The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1920-04-12
STRIKERS LOSE:
GROUND IN SOME
WESTERN CENTER
First Important Break Reported
at Columbus, Ohio
NEW YORK CITY HARD HIT
Commuters Suffer Inconvenience
Some Food and Milk Trains
Crawl in Hours Behind Time

Chicago April 12--Developments
west of Pittsburgh in the switchmen's
unauthorized strike are regarded to-
day as pointing toward dissolution
Of the insurgent forces, but in the
east the situation is assuming a more
serious aspect.
In the central and far west there
are numerous reports of defections
from the ranks Of the strikes, follow.
ed by the report of the first important
break at Columbus, o., where 600 men
voted to return TO work.
In the Chicago district in the neigh
borhood OF the steel centers thous-
and men are idle.
New York, April 12.-Commuters
were the hardest hit as the city enters
upon the fifth day of the local tieup
caused by the unauthorized railroad
strike. Gaps in the ranks of the
workers increase. Railroad officials
profess to see some ray of hope be-
cause some passenger service Is be-
ing maintained and food and milk
trains have managed to crawl into the
city.
The Chicago express on the Erie
railroad, abandoned at Por. Jarvis
yesterday, reached Jersey City this
morning ten hours late.
Boston, April 12.--There is cur.
tailment OF all traflice passenger,
freight and express on through lines
in New England because of the outlaw
strike.
Reports indicate that the efforts of
the strikes to obtain recruits In New
England have proved unayailing
Cleveland, Ohio, April ll.-New
York Central Railroad officials an
nounced tonight that 800 cars of west
bound general freight anG 200 cars of
eastbound foodstuffs had been handled
in the Collinwood switching yards to-
day by a force of a dozen regular
switchmen This is about one-fifth
the normal Sunday movement
All other Cleveland terminals were
reported tied up.
Blast furnaces and steel mills We're
laying off men today. Fires in three
of the four stacks at the central furn.
ace of the American Steel and Wire
company plant in Newburgh were
banked, throwing eleven hundred men
out of work, company officials said.
Samuel Gompers, president of the
American Federation Of Labor who
arrived here today to attend the con.
vention of the Cigarmakers' Internal
ional union, expects to confer with the
chiefs of the three transportation
brotherhoods tomorrow, he said, and
hopes to urge the striking switchmen
and yardmen to return to work.
Mr.. Gompers expressed confidence
that the strike soon would he ended
and declared he had no fear Of its eff
feet on the union labor movement
generally.
THE strike is a mistake he said
These men don't realize the millen-
mum cannot be made in day. Pro-
gress comes only by years OF perse.
verencc and labor.
w non tllNlA ulbNl 10 bNti Alt1 VIII
realize this and will return to work
and to their established organizations.
This strike has no real leadership and
no real plan"
OF his support of the railroad
brotherhoods and established union
leaders among railroad workers by
every practical means Mr.. Gompers
gave emphatic assurance.
"The full force of the American Fed
Grafton of Labor is behind them, he
said.
81 saw this trouble coming on he
continued. 81 testified at Washington
it would happen. 1t was inevitable. II
is the protest Of the men against the
effort to legislate away their rights.
"It is men like Senator Cummings
and Gov. Allen of Kansas who are to
blame for this situation with their
legislation to deny man the right
to quit work TO enforce a legitimate
claim or redress an injury.
ut isn't the brotherhood officials or
the union leaders, They have done all
they could at all times to hold their
men within bounds, but there are
times when human nature will assert
itself, This is one OF them"