, 1886-04-15

lenses with which you are charged
should be refuted. You have remainet
silent under many damaning charges o
i~niuring the state. We will be YOU
avengers. If you haye been wronged VIZ
will let 1t be known to the world through
the medium Of courts of justice. And lei
me say right here that no money will buy
a verdict at the hands of these courts.
This certainly means war, but it is a war
between legitimate capital, honest enter
prise. and honest labor on one hand, and
Legitimate on the other hand. There will
be no mobs in this supreme hour to silence
any mans opinion; n 20 converts will be
made by physical force. You have been
warned that your life is in danger. Pay
no attention to such talk. No man who
has the interest of his country at heart
would harm a hair of your head; but the
system which reaches out on all sides of
gathering In millions Of dollars of treasure
and keeping them out Of the legitimate
channels Of commerce must die. l have
taken counsel from the best legal
minds Of the United States, and we
are prepared to face you before
the courts and now await your action in
the matter. This is no threat. | speak
for 500, 900 organized men who are ready
to pay out the last farthing in order that
justice may prevail. You have it in your
power to make friends of these men by
acting the part of a man, by taking this
matter into your own hands. WI you
do so and end this strike in the interest of
humanity and our common country"
Mr.. Powderly's letter was sent to Gould
through W. o. Mcdowell. with ~instruc-
tons that if Gould Ito whom these written
instructions we're also submitted) did not
consent to an honorable settlement OF the
difficulty before 5 O'Clock of the day the
letters were delivered, or at that hour still
preserved silence, to allow the letters to be
published.
At the opening of his reply to Mr..
Powderly, Gould quotes this letter of in
structions to Mcdowell and acknowledges
the receipt of Powderly's letter, the sub
stance of which is given above. Gould
then proceeded to construe Powderly's let
ter as an official declaration that the
Knights of Labor had determined to pur-
sue him personally unless thu Missouri
Pacific company should yield to its de-
msnds in what they called a strike on that
road. In answer to these personal threats
he would say hat he was still a free
American citizen. Gould then refers to
his lowly beginning in life and to his sue
cess through habits OF temperance and in
dustry, and that if, as Powderly says, he
is to be destroyed by the Knights Of
Labor, it is fortunate that he has retained
his early habits of industry. Gould then
says he is quite content to leave his per-
sonal record in the hands of his neighbors
and business associates. If they have
aught to complain of he will be glad to
submit to any arbitration.
In conclusion Gould says: In the
face of all this you notify me that unless
by s o'clock | personally consent to do
something, precisely what. l do not see,
then the personal consequences of a sort
vaguely expressed, but not hard to under
stand, will at the hands of your order be
visited upon me. Let me again remind
you that it is an American citizen whom
you and your order thus propose TO destroy.
The contest is not between your order and
me, but between your order and the laws
of the land. Your order has already
deied those laws in preventing by violence
this company from operating its roads.
You held then that this company should
not operate its roads under the conditions
prescribed by law, but only under condi-
tons prescribed by you. You now declare
in effect that l now hold my individual
property and rights not as other men hold
theirs, but only at the peril of your letting
loose irrevocably after 5 o'clock your order
upon me. If this is true of this company
and of me. it is true of other men and
companies. II so you and your orderare the
law and an American citizen is such only
in name. Already, for weeks, your
order has, in your attack upon thus com
pany not hesitated to disable it by vio-
lence from rendering its duty to the pub
lie and from doing work and navinp wages