The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1892-09-16
All About the Homestead Strike

later was deposed and died IN exile.
All About the Homestead Strike.
The North American Review has been
at pains to get the Judgment of three
distinguished gentlemen in regard to
the right and wrong of the Homestead
strike. The gentlemen are Hon. w. G.
Oates, of Alabama, chairman of the con-
gressional committee that investigated
the strike; Hon. George Ticknor Curtis.
the eminent constitutional lawyer, am!
General Master Workman T. V. Pow
derby, of the knights of Labor. Mr..
Powderly gets the last word.
The contract between the Carnegie
company and its employees expired June
30. The company proposed to reduce
the wages of the men in some of the de-
partments, also to change the time Of
renewing the contracts from the last day
of June to the last day of December.
The reduction of wages was to take
place because, as represented by Presi-
dent Prick, of the company, overproduc-
ton during the year had reduced the
price of the products made until the
company was losing money. Further,
improved machinery put into the mills
since the three years contract was signed
in 1889 had doubled the output in GER
tain departments with no increase of
labor to the workmen. In these depart
mepts, in order to equalize matters, he
desired to reduce the rate of wages. The
workmen, however, deny that the out
put was doubled with no increase in the
number of laborers, and thus that point
remains a disputed one At any rate
the workmen declined to sign the new
contract.
Mr.. Oates believes that Mr.. Prick was
actuated by a desire to sit on trades
unions in general, and that he met the
men throughout in "stern, brusque and
autocratic" manner that did not sweeten
their tempers. Mr.. Oates says:
If the business of his company, on account
of fall in the market price of the products of
e'N
of the employees, he should have appealed to
their reason and shown them the true state of
the companys affairs. am persuaded that if
ne mad done SO an agreement would have been
reached and all the troubles which followed
would thus have been avoided
Further, Mr.. Oates says congress has
no power to interfere in the Homestead
labor troubles or in any other labor
troubles, and that a compulsory arbitra-
ton law is not practicable.
Mr. Curtis, from the lawyers side of
the affair, calls attention to the fact
that the Pinkertons We're not armed
when they went up the river to Home.
stead. The arms and ammunition were
packed in boxes to be delivered at the
Homestead yards. He writes:
Klein, one of the Pinkerton watchmen, had
been killed by the strikers and about five other
men shot and wounded before the Pinkerton
men began their fire in self defense. Then it
was impossible to shoot those firing from the
shore at the barges, because the strikers had
made breastwork for themselves by placing
women and children in front and firing rom
behind them.
Mr.. Curtis declares that the first duty
OF the legislative power is to emancipate
the individual workman from the tyr
amy of his class. He sells himself into
slavery when he joins a trades union.
"The coercion of nonunion men should
be made crime and punished with Sc
verify" The law points in the case Mr.
Curtis puts thus:
First-That the owners of the mills had a
perfect legal right to employ any necessary
number of men to defend their property.
Second-That all the acts of the Pinkerton
men at Homestead were lawful; and that as
watchmen they had right to bear arms on
the premises of the Carnegie company in order
10 protect life and property, whether they
were or were not deputized by the sheriff of
Allegheny county: and that the agency had
the right to ship arms for such purposes from
Chicago to the Carnegie yards at Homestead:
ana That In view of the attack on the barges |
the watchmen had the right to bear arms and
defend themselves; and that all their acts in
firing In self defense from the barges after the |
attack on them were legally justifable under |
the laws of the United States and the state of |
Third-That the killing Of Klein by one or |
more of the riotous strikers was murder.
Fourth-That all who stood by sympathiz-
ing with and encouraging the strikers. or not |
exerting themselves to prevent the strikers |
who were armed from firing on the barges. |
were accessories to the murder
Then Mr.. Powderly takes up the tale. |
We are to infer from his story that it is
the workmen who built up the thriving
town of Homestead and made the pros |
perity of the mills; it was they who Gre
ated the great steel plant, and Mr.. Car
negie and Mr.. Prick or their money had
little or nothing to do with it. Manufac-
turing has changed altogether, says Mr.
Powderly. 1t is now in the hands OF
great corporations. Bodies of organized
workmen stand in the same relation to
the men as the corporation does to the
investing capitalist. Every law, every
right, every concession which the work
ingmen now enjoy has come to them
through the labor organization. The
Knights of Labor demand a compulsory
arbitration law.
1t should be a law in every state that in dis
puted cases the employer should be Obliged to
select two arbitrators and the employees two.
these four to select the fifth. This arbitration
to have access to all books, papers
md facts bearing on the question at issue
rom both sides.
Mr.. Powderly gently informs his
readers at the close that if the law does
not do this for the workingmen, then
hey must do it for themselves, as at
Homestead, "by the light of the blazing
runs"