THE LABOR AGITATION AT BOSTON

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5493, 4 November 1878, Page 3

THE LABOR AGITATION AT BOSTON

(From the New York Herald , Aug. 6.) Mr. Kearney disappoints us. Ho has not yet learned the difference between scolding and reasoning. Moreover, he is too full of himself—too self-conscious, and his friends ought to tell him that this Is always a sign of weakness. What difference does it make to him whether the press or the telegraph misrepresents him ? To take up part of his evening in Fanueil Hall with a defence of himself was to make his opponents laugh and his friends blush. Practical men do not get up before an audience of three thousand people to talk about themselves. He remarked that of the sixty thousand words in the English language he had possessed himself of a few hundred; but it must presently have occurred to a good many of his audience that he had made a very poor selection. “ Lecherous, thieving bond-holders/' “ railroad robbers," “rancorous, villainous, political bumraerH;" “cut-throats," “ political bilks," “midnight assassins,” “lying scalawags,” “ classical thieves," “legal pirates," “capitalistic thieves," and “ land robbers," —these are the favorite words in his vocabulary ; and a public speaker is but a tyro who thinks ho has to use such strong language to make an impression. We recommend to Mr, Kearney the advice which it is said Mr. Wendell Phillips once gave to an energetic young speaker, “ Never call a man a liar," he said. “ Prove that he Is one; that is ten times as effective." His account of how his party carried California and what they accomplished is instructive. The election was for members of a Convention which is to frame a new constitution for the State, and Mr, Kearney related, evidently with pride, that his party chose to do this work “ none but poor, obscure artisans, men from the cooper and tailor shops and carpenter benches." We should have thought the Kearney party wiser—-and showder alsohad they sought out prominent and able moo, the ablest in the State, to represent them; for then, his party would have wielded some influence in-the Convention. When the men from the, coopor and tailor shops meet mith the anti-Kearney men, who arc probably of a different kind, they will find themselves unaccustomed to tho work of legislation, and at the mercy of bettor informed men. .The Constitution of tho United States—which we suppose Mr; Kearney admits to have some merit—was also made by delegates chosen by tho work-ing-men and farmers of the country; but those working-men and farmers were wise enough to select the ablest, the moat influential, the most Intelligent and experienced members of the cora-rmnity to make their Constitution. The labor organisations of this country have yet to discover what their English cousins long ago found out, that if they want to make an impression on legislation they must choose as their representatives men who have made economical questions :a study. * The notion that they can get oil without brains or information, or that Providence will inspire the men from tho cooper and tailor shops, is one of the causes of their perpetual failure. 4 ; Mr. Kearney’s plan of campaign has the merit o£ simplicity, “Pool your issues, ’’ ho said; “drop all tho questions on which you

can never agree; don't talk about greenbacks or eight-hour questions or banks, but pool all your issues in one pot." That is really what the Kearney party did in California, and, of course, forced their opponents to do the same, with the following noteworthy result : —Of 152 members the Kearney men elected 51 and their opponents 101.