"Graft"—Seeking Contracts in Los Angeles—In Charge of Street
Work—Crooked Business.
Winston Churchill’s _Coniston_ and _Mr. Crewe’s Career_ explain the
methods of bosses and railway presidents, and their conflicts or
combinations for the robbing of the public in America. For the railways
it may perhaps be said that they have to protect themselves against the
“Bosses,” and for the “Bosses” that they are what the people make them:
at any rate, I need not discuss the forms of that business immorality
against which Mr. Roosevelt has struggled. But I will try to give some
idea of the rottenness of the contracting business and the city
officials, and truly it was awful. But what can be expected when
contractors make their men scoundrels in order to hold their jobs, and
teach them to rob the public, and then are horrified when they are
robbed or cheated by their own men! Then the men, many of whom have no
idea of honour, are all the time trying to hurt one another in order to
show up well with the company; of this I shall say more later on. Those
who are inclined to seek fortune in America must reckon with such
difficulties.
Los Angeles is a very expensive town to live in, and I soon found that
financially I had not made a change for the better. But I was gaining in
experience in my business, and being in a city, had a better chance to
look for openings than I had when cut off from the world, as I was out
at the Uvalde Mines. A good part of my work consisted in going round
town keeping track of all building and improvement work going on, and
trying to get contracts for paving cellars, driveways, and warehouse
floors; in fact, anything I could obtain. For this purpose the company
gave me the use of a horse and dog-cart. I would see a fine house going
up, try to find the architect, get the specifications, and, if asphalt
was mentioned, would put in a bid on the spot. I was given a free hand
as to prices, the only condition being that the work should show some
profit, and, in case the other companies had put in a bid, I was to cut
their bid if I could do it without showing a decided loss. In the case
of a very big job, or something that might lead to more work, I referred
to Mr. Arthur, who would sometimes take the work even at a loss, to keep
the other fellow from getting it. This does not sound like good
business, but our company was the largest, and could stand a small loss
if Mr. Arthur could keep the other fellow without work, so that his
pay-roll should eat him up. We could stand the game longer than they
except for politics. Of this and our final downfall I shall write in
another chapter.
After I had been some months with the company my salary was raised to
$3.50 per day, and I was put in charge of the work on the street, and
turned the yard over to a man who came down from a branch in San
Francisco. The company employed at this time in Los Angeles, beside the
general manager, two superintendents, myself as foreman of the asphalt
gang, and a yard foreman to whom I had given over charge of that job.
Some weeks after the change this man Bister asked me to come up to his
room as he wanted to see me about something important. One night I did
go, and he informed me that he had heard that the company was going to
cut operating expenses, and some of us would be let out as soon as the
present rush of work was over. One of the superintendents, Mr. Weber,
was drinking, he said, and he proposed that I should join himself and
the other superintendent, Cressfield, to get Weber discharged; in return
for which Cressfield would guarantee our jobs to Bister and me. I never
found out if he had any authority from Cressfield to make me such a
proposition, but in order to clinch me, he said that Weber had been
speaking rather disparagingly about my work. I laughed at him and told
him that I wanted no hand in the fight as I was not interested enough,
and that when the company wanted my job back they could have it.
Finally, however, they dragged me into the fight against my will, but on
the opposite side to that he wanted me to join.
Weber and Cressfield were each in charge of a contract, and my gang did
the asphalt work for both of them, so that I worked part of the week for
one and part of the week for the other. Cressfield asked me to put his
brother on as a skilled tamperman at $2.25 per day, but after he had
worked a few days I found that he was not skilled, and the other men
would have kicked if I had paid him as a skilled tamperman. I told
Cressfield that I could not keep him on as tamperman, but would keep him
as a labourer, if he wished, at $1.75. Cressfield did not seem much put
out, but told me I was too particular. He took his brother on his
concrete gang, where, of course, he had nothing to do with me, though I
had made an enemy of him, a fact I was made to feel in a hundred
different ways. Weber, on the other hand, tried to help me in as many
ways, even when I refused to join him in some of the schemes he was
working. Mr. Arthur seemed to be the only man who really was absolutely
square, and his principles were such as do not help a man in contracting
business in the States.
Some time before I came to the company the foreman of one of the street
railway companies in the city had come to Mr. Arthur with a proposition
to turn over to him the contract for all the company’s business for a
term of two years if Arthur would give him $2000 as a bonus. Arthur
replied that he had already put up a bid lower than any other company,
and if he could not get the work by a fair bid he did not want it at
all; and, furthermore, that he (Arthur) would report the conversation to
the owners of the railway line. He did so, but the owners would not
listen to him; they said that it was impossible: the man had been in
their employ for a number of years, and they trusted him completely.
Later on this man was found out and discharged, but through political
pull he got the position of chief inspector of the Public Works
Department. This occurred shortly after I went on to the street
business. The first intimation I got was when we had a new inspector
sent out to stay with my gang, and this man from the very first day
proceeded to condemn our material, our work, me, and my men; we could do
nothing right. I had a great friend in the Public Works Department, a
member of my Order, and to him I went at once to see what it all meant.
He told me, “You had better get out from under, as the word is out to
kill Arthur (in a business sense), and we can only hit him through you
fellows. There is nothing personal to you in this, but move while you
can.” I could not of course repeat this to Arthur, but I went and told
him that the inspector was most unreasonable, and asked him what I
should do about it. He told me not to give way to the inspector, and
that he would back me in anything reasonable.
I went back to the street and told the inspector that he must not
interfere with my men any more, but, if he had complaints to make, to
make them to me. He got impudent, and I requested him to take off his
spectacles (in California and some other states it is a most serious
offence to strike a man with glasses on his nose); he dashed off to a
telephone and sent for the street superintendent; I went to another
telephone and sent for Arthur. When they both arrived on the scene the
inspector stated that I had threatened to assault him for doing his
duty. I told the street superintendent that the man was interfering with
my men, contrary to rules, and had been abusive to me. The upshot of it
was that the superintendent told me that if I could not get along with
the man from his office he would “Call me off public work” (the law
gives this power to the street superintendent, and any man called off
can work on no further public work in that city). During all this Arthur
sat in his buggy and never said a word. After it was over I went across
to him and offered my resignation, but he asked me to stay on till the
job in hand was through.