The San Francisco call., 1899-03-26
EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW.

THE Arena for March contains an able article
upon the plan of blacklisting adopted by rail
L road corporations and prominently mentions a
case recently decided by the Supreme Court OF the
United States, in which the word liberty as used
in the fourteenth amendment to the constitution was
construed to include the right livelihood by
following any legal calling. 1t also fully refers to a
case lately tried Chicago in which former employe
of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway Company
had verdict against that corporation for $26 $50 49,
of which $3.50 was for actual and $1o,8I6 80 for
cmpary or punitive damages, because during the
strike OF the American Railroad Union in 1894 the
plaintiff freight conductor, had quit work and was
afterward discharged from the employment of the
Chicago Great Western through an agreement that
no striker should be employed unless he obtained
what is called Clearance" that is the written
sent of the corporation the, service OF which he had
abandoned
1t is satisfactory to note that on the question OF
blacklisting as in other directions, there is
prospect of a returnto equality before thelaw Here
toore there has been decided Inconsistency in the
judgments of the courts upon controversies identical
in principle but affecting different interests differ
ent classes of persons. On behalf OF Chinese laun
dryman, deprived by invalid municipal order of
the opportunity follow his vocation the late Judge
Lorenzo Sawyer of the United States Circuit Court
delivered an eloquent vindication OF the divine in
junction that in the of his face should eat
bread But when the Musse Slough settlers formed
an association to protect themselves against the
Southern Pacific Railroad Company, which, by vir-
tue OF a local track from Goshen to Huron that hap
pered to be on the line which the Southern Pacific
railroad ought to have been constructed claimed
their farms under the grant from the United States it
required fearless jury to acqut them OF charge OF
conspiracy to which very severe penalties were at
tached When the great strike of the American Rail
way Union occurred that combination to parayze the
railroad business OF the country, which produced
much violence and caused severe commercial and
financial arrangement, justly held to be illegal,
and for the protection OF property and OF good or
der injunction after injunction was issued and en-
forced But for years the equally Objectionable al
lance between the railroads to drive their former
ployes to pauperism crime by deprving them OF
employment unless they secured the written consent
of the corporations they had formerly served,
permitted to stand without question.
1t is idle to talk of equality before the law
birthrght of American citizens protected by the Fed
era constitution when the fact is declared legal
in one case and illegal in another, when railroad
combination to oppress labor is sustained and labor
combination to assail capital is destroyed There is
but one law in the United States for ALL and every in
dication that inequalities in its administration
being rectihed is an additional evidence OF the suffi-
cheney of our institutions.