The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-03-13
RIOT MUST CEASE.
People of New Orleans Demand
Law and Order.
If the Officers Won't Enforce It
They Will.
ISSUE AN ADDRESS.
All Workmen of Any Color
Will Be Protected.
No RiOting Has Taken Place
Yet Today.

NEW ORLEANS, March 13-The bureau
of freight and transportation held spe-
cial meeting to discuss the troubles and
decided the local authorities having
failed to take steps to repress the law
lessness, to request the various CONNER
cial bodies to send delegates to a general
meeting, to take the necessary steps to
protect commerce, and the lives and
property of the citizens. The response
to the call was unanimous.
During the first session the de- bate was
heated and finally resulted in the adop-
ton of a resolution appealing to
the federal authorities for pro-
lection, and requesting the presI-
dent of the United States to
intervene in the interest of both law and
order, the governor of the state and the
local authorizes having unanimously
failed to meet the situation and preserve
the peace.
Later the decision to appeal to the
president was rescinded upon the receipt
of a telegram from Gov Foster stating
that he could reach the city during the
evening
Resolutions were introduced pledging
the various bodies to see that the labor
ing men were accorded ample protec
ton in any portion of the city at all
times.
AIthe latter session Gov. Foster made
a speech in the course OF which he said
the state troops had been ordered to re-
port at armories at O'Clock today in case
of emergency. The following addresses
were then adopted:
To the People of New Or leans:
The acts of lawless violence that have
been witnessed on the levee front during
the last twenty four hours, around which
wheel of events covering many months
which have seriously injured the fair
name of this city. call for the expression
of the merchants of-New Orleans.
! We have patiently stood an interfer-
ence from organized labor, which has
cost US and the city and the state many
| hundreds of thousands of dollars. With
our business drifting from us because
want of confidence elsewhere born of
labor troubles, of Interruptions, we have
quietly stood by hoping against hope
tnat we could by moral suasion and fair
offers bring about peaceful aud AMIGA
| BILE solution.
Every effort in this direction has
| failed and we find that, mistak-
| ing our forbearance for fear, an
armed mob has taken possession
of our wharves and landings. de-
termined to uphold minority who insist
that the merchants of New Orleans shall
! them.
1t is not question of wages nor COM
pensation, but simply and solely one of
whether the merchants of New Orleans
shall conduct their own business in their
| own way, or whether they shall be die
tated by handful of employees. We say
handful, as the men who insist on domi-
mating our business methods are two
thousand out of about $4,000 male adults
I @f - rh0 ho hovr
| and do insist that the means of subsist-
ence of $4,000 and their families shall be
stopped unless allowed to dictate.
| "It is useless to enter into details The
facts are too we'll known to every man
and woman and child to need recital.
The time has come when forbear-
ance has ceased to be q virtue.
we can no longer treat with men who
with arms in their hands are shooting
down an inoffensive people because they
| will not think and act with them.
''For these reasons we say to these peo-
! pie that cost what it may we are determ-
ined that the commerce of this city
must and shall be protected so that
| every man who desires to perform
honorable labor must and shall be per-
mitted to do so regardless of race, color
or previous condition; no man shall be
interfered with in the pursuance OF his
right of every employer to hire whom
he may choose, and they have their work
| performed in such manner as he may
| direct.
"We do not deny the right of the men
to combine for mutual protection, or to
stop work if they choose, but we
deny their right to prevent others from
working, and we warn these men who
have taken the law into their own hands
that the conditions they have brought
meet them amicably if they will return
to peaceful methods and accept work,
according to all mems equal rights. If
not they must stand aside and let others
work who will
The levee, the scene of yesterdays
rioting. presents a peaceful aspect this
morning. Where yesterdays crowds of
excited workmen, armed with all kinds
of weapons patrolled the river front,
nothing was to be seen this morning but
squads of policemen, discussing the af-
fair of yesterday and its probable out
come. The police did not wait until ac-
tual shooting began before they took ac-
ton. as was the case yesterday morning.
Every colored man whose business
calls him to the river front today, took a
day off and very sensibly kept at home.
The various agents who have up to yes
terday been working nogro screwmen,
told their men to remain away until they
were sent for.
At a meeting of the agents held last
night they decided that in view of the
I resent unsettled state of affairs it would
| be Bad policy TO attempt 10 work their
| coIored laborers They realize that the