The Mt. Sterling advocate. (Mt. Sterling, Ky.) 1890-current, 1894-07-17
THE STRIKE.
This is the Way the Commercial
Gazette Tells How it Was
Worked Up,

"The great Pullman strike is TO be
attributed to the conspiracy of agita-
tors who have worked themselves into
conspicuous positions in labor organi-
cations, and found war essential 10
the cultivation of their personal
greatness.
"Three gentlemen have found them
selves in command of forces that
could be employed to disturb the
country, and they have made mani
festation of power in every way re-
'msrkable, and indeed ominous. The
raw material they had to work upon
was very small.
In the case of difference of opinion
between Mr.. Pullman and his men
there was nothing sensational.
Mr.. Pullman was striving to find
work for his meu to do, and willing to
stand considerable direct loss rather
than close the shops. The men knew.
the times were hard on great enter
prises as well as small ones, and con-
sented for time to the reduction of
their wages, knowing that there had
been overproduction of cars, and that
the new ones could not be sold at the
actual cost of turning out the work.
They naturally wanted return to the
old scale of wages, and they had been
sensible for some time that there was
something in the air to the effect that
Mr.. Pullman was too rich for a man
who had been poor to become. If he
had made his money by the rise of
land. or if his grandfather or father
had made it for him, the riches of the
man of the model town would not
have been so raw and offensive.
Once it was thought that il was rather
a good thing for man to be architect
OF his own fortunes, but now there is
another view of the case.
sit goes hard with the workingman
if he works over time and caves
money, and puts money to work MAX
ing money. Advanced views have
caused change in feeling on this
subject in quarters susceptible of sud-
den excitements. But Mr.. Pullman
and his men did not quarrel particu-
larly. They disagreed and the works
were closed. Many of the men were
living in the Pullman houses. They
have not been evicted. Mr. Pullman
has not attempted to introduce "black
sheep" and "scabs" and thieves. He
has not used bad language. He knows
his men as rule would prefer to be
at work at the wages he agreed he
was able to pay. and were constrained |
by uncomfortable Influences to 90 on |
with the miserable strike, There was
to compromise or arbitrate; it
was simple question to work or not
to work, land the strike would have been
over if it had not been for meddlers-
for the meanest of all kinds of polite
ians, who would sacrifice an army of
workingme l for the sake of notoriety.
The motive of such man as Debs is
as low and wicked as that of the fa-
nous fool who fired the Ephesian
dome.
"Mr. Pullman and his company did
not fight the workingmen, but stopped |
the Improbable work. Here came
Debs, and demanded a string of i'm
possibilities. He knew he could not
force the opening of shops at loss
to openers, and he pushed the matter
of boycotting the Pullman caIs mere
ly to secure declaration of war ~,
all the roads using cars that were
made in shops by Union workmen at |
the standard scale. He knew the
railroad companies could not throw |
aside the cars he proposed to boycott,
for they had long contracts to use them
and more than that, they could not be
so base as to consent to servility and |
to put the travelling public to i'm
mense inconvenience. The purpose
of the boycott was the opening of a
railroad war, and the various labor
organizations were expected TO rush to
the rescue. 1t was shrewd calcula-
ton, that however little the working
men fancied the task, there were
enough idlers from choice, such ma
erial as make up the Coxey armies,
to personify labor and enter upon a
of disorder. The great majority
of the workingmen have no sympathy
with the riots. They are not Anarch-
lists nor Nihilists; but we have anar-
chial elements, and crowded into
4. l. 4. A.