The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1916-10-20
Samuel GOmpers'
Address.
Before the Convention Of the
Steam and Operating En-
gineGrS, Newark, N. ].
Continued from last week.

The law was enacted in 1890 and |
within year or two it was inter
preted by the courts to mean that
its provisions affected tha workers.
According to their Interpretation
the working men and working
women who have no interests to
manipulate, who do not control in.
dustry, who do not own anything
on earth but their power to labor,
and that the association of men,
two or more, for the purpose of in
creasing wages, shortening hours
of labor, securing improved work
ing conditions, that such workers
and associations doing what | have
indicated were a trust, an illegal |
association in restraint of trade. +!
In other words, that you and ! and
all of us were trust magnates and
that we were liable to the civil and
criminal provisions Of the Sherman
Anti Trust Laws; that our associa-
tions and unions conld be dissolved
as they were trusts; that we could
be sued, brought into court and
made to defend ourselves against
civil suits such as the Hatters' case
where the aged men in that indus
try were mulcted out OF more than
$500, 600. In that case their little
cash accounts in the banks, pro-
vided TO care for them in their old
age, were taken, and their little
homes, in which many of them
were born, were taken away from
them In other words, law made
to protect the people was made to
effect that criminal, vile purpose.
The miners were sued for mil
lion dollars. The women were sued
for fifty thousand dollars in the
Philadelphia shirt waist workers
strike The longshoremen were
indicted in Jacksonville, Fla The
men in the labor movementin in New
Orleans were brought into court by
Injunction because they undertook
to help the longshoremen against
the effort on the part Of the com
panies to reduce wages. | haven't
the time to recount the very many
instances of the application of the
Sherman Anti Trust Law to tae
voluntary associations of the work
ers; nor need ! say to you men how
the wonderfully protective and
bene6cent writ Of injunction was
perverted in way that meant the
taking away of the fundamental,
inherent and constitutional rights
of American citizenship, the right
Of free assemblage, The right OF
free press.
want also TO refer to the con
tempt proceedings under these in
functions, where the Judge became
the plaintiff, the judge, the jury
and the executioner. Need | call
attention to the number Of men
and women who were cited in the
courts for alleged violation of the
terms of injunctions when all they
had done was to exercise their
right of free speech and free press
Some Of them were fined, some inn
prisoned some OF them were sen
fenced to imprisonment You re-
member the case in which three Of
hcers Of the American Federation
of Labor were selected as the vic
Tins in one of these injunction and
contempt cases, John Mitchell
Frank Morrison and myself. What
had we done
We were in dispute with an EN-
ployer whom we regarded as an
tagonistic and who had TN lertaken
to do all he could todestroy our ef
fort to associate and improve oul
conditions We declared that te
the world. Then came the injunc
tion in which we were all forbidden
to discuss his fact that we were il
dispute with this company, that i
was unfair to organized labor, tba
1t was autagonistic to labor, 'ha
it ought not to be patronized, o
to speak of il in any way in which
the interests of that company yer,
involved. We are going to fgh
that case before the courts. w
were going 10 ask legislation
What were we to do except appea
to our fellow workers and fellow
citizens, and we did it. Your as
s1ciation through its rank and fiji