St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-11-14
STRUCK A SORE SLOT.
Strike Investiga alton Commits
sion's Report Brings Forth
a Big Howl.
CORPORATIONS ANSWER.
CORPORATIONS
A General Denial of the Al
legations Made by the
Committee.
THE COMMISSIONERS SCORED
The Report Declared to Be
Biased and a Discredit to
the Country.

i'll its next issue will contain reply 10
the report of the United States strike
commissioners addressed to those gen
tlemen. 1t says in part:
The personal opinions as conveyed
i'll the report of the federal strike COM
mission are invested with unwonted in
terest to the public at large from the
fact of the official dignity with which
they have been clothed. All good citl-
Zens must of necessity be Interested in
the commissions official conclusions.
and it appears to be the part Of citizen
ship to call attention to. and, ii possible.
correct any Oversights or misstatements
Of facts in which the commission may
have fallen.
The report says: ut should be noted
that until the railroads set the example
a general union OF railroad employees
was never attempted. The union had
not then gone beyond enlisting the men
upon different systems in separate trade
organizations" This statement is
Wholly False.
The report itself says in another
place: The order Of the Knights of
Labor, with an estimated membership
of from 10000 to 175,OOO, has always
advocated the solidarity of labor"
The history of railroad labor organi-
cations of the last twenty years is large
ly made Of what the report says was
never attempted. Again and again have
efforts been made to consolidate, fed
crate or absorb various existing orders
inf
have the different classes of labor on the
same road and the same classes OF labor
on different roads stood together
Again and again has the allied labor of
several companies been called on to en-
force the demand of one class of labor
against one company. The ignorance
of this fact, and Of the further fact that
it was the repeated experience of it
which at length drove the railways re-
luctantly to unite also in self>defence.
is to any one at all familiar with the
history of labor almost incOmprehenSi-
Bile. The misstatement is made the
more gross by the Importance which the
commission seems to attach TO its asser-
ton
The report speaking of the Pullman
phase of the trouble says: The cut IN
wages during this period averaged about
25 per cent" This is not true. the
amount of the reduction was placed in
evidence before the commission in great
detail and with eXactitude. The aver
age reduction in wages for jOurneymen
and mechanics was % $40 per cent, and
the average reduction for all other shop
employees was 1l13 per cent. The aver
age reduction for all shop employees was
10 per cent.
Again the report says: Under the
contracts between the railroad COM
panieS and The Pullman company, the
railroads have paid since 1887 two cents
mile for each mile run by Pullman
cars" This is not fact, nor from the
one form of "standard' contract placed
in evidence before the commission was
it justified in concluding it to be fact.
The contract specifically provides for
exceptions to this rate of payment.
which enter so largely into the aggre-
gate business with the railways as to
totally falSlfy the generalization which
is made.
On page Sc the report says: Through
out the strike the strife was simply
over handling Ppllman cars, the men
being ready to do their duty other
wise"
This is not only untrue, but is radi-
cal and
Gross misrepresentation
of the entire circumstances of the strike.
1t is only necessary 10 point out that
the strike extended, among other roads,
to the Michigan Central, Lake Shore d
Michigan Southern and Wabash com=
panles, on which no Pullman cars were
in operation. The statement quoted
shows an amazing and almost lncOm-
prehensible misunderstanding of the
essential elements of the strike. Fur
ther OH the report says in reference to
the Pullman tenants:
LAS the bank is rent collector. It
presses for the rent, and is aided in COLI
lecung it by knowledge on the part Of
the tenant that by arrears he may lose
his job"
On what was this knowledge" based?
During all the years there has never
been case where any employe "lOst
his job' for non-payment of rent, and
the employees had knowledge of that.
How Is the statement quoted reconcila-
bic With the very next sentence: "At
the time of the strike $4,000 OF unpaid
rent had accumulated" and the debtors
still were III possession of their Jobs?
The commission oInits also to state the
fact clearly placed in evidence that at
the time of the strike less than one
third of the shop employees were tenants
of the company, and the question of
rentals could, therefore, have nothing
to do with the terms of employment of
over tWo-thirds of them.
Further on the report says: SIT is in
evidence, and uncontradicted, that no
violence or destruction of property by
strikers or sympathiZers took place at
Pullman. and that until July no ex-
traordnary protection was had from the
police or military against even antici-
pated disorder"
''It was not until July 4 that the serv-
ice of the military was called for even
in Chicago itself, and the commission
omits to mention the extraordinary pro-
lection OF the 221 guards OF the Pull
man company who were in service
before the end of June, and who (the
danger of anticipated disorder being so
great were increased to $50 in the first
week in July. Moreover
There Was Violence
at Pullman, physics. assaults upon per-
sons who ATTEMPTED to return to work.
When the military were put in the field
they were used at Pullman longer than
anywhere else. Nowhere did the pulice
have more difficulty than In protecting
from violence those who wished to re-
sumo work at Pullman. Some or all of
these facts we're clearly in evidence be-
fore your commission. So public ana