Omaha Daily Bee Newspaper, September 6, 1903, Page 23

T.Y, great and worthy work 1s done under the inspiration of ideals. The eculptor is looking, net at the things that are seen, but at things that are unseen, when he calls the angel out of the marble block. The musician is listening to voices that were never heard on land or ®ea when he Indites the symphony, The architect beholds the temple in the air before he builds it upon the earth. And we to whom the larger, fairer, diviner task is given of building the city— not merely the streets and parks, the ware- houses and shops and halls and homes, but the institutions, customs, laws in which its civic life is manifested—must needs lift our thoughts to rcalms above ourselves that the pattern of the structure we are to build may be revealed to us, The city that might be—the city that ought to be—this is the oubject of our faith, of our devotion. What might this city of ours —this New York, Phiiadelphia, Chicago, Cleveland, Buffalo, Columbus- what might it be, what ought it to be—how clean and bright and safe and healthful; how free from everything that could hurt or detile or destroy; how full of everything that could minister to the comfort and convenience and culture and happiness of the citizens; its laws, how wisely and impartially ad- ministered; its burdens, how equitably adjusted; its curse, how swift and deadly upon all who seek to make spoil of its revenues; its officers, how diligent, how conscientious, how self-denying in the pub- lic service; its citize ns, how prompt to re- spond to the call of the community; its property-holders, how ready each to be his portion of the public burden; its hel less wards, how tenderly cared for; its beggars and parasites, how sternly com- pelled to eat their own bread; its whole life, how instinct with Justice and truth and righteousness, how vital with meorey and good will! This is the city which is coming down out of heaven from God—com- ing as fast as we make room for It. It comes very slowly, because there are so few who believe in it, and look for it, and make ready for it; according to our fuith it must be unto us. For just as soon as the people begin to believe in a city like this it will be here in all its glory. Nothing hinders its coming—nothing in the world— but our want of faith. Is it not true that the one thing needful is a little more of genuine civic religion? ar Never until some such ideal as this takes possession of the thought of the people and kindies their enthusiasm shall we have good government in our cities. Men must have something to believe in, to love, to be loyal Labor Day HE WORK of the Civic Federation is Dbeing quietly pushed by the men behind it, and is gradually, quietly and unostentatious complishing a great good—more than 1s generally appreciated. The wage- earners are beginning to better understand the ohjects of the federation and to re- spect it, It is wrong, in my opinion. to belittle the efforts of the Civic Federation—it is quite unfair to expect a solution of the labor troubles all at once. There are many who eriticise; many un- believers and doubters as to the fruition of this great question, but my reply to them is that the men who at long range criticise and doubt the future of a settle- ment of this great question only demon- strate their ignorance. They do not know the workings of it. I have had over thirty-five years' ex- perience in operating mines, and the last five have been the most satisfactory ones. During that period the miners have re- spected their agreement and have refused to go out on sympathetic strikes. Thirty years ago I was a witness of and participated in one of the most serious strikes that ever occurred in Ohio. It was the miners’ strike of the Tuscarawas val- ley. After it had been settled, after prop- erty had been destroyed and blood had been shed, there came a time to think it over, and T made up my mind that there was a better way to settle such disputes than that, In most instances the Civie Fedcration has settled every labor difficulty that has come to it, although the organizition failed to settle the anthracite coal strike. I admit that the Civie Federaion failed in its efforts there. It is hard to conciliate. It is hard to arbitrate a question when only one side will consider it, When appealing to the employers to con- sider some things in connection with the situation that 1 did not think they fully appreciated or understood, I told of the experience of myself and associates re- cently in connection with the coal mining of western Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, After days and nights of negotiation, five years ago we organized what was termed “the Interstate associztion,” composed of the operatives of the coal mines of these states. We agreed upon a scale of wages Bexible enough to adapt itself to different ae- The City that Might Be to, to fight for, and it is always the idcal that inspires heroism and devotion. A na- tional idea we have; the prosiest American has some conception of it. It was the na- tion that might be, the nation that ought to be, that kindled the ardors of revolu- tionary partriotism, that Sam Adams and *atrick Henry plead for and that Wash- ington and Prescott and Stark and Greene fought for; it was the nation that ought to be that Meade's army saved from death upon the heights of Gettysburg and that Lincoln crowned there with his immortal words, It has not been the actual nation, with its broken promises and its lame purposes and its piggish politics, that has inspired our ardor of patriotism; the nation that we live for and are ready to die for, I8 the one to whom we cry: Our Learts, our hopes, are all with thee! Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Our faith, triumphant o'er our fears, Are all with thee—are all with thee. It is only because there is an ideal nation to which our love and loyalty can be given that patriotism exists. It is to be feared that such a conception is scarcely enter- tained in relation to the life of many of our cities. What we are constrained, for want of a better term, to call municipal patriotism hardly has a name to live. There 1s, indced, in some cases, not a little local pride, but not much, though, of the city as invested with a character and life of its own, as a kind of moral personality toward which one might cherish a loyal love. What is a city? We are told that it is a corpora- tion. Well, I am afraid that that is just about all there is of it in the minds of many of us. Such a soulless entity can in- spire no love, can call forth no loyalty. It is something that the legislature had cre- ated, and we are not generally moved to worship the work of such hands. The city is thus invested with a kind of legal, for- mal, artificial character, and there is noth- ing that appeals to our higher sentiments. These frigid conceptions must be put away from our minds. It may be useful, for some purposes, to consider the clty as a corpora- tion, but unless it is vastly more than that to the great body of its citizens its history will not be an inspiring one. It seems to me that there ought to be something in the civie life of a great city which admits of idcalization, something that appeals to the imagination of the citizen, something that inspires in him a genuine devotion. Can we not think of the city in which we live as becoming, more and more, a great social organism, bound together by bonds that are not wholly economic—by human sympathies and interests, with a character to develop and a destiny to fulfill; moving Talk on Arbitration physical conditions. The scale once agreed upon, all that became necessary was to fix the basic price. That was tive years ago. The contract was made. The operators went into the markets and sold their coal and the coal miners abided by their contracts and de- livered it. The next year it was renewed by a horizontal advance and then last year it was renewed. In using that argument with others it was said to me: ‘“Why, what is your con- tract worth with a labor organization? If it don’t want to keep it, it won't, and you can't make it.”" That is true, but when the remark carried with it the insinuation that men of that class had no honor in carrying out a contract, I want to say that I deny ft, and now I have the proof. President Mitchell of the miners’ associa- tion s a good man. There ought tc be more like him. He 1s able and honest, Such men at the head of the labor organi- zations of the country would assure rea- sonable consideration of labor questions, It is not fair because overt acts have been committed by irresponsible parties to say to such an organlzation as this: “We condemn you because there have been in- dividual cases—perhaps too many of them —when those in the interests of labor, whether organized or unorganized, have pursued a policy antagonistic to social and moral law."” It is not within our province to econdemn in a wholesale way this great movement ause of those conditions, but rather {t is a duty, a sacred duty, for us to use all the efforts and influences in the circles of labor and in the ranks of capital to bring about & condition of things which will pre- vent the occurrence and reoccurrenca of such differences. There is nothing in re- ligion that appeals more strongly to human nature than a determination on the part of every good man to do all in his p,wer to benefit his fellow man and society, And I say, shame upon the man, or men, in the face of the spirit of our institutions; in the face of our high educational opportunities; in the face of the spirit of this government and its people, to rise up and siy, “I am better than thou,” and condemn th)ze who, not having in their early environments those opportunities of education and cn- lightenment, may go astray in the pursuit of their own interests, to comdemn all ther fellow men who are honestly and earnestly stoadily forward, under the influence of a righteous purpose, in the ways of peaceful progress, strengthening law, enlarging lib- erty, diffusing intelligence, promoting hap- piness, becoming, through the co-operative good will of its people, a mighty and benignant Providence to all who dwell within its walls? Are there not possibili- ties in the life of these cities of ours that can make a man's heart glow with great hopes and high enthusiasms? On what forces do we rely for the reformation of our municipal life? For the accomplishment of this work there must be motives. What are they? To what can we appeal? We can appeal to the citizen's love of comfort and cleanliness; we can show him the flithy streets and the clogged sewers and tell him that such things ought not to be; we can awaken his fears of cholera, and such appeals have their place and are not ineffectual, We can show him, no doubt, that under such government as he is permitting there is a great lack of security for his pe:son and his property, and that, also, Is an in- fluential motive, What we do urge upon him most dili- gently is the increase of the tax rate and the fact that unless he is adroit enough to hide his gains from the assessor his profits will be greatly reduced by the growth of taxation. This is the motive on which we chiefly rely. Municipal re- form, in the conception of nine men out of ten, is the reduction of the tax rate. Well, that is not an insignificant matter; it ought to be duly considered, and it will be; there is no danger that it will be over- looked. But can we draw from all these con- siderations an adequate motive power for the work of thoroughly reforming the gov- ernments of our cities? Will the craving for comfort and the fear of contagion, coupled with the wish for a reduction of taxes, call forth an energy and a unity of popular feeling which will achieve the glorious work? It seems to me that they reckon ill who put their trust in such forces. Down on this plaue, pottering with such motives, we shall find our structurs crumbling under our hands; any gains that we make in one direction will be neutralized by losses in another. Unless we can find something higher and nobler than this to work for our labor will Le as the task of Sisyphus, We sometimes hear it said that the one thing needful is the administration of the municipality on business principles. In a certain narrow sense this saying may be justified. We ought to have a methodical economical administration, of coursze; we working for the benefit of themselves and their families, whether in organized labor or outside of it, The men who are at the head of organ- fzed labor have seen service. They know the conditions and environment of their fellows, and all that labor organizations are called upon to do (and that is a very im- portant factor) is to choose men for these high places of responsib’lity who are looked to for advica and leadership; of such a character that they will lead, when they de lead, in the right direction, Many of the great captains of indusiry today, men who are at the head of very many of our great {industrial concerns, worked at the bench, worked at the pud- dling furnace, worked at the loom, worked in the mines and worked in the factory. They did not seize anybody's money. They earned it by their intelligence and ex- perience. They earned it beause they had the opportunities to acquire that practice which enabled them to put it upon an equal plane with capital, and in the progress of development it has had their share of the products. The workingmen of fifty years ago—those who are alive, many of them-—are the em- ployers of today. Is it in their nature to oppre Is it in their nature to cavil because others who have started after them, with less opportunity, are demanding all the advantages that conditions will afford them? It is a narrow-minded view to take of a broad question to undertake to prove that because some men have acquired more of this world's goods than others they have come by it in an illegitimate and unlawful or an unfair way. Starting in the race of life along the industrial pursuits of this country, cvery man has been successful in proportion to his efforts and his energies and his oppor- tunities. There can be no custom or law that will change these conditions. Nor do I believe it is a fair eriticism upon organized labor to say that the poor workman under the system of organized labor recelves just as great advantage as the good workman. There may be isolated cases. It is a mis- taken policy that permits it, in my judg- ment, bLut because we are In our infancy in demonstrating these great principles, with experience before us as our teacher, we can find an adjustment for all such difficulties. From what I know of buman nature, By Washington Gladden, D. D. ought to insist on getting money's worth for our taxes But other than b E principles must control our people and their representatives in office, else we shall continue to have precisely what we have had. The trouble with our citizsens < our best citigens—has always be:n that thay have quite too much inclined to base theip civic action upon ‘“business principles.' They have always wanted to buy the benee fits of good municipal government in the cheapest market and to sell them in the dearest, Their problem has been to g Just much as possible for themse ves out of the city and to give just as little as possible in return for it—of time, of money, of sacrifice So long as this is the pre- vailing purpose of the cltizens it will be the prevailing purpose of their representiatives in office; business prineiples wiil control their conduct; office will be to them an op- portunity of gain, and they will make what they can out of it. I think it is ti no that we begun to see that good government ealls for some higher principles on the part of the citizens than what we describ> as business principles It calls for the recognition of civie ideals; for a vision that can discern not mercly the city that stands upon the earth, bt the fairer city which is coming down from heaven to earth, after whose patiern the earthly forms must be continually re- shaped. There is just as much need in the city as in the nation of chertshing an ideal of liberty, of purity, of perfection, of leaving the things that are behind and stretehing forth unto the things that are before, of cultivating a generous faith and a high enthusiasm. There is need of thinking much of a kind of civie life that is pot as yet, but that might be, and that ought to be, and that must be if there is a God in heaven; a city whore officers shall be peace and whose exactors righteou ness; a city whose homes shall be sacred and secure; whose traflic shall be wholesomne and beneficent; whose laborers shall go forth te their cheerful toil unburdened by the heavy hand of legalized monopolies; whose laws shall foster no more curses, nor open the gates to whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie; whose streets shall be full of happy children,’ playing in safety and learning the great lessons of civic piety, and whose citizens on any shore shall find their thoughts turning homeward with a great longing, while they cry: 1f 1 forget thee, Oh city of my heart! Let my right hand forget her cunning; Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, If 1T remember thee not, 1f 1 prefer thee not Above my chief joy. Columbus, O, Senator Mark Hanna in : Philadelphia North American every man has an approachable spot, and the best way to reach that spot is by kind- ness. You can reach men by coming near thesmn and learning their conditions. To say that labor leaders are always in the wrong is not true; to say that the majority of them do not intend to do right is a mis- take, My theory is that if you bring men toe gether in o way to make them know each other, and if you appeal to the head and the heart, you establish a bond between the two factions that cannot be broken, The Civie Federation is trying to establish a condition of absolute confidence between (-m.nlnyu-r and employe. We remember the golden rule and try to live up to its prin- ciple This is the only way that 1 know to settle the dispute between capital and labor. As long as labor was in a situation that it must submit, it did so, but in the twen- tieth century, when thinking men began to think seriously upon this question, they made up their minds that they must give consideration to the fact that the labor- ing man is entitled to a greater share of the products of industry than he has en- Joyed in the past. We must give them a larger share of the profits of industry which they helped to create. Dut there are other grievances than the matter of labor which demand at- tention. Therefore workmen banded them- selves together into organizations for thele own benefit-——organizations which through proper means will enable them to reach that source of power which will bring a remedy. These organizations, so far as I am fa- miliar with them, carry beneficial features —a mutual assistance to the members and their families, What better motive, what greater in- centive can be urged to induce the amal. gamation of labor than this? How much of that principle enters into the organiza- tion of capital? None of it, so far as I know. As long as I live and have my strength I shall do as 1 am doing today— appeal to my fellow countrymen and all classes of citizens who are interested in these great soclal questions to appreciate these conditions, It is a fact, then, that more than 50 per cent of the strikes in this country have been settlod in favor of the laborers. We (Continued on Page Sixteen.) e