The record-union., 1894-07-14
SYMPATHY WAS EXTENDED. BUT NO
WALK-OUT.
The Best Interests of the Unions Af1il-
lated Declared to Be That They
Refrain From Participating In
General or Local Strike Which May
Be Proposed In Connection With
the Present Railroad Trouble.
Special to the REcoRp-uxrox.


journed at $50 this evening. after having
decided against q general strike. The pc
tition of p resident Debs of the American
Railway Union was indorsed. however.
and $1,000 voted for a defense fund for
the coming trial of Debs. The Executive
Council of Seven will hold a final session
tomorrow. The following address to the
public was issued after a long discussion:
1.-THE great industrial upheaval now
agitating the country has been carefully
and fully considered in a conference of
the Executive Council of the American
Railway Union, and to the executive
officers and representatives of the ma
donal and international unions and
brotherhoods of railway unicns, called to
meet in the city of Chicago on the 11th
day of July. 1894. In the light of all the
evidence obtainable, and in view of the
peculiar complications now developing
the situation, we are forced to the con-
clusion that the best interests of the
unions affiliated with the American Fed
Grafton of Labor demand that we refrain
from participating in any general or local
strike which may be proposed in connec-
t4OA WIN tliO PAOSCBb 1alAAOd0 OIOOO1Ccs
sin making this declaration we do not
wish it understood that we are in any
way antagonistic to labor organizations
now struggling for right or justice, but
rather than the fact that the present con-
test has become surrounded and beset
with complications so grave in their
nature that we cannot consistently ad-
wise a course which would but add to the
general confusion. The public press,
ever alive to the interest of corporate
wealth, have with few exceptions so
maliciously misrepresented the strikers
that in the public mind the working
classes are now arrayed in open hos
tility to Federal authority. That is a po-
sition we do not wish to be placed in, nor
will we occupy without a protest.
''By misrepresentation and duplicity
certain corporations assume that they
stand for law and order, and that those
opposing them represent lawlessness and
anarchy. We protest against this as
sumption, as we protest against the in
reference that, because a certain indi-
vidual or certain class enjoy a
monopoly in particular lines of trade or
ooIn.lerce, it necessarily follows that
they are entitled to monopoly in loyal
ty and citizenship.
while we may not have the power to
order a strike of the working people of
our country. we are fully aware that
recommendation from this conference to
them to lay down their tools of labor
will largely influence the members of
our affiliated organizations, and appreci-
ating the responsibility upon US and the
duty we owe to all. we declare it to be
the sense of this conference that gen.
eral strike at this time is unwise and
contrary to the best interests of the
working people.
'We further recommend that all con-
nected with the American Federation Of
Labor now out on a sympathetic strike
should return to work, and those who
contemplate going out on a sympathetic
strike are advised to remain at their
usual avocations. In the strike of the
American Railway Union we recognize
an impulsive. vigorous protest against
the gathering growing forces of pluto
cratic power and corporation rule. In
the sympathetic rule of that order to help
the Pullman employees they have dem
onstrated the shallow shams of Pull
mans paradise. Mr.. Pullman, in his
persistent repulses of arbitration and in
his heartless autocratic treatment to his
employees, has shown himself public
enemy. The heart of labor everywhere
throbs responsive to the manly purposes
and sturdy struggle of the American
Railway Union in their heroic endeavor
TO redress the wrongs of the Pullman
employees"
The address then states that the railroad
corporations have an utter disregard for
law, and that they have given the great
est impetus TO anarchy and lawlessness.
1t also refers to the display of armed
force at the request of the ''moneyed au-
tocracy," and continues: would it not
be worse than folly to call men out on
general or local strike in these days of
stagnant trade and commercial depres-
sion? Better let us organize more gen.
orally, combine more closely with our
forces, educate and prepare ourselves to
protect our interests, and then we may go
to the ballot box and cast our votes as
American freemen, united and deter
mined to redeem this country from its
present political and industrial misrule,
TO take it from the hands OF plutocratic
wreckers and place it in the hands OF the
common people,"
The morning session of the Federation
took up the resolution where it was
dropped the night before. Many strong
speeches were made on both sides of the
resolution to order general strike of the
members IN sympathy with the Pullman
strikers.
NJ. J. Croll of the International Typo
graphical Union appealed to the feeling
of the conference of the manner in which
labor had been trampled upon by capital,
and said that the only way to force a
recognition was to order complete tie
mp.
Messrs. MCGUIRE and Perkins made
sneeebes on the same line, arguing most
empbatically in favor of the resolution.
Mr.. Drummond took up the opposi-
tion and discussed at some length the in
adyisability of a general strike. He said:
81 want Debs to understand that it is un-
necessary for us to order a strike. He
wishes to shift the responsibility off from
his shoulders and / object to il. If he has
started it and cannot win, let him lose it. If
we should order strike, the hnacial situa-
sion of the country is such that a great