The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-09-04
Immigration Commissioner VII
 Have te RetraCt Views
HE ONCE CONDEMNED TAFT I
Mr. Sargent In 1893 Wrote a Severe Article Against Taft's Injunction Methods and Now He Must
 Swallow His Words.
By THOMAS J. PoNco.

Chicago, September 3.-(Special )-An- nouncement has been made that Frank P. Sargent, commissioner of immigration, will take the stump for Judge Taft, and that the republican campaign managers expect the former chief of the Brother hood of Locomotive Fireman to be their star campaigner with the labor voters.
 When MT. Sargent takes the stump for MT. Taft he will doubtless be confronted with an article that he contributed to the North American Review of May, 1893, in which he severely arraigned Judge Taft and scored the original labor injunction issued by him. The democratic campaign textbook, which is soon to be issued, de- votes chapter to what MT. Sargent real ly thought of the action of Judge Taft in 1893, and what every railroad man who opposes government injunction thinks of him today
 In his article in the North American Re- view MT. Sargent, who was at that time working for the interests of the laboring men ia his capacity as chief of the Broth erhood of Locomotive Bremen, said in part:
 "The strike on the Toledo, Ann Arbor and North Michigan railroad had no ex- traordinary features, but the interference of the United States judges has given it national prominence, and if the dictum of those judges is to stand as the law, the dearest rights of the citizens are swept away and an autocracy is established. This view of the situation is not strained, but is strictly in consonance with the avowals of the press through the coun- try. The questions of law involved are fundamental and are commanding, as they should command, the best thought of the nation It has hitherto been conceded that railroad employees possessed all the rights as citizens which attached to the employers, that is to say that If the em- ployers possessed the right to discharge employees, when 1t pleased them to ex- ercise such authority, the employees also possessed the right, unchallenged, to quit work when they elected to exercise that right. If a judge of the United States court may abolish this right of an em- ploye, he remands him, unequivocally, to a servitude as degrading as the spartans imposed upon their helots, and it is this phase or the SIflke WHICH ndS dIOuSeo such intense concern and alarm.
 Tt will not be expected that I should enter upon a discussion of the legal points involved; at best 1 can only voice the sen- timents of a body of law-abiding men who have been trained by their organization to respect laws and decisions of courts, and who find themselves suddenly re- +o tha If nv 10 decision of a United States judge. The learned judge (referring to Judge TafD in his decision. finds 1t convenient to omit all reference to the duties of railroad magnates and devotes all his attention to employees intimating to them that, having sought employment upon Railroads they have become, by some legal hocus-pocus, part of it's machinery to remain during the pleasure of their employer.
 For myself. 1 do not regret that a United States judge has forced upon pub lie attention questions of such acknowl- edged gravity The time has come for workingmen to know if they have rights, which the courts are bound to respect or if these rights may be at any time ab- rogated to meet the demands of corpora tions or the combined capitalistic power. The United States judge at Toledo has started the controversy, and l desire to have 1t proceed until the unquestioned rights of railroad employees, if rights they have, are established as also the rights of their employers.
 Such is the new-fangled logic relied upon to reduce railroad trainmen to ma chimes, to do the bidding of masters with authority conferred by a United States judge. In at least one notable instance. a United States judge has shown his utter contempt for sovereign state and the laws made in conformity with the constitution, and has sent county officials to prison because they would not disre- gard their oaths and obey his mandates and 1t will readily be conceded, If such a high-handed outrage can be perpetrated and the judge remain unimpeached, that a judge may, with equal impunity, sub ject railroads to autocratic indignities. Such acts on the part of the judges may lead a movement to define the limits Of judicial power, since, if it is far-reaching as I have indicated, the demand to know the worst will grow in emphasis until the worst is known, and the present Is as favorable a period as will ever occur in the history of workingmen or of the country for adjustments and re-adjust- ments."
 Concluding his caustic criticism of Judge Taft, Mr. Sargent said: "The court with an iron grip holds freemen in bondage, and the victims are as powerless as when, under another combination of power, men were sold at the auction block
 Commenting upon MT. Sargent's arraign- ment of Judge Taft, the democratic cam paign textbook says:
 MT. Sargent is now commissioner of immigration. It has been published that he will favor the election of MT. Taft If Officeholder Sargent advces labor men to vote for the Father of Injunction in labor disputes in 190S the men who labor and do not hold office with Taft will appeal from Sars ent, the officeholder in 1908, to Sargent the grand master of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Bremen in 1883"