The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-09-22
BLAMEs THE RAILROADS.
President Mitchell Issues an Open
Letter on the Strike.

IlAELIIO4N, sept -l-I e9iuSili
Mitchell of the United Mine Workers
Union gave out a long statement this
evening in the form of an open letter to
the public, in which he charges the Penn
sylvania Railroad Company, Delaware,
Lackawanna and Western Company, Gen.
trail Railroad Company of New Jersey,
Philadelphia and Reading, Erie Railroad,
| and New York, Susquehanna and Western
| Railroad Company, Delaware. Susque-
| hanna and Schuylkill Company, and New
York, Ontario and Western Railway Com
pany with being responsible for the fail
ure to effect settlement of the miners
| grievances. He says:
These nine railroad corporations. be-
sides producing approximately 72 per cent
i of the hard coal. are the sole carriers to
| tidewater of all coal mined in the an
thracite field of Pennsylvania, and for this
| service a charge from 40 to 6S per cent
per ton, according to the size of coal. is
made. AS Incredible as ii may seem, they
charge three times as much to carry a
ton of anthracite coal 100 miles as is
charged to carry a ton of bituminous coal
the same distance. So exorbitant are
| these rates that the legitimate profits that
should be credited to the mining depart
ments of these railroads, are absorbed by
freight rates, and, as a consequence, their
coal properties are made TO show very
small profit on their capitalization.
IF this is the state of affairs with the
railroad mining departments what is the
Tc
it not a matter of reason that he can do
nothing which his railroad master will not
commend Is il not matter .. public no.
toriety thai he does nothing Thich the
railroads do not sanction? Therefore,
whether or not individual operators see in
the railroad monopolies their great enc
mics, whether or not the. individual oper-
ators feel themselves free to make com
mon cause against these railroad sys-
tens, 1, speaking for 10000 min'
workers, this day on strike, recognize
these railroads as orr real enemies.
and name their presidents as the men
responsible for refusal to arbitrate or
even confer upon the differences which
have grown up not between them and the
i
men and their own employees who met in
convention in the city of Hazleton on Au-
gust II, framed -Iist,cf grievances, which
were mailed to the general superintend-
ents of the mining departments of these
railroads, accompanied by an invitation to
meet in joint convention on August q for
the purpose of discussing and if possible
agreeing upon such changes in the scale
of mining and conditions of employment as
were warranted by the conditions Of the
coal industry; but to our chagrin the COR
dial invitation extended was not even ac-
knowledged by those in charge of coal de-
partments."
Mr. Mitchell makes this proposition for
a settlement: Because ! am aware that
there is serious, if misguided, repugnance
or the part of railroad carriers to recog-
nize cur organization or its officers. the
miners organization, whose chief officer l
have the honor to be. yielding all natural
pride. l repeat what ! have publicly and
privately stated before thatI and my Of
fetal colleagues will not ask. TO. be recog-
nized or consulted by the mine owners. IL
railroad companies will DO what they hays
many times said they would do. meet COM
mittees OF their own employees and come
to peaceful agreement; provided, how
ever. that such conference between the
various companies and committees repre-,
senting their own employees will meet in
separate halls in the satae city and on the
same date. The provision is inserted be
cause heretofore. when committees pre-
sented grievances 10 any of these great
companies, they were invariably met with
the argument that the company could not
remedy the wrongs complained of. because
competing companies enforced conditions
of employment not more favorable to the
mine workers than their own.
by holding these separate conferences
simultaneously in one city there could le
an exchange OF opinion between all Of the
mine owners and miners whose interests
were at stake. thus removing the possi-
bility of the company being placed at
disadvantage by paying more for labor
than was exacted from their competitors.
Were they to act upon this idea. | firmly
believe that the railroad companies could
finally arrive at an agreement with their
employees and establish a relation and set
up a precedent which would make strikes
almcst impossible in the future.
such action on the part of nine great
railroads would. of course. deprive the
United Mine Workers of much of the
credit TO which they believe 1t to be justly
entitled. but We place far above any con-
sideration of Individual or organization
the question of what shall be for the good
of all the anthracite workers. their wives
,TgI ;,,4 hi