The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1890-08-24
The Sweating System in Vogue
on Vanderbilt Roads
WEBB OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES.
Chauncey N. Depew's Words Condemn
the Company's Action.
Conference Of the United Order Of Rail-
way Employees at Terre Haute-Dela-
ware 3 Hudson switchmen Go ON
Sympathetic Strike.

NEW YoRK, Aug 33.--Powderly tonight
wrote reply to the statement of Vice.
President Webb. as follows:
81 see that you have at last ventured to break
the silence that has sealed your lips in re a.ion
to the causes which led 10 he discharge OF 6fty
or sixty of your employees. Your alleged expla-
nation is even less creditable to you than the
silence it has broken, and does not in any
way excuse the stand you have taken. Your
statement is worthy of man who can see no
cause for investigation in cases of drunkenness,
incapacity, breach OF duty and insubordination.
All these men have the right to know whether
they were discharged for cause. You cannot
assert with any degree of accuracy that any OF
these men were dismissed for the cause you put
forth. You must depend on statements made
to YOU by your subordin ates, your superin-
tenden!s and foreman.
Let me do you the favor to show you what
manner OF men you have to rely on for your
supply of truth. John Briggs is . fireman in
the employ Of your compsny. He was hiring
and discharging workmen. Upon his word you
decide the fac OF the poor fellows who appeal
to You against the decision Of said John Brlsgs
APPEND % to this commun cation you will find
sIafemenf from number OF employees of
the New York Cent al which may cause
un biased people to shink that drunkenness Is
excused If the druRkard will only share his
whisky with the man VINO inspired your state
ments. You will furthermore learn that In
order to retain employ "in the best corporation
in America to the men, the poor laborers have
to pay bosses several dollars month to get
work, on whose statements you lean. When as
sertipg that you have the right to discharge any
man for any one Of cozen causes
without telling him which one
applied to him, I must yet learn
should stand unquestioned, or that it should
have any more weight Than that of the poor,
honest workingman. For from five to twenty
years the discharg men were in the employ of
the company yen represent. but 1t was only
when they Joined th- Knights of Labor that
you discovered they were drunkards, incompe.
mt aud unfit Tor duty. You further assert
that there is nothing TO arbitrate. Can you be
SO blinied by your associations and your sur-
roundings as to not realize that the travelling
public ought to know which OF these men are
orunkards, which incompetent, and SO on, so
that they may not trust their lives in the hands
OF such characters, either in your service,
shou you see fit to again employ them. or in
any ether concern?
would know what the sweating systems means
You would know that it was classed among the
worst features of the competitive systems I'm
der your own nose. beneath your own eye, and
carried on by the very men upon whose bare
words you dismiss old employees, exists form
of the sweating system which finds parallel
origin that is practlced on the sewing girls OF
London,
In the face of the plain, stafesmanlike words
OF your superior in Office, Chauncey NJ Depew,
you deny the right of arbitration. Let me re-
mind you, sir. that he does not or did not sus-
tain you in the position you have assumed.
Dese s words, SPOKEN when the question of
national arbitration law was before the country,
indicate where Depew stood that day. You
alone claim to have any rights in the matter,
and nothing but the fact that you are in posses
sion OF immense wealth warrants you in
taking the stand you have taken.
Tae men who have located on the
Vanderbilt system could not not have done
so had not the hope obtaining
and retaining employment been held out to
them by tue company having induced the work.
men to make their homes along the line of the
road. The management OF the concern are re-
sponsible for their presence at these points, and
should recognize that they have some rights in
the premises the least of which is to be heard
in their own defense.
Men whose words have never had reason to
doubt make the statement 10 me that they were
called up before their foreman or superiatend-
ent and asked If they were Knights of Labor,
and, when they brAvey admitted that they
were, were discharged. 1t is not arbitration
alone that you reused you have
re used to arbitrate; second. to in
vesf!gate; third, 70 face those men
in my presence and satisfy yourself whether
YOUR men told you the truth; fourth. yon have
de fed the laws of the state in ignoring the
board of mediation and arbitration; fifth, you
nave refused 10 listen 10 the voice of the public,
which asked for simple justice and cares moth
ing for personality # either OF the parties to
the controversy: sixth and last, you have
shown that humanity had no claims upon
you whatever. You have refused to satisfy the
men whom you have discharged and that act
will always stand to protest your claim to true
maaliness. Had you satsfied the men there
would be nothing for to ask. You are as
much in duty bound to satisfy them in this
matter a YOU are to satisfy the legally consti-
tutueo authorities OF the company.
T. " powDERLy