Newspapers / The Harbinger (Raleigh, N.C.) / Oct. 25, 1902, edition 1 / Page 1
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7 THE HARB INGER , - ORGANIZATION. EDUCATION, ELEVATION. Vol. I. x Raleigh, N. C, Saturday, October 25, 1902. mo. 42 : . - ; ; i - : - , THE "FAC'TRY FOLKS." BY C. E. A. BVERS. Let poets write of crested knight And gay-bedizzened beauteous dame ; I sing of those who court the light But who ar still unknown to Fame. Yehudim bold in days of old Askt "Can aught good of Naz'reih cum ?" Lo, Jesus, from the town depised, Now makes of Hevn His royal home ! ' So purs-proud fools who'r Mammon's tools Now strike with dull sarcastic strokes At operatives, good and bad, The tree-born Southern factry folks. Perhaps some day not far away Some King of Men shal hav command Of all this Nation, who has bin The one despised fact'ry hand. Broad rivers grand in every land From littl fountins ofn flo ; . . The day of smal things ne'er despise ; Great oaks from little ajcerns gro. O God abuv, who onse in luv ' . "Didst send Thy Son for am. to die, Hastn the day when Christ shal reign And working men will cease to sigh ! SHOULD THE GOVERNMENT OWN THE COAL MINES ? Public ownership and operation of the anthracite coal -mines is one of the most positive demands made in the platform adopted by the New York Democratic Convention, inese are strong words : "We advocate the national owner ship and operation of the anthracite coal mines by the exercise of the right of eminent domain, with just compen- satiolntoth'en5wner&i ' . 'Fuel, like water, being a public necessity, we advocate national owner ship and operation of the mines as a solution of the problem which will re lieve the country from the sufferings which follow differences between labor and capital. It will relieve the consumers of coal, not in this State but throughout the whole country ; in sure steady employment and ample compensation of labor ; transfer chil dren from the mines to the schools ; insure, strengthen and preserve the stability of the business interests and popular institutions of our country." Whatever differences of opinion may exist over other propositions of public ownership, the propriety of that policy as applied to anthracite coal mines must be apparent to every citizen It is not necessary here to enter into the endless arguments for and against such a policy. There are features more significant than the demand itself. Five years ago, two years ago, such a proposition would have been met not only by sneers, but by violent denun ciation. It would have been termed a vicious attack upon vested interest, a blow at established government, an out spoken indictment to anarchy. . Yet to-day there is no such outburst. The demand is received with the re spect due to a proposition which is radical, yet open to free and honest dis cussion. V Thinking men must realize that it is to be met by argument on it merits, not by sweeping vituperation. Likewise significant is the character of the organization which endorses the policy. From a convention of Popu listic theorists or radical Socialists such an utterance would be accepted as a matter of course. But the Democratic party in New York State has always been conservative. , Seyinour,, Tildep, Cleveland, Hill--naije ' of 5 these men has ever been, honestly charged with fanaticism,' however resolute theV po litical policies may ay! bw,attackec(. From such. source, therefore, the ( proposition must be taken seriously. And that it is taken seriously indicates how far the revolution of public opin ion has progressed. Men are no lon ger startled by the demand for public ownership of a great natural monopoly They accept it as a reasonable policy, the justice and feasibility of which may be established. The steady concentration of wealth and the growing power of combinations of capital are two of the chief reasons for this development. But the most recent and the most effective has been the attitude of the association of rail roads and operators which absolutely controls the production of anthracite. The people have before them an ob ject lesson of the perils which result from permitting; one of the chief necessaries of life to be owned by pri vate persons. They are ready to listen to plans which will chage the situation. The abduracy of the operators, their refusal to consult the public interest, and their impudent assumtion of De vine authority for their acts these are the things which have brought tfiem face to face with a glowing de mand that their power be taken from them and be restored to the people Philadelphia North American. BIRD DOGS. Roading denotes that a dog is fol lowing, a trail toward the birds by their footscent, as a man, in an ana logous manner might follow a flock of sheep by watching their tracks. Draw ing denotes that a dog is approaching birds by the scent in the air as a man might follow a fiock of sheep by a long line of dust hovering over and around their trail. Drawing is considered a much superior manner to roading. It is commonly marked by greater ac curacy, quickness of execution, and dash of manner. Pointing is the stoop which the dogs make when he has definitely located the birds, or , men, whose energy, zeal, singleness of when he thinks he has done so. It is purpose, and unfaltering devotion to the preliminary pause to accurately ( labor's cause more than to anything determine the whereabouts of the .else, is due the gradual improvements hidden birds before he springs to cap- gained for the toiling masses, should ture. If he misjudges and springs in j be directed the irritable and prejudi ce wrong direction, all his pains and cial criticism of pride bound capitalists labor comes to nothing. In his train- and their sycophantic followers. La ing, he is encouraged to point, but bor unions and labor leaders are not is prohibited springing, so that after sudden flashes whose forces will be as a time he makes his point and holds suddenly spent. They are permanent it stanchly. If by any act, wilful or , fixtures, the logical result of capital's otherwise, he alarms the birds and j insatiate demands, here to remain un they take wing it is called a flush. If til the future discovers a more practi the dog, when going up wind on game, j cal and speedier method of emancipat- flushes the birds, he commits an error ; if under certain circumstances he .from wage slavery. There is no pow flushes when going down wind the er- er on earth today strong enough to ror may be excused on the ground ' more than temporarily disrupt organ that being up wind of them it was im-J ized labor. It never again can be possible to scent thein and therefore effectually dismembered and rendered impossible to know of their presence. From Field Trials for Setters and Pointers, in Outing. EVIL OF CHILD LABOR. The cry for the protection of chil dren is not the cry of a section, but of humanity. Every new manufactur ing community hjsU to face this tempta tion to exploit child labor. England had the struggle years ago. The north ern manufacturing States have been compelled to make increasingly strict aws to protect the!r children and now the great .development of the South makes the question an issue there, which should be settled right before vast numbers of children are ruined. WHY WAGE EARNERS ORGAN IZE Labor organizations are not formed for the purpose of dispossessing capi tal of its rightful pos-essions, or even of that which is wrongfully holds, but are formed in the interests of wage earners to secure for them better and more humane living conditions. Whenever the efforts of these organ- izat:ons to secure what rightfully be longs to labor through the adjustment ui grievous wrongs culminates in a strike which becomes important r ; ... enough to become a public incon venience, laoor ana lis leaders are abusively assailed by the irresponsible of the clergymen who have commer cialized their calling, and subsidized judges barricaded with the monstrous power of injuctions. This but serves to excite and inflame that portion of wage earners already rendered desper ate by the cruel wrongs inflicted by capitalists, the scientific slave holders of our present era, and to more firmly impress upon the minds of the thought ful and industrious the absolute ne cessity or organized strength. Labor leaders are neither vampires nor parasites, but able, conscientious and self-sacrificing men, who removed their trappings and left their benches at the call of their fellow wage earners as being best fitted to direct the organ ized efforts of their union. Thev are strong in their convictions, backed by every moral right, and courageous to the point of almost any sacrifice in promoting the cause for which they labor, and when their work in this direction is finished they can again return to their "benches, and taking their tools again become producers of wealth by honest toil, the only way by which the world's store of wealth is added to and which a few capitalists so thoroughly know how to distribute. It is not strange that against these ing the great majority of mankind powerless, and every local defeat it may suffer makes it unsversally strong er. Every defeat is a compulsory edu cator teaching the wage earner the helplessness of his unorganized state. The merciless methods, employed by capital during times of strike to gain victory, are the professors of labor's cause, and do more to drive labor to organize than all of the printing press es and vocal organs in Christendom. POVERTY IS A "CRUEL CURSE. History repeats itself. Just . as vn the past, no evil has been attacked but that "some sober brow would bless it and approve it with a text," so now the most serious question with us is the question of poverty, and the apology which pious men make for removing the cause of this evil is couched in the words of Jesus, "Ye have the poor always with you Jesus might have said: "Slaves ye have always with you." He might have said: "Emperors ve have always with you." He might have said : "Leper ye have always with you." The peo ple to whom he spoke never knew a civilization without these. He stated what was a fact, that when he was gone there were still opportunity to help the poor. To distort this state ment into meaning that never in all the centuries could men hope to solve the problem of poverty this interpre tation is either puerile or malicious although it is continually made by men who think well of themselves both for wisdom and piety. Not only do men resign themselves to the inevitableness of poverty, but they even try to persuade themselves that poverty is a blessing. They never think it is a blessing to them selves, but they talk softly about the blessings of other people's poverty General Booth of the Salvation Army recently preached a sermon in which he gave seven reasons for considering poverty a blessing. The Salvation Army claims to have fed Christmas day in New York city 25,000 people. Montrous! Seven reasons for the blessedness of eating your Christmas dinner at a charity trough with 25,000 other paupers ! The blessings of pover ty! You might as well talk of the gentleness of a Dakota blizzard. It would be as appropriate to speak of a balmy St. Louis cyclone. Cannot the preachers give us a sermon on the hopefulness of despair or on the pleas- urableness of pain ? I have heard it said of these preachers that they think in their hearts. Thev seem to me to think in their stomachs. Poverty means want, cold, hunger, shame, hate, vice, crime; it means bodily sickness and moral degradation. Poverty is a curse and I know of no work so deeply religious and so truly in accord with the spirit of the Naza rene as t e work of using the political tools that are within our reach in this republic to put an end to the wrongs which breed poverty in the sight of plenty and cause the slums of human misery to mock the triumphs of civili zation. Let us not blaspheme the memory of that Lover of Men by quoting his words against those who point the way to a higher civilization in which pov erty as we know it will not be. Let us rather address ourselves to this splen did task as the only way in which we in our time have opportunity to con tinue his work in the world. In the garret of a tenement house which stands in the shadow of five churches there lived a family with seven - children. During the intense heat of last July the youngest, a nurs ing baby, fell sick. In a single day it wilted like a flower. Night brought no relief. All night long the ugly brick walls gave forth heat like great human ovens. The mother carried the little sufferer down in the street in the hope of finding a breath of air. She went to a market place near by and, sitting on the curbstone, rocked the babe in her arms, watching its twitching hands- and pleading face. The old cathedral clock . tolled away the hours. At last the clatter of hoofs and rumble of wheels announced the rising tide of humanity. But that day brought no light to the mother's heart, for in the gray dawn of that morning she saw the light of her life go out, and on her arms she felt the heaviness of death Yon may read in the health reports that the baby died of some dis ease with a Latin name. It died of starvation. The father works from 6 in the morn ing until 7 at night On Saturday he works until 12 at night. On Sunday he works until noon. For all this he receives $j a week. A more sober, honest, industrious, willing man never lived. And the mother? Ah, the struggle she has had to make $7 satisfy the claims of the landlord and the gro cer, and pay for shoes and clothes and school books ! The truth is, she had not enough to eat, and the baby, there fore, was not properly nourished. Its puny body became the culture ground for disease germs, which it would have had a chance of resisting if it had had good food and pure air. Not having had these, it died, virtually, of starva tion. Mothers, have you known what it means to stand in the lonely nursery with arms so empty and breasts so full? Fathers, have you listened in vain for the music of the little feet and the merry voice in the silent hall ? Have not these common experiences of joy O.UU SU11UW liiUglll yUU lllCglCclt ICSbUU of human brotherhood? How long will you insult your unfortunate fel j 1 xi 1. 1 lows with alms ? When will you see the need of changing the laws that deny them justice ? When will you learn to hear in the cry of these chil dren of poverty the voice of your Christ? "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these ye have done it unto me." Rev. Herbert S. Bigelow in Pilgrim, Cincinnati. AN UP-TO-DATE CHILD. It was in a photographer's studio, and a lady called and stated that she wished to have her child's portrait taken. "Certainly, madam," said the, pho tographer. "This is the little man, is it? Boo-roo. Bless 'im, little tootsie wootsie. Dear 'ickle fellow." "Mother," said the up-to-date child in a voice of scorn, "will vou kindly inform me whether the deplorable con dition of this person is due to lack of education or hereditary insanity ? Kindly proceed, sir, and make as cred itable a likeness as lies within your apparently limited capacities." TWELVE HUNDRED FEEDERS ON A STRIKE. A strike of 1 200 press feeders em ployed in the book and job printing trade of New York city has involved 550, pressmen and has, it is stated, nearly tied up the business in a large number of plants. The strike may prevent many magazines and periodi cals from coming out on time. Some time ago many of the feeders demanded an advance in wages from $12 to $14 a week and struck to en force them. Then it was decided af ter several conferences with the em ployers to make a demand for the ad vance in wages in all of the union shops- . . ..The employers refused the demand and the strike followed.
The Harbinger (Raleigh, N.C.)
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Oct. 25, 1902, edition 1
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