The San Francisco call., 1907-02-27

May 1 they will present their request
for the fiat raise they seek, and In the
event of it not being granted they Will
simply quit.
In the award the writer rehearses the
arguments put forward by the company
for the ten-hour day and then goes on
to say that the board does not leel
that it is qualified to formulate an
eight-hour time table, and that as put
two months remain of the present con-
tract confusion only could result from
an award Of an eight-hour day IL is
also asserted that it would now be I'M
possible to give the men the eight hours
they sought for the six months con-
sumed during the dilatory progress OF
the arbitration. Time has decloed ina.
against the men and for that reason no
change will be made.
In the matter of the overcrowdlng
of the cars and the extra work IoIcea
upon the men since the fire, the award
takes the same view put forward by
Statistician Hibbs, who test11ed that
the overcrowding of the cars was only
apparent and not real The majority
opinion holds that the only INES tnal
have been appreciably oVercroWueo
have been the Fillmore street ana the
Fillmore street hill lines. The evil
dence put in by the men showed that
being transported as before the nre In
half the number of ears. The pop
ular impression seems to be in &C
cordance with those figures rather
than with the testimony of Hibbs,
which is adopted by the two majority
arbitrators
From this point the opinion goes
on to say that the additional work
forced upon the men was not great
fa~ fr1- 1-p1
ject of complaint.
Going somewhat outside its loglcal
purview, the opinion states that the
United Railroads has done everything
in its power to effect speedy re-
Mobilization of its lines. The earth
quake and fire, 1t holds, was an act
of Cod for which the United Rail-
roads cannot be held accountable, and
that subsequently the company had
done everything In its power to re-
sumo it's service on the various lines
The wages of the carmen, as pub
Iished in The Call previously, are
raised to 81. 80 and 33 cents an hour,
according to the number of years they
have been in the employ of the COM
pany. This is an increase of about
20 per cent
In the case of the other unions in
volved, not only is a raise in wages
accorded, but the eight-hour day is
awarded in nearly every case. This
makes a raise in some instances of
as much as so per cent in the pay of
the men as reekoned by the hour.
These large raises. however, apply to
a comparatively small number of men,
while the small advance allowed the
carmen effects more than 1000.
The secretary of the union reports
that hundred platform men have
turned in their badges recently and
left the employ of the company, and
he says that several hundred others
will follow when the award is formal
iy published Some of these men will
have from $50 to SIS bonus coming
to them from the increase, which is
made to date from the time of the
appointment of the arbitration board
in September. This fund will give
them an opportLn to seek employ
ment in other and more remunerative
lines of work.
The majority members of the board
are known to be apprehensive of the
effect of Father Yorke's minority
opinion, which is -said to be written
in no uncertain style and to bring out
the claims OF the carmen as clearly
as the majority opinion recites. the
position of the company. 1t will be
read at the meeting to be held this
morning, and there is slight possi-
biiity that even yet some more favor
able compromise may be reached.