The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1903-05-08
THE MEN AND THE RAILROAD.

1900 800 1890
Employees with the Great Northern.
From Grand Forks Daily Herald,
Wednesday morning. April 29th. 1903,
editorial column
The Matter Of Strikes.
To strike or not to strike seems to
be the question to be decided by the
Great Northern trainmen. 1t is con-
coded that this is the matter on which
a vote is now being taken all over the
system, and the result will be awaited
with not a little interest throughout
the Northwest.
The particular matter of disagree
ment at this time is the compensation
to be paid trainmen for work on dou-
b~le-header trains. After a long con-
ference, in which all the subjects III
controversy were thoroughly gone
over, agreement was reached ON every
point except this, and on this both
the committees representing the en-
ployes and the general manager of
the road remained firm. The con-
ference was therefore broken off, and
the men are now voting OIL whether
they will accept the situation as it
now is or not. =
General Manager Ward has issued
a pamphlet in which, the proceedings
at the conference are reported, and
the summary of the contents of that
pamphlet SO far as they apply to the
question at issue is given in another
column. Still more briefly stated the
controversy resolves itself into this:
The trainmen claim that The cons
pany, by running trains with two en-
igines. and only one train crew., is; inn
posing work on the single train crew
that; would ordinarily be performed
by two, with a proportionate increase
Of responsibility. The idea seems to
be that any train too heavy for one
engine is too heavy for one train
crew. They demand, therefore, either
hat the: practice of double-heading
shall be discontinued or that the train
rews employed on this work shall re-
ceive double pay.
The company claims that there is
practically no double-heading done on
the rQads except on the mountain di-
Visions, whereaan~additional engine is
sometimes employedz~to help heavy
trains over the steep grades: anad$that
the company il expendingS@largn sums
of money, to avoid even this. Mr..
Ward admits that the men. have a
right to "a VOICE <in> the decision ~of
questions affecting. their: comfort,
wages, and conditions. of work, but
denies that any of these elements
enter into the, question of double
heading on@thei Great NorthernSroad:
He says that the company cannot per-
NIT the employees to dictate as to the
makeup of trains, as that is solely an
administrative matter. !: = -. ~" +" -. -
AS; in all questions Of this kind,
there is::a third, party which Sis in,
:! tehsely interested iii the question, the
general public. The public is inter-
ested primarily in the regular run
| ming of trains, that business may be
| carried on with the least possible de-
lay and Inconvenience. For that rea-
son The public..is always injured by a
strike. At the same. time the public
is interested in the fair compensation
| of all who serve it, whether as owners
of railroads or as employees thereon.
A strike is an act of war. War is
sometimes justifiable. There are times
when it is the only means left for the
prevention of abuse or the accom-
plishment of reforms. But for a war
to be justifable there must be an ade-
quate' cause It would be inexcusable
for nations to appeal to force for the
settlement of a trivial question.
Similarly the precipitation of a strike
without sufficient cause would MOI. be
viewed patiently bysTthe#great ship
ping andztraveling public which must
suffer the. inconvenienceseand eventu-
ally pay the bills. In the. present
case there does not appear to besany-
thing of real value to either Of the
parties involved smt.the controversy.
II does not appear that the question
is, Of. sufficient Importance to warrant
resort to extreme measures.