Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1912-03-05
PRECEDENT THAT MAY HAVE
VAST INFLUENCE

The determination of the British
government to assist the coal miners
in establishing a minimum scale Of
wages opens up a great vista of prob
able governmental interference here
latter in the settlement of wage ques-
ltions and the gradual assumption of
the right on the part of the govern
ment, not only in England but in 9TH
ed countries, to fix a minimum scale
that employers must pay. The hand
played by the British government in
the settlement of the railroad strikes
in recent years, and its efforts
10 prevent, if in anywise possible. a
strike of the coal miners, naturally
leads to the belief that from now on
the government there may be expected
o exercise a greater power of sover-
eighty over the complex industrial
life of the nation, preventing its sud
den wholesale disturbance with man
fold injury to every citizen of the
country Now that it has established
such precedents it may be expected to
go further and intervene in cotton mill
strikes and other labor disturbances,
assisting the workers in securing min
imum scales of wages and other ad-
vantages heretofore denied them.
If the purpose of a government is to
protect the mass of the people and see
10 it that they are not ground down by
the power of capital there can be no
gainsaying that the British govern
ment is taking the proper stand and
that its course will be followed by
other governments under similar con-
ditioHs. In this country the govern
ment has interviewed only in some
grave political crisis, as at the time OF
the Homestead strike. When it was
evident that the prolongation of the
strike, with the fiood-light that it was
letting in on the beauties of the highly
protected industries, would mean Re-
publican defeat, political influences
were put to work from Washington
anG the strike brought to an end The
present strike at Lawrence, Mass,
whose mills have enjoyed the high
est measure of protection and paid
the lowest possible scale Of wages to
an army of imported workers. speak
ing, it is said, thirty languages, is of q
similar type to that at Homestead and
every pressure will undoubtedly be
brought to bear from Washington to
put an end to it before it Injuries the
party prospects at the polls. In the
great coal strike in Pennsylvania
during Rooseyelt's administration, too
| there was governmental Intervention
| in a measure, with satisfactory results,
but there have never been steps taken
that quite coincide with the manifest
willingness of the British government
to espouse the cause of the miners and
make a reasonable minimum wage a
government issue.
Governments are moving on. At one
time they were the organized protec-
ton of classes and wealth TODAY
they are more and more becoming the
agents for the amelioration of the con-
d'tiou of the masses. The thought
naturally suggests itself, though, that
if governments are to fix a minimum
wage scale then, of necessity, they
should fix minimum prices for pro
ducts and maximum as we'll. If wages
| are in a large measure to be regulated
Iby governments, directly or indirectly
then the prices of commodities must
eventually come within the same gov
erning power Applied socialism is
gradually coming and the stand taken
Iby the British government, with its
probable vast influence in other in
dustries and other lands, will assist
materially in incdining the public mind
generally to a great broadening of the
scope of governmental powers not only
| in England but in the United States
and other nations where the people
have potent voice, through their rep
resentatives, in debating the course to
be pursued