The wageworker., 1910-03-19

The daily papers, notably those
served by the Scripps-McRae tele-
graph service, have been busy reiter
ating an old and exploded falsehood
concerning the American Railway
Union strike in 1894 Taking advan- |
tage of the interest in the threatened |
strike of the firemen and enginemen, |
the daily papers have sought to mini |
mize the danger by telling how the |
1894 strike was broken. In Chicago
dispatch to the Lincoln Evening News
Of March Is appeared the following:
"Mobs raided the yards and burned
cars and depots. The police in nearly
every instance were powerless and
national guardsmen took their places.
They, too, were impotent and rioting
was general in the middle west, but
most serious in Chicago, where thou
sands of persons, out of work follow
ing the worlds fair aided the strik-
ers. 1t was not until mail trains were
| interferred with that the federal gov
ernment intervened and from that mo-
ment the collapse of the strike was
+! certain.
The above quotation contains much
| that is untrue, and intimates a whole
lot more that is equally untrue. In
| the first place the strikers in Chicago
never delayed the mails for minute.
From the time that Debs called the
strike until Grover Cleveland sent the
troops to Cook county, there never
was minute that the mails could
not have been moved on time. But
| the federal authorities were not near
| ly so much interested in moving the
mails as they were in moving George
Pullmans cars. 1t was anything to
help out Pullman, and the excuse of
! protecting the mails was seized upon
! But if the str kers willingly pulled the
offered? 1t didn't take the big wigs
of the railroads long to figure it out,
and it took an equally short time to
find a federal judge to make the prop
er ruling upon which Grover Cleve-
land, then president, would violate the
constitution of the United States, rape
a sovereign state and use the regular
troops to beat workingmen into sub
mission The railroad attorneys set
up the claim that any train in which
mail car was coupled was mail
train, and thereupon every car in that
train became, in fact, a mail car
This being true, and the federal judge
said it was true, of course any striker
who refused to handle a Pullman car
interfered with the mails. 1t was
very simple thing, but at the same
time it was a travesty on justice
Just as soon as that judicial decision
was rendered Grover Cleveland or
dered the troops to Chicago, and OF
course the mail cars" in which pas
sengers bought sleeping berths began
to move. 1t was Abraham Lincoln
who was elected on platform de
nouncing the idea of sending govern
ment troops into a sovereign state
without first being requested SO to dc
by the state authorities. But Lincolr
1 was statesman who would be called
an anarchist" or labor agitator'
l in these days of 'tbig interests
The assertion that mobs ''raided
: the yards and burned cars and depots'
is not borne out by the facts. True
= lot of cars were burned, but thu
evidence points very strongly to thu
S fact that the railroad manager
4 switched every dilapidated car the!
S had to the Chicago yards and the1
gave the hint to deputy United States
+ marshals and others that if those car
were burned it would not only be cas-.
\ to get government troops, but to col
t lect heavy damages from Cook county
v The Illinois law makes a county re
f sponsible for damages done by mob
that can not be controlled by th'
- county authorities. There is plent.
= of evidence on hand to show that bo'
cars were ignited by men wearin'
e the badges of deputy United State
e marshals. If the mobs burned cars AM
s depots, as alleged, why is it that tn
railroads never tried to collect dam
z, ages from Cock county? After retlr
t ing from his second term Grove
e Cleveland wrote for McClure's Maga
zine a story of the A. R. U. strike
e Eugene v. Debs proved by the record
7, of the courts, by the reports OF Cleve
e lands own committee of investigation
n by the public prints and by the cor
respondence. that Grover Cleveland
a failed m'serably in confining himsel
to the truth and the facts. McClur'
a printed the Debs article. but 1t In
# sisted on censoring it. If you wan
s to know the real facts about the A. r
J.. TT s+,.;ko ~ 1RqA do not relv on tn