The Mena weekly star., 1909-07-22
TQ SETTLE STRIKES
A NEW METHOD TO BE TRIED BY PlTTsHuRe PUBLIC DEFENsE
 ASSOCIATION,
AID OF THE COURTS IS SOUGHT
Petitioners Would Have Court Exam. Inc Into Merits of Dispute and In Meantime EnJoln Both Sides From Committing Wrongful Acts.

Pittsburg, Pa, July 20.-The turmoil and excitement and general sense oi imminent riot and uprising which have pervaded MeKees Rocks and the immediate vicinity of the plant of the Pressed Steel Car company, last week. has given way to unbroken quiet.
 On both sides there seemed to be a feeling that truce had been declared and that if resort was had to violence 1t would only be after failure of the attempt to the public defense associa- tion, to compeli arbitration.
 The move of the association, a non partisian civic organization, formed to further public interests by invoking action by the courts. Is believed to be unique in the annals of labor disputes. The association seeks to enjoin the strikers from trespassing upon, dam- aging or destroying the property of the company and to enjoin the com pany from dischargIng the striking employees or from importing strike breakers to take their places.
 The ground taken by the association is that inasmuch as the entire expense of the strike Is being borne by the tax payers they should have some say as to whether or not the strike continue day or year. The law of the state Is such that In the event of the plant of the Pressed Steel Car company being dynamited or destroy. ed by fire or seriously damaged by the strikers the loss would fall neither on the company nor on the strikers. but on the county which would have to reimburse the company for what ever damage 1t had suffered.
 At the time of the Pennsylvania railroad strike in 1877 the county, un- der this law. was compelled to pay strike losses aggregating s21,000,000 The proceedings are in the nature of taxpayers suit. the petitions praying the court to look into the mer- it's of the dispute and to decide wheth- CT the interests of the county are not being endangered by It's continu- ance. Pending a decision on that point the court is asked to prohibit practices likely to incite violence. | The suspension of all hostilities by | the strikers has caused a marked change of sentiment in their favor and public opinion now looks upon the simultaneous marching out of nearly 6,000 men not bound together by any labor organization or union, as signi- fioant of the existence of conditions that had become intolerable.
 The chief grievance of the strikers is not the smallness of the rate per hour, but the lack of fixed hourly rate A wage system which permits of an elastic computation such as the | pooling" system and which is alto gether incomprehensible 10 the Hun garians. Poles, Italians or Slavs who constitute four-flfths of the personnel of the mills, Is looked upon with sus- picion by all the workmen. Un- der the present system the men can not question the correctness of the aggregate sums which are paid them every other week and which are com puted according to the volume of piece work turned out They know, how. ever, that they have worked so many hours and that the amount paid them not infrequently represents pay at the rate of 50 or 60 cents day.