu-
lationS for the men and women in
the Black Hole as for those
breathing the free air outside,
Lawmakers. writer's. courts. must
remember that labor is in the