The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1921-10-04
CHURCHMEN REVEAL WHOLESALE VIOLATIONS
 OF CIVIL RIGHTS OF STEEL STRIKERS
Startling Charges Against Pennsylvania Authorities Include Clubbing And Murder Of Peaceful Strikers Excessive Punshments by Courts and Shooting By Armed Negro Strikebreakers

New York, Oct. 1.-Two hundred affidavits charging violation of civil rights through alleged acts of ter rorism by the authorities of Western Pennsylvania during the steel strike of 1919, were made public by the Commission of Inqury of the Inter church World MoveWent tonight. These charges were contained in supplementary report written byl
 George Soule, which gave the basis
 for the commissions finding in its
 main inquiry that the steel strike
 made thousands of citizens believe that our institutions were not demo- cratic or not dennocratically admin | is:ered and that local magistrates and
 police often tried to break strikes thorities.
 Mills Dominate Politics. The commissions report GeclaI ed ! that the steel corporations actively l engaged in focal politics. and dom- | mated the local governments, adding that "the moment any Subordinaes m
 the mill begins actively to oppose the
 political machine. he becomes a l marked man.
 "6ften political candidates are
 themselves members of the mill man. | agement,'' the report added, having | the power of discharge, but in any case the superintendents and foremen | take an active part in election eering- There are always watchers from l the mill 1ounging about the polls.
 The chances of corruption either ei1r | which are latent in this possibility are obviously large.
 '1n short, the prestige and power | of the dominating industry is so great | that political opposition rarely grows | beyond it's primitive stages. An ob | server of long residence in Pitts | burgh declared that the only thing | that would make the steel worker in- ' 6 iy1 1JTajn nn- | pablo of protecting them from dis charge
 No Chance For Citizenship. An important element in the whole | situation, asserted the commission, | was the question of naturalization, as come citizens, because of their ''inab | ility to learn English and, attend 70
 civic duties while working 12 hours a | day, seven days a week.
 1 The affidavfts made public by the | commission deal with the alleged per
 seCution by public authorities of
 strikers in Pittsburgh. Braddock, But 1 Ter. Clairton, Donora, Duquesne, Far
 rell, Homestead, Johnstown, McKees- | port, Monessen, New Castle, New | Kensington, Natrona and Woodlawn. | ditions in Ohio and West Virginia, | where civil rights, it was stated, were ! not denied and no violence attended
 the strikers exercise of their rights. | Jailed Without Charges. | The commission said that the | constabulary, deputy sheriffs, and | company police, in affidavits and
 statements to it's Investigators Ideal l with the murder of men and women -one as he was in his own yard | and the wounding of hundreds of | others. the clubbing of hundreds; the l assaulting of men while they were
 lawfully and peacefully pursuing CT 1 rands on the streets, and of prisoners l while they were locked up in their | cells; the arrestfng and holding Cf l men and women for long periods in
 the jails and police stations without | provocation and even without def
 mite charges being lodged agains
 them; the excessive punishment met
 ed out to these strikers by the diff
 ferent justices of peace. burgesse:
 crimination of the courts betweer ! those who were at work and those l who were out on strike; the frequent
 surrender of law and it's admfnistra- tionS by public auth critics to local company officials.
 'In a. few towns the public officials | made flat denials of the charges of | unwarranted arrests and assaults. as
 was done for example by the head of 1 the state constabulary at Braddock l to a member of this commission; oth-
 CT officials, such as the sheriff and
 chief of police of Newcastle, admitted
 that of about 100 persons arrested
 during the first week of the strike at | least 40 were held without bail as | suspicious persons and that these | would be held until the strike is | over, even if we have to build a new | house to house them" ,"
 Peaceful Assemblage Denied. | The report found that denial of the rights of free speech and assem- l bly, to workingmen was practiced in | Pennsylvania before the strike be- | gan. Local regulations and state
 laws, it was stated, were such as to | facilitate suppression by local au-
 HEADS ST. LOUIS POLICE