The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-10-17
LABOR AND CAPITAL.
Depew Addresses the Brother
hood of Locomotive Engineers.
GRAND CHIEF ENGINEER ARTHUR
Makes Some Commendable and Conservative
Comments Upon the Objects and Meth
DDS of the Organization.

0uS OF une organization.
PrrTsBURS, Oct 16.-The Brotherhood of
this morning, but as the committee on or
ganiza, ion was not ready to report, no i'm
portant business was transacted.
The International Brotherhood of Loco
motive Engineers held their annual open |
meeting in the Grand opera house this |
afternoon. A number of letters were read |
from prominent gentlemen expressing re-
greet at theirinability to be present. Among |
them were Governor Campbell, of Ohio; |
Governor Beaver, of PennSylvan a;
George w. Childs, of Philadelphia; Presi-
dent Roberts, of the Pennsylvania railroad, |
and other prominent railroad officials.
After prayer by Grand Chaplain
Dorrety, Mayor Gourley welcomed the
delegates to thecity. Chairman Adams then
introduced Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, pres
ident of the New York Central railroad
company. The appearance of the distin-
gulshed gentleman was the signal for the
widest applause. When order had been
restored Mr.. Depew proceeded to deliver
an address, which was listened to with
great interest. Several times he was com
PEELED to pause, owing to the deafening ap-
plause of his hearers.
Mr.. Depew spoke highly of the
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers
and said that during the period
of its existence and prosperity and growth,
hundreds of labor organizations had been
formed and dissolved. They had been
started to carry out novel theories or to
put in practice unusual and untried pro-
cesses. 1.-THE success of your body is due to
It's rigid adherence to the right principles
upon which it was founded. No labor
organization can permanently succeed
Ir-h who and Onl &c toi
wages and diminish hours. 1t lacks the
| essential bond of mutual sympathy and
brotherly help in bearing or tightening
each others burdens. The tendency of
such organization is inevitably and rapidly
to communism and failure. The fundamen-
tai idea of the engineers brotherhood is:
| l. Charity, the support of the injured and
contributions to the family of the dead.
| 2. Education which perfects the artisa n
in the theory and practice of his trade and
broadens him for larger usefulness as a
citizen.
3-The protection, securing aud main
tanning of your rights. Your record is I'M
exampled in the history of contract between
employer and employee, at home or abroad,
and in the intelligence and prosperity of
your MEMBERS
MIR. Depew spoke of the all-pervading
idea of the past few years of the trust,
and said this universal effort to absorb the
Individual to divide the people into en-
ploying companies and employees, and to
destroy competition, will inevitably end III
disaster. In the same way and from the
| same causes there have been several am
| bilious attempts to form gigantic labor
trusts, which should combine under one
central and autocratic authority every
| occupation in which the wage Garner could
engage. In all such associations of trades
and occupations, having nothing in common
but the qualities of audacity, the influence
of speech and capacity for manipulating
| caucuses and conventions, they push for
ward many men who know little of the
great interests contded to their care.
Labor must be as intelligent as capital upon
its own grounds A committee which calls
upon an employer or railroad officer must
know its own business as well as he
knows his, otherwise they make angry con-
tentions because of their ignorance. Then
comes the exercise of brute force and VIC
lence, which fails to secure that which, in
nine cases out of ten, could have been had
by intelligent representation.
| Hundreds of committees of our en-
ployees have been to see rue and / can safely
say that after the full and free discussion
which always took place, not one of them
ever went out Of my Office except to carry
back satisfactory messages to their constit
uents.
'sThe reason for these ready settlements
was that the men understood their own
business and knew precisely what they
wanted and how much the company could
afford to conceede. But in the operations
of what | may call the labor trusts, [ have
had different experiences"
Mr.. Depew cited an instance of where
fifteen men at one point on the line were
ordered out by the chief of their local as
sembly, who was a shoemaker, and who
took that action because he had had row
with passenger conductor. On another
occasion high official in the order called
on Mr.. Depew, who soon discovered thai
he knew nothing of what he was talking
about. The official confessed he never hac
been in railway service in his life.
"Such representatives of organized
labor said Depew, "bring it into dis
repute both with employers aud the public
A committee called upon me last fall with
: series of complaints all of which wer,
quickly and satisfactorily adjusted. They
then made demand on behalf of the Loco
motive engineers, when [ informed then
that that order could speak for itself, they
| then said their object was to cut up the or
7 ganlzatlon OF the Locomotive engineer
and gather into one organization every de
, partment of the railway service. If tn
management of the New York Contra
would recognize the engineers only through
them this result would be brought about
, and upon much lower basis than tn
brotherhood could admit, and if we did no
q do so they would strike and tie up tn
road"
Mr.. Depew informed the committee the
I might do their worst but that in matte
y affecting the brotherhood he would recog
nize only that body. The threatene
! strike never came
q Speaking of the great New York Contra
+ strike, Depew said years of successful tria
- of fair, frank and friendly discussions wit
/ the employees of the New York Centra
4 had led them to believe strike was i'm
n possible on that road. In that trust h
: went abroad on his annual holiday to hav
his hopes rudely shattered by a cablegra1
o. announcing a strike. "But the engineers,
i, he added, 'were true to the relation whic
o for many years had been established an
2 sustained, and reinvigorated my falterin
faith in the possibility of any effort
2 maintain a satisfactory and permaner
q understanding between capital and labol
= The citizens of New York and of the whol
. country owe to the Brotherhood of Loco
4 motive Engineers debt of gratitude TO
q the courage, fidelity and intelligence viii
which they stood by their posts and PEI
formed their duties during the recen
troubles on the New York Central.''
thine does not permit he said, "a di
o. cussion of the effects upon our institution
q of the appointment of million public Sc
y wants being given to one administratio
e and made the patronage of party bosses.
IL He referred to the letter carriers in En-,
J. land, who worked long hours and got on a
average Sc week. After vain effort fl