The age-herald., 1899-05-27
KEEP ARMS AND
 REFUSE MONEY Gist of Resolution by Cuban
 Faction Called VETERANS OF INDEPENDENCE The Distribution Will Go On
 Nevertheless. WILL co < ICE THIS MORNING
 
 s9Y Arms Be Turned Over to the United States. z Y ST ." E OF THE LIGHTERMEN g
ST S E OF THE LIGHTERMEN
Is Rapidly Assuming Serious Propor- tions-Stevedores of Plant Line Have Joined Movement-Sym-
 pathize With Strikers

Havana, May 26.-The distribution of the $3,O00OOo which the United States govern ment has offered as a gratuity to the Gu ban troops on disbandment and surrender of their arms will begin tomorrow morn- ing.
 At a meeting of the Veterans of Indepen- dence last night, which was largely att tended, 1t was resolved to approve the de- csion of the army in the orient or eastern provinces, and to recommend the assem- ply in the occdent or western provinces to take the same course. A resolution de- claring against either giving up arms or accepting money from the United States was carried unanimously
 The strike of the lightermen, in the opin- ion of Admiral Cromwell captain of the port, and the principal shippers, Is fast as- suming serious proportions. Lawton Childs, agent of the Plant line, was noti- fled today that the stevedores in his com panys employ had joined the strike, giving as their only reason their sympathy with the others and the order of the trade union. He was also informed of the prob ability of 0 strike by the carters. If the latter go on a strike the cabmen will fol- low suit, which will mean a tremendous blow to the commerce of this city.
 The general opinion is that the strike is absolutely without justification. The men have been earning good wages. from $50 to sS0 per month. The difficulty involves also the importation of men from Florida, as happened five years ago. Trouble has been brewing for some time. but no one could explain the cause, as the lightermen have all along been the best paid body of men engaged in manual labor in Havana.
 Admiral Cromwell said he has been doing all in his power to avert the strike. At the very outset the terms of the strikers were accepted when all the employers raised the lightermen's wages, the increase being 26 per cent. a ton on the old figures. He believes the present discontent is due solely to agitators. In the beginning he pointed out to the strikers that the ex- orbitant terms exacted by the lightermen at Buenos Ayres completely plotted out their existence, as the merchants hired tugs, lowed the ships right to the city wharves and soon found no further use for lightermen. The same possibility. he tod them, existed In Havana harbor, where wharves could easily be built that would altogether do away with the dightermen. The issue of the strike is doubtful.
 Admiral Cromwell has received word that the respective trades unions intend to order out the masons plumbers and other work men, but he believes that the workmen of the United States would be astonished at the grounds offered for the present strike, and could not extend their sympathy. la his judgment Major-General Leonard Woods policy regarding the dock laborers' strike last October in Santiago is the lest in dealing with such problems, giving the strikers twenty-four hours in which to go to work, with the alternative of importa- tion from Jamaica of all the labor neces- sary. He recalls the fact that the Sam tiago strikers knowing that General Wood meant what he said, resumed work the next morning. "Such men," he says, 'are accustomed to the curb, and require rul- ing. They do not understand the free rein. Personally I have done all l could for them, and l consider that I am relieved of all responsibility"