The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1877-08-04

| Sented by our City, State ana National
authorities, backed by the good and true
men of the country, shall be as firmly
maintained from this time forth, it
must prove to be as irreparable as it is
iucalculable.
Such ia the result of the two weeks of
violence destruction, alarm and blood
shed, through which the country has
| just passed, and into which it was
thrown by the strike Of the railway
men. The strike upon its face was a
contest for wages in the train of de-
structive influences Il set in motion it
was war upon all labor. No one dis
putes the right of any man, on a rail-
way or anywhere else, to say he will
not work unless he gets the wages he
thinks his services entitle him to and
which he demands. This is the indis-
putable right of all men but there that
right ends. They have no right to say
other men shall not work for any wa
ges the latter choose to agree to. They
have no right TO prevent or to attempt
to prevent other men from using their
tools, their horses and wagons, their
facturies, their mills, theft engines, their
locomotives, their trains Of cars, their
hands, their brains, or any other imple-
ment or impliaDce that belongs to them
or their trades. When the railway men
| quit work to force an advance in their
wages they exercised an indefeasible
right. The method by strike is bad
one, however, on railways especially,
because it inevitably involves break
ing of agreements and contracts, and
damage to the rights OF innocent third
parties who have nothing to do with the
dispute. Still the right to quit work, if
wages are not satisfactory, is a natural
right and cannot be gainsaid, That far
1t is contest of workmen in behalf of
their wages and the rights Of labor.
But when the railway strikers advanced
beyond that, and by violent demonstra-
tions, threats of shooting and other
means of intimidation, prevented other
men from going to work, and stopped
the trains, blockading all traffic for
thousands of miles, their acts were no
longer a contest for the rights of the
working men, but a war against all
working men and against tile rights Of
all labor. They blocked at once the
great wheels of industry. Materials
and tools for thousands Of workshops
were embargoed along the tracks
on the way to the looms cotton yarn
on the way to the spndles; iron and
lumber To the work shops leather going
to the shoemaEers grain to the -four
ing mill oil to the hands in the refine
ries manufactured articles on the way
to market meats and provisions to
| mil nf 10 in
ing messages of life and death money
on the way to employers, to be distrib.
uted in wages ; goods to be shipped by
land and by sea coal from the mines
on its way to market. In all these in-
stances the wOrkmen and laboTers who
would have been otherwise employed
without interruption, were thrown into
enforced idleness; because the railway
strikers, not content with the exercise
of thelI own indisputabe right to quit
work themselves, marched forward in a
lawleSs attempt to stop others. They
and their allies did stop not less thar q
hundred Thousand who had nothing to
do with the strike, and no part in the
dispute between them and their employ
ers. This, it must he repeated, changed
the whole character of the contest-t
was no longer a struggle for the wages
of labor, but war against the rights Of
all labor.
That war was inaugurated the mo-
ment the first railway train man at
Martinshurg threatened another railway
man with death if he took out train,
and it became an open, avOwed, rndis-
puised war OF all labor, when that
method of vindicGtin the wages of the
railway men was ordered on all the
Hires by the leaders oS the strike, who
kept themselves in the background.
From THAT moment it was not only q
war against all other labor, but wal
upon the safety of society. When the
J combined railway strikers set the law
less example of intimidation to other
, workmen-of Selling by force and pre-
venting the use of depOts, trains and
trackS-of successful defiance to mum"
cipal and State authorities-Of subver.
, sion of all law .-they let loose upon all
lstor and upon all people the wOrsi
men, the vilest passions, the most de-
strnctive elements of society. Sound
: TelS Of ali sorts, swind lers, demagogues
? thieves, burglars, assassins, Jail bird,
saw their chance in the temporary tr
: umph of lawlessness over a law estab
l llshed by the railway strikers, who re
5 sorted to violence in the stoppage o
trains and in taking forcible possession
p of all railway property. The degraded
/ villains who never work, whose live
, are spent in depredating on those VIII
do work, instantly rushed in, mad
a themselves the champions of labor, ant
n carried on the terrible business of vic
\ lence by stopping workshops, mills ant
h factories, and by burning, IobOing, de
4 stroying and slaughter of the Lawful
, authorities. Wherever they appearet
! they left blood, and devastation, an
n terror in their tracks.
/. All this came about because cOntes
|. by the railway men for the wages of la
v Dor was perverted by the strikers int
/. the setting of an example OF war agains
/. all labor. Surely the mass of the men
!. befship of the Train Mems Union coul
a never have contemplated such proceed
= ings with such terrible results whe
!. they bouad themselves hand and foot
q that orgaui cation, Yet such proceed
/. ings aud such results are sure to folio
n whenever men surrender their indiYid