The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1912-04-12
CARMEN VS..
G. N. RAILROAD
THE SHAME OF A GREAT
RAILWAY SYSTEM IN THE
"CROOKSTON" CASE-MIL-
LIONS FOR CHARITY BUT
NOT A CENT FOR JUSTICE
TO UNDERPAID EMPLOYEES.

| NO1 "A OGN FUN JUSIlCE
TO UNDERPAID EMPLOYEES.
Seven hundred and fifty thousand dol
lars for a library, to the city of st.
Paul, is what j. j. Hill has promised to
give. Just think of it, three quarters
of a million. The newspapers of the
land 90 into Mysteries and accalim J. j.
Hill a great public benefactor, and the
rank and file of we northwest people
add Amenl
This James J. Hill is the head of a
certain transcontinental railroad. to be
exact, the Great Northern railway.
Along the line of that road he employs
among others some 5000 carmen, men
employed in building and maintaining
freight and passenger ears.
The average wage paid to these EN-
ployes is $42.50 per month, a large
portion of these employees are paid not
more than $1.35 a day for ten hours
work. OF late these employees have been
organizing in the Brotherhood of Railway
Carmen of America, their object being
to raise the wages paid up somewhere
near the standard of the other roads in
the northwest, which average from $40
to $50 more per month.
James J. Hill has promised the city
of st. Paul $750,0OO and if he permits
these employees to continue along with
their plans he will not be able to make
good; for if these poor needy, hungry
wretches of carmen get at that pile
there won't be any left for the city of
st. Paul, so something must be done to
insure against such an accident.
Orders are issued to the district and
division officials that this money must
be saved from the rightful owners be-
cause Mr.. Hill has promised it to the
city of st, Paul and they are instructed
to call into their presence each individual
employe in the car department, ascertain
brotherhood (for these are the men who
want that $75O,OOO) and to all that
are members deliver the message from
he on high, that they must either cease
their affiliation with those who would
dare to even dream of asking that which
is rightly theirs, or leave the service of
the company.
Pinched down to exist on a mere pit
tance, these employees are threatened
that if they dare to resist the whim of
their Uncle Jim" or dare to assert their
rights as citizens to belong to any church
society or organization their conscience
dictates as right; if they dare to try
to be men, that mere pittance will be
taken from them and they and their
families may take their chances with
starvation. This is undisputably proven
in the evidence before the commissioner
of labor at Crookston MINI.
Having exhausted every honorable
means to secure an audience with the
general officials of the Great Northern
railway without result John II. Walters,
the deputy general president of the
Brotherhood of Railway Carmen, in a
final effort called into consultation w,
F. Houk. the commissioner of labor for
the state of Minnesota; f. G. Hall, pres
ident of the Minnesota State Federation
of Labor, and John D. Chubbuck of the
American Federation of Labor. These
gentlemen forced a conference with Gen
eral Manager Gruber of the Great North
ern, the only real result of which confer
ence was to get the Great Northern
flatly on record in the statements that
they intended to put organized labor out
Of existence on their lines.
These gentlemen returning from their
conference Immediately went into another
conference which resulted in action being
taken along a line never heretofore tried
by the employe-the demand was made
for rights under the state law, and
while the officials of the G. \. were
busily engaged in preparing to fill places
of strikers with Dagoes and Japs, NO
strike was planned. Instead officials
of the G. n were arrested on criminal
warrants charged with violating state
statutes.
Driven to the last ditch by this unex-
pected move, they forced these case:
up to the supreme court. In the mean
time the carmen are fighting a fight
that concerns every laboring man in th'
Northwest, and blazing their way owe
an unknown trail.