St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-08-30
THE PoLICY TO CRUSH.

The attitude of the railway Managers
toward the union of their employees is
one of hostility which refuses 10 treat
and seeks simply and solely to crush.
Organizers themselves OF the StricteSt ct
sects. binding themselves by contracts
forfeitures and "gentlemen'S agree
ments," they will not permit the use OF
the same implement by their employees.
Aided Practically by the law in'their
combinations. because law, so far, is
futile to prevent them, they invoke sue
cessfully the law to aid them when they
would crush. 1t is this aid given to
law breakers and denied them that
makes men desperate and stirs those
deep and sinister passions that find
vent in destruction.
That the managers. aided by mar.
shall too ready to assist them, invoked
the military arm, not so much To open
the tracks as to crush the A. Il. u, de-
velops III the testimony unwillingly
wrung from them by the commission
now sitting in Chicago. Mr.. Egan's
testimony is that he told an alderman.
who came TO see il the strike could not
be settled. that he had 10 authority to
confer with the representatives of the
union, and later, when Mayor Hopkins
brought proposition from Debs con-
tanning overtures for peace, he refused
10 receive it because he thought that
''any party that fought railways as they
had and was beaten r it was lots
of cheek to dictate the terms of their
surrender" Again: 1--WE didn't need
a settlement; we had 'em beat already"
although when Mr.. Worthington asked
why, ii they were beaten, the troops re-
manned. Egan said 1--WE needed them to
protect our property" To question
whether the troops could not have been
dismissed if then peaceable settlement
had been reached. the blunt MIR. Egan
replied that ut was not their intention
to recognize the American Railway
union" To Mr.. Wright's question i
there was any time when the managers
would have received overtures for a
peaceable settlement, the manager re-
piled that their policy was to crush the
strike"
From another source we have as eX-
plicit an expression OF the attitude of
the railways to the union. The bust
ness men of Bralnerd, without an eX-
ception, signed request to the North
ern Pacific manager to reinstate the
employees there who had struck, stating
the reasons why such course would
be reasonable and polite. The 10 urnal
says that its editor received long
nj No L I,.in iah
among other things, he says: 1T would
be most extraordinary thing for me
to receive the president. past or active.
of the Brainerd A. r. U. l do not rec
ognize such an institution, and have
steadfastly refused to have anything to
do with it except to suppress it"
The point all this emphasizes, the only
one i'll all the controversy that the
GLOBE cares to press, is that managers
of railways must expect to be treated as
they treat others. If they form their
own organizations to exact better rates :;
If they boycott offending roads. they do
not come before the bar of public opin-
ion with clean hands when they upbraid
their employees for also organizing to
exact better wages. The organizations
of the men are precisely as laudable and
1ustifiable as are those of the railways,
and not particle more so. The rail-
ways have 90 moral right to combine to
increase or maintain rates. or to prevent
other railways from carrying for less.
nor have the men any right in morals to
combine to prevent other men from
working in their places when they leave
them because they cannot get the wage
they want. But just so long as the rail-
ways continue to keep up their organ
ization the men have a similar right,
and il does not lie in the mouths of the
managers to say them nay, or to try to
crush them out.