The Wadsworth dispatch. [volume] (Wadsworth, Nev.) 1892-1899, 1892-10-12
Al, Abou. the Homestead Strike.

at pains 10 get n 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. and
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-
lion 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 1850 had doubled the output in GER
tain departments with no increase of
labor to the workmen. In these depart
ments. 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 hat point
remains q disputed one. At any rate
the workmen declined ito sign the new
contract.
Mr.. Oates believes that Mr.. Frick was
actuated by a desire to sit on trades
unions in general. and that he met the
men throughout in a "stern. brusque and
autocratic' manner that did not sweeten
their tempers. MI. Oates says:
II the business Of his company, on account
of a fall in the market price of the products Of
the works, required a reduction OF the wages
of the employees, he should rave appealed to
their reason and shown them the true state of
the company's affairs. | am persuaded that II
he had done 30 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 20 interfere in the Homestead
labor troubles OF 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 were 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 thestrikers and about Ave other
men shot and wounded before the Pinkerton
men began their fire In self defense. Then II
was impossible TO shoot those firing from the
shore at the barges. because the strikers had
made u breastwOrk for themselves by placing
women and children In front and firing nom
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 u crime and panished 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
lumber OF men to defend their property,
Second-Tha all the acts Of the Pinkerton
men at Homestead were lawful; and that as
watchmen they had a right to bear arms on
the premises OF the Carnegie company In order
to protect life and property. whether they
were or were not deputized by the sheriff Of
Allegheny county,: and that the agency had
tbs right to ship arms for such purposes from
Chicago to the Carnegie yards, at Homestead;
and 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 UNSUITABLE under
the laws of the United States and the state of
Pennsylvania.
J Third-That the killing OF Klein by one or
more Of the rlotous strikers was a 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 Nh. Prick or their money had
little or nothing to do with it. Manufac-
turing has changed altogether, says Mr.