THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SIDES WITH THE MANAGERS.
The fifth day of the great strike showed no cessation of hostilities,
the entire Northwestern and Southwestern portion of the United States
was practically at a standstill. Every road entering Chicago was
partially, if not completely tied up, and the General Managers
Association, under the leadership of John M. Egan was at sea.
They now realized that they had taken a contract that it would be
difficult to fulfill, and without the co-operation of some greater power
they would be defeated. A lack of confidence in their ability to subdue
the strikers and compel them to work, was well illustrated in a meeting
between Sir George Pullman and Vice-President Harahan of the Illinois
Central. W. M. Daley, of New Orleans, was the only witness to the
meeting and his presence undoubtedly saved Sir George from a masterly
drubbing at the hands of Mr. Harahan. Mr. Pullman entered the office of
Vice-President Harahan, and in the course of time his conversation
turned to the strike and its effect on the Illinois Central.
This was the opening round.
It aroused all the ire in the portly form of Mr. Harahan, and with
blazing eyes he turned on Sir George.
"You are not fit to govern men," he said; "instead of visiting your own
works, you have a number of superintendents who furnish you with
reports, and when they are colored to suit you take them as facts, and a
result is business is embargoed, poverty stalks all over your grounds,
you are alone responsible for the present condition of affairs on the
railroads. Why don't you go among your employes and see things for
yourself? If you did there would be no such trouble." Then followed a
number of epithets such as thick head, incompetent, over-rated, and the
official shook his fist under the stubby nose of Sir George in a very
threatening manner. Mr. Pullman tried to speak, but the Vice-President
broke in on him again. "You think you have a contract with this road
that you can rub it in on us, but you can't, never will we submit to
it, the railroads are losing $250,000 a day owing to your obstinacy. You
are unfit to act as president of any company, and if you were to visit
your much boasted town to-day, the chances are that you would be dealt
with severely. Why, you are nothing but a figure head, you are not the
actual president of the company, for if you were you would know
something about it. You know nothing in regard to the actual state of
affairs." It did not take long for the story to reach the different
railroad centers about the city.
It came to the knowledge of the American Railway Union that J. M. Egan
and Manager St. John of the Rock Island road had employed two thousand
men in Canada to fill the places of the strikers, and steps were taken
immediately to stop their importation, but with what success it was
impossible to determine.
All this time the strike was spreading and the membership of the
American Railway Union was increasing rapidly. The sensational reports
of rioting and bloodshed in various yards proved upon investigation to
be false, and beyond doubt circulated by the General Managers and
eagerly seized by the subsidized press to win the sympathy of the
public in the interest of the corporations.
The police when questioned positively denied the stories saying there
were no grounds for the reports.
Marching orders were received at the headquarters of the Missouri U. S.
troops, for the 15th infantry and though it was not known at the time
the orders were received from Washington, it was soon learned that they
were to go to Chicago and assist the General Managers to run their
trains.
At this time occurred the tie-up at Minnesota Transfer, which was the
most complete and effectual blockade of any in the strike district. The
Minnesota Transfer represents nine different roads. The Chicago,
Milwaukee & St. Paul; Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha; Great
Northern; Northern Pacific; Minneapolis & St. Louis; Chicago Great
Western; Wisconsin Central; Chicago, Burlington & Northern and Belt Line
Ry.
All freight through the Twin Cities handled by these roads, is
interchanged at this point. It is situated midway between St. Paul and
Minneapolis and employes from three hundred to five hundred men
according to the volume of business. This is a freight yard exclusively,
and therefore had nothing to do with the handling of Pullman equipment.
But this little technicality did not prevent this body of men from
coming to the assistance of their brothers, and as each road was brought
under the ban of the boycott they refused to handle cars or in any way
assist them to operate their line.
On the night of the 1st day of July, the Milwaukee road now under
boycott brought in five cars of beer for delivery to the Great Northern.
The men including the yardmaster refused to deliver the cars, and were
sent home. A meeting was called for the night of July 2nd, and a
committee appointed to wait upon the superintendent, Mr. D. M. Sullivan,
and ascertain if the men were discharged. Mr. Sullivan answered in the
affirmative, and an unanimous vote to strike was then taken, over three
hundred men, the entire force with three exceptions quit work, and not a
wheel was turned except by the superintendent himself, for ten days.
The general Managers now got in their fine work by utilizing the
government. A Washington special to the Chicago Times says:
Our wretched administration is in the hands of the railroads, there is
no doubt about it, Cleveland, Lamont, Olney and Bissel are at the beck
and call of the corporations, from the White House down it has been
determined to put forth every effort even to Gatling guns, to employ
every arm of the government even to its Supreme Judges to destroy this
strike and the laboring people concerned in it. The case is decided
against the strikers in advance, the wired words of the General Managers
are accepted as settled facts; what they ask for they will get, what
they suggest will be adopted. The workingmen are to be ground beneath
the heel of the military, and if necessary, to force them into
submission they are to be sabered, bayoneted, shot down or taken
prisoners or whatever is deemed sternly necessary to compel them to
submit to such terms as their moneycrat owner sees fit to impose.
This is a railway administration. So promptly loyal has Cleveland proven
himself to be that it is to be believed that should the companies desire
it, they could have the Executive Mansion for a round house and the
White House grounds for switching purposes.
The managers wired Olney to name Edwin Walker, who is attorney for the
Milwaukee road as special solicitor for the government, to take measures
against the strikers as they had no confidence in Milchrist.
He seemed weak, his term was soon to expire and he seemed inclined to
avoid harsh measures ablest with the men. They wanted Walker, he was the
corporation attorney in the country; he had been cradled by, and grown
up at the knee of corporations; he was their body and soul in the life
and death struggle with their employes.
They urged Olney to clothe Walker with the special United States
authority to better protect them and overthrow the strike. By thus
making the railway attorney Walker solicitor for the United States, the
control of government power could be placed in the hands of the
corporations to wield against the men. Walker was appointed by Olney and
placed in control over Milchrist in the affairs of the strike. Mr.
Walker was known personally by Olney, and Olney is at the present time
one of the counsels of the Santa Fe and Chicago, Burlington and Quincy,
and said to be a director of the latter road. He has been for years
intimate with Mr. Walker, who, by the way, is a hot favorite of Fuller
of the supreme bench. There was, therefore a dozen good reasons for this
selection, which addressed themselves to Mr. Olney, who is in this not
as a cabinet officer, but as a friend and director of railway
corporations, and he therefore precipitately granted the request of the
general managers. Bissel, also a railroad director, shows Olney's
anxiety to come to the back of the roads. (The truth of the above
correspondence could not be denied.) In this way the entire available
force of troops at Ft. Sheridan, including infantry, cavalry and
artillery was ordered out by the President of the United States to
assist the railroad managers against the people. Such was the attitude
of this government "of the people, by the people, and for the people"
against the people. The railway managers having now secured the federal
troops, proceeds to issue injunctions restraining the strikers from
using the power of persuasion on those men still in the service, to
induce them to quit. This order drawn up by Judges Wood and Grosscup was
a lengthy one, and peculiarly in harmony with the corporation interest.
The Chicago Times, in an editorial says: In this Federal injunction,
which is in the main eminently just and equally unnecessary, appears a
claim in which certain persons named, and all other persons whatsoever
are ordered to refrain from compelling or inducing, or attempting to
compel or induce, by threats, intimidation, force or violence any of the
employes of any of the said railroads, to refuse or fail to perform any
of their duties, as employes of said railroads, in connection with the
interstate business or commerce of such railroads, or the transportation
of passenger or property between or among the states; or from compelling
or inducing or attempting to compel or induce by threats, intimidation,
persuasion, force or violence, any of the employes of any of said
railroads, who are employed by said railroads and engaged in its
service, in the conduct of interstate business or in the operation of
any of its trains carrying mail of the United States or doing interstate
business or transportation of passengers or freight, between and among
the states, to leave the service of such railroad. The Times
emphatically does not believe that any court whatever has a right to
order men to refrain from attempting by persuasion to induce others to
leave the employment they are engaged in. There is a natural law that in
the end will prevail over the formal law built up by lawyers and courts.
If as Judge Gary says, the law is common sense, this injunction will not
stand, for common sense will certainly pronounce an orderly and
respectful request to a railroad employee to give up his position and
join the organized strikers, no crime. It is idle to plead that a
discreet and just court will only enforce this injunction against actual
law breakers, for there is in it an opportunity for injustice and
oppression which makes it wholly bad. The injunction is becoming a
menace to liberty, it is a weapon ever ready for the capitalist, and
there should be more careful federal legislation limiting its use.
Certainly if the restraining order of Judges Wood and Grosscup be good
law there is no sense in maintaining organized labor. Childlike trust in
the benevolence and fairness of the employer must be the workingman's
future policy if this injunction be made a precedent.
In the meantime the General Manager's association and the subsidized
press were endeavoring to impress the public with the belief that the
strikers were a lot of disorderly and riotous law breakers of the worst
description. To show how much truth there was in these tales, I will
give the statement of Capt. J. Hartnett as made after dispersing a mob.
He said: There wasn't a railroad man in the whole outfit, but a lot of
bums who thought they would have a lot of sport at the expense of the
railroads. But we soon gave them a hustling, and I want to say this for
the strikers, and by that I mean the real railroad men, they are orderly
here and as quiet as possible, I have had no disturbance in any district
that can be traced to railroad men. It is well known that on occasions
like these every loafer turns loose and takes advantage of the strike to
start a row, but the genuine railroad men are too sensible to cause any
disturbance.
This was true also of all other cities engaged in the strike.