The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-08-14
FARLEY ISSUES
 LONG STATEMENT
SAYS MINERS UNION DOES NOT COUNTENANCE LAWLESSNESS AND URGES JUSTICE AND FAIR PLAY TOWARD MEN.

w. R. Fairley. Alabama member of the national executive board of the United Mine Workers of America, yesterday is- sued the following
 "An Appeal to the Public for Justice and
 Fair Play
 ''I, together with every officer of the United Mine Workers, unqualifiedly con- demn the atrocious and inhuman conduct of those who fired into the train near Blocton, murdering and maming some of the men on it; as also the dynamitlng at Acton, as well as any other violent or un- lawful conduct committed during this
 strike. Nearly all of those who are charged with any participation in this Blocton affair, as shown by the core spondence in the daily papers, are slavs and other foreigners, who were imported to that place by the Tennessee company as strike-breakers during the strike three years ago. We have at all times, and do now, beg and impiore all union miners to .desist and refrain from any violent or unlawful conduct. The peace and quiet of the community is more valuable to them and the state than the success of this strike or of anything. Humanity and good citizenship, as well as the good name and success of the miners organ ization, demand that this course be pur- sued and the officers of the Mine Work CTS intend at all hazards to pursue it.
 q feel that it is but just to the union miners that the public should be in formed at least to some extent about the unfortunate situation now existing, and to know that the miners are not responsi- ble for the murder and violence which has occurred They surely were not re- sponsible for the murder of one man and the shooting of three others by guards and deputies at Republic on July 16. That case has been investigated by a judicial officer of high character, Hon. I. H. Ben ners, one of the judges of the inferior court of Jefferson county, who sat for over a week, and after hearing all the evidence and argument of counsel, held six of the guards and deputy sheriffs to answer before the grand jury on a trial of murder. Union miners are not re- sponsible for the occurrence at Jefferson, read and paraded in some of the daily papers as the battle at Jefferson. The acting mayor of Cardiff who had juris- dction over the police, was at Jefferson at the time as a peace officer. He has made an affidavit that he was present, and that the miners did not fire a single shot. Sixteen of the union miners were arrested, charged with shooting into that train and with assault and battery with intent to kill and murder; they all ap- peared before the same judge, Hon. I. H. Benners, and were all discharged by him, not even a witness appearing against them They certainly were not respon- sible for the atrocious murder of the union miner who was put in a jail at Brighton on a bare suspision, taken from there dt night and hung and his body riddled with bullets. In this jail the of- ficers had no right to place this person. which ran from Birmingham to Besse- mer, and he should have been taken to one or the other of these places, and not left at the Brighton calaboose, intended only for the prisoners of the town, and at which number of guards and depu- ties of the Woodward Iron company made their headquarters at night.
 "Certainly the miners are not respon- sible for the outrages perpetrated on John Burros, white man, who was dragged from his bed at Vivian at night by deputies and guards. and in order to try to make him confess that he knew something of the dynamiting out there, was hung by his neck until his tongue and eyes protruded, his nose made to bleed, and when he was let down was more dead than alive.
 Nor are they responsible for hand cuffing white woman to a man in Walker county and carrying her, hand cuffed to the man, to the railroad sta tion, on the trivial charge of trespass after warning.
 Many other occurrences nearly, if not quite so bad as these mentioned. could be named, for which union min CTS cannot be held responsible. But these for the present will suffice. sixty-three cases growing out of this