Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 October 1888 — A THOUSAND MEN DISCHARGED. [ARTICLE]

A THOUSAND MEN DISCHARGED.

Brooklyn Citizen: Yesterday The Citizen called attention to the action of the notorious Sugar Trust in dosing up two refineries n Boston and throwing out of employment, on the edge of the win:«r, some three hundred of their lands. It was stated at the same ime that a similar closing down vas threatened for Brooklyn, on :he ground that the price of sugar is not np to the high water mark set by the trust, and to force it up ligher it would be necessary tc reduce the amount produced. I n complete verification of this announcement, as will be seen from our mews columns to-day, President Havemeyer, of the Sugar Trust, has issued an order to shut down the two refineries operated >y Messrs. Decastro & Donner, which employ altogether 1,000 men. The members of the firm will receive their allotted share of ;he profits of the pool, but their workmen will go idle until such ime as the trust has disposed of all the sugar on hand, and, by making a shortage, has forced up ;he price. Thej profits that will ihus accrue to the firm and the irnst at large will be taken directly ! rom the pockets of the 1,000 workingmen, who have been summarily discharged for no fault of their own.

From a moral point of view, we think, the reader will agree with HI that this act is infamous. It is no more defensible than an act of highway robbery. The employees are simply overwhelmed bra superior force and are compelled to surrender their wages to tne trusts. According to the Democratic Attorney General of this State the aetion is not only a moral crime, but depends for its commission upon a distinctly illegal act, namely, the transfer to an illegal body called a trust of 4 he corporate privileges bestowed upon the firms of which the trust consists. And the Supreme Court of Tennessee has deoided that such action is unlawful. But the Republicans have laid it down, as one of the issues of thisTfempaign, that the formation of these combinations, or, es President Cleveland justly entitles them, conspiracies, is entirely lawful. General Harrison and Warner Miller acquiesce in Mr. Blaine's positive statement that “trusts are private concerns, with which neither the President nor any one else has a right to interfere." The Republicans made this issue and the Democrats have accepted ii ' " ' Ml i General Harrison criticises Secretary Fairchild |for depositing part of the surplus where the people can borrow it Yet John Sherman, when Secretary, deposited in one favored bank, more money than all of them now hold. —Minneapolis News Letter.