The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1897-08-21
Asking All Who Oppose Govern
ment by Injunction
TO MEET IN ST. LOUIS
And Help Them Decide on What
Should Be Done.
Call is Endorsed by GOmpers
and Sovereign.

ence of organized labor to be held in ST.
Louis, August 80. The board TeJected
the proposition of the Pittsburg opera
tors for a conference to arbitrate the
wage dispute in that district, claiming
that such action would be prejudical TO
the interests of the miners at large.
The board is ready to consider over
lures for the arbitration of the issues OF
the great strike only when overtures
come from all the operators in the
competitive districts, which include
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, West Virginia
and Pennsylvania. The board has de-
cided not to deviate from the establish
ed policy until the result of the ST.
Louis conference is known.
The aggressive work in the field will
be continued and the efforts to spread
the strike in the West Virginia district
will be renewed. The success or fail
ure of the. strike hangs upon the result
been endorsed by Samuel Gompers,
president of the American Federation
of Labor and J. r. Sovereign, general
master workman of the knights of La
Dor. They maintain that the fight now
being waged by the miners is one OF
common interest to organized labor
throughout the country.
At the ST. Louis conference all LABOR
organizations will be asked to join is
sues with the miners. The failure to
secure a general suspension in West
Virginia has greatly interfered with
the prospects of success as the coal
supplied from that and the few isolated
districts is meeting the light demand
The only hope Of cutting off this sup
ply appears to lie in the refusal of or
ganized labor in the ordinary channels
of traffic and business to han.
die or use this coal. If the object of
the ST. Louis conference is accomplish,
ed the strike will be extended to nearly
every branch of labor in the country.
Following is the call for the confer
ence:
To organized labor, it's various divis-
ions and subdivisions, and to all re
! bodies, who condemn government py
| injunction and the use of force to CO.
cree the people and deprive them OF
| the rights as American citizens:
Columbus, O., Aug. 20, 1897
To the organized labor of the coun-
try, greeting:-The great miners strike
wages. A crisis in the affairs of the
nation has arrived in which all patriot
| ic people must determine whether they
will accept and consent to live under
the rule of an oligarchy of wealth, or
whether the institutions of free govern
| ment, the rights of free speech and
peacea BILE public aSSemblage are to be
preserved.
| The present struggle has assumed the
| form of a contest for the preservation
| of civil liberty and constitutional rights.
| The tyrannicaI and un-American in
| functions of the federal and state
| courts are revolutionary, against the
| principles OIL Tree government anu
| derogatory to the interests of the
| masses endangering the public peace
| and destroying the personal safety and
| individual liberties of the common peo-
| pie.
The courts have desecrated the tenn
| pie of justice, and now stand for the
| defiant bulwark of confederated capt.
| tai. Their arbitrary rulings have set
| up one standard of rights for the rich
| and another for the poor. They decree
| that capital is always right, as labor
l
| unlawful for starving working people
| to appeal against tyrannical treatment,
present grievances or propose just and
| peaceable terms for the redress of such
| wrongs. The present great miners
| strike is an expression of discomfort
| that originated in poverty and starva-
| ton. 1t was born in the sorrow and
| restitution of hungry women and chill
dren; it was the last protest of impov-
erished and enslaved labor, and it pre-
| sents to the world cause as righteous
| and humane as ever inspired the souls
| of Christian people. The philan-
| thropic heart of this great nation has
| responded in sympathy with the min
| ers' appeal for the right to receive a
respectable living for the most arduous
and hazardous labor in the world Their
| appeal for a small share of the wealth
| they create and for the right to enjoy
the fruits of advanced civilization finds
a responsive chord everywhere in the
| commonality of mankind. and if it were
| struggle between miners and mine
| operators, only, liberty would triumph
| over oppression, industry over greed,
| and right over wrong without the ne
| cessity of this call.
| But it is not a mere struggle be-
| tween employee and employer The ju-
| dietary has assumed the indefenSible
| claims of the operators and the strug-
gle is between tyrannical courts and
| the whole people. The courts although
| under oath to serve the rich and poor
alike. have volunteered to defend the
| Sordid interests of the rich as against
the God-gfven rights of the poor and
now threaten to turn the gatling guns
and the wincheSters of criminals and
thugs against all who dare to protest
against their despicable restraining or
| derS.
The judiciary is prostituted to the
bidding of oppressive capital. has
placed the rights of property above
| the rights of persons, and has discrim-
| mated against the many in the interest
of the few.
That $50, 900 miners should be con-
| demned to lives of drudgery and star
| walton by the arbitrary rulings of the
| courts is an insult to a beneficent Gre
| ator, outrage upon free govern
| ment, and a disgrace to the Christian
| civilization under which we live
The recent injunctions and their ex-
treme application against the lawful
| rights of the poor, the arrest and in
generation of hundreds of innocent,
inoffensive people, the general employ
| ment of armed thugs to overawe ha-
rass and coerce the miners, have so
exasperated people in localities where
ever applied that we feel that we can
not longer be responsible for the pub
| lie peace.
And to the end that a Just and equit-
able settlement of the differences be-
tween employers and employees may
be effected, the public peace. the liber-
| ty of the masses, the sacred institutions
| of free government preserved and the
. | REf0nnQ6 from these