It was hard for them to see not only their wages cut down, but also to see an order issued, which, if carried out, would result in the discharge of one half of their number, at a time when work was not to be had, but this does not justify, and cannot excuse their interference with the right of a corporation to take such measures as it may think most beneficial for its own interest, so long as it does not interfere with the rights of others, and especially can it be no excuse for one man, or set of men, who do not wish to work under certain regulations, to interfere with those who are willing to do so. The property of all citizens must be protected, and the laws must be enforced, and those who undertake to interfere with the one, or stand in the way of the enforcement of the other, must learn, however severe the lesson, that these things cannot be tolerated in a land of liberty and of law, and that however much trouble and expense they may succeed in inflicting on the subjects of their spite, in the end law and order will triumph, and those who stand in the way are those who suffer the most.
Every violation of law, if suppressed or punished, is done so at the expense of the community where the violation occurs, and the greater the violation the greater the expense. This expense must be met by taxation, and as taxation is so arranged as to reach every member of the community, the result of this, therefore, is that the person who creates a disturbance or commits a crime which requires the intervention of the officers of the law, is forced to pay from his own pocket a portion of the expense incurred in its vindication.
The practice of a little arithmetic ought to convince any one that violating the law is a very expensive luxury, besides bringing him into disgrace and subjecting him to a penalty. This argument is not intended for the professional criminal, as it is not expected that he can be reached by any argument, but it is hoped that it may reach those who usually intend to be law-abiding citizens, and whose fortunes are affected by the good or evil fortune of the community in which they reside, and that this class may be induced to pause and consider before they attempt to use unlawful means to redress any grievances, however great it may seem to them. The destruction of property, although it may belong to a corporation, results in a direct loss to the labor of the country. It is conceded that all property and capital is created or produced by labor, and, therefore, any absolute loss, by the destruction of either, must, in the end, fall upon the laborer. The argument sometimes used, that if property is destroyed its replacement gives employment to the laborer, and that, therefore, it is a benefit to him, is fallacious, for the reason that the capital necessary to pay for the reproduction of the property destroyed must be originally created by labor. The capitalist who loses his property by fire is much less able to furnish employment than he was before, and if this destruction overtakes the property of a whole community, capital to replace what is lost must be drawn from some other locality by borrowing, and while times may seem prosperous during the time the re-building is being done, yet there has been an actual loss to the community, which, sooner or later, must be felt. The draining of capital from one place, to any great extent, causes its loss to be felt there, and there is no way in which the destruction of property, in one place, can be made good there, without the loss being felt somewhere, and in the end most fully and completely realized at the locality where it occurred.
The effects of such destruction of property may be temporarily prevented by bringing capital from other localities, as before suggested, and business affairs may, for a time, seem even more prosperous than ever; but when the capital thus brought is to be repaid, comes the re-action, and the loss is felt even worse than it would have been had no such borrowing have taken place. Witness the city of Chicago, as a notable instance in the recent history of the country. The buildings destroyed by the great fire at that place were speedily rebuilt, a good portion being done by borrowed capital, and it was really surprising to see with what amazing rapidity the losses seemed to be replaced, and the city rise, as the phrase goes, "Phoenix like from its ashes." Business went on, seemingly, as brisk as ever, and it was boastingly proclaimed that Chicago beat any city on the continent in recuperating power, and that it was a greater city than before the fire. But pay day must come. The property destroyed had been replaced, but not by the creation of capital by labor. The seeming wealth had no substantial foundation, the re-growth having been too rapid to come from this source, and how stands that city to-day?
The city treasury bankrupt, with a very serious question arising whether the municipal government can be maintained much longer, and private bankruptcy on every hand, for the pay day has come to considerable of the indebtedness, and the shift of borrowing cannot be resorted to forever. The lesson to be drawn by the striking laborers of Pittsburgh, from this illustration is obvious, and it should be taken to heart and pondered on by all labor organizations throughout the country, lest, by their unwise and hasty action, they may strike a blow which will re-act on themselves with treble the force with which it is aimed at some corporation or capitalist. It may be expected that an opinion will be given as to whether or not the Pennsylvania Railroad Company were justified in making the reduction in wages of ten per cent. on June 11, 1877, and, ordinarily, the question might be answered that this, or any other, corporation or individual has the right to pay such wages as it or he pleases, and to require such services for the money paid as it or he may choose. This rule must be received with considerable modification, in the case of a great corporation, receiving special privileges from the State, and employing thousands of men, scattered from one end of the State to another.
If such corporation should execute a written contract with all of its employés on taking them into its service, specifying fully and particularly the hours and service required from them, the length of time for which each was hired, and the causes for which he could be discharged, no one would claim that they could vary the terms of that contract, without the assent of the employé. From the manner of the employment of the railroad employés in this country, and especially of the trainmen, there is in good faith an implied contract that the employé shall continue to receive the wages the company is at that time paying for the particular duty which he discharges, until the price is changed by mutual consent, and that his term of service shall continue as long as he behaves himself well and performs the services required of men in his position. This ought to be, and is in equity the implied contract between the parties, although not legally enforceable. But the railroad employé has a right to expect such treatment by the company into whose employ he enters. He is required to be on hand whenever called for, to give his entire attention to the business of the corporation, and he settles down with his family in such place as will make it most convenient for him to attend to the business of the company. His whole services are theirs, his arrangements are all made with reference to their business, and when he is discharged, without any reasonable cause, without any prior notice, or his wages reduced while his labor is not reduced, and, as is sometimes the case, increased without his consent, and the order for that purpose made without consulting him in any manner, he has a right to find fault. He is like a soldier, whose whole time has been spent in the service. His occupation is more dangerous than that followed by others, and the kind of services he has to perform unfits him for other duties, and railroad officers should always take these facts into consideration in dealing with him.
The wages of the trainmen, after the reduction in June, 1877, were as follows, to wit; Freight conductors: first class, two dollars and twelve cents per day; second class, one dollar and ninety-one cents per day; brakemen, one dollar and forty-five cents per day, and the day's work averaged from seven hours and twenty-five minutes, the shortest time, to eight hours and thirty-five minutes, the longest time. These wages were good wages for the amount of labor performed per day, and if the men could make full time, would amount to thirty-eight dollars and seventy cents per month for brakemen, and fifty-five dollars and twelve cents for first class conductors. This was higher wages than the same class of men could get in other employments and seemed to be, as stated by the president of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, some twenty per cent. higher than the wages paid in other lines of business, the company intending to keep the wages of its men about so much more than is paid in other occupations on account of the risk taken by the trainmen. It is claimed by the railroad officials that the depression in freight traffic on the railroads, both in amount and in price, required a consequent reduction in the expenses of the railroads, and the reduction of June, 1877, they asserted to be justifiable, under all the circumstances, and it is the opinion of your committee that, if before it had gone into effect, the men had been made fully acquainted with the reasons for the step taken, and the necessity of it, in short, treated as if they were reasonable men and entitled to consideration, very much of the dissatisfaction would not have existed, and the country might possibly have been spared the troublous scenes through which it passed at that time. No doubt the fact that a strike of the trainmen of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad had taken place at Martinsburg, West Virginia, on the 16th of July, and was gaining strength and headway, had its influence in determining the trainmen of the Pennsylvania railroad, at Pittsburgh, to commence their strike at that place, and, in consequence thereof, a much less grievance was needed than would otherwise have sufficed, as an excuse for their action. The fact, also, that the trainmen on other railroads were rapidly following suit, and stopping the running of freight trains on such roads, encouraged the men to persist in their course to stand out and prevent, by force, trains from being run on the Pennsylvania railroad.
There seemed at this time to be an epidemic of strikes running through the country, not only among the railroad men, but among all classes of laborers, and this helped to precipitate and bring about strikes at all the places about which this report will treat. The general feeling of uneasiness existing among the laboring classes of the country before mentioned, and the sympathy felt by these classes for each other made them very susceptible to anything which affected their fellow laborers, and, to use a medical phrase, the labor system was in a good condition to receive the epidemic which was spreading over the country, and in a very poor condition to resist and throw off the disease. The strike once inaugurated at Pittsburgh, was strengthened and encouraged by the sympathy the strikers received from nearly all classes of the citizens, and more especially by the sympathy shown by the city officials. Had the community frowned on the attempt of the strikers to prevent, by force, the running of freight trains, as it should have been done, and had the civil authorities shown a firm determination to enforce the law at the outset, as it was their sworn duty to do, there can be no doubt but the mob would have been dispersed without bloodshed and riot, as it was in Philadelphia, Scranton, and other places. Philadelphia and Scranton are particularly mentioned, for at these places there is a much larger proportion of the turbulent class than at Pittsburgh, and consequently a great deal more of the material of which riotous mobs are composed. When any community winks at a small violation of the law, by any person, and more especially by a combination of persons, it is laying the foundation for trouble and difficulty. A crowd of people assembled for the purpose of accomplishing, however worthy, a purpose in a questionable manner, is very easily converted into a riot, and when a crowd proposed to carry out an unlawful object by violence it soon becomes an uncontrollable mob, if encouraged in its purposes by the sympathy, either expressed or passive, of the community and the civil authorities. The small show of force made by the police in the spasmodic manner, it was on July 19th and 20th, was worse than if no police force had ever appeared on the ground, for the strikers knew they had nothing to fear from them, and the lawless characters, who had begun to gather around, construed this action as a sort of license to do what they chose as long as they interfered with nothing but railroad interests.
The refusal of the mayor to go to the scene of the disturbance himself, when specially requested to do so, and to raise a special police to meet the emergency, is inexplicable on any theory of a wish on his part to do his duty and enforce the law, and when contrasted with the vigorous measures taken by the mayor of the sister city of Allegheny, and of nearly every other place in which riots occurred, must be most humiliating to the people who elected such a man as their chief magistrate. Had he shown a proper appreciation of his duty by going to the grounds of the railroad company when requested, he would have known better the extent of the troubles threatened, and if determined to enforce the law, could have prepared to do so by swearing in special policemen, as was done in all other places. If he chose to rely on a subordinate to do what was manifestly his duty, and that subordinate failed from any cause, either incapacity or sympathy with the mob, to appreciate the danger, and take measures to prepare for it, the responsibility must still rest on him. His evidence, that he received reports from his officers through the night of the 19th and 20th, that all was quiet, is belied by all the testimony in the case. When a call was first made by the railroad officials for ten policemen, and for his personal presence, followed in a short time by a call for fifty policemen, and that by a call for one hundred and fifty, most men would have concluded that all was not quiet, even if the police should report to the contrary. This taken in connection with the fact that the morning papers of the 20th, contained the call of the sheriff on the Governor for troops, and the orders for the troops to assemble, and that this was done only after an appeal, soon after midnight, by the sheriff in person to the crowd to disperse, and their answer to him by blasphemy, and hooting, and yelling, and other indignities would leave the people generally to believe that the mayor had willfully shut his eyes to what was transpiring on the premises of the railroad company.
Very blind or confiding policemen they must have been that night of the 19th and 20th, and very confiding was the mayor to go to Castle Shannon, a distance of six miles, and let matters take care of themselves. The mayor, to excuse himself for doing nothing after the sheriff made a call for the troops, says that he considered himself superseded by the sheriff and by the military. It has usually been considered that the military was subordinate to the civil authority, and that the clause of the Constitution, which reads: "The military shall, in all cases, and at all times, be in strict subordination to the civil power," means something, and was placed in the Constitution for a purpose. If the construction of the law, given by the mayor, is to prevail, people have been very much mistaken in their understanding of what is the law, and that all the military need do, under the mayor's dispensation, is to get some authority to call them out, and then, as they supersede the civil authority, they have full control, and can decide for themselves, when the necessity for their services has ceased, and can, therefore, take charge of the affairs of the community as long as any ambitious officer may elect. It is a new doctrine, this of the mayor's, in this country, and he must excuse this committee if they fail to take any stock in it. The other excuse given by the mayor for his inaction, to wit: That the men (meaning the sheriff and military officers,) who had charge of matters after the 19th, were narrow gauge men, and he could not coöperate with them in their views, and the measures necessary to be taken in the emergency, is also untenable. It does not appear that he ever consulted with these men, or any one of them, in regard to what should be done, while it does appear that he was sought after, and frequent attempts made to consult with him by the railroad officials, until they learned that nothing could be expected of him. If his excuse for neglecting his duty in the matters within his immediate jurisdiction, (to wit: Keeping the peace, dispersing a mob, and enforcing the law in the city of which he was chief executive officer,) is a valid one, the others might, with the same propriety, claim that his gauge did not suit them, and, therefore, they could not coöperate with him, to keep the peace in his bailiwick, and refuse to do anything, and the mob allowed to have its own way.