The Connecticut labor news., 1923-02-09

A large gathering Ot strikers and
 their sympathizers assembled at Music
 Hall last Monday evening and listen
 ed to very interesting address by
 Bert M. Jewell, president of the Rail-
 way Employees Department of the A
 F. of L., in which he gave history of the events leading up to the strike
 and told of the efforts made by his
 department to effect a settlement
 without calling strike
 The meeting, which was originally
 scheduled to be held in the auditor
 ium of the Commercial High School
 on Friday evening, but was postponed when permission to use the hall was
 denied atthe last minute by the Board of Education on the rather himSy ex-
 cuse that MT. Jewell had defied the
 laws of the Federal government in connection with certain rulings in the controversy between the rail workers and the railroads.
 Referring to this matter Mr. Jewell challenged "any city, county, state or government official to say I have com mitted violation of the law" and urged the Shop craftsmen and women voters of New Haven to remember the uncalled for and unjustihed mis- statement of facts which have been informed brought about the cancella- tion of your permit to hold meeting as you intended. When you go to the polls the next time to mark ballot l trust that you won't forget"
 MT. Jewell pointed out that the objection to the contracting out of ing condition rules and reduction of wages, all of which had been pre- sented to the shopmen for vote and resulting in an overwhelming decision in favor of astrike.
 The strike, asserted Mr. Jewell, lasted only from July I to July 7, and out by the railroads had been in ex- istence. Since the Baltimore agree ment of August %, 1922, the railroad shopmen have been in a position to settle the strike on each local system separately without any interference by the national leaders while the rail- roads must obey the orders of 25 New York bankers representing the 200 directorships on 8I per cent of the mileage of the United States rail- roads"
 Defending his position in refusing to appear before the Railroad Labor Board last summer Mir Jewell said: |
 T know now, better than I knew then, that l dare not go down there. lThe. speaker meant the meeting of the Labor Board.) That 1t would not be in the interests of the Amer jean public, not in the interests of the railways, neither was 1t in the 1 interests of our men that I go down l there on June 30. We received a l note at 2 p. m. on June 2o and at | 3 a. m. on June 30, we were still in l conference attempting to arrive at. a | conclusion as to what was the best | course to pursue. We finally de- | cided that we had best not go to the hearing because we knew that the ] shop craftsmen had held meetings on | June 26, 27, and 28, and had made | for the strike on | July I.
 4The only opportunity to get the results of the conference to them would be by night letter There are necessary to send 24,ooo telegrams. Even though we got everything the men might want, we could not con vey any measure which would avoid | confusion and even danger.
 Some men would believe that | they should strike and others that] they should not When 10 o'clock was come, those that were intending | to strike would chide their fellows who had decided to stay in and there would possibly occur the accident we would not desire to be responsible for. Right then would be the time when property of the railroad might suffer destruction when the Iken might be fighting with each other Had we attended the session firmly believe that I might not be able to say, Thank God, not one drop of rail road mans blood is on my head
 Not being familiar with the high handed manner in which public util- | ities in this state conduct their busi-