The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1921-10-26

'Let it Gomez" Wouldn't you rather
try to help to avoid a nationwide
calamity? Won't you admit that the
majority of the press of the country
is not on the public's side, but are
the paid tools of the profiteer capital
ist. Not preaching and publishing
what they honestly think and believe,
but what they are paid for? We rail-
road men are law abiding and l will
prove it. Have we broken or disobey-
ed any law when we use the only
weapon that we have-the strike?
Who first violated and defied the
United States labor board? Was it
the wage earners? Emphatically no.
You only have to go back a few
months to see where the A, B. & A.
and the M. & N. A. defed and set
aside the boards ruling. Did the press
censure these roads for their viola
tions? They did not. With few ex-
ceptions they were praised for their
unfair actions. The press likes to
harp on the war time wage. Along
this line / wish to say, there is no
war time wage in effect. The employees
were given slight increase in wages
in 1917, the first they had received
since 1913. Then very nearly two
years after the end of the war they
were given an increase by the labor
board. This was in July, 1920, retro
active to May 1st, 1920, and amounted
to an increase of 81 per day.
In 1917 w. G. McAdoo appealed to
the patriotism of the railroad work
ers to lay aside their differences and
grievances and put forth every effort
to win the war and we responded to
man. We did this while all other
classes of labor were given increases.
We were not slackers. When the
unions were called on for ten locomo-
tive engineers to man tanks, saying
they wanted men who were ready to
almost commit suicide, instead of the
ten asked for. there was response
from over four hundred experienced
locomotive engineers. When the con-
ductors were asked to furnish men ex-
perienced in yard and road service for
immediate duty in France, ten men
were asked for and hundred respond
ed, and was one among many. We
have men right here, engineers, con-
ductors and trainmen who served on
the front lines in France.
The men as a whole do not want a
strike, but realize that we have a
fight on hand now that means life or
death, freedom or slavery for US and
our wives, children and homes. There
are less than one per cent of the rail-
road workers prepared to exist be-
yond a few days without their daily
wage, but we will make a fight for
what the labor board based their
awards on in the 1920 increase-wage
to provide decent living and an op-
portunity for educating our children.
If we had the funds to outline our po-
sition to the public and have it under
stand the situation as it is, we feel
that sentiment for our cause would
Immediately crystalize. The unem-
ployment conference called by Presi-
dent Harding in Washington a few
days ago was worse than joke. They
proposed to relieve the situation by
penalizing the ones that had work,
cutting down their hours of employ
ment, reducing their wages and caus-
ing more distress, and not asking
anything of the employers. If this
had come from old German regime we
could be reconciled to it, but coming
from what is supposed to be the best
brains of the country, it seems incon-
ccivable.
The Association of Railroad Execu-
tives has spent millions of dollars ad-
vertising in farm papers the last year
and you cannot reconcile all of this
money spent to the desire of educat-
ing the farmers, but only to attempt
to create a sentiment favorable to the
railroad executives. They do not
credit the public with any great
amount of intelligence. Any high
school child could see through their
scheme.
Now, Mr.. Editor of the Tribune, ii
is reasonable to suppose that you are
fair-minded and have the public in
terest and welfare at heart, instead
of knocking and advocating a calam-
ity to the whole American people,
why not be fair to both sides and try
to offer a solution that will save lives