T. A. T.
TRADES UNIONISM IN ITS INFANCY.
In these days of trades unionism and strikes an account of the germ of such associations in this country is not without interest. So far back as 1806 a remarkable trial arising out of such a combination took place before the recorder of Philadelphia and a jury. It lasted three days and excited extraordinary interest. Jared Ingersoll and Joseph Hopkinson were counsel for the prosecution, and Caesar A. Rodney and Walter Franklin for the defence.
The defendants, eight in number, were indicted for not being content to work at the usual prices, but contriving to increase and augment them, and for endeavoring to prevent by threats, menaces and other unlawful means other artificers from working at the usual rate, and uniting into a club or combination to make and ordain unlawful and arbitrary rules to govern those engaged in their trade, and unjustly exact great sums of money by means thereof.
The evidence went to show in the clearest manner that a system of frightful thralldom had been put in force. A witness named Harrison stated that when he reached the United States in 1794 he found this system of terrorism prevalent. He went to work for a Mr. Bedford, and presently got a hint that if he did not join the association of journeymen shoemakers he was liable to be "scabbed," which meant that men would not work in the same shop, nor board or lodge in the same house, nor would they work at all for the same employer. The case of this man seemed exceptionally hard. He made shoes exclusively, and when "a turn-out came to raise the wages on boots" he remonstrated, pleading that shoes did not enter into the question, and urging that he had a sick wife and a large family. But it was all to no purpose. He then resolved that he would turn a "scab" unknown to the association, and continue his work; but having a neighbor whom it was impossible for him to deceive, he went to him and said that he knew his circumstances, and that his family must perish or go to "the bettering-house" unless he continued to work. This neighbor, Swain, replied that he knew his condition was desperate, but that a man had better make any sacrifice than turn a "scab" at that time. He presently informed against him, and Mr. Bedford (his employer) was warned that he must discharge his "scabs." He refused, saying that, "Let the consequence be what it might, we should sink or swim together." However, one Saturday night, when all but Harrison and a man named Logan had left him, Bedford's resolution gave way, and he exclaimed, "I don't know what the devil I am to do: they will ruin me in the end. I wish you would go to the body and pay a fine, if not very large, in order to set the shop free once more." The fine offered was refused, and Mr. Bedford's shop remained "under scab" for a year. Still, Mr. Bedford, who must have been a very plucky fellow, would not give Harrison up, but removed in 1802 to Trenton. Harrison stated that although he could not, had Mr. Bedford given him up, have got work anywhere else, and that he might have ground him down to any terms, yet he (Bedford) very nobly always gave him full price. At length, by paying a fine, Harrison became reconciled to his persecutors, and Bedford's shop was once more free.
William Forgrave said that "the name of a 'scab' is very dangerous: men of this description have been hurt when out at night." He had been threatened, and joined the association from fear of personal injury. A vast deal more of evidence was given and eloquent speeches delivered by counsel, but the foregoing gives the sum and substance of the case.
In the course of the summing up Recorder Levy said: "To make an artificial regulation is not to regard the excellence of the work or quality of the material, but to fix a positive and arbitrary price, governed by no standard, but dependent on the will of the few who are interested.... What, then, is the operation of this kind of conduct upon the commerce of the city? It exposes it to inconveniences, if not to ruin: therefore it is against the public welfare. How does it operate upon the defendants? We see that those who are in indigent circumstances, and who have families to maintain, have declared here on oath that it was impossible for them to hold out. They were interdicted from all employment in future if they did not continue to persevere in the measures taken by the journeymen shoemakers. Does not such a regulation tend to involve necessitous men in the commission of crimes? If they are prevented working for six weeks, it might lead them to procure support for their wives and children by burglary, larceny or highway robbery."
The jury found the defendants "guilty of a combination to raise their wages," and the court sentenced them to pay a fine of eight dollars each, with costs of suit, and to stand committed till paid.
MORAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
One of our popular clergymen, in a late Sunday discourse upon the Bible in the public schools, labored to show that the question was a very unimportant one. because none were much interested in it except infidels and politicians—a sufficiently absurd position for a professed teacher of the people to assume. Doubtless it is a folly to fan into flame the slumbering embers of a quarrel, but it is a greater folly to pretend, in the face of the common sense of the people, that all signs of fire are extinguished or never existed where there is so much inflammable material about and the "wind of doctrine" running high.