The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-08-24
FI0HTfNG THE STATE.

The strikers OF Buffalo yesterday COM
mitted the crime of waging war against
the state, defying its authority by attack
ing the militia Shooting down the militia
of the state is not only murder; it is also
treason. The present switchmen's strike
is like all railroad strikes, an ugly affair
and difficult to deal with. The striking
switchmen have burned and wrecked some
$4,000 worth of property, and have
striven to kill the sheriff's officers and
soldiers who have sought to protect the
railway managers in their attempt to oper-
ate the abandoned roads
There is a growing feeling at the East
that these great interruptions of railway
traffic shall be made legally impossible. as
they are in England. In England several
breaches of contract are properly made
the subject of special legislation. If, for
example, a man wilifully or maliciously
breaks his contract Of service to a gas or
water company and runs away, knowing
that By so doing he might cause great pub
employed to watch a line of railway, who
willfully breaks his contract Of service
when his sudden desertion ofhis post may
work mischief may be punished. On the
other hand, under the English law, the
employer may be imprisoned for breach of
contract as well as the employed if his
breach Of contract involves serious injury
or even serious danger to life or property.
Under the English law it is made punish
able by imprisonment to hide or inJure
the tools Of workmen in order to prevent
them doing their work: or to beset work.
men to prevent them from going to their
place of business, or to intimidate them
into keeping away from it. The old
English trades union, while refusing to
associate or work with non-union men,
never attempted to coerce or intimidate
any one into agreement with them.
So many interests are affected by the
stoppage of traffic that the Eastern press
today argue that the state ought to inter-
vene in some effectual way to insure the
continuous and regular movement of
trains, because the law compels the rail-
ways as common carriers to interchange
traffic. The railroad commissioners of
New York several years ago pointed out
the necessity and the equity of legislation
which required men employed on railways
to give reasonable notice of their intention
to quit, SO that their places may be filled
and the movement Of traffic continued.
The employers should be equally required
to give notice Of intention to clay off, any
hands in their employ. Railway and tele-
graph service should be made subject to
army discipline, the obligations being
mutual between employer and employed.
The forcible stoppage of trains by men
who have discharged themselves without
q moments warning is an outrage against
the general public and should be dealt
with most severely by the law. Suppose
tomorrow Chief Arthur, of the Brother
hood Of Locomotive Engineers, should
without warning call out his 10000 en-
gineers and stop every wheel in the coun-
try. Such action would be intolerable. The
state which legally compels the rail ways to
interchange traffic would naturally hold
through its courts that such an act would
be conspiracy against the public veal;
Chief Arthur, because Of the national mis-
chief and distress he could create by sud-
denly ordering every engineer from his
locomotive, would undoubtedly give
reasonable notice of his intention to order
general strike. The general public veal
will demand protection against the conse-
quences of all conspiracies of any kind
against it.
No fair-minded man impugns the right
of workingmen to organize or denies the
benefits which labor organizations have
conferred upon society, but labor organ
izations, like corporations and railroads,
should be held subject to law and be made
to respect the rights Of men. A labor or
ganization might be SO abused as to plan
and attempt great public wrong, as We
illustrated above, and when it makes such
an attempt it should be held in legal sub
lection just as we hold trusts, corpora
tions and monopolies to legal account for
operations against the public veal.
An organized minority of labor forcing
a conflict with an unorganized majority of
labor should never be permitted to become
the oppressor Of labor, the foe of liberty
or the violator Of law. Suppose the stua-
ton at Buffalo had been reversed. Sup
pose the officers and stockholders of the
Erie and Reading system had sailed out
and burned the houses of the striking
switchmen, had beaten and kicked every
switchmsn that would not accept the COM
pany's terms, and switched Off the track
every car in which switchman or his
family were riding and had tried to kill
them, what wonld the Switchmen's
Union and the American Fedora
ton Of Labor say to such law
less and murderous proceedings?
Why, roar ofindignation would be heard
from the Hudson river to the Pacific
ocean. And yet any rejecting workman
knows that he has no more right TO burn
and beat and MAIN and kill in defiance Of
law than the representatives of the rail.
ways have a right to commit lawless vio-
lence.
In these United States armed resistance
to the laws cannot be condoned for a mo-
meut, and the attack of she Buffalo
strikers upon the militia was not only
murder, but it was treason against the
state.
THE MURDER PROBLEM.
Ex-President Andrew y. White, Of
Cornell university. recently opened lee
,-,re IN ssyhe Murder prohIs-,, =, a..