Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 February 1891 — THE CYCLONE OF FEAR. [ARTICLE]

THE CYCLONE OF FEAR.

REDUCED WAGES IN PROTECTED INDUSTRIES. McKinley’s Promise and the Manufacturers’Performance—How tiie Workman Is Failing to Get the Tariff Spoils—How Labor Strikes—Figures of Strikes and Lockouts. No one of the many supcrstitioiJl in the whole system of protection is being so much damaged by the light of experience and fact as the superstition that protection raises wages. It was shown in the last Presidential election that this old stand-by of protectionist catch-words was losing its power among the workingmen in factory towns. In nearly all of the manufacturing centers of New England, where the “European pauper labor argument” was used persistently by the protectionists, the Democrats made gains in that election. “The cyclone of fear” which had been predicted by Chauncey M. Depew as the thing that was going to sweep the country was not realized among the working people. If the cry of high tariff and high wages failed then much more is it doomed to become a derision and a jest to-day. The McKinley tariff la'w went Into operation on Oct. 6 last year with higher duties and the promise of higher wages. What has been the result on wages thus far? In two or three unimportant cases higher wages have been reported, but in a very large number of eases reductions have been made. Here is only a partial list of reductions of wages, nearly all of which have been made since Jan. 1:

Brooke Iron Company. Birdsborough, Venn., closed Feb. 2, and 4"0 men thrown out of work because they refused to accept a reduction of about 7 per cent. Ellis <fc Lessig Steel and Iron Company, Pottstown, Penn., closed Feb 2; 700 men out of work because a reduction of 12}* per cent, was rejected. Hopedale Fabric Mill, Hopedale, Mass.: wages of weavers reduced 2J* cunts a yard. Silk mill at Warehouse Point, Conn.: w:,ges of winders and doublers reduced fre.-n $1.37 to SI per day. A.tuttcvant Blower Works, Jamaica Plain, Mass.; reduction of from 10 to 30 per xent. Pjttstown Iron Company, Pottstown, Pena.; reduction of about 7 per ceht. Bethlehem Iron Company, Bethlehem, Pen it.; reduction of 10 per cent. Feb. 2. PeAnsylvan : a Steel Company, Steelton, Penn ; reduction of from 8 to 10 per cent Feb. 1. Lacjcawanna Iron and Coat Company, Scranmn, Penn.: an average reduction of 20 cents a day on Jan. 1. Homestead Steel Works, Carnegie, Fhippt&Co.; 10 per cent., by agreement. Pulljnan Palace Car Company’s works; new st ale, making a reduction of about 10 per cent., brought forward Jan. 1. Otis iron and Steel Company, Cleveland, Ohio; reduction of 30 per cent. Coal mines, Duquoin, HL, reduction from 69 to «0 cents per ton. Ribbon weavers in Paterson, N. J.; reduction of 15 per cent

Coal mines, near Leavenworth. Kan.; reduction or 11 per cent Cocheco Manufacturing Company, wages of weavers reduced 4 per cent Manufacturers of pottery, Trenton, N. J.; wages of sanitary ware pressers reduced 22 per cetyl. Merrimac Mills, Lowell, Mass; wages of mule spinners reduced 3 cents per hundred. Buckeye Mower and Reaper Works. Akron, Ohio; reduction of from 30 to 60 per cent, reported on Feb. 3. Saxony Knitting Mill, Little Falls, N. Y,; reduction of about 20 per cent.. Southern Steel Company, Chattanooga, Tenn.; reduction of 10 per cent. The official statistics of strikes and lockouts for the six years, 1881-86, as published by United States Labor Commissioner Carroll D._ Wright in his third annual report, afford a striking commentary to the oft-repeated assertion that protection raises wages and insures steady emnloyment. In the whole country there were dur ing these six years 22,304 strikes and 2,214 lockouts. Of the strikes, 9,439 were for increase of wages, 4,344 for re duction of hours, 1,734 against reduction of wages, 1,692 for increase of wages and reduction of hours, and so on to the smaller classes in which some special form of the wage question was under dispute. Of the 2,214 lockouts, 314 were against demand for increase of wagesand 229 to enforce reduction of wages. Does protection then guarantee steady employment? Does it keep wages up to a point which satisfies the laborer? Is it not the height of folly to make claims about what protection can do in raising wages in the face of the evident fact that it does not give the laborer such wages as will keep him from striking?

As the laborer is compelled to contest every inch of ground he gains by trades unions, by strikes, and by other means, it will be difficult to persuade him that protection is a good thing for him.