Farm Labor.

Table showing the average Daily Wages for Farm Labor in 1860 and 1874.

PART XII.

Democratic Responsibility for
Recent Hard Times--The Dem-
ocratic Tariff Tinkering
Cheese-Paring Economy
Opposition to Resumption.

and

From the preceding tabulations it will be seen that, even during the period of depression recently passed, the condition and wages of American labor were far superior to the condition and wages of foreign labor, and that the wages of the American laborer were far greater in 1874, when the Republicans were in full power, than in 1860, when the Democrats had full sway. It must be remembered that when the Democrats regained partial control of the government by securing a majority of the House of Representatives, through bulldozing and tissue ballots in the South, and under the sham cry of "economy in the North, they at once commenced the work of dragging down the American laborer-the "mudsill," as they termed him. They have made more than one desperate effort to destroy the tariff in the interest of foreign manufacturers and importers, and against the interests of home manufacturers and the laborers in their employ. Their efforts to defeat resumption, their tariff-tinkering, their "cheeseparing" policy of cutting down both the pay and the number of the poor government laborers and clerks-inaugurated five years ago, when the control of the House passed to them—and which led to the throwing out of numberless thousands of deserving workingmen and workingwomen from employment in all our cities and towns, have caused most of the distress which in recent years has afflicted this land. Despite all this, however, the wages of labor in this country-owing mainly to the firm attitude of the Republican administration and the Republican party in Congress at this time, and in all of even the worst years with which Democratic folly and wickedness has afflicted us of late years, compares favorably both with foreign wages of labor, and with the low wages which labor could earn under full Democratic rule in 1860.

PART XIII.

come

Comparative Prosperity
Again-Increased Wages and
Demand for Farm Labor-Shall
we go with the Republicans
Forward or with the Democrats
Backward again?

The annual report of the Agricultural Department just completed-on farm labor and wages-states that:

"The decline which had been steadily going on since 1873 till last year seems to have been arrested, and there is a decided advance in almost every section;

the average wage of labor engaged by the year or season, and which represents the steady and trustworthy force on the farms, was for the whole country last year

The cost

$20.26 a month without board. This year it is $21.75,
being an increase of 7.25 per cent.
of subsistence to the laborer for the average of the
whole country in 1880 is $7.17 a month against $7.14
in 1879. Heretofore, in the decline of wages, the cost
of subsistence declined in quite the same ratio, but
for this year the proportion is largely in favor of the
laborer; as the cost of subsistence remains nearly at
the lowest rate, while the wage has materially ad-
vanced. The average price for labor with board is
$14.56. An analysis of the figures of wages paid with-
out board shows only three States reporting less than
last year, viz.: Texas, Minnesota and California; but
a glance at the report of the wage paid with board
shows a marked increase. It must be borne in mind,
however, that in all these States the sparseness of pop-
ulation and absence of the facilities of the older
States, render it both necessary and convenient to
lodge and feed the hired help. The price paid, there-
fore, with board, is the safest indication of the value
of labor. As was to be expected, the greatest increase
has been in those States where agriculture has been
the most remunerative since last year. Thus in the
West, and those States bordering on the Ohio River
which were the most favored, the increase has been
the largest. The same applies to the cotton States.
With the higher price for cotton the advance has been
universal, and is in some as high as 8 or 10 per cent.
The demand for labor is good in all sections of the
country. In the New England and Middle States there
is a steady and good demand for trustworthy men,
and prices for that class have advanced very mate-
rially. The large number of reports from those sec-
tions state that the usual custom is to hire with board
and for the season. In the South Atlantic and Gulf
States there is an active demand for all kinds of steady
labor. Many correspondents report that the share sys-
tem, or a division of the product in lieu of wages, is
growing more unpopular daily, and that the freedmen
are becoming more and more landholders. In Missie-
sippi and Louisiana there are a few reports of scarcity
of labor owing to the exodus to Kansas and the North,
but in the same localities there is reported a good de-
In the
mand for trustworthy labor of all kinds.
Northwestern States the supply of labor is quite equal
to the demand in that section. Most of the inhabi-
tants are land-owners, and only hire help at harvest
time, but skilled laborers are reported in good demand.
In the Territories and on the Pacific slope the demand
is reported as good, except in New Mexico and Mon-
tana, where a surplus is noticed. In the first-named
Territory the surplus is attributed to the opening of
the railway from Kansas, and in the latter to the large
number of young and unskilled laborers arriving."
Republican sympathy for the workingmen

-Democratic scoffs at the "mudsills
The free school systèm.

The Republican party has always believed in and acted upon a humanitarian creed. They have believed that business could be transacted as correctly by men with human sympathies as by those who sneered at what they termed "sentimentalism." The Democratic leaders have always scoffed at the idea that Government should, even incidentally, consider the woes and sufferings of the multitude; or, as a Democratic Senator once termed them, "the mudsills of society"-a term of approbrium which at the last session of Congress was again scornfully revived by a Democratic representative from Kentucky. The Republican party has cherished the free school system, where the workingman's children are freely educated, and thus afforded an opportunity of elevating themselves in after life to place and power in both social and political spheres. The Democratic party has not been kindly to that free school system.

Democratic nostrums-What workingmen of remaining problems, and to co-operate in think of them—Republican efforts to solve the labor problem.

Many nostrums are prescribed by Democratic quacks to remedy the ills to which labor is sometimes subjected in its struggle with capital. These are rejected by the workingmen themselves. The Republican party has no infallible plan to propose; but it points to what it has already done to bring about good times, and calls on the laboring men themselves to set their best minds to work to co-operate with it in reaching a true solution

the selection of candidates for place in the National Councils and in the White House. Farmers, miners, mechanics, workingmen, and the sons of workingmen, have sat in the Senate and House of Representatives and in the Presidential chair by Republican suffrages. They know, from all past experience, that in the Republican party, if they cannot always get relief when it is needed, they are at least certain to find sincere desire and honest effort to elevate humanity and help the laboring interest.

"Public land for actual settlers."-National Democratic Platform of 1880.

PART I.

The Great Question of the

The Public Domain.

Durfee, Foster, Geddings, Goodwin, Granger, Grow, R. B. Hall, Harlan, T. L. Harris, Hickman, Hoard, HorDay-gore, Knapp, Leach, Lovejoy, Mason, Morgan, Isaac N. ton, Howard, G. W. Jones, Kellogg, Kelly, Kelsey, KilMorris, F. H. Morse, Palmer, Parker, Pettit, Pike, Potter, Ritchie, Royce, A. Shaw, J. Sherman, J. W. Sherkins, Wade, Walbridge, Walton, C. C. Washburn, Ē. man, Spinner, W. Stewart, Tappan, G. Taylor, TompB. Washburne, Israel Washburn-73.

In 1858 it was estimated that there were within the States and Territories 1,000,000,000 acres of the public lands unentered. The great question of the day was : "What shall be done with this immense domain? Shall it be open to monopoly by speculators, be used to build up a landed aristocracy, or shall it be reserved to actual settlers at a nominal price, or without price?" The Republicans proposed to solve the problem by practical legisÎation in favor of our landless people.

NAYS-Messrs. Anderson, Atkins, Avery, Barksdale, Bishop, Bocock, Boyce, Branch, Bryant, Burnett, Burns, Caruthers, J. B. Clark, Clay, Clemens, Clingman, Cobb, John Cochrane, Cockrill, Crawford, Davidson, Davis (Ind.), Debrart, Dowdell, Edmunson, English, Foley, Garnett, Gartrell, Gillis, Goode, Greenwood, Gregg, L. W. Hall, Hawkins, Houston, Hughes, Jackson, Jewett, J. G. Jones, Owen Jones, Lawrence, Leidy, Leiter, Letcher, McQueen,

MARSHALL, MAYNARD, Millson, Niblack, Nichols, Peyton, Phelps, Powell, READY, Reagan, Reilly, Ruffin, Rus

sell, Sandige, Savage, Scales, Seward, Shorter, Sickles, Singleton, S. A. Smith, Stallworth, Stephens, TRIPPE, UNDERWOOD, Watkins, White, WOODSON, Wortendyke, A. R. Wright, J. V. Wright, ZOLLICOFFER-78.

The Republicans attempt to flank the land sharks, to discourage speculation, and secure to the poor settler ten years or more to pay for his farm from proceeds of soil Pre-emption bill of 1859-Grow's amend-Are defeated by the Democracy.

At the first session of Thirty-fifth Congress Mr. Grow, of Pennsylvania, a member of the House, introduced into that body the following bill for the protection of actual settlers on the public domains:

The Grow bill-The vote defeating it.

Be it enacted, etc., That from and after the first day of September, A. D. 1858, no public lands shall be exposed to sale by proclamation of the President until the same shall have been surveyed, and the return thereof in the land office for at least ten years.

This bill gave to the settler ten years precedence over the speculator, but it was defeated by the following vote (Republicans in roman, Democrats in italics, South Americans in small caps):

YEAS-Messrs. Abbott, Adrian, Andrews, Bennett, Bingham, Blair, Bliss, Brayton, Buffinton, Burlingame,

Case, E. Clark, H. F. Clark, Clawson, Colfax, Comins, Cox, Cragin, James Craig, Burton Craige, Curtis, Damrell, Davis (Mass.), Davis (Iowa), Dean, Dick, Dodd,

ment carried.

Again, on the 20th of January, 1859, in the House, a bill reported from the Committee on Public Lands, relating to pre-emptions, Mr. Grow, of Pennsylvania, moved to amend by adding the following section:

Be it further enacted, That from and after the passage of this act no public land shall be exposed to sale, by proclamation of the President, unless the same shall have been surveyed and the return of such survey duly filed in the Land Office for ten years or more before such sale.

that of the bill of the previous session, was to The practical effect of this amendment, like give to the pre-emptor, the actual settler, ten years' precedence of the speculator, and to protect him from the enormous usury of the money sharks, in borrowing from whom he was frequenty compelled to heavily mortgage his land. The amendment was opposed by the Southern landed Democracy, the slaveholding aristocracy, which, prior to 1861 as