The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1902-03-08
AN UNJUST JUDGE
PLAYS IMPORTANT PART IN THE
HISTORY OF THE WORLD.
judge Smith of Cincinnati Comes in
for a Pretty Severe Roast from
the Chronicle-It Compares Judi
cial Decisions With Those of Old.
to Form a DespOtism in America.

The unjust judge has played a prom
inent part in the history of the world.
Whenever indignant peoples were
about to abolish q tyranny the unjust
judge has threatened them with pris-
ons and scaffolds.: The unjust judge
has always propped the falling wrongs.
In the old days of Rome, the unjust
judge declared the virgin, Virginia, a
slave. In the seventeenth century, in
England, the unjust judge helped on
the civil broils in which King Charles
lost his head. The unjust Judge with
his Dred Scitt decisions hurried our
own country into civil war that cost
million lives.
And, in our own country, in the
present day, the unjust judge Is laying
a deep foundation for future woe.
His name is legion.
His weapon is injunction.
He cares nothing for human rights.
He laughs at constitutions.
He breaks laws and regulations and
customs that have protected mankind
from the caprice of his masters-the
actors behind the scenes who pull the
string and make him jump.
He makes laws.
He interprets them.
He enforces them.
He usurps the powers of the whole
government and establishes a despot-
ism in which his superiors are the su-
preme lords.
His superiors are the trusts.
At their bidding he threatens Amer
ican citizens with imprisonment for
talking. Persuasion is misdemeanor!
Argument is a. crime! To tell the truth
is felony. Absolutely so.
Judge Smith menaces carriage work.
ers with Imprisonment If they tell the
| men imported by the manufacturers
that the latter broke their contract,
| that wages are low, conditions hard,
and that the only hope Of the working
class is to stand as one man in the
struggle for human rights.
OF course, if the carriage workers
| told falsehood-if they uttered the
lie, that employers were fair, that
wages were high, conditions good, and
! that the unions should disband, every
| man for himself and the devil take the
hindmost. Judge Smith would never
enjoip them from sessel.cisi1ag that sort
of persuasfon: - fss@t fs@t ssa Y
Oh, no! He would exclaim: 'Per-
| fectly proper! You are within your
| rights as American citizens"
| In other words, these wronged men
have the right to lie, but they will be
jailed if they tell the truth.
Judge Smith says he will Jail them
if they attempt to explain to those i'm
ported to take their places, the true
condition of affairs.
He will make convicts of honorable
men. He will lop away the heads Of
homes. He will Jail husbands. He
will imprison fathers. He will leove
wives and children defenseless and
tbradlss, bcaus their defenders and
bread winners dare to assume they
| have the right to tell the truth.
How does Judge Smith defend his
position?
Why, the telling Of the truth to cer-
| tain deceived Workmen may in the end
! force the bosses to grant better condi-
tions. These better conditions would
put more clothing and bread and
| warmth and light into American
homes. Judge Smith does not consider
| the latter point-does not weigh it at
| all. He listens only to the organized
| employers who tell him that business
| will suffer unless conditions more near
| ly resembling those of China prevail,
so at their bidding he issuss the in
! junction.
The appearance Of the unjust Judge
has always marked the decadence Of
certain systems.
Appius Cladius, Strafford, Jeffries,
Taney-all the unjust judges Of the
past-open wide their arms to embrace
the latest accession to their ranks.
But humanity pauses not. In spite
Of the unjust Judges it sweeps onward
and upward
So let Judge Smith enforce his out
rageous decision. Let him imprison
the heroes of labor. Let him Jail
American citizens because they refuse
to be slaves. Let him use power of
his self-made law to destroy the Amer
ican home.
In his madness the tyrant has al
ways made a wider way for liberty
Cincinnati (O.) Chronicle.
ELECTRICAL WORKERS.