The Connecticut labor news., 1921-07-15

The shopmen have already over
whelmingly voted here and throughout
the country to strike if necessary to re-
sist the wage cut. They will, however,
| delay any such action until the other
| declarations or brotherhoods on the rail-
roads have completed the referendum
ordered by the big conference of rail-
road brotherhood chairman which is still
on at Chicago and which decided that
j before taking any drastic action the en-
tire workers of the country should be
polled. The trainmen and other en-
ployes far outnurnber the shopmen and
! the sentiment seems to prevail among
| these others that while the wage cut is
resented, it probably cannot be avoided,
that the cards are stacked against the
| workers for the present at least and
| they will probably have to submit
| The shop and other working condi-
| of the bone of contention Just now.
B. NJ. Jewell, president of the Rail-
| way Employees Department of the
American Federation of Labor, has
| warned the railroad managers that the
| men would not stand for notifications
| OF agreements tending to deprive shop
men and other railway workers of de-
cent working conditions and beyond that
warning is a story.
The propaganda of misstatement, lies
and suppression carried on by railroad
arrangements during the past two years
has tended to make the public believe
that the national agreement was con-
coction of the devil forced upon the
poor, unoffensive managers by the bold,
bad, vicious, debasing and debased rail-
road administration controlling the roads
during government control.
When pinned down and forced to tell
the truth before the Senate committee
investigating the railroad situation, ex-
ecutives of the roads and their lawyers
grudingly admitted that the rules con-
tanned in the national agreement had
been in force on many roads before the
period of federal control They further
admitted that such rules had been agreed
to in conference between actual operat-
ing officials and representatives of en-
plOyees and were the result of years of
thought and effort. Let it be known, says
Mr.. Jewell, that the conditions surround
ing man at work mean more IN many
instances to that man that does the
wages he receives. The rules under
which he works makes all the difference
in the world and fixes his status as man
or beast Also do these rules affect his
pay and, therefore, his life and that of
his wife and children. The men in the
shops and on the roads fought for,
worked for and paid for those agree
ments and rules through and during
many years-aye, back to the beginning
of railroading, and let no one be under
the impression that they will tamely SUBJ
nit to having those agreements swept
info he HISC arH hXy n
thugs drunk with a victory achieved
through the misuse of the press and a
campaign of lying abuse of the men and
the government.
The total result of that campaign OF
villihcation and abuse has been to make
the average railroad employee feel hurt,
inSulted and indignant. Never would he
have believed that such lies as were told
of him could be spread so widely and
believed SO readily, nor did he believe
that all his attempts to refute such de-
liberate and Willfu1 abuse and lying vii
LITIGATION would be, as they were, re-
/, fused publication by all sections OF the
press, with the exception OF the papers
controlled by labor. He has seen day
after day and month after month during
the last few years the most utterly pre-
posterous and ridiculous statements re-
9ard1ng the wages he received anu the
way he worked given prominence in the
press and he is at loss to understand
the mentality of those who will believe
such nonsense. He has had forced on
him the opinion that there is no believ-
ing any railroad official and that the
power for harm and to do him injury
possessed by those officials is SO great
that they can easily prevent him telling
his side of the story
CONTINUED ON Page Eight.)