The Labor Panic of 1877

A late telegraphic dispatch says: 'There is a rumor from the coal regions which is calculated to alarm English miners. It is to the effect that the proprietors of the mines have resolved to import cheap labor from China, and have already consulted the Chinese ambassador on the subject.' This report can be regarded in no other light than that of a mere piece of idle bravado on the part of the British coal landlords for effect upon the trades unions and labor leagues to anticipate strikes. Wages, generally, in England are already down to the lowest notch compatible with existence. Coal mining is a sort of special trade, for which the Chinamen have had no training and therefore no adaptation. Doubtless the experiment of importing them half way around the world to supplant the native skilled laborers, whose numbers already exceed the demand, would prove as impracticable and unprofitable—not to say inhuman—a speculation as that of introducing them into the shoe factories of Lynn, Massachusetts proved a few years ago. Extending a welcome in an industrial capacity to the Mongols is more reasonable, here in a new country, where there are tailings of gold mines going to waste, whole counties, rich in natural wealth, tenantless, seas swarming with unfathered and unrequired food, and avenues of industry open, yet with no applicants to occupy them. But to ship them to the old overcrowded countries to take the bread from the starving children of the soil would be infamous. Free land is the great escape-valve of society, the counter check to misery and low wages. It is better to foster immigration than undue competition in the labor market. In this way the market of the capitalist is enlarged at the same time that the compensation of the laborer is increased.