The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-05-17
.RiOting Follows Attempt to Run Cars of Cleveland Street
 Railway Lines
ATTEMPT ID GET STRIKE
 SETTLED BY ARBITRATION
Mayor Tom Johnson Says the Strike Is All Foolishness, While the Peo- pie Are Urged To Protect
 Their Own Cars.

Cleveland. May 16-In the midst of a day of ineipient rioting. some bloodshed, general disorder, inconvenience to the car riring public, and partial stopping of the street railway service incident to
 the strike of the conductors and motormen
 of the Municipal Traction company,
 came proposition tonight to stop further violence and submit the whole matter to arbitration. This was the situation tonight, created by Joseph Bishop. mem Der of the state board of arbitration. MT. Bishop arrived here during the aft
 ernoon and immediately went into con
 ference with Vice President Adolph Beh-
 ner of the Amalgamated Association of Street and Electric Railway Employees He proposed that overtures be made to the company looking to a peaceful settle ment of the controversy. MT Behner was appar ently willing to enter into such negotiations. MT. Bishop called upon Pres l ident Dupont of the Municipal Traction company. The traction head said the com pany was willing to arbitrate, but that 1 the proposition should come from the union.
 1 With the union unwilling to take the initiative, the matter of a peaceful set tlement still is an open question. All
 night MT. Bishop labored with the head l of the union and with the head of the 1 traction company.
 1 In the meantime disorder continued. 1 The night was made eventful as a re-
 suit of the company resembling an order 1 made during the day. It was first pro- | posed to Stor, all rs at darL and ,,,,i,., | no further attempts to operate until to- l morrow morning. Late today the com 1 pany decided to continue the service.
 l Much Rioting.
 From the moment the strike went into
 effect, early this morning, there was more l or less roting. At first the men who | remained at work were appealed to by the 1 strikers to leave the cars. When they | refused to strike or quit work efforts l were made by the union men and sym 1 pathizers to force them to leave the cars l This resulted in the conductors and mo- l tormen being forcibly taken from the
 cars. Cars were stopped by the placing l of Instructions upon the tracks Trolley wires were cut, tracks were ripped up and l switch points broken One of the ariest l disturbances occurred at the Lakeview car barns, when one car attempted to leave. A mob surrounded the crew. The l l Stones and clubs were hurled. The of | ficers used their maces. Chief of Po- l lice koehler was struck by a stone, but l not seriously injured. At noon Mayor
 Johnson issued a proclamation warning all persons that disturbances would not l be tolerated and that disorder would be
 met with force adequate to suppress it. | Motorman John Dubler was beaten into inconsistencies late tonight and left 1 lying upon the street He is thought to 1 have been fatally injured. Many others were roughly handled but their wounds
 are not considered serious
 1 ''All we wanted st the hands of the Municipal Traction company" said Vice l President Behner, was a square deal.
 We gave the company days and days to
 settle or arbitrate. All we got was prom
 ises, and not a promise was kept"
 Ready To Arhitrate. 1 President Dupont of the Municipal Trac- 1 ton company said: We have been ready 1 from the beginning to arbitrate all differ ences between the employees and the coln- l pany. The offer of arbitration came from
 the union and we accepted it. We ln- 1 tended to carry it out in the utmost good l faith.'
 i Mayor Tom l.. Johnson said the strike i was all foolishness and a great wasts
 and that he hopped to bring it to close i speedily.
 While the general car service was seri- l ously crlpI ,ed during the early hours if l the strike the company made headway 1 In restoring schedules. Tonight fully .5
 per cent of the normal service was main | tained. Some of the lines were running l full Others were not running at all 1 President Dupont said he expected to be | ble to have normal condition through
 out the city restored not later than next i Monday.
 1 Late in the day the company posted | the following notice in its cars: l Notice to the Public-These cars be- 1 long to you. You should protect themr | To give the men who worked all pos l sible protection heavy wire screens were 1 placed In front of the cars to shield the motormen from stones and clubs. A 1 policemen rode upon each car. The police claim to be able to handle l the situation. There has been no talk of | asking for military protection. The fun eral and mail cars were not interfered with by the strikers. The suburban cars
 were allowed to run in the city, except ] in cases where the trolley wire had been cut to obstruct city cars, which necessarily l interferred with the big suburban cars. l nnnn | HInr nr TIur nanas 7nasr