The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-03-02
STRIKES IN RUSSIA
ON THE INCREASE
Workmen Falling Back Into
Condition of Discomfort
NUISANCE OF PARIS
Mud Splashing Automobiles and Auto
buses Cause Much Annoyance to
Parisians--Shall Foreign
Workmen Be Taxed?

Paris, March 1.-Americans interested
in the labor problem in the United States
have gathered here some interesting data
about Russia in connection with their
study of the general European situation.
1t appears that Russian worlmen are
falling back into the condition of politi-
cal and Industrial discomfort character
istic of the revolutionary years of 1905,
1906 and 1907. Official figures of the board
of factory inspection show there were
1918 factory strikes in Russia last year.
involving $500 workmen and causing a
loss of over 100000 working days. against
464 strikes affecting 10000 workmen in
1911 and 222 strikes affecting only 1900
workmen in 1910. TO find a year to COM
pare with 1912 for industrial demoraliza-
tion it is necessary to return to the strike
statistics of 1907. the last of the revolu-
tionary years, when 10000 men were out
during the year.
About two-thirds of the strikes last year
were declared for purely political pur-
poses, according to the official report.
They show the increasingly successful
activity of political agitators of the So
cial democratic and social revolutionary
schools. These concentrate their efforts
largely on the workmen in the large cen
ters like ST. Petersburg, Moscow and
Warsaw. The bases of these political
strikes were the shooting down of work
men in the Lena gold fields, Siberia, for
which general strike of Russian work.
men was ordered as a protest; May day
demonstrations of the solidarity of labor;
protests against elections to the fourth
duma under the law of 1906, which the
radical parties refuse to regard as legal;
protests against the Introduction of the
| svorkmen's sickness and casualty law
adopted last year. and demonstration
aginst the infection of the death penalty
on mutinous sailors of the Black Sea
fleet.
This rapid growth in the strike move
ment in 1912. when six times as many
workmen were out as in 1911 and almost
| IS times as many as in 1910, is being kept
up in the current year. which started out
with a widespread strike in memory of
the victims of Red Sunday in st.
Petersburg, January %. 1905. Fifty-five
thousand workmen, according to the police
figures or some 10000, according to pri-
vate accounts, laid down their tools Jan
uary % in st. Petersburg alone as a pro-
test against the shooting of the followers
of Father Gapon by the troops eight years
earlier, an event which the world abroad
has almost forgotten and which in Rus.
sia is rarely heard of except on the an
nual recurrence of the date.
| The Russian police are active in their
efforts to check the agitation among the
workmen, and arrests of agtators and
workmens committees are taking place
as in the heyday of the revolution. Re-
pressive measures against Russian news
papers have also been vigorously revived
and fines and imprisonments of editors of
radical papers, or suppression of often
sive periodicals, are matters of frequent
occurrence.
Americans who know Paris well quick
ly join the chorus of Parisians that mud
splashing automobiles and autobuses con-
stitute one of the greatest nuisances of
Paris life. Beautiful gowns have been
ruined and many new morning coat
wrecked by flying mud which, being mixed
with motor oil, is of the kind that never
comes off. This evil may now cease. at
least in part.
AS consequence of the recent instruc-
tions of the government to the police to
prosecute the owners OF VenlcleS DeSpdI-
tering store windows and passersby, om-
nibus and automobile companies and pub
lie spirited persons arranged competitions
for inventors of mud guards at Versailles.
A track with a muddy surface was ar
ranged and boardings were placed at in
tervals along the course. these being COW
cred with sheets of white canvas about
four feet high and nine feet long, sub
divided into small squares. The mud
splashes could readily be detected on the
white squares and their number and com-
parative sizes noted. Every competing
vehicle had the mud guard under test
fitted to each wheel and was driven along
the track at speeds varying from Is to
were selected, although none of the Is
ideas presented entirely prevented mud
from being thrown on the canvas screens.
Shall tax be placed upon the employ
ment of foreigners in France? This is the
important question submitted to parlia-
ment by Frenchmen who see a grave
menace in the rapidly increasing foreign
labor. Statistics show that foreigners
are encroaching upon agricultural France
on all her frontiers. The Belgians come
from the north, the Germans from the
east, the Italians cross the Alps and the
Spaniards the Pyranees to find easier
conditions in the riches of this country.
In the departments on all these frontiers
the foreign born form an average Of 10
per cent of the inhabitants.