Waterbury Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury [Connecticut]) 1900-1903, 1902-08-07
GrieYc, BiSSet 4 Holland
AND COAL STRIKERS

.f
The Hon Mark Hanna. in the opin-
ion of the operators of the anrnraclte
coal mines of Pennsylvania, is about
the smoothest citizen OF the Unlteu
States. He is largely engaged ln the
business of mining bituminous coal,
which has been greatly benefited by the
strike of the workman in the hard coal
mines. and he is also on very intimate
terms with Mr. John Mitchell the head
man in the Mine Workers Union The
hard coal men seem TO think that III
using his influence against the suspen-
sion of work in the soft coal mines,
Mr. Mitchell was merely doing the
handsome thing to his friend, Mr. Han
ma There was strike two years ago,
during the Presidential campaign One
of the mine superintendent tells what
happened:
Two years ago. in Presidential
campaign, there was a strike Through,
Mark Hanna's influence with Wall
street.-the said that unless it was set
tied before election BRYAN would de-
feat McKinley-the owners and opera
tors gave in, and made a fat 10 per
cent advance in wages Two years ago
the superintendent of the mines, who
had the duty of managing the men,
feared to have concessions made to the
union The presidents. under pressure
from Wall street. overruled them,
ssand," as they now put it. I'VE had TO
eat crow The result was demorallz-
ing: there were hundred strikes a
year At the end of the first year finan-
cial reasons made it undesirable to
have trouble with the union; but this
spring the discipline had become so
broken. control of the labor in the
mines had gone so far out of our hands,
that we could not renew dealings with
the union which had put us in such un-
ending difficulty You are not my
boss men would saw: John Mitchell
of Indianapolis is my boss When the
strike came we said to the presidents:
Here's strike again. What do you
want done with it? And they deter
mined not to interfere. Politics, they
said, shall not have ANYTHING more to
| do with our mines; thew are two diff
| ferent businesses.
1t is interesting to learn that the
anthracite coal operators think that
Boss Quay in Pennsylvania had quite
| as much to do with bringing on the
strike in the anthracite mines as Mr.
| Hanna had to do with preventing the
strike from extending to the soft coal
mines. Both of these eminent politi-
| cal bosses are alleged to be profting
finely by the result So much by way
| of introduction to the following which
appears in to-day's dispatches from
Cleveland:
The seven or eight hundred EN-
ployees of the Cleveland City Railway
| Company, of which Senator FL. A. Han
ma is president, net last night and pre-
scented Senator Hanna with valuable
cane Senator Hanna expressed his
sincere thanks to his employees for
/ their gift, and incidentally spoke of the
relations that he hopes TO see soon to
exist between capital and labor. Con-
corning the anthracite strike, Senator
Hanna said: when the great an
/ thracite strike was threatening our
federation worked hard for weeks to
avert ito bring men and employees
together, but failed. After it was on
we worked hard to settle it, but failed.
i However, in that matter it is my per-
sonal satisfaction to know that the
i statement that I made at that time,
that the men would not go back on
their word, has been kept, and that a
sympathetic strike has been averted
/ told the federation that there would
4 be no sympathetic strike among the
bituminous miners"
4 Butter will scarcely melt in this good
4 mans mouth, but he is not losing a
cent by the continuance of the anthra-
cite coal strike. Nor is this good
friend, the Hon NJ. s. Quay.-Hartford
Times.