Year: 1869

From the New York Evening Post.


The Condition of Unskilled Labor.


The question which really decides the
economical state of the country is always the
same it is, how much does the day laborel
get. on the average, in substantial support
for bis days work.


The answer to this question is not Away.
easy. The solution is often complicated foI
time or in a particular place. by influence:
which have. nothing to do with the genera
prosperity. One trade may suffer while
others flourish; one city may be depressed
while the country at large grows rich the
effects Of strikes, mobs, new inventions, and
other such disturbing causes, must not be
mistaken for symptoms of universal disor-
der. But there are times when deep dis
tress and gradual decay of prosperity
among the workingmen are SO wide spread
and so plain, that all such considerations are
wholly inadequate TO account for them and
we must look beyond item to those general
principles Of social science under which bad
laws and bad social organization always
revenge themselves.


This is sure to be the case when for long
periods and in large communities, the com
mon, unskilled laborer finds it hard to make
decent living. 1t is true above all of this
country, the strength of which has always
been the reasonable certainty it offered to
able workmen, that their labor would al
ways be in demand here and would be fairly
rewarded. With the unbounded wealth
waiting in our soil to be created, with hands
which need only labor to produce food for
the whole world, this would inevitably be tie
case for ages to come, if the natural demand
for labor, and the natural distribution Of its
rewards, were distributed.


A morning paper tells us that on Monday
last, In an answer to an advertisement for
night watchman, one thousand persons, ap-
piled for the situation. What will be the
numbers and condition Of this growing null
titude of th1 unemployed when traGe slack
ems, when the canals and rivers freeze, and
when the seventies Of winter come upon
them or if the embarrassments now felt in
trade should result in a commercial panic ?


This is the inevitable consequence Of the
present condition of the country. We have
deprecated currency which stimulates a
speculation and diverts an excessive and in
creasing share of the products of industry to
those who already have much capital. We
have an excessive and badly arranged tariff,
which raises unreasonably the necessaries Of
life, and takes from the workingman twice
as much as the government itself receives, in
order that certain monopolists may still fur
ther be enriched. These things work togeth-
er. They discourage agriculture they dis
courage commerce. they destroy the far
mer's enterprise, and rob him Of his natural
rewards, they drive laoor, in great masses,
into the large cities and crowded districts,
where its employment is fitful and its wages
represent less of real comfort; they steadily
conspire to widen the chasm between the
capitalist and workman, ''to make the rich
richer, and the poor poorer.


These are the great days Of spectators
and of mining and manufacturing monopo-
lies. But while these are building palaces.
and unveiling statues, the industrious poor
cry for bread To-day all the produce of
the farmer is as low in this city as it was
when specie payments were suspended,
though his outlay for land, implements, gro
ceries, clothing, and other necessaries, must
be twice as great as then. Yet the cost of
the common means Of life to the laborer is
SO much higher than it was when that, after
paying his rent, in the humblest house in
which health can be maintained, and buying
the coarsest clothing, the workingman in
this city cannot buy nearly as much bread
with his wages now as be could then. We
have given the figures which prove this,
again and again, they have never been an
euarod o. dor,oJ